Composer of the Month 11/2012: Christoph Willibald Gluck (selected by Peter van Dessel / Belgium)

Austria 13.11.1987 The video shows the "Choir of the Blessed Spirits" from Gluck's opera "Orpheus and Eurydice", choreographed by Pina Bausch. The German composer Christoph Willibald Gluck was born on 2. July 1714 in Erasbach. From 1731 he studied at the University of Prague, 1736 he became a chamber musician in Vienna and finally he studied in Milan in 1737. His first operas were so successful that he was appointed to the Haymarket Theatre in London, where he met with Handel. In 1752 he settled in Vienna. Gluck's name is inseparable from the development of the composition of opera in the 18th Century. His so-called "reform operas" placed particular emphasis on the text and the subordination of music under the act. Thus he caused a huge argument from 1770 to 1780 with the adherents of the Italian composer Piccini, who still used the style of Baroque opera. Gluck left some 50 operas and several ballets, instrumental works and several religious songs and cantatas. Christoph Willibald Gluck died on 15.11.1787 in Vienna. In November 2012, we commemorate his 225th Death anniversary. More composer can be found in the members only section