# Classical Music Activists and Philanthopists



## regenmusic (Oct 23, 2014)

Just curious how the classical music, past and present, contributed outside of the music world in activism and philanthropy. Just watched an amazing interview with Bono on an Irish religious television show which inspired the question.


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## SomeAustrianBloke (Nov 1, 2018)

Sounds interesting. How did Bono contribute to the world? How well did his "One" Foundation perform? If there's one thing I've learned, it's that people talking about doing good to the world, especially musicians, tend to virtue signal on TV, perform "symbolic acts" and do their best to avoid taxes and keeping safe in their ivory towers.


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## RICK RIEKERT (Oct 9, 2017)

regenmusic said:


> Just curious how the classical music, past and present, contributed outside of the music world in activism and philanthropy.


Historically, there are many notable examples of musicians lending a hand:

In 1749 Handel gave a concert to fund the completion of the chapel for London's Foundling Hospital that was established for the 'education and maintenance of exposed and deserted young children'. The next year, a benefit performance of 'Messiah' sold out and a second performance had to be given two weeks later. Handel put 'Messiah' on every year after that until his death, raising some £500,000 in today's money for the Hospital.

The premiere of Beethoven's Symphony No. 7 was given at a benefit for wounded Austro-Bavarian soldiers. He also performed for his favorite spa town of Baden after a fire in 1812 almost completely destroyed it. The concert raised 1,000 florins, which amount was a little over 2 months rent for the apartment Beethoven was leasing in the Pasqualati House, but Beethoven thought they could have made much more. "It was, so to speak, a poor concert for the poor," he grumbled.

In June 1876, Serbia and the Ottoman Empire were at loggerheads, with Russia siding with the Serbs. The Russian Musical Society commissioned Tchaikovsky to write something for a concert in aid of the Red Cross. Tchaikovsky composed the 'Marche Slave', which starts by evoking the oppression of the Serbs by the Turks - using Serbian folk songs - and climaxes with the Russians marching to save the Serbs and a blazing rendition of God save the Tzar.

The English violinist John Abraham Fisher composed the oratorio 'Providence' to raise funds for the Middlesex Hospital. It was premiered at the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford on 3 July 1777. There were also annual oratorio performances at the Methodist-run Lock Hospital - London's first VD clinic.

In April 1786, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach put together a concert in support of the medical poorhouse in Hamburg. He had another motive - to revive interest in the music of his father. The audience heard the 'Credo' from J.S. Bach's 'Mass in B minor'. And, of course, Handel's Hallelujah Chorus was thrown in at the end for good measure.

In 1824 the 12-year old Franz Liszt made his English debut at a fundraising dinner hosted by The Royal Society of Musicians, set up as a 'Fund for Decay'd Musicians'. Their annual event aimed to raise funds for the widows and orphans of musicians. Later in the 19th century, Berlioz and Dvorak performed at it. Clara Schumann attended once but declined a second invitation, because the events ended up being rather rowdy. The evening typically offered 'Bread, Beer and strong Beer and one Bottle of Wine to each person at 11/6'.

In 1914, Elgar composed 'Carillon', in support of wartime charities in Belgium, which had just been overrun by German troops. The piece was a big hit and, the following year, Elgar was approached to write something for a concert to help Polish refugees. Within just two months, Elgar wrote 'Polonia'. It was first performed at London's Queen's Hall at a Polish Victims' Relief Fund Concert in July 1915, with Elgar conducting. He dedicated the work to his friend Paderewski.

If it's contemporary classical music activism you're looking for we have it here in New York. An orchestra called The Dream Unfinished was founded in 2015, as an activist orchestra, whose mission is to use classical music as a platform to engage audiences in dialogues surrounding social and racial justice. Each year, TDU selects a social justice issue, which dictates their artistic programming. This year's season, SANCTUARY, centers on America's current and historic immigration crisis, and does so through artists who have roots here and elsewhere. According to their website, it will feature the music of Tania Leon, Huang Ruo, George Walker, Vijay Iyer, and Kareem Roustom, and include a performance by Vijay Iyer and Jennifer Koh.


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## regenmusic (Oct 23, 2014)

SomeAustrianBloke said:


> Sounds interesting. How did Bono contribute to the world? How well did his "One" Foundation perform? If there's one thing I've learned, it's that people talking about doing good to the world, especially musicians, tend to virtue signal on TV, perform "symbolic acts" and do their best to avoid taxes and keeping safe in their ivory towers.







You can see his sincerity here. He worked with GW Bush and Clinton heavily on curbing AIDS in Africa and reducing infant death.


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## SomeAustrianBloke (Nov 1, 2018)

regenmusic said:


> You can see his sincerity here. He worked with GW Bush and Clinton heavily on curbing AIDS in Africa and reducing infant death.


Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate people doing good stuff. But I'm pretty sick of people in private jets telling me to stop using my car because of climate change, people with millions of dollars in their pocket (offshore, in weird countries to avoid taxes) telling me to be more generous towards the poor, and all the other stuff they are talking about, while living like gods. To me, most of them are like so many politicians, the only difference being the way they earn their money.

I'm all for people doing good stuff, but I'm really skeptical when I see people in high places talking down to the general public telling them how to think and live.

That being said, every act of humanity should be highly regarded, and every single one of us has the chance to make the world a better place, even if it's only in your own, small community.



RICK RIEKERT said:


> Historically, there are many notable examples of musicians lending a hand:
> 
> In 1749 Handel gave a concert to fund the completion of the chapel for London's Foundling Hospital that was established for the 'education and maintenance of exposed and deserted young children'. The next year, a benefit performance of 'Messiah' sold out and a second performance had to be given two weeks later. Handel put 'Messiah' on every year after that until his death, raising some £500,000 in today's money for the Hospital.
> 
> ...


That's some pretty interesting information.

Thank you!


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

On New Years Day, Berlioz would go out to various Parisian slums and deliver bags of salted peanuts to indigent families.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Sergei Koussevitsky: from Wikipedia....

"Koussevitsky was a great champion of modern music, commissioning a number of works from prominent composers. During his time in Paris in the early 1920s he programmed much contemporary music, ensuring well-prepared and good quality performances. Among the well-received premieres were Honegger’s Pacific 231, George Gershwin's Second Rhapsody and Roussel’s Suite in F.

For the Boston Symphony Orchestra's 50th anniversary, he commissioned Ravel's Piano Concerto in G, Copland's Ode, Prokofiev's Symphony No. 4 (which Prokofiev later revised), Paul Hindemith's Concert Music for Strings and Brass, and Stravinsky's Symphony of Psalms, as well as works by Albert Roussel and Howard Hanson.

In 1922, Koussevitzky commissioned Maurice Ravel's arrangement of Modest Mussorgsky's 1874 suite for piano, Pictures at an Exhibition, which was premiered on 19 October that year and quickly became the most famous and celebrated orchestration of the work. Koussevitzky held the rights to this version for many years.

In 1940, Koussevitzky commissioned Randall Thompson, then a professor at the University of Virginia and director of the men's Glee club, to write a new piece for performance at Tanglewood. Koussevitzky had a large-scale festival piece in mind, but with World War II underway and France having fallen to Germany, Thompson could not find such an inspiration. Instead, he produced his unaccompanied Alleluia – with the word sung 64 times in the Russian manner – which became his most frequently performed work.

Legacy
KoussevitzkyFoundation.png
As an avid supporter of new music, Koussevitzky created the Koussevitzky Music Foundations in 1942. The basic aim of the foundations was to assist composers by commissioning new compositions and underwriting the cost of their performance. New works created with the foundations' support include: Benjamin Britten's opera Peter Grimes, Douglas Moore's opera The Ballad of Baby Doe, Béla Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra, Aaron Copland's Symphony No. 3, Henri Dutilleux's string quartet Ainsi la nuit and Olivier Messiaen's Turangalîla-Symphonie."

Koussevitsky also commissioned Martinů's Symphony No. 1 (but not as a symphony).


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## regenmusic (Oct 23, 2014)

From Ken0C's page:

185. "I do not desire that you shall esteem me greater as an artist, but better and more perfect as a man; when the condition of our country is somewhat better, then my art shall be devoted to the welfare of the poor." (Vienna, June 29, 1800, to Wegeler, in Bonn, writing of his return to his native land.)

Beethoven.

https://sites.google.com/site/kenocstuff/beethoven-s-words/10-on-his-own-character


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