1868 | Music
Music
Opera: Mefistofele 3/5 at Milan's Teatro alla Scala, with music by Italian composer Arrigo Boito, 26; Hamlet 3/9 at the Opéra-Comique, Paris, with music by Ambroise Thomas; Dalibor 5/16 at Prague, with music by Bedrich Smetana; Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg 6/21 at Munich, with music by Richard Wagner; La Perichole 10/6 at the Théâtre des Variétés, Paris, with Hortense Schneider, music by Jacques Offenbach, libretto by Ludovic Halévy and Henri Meilhac; Geneviève de Brabant 10/22 at New York, with music by Offenbach in the first U.S. performance of the opera which contains an aria that will become the hymn of the U.S. Marine Corps (lyrics beginning, "From the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli" will be published in 1918).
Composer Gioacchino Rossini dies at Passy, outside Paris, November 13 at age 76 and is buried at Florence's Church of Santa Croce.
First performances: Symphony No. 1 in G minor (Winter Dreams) by Russian composer Petr Ilich Tchaikovsky, 27, 2/15 at Moscow; A German Requiem (Ein Deutsches Requiem) by Johannes Brahms 4/10 (Good Friday) at St. Stephans' Cathedral, Bremen; Symphony No. 1 in C minor by Austrian composer Anton Bruckner, 43, 5/9 at Linz. The work is too difficult for the orchestra but Vienna will hear a revised version in 1891; Concerto No. 2 in G minor for Piano and Orchestra by Camille Saint-Saëns 5/13 at Paris; Tales of the Vienna Woods (Geschichten aus dem Wienerwald) by Johann Strauss 6/9 at Vienna.
The Brahms Lullaby published at Berlin has words from "Des Knaben Wunderhorn" (the second verse is by George Scherer and a Mrs. Natalia Macfarren writes English lyrics).
Hymns: "Lead, Kindly Light" ("Lux Benigna") by English clergyman-composer John Bacchus Dykes, 45, lyrics by John Henry Newman (see 1833); "Yield Not to Temptation" by U.S. composer Horatio Richmond Palmer, 34; "O Little Town of Bethlehem" by Philadelphia Holy Trinity Episcopal Church organist Lewis H. Redner, 37, lyrics by church rector Philips Brooks, 33.
Popular song: "Sweet By and By" by U.S. composer Joseph P. Webster, lyrics by S. Fillmore.