Music is filled with relationships and collaboration of all kinds. As we approach Valentine’s Day, classical host Victor Forman reflects on the different types of affection, trust and partnerships it can take to create music.
Romantic Partnerships
Romantic love can be depicted within music, as in the Adagio of Spartacus and Phrygia from the 1955 ballet Spartacus by Aram Khachaturian. Thracian king Spartacus and his wife Phrygia were captured and enslaved by the Romans and separated. The ballet’s Adagio is a sentimental interlude when they are both reunited.
Romantic love can be outside the music itself but created from love in real life. English composer Edward Elgar and his poet wife Alice once took a vacation through Bavaria. She wrote poems about their favorite experiences together, and he set them to music, eventually becoming his charming Three Bavarian Dances.
Familial Partnerships
Family of course, has its own type of love. Brother and sister Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn adored each other, each of them accomplished musicians. Felix had a successful career, but the 1800s way of life constrained Fanny to home and marriage. With her brother's support, Fanny still composed, though she struggled to get pieces published, and Felix would often turn to his sister to consult and advise on his music.
Mentorships
Mentorships in music have long demonstrated admiration and trust in one another. As a youth, Italian born composer and pianist Muzio Clementi enjoyed the sponsorship of a wealthy British patron who brought him to England to further his studies. Later, Clementi found a young Irish piano prodigy, John Field, whom Clementi mentored and brought to major European cities; in later years Field, in turn, became an influence on Frédéric Chopin, Johannes Brahms and Robert Schumann.
Friendships
Friendships and working relationships give us a sense of self-esteem and purpose, bringing benefits to each. Gilbert & Sullivan were a partnership of separate geniuses that produced brilliant comic operas in the 1880s. In the 1980s, composers Roylance and Galvin met at a recording studio who found a mutual simpatico and collaborated on multiple compositions such as the popular Ocean Fantasia. And there have been numerous trusted friendship-collaborations of film director and composer, such as Steven Spielberg and John Williams; Tim Burton and Danny Elfman; and Alfred Hitchcock and Bernard Herrmann. | 
