6th of June : Aram Khachaturian : first love
Aram Khachaturian was born on June 6th in 1903 in Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia. He would have known his birthday as two dates - the 24th of May under the Julian Calendar and the 6th of June under the Gregorian Calendar.

When I was a scruffy eight year-old in 1975 I fell in love with the theme song of a television drama called The Onedin Line. The show came on - I think Tuesday nights - right at my bedtime, so I'd plead with Mum for just a couple more minutes, sit close in front of our black and white tele, turn up the sound, and let myself be carried away by the magical theme.It never occurred to me then that someone actually composed the music. And certainly not that the composer was at that time a 70 year old Soviet Armenian living in Moscow, sadly with only four more years to live, as he passed away aged 74 in 1978. I didn't know the piece was called Adagio of Spartacus and Phrygia from Khachaturian's ballet Spartacus, which I would be lucky enough to see in 2018 when it was presented by The Australian Ballet.

Khachaturian's most famous piece is something most people would recognise, although they may not know it by its name: The Sabre Dance. Fans of cartoon cat and mouse chases might find it very familiar! If Khachaturian was alive today he would be more than 120 years old. He is one of the most famous composers of the 20th Century, and his music continues to be much loved and appreciated all over the world.

7th of June : Charles Strouse : high school memories

When I was in year 7 at high school, I was part of a school musical called Bye Bye Birdie. My small part was lucky to have a name - Nancy - but I wasn't needed much, and spent most of rehearsal-time playing hide-and-seek amongst hessian bales stashed in the dusty and dark room under the stage. Faint sounds of the proper business of musical-making floated down through the stage floorboards, and that music was written by a man born in New York on the 7th of June 1928: Charles Strouse. His career spans from Broadway musicals to scores for film and television, and one of his most well-known songs is Tomorrow from the television of adaption of the musical Annie.

8th of June : Robert Schumann : Piano Students' Friend

If Robert Schumann were alive today (2024) he'd be 214. Tragically he died in 1856 at only 46 having spent the last two years of his life suffering alone in a mental asylum near Bonn (the birthplace of Beethoven) in Germany, not allowed to see his wife Clara Schumann (though sometimes visited by his good friend Johannes Brahms - who incidentally was irretrievably in love with Clara). Schumann's horrific bouts of mental illness marred his chance to reach his full potential as a symphonic composer, yet almost every piano student will at some stage learn at least one of his Scenes from Childhood pieces, if not one of his other famous piano solos.

Schumann is also famous for his beautiful lieder; German songs composed for voice and piano. My favourite lied is the haunting Im wunderschonen Monat Mai (In the lovely month of May) beginning his incredible song cycle Dichterliebe (A Poet's Love) which he wrote in the first year of his marriage to Clara. This version sung by the late Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau is beyond beautiful.