Our greatest connection to a composer is through his music. And as a lot of the music we listen to is so exceptional, it is easy to imagine that the person who created it is also entirely exceptional. While there is no doubt they would have had exceptional musical talent and artistic insight, this almost makes it impossible for us to look at the other parts of their personality and life. Here is a rare photo collection of some famous composers showing some interesting aspects of their day-to-day activities.
Samuel Barber smoking under a tree.
Manuel de Falla checking out a menu.
Zoltán Kodály playing with his children.
Richard Strauss playing cards.
Paul Hindemith at an early age playing with a toy carriage.
Jean Sibelius having an afternoon tea.
Erik Satie having a drink.
Theodor Adorno at the beach.
Camille Saint-Saëns wearing some fancy pajamas.
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky properly dressed for winter.
Ennio Morricone playing some ping-pong.
Béla Bartók looking trim.
Giuseppe Verdi at a garden party surrounded by friends.
John Corigliano having a beer with an eland.
Olivier Messiaen with his son, Pascal.
Gian Carlo Menotti walking his dog in the rain.
Johannes Brahms having a picnic with violinist Marie Soldat and a couple other ladies.
Edward Elgar smoking a cigarette with his dog Marco.
Ruth Crawford Seeger chopping wood on a beach with Carl Sandburg.
Krzysztof Penderecki doing yardwork.
Heitor Villa-Lobos playing billiards.
Giacomo Puccini at the Brooklyn Bridge.
Leonard Bernstein going for a swim in Israel.
Claude Debussy holding an umbrella on a beach.
Arnold Schoenberg and Winfried Zillig rocking one piece bathing suits.
John Philip Sousa reading daily news.
Gustav Mahler at a party.
Arvo Pärt and Alfred Schnittke reenact their high school yearbook photos.
Aaron Copland eating an ice cream cone.
Jules Massenet petting his dog.
Pierre Boulez and Simon Rattle chatting at a party in 1989.
Anton Webern bowling.
Morton Feldman playing cards on a train.
John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen flying a cartoon plane.
Igor Stravinsky having breakfast.
Antonín Dvořák having a picnic with his family.
Richard Wagner with his family.
Duke Ellington playing baseball.
Sergei Prokofiev playing chess against violinist David Oistrakh with violinist Liza Gilels watching.
Igor Stravinski rocking a speedo.
Benjamin Britten playing tennis.
György Ligeti pouring water on Pierre-Laurent Aimard on a train.
Dmitri Shostakovich showing off his billiard skills.
Sergei Rachmaninoff cutting his birthday cake.
Tchaikovsky with his family.
George Gershwin painting a picture of Arnold Schoenberg.
Wonderful, thanks very much for sharing the wonderful photos.
Terrific photo’s. Thanks very much!!
Very Very interesting! Thank you