With that said, here are a few you probably didn’t know:
- The London Symphony Orchestra was booked to travel on the Titanic's maiden voyage, but they changed boats at the last minute.
- Franz Liszt received so many requests for locks of his hair that he bought a dog and sent fur clippings instead.
- Havergal Brian's Symphony No. 1, the 'Gothic', requires over 800 musicians to perform, including 82 string players.
- Domenico Scarlatti composed his 'cat fugue' after his cat, Pulcinella, walked across his keyboard.
- The most expensive opera costume of all time was worn by Adelina Patti at Covent Garden in 1895. It was worth over $20 million.
- Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin sang a Shostakovich song, 'My Homeland Hears', over the radio on his first space mission.
- A single violin is made from over 70 individual pieces of wood.
Rossini wrote the aria ‘Di tanti palpiti’ while waiting for some risotto in a Venice restaurant. - There are two skulls in Haydn’s tomb. His head was stolen by phrenologists and a replacement skull was put in his tomb. In 1954, the real skull was restored but the substitute was not removed.
- The tension of the 230-odd strings in a grand piano exert a combined force of 22 tons on the cast iron frame.
For more interesting facts about the music you love, all you have to do is tune to 90.9 FM!
-Andy Ellis
