ALISON BAULD - AUSTRALIA
BORN 7 MAY
Alison Bauld was born in 1944 in Sydney. A piano student of Alexander Sverjensky at the Conservatorium of NSW, she later studied acting at the National Institute of Dramatic Art, subsequently touring in Shakespearian productions for a year before completing a Bachelor of Music degree at the University of Sydney.
She came to England on a university scholarship in 1969 and after studying composition in her first two years in London with Elisabeth Lutyens and Hans Keller, she completed a doctorate in composition at the University of York in 1974.
Her music, almost all of a theatrical genre, has won international prizes and is regularly performed in concerts and broadcasts throughout Europe, the USA and Australia. "A theatrical background has shared centre stage with her musicianship in informing her writing style . . . Bauld has instilled her vocal music with a dramatic flare uncommon among other contemporary song writers." Joyce Andrews, Journal of Singing, USA, Vol. 60, No 1, 2003.
Music theatre compositions include an opera, Nell, commissioned and performed by Midsummer Opera at the Donmar Warehouse in 1987 and a multi-track broadcast for the BBC of a dramatic scena from Shakespeare's Richard III with the Arditti String Quartet and with the composer as narrator. This was later adapted as Farewell Already and recorded on NMC by Jane Manning with her Minstrels in 1995. Pluto, performed by the same ensemble, was a millenium commission by the Spitalfield's Festival for the vocal and instrumental forces of Holst's Planets and most recently, a song for soprano and piano, No More of Love, was written for inclusion in her novel, Mozart's Sister. An interest in music education led to a Novello commission to write a three volume piano tutor, Play Your Way, in which she explores the credo that mistakes can be used as a creative tool in musical development.
Bauld has composed a brace of dramatic scenas with Shakespearian settings of which Banquo's Buried for soprano and piano and Where Should Othello Go for tenor/baritone and piano are her most performed. Recent settings for piano and voice include further texts from Macbeth, The Tempest, Anthony and Cleopatra, Henry VI Part 3 and Merchant of Venice, all of which were staged in a concert of her vocal music given by the Australian soprano, Helen Noonan in Melbourne, 2003.
♫ LISTEN
EDNA FRIDA PIETSCH - USA
BORN 7 MAY
Edna Pietsch shared a birthday with Brahms and Tchaikovsky, a fact she reported with immense pride. Perhaps this was an omen that she would go on to become an accomplished composer herself. Pietsch was quite a character and possessed an unforgettable persona. She had strong opinions about many matters. Regarding music, she likened "modern music" to a garbage dump; if you were around it long enough, it stopped smelling.
Edna Pietsch was quite colorful and multi-talented. To cheer a friend's accomplishment or a relatives' milestone,she would compose personalized, creative, invariably silly, poems. Pietsch was quick to tell you what was on her mind and let you know where you stood with her. She lived her whole life in the same Milwaukee house in which she was born and delighted in that fact. Pietsch poured her heart and soul into her compositions. Likewise, she taught piano with a passion and was disappointed with students who did not share her passion, especially if the student was naturally gifted.
Pietsch loved to entertain and was quite exacting in her attempts to teach proper table manners to her somewhat reluctant neices and nephews. She did things with a flourish. Another one of her avocations was gardening. Pietsch associated the beauty of the garden with the beauty of music and flowers provided inspiration for some of her works.
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Andante Cantabile for Viola and Piano by Edna Frida Prietsch 
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