Born Today! 08.03.2024

Alphonse Thys (8 March 1807 – 1 August 1879) was a 19th-century French composer.

Jean-Delphin Alard (8 March 1815 – 22 February 1888) was a French violinist, composer, and teacher. He was the son-in-law of Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume, and had Pablo de Sarasate amongst his students.

Francesco (Franco) Antonio Faccio (8 March 1840 – 21 July 1891) was an Italian composer and conductor. Born in Verona, he studied music at the Milan Conservatory from 1855 where he was a pupil of Stefano Ronchetti-Monteviti and, as scholar William Ashbrook notes, "where he struck up a lifelong friendship with Arrigo Boito, two years his junior" and with whom he was to collaborate in many ways.Initially, he became known as the composer of two operas and, in his years (1871–1889) as music director of the Teatro alla Scala opera house, Faccio became known as a conductor of Verdi's music at La Scala, in different parts of Italy, and abroad.

Georg Wilhelm Rauchenecker (8 March 1844, in Munich – 17 July 1906, in Elberfeld, today part of Wuppertal) was a German composer, conductor and violinist.

Franco Alfano (8 March 1875 – 27 October 1954) was an Italian composer and pianist, best known today for his operas Cyrano de Bergerac (1936), Risurrezione (1904) and for having completed Puccini's opera Turandot in 1926. He had considerable success with several of his own works during his lifetime.

Franco Alfano (8 March 1875 – 27 October 1954) was an Italian composer and pianist, best known today for his operas Cyrano de Bergerac (1936), Risurrezione (1904) and for having completed Puccini's opera Turandot in 1926. He had considerable success with several of his own works during his lifetime.

Harald Heide (March 8, 1876 – January 27, 1956) was a Norwegian violinist, conductor, and composer.Heide was born in Fredrikstad, the son of the violin-maker Johan Albert Heide (1847–1925). He studied music theory and violin at the Oslo Conservatory of Music from 1891 to 1896, and after that studied violin in Berlin under Florián Zajíc. He taught at the Bergen Music School from 1898 to 1899 and was the concertmaster at the National Theater orchestra in Oslo from 1899 to 1903. He then studied under César Thomson in Brussels, followed by a tour as a concert violinist in England and the United States. In 1907 he became the conductor at the National Theater in Bergen, working there from 1907 to 1919 and again from 1925 to 1926.Heide's main occupation in Bergen was as director of the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra—at that time still named the Harmony Music Society (Musikselskabet Harmonien)—from 1907 to 1948. Under Heide's management, the orchestra's program was expanded, from six to eight concerts per year to over 80, and it was also better staffed with musicians for all of the positions in a symphony orchestra. Heide was a guest conductor in Helsingfors in 1924, in Göteborg in 1928, and in Stockholm in 1931. Under his direction, the Harmony Music Society performed over 6,000 works by 455 different composers. Heide's compositions for orchestra, including his Symphonie romantique, were stylistically influenced by Johan Halvorsen. In 1929, Heide married the singer Henriette Strindberg, née Nielsen (1894–1964). After her debut in 1918, she performed in operas and operettas in Oslo and Bergen, and also as a concert singer in these cities and in London. She later worked as a voice instructor at the Bergen Conservatory.Harald Heide was the brother of the actress Signe Heide Steen (1881–1959), who was the mother of the singer Randi Heide Steen, the actor Harald Heide Steen, and the actress Kari Diesen. He died in Bergen.

Anoushavan Ter-Ghevondyan (Armenian: Անուշավան Գրիգորի Տեր-Ղևոնդյան; 8 March 1887 – 6 June 1961) was an Armenian composer, pedagogue, and sociocultural activist. His father was the photographer Grigor Ter-Ghevondyan; and his daughter, pianist Heghine Ter-Ghevondyan.

Ina Boyle (8 March 1889 – 10 March 1967) was an Irish composer. Her compositions encompass a broad spectrum of genres and include choral, chamber and orchestral works as well as opera, ballet and vocal music. While a number of her works, including The Magic Harp (1919), Colin Clout (1921), Gaelic Hymns (1923–24), Glencree (1924-27) and Wildgeese (1942), received acknowledgement and first performances, the majority of her compositions remained unpublished and unperformed during her lifetime.

Alan Hovhaness (; March 8, 1911 – June 21, 2000) was an American composer of Armenian ancestry. He was one of the most prolific 20th-century composers, with his official catalog comprising 67 numbered symphonies (surviving manuscripts indicate over 70) and 434 opus numbers. The true tally is well over 500 surviving works, since many opus numbers comprise two or more distinct works. The Boston Globe music critic Richard Buell wrote: "Although he has been stereotyped as a self-consciously Armenian composer (rather as Ernest Bloch is seen as a Jewish composer), his output assimilates the music of many cultures. What may be most American about all of it is the way it turns its materials into a kind of exoticism. The atmosphere is hushed, reverential, mystical, nostalgic."

Josef Berg (8 March 1927 – 26 February 1971) was a Czech composer, musicologist and librettist. His work represents a remarkable value in the context of Czech music after World War II.

Liu Shikun (simplified Chinese: 刘诗昆; traditional Chinese: 劉詩昆; pinyin: Liú Shīkūn; born March 8, 1939) is a Chinese pianist and composer. He began his piano training at the age of three and started publicly performing by the age of five. He won third prize and the Special Prize of the Liszt International Piano Competition in Budapest in 1956 and was awarded a strand of Franz Liszt's hair. In 1958, he shared with Lev Vlassenko the second prize in the First Tchaikovsky International Piano Competition in Moscow.Liu became one of China's top concert performers until 1966, when the Cultural Revolution and the Gang of Four attacked the country; Western music was banned and, along with thousands of other artists, Liu was arrested. He stayed in prison for eight years.Liu studied at Beijing's Central Conservatory of Music and graduated from the Moscow Conservatory of Music.

Ivana Loudová (8 March 1941 – 25 July 2017) was a Czech composer. Loudová was born at Chlumec nad Cidlinou. She studied at the Prague Conservatory and the Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts under Miloslav Kabeláč and Emil Hlobil. She later studied in Paris at the Centre Bourdan under Olivier Messiaen and Andre Jolivet. She has written orchestral and chamber music, as well as music for the voice and film/stage. She obtained an honourable mention in Mannheim for the composition Rhapsody in Black, and won at the Guido d'Arezzo” International Polyphonic Competition in Italy in 1978, 1980 and 1984. In the choral area, she wrote the Vocal Symphony in 1965 and later wrote children's choral works such as the prize-winning Little Christmas Cantata. She has also written music for American Wind Symphony Orchestra and other orchestral works. Since 1992 Ivana Loudová has taught composition at the Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts in Prague. For her work, Ivana Loudová received the award Heidelberger Kunstpreis 1993, the award of the Ministry of culture for a contribution to the music world for the year 2015 and the award of the Protective Association 2017. Ivana Loudová died in Prague on 25 July 2017 after a long and perilous disease. She was 76 years old.

Bruce Harold Broughton (born March 8, 1945) is an American orchestral composer of television, film, and video game scores and concert works. He has composed several highly acclaimed soundtracks over his extensive career and has contributed many pieces to music archives, including the 1994 version of the 20th Century Fox fanfare with short versions for 20th Century Fox Television and Foxstar Productions and conducting the Cinergi Pictures logo composed by Jerry Goldsmith. He has won ten Emmy Awards and has been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Score. Broughton is currently a lecturer in composition at UCLA.

Jakub Polaczyk, (born 1983 in Kraków) is a Polish composer and pianist based in New York City. Winner of the American Prize in Composition 2020 and Iron Composer 2013. Graduated from the Academy of Music in Kraków, Jagiellonian University and Carnegie Mellon University. He studied in Poland with: Marcel Chyrzyński, Krzysztof Penderecki, Marek Chołoniewski (pl), in Belgium with Jan Van Landeghem and in the USA with Reza Vali. Since 2020 has been hosting program "Coffees After Bach" in the Polish Radio Chicago AM1030. Currently teaching at The New York Conservatory of Music. Since 2018 Polaczyk has been the New Music Director of the International Chopin & Friends Festival in NYC.