"Bloomer march," by M. Florence. New York: T.B. Harms & Co., 1895.In Washington, meteorological spring came in like a lamb. In the Muse would like to take this fair-weather opportunity to revisit last week’s bicycle theme with M. Florence’s “Bloomer March,” which if the illustration is to be believed, conveys the fin de siècle pleasures of riding a bicycle while dressed in bloomers. Florence dedicates the piece, arranged for solo piano, to “The Cycling Women of America.” The musically inclined bicyclist of 1895 could not safely perform or even listen to the piece while cycling. But today’s two-wheel enthusiasts are welcome to perform and record this public-domain composition and play it on their mp3 player as they navigate the city by bike.
Posted in: Collections, Sheet Music, Sheet Music of the WeekFebruary 29th, 2012 by Cait MillerThe following is a guest post from Senior Music Cataloger Sharon McKinley. As a cataloger, I don’t generally become intimate with the Library of Congress’s special collections, but sometimes magic happens. Several years ago, I encountered American soprano Geraldine Farrar (1882-1967) quite by accident in the course of creating a bibliographic record for her collection. …
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Posted in: CollectionsFebruary 24th, 2012 by Pat PaduaIconic tenor Enrico Caruso was born on February 25, 1873 in Naples, Italy. Over a career spanning 25 years, he performed at the world’s great opera houses, including nearly 900 appearances at New York’s Metropolitan Opera alone. In this age of the mp3 we take recorded music for granted, but Caruso was one of …
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Posted in: Birthdays, Musicians, Pic of the WeekFebruary 22nd, 2012 by Cait MillerThe following is a guest post from Archivist Janet McKinney. Before becoming an archivist I had the privilege of working as a Junior Fellow contributing records to It’s Showtime! Sheet Music from Stage and Screen, our database of excerpts from operas, musicals, revues, and films. As part of the Junior Fellow program, we were able …
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Posted in: Collections, Guest bloggers, Sheet Music of the WeekFebruary 17th, 2012 by Pat PaduaThe Music Division is proud to announce a new exhibition in the lobby of the Performing Arts Reading Room. Choreographers have long used the medium of dance to express America’s cultural diversity. Politics and the Dancing Body also explores the way choreographers employ the body as a tool in the fight against injustice. The exhibit …
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Posted in: Collections, Dance, Exhibitions, Pic of the WeekFebruary 14th, 2012 by Cait MillerThe past couple of years we’ve taken time out on Valentine’s Day to highlight love songs and love letters from the Music Division’s collections; however, Valentine’s Day is not exactly everyone’s favorite day of the year. I scoured our digitized sheet music for a selection that might speak to those who are not in love, the …
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Posted in: Holidays, Sheet Music of the WeekFebruary 10th, 2012 by Pat PaduaKnown as the Texas Troubador, Ernest Tubb was born on February 9, 1914 in Ellis County, Texas. His best known song is probably “Walking the floor over you,” but owing to my heritage I am partial to “My Filipino baby.” In September 1947, Tubb led the first Grand Ole Opry in New York’s Carnegie Hall, …
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Posted in: Birthdays, Composers, Musicians, Pic of the WeekFebruary 8th, 2012 by Cait MillerThe following is a guest post from Head of Acquisitions & Processing Denise Gallo. Today marks the 192nd birthday of Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman. Born into an Ohio family steeped in law and politics, Sherman was at various points in his life a banker, lawyer, and president of a streetcar company. He is remembered above …
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Posted in: Birthdays, Guest bloggers, Sheet Music of the WeekFebruary 7th, 2012 by Cait MillerThe following is a guest post from Head of Acquisitions & Processing Denise Gallo. It’s not often that the Music Division dedicates a blog to a literary giant, but today we wish a happy 200th birthday to Charles Dickens, one of the greatest British authors of the nineteenth century. When he penned his novels, myriad …
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Posted in: Birthdays, CollectionsFebruary 2nd, 2012 by Cait MillerI’m sure there are plenty of In the Muse readers who share my love for the hit series Downton Abbey airing on PBS (am I right?). Every week I tune in to the addictive British period drama and a couple of weeks ago I swooned during that wonderful closing scene where Lady Mary sings “If …
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Posted in: Sheet Music of the Week
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