music
Composers who founded churches of one and walked ten miles to work.
Prizes Are For Boys
What does it take to invent modern estate planning, compose polytonal symphonies on weekends, and then leave a Pulitzer-winning piece in a drawer for thirty-six years?
The Affectionate Sister
He was too shy to say it aloud, so he pressed the proposal into her hand as the train pulled away — what did she write back?
The Prince Who Painted Hell
What kind of man commissions an altarpiece of himself praying, then hangs it in the room where he prays?
The Chair
What kind of performer turns down every replacement for a seat that no longer has a seat?
The Man Who Played You Back
If he memorized 7,000 pieces but only 100 words, what exactly was he listening for?
The Viking of Sixth Avenue
What happens when a blind composer in a Viking helmet stands on the same Manhattan corner for thirty years and becomes more famous silent than playing?
The Woman Who Got the Moonlight by Accident
The most famous piano dedication in history was a last-minute substitution, named by a man who never met her, for a woman who was busy doing other things.
The Woman Who Rewrote French Opera With a Sword at Her Hip
She broke a woman out of a convent by stealing a dead nun's body, and then went back to singing.
The Woman Who Thanked the Taxi Driver
She was in a taxi crash at seventy-five and discovered she could now sing a higher F than ever before. She did not sue. She sent cigars.
The Knight Whose Insult Became a Mozart Composition
He had a second, fancier iron hand built for Sundays.
The Man Who Never Opened His Mail
When Satie died, his friends entered his apartment for the first time in twenty-seven years.