Born Today! 08.05.2025

Jan Bedřich Kittl (German: Johann Friedrich Kittl; 8 May 1806 – 20 July 1868) was a Czech composer.

Louis Moreau Gottschalk (May 8, 1829 – December 18, 1869) was an American composer, pianist, and virtuoso performer of his own romantic piano works. He spent most of his working career outside the United States.

Oscar Hammerstein I (8 May 1846 – 1 August 1919) was a German-born businessman, theater impresario, and composer in New York City. His passion for opera led him to open several opera houses, and he rekindled opera's popularity in America. He was the grandfather of American playwright/lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II and the father of theater manager William Hammerstein and American producer Arthur Hammerstein.

Heinrich Berté ([berˈte]), born Heinrich Bettelheim (8 May 1857 – 23 August 1924) was an Austria-Hungarian composer of operas and operettas.

Inglis Gundry (8 May 1905 – 13 April 2000) was an English composer, novelist, musicologist, music pedagogue and writer. He is particularly remembered for his operas and for his numerous books; not only on music, but on a broad array of historical subjects. For five decades he lectured on music appreciation for WEA London and also taught on the music faculties at the University of Cambridge, the University of London, and the University of Surrey.

Mary Lou Williams (born Mary Elfrieda Scruggs; May 8, 1910 – May 28, 1981) was an American jazz pianist, arranger, and composer. She wrote hundreds of compositions and arrangements and recorded more than one hundred records (in 78, 45, and LP versions). Williams wrote and arranged for Duke Ellington and Benny Goodman, and she was friend, mentor, and teacher to Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Tadd Dameron, Bud Powell, and Dizzy Gillespie. She has been noted for her 1954 conversion to Catholicism, which led to a musical hiatus and a later transformation in the nature of her music. She continued to perform and work as a philanthropist, educator, and youth mentor until her death from bladder cancer in 1981.

Soltan Ismayil oghlu Hajibeyov (5 May 1919 – 19 September 1974) was an Azerbaijani and Soviet composer. He was awarded the People's Artist of the USSR on 26 July 1973.

William Jay Sydeman (May 8, 1928 – May 27, 2021) was a prolific American composer. He was born in New York. He studied at Duke University, and received a B.S. degree in 1955 from the Mannes School of Music, having studied with Felix Salzer, Roy Travis, and Roger Sessions. He received his master's in music from the Hartt School in 1958, studying under Arnold Franchetti and Goffredo Petrassi. From 1959 to 1970 he joined the composition faculty at his alma mater Mannes School of Music. In 1951 he married Hope Millholland, a pianist and fellow student at Mannes. Winning early acclaim for his avant-garde music (principally published by C. F. Peters), he felt trapped by the prevailing orthodoxies and moved to California in 1970, beginning a period of wandering during which he also studied Buddhism and Anthroposophy. He joined ASCAP in 1975. From 1980 to 1982 he taught at Rudolph Steiner College in Fair Oaks. In 1981 he settled in Sacramento and resumed composition at his former prolific rate, having newly embraced a neotonal musical language. He later moved to Mendocino. In 1966, his catalog (nearly 75 works by this date) was edited by Nancy B. Reich and published as an early exercise in machine-readable catalogs. A 2nd edition, published by NYU Department of Music Education, was released in 1968. 35 years later she would write his entry for Grove Dictionary of Music. His music was commissioned from many leading institutions and performers. He won awards from the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Pacifica Foundation, and the National Institutes of Arts and Letters.

Charles Mills Wilson (8 May 1931 – 13 June 2019) was a Canadian composer, choral conductor, and music educator.

Lepo Sumera (8 May 1950 – 2 June 2000) was an Estonian composer and teacher.

Denys Bouliane (born May 8, 1955) is a Canadian composer and conductor. He is a Professor of Composition at McGill University.

Thierry Joseph-Louis Escaich (born 8 May 1965) is a French organist and composer.