Born Today! 16.02.2024

Johann Melchior Molter (10 February 1696 – 12 January 1765) was a German composer and violinist of the late Baroque period. He was born at Tiefenort, near Eisenach, and was educated at the Gymnasium in Eisenach. By autumn 1717 he had left Eisenach and was working as a violinist in Karlsruhe. Here he married Maria Salome Rollwagen, with whom he had eight children. From 1719 to 1721 he studied composition in Italy. From 1722 to 1733 he was court Kapellmeister at Karlsruhe. In 1734 he became Kapellmeister at the court of Duke Wilhelm Heinrich of Saxe-Eisenach. Maria died in 1737; by 1742 Molter had married Maria Christina Wagner. In that year he returned to Karlsruhe and began teaching at the gymnasium there. From 1747 to his death Molter was employed by Margrave Carl Friedrich of Baden-Durlach, the son of his first employer. He died at Karlsruhe. Molter's surviving works include an oratorio; several cantatas; over 140 symphonies, overtures, and other works for orchestra; many concertos, including some of the first clarinet concertos ever written; and many pieces of chamber music. One of Molter's many Trumpet Concertos is the signature piece of C-SPAN's Washington Journal.

Chrétien Urhan (Baptised as Christian Urhan; 16 February 1790 – 2 November 1845) was a French violinist, violist, organist and composer.

Semen Stepanovych Hulak-Artemovsky (Ukrainian: Семен Степанович Гулак-Артемовський, also referred to as Semyon Gulak-Artemovsky and Artemovs’kyj) (February 16 [O.S. February 4] 1813 – April 17 [O.S. April 5] 1873), was an opera composer, baritone, actor, and dramatist who worked in Imperial Russia. He is known mainly for his comic opera Zaporozhets za Dunayem (A Zaporozhian (Cossack) Beyond the Danube), as well as for his dramatic talent and his powerful, rich baritone voice. He was the nephew of the poet Petro Hulak-Artemovsky and a close friend of Taras Shevchenko.

Émile Durand (French: [emil dyʁɑ̃]; 16 February 1830 – 7 May 1903) was a French musical theorist, teacher and composer. He was better known for his theoretical writings than for his compositions.

Benjamin E. Woolf (February 16, 1836 – February 7, 1901) was a British-born American violinist, composer, playwright, and journalist. His best-known works were the comic operas The Mighty Dollar and Westward Ho.

Ludwig Philipp Scharwenka (16 February 1847, in Szamotuły [Samter], Grand Duchy of Posen – 16 July 1917, in Bad Nauheim) was a German-Polish composer and teacher of music. He was the older brother of Xaver Scharwenka.

Willem Kes (Dordrecht, 16 February 1856 – München, 22 February 1934, was a Dutch conductor, composer, violist, and violinist. He was the first principal conductor of the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam, holding that position from 1888 to 1895.

Johann Maria Eduard Strauss III (16 February 1866 – 9 January 1939; German: Johann Strauß III) was an Austrian composer whose father was Eduard Strauss, whose uncles were Johann Strauss II and Josef Strauss, and whose grandfather was Johann Strauss I. Born in Vienna, he was unofficially entrusted with the task of upholding his family's tradition after the dissolution of the Strauss Orchestra by his father in 1901. His talents were not fully realized during his lifetime as musical tastes had changed in the Silver Age with more popular composers such as Franz Lehár and Oscar Straus dominating the Viennese musical scene with their operettas, although his uncle, Johann Strauss II, supervised his development as a musician, a fact disputed by Eduard Strauss. Despite Strauss’ keen interest in composing, he was better remembered as a conductor. His only stage work, the three-act operetta Katze und Maus, composed in 1898, premiered in Vienna on 23 December 1898, at the Theater an der Wien. Its public reaction bordered on utter dislike, and music critics called for the distraught composer to reassess himself and to appear under a pseudonym, in order not to tarnish the name of his famous relatives. He salvaged the music score and produced independent pieces of which the waltzes Sylvanien, Op. 1 and Leonie, Op. 2 survived obscurity. Strauss also conducted from the violin in the style of the Vorgeiger and of his family. In 1903, he elevated the Strauss family to a new age of development when the Deutsche Grammophon AG of Germany recorded his conducting of the Johann Strauss Orchestra on eight single-sided records of works by his family. Principally, he was the first conductor in the Strauss family to actively conduct works to be recorded by prominent recording companies. His later works, such as Dem Muthigen gehört die Welt (The World Belongs to the Brave), Op. 25, Unter den Linden (Under the Linden Trees), Op. 30, and Krönungs-Walzer (Coronation Waltz), Op. 40 (the latter celebrating the coronation of King Edward VII of the United Kingdom), were also considerably more popular than his earlier efforts. He died in Berlin at the age of 72.

Selim Gustaf Adolf Palmgren (16 February 1878 – 13 December 1951) was a Finnish composer, pianist, and conductor. Palmgren was born in Pori, Finland, February 16, 1878. He studied at the Conservatory in Helsinki from 1895 to 1899, then continued his piano studies in Berlin with Ansorge, Berger and Busoni. He conducted choral and orchestral societies in his own country and made several very successful concert tours as a pianist in the principal cities of Finland and Scandinavia, appearing also as a visiting conductor. In 1921, he went to the United States, where he taught composition at the Eastman School of Music, later returning to Finland, where he died in Helsinki, aged 73. Palmgren was married to the opera singer Maikki Järnefelt.

Fernando Previtali (16 February 1907 Adria, Italy – 1 August 1985, Rome, Italy) was an Italian conductor, particularly associated with the Italian repertory, especially Verdi operas. He studied at the Giuseppe Verdi Music Conservatory in Turin, and later with Franco Alfano. He began his career as assistant conductor to Vittorio Gui in Florence from 1928 to 1935, and later in Genoa from 1935 to 1936. He was artistic director of the RAI National Symphony Orchestra from 1936 until 1953, and conducted the Verdi cycle in 1951, to commemorate the composer's 50th death anniversary, and left recordings of Nabucco, Ernani, La battaglia di Legnano, Il trovatore, and Don Carlo. He also conducted at all the major opera houses of Italy, and was principal conductor at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires in the 1960s. He was appointed artistic director of the Teatro Regio in Turin in 1970, and later of the Teatro Comunale in Genoa. He conducted the first performances of Dallapiccola's Volo di notte and Ghedini's Rè Hassan and Le Baccanti. His students included the British conductor Meredith Davies.

Alexander Lafayette Chew Wilder (February 16, 1907 – December 24, 1980) was an American composer.

Yevgeny Kirillovich Golubev (Russian: Евге́ний Кири́ллович Го́лубев) (16 February 1910 – 25 December 1988) was a Soviet and Russian composer. Golubev was born and died in Moscow. He was taught by Nikolai Myaskovsky, and his students included Iosif Andriasov from 1958 till 1963, Alfred Schnittke, who studied with him from 1953 until 1958, Asya Sultanova, and Michael L. Geller. His own compositions included at least twenty-four string quartets, seven symphonies, three piano concertos - the last dedicated to and recorded by Tatiana Nikolayeva -, concertos for violin, cello and viola, ten piano sonatas (the sixth dedicated to Myaskovsky), sonatas for violin, cello and for trumpet (1956) (the latter dedicated to Sergei Nikolaevich Yeryomin), and quintets for strings with piano and with harp, among other works. This harp quintet is one of Golubev's few works that are still occasionally performed. The Soviet state record label Melodiya released several LPs of his music, including the three piano concertos, two of the symphonies, and some chamber works and songs which are no longer easily available. During the last years, some of these old recordings were released on CD. Melodiya has in 2005 reissued Nikolayeva's recordings of the 3rd piano concerto and 4th piano sonata (1942–1943).

Miguel Bernal Jiménez (16 February 1910 – 26 July 1956) was a Mexican composer, organist, pedagogist and musicologist. He is widely regarded as the best representative of 20th century Mexican religious music, in addition to his important contributions to the Mexican nationalist music movement. He is considered by some to be the mainstay of the nacionalismo sacro (sacred nationalism) movement.

Karsten Anker Andersen (16 February 1920 – 15 December 1997) was a Norwegian conductor.

Sigiswald Kuijken (Dutch: [ˌsiɣɪsʋɑlt ˈkœykə(n)]; born 16 February 1944) is a Belgian violinist, violist, and conductor known for playing on period and original instruments.