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glbtq people have made
major contributions to
Classical Music
since its earliest days. |
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Pyotr Ilich Tchaikovsky
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Castrati,
male singers who were
castrated before they
reached puberty, attained the height of their popularity in the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Though they were not necessarily
homosexual, they occupy a "queer space" in cultural history. |
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Arcangelo Corelli
(1653-1713), who was probably homosexual, was one of the
seventeenth century's most widely admired and influential composers and
performers. |
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The Diva has
traditionally played a significant role in both gay and lesbian culture
as an object of cult worship. Those who suffer the heartaches of
forbidden love and ostracism from an unaccepting society have
traditionally found solace through adulation of and identification with
the Diva. |
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 George Frideric Handel
(1685-1759), a towering figure of Western classical music,
has been surrounded by a biographical closet that has concealed the
possibility that he was in some sense queer. |
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Hildegard of Bingen
(1098-1179), a German Benedictine
abbess, mystic, scientific and theological writer, dramatist, and
composer, formed a strong emotional attachment to a young nun and wrote
music that expresses physical and spiritual desire for the Virgin Mary. |
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Jean Baptiste Lully
(1632-1687) was a composer who established the basic principles of
French opera. His career declined as the result of a homosexual
scandal. |
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Opera, an
eclectic synthesis of voice, drama, music, costume, visual arts and
spectacle, has played an integral role in queer culture since its
development in seventeenth-century Venice. |
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Johann Rosenmüller
(1619-1684) was an important seventeenth-century German composer
who survived a homosexual scandal in Leipzig to reconstitute his career
in Venice. |
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Camille Saint-Saëns
(1835-1921) was considered one of the greatest composers of his
day. His personal life was both dramatic and glamorous, and he traveled
in circles that included many of the most prominent homosexual figures
of the fin-de-siècle. |
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 Franz Schubert
(1797-1828) enjoyed popularity in his native Vienna, but the depth
of his talent remained unknown until after his death because many of
his most important works were unperformed during his lifetime. |
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Pyotr Ilich Tchaikovsky
(1840-1893) was one of the greatest composers in history. Scholars
continue to debate the impact his homosexuality had on his music. |
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Wagnerism
is concerned with
the music, theoretical writings, political ideas, and aesthetics of the
German composer Richard Wagner (1813-1883). Wagnerism had a profound
influence on late nineteenth-century European culture, including the
expression of same-sex desire. |
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Related Special
Features |
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Dance
Music:
Classical, Twentieth Century
Music: Women's
Rock Music: Part 1
Rock Music: Part 2
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Photo
Credits:
Images of Pyotr Ilich Tchaikovsky, George Frideric Handel, and
Franz Schubert courtesy Library of Congress Prints and Photographs
Division. |
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