December 24, 1951: The 1st Hallmark Christmas Movie

When was the 1st "Hallmark Christmas Movie"? It seems like a recent phenomenon. Indeed, the Hallmark Channel has made the sappy, holiday-themed romance films a regular feature of its October, November and December programming since 2009.

But before there was a Hallmark Channel, there was the anthology TV series Hallmark Hall of Fame. And the 1st one of those goes back a lot further than that. It's not a sappy romance story. And it's not an original story, either. Unless you mean a variation on the original Christmas story.

December 24, 1951: Amahl and the Night Visitors is broadcast on NBC, live from Studio 8H at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in New York. It is the 1st program in the Hallmark Hall of Fame series, sponsored by the Hallmark greeting-card company.

It is an opera, the 1st ever composed specifically for television, by Gian Carlo Menotti. He was born in 1911, in Cadegliano-Viconago, in Lombardy near the Italian border with Switzerland. In the booklet for the original cast recording, Menotti wrote:

This is an opera for children because it tries to recapture my own childhood. You see, when I was a child I lived in Italy, and in Italy we have no Santa Claus. I suppose that Santa Claus is much too busy with American children to be able to handle Italian children as well. Our gifts were brought to us by the Three Kings, instead.

I actually never met the Three Kings -- it didn't matter how hard my little brother and I tried to keep awake at night to catch a glimpse of the Three Royal Visitors, we would always fall asleep just before they arrived. But I do remember hearing them. I remember the weird cadence of their song in the dark distance; I remember the brittle sound of the camel's hooves crushing the frozen snow; and I remember the mysterious tinkling of their silver bridles.

(In fact, Italy does have a version of Santa Claus, although he's closer to St. Nicholas, the original bishop form of the character, known as Father Christmas in Britain, Père Noël in France, and, in Italy, Babbo Natale.)

The lead character is Amahl, a boy who, like Tiny Tim in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, can walk only with a crutch. He compensates for his disability by telling tall tales. His mother does not believe him when he tells her there is an amazing star "as big as a window" outside over the roof of their house in Bethlehem.

After bedtime, there is a knock at the door and the mother tells Amahl to go see who it is. He is amazed when he sees three splendidly dressed kings, the Magi. (The Bible does not specifically call them kings. Nor does it specify the number of "wise men.") At first, the mother does not believe Amahl, but when she goes to the door to see for herself, she is stunned.

The Three Kings tell the mother and Amahl they are on a long journey, to give gifts to a wondrous Child, and they would like to rest at their house, to which the mother agrees, saying that all she can offer is "a cold fireplace and a bed of straw." The mother goes to fetch firewood, and Amahl seizes the opportunity to speak with the kings.

King Balthazar answers Amahl's questions about his life as a king, and asks what Amahl does. Amahl responds that he was once a shepherd, but his mother had to sell his sheep. Now, he and his mother will have to go begging.

Amahl then talks with King Kaspar, who is childlike, eccentric, and a bit deaf. Kaspar shows Amahl his box of magic stones, beads, and licorice, and offers Amahl some of the candy. The mother returns. He defends himself, saying "They kept asking me questions," when of course it has in fact been Amahl asking the kings questions. Amahl is told to go fetch the neighbors, so the kings may be fed and entertained properly.

After the neighbors have left and the kings are resting, the mother attempts to steal for her son some of the kings' gold that was meant for the Christ Child. She is thwarted by the kings' page. When Amahl wakes to find the page grabbing his mother, he attacks him. Seeing Amahl's defense of his mother and understanding the motives for the attempted theft, King Melchior says she may keep the gold, as the Holy Child will not need earthly power or wealth to build his kingdom.

The mother says she has waited all her life for such a king and asks the kings to take back the gold. She wishes to send a gift but has nothing to send. Amahl, too, has nothing to give the Child except his crutch. When he offers it to the kings, his leg is miraculously healed. With permission from his mother, he leaves with the kings to see the Child, and give his crutch in thanks for being healed.

Thomas Schippers conducted the orchestra. Chet Allen, then 12 years old, played Amahl. Rosemary Kuhlmann played the Mother, Andrew McKinley played King Kaspar, David Aiken played King Melchior, Leon Lishner played King Balthazar, and Francis Monachino played the page. Melissa Hayden, Glen Tetley and Nicholas Magallanes played "Dancing Shepherds."

Amahl and the Night Visitors was the 1st network television Christmas special to become an annual tradition. Until 1963, Amahl was nearly always presented with many of the same singers and production staff. From 1951 until 1966 it was presented every year on NBC on or around Christmas Eve. A 1978 production of Amahl also premiered on NBC, before it went to cable television in the early 1980s. A British film version was made in 1996.

Nicholas Magallanes and later Thomas Schippers died in 1977. Chet Allen became depressed over his failing career, and died by suicide in 1984. Leon Lishner died in 1995, Andrew McKinley in 1996, Francis Monachino in 2003, Melissa Hayden in 2006, Glen Tetley and later Gian Carlo Menotti in 2007, David Aiken in 2011, and Rosemary Kuhlmann was the last survivor of the cast, living until 2019.

Studio 8H has been the home of NBC's Saturday Night Live since 1975. Most of Menotti's work is forgotten. Arturo Toscanini, NBC's Italian-born main conductor, knew it when he heard the rehearsal for Amahl, telling him, "This is the best you've ever done."

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December 24, 1951 was a Monday. Baseball was out of season. No games were scheduled in the NBA or the NHL And the NFL Championship Game was played the previous day, with the Los Angeles Rams beating the Cleveland Browns, 24-17 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. So there were no scores on this historic day.

December 24, 1871: "Aida" Premieres

December 24, 1871: Aida premieres at the Khedivial Opera House in Cairo, the capital of the country where the opera takes place, Egypt. Antonietta Anastasi-Pozzoni plays Princess Aida of Ethiopia. Pietro Mongini plays Captain of the Guard Radamès. The conductor is Giovanni Bottesini. The libretto was written by Antonio Ghislanzoni. And the composer is Giuseppi Verdi, making a triumphal return to opera after some time away.

Before I go any further: This is the earliest work of classical music for which I felt it necessary to do one of these entries. Some other notable works that came before my 1869 cutoff date:

* Johann Sebastian Bach: Toccata and Fugue in D Minor (a.k.a. the Phantom of the Opera's song), 1704; the Brandenburg Concertos, 1721.

* George Frideric Handel: Water Music, 1717; Messiah, including its "Hallelujah Chorus," 1741.

* Christian Petzol: Minuet in G, 1720. Long thought to have been written by Bach in 1725, in 1965 it was adapted by Sandy Linzer and Denny Randell as "A Lover's Concerto," a hit by female vocal group The Toys.

* Antonio Vivaldi: The Four Seasons, 1725.

* Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: The Marriage of Figaro, 1786; Eine kleine Nachtmusik (A Little Night Music) and Don Giovanni (Don Juan), 1787; Symphony No. 40, 1788; The Magic Flute, 1791.

* Ludwig van Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 14 (a.k.a. the Moonlight Sonata, a name not given to it until long after his death), 1801; Bagatelle No. 25 in A Minor (a.k.a. Für Elise), 1810, although it wasn't published until 1867; and his 9 Symphonies, 1800, 1803, 1805, 1807, 1808, 1808, 1813, 1814, and 1824.

* Niccolo Paganini: Carnival of Venice, 1829.

* Gioachino Rossini: William Tell, including its Overture (a.k.a. the Lone Ranger Theme), 1829.

* Johan Strauss: The Blue Danube, 1867.

* Edvard Grieg: Piano Concerto No. 1, 1869.

*

Giuseppe Verdi -- or, as the Danish pianist and comedian Victor Borge liked to call him, Joe Green, for the literal English translation of his name is "Joseph Green" -- was born as Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi on October 9, 1813 in Le Roncole, outside Parma, Italy. He would remain the greatest composer born on an October 9, until 1940, when John Lennon was born in Liverpool, England.

By the age of 8, Verdi was already paid to be the organist at his church. Although he liked to associate himself with the common people, his parents were landowners, so they could afford to assist his love of music. He was writing operas by 1834, and married Margherita Barezzi in the Spring of 1836. By the Summer of 1838, they had a daughter and a son; by the Summer of 1840, Margherita and both children had died. So many operas have been tragic, but, by 27, Verdi had already sustained more tragedy than anyone should.

In 1847, at 34, Verdi wrote I Masnadieri, (The Robbers), based on Friedrich Schiller's play Die Räuber. The female lead was Giuseppina Strepponi. At 32, she was famous for her voice, and infamous for already having had 5 (or 6, depending on who was telling the story) illegitimate pregnancies, although only 2 children survived infancy. She moved in with him, and, in mostly-Catholic, very conservative 19th Century Italy, that caused a scandal that hurt him commercially.

He didn't care, especially since her linguistic skill made her a good translator. From French, she translated Victor Hugo's 1832 play Le Roi S'Amuse (The King Amuses Himself), and it became Verdi's 1851 opera Rigoletto, with perhaps the most famous song in all of Italian opera, the Duke of Mantua's "La Donna è Mobile" ("Woman is Fickle").

From Spanish, she translated the 1836 play El Trovador (The Troubadour) by Antonio García Gutiérrez, and it became Verdi's 1853 opera Il Trovatore, which, thanks in large part to its Anvil Chorus, brought the public back over to his side. Also in 1853, in her honor, he wrote La Traviata (The Fallen Woman), based on La Dame aux Camélias (The Lady of the Camellias) by Alexandre Dumas fils, which eventually became the Greta Garbo film Camille.

In 1859, Verdi stepped back from composing, having married Strepponi, although they had no children together; and inherited his family's lands, and concentrated on running them. He supported the unification of Italy, which occurred in 1861, and became friends with King Victor Emmanuel II, who kept his numbering as King of Piedmont when he became King of united Italy. One of Verdi's few works in this period was La Forza del Destino (The Force of Destiny, or The Power of Fate), in 1862, another of his works to be based on a Spanish play.

Isma'il Pasha, the Khedive (Sultan) of Egypt, offered Verdi 150,000 francs to write an opera for his new Opera House in Cairo. Difficulties led to delays, which resulted in the 1st opera being performed there, on November 1, 1869, being an established Verdi work, Rigoletto. Verdi was living in Paris, and had sets and costumes made for the original work that he had intended to open the Opera House, but the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71 prevented him from leaving the country with them. Finally, on December 24, 1871, Aida could premiere at the Khedivial Opera House.

The story tells of a war between Egypt, during its Old Kingdom period (2700-2200 BC, also known as the Age of the Pyramid Builders), and Ethiopia, and the love between Egyptian warrior Radamès and Aida, the captured daughter of the King of Ethiopia.

Verdi did not attend the premiere in Cairo, and was angry that the audience consisted of invited dignitaries, politicians and critics, but no members of the general public. He therefore considered the European premiere, in which he was heavily involved at every stage, to be its real première: February 8, 1872, at the home of Italian opera, Teatro alla Scala (usually written as just "La Scala") in Milan.

He had written the role of Aida for the Czech spinto soprano Teresa Stolz, and she sang it at that premiere. She was then engaged to Angelo Mariani, and asked him to conduct, but he declined, and Bottesini conducted it again. Giuseppe Fancelli played Radamès.

In his later years, having already turned Macbeth into an opera, Verdi wrote some operas based on other works of William Shakespeare, including Otello (the lack of an H differentiates it from the play Othello), The Merry Wives of Windsor, and Falstaff.

Giuseppina died in 1897, and Verdi was heartbroken. He died on January 27, 1901, 6 days after suffering a stroke. He was buried next to his wife at the Casa di Riposo (House of Repose) in Milan.

Isma'il Pasha was deposed as Khedive in 1879, and died in 1895. Pietro Mongini, the Cairo premiere's Radamès, died of a heart ailment in 1874, only 45 years old. Giuseppi Fancelli, the Milan premiere's Radamès, lived until 1887; conductor Giovanni Bottesini, until 1889; librettist Antonio Ghislanzoni, 1893; Teresa Stolz, the Milan premiere's Aida, until 1902; Antonietta Anastasi-Pozzoni, the Cairo premiere's Aida, until 1917. 

The Khedivial Opera House burned down on October 28, 1971, and wasn't replaced until a new Cairo Opera House opened at a different location in 1988. The site of the original building is now a parking garage, but its street is still named Opera Square.

Verdi's operas Rigoletto, Aida, Il Trovatore and La Forza del Destino were mentioned in "Does Your Mother Know You're Out, Rigoletto?" an episode of The Odd Couple that aired on ABC on November 5, 1971, almost exactly 100 years after Aida premiered -- and mere days after the Khedivial Opera House burned down.

*

December 24, 1871 was a Sunday. It was Christmas Eve. No major sporting events were held that day.

September 23, 1962: Lincoln Center Opens

September 23, 1962: The Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts opens, with a concert by the New York Philharmonic at their new home, Philharmonic Hall. Leonard Bernstein conducts Aaron Copland's Connotations, and it is broadcast live nationwide on NBC.

The campus of Lincoln Center is bounded by West 66th Street on the north (65th cuts through, but 64th and 63rd do not), Broadway and Lincoln Square on the northeast, Columbus Avenue (known as 9th Avenue below 59th Street) on the east, West 62nd Street on the south, and Amsterdam Avenue (known as 10th Avenue below 59th Street) on the west.

Robert Moses, New York City's "building czar" -- also its demolition czar -- got the City Board of Estimate to approve the Lincoln Square area for urban renewal in 1955. The last thing to happen in that neighborhood, after it was vacated but before it was demolished, was the filming of the movie version of the musical West Side Story.

John D. Rockefeller III, grandson of the oil baron who became America's 1st billionaire, son of the man who built New York's Rockefeller Center and restored Colonial Williamsburg, and brother of Nelson Rockefeller, who soon became Governor of New York and later the Vice President of the United States, led the fundraising to build it, and his family, then still the richest in America, funded half of the construction of the original 3 buildings.

Philharmonic Hall was renamed Avery Fisher Hall in 1973, and renamed David Geffen Hall in 2015. Avery Fisher (1906-1994), a Brooklynite, was an amateur violinist, a pioneer in the field of high fidelity sound reproduction, the founder of Fisher Electronics, and a philanthropist who donated millions of dollars to arts organizations and universities. David Geffen is a titan in the recording industry, and one of the founders of DreamWorks Pictures along with Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg. Geffen had donated $100 million to Lincoln Center, despite being far better known for his association with rock music. The Hall seats 2,200.

The New York State Theater opened on April 23, 1964, seating 2,586. In 2015, it was renamed the David H. Koch Theater. Koch (pronounced "coke," 1940-2019), along with his brother Charles (born in 1935, and still alive as of this writing), was an energy baron who has donated billions of dollars to conservative causes and candidates, many of whom are opposed to the promotion of the arts. His contributions to help renovate Lincoln Center do not absolve him of his disgusting politics.

The centerpiece -- if you're looking straight ahead at Lincoln Center from its "front door" to the east, this building is in the center, with the New York State/Koch Theater on the left and Philharmonic/Avery Fisher/David Geffen Hall on the right -- of Lincoln Center is the Metropolitan Opera House. The original "Met" stood at 1411 Broadway at 39th Street from 1883 to 1966. The current one opened at Lincoln Center on September 16, 1966, with 3,850 seats, a little larger than the old one at 3,625.

On October 14, 1965, the Vivian Beaumont Theater opened, behind David Geffen Hall. Beaumont (1885-1962) was an actress and philanthropist who funded its construction. In the same building, on November 30, 1965, the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts opened. It is now named the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center. Dorothy (1918-2009) and Lewis (1919-2019 -- yes, he lived to be 100) were TV producers, who, in 1976, began producing the PBS series Live from Lincoln Center. In the building's basement, the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater opened on November 10, 1967, in honor of Mrs. Newhouse (1902-1989), the wife of broadcast executive Samuel "Si" Newhouse (1927-2017, and also a major donor).

On May 22, 1969, Damrosch Park and the Daniel and Flor Guggenheim Band Shell opened, behind the NYS/Koch Theater. The Park was named for the Damrosch family, which has produced many classical musicians who contributed to the cultural life of the city. Daniel Guggenheim (1856-1930), brother of Solomon Guggenheim (1861-1949), for whom the egg-shaped art museum on 5th Avenue is named, was a mining magnate. He and his wife Florence (1863-1944) gave heavily to the arts.

On September 11, 1969, Alice Tully Hall opened across 65th Street. It has kept its original name, for Tully (1902-1993), an opera singer and arts patron. On October 26, 1969, a new campus opened for the Julliard School, which had been founded by conductor Frank Damrosch (1859-1937) in 1905, and named for Augustus D. Juilliard (1836–1919), another arts-funding businessman.

Julliard may be Lincoln Center's most lasting legacy: Since 1969, it has produced, in chronological order: Perry King, Patti LuPone, Kevin Kline, David Ogden Stiers, Robin Williams, Mandy Patinkin, William Hurt, Stephanie Zimbalist, Christine Baranski, Tom Robbins, Phoebe Cates, Andre Braugher, Keith David, Evan Handler, Elizabeth McGovern, Marcia Cross, Eriq LaSalle, Kelly McGillis, Lorraine Toussaint, Ving Rhames, James Marsters, Bradley Whitford, LisaGay Hamilton, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Laura Linney, Viola Davis, Sara Ramirez, Morena Baccarin, Anthony Mackie, Jessica Chastain and Shalita Grant.

Also: Superman star Christopher Reeve (he and Robin Williams were best friends), Lex Luthor actor (but not opposite Reeve) Kevin Spacey, Batman actors Val Kilmer and Kevin Conroy; Cheers ex-couple Kelsey Grammer and Bebe Neuwirth; Star Trek actors John de Lancie, Penny Johnson Jerald and Robert Duncan McNeill; and Star Wars sequel series opponents Oscar Isaac and Adam Driver (they graduated 4 years apart, so they were never students there together).

On May 20, 1974, the Lincoln Center Institute was founded. On November 19, 1990, the Samuel B. and David Rose Building opened, across 65th Street from the Met. Samuel (1890-1964) and David Rose (1892-1986) were brothers and real estate developers. The building includes the Walter Reade Theater, the Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse, the Daniel and Joanna S. Rose Rehearsal Studio, the Clark Studio Theater, the School of American Ballet, the Claire Tow Theater, Julliard student residences, and office space for Lincoln Center's member organizations.

On October 18, 2004, Jazz at Lincoln Center opened -- but not at Lincoln Center. Rather, it is a few blocks away, at the Deutsche Bank Center (formerly the Time Warner Center), the mini-twin towers at 10 Columbus Circle (Broadway, 59th Street and 8th Avenue). It includes 3 theaters: The Rose Theater (the Rose family must have donated a lot of money to get 3 venues named for them), the Allen Room, and Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola (named for jazz icon John "Dizzy" Gillespie, 1917-1993).

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September 23, 1962 was a Sunday. These baseball games were played that day:

* The New York Yankees beat the Chicago White Sox, 5-1 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. Elston Howard hit a home run off Early Wynn, part of a 4-run 10th inning. Mickey Mantle went 0-for-1 with 4 walks. Probably because Roger Maris wasn't playing, so it was Hector Lopez playing right field and batting behind him. Yogi Berra also didn't play. Bill Stafford went the distance for the win.

* The New York Mets beat the Chicago Cubs, 2-1 at the Polo Grounds. Roger Craig, the closest thing those 1st-year expansion Mets had to an ace, advanced to 10-23 on the season. Frank Thomas (not the later White Sox Hall-of-Famer) hit a home run. Ernie Banks went 0-for-4 for the Cubs.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 4-2 at Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia. Frank Robinson and Vada Pinson hit home runs. Pinson's won the game in the top of the 10th inning.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Baltimore Orioles, 9-2 at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. Harmon Killebrew and Vic Power hit home runs for the Twins. Brooks Robinson went 1-for-3 for the Orioles.

* The Milwaukee Braves beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 10-3 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Hank Aaron hit 2 home runs, Eddie Mathews 1. Roberto Clemente went 1-for-4. Rookie Willie Stargell went 2-for-3 with 2 RBIs.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 12-2 at Busch Stadium (formerly Sportsman's Park) in St. Louis. This was one of the few games in which Don Drysdale and Sandy Koufax both pitched, because Drysdale got knocked out of the box in the 4th inning, while Koufax pitched the last 2 innings in relief. Stan Musial went 2-for-3 with a walk and 2 RBIs.

The only bright spot for the Dodgers was from Maury Willis, who stole his 96th and 97th bases of the season, to set a new single-season record. However, because it came in the 156 game of the season, not within the 1st 154, until 1991, the official MLB record book -- along with Roger Maris' 61 home runs the year before -- left Wills and the 154-game record, Ty Cobb's 96 in 1915, as side-by-side records. Wills finished with 104 steals. I have a separate entry for this event.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Kansas City Athletics, 3-1 at Kansas City Municipal Stadium. Al Kaline went 2-for-5.

* The San Francisco Giants beat the Houston Colt .45s, 10-3 at Colt Stadium in Houston. (The Astrodome opened next-door in 1965, and the Colts changed their name to the Astros.) Willie McCovey hit a home run, and Willie Mays went 1-for-5.

* The Cleveland Indians beat the Los Angeles Angels, 11-5 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, where the Angels groundshared with the Dodgers until their stadium opened in Anaheim in 1966.

* And the Boston Red Sox and the Washington Senators were rained out at District of Columbia Stadium in Washington. (It was renamed Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium in 1969.) The game was never made up.

Since it was a Sunday, there were NFL games:

* The New York Giants beat their arch-rivals, the Philadelphia Eagles, 29-13 at Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

* The Washington Redskins beat the Cleveland Browns, 17-16 at Cleveland Municipal Stadium.

* The Detroit Lions beat the San Francisco 49ers, 45-28 at Tiger Stadium in Detroit.

* The Green Bay Packers beat the NFL version of the St. Louis Cardinals, 17-0 at Milwaukee County Stadium.

* The Baltimore Colts beat the Minnesota Vikings, 34-7 at Metropolitan Stadium in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota.

* The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Dallas Cowboys, 30-28 at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas.

* And the Chicago Bears beat the Los Angeles Rams, 27-23 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

And in the American Football League:

* The Houston Oilers beat the San Diego Chargers, 42-17 at Balboa Stadium in San Diego.

* The Dallas Texans beat the Oakland Raiders, 26-16 at Frank Youell Field in Oakland. The Texans won the AFL Championship, but still couldn't compete with the still-losing Cowboys for North Texas fan acceptance. In the off-season, they moved, becoming the Kansas City Chiefs.

* The previous day, the New York Titans beat the Buffalo Bills, 17-6 at War Memorial Stadium in Buffalo. The Titans were renamed the Jets the next season.

* The night before that, a Friday, the Boston Patriots beat the Denver Broncos, 41-16 at Boston University Field (later renamed Nickerson Field).

August 17, 1876: Richard Wagner Completes His "Ring Cycle"

August 17, 1876: Götterdämmerung premieres, as part of the opening festival of the Bayreuth Festspielhaus in Bayreuth, Bavaria, Germany. It is the 1st performance in the final part of Richard Wagner's operas, Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung).

Born on May 22, 1813 in Leipzig, Saxony, Richard Wagner (pronounced "REE-kard VOG-ner"), 61 years old at the time of the opening, had the concert hall designed to his specifications, and, in a 5-day stretch, it produced all 4 parts of the "Ring Cycle":

* August 13: Das Rheingold (The Rhine Gold). Premiering in Munich in 1869, it tells the story from Norse mythology of Alberich, from the race of dwarves known as the titular Nibelung, stealing gold from the Rhine River in Germany, and making an all-powerful ring from it. Wotan (usually written as "Odin"), king of the Norse gods, steals the ring, and Alberich puts a curse on the ring and its possessors. (J.R.R. Tolkien wouldn't publish The Hobbit until 1937.) 

* August 14: Die Walküre (The Valkyrie). Premiering in Munich in 1870, it tells of the valkyrie Brünnhilde, who saves the lives of the unwittingly incestuous couple Sieglinde and Siegmund, and of the retribution of the gods that each of them must face.

* August 15: A night off.

* August 16: Siegfried. As with Götterdämmerung the next evening, this was the 1st performance of this opera.

* August 17: Götterdämmerung (The Twilight of the Gods -- in Norse, Ragnarök). A final battle occurs, and the world as the Norse gods knew it is destroyed, and humanity must start over without them.

Wagner Festspielhaus

The Cycle was one of the greatest successes in the history of classical music, and, despite its length (about 18 hours if played straight through) and its elaborate costuming, remains popular today. This is in spite of the familiar jab, "Wagner's music is better than it sounds." This is one of many quotes attributed to Mark Twain. Of course, many quotes attributed to Twain actually came from other people, and he properly credited another humorist of that time, Edgar Wilson "Bill" Nye. (He was not related to the later Bill Nye the Science Guy.)

It is also in spite of the fact that it has led to the association of horned helmets with the Norse gods and Viking warriors. Such headgear would be ridiculous, because it would give an opponent something to grab onto, and hold a fighter in place. Still, football teams named the Vikings, including the NFL team in Minnesota, with its large population of people of Scandinavian descent, have renderings of horns as their helmet logo.

It's also given rise to the image of Brünnhilde as a fat woman wearing armor and a horned helmet, and the stereotyping of female opera singers in general as fat. As Brünnhilde is the last character to sing in the Cycle, it led to the expression, "The opera ain't over 'til the fat lady sings."

The Cycle's continued popularity is also in spite of the fact of Wagner's recorded anti-Semitism, and thus his music's embrace by the Nazis over half a century later, particularly by Adolf Hitler himself. Since the story ties ancient Germany to the Norse mythology (however dubiously), Hitler once gave a speech saying that Wagner's works "glorified the heroic Teutonic nature." He ordered that Wagner's music be played at many Nazi events.

(Not all Nazis liked it, though: Hanns Johst, a poet approved by the Nazis, said, "When I hear the word 'culture,' I reach for my gun." That line is usually misattributed to Hitler's second-in-command, Hermann Göring.)

Act 3 of Die Walküre begins with an orchestral piece titled Ritt der Walküren, or Ride of the Valkyries. Lasting only 3 minutes, it is Wagner's best-remembered composition, and has been used in many films and TV shows, sometimes in parody.

D.W. Griffith used it for his silent film epic Birth of a Nation in 1915 (as if Wagner hadn't been connected to bigotry enough). Francis Ford Coppola used it for a helicopter scene in his 1979 Vietnam War film Apocalypse Now -- although, in the Ring Cycle, it's Götterdämmerung that is the apocalypse.

In 1957, Warner Brothers made the Bugs Bunny cartoon What's Opera, Doc? in which Elmer Fudd, wearing a Viking "magic helmet," claims, singing to the tune, that he wants to "Kill de wabbit, kill de wabbit, kill de wabbit!" And he does, and yet is remorseful over it. The movie ends with Bugs coming back to life, breaking the fourth wall, and saying, "Well, what did you expect in an opera, a happy ending?"

Because the field of play for boxing is known as a ring, even though it is square in modern times, the Rocky films have also been nicknamed "The Ring Cycle."

Wagner died on February 13, 1883, at age 68, still a big musical star by the standards of the era, but before any of this legacy was cemented.

Katharina Wagner, great-granddaughter of Richard, a great-great-granddaughter of Hungarian pianist and composer Franz Liszt, and a noted opera singer and director in her own right, is the current director of the annual Bayreuth Festival. She had previously co-run it with her much-older half-sister, Eva Wagner-Pasquier, who retired in 2010.

Katharina Wagner

In 2010, she announced that she was going to visit Israel, to invite the Israel Chamber Orchestra to come to the 2011 Bayreuth Festival, in the hopes of reconciliation between her ancestor's music and the people it indirectly harmed. The angry response of Holocaust survivors led her to cancel the visit, and Wagner's works are still banned in Israel. In 2015, she had the concert hall, now named the Richard-Wagner-Festpielhaus, renovated to modern standards of safety and comfort.

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August 17, 1876 was a Thursday. It was the 1st season of baseball's National League, and 2 games were played. The Philadelphia Athletics beat the New York Mutuals, 13-5 at the Jefferson Street Grounds in Philadelphia. Both of these teams folded after the season, and these Philadelphia Athletics bear no connection besides name to the American League team founded in 1901, and since 1968 playing in Oakland.

And the St. Louis Brown Stockings beat the Chicago White Stockings, 3-0 at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis. The White Stockings still exist, and since 1903 have been known as the Chicago Cubs. The American League team founded in 1901 took the former name, and since 1904 have been known as the Chicago White Sox, predating the Boston team's use of "Red Sox" by 3 years.

The Brown Stockings lasted until 1877, and a new team founded in 1882 took up the name "St. Louis Browns," becoming the St. Louis Cardinals in 1900. In 1902, the St. Louis team in the American League took the Browns name. There were several ballparks named Sportsman's Park in St. Louis, all built on the same site on the city's north side. The last one opened in 1909 as the home of the Browns. The Cardinals moved in for the 1920 season. The Browns moved in 1954 to become the Baltimore Orioles, and the Cardinals left in 1966, moving downtown to Busch Memorial Stadium.

March 3, 1875: The Premiere of "Carmen"

Georges Bizet

March 3, 1875: Carmen, an opera by French composer Georges Bizet, premieres, at the Opéra-Comique in Paris. It is based on the 1845 novella of the same title, by French writer Prosper Mérimée. He died in 1870, and so did not live to see the opera.

The opera is not comic: It is set in southern Spain in 1820, in the wake of the country's devastating defense of itself against Napoleon in the Peninsular War, and with the loss of its Latin American colonies in progress.

Don José, a naïve soldier, is seduced by the wiles of the fiery Romani woman Carmen. (She is referred to as a "gypsy," but that term for the Romani is now considered a slur.) He abandons his childhood sweetheart, and deserts from his military duties, but loses Carmen's love to the bullfighter Escamillo, after which José kills her in a jealous rage.

The depictions of proletarian life, immorality, and lawlessness, and the tragic death of the main character on stage, broke new ground in French opera, and were highly controversial. It has become part of the trope that every opera is a tragedy, which is far from true.

Bizet died just 3 months after the premiere, on June 3, 1875, at 36, from a lingering fever and 2 heart attacks.

Just as most 20th Century Americans came to know "The March of the Swiss Soldiers," the end of the the Overture to Gioachino Rossini's 1829 opera William Tell as the theme from the 1949-57 TV show The Lone Ranger, many Americans came to know the songs "Habanera" and "The Toreador Song" from their inclusion in the 1976 baseball film The Bad News Bears.

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March 3, 1875 was a Wednesday. This was also the day of the 1st recorded indoor hockey game, in Montreal. Team Creighton defeated Team Torrance, 2-1.

Since it was too soon for baseball, the off-season for what Americans were then calling "football," and over 16 years before the invention of basketball, there were no other scores on this historic day.