Quiz: Test Your Knowledge of Gay Composers

Gay Pride Weekend brings a chance to reflect on gay and lesbian composers who have enriched classical music throughout history. It’s a topic that concert programmers or musicologists rarely address, whether because of conservative attitudes or the risk of improperly linking musical styles and sexual politics.

Still, the question hasn't been completely ignored. In the fall 2013 issue of Daedalus, the Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, University of Michigan women's studies professor Nadine Hubbs asserts that a core of American classical music developed a gay aesthetic during the mid-20th century. More

Lorin Maazel, Intense and Enigmatic Conductor, Dies at 84

Lorin Maazel, a former child prodigy who went on to become the music director of the New York Philharmonic, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Vienna State Opera and several other ensembles and companies around the world, and who was known for his incisive and sometimes extreme interpretations, died on Sunday at his home in Castleton, Va. He was 84.

The cause was complications of pneumonia, said Jenny Lawhorn, a spokeswoman for Mr. Maazel. In recent days, he had been rehearsing for the Castleton Festival, which takes place on his farm. More

Make your own carrot clarinet! (video)

Watch here!