Virtuoso pianist Art Tatum was born on October 13th, 1909. Tatum was one of the foremost musicians of his era, and is considered one of the most technically gifted pianists on record. Take a listen to this recording of Harold Arlen’s “Over the Rainbow” below. This performance speaks for itself.

Born in Toledo, Ohio on October 13th, 1909, Tatum began his musical journey at an early age. Born with severely limited vision, Tatum attended the School for the Blind in Columbus Ohio in 1924, then returned to Toledo and briefly studied at the Toledo School of Music with Overton G. Rainey, focusing on classical music. His time there was short, and scholars have concluded that much of musical education must have been self-directed, learning songs from records, radio and player piano rolls.

In 1927, at age 18, Tatum began playing on Toledo radio station WSPD, and before long was given his own program. He garnered from prominent musicians quickly, including bandleaders Duke Ellington and Fletcher Henderson. Vocalist Adelaide Hall heard Tatum play while on tour in Toledo in 1932 and soon recruited him for her band, and shortly after he relocated to New York City. Before long, he made contact with James P. Johnson, Willie “The Lion” Smith, and Fats Waller, who were considered the top jazz pianists at the time, who would all recognize his incredible talent. This lead to many years of standing club gigs throughout New York City and abroad.

Art Tatum was well known for his playing outside of formal settings. At the time, it was the norm for jazz musicians to continue to play in homes and at parties after the clubs would close, and Tatum’s playing at these informal gatherings had a reputation for audacity and freewheeling improvisation. Musicians were uniformly dazzled by these performances, and he became known as the great virtuoso in New York.

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Steve Reich, born October 3rd, 1976, is a central figure in 20th century music. His compositions are groundbreaking in many ways, and is cited today by musicians across genres as an inspiration. Have a listen to his most famous piece, Music for 18 Musicians:

During his formative years, Steve Reich studied with several luminaries in the American music scene, including Hall Overton, Luciano Berio, and Darius Milhaud. Shortly after concluding his education, Reich retreated from many of the traditional and contemporary compositional methods to focus on a new concept involving the manipulation of recordings on tape.

Reich connected multiple tape machines and would adjust their individual playback speeds such that identical loops of music or sound would overlap at varied timings. This process would generate rhythm, harmony and form, all from the interaction of existing sound. The resulting style was dubbed phase music, referring to the way that the sounds would “phase” in and out of sync as the tape speeds were gradually adjusted. Below is a performance of his composition Melodica, which is constructed from a single musical phrase, with a second copy of the recording layered over the first. The phase effect begins to sound at approximately 40 seconds.

Reich soon began adapting these sounds for use with live musicians. Here is a performance of Piano Phase, where one pianist keeps perfect, nearly robotic time, while the other speeds up very slowly throughout the performance. Each pianist is playing identical notes and rhythms. This technique mirrors the action of Reich’s dueling tape machines.

Reich’s distinctive style would come to be known as minimalism. It’s easy to draw a direct line from his compositions to other modern genres, like electronic dance music or hip hop. This sort of repetition and manipulation of recorded sound is ubiquitous in popular music today.

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Domenico Scarlatti (1685-1757) was a renowned composer from Italy who spent most of his career working for the royal courts of Spain and Portugal. He was quite prolific, and much of his work is considered standard repertoire for any musician concerned with Baroque music. However, Scarlatti did receive some help from his cat Pulcinella, who provided the inspiration for one of his most popular works, Sonata K. 30, known as the Cat’s Fugue. “Sonata” refers to the fact that the piece is for keyboard alone, without singers. The story goes that Pulcinella was often inclined to walk across the keys of Scarlatti’s harpsichord, and when she produced this melody he immediately wrote it down, and later developed it into a type of composition called a fugue.

Fugue is a form of composition centered around a single melody, called a motif, which is developed throughout the piece using using a variety of methods. Think of a motif as the seed from which the rest of the composition is grown. This central motif is then woven through ever-increasing layers of counter melodies and harmonies, using guidelines derived from the rules of counterpoint.

The Cat Fugue proved influential, and the same theme was later used by notable composers such as George Frideric Handel, Anton Reicha, and Hans von Bulow. Other musicians have been inspired by their feline companions as well, including Zez Confrey’s ragtime-esque “Kitten on the Keys” and Amy Beach’s Fantasia Fugata, Op. 87.

Have a listen to Scarlatti’s Cat’s Fugue below. This video illustrates each note, with red dots representing Pulcinella’s melody. If you’d like to follow along with the sheet music, a copy is available online via the Library of Congress.

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