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[ "Matt Hardy", "Version 1 (2002-2004)", "What is Version 1?", "At the beginning of 2002, it seemed Team Xtreme had patched things up. After the brand extension, however, Hardy was relegated to Heat while Jeff wrestled", "Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?", "Along with his MF'er (Mattitude Follower) Shannon Moore in his corner, 2003 began with Hardy frantically trying to lose weight to get under", "Did Hardy end up loosing weight?", "After just barely making weight,", "Did he fight against someone after accomplishing this weight loss goal?", "Hardy defeated Billy Kidman at No Way Out to win the Cruiserweight title.", "Did he kept the Cruiserweight title for a long time?", "At WrestleMania XIX, he successfully defended it against Rey Mysterio." ]	C_8bf9dcbf1a034e02873104f08a75bf5d_1	Did anyone else challange him for the tittle?	6	Did anyone else challange Matt Hardy for the Cruiserweight tittle besides Rey Mysterio?	Matt Hardy	At the beginning of 2002, it seemed Team Xtreme had patched things up. After the brand extension, however, Hardy was relegated to Heat while Jeff wrestled on the main show, Raw. On the August 12 episode of Raw, Hardy turned against Jeff during Jeff's match against Rob Van Dam, because Hardy was frustrated at not receiving a match against Van Dam for the number one contendership for the Intercontinental Championship. A short time later, Hardy joined the SmackDown! roster, and began dubbing himself "Matt Hardy: Version 1", complete with a "version 1" hand signal. Hardy defeated The Undertaker on the September 12 and October 3 episodes of the show, due to interference from Brock Lesnar. Along with his MF'er (Mattitude Follower) Shannon Moore in his corner, 2003 began with Hardy frantically trying to lose weight to get under the 215 lb (98 kg) weight limit to compete for the Cruiserweight Championship. After just barely making weight, Hardy defeated Billy Kidman at No Way Out to win the Cruiserweight title. At WrestleMania XIX, he successfully defended it against Rey Mysterio. Hardy lost the Cruiserweight Championship to Mysterio in the main event of the June 5 edition of SmackDown - the first and only time a Cruiserweight Championship match main evented a show. After dropping the Cruiserweight Championship, Hardy briefly feuded with Eddie Guerrero, but was unsuccessful in capturing Guerrero's United States Championship or Tag Team Championship. The Mattitude faction then expanded to include Crash Holly as Moore's "Moore-on" (apprentice). He later disbanded the group in November and returned to Raw in order to be able to travel and work with his then girlfriend Lita, who just returned from an injury. On his first night back, he turned on Lita in storyline after teasing a proposal to her. He defeated Christian, who was vying for Lita's affections, on the following edition of Raw. In April 2004, Hardy saved Lita from getting attacked by Kane. Hardy defeated Kane at Vengeance, but lost a match against Kane at SummerSlam. On the August 23 episode of Raw, Hardy was chokeslamed off the stage by Kane. Hardy then spent almost a year off from wrestling due to a severe knee injury. CANNOTANSWER	Hardy lost the Cruiserweight Championship to Mysterio in the main event	Matthew Moore Hardy (born September 23, 1974) is an American professional wrestler currently signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW). He is also known for his time with WWE, Impact Wrestling, and Ring of Honor (ROH). With his real life brother Jeff, Hardy gained notoriety in WWF's tag team division during the 2000s due to his participation in TLC matches. He is a 14-time world tag team champion, having held the WWE World Tag Team Championship six times, the WWE Raw Tag Team Championship three times, the WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship, ROH World Tag Team Championship, and WCW Tag Team Championship once each, and the TNA World Tag Team Championships twice. Wrestling through four separate decades, Hardy has kept himself relevant partially through a variety of different gimmicks and his use of social media. In 2002, Hardy began a solo career in WWE. His subsequent "Version 1" persona was named Best Gimmick by the Wrestling Observer Newsletter. Hardy's eccentric "Broken" gimmick, which he debuted in 2016 (and which was renamed "Woken" following his subsequent WWE return), garnered praise from wrestling critics and earned him multiple awards, including a second Best Gimmick award, becoming one of the most talked about characters in all of wrestling. As a singles wrestler, Hardy has won three world championships (one ECW Championship, and two TNA World Heavyweight Championships). All totaled between WWE, TNA/Impact, and ROH, Hardy has held 21 total championships. Early life Hardy was born in Cameron, North Carolina, the son of Gilbert and Ruby Moore Hardy. He is the older brother of Jeff Hardy. Their mother died of brain cancer in 1987. Hardy played baseball as a child and throughout high school, but had stopped by his senior year. He also played football, either as a linebacker or a defensive end. Hardy was a good student at Union Pines High School in North Carolina, and was a nominee for the "Morehead Award", a scholarship to any university in North Carolina. Hardy attended University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where he majored in engineering; after a year, however, he dropped out due to his father being ill. He then attended Sandhills Community College in Pinehurst to gain his associate degree. Professional wrestling career Early career (1992–2001) Hardy, along with his brother Jeff and friends, started their own federation, the Trampoline Wrestling Federation (TWF) and mimicked the moves they saw on television. Shortly after Hardy sent in a tape for the World Championship Wrestling (WCW) Amateur Challenge using the ring name High Voltage, a tag team named High Voltage began competing in WCW, causing Hardy to change his name to Surge. A few years later, it was revealed to him by Chris Kanyon that the tape had been kept in the WCW Power Plant, watched multiple times, and that the name High Voltage was blatantly stolen from it. Beginning in 1994, The Hardys wrestled for several North Carolina-based independent circuit promotions and adapted a number of alter-egos. As The Wolverine, Hardy captured the New England Wrestling Alliance (NEWA) Championship in May 1994. As High Voltage, he teamed with Venom to claim the New Frontier Wrestling Association (NFWA) Tag Team Championship in March 1995. A month later, High Voltage defeated the Willow for the NFWA Championship. In 1997, Matt and Jeff created their own wrestling promotion, The Organization of Modern Extreme Grappling Arts (frequently abbreviated to OMEGA Championship Wrestling, or simply OMEGA), in which Matt competed under the name High Voltage. Both Matt and Jeff took apart the ring and put it back together at every event they had, while Matt sewed all the costumes worn in OMEGA. The promotion folded in October 1999, after both Matt and Jeff signed with the World Wrestling Federation. World Wrestling Federation/Entertainment Early years (1994–1998) Hardy worked as a jobber for the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) from 1994 up until he signed a full-time contract in 1998. His first WWF match was against Nikolai Volkoff on the May 23, 1994 episode of Monday Night Raw, which he lost by submission. A night later at a taping of WWF Wrestling Challenge, he lost a match against Owen Hart. He continued to wrestle sporadically in the WWF throughout 1994 and 1995, losing matches against Crush, Razor Ramon, Hakushi, Owen Hart, the imposter Undertaker, Hunter Hearst Helmsley and "The Ringmaster" Steve Austin. Hardy teamed with Jeff for the first time in the WWF in 1996, losing to teams such as The Smoking Gunns and The Grimm Twins on WWF television. Matt and Jeff had a short lived feud with The Headbangers (Thrasher and Mosh), losing to the duo twice in 1997. It was during this time that Matt and Jeff experimented with different ring names, at one stage being called Ingus (Matt) and Wildo Jinx (Jeff). In Matt's final singles match for the promotion before signing a full-time contract he lost to Val Venis on a taping of Shotgun in 1998. The Hardy Boyz (1998–2001) It was not until 1998, however, (at the height of The Attitude Era) that the Hardy brothers were given full-time WWF contracts and sent to train with former wrestler Dory Funk, Jr. The Hardy Boyz used a cruiserweight, fast-paced high flying style in their matches, often leaping from great heights to do damage to their opponents (and themselves in the process). In 1999, while feuding with Edge and Christian, the duo briefly picked up Michael Hayes as a manager. At King of the Ring, The Hardyz defeated Edge and Christian to earn the #1 contendership for the WWF Tag Team Championship. On July 5, they defeated The APA to win their first Tag Team Championship. They soon dumped Hayes and briefly picked up Gangrel as a manager, after Gangrel turned on Edge and Christian. At No Mercy, The Hardyz defeated Edge and Christian in the first ever tag team ladder match. At the Royal Rumble pay-per-view, The Hardyz defeated The Dudley Boyz in the first ever tag team tables match. They competed against The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian for the Tag Team Championships at WrestleMania 2000 in the first ever Triangle Ladder match, but were unsuccessful. Hardy won the Hardcore Championship on April 24, 2000, on Raw Is War, by defeating Crash Holly, but lost it back to Holly three days later on SmackDown!, when Holly applied the "24/7 rule" during Hardy's title defense against Jeff. The Hardy Boyz then found a new manager in Matt's real-life girlfriend Lita. Together, the three became known as "Team Xtreme". The Hardy Boyz competed in the first ever Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match, for the WWF Tag Team Championship against The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian, but were unsuccessful. At Unforgiven, The Hardyz defeated Edge and Christian in a steel cage match to win the tag team championship, and successfully retained it the following night on Raw Is War against Edge and Christian in a ladder match. In April 2001, The Hardyz began feuding with Stone Cold Steve Austin and Triple H (known as The Power Trip), which also led to a singles push for both Matt and Jeff. Hardy helped Jeff defeat Triple H for the Intercontinental Championship, and shortly after Hardy defeated Eddie Guerrero to win the European Championship on SmackDown!. At Backlash he retained the title against Guerrero and Christian in a triple threat, and against Edge the following night on Raw. Throughout the year, the Hardy Boyz continued to win as a tag team, winning the WWF Tag Team Titles two more times, and the WCW Tag Team Championship during the Invasion. By the end of the year, the Hardy Boyz began a storyline where they were having trouble co-existing. This culminated in a match between the two, with Lita as the guest referee, at the Vengeance pay-per-view, which Jeff won. Hardy defeated Jeff and Lita the following night on Raw in a two-on-one handicap match. Version 1 gimmick and feud with Kane (2002–2004) At the beginning of 2002, it seemed Team Xtreme had patched things up. After the brand extension, however, Matt was relegated to Heat while Jeff wrestled on the main show, Raw. On the August 12 episode of Raw, Hardy turned heel by attacking Jeff during Jeff's match against Rob Van Dam, because Hardy was frustrated at not receiving a match against Van Dam for the number one contendership for the Intercontinental Championship. A short time later, Hardy joined the SmackDown! roster, and began dubbing himself "Matt Hardy: Version 1", complete with a "version 1" hand signal. Hardy defeated The Undertaker on the September 12 and October 3 episodes of the show, due to interference from Brock Lesnar. Along with his Mattitude Follower Shannon Moore in his corner, 2003 began with Hardy frantically trying to lose weight to get under the weight limit to compete for the Cruiserweight Championship. After just barely making weight, Hardy defeated Billy Kidman at No Way Out to win the Cruiserweight title. At WrestleMania XIX, he successfully defended it against Rey Mysterio. Hardy lost the Cruiserweight Championship to Mysterio in the main event of the June 5 episode of SmackDown! - the first and only time a Cruiserweight Championship match main evented a show. After dropping the Cruiserweight Championship, Hardy briefly feuded with Eddie Guerrero, but was unsuccessful in capturing Guerrero's United States Championship or WWE Tag Team Championship. The Mattitude faction then expanded to include Crash Holly as Moore's "Moore-on" (apprentice). He later disbanded the group in November and returned to Raw in order to be able to travel and work with his then girlfriend Lita, who just returned from an injury. On his first night back, he turned on Lita in storyline after teasing a proposal to her. He defeated Christian, who was vying for Lita's affections, on the following edition of Raw. In April 2004, Hardy saved Lita from getting attacked by Kane, turning face in the process. Hardy defeated Kane in a no disqualification match at Vengeance, but lost a "Till Death To Us Part" match against Kane at SummerSlam, resulting in Lita being forced to marry Kane. On the August 23 episode of Raw, Hardy was chokeslamed off the stage by Kane during the wedding. Hardy then spent almost a year off from wrestling due to a severe knee injury. Departure and sporadic appearances (2005) Along with his friend Rhyno, Hardy was released by WWE on April 11, 2005. Hardy's release was largely due to unprofessional conduct with social media after discovering that Lita was having a real-life affair with his best friend Edge. The public knowledge of the affair and Hardy's release led to Edge and Lita receiving jeers from the crowds at WWE events, often resulting in chants of "You screwed Matt!", and, "We want Matt!", which meant kayfabe storylines being affected considering that Lita was married to Kane at the time in kayfabe. Edge and Lita used the affair and fan backlash to become a hated on-screen couple, which led to Lita turning heel for the first time in over five years. Fans began a petition on the internet, wanting WWE to re-sign Hardy, and amassed over fifteen thousand signatures. Hardy released two character promotional vignettes, that he was planning to use before he was offered a new contract by WWE. Hardy called himself The Angelic Diablo with the tagline "the scar will become a symbol" in reference to the way in which he had been treated by Lita and WWE. On the June 20 episode of Raw, during the storyline wedding of Edge and Lita, Hardy's entrance music and video were played when the priest asked if anyone had a reason why Edge and Lita should not be wed. Independent circuit and Ring of Honor (2005) Following his WWE release, Matt returned to the independent circuit and wrestled several matches for the Allied Powers Wrestling Federation (APWF), International Wrestling Cartel (IWC) and Big Time Wrestling (BTW). Hardy appeared at a scheduled Ring of Honor (ROH) event on July 16, 2005, in Woodbridge, Connecticut where he defeated Christopher Daniels via submission. Hardy also cut a brief worked shoot promo where he criticized WWE and John Laurinaitis. Following his official return to WWE, Hardy was met with backlash following a match with Homicide from the fans at a subsequent ROH event, which Hardy won. The next day at his final ROH appearance, he lost to Roderick Strong. Return to WWE Feud with Edge (2005–2006) On July 11, 2005, on Raw, Hardy attacked Edge backstage and again later during Edge's match with Kane. Before being escorted out of the building by security, Hardy stated that Edge (calling him by his real name of "Adam") and Lita would pay for their actions and told fans that they could see him at Ring of Honor while security officials and event staff were trying to restrain him. Hardy also called out Johnny Ace as security had him in handcuffs taking him out of the arena. This caused an uproar amongst fans, who were confused and wondered if the whole thing was a work or a shoot. Similar occurrences repeated during the following two weeks. On the August 1 episode of Raw, Vince McMahon officially announced Hardy's return to WWE, adding that Hardy would face Edge at SummerSlam. Hardy made his in-ring return, defeating Snitsky on the August 8 Raw. Seconds after the victory, Hardy was attacked by Edge, and as he was being carried backstage, Matt counterattacked Edge in the locker room. On August 21 at SummerSlam, their match came to a premature end when Edge dropped Hardy onto the top of a ring post, causing him to bleed heavily. The referee ended the match on the grounds that Hardy could not continue, and Edge was declared the winner. After SummerSlam, the two continued feuding on Raw, including a Street Fight on August 29 that resulted in Hardy performing a Side Effect on Edge off the entrance stage and into electrical equipment below; the match ended in a no contest. At Unforgiven, Edge faced Hardy in a steel cage match. Hardy caught an interfering Lita with the Twist of Fate and won the match with a leg drop off the top of the cage. Hardy and Edge faced each other on October 3 at WWE Raw Homecoming in a Loser Leaves Raw ladder match. Edge's briefcase holding his Money in the Bank contract for his WWE Championship opportunity was suspended above the ring. The winner of the match received the contract and the loser was forced to leave Raw. Edge tied Hardy's arms in the ropes, and Lita trapped Hardy in a crucifix hold, leaving Hardy only able to watch Edge win. With his defeat at the hands of Edge, Hardy was moved to the SmackDown! brand where he re-debuted with a win over Simon Dean on October 21 in Reno, Nevada. One week later, Hardy won the fan vote to represent Team SmackDown! (alongside Rey Mysterio) to challenge Team Raw (Edge and Chris Masters) at Taboo Tuesday. Edge, however, refused to wrestle and sent Snitsky in place of him in the match, which Hardy and Mysterio won. Back on SmackDown!, Hardy started an angle with MNM (Johnny Nitro and Joey Mercury) and their manager Melina when Melina approached Hardy, seemingly wanting Hardy to join with her team. Hardy refused the offer, which led to him facing the tag team on several occasions with a variety of partners. On July 25, after the SmackDown! taping, Hardy was taken out of action after doctors found the remnants of the staph infection that had plagued him the previous year. He was sidelined until August 25 while he healed. Upon his return to action, Hardy feuded against childhood friend and reigning Cruiserweight Champion Gregory Helms. At No Mercy, in their home state, Hardy beat Helms in a non-title match. The two met again at Survivor Series, where Hardy's team won in a clean sweep. They wrestled one final match, a one time appearance in Booker T's Pro Wrestling Alliance (PWA) promotion, where Hardy defeated Helms in a North Carolina Street Fight. The Hardy Boyz reunion (2006–2007) On the November 21, 2006 episode of ECW on Sci Fi, Hardy and Jeff competed in a match together for the first time in almost five years, defeating The Full Blooded Italians. At December to Dismember, the Hardy Boyz issued an open challenge to any tag team who wanted to face them. MNM answered their challenge by reuniting at December to Dismember, a match won by the Hardy Boyz. At Armageddon, Hardy and Jeff competed against Paul London and Brian Kendrick, MNM, and Dave Taylor and William Regal in a Ladder match for the WWE Tag Team Championship but lost. Subsequently, he and Jeff feuded with MNM after the legitimate incident where they injured Mercury's face at Armageddon. This led to a long term rivalry, and at the Royal Rumble, Hardy and Jeff defeated MNM. Mercury and Hardy continued to feud on SmackDown! until Mercury was released from WWE on March 26. The night after WrestleMania 23 on Raw, the Hardys competed in a 10-team battle royal for the World Tag Team Championship. They won the titles for the sixth time from then WWE Champion John Cena and Shawn Michaels after last eliminating Lance Cade and Trevor Murdoch. This started a feud with Cade and Murdoch, and the Hardys successfully retained their World Tag Team Championship in their first title defense at Backlash. The Hardy Boyz also successfully retained their titles at Judgment Day against Cade and Murdoch. One month later at One Night Stand, they defeated The World's Greatest Tag Team to retain the titles in a Ladder match. The following night on Raw, Vince McMahon demanded that The Hardys once again defend their championships against Cade and Murdoch. The Hardys were defeated after Murdoch pushed Jeff's foot off the bottom rope during Cade's pinfall, causing the three count to continue. They invoked their rematch clause against Cade and Murdoch at Vengeance: Night of Champions, but were unsuccessful. Feud with MVP and championship reigns (2007–2009) On the July 6, 2007 episode of SmackDown!, Hardy won a non-title match against United States Champion Montel Vontavious Porter (MVP), which resulted in a feud between the two. Hardy was defeated by MVP at The Great American Bash for the United States Championship. MVP then claimed that he was "better than Hardy at everything", which led to a series of contests between Hardy and MVP, such as a basketball game, an arm wrestling contest, and a chess match which MVP "sneezed" on and ruined when Hardy put him in check. MVP challenged Hardy to a boxing match at Saturday Night's Main Event XXXV, however MVP was legitimately diagnosed with the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome. Since MVP was unable to compete, Hardy faced his replacement, former world champion boxer, Evander Holyfield. The match ended in a no contest after MVP entered the ring to verbally abuse Holyfield, who then knocked him out. MVP also challenged Hardy to a beer drinking contest at SummerSlam, but as revenge for what happened at SNME, Hardy allowed Stone Cold Steve Austin to replace him; Austin simply performed a stunner on MVP then kept drinking. After a segment involving MVP inadvertently choosing Hardy as his tag-team partner, Theodore Long promptly set up a match against Deuce 'n Domino for the WWE Tag Team Championship on the August 31 episode of SmackDown! which Hardy and MVP were able to win, therefore setting up Hardy's first reign as WWE Tag Team Champion. Hardy and MVP retained the titles at Unforgiven in a rematch against former champions Deuce 'n Domino. Hardy was scheduled to face MVP at Cyber Sunday, but due to a real-life head injury sustained on the October 26 episode of SmackDown!, he was not medically cleared to compete. As part of the storyline, Hardy continually asked MVP for a shot at the United States Championship but MVP refused stating that he was more focused on the Tag Team Championship. On the November 16 episode of SmackDown!, Hardy and MVP dropped the WWE Tag Team Championship to John Morrison and The Miz. Despite the fact that Hardy was hurt, MVP immediately invoked the rematch clause. After the rematch, in which Hardy was forced to tap out, MVP attacked Hardy, repeatedly targeting his knee. It was later confirmed by WWE.com that Hardy had suffered an injury at his former partner's hands and that he might not be able to compete at Survivor Series. Despite Hardy's absence at Survivor Series, his team was able to win the match. On November 21, WWE's official website reported that Hardy underwent an emergency appendectomy in Tampa, Florida after his appendix burst. Hardy made an appearance at the December 31 episode of Raw supporting his brother Jeff. To further Jeff's storyline with Randy Orton, however, Hardy was attacked by Orton. Hardy made his return at a live event in Muncie, Indiana on March 1, 2008. On March 30, 2008, at WrestleMania XXIV, during the Money in the Bank ladder match Hardy cut through the crowd and attacked MVP to prevent him from winning the match. He made his official in-ring return the next night on Raw, losing a singles match to WWE Champion Randy Orton. On the April 4 episode of SmackDown, Hardy faced MVP in a non-title match, which he won, re-igniting their storyline rivalry. On April 27, 2008, Hardy defeated MVP to win the United States Championship at Backlash, and successfully retained his title against MVP five days later on SmackDown. Hardy declared himself as a fighting champion that would take on all challenges, defending the United States championship against Shelton Benjamin, Elijah Burke, Chuck Palumbo, Mr. Kennedy, Chavo Guerrero and Umaga. Hardy was drafted to the ECW brand on the June 23, 2008 episode of Raw during the 2008 WWE Draft, in the process making the United States Championship exclusive to ECW. He dropped the United States Championship to Shelton Benjamin at the Great American Bash pay-per-view on July 20, 2008, which meant that the title returned to SmackDown. On the July 22 episode of ECW, Hardy became the number one contender to Mark Henry's ECW Championship after defeating John Morrison, The Miz and Finlay in a fatal four-way match. He won the title match at SummerSlam by disqualification due to interference from Henry's manager, Tony Atlas, thus he failed to win the title. Due to the ending of the pay-per-view match, Hardy received a rematch for the title on the next episode of ECW, but again failed to win the title when Henry pinned him after a distraction by Atlas. At Unforgiven, Hardy won the ECW Championship during the Championship scramble match, defeating then-champion Henry, The Miz, Finlay and Chavo Guerrero by pinning the Miz with three minutes left, marking his first world heavyweight championship win. He continued to feud with Henry until No Mercy, where Hardy successfully retained the title. Hardy lost the title to Jack Swagger on the January 13, 2009 episode of ECW, which was taped on January 12. Feud with Jeff Hardy and departure (2009–2010) At the 2009 Royal Rumble pay-per-view, after losing an ECW Championship rematch to Swagger, Hardy turned on his brother when he hit Jeff with a steel chair, allowing Edge to win the WWE Championship, turning heel in the process. On the January 27, 2009 episode of ECW, it was announced by General Manager Theodore Long that Hardy had requested, and been granted, his release from ECW and had re-signed with the SmackDown brand. As part of the buildup to this feud, Matt strongly implied that he was responsible for all of Jeff's accidents leading back to November, including an assault in a hotel stairwell that prevented Jeff from appearing at Survivor Series, an automobile accident where Jeff's car was run off the road, and a pyrotechnics malfunction where part of the pyro from Jeff's entrance was fired directly at Jeff, in an attempt to stop Jeff holding the WWE Championship. Despite Hardy's attempts to goad Jeff into fighting him, Jeff refused to fight his brother, but, on the March 6 episode of SmackDown, Jeff attacked him during a promo where Matt implied that he was also responsible for the fire that burned down Jeff's house, going so far as to reveal that he had in his possession a dog collar that supposedly belonged to Jeff's dog, Jack (who died in the fire), that he claimed to have salvaged from the wreckage of the house. At WrestleMania 25, Matt defeated Jeff in an Extreme Rules match, and in a stretcher match on the following episode of SmackDown. On the April 13 episode of Raw, Hardy was drafted to the Raw brand as part of the WWE draft. Despite the fact that the two were on different brands, he continued his feud with Jeff. Two weeks later, in a rematch from WrestleMania, Hardy lost to Jeff in an "I Quit" match at Backlash, in which he legitimately broke his hand. Hardy continued to wrestle with his hand in a cast, incorporating it into his persona and claiming that he was wrestling under protest. He reignited his feud with MVP on Raw for the United States Championship. He also formed a tag team with William Regal, and the two acted as henchmen for General Manager Vickie Guerrero. At the June 22 taping of WWE Superstars, Hardy suffered yet another injury, when his intestines went through his abdominal wall, during a triple threat match against MVP and Kofi Kingston. Hardy had suffered a tear in his abdominal muscle two years previously, but had not needed surgery until it worsened, and became a danger to his health. He was then traded back to the SmackDown brand on June 29, and underwent surgery for the torn abdominal muscle on July 2. He made his return on the August 7 episode of SmackDown as the special guest referee in the World Heavyweight Championship match between his brother, Jeff, and CM Punk, and helped Jeff retain the championship by counting the pinfall. The following week Hardy turned face again when he saved his brother when CM Punk and The Hart Dynasty attacked both Jeff and John Morrison. On the August 21 episode of SmackDown, after apologizing for his past actions towards Jeff and admitting that he was not behind any of Jeff's accidents, he had his first match back after his injury when he teamed with Jeff and John Morrison to defeat The Hart Dynasty and CM Punk, when Matt pinned Punk. In early 2010, Hardy began an on-screen relationship with Maria; but was brief and the relationship ended when Maria was released from her WWE contract. On the March 5 episode of SmackDown, Hardy qualified for the Money in the Bank ladder match at WrestleMania XXVI by defeating Drew McIntyre, but was unsuccessful at WrestleMania, as the match was won by Jack Swagger. Hardy was suspended by Vince McMahon because he attacked McIntyre after McIntyre lost to Kofi Kingston at Over the Limit. He was able to get his revenge on McIntyre during the Viewer's Choice episode of Raw when chosen as the opponent for McIntyre, with General Manager Theodore Long stating that Hardy was suspended from SmackDown, but not from Raw. On the following episode of SmackDown, however, Vickie Guerrero announced that, per orders of Vince McMahon, Hardy had been suspended from all WWE programming. However, at Fatal 4-Way, Hardy prevented McIntyre from regaining the Intercontinental Championship, thus continuing their feud. On the following edition of SmackDown, he was reinstated by Long and had a match with McIntyre, which Hardy won. After the match, it was announced that McIntyre's visa had legitimately expired and was sent back to Scotland, thus ending their feud. Hardy was featured in the SmackDown Money in the Bank ladder match but was unsuccessful in winning with Kane coming out victorious. On September 12, WWE confirmed they had sent Hardy home from a European tour. Following this, Hardy began posting videos on his YouTube channel expressing his disinterest in the WWE product and insisting that he wanted to be released from the company. On October 15, 2010, WWE announced that Hardy had been released from his contract. Hardy later stated that his release had been in effect two weeks before WWE made the announcement. Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (2011) On January 9, 2011, Hardy made his debut for Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) at the Genesis pay-per-view, as part of the stable Immortal. He was the surprise opponent for Rob Van Dam, and defeated him to prevent Van Dam from receiving a match for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship, held by Hardy's brother Jeff. In the main event, Hardy attempted to interfere in Jeff's World Heavyweight Championship match with Mr. Anderson, but was stopped by Van Dam, which led to Jeff losing both the match and the championship. On the January 13 episode of Impact!, the Hardy Boyz reunited to defeat Anderson and Van Dam in a tag team match, following interference from Beer Money, Inc. On February 13 at Against All Odds, Van Dam defeated Hardy in a rematch. On the following episode of Impact!, Hardy, along with the rest of Immortal and Ric Flair, betrayed Fortune. On March 13 at Victory Road, Hardy was defeated by Flair's previous protégé, A.J. Styles. On April 17 at Lockdown, Immortal, represented by Hardy, Abyss, Bully Ray and Ric Flair, were defeated by Fortune members James Storm, Kazarian and Robert Roode and Christopher Daniels, who replaced an injured A.J. Styles, in a Lethal Lockdown match. On the April 21 episode of Impact!, Hardy faced Sting for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship, Hardy's first World Title match in TNA, but was defeated. The following month, Hardy was granted a shot at the TNA World Tag Team Championship against Beer Money, Inc. (James Storm and Robert Roode). While the champions looked to defend the title against the Hardy Boyz, Matt instead introduced the returning Chris Harris, Storm's old tag team partner, as his partner for the title match. The match took place at Sacrifice, where Storm and Roode retained their titles. On June 21, it was reported that TNA had suspended Hardy. On August 20, Hardy was released from TNA following a DUI arrest that occurred earlier that same day. Return to the independent circuit (2011–2017) Hardy announced his retirement from full-time professional wrestling due to injuries on September 1, 2011. He issued a challenge to his long-time rival MVP, who was wrestling in Japan at the time, to one final match at "Crossfire Live!" in Nashville. The event was held May 19, 2012 and benefited the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Hardy won the match. Throughout 2012, Hardy wrestled sporadically on the independent circuit, working with promotions such as Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling, Pro Wrestling Syndicate and Northeast Wrestling. On October 5, Hardy was defeated by Kevin Steen at Pro Wrestling Xperience's An Evil Twist of Fate. On November 11, Hardy, as the masked wrestler Rahway Reaper, defeated the Pro Wrestling Syndicate Kevin Matthews, winning the championship. On February 9, 2013, Hardy lost the Pro Wrestling Syndicate Championship back to Matthews. On February 16, 2013, at Family Wrestling Entertainment's No Limit, Hardy wrestled a TLC match for the FWE Heavyweight Championship against the champion Carlito and Tommy Dreamer, but he was defeated. On November 30, 2013, at WrestleCade, Hardy defeated Carlito to become the first ever WrestleCade Champion. On May 3, 2014, following a match between Christian York and Drolix, Hardy defeated Drolix to become the new MCW Heavyweight Champion. At Maryland Championship Wrestling's Shane Shamrock Cup, Hardy defeated Luke Hawx in a TLC match for Hardy's title and Hawx's Extreme Rising World title. Hardy won the match, but he gave back the title to Hawx. On October 4, Hardy lost the MCW Heavyweight Championship back to Drolix, following outside interference from Kevin Eck. On February 9, 2015, Hardy appeared on FWE's "No Limits 2015" iPPV, challenging Drew Galloway for the ICW World Heavyweight Championship, but was defeated. On November 28, 2015, Hardy lost the WrestleCade Championship to Jeff Jarrett at WrestleCade IV in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Hardy regained the title in a triple-threat cage match against Jarrett and Ethan Carter III in Hickory, North Carolina on May 20, 2016. He appeared at the #DELETEWCPW event for What Culture Pro Wrestling (WCPW) in Nottingham, England on November 30. Hardy, billed as "Broken" Matt Hardy, lost a no-disqualification match to Bully Ray, with Ray proposing the no-disqualification stipulation at the last minute, and Hardy accepting there and then. Return to ROH (2012–2014) At Death Before Dishonor X: State of Emergency in 2012, Hardy returned to Ring of Honor, confronting Adam Cole and challenging him to a match for the ROH World Television Championship. On December 16 at Final Battle 2012: Doomsday, Hardy defeated Cole in a non-title match. At the following iPPV, 11th Anniversary Show on March 2, 2013, Hardy joined the villainous S.C.U.M. stable. On April 5 at the Supercard of Honor VII iPPV, Hardy unsuccessfully challenged Matt Taven for the ROH World Television Championship in a three-way elimination match, which also included Adam Cole. On June 22 at Best in the World 2013, Hardy defeated former S.C.U.M. stablemate Kevin Steen in a No Disqualification match to become the number one contender to the ROH World Championship. Hardy received his title shot at the following day's Ring of Honor Wrestling tapings, but was defeated by the defending champion, Jay Briscoe. Later that same day, S.C.U.M. was forced to disband after losing a Steel Cage Warfare match against Team ROH. On December 14, 2013, at Final Battle 2013, Hardy defeated Adam Page in a singles match; later on in the main event, Hardy aided Adam Cole in retaining his title and forming a tag team with him. After aiding Cole at Supercard of Honor VIII, Hardy was given Jay Briscoe's unofficial "Real World Title" belt, which he renamed the "ROH Iconic Championship". In July, Hardy opted out of his ROH contract and went back to TNA. Return to OMEGA (2013–2018) Matt announced that OMEGA would return in January 2013 with an event titled "Chinlock For Chuck". The main event featured Matt, Jeff, Shane "Hurricane" Helms and "Cowboy" James Storm defeating Gunner, Steve Corino, CW Anderson and Lodi. On October 12, 2013, at "Chapel Thrill", Hardy announced a Tournament for the OMEGA Heavyweight Championship which featured himself vs. CW Anderson and Shane "Hurricane" Helms vs. "The King" Shane Williams. After Hardy's qualifying match he was attacked by CW but was saved by the returning Willow the Whisp. Hardy won that match and advanced to the finals. On November 21, 2015, Matt won the OMEGA Heavyweight Championship for the second time, defeating former student Trevor Lee. Following this, Matt (upon regaining the TNA world title as part of his villainous egotistical "Iconic" gimmick) began proclaiming himself to be the only world champion that matters, and the only "true" world champion in wrestling, as he held both the TNA and OMEGA Championships, which (according to him) put him above any other promotions' world champions. Throughout 2016, Hardy defended the TNA and OMEGA titles jointly at OMEGA events as part of his "only true world champion" gimmick. On January 29, The Hardys won the OMEGA Tag Team Championships. Return to TNA The Hardys third reunion (2014–2015) On July 24, 2014, Hardy returned to TNA and reunited with Jeff to reform The Hardys for the third time. At the Destination X episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys were defeated by The Wolves in a match for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On the August 14 episode of Impact Wrestling, Team 3D (formerly the Dudley Boyz) challenged The Hardys to a match, which Team 3D won. At the Hardcore Justice episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys and Team 3D talked about a match involving themselves and The Wolves. When The Wolves were asked by the two teams, they agreed. Later that night, Kurt Angle announced all three teams would compete in a best of three series for the TNA World Tag Team Championship with the winners of the first match choosing the stipulation of the next one. The Hardys won the second match of the series on the September 10 episode of Impact Wrestling in a tables match and choose a ladder match for the third match of the series. The Hardys were unsuccessful in winning that match on the September 17 episode of Impact Wrestling, as the Wolves won that match. The Wolves then went on to pick the final match of the series to be a Full Metal Mayhem match to take place on the October 8 episode of Impact Wrestling. The Hardys were unsuccessful in that match as the Wolves won that match. On October 22, The Hardys entered a number one contenders tournament for the TNA World Tag Team Championship defeating The BroMans (Jessie Godderz and DJ Z) in the first round of the tournament. On the October 29 episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys defeated Team Dixie (Ethan Carter III and Tyrus) in the semifinals to advance to the finals of the tournament, where they defeated Samoa Joe and Low Ki to become number one contenders for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On the January 16, 2015 episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys defeated the Wolves. At the Lockdown episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys were defeated by The Revolution in a six sides of steel cage match for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On the February 20 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy and The Wolves defeated The Revolution in a six-man tag team match. In March, The Hardys participated in a tournament for the vacant TNA World Tag Team Championship. On March 16, 2015, Matt and Jeff won an Ultimate X match for the titles. On May 8, 2015, Hardy vacated the TNA World Tag Team Championship due to his brother Jeff being injured. World Heavyweight Champion (2015–2016) On June 28, 2015, Hardy was among the five wrestlers who competed for the TNA King of the Mountain Championship at Slammiversary, with Jeff Jarrett ultimately emerging victorious. On the July 8 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy requested a world title shot against Ethan Carter III, but was denied and forced to face the Dirty Heels (Austin Aries and Bobby Roode) in a handicap match, which he lost. On the July 22 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy defeated Roode in a Tables match to become the #1 contender for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship. On the August 5 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy got his shot at the title against EC3 in a Full Metal Mayhem match, but failed to win the title. On the September 2 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy got another shot at the TNA World Heavyweight Championship against EC3, but again failed to win the title; as part of the storyline, Jeff Hardy was forced to act as Ethan Carter's personal assistant. On the September 30 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy was added to the Ethan Carter III vs. Drew Galloway main event match for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship at Bound for Glory after he and Galloway defeated Carter and Tyrus, making it a three-way match, following which Jeff, who EC3 had just "fired" in the previous episode, was revealed to be the special guest referee. On October 4 at Bound for Glory, Matt won the TNA World Heavyweight Championship by pinning Galloway. However, EC3 filed an injunction (kayfabe) that banned Hardy from appearing on Impact Wrestling for a month, which forced Hardy to relinquish the title in order to stay on the show. However, Hardy had been participating in the TNA World Title Series for the vacant title. He qualified to the round of 16 by defeating Davey Richards, Robbie E and Eddie Edwards. He then advanced to the round of 8 by defeating the King of the Mountain Champion Bobby Roode and then to Jessie Godderz to continue his winning streak. The semifinals and finals were held on the January 5, 2016, live episode of Impact Wrestling during its debut on Pop TV, in which he defeated Eric Young to advance to the final round. Hardy faced EC3 in the TNA World Title Series finals, but lost the match via pinfall. Hardy won the TNA World Title from EC3 on the January 19, 2016 episode of Impact Wrestling, becoming the first man to defeat him in a one-on-one match in TNA. During the match a double turn took place; Hardy turned heel after Tyrus betrayed EC3. The following week on Impact Wrestling, Jeff Hardy had confronted him about last week and issued a challenge to Matt for the World Heavyweight title in the main event and Matt accepted. However, later before the main event could begin, Eric Young and Bram attacked Jeff from behind. Kurt Angle then came out to try save Jeff, and Matt had Tyrus attack Angle from behind. While Matt watched from the ramp, Young attacked Jeff with the Piledriver off the apron through a table. The following week, he successfully retained his title against Angle. At Lockdown, he retained his title in a Six-side of steel match against Ethan Carter III, with the help of Rockstar Spud. He lost his title against Drew Galloway on the March 15 episode of Impact Wrestling, after a match featuring EC3 and Jeff Hardy. Two weeks later he received a rematch for the title on Impact Wrestling, but was again defeated by Galloway. After losing the title he started a feud with Jeff. On the April 19 episode of Impact Wrestling, and an I Quit match ended in a no-contest as both Matt and Jeff were badly injured and Matt was taken out to the hospital on a stretcher. The Broken Universe (2016–2017) Hardy returned on May 17 episode of Impact Wrestling, revealing himself to be one of the impostor Willows behind the attacks on Jeff. Later that night, he attacked Jeff. In the following weeks, Hardy debuted a new persona as a "Broken" man with part of his hair bleached blonde along with a strange sophisticated accent, blaming Jeff (who he began referring to as "Brother Nero", Nero being Jeff's middle name) for breaking him and becoming obsessed with "deleting" him. His line “Delete”, is mostly inspired by the Death Note manga/anime series character Teru Mikami. On June 12, at Slammiversary, Matt was defeated by Jeff in a Full Metal Mayhem match. On the June 21 episode of Impact Wrestling, Matt was once again defeated by Jeff in a Six Sides of Steel match. On the June 28 episode of Impact Wrestling, Matt challenged Jeff to a final battle with the Hardy brand on the line, to take place at their home in Cameron, North Carolina the next week. On July 5, during special episode "The Final Deletion", Matt defeated Jeff in the match to become sole owner of the Hardy brand, forcing Jeff to drop his last name and become referred to as "Brother Nero". On the August 18 episode of Impact Wrestling, Matt and Brother Nero defeated The Tribunal, The BroMans and The Helms Dynasty in an "Ascension To Hell" match for an opportunity to challenge Decay for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On September 8, during special episode "Delete or Decay", the Hardys faced Decay in a match held at the Hardy compound, where Brother Nero sacrificed himself to save Matt from Abyss. Thanks to Brother Nero's sacrifice, Hardy was able to confront Rosemary and prevent his son Maxel from being abducted, which turned Hardy babyface as a result, and he furthered the face turn by healing Brother Nero in the Lake of Reincarnation. At Bound for Glory, the Hardys defeated Decay in "The Great War" to win the TNA World Tag Team Championship for the second time. On the October 6 episode of Impact Wrestling, they successfully defended their titles against Decay, in a Wolf Creek match. On the November 3 episode of Impact Wrestling, the Hardys successfully defended the titles against The Tribunal. After the match, the Hardys were attacked by the masked trio known as Death Crew Council (DCC). After accepting DCC's title challenge, The Hardys faced Bram and Kingston, and Matt pinned Kingston to retain the titles. On December 15, during special episode "Total Nonstop Deletion", they were once again successful in retaining. Brother Nero attacked Crazzy Steve with the Twist of Fate, who then fell into a volcano (that had appeared on the compound in the weeks leading up the event), and was shot up into the sky, landing in the ring. Matt then covered him to win the match. On the January 12, 2017 episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys successfully defended their titles against The Wolves. At Genesis, The Hardys retained their titles against the DCC and Decay in a three-way tag team match. On Open Fight Night, the Hardys began a storyline where they would teleport to different promotions and win that promotions' tag team championship gold, which was referred to by Matt as their "Expedition of Gold". On February 27, Hardy announced that both he and Jeff had finally left TNA, following years of speculation, with their contracts expiring that week. Though the two sides were reportedly close to a contract agreement, talks began to break down and changes in management prompted their departure from the company. The TNA World Tag Team Championships were vacated due to the Hardys' departure and was explained on TNA television in a segment where The Hardys teleported to their next Expedition of Gold destination, but a technicality resulted in them disappearing and the belts appearing in the arms of Decay. Broken gimmick legal battle Shortly after the departure of Matt and Jeff from TNA was made public, Matt's wife, Reby, went on a social media tirade in which she repeatedly slammed TNA, the company's new management and the way in which contract negotiations between the company and the Hardy family were conducted. A few weeks following this, the bad blood between the two sides intensified, so much so that the new management of TNA (now renamed Impact Wrestling) Anthem Sports & Entertainment issued a cease and desist letter to The Hardys' new promotion Ring of Honor (ROH), in which Anthem essentially ordered ROH as well as any broadcasting company airing ROH's 15th Anniversary pay–per–view show (on which The Hardys were to participate in a match) to not in any way speak of, indicate or acknowledge the existence of the Broken Matt and Brother Nero characters and instead to refer to The Hardys as simply Matt Hardy and Jeff Hardy. The issue with this is that while The Hardys were in TNA, they had full creative control over the Broken gimmick, with them even filming their own segments to air on TNA programming in some circumstances, thus making the Hardy family (in their belief) the owners of the Broken gimmick. It is believed that civil litigation will follow and a potential court hearing will take place regarding the outcome on who owns the Broken gimmick: Anthem or the Hardy family. Until then, the status of the Broken gimmick remains undecided. Despite this, Matt continues to use the Broken gimmick through his social media accounts, but neither he nor Jeff uses the Broken gimmick at any professional wrestling shows for ROH or on the independent circuit, presumably until the results of the expected legal proceedings have been finalized. Newly–appointed Impact Wrestling President Ed Nordholm credits the invention of and the vision behind the Broken gimmick to Jeremy Borash, Dave Lagana and Billy Corgan, and while Borash specifically had the most input into the gimmick of the three aside from Matt, the Hardy family deny that Borash was the sole person behind the gimmick. In November 2017, Impact Wrestling changed their policy, allowing all talent to retain complete ownership over their intellectual property, essentially forfeiting ownership of the "Broken" character to Hardy. On January 31, 2018, the legal battle officially concluded when Matt legally acquired ownership of all trademarks related to the Broken universe and the Broken gimmick, which includes 'Broken Matt', 'Brother Nero', 'Broken Brilliance' and 'Vanguard1'. International matches (2014–2015) On November 1, 2014, Hardy traveled to Japan to compete for Wrestle-1 at the promotions Keiji Muto 30th Anniversary Hold Out show in a triple threat match against Seiya Sanada and Tajiri, which he lost. On May 24, 2015, Hardy traveled to Mexico to compete as a team captain for Team TNA/Lucha Underground with teammates Mr. Anderson and Johnny Mundo at Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide's 2015 Lucha Libre World Cup pay–per–view show. In the quarter–final round, Team TNA/Lucha Underground faced Team Rest of the World (Drew Galloway, Angélico and El Mesías) to a 15-minute time limit draw, with Team TNA/Lucha Underground winning in overtime and advancing to the semi–final round. In the semi–final round, Team TNA/Lucha Underground defeated Team MexLeyendas (Blue Demon Jr., Dr. Wagner Jr. and El Solar) to advance to the final round. In the final round, Team TNA/Lucha Underground faced Dream Team (El Patrón Alberto, Myzteziz and Rey Mysterio Jr.) to a 15–minute time limit draw, with Dream Team winning both the match and the tournament in overtime with Hardy on the losing end of the final pinfall. Second return to ROH (2016–2017) On December 2, 2016, Hardy returned to ROH for the second time while still under contract with TNA, appearing at the promotions Final Battle pay-per-view show as Broken Matt, where a video message showed him addressing The Young Bucks (Matt Jackson and Nick Jackson) and The Briscoes (Jay Briscoe and Mark Briscoe). On March 4, 2017, in the same week that both Matt and Jeff were released from TNA, The Hardys defeated The Young Bucks in an impromptu match at ROH's 2017 installment of the company's Manhattan Mayhem show series to become the new ROH World Tag Team Champions for the first time. Moments after winning the titles, Hardy announced in a post-match promo that both he and Brother Nero (Jeff) had signed "the biggest ROH contracts in (the company's) history". It was later confirmed that the contracts were short-term, only for the "immediate future". On March 10, The Hardys successfully defended the ROH World Tag Team Championship for the first time at ROH's 15th Anniversary pay-per-view show against The Young Bucks and Roppongi Vice (Beretta and Rocky Romero) in a three-way Las Vegas tag team street fight match. Prior to the event, the Hardys had been sent a legal threat by Impact Wrestling regarding the use of the Broken Matt and Brother Nero gimmicks. The following night on March 11, The Hardys (not billed but using the Broken gimmicks anyway) once again retained the titles, this time against The Briscoes at a set of Ring of Honor Wrestling television tapings. The Hardys lost the titles back to The Young Bucks in a ladder match on April 1 at ROH's Supercard of Honor XI pay-per-view show, which would be the final ROH appearances for both Hardys in this tenure with the promotion. Second return to WWE (2017–2020) Feud with The Bar (2017) At the WrestleMania 33 pay-per-view on April 2, 2017, Hardy made his surprise return to WWE, along with his brother Jeff Hardy, being added as last-minute participants in the ladder match for the Raw Tag Team Championship, defeating Gallows and Anderson, Cesaro and Sheamus, and Enzo and Cass to win the Raw Tag Team Championship. Afterwards on Raw Talk, Hardy mentioned that The Hardy Boyz had successfully completed the Expedition of Gold, after winning the Raw Tag Team Championship. At Payback, The Hardy Boyz retained their championships against Cesaro and Sheamus, who attacked them after the match. The next night on Raw, Cesaro and Sheamus explained their actions, claiming the fans were more supportive of 'novelty acts' from the past like The Hardy Boyz, who they feel did not deserve to be in the match at WrestleMania 33. Subsequently, at Extreme Rules, The Hardy Boyz lost the titles against Cesaro and Sheamus in a steel cage match, and failed to regain it back the following month at the Great Balls of Fire event. Afterwards, it was revealed that Jeff had gotten injured and would be out for an estimated six months, thus Hardy began wrestling in singles matches. Woken Universe and storyline with Bray Wyatt (2017–2018) During his feud with Bray Wyatt, Hardy introduced his "Woken" gimmick, after Impact Wrestling dropped their claim to the gimmick and Hardy gained full ownership of it. Wyatt defeated Hardy at Raw 25 on January 22, 2018, and Hardy defeated Wyatt at Elimination Chamber on February 25. Their final match happened on the March 19 episode of Raw, dubbed The Ultimate Deletion, with Hardy winning after distractions from Señor Benjamin. Wyatt then disappeared after being thrown into the Lake of Reincarnation. At WrestleMania 34 on April 7, Hardy competed in the annual André the Giant Memorial Battle Royal, and won the match due to a distraction by the returning Wyatt. After WrestleMania, Hardy and Wyatt performed as a tag team, sometimes referred to as The Deleters of Worlds. They won a tournament for the vacant Raw Tag Team Championship, defeating Cesaro and Sheamus at the Greatest Royal Rumble event to win the title. However, they lost the titles at Extreme Rules to The B-Team (Bo Dallas and Curtis Axel). On the July 23 episode of Raw, Hardy and Wyatt received a rematch for the titles, but was again defeated by The B-Team. Following this, Hardy revealed that he was taking time off due to his back fusing with his pelvis, effectively disbanding the team. According to Hardy, the reason WWE disbanded the team was because he and Wyatt pitched several ideas to WWE to work with their characters. The Hardys fourth reunion and departure (2019–2020) After more than seven months of absence from television, Hardy returned on the February 26, 2019 episode of SmackDown Live, teaming with his brother Jeff to defeat The Bar (Cesaro and Sheamus). At WrestleMania 35 on April 7, Hardy competed in the André the Giant Memorial Battle Royal, but was eliminated by eventual winner, Braun Strowman. Two days later on SmackDown Live, The Hardy Boyz defeated The Usos to win the SmackDown Tag Team Championship. The reign only lasted 21 days (recognized as 20 days by WWE), as they had to vacate the title due to Jeff injuring his knee, this was explained in storyline as injuries afflicted by Lars Sullivan. After his brother Jeff's injury, Hardy began to appear on WWE programming less frequently. At Super ShowDown on June 7, Hardy competed in the 51-man Battle Royal, which was eventually won by Mansoor. From November to December, Hardy occasionally appeared on Raw, losing matches against superstars like Buddy Murphy, Drew McIntyre, Ricochet and Erick Rowan. On the February 10, 2020 episode of Raw, Hardy confronted Randy Orton about Orton's attack on Edge two weeks earlier. Hardy then got himself into a brawl with him moments after, and was viciously attacked by Orton. The following week on Raw, an injured Hardy appeared and was once again assaulted by Orton, which would be his final appearance in WWE. On March 2, Hardy announced his departure from WWE through his official YouTube channel, where Hardy said that while he's grateful towards the people behind the scenes, he said he is also on different pages with WWE as he feels he needs to have creative input and still has more to give. Later that day, WWE announced that his contract had expired. All Elite Wrestling Multiple personalities (2020–2021) Hardy made his All Elite Wrestling (AEW) debut on the March 18, 2020 episode of Dynamite, reverting to his "Broken" gimmick and being announced as the replacement for the kayfabe injured Nick Jackson on The Elite's team at Blood and Guts. However, the event was postponed to the following year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. On the May 6 episode of Dynamite, Hardy wrestled his first match with AEW, teaming up with Kenny Omega for a street fight against The Inner Circle's Chris Jericho and Sammy Guevara, and Hardy and Omega lost when Jericho pinned Omega. During this period, due to the lack of live audience, Hardy felt that the Broken character needs public, so he began to include several of his gimmicks, including Broken Matt Hardy, Big Money Matt, Matt Hardy V1, and Unkillable Matt Hardy, being referred to as "Multifarious" Matt Hardy. AEW president Tony Khan later admitted that he "wasn't a fan" of the Broken gimmick and much preferred more realistic presentations in wrestling. At Double or Nothing, Hardy teamed with The Elite to defeat The Inner Circle in the first ever Stadium Stampede match. During the match, Santana and Ortiz dunked Hardy in the stadium pool, which acted as a version of the Lake of Reincarnation, as Hardy kept cycling through his various gimmicks throughout his career when he surfaced. Hardy then feuded with Sammy Guevara, and after Hardy defeated Guevara in a Broken Rules match at All Out, Hardy took time off until he was cleared to return, due to an injury sustained during the match. On the September 16 episode of Dynamite, Hardy aligned with Private Party (Isiah Kassidy and Marq Quen) as their manager, but was attacked backstage before their match. The attacker was later revealed as Guevara and The Elite Deletion match was announced, which took place at The Hardy Compound in Cameron, North Carolina, where Hardy won. The Hardy Family Office (2021–present) Hardy then switched to his Big Money persona as he focused on managing Private Party. Over the following weeks, Hardy would display villainous tactics as he began cheating during matches much to Private Party's dismay. On the January 20, 2021 episode of Dynamite, Hardy and Private Party defeated Matt Sydal and Top Flight (Dante Martin and Darius Martin) after using a steel chair before attacking Sydal and Top Flight afterwards, thus turning heel. Hardy then approached Adam Page to accompany and befriend him, and during tag team matches, Hardy would always tag himself in and pick up the victory for his team to Page's behest. After Page set up a match between Hardy and himself, Hardy double-crossed Page, with Private Party and The Hybrid 2 (Angélico and Jack Evans) attacking Page until The Dark Order came out to save him. At the Revolution event, Hardy lost to Page despite multiple interferences from Private Party. Following Revolution, Hardy became the manager for The Butcher and The Blade (with their valet The Bunny in tow), and along with Private Party, the stable became known as the Matt Hardy Empire before settling on the name Hardy Family Office. Hardy also added The Hybrid 2 to his group in July having previously hiring them on a mercenary basis. At Double or Nothing, Hardy competed in Casino Battle Royale but was eliminated by Christian Cage. This led to a match between the two at Fyter Fest, where Hardy lost to Cage. In August, Matt Hardy and HFO began a feud with Orange Cassidy and Best Friends, which led to a match on the August 25 episode of Dynamite, where Hardy was defeated by Cassidy. However, on the November 12 episode of Rampage, Hardy defeated Cassidy in a Lumberjack match, thanks to an interference from HFO and the heel lumberjacks. Their feud ended on the November 17 episode of Dynamite where his team of The Butcher and The Blade lost to the team of Cassidy and Tomohiro Ishii, where Cassidy gave a crossbody to the interfering Hardy and The Blade during the match. Professional wrestling style and persona After the creation of his Broken character, Hardy was praised by several wrestlers and critics for reinventing himself several times during his career. During his career, Hardy has won the Wrestling Observer Newsletter Best Gimmick award two times under two different characters, once in 2002 and again in 2016. Personal life Hardy was in a six-year relationship with wrestler Amy Dumas, better known as Lita. They first met in January 1999 at a NWA Mid-Atlantic show but did not begin dating until a few months later. They broke up in February 2005 when he discovered that she was having an affair with one of Hardy's close friends, fellow wrestler Adam Copeland, better known as Edge. Hardy also dated WWE wrestler Ashley Massaro. Hardy married wrestler Rebecca Reyes, better known as Reby Sky, on October 5, 2013. They have three sons and one daughter. Hardy had previously been an addict, and credits his wife for helping him get clean. Hardy is good friends with fellow wrestlers Marty Garner, Shannon Moore, and Gregory Helms. In December 2020, he claimed to have Native American ancestry. Legal issues Hardy was arrested for a DUI on August 20, 2011. Two days later, he was arrested on felony drug charges when police found steroids in his home. In November 2011, Hardy was removed from court-ordered rehab and sent back to jail for drinking. In January 2014, Hardy and his wife were both arrested after a fight at a hotel. Other media In 1999, Matt, along with his brother Jeff, appeared as an uncredited wrestler on That '70s Show episode "That Wrestling Show". Matt and Jeff also appeared on Tough Enough in early 2001, talking to and wrestling the contestants. He appeared in the February 25, 2002 episode of Fear Factor competing against five other World Wrestling Federation wrestlers, including his brother. He won $50,000 for the American Cancer Society. Hardy also appeared on the October 13, 2009 episode of Scare Tactics, as a mental patient who threatens to attack the prank's victim. In 2001, Matt, Jeff, and Lita appeared in Rolling Stone magazine's 2001 Sports Hall of Fame issue. In 2003, Matt and Jeff, with the help of Michael Krugman, wrote and published their autobiography The Hardy Boyz: Exist 2 Inspire. As part of WWE, Matt appeared in their DVD, The Hardy Boyz: Leap of Faith in 2001. On April 29, 2008, WWE released Twist of Fate: The Matt and Jeff Hardy Story. The DVD featured footage of the brothers in OMEGA and WWE. Hardy also appears on The Hardy Show, an Internet web show which features the Hardys, Shannon Moore, and many of their friends. Hardy plays himself in the 2013 film Pro Wrestlers vs Zombies in which he and his real-life wife Reby Sky battle the undead. Hardy's first WWE video game was WWF WrestleMania 2000 in 1999 on the Nintendo 64 shortly followed by WWF SmackDown! in early 2000 on the PlayStation. He made several appearances later in WWF SmackDown! 2: Know Your Role, WWF SmackDown! Just Bring It, WWE SmackDown! Shut Your Mouth, WWE SmackDown! Here Comes the Pain, and WWE SmackDown vs. Raw. He later returned to the series in WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2007, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2008, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2009, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2010, and WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2011, which was his last WWE video game before his departure to TNA. Following his return to WWE in 2017, he was revealed as a DLC character in WWE 2K18 on September 25 that year alongside tag team partner and brother, Jeff Hardy. Hardy was revealed as a playable character in WWE 2K19 on August 30, 2018. His final appearance in a WWE video game came with WWE 2K20 in 2019. Filmography Championships and accomplishments All Elite Wrestling Dynamite Award (1 time) "Bleacher Report PPV Moment of the Year" (2021) – Stadium Stampede match (The Elite vs. The Inner Circle) – Double or Nothing (May 23) All Star Wrestling (West Virginia) ASW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Brother Nero CBS Sports Worst Moment of the Year (2020) vs. Sammy Guevara at All Out (2020) The Crash The Crash Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Brother Nero Future Stars of Wrestling FSW Heavyweight Championship (1 time) House of Glory HOG Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy Maryland Championship Wrestling/MCW Pro Wrestling MCW Heavyweight Championship (1 time) MCW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy Extreme Rising World Championship (1 time) National Championship Wrestling NCW Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NCW Light Heavyweight Championship (1 time) New Dimension Wrestling NDW Light Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NDW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy New England Wrestling Alliance NEWA Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NEWA Hall of Fame (class of 2012) New Frontier Wrestling Association NFWA Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NFWA Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Venom NWA 2000 NWA 2000 Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy OMEGA Championship Wrestling OMEGA Heavyweight Championship (2 times) OMEGA Tag Team Championship (2 times) – with Brother Nero/Jeff Hardy Pro Wrestling Illustrated Comeback of the Year (2017) with Jeff Hardy Feud of the Year (2005) vs. Edge and Lita Match of the Year (2000) with Jeff Hardy vs. The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian in a triangle ladder match at WrestleMania 2000 Match of the Year (2001) with Jeff Hardy vs. The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian in a Tables, Ladders and Chairs match at WrestleMania X-Seven Tag Team of the Year (2000) with Jeff Hardy Ranked No. 17 of the top 500 singles wrestlers in the PWI 500 in 2003 Pro Wrestling Syndicate PWS Heavyweight Championship (1 time) Remix Pro Wrestling Remix Pro Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Facade Ring of Honor ROH World Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy Holy S*** Moment of the Decade (2010s) – – with Jeff Hardy Total Nonstop Action Wrestling TNA World Heavyweight Championship (2 times) TNA World Tag Team Championship (2 times) – with Jeff Hardy/Brother Nero TNA World Tag Team Championship Tournament (2015) – with Jeff Hardy TNA World Tag Team Championship #1 Contender Tournament (2014) – with Jeff Hardy WrestleCade WrestleCade Championship (2 times) Wrestling Observer Newsletter Best Gimmick (2002, 2016) Worst Feud of the Year (2004) with Lita vs. Kane Wrestling Superstar Wrestling Superstar Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy WWE/World Wrestling Entertainment/Federation ECW Championship (1 time) WWF Hardcore Championship (1 time) WWF European Championship (1 time) WWE United States Championship (1 time) WWE Cruiserweight Championship (1 time) WWF/World Tag Team Championship (6 times) – with Jeff Hardy WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy WWE Raw Tag Team Championship (3 times) – with Montel Vontavious Porter (1) Jeff Hardy (1) and Bray Wyatt (1) WCW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy André the Giant Memorial Trophy (2018) Bragging Rights Trophy (2009) – with Team SmackDown Terri Invitational Tournament (1999) – with Jeff Hardy WWE Tag Team Eliminator (2018) - with Bray Wyatt Luchas de Apuestas record Notes References Sources External links 1974 births All Elite Wrestling personnel American bloggers American male professional wrestlers American YouTubers Male YouTubers ECW champions ECW Heavyweight Champions/ECW World Heavyweight Champions Living people NWA/WCW/WWE United States Heavyweight Champions Participants in American reality television series Professional wrestlers from North Carolina Professional wrestling managers and valets Reality show winners Sportspeople from Raleigh, North Carolina TNA World Heavyweight/Impact World Champions TNA/Impact World Tag Team Champions Twitch (service) streamers University of North Carolina at Charlotte alumni WWF European Champions WWF/WWE Hardcore Champions	true	[ "Yelberton Abraham Tittle Jr. (October 24, 1926 – October 8, 2017) was a professional American football quarterback. He played in the National Football League (NFL) for the San Francisco 49ers, New York Giants, and Baltimore Colts, after spending two seasons with the Colts in the All-America Football Conference (AAFC). Known for his competitiveness, leadership, and striking profile, Tittle was the centerpiece of several prolific offenses throughout his 17-year professional career from 1948 to 1964.\n\nTittle played college football for Louisiana State University, where he was a two-time All-Southeastern Conference (SEC) quarterback for the LSU Tigers football team. As a junior, he was named the most valuable player (MVP) of the infamous 1947 Cotton Bowl Classic—also known as the \"Ice Bowl\"—a scoreless tie between the Tigers and Arkansas Razorbacks in a snowstorm. After college, he was drafted in the 1947 NFL Draft by the Detroit Lions, but he instead chose to play in the AAFC for the Colts.\n\nWith the Colts, Tittle was named the AAFC Rookie of the Year in 1948 after leading the team to the AAFC playoffs. After consecutive one-win seasons, the Colts franchise folded, which allowed Tittle to be drafted in the 1951 NFL Draft by the 49ers. Through ten seasons in San Francisco, he was invited to four Pro Bowls, led the league in touchdown passes in 1955, and was named the NFL Player of the Year by the United Press in 1957. A groundbreaker, Tittle was part of the 49ers' famed Million Dollar Backfield, was the first professional football player featured on the cover of Sports Illustrated, and is credited with having coined \"alley-oop\" as a sports term.\n\nConsidered washed-up, the 34-year-old Tittle was traded to the Giants following the 1960 season. Over the next four seasons, he won several individual awards, twice set the league single-season record for touchdown passesincluding a 1962 game with a combined 7 touchdown passes and 500-yards passing with a near perfect (151.4 out of 158.33) passer rating, and led the Giants to three straight NFL championship games. Although he was never able to deliver a championship to the team, Tittle's time in New York is regarded among the glory years of the franchise.\n\nIn his final season, Tittle was photographed bloodied and kneeling down in the end zone after a tackle by a defender left him helmetless. The photograph is considered one of the most iconic images in North American sports history. He retired as the NFL's all-time leader in passing yards, passing touchdowns, attempts, completions, and games played. Tittle was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1971, and his jersey number 14 is retired by the Giants.\n\nEarly years and college career\nBorn and raised in Marshall, Texas, to Alma Tittle (née Allen) and Yelberton Abraham Tittle Sr., Tittle aspired to be a quarterback from a young age. He spent hours in his backyard throwing a football through a tire swing, emulating his fellow Texan and boyhood idol, Sammy Baugh. Tittle played high school football at Marshall High School. In his senior year the team posted an undefeated record and reached the state finals.\n\nAfter a recruiting battle between Louisiana State University and the University of Texas, Tittle chose to attend LSU in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and play for the LSU Tigers. He was part of a successful 1944 recruiting class under head coach Bernie Moore that included halfbacks Jim Cason, Dan Sandifer, and Ray Coates. Freshmen were eligible to play on the varsity during World War II, so Tittle saw playing time immediately. He later said the finest moment of his four years at LSU was beating Tulane as a freshman, a game in which he set a school record with 238 passing yards. It was one of two games the Tigers won that season.\n\nMoore started Tittle at tailback in the single-wing formation his first year, but moved him to quarterback in the T formation during his sophomore season. As a junior in 1946, Tittle's three touchdown passes in a 41–27 rout of rival Tulane helped ensure LSU a spot in the Cotton Bowl Classic. Known notoriously as the \"Ice Bowl\", the 1947 Cotton Bowl pitted LSU against the Arkansas Razorbacks in sub-freezing temperatures on an ice-covered field in Dallas, Texas. LSU moved the ball much better than the Razorbacks, but neither team was able to score, and the game ended in a scoreless tie. Tittle and Arkansas end Alton Baldwin shared the game's MVP award. Following the season, United Press International (UPI) placed Tittle on its All-Southeastern Conference (SEC) first-team.\n\nUPI again named Tittle its first-team All-SEC quarterback in 1947. In Tittle's day of iron man football, he played on both offense and defense. While on defense during a 20–18 loss to SEC champion Ole Miss in his senior season, Tittle's belt buckle was torn off as he intercepted a pass from Charlie Conerly and broke a tackle. He ran down the sideline with one arm cradling the ball and the other holding up his pants. At the Ole Miss 20-yard line, as he attempted to stiff-arm a defender,(#87 Jack Odom), Tittle's pants fell and he tripped and fell onto his face. The fall kept him from scoring the game-winning touchdown.\n\nIn total, during his college career Tittle set school passing records with 162 completions out of 330 attempts for 2,525 yards and 23 touchdowns. He scored seven touchdowns himself as a runner. His passing totals remained unbroken until Bert Jones surpassed them in the 1970s.\n\nProfessional career\n\nBaltimore Colts\nTittle was the sixth overall selection of the 1948 NFL Draft, taken by the Detroit Lions. However, Tittle instead began his professional career with the Baltimore Colts of the All-America Football Conference in 1948. That season, already being described as a \"passing ace\", he was unanimously recognized as the AAFC Rookie of the Year by UPI after passing for 2,739 yards and leading the Colts to the brink of an Eastern Division championship. After a 1–11 win–loss record in 1949, the Colts joined the National Football League in 1950. The team again posted a single win against eleven losses, and the franchise folded after the season due to financial difficulties. Players on the roster at the time of the fold were eligible to be drafted in the next NFL draft.\n\nSan Francisco 49ers\nTittle was then drafted by the San Francisco 49ers in the 1951 NFL Draft after the Colts folded. While many players at the time were unable to play immediately due to military duties, Tittle had received a class IV-F exemption due to physical ailments, so he was able to join the 49ers roster that season. In 1951 and 1952, he shared time at quarterback with Frankie Albert. In 1953, his first full season as the 49ers' starter, he passed for 2,121 yards and 20 touchdowns and was invited to his first Pro Bowl. San Francisco finished with a 9–3 regular season record, which was good enough for second in the Western Conference, and led the league in points scored.\n\nIn 1954, the 49ers compiled their Million Dollar Backfield, which was composed of four future Hall of Famers: Tittle; fullbacks John Henry Johnson and Joe Perry; and halfback Hugh McElhenny. \"It made quarterbacking so easy because I just get in the huddle and call anything and you have three Hall of Fame running backs ready to carry the ball,\" Tittle reminisced in 2006. The team had aspirations for a championship run, but injuries, including McElhenny's separated shoulder in the sixth game of the season, ended those hopes and the 49ers finished third in the Western Division. Tittle starred in his second straight Pro Bowl appearance as he threw two touchdown passes, including one to 49ers teammate Billy Wilson, who was named the game's MVP.\n\nTittle became the first professional football player featured on the cover of Sports Illustrated when he appeared on its 15th issue dated November 22, 1954, donning his 49ers uniform and helmet featuring an acrylic face mask distinct to the time period. The cover photo also shows a metal bracket on the side of Tittle's helmet which served to protect his face by preventing the helmet from caving in. The 1954 cover was the first of four Sports Illustrated covers he graced during his career.\n\nTittle led the NFL in touchdown passes for the first time in 1955, with 17, while also leading the league with 28 interceptions thrown. When the 49ers hired Frankie Albert as head coach in 1956, Tittle was pleased with the choice at first, figuring Albert would be a good mentor. However, the team lost four of its first five games, and Albert replaced Tittle with rookie Earl Morrall. After a loss to the Los Angeles Rams brought San Francisco's record to 1–6, Tittle regained the starting role and the team finished undefeated with one tie through the season's final five games.\n\nIn 1957, Tittle and receiver R. C. Owens devised a pass play in which Tittle tossed the ball high into the air and the Owens leapt to retrieve it, typically resulting in a long gain or a touchdown. Tittle dubbed the play the \"alley-oop\"—the first usage of the term in sports—and it was highly successful when utilized. The 49ers finished the regular season with an 8–4 record and hosted the Detroit Lions in the Western Conference playoff. Against the Lions, Tittle passed for 248 yards and tossed three touchdown passes—one each to Owens, McElhenny, and Wilson—but Detroit overcame a 20-point third quarter deficit to win 31–27. For the season, Tittle had a league-leading 63.1 completion percentage, threw for 2,157 yards and 13 touchdowns, and rushed for six more scores. He was deemed \"pro player of the year\" by a United Press poll of members of the National Football Writers Association. Additionally, he was named to his first All-Pro team and invited to his third Pro Bowl.\n\nAfter a poor 1958 preseason by Tittle, Albert started John Brodie at quarterback for the 1958 season, a decision that proved unpopular with the fan base. Tittle came in to relieve Brodie in a week six game against the Lions, with ten minutes left in the game and the 49ers down 21–17. His appearance \"drew a roar of approval from the crowd of 59,213,\" after which he drove the team downfield and threw a 32-yard touchdown pass to McElhenny for the winning score. A right knee ligament injury against the Colts in week nine ended Tittle's season, and San Francisco finished with a 7–5 record, followed by Albert's resignation as coach. Tittle and Brodie continued to share time at quarterback over the next two seasons. In his fourth and final Pro Bowl game with the 49ers in 1959, Tittle completed 13 of 17 passes for 178 yards and a touchdown.\n\nUnder new head coach Red Hickey in 1960, the 49ers adopted the shotgun formation. The first implementation of the shotgun was in week nine against the Colts, with Brodie at quarterback while Tittle nursed a groin injury. The 49ers scored a season-high thirty points, and with Brodie in the shotgun won three of their last four games to salvage a winning season at 7–5. Though conflicted, Tittle decided to get into shape and prepare for the next season. He stated in his 2009 autobiography that at times he thought, \"The hell with it. Quit this damned game. You have been at it too long anyway.\" But then another voice within him would say, \"Come back for another year and show them you're still a good QB. Don't let them shotgun you out of football!\" However, after the first preseason game of 1961, Hickey informed Tittle he had been traded to the New York Giants.\n\nNew York Giants\nIn mid-August 1961, the 49ers traded the 34-year-old Tittle to the New York Giants for second-year guard Lou Cordileone. Cordileone, the 12th overall pick in the 1960 NFL Draft, was quoted as reacting \"Me, even up for Y. A. Tittle? You're kidding,\" and later remarked that the Giants traded him for \"a 42-year-old quarterback.\" Tittle's view of Cordileone was much the same, stating his dismay that the 49ers did not get a \"name ballplayer\" in return. He was also displeased with being traded to the East Coast, and said he would rather have been traded to the Los Angeles Rams.\n\nAlready considered washed up, Tittle was intended by the Giants to share quarterback duties with 40-year-old Charlie Conerly, who had been with the team since 1948. The players at first remained loyal to Conerly, and treated Tittle with the cold shoulder. Tittle missed the season opener due to a back injury sustained before the season. His first game with New York came in week two, against the Steelers, in which he and Conerly each threw a touchdown pass in the Giants' 17–14 win. He became the team's primary starter for the remainder of the season and led the revitalized Giants to first place in the Eastern Conference. The Newspaper Enterprise Association (NEA) awarded Tittle its Jim Thorpe Trophy as the NFL's players' choice of MVP. In the 1961 NFL Championship Game, the Giants were soundly defeated by Vince Lombardi's Green Bay Packers, as they were shut-out 37-0. Tittle completed six of 20 passes in the game and threw four interceptions.\n\nIn January 1962, Tittle stated his intention to retire following the 1962 season. After an off-season quarterback competition with Ralph Guglielmi, Tittle played and started in a career-high 14 games. He tied an NFL record by throwing seven touchdown passes in a game on October 28, 1962, in a 49–34 win over the Washington Redskins. Against the Dallas Cowboys in the regular season finale, Tittle threw six touchdown passes to set the single-season record with 33, which had been set the previous year by Sonny Jurgensen's 32. He earned player of the year honors from the Washington D.C. Touchdown Club, UPI, and The Sporting News, and finished just behind Green Bay's Jim Taylor in voting for the AP NFL Most Valuable Player Award. The Giants again finished first in the Eastern Conference and faced the Packers in the 1962 NFL Championship Game. In frigid, windy conditions at Yankee Stadium and facing a constant pass rush from the Packers' front seven, Tittle completed only 18 of his 41 attempts in the game. The Packers won, 16–7, with New York's lone score coming on a blocked punt recovered in the end zone by Jim Collier.\n\nTittle returned to the Giants in 1963 and, at age 37, supplanted his single-season passing touchdowns record by throwing 36. He broke the record in the final game with three touchdowns against the Steelers, three days after being named NFL MVP by the AP. The Giants led the league in scoring by a wide margin, and for the third time in as many years clinched the Eastern Conference title. The Western champions were George Halas' Chicago Bears. The teams met in the 1963 NFL Championship Game at Wrigley Field. In the second quarter, Tittle injured his knee on a tackle by Larry Morris, and required a novocaine shot at halftime to continue playing. After holding a 10–7 halftime lead, The Giants were shutout in the second half, during which Tittle threw four interceptions. Playing through the knee injury, he completed 11 of 29 passes in the game for 147 yards, a touchdown, and five interceptions as the Bears won 14–10.\n\nThe following year in 1964, Tittle's final season, the Giants went 2–10–2 (), the worst record in the 14-team league. In the second game of the year, against Pittsburgh, he was blindsided by defensive end John Baker. The tackle left Tittle with crushed cartilage in his ribs, a cracked sternum, and a concussion. However, he played in every game the rest of the season, but was relegated to a backup role later in the year. After throwing only ten touchdowns with 22 interceptions, he retired after the season at age 39, saying rookie quarterback Gary Wood not only \"took my job away, but started to ask permission to date my daughter.\" Over 17 seasons as a professional, Tittle completed 2,427 out of 4,395 passes for 33,070 yards and 242 touchdowns, with 248 interceptions. He also rushed for 39 touchdowns.\n\nCareer statistics\n\nProfile and playing style\n\nTittle threw the ball from a sidearm, almost underhand position, something novel at those times, though it was common practice in earlier decades. It was this seemingly underhand style that drew the curiosity and admiration of many fans. This, in tandem with his baldness—for which he was frequently referred to as the \"Bald Eagle\"—made him a very striking personality. Despite his throwing motion, he had a very strong and accurate arm with a quick release. His ability to read defenses made him one of the best screen passers in the NFL. He was a perfectionist and highly competitive, and he expected the same of his teammates. He possessed rare leadership and game-planning skills, and played with great enthusiasm even in his later years. \"Tittle has the attitude of a high school kid, with the brain of a computer,\" said Giants teammate Frank Gifford. Baltimore Colts halfback Lenny Moore, when asked in 1963 to compare Tittle and Colts quarterback Johnny Unitas, said:\n\nI played with Tittle in the Pro Bowl two years ago, and I discovered he's quite a guy ... He and John, however, are entirely different types ... Tittle is a sort of 'con man' with his players ... he comes into a huddle and 'suggests' that maybe this or that will work on account of something he saw happen on a previous play ... The way he puts it, you're convinced it's a good idea and maybe it will work. John, now, he's a take-charge guy ... you what the other guy's going to do, what he's going to do, and what he wants you to do.\n\nTittle's most productive years came when he was well beyond his athletic prime. He credited his ability to improve with age to a feel for the game borne from years of league experience. \"If you could learn it by studying movies, a good, smart college quarterback could learn all you've got to learn in three weeks and then come in and be as good as the old heads,\" he told Sports Illustrated in 1963. \"But they can't.\"\n\nLegacy\nAt the time of his retirement, Tittle held the following NFL records:\n\nTittle was the fourth player to throw seven touchdown passes in a game, when he did so in 1962 against the Redskins. He followed Sid Luckman (1943), Adrian Burk (1954), and George Blanda (1961). The feat has since been equaled by four more players: Joe Kapp (1969), Peyton Manning (2013), Nick Foles (2013), and Drew Brees (2015). Tittle, Manning and Foles did it without an interception. His 36 touchdown passes in 1963 set a record which stood for over two decades until it was surpassed by Dan Marino in 1984; as of 2016 it remains a Giants franchise record.\n\nDespite record statistics and three straight championship game appearances, Tittle was never able to deliver a title to his team. His record as a starter in postseason games was 0–4. He threw four touchdown passes against 14 interceptions and had a passer rating of 33.8 in his postseason career, far below his regular season passer rating of 74.3. Seth Wickersham, writing for ESPN The Magazine in 2014, noted the dichotomy in the 1960s between two of New York's major sports franchises: \"... Gifford, Huff and Tittle, a team of Hall of Famers known for losing championships as their peers on the Yankees—with whom they shared a stadium, a city, and many rounds of drinks—became renowned for winning them.\" The Giants struggled after Tittle's retirement, posting only two winning seasons from 1964 to 1980.\n\nHe made seven Pro Bowls, four first-team All-Pro teams, and four times was named the NFL's Most Valuable Player or Player of the Year: in 1957 and 1962 by the UPI; in 1961 by the NEA; and in 1963 by the AP and NEA. In a sports column in 1963, George Strickler for the Chicago Tribune remarked Tittle had \"broken records that at one time appeared unassailable and he has been the hero of more second half rallies than Napoleon and the Harlem Globetrotters.\" He was featured on four Sports Illustrated covers: three during his playing career and one shortly after retirement. His first was with the 49ers in 1954. With the Giants, he graced covers in November 1961, and he was on the season preview issue for 1964; a two-page fold-out photo from the 1963 title game. Tittle was on a fourth cover in August 1965.\n\nThe trade of Tittle for Lou Cordileone is seen as one of the worst trades in 49ers history; it is considered one of the best trades in Giants franchise history. Cordileone played just one season in San Francisco.\n\nFamous photo\n\nA photo of a dazed Tittle in the end zone taken by Morris Berman of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on September 20, 1964, is regarded among the most iconic images in the history of American sports and journalism. Tittle, in his 17th and final season, was photographed helmet-less, bloodied and kneeling immediately after having been knocked to the ground by John Baker of the Pittsburgh Steelers and throwing an interception that was returned for a touchdown at the old Pitt Stadium. He suffered a concussion and cracked sternum on the play, but went on to play the rest of the season.\n\nPost-Gazette editors declined to publish the photo, looking for \"action shots\" instead, but Berman entered the image into contests where it took on a life of its own, winning a National Headliner Award. It is regarded as having changed the way that photographers look at sports, having shown the power of capturing a moment of reaction. It became one of three photos to hang in the lobby of the National Press Photographers Association headquarters, alongside Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima and the Hindenburg disaster. A copy has hung in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.\n\nA similar photo by Dozier Mobley of the Associated Press, which shows Tittle looking forward rather than down, was published in the October 2, 1964, issue of Life magazine. After at first having failed to see the appeal of the image, Tittle eventually grew to embrace it, putting the Mobley version on the back cover of his 2009 autobiography. \"That was the end of the road,\" he told the Los Angeles Times in 2008. \"It was the end of my dream. It was over.\" Pittsburgh player John Baker, who hit Tittle right before the picture was taken, ran for sheriff in his native Wake County, North Carolina in 1978, and used the photo as a campaign tool. He was elected and went on to serve for 24 years. Tittle also held a fundraiser to assist Baker in his bid for a fourth term in 1989.\n\nHonors\nIn recognition of his high school and college careers, respectively, Tittle was inducted to the Texas Sports Hall of Fame in 1987 and the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame in 1972.\n\nTittle was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame with its 1971 class, which included contemporaries Jim Brown, Norm Van Brocklin, the late Vince Lombardi, and former Giants teammate Andy Robustelli. By virtue of his membership in the pro hall of fame, he was automatically inducted as a charter member of the San Francisco 49ers Hall of Fame in 2009.\n\nThe Giants had originally retired the number 14 jersey in honor of Ward Cuff, but Tittle requested and was granted the jersey number by Giants owner Wellington Mara when he joined the team. It was retired again immediately following his retirement, and is now retired in honor of both players. In 2010, Tittle became a charter member of the New York Giants Ring of Honor.\n\nPersonal life\nAfter his retirement, he rejoined the 49ers staff and served as an assistant coach before being hired by the Giants in 1970 as a quarterback mentor. During his NFL career, Tittle worked as an insurance salesman in the off-season. After retiring, he founded his own company, Y. A. Tittle Insurance & Financial Services. Tittle appeared on the October 9, 1961 episode of To Tell the Truth as one of three challengers. Tittle claimed to be hair stylist-weekend pro wrestler Richard Smith. Tittle received one vote from the four Celebrity Panelists (Johnny Carson). \n\nUntil his death, Tittle resided in Atherton, California. His wife Minnette died in 2012. They had three sons: Michael, Patrick and John, and a daughter, Dianne Tittle de Laet. Their daughter is a harpist and poet, and in 1995 she published a biography of her father titled Giants & Heroes: A Daughter's Memories of Y. A. Tittle.\n\nIn his later life, Tittle suffered from severe dementia, which adversely affected his memory and limited his conversation to a handful of topics. Tittle died on October 8, 2017, at a hospital in Stanford, California, of natural causes.\n\n List of 500-yard passing games in the National Football League\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n\nExternal links\n\n \n \n \n\n1926 births\n2017 deaths\nAmerican football quarterbacks\nBaltimore Colts (1947–1950) players\nDeaths from dementia\nEastern Conference Pro Bowl players\nLSU Tigers football players\nNational Football League Most Valuable Player Award winners\nNational Football League players with retired numbers\nNeurological disease deaths in California\nNew York Giants players\nPeople from Atherton, California\nPeople from Marshall, Texas\nPlayers of American football from Texas\nPro Football Hall of Fame inductees\nSan Francisco 49ers players\nWestern Conference Pro Bowl players", "LaDonna Theresa Tittle (born March 13, 1946) is an American radio personality, actress and former model. Tittle is perhaps best known for her radio career from the mid–1970s until the early–2000s. Tittle most notable career stints were in Chicago at several stations; WBMX-FM, WJPC-AM alongside Tom Joyner and WGCI-AM. From 2018 until 2020, Tittle had a recurring role as Ethel Brown in the Showtime television series The Chi.\n\nBiography\n\nEarly life and education\nTittle was born the oldest of five children to Juanita (née Wiley; 1922–2000) and James Olden Tittle in the Bronzeville neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. Her mother owned a record shop and managed several businesses within the neighborhood. According to Tittle, Her mom served as part-time manager of WVON during the early 1960s. Her father was a businessman who owned several pool halls along East 47th street in the neighborhood. Sometime during her early childhood, Tittle and her brother attended school in Covert, Michigan. After her parents divorced in 1959, Tittle relocated to the Hyde Park neighborhood with her mother and siblings. As a child, Tittle sold candy at the Regal Theater during the late 1950s. During her teenage years, Tittle's family relocated to the Robert Taylor Homes public housing project; returning to the Bronzeville neighborhood. While a resident at Robert Taylor, Tittle began taking acting classes at the neighborhood club there. For high school, Tittle attended Dunbar Vocational High School; graduating in 1964. After high school, Tittle studied briefly at Loop College (now known as Harold Washington College) and later transferred to Chicago State University. At Chicago State University, Tittle majored in art education and drama with a minor in journalism; graduating in January 1971. Tittle was enrolled in the Master's of Art program at the Art Institute of Chicago shortly after graduating college but later dropped out.\n\nCareer\nPrior to graduating college, Tittle began doing modeling work with Shirley Hamilton Talent Inc along with the Mannequin Guild of Chicago. While working for Shirley Hamilton, Tittle modeled for department stores such as Marshall Fields. Tittle was offered a position to do public service announcements for WBEE-AM located in Harvey, Illinois; beginning her radio career in February 1971. Tittle later became a permeant radio personality for the station, playing jazz from 1PM until 2PM. During a break in her time at WBEE, Tittle temporarily moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin where she worked as a weekend radio personality at WNOV radio in 1972.\n\nTittle worked at WBEE radio station for two years, later returning to Chicago in May 1973. Shortly after returning to Chicago, Tittle became the midday and evening host of WBMX-FM radio, where R&B and soul music were showcased. Tittle started her career at the station reporting news and working overnight, eventually moving to weekday afternoons by 1974. Due to her growing popularity, Tittle was sought after by Johnson Publishing Company's WJPC-AM radio station. They offered to double her salary, an offer she accepted in 1978. Tittle co-hosted alongside Tom Joyner and DJ Bebe D'Banana, and later JoJo Bell. In April 1979, Tittle was featured as JET magazine's \"Beauty of the Week\" while wearing bathing suit made out of the radio station bumper stickers. Tittle began hosting the midday show from 10AM until 3PM, naming it \"Tittle In The Middle, Right In The Middle\" by April 1982. Tittle worked at WJPC until the station was sold in December 1989. Thereafter, Tittle worked part–time at WNUA-FM, a blues and smooth-jazz radio station located in Joliet, Illinois in 1991. After a year at WNUA, Tittle landed full–time work for Chicago's WGCI-AM in 1992. For the first few years, Tittle worked between the FM and AM stations until automated overnight broadcasts came into play, which resulted in her being laid off in 2000.\n\nAfter a year's hiatus from the public, Tittle launched The LaDonna Tittle TV/Radio Show on Chicago's CAN-TV in 2001. The show began as a platform to chat with entertainers until she decided to shift to cooking after viewing a soul food exhibit in 2003. Tittle also starred in R. Kelly's 2005 melodrama Trapped in the Closet, as Rosie the nosy neighbor. Tittle has received many Awards and Recognitions for her public community service, mentoring, educational self-esteem activities, and Culinary contributions. Tittle is \"radio-act-tive\"...\n\nPersonal life\nTittle was married once and had no children. Her only marriage was to Ronald Horton, a Vietnam army volunteer from 1967 until his death in 1973. Tittle dated John E. Johnson of the Johnson hair-care product family from the late–1970s until his death in 1981.\n\nReferences\n\n1946 births\nLiving people\nPeople from Chicago\nActresses from Chicago\nAfrican-American actresses\nAmerican television actresses\n20th-century American actresses\n21st-century American actresses\nRadio personalities from Chicago\n20th-century African-American women\n20th-century African-American people\n21st-century African-American women\n21st-century African-American people" ]
[ "Matt Hardy", "Version 1 (2002-2004)", "What is Version 1?", "At the beginning of 2002, it seemed Team Xtreme had patched things up. After the brand extension, however, Hardy was relegated to Heat while Jeff wrestled", "Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?", "Along with his MF'er (Mattitude Follower) Shannon Moore in his corner, 2003 began with Hardy frantically trying to lose weight to get under", "Did Hardy end up loosing weight?", "After just barely making weight,", "Did he fight against someone after accomplishing this weight loss goal?", "Hardy defeated Billy Kidman at No Way Out to win the Cruiserweight title.", "Did he kept the Cruiserweight title for a long time?", "At WrestleMania XIX, he successfully defended it against Rey Mysterio.", "Did anyone else challange him for the tittle?", "Hardy lost the Cruiserweight Championship to Mysterio in the main event" ]	C_8bf9dcbf1a034e02873104f08a75bf5d_1	What happened after he lost the title to Rey Misterio?	7	What happened after Matt Hardy lost the Cruiserweight title to Rey Misterio?	Matt Hardy	At the beginning of 2002, it seemed Team Xtreme had patched things up. After the brand extension, however, Hardy was relegated to Heat while Jeff wrestled on the main show, Raw. On the August 12 episode of Raw, Hardy turned against Jeff during Jeff's match against Rob Van Dam, because Hardy was frustrated at not receiving a match against Van Dam for the number one contendership for the Intercontinental Championship. A short time later, Hardy joined the SmackDown! roster, and began dubbing himself "Matt Hardy: Version 1", complete with a "version 1" hand signal. Hardy defeated The Undertaker on the September 12 and October 3 episodes of the show, due to interference from Brock Lesnar. Along with his MF'er (Mattitude Follower) Shannon Moore in his corner, 2003 began with Hardy frantically trying to lose weight to get under the 215 lb (98 kg) weight limit to compete for the Cruiserweight Championship. After just barely making weight, Hardy defeated Billy Kidman at No Way Out to win the Cruiserweight title. At WrestleMania XIX, he successfully defended it against Rey Mysterio. Hardy lost the Cruiserweight Championship to Mysterio in the main event of the June 5 edition of SmackDown - the first and only time a Cruiserweight Championship match main evented a show. After dropping the Cruiserweight Championship, Hardy briefly feuded with Eddie Guerrero, but was unsuccessful in capturing Guerrero's United States Championship or Tag Team Championship. The Mattitude faction then expanded to include Crash Holly as Moore's "Moore-on" (apprentice). He later disbanded the group in November and returned to Raw in order to be able to travel and work with his then girlfriend Lita, who just returned from an injury. On his first night back, he turned on Lita in storyline after teasing a proposal to her. He defeated Christian, who was vying for Lita's affections, on the following edition of Raw. In April 2004, Hardy saved Lita from getting attacked by Kane. Hardy defeated Kane at Vengeance, but lost a match against Kane at SummerSlam. On the August 23 episode of Raw, Hardy was chokeslamed off the stage by Kane. Hardy then spent almost a year off from wrestling due to a severe knee injury. CANNOTANSWER	After dropping the Cruiserweight Championship, Hardy briefly feuded with Eddie Guerrero,	Matthew Moore Hardy (born September 23, 1974) is an American professional wrestler currently signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW). He is also known for his time with WWE, Impact Wrestling, and Ring of Honor (ROH). With his real life brother Jeff, Hardy gained notoriety in WWF's tag team division during the 2000s due to his participation in TLC matches. He is a 14-time world tag team champion, having held the WWE World Tag Team Championship six times, the WWE Raw Tag Team Championship three times, the WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship, ROH World Tag Team Championship, and WCW Tag Team Championship once each, and the TNA World Tag Team Championships twice. Wrestling through four separate decades, Hardy has kept himself relevant partially through a variety of different gimmicks and his use of social media. In 2002, Hardy began a solo career in WWE. His subsequent "Version 1" persona was named Best Gimmick by the Wrestling Observer Newsletter. Hardy's eccentric "Broken" gimmick, which he debuted in 2016 (and which was renamed "Woken" following his subsequent WWE return), garnered praise from wrestling critics and earned him multiple awards, including a second Best Gimmick award, becoming one of the most talked about characters in all of wrestling. As a singles wrestler, Hardy has won three world championships (one ECW Championship, and two TNA World Heavyweight Championships). All totaled between WWE, TNA/Impact, and ROH, Hardy has held 21 total championships. Early life Hardy was born in Cameron, North Carolina, the son of Gilbert and Ruby Moore Hardy. He is the older brother of Jeff Hardy. Their mother died of brain cancer in 1987. Hardy played baseball as a child and throughout high school, but had stopped by his senior year. He also played football, either as a linebacker or a defensive end. Hardy was a good student at Union Pines High School in North Carolina, and was a nominee for the "Morehead Award", a scholarship to any university in North Carolina. Hardy attended University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where he majored in engineering; after a year, however, he dropped out due to his father being ill. He then attended Sandhills Community College in Pinehurst to gain his associate degree. Professional wrestling career Early career (1992–2001) Hardy, along with his brother Jeff and friends, started their own federation, the Trampoline Wrestling Federation (TWF) and mimicked the moves they saw on television. Shortly after Hardy sent in a tape for the World Championship Wrestling (WCW) Amateur Challenge using the ring name High Voltage, a tag team named High Voltage began competing in WCW, causing Hardy to change his name to Surge. A few years later, it was revealed to him by Chris Kanyon that the tape had been kept in the WCW Power Plant, watched multiple times, and that the name High Voltage was blatantly stolen from it. Beginning in 1994, The Hardys wrestled for several North Carolina-based independent circuit promotions and adapted a number of alter-egos. As The Wolverine, Hardy captured the New England Wrestling Alliance (NEWA) Championship in May 1994. As High Voltage, he teamed with Venom to claim the New Frontier Wrestling Association (NFWA) Tag Team Championship in March 1995. A month later, High Voltage defeated the Willow for the NFWA Championship. In 1997, Matt and Jeff created their own wrestling promotion, The Organization of Modern Extreme Grappling Arts (frequently abbreviated to OMEGA Championship Wrestling, or simply OMEGA), in which Matt competed under the name High Voltage. Both Matt and Jeff took apart the ring and put it back together at every event they had, while Matt sewed all the costumes worn in OMEGA. The promotion folded in October 1999, after both Matt and Jeff signed with the World Wrestling Federation. World Wrestling Federation/Entertainment Early years (1994–1998) Hardy worked as a jobber for the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) from 1994 up until he signed a full-time contract in 1998. His first WWF match was against Nikolai Volkoff on the May 23, 1994 episode of Monday Night Raw, which he lost by submission. A night later at a taping of WWF Wrestling Challenge, he lost a match against Owen Hart. He continued to wrestle sporadically in the WWF throughout 1994 and 1995, losing matches against Crush, Razor Ramon, Hakushi, Owen Hart, the imposter Undertaker, Hunter Hearst Helmsley and "The Ringmaster" Steve Austin. Hardy teamed with Jeff for the first time in the WWF in 1996, losing to teams such as The Smoking Gunns and The Grimm Twins on WWF television. Matt and Jeff had a short lived feud with The Headbangers (Thrasher and Mosh), losing to the duo twice in 1997. It was during this time that Matt and Jeff experimented with different ring names, at one stage being called Ingus (Matt) and Wildo Jinx (Jeff). In Matt's final singles match for the promotion before signing a full-time contract he lost to Val Venis on a taping of Shotgun in 1998. The Hardy Boyz (1998–2001) It was not until 1998, however, (at the height of The Attitude Era) that the Hardy brothers were given full-time WWF contracts and sent to train with former wrestler Dory Funk, Jr. The Hardy Boyz used a cruiserweight, fast-paced high flying style in their matches, often leaping from great heights to do damage to their opponents (and themselves in the process). In 1999, while feuding with Edge and Christian, the duo briefly picked up Michael Hayes as a manager. At King of the Ring, The Hardyz defeated Edge and Christian to earn the #1 contendership for the WWF Tag Team Championship. On July 5, they defeated The APA to win their first Tag Team Championship. They soon dumped Hayes and briefly picked up Gangrel as a manager, after Gangrel turned on Edge and Christian. At No Mercy, The Hardyz defeated Edge and Christian in the first ever tag team ladder match. At the Royal Rumble pay-per-view, The Hardyz defeated The Dudley Boyz in the first ever tag team tables match. They competed against The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian for the Tag Team Championships at WrestleMania 2000 in the first ever Triangle Ladder match, but were unsuccessful. Hardy won the Hardcore Championship on April 24, 2000, on Raw Is War, by defeating Crash Holly, but lost it back to Holly three days later on SmackDown!, when Holly applied the "24/7 rule" during Hardy's title defense against Jeff. The Hardy Boyz then found a new manager in Matt's real-life girlfriend Lita. Together, the three became known as "Team Xtreme". The Hardy Boyz competed in the first ever Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match, for the WWF Tag Team Championship against The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian, but were unsuccessful. At Unforgiven, The Hardyz defeated Edge and Christian in a steel cage match to win the tag team championship, and successfully retained it the following night on Raw Is War against Edge and Christian in a ladder match. In April 2001, The Hardyz began feuding with Stone Cold Steve Austin and Triple H (known as The Power Trip), which also led to a singles push for both Matt and Jeff. Hardy helped Jeff defeat Triple H for the Intercontinental Championship, and shortly after Hardy defeated Eddie Guerrero to win the European Championship on SmackDown!. At Backlash he retained the title against Guerrero and Christian in a triple threat, and against Edge the following night on Raw. Throughout the year, the Hardy Boyz continued to win as a tag team, winning the WWF Tag Team Titles two more times, and the WCW Tag Team Championship during the Invasion. By the end of the year, the Hardy Boyz began a storyline where they were having trouble co-existing. This culminated in a match between the two, with Lita as the guest referee, at the Vengeance pay-per-view, which Jeff won. Hardy defeated Jeff and Lita the following night on Raw in a two-on-one handicap match. Version 1 gimmick and feud with Kane (2002–2004) At the beginning of 2002, it seemed Team Xtreme had patched things up. After the brand extension, however, Matt was relegated to Heat while Jeff wrestled on the main show, Raw. On the August 12 episode of Raw, Hardy turned heel by attacking Jeff during Jeff's match against Rob Van Dam, because Hardy was frustrated at not receiving a match against Van Dam for the number one contendership for the Intercontinental Championship. A short time later, Hardy joined the SmackDown! roster, and began dubbing himself "Matt Hardy: Version 1", complete with a "version 1" hand signal. Hardy defeated The Undertaker on the September 12 and October 3 episodes of the show, due to interference from Brock Lesnar. Along with his Mattitude Follower Shannon Moore in his corner, 2003 began with Hardy frantically trying to lose weight to get under the weight limit to compete for the Cruiserweight Championship. After just barely making weight, Hardy defeated Billy Kidman at No Way Out to win the Cruiserweight title. At WrestleMania XIX, he successfully defended it against Rey Mysterio. Hardy lost the Cruiserweight Championship to Mysterio in the main event of the June 5 episode of SmackDown! - the first and only time a Cruiserweight Championship match main evented a show. After dropping the Cruiserweight Championship, Hardy briefly feuded with Eddie Guerrero, but was unsuccessful in capturing Guerrero's United States Championship or WWE Tag Team Championship. The Mattitude faction then expanded to include Crash Holly as Moore's "Moore-on" (apprentice). He later disbanded the group in November and returned to Raw in order to be able to travel and work with his then girlfriend Lita, who just returned from an injury. On his first night back, he turned on Lita in storyline after teasing a proposal to her. He defeated Christian, who was vying for Lita's affections, on the following edition of Raw. In April 2004, Hardy saved Lita from getting attacked by Kane, turning face in the process. Hardy defeated Kane in a no disqualification match at Vengeance, but lost a "Till Death To Us Part" match against Kane at SummerSlam, resulting in Lita being forced to marry Kane. On the August 23 episode of Raw, Hardy was chokeslamed off the stage by Kane during the wedding. Hardy then spent almost a year off from wrestling due to a severe knee injury. Departure and sporadic appearances (2005) Along with his friend Rhyno, Hardy was released by WWE on April 11, 2005. Hardy's release was largely due to unprofessional conduct with social media after discovering that Lita was having a real-life affair with his best friend Edge. The public knowledge of the affair and Hardy's release led to Edge and Lita receiving jeers from the crowds at WWE events, often resulting in chants of "You screwed Matt!", and, "We want Matt!", which meant kayfabe storylines being affected considering that Lita was married to Kane at the time in kayfabe. Edge and Lita used the affair and fan backlash to become a hated on-screen couple, which led to Lita turning heel for the first time in over five years. Fans began a petition on the internet, wanting WWE to re-sign Hardy, and amassed over fifteen thousand signatures. Hardy released two character promotional vignettes, that he was planning to use before he was offered a new contract by WWE. Hardy called himself The Angelic Diablo with the tagline "the scar will become a symbol" in reference to the way in which he had been treated by Lita and WWE. On the June 20 episode of Raw, during the storyline wedding of Edge and Lita, Hardy's entrance music and video were played when the priest asked if anyone had a reason why Edge and Lita should not be wed. Independent circuit and Ring of Honor (2005) Following his WWE release, Matt returned to the independent circuit and wrestled several matches for the Allied Powers Wrestling Federation (APWF), International Wrestling Cartel (IWC) and Big Time Wrestling (BTW). Hardy appeared at a scheduled Ring of Honor (ROH) event on July 16, 2005, in Woodbridge, Connecticut where he defeated Christopher Daniels via submission. Hardy also cut a brief worked shoot promo where he criticized WWE and John Laurinaitis. Following his official return to WWE, Hardy was met with backlash following a match with Homicide from the fans at a subsequent ROH event, which Hardy won. The next day at his final ROH appearance, he lost to Roderick Strong. Return to WWE Feud with Edge (2005–2006) On July 11, 2005, on Raw, Hardy attacked Edge backstage and again later during Edge's match with Kane. Before being escorted out of the building by security, Hardy stated that Edge (calling him by his real name of "Adam") and Lita would pay for their actions and told fans that they could see him at Ring of Honor while security officials and event staff were trying to restrain him. Hardy also called out Johnny Ace as security had him in handcuffs taking him out of the arena. This caused an uproar amongst fans, who were confused and wondered if the whole thing was a work or a shoot. Similar occurrences repeated during the following two weeks. On the August 1 episode of Raw, Vince McMahon officially announced Hardy's return to WWE, adding that Hardy would face Edge at SummerSlam. Hardy made his in-ring return, defeating Snitsky on the August 8 Raw. Seconds after the victory, Hardy was attacked by Edge, and as he was being carried backstage, Matt counterattacked Edge in the locker room. On August 21 at SummerSlam, their match came to a premature end when Edge dropped Hardy onto the top of a ring post, causing him to bleed heavily. The referee ended the match on the grounds that Hardy could not continue, and Edge was declared the winner. After SummerSlam, the two continued feuding on Raw, including a Street Fight on August 29 that resulted in Hardy performing a Side Effect on Edge off the entrance stage and into electrical equipment below; the match ended in a no contest. At Unforgiven, Edge faced Hardy in a steel cage match. Hardy caught an interfering Lita with the Twist of Fate and won the match with a leg drop off the top of the cage. Hardy and Edge faced each other on October 3 at WWE Raw Homecoming in a Loser Leaves Raw ladder match. Edge's briefcase holding his Money in the Bank contract for his WWE Championship opportunity was suspended above the ring. The winner of the match received the contract and the loser was forced to leave Raw. Edge tied Hardy's arms in the ropes, and Lita trapped Hardy in a crucifix hold, leaving Hardy only able to watch Edge win. With his defeat at the hands of Edge, Hardy was moved to the SmackDown! brand where he re-debuted with a win over Simon Dean on October 21 in Reno, Nevada. One week later, Hardy won the fan vote to represent Team SmackDown! (alongside Rey Mysterio) to challenge Team Raw (Edge and Chris Masters) at Taboo Tuesday. Edge, however, refused to wrestle and sent Snitsky in place of him in the match, which Hardy and Mysterio won. Back on SmackDown!, Hardy started an angle with MNM (Johnny Nitro and Joey Mercury) and their manager Melina when Melina approached Hardy, seemingly wanting Hardy to join with her team. Hardy refused the offer, which led to him facing the tag team on several occasions with a variety of partners. On July 25, after the SmackDown! taping, Hardy was taken out of action after doctors found the remnants of the staph infection that had plagued him the previous year. He was sidelined until August 25 while he healed. Upon his return to action, Hardy feuded against childhood friend and reigning Cruiserweight Champion Gregory Helms. At No Mercy, in their home state, Hardy beat Helms in a non-title match. The two met again at Survivor Series, where Hardy's team won in a clean sweep. They wrestled one final match, a one time appearance in Booker T's Pro Wrestling Alliance (PWA) promotion, where Hardy defeated Helms in a North Carolina Street Fight. The Hardy Boyz reunion (2006–2007) On the November 21, 2006 episode of ECW on Sci Fi, Hardy and Jeff competed in a match together for the first time in almost five years, defeating The Full Blooded Italians. At December to Dismember, the Hardy Boyz issued an open challenge to any tag team who wanted to face them. MNM answered their challenge by reuniting at December to Dismember, a match won by the Hardy Boyz. At Armageddon, Hardy and Jeff competed against Paul London and Brian Kendrick, MNM, and Dave Taylor and William Regal in a Ladder match for the WWE Tag Team Championship but lost. Subsequently, he and Jeff feuded with MNM after the legitimate incident where they injured Mercury's face at Armageddon. This led to a long term rivalry, and at the Royal Rumble, Hardy and Jeff defeated MNM. Mercury and Hardy continued to feud on SmackDown! until Mercury was released from WWE on March 26. The night after WrestleMania 23 on Raw, the Hardys competed in a 10-team battle royal for the World Tag Team Championship. They won the titles for the sixth time from then WWE Champion John Cena and Shawn Michaels after last eliminating Lance Cade and Trevor Murdoch. This started a feud with Cade and Murdoch, and the Hardys successfully retained their World Tag Team Championship in their first title defense at Backlash. The Hardy Boyz also successfully retained their titles at Judgment Day against Cade and Murdoch. One month later at One Night Stand, they defeated The World's Greatest Tag Team to retain the titles in a Ladder match. The following night on Raw, Vince McMahon demanded that The Hardys once again defend their championships against Cade and Murdoch. The Hardys were defeated after Murdoch pushed Jeff's foot off the bottom rope during Cade's pinfall, causing the three count to continue. They invoked their rematch clause against Cade and Murdoch at Vengeance: Night of Champions, but were unsuccessful. Feud with MVP and championship reigns (2007–2009) On the July 6, 2007 episode of SmackDown!, Hardy won a non-title match against United States Champion Montel Vontavious Porter (MVP), which resulted in a feud between the two. Hardy was defeated by MVP at The Great American Bash for the United States Championship. MVP then claimed that he was "better than Hardy at everything", which led to a series of contests between Hardy and MVP, such as a basketball game, an arm wrestling contest, and a chess match which MVP "sneezed" on and ruined when Hardy put him in check. MVP challenged Hardy to a boxing match at Saturday Night's Main Event XXXV, however MVP was legitimately diagnosed with the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome. Since MVP was unable to compete, Hardy faced his replacement, former world champion boxer, Evander Holyfield. The match ended in a no contest after MVP entered the ring to verbally abuse Holyfield, who then knocked him out. MVP also challenged Hardy to a beer drinking contest at SummerSlam, but as revenge for what happened at SNME, Hardy allowed Stone Cold Steve Austin to replace him; Austin simply performed a stunner on MVP then kept drinking. After a segment involving MVP inadvertently choosing Hardy as his tag-team partner, Theodore Long promptly set up a match against Deuce 'n Domino for the WWE Tag Team Championship on the August 31 episode of SmackDown! which Hardy and MVP were able to win, therefore setting up Hardy's first reign as WWE Tag Team Champion. Hardy and MVP retained the titles at Unforgiven in a rematch against former champions Deuce 'n Domino. Hardy was scheduled to face MVP at Cyber Sunday, but due to a real-life head injury sustained on the October 26 episode of SmackDown!, he was not medically cleared to compete. As part of the storyline, Hardy continually asked MVP for a shot at the United States Championship but MVP refused stating that he was more focused on the Tag Team Championship. On the November 16 episode of SmackDown!, Hardy and MVP dropped the WWE Tag Team Championship to John Morrison and The Miz. Despite the fact that Hardy was hurt, MVP immediately invoked the rematch clause. After the rematch, in which Hardy was forced to tap out, MVP attacked Hardy, repeatedly targeting his knee. It was later confirmed by WWE.com that Hardy had suffered an injury at his former partner's hands and that he might not be able to compete at Survivor Series. Despite Hardy's absence at Survivor Series, his team was able to win the match. On November 21, WWE's official website reported that Hardy underwent an emergency appendectomy in Tampa, Florida after his appendix burst. Hardy made an appearance at the December 31 episode of Raw supporting his brother Jeff. To further Jeff's storyline with Randy Orton, however, Hardy was attacked by Orton. Hardy made his return at a live event in Muncie, Indiana on March 1, 2008. On March 30, 2008, at WrestleMania XXIV, during the Money in the Bank ladder match Hardy cut through the crowd and attacked MVP to prevent him from winning the match. He made his official in-ring return the next night on Raw, losing a singles match to WWE Champion Randy Orton. On the April 4 episode of SmackDown, Hardy faced MVP in a non-title match, which he won, re-igniting their storyline rivalry. On April 27, 2008, Hardy defeated MVP to win the United States Championship at Backlash, and successfully retained his title against MVP five days later on SmackDown. Hardy declared himself as a fighting champion that would take on all challenges, defending the United States championship against Shelton Benjamin, Elijah Burke, Chuck Palumbo, Mr. Kennedy, Chavo Guerrero and Umaga. Hardy was drafted to the ECW brand on the June 23, 2008 episode of Raw during the 2008 WWE Draft, in the process making the United States Championship exclusive to ECW. He dropped the United States Championship to Shelton Benjamin at the Great American Bash pay-per-view on July 20, 2008, which meant that the title returned to SmackDown. On the July 22 episode of ECW, Hardy became the number one contender to Mark Henry's ECW Championship after defeating John Morrison, The Miz and Finlay in a fatal four-way match. He won the title match at SummerSlam by disqualification due to interference from Henry's manager, Tony Atlas, thus he failed to win the title. Due to the ending of the pay-per-view match, Hardy received a rematch for the title on the next episode of ECW, but again failed to win the title when Henry pinned him after a distraction by Atlas. At Unforgiven, Hardy won the ECW Championship during the Championship scramble match, defeating then-champion Henry, The Miz, Finlay and Chavo Guerrero by pinning the Miz with three minutes left, marking his first world heavyweight championship win. He continued to feud with Henry until No Mercy, where Hardy successfully retained the title. Hardy lost the title to Jack Swagger on the January 13, 2009 episode of ECW, which was taped on January 12. Feud with Jeff Hardy and departure (2009–2010) At the 2009 Royal Rumble pay-per-view, after losing an ECW Championship rematch to Swagger, Hardy turned on his brother when he hit Jeff with a steel chair, allowing Edge to win the WWE Championship, turning heel in the process. On the January 27, 2009 episode of ECW, it was announced by General Manager Theodore Long that Hardy had requested, and been granted, his release from ECW and had re-signed with the SmackDown brand. As part of the buildup to this feud, Matt strongly implied that he was responsible for all of Jeff's accidents leading back to November, including an assault in a hotel stairwell that prevented Jeff from appearing at Survivor Series, an automobile accident where Jeff's car was run off the road, and a pyrotechnics malfunction where part of the pyro from Jeff's entrance was fired directly at Jeff, in an attempt to stop Jeff holding the WWE Championship. Despite Hardy's attempts to goad Jeff into fighting him, Jeff refused to fight his brother, but, on the March 6 episode of SmackDown, Jeff attacked him during a promo where Matt implied that he was also responsible for the fire that burned down Jeff's house, going so far as to reveal that he had in his possession a dog collar that supposedly belonged to Jeff's dog, Jack (who died in the fire), that he claimed to have salvaged from the wreckage of the house. At WrestleMania 25, Matt defeated Jeff in an Extreme Rules match, and in a stretcher match on the following episode of SmackDown. On the April 13 episode of Raw, Hardy was drafted to the Raw brand as part of the WWE draft. Despite the fact that the two were on different brands, he continued his feud with Jeff. Two weeks later, in a rematch from WrestleMania, Hardy lost to Jeff in an "I Quit" match at Backlash, in which he legitimately broke his hand. Hardy continued to wrestle with his hand in a cast, incorporating it into his persona and claiming that he was wrestling under protest. He reignited his feud with MVP on Raw for the United States Championship. He also formed a tag team with William Regal, and the two acted as henchmen for General Manager Vickie Guerrero. At the June 22 taping of WWE Superstars, Hardy suffered yet another injury, when his intestines went through his abdominal wall, during a triple threat match against MVP and Kofi Kingston. Hardy had suffered a tear in his abdominal muscle two years previously, but had not needed surgery until it worsened, and became a danger to his health. He was then traded back to the SmackDown brand on June 29, and underwent surgery for the torn abdominal muscle on July 2. He made his return on the August 7 episode of SmackDown as the special guest referee in the World Heavyweight Championship match between his brother, Jeff, and CM Punk, and helped Jeff retain the championship by counting the pinfall. The following week Hardy turned face again when he saved his brother when CM Punk and The Hart Dynasty attacked both Jeff and John Morrison. On the August 21 episode of SmackDown, after apologizing for his past actions towards Jeff and admitting that he was not behind any of Jeff's accidents, he had his first match back after his injury when he teamed with Jeff and John Morrison to defeat The Hart Dynasty and CM Punk, when Matt pinned Punk. In early 2010, Hardy began an on-screen relationship with Maria; but was brief and the relationship ended when Maria was released from her WWE contract. On the March 5 episode of SmackDown, Hardy qualified for the Money in the Bank ladder match at WrestleMania XXVI by defeating Drew McIntyre, but was unsuccessful at WrestleMania, as the match was won by Jack Swagger. Hardy was suspended by Vince McMahon because he attacked McIntyre after McIntyre lost to Kofi Kingston at Over the Limit. He was able to get his revenge on McIntyre during the Viewer's Choice episode of Raw when chosen as the opponent for McIntyre, with General Manager Theodore Long stating that Hardy was suspended from SmackDown, but not from Raw. On the following episode of SmackDown, however, Vickie Guerrero announced that, per orders of Vince McMahon, Hardy had been suspended from all WWE programming. However, at Fatal 4-Way, Hardy prevented McIntyre from regaining the Intercontinental Championship, thus continuing their feud. On the following edition of SmackDown, he was reinstated by Long and had a match with McIntyre, which Hardy won. After the match, it was announced that McIntyre's visa had legitimately expired and was sent back to Scotland, thus ending their feud. Hardy was featured in the SmackDown Money in the Bank ladder match but was unsuccessful in winning with Kane coming out victorious. On September 12, WWE confirmed they had sent Hardy home from a European tour. Following this, Hardy began posting videos on his YouTube channel expressing his disinterest in the WWE product and insisting that he wanted to be released from the company. On October 15, 2010, WWE announced that Hardy had been released from his contract. Hardy later stated that his release had been in effect two weeks before WWE made the announcement. Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (2011) On January 9, 2011, Hardy made his debut for Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) at the Genesis pay-per-view, as part of the stable Immortal. He was the surprise opponent for Rob Van Dam, and defeated him to prevent Van Dam from receiving a match for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship, held by Hardy's brother Jeff. In the main event, Hardy attempted to interfere in Jeff's World Heavyweight Championship match with Mr. Anderson, but was stopped by Van Dam, which led to Jeff losing both the match and the championship. On the January 13 episode of Impact!, the Hardy Boyz reunited to defeat Anderson and Van Dam in a tag team match, following interference from Beer Money, Inc. On February 13 at Against All Odds, Van Dam defeated Hardy in a rematch. On the following episode of Impact!, Hardy, along with the rest of Immortal and Ric Flair, betrayed Fortune. On March 13 at Victory Road, Hardy was defeated by Flair's previous protégé, A.J. Styles. On April 17 at Lockdown, Immortal, represented by Hardy, Abyss, Bully Ray and Ric Flair, were defeated by Fortune members James Storm, Kazarian and Robert Roode and Christopher Daniels, who replaced an injured A.J. Styles, in a Lethal Lockdown match. On the April 21 episode of Impact!, Hardy faced Sting for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship, Hardy's first World Title match in TNA, but was defeated. The following month, Hardy was granted a shot at the TNA World Tag Team Championship against Beer Money, Inc. (James Storm and Robert Roode). While the champions looked to defend the title against the Hardy Boyz, Matt instead introduced the returning Chris Harris, Storm's old tag team partner, as his partner for the title match. The match took place at Sacrifice, where Storm and Roode retained their titles. On June 21, it was reported that TNA had suspended Hardy. On August 20, Hardy was released from TNA following a DUI arrest that occurred earlier that same day. Return to the independent circuit (2011–2017) Hardy announced his retirement from full-time professional wrestling due to injuries on September 1, 2011. He issued a challenge to his long-time rival MVP, who was wrestling in Japan at the time, to one final match at "Crossfire Live!" in Nashville. The event was held May 19, 2012 and benefited the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Hardy won the match. Throughout 2012, Hardy wrestled sporadically on the independent circuit, working with promotions such as Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling, Pro Wrestling Syndicate and Northeast Wrestling. On October 5, Hardy was defeated by Kevin Steen at Pro Wrestling Xperience's An Evil Twist of Fate. On November 11, Hardy, as the masked wrestler Rahway Reaper, defeated the Pro Wrestling Syndicate Kevin Matthews, winning the championship. On February 9, 2013, Hardy lost the Pro Wrestling Syndicate Championship back to Matthews. On February 16, 2013, at Family Wrestling Entertainment's No Limit, Hardy wrestled a TLC match for the FWE Heavyweight Championship against the champion Carlito and Tommy Dreamer, but he was defeated. On November 30, 2013, at WrestleCade, Hardy defeated Carlito to become the first ever WrestleCade Champion. On May 3, 2014, following a match between Christian York and Drolix, Hardy defeated Drolix to become the new MCW Heavyweight Champion. At Maryland Championship Wrestling's Shane Shamrock Cup, Hardy defeated Luke Hawx in a TLC match for Hardy's title and Hawx's Extreme Rising World title. Hardy won the match, but he gave back the title to Hawx. On October 4, Hardy lost the MCW Heavyweight Championship back to Drolix, following outside interference from Kevin Eck. On February 9, 2015, Hardy appeared on FWE's "No Limits 2015" iPPV, challenging Drew Galloway for the ICW World Heavyweight Championship, but was defeated. On November 28, 2015, Hardy lost the WrestleCade Championship to Jeff Jarrett at WrestleCade IV in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Hardy regained the title in a triple-threat cage match against Jarrett and Ethan Carter III in Hickory, North Carolina on May 20, 2016. He appeared at the #DELETEWCPW event for What Culture Pro Wrestling (WCPW) in Nottingham, England on November 30. Hardy, billed as "Broken" Matt Hardy, lost a no-disqualification match to Bully Ray, with Ray proposing the no-disqualification stipulation at the last minute, and Hardy accepting there and then. Return to ROH (2012–2014) At Death Before Dishonor X: State of Emergency in 2012, Hardy returned to Ring of Honor, confronting Adam Cole and challenging him to a match for the ROH World Television Championship. On December 16 at Final Battle 2012: Doomsday, Hardy defeated Cole in a non-title match. At the following iPPV, 11th Anniversary Show on March 2, 2013, Hardy joined the villainous S.C.U.M. stable. On April 5 at the Supercard of Honor VII iPPV, Hardy unsuccessfully challenged Matt Taven for the ROH World Television Championship in a three-way elimination match, which also included Adam Cole. On June 22 at Best in the World 2013, Hardy defeated former S.C.U.M. stablemate Kevin Steen in a No Disqualification match to become the number one contender to the ROH World Championship. Hardy received his title shot at the following day's Ring of Honor Wrestling tapings, but was defeated by the defending champion, Jay Briscoe. Later that same day, S.C.U.M. was forced to disband after losing a Steel Cage Warfare match against Team ROH. On December 14, 2013, at Final Battle 2013, Hardy defeated Adam Page in a singles match; later on in the main event, Hardy aided Adam Cole in retaining his title and forming a tag team with him. After aiding Cole at Supercard of Honor VIII, Hardy was given Jay Briscoe's unofficial "Real World Title" belt, which he renamed the "ROH Iconic Championship". In July, Hardy opted out of his ROH contract and went back to TNA. Return to OMEGA (2013–2018) Matt announced that OMEGA would return in January 2013 with an event titled "Chinlock For Chuck". The main event featured Matt, Jeff, Shane "Hurricane" Helms and "Cowboy" James Storm defeating Gunner, Steve Corino, CW Anderson and Lodi. On October 12, 2013, at "Chapel Thrill", Hardy announced a Tournament for the OMEGA Heavyweight Championship which featured himself vs. CW Anderson and Shane "Hurricane" Helms vs. "The King" Shane Williams. After Hardy's qualifying match he was attacked by CW but was saved by the returning Willow the Whisp. Hardy won that match and advanced to the finals. On November 21, 2015, Matt won the OMEGA Heavyweight Championship for the second time, defeating former student Trevor Lee. Following this, Matt (upon regaining the TNA world title as part of his villainous egotistical "Iconic" gimmick) began proclaiming himself to be the only world champion that matters, and the only "true" world champion in wrestling, as he held both the TNA and OMEGA Championships, which (according to him) put him above any other promotions' world champions. Throughout 2016, Hardy defended the TNA and OMEGA titles jointly at OMEGA events as part of his "only true world champion" gimmick. On January 29, The Hardys won the OMEGA Tag Team Championships. Return to TNA The Hardys third reunion (2014–2015) On July 24, 2014, Hardy returned to TNA and reunited with Jeff to reform The Hardys for the third time. At the Destination X episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys were defeated by The Wolves in a match for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On the August 14 episode of Impact Wrestling, Team 3D (formerly the Dudley Boyz) challenged The Hardys to a match, which Team 3D won. At the Hardcore Justice episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys and Team 3D talked about a match involving themselves and The Wolves. When The Wolves were asked by the two teams, they agreed. Later that night, Kurt Angle announced all three teams would compete in a best of three series for the TNA World Tag Team Championship with the winners of the first match choosing the stipulation of the next one. The Hardys won the second match of the series on the September 10 episode of Impact Wrestling in a tables match and choose a ladder match for the third match of the series. The Hardys were unsuccessful in winning that match on the September 17 episode of Impact Wrestling, as the Wolves won that match. The Wolves then went on to pick the final match of the series to be a Full Metal Mayhem match to take place on the October 8 episode of Impact Wrestling. The Hardys were unsuccessful in that match as the Wolves won that match. On October 22, The Hardys entered a number one contenders tournament for the TNA World Tag Team Championship defeating The BroMans (Jessie Godderz and DJ Z) in the first round of the tournament. On the October 29 episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys defeated Team Dixie (Ethan Carter III and Tyrus) in the semifinals to advance to the finals of the tournament, where they defeated Samoa Joe and Low Ki to become number one contenders for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On the January 16, 2015 episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys defeated the Wolves. At the Lockdown episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys were defeated by The Revolution in a six sides of steel cage match for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On the February 20 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy and The Wolves defeated The Revolution in a six-man tag team match. In March, The Hardys participated in a tournament for the vacant TNA World Tag Team Championship. On March 16, 2015, Matt and Jeff won an Ultimate X match for the titles. On May 8, 2015, Hardy vacated the TNA World Tag Team Championship due to his brother Jeff being injured. World Heavyweight Champion (2015–2016) On June 28, 2015, Hardy was among the five wrestlers who competed for the TNA King of the Mountain Championship at Slammiversary, with Jeff Jarrett ultimately emerging victorious. On the July 8 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy requested a world title shot against Ethan Carter III, but was denied and forced to face the Dirty Heels (Austin Aries and Bobby Roode) in a handicap match, which he lost. On the July 22 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy defeated Roode in a Tables match to become the #1 contender for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship. On the August 5 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy got his shot at the title against EC3 in a Full Metal Mayhem match, but failed to win the title. On the September 2 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy got another shot at the TNA World Heavyweight Championship against EC3, but again failed to win the title; as part of the storyline, Jeff Hardy was forced to act as Ethan Carter's personal assistant. On the September 30 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy was added to the Ethan Carter III vs. Drew Galloway main event match for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship at Bound for Glory after he and Galloway defeated Carter and Tyrus, making it a three-way match, following which Jeff, who EC3 had just "fired" in the previous episode, was revealed to be the special guest referee. On October 4 at Bound for Glory, Matt won the TNA World Heavyweight Championship by pinning Galloway. However, EC3 filed an injunction (kayfabe) that banned Hardy from appearing on Impact Wrestling for a month, which forced Hardy to relinquish the title in order to stay on the show. However, Hardy had been participating in the TNA World Title Series for the vacant title. He qualified to the round of 16 by defeating Davey Richards, Robbie E and Eddie Edwards. He then advanced to the round of 8 by defeating the King of the Mountain Champion Bobby Roode and then to Jessie Godderz to continue his winning streak. The semifinals and finals were held on the January 5, 2016, live episode of Impact Wrestling during its debut on Pop TV, in which he defeated Eric Young to advance to the final round. Hardy faced EC3 in the TNA World Title Series finals, but lost the match via pinfall. Hardy won the TNA World Title from EC3 on the January 19, 2016 episode of Impact Wrestling, becoming the first man to defeat him in a one-on-one match in TNA. During the match a double turn took place; Hardy turned heel after Tyrus betrayed EC3. The following week on Impact Wrestling, Jeff Hardy had confronted him about last week and issued a challenge to Matt for the World Heavyweight title in the main event and Matt accepted. However, later before the main event could begin, Eric Young and Bram attacked Jeff from behind. Kurt Angle then came out to try save Jeff, and Matt had Tyrus attack Angle from behind. While Matt watched from the ramp, Young attacked Jeff with the Piledriver off the apron through a table. The following week, he successfully retained his title against Angle. At Lockdown, he retained his title in a Six-side of steel match against Ethan Carter III, with the help of Rockstar Spud. He lost his title against Drew Galloway on the March 15 episode of Impact Wrestling, after a match featuring EC3 and Jeff Hardy. Two weeks later he received a rematch for the title on Impact Wrestling, but was again defeated by Galloway. After losing the title he started a feud with Jeff. On the April 19 episode of Impact Wrestling, and an I Quit match ended in a no-contest as both Matt and Jeff were badly injured and Matt was taken out to the hospital on a stretcher. The Broken Universe (2016–2017) Hardy returned on May 17 episode of Impact Wrestling, revealing himself to be one of the impostor Willows behind the attacks on Jeff. Later that night, he attacked Jeff. In the following weeks, Hardy debuted a new persona as a "Broken" man with part of his hair bleached blonde along with a strange sophisticated accent, blaming Jeff (who he began referring to as "Brother Nero", Nero being Jeff's middle name) for breaking him and becoming obsessed with "deleting" him. His line “Delete”, is mostly inspired by the Death Note manga/anime series character Teru Mikami. On June 12, at Slammiversary, Matt was defeated by Jeff in a Full Metal Mayhem match. On the June 21 episode of Impact Wrestling, Matt was once again defeated by Jeff in a Six Sides of Steel match. On the June 28 episode of Impact Wrestling, Matt challenged Jeff to a final battle with the Hardy brand on the line, to take place at their home in Cameron, North Carolina the next week. On July 5, during special episode "The Final Deletion", Matt defeated Jeff in the match to become sole owner of the Hardy brand, forcing Jeff to drop his last name and become referred to as "Brother Nero". On the August 18 episode of Impact Wrestling, Matt and Brother Nero defeated The Tribunal, The BroMans and The Helms Dynasty in an "Ascension To Hell" match for an opportunity to challenge Decay for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On September 8, during special episode "Delete or Decay", the Hardys faced Decay in a match held at the Hardy compound, where Brother Nero sacrificed himself to save Matt from Abyss. Thanks to Brother Nero's sacrifice, Hardy was able to confront Rosemary and prevent his son Maxel from being abducted, which turned Hardy babyface as a result, and he furthered the face turn by healing Brother Nero in the Lake of Reincarnation. At Bound for Glory, the Hardys defeated Decay in "The Great War" to win the TNA World Tag Team Championship for the second time. On the October 6 episode of Impact Wrestling, they successfully defended their titles against Decay, in a Wolf Creek match. On the November 3 episode of Impact Wrestling, the Hardys successfully defended the titles against The Tribunal. After the match, the Hardys were attacked by the masked trio known as Death Crew Council (DCC). After accepting DCC's title challenge, The Hardys faced Bram and Kingston, and Matt pinned Kingston to retain the titles. On December 15, during special episode "Total Nonstop Deletion", they were once again successful in retaining. Brother Nero attacked Crazzy Steve with the Twist of Fate, who then fell into a volcano (that had appeared on the compound in the weeks leading up the event), and was shot up into the sky, landing in the ring. Matt then covered him to win the match. On the January 12, 2017 episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys successfully defended their titles against The Wolves. At Genesis, The Hardys retained their titles against the DCC and Decay in a three-way tag team match. On Open Fight Night, the Hardys began a storyline where they would teleport to different promotions and win that promotions' tag team championship gold, which was referred to by Matt as their "Expedition of Gold". On February 27, Hardy announced that both he and Jeff had finally left TNA, following years of speculation, with their contracts expiring that week. Though the two sides were reportedly close to a contract agreement, talks began to break down and changes in management prompted their departure from the company. The TNA World Tag Team Championships were vacated due to the Hardys' departure and was explained on TNA television in a segment where The Hardys teleported to their next Expedition of Gold destination, but a technicality resulted in them disappearing and the belts appearing in the arms of Decay. Broken gimmick legal battle Shortly after the departure of Matt and Jeff from TNA was made public, Matt's wife, Reby, went on a social media tirade in which she repeatedly slammed TNA, the company's new management and the way in which contract negotiations between the company and the Hardy family were conducted. A few weeks following this, the bad blood between the two sides intensified, so much so that the new management of TNA (now renamed Impact Wrestling) Anthem Sports & Entertainment issued a cease and desist letter to The Hardys' new promotion Ring of Honor (ROH), in which Anthem essentially ordered ROH as well as any broadcasting company airing ROH's 15th Anniversary pay–per–view show (on which The Hardys were to participate in a match) to not in any way speak of, indicate or acknowledge the existence of the Broken Matt and Brother Nero characters and instead to refer to The Hardys as simply Matt Hardy and Jeff Hardy. The issue with this is that while The Hardys were in TNA, they had full creative control over the Broken gimmick, with them even filming their own segments to air on TNA programming in some circumstances, thus making the Hardy family (in their belief) the owners of the Broken gimmick. It is believed that civil litigation will follow and a potential court hearing will take place regarding the outcome on who owns the Broken gimmick: Anthem or the Hardy family. Until then, the status of the Broken gimmick remains undecided. Despite this, Matt continues to use the Broken gimmick through his social media accounts, but neither he nor Jeff uses the Broken gimmick at any professional wrestling shows for ROH or on the independent circuit, presumably until the results of the expected legal proceedings have been finalized. Newly–appointed Impact Wrestling President Ed Nordholm credits the invention of and the vision behind the Broken gimmick to Jeremy Borash, Dave Lagana and Billy Corgan, and while Borash specifically had the most input into the gimmick of the three aside from Matt, the Hardy family deny that Borash was the sole person behind the gimmick. In November 2017, Impact Wrestling changed their policy, allowing all talent to retain complete ownership over their intellectual property, essentially forfeiting ownership of the "Broken" character to Hardy. On January 31, 2018, the legal battle officially concluded when Matt legally acquired ownership of all trademarks related to the Broken universe and the Broken gimmick, which includes 'Broken Matt', 'Brother Nero', 'Broken Brilliance' and 'Vanguard1'. International matches (2014–2015) On November 1, 2014, Hardy traveled to Japan to compete for Wrestle-1 at the promotions Keiji Muto 30th Anniversary Hold Out show in a triple threat match against Seiya Sanada and Tajiri, which he lost. On May 24, 2015, Hardy traveled to Mexico to compete as a team captain for Team TNA/Lucha Underground with teammates Mr. Anderson and Johnny Mundo at Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide's 2015 Lucha Libre World Cup pay–per–view show. In the quarter–final round, Team TNA/Lucha Underground faced Team Rest of the World (Drew Galloway, Angélico and El Mesías) to a 15-minute time limit draw, with Team TNA/Lucha Underground winning in overtime and advancing to the semi–final round. In the semi–final round, Team TNA/Lucha Underground defeated Team MexLeyendas (Blue Demon Jr., Dr. Wagner Jr. and El Solar) to advance to the final round. In the final round, Team TNA/Lucha Underground faced Dream Team (El Patrón Alberto, Myzteziz and Rey Mysterio Jr.) to a 15–minute time limit draw, with Dream Team winning both the match and the tournament in overtime with Hardy on the losing end of the final pinfall. Second return to ROH (2016–2017) On December 2, 2016, Hardy returned to ROH for the second time while still under contract with TNA, appearing at the promotions Final Battle pay-per-view show as Broken Matt, where a video message showed him addressing The Young Bucks (Matt Jackson and Nick Jackson) and The Briscoes (Jay Briscoe and Mark Briscoe). On March 4, 2017, in the same week that both Matt and Jeff were released from TNA, The Hardys defeated The Young Bucks in an impromptu match at ROH's 2017 installment of the company's Manhattan Mayhem show series to become the new ROH World Tag Team Champions for the first time. Moments after winning the titles, Hardy announced in a post-match promo that both he and Brother Nero (Jeff) had signed "the biggest ROH contracts in (the company's) history". It was later confirmed that the contracts were short-term, only for the "immediate future". On March 10, The Hardys successfully defended the ROH World Tag Team Championship for the first time at ROH's 15th Anniversary pay-per-view show against The Young Bucks and Roppongi Vice (Beretta and Rocky Romero) in a three-way Las Vegas tag team street fight match. Prior to the event, the Hardys had been sent a legal threat by Impact Wrestling regarding the use of the Broken Matt and Brother Nero gimmicks. The following night on March 11, The Hardys (not billed but using the Broken gimmicks anyway) once again retained the titles, this time against The Briscoes at a set of Ring of Honor Wrestling television tapings. The Hardys lost the titles back to The Young Bucks in a ladder match on April 1 at ROH's Supercard of Honor XI pay-per-view show, which would be the final ROH appearances for both Hardys in this tenure with the promotion. Second return to WWE (2017–2020) Feud with The Bar (2017) At the WrestleMania 33 pay-per-view on April 2, 2017, Hardy made his surprise return to WWE, along with his brother Jeff Hardy, being added as last-minute participants in the ladder match for the Raw Tag Team Championship, defeating Gallows and Anderson, Cesaro and Sheamus, and Enzo and Cass to win the Raw Tag Team Championship. Afterwards on Raw Talk, Hardy mentioned that The Hardy Boyz had successfully completed the Expedition of Gold, after winning the Raw Tag Team Championship. At Payback, The Hardy Boyz retained their championships against Cesaro and Sheamus, who attacked them after the match. The next night on Raw, Cesaro and Sheamus explained their actions, claiming the fans were more supportive of 'novelty acts' from the past like The Hardy Boyz, who they feel did not deserve to be in the match at WrestleMania 33. Subsequently, at Extreme Rules, The Hardy Boyz lost the titles against Cesaro and Sheamus in a steel cage match, and failed to regain it back the following month at the Great Balls of Fire event. Afterwards, it was revealed that Jeff had gotten injured and would be out for an estimated six months, thus Hardy began wrestling in singles matches. Woken Universe and storyline with Bray Wyatt (2017–2018) During his feud with Bray Wyatt, Hardy introduced his "Woken" gimmick, after Impact Wrestling dropped their claim to the gimmick and Hardy gained full ownership of it. Wyatt defeated Hardy at Raw 25 on January 22, 2018, and Hardy defeated Wyatt at Elimination Chamber on February 25. Their final match happened on the March 19 episode of Raw, dubbed The Ultimate Deletion, with Hardy winning after distractions from Señor Benjamin. Wyatt then disappeared after being thrown into the Lake of Reincarnation. At WrestleMania 34 on April 7, Hardy competed in the annual André the Giant Memorial Battle Royal, and won the match due to a distraction by the returning Wyatt. After WrestleMania, Hardy and Wyatt performed as a tag team, sometimes referred to as The Deleters of Worlds. They won a tournament for the vacant Raw Tag Team Championship, defeating Cesaro and Sheamus at the Greatest Royal Rumble event to win the title. However, they lost the titles at Extreme Rules to The B-Team (Bo Dallas and Curtis Axel). On the July 23 episode of Raw, Hardy and Wyatt received a rematch for the titles, but was again defeated by The B-Team. Following this, Hardy revealed that he was taking time off due to his back fusing with his pelvis, effectively disbanding the team. According to Hardy, the reason WWE disbanded the team was because he and Wyatt pitched several ideas to WWE to work with their characters. The Hardys fourth reunion and departure (2019–2020) After more than seven months of absence from television, Hardy returned on the February 26, 2019 episode of SmackDown Live, teaming with his brother Jeff to defeat The Bar (Cesaro and Sheamus). At WrestleMania 35 on April 7, Hardy competed in the André the Giant Memorial Battle Royal, but was eliminated by eventual winner, Braun Strowman. Two days later on SmackDown Live, The Hardy Boyz defeated The Usos to win the SmackDown Tag Team Championship. The reign only lasted 21 days (recognized as 20 days by WWE), as they had to vacate the title due to Jeff injuring his knee, this was explained in storyline as injuries afflicted by Lars Sullivan. After his brother Jeff's injury, Hardy began to appear on WWE programming less frequently. At Super ShowDown on June 7, Hardy competed in the 51-man Battle Royal, which was eventually won by Mansoor. From November to December, Hardy occasionally appeared on Raw, losing matches against superstars like Buddy Murphy, Drew McIntyre, Ricochet and Erick Rowan. On the February 10, 2020 episode of Raw, Hardy confronted Randy Orton about Orton's attack on Edge two weeks earlier. Hardy then got himself into a brawl with him moments after, and was viciously attacked by Orton. The following week on Raw, an injured Hardy appeared and was once again assaulted by Orton, which would be his final appearance in WWE. On March 2, Hardy announced his departure from WWE through his official YouTube channel, where Hardy said that while he's grateful towards the people behind the scenes, he said he is also on different pages with WWE as he feels he needs to have creative input and still has more to give. Later that day, WWE announced that his contract had expired. All Elite Wrestling Multiple personalities (2020–2021) Hardy made his All Elite Wrestling (AEW) debut on the March 18, 2020 episode of Dynamite, reverting to his "Broken" gimmick and being announced as the replacement for the kayfabe injured Nick Jackson on The Elite's team at Blood and Guts. However, the event was postponed to the following year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. On the May 6 episode of Dynamite, Hardy wrestled his first match with AEW, teaming up with Kenny Omega for a street fight against The Inner Circle's Chris Jericho and Sammy Guevara, and Hardy and Omega lost when Jericho pinned Omega. During this period, due to the lack of live audience, Hardy felt that the Broken character needs public, so he began to include several of his gimmicks, including Broken Matt Hardy, Big Money Matt, Matt Hardy V1, and Unkillable Matt Hardy, being referred to as "Multifarious" Matt Hardy. AEW president Tony Khan later admitted that he "wasn't a fan" of the Broken gimmick and much preferred more realistic presentations in wrestling. At Double or Nothing, Hardy teamed with The Elite to defeat The Inner Circle in the first ever Stadium Stampede match. During the match, Santana and Ortiz dunked Hardy in the stadium pool, which acted as a version of the Lake of Reincarnation, as Hardy kept cycling through his various gimmicks throughout his career when he surfaced. Hardy then feuded with Sammy Guevara, and after Hardy defeated Guevara in a Broken Rules match at All Out, Hardy took time off until he was cleared to return, due to an injury sustained during the match. On the September 16 episode of Dynamite, Hardy aligned with Private Party (Isiah Kassidy and Marq Quen) as their manager, but was attacked backstage before their match. The attacker was later revealed as Guevara and The Elite Deletion match was announced, which took place at The Hardy Compound in Cameron, North Carolina, where Hardy won. The Hardy Family Office (2021–present) Hardy then switched to his Big Money persona as he focused on managing Private Party. Over the following weeks, Hardy would display villainous tactics as he began cheating during matches much to Private Party's dismay. On the January 20, 2021 episode of Dynamite, Hardy and Private Party defeated Matt Sydal and Top Flight (Dante Martin and Darius Martin) after using a steel chair before attacking Sydal and Top Flight afterwards, thus turning heel. Hardy then approached Adam Page to accompany and befriend him, and during tag team matches, Hardy would always tag himself in and pick up the victory for his team to Page's behest. After Page set up a match between Hardy and himself, Hardy double-crossed Page, with Private Party and The Hybrid 2 (Angélico and Jack Evans) attacking Page until The Dark Order came out to save him. At the Revolution event, Hardy lost to Page despite multiple interferences from Private Party. Following Revolution, Hardy became the manager for The Butcher and The Blade (with their valet The Bunny in tow), and along with Private Party, the stable became known as the Matt Hardy Empire before settling on the name Hardy Family Office. Hardy also added The Hybrid 2 to his group in July having previously hiring them on a mercenary basis. At Double or Nothing, Hardy competed in Casino Battle Royale but was eliminated by Christian Cage. This led to a match between the two at Fyter Fest, where Hardy lost to Cage. In August, Matt Hardy and HFO began a feud with Orange Cassidy and Best Friends, which led to a match on the August 25 episode of Dynamite, where Hardy was defeated by Cassidy. However, on the November 12 episode of Rampage, Hardy defeated Cassidy in a Lumberjack match, thanks to an interference from HFO and the heel lumberjacks. Their feud ended on the November 17 episode of Dynamite where his team of The Butcher and The Blade lost to the team of Cassidy and Tomohiro Ishii, where Cassidy gave a crossbody to the interfering Hardy and The Blade during the match. Professional wrestling style and persona After the creation of his Broken character, Hardy was praised by several wrestlers and critics for reinventing himself several times during his career. During his career, Hardy has won the Wrestling Observer Newsletter Best Gimmick award two times under two different characters, once in 2002 and again in 2016. Personal life Hardy was in a six-year relationship with wrestler Amy Dumas, better known as Lita. They first met in January 1999 at a NWA Mid-Atlantic show but did not begin dating until a few months later. They broke up in February 2005 when he discovered that she was having an affair with one of Hardy's close friends, fellow wrestler Adam Copeland, better known as Edge. Hardy also dated WWE wrestler Ashley Massaro. Hardy married wrestler Rebecca Reyes, better known as Reby Sky, on October 5, 2013. They have three sons and one daughter. Hardy had previously been an addict, and credits his wife for helping him get clean. Hardy is good friends with fellow wrestlers Marty Garner, Shannon Moore, and Gregory Helms. In December 2020, he claimed to have Native American ancestry. Legal issues Hardy was arrested for a DUI on August 20, 2011. Two days later, he was arrested on felony drug charges when police found steroids in his home. In November 2011, Hardy was removed from court-ordered rehab and sent back to jail for drinking. In January 2014, Hardy and his wife were both arrested after a fight at a hotel. Other media In 1999, Matt, along with his brother Jeff, appeared as an uncredited wrestler on That '70s Show episode "That Wrestling Show". Matt and Jeff also appeared on Tough Enough in early 2001, talking to and wrestling the contestants. He appeared in the February 25, 2002 episode of Fear Factor competing against five other World Wrestling Federation wrestlers, including his brother. He won $50,000 for the American Cancer Society. Hardy also appeared on the October 13, 2009 episode of Scare Tactics, as a mental patient who threatens to attack the prank's victim. In 2001, Matt, Jeff, and Lita appeared in Rolling Stone magazine's 2001 Sports Hall of Fame issue. In 2003, Matt and Jeff, with the help of Michael Krugman, wrote and published their autobiography The Hardy Boyz: Exist 2 Inspire. As part of WWE, Matt appeared in their DVD, The Hardy Boyz: Leap of Faith in 2001. On April 29, 2008, WWE released Twist of Fate: The Matt and Jeff Hardy Story. The DVD featured footage of the brothers in OMEGA and WWE. Hardy also appears on The Hardy Show, an Internet web show which features the Hardys, Shannon Moore, and many of their friends. Hardy plays himself in the 2013 film Pro Wrestlers vs Zombies in which he and his real-life wife Reby Sky battle the undead. Hardy's first WWE video game was WWF WrestleMania 2000 in 1999 on the Nintendo 64 shortly followed by WWF SmackDown! in early 2000 on the PlayStation. He made several appearances later in WWF SmackDown! 2: Know Your Role, WWF SmackDown! Just Bring It, WWE SmackDown! Shut Your Mouth, WWE SmackDown! Here Comes the Pain, and WWE SmackDown vs. Raw. He later returned to the series in WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2007, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2008, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2009, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2010, and WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2011, which was his last WWE video game before his departure to TNA. Following his return to WWE in 2017, he was revealed as a DLC character in WWE 2K18 on September 25 that year alongside tag team partner and brother, Jeff Hardy. Hardy was revealed as a playable character in WWE 2K19 on August 30, 2018. His final appearance in a WWE video game came with WWE 2K20 in 2019. Filmography Championships and accomplishments All Elite Wrestling Dynamite Award (1 time) "Bleacher Report PPV Moment of the Year" (2021) – Stadium Stampede match (The Elite vs. The Inner Circle) – Double or Nothing (May 23) All Star Wrestling (West Virginia) ASW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Brother Nero CBS Sports Worst Moment of the Year (2020) vs. Sammy Guevara at All Out (2020) The Crash The Crash Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Brother Nero Future Stars of Wrestling FSW Heavyweight Championship (1 time) House of Glory HOG Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy Maryland Championship Wrestling/MCW Pro Wrestling MCW Heavyweight Championship (1 time) MCW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy Extreme Rising World Championship (1 time) National Championship Wrestling NCW Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NCW Light Heavyweight Championship (1 time) New Dimension Wrestling NDW Light Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NDW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy New England Wrestling Alliance NEWA Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NEWA Hall of Fame (class of 2012) New Frontier Wrestling Association NFWA Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NFWA Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Venom NWA 2000 NWA 2000 Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy OMEGA Championship Wrestling OMEGA Heavyweight Championship (2 times) OMEGA Tag Team Championship (2 times) – with Brother Nero/Jeff Hardy Pro Wrestling Illustrated Comeback of the Year (2017) with Jeff Hardy Feud of the Year (2005) vs. Edge and Lita Match of the Year (2000) with Jeff Hardy vs. The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian in a triangle ladder match at WrestleMania 2000 Match of the Year (2001) with Jeff Hardy vs. The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian in a Tables, Ladders and Chairs match at WrestleMania X-Seven Tag Team of the Year (2000) with Jeff Hardy Ranked No. 17 of the top 500 singles wrestlers in the PWI 500 in 2003 Pro Wrestling Syndicate PWS Heavyweight Championship (1 time) Remix Pro Wrestling Remix Pro Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Facade Ring of Honor ROH World Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy Holy S*** Moment of the Decade (2010s) – – with Jeff Hardy Total Nonstop Action Wrestling TNA World Heavyweight Championship (2 times) TNA World Tag Team Championship (2 times) – with Jeff Hardy/Brother Nero TNA World Tag Team Championship Tournament (2015) – with Jeff Hardy TNA World Tag Team Championship #1 Contender Tournament (2014) – with Jeff Hardy WrestleCade WrestleCade Championship (2 times) Wrestling Observer Newsletter Best Gimmick (2002, 2016) Worst Feud of the Year (2004) with Lita vs. Kane Wrestling Superstar Wrestling Superstar Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy WWE/World Wrestling Entertainment/Federation ECW Championship (1 time) WWF Hardcore Championship (1 time) WWF European Championship (1 time) WWE United States Championship (1 time) WWE Cruiserweight Championship (1 time) WWF/World Tag Team Championship (6 times) – with Jeff Hardy WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy WWE Raw Tag Team Championship (3 times) – with Montel Vontavious Porter (1) Jeff Hardy (1) and Bray Wyatt (1) WCW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy André the Giant Memorial Trophy (2018) Bragging Rights Trophy (2009) – with Team SmackDown Terri Invitational Tournament (1999) – with Jeff Hardy WWE Tag Team Eliminator (2018) - with Bray Wyatt Luchas de Apuestas record Notes References Sources External links 1974 births All Elite Wrestling personnel American bloggers American male professional wrestlers American YouTubers Male YouTubers ECW champions ECW Heavyweight Champions/ECW World Heavyweight Champions Living people NWA/WCW/WWE United States Heavyweight Champions Participants in American reality television series Professional wrestlers from North Carolina Professional wrestling managers and valets Reality show winners Sportspeople from Raleigh, North Carolina TNA World Heavyweight/Impact World Champions TNA/Impact World Tag Team Champions Twitch (service) streamers University of North Carolina at Charlotte alumni WWF European Champions WWF/WWE Hardcore Champions	true	[ "Miguel Aarón López Hernández (born November 9, 1988) is an American luchador enmascarado, or masked professional wrestler, best known under the name El Hijo de Rey Misterio. His ring name is Spanish for \"The Son of the Mystery King\". He is the first-born son of the luchador Rey Misterio Sr. He is also the cousin of Rey Mysterio. He mainly works on the independent circuit in the United States, especially in California and in Mexico, especially in Tijuana, Baja California.\n\nProfessional wrestling career\nEl Hijo de Rey Misterio grew up in a wrestling family with both his father, Miguel Ángel López Díaz who wrestles as Rey Misterio Sr., and his cousin, Óscar Gutiérrez, better known as Rey Mysterio, being very well known luchadors. At the age of 13 he began training with his father at his wrestling school in Tijuana. He made his professional wrestling debut in 2006, initially working under the ring name Diablo. By the end of 2006 his father gave him permission to use the \"Rey Misterio\" name and he became \"El Hijo de Rey Misterio\". The name has led to some confusion, especially when wrestling in the United States where a lot of fans have mistaken him for the son of Rey Mysterio, but Mysterio is actually his cousin. Some promoters have actively sought to exploit this confusion by neglecting to bill him as \"El Hijo de\" and just billed him as Rey Misterio. In one controversial case a Bolivian promoter used World Wrestling Entertainment footage of Rey Mysterio to promote a tour by El Hijo de Rey Misterio, when Hijo de Rey Misterio found out he cancelled his tour. When El Hijo de Rey Misterio cancelled his tour the Bolivian promoter had someone else wrestle under the mask, pretending to be El Hijo de Rey Misterio.\n\nSince adopting the \"Hijo de Rey Misterio\" name he has been working mainly for Pro Wrestling Revolution (PWR) in Northern California, shows in Tijuana and made various independent wrestling promotion appearances in America. His stint in PWR saw him team with his father on several occasions, the two won a tournament to become the first PWR Tag Team Champions when they defeated the Border Patrol (Oliver John and Nathan Rulez) on May 31, 2008. The duo defended the title a couple of times during 2008 but were forced to vacate the title in June, 2009 as Rey Misterio, Sr. suffered a serious injury. He has stated that while he likes working in the United States he really wants to focus on a wrestling career in Mexico, hoping to work for Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL) Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide (AAA), Mexico's two largest professional wrestling promotions. In October 2009 it was reported that El Hijo de Rey Misterio had been working at CMLL's wrestling school in Mexico City, Mexico to train for his future CMLL debut. He would, however, never make an appearance for CMLL, before suddenly announcing his retirement from professional wrestling in early 2011. On May 27, 2011, a new El Hijo de Rey Misterio was introduced by Rey Misterio, Sr. and Konnan, making his debut in Tijuana. He now goes by Rey Horus. The original El Hijo de Rey Misterio returned to professional wrestling in November 2011. On December 25, 2011, he defeated Mortiz and Mr. Tempest in a ladder match to win the Baja California Championship, joining Los Perros del Mal in the process.\n\nPersonal life\nEl Hijo de Rey Misterio is part of an extended family of wrestlers, his father Miguel Ángel López Díaz is best known under the ring name Rey Misterio (Sr.), his cousin Oscar Gutiérrez, works for World Wrestling Entertainment as Rey Mysterio. His other cousin is a wrestler known as Metalika and his uncle, Juan Zezatti Ramírez, is better known as Super Astro. \n\nIn May 2012 López and his younger brother were arrested in Playas de Rosarito, Baja California, with a kilogram of the drug \"ice\" in their possession. Both were turned over to the federal authorities for prosecution. It was never reported if López was ever convicted of any crime.\n\nChampionships and accomplishments\nPro Wrestling Revolution\nPro Wrestling Revolution Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Rey Misterio, Sr.\nVendetta Pro Wrestling\nVendetta Pro Wrestling Heavyweight Championship (1 time)\nOther titles\nBaja California Championship (1 time, current)\n\nLuchas de Apuestas record\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Profile at Luchawiki.com\n\n1989 births\nLiving people\nMexican male professional wrestlers\nAmerican male professional wrestlers\nSportspeople from San Diego\nProfessional wrestlers from California", "Miguel Ángel López Díaz (born July 8, 1956) is a Mexican retired professional wrestler and trainer, better known by his ring name, Rey Misterio (\"Mystery King\"). He is also referred to as Rey Misterio Sr. to distinguish him from his nephew.\n\nProfessional wrestling career\nMisterio first began training to be a boxer, but after his body got bigger, he took a lot of bumps and lost some of his punching ability. When his trainers told him that he could still punch hard, they told Misterio about wrestling. His brother soon began to take him to train for wrestling and lucha libre. On the sixth of January 1976, Misterio finally made his debut as a wrestler on a show called \"Day of the Kings\", or Día de los Reyes.\n\nMisterio appeared at World Championship Wrestling's Starrcade 1990 pay-per-view event where he teamed with Konnan and competed in the \"Pat O'Connor Memorial International Cup\" representing Mexico. In the first round the team defeated Chris Adams and Norman Smiley representing the United Kingdom, but lost to The Steiner Brothers in the second round.\n\nTraining\nIn 1987, Misterio opened a gym with Negro Casas and Super Astro. His first class included future international superstars such as Konnan, Psicosis, Halloween, Damian 666 and his nephew Rey Mysterio Jr. Misterio is also known to have trained wrestlers such as Cassandro, Eiji Ezaki, Extassis, Extreme Tiger, Fobia, Misterioso, Pequeño Damián 666, Ruby Gardenia, The Warlord and Venum Black,\n\nPersonal life\nMisterio's son is also a wrestler,\nwho wrestles under the name El Hijo de Rey Misterio. Misterio is also the uncle of wrestlers Rey Mysterio and Metalika, great uncle to Dominik Mysterio and brother-in-law to Super Astro. He is featured in the horror film El Mascarado Massacre (or Wrestlemaniac).\n\nChampionships and accomplishments\nAsistencia Asesoría y Administración\nIWC Television Championship (1 time)\nIWC World Middleweight Championship (2 times)\nPro Wrestling Illustrated\nPWI ranked him #373 of the 500 best singles wrestlers during the PWI Years in 2003\nPWI ranked him #212 of the 500 best singles wrestlers of the PWI 500 in 2004\nPro Wrestling Revolution\nRevolution Tag Team Championship (1 time)- with El Hijo de Rey Misterio\nTijuana Wrestling\nAmerica's Championship (1 time)\nBaja California Middleweight Championship (1 time)\nTijuana Welterweight Championship\nTijuana Tag Team Championship (3 times) – Saeta Oriental (1), Pequeño Apolo / Super Astro (1) and Rey Guerrero (1)\nWorld Wrestling Association\nWWA World Junior Light Heavyweight Championship (1 time)\nWWA Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Rey Mysterio Jr.\nWorld Wrestling Organization\nWWO World Championship (1 time)\nXtreme Latin American Wrestling\nXLAW Extreme Championship (2 times)\nOther accomplishments\n Tijuana Sports Hall of Fame (Class of 2006)\n\nLuchas de Apuestas record\n\nFootnotes\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1958 births\nLiving people\nMasked wrestlers\nMexican male professional wrestlers\nPeople from Tijuana\nProfessional wrestlers from Baja California" ]
[ "Matt Hardy", "Version 1 (2002-2004)", "What is Version 1?", "At the beginning of 2002, it seemed Team Xtreme had patched things up. After the brand extension, however, Hardy was relegated to Heat while Jeff wrestled", "Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?", "Along with his MF'er (Mattitude Follower) Shannon Moore in his corner, 2003 began with Hardy frantically trying to lose weight to get under", "Did Hardy end up loosing weight?", "After just barely making weight,", "Did he fight against someone after accomplishing this weight loss goal?", "Hardy defeated Billy Kidman at No Way Out to win the Cruiserweight title.", "Did he kept the Cruiserweight title for a long time?", "At WrestleMania XIX, he successfully defended it against Rey Mysterio.", "Did anyone else challange him for the tittle?", "Hardy lost the Cruiserweight Championship to Mysterio in the main event", "What happened after he lost the title to Rey Misterio?", "After dropping the Cruiserweight Championship, Hardy briefly feuded with Eddie Guerrero," ]	C_8bf9dcbf1a034e02873104f08a75bf5d_1	What was the result of this feud?	8	What was the result of the feud between Matt Hardy and Eddie Guerrero?	Matt Hardy	At the beginning of 2002, it seemed Team Xtreme had patched things up. After the brand extension, however, Hardy was relegated to Heat while Jeff wrestled on the main show, Raw. On the August 12 episode of Raw, Hardy turned against Jeff during Jeff's match against Rob Van Dam, because Hardy was frustrated at not receiving a match against Van Dam for the number one contendership for the Intercontinental Championship. A short time later, Hardy joined the SmackDown! roster, and began dubbing himself "Matt Hardy: Version 1", complete with a "version 1" hand signal. Hardy defeated The Undertaker on the September 12 and October 3 episodes of the show, due to interference from Brock Lesnar. Along with his MF'er (Mattitude Follower) Shannon Moore in his corner, 2003 began with Hardy frantically trying to lose weight to get under the 215 lb (98 kg) weight limit to compete for the Cruiserweight Championship. After just barely making weight, Hardy defeated Billy Kidman at No Way Out to win the Cruiserweight title. At WrestleMania XIX, he successfully defended it against Rey Mysterio. Hardy lost the Cruiserweight Championship to Mysterio in the main event of the June 5 edition of SmackDown - the first and only time a Cruiserweight Championship match main evented a show. After dropping the Cruiserweight Championship, Hardy briefly feuded with Eddie Guerrero, but was unsuccessful in capturing Guerrero's United States Championship or Tag Team Championship. The Mattitude faction then expanded to include Crash Holly as Moore's "Moore-on" (apprentice). He later disbanded the group in November and returned to Raw in order to be able to travel and work with his then girlfriend Lita, who just returned from an injury. On his first night back, he turned on Lita in storyline after teasing a proposal to her. He defeated Christian, who was vying for Lita's affections, on the following edition of Raw. In April 2004, Hardy saved Lita from getting attacked by Kane. Hardy defeated Kane at Vengeance, but lost a match against Kane at SummerSlam. On the August 23 episode of Raw, Hardy was chokeslamed off the stage by Kane. Hardy then spent almost a year off from wrestling due to a severe knee injury. CANNOTANSWER	but was unsuccessful in capturing Guerrero's United States Championship or Tag Team Championship.	Matthew Moore Hardy (born September 23, 1974) is an American professional wrestler currently signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW). He is also known for his time with WWE, Impact Wrestling, and Ring of Honor (ROH). With his real life brother Jeff, Hardy gained notoriety in WWF's tag team division during the 2000s due to his participation in TLC matches. He is a 14-time world tag team champion, having held the WWE World Tag Team Championship six times, the WWE Raw Tag Team Championship three times, the WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship, ROH World Tag Team Championship, and WCW Tag Team Championship once each, and the TNA World Tag Team Championships twice. Wrestling through four separate decades, Hardy has kept himself relevant partially through a variety of different gimmicks and his use of social media. In 2002, Hardy began a solo career in WWE. His subsequent "Version 1" persona was named Best Gimmick by the Wrestling Observer Newsletter. Hardy's eccentric "Broken" gimmick, which he debuted in 2016 (and which was renamed "Woken" following his subsequent WWE return), garnered praise from wrestling critics and earned him multiple awards, including a second Best Gimmick award, becoming one of the most talked about characters in all of wrestling. As a singles wrestler, Hardy has won three world championships (one ECW Championship, and two TNA World Heavyweight Championships). All totaled between WWE, TNA/Impact, and ROH, Hardy has held 21 total championships. Early life Hardy was born in Cameron, North Carolina, the son of Gilbert and Ruby Moore Hardy. He is the older brother of Jeff Hardy. Their mother died of brain cancer in 1987. Hardy played baseball as a child and throughout high school, but had stopped by his senior year. He also played football, either as a linebacker or a defensive end. Hardy was a good student at Union Pines High School in North Carolina, and was a nominee for the "Morehead Award", a scholarship to any university in North Carolina. Hardy attended University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where he majored in engineering; after a year, however, he dropped out due to his father being ill. He then attended Sandhills Community College in Pinehurst to gain his associate degree. Professional wrestling career Early career (1992–2001) Hardy, along with his brother Jeff and friends, started their own federation, the Trampoline Wrestling Federation (TWF) and mimicked the moves they saw on television. Shortly after Hardy sent in a tape for the World Championship Wrestling (WCW) Amateur Challenge using the ring name High Voltage, a tag team named High Voltage began competing in WCW, causing Hardy to change his name to Surge. A few years later, it was revealed to him by Chris Kanyon that the tape had been kept in the WCW Power Plant, watched multiple times, and that the name High Voltage was blatantly stolen from it. Beginning in 1994, The Hardys wrestled for several North Carolina-based independent circuit promotions and adapted a number of alter-egos. As The Wolverine, Hardy captured the New England Wrestling Alliance (NEWA) Championship in May 1994. As High Voltage, he teamed with Venom to claim the New Frontier Wrestling Association (NFWA) Tag Team Championship in March 1995. A month later, High Voltage defeated the Willow for the NFWA Championship. In 1997, Matt and Jeff created their own wrestling promotion, The Organization of Modern Extreme Grappling Arts (frequently abbreviated to OMEGA Championship Wrestling, or simply OMEGA), in which Matt competed under the name High Voltage. Both Matt and Jeff took apart the ring and put it back together at every event they had, while Matt sewed all the costumes worn in OMEGA. The promotion folded in October 1999, after both Matt and Jeff signed with the World Wrestling Federation. World Wrestling Federation/Entertainment Early years (1994–1998) Hardy worked as a jobber for the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) from 1994 up until he signed a full-time contract in 1998. His first WWF match was against Nikolai Volkoff on the May 23, 1994 episode of Monday Night Raw, which he lost by submission. A night later at a taping of WWF Wrestling Challenge, he lost a match against Owen Hart. He continued to wrestle sporadically in the WWF throughout 1994 and 1995, losing matches against Crush, Razor Ramon, Hakushi, Owen Hart, the imposter Undertaker, Hunter Hearst Helmsley and "The Ringmaster" Steve Austin. Hardy teamed with Jeff for the first time in the WWF in 1996, losing to teams such as The Smoking Gunns and The Grimm Twins on WWF television. Matt and Jeff had a short lived feud with The Headbangers (Thrasher and Mosh), losing to the duo twice in 1997. It was during this time that Matt and Jeff experimented with different ring names, at one stage being called Ingus (Matt) and Wildo Jinx (Jeff). In Matt's final singles match for the promotion before signing a full-time contract he lost to Val Venis on a taping of Shotgun in 1998. The Hardy Boyz (1998–2001) It was not until 1998, however, (at the height of The Attitude Era) that the Hardy brothers were given full-time WWF contracts and sent to train with former wrestler Dory Funk, Jr. The Hardy Boyz used a cruiserweight, fast-paced high flying style in their matches, often leaping from great heights to do damage to their opponents (and themselves in the process). In 1999, while feuding with Edge and Christian, the duo briefly picked up Michael Hayes as a manager. At King of the Ring, The Hardyz defeated Edge and Christian to earn the #1 contendership for the WWF Tag Team Championship. On July 5, they defeated The APA to win their first Tag Team Championship. They soon dumped Hayes and briefly picked up Gangrel as a manager, after Gangrel turned on Edge and Christian. At No Mercy, The Hardyz defeated Edge and Christian in the first ever tag team ladder match. At the Royal Rumble pay-per-view, The Hardyz defeated The Dudley Boyz in the first ever tag team tables match. They competed against The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian for the Tag Team Championships at WrestleMania 2000 in the first ever Triangle Ladder match, but were unsuccessful. Hardy won the Hardcore Championship on April 24, 2000, on Raw Is War, by defeating Crash Holly, but lost it back to Holly three days later on SmackDown!, when Holly applied the "24/7 rule" during Hardy's title defense against Jeff. The Hardy Boyz then found a new manager in Matt's real-life girlfriend Lita. Together, the three became known as "Team Xtreme". The Hardy Boyz competed in the first ever Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match, for the WWF Tag Team Championship against The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian, but were unsuccessful. At Unforgiven, The Hardyz defeated Edge and Christian in a steel cage match to win the tag team championship, and successfully retained it the following night on Raw Is War against Edge and Christian in a ladder match. In April 2001, The Hardyz began feuding with Stone Cold Steve Austin and Triple H (known as The Power Trip), which also led to a singles push for both Matt and Jeff. Hardy helped Jeff defeat Triple H for the Intercontinental Championship, and shortly after Hardy defeated Eddie Guerrero to win the European Championship on SmackDown!. At Backlash he retained the title against Guerrero and Christian in a triple threat, and against Edge the following night on Raw. Throughout the year, the Hardy Boyz continued to win as a tag team, winning the WWF Tag Team Titles two more times, and the WCW Tag Team Championship during the Invasion. By the end of the year, the Hardy Boyz began a storyline where they were having trouble co-existing. This culminated in a match between the two, with Lita as the guest referee, at the Vengeance pay-per-view, which Jeff won. Hardy defeated Jeff and Lita the following night on Raw in a two-on-one handicap match. Version 1 gimmick and feud with Kane (2002–2004) At the beginning of 2002, it seemed Team Xtreme had patched things up. After the brand extension, however, Matt was relegated to Heat while Jeff wrestled on the main show, Raw. On the August 12 episode of Raw, Hardy turned heel by attacking Jeff during Jeff's match against Rob Van Dam, because Hardy was frustrated at not receiving a match against Van Dam for the number one contendership for the Intercontinental Championship. A short time later, Hardy joined the SmackDown! roster, and began dubbing himself "Matt Hardy: Version 1", complete with a "version 1" hand signal. Hardy defeated The Undertaker on the September 12 and October 3 episodes of the show, due to interference from Brock Lesnar. Along with his Mattitude Follower Shannon Moore in his corner, 2003 began with Hardy frantically trying to lose weight to get under the weight limit to compete for the Cruiserweight Championship. After just barely making weight, Hardy defeated Billy Kidman at No Way Out to win the Cruiserweight title. At WrestleMania XIX, he successfully defended it against Rey Mysterio. Hardy lost the Cruiserweight Championship to Mysterio in the main event of the June 5 episode of SmackDown! - the first and only time a Cruiserweight Championship match main evented a show. After dropping the Cruiserweight Championship, Hardy briefly feuded with Eddie Guerrero, but was unsuccessful in capturing Guerrero's United States Championship or WWE Tag Team Championship. The Mattitude faction then expanded to include Crash Holly as Moore's "Moore-on" (apprentice). He later disbanded the group in November and returned to Raw in order to be able to travel and work with his then girlfriend Lita, who just returned from an injury. On his first night back, he turned on Lita in storyline after teasing a proposal to her. He defeated Christian, who was vying for Lita's affections, on the following edition of Raw. In April 2004, Hardy saved Lita from getting attacked by Kane, turning face in the process. Hardy defeated Kane in a no disqualification match at Vengeance, but lost a "Till Death To Us Part" match against Kane at SummerSlam, resulting in Lita being forced to marry Kane. On the August 23 episode of Raw, Hardy was chokeslamed off the stage by Kane during the wedding. Hardy then spent almost a year off from wrestling due to a severe knee injury. Departure and sporadic appearances (2005) Along with his friend Rhyno, Hardy was released by WWE on April 11, 2005. Hardy's release was largely due to unprofessional conduct with social media after discovering that Lita was having a real-life affair with his best friend Edge. The public knowledge of the affair and Hardy's release led to Edge and Lita receiving jeers from the crowds at WWE events, often resulting in chants of "You screwed Matt!", and, "We want Matt!", which meant kayfabe storylines being affected considering that Lita was married to Kane at the time in kayfabe. Edge and Lita used the affair and fan backlash to become a hated on-screen couple, which led to Lita turning heel for the first time in over five years. Fans began a petition on the internet, wanting WWE to re-sign Hardy, and amassed over fifteen thousand signatures. Hardy released two character promotional vignettes, that he was planning to use before he was offered a new contract by WWE. Hardy called himself The Angelic Diablo with the tagline "the scar will become a symbol" in reference to the way in which he had been treated by Lita and WWE. On the June 20 episode of Raw, during the storyline wedding of Edge and Lita, Hardy's entrance music and video were played when the priest asked if anyone had a reason why Edge and Lita should not be wed. Independent circuit and Ring of Honor (2005) Following his WWE release, Matt returned to the independent circuit and wrestled several matches for the Allied Powers Wrestling Federation (APWF), International Wrestling Cartel (IWC) and Big Time Wrestling (BTW). Hardy appeared at a scheduled Ring of Honor (ROH) event on July 16, 2005, in Woodbridge, Connecticut where he defeated Christopher Daniels via submission. Hardy also cut a brief worked shoot promo where he criticized WWE and John Laurinaitis. Following his official return to WWE, Hardy was met with backlash following a match with Homicide from the fans at a subsequent ROH event, which Hardy won. The next day at his final ROH appearance, he lost to Roderick Strong. Return to WWE Feud with Edge (2005–2006) On July 11, 2005, on Raw, Hardy attacked Edge backstage and again later during Edge's match with Kane. Before being escorted out of the building by security, Hardy stated that Edge (calling him by his real name of "Adam") and Lita would pay for their actions and told fans that they could see him at Ring of Honor while security officials and event staff were trying to restrain him. Hardy also called out Johnny Ace as security had him in handcuffs taking him out of the arena. This caused an uproar amongst fans, who were confused and wondered if the whole thing was a work or a shoot. Similar occurrences repeated during the following two weeks. On the August 1 episode of Raw, Vince McMahon officially announced Hardy's return to WWE, adding that Hardy would face Edge at SummerSlam. Hardy made his in-ring return, defeating Snitsky on the August 8 Raw. Seconds after the victory, Hardy was attacked by Edge, and as he was being carried backstage, Matt counterattacked Edge in the locker room. On August 21 at SummerSlam, their match came to a premature end when Edge dropped Hardy onto the top of a ring post, causing him to bleed heavily. The referee ended the match on the grounds that Hardy could not continue, and Edge was declared the winner. After SummerSlam, the two continued feuding on Raw, including a Street Fight on August 29 that resulted in Hardy performing a Side Effect on Edge off the entrance stage and into electrical equipment below; the match ended in a no contest. At Unforgiven, Edge faced Hardy in a steel cage match. Hardy caught an interfering Lita with the Twist of Fate and won the match with a leg drop off the top of the cage. Hardy and Edge faced each other on October 3 at WWE Raw Homecoming in a Loser Leaves Raw ladder match. Edge's briefcase holding his Money in the Bank contract for his WWE Championship opportunity was suspended above the ring. The winner of the match received the contract and the loser was forced to leave Raw. Edge tied Hardy's arms in the ropes, and Lita trapped Hardy in a crucifix hold, leaving Hardy only able to watch Edge win. With his defeat at the hands of Edge, Hardy was moved to the SmackDown! brand where he re-debuted with a win over Simon Dean on October 21 in Reno, Nevada. One week later, Hardy won the fan vote to represent Team SmackDown! (alongside Rey Mysterio) to challenge Team Raw (Edge and Chris Masters) at Taboo Tuesday. Edge, however, refused to wrestle and sent Snitsky in place of him in the match, which Hardy and Mysterio won. Back on SmackDown!, Hardy started an angle with MNM (Johnny Nitro and Joey Mercury) and their manager Melina when Melina approached Hardy, seemingly wanting Hardy to join with her team. Hardy refused the offer, which led to him facing the tag team on several occasions with a variety of partners. On July 25, after the SmackDown! taping, Hardy was taken out of action after doctors found the remnants of the staph infection that had plagued him the previous year. He was sidelined until August 25 while he healed. Upon his return to action, Hardy feuded against childhood friend and reigning Cruiserweight Champion Gregory Helms. At No Mercy, in their home state, Hardy beat Helms in a non-title match. The two met again at Survivor Series, where Hardy's team won in a clean sweep. They wrestled one final match, a one time appearance in Booker T's Pro Wrestling Alliance (PWA) promotion, where Hardy defeated Helms in a North Carolina Street Fight. The Hardy Boyz reunion (2006–2007) On the November 21, 2006 episode of ECW on Sci Fi, Hardy and Jeff competed in a match together for the first time in almost five years, defeating The Full Blooded Italians. At December to Dismember, the Hardy Boyz issued an open challenge to any tag team who wanted to face them. MNM answered their challenge by reuniting at December to Dismember, a match won by the Hardy Boyz. At Armageddon, Hardy and Jeff competed against Paul London and Brian Kendrick, MNM, and Dave Taylor and William Regal in a Ladder match for the WWE Tag Team Championship but lost. Subsequently, he and Jeff feuded with MNM after the legitimate incident where they injured Mercury's face at Armageddon. This led to a long term rivalry, and at the Royal Rumble, Hardy and Jeff defeated MNM. Mercury and Hardy continued to feud on SmackDown! until Mercury was released from WWE on March 26. The night after WrestleMania 23 on Raw, the Hardys competed in a 10-team battle royal for the World Tag Team Championship. They won the titles for the sixth time from then WWE Champion John Cena and Shawn Michaels after last eliminating Lance Cade and Trevor Murdoch. This started a feud with Cade and Murdoch, and the Hardys successfully retained their World Tag Team Championship in their first title defense at Backlash. The Hardy Boyz also successfully retained their titles at Judgment Day against Cade and Murdoch. One month later at One Night Stand, they defeated The World's Greatest Tag Team to retain the titles in a Ladder match. The following night on Raw, Vince McMahon demanded that The Hardys once again defend their championships against Cade and Murdoch. The Hardys were defeated after Murdoch pushed Jeff's foot off the bottom rope during Cade's pinfall, causing the three count to continue. They invoked their rematch clause against Cade and Murdoch at Vengeance: Night of Champions, but were unsuccessful. Feud with MVP and championship reigns (2007–2009) On the July 6, 2007 episode of SmackDown!, Hardy won a non-title match against United States Champion Montel Vontavious Porter (MVP), which resulted in a feud between the two. Hardy was defeated by MVP at The Great American Bash for the United States Championship. MVP then claimed that he was "better than Hardy at everything", which led to a series of contests between Hardy and MVP, such as a basketball game, an arm wrestling contest, and a chess match which MVP "sneezed" on and ruined when Hardy put him in check. MVP challenged Hardy to a boxing match at Saturday Night's Main Event XXXV, however MVP was legitimately diagnosed with the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome. Since MVP was unable to compete, Hardy faced his replacement, former world champion boxer, Evander Holyfield. The match ended in a no contest after MVP entered the ring to verbally abuse Holyfield, who then knocked him out. MVP also challenged Hardy to a beer drinking contest at SummerSlam, but as revenge for what happened at SNME, Hardy allowed Stone Cold Steve Austin to replace him; Austin simply performed a stunner on MVP then kept drinking. After a segment involving MVP inadvertently choosing Hardy as his tag-team partner, Theodore Long promptly set up a match against Deuce 'n Domino for the WWE Tag Team Championship on the August 31 episode of SmackDown! which Hardy and MVP were able to win, therefore setting up Hardy's first reign as WWE Tag Team Champion. Hardy and MVP retained the titles at Unforgiven in a rematch against former champions Deuce 'n Domino. Hardy was scheduled to face MVP at Cyber Sunday, but due to a real-life head injury sustained on the October 26 episode of SmackDown!, he was not medically cleared to compete. As part of the storyline, Hardy continually asked MVP for a shot at the United States Championship but MVP refused stating that he was more focused on the Tag Team Championship. On the November 16 episode of SmackDown!, Hardy and MVP dropped the WWE Tag Team Championship to John Morrison and The Miz. Despite the fact that Hardy was hurt, MVP immediately invoked the rematch clause. After the rematch, in which Hardy was forced to tap out, MVP attacked Hardy, repeatedly targeting his knee. It was later confirmed by WWE.com that Hardy had suffered an injury at his former partner's hands and that he might not be able to compete at Survivor Series. Despite Hardy's absence at Survivor Series, his team was able to win the match. On November 21, WWE's official website reported that Hardy underwent an emergency appendectomy in Tampa, Florida after his appendix burst. Hardy made an appearance at the December 31 episode of Raw supporting his brother Jeff. To further Jeff's storyline with Randy Orton, however, Hardy was attacked by Orton. Hardy made his return at a live event in Muncie, Indiana on March 1, 2008. On March 30, 2008, at WrestleMania XXIV, during the Money in the Bank ladder match Hardy cut through the crowd and attacked MVP to prevent him from winning the match. He made his official in-ring return the next night on Raw, losing a singles match to WWE Champion Randy Orton. On the April 4 episode of SmackDown, Hardy faced MVP in a non-title match, which he won, re-igniting their storyline rivalry. On April 27, 2008, Hardy defeated MVP to win the United States Championship at Backlash, and successfully retained his title against MVP five days later on SmackDown. Hardy declared himself as a fighting champion that would take on all challenges, defending the United States championship against Shelton Benjamin, Elijah Burke, Chuck Palumbo, Mr. Kennedy, Chavo Guerrero and Umaga. Hardy was drafted to the ECW brand on the June 23, 2008 episode of Raw during the 2008 WWE Draft, in the process making the United States Championship exclusive to ECW. He dropped the United States Championship to Shelton Benjamin at the Great American Bash pay-per-view on July 20, 2008, which meant that the title returned to SmackDown. On the July 22 episode of ECW, Hardy became the number one contender to Mark Henry's ECW Championship after defeating John Morrison, The Miz and Finlay in a fatal four-way match. He won the title match at SummerSlam by disqualification due to interference from Henry's manager, Tony Atlas, thus he failed to win the title. Due to the ending of the pay-per-view match, Hardy received a rematch for the title on the next episode of ECW, but again failed to win the title when Henry pinned him after a distraction by Atlas. At Unforgiven, Hardy won the ECW Championship during the Championship scramble match, defeating then-champion Henry, The Miz, Finlay and Chavo Guerrero by pinning the Miz with three minutes left, marking his first world heavyweight championship win. He continued to feud with Henry until No Mercy, where Hardy successfully retained the title. Hardy lost the title to Jack Swagger on the January 13, 2009 episode of ECW, which was taped on January 12. Feud with Jeff Hardy and departure (2009–2010) At the 2009 Royal Rumble pay-per-view, after losing an ECW Championship rematch to Swagger, Hardy turned on his brother when he hit Jeff with a steel chair, allowing Edge to win the WWE Championship, turning heel in the process. On the January 27, 2009 episode of ECW, it was announced by General Manager Theodore Long that Hardy had requested, and been granted, his release from ECW and had re-signed with the SmackDown brand. As part of the buildup to this feud, Matt strongly implied that he was responsible for all of Jeff's accidents leading back to November, including an assault in a hotel stairwell that prevented Jeff from appearing at Survivor Series, an automobile accident where Jeff's car was run off the road, and a pyrotechnics malfunction where part of the pyro from Jeff's entrance was fired directly at Jeff, in an attempt to stop Jeff holding the WWE Championship. Despite Hardy's attempts to goad Jeff into fighting him, Jeff refused to fight his brother, but, on the March 6 episode of SmackDown, Jeff attacked him during a promo where Matt implied that he was also responsible for the fire that burned down Jeff's house, going so far as to reveal that he had in his possession a dog collar that supposedly belonged to Jeff's dog, Jack (who died in the fire), that he claimed to have salvaged from the wreckage of the house. At WrestleMania 25, Matt defeated Jeff in an Extreme Rules match, and in a stretcher match on the following episode of SmackDown. On the April 13 episode of Raw, Hardy was drafted to the Raw brand as part of the WWE draft. Despite the fact that the two were on different brands, he continued his feud with Jeff. Two weeks later, in a rematch from WrestleMania, Hardy lost to Jeff in an "I Quit" match at Backlash, in which he legitimately broke his hand. Hardy continued to wrestle with his hand in a cast, incorporating it into his persona and claiming that he was wrestling under protest. He reignited his feud with MVP on Raw for the United States Championship. He also formed a tag team with William Regal, and the two acted as henchmen for General Manager Vickie Guerrero. At the June 22 taping of WWE Superstars, Hardy suffered yet another injury, when his intestines went through his abdominal wall, during a triple threat match against MVP and Kofi Kingston. Hardy had suffered a tear in his abdominal muscle two years previously, but had not needed surgery until it worsened, and became a danger to his health. He was then traded back to the SmackDown brand on June 29, and underwent surgery for the torn abdominal muscle on July 2. He made his return on the August 7 episode of SmackDown as the special guest referee in the World Heavyweight Championship match between his brother, Jeff, and CM Punk, and helped Jeff retain the championship by counting the pinfall. The following week Hardy turned face again when he saved his brother when CM Punk and The Hart Dynasty attacked both Jeff and John Morrison. On the August 21 episode of SmackDown, after apologizing for his past actions towards Jeff and admitting that he was not behind any of Jeff's accidents, he had his first match back after his injury when he teamed with Jeff and John Morrison to defeat The Hart Dynasty and CM Punk, when Matt pinned Punk. In early 2010, Hardy began an on-screen relationship with Maria; but was brief and the relationship ended when Maria was released from her WWE contract. On the March 5 episode of SmackDown, Hardy qualified for the Money in the Bank ladder match at WrestleMania XXVI by defeating Drew McIntyre, but was unsuccessful at WrestleMania, as the match was won by Jack Swagger. Hardy was suspended by Vince McMahon because he attacked McIntyre after McIntyre lost to Kofi Kingston at Over the Limit. He was able to get his revenge on McIntyre during the Viewer's Choice episode of Raw when chosen as the opponent for McIntyre, with General Manager Theodore Long stating that Hardy was suspended from SmackDown, but not from Raw. On the following episode of SmackDown, however, Vickie Guerrero announced that, per orders of Vince McMahon, Hardy had been suspended from all WWE programming. However, at Fatal 4-Way, Hardy prevented McIntyre from regaining the Intercontinental Championship, thus continuing their feud. On the following edition of SmackDown, he was reinstated by Long and had a match with McIntyre, which Hardy won. After the match, it was announced that McIntyre's visa had legitimately expired and was sent back to Scotland, thus ending their feud. Hardy was featured in the SmackDown Money in the Bank ladder match but was unsuccessful in winning with Kane coming out victorious. On September 12, WWE confirmed they had sent Hardy home from a European tour. Following this, Hardy began posting videos on his YouTube channel expressing his disinterest in the WWE product and insisting that he wanted to be released from the company. On October 15, 2010, WWE announced that Hardy had been released from his contract. Hardy later stated that his release had been in effect two weeks before WWE made the announcement. Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (2011) On January 9, 2011, Hardy made his debut for Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) at the Genesis pay-per-view, as part of the stable Immortal. He was the surprise opponent for Rob Van Dam, and defeated him to prevent Van Dam from receiving a match for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship, held by Hardy's brother Jeff. In the main event, Hardy attempted to interfere in Jeff's World Heavyweight Championship match with Mr. Anderson, but was stopped by Van Dam, which led to Jeff losing both the match and the championship. On the January 13 episode of Impact!, the Hardy Boyz reunited to defeat Anderson and Van Dam in a tag team match, following interference from Beer Money, Inc. On February 13 at Against All Odds, Van Dam defeated Hardy in a rematch. On the following episode of Impact!, Hardy, along with the rest of Immortal and Ric Flair, betrayed Fortune. On March 13 at Victory Road, Hardy was defeated by Flair's previous protégé, A.J. Styles. On April 17 at Lockdown, Immortal, represented by Hardy, Abyss, Bully Ray and Ric Flair, were defeated by Fortune members James Storm, Kazarian and Robert Roode and Christopher Daniels, who replaced an injured A.J. Styles, in a Lethal Lockdown match. On the April 21 episode of Impact!, Hardy faced Sting for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship, Hardy's first World Title match in TNA, but was defeated. The following month, Hardy was granted a shot at the TNA World Tag Team Championship against Beer Money, Inc. (James Storm and Robert Roode). While the champions looked to defend the title against the Hardy Boyz, Matt instead introduced the returning Chris Harris, Storm's old tag team partner, as his partner for the title match. The match took place at Sacrifice, where Storm and Roode retained their titles. On June 21, it was reported that TNA had suspended Hardy. On August 20, Hardy was released from TNA following a DUI arrest that occurred earlier that same day. Return to the independent circuit (2011–2017) Hardy announced his retirement from full-time professional wrestling due to injuries on September 1, 2011. He issued a challenge to his long-time rival MVP, who was wrestling in Japan at the time, to one final match at "Crossfire Live!" in Nashville. The event was held May 19, 2012 and benefited the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Hardy won the match. Throughout 2012, Hardy wrestled sporadically on the independent circuit, working with promotions such as Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling, Pro Wrestling Syndicate and Northeast Wrestling. On October 5, Hardy was defeated by Kevin Steen at Pro Wrestling Xperience's An Evil Twist of Fate. On November 11, Hardy, as the masked wrestler Rahway Reaper, defeated the Pro Wrestling Syndicate Kevin Matthews, winning the championship. On February 9, 2013, Hardy lost the Pro Wrestling Syndicate Championship back to Matthews. On February 16, 2013, at Family Wrestling Entertainment's No Limit, Hardy wrestled a TLC match for the FWE Heavyweight Championship against the champion Carlito and Tommy Dreamer, but he was defeated. On November 30, 2013, at WrestleCade, Hardy defeated Carlito to become the first ever WrestleCade Champion. On May 3, 2014, following a match between Christian York and Drolix, Hardy defeated Drolix to become the new MCW Heavyweight Champion. At Maryland Championship Wrestling's Shane Shamrock Cup, Hardy defeated Luke Hawx in a TLC match for Hardy's title and Hawx's Extreme Rising World title. Hardy won the match, but he gave back the title to Hawx. On October 4, Hardy lost the MCW Heavyweight Championship back to Drolix, following outside interference from Kevin Eck. On February 9, 2015, Hardy appeared on FWE's "No Limits 2015" iPPV, challenging Drew Galloway for the ICW World Heavyweight Championship, but was defeated. On November 28, 2015, Hardy lost the WrestleCade Championship to Jeff Jarrett at WrestleCade IV in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Hardy regained the title in a triple-threat cage match against Jarrett and Ethan Carter III in Hickory, North Carolina on May 20, 2016. He appeared at the #DELETEWCPW event for What Culture Pro Wrestling (WCPW) in Nottingham, England on November 30. Hardy, billed as "Broken" Matt Hardy, lost a no-disqualification match to Bully Ray, with Ray proposing the no-disqualification stipulation at the last minute, and Hardy accepting there and then. Return to ROH (2012–2014) At Death Before Dishonor X: State of Emergency in 2012, Hardy returned to Ring of Honor, confronting Adam Cole and challenging him to a match for the ROH World Television Championship. On December 16 at Final Battle 2012: Doomsday, Hardy defeated Cole in a non-title match. At the following iPPV, 11th Anniversary Show on March 2, 2013, Hardy joined the villainous S.C.U.M. stable. On April 5 at the Supercard of Honor VII iPPV, Hardy unsuccessfully challenged Matt Taven for the ROH World Television Championship in a three-way elimination match, which also included Adam Cole. On June 22 at Best in the World 2013, Hardy defeated former S.C.U.M. stablemate Kevin Steen in a No Disqualification match to become the number one contender to the ROH World Championship. Hardy received his title shot at the following day's Ring of Honor Wrestling tapings, but was defeated by the defending champion, Jay Briscoe. Later that same day, S.C.U.M. was forced to disband after losing a Steel Cage Warfare match against Team ROH. On December 14, 2013, at Final Battle 2013, Hardy defeated Adam Page in a singles match; later on in the main event, Hardy aided Adam Cole in retaining his title and forming a tag team with him. After aiding Cole at Supercard of Honor VIII, Hardy was given Jay Briscoe's unofficial "Real World Title" belt, which he renamed the "ROH Iconic Championship". In July, Hardy opted out of his ROH contract and went back to TNA. Return to OMEGA (2013–2018) Matt announced that OMEGA would return in January 2013 with an event titled "Chinlock For Chuck". The main event featured Matt, Jeff, Shane "Hurricane" Helms and "Cowboy" James Storm defeating Gunner, Steve Corino, CW Anderson and Lodi. On October 12, 2013, at "Chapel Thrill", Hardy announced a Tournament for the OMEGA Heavyweight Championship which featured himself vs. CW Anderson and Shane "Hurricane" Helms vs. "The King" Shane Williams. After Hardy's qualifying match he was attacked by CW but was saved by the returning Willow the Whisp. Hardy won that match and advanced to the finals. On November 21, 2015, Matt won the OMEGA Heavyweight Championship for the second time, defeating former student Trevor Lee. Following this, Matt (upon regaining the TNA world title as part of his villainous egotistical "Iconic" gimmick) began proclaiming himself to be the only world champion that matters, and the only "true" world champion in wrestling, as he held both the TNA and OMEGA Championships, which (according to him) put him above any other promotions' world champions. Throughout 2016, Hardy defended the TNA and OMEGA titles jointly at OMEGA events as part of his "only true world champion" gimmick. On January 29, The Hardys won the OMEGA Tag Team Championships. Return to TNA The Hardys third reunion (2014–2015) On July 24, 2014, Hardy returned to TNA and reunited with Jeff to reform The Hardys for the third time. At the Destination X episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys were defeated by The Wolves in a match for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On the August 14 episode of Impact Wrestling, Team 3D (formerly the Dudley Boyz) challenged The Hardys to a match, which Team 3D won. At the Hardcore Justice episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys and Team 3D talked about a match involving themselves and The Wolves. When The Wolves were asked by the two teams, they agreed. Later that night, Kurt Angle announced all three teams would compete in a best of three series for the TNA World Tag Team Championship with the winners of the first match choosing the stipulation of the next one. The Hardys won the second match of the series on the September 10 episode of Impact Wrestling in a tables match and choose a ladder match for the third match of the series. The Hardys were unsuccessful in winning that match on the September 17 episode of Impact Wrestling, as the Wolves won that match. The Wolves then went on to pick the final match of the series to be a Full Metal Mayhem match to take place on the October 8 episode of Impact Wrestling. The Hardys were unsuccessful in that match as the Wolves won that match. On October 22, The Hardys entered a number one contenders tournament for the TNA World Tag Team Championship defeating The BroMans (Jessie Godderz and DJ Z) in the first round of the tournament. On the October 29 episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys defeated Team Dixie (Ethan Carter III and Tyrus) in the semifinals to advance to the finals of the tournament, where they defeated Samoa Joe and Low Ki to become number one contenders for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On the January 16, 2015 episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys defeated the Wolves. At the Lockdown episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys were defeated by The Revolution in a six sides of steel cage match for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On the February 20 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy and The Wolves defeated The Revolution in a six-man tag team match. In March, The Hardys participated in a tournament for the vacant TNA World Tag Team Championship. On March 16, 2015, Matt and Jeff won an Ultimate X match for the titles. On May 8, 2015, Hardy vacated the TNA World Tag Team Championship due to his brother Jeff being injured. World Heavyweight Champion (2015–2016) On June 28, 2015, Hardy was among the five wrestlers who competed for the TNA King of the Mountain Championship at Slammiversary, with Jeff Jarrett ultimately emerging victorious. On the July 8 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy requested a world title shot against Ethan Carter III, but was denied and forced to face the Dirty Heels (Austin Aries and Bobby Roode) in a handicap match, which he lost. On the July 22 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy defeated Roode in a Tables match to become the #1 contender for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship. On the August 5 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy got his shot at the title against EC3 in a Full Metal Mayhem match, but failed to win the title. On the September 2 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy got another shot at the TNA World Heavyweight Championship against EC3, but again failed to win the title; as part of the storyline, Jeff Hardy was forced to act as Ethan Carter's personal assistant. On the September 30 episode of Impact Wrestling, Hardy was added to the Ethan Carter III vs. Drew Galloway main event match for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship at Bound for Glory after he and Galloway defeated Carter and Tyrus, making it a three-way match, following which Jeff, who EC3 had just "fired" in the previous episode, was revealed to be the special guest referee. On October 4 at Bound for Glory, Matt won the TNA World Heavyweight Championship by pinning Galloway. However, EC3 filed an injunction (kayfabe) that banned Hardy from appearing on Impact Wrestling for a month, which forced Hardy to relinquish the title in order to stay on the show. However, Hardy had been participating in the TNA World Title Series for the vacant title. He qualified to the round of 16 by defeating Davey Richards, Robbie E and Eddie Edwards. He then advanced to the round of 8 by defeating the King of the Mountain Champion Bobby Roode and then to Jessie Godderz to continue his winning streak. The semifinals and finals were held on the January 5, 2016, live episode of Impact Wrestling during its debut on Pop TV, in which he defeated Eric Young to advance to the final round. Hardy faced EC3 in the TNA World Title Series finals, but lost the match via pinfall. Hardy won the TNA World Title from EC3 on the January 19, 2016 episode of Impact Wrestling, becoming the first man to defeat him in a one-on-one match in TNA. During the match a double turn took place; Hardy turned heel after Tyrus betrayed EC3. The following week on Impact Wrestling, Jeff Hardy had confronted him about last week and issued a challenge to Matt for the World Heavyweight title in the main event and Matt accepted. However, later before the main event could begin, Eric Young and Bram attacked Jeff from behind. Kurt Angle then came out to try save Jeff, and Matt had Tyrus attack Angle from behind. While Matt watched from the ramp, Young attacked Jeff with the Piledriver off the apron through a table. The following week, he successfully retained his title against Angle. At Lockdown, he retained his title in a Six-side of steel match against Ethan Carter III, with the help of Rockstar Spud. He lost his title against Drew Galloway on the March 15 episode of Impact Wrestling, after a match featuring EC3 and Jeff Hardy. Two weeks later he received a rematch for the title on Impact Wrestling, but was again defeated by Galloway. After losing the title he started a feud with Jeff. On the April 19 episode of Impact Wrestling, and an I Quit match ended in a no-contest as both Matt and Jeff were badly injured and Matt was taken out to the hospital on a stretcher. The Broken Universe (2016–2017) Hardy returned on May 17 episode of Impact Wrestling, revealing himself to be one of the impostor Willows behind the attacks on Jeff. Later that night, he attacked Jeff. In the following weeks, Hardy debuted a new persona as a "Broken" man with part of his hair bleached blonde along with a strange sophisticated accent, blaming Jeff (who he began referring to as "Brother Nero", Nero being Jeff's middle name) for breaking him and becoming obsessed with "deleting" him. His line “Delete”, is mostly inspired by the Death Note manga/anime series character Teru Mikami. On June 12, at Slammiversary, Matt was defeated by Jeff in a Full Metal Mayhem match. On the June 21 episode of Impact Wrestling, Matt was once again defeated by Jeff in a Six Sides of Steel match. On the June 28 episode of Impact Wrestling, Matt challenged Jeff to a final battle with the Hardy brand on the line, to take place at their home in Cameron, North Carolina the next week. On July 5, during special episode "The Final Deletion", Matt defeated Jeff in the match to become sole owner of the Hardy brand, forcing Jeff to drop his last name and become referred to as "Brother Nero". On the August 18 episode of Impact Wrestling, Matt and Brother Nero defeated The Tribunal, The BroMans and The Helms Dynasty in an "Ascension To Hell" match for an opportunity to challenge Decay for the TNA World Tag Team Championship. On September 8, during special episode "Delete or Decay", the Hardys faced Decay in a match held at the Hardy compound, where Brother Nero sacrificed himself to save Matt from Abyss. Thanks to Brother Nero's sacrifice, Hardy was able to confront Rosemary and prevent his son Maxel from being abducted, which turned Hardy babyface as a result, and he furthered the face turn by healing Brother Nero in the Lake of Reincarnation. At Bound for Glory, the Hardys defeated Decay in "The Great War" to win the TNA World Tag Team Championship for the second time. On the October 6 episode of Impact Wrestling, they successfully defended their titles against Decay, in a Wolf Creek match. On the November 3 episode of Impact Wrestling, the Hardys successfully defended the titles against The Tribunal. After the match, the Hardys were attacked by the masked trio known as Death Crew Council (DCC). After accepting DCC's title challenge, The Hardys faced Bram and Kingston, and Matt pinned Kingston to retain the titles. On December 15, during special episode "Total Nonstop Deletion", they were once again successful in retaining. Brother Nero attacked Crazzy Steve with the Twist of Fate, who then fell into a volcano (that had appeared on the compound in the weeks leading up the event), and was shot up into the sky, landing in the ring. Matt then covered him to win the match. On the January 12, 2017 episode of Impact Wrestling, The Hardys successfully defended their titles against The Wolves. At Genesis, The Hardys retained their titles against the DCC and Decay in a three-way tag team match. On Open Fight Night, the Hardys began a storyline where they would teleport to different promotions and win that promotions' tag team championship gold, which was referred to by Matt as their "Expedition of Gold". On February 27, Hardy announced that both he and Jeff had finally left TNA, following years of speculation, with their contracts expiring that week. Though the two sides were reportedly close to a contract agreement, talks began to break down and changes in management prompted their departure from the company. The TNA World Tag Team Championships were vacated due to the Hardys' departure and was explained on TNA television in a segment where The Hardys teleported to their next Expedition of Gold destination, but a technicality resulted in them disappearing and the belts appearing in the arms of Decay. Broken gimmick legal battle Shortly after the departure of Matt and Jeff from TNA was made public, Matt's wife, Reby, went on a social media tirade in which she repeatedly slammed TNA, the company's new management and the way in which contract negotiations between the company and the Hardy family were conducted. A few weeks following this, the bad blood between the two sides intensified, so much so that the new management of TNA (now renamed Impact Wrestling) Anthem Sports & Entertainment issued a cease and desist letter to The Hardys' new promotion Ring of Honor (ROH), in which Anthem essentially ordered ROH as well as any broadcasting company airing ROH's 15th Anniversary pay–per–view show (on which The Hardys were to participate in a match) to not in any way speak of, indicate or acknowledge the existence of the Broken Matt and Brother Nero characters and instead to refer to The Hardys as simply Matt Hardy and Jeff Hardy. The issue with this is that while The Hardys were in TNA, they had full creative control over the Broken gimmick, with them even filming their own segments to air on TNA programming in some circumstances, thus making the Hardy family (in their belief) the owners of the Broken gimmick. It is believed that civil litigation will follow and a potential court hearing will take place regarding the outcome on who owns the Broken gimmick: Anthem or the Hardy family. Until then, the status of the Broken gimmick remains undecided. Despite this, Matt continues to use the Broken gimmick through his social media accounts, but neither he nor Jeff uses the Broken gimmick at any professional wrestling shows for ROH or on the independent circuit, presumably until the results of the expected legal proceedings have been finalized. Newly–appointed Impact Wrestling President Ed Nordholm credits the invention of and the vision behind the Broken gimmick to Jeremy Borash, Dave Lagana and Billy Corgan, and while Borash specifically had the most input into the gimmick of the three aside from Matt, the Hardy family deny that Borash was the sole person behind the gimmick. In November 2017, Impact Wrestling changed their policy, allowing all talent to retain complete ownership over their intellectual property, essentially forfeiting ownership of the "Broken" character to Hardy. On January 31, 2018, the legal battle officially concluded when Matt legally acquired ownership of all trademarks related to the Broken universe and the Broken gimmick, which includes 'Broken Matt', 'Brother Nero', 'Broken Brilliance' and 'Vanguard1'. International matches (2014–2015) On November 1, 2014, Hardy traveled to Japan to compete for Wrestle-1 at the promotions Keiji Muto 30th Anniversary Hold Out show in a triple threat match against Seiya Sanada and Tajiri, which he lost. On May 24, 2015, Hardy traveled to Mexico to compete as a team captain for Team TNA/Lucha Underground with teammates Mr. Anderson and Johnny Mundo at Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide's 2015 Lucha Libre World Cup pay–per–view show. In the quarter–final round, Team TNA/Lucha Underground faced Team Rest of the World (Drew Galloway, Angélico and El Mesías) to a 15-minute time limit draw, with Team TNA/Lucha Underground winning in overtime and advancing to the semi–final round. In the semi–final round, Team TNA/Lucha Underground defeated Team MexLeyendas (Blue Demon Jr., Dr. Wagner Jr. and El Solar) to advance to the final round. In the final round, Team TNA/Lucha Underground faced Dream Team (El Patrón Alberto, Myzteziz and Rey Mysterio Jr.) to a 15–minute time limit draw, with Dream Team winning both the match and the tournament in overtime with Hardy on the losing end of the final pinfall. Second return to ROH (2016–2017) On December 2, 2016, Hardy returned to ROH for the second time while still under contract with TNA, appearing at the promotions Final Battle pay-per-view show as Broken Matt, where a video message showed him addressing The Young Bucks (Matt Jackson and Nick Jackson) and The Briscoes (Jay Briscoe and Mark Briscoe). On March 4, 2017, in the same week that both Matt and Jeff were released from TNA, The Hardys defeated The Young Bucks in an impromptu match at ROH's 2017 installment of the company's Manhattan Mayhem show series to become the new ROH World Tag Team Champions for the first time. Moments after winning the titles, Hardy announced in a post-match promo that both he and Brother Nero (Jeff) had signed "the biggest ROH contracts in (the company's) history". It was later confirmed that the contracts were short-term, only for the "immediate future". On March 10, The Hardys successfully defended the ROH World Tag Team Championship for the first time at ROH's 15th Anniversary pay-per-view show against The Young Bucks and Roppongi Vice (Beretta and Rocky Romero) in a three-way Las Vegas tag team street fight match. Prior to the event, the Hardys had been sent a legal threat by Impact Wrestling regarding the use of the Broken Matt and Brother Nero gimmicks. The following night on March 11, The Hardys (not billed but using the Broken gimmicks anyway) once again retained the titles, this time against The Briscoes at a set of Ring of Honor Wrestling television tapings. The Hardys lost the titles back to The Young Bucks in a ladder match on April 1 at ROH's Supercard of Honor XI pay-per-view show, which would be the final ROH appearances for both Hardys in this tenure with the promotion. Second return to WWE (2017–2020) Feud with The Bar (2017) At the WrestleMania 33 pay-per-view on April 2, 2017, Hardy made his surprise return to WWE, along with his brother Jeff Hardy, being added as last-minute participants in the ladder match for the Raw Tag Team Championship, defeating Gallows and Anderson, Cesaro and Sheamus, and Enzo and Cass to win the Raw Tag Team Championship. Afterwards on Raw Talk, Hardy mentioned that The Hardy Boyz had successfully completed the Expedition of Gold, after winning the Raw Tag Team Championship. At Payback, The Hardy Boyz retained their championships against Cesaro and Sheamus, who attacked them after the match. The next night on Raw, Cesaro and Sheamus explained their actions, claiming the fans were more supportive of 'novelty acts' from the past like The Hardy Boyz, who they feel did not deserve to be in the match at WrestleMania 33. Subsequently, at Extreme Rules, The Hardy Boyz lost the titles against Cesaro and Sheamus in a steel cage match, and failed to regain it back the following month at the Great Balls of Fire event. Afterwards, it was revealed that Jeff had gotten injured and would be out for an estimated six months, thus Hardy began wrestling in singles matches. Woken Universe and storyline with Bray Wyatt (2017–2018) During his feud with Bray Wyatt, Hardy introduced his "Woken" gimmick, after Impact Wrestling dropped their claim to the gimmick and Hardy gained full ownership of it. Wyatt defeated Hardy at Raw 25 on January 22, 2018, and Hardy defeated Wyatt at Elimination Chamber on February 25. Their final match happened on the March 19 episode of Raw, dubbed The Ultimate Deletion, with Hardy winning after distractions from Señor Benjamin. Wyatt then disappeared after being thrown into the Lake of Reincarnation. At WrestleMania 34 on April 7, Hardy competed in the annual André the Giant Memorial Battle Royal, and won the match due to a distraction by the returning Wyatt. After WrestleMania, Hardy and Wyatt performed as a tag team, sometimes referred to as The Deleters of Worlds. They won a tournament for the vacant Raw Tag Team Championship, defeating Cesaro and Sheamus at the Greatest Royal Rumble event to win the title. However, they lost the titles at Extreme Rules to The B-Team (Bo Dallas and Curtis Axel). On the July 23 episode of Raw, Hardy and Wyatt received a rematch for the titles, but was again defeated by The B-Team. Following this, Hardy revealed that he was taking time off due to his back fusing with his pelvis, effectively disbanding the team. According to Hardy, the reason WWE disbanded the team was because he and Wyatt pitched several ideas to WWE to work with their characters. The Hardys fourth reunion and departure (2019–2020) After more than seven months of absence from television, Hardy returned on the February 26, 2019 episode of SmackDown Live, teaming with his brother Jeff to defeat The Bar (Cesaro and Sheamus). At WrestleMania 35 on April 7, Hardy competed in the André the Giant Memorial Battle Royal, but was eliminated by eventual winner, Braun Strowman. Two days later on SmackDown Live, The Hardy Boyz defeated The Usos to win the SmackDown Tag Team Championship. The reign only lasted 21 days (recognized as 20 days by WWE), as they had to vacate the title due to Jeff injuring his knee, this was explained in storyline as injuries afflicted by Lars Sullivan. After his brother Jeff's injury, Hardy began to appear on WWE programming less frequently. At Super ShowDown on June 7, Hardy competed in the 51-man Battle Royal, which was eventually won by Mansoor. From November to December, Hardy occasionally appeared on Raw, losing matches against superstars like Buddy Murphy, Drew McIntyre, Ricochet and Erick Rowan. On the February 10, 2020 episode of Raw, Hardy confronted Randy Orton about Orton's attack on Edge two weeks earlier. Hardy then got himself into a brawl with him moments after, and was viciously attacked by Orton. The following week on Raw, an injured Hardy appeared and was once again assaulted by Orton, which would be his final appearance in WWE. On March 2, Hardy announced his departure from WWE through his official YouTube channel, where Hardy said that while he's grateful towards the people behind the scenes, he said he is also on different pages with WWE as he feels he needs to have creative input and still has more to give. Later that day, WWE announced that his contract had expired. All Elite Wrestling Multiple personalities (2020–2021) Hardy made his All Elite Wrestling (AEW) debut on the March 18, 2020 episode of Dynamite, reverting to his "Broken" gimmick and being announced as the replacement for the kayfabe injured Nick Jackson on The Elite's team at Blood and Guts. However, the event was postponed to the following year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. On the May 6 episode of Dynamite, Hardy wrestled his first match with AEW, teaming up with Kenny Omega for a street fight against The Inner Circle's Chris Jericho and Sammy Guevara, and Hardy and Omega lost when Jericho pinned Omega. During this period, due to the lack of live audience, Hardy felt that the Broken character needs public, so he began to include several of his gimmicks, including Broken Matt Hardy, Big Money Matt, Matt Hardy V1, and Unkillable Matt Hardy, being referred to as "Multifarious" Matt Hardy. AEW president Tony Khan later admitted that he "wasn't a fan" of the Broken gimmick and much preferred more realistic presentations in wrestling. At Double or Nothing, Hardy teamed with The Elite to defeat The Inner Circle in the first ever Stadium Stampede match. During the match, Santana and Ortiz dunked Hardy in the stadium pool, which acted as a version of the Lake of Reincarnation, as Hardy kept cycling through his various gimmicks throughout his career when he surfaced. Hardy then feuded with Sammy Guevara, and after Hardy defeated Guevara in a Broken Rules match at All Out, Hardy took time off until he was cleared to return, due to an injury sustained during the match. On the September 16 episode of Dynamite, Hardy aligned with Private Party (Isiah Kassidy and Marq Quen) as their manager, but was attacked backstage before their match. The attacker was later revealed as Guevara and The Elite Deletion match was announced, which took place at The Hardy Compound in Cameron, North Carolina, where Hardy won. The Hardy Family Office (2021–present) Hardy then switched to his Big Money persona as he focused on managing Private Party. Over the following weeks, Hardy would display villainous tactics as he began cheating during matches much to Private Party's dismay. On the January 20, 2021 episode of Dynamite, Hardy and Private Party defeated Matt Sydal and Top Flight (Dante Martin and Darius Martin) after using a steel chair before attacking Sydal and Top Flight afterwards, thus turning heel. Hardy then approached Adam Page to accompany and befriend him, and during tag team matches, Hardy would always tag himself in and pick up the victory for his team to Page's behest. After Page set up a match between Hardy and himself, Hardy double-crossed Page, with Private Party and The Hybrid 2 (Angélico and Jack Evans) attacking Page until The Dark Order came out to save him. At the Revolution event, Hardy lost to Page despite multiple interferences from Private Party. Following Revolution, Hardy became the manager for The Butcher and The Blade (with their valet The Bunny in tow), and along with Private Party, the stable became known as the Matt Hardy Empire before settling on the name Hardy Family Office. Hardy also added The Hybrid 2 to his group in July having previously hiring them on a mercenary basis. At Double or Nothing, Hardy competed in Casino Battle Royale but was eliminated by Christian Cage. This led to a match between the two at Fyter Fest, where Hardy lost to Cage. In August, Matt Hardy and HFO began a feud with Orange Cassidy and Best Friends, which led to a match on the August 25 episode of Dynamite, where Hardy was defeated by Cassidy. However, on the November 12 episode of Rampage, Hardy defeated Cassidy in a Lumberjack match, thanks to an interference from HFO and the heel lumberjacks. Their feud ended on the November 17 episode of Dynamite where his team of The Butcher and The Blade lost to the team of Cassidy and Tomohiro Ishii, where Cassidy gave a crossbody to the interfering Hardy and The Blade during the match. Professional wrestling style and persona After the creation of his Broken character, Hardy was praised by several wrestlers and critics for reinventing himself several times during his career. During his career, Hardy has won the Wrestling Observer Newsletter Best Gimmick award two times under two different characters, once in 2002 and again in 2016. Personal life Hardy was in a six-year relationship with wrestler Amy Dumas, better known as Lita. They first met in January 1999 at a NWA Mid-Atlantic show but did not begin dating until a few months later. They broke up in February 2005 when he discovered that she was having an affair with one of Hardy's close friends, fellow wrestler Adam Copeland, better known as Edge. Hardy also dated WWE wrestler Ashley Massaro. Hardy married wrestler Rebecca Reyes, better known as Reby Sky, on October 5, 2013. They have three sons and one daughter. Hardy had previously been an addict, and credits his wife for helping him get clean. Hardy is good friends with fellow wrestlers Marty Garner, Shannon Moore, and Gregory Helms. In December 2020, he claimed to have Native American ancestry. Legal issues Hardy was arrested for a DUI on August 20, 2011. Two days later, he was arrested on felony drug charges when police found steroids in his home. In November 2011, Hardy was removed from court-ordered rehab and sent back to jail for drinking. In January 2014, Hardy and his wife were both arrested after a fight at a hotel. Other media In 1999, Matt, along with his brother Jeff, appeared as an uncredited wrestler on That '70s Show episode "That Wrestling Show". Matt and Jeff also appeared on Tough Enough in early 2001, talking to and wrestling the contestants. He appeared in the February 25, 2002 episode of Fear Factor competing against five other World Wrestling Federation wrestlers, including his brother. He won $50,000 for the American Cancer Society. Hardy also appeared on the October 13, 2009 episode of Scare Tactics, as a mental patient who threatens to attack the prank's victim. In 2001, Matt, Jeff, and Lita appeared in Rolling Stone magazine's 2001 Sports Hall of Fame issue. In 2003, Matt and Jeff, with the help of Michael Krugman, wrote and published their autobiography The Hardy Boyz: Exist 2 Inspire. As part of WWE, Matt appeared in their DVD, The Hardy Boyz: Leap of Faith in 2001. On April 29, 2008, WWE released Twist of Fate: The Matt and Jeff Hardy Story. The DVD featured footage of the brothers in OMEGA and WWE. Hardy also appears on The Hardy Show, an Internet web show which features the Hardys, Shannon Moore, and many of their friends. Hardy plays himself in the 2013 film Pro Wrestlers vs Zombies in which he and his real-life wife Reby Sky battle the undead. Hardy's first WWE video game was WWF WrestleMania 2000 in 1999 on the Nintendo 64 shortly followed by WWF SmackDown! in early 2000 on the PlayStation. He made several appearances later in WWF SmackDown! 2: Know Your Role, WWF SmackDown! Just Bring It, WWE SmackDown! Shut Your Mouth, WWE SmackDown! Here Comes the Pain, and WWE SmackDown vs. Raw. He later returned to the series in WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2007, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2008, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2009, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2010, and WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2011, which was his last WWE video game before his departure to TNA. Following his return to WWE in 2017, he was revealed as a DLC character in WWE 2K18 on September 25 that year alongside tag team partner and brother, Jeff Hardy. Hardy was revealed as a playable character in WWE 2K19 on August 30, 2018. His final appearance in a WWE video game came with WWE 2K20 in 2019. Filmography Championships and accomplishments All Elite Wrestling Dynamite Award (1 time) "Bleacher Report PPV Moment of the Year" (2021) – Stadium Stampede match (The Elite vs. The Inner Circle) – Double or Nothing (May 23) All Star Wrestling (West Virginia) ASW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Brother Nero CBS Sports Worst Moment of the Year (2020) vs. Sammy Guevara at All Out (2020) The Crash The Crash Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Brother Nero Future Stars of Wrestling FSW Heavyweight Championship (1 time) House of Glory HOG Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy Maryland Championship Wrestling/MCW Pro Wrestling MCW Heavyweight Championship (1 time) MCW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy Extreme Rising World Championship (1 time) National Championship Wrestling NCW Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NCW Light Heavyweight Championship (1 time) New Dimension Wrestling NDW Light Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NDW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy New England Wrestling Alliance NEWA Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NEWA Hall of Fame (class of 2012) New Frontier Wrestling Association NFWA Heavyweight Championship (1 time) NFWA Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Venom NWA 2000 NWA 2000 Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy OMEGA Championship Wrestling OMEGA Heavyweight Championship (2 times) OMEGA Tag Team Championship (2 times) – with Brother Nero/Jeff Hardy Pro Wrestling Illustrated Comeback of the Year (2017) with Jeff Hardy Feud of the Year (2005) vs. Edge and Lita Match of the Year (2000) with Jeff Hardy vs. The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian in a triangle ladder match at WrestleMania 2000 Match of the Year (2001) with Jeff Hardy vs. The Dudley Boyz and Edge and Christian in a Tables, Ladders and Chairs match at WrestleMania X-Seven Tag Team of the Year (2000) with Jeff Hardy Ranked No. 17 of the top 500 singles wrestlers in the PWI 500 in 2003 Pro Wrestling Syndicate PWS Heavyweight Championship (1 time) Remix Pro Wrestling Remix Pro Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Facade Ring of Honor ROH World Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy Holy S*** Moment of the Decade (2010s) – – with Jeff Hardy Total Nonstop Action Wrestling TNA World Heavyweight Championship (2 times) TNA World Tag Team Championship (2 times) – with Jeff Hardy/Brother Nero TNA World Tag Team Championship Tournament (2015) – with Jeff Hardy TNA World Tag Team Championship #1 Contender Tournament (2014) – with Jeff Hardy WrestleCade WrestleCade Championship (2 times) Wrestling Observer Newsletter Best Gimmick (2002, 2016) Worst Feud of the Year (2004) with Lita vs. Kane Wrestling Superstar Wrestling Superstar Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy WWE/World Wrestling Entertainment/Federation ECW Championship (1 time) WWF Hardcore Championship (1 time) WWF European Championship (1 time) WWE United States Championship (1 time) WWE Cruiserweight Championship (1 time) WWF/World Tag Team Championship (6 times) – with Jeff Hardy WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy WWE Raw Tag Team Championship (3 times) – with Montel Vontavious Porter (1) Jeff Hardy (1) and Bray Wyatt (1) WCW Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Jeff Hardy André the Giant Memorial Trophy (2018) Bragging Rights Trophy (2009) – with Team SmackDown Terri Invitational Tournament (1999) – with Jeff Hardy WWE Tag Team Eliminator (2018) - with Bray Wyatt Luchas de Apuestas record Notes References Sources External links 1974 births All Elite Wrestling personnel American bloggers American male professional wrestlers American YouTubers Male YouTubers ECW champions ECW Heavyweight Champions/ECW World Heavyweight Champions Living people NWA/WCW/WWE United States Heavyweight Champions Participants in American reality television series Professional wrestlers from North Carolina Professional wrestling managers and valets Reality show winners Sportspeople from Raleigh, North Carolina TNA World Heavyweight/Impact World Champions TNA/Impact World Tag Team Champions Twitch (service) streamers University of North Carolina at Charlotte alumni WWF European Champions WWF/WWE Hardcore Champions	false	[ "A feud letter ( or Absagebrief) was a document in which a feud was announced, usually with few words, in medieval Europe. The letter had to be issued three days in advance to be legally valid.\n\nTo prevent the feud from becoming a case of murder and thus become punishable by law, those involved had to abide by the following rules:\n\n The feud, whether between knights or between the nobility and towns, had to be initiated by a formal feud letter.\n Killing innocent parties was forbidden.\n Razing of houses and laying waste to the land were allowed.\n During the feud, fighting was not permitted in churches or at home, and the parties were to be allowed to go to and to return from church or court without being molested.\n\nExamples \n Around 1444, the town of Soest declared war on the Archbishop of Cologne at the start of the Soest Feud with the following famous, brief feud letter:\n\n\"Wettet, biscop Dierich van Moeres, dat wy den vesten Junker Johan can Cleve lever hebbet alls Juwe, unde wert Juwe hiermit affgesaget\"(\"Know this, Bishop Dietrich of Moers, that we prefer the steadfast Junker, John of Cleves, to you, and hereby give you notice thereof.\")\n\nSee also\nThrow down the gauntlet\n\nLandfrieden - waiver of the right to feuding\n\nLegal documents\nLetter", "Moses J. Liddell (1845 – 1891) was born in Louisiana and appointed Justice of the Territorial Montana Supreme Court, by President Grover Cleveland, serving from 1888 to 1889.\n\nEarly life\nMoses J. Liddell was born to the wealthy plantation owner and Confederate General, St. John Richardson Liddell and Mary Metcalfe Roper Liddell. He was the third of ten children and the first male. The Liddell family had previously lived on a plantation in Woodville, Mississippi, but had established a plantation named \"Llanada\" in Catahoula Parish near Harrisonburg, Louisiana prior to Moses' birth. A famous feud began between the Liddell family and a prominent neighboring landowner named Charles Jones during the 1850s, which would become known as the Jones-Liddell feud.\n\nMilitary service\nMoses J. Liddell enlisted in the Confederate Army when the Civil War began, and was made a Second Lieutenant in the 1st (Wheat's) Special Battalion, Infantry (Louisiana Tigers). He was listed as a prisoner of war, and paroled at Jackson, Mississippi on May 12, 1865.\n\nMarriage and children\nLiddell married Isabella Turnbull Semple on March 11, 1868. Together they had three children.\n\nJones-Liddell feud\nHis father struggled following the Civil War to retain \"Llanada\" in Catahoula Parish, due in part to reconstruction policies and the loss of slave labor. As a result of these conditions the Jones-Liddell feud came to a boil when Liddell's father, St. John Richardson Liddell, was assassinated by the Jones family on February 14, 1870. In retaliation for his father's murder, on February 18, 1870, when Moses J. Liddell saw the accused assassin of his father, Col. Charles Jones, Liddell shot him while Jones was being transported to the boat in custody at Harrisonburg. Jones did not die as a result of the gunshot wounds.\n\nMove to Richland Parish\nAs a result of the political unrest due to the sensationalized feud, Moses J. Liddell along with his wife and children moved to Richland Parish, Louisiana, where the Liddell's had acquired thousands of acres between Girard and Alto, primarily along the banks of Boeuf River.\n\nBy 1884, Liddell had opened a law office in Rayville, Louisiana.\n\nIn 1876, Liddell was nominated to attend the Democratic State Convention representing Richland Parish and served as chairman of the Democratic Executive Committee of Richland in 1878. Liddell was endorsed by the Democratic club of Ward 3 as their choice for State Representative. On November 5, 1878, Liddell defeated A.B. Cooper by a vote of 621-440 for the State Representative seat.\n\nAppointed as judge\nIn 1880, Liddell retired from the legislature and moved to Monroe, Louisiana, where he joined Charles J. Boatner in a law practice. Liddell traveled to Washington in 1887 and received a commitment from President Grover Cleveland for an appointment to the State Supreme Court of the Montana Territory. His colleague, Charles Boatner, went on to become an elected member of United States House of Representatives in 1889.\n\nDeath and legacy\nIn 1891, Liddell died at his home in Bozeman, Montana, after a brief illness.\n\nReferences\n\nJustices of the Montana Supreme Court\nConfederate States Army officers\n1845 births\n1891 deaths\n19th-century American judges" ]
[ "Steffi Graf", "Playing style" ]	C_d0e9bc4e72184f1fb6ceb489ddce9e70_0	What did Steffi play?	1	What did Steffi play?	Steffi Graf	The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Slozil and Heinz Gunthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to 174 km/h (108 mph), making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Stefanie Maria "Steffi" Graf ( , ; born 14 June 1969) is a German former professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 1 for a record 377 weeks and won 22 major singles titles, the second-most since the start of the Open Era in 1968 and third-most of all-time behind Margaret Court (24) and Serena Williams (23). In 1988, she became the first tennis player to achieve the Golden Slam by winning all four Grand Slam singles titles and the Olympic gold medal in the same calendar year. Furthermore, she is the only tennis player, male or female, to have won each major at least four times. Graf was ranked singles world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for a record 377 total weeks: the longest period for which any player, male or female, has held the singles number-one ranking since the WTA and the Association of Tennis Professionals began issuing rankings. She won 107 singles titles, which ranks her third on the WTA's all-time list after Martina Navratilova (167 titles) and Chris Evert (157 titles). She and Margaret Court are the only players, male or female, to win three majors in a calendar year five times (1988, 1989, 1993, 1995 and 1996). Notable features of Graf's game were her versatility across all playing surfaces, footwork and powerful forehand drive. Graf's athletic ability and aggressive game played from the baseline have been credited with developing the modern style of play that has come to dominate today's game. She won six French Open singles titles (second to Evert), seven Wimbledon singles titles, four Australian Open titles, and five U.S. Open singles titles. She is the only singles player (male or female) to have achieved a Grand Slam since the hard court was introduced as a playing surface, replacing grass, at the US Open in 1978. Graf's Grand Slam was achieved on grass, clay, and hard court while the previous five singles Grand Slams were achieved on only grass and clay. Graf reached 13 consecutive singles major finals, from the 1987 French Open through to the 1990 French Open, winning nine of them. She won five consecutive singles majors (1988 Australian Open to 1989 Australian Open), and seven out of eight, in two calendar years (1988 Australian Open to 1989 US Open, except 1989 French Open). She reached a total of 31 singles major finals. Graf retired at the age of 30 in 1999 while she was ranked world No. 3. She is regarded as one of the greatest female tennis players of all time. Martina Navratilova included Graf at the top of her list of the greatest players ever. In the year of Graf's retirement, Billie Jean King said, "Steffi [Graf] is definitely the greatest women's tennis player of all time." In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. She married former world No. 1 men's tennis player Andre Agassi in October 2001. They have two children. Graf was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004. Along with Boris Becker, Graf was considered instrumental in popularizing tennis in Germany, where it remains one of the foremost national sports. Early life Stefanie Graf was born on 14 June 1969, in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany, to Heidi Schalk and car-and-insurance salesman Peter Graf (18 June 1938 − 30 November 2013). When she was nine years old, her family moved to the neighboring town of Brühl. She has a younger brother, Michael. Her father, an aspiring tennis coach, first introduced her to the game, teaching his three-year-old daughter how to swing a wooden racket in the family's living room. She began practising on a court at the age of four and played in her first tournament at five. She soon began taking the top prize at junior tournaments with regularity, going on to win the European Championships 12s and 18s in 1982. Career Early career Graf played in her first professional tournament in October 1982 at Filderstadt, Germany. She lost her first round match 6–4, 6–0 to Tracy Austin, a two-time US Open champion and former world No. 1 player. (Twelve years later, Graf defeated Austin 6–0, 6–0 during a second round match at the Evert Cup in Indian Wells, California, which was their second and last match against each other.) At the start of her first full professional year in 1983, Graf was 13 years old and ranked world No. 124. She won no titles during the next three years, but her ranking climbed steadily to world No. 98 in 1983, No. 22 in 1984, and No. 6 in 1985. In 1984, she first gained international attention when she almost upset the tenth seed, Jo Durie of the United Kingdom, in a fourth round Centre Court match at Wimbledon. In August as a 15-year-old (and youngest entrant) representing West Germany, she won the tennis demonstration event at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. No medals were awarded as this was not an official Olympic event. Graf's schedule was closely controlled by her father, who limited her play so that she would not burn out. In 1985, for instance, she played only ten events leading up to the US Open, whereas another up-and-coming star, Gabriela Sabatini of Argentina, who was a year younger than Graf, played 21. Peter Graf also kept a tight rein on Graf's personal life. Social invitations on the tour were often declined as Graf's focus was kept on practicing and match play. Working with her father and then-coach Pavel Složil, Graf typically practiced for up to four hours a day, often heading straight from airports to practice courts. This narrow focus meant that Graf, already shy and retiring by nature, made few friends on the tour in her early years, but it led to a steady improvement in her play. In 1985 and early 1986, Graf emerged as the top challenger to the dominance of Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert. During that period, she lost six times to Evert and three times to Navratilova, all in straight sets. She did not win a tournament but consistently reached tournament finals, semifinals and quarterfinals, with the highlight being her semifinal loss to Navratilova at the US Open. On 13 April 1986, Graf won her first WTA tournament and beat Evert for the first time in the final of the Family Circle Cup in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (She never lost to Evert again, beating her six more times over the next three and a half years.) Graf then won her next three tournaments at Amelia Island, Charleston, and Berlin, culminating in a 6–2, 6–3 defeat of Navratilova in the final of the latter. Illness caused her to miss Wimbledon, and an accident where she broke a toe several weeks later also curtailed her play. She returned to win a small tournament at Mahwah just before the US Open where, in one of the most anticipated matches of the year, she encountered Navratilova in a semifinal. The match was played over two days with Navratilova finally winning after saving three match points 6–1, 6–7, 7–6. Graf then won three consecutive indoor titles at Tokyo, Zurich, and Brighton, before once again contending with Navratilova at the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships in New York. This time, Navratilova beat Graf 7–6, 6–3, 6–2. Breakthrough year: 1987 Graf's Grand Slam tournament breakthrough came in 1987. She started the year strongly, with six tournament victories heading into the French Open, with the highlight being at the tournament in Miami, where she defeated Martina Navratilova in a semifinal and Chris Evert in the final and lost only 20 games in the seven rounds of the tournament. In the French Open final, Graf defeated Navratilova, who was the world No. 1, 6–4, 4–6, 8–6 after beating Sabatini in a three-set semifinal. Graf then lost to Navratilova 7–5, 6–3 in the Wimbledon final, her first loss of the year. However, in the Federation Cup final in Vancouver, Canada, three weeks later, she defeated Evert easily 6–2, 6–1. The US Open ended anti-climactically as Navratilova defeated Graf in the final 7–6, 6–1. Graf had a win-loss record of 75-2 for a 97.4 winning percentage in 1987, both losses coming to Navratilova as they split the four matches they played during the year. On 17 August, after defeating Evert in a straight set final in the Virginia Slims of Los Angeles, Graf overtook Navratilova for the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in her career, a ranking she would hold for the next 186 consecutive weeks, a record (it was tied by Serena Williams in 2016). Graf was the first player other than Navratilova or Evert to hold the top spot since Tracy Austin in 1980. Golden Slam: 1988 Graf started 1988 by winning the Australian Open, defeating Chris Evert in the final 6–1, 7–6. Graf did not lose a set during the tournament and lost a total of only 29 games. Graf lost twice to Sabatini during the spring, once on hardcourts in Boca Raton, Florida, and once on clay at Amelia Island, Florida. Graf, however, won the tournament in San Antonio, Texas, and retained her title in Miami, where she once again defeated Evert in the final. Graf then won the tournament in Berlin, losing only twelve games in five matches. At the French Open, Graf successfully defended her title by defeating Natasha Zvereva 6–0, 6–0 in a 34-minute final. The official time of the match given on the scoresheet was 34 minutes; however, just 32 minutes of that was spent on the court, as a rain break split the match into two periods of play, of nine and 23 minutes. That was the shortest-ever and most one-sided Grand Slam final ever and the only double bagel in a Major final since 1911. Zvereva, who had eliminated Martina Navratilova in the fourth round, won only thirteen points in the match. Next came Wimbledon, where Martina Navratilova had won six straight titles. Graf was trailing Martina Navratilova in the final 7–5, 2–0 before winning the match 5–7, 6–2, 6–1. She then won tournaments in Hamburg and Mahwah (where she lost only eight games all tournament). At the US Open, Graf beat Sabatini in a three-set final to win the Grand Slam by 6–3, 3–6, 6–1, a feat previously performed by only two other women, Maureen Connolly Brinker in 1953 and Margaret Court in 1970. Graf's 1988 Grand Slam remains the only one in history completed on three surfaces (grass, clay, hard court), as all other Grand Slams in tennis history were achieved prior to the introduction of hard court at the US Open in 1978. In reaching and winning all four Grand Slam finals, Graf became the first player in history to contest and win 28 Grand Slam singles matches in a single year; albeit including the unplayed walkover against Evert in the US Open. Even discounting that result, no other player had played and won 27 Grand Slam matches in a single year before and the feat has to date only been matched by Novak Djokovic since, in both 2015 and 2021, when he failed in both bids to win the Grand Slam. Graf then defeated Sabatini 6–3, 6–3 in the gold medal match at the Olympic Games in Seoul and achieved what the media had dubbed the "Golden Slam". Graf also won her only Grand Slam doubles title that year—at Wimbledon partnering Sabatini—and picked up a women's doubles Olympic bronze medal. Graf was the first tennis player to achieve the feat: wheelchair tennis players Diede de Groot and Dylan Alcott achieved the Golden Slam in 2021. At the year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf was upset by Pam Shriver, only her third loss of the year. The loss deprived her of the Golden Super Slam. She was named the 1988 BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year. At the end of the year, the municipality of Brühl, her hometown, gave her the title of honorary citizen. New challengers and personal challenges 1989 Speculation was rife at the beginning of 1989 about the possibility of Graf winning another Grand Slam. Some noted observers, such as Margaret Court, suggested that Graf could achieve the feat a couple more times. And the year began as expected, with Graf extending her Grand Slam tournament winning streak to five events at the Australian Open, defeating Helena Suková in the final. Her 6–3, 6–0 defeat of Gabriela Sabatini in a semifinal was described by veteran observer Ted Tinling as "probably the best tennis I've seen". He went on to add, "I saw what Steffi did to Sabatini at the Australian Open this year, and that was it. She is better than them all." Graf followed this with easy victories in her next four tournaments at Washington, D.C., San Antonio, Texas, Boca Raton, Florida, and Hilton Head. The Washington, D.C. tournament was notable because Graf won the first twenty points of the final against Zina Garrison. In the Boca Raton final, Graf lost the only set she conceded to Chris Evert in their final seven matches. In the subsequent Amelia Island final on clay, Graf lost her first match of the year to Sabatini but returned to European clay with easy victories at Hamburg and Berlin. Graf's Grand Slam tournament winning streak ended at the French Open, where 17-year-old Spaniard Arantxa Sánchez Vicario beat Graf in three sets. Graf served for the match at 5–3 in the third set but lost the game and won only three more points in the match. Suffering from food poisoning, she had struggled to beat Monica Seles in their semifinal 6–3, 3–6, 6–3 and said that she had menstrual cramps in the final. Graf, however, recovered to defeat Martina Navratilova 6–2, 6–7, 6–1 in the Wimbledon final after defeating Monica Seles 6–0, 6–1 in a fourth round match, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in a quarterfinal, and Chris Evert in a semifinal. Graf warmed up for the US Open with easy tournament victories in San Diego and Mahwah. In her semifinal match at the US Open, Graf defeated Sabatini 3–6, 6–4, 6–2. The match was notable for its dramatic ending. Having suffered from leg cramps since the middle of the third set, Graf ran off the court seconds after match point to seek medical treatment. In the final, Navratilova led 6–3, 4–2 before Graf rallied to win 3–6, 7–5, 6–1 for her third Grand Slam singles title of the year. Victories at Zurich and Brighton preceded the Virginia Slims Championships, where Graf cemented her top-ranked status by beating Navratilova in the four-set final. Graf ended 1989 with an 86–2 match record and the loss of only 12 sets. Her 0.977 winning percentage is the second-highest in the open era behind Navratilova. 1990 Graf defeated Mary Joe Fernández in the final of the Australian Open, which was her eighth Grand Slam singles title in the last nine she contested. She survived an intense three-set battle with Helena Sukova in the semis, breaking in the tenth and final game to win the third set 6–4. Her winning streak (unbeaten since the 1989 French Open loss to Arantxa Sánchez) continued with victories in Tokyo, Amelia Island, and Hamburg. Shortly after winning in Tokyo, Graf injured her right thumb while cross-country skiing in Switzerland and subsequently withdrew from the Virginia Slims of Florida and the Lipton Championships. In Berlin, she extended her unbeaten streak to 66 matches (second in WTA history to Navratilova's 74) before losing the final to Monica Seles, 4–6, 3–6. While the Berlin tournament was being played, the largest-circulation German tabloid, Bild, ran a story about an alleged scandal involving Graf's father. The difficulty of answering questions about the matter came to a head at a Wimbledon press conference, where Graf broke down in tears. Wimbledon authorities then threatened to immediately shut down any subsequent press conferences where questions about the issue were asked. Whether this scandal affected Graf's form is open to debate. In an interview with Stern magazine in July 1990, Graf stated, "I could not fight as usual." Graf again lost to Monica Seles in the final of the French Open 6–7, 4–6. Seles was behind 2–6 in the first-set tiebreaker, but then came back to win six points in a row and take the set. At Wimbledon, Graf lost in the semifinals to Zina Garrison, who with this victory broke Graf's string of 13 consecutive major finals. This was a major upset as Garrison had to save a match point to defeat Monica Seles in the quarterfinal, and was expected to easily fall to Graf, whom she had not beaten in four years. After victories in Montreal and San Diego, Graf reached the US Open final, where she lost in straight sets to Sabatini. Graf won four indoor tournaments after the US Open, including a pair of straight-set wins over Sabatini in the finals of Zürich and Worcester. Although Sabatini got the best of Graf in the semifinals of the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf still finished the year as the top-ranked player. 1991 A mixture of injury problems, personal difficulties, and loss of form made 1991 a tough year for Graf. Seles established herself as the new dominant player on the women's tour, winning the Australian Open, French Open, and US Open and, in March, ending Graf's record 186 consecutive-weeks hold on the World No. 1 ranking. Graf briefly regained the top ranking after winning at Wimbledon but lost it again after her loss to Navratilova at the US Open. Graf lost an Australian Open quarterfinal to Jana Novotná, the first time she did not reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament since the 1986 French Open. She then lost to Sabatini in her next three tournaments before winning the U.S. Hardcourt Championships in San Antonio, beating Monica Seles in the final. After losing a fifth straight time to Sabatini in Amelia Island, Florida, Graf again defeated Seles in the Hamburg final. Following her tournament victory in German Open in Berlin, Graf suffered one of the worst defeats of her career in a French Open semifinal where she won only two games against Sánchez Vicario and lost her first 6–0 set since 1984. At Wimbledon, however, Graf captured her third women's crown, this time at Sabatini's expense. Sabatini served for the match twice, and was two points away from her first Wimbledon title. After breaking Sabatini's serve to even the third set at 6–6, Graf defeated Sabatini by winning the next two games to take the match 6–4, 3–6, 8–6. Martina Navratilova then defeated Graf 7–6, 6–7, 6–4 in a US Open semifinal, the first time she had beaten Graf in four years. Graf then won in Leipzig, with her 500th career victory coming in a quarterfinal against Judith Wiesner. After winning two more indoor tournaments at Zurich and Brighton, she failed once again in the Virginia Slims Championships, losing her quarterfinal to Novotná. Soon after, she split with her long-time coach, Pavel Složil. 1992 A bout of rubella forced Graf to miss the first major event of 1992, the Australian Open. Her year continued indifferently with losses in three of her first four tournaments, including a semifinal loss to Jana Novotná in Chicago. It was Graf's second consecutive loss to Novotna, and dating back to their 1991 Australian Open quarterfinal match, Jana had won three of their last five meetings. It would also be the last loss Graf would ever have to Novotna in a match she completed (she did have a loss after withdrawing with injury after the first set of a late 1996 match). Chicago was notable, however, for being the first tournament Graf played with her new coach, former Swiss player Heinz Günthardt. Graf's father had approached Günthardt during the 1991 Virginia Slims Championships. She would work with him for the remainder of her career. In Boca Raton, Florida, Graf reached her first final of the year, where she faced Conchita Martínez for the title. In their five previous head-to-head matches, Graf had defeated Martínez each time. Even though she lost the opening set, Graf went on to prevail in three sets. She lost twice to Sabatini in the early spring at the Lipton International and the Bausch & Lomb Championships, which now brought her to seven losses in her last eight matches against Sabatini; however, the Bausch & Lomb loss would be Graf's final loss to Sabatini, winning her next, and last eight matches against Sabatini. Victories at Hamburg and Berlin (beating Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both) prepared her for the French Open, where she defeated Sánchez Vicario in the semifinals after losing the first set 6–0. Graf then lost a closely contested final to Monica Seles, 2–6, 6–3, 8–10. Seles won the match on her fifth match point; Graf came within two points of winning the match a few games earlier. At Wimbledon, after struggling through early-round three-setters against Mariaan de Swardt and Patty Fendick, she easily defeated Natasha Zvereva in the quarterfinal, Sabatini in the semifinal, and Seles in the final, 6–2, 6–1, with Seles playing in almost complete silence because of widespread media and player criticism of her grunting. Graf then won all five of her Fed Cup matches, helping Germany defeat Spain in the final by defeating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, 6–4, 6–2. At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Graf lost to Jennifer Capriati in the final and claimed the silver medal. At the US Open, Graf was upset in the quarterfinals by Sánchez Vicario 7–6, 6–3. Four consecutive indoor tournament victories in the autumn helped improve her season, but for the third consecutive year, she failed to win the Virginia Slims Championships, where she lost in the first round to Lori McNeil. Second period of dominance 1993 Graf began 1993 with four losses in her first six tournaments of the year: two to Sánchez Vicario and one each to Seles and the 36-year-old Martina Navratilova. Seles defeated Graf at the Australian Open 4–6, 6–3, 6–2. She struggled at the German Open in Berlin where she lost a 6–0 set to the unheralded Sabine Hack before defeating Mary Joe Fernández and Sabatini in three-set matches to claim her seventh title there in eight years. During a quarterfinal match between Seles and Magdalena Maleeva in Hamburg, Seles was stabbed between the shoulder blades by a mentally ill German fan of Graf, Günter Parche. He claimed that he committed the attack to help Graf reclaim the world No. 1 ranking. More than two years elapsed before Seles competed again. Shortly after the stabbing, during a players meeting at the Italian Open in Rome, 17 of the world's top 25 WTA members voted against preserving Seles' world No. 1 ranking while she was sidelined. Since Graf skipped the Italian Open, she did not take part in the vote. During Seles's absence, Graf won 65 of 67 matches, three of four Grand Slam events and the year-end Virginia Slims championships. She won her first French Open title since 1988 with a three-set victory over Mary Joe Fernández in the final. Fernandez had two break points to take a 3–0 and double break lead in the third set. The win elevated Graf to the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in 22 months. At Wimbledon, Graf defeated Jana Novotná to win her third consecutive, and fifth overall, ladies' title. In the third and deciding set, Novotná had a point to go up 5–1 on her serve. After breaking Novotná's serve, Graf won the next four games to take the match 7–6, 1–6, 6–4. Graf had a bone splinter in her right foot during this tournament (and for the next few months), finally resulting in surgery on 4 October. In the meantime, she lost surprisingly to Nicole Bradtke of Australia in a Fed Cup match on clay before winning the Acura Classic in San Diego and the Canadian Open in Toronto in preparation for the US Open. She won there, comfortably beating Helena Suková in the final after needing three sets to eliminate Gabriela Sabatini and Manuela Maleeva-Fragniere in the quarterfinals and semifinals respectively. In the fall, Graf won the Volkswagen Card Cup in Leipzig a day before her foot operation, losing only two games to Jana Novotná in the final. Graf lost to Conchita Martínez in her comeback tournament a month later in Philadelphia. However, she finished her year with a highlight, winning her first Virginia Slims Championships since 1989 by beating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final despite needing painkillers for a back injury. 1994 Seemingly free of injury for the first time in years, Graf began the year by winning the Australian Open, where she defeated Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final with the loss of only two games. Graf later stated it was the best tennis she had ever played in a Grand Slam final. She then won her next four tournaments in Tokyo, Indian Wells, Delray Beach and Miami respectively. In the Miami final, she lost her first set of the year—to Natasha Zvereva—after winning 54 consecutive sets. In the Hamburg final, she lost for the first time in 1994 after 36 consecutive match victories, losing to Sánchez Vicario in three sets. She then won her eighth German Open, but there were signs that her form was worsening as she almost lost to Julie Halard in a quarterfinal. As the defending champion Graf lost in straight sets to Mary Pierce in the French Open semifinal. This was followed by a first-round straight-sets loss at Wimbledon to Lori McNeil, her only loss at Wimbledon between 1991 and 1997 and her first loss in a first round Grand Slam tournament in ten years. Graf still managed to win San Diego the following month but aggravated a long-time back injury in beating Sánchez Vicario in the final. Graf developed a bone spur at the base of her spine due to a congenital condition of the sacroiliac joint. She began to wear a back brace and was unsure about playing the US Open but elected to play while receiving treatment and stretching for two hours before each match. She made it to the final and took the first set against Sánchez Vicario but lost the next two sets — Sanchez Vicario's last victory over Graf. In the middle of the second set, Graf suffered back spasms while reaching for a ball in the ad court. She took the following nine weeks off, returning only for the Virginia Slims Championships where she lost in straight sets to Pierce in the quarterfinal. Although Graf ended the year ranked No. 1 on the computer the ITF named Sanchez Vicario its World Champion for the year, while the WTA backed their official rankings and named Graf. 1995 A strained right calf muscle forced Graf to withdraw from the Australian Open. She came back in February, winning four consecutive tournaments in Paris, Delray Beach, Miami and Houston. She then beat Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both the French Open and Wimbledon. The 1995 Wimbledon final is regarded as one of the most dramatic women's major finals in history as Graf and Sánchez Vicario battled in a tight third set that included a 16-minute long, 13-deuce game on Sanchez Vicario's serve at 5–5. In August Monica Seles made her much anticipated return to tennis at the Canadian Open. It was decided to grant her a joint number-one ranking with Graf who took her first loss of the year in the first round to Amanda Coetzer. The US Open was Monica Seles's first Grand Slam event since the 1993 attack, with much anticipation again around a potential Seles-Graf final. After surviving a scare in a three-setter against Amanda Coetzer in the first round, Graf reached the final with relative ease, while Seles went through her side of the draw in even more convincing fashion. Seles and Graf met in the final, with Graf winning in three sets, saving a set point in the first set. Graf then capped the year by beating countrywoman Anke Huber in a five-set final at the season-ending WTA Championships in 2 hours and 46 minutes. Tax issues In personal terms, 1995 was a difficult year for Graf, as she was accused by German authorities of tax evasion in the early years of her career. In her defense, she stated that her father Peter was her financial manager, and all financial matters relating to her earnings at the time had been under his control. Her father was arrested in August and was sentenced to 45 months in jail. He was eventually released after serving 25 months. Prosecutors dropped their case against Graf in 1997, when she agreed to pay a fine of 1.3 million Deutsche Marks to the government and an unspecified charity. 1996 Graf again missed the Australian Open after undergoing surgery in December 1995 to remove bone splinters from her left foot. Graf came back to the tour in March, winning back to back titles in Indian Wells and Miami, followed by a record ninth title at the German Open in May and a quarterfinal defeat in Rome against Martina Hingis. She then successfully defended the three Grand Slam titles she won the year before. In a close French Open final, Graf again overcame Sánchez Vicario, taking the third set 10–8. Graf had led 4–1 in the second set tiebreak, only to lose six points in a row and force a decider. Twice in the third set Sánchez Vicario served for the championship but was broken each time by Graf. It was the longest French Open women's singles final in history, both in terms of time (3 hours and 3 minutes) and number of games played (40). Graf then had a straight-sets win against Sánchez Vicario in the Wimbledon final. That was the last competitive match Graf and Sánchez Vicario would ever play against one another. In July, a left knee injury forced Graf to withdraw from the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Graf played only one warm-up event ahead of the US Open, the Acura Classic in Manhattan Beach, California, where she lost to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinals. She then successfully defended her title at the US Open, defeating Monica Seles in the final. Her toughest battle came against rising star Martina Hingis in the semifinal, with Hingis unable to convert on five set points. Graf did not lose a set the whole tournament. She also won her fifth and final WTA Tour Championships title with a five set win over Martina Hingis, with Hingis cramping up in the fifth set. In 1988, Graf became only the second tennis player in history to win a Slam on hardcourt, clay, and grass all in the same season. She repeated the feat in 1993, 1995, and 1996. Final years on the tour: 1997–99 The last few years of Graf's career were beset by injuries, particularly to her knees and back. She lost the world No. 1 ranking to Martina Hingis and failed to win a Grand Slam title for the first time in ten years in 1997. That year Graf lost in the fourth round of the Australian Open in straight sets to Amanda Coetzer. She subsequently withdrew from the Pan Pacific Open and had arthroscopic surgery performed on her left knee. After several months injury lay off, Graf returned to play in the German Open in Berlin in front of a home crowd and had the worst defeat of her career in the quarterfinal, when Amanda Coetzer beat her in just 56 minutes 6–0, 6–1. In the French Open Graf was again beaten by Amanda Coetzer in straight sets, 6–1, 6–4. Only one week later, she underwent reconstructive knee surgery in Vienna and subsequently missed the 1997 Wimbledon and US Open championships. The treatment was for a fracture of the cartilage as well as a shortening and partial rupture of the patellar tendon of her left knee. After missing almost half of the tour in 1998, Graf lost in the third round at Wimbledon and in the fourth round at the US Open. Shortly after the US Open, she underwent surgery to remove a bone spur in her right wrist. Upon her return Graf defeated world No. 2 Hingis and world No. 1 Lindsay Davenport en route to the Philadelphia title. At the first round of the season-ending Chase Championships, Graf defeated world No. 3, Jana Novotná, before losing in the semifinal to first-seeded Davenport. At the beginning of 1999 Graf played the warm up event to the Australian Open in Sydney; she defeated Serena Williams in the second round and Venus in the quarterfinals before losing to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinal. Graf then went on to reach the quarterfinals of the Australian Open before losing to Monica Seles in two sets. In Indian Wells Graf lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At the French Open, Graf reached her first Grand Slam final in three years and fought back from a set and twice from a break down in the second set to defeat the top ranked Hingis in three sets for a memorable victory. Graf became the first player in the open era to defeat the first, second, and third ranked players in the same Grand Slam tournament by beating second-ranked Davenport in the quarterfinals and third-ranked Seles in the semifinals. Graf said after the final that it would be her last French Open, fueling speculation about her retirement. Graf then reached her ninth Wimbledon singles final, losing to third-seeded Davenport in straight sets. She had to overcome three difficult three set matches en route to this final, against Mariaan De Swardt in the third round, Venus Williams in the quarterfinals and Mirjana Lučić in the semifinals. On 13 August 1999, shortly after retiring with a strained hamstring from a second round match against Amy Frazier in San Diego, Graf announced her retirement from the women's tour at age 30. She was ranked No. 3 at that time and said, "I have done everything I wanted to do in tennis. I feel I have nothing left to accomplish. The weeks following Wimbledon [in 1999] weren't easy for me. I was not having fun anymore. After Wimbledon, for the first time in my career, I didn't feel like going to a tournament. My motivation wasn't what it was in the past." Doubles career From the beginning of her career until 1990, Graf regularly played doubles events in Grand Slams and other tournaments, winning a total of eleven titles. In 1986, she formed a partnership with rival Gabriela Sabatini. The pair was moderately successful, winning the 1988 Wimbledon Championships together and reaching the finals of the French Open in 1986, 1987 and 1989. The partnership was the subject of much discussion, as the two women, both known to be shy, usually kept communication to a minimum during changeovers and between points, a highly unusual situation in doubles. Sabatini said of the partnership: "doubles is all about communicating with each other, and we didn't communicate that much. We would just say the basic things, but nothing else." The pair played their last major tournament together at the 1990 Wimbledon Championships, losing in the quarterfinals. From 1991 until the end of her career, Graf would only play doubles sporadically, forming short-term partnerships with a variety of players, including Lori McNeil, Anke Huber and her best friends on the tour, Rennae Stubbs, Patricia Tarabini and Ines Gorrochategui. She played her last Grand Slam doubles tournament at the 1999 Australian Open with Gorrochategui, losing in the second round. Graf also occasionally played mixed doubles, although she never won a title. She partnered with doubles specialist Mark Woodforde at the Australian Open in 1994, with Henri Leconte at Wimbledon in 1991 and at the French Open in 1994, and with Charlie Pasarell at the US Open in 1984. In an unusual arrangement, she paired with her coaches Pavel Složil at Wimbledon in 1988 and Heinz Günthardt in 1992 and 1996, also at Wimbledon. At the 1999 Wimbledon Championships, Graf formed a much-publicized partnership with John McEnroe, with whom she reached the semifinals before withdrawing due to concerns that her uncertain hamstring, coupled with a bout of bronchitis, would affect her in the singles final. Post-career exhibition matches In late 1999 and early 2000, as part of her Farewell Tour, Graf played a series of exhibition matches against former rivals in New Zealand, Japan, Spain, Germany and South Africa. She played Jelena Dokic in Christchurch, New Zealand, Amanda Coetzer in Durban, South Africa, and her former rival Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in Zaragoza, Spain. It was Graf and Sánchez Vicario's first head-to-head meeting since 1996. In February 2000, Graf played against Kimiko Date at Nagoya Rainbow Hall in Tokyo, winning in three sets. In September 2004, Graf dispatched her former doubles partner Gabriela Sabatini, in straight sets, in an exhibition match played in Berlin, Germany. She was also in Berlin to host a charity gala, as well as inaugurating a tennis stadium renamed the "Steffi Graf Stadion". Proceeds from her match against Sabatini went to Graf's foundation, "Children for Tomorrow". In July 2005, Graf competed in one tie of World Team Tennis (WTT) on the Houston Wranglers team. She was beaten in two out of three matches, with each match being one set. Graf lost her singles match to Elena Likhovtseva 5–4. She teamed with Ansley Cargill in women's doubles against Anna Kournikova and Likhovtseva but lost 5–2. She was successful, however, in the mixed doubles match. Graf completely ruled out a return to professional tennis. In October, Graf defeated Sabatini in an exhibition match in Mannheim, Germany, winning both of their sets. Like the exhibition match the previous year against Sabatini, proceeds went to "Children for Tomorrow". In 2008 Graf lost an exhibition match against Kimiko Date at Ariake Colosseum in Tokyo. As part of the event, billed as "Dream Match 2008", she defeated Martina Navratilova in a one-set affair 8–7, with Graf winning a tiebreaker 10–5. It was the first time in 14 years Graf had played Navratilova. Graf played a singles exhibition match against Kim Clijsters and a mixed doubles exhibition alongside husband Andre Agassi against Tim Henman and Clijsters as part of a test event and celebration for the newly installed roof over Wimbledon's Centre Court in 2009. She lost a lengthy one-set singles match to Clijsters and also the mixed doubles. In 2010, Graf participated in the WTT Smash Hits exhibition in Washington, D.C. to support the Elton John AIDS Foundation. She and Agassi, her husband, were on Team Elton John, which competed against Team Billie Jean King. Graf played in the celebrity doubles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles before straining her left calf muscle and being replaced by Anna Kournikova. Summary of career Graf won seven singles titles at Wimbledon, six singles titles at the French Open, five singles titles at the US Open, and four singles titles at the Australian Open. Her overall record in 56 Grand Slam events was 278–32 (90 percent) (84–10 at the French Open, 74–7 at Wimbledon, 73–9 at the US Open, and 47–6 at the Australian Open). Her career prize-money earnings totalled US$21,895,277 (a record until Lindsay Davenport surpassed this amount in January 2008). Her singles win/loss record was 900–115 (88.7 percent). She was ranked world No. 1 for 186 consecutive weeks (from August 1987 to March 1991; tied with Serena Williams, a record in the women's game) and a record total 377 weeks overall. Career statistics Grand Slam tournament performance timeline Note: Graf's semifinal match at the 1988 US Open was walkover (so not counted as win) Grand Slam tournament finals Singles: 31 (22 titles, 9 runner-ups) Doubles: 4 (1 title, 3 runner-ups) Records These records were attained in Open Era of tennis. Records in bold indicate Open Era peer-less achievements. Playing style The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fräulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Složil and Heinz Günthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to , making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. Equipment and endorsements Early in her career, Graf wore Dunlop apparel, before signing an endorsement contract with Adidas in 1985. She had an Adidas sneakers line known as the St. Graf Pro line. Early in her career, Graf used the Dunlop Maxpower Pro and Maxpower Kevlar racquets and then played with the Max 200G racquet from 1984 to 1993 before switching to Wilson from 1994 to 1999. She first used the Wilson Pro Staff 7.0 lite, then switched to the Pro Staff 7.5 in 1996 and to the Pro Staff 7.1 in 1998. Graf's racquets were strung at 29 kilograms (64 pounds), significantly above the 50-60 pound range recommended by Wilson. In 2006, she signed an endorsement deal with Head. In 2010, Graf and Agassi collaborated with Head and developed the new line of Star Series tennis racquets. Graf has signed many endorsement deals throughout the years including a ten-year endorsement deal with car manufacturer Opel in 1985, and Rexona from 1994 to 1998. Other companies she has endorsed include Barilla, Apollinaris, Citibank, Danone and Teekanne. She has appeared in many advertisements and television commercials with Andre Agassi including Canon Inc. and Longines in 2008 (Agassi became Longines ambassador in 2007). In 2015, she was appointed as the brand ambassador of Kerala tourism, for promoting Ayurveda in North America and Europe. Personal life In 1997, she left the Catholic Church, citing personal reasons. During her career, Graf divided her time between her hometown of Brühl; Boca Raton, Florida; and New York City where she owned a penthouse in the former Police Headquarters Building in SoHo. From 1992 to 1999, Graf dated racing driver Michael Bartels. She started dating Andre Agassi after the 1999 French Open and they married on 22 October 2001, with only their mothers as witnesses. They have two children, a son born in 2001 and a daughter born in 2003. Agassi has said that he and Graf are not pushing their children toward becoming tennis players. The Graf-Agassi family resides in Summerlin, a community in the Las Vegas Valley. Graf's mother and her brother also live there. In 1991, the Steffi Graf Youth Tennis Center in Leipzig was dedicated to her. She is the founder and chairperson of "Children for Tomorrow", a non-profit foundation established in 1998 for implementing and developing projects to support children who have been traumatized by war or other crises. In 2001, Graf indicated that she preferred to be called Stefanie instead of Steffi. On 30 November 2013, Graf's father Peter died of pancreatic cancer. He was 75 years old. Legacy In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. In March 2012, Tennis Channel picked Graf as the greatest female tennis player ever in their list of 100 greatest tennis players of all time. In November 2018, Tennis.com polled its readers to choose the greatest women's tennis player of all time and Graf came in first. In July 2020, The Guardian polled its readers to determine the greatest female tennis player of the past 50 years, and Steffi was the clear favorite, picking up nearly twice as many votes as any other player. Tennis writer Steve Flink, in his book The Greatest Tennis Matches of the Twentieth Century, named Graf as the best female player of the 20th century. Flink said in 2020 that the jury was still out on (Serena) Williams as the greatest ever, but Williams' consistency over the long span did not match that of Graf or Navratilova. Graf compiled superior career accomplishments over Serena Williams (as of December 2, 2020); 900–115 career record (88.7 win %) versus 843–147 career record (85.2 win %), 107 career tournament victories versus 72 career tournament victories, 377 total weeks ranked as world No. One versus 319 total weeks ranked as world No. One. While Graf's 22 Grand Slam wins is one fewer than Williams' 23 (and two fewer than Margaret Court's 24), Graf's professional career is eight years shorter than Williams, plus Graf also faced much tougher competition during her era (Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Gabriela Sabatini, and Monica Seles) compared to Williams. However, with the stabbing of Monica Seles in 1993, some have questioned its impact on Graf's career statistics and legacy. Awards and honours Graf was voted the ITF World Champion in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1995 and 1996. She was voted the WTA Player of the Year in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996. She was elected as the German Sportsperson of the Year in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1999. In 2004, the Berliner Tennis-Arena was renamed Steffi-Graf-Stadion in honor of Graf. Graf was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004 and the German Sports Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2015, Graf was the recipient of the International Club's Jean Borotra Sportsmanship Award. See also Graf–Navratilova rivalry Graf–Sabatini rivalry Graf–Seles rivalry List of female tennis players List of tennis rivalries Overall tennis records - women's singles Tennis records of the Open Era - women's singles References External links Official Wimbledon profile BBC profile ESPN biography Steffi Graf's victories German female tennis players International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees 1969 births Living people Australian Open (tennis) champions French Open champions German emigrants to the United States Hopman Cup competitors Olympic medalists in tennis Olympic bronze medalists for West Germany Olympic gold medalists for West Germany Olympic silver medalists for Germany Olympic tennis players of Germany Olympic tennis players of West Germany Sportspeople from Mannheim Recipients of the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of Baden-Württemberg Recipients of the Olympic Order Tennis players at the 1984 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1988 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1992 Summer Olympics US Open (tennis) champions West German expatriates in the United States Wimbledon champions World No. 1 tennis players Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's singles Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's doubles Recipients of the Silver Laurel Leaf German philanthropists German women philanthropists Medalists at the 1988 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics People from SoHo, Manhattan Andre Agassi Tennis people from Baden-Württemberg	false	[ "Steffi is a feminine given name, often a short form (hypocorism) of Stephanie or Stefanie.\n\nSteffi is the name of:\n\nSteffi Duna (1910-1992), Hungarian-born film actress born Erzébet Berindey\nSteffi Götzelt (born 1960), East German retired rower\nSteffi Graf (born 1969), German former tennis player\nSteffi Jacob (born 1975), German skeleton racer\nSteffi Jones (born 1972), German football manager and retired defender\nStefanie Koch (born 1981), German ski mountaineer\nSteffi Kräker (born 1960), East German retired gymnast\nSteffi Kriegerstein (born 1992), German canoeist\nSteffi Martin (born 1962), East German former luger\nSteffi Nerius (born 1972), German javelin thrower\nSteffi Scherzer (born 1957), German ballet dancer, director and instructor\nSteffi Sieger (born 1988), German luger\nSteffi Van Wyk (born 1995), Namibian model and Miss Namibia 2015\n\nFeminine given names\nHypocorisms\nGerman feminine given names", "Big Girls Don't Cry () is a 2002 German drama film. Written and directed by Maria von Heland, it tells the story of two teenage girls in Berlin, one of whom takes revenge on the daughter of her father's lover. A subplot involves a third girl who drifts into pornography and comes to a bad end. As part of the coming of age tale, the girls lose their virginity and experiment with drugs.\n\nPlot\nKati and Steffi, inseparable since childhood, are teenagers at school. Kati endures a modest and difficult home life with a neurotic mother but Steffi's family are well off and harmonious. Everything changes when in a night club the two see Steffi's father entwined with another woman. Furious at this treachery, Steffi plots revenge against the woman's daughter Tessa. First she sends the girl to audition for a band, but it emerges that she can sing well and the band like her. That having failed, Steffi sends her to a pornographer, having got the address from a schoolmate Yvonne, who posed to earn some money so that she could leave home. Kati gets worried over Steffi's obsessive behaviour and, tracking down Tessa, rescues her as she is being raped by the pornographer.\n\nFurious, Tessa's mother storms round to the home of Steffi's parents and tells them what's been going on, upon which Steffi's mother leaves home. In the meantime, a nationwide police search has been launched for the missing Yvonne. Suspecting the pornographer, Kati recounts all she knows to the police, who tell her Yvonne has in fact been murdered. Going to see Steffi, she tells her that it was she who saved Tessa and so triggered the crisis in Steffi's family. When Steffi does not appear at school next day, Kati breaks into her home to find she has slashed both wrists. By calling an ambulance, Kati saves her life and at the hospital Steffi's parents turn up, apparently reconciled. Kati's mother at last shows sympathy towards her daughter and in a final shot the recovering Steffi makes it up with Kati.\n\nCast\n\nExternal links \n\n2002 films\nGerman films\nGerman-language films\nFilms set in Berlin\nGerman teen drama films\n2000s teen drama films\n2002 drama films" ]
[ "Steffi Graf", "Playing style", "What did Steffi play?", "I don't know." ]	C_d0e9bc4e72184f1fb6ceb489ddce9e70_0	what was her play style?	2	what was Steffi play style?	Steffi Graf	The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Slozil and Heinz Gunthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to 174 km/h (108 mph), making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. CANNOTANSWER	The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork.	Stefanie Maria "Steffi" Graf ( , ; born 14 June 1969) is a German former professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 1 for a record 377 weeks and won 22 major singles titles, the second-most since the start of the Open Era in 1968 and third-most of all-time behind Margaret Court (24) and Serena Williams (23). In 1988, she became the first tennis player to achieve the Golden Slam by winning all four Grand Slam singles titles and the Olympic gold medal in the same calendar year. Furthermore, she is the only tennis player, male or female, to have won each major at least four times. Graf was ranked singles world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for a record 377 total weeks: the longest period for which any player, male or female, has held the singles number-one ranking since the WTA and the Association of Tennis Professionals began issuing rankings. She won 107 singles titles, which ranks her third on the WTA's all-time list after Martina Navratilova (167 titles) and Chris Evert (157 titles). She and Margaret Court are the only players, male or female, to win three majors in a calendar year five times (1988, 1989, 1993, 1995 and 1996). Notable features of Graf's game were her versatility across all playing surfaces, footwork and powerful forehand drive. Graf's athletic ability and aggressive game played from the baseline have been credited with developing the modern style of play that has come to dominate today's game. She won six French Open singles titles (second to Evert), seven Wimbledon singles titles, four Australian Open titles, and five U.S. Open singles titles. She is the only singles player (male or female) to have achieved a Grand Slam since the hard court was introduced as a playing surface, replacing grass, at the US Open in 1978. Graf's Grand Slam was achieved on grass, clay, and hard court while the previous five singles Grand Slams were achieved on only grass and clay. Graf reached 13 consecutive singles major finals, from the 1987 French Open through to the 1990 French Open, winning nine of them. She won five consecutive singles majors (1988 Australian Open to 1989 Australian Open), and seven out of eight, in two calendar years (1988 Australian Open to 1989 US Open, except 1989 French Open). She reached a total of 31 singles major finals. Graf retired at the age of 30 in 1999 while she was ranked world No. 3. She is regarded as one of the greatest female tennis players of all time. Martina Navratilova included Graf at the top of her list of the greatest players ever. In the year of Graf's retirement, Billie Jean King said, "Steffi [Graf] is definitely the greatest women's tennis player of all time." In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. She married former world No. 1 men's tennis player Andre Agassi in October 2001. They have two children. Graf was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004. Along with Boris Becker, Graf was considered instrumental in popularizing tennis in Germany, where it remains one of the foremost national sports. Early life Stefanie Graf was born on 14 June 1969, in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany, to Heidi Schalk and car-and-insurance salesman Peter Graf (18 June 1938 − 30 November 2013). When she was nine years old, her family moved to the neighboring town of Brühl. She has a younger brother, Michael. Her father, an aspiring tennis coach, first introduced her to the game, teaching his three-year-old daughter how to swing a wooden racket in the family's living room. She began practising on a court at the age of four and played in her first tournament at five. She soon began taking the top prize at junior tournaments with regularity, going on to win the European Championships 12s and 18s in 1982. Career Early career Graf played in her first professional tournament in October 1982 at Filderstadt, Germany. She lost her first round match 6–4, 6–0 to Tracy Austin, a two-time US Open champion and former world No. 1 player. (Twelve years later, Graf defeated Austin 6–0, 6–0 during a second round match at the Evert Cup in Indian Wells, California, which was their second and last match against each other.) At the start of her first full professional year in 1983, Graf was 13 years old and ranked world No. 124. She won no titles during the next three years, but her ranking climbed steadily to world No. 98 in 1983, No. 22 in 1984, and No. 6 in 1985. In 1984, she first gained international attention when she almost upset the tenth seed, Jo Durie of the United Kingdom, in a fourth round Centre Court match at Wimbledon. In August as a 15-year-old (and youngest entrant) representing West Germany, she won the tennis demonstration event at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. No medals were awarded as this was not an official Olympic event. Graf's schedule was closely controlled by her father, who limited her play so that she would not burn out. In 1985, for instance, she played only ten events leading up to the US Open, whereas another up-and-coming star, Gabriela Sabatini of Argentina, who was a year younger than Graf, played 21. Peter Graf also kept a tight rein on Graf's personal life. Social invitations on the tour were often declined as Graf's focus was kept on practicing and match play. Working with her father and then-coach Pavel Složil, Graf typically practiced for up to four hours a day, often heading straight from airports to practice courts. This narrow focus meant that Graf, already shy and retiring by nature, made few friends on the tour in her early years, but it led to a steady improvement in her play. In 1985 and early 1986, Graf emerged as the top challenger to the dominance of Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert. During that period, she lost six times to Evert and three times to Navratilova, all in straight sets. She did not win a tournament but consistently reached tournament finals, semifinals and quarterfinals, with the highlight being her semifinal loss to Navratilova at the US Open. On 13 April 1986, Graf won her first WTA tournament and beat Evert for the first time in the final of the Family Circle Cup in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (She never lost to Evert again, beating her six more times over the next three and a half years.) Graf then won her next three tournaments at Amelia Island, Charleston, and Berlin, culminating in a 6–2, 6–3 defeat of Navratilova in the final of the latter. Illness caused her to miss Wimbledon, and an accident where she broke a toe several weeks later also curtailed her play. She returned to win a small tournament at Mahwah just before the US Open where, in one of the most anticipated matches of the year, she encountered Navratilova in a semifinal. The match was played over two days with Navratilova finally winning after saving three match points 6–1, 6–7, 7–6. Graf then won three consecutive indoor titles at Tokyo, Zurich, and Brighton, before once again contending with Navratilova at the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships in New York. This time, Navratilova beat Graf 7–6, 6–3, 6–2. Breakthrough year: 1987 Graf's Grand Slam tournament breakthrough came in 1987. She started the year strongly, with six tournament victories heading into the French Open, with the highlight being at the tournament in Miami, where she defeated Martina Navratilova in a semifinal and Chris Evert in the final and lost only 20 games in the seven rounds of the tournament. In the French Open final, Graf defeated Navratilova, who was the world No. 1, 6–4, 4–6, 8–6 after beating Sabatini in a three-set semifinal. Graf then lost to Navratilova 7–5, 6–3 in the Wimbledon final, her first loss of the year. However, in the Federation Cup final in Vancouver, Canada, three weeks later, she defeated Evert easily 6–2, 6–1. The US Open ended anti-climactically as Navratilova defeated Graf in the final 7–6, 6–1. Graf had a win-loss record of 75-2 for a 97.4 winning percentage in 1987, both losses coming to Navratilova as they split the four matches they played during the year. On 17 August, after defeating Evert in a straight set final in the Virginia Slims of Los Angeles, Graf overtook Navratilova for the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in her career, a ranking she would hold for the next 186 consecutive weeks, a record (it was tied by Serena Williams in 2016). Graf was the first player other than Navratilova or Evert to hold the top spot since Tracy Austin in 1980. Golden Slam: 1988 Graf started 1988 by winning the Australian Open, defeating Chris Evert in the final 6–1, 7–6. Graf did not lose a set during the tournament and lost a total of only 29 games. Graf lost twice to Sabatini during the spring, once on hardcourts in Boca Raton, Florida, and once on clay at Amelia Island, Florida. Graf, however, won the tournament in San Antonio, Texas, and retained her title in Miami, where she once again defeated Evert in the final. Graf then won the tournament in Berlin, losing only twelve games in five matches. At the French Open, Graf successfully defended her title by defeating Natasha Zvereva 6–0, 6–0 in a 34-minute final. The official time of the match given on the scoresheet was 34 minutes; however, just 32 minutes of that was spent on the court, as a rain break split the match into two periods of play, of nine and 23 minutes. That was the shortest-ever and most one-sided Grand Slam final ever and the only double bagel in a Major final since 1911. Zvereva, who had eliminated Martina Navratilova in the fourth round, won only thirteen points in the match. Next came Wimbledon, where Martina Navratilova had won six straight titles. Graf was trailing Martina Navratilova in the final 7–5, 2–0 before winning the match 5–7, 6–2, 6–1. She then won tournaments in Hamburg and Mahwah (where she lost only eight games all tournament). At the US Open, Graf beat Sabatini in a three-set final to win the Grand Slam by 6–3, 3–6, 6–1, a feat previously performed by only two other women, Maureen Connolly Brinker in 1953 and Margaret Court in 1970. Graf's 1988 Grand Slam remains the only one in history completed on three surfaces (grass, clay, hard court), as all other Grand Slams in tennis history were achieved prior to the introduction of hard court at the US Open in 1978. In reaching and winning all four Grand Slam finals, Graf became the first player in history to contest and win 28 Grand Slam singles matches in a single year; albeit including the unplayed walkover against Evert in the US Open. Even discounting that result, no other player had played and won 27 Grand Slam matches in a single year before and the feat has to date only been matched by Novak Djokovic since, in both 2015 and 2021, when he failed in both bids to win the Grand Slam. Graf then defeated Sabatini 6–3, 6–3 in the gold medal match at the Olympic Games in Seoul and achieved what the media had dubbed the "Golden Slam". Graf also won her only Grand Slam doubles title that year—at Wimbledon partnering Sabatini—and picked up a women's doubles Olympic bronze medal. Graf was the first tennis player to achieve the feat: wheelchair tennis players Diede de Groot and Dylan Alcott achieved the Golden Slam in 2021. At the year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf was upset by Pam Shriver, only her third loss of the year. The loss deprived her of the Golden Super Slam. She was named the 1988 BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year. At the end of the year, the municipality of Brühl, her hometown, gave her the title of honorary citizen. New challengers and personal challenges 1989 Speculation was rife at the beginning of 1989 about the possibility of Graf winning another Grand Slam. Some noted observers, such as Margaret Court, suggested that Graf could achieve the feat a couple more times. And the year began as expected, with Graf extending her Grand Slam tournament winning streak to five events at the Australian Open, defeating Helena Suková in the final. Her 6–3, 6–0 defeat of Gabriela Sabatini in a semifinal was described by veteran observer Ted Tinling as "probably the best tennis I've seen". He went on to add, "I saw what Steffi did to Sabatini at the Australian Open this year, and that was it. She is better than them all." Graf followed this with easy victories in her next four tournaments at Washington, D.C., San Antonio, Texas, Boca Raton, Florida, and Hilton Head. The Washington, D.C. tournament was notable because Graf won the first twenty points of the final against Zina Garrison. In the Boca Raton final, Graf lost the only set she conceded to Chris Evert in their final seven matches. In the subsequent Amelia Island final on clay, Graf lost her first match of the year to Sabatini but returned to European clay with easy victories at Hamburg and Berlin. Graf's Grand Slam tournament winning streak ended at the French Open, where 17-year-old Spaniard Arantxa Sánchez Vicario beat Graf in three sets. Graf served for the match at 5–3 in the third set but lost the game and won only three more points in the match. Suffering from food poisoning, she had struggled to beat Monica Seles in their semifinal 6–3, 3–6, 6–3 and said that she had menstrual cramps in the final. Graf, however, recovered to defeat Martina Navratilova 6–2, 6–7, 6–1 in the Wimbledon final after defeating Monica Seles 6–0, 6–1 in a fourth round match, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in a quarterfinal, and Chris Evert in a semifinal. Graf warmed up for the US Open with easy tournament victories in San Diego and Mahwah. In her semifinal match at the US Open, Graf defeated Sabatini 3–6, 6–4, 6–2. The match was notable for its dramatic ending. Having suffered from leg cramps since the middle of the third set, Graf ran off the court seconds after match point to seek medical treatment. In the final, Navratilova led 6–3, 4–2 before Graf rallied to win 3–6, 7–5, 6–1 for her third Grand Slam singles title of the year. Victories at Zurich and Brighton preceded the Virginia Slims Championships, where Graf cemented her top-ranked status by beating Navratilova in the four-set final. Graf ended 1989 with an 86–2 match record and the loss of only 12 sets. Her 0.977 winning percentage is the second-highest in the open era behind Navratilova. 1990 Graf defeated Mary Joe Fernández in the final of the Australian Open, which was her eighth Grand Slam singles title in the last nine she contested. She survived an intense three-set battle with Helena Sukova in the semis, breaking in the tenth and final game to win the third set 6–4. Her winning streak (unbeaten since the 1989 French Open loss to Arantxa Sánchez) continued with victories in Tokyo, Amelia Island, and Hamburg. Shortly after winning in Tokyo, Graf injured her right thumb while cross-country skiing in Switzerland and subsequently withdrew from the Virginia Slims of Florida and the Lipton Championships. In Berlin, she extended her unbeaten streak to 66 matches (second in WTA history to Navratilova's 74) before losing the final to Monica Seles, 4–6, 3–6. While the Berlin tournament was being played, the largest-circulation German tabloid, Bild, ran a story about an alleged scandal involving Graf's father. The difficulty of answering questions about the matter came to a head at a Wimbledon press conference, where Graf broke down in tears. Wimbledon authorities then threatened to immediately shut down any subsequent press conferences where questions about the issue were asked. Whether this scandal affected Graf's form is open to debate. In an interview with Stern magazine in July 1990, Graf stated, "I could not fight as usual." Graf again lost to Monica Seles in the final of the French Open 6–7, 4–6. Seles was behind 2–6 in the first-set tiebreaker, but then came back to win six points in a row and take the set. At Wimbledon, Graf lost in the semifinals to Zina Garrison, who with this victory broke Graf's string of 13 consecutive major finals. This was a major upset as Garrison had to save a match point to defeat Monica Seles in the quarterfinal, and was expected to easily fall to Graf, whom she had not beaten in four years. After victories in Montreal and San Diego, Graf reached the US Open final, where she lost in straight sets to Sabatini. Graf won four indoor tournaments after the US Open, including a pair of straight-set wins over Sabatini in the finals of Zürich and Worcester. Although Sabatini got the best of Graf in the semifinals of the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf still finished the year as the top-ranked player. 1991 A mixture of injury problems, personal difficulties, and loss of form made 1991 a tough year for Graf. Seles established herself as the new dominant player on the women's tour, winning the Australian Open, French Open, and US Open and, in March, ending Graf's record 186 consecutive-weeks hold on the World No. 1 ranking. Graf briefly regained the top ranking after winning at Wimbledon but lost it again after her loss to Navratilova at the US Open. Graf lost an Australian Open quarterfinal to Jana Novotná, the first time she did not reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament since the 1986 French Open. She then lost to Sabatini in her next three tournaments before winning the U.S. Hardcourt Championships in San Antonio, beating Monica Seles in the final. After losing a fifth straight time to Sabatini in Amelia Island, Florida, Graf again defeated Seles in the Hamburg final. Following her tournament victory in German Open in Berlin, Graf suffered one of the worst defeats of her career in a French Open semifinal where she won only two games against Sánchez Vicario and lost her first 6–0 set since 1984. At Wimbledon, however, Graf captured her third women's crown, this time at Sabatini's expense. Sabatini served for the match twice, and was two points away from her first Wimbledon title. After breaking Sabatini's serve to even the third set at 6–6, Graf defeated Sabatini by winning the next two games to take the match 6–4, 3–6, 8–6. Martina Navratilova then defeated Graf 7–6, 6–7, 6–4 in a US Open semifinal, the first time she had beaten Graf in four years. Graf then won in Leipzig, with her 500th career victory coming in a quarterfinal against Judith Wiesner. After winning two more indoor tournaments at Zurich and Brighton, she failed once again in the Virginia Slims Championships, losing her quarterfinal to Novotná. Soon after, she split with her long-time coach, Pavel Složil. 1992 A bout of rubella forced Graf to miss the first major event of 1992, the Australian Open. Her year continued indifferently with losses in three of her first four tournaments, including a semifinal loss to Jana Novotná in Chicago. It was Graf's second consecutive loss to Novotna, and dating back to their 1991 Australian Open quarterfinal match, Jana had won three of their last five meetings. It would also be the last loss Graf would ever have to Novotna in a match she completed (she did have a loss after withdrawing with injury after the first set of a late 1996 match). Chicago was notable, however, for being the first tournament Graf played with her new coach, former Swiss player Heinz Günthardt. Graf's father had approached Günthardt during the 1991 Virginia Slims Championships. She would work with him for the remainder of her career. In Boca Raton, Florida, Graf reached her first final of the year, where she faced Conchita Martínez for the title. In their five previous head-to-head matches, Graf had defeated Martínez each time. Even though she lost the opening set, Graf went on to prevail in three sets. She lost twice to Sabatini in the early spring at the Lipton International and the Bausch & Lomb Championships, which now brought her to seven losses in her last eight matches against Sabatini; however, the Bausch & Lomb loss would be Graf's final loss to Sabatini, winning her next, and last eight matches against Sabatini. Victories at Hamburg and Berlin (beating Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both) prepared her for the French Open, where she defeated Sánchez Vicario in the semifinals after losing the first set 6–0. Graf then lost a closely contested final to Monica Seles, 2–6, 6–3, 8–10. Seles won the match on her fifth match point; Graf came within two points of winning the match a few games earlier. At Wimbledon, after struggling through early-round three-setters against Mariaan de Swardt and Patty Fendick, she easily defeated Natasha Zvereva in the quarterfinal, Sabatini in the semifinal, and Seles in the final, 6–2, 6–1, with Seles playing in almost complete silence because of widespread media and player criticism of her grunting. Graf then won all five of her Fed Cup matches, helping Germany defeat Spain in the final by defeating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, 6–4, 6–2. At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Graf lost to Jennifer Capriati in the final and claimed the silver medal. At the US Open, Graf was upset in the quarterfinals by Sánchez Vicario 7–6, 6–3. Four consecutive indoor tournament victories in the autumn helped improve her season, but for the third consecutive year, she failed to win the Virginia Slims Championships, where she lost in the first round to Lori McNeil. Second period of dominance 1993 Graf began 1993 with four losses in her first six tournaments of the year: two to Sánchez Vicario and one each to Seles and the 36-year-old Martina Navratilova. Seles defeated Graf at the Australian Open 4–6, 6–3, 6–2. She struggled at the German Open in Berlin where she lost a 6–0 set to the unheralded Sabine Hack before defeating Mary Joe Fernández and Sabatini in three-set matches to claim her seventh title there in eight years. During a quarterfinal match between Seles and Magdalena Maleeva in Hamburg, Seles was stabbed between the shoulder blades by a mentally ill German fan of Graf, Günter Parche. He claimed that he committed the attack to help Graf reclaim the world No. 1 ranking. More than two years elapsed before Seles competed again. Shortly after the stabbing, during a players meeting at the Italian Open in Rome, 17 of the world's top 25 WTA members voted against preserving Seles' world No. 1 ranking while she was sidelined. Since Graf skipped the Italian Open, she did not take part in the vote. During Seles's absence, Graf won 65 of 67 matches, three of four Grand Slam events and the year-end Virginia Slims championships. She won her first French Open title since 1988 with a three-set victory over Mary Joe Fernández in the final. Fernandez had two break points to take a 3–0 and double break lead in the third set. The win elevated Graf to the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in 22 months. At Wimbledon, Graf defeated Jana Novotná to win her third consecutive, and fifth overall, ladies' title. In the third and deciding set, Novotná had a point to go up 5–1 on her serve. After breaking Novotná's serve, Graf won the next four games to take the match 7–6, 1–6, 6–4. Graf had a bone splinter in her right foot during this tournament (and for the next few months), finally resulting in surgery on 4 October. In the meantime, she lost surprisingly to Nicole Bradtke of Australia in a Fed Cup match on clay before winning the Acura Classic in San Diego and the Canadian Open in Toronto in preparation for the US Open. She won there, comfortably beating Helena Suková in the final after needing three sets to eliminate Gabriela Sabatini and Manuela Maleeva-Fragniere in the quarterfinals and semifinals respectively. In the fall, Graf won the Volkswagen Card Cup in Leipzig a day before her foot operation, losing only two games to Jana Novotná in the final. Graf lost to Conchita Martínez in her comeback tournament a month later in Philadelphia. However, she finished her year with a highlight, winning her first Virginia Slims Championships since 1989 by beating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final despite needing painkillers for a back injury. 1994 Seemingly free of injury for the first time in years, Graf began the year by winning the Australian Open, where she defeated Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final with the loss of only two games. Graf later stated it was the best tennis she had ever played in a Grand Slam final. She then won her next four tournaments in Tokyo, Indian Wells, Delray Beach and Miami respectively. In the Miami final, she lost her first set of the year—to Natasha Zvereva—after winning 54 consecutive sets. In the Hamburg final, she lost for the first time in 1994 after 36 consecutive match victories, losing to Sánchez Vicario in three sets. She then won her eighth German Open, but there were signs that her form was worsening as she almost lost to Julie Halard in a quarterfinal. As the defending champion Graf lost in straight sets to Mary Pierce in the French Open semifinal. This was followed by a first-round straight-sets loss at Wimbledon to Lori McNeil, her only loss at Wimbledon between 1991 and 1997 and her first loss in a first round Grand Slam tournament in ten years. Graf still managed to win San Diego the following month but aggravated a long-time back injury in beating Sánchez Vicario in the final. Graf developed a bone spur at the base of her spine due to a congenital condition of the sacroiliac joint. She began to wear a back brace and was unsure about playing the US Open but elected to play while receiving treatment and stretching for two hours before each match. She made it to the final and took the first set against Sánchez Vicario but lost the next two sets — Sanchez Vicario's last victory over Graf. In the middle of the second set, Graf suffered back spasms while reaching for a ball in the ad court. She took the following nine weeks off, returning only for the Virginia Slims Championships where she lost in straight sets to Pierce in the quarterfinal. Although Graf ended the year ranked No. 1 on the computer the ITF named Sanchez Vicario its World Champion for the year, while the WTA backed their official rankings and named Graf. 1995 A strained right calf muscle forced Graf to withdraw from the Australian Open. She came back in February, winning four consecutive tournaments in Paris, Delray Beach, Miami and Houston. She then beat Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both the French Open and Wimbledon. The 1995 Wimbledon final is regarded as one of the most dramatic women's major finals in history as Graf and Sánchez Vicario battled in a tight third set that included a 16-minute long, 13-deuce game on Sanchez Vicario's serve at 5–5. In August Monica Seles made her much anticipated return to tennis at the Canadian Open. It was decided to grant her a joint number-one ranking with Graf who took her first loss of the year in the first round to Amanda Coetzer. The US Open was Monica Seles's first Grand Slam event since the 1993 attack, with much anticipation again around a potential Seles-Graf final. After surviving a scare in a three-setter against Amanda Coetzer in the first round, Graf reached the final with relative ease, while Seles went through her side of the draw in even more convincing fashion. Seles and Graf met in the final, with Graf winning in three sets, saving a set point in the first set. Graf then capped the year by beating countrywoman Anke Huber in a five-set final at the season-ending WTA Championships in 2 hours and 46 minutes. Tax issues In personal terms, 1995 was a difficult year for Graf, as she was accused by German authorities of tax evasion in the early years of her career. In her defense, she stated that her father Peter was her financial manager, and all financial matters relating to her earnings at the time had been under his control. Her father was arrested in August and was sentenced to 45 months in jail. He was eventually released after serving 25 months. Prosecutors dropped their case against Graf in 1997, when she agreed to pay a fine of 1.3 million Deutsche Marks to the government and an unspecified charity. 1996 Graf again missed the Australian Open after undergoing surgery in December 1995 to remove bone splinters from her left foot. Graf came back to the tour in March, winning back to back titles in Indian Wells and Miami, followed by a record ninth title at the German Open in May and a quarterfinal defeat in Rome against Martina Hingis. She then successfully defended the three Grand Slam titles she won the year before. In a close French Open final, Graf again overcame Sánchez Vicario, taking the third set 10–8. Graf had led 4–1 in the second set tiebreak, only to lose six points in a row and force a decider. Twice in the third set Sánchez Vicario served for the championship but was broken each time by Graf. It was the longest French Open women's singles final in history, both in terms of time (3 hours and 3 minutes) and number of games played (40). Graf then had a straight-sets win against Sánchez Vicario in the Wimbledon final. That was the last competitive match Graf and Sánchez Vicario would ever play against one another. In July, a left knee injury forced Graf to withdraw from the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Graf played only one warm-up event ahead of the US Open, the Acura Classic in Manhattan Beach, California, where she lost to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinals. She then successfully defended her title at the US Open, defeating Monica Seles in the final. Her toughest battle came against rising star Martina Hingis in the semifinal, with Hingis unable to convert on five set points. Graf did not lose a set the whole tournament. She also won her fifth and final WTA Tour Championships title with a five set win over Martina Hingis, with Hingis cramping up in the fifth set. In 1988, Graf became only the second tennis player in history to win a Slam on hardcourt, clay, and grass all in the same season. She repeated the feat in 1993, 1995, and 1996. Final years on the tour: 1997–99 The last few years of Graf's career were beset by injuries, particularly to her knees and back. She lost the world No. 1 ranking to Martina Hingis and failed to win a Grand Slam title for the first time in ten years in 1997. That year Graf lost in the fourth round of the Australian Open in straight sets to Amanda Coetzer. She subsequently withdrew from the Pan Pacific Open and had arthroscopic surgery performed on her left knee. After several months injury lay off, Graf returned to play in the German Open in Berlin in front of a home crowd and had the worst defeat of her career in the quarterfinal, when Amanda Coetzer beat her in just 56 minutes 6–0, 6–1. In the French Open Graf was again beaten by Amanda Coetzer in straight sets, 6–1, 6–4. Only one week later, she underwent reconstructive knee surgery in Vienna and subsequently missed the 1997 Wimbledon and US Open championships. The treatment was for a fracture of the cartilage as well as a shortening and partial rupture of the patellar tendon of her left knee. After missing almost half of the tour in 1998, Graf lost in the third round at Wimbledon and in the fourth round at the US Open. Shortly after the US Open, she underwent surgery to remove a bone spur in her right wrist. Upon her return Graf defeated world No. 2 Hingis and world No. 1 Lindsay Davenport en route to the Philadelphia title. At the first round of the season-ending Chase Championships, Graf defeated world No. 3, Jana Novotná, before losing in the semifinal to first-seeded Davenport. At the beginning of 1999 Graf played the warm up event to the Australian Open in Sydney; she defeated Serena Williams in the second round and Venus in the quarterfinals before losing to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinal. Graf then went on to reach the quarterfinals of the Australian Open before losing to Monica Seles in two sets. In Indian Wells Graf lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At the French Open, Graf reached her first Grand Slam final in three years and fought back from a set and twice from a break down in the second set to defeat the top ranked Hingis in three sets for a memorable victory. Graf became the first player in the open era to defeat the first, second, and third ranked players in the same Grand Slam tournament by beating second-ranked Davenport in the quarterfinals and third-ranked Seles in the semifinals. Graf said after the final that it would be her last French Open, fueling speculation about her retirement. Graf then reached her ninth Wimbledon singles final, losing to third-seeded Davenport in straight sets. She had to overcome three difficult three set matches en route to this final, against Mariaan De Swardt in the third round, Venus Williams in the quarterfinals and Mirjana Lučić in the semifinals. On 13 August 1999, shortly after retiring with a strained hamstring from a second round match against Amy Frazier in San Diego, Graf announced her retirement from the women's tour at age 30. She was ranked No. 3 at that time and said, "I have done everything I wanted to do in tennis. I feel I have nothing left to accomplish. The weeks following Wimbledon [in 1999] weren't easy for me. I was not having fun anymore. After Wimbledon, for the first time in my career, I didn't feel like going to a tournament. My motivation wasn't what it was in the past." Doubles career From the beginning of her career until 1990, Graf regularly played doubles events in Grand Slams and other tournaments, winning a total of eleven titles. In 1986, she formed a partnership with rival Gabriela Sabatini. The pair was moderately successful, winning the 1988 Wimbledon Championships together and reaching the finals of the French Open in 1986, 1987 and 1989. The partnership was the subject of much discussion, as the two women, both known to be shy, usually kept communication to a minimum during changeovers and between points, a highly unusual situation in doubles. Sabatini said of the partnership: "doubles is all about communicating with each other, and we didn't communicate that much. We would just say the basic things, but nothing else." The pair played their last major tournament together at the 1990 Wimbledon Championships, losing in the quarterfinals. From 1991 until the end of her career, Graf would only play doubles sporadically, forming short-term partnerships with a variety of players, including Lori McNeil, Anke Huber and her best friends on the tour, Rennae Stubbs, Patricia Tarabini and Ines Gorrochategui. She played her last Grand Slam doubles tournament at the 1999 Australian Open with Gorrochategui, losing in the second round. Graf also occasionally played mixed doubles, although she never won a title. She partnered with doubles specialist Mark Woodforde at the Australian Open in 1994, with Henri Leconte at Wimbledon in 1991 and at the French Open in 1994, and with Charlie Pasarell at the US Open in 1984. In an unusual arrangement, she paired with her coaches Pavel Složil at Wimbledon in 1988 and Heinz Günthardt in 1992 and 1996, also at Wimbledon. At the 1999 Wimbledon Championships, Graf formed a much-publicized partnership with John McEnroe, with whom she reached the semifinals before withdrawing due to concerns that her uncertain hamstring, coupled with a bout of bronchitis, would affect her in the singles final. Post-career exhibition matches In late 1999 and early 2000, as part of her Farewell Tour, Graf played a series of exhibition matches against former rivals in New Zealand, Japan, Spain, Germany and South Africa. She played Jelena Dokic in Christchurch, New Zealand, Amanda Coetzer in Durban, South Africa, and her former rival Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in Zaragoza, Spain. It was Graf and Sánchez Vicario's first head-to-head meeting since 1996. In February 2000, Graf played against Kimiko Date at Nagoya Rainbow Hall in Tokyo, winning in three sets. In September 2004, Graf dispatched her former doubles partner Gabriela Sabatini, in straight sets, in an exhibition match played in Berlin, Germany. She was also in Berlin to host a charity gala, as well as inaugurating a tennis stadium renamed the "Steffi Graf Stadion". Proceeds from her match against Sabatini went to Graf's foundation, "Children for Tomorrow". In July 2005, Graf competed in one tie of World Team Tennis (WTT) on the Houston Wranglers team. She was beaten in two out of three matches, with each match being one set. Graf lost her singles match to Elena Likhovtseva 5–4. She teamed with Ansley Cargill in women's doubles against Anna Kournikova and Likhovtseva but lost 5–2. She was successful, however, in the mixed doubles match. Graf completely ruled out a return to professional tennis. In October, Graf defeated Sabatini in an exhibition match in Mannheim, Germany, winning both of their sets. Like the exhibition match the previous year against Sabatini, proceeds went to "Children for Tomorrow". In 2008 Graf lost an exhibition match against Kimiko Date at Ariake Colosseum in Tokyo. As part of the event, billed as "Dream Match 2008", she defeated Martina Navratilova in a one-set affair 8–7, with Graf winning a tiebreaker 10–5. It was the first time in 14 years Graf had played Navratilova. Graf played a singles exhibition match against Kim Clijsters and a mixed doubles exhibition alongside husband Andre Agassi against Tim Henman and Clijsters as part of a test event and celebration for the newly installed roof over Wimbledon's Centre Court in 2009. She lost a lengthy one-set singles match to Clijsters and also the mixed doubles. In 2010, Graf participated in the WTT Smash Hits exhibition in Washington, D.C. to support the Elton John AIDS Foundation. She and Agassi, her husband, were on Team Elton John, which competed against Team Billie Jean King. Graf played in the celebrity doubles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles before straining her left calf muscle and being replaced by Anna Kournikova. Summary of career Graf won seven singles titles at Wimbledon, six singles titles at the French Open, five singles titles at the US Open, and four singles titles at the Australian Open. Her overall record in 56 Grand Slam events was 278–32 (90 percent) (84–10 at the French Open, 74–7 at Wimbledon, 73–9 at the US Open, and 47–6 at the Australian Open). Her career prize-money earnings totalled US$21,895,277 (a record until Lindsay Davenport surpassed this amount in January 2008). Her singles win/loss record was 900–115 (88.7 percent). She was ranked world No. 1 for 186 consecutive weeks (from August 1987 to March 1991; tied with Serena Williams, a record in the women's game) and a record total 377 weeks overall. Career statistics Grand Slam tournament performance timeline Note: Graf's semifinal match at the 1988 US Open was walkover (so not counted as win) Grand Slam tournament finals Singles: 31 (22 titles, 9 runner-ups) Doubles: 4 (1 title, 3 runner-ups) Records These records were attained in Open Era of tennis. Records in bold indicate Open Era peer-less achievements. Playing style The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fräulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Složil and Heinz Günthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to , making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. Equipment and endorsements Early in her career, Graf wore Dunlop apparel, before signing an endorsement contract with Adidas in 1985. She had an Adidas sneakers line known as the St. Graf Pro line. Early in her career, Graf used the Dunlop Maxpower Pro and Maxpower Kevlar racquets and then played with the Max 200G racquet from 1984 to 1993 before switching to Wilson from 1994 to 1999. She first used the Wilson Pro Staff 7.0 lite, then switched to the Pro Staff 7.5 in 1996 and to the Pro Staff 7.1 in 1998. Graf's racquets were strung at 29 kilograms (64 pounds), significantly above the 50-60 pound range recommended by Wilson. In 2006, she signed an endorsement deal with Head. In 2010, Graf and Agassi collaborated with Head and developed the new line of Star Series tennis racquets. Graf has signed many endorsement deals throughout the years including a ten-year endorsement deal with car manufacturer Opel in 1985, and Rexona from 1994 to 1998. Other companies she has endorsed include Barilla, Apollinaris, Citibank, Danone and Teekanne. She has appeared in many advertisements and television commercials with Andre Agassi including Canon Inc. and Longines in 2008 (Agassi became Longines ambassador in 2007). In 2015, she was appointed as the brand ambassador of Kerala tourism, for promoting Ayurveda in North America and Europe. Personal life In 1997, she left the Catholic Church, citing personal reasons. During her career, Graf divided her time between her hometown of Brühl; Boca Raton, Florida; and New York City where she owned a penthouse in the former Police Headquarters Building in SoHo. From 1992 to 1999, Graf dated racing driver Michael Bartels. She started dating Andre Agassi after the 1999 French Open and they married on 22 October 2001, with only their mothers as witnesses. They have two children, a son born in 2001 and a daughter born in 2003. Agassi has said that he and Graf are not pushing their children toward becoming tennis players. The Graf-Agassi family resides in Summerlin, a community in the Las Vegas Valley. Graf's mother and her brother also live there. In 1991, the Steffi Graf Youth Tennis Center in Leipzig was dedicated to her. She is the founder and chairperson of "Children for Tomorrow", a non-profit foundation established in 1998 for implementing and developing projects to support children who have been traumatized by war or other crises. In 2001, Graf indicated that she preferred to be called Stefanie instead of Steffi. On 30 November 2013, Graf's father Peter died of pancreatic cancer. He was 75 years old. Legacy In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. In March 2012, Tennis Channel picked Graf as the greatest female tennis player ever in their list of 100 greatest tennis players of all time. In November 2018, Tennis.com polled its readers to choose the greatest women's tennis player of all time and Graf came in first. In July 2020, The Guardian polled its readers to determine the greatest female tennis player of the past 50 years, and Steffi was the clear favorite, picking up nearly twice as many votes as any other player. Tennis writer Steve Flink, in his book The Greatest Tennis Matches of the Twentieth Century, named Graf as the best female player of the 20th century. Flink said in 2020 that the jury was still out on (Serena) Williams as the greatest ever, but Williams' consistency over the long span did not match that of Graf or Navratilova. Graf compiled superior career accomplishments over Serena Williams (as of December 2, 2020); 900–115 career record (88.7 win %) versus 843–147 career record (85.2 win %), 107 career tournament victories versus 72 career tournament victories, 377 total weeks ranked as world No. One versus 319 total weeks ranked as world No. One. While Graf's 22 Grand Slam wins is one fewer than Williams' 23 (and two fewer than Margaret Court's 24), Graf's professional career is eight years shorter than Williams, plus Graf also faced much tougher competition during her era (Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Gabriela Sabatini, and Monica Seles) compared to Williams. However, with the stabbing of Monica Seles in 1993, some have questioned its impact on Graf's career statistics and legacy. Awards and honours Graf was voted the ITF World Champion in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1995 and 1996. She was voted the WTA Player of the Year in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996. She was elected as the German Sportsperson of the Year in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1999. In 2004, the Berliner Tennis-Arena was renamed Steffi-Graf-Stadion in honor of Graf. Graf was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004 and the German Sports Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2015, Graf was the recipient of the International Club's Jean Borotra Sportsmanship Award. See also Graf–Navratilova rivalry Graf–Sabatini rivalry Graf–Seles rivalry List of female tennis players List of tennis rivalries Overall tennis records - women's singles Tennis records of the Open Era - women's singles References External links Official Wimbledon profile BBC profile ESPN biography Steffi Graf's victories German female tennis players International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees 1969 births Living people Australian Open (tennis) champions French Open champions German emigrants to the United States Hopman Cup competitors Olympic medalists in tennis Olympic bronze medalists for West Germany Olympic gold medalists for West Germany Olympic silver medalists for Germany Olympic tennis players of Germany Olympic tennis players of West Germany Sportspeople from Mannheim Recipients of the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of Baden-Württemberg Recipients of the Olympic Order Tennis players at the 1984 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1988 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1992 Summer Olympics US Open (tennis) champions West German expatriates in the United States Wimbledon champions World No. 1 tennis players Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's singles Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's doubles Recipients of the Silver Laurel Leaf German philanthropists German women philanthropists Medalists at the 1988 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics People from SoHo, Manhattan Andre Agassi Tennis people from Baden-Württemberg	false	[ "Nigâr Hanım (1856 – 1 April 1918) () was an Ottoman poet, who pioneered modern Western styles in a feminine mode. She is a major figure in post-Tanzimat Turkish poetry.\n\nBiography \nNigâr was born in Istanbul to Macar Osman Pasha, an Ottoman nobleman of Hungarian origin. She was educated at the Kadıköy Fransız Mektebi (French School in Kadıköy), later receiving lectures at home from private teachers. She was able to speak eight different languages and play piano at a young age.\n\nShe was married at age fourteen, but divorced after a few years of great unhappiness.\n\nHer early poetry is in the traditional divan style, but later she was influenced by Recaizade Mahmut Ekrem and others, and adopted a more modernist stance, influenced by the Western poetry of her time. She was well versed in the cultures of East and West, and knew French, Greek, Arabic, and German.\n\nHer book Efsus was the first poetry book written in Western style of poetry by a woman author. Like Mihrî Hatun, and possibly the first woman poet since her, her femininity is not hidden. Her writing style, choice of themes and presentation reflects a very feminine sensibility. Apart from poetry, she wrote prose and made several translations.\n\nIn her personal life, she was an important and well-known figure in the society of her time. Apart from her career as a poet, her life-style, outgoing personality and choice of clothing had a wide influence on society and the perspective of women at the time. Although it is not possible to say that she was a feminist, her view of woman rights was much ahead of her time.\n\nShe became increasingly isolated in the last years of her life, and was in great pain. She died 1918 in İstanbul.\n\nAward\nHer humanitarian work was recognised by the award of the Order of Charity (Şefkat Nişanı).\n\n\"Tell me Again\" \n\"Tell me Again\" is an early love poem by Hanım (translation by Talat S. Halman).\n\nAm I your only love -- in the whole world -- now?\nAm I really the only object of your love?\nIf passions rage in your mind,\nIf love springs eternal in your heart --\nIs it all meant for me? Tell me again.\n\nTell me right now, am I the one who inspires\nAll your dark thoughts, all your sadness?\nShare with me what you feel, what you think.\nCome, my love, pour into my heart\nWhatever gives you so much pain.\nTell me again.\n\nSelected works\n\nPoetry \nEfsus I\nEfsus II\nNîrân\nAks-i Sada\nSafahat-ı Kalb\nElhan-ı Vatan\n\nPlay \nTesir-i Aşk\n\nMemoir \nHayatımın Hikâyesi (1959)\n\nReferences \n\n1856 births\n1918 deaths\nWomen poets of the Ottoman Empire\nDivan poets of the Ottoman Empire\nTurkish women writers\nBurials at Aşiyan Asri Cemetery\nPeople from Istanbul\n19th-century writers of the Ottoman Empire\n19th-century women writers of the Ottoman Empire\n20th-century writers of the Ottoman Empire\n20th-century women writers of the Ottoman Empire", "Lotte's Gift is a play by David Williamson. It was written as a deliberate attempt by Williamson to try something in a different style and was written as a vehicle for guitarist Karin Schaupp.\n\nBackground\nKarin Schaupp approached Williamson in 2002 to write the project. She wanted to act in a production that combined drama with her musical skills. Williamson was enthusiastic and started asking Schaupp about her family history. When the guitarist told her about her grandmother Lotte, Williamson decided to structure the story around three generations of women in her family.\n\nThe play premiered at the 2006 Noosa Festival as Strings Under Her Fingers. It was subsequently reworked as Lotte's Gift.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nKarin Schaupp on the play at \"Life Matters\" on ABC Radio National\nReview of Brisbane production at 4MBS Classic FM\nReview of 2007 Sydney Production at Variety\n\nPlays by David Williamson\n2007 plays" ]
[ "Steffi Graf", "Playing style", "What did Steffi play?", "I don't know.", "what was her play style?", "The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork." ]	C_d0e9bc4e72184f1fb6ceb489ddce9e70_0	what else represented her play style?	3	what else represented Steffi play style other than inside-out forehand drive?	Steffi Graf	The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Slozil and Heinz Gunthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to 174 km/h (108 mph), making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. CANNOTANSWER	Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable:	Stefanie Maria "Steffi" Graf ( , ; born 14 June 1969) is a German former professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 1 for a record 377 weeks and won 22 major singles titles, the second-most since the start of the Open Era in 1968 and third-most of all-time behind Margaret Court (24) and Serena Williams (23). In 1988, she became the first tennis player to achieve the Golden Slam by winning all four Grand Slam singles titles and the Olympic gold medal in the same calendar year. Furthermore, she is the only tennis player, male or female, to have won each major at least four times. Graf was ranked singles world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for a record 377 total weeks: the longest period for which any player, male or female, has held the singles number-one ranking since the WTA and the Association of Tennis Professionals began issuing rankings. She won 107 singles titles, which ranks her third on the WTA's all-time list after Martina Navratilova (167 titles) and Chris Evert (157 titles). She and Margaret Court are the only players, male or female, to win three majors in a calendar year five times (1988, 1989, 1993, 1995 and 1996). Notable features of Graf's game were her versatility across all playing surfaces, footwork and powerful forehand drive. Graf's athletic ability and aggressive game played from the baseline have been credited with developing the modern style of play that has come to dominate today's game. She won six French Open singles titles (second to Evert), seven Wimbledon singles titles, four Australian Open titles, and five U.S. Open singles titles. She is the only singles player (male or female) to have achieved a Grand Slam since the hard court was introduced as a playing surface, replacing grass, at the US Open in 1978. Graf's Grand Slam was achieved on grass, clay, and hard court while the previous five singles Grand Slams were achieved on only grass and clay. Graf reached 13 consecutive singles major finals, from the 1987 French Open through to the 1990 French Open, winning nine of them. She won five consecutive singles majors (1988 Australian Open to 1989 Australian Open), and seven out of eight, in two calendar years (1988 Australian Open to 1989 US Open, except 1989 French Open). She reached a total of 31 singles major finals. Graf retired at the age of 30 in 1999 while she was ranked world No. 3. She is regarded as one of the greatest female tennis players of all time. Martina Navratilova included Graf at the top of her list of the greatest players ever. In the year of Graf's retirement, Billie Jean King said, "Steffi [Graf] is definitely the greatest women's tennis player of all time." In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. She married former world No. 1 men's tennis player Andre Agassi in October 2001. They have two children. Graf was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004. Along with Boris Becker, Graf was considered instrumental in popularizing tennis in Germany, where it remains one of the foremost national sports. Early life Stefanie Graf was born on 14 June 1969, in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany, to Heidi Schalk and car-and-insurance salesman Peter Graf (18 June 1938 − 30 November 2013). When she was nine years old, her family moved to the neighboring town of Brühl. She has a younger brother, Michael. Her father, an aspiring tennis coach, first introduced her to the game, teaching his three-year-old daughter how to swing a wooden racket in the family's living room. She began practising on a court at the age of four and played in her first tournament at five. She soon began taking the top prize at junior tournaments with regularity, going on to win the European Championships 12s and 18s in 1982. Career Early career Graf played in her first professional tournament in October 1982 at Filderstadt, Germany. She lost her first round match 6–4, 6–0 to Tracy Austin, a two-time US Open champion and former world No. 1 player. (Twelve years later, Graf defeated Austin 6–0, 6–0 during a second round match at the Evert Cup in Indian Wells, California, which was their second and last match against each other.) At the start of her first full professional year in 1983, Graf was 13 years old and ranked world No. 124. She won no titles during the next three years, but her ranking climbed steadily to world No. 98 in 1983, No. 22 in 1984, and No. 6 in 1985. In 1984, she first gained international attention when she almost upset the tenth seed, Jo Durie of the United Kingdom, in a fourth round Centre Court match at Wimbledon. In August as a 15-year-old (and youngest entrant) representing West Germany, she won the tennis demonstration event at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. No medals were awarded as this was not an official Olympic event. Graf's schedule was closely controlled by her father, who limited her play so that she would not burn out. In 1985, for instance, she played only ten events leading up to the US Open, whereas another up-and-coming star, Gabriela Sabatini of Argentina, who was a year younger than Graf, played 21. Peter Graf also kept a tight rein on Graf's personal life. Social invitations on the tour were often declined as Graf's focus was kept on practicing and match play. Working with her father and then-coach Pavel Složil, Graf typically practiced for up to four hours a day, often heading straight from airports to practice courts. This narrow focus meant that Graf, already shy and retiring by nature, made few friends on the tour in her early years, but it led to a steady improvement in her play. In 1985 and early 1986, Graf emerged as the top challenger to the dominance of Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert. During that period, she lost six times to Evert and three times to Navratilova, all in straight sets. She did not win a tournament but consistently reached tournament finals, semifinals and quarterfinals, with the highlight being her semifinal loss to Navratilova at the US Open. On 13 April 1986, Graf won her first WTA tournament and beat Evert for the first time in the final of the Family Circle Cup in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (She never lost to Evert again, beating her six more times over the next three and a half years.) Graf then won her next three tournaments at Amelia Island, Charleston, and Berlin, culminating in a 6–2, 6–3 defeat of Navratilova in the final of the latter. Illness caused her to miss Wimbledon, and an accident where she broke a toe several weeks later also curtailed her play. She returned to win a small tournament at Mahwah just before the US Open where, in one of the most anticipated matches of the year, she encountered Navratilova in a semifinal. The match was played over two days with Navratilova finally winning after saving three match points 6–1, 6–7, 7–6. Graf then won three consecutive indoor titles at Tokyo, Zurich, and Brighton, before once again contending with Navratilova at the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships in New York. This time, Navratilova beat Graf 7–6, 6–3, 6–2. Breakthrough year: 1987 Graf's Grand Slam tournament breakthrough came in 1987. She started the year strongly, with six tournament victories heading into the French Open, with the highlight being at the tournament in Miami, where she defeated Martina Navratilova in a semifinal and Chris Evert in the final and lost only 20 games in the seven rounds of the tournament. In the French Open final, Graf defeated Navratilova, who was the world No. 1, 6–4, 4–6, 8–6 after beating Sabatini in a three-set semifinal. Graf then lost to Navratilova 7–5, 6–3 in the Wimbledon final, her first loss of the year. However, in the Federation Cup final in Vancouver, Canada, three weeks later, she defeated Evert easily 6–2, 6–1. The US Open ended anti-climactically as Navratilova defeated Graf in the final 7–6, 6–1. Graf had a win-loss record of 75-2 for a 97.4 winning percentage in 1987, both losses coming to Navratilova as they split the four matches they played during the year. On 17 August, after defeating Evert in a straight set final in the Virginia Slims of Los Angeles, Graf overtook Navratilova for the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in her career, a ranking she would hold for the next 186 consecutive weeks, a record (it was tied by Serena Williams in 2016). Graf was the first player other than Navratilova or Evert to hold the top spot since Tracy Austin in 1980. Golden Slam: 1988 Graf started 1988 by winning the Australian Open, defeating Chris Evert in the final 6–1, 7–6. Graf did not lose a set during the tournament and lost a total of only 29 games. Graf lost twice to Sabatini during the spring, once on hardcourts in Boca Raton, Florida, and once on clay at Amelia Island, Florida. Graf, however, won the tournament in San Antonio, Texas, and retained her title in Miami, where she once again defeated Evert in the final. Graf then won the tournament in Berlin, losing only twelve games in five matches. At the French Open, Graf successfully defended her title by defeating Natasha Zvereva 6–0, 6–0 in a 34-minute final. The official time of the match given on the scoresheet was 34 minutes; however, just 32 minutes of that was spent on the court, as a rain break split the match into two periods of play, of nine and 23 minutes. That was the shortest-ever and most one-sided Grand Slam final ever and the only double bagel in a Major final since 1911. Zvereva, who had eliminated Martina Navratilova in the fourth round, won only thirteen points in the match. Next came Wimbledon, where Martina Navratilova had won six straight titles. Graf was trailing Martina Navratilova in the final 7–5, 2–0 before winning the match 5–7, 6–2, 6–1. She then won tournaments in Hamburg and Mahwah (where she lost only eight games all tournament). At the US Open, Graf beat Sabatini in a three-set final to win the Grand Slam by 6–3, 3–6, 6–1, a feat previously performed by only two other women, Maureen Connolly Brinker in 1953 and Margaret Court in 1970. Graf's 1988 Grand Slam remains the only one in history completed on three surfaces (grass, clay, hard court), as all other Grand Slams in tennis history were achieved prior to the introduction of hard court at the US Open in 1978. In reaching and winning all four Grand Slam finals, Graf became the first player in history to contest and win 28 Grand Slam singles matches in a single year; albeit including the unplayed walkover against Evert in the US Open. Even discounting that result, no other player had played and won 27 Grand Slam matches in a single year before and the feat has to date only been matched by Novak Djokovic since, in both 2015 and 2021, when he failed in both bids to win the Grand Slam. Graf then defeated Sabatini 6–3, 6–3 in the gold medal match at the Olympic Games in Seoul and achieved what the media had dubbed the "Golden Slam". Graf also won her only Grand Slam doubles title that year—at Wimbledon partnering Sabatini—and picked up a women's doubles Olympic bronze medal. Graf was the first tennis player to achieve the feat: wheelchair tennis players Diede de Groot and Dylan Alcott achieved the Golden Slam in 2021. At the year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf was upset by Pam Shriver, only her third loss of the year. The loss deprived her of the Golden Super Slam. She was named the 1988 BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year. At the end of the year, the municipality of Brühl, her hometown, gave her the title of honorary citizen. New challengers and personal challenges 1989 Speculation was rife at the beginning of 1989 about the possibility of Graf winning another Grand Slam. Some noted observers, such as Margaret Court, suggested that Graf could achieve the feat a couple more times. And the year began as expected, with Graf extending her Grand Slam tournament winning streak to five events at the Australian Open, defeating Helena Suková in the final. Her 6–3, 6–0 defeat of Gabriela Sabatini in a semifinal was described by veteran observer Ted Tinling as "probably the best tennis I've seen". He went on to add, "I saw what Steffi did to Sabatini at the Australian Open this year, and that was it. She is better than them all." Graf followed this with easy victories in her next four tournaments at Washington, D.C., San Antonio, Texas, Boca Raton, Florida, and Hilton Head. The Washington, D.C. tournament was notable because Graf won the first twenty points of the final against Zina Garrison. In the Boca Raton final, Graf lost the only set she conceded to Chris Evert in their final seven matches. In the subsequent Amelia Island final on clay, Graf lost her first match of the year to Sabatini but returned to European clay with easy victories at Hamburg and Berlin. Graf's Grand Slam tournament winning streak ended at the French Open, where 17-year-old Spaniard Arantxa Sánchez Vicario beat Graf in three sets. Graf served for the match at 5–3 in the third set but lost the game and won only three more points in the match. Suffering from food poisoning, she had struggled to beat Monica Seles in their semifinal 6–3, 3–6, 6–3 and said that she had menstrual cramps in the final. Graf, however, recovered to defeat Martina Navratilova 6–2, 6–7, 6–1 in the Wimbledon final after defeating Monica Seles 6–0, 6–1 in a fourth round match, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in a quarterfinal, and Chris Evert in a semifinal. Graf warmed up for the US Open with easy tournament victories in San Diego and Mahwah. In her semifinal match at the US Open, Graf defeated Sabatini 3–6, 6–4, 6–2. The match was notable for its dramatic ending. Having suffered from leg cramps since the middle of the third set, Graf ran off the court seconds after match point to seek medical treatment. In the final, Navratilova led 6–3, 4–2 before Graf rallied to win 3–6, 7–5, 6–1 for her third Grand Slam singles title of the year. Victories at Zurich and Brighton preceded the Virginia Slims Championships, where Graf cemented her top-ranked status by beating Navratilova in the four-set final. Graf ended 1989 with an 86–2 match record and the loss of only 12 sets. Her 0.977 winning percentage is the second-highest in the open era behind Navratilova. 1990 Graf defeated Mary Joe Fernández in the final of the Australian Open, which was her eighth Grand Slam singles title in the last nine she contested. She survived an intense three-set battle with Helena Sukova in the semis, breaking in the tenth and final game to win the third set 6–4. Her winning streak (unbeaten since the 1989 French Open loss to Arantxa Sánchez) continued with victories in Tokyo, Amelia Island, and Hamburg. Shortly after winning in Tokyo, Graf injured her right thumb while cross-country skiing in Switzerland and subsequently withdrew from the Virginia Slims of Florida and the Lipton Championships. In Berlin, she extended her unbeaten streak to 66 matches (second in WTA history to Navratilova's 74) before losing the final to Monica Seles, 4–6, 3–6. While the Berlin tournament was being played, the largest-circulation German tabloid, Bild, ran a story about an alleged scandal involving Graf's father. The difficulty of answering questions about the matter came to a head at a Wimbledon press conference, where Graf broke down in tears. Wimbledon authorities then threatened to immediately shut down any subsequent press conferences where questions about the issue were asked. Whether this scandal affected Graf's form is open to debate. In an interview with Stern magazine in July 1990, Graf stated, "I could not fight as usual." Graf again lost to Monica Seles in the final of the French Open 6–7, 4–6. Seles was behind 2–6 in the first-set tiebreaker, but then came back to win six points in a row and take the set. At Wimbledon, Graf lost in the semifinals to Zina Garrison, who with this victory broke Graf's string of 13 consecutive major finals. This was a major upset as Garrison had to save a match point to defeat Monica Seles in the quarterfinal, and was expected to easily fall to Graf, whom she had not beaten in four years. After victories in Montreal and San Diego, Graf reached the US Open final, where she lost in straight sets to Sabatini. Graf won four indoor tournaments after the US Open, including a pair of straight-set wins over Sabatini in the finals of Zürich and Worcester. Although Sabatini got the best of Graf in the semifinals of the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf still finished the year as the top-ranked player. 1991 A mixture of injury problems, personal difficulties, and loss of form made 1991 a tough year for Graf. Seles established herself as the new dominant player on the women's tour, winning the Australian Open, French Open, and US Open and, in March, ending Graf's record 186 consecutive-weeks hold on the World No. 1 ranking. Graf briefly regained the top ranking after winning at Wimbledon but lost it again after her loss to Navratilova at the US Open. Graf lost an Australian Open quarterfinal to Jana Novotná, the first time she did not reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament since the 1986 French Open. She then lost to Sabatini in her next three tournaments before winning the U.S. Hardcourt Championships in San Antonio, beating Monica Seles in the final. After losing a fifth straight time to Sabatini in Amelia Island, Florida, Graf again defeated Seles in the Hamburg final. Following her tournament victory in German Open in Berlin, Graf suffered one of the worst defeats of her career in a French Open semifinal where she won only two games against Sánchez Vicario and lost her first 6–0 set since 1984. At Wimbledon, however, Graf captured her third women's crown, this time at Sabatini's expense. Sabatini served for the match twice, and was two points away from her first Wimbledon title. After breaking Sabatini's serve to even the third set at 6–6, Graf defeated Sabatini by winning the next two games to take the match 6–4, 3–6, 8–6. Martina Navratilova then defeated Graf 7–6, 6–7, 6–4 in a US Open semifinal, the first time she had beaten Graf in four years. Graf then won in Leipzig, with her 500th career victory coming in a quarterfinal against Judith Wiesner. After winning two more indoor tournaments at Zurich and Brighton, she failed once again in the Virginia Slims Championships, losing her quarterfinal to Novotná. Soon after, she split with her long-time coach, Pavel Složil. 1992 A bout of rubella forced Graf to miss the first major event of 1992, the Australian Open. Her year continued indifferently with losses in three of her first four tournaments, including a semifinal loss to Jana Novotná in Chicago. It was Graf's second consecutive loss to Novotna, and dating back to their 1991 Australian Open quarterfinal match, Jana had won three of their last five meetings. It would also be the last loss Graf would ever have to Novotna in a match she completed (she did have a loss after withdrawing with injury after the first set of a late 1996 match). Chicago was notable, however, for being the first tournament Graf played with her new coach, former Swiss player Heinz Günthardt. Graf's father had approached Günthardt during the 1991 Virginia Slims Championships. She would work with him for the remainder of her career. In Boca Raton, Florida, Graf reached her first final of the year, where she faced Conchita Martínez for the title. In their five previous head-to-head matches, Graf had defeated Martínez each time. Even though she lost the opening set, Graf went on to prevail in three sets. She lost twice to Sabatini in the early spring at the Lipton International and the Bausch & Lomb Championships, which now brought her to seven losses in her last eight matches against Sabatini; however, the Bausch & Lomb loss would be Graf's final loss to Sabatini, winning her next, and last eight matches against Sabatini. Victories at Hamburg and Berlin (beating Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both) prepared her for the French Open, where she defeated Sánchez Vicario in the semifinals after losing the first set 6–0. Graf then lost a closely contested final to Monica Seles, 2–6, 6–3, 8–10. Seles won the match on her fifth match point; Graf came within two points of winning the match a few games earlier. At Wimbledon, after struggling through early-round three-setters against Mariaan de Swardt and Patty Fendick, she easily defeated Natasha Zvereva in the quarterfinal, Sabatini in the semifinal, and Seles in the final, 6–2, 6–1, with Seles playing in almost complete silence because of widespread media and player criticism of her grunting. Graf then won all five of her Fed Cup matches, helping Germany defeat Spain in the final by defeating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, 6–4, 6–2. At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Graf lost to Jennifer Capriati in the final and claimed the silver medal. At the US Open, Graf was upset in the quarterfinals by Sánchez Vicario 7–6, 6–3. Four consecutive indoor tournament victories in the autumn helped improve her season, but for the third consecutive year, she failed to win the Virginia Slims Championships, where she lost in the first round to Lori McNeil. Second period of dominance 1993 Graf began 1993 with four losses in her first six tournaments of the year: two to Sánchez Vicario and one each to Seles and the 36-year-old Martina Navratilova. Seles defeated Graf at the Australian Open 4–6, 6–3, 6–2. She struggled at the German Open in Berlin where she lost a 6–0 set to the unheralded Sabine Hack before defeating Mary Joe Fernández and Sabatini in three-set matches to claim her seventh title there in eight years. During a quarterfinal match between Seles and Magdalena Maleeva in Hamburg, Seles was stabbed between the shoulder blades by a mentally ill German fan of Graf, Günter Parche. He claimed that he committed the attack to help Graf reclaim the world No. 1 ranking. More than two years elapsed before Seles competed again. Shortly after the stabbing, during a players meeting at the Italian Open in Rome, 17 of the world's top 25 WTA members voted against preserving Seles' world No. 1 ranking while she was sidelined. Since Graf skipped the Italian Open, she did not take part in the vote. During Seles's absence, Graf won 65 of 67 matches, three of four Grand Slam events and the year-end Virginia Slims championships. She won her first French Open title since 1988 with a three-set victory over Mary Joe Fernández in the final. Fernandez had two break points to take a 3–0 and double break lead in the third set. The win elevated Graf to the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in 22 months. At Wimbledon, Graf defeated Jana Novotná to win her third consecutive, and fifth overall, ladies' title. In the third and deciding set, Novotná had a point to go up 5–1 on her serve. After breaking Novotná's serve, Graf won the next four games to take the match 7–6, 1–6, 6–4. Graf had a bone splinter in her right foot during this tournament (and for the next few months), finally resulting in surgery on 4 October. In the meantime, she lost surprisingly to Nicole Bradtke of Australia in a Fed Cup match on clay before winning the Acura Classic in San Diego and the Canadian Open in Toronto in preparation for the US Open. She won there, comfortably beating Helena Suková in the final after needing three sets to eliminate Gabriela Sabatini and Manuela Maleeva-Fragniere in the quarterfinals and semifinals respectively. In the fall, Graf won the Volkswagen Card Cup in Leipzig a day before her foot operation, losing only two games to Jana Novotná in the final. Graf lost to Conchita Martínez in her comeback tournament a month later in Philadelphia. However, she finished her year with a highlight, winning her first Virginia Slims Championships since 1989 by beating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final despite needing painkillers for a back injury. 1994 Seemingly free of injury for the first time in years, Graf began the year by winning the Australian Open, where she defeated Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final with the loss of only two games. Graf later stated it was the best tennis she had ever played in a Grand Slam final. She then won her next four tournaments in Tokyo, Indian Wells, Delray Beach and Miami respectively. In the Miami final, she lost her first set of the year—to Natasha Zvereva—after winning 54 consecutive sets. In the Hamburg final, she lost for the first time in 1994 after 36 consecutive match victories, losing to Sánchez Vicario in three sets. She then won her eighth German Open, but there were signs that her form was worsening as she almost lost to Julie Halard in a quarterfinal. As the defending champion Graf lost in straight sets to Mary Pierce in the French Open semifinal. This was followed by a first-round straight-sets loss at Wimbledon to Lori McNeil, her only loss at Wimbledon between 1991 and 1997 and her first loss in a first round Grand Slam tournament in ten years. Graf still managed to win San Diego the following month but aggravated a long-time back injury in beating Sánchez Vicario in the final. Graf developed a bone spur at the base of her spine due to a congenital condition of the sacroiliac joint. She began to wear a back brace and was unsure about playing the US Open but elected to play while receiving treatment and stretching for two hours before each match. She made it to the final and took the first set against Sánchez Vicario but lost the next two sets — Sanchez Vicario's last victory over Graf. In the middle of the second set, Graf suffered back spasms while reaching for a ball in the ad court. She took the following nine weeks off, returning only for the Virginia Slims Championships where she lost in straight sets to Pierce in the quarterfinal. Although Graf ended the year ranked No. 1 on the computer the ITF named Sanchez Vicario its World Champion for the year, while the WTA backed their official rankings and named Graf. 1995 A strained right calf muscle forced Graf to withdraw from the Australian Open. She came back in February, winning four consecutive tournaments in Paris, Delray Beach, Miami and Houston. She then beat Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both the French Open and Wimbledon. The 1995 Wimbledon final is regarded as one of the most dramatic women's major finals in history as Graf and Sánchez Vicario battled in a tight third set that included a 16-minute long, 13-deuce game on Sanchez Vicario's serve at 5–5. In August Monica Seles made her much anticipated return to tennis at the Canadian Open. It was decided to grant her a joint number-one ranking with Graf who took her first loss of the year in the first round to Amanda Coetzer. The US Open was Monica Seles's first Grand Slam event since the 1993 attack, with much anticipation again around a potential Seles-Graf final. After surviving a scare in a three-setter against Amanda Coetzer in the first round, Graf reached the final with relative ease, while Seles went through her side of the draw in even more convincing fashion. Seles and Graf met in the final, with Graf winning in three sets, saving a set point in the first set. Graf then capped the year by beating countrywoman Anke Huber in a five-set final at the season-ending WTA Championships in 2 hours and 46 minutes. Tax issues In personal terms, 1995 was a difficult year for Graf, as she was accused by German authorities of tax evasion in the early years of her career. In her defense, she stated that her father Peter was her financial manager, and all financial matters relating to her earnings at the time had been under his control. Her father was arrested in August and was sentenced to 45 months in jail. He was eventually released after serving 25 months. Prosecutors dropped their case against Graf in 1997, when she agreed to pay a fine of 1.3 million Deutsche Marks to the government and an unspecified charity. 1996 Graf again missed the Australian Open after undergoing surgery in December 1995 to remove bone splinters from her left foot. Graf came back to the tour in March, winning back to back titles in Indian Wells and Miami, followed by a record ninth title at the German Open in May and a quarterfinal defeat in Rome against Martina Hingis. She then successfully defended the three Grand Slam titles she won the year before. In a close French Open final, Graf again overcame Sánchez Vicario, taking the third set 10–8. Graf had led 4–1 in the second set tiebreak, only to lose six points in a row and force a decider. Twice in the third set Sánchez Vicario served for the championship but was broken each time by Graf. It was the longest French Open women's singles final in history, both in terms of time (3 hours and 3 minutes) and number of games played (40). Graf then had a straight-sets win against Sánchez Vicario in the Wimbledon final. That was the last competitive match Graf and Sánchez Vicario would ever play against one another. In July, a left knee injury forced Graf to withdraw from the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Graf played only one warm-up event ahead of the US Open, the Acura Classic in Manhattan Beach, California, where she lost to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinals. She then successfully defended her title at the US Open, defeating Monica Seles in the final. Her toughest battle came against rising star Martina Hingis in the semifinal, with Hingis unable to convert on five set points. Graf did not lose a set the whole tournament. She also won her fifth and final WTA Tour Championships title with a five set win over Martina Hingis, with Hingis cramping up in the fifth set. In 1988, Graf became only the second tennis player in history to win a Slam on hardcourt, clay, and grass all in the same season. She repeated the feat in 1993, 1995, and 1996. Final years on the tour: 1997–99 The last few years of Graf's career were beset by injuries, particularly to her knees and back. She lost the world No. 1 ranking to Martina Hingis and failed to win a Grand Slam title for the first time in ten years in 1997. That year Graf lost in the fourth round of the Australian Open in straight sets to Amanda Coetzer. She subsequently withdrew from the Pan Pacific Open and had arthroscopic surgery performed on her left knee. After several months injury lay off, Graf returned to play in the German Open in Berlin in front of a home crowd and had the worst defeat of her career in the quarterfinal, when Amanda Coetzer beat her in just 56 minutes 6–0, 6–1. In the French Open Graf was again beaten by Amanda Coetzer in straight sets, 6–1, 6–4. Only one week later, she underwent reconstructive knee surgery in Vienna and subsequently missed the 1997 Wimbledon and US Open championships. The treatment was for a fracture of the cartilage as well as a shortening and partial rupture of the patellar tendon of her left knee. After missing almost half of the tour in 1998, Graf lost in the third round at Wimbledon and in the fourth round at the US Open. Shortly after the US Open, she underwent surgery to remove a bone spur in her right wrist. Upon her return Graf defeated world No. 2 Hingis and world No. 1 Lindsay Davenport en route to the Philadelphia title. At the first round of the season-ending Chase Championships, Graf defeated world No. 3, Jana Novotná, before losing in the semifinal to first-seeded Davenport. At the beginning of 1999 Graf played the warm up event to the Australian Open in Sydney; she defeated Serena Williams in the second round and Venus in the quarterfinals before losing to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinal. Graf then went on to reach the quarterfinals of the Australian Open before losing to Monica Seles in two sets. In Indian Wells Graf lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At the French Open, Graf reached her first Grand Slam final in three years and fought back from a set and twice from a break down in the second set to defeat the top ranked Hingis in three sets for a memorable victory. Graf became the first player in the open era to defeat the first, second, and third ranked players in the same Grand Slam tournament by beating second-ranked Davenport in the quarterfinals and third-ranked Seles in the semifinals. Graf said after the final that it would be her last French Open, fueling speculation about her retirement. Graf then reached her ninth Wimbledon singles final, losing to third-seeded Davenport in straight sets. She had to overcome three difficult three set matches en route to this final, against Mariaan De Swardt in the third round, Venus Williams in the quarterfinals and Mirjana Lučić in the semifinals. On 13 August 1999, shortly after retiring with a strained hamstring from a second round match against Amy Frazier in San Diego, Graf announced her retirement from the women's tour at age 30. She was ranked No. 3 at that time and said, "I have done everything I wanted to do in tennis. I feel I have nothing left to accomplish. The weeks following Wimbledon [in 1999] weren't easy for me. I was not having fun anymore. After Wimbledon, for the first time in my career, I didn't feel like going to a tournament. My motivation wasn't what it was in the past." Doubles career From the beginning of her career until 1990, Graf regularly played doubles events in Grand Slams and other tournaments, winning a total of eleven titles. In 1986, she formed a partnership with rival Gabriela Sabatini. The pair was moderately successful, winning the 1988 Wimbledon Championships together and reaching the finals of the French Open in 1986, 1987 and 1989. The partnership was the subject of much discussion, as the two women, both known to be shy, usually kept communication to a minimum during changeovers and between points, a highly unusual situation in doubles. Sabatini said of the partnership: "doubles is all about communicating with each other, and we didn't communicate that much. We would just say the basic things, but nothing else." The pair played their last major tournament together at the 1990 Wimbledon Championships, losing in the quarterfinals. From 1991 until the end of her career, Graf would only play doubles sporadically, forming short-term partnerships with a variety of players, including Lori McNeil, Anke Huber and her best friends on the tour, Rennae Stubbs, Patricia Tarabini and Ines Gorrochategui. She played her last Grand Slam doubles tournament at the 1999 Australian Open with Gorrochategui, losing in the second round. Graf also occasionally played mixed doubles, although she never won a title. She partnered with doubles specialist Mark Woodforde at the Australian Open in 1994, with Henri Leconte at Wimbledon in 1991 and at the French Open in 1994, and with Charlie Pasarell at the US Open in 1984. In an unusual arrangement, she paired with her coaches Pavel Složil at Wimbledon in 1988 and Heinz Günthardt in 1992 and 1996, also at Wimbledon. At the 1999 Wimbledon Championships, Graf formed a much-publicized partnership with John McEnroe, with whom she reached the semifinals before withdrawing due to concerns that her uncertain hamstring, coupled with a bout of bronchitis, would affect her in the singles final. Post-career exhibition matches In late 1999 and early 2000, as part of her Farewell Tour, Graf played a series of exhibition matches against former rivals in New Zealand, Japan, Spain, Germany and South Africa. She played Jelena Dokic in Christchurch, New Zealand, Amanda Coetzer in Durban, South Africa, and her former rival Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in Zaragoza, Spain. It was Graf and Sánchez Vicario's first head-to-head meeting since 1996. In February 2000, Graf played against Kimiko Date at Nagoya Rainbow Hall in Tokyo, winning in three sets. In September 2004, Graf dispatched her former doubles partner Gabriela Sabatini, in straight sets, in an exhibition match played in Berlin, Germany. She was also in Berlin to host a charity gala, as well as inaugurating a tennis stadium renamed the "Steffi Graf Stadion". Proceeds from her match against Sabatini went to Graf's foundation, "Children for Tomorrow". In July 2005, Graf competed in one tie of World Team Tennis (WTT) on the Houston Wranglers team. She was beaten in two out of three matches, with each match being one set. Graf lost her singles match to Elena Likhovtseva 5–4. She teamed with Ansley Cargill in women's doubles against Anna Kournikova and Likhovtseva but lost 5–2. She was successful, however, in the mixed doubles match. Graf completely ruled out a return to professional tennis. In October, Graf defeated Sabatini in an exhibition match in Mannheim, Germany, winning both of their sets. Like the exhibition match the previous year against Sabatini, proceeds went to "Children for Tomorrow". In 2008 Graf lost an exhibition match against Kimiko Date at Ariake Colosseum in Tokyo. As part of the event, billed as "Dream Match 2008", she defeated Martina Navratilova in a one-set affair 8–7, with Graf winning a tiebreaker 10–5. It was the first time in 14 years Graf had played Navratilova. Graf played a singles exhibition match against Kim Clijsters and a mixed doubles exhibition alongside husband Andre Agassi against Tim Henman and Clijsters as part of a test event and celebration for the newly installed roof over Wimbledon's Centre Court in 2009. She lost a lengthy one-set singles match to Clijsters and also the mixed doubles. In 2010, Graf participated in the WTT Smash Hits exhibition in Washington, D.C. to support the Elton John AIDS Foundation. She and Agassi, her husband, were on Team Elton John, which competed against Team Billie Jean King. Graf played in the celebrity doubles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles before straining her left calf muscle and being replaced by Anna Kournikova. Summary of career Graf won seven singles titles at Wimbledon, six singles titles at the French Open, five singles titles at the US Open, and four singles titles at the Australian Open. Her overall record in 56 Grand Slam events was 278–32 (90 percent) (84–10 at the French Open, 74–7 at Wimbledon, 73–9 at the US Open, and 47–6 at the Australian Open). Her career prize-money earnings totalled US$21,895,277 (a record until Lindsay Davenport surpassed this amount in January 2008). Her singles win/loss record was 900–115 (88.7 percent). She was ranked world No. 1 for 186 consecutive weeks (from August 1987 to March 1991; tied with Serena Williams, a record in the women's game) and a record total 377 weeks overall. Career statistics Grand Slam tournament performance timeline Note: Graf's semifinal match at the 1988 US Open was walkover (so not counted as win) Grand Slam tournament finals Singles: 31 (22 titles, 9 runner-ups) Doubles: 4 (1 title, 3 runner-ups) Records These records were attained in Open Era of tennis. Records in bold indicate Open Era peer-less achievements. Playing style The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fräulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Složil and Heinz Günthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to , making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. Equipment and endorsements Early in her career, Graf wore Dunlop apparel, before signing an endorsement contract with Adidas in 1985. She had an Adidas sneakers line known as the St. Graf Pro line. Early in her career, Graf used the Dunlop Maxpower Pro and Maxpower Kevlar racquets and then played with the Max 200G racquet from 1984 to 1993 before switching to Wilson from 1994 to 1999. She first used the Wilson Pro Staff 7.0 lite, then switched to the Pro Staff 7.5 in 1996 and to the Pro Staff 7.1 in 1998. Graf's racquets were strung at 29 kilograms (64 pounds), significantly above the 50-60 pound range recommended by Wilson. In 2006, she signed an endorsement deal with Head. In 2010, Graf and Agassi collaborated with Head and developed the new line of Star Series tennis racquets. Graf has signed many endorsement deals throughout the years including a ten-year endorsement deal with car manufacturer Opel in 1985, and Rexona from 1994 to 1998. Other companies she has endorsed include Barilla, Apollinaris, Citibank, Danone and Teekanne. She has appeared in many advertisements and television commercials with Andre Agassi including Canon Inc. and Longines in 2008 (Agassi became Longines ambassador in 2007). In 2015, she was appointed as the brand ambassador of Kerala tourism, for promoting Ayurveda in North America and Europe. Personal life In 1997, she left the Catholic Church, citing personal reasons. During her career, Graf divided her time between her hometown of Brühl; Boca Raton, Florida; and New York City where she owned a penthouse in the former Police Headquarters Building in SoHo. From 1992 to 1999, Graf dated racing driver Michael Bartels. She started dating Andre Agassi after the 1999 French Open and they married on 22 October 2001, with only their mothers as witnesses. They have two children, a son born in 2001 and a daughter born in 2003. Agassi has said that he and Graf are not pushing their children toward becoming tennis players. The Graf-Agassi family resides in Summerlin, a community in the Las Vegas Valley. Graf's mother and her brother also live there. In 1991, the Steffi Graf Youth Tennis Center in Leipzig was dedicated to her. She is the founder and chairperson of "Children for Tomorrow", a non-profit foundation established in 1998 for implementing and developing projects to support children who have been traumatized by war or other crises. In 2001, Graf indicated that she preferred to be called Stefanie instead of Steffi. On 30 November 2013, Graf's father Peter died of pancreatic cancer. He was 75 years old. Legacy In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. In March 2012, Tennis Channel picked Graf as the greatest female tennis player ever in their list of 100 greatest tennis players of all time. In November 2018, Tennis.com polled its readers to choose the greatest women's tennis player of all time and Graf came in first. In July 2020, The Guardian polled its readers to determine the greatest female tennis player of the past 50 years, and Steffi was the clear favorite, picking up nearly twice as many votes as any other player. Tennis writer Steve Flink, in his book The Greatest Tennis Matches of the Twentieth Century, named Graf as the best female player of the 20th century. Flink said in 2020 that the jury was still out on (Serena) Williams as the greatest ever, but Williams' consistency over the long span did not match that of Graf or Navratilova. Graf compiled superior career accomplishments over Serena Williams (as of December 2, 2020); 900–115 career record (88.7 win %) versus 843–147 career record (85.2 win %), 107 career tournament victories versus 72 career tournament victories, 377 total weeks ranked as world No. One versus 319 total weeks ranked as world No. One. While Graf's 22 Grand Slam wins is one fewer than Williams' 23 (and two fewer than Margaret Court's 24), Graf's professional career is eight years shorter than Williams, plus Graf also faced much tougher competition during her era (Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Gabriela Sabatini, and Monica Seles) compared to Williams. However, with the stabbing of Monica Seles in 1993, some have questioned its impact on Graf's career statistics and legacy. Awards and honours Graf was voted the ITF World Champion in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1995 and 1996. She was voted the WTA Player of the Year in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996. She was elected as the German Sportsperson of the Year in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1999. In 2004, the Berliner Tennis-Arena was renamed Steffi-Graf-Stadion in honor of Graf. Graf was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004 and the German Sports Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2015, Graf was the recipient of the International Club's Jean Borotra Sportsmanship Award. See also Graf–Navratilova rivalry Graf–Sabatini rivalry Graf–Seles rivalry List of female tennis players List of tennis rivalries Overall tennis records - women's singles Tennis records of the Open Era - women's singles References External links Official Wimbledon profile BBC profile ESPN biography Steffi Graf's victories German female tennis players International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees 1969 births Living people Australian Open (tennis) champions French Open champions German emigrants to the United States Hopman Cup competitors Olympic medalists in tennis Olympic bronze medalists for West Germany Olympic gold medalists for West Germany Olympic silver medalists for Germany Olympic tennis players of Germany Olympic tennis players of West Germany Sportspeople from Mannheim Recipients of the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of Baden-Württemberg Recipients of the Olympic Order Tennis players at the 1984 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1988 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1992 Summer Olympics US Open (tennis) champions West German expatriates in the United States Wimbledon champions World No. 1 tennis players Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's singles Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's doubles Recipients of the Silver Laurel Leaf German philanthropists German women philanthropists Medalists at the 1988 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics People from SoHo, Manhattan Andre Agassi Tennis people from Baden-Württemberg	true	[ "The discography of Ira Losco, a Maltese singer, contains five studio albums and forty-three singles. She represented Malta at the Eurovision Song Contest 2002 in Tallinn, Estonia with the song \"7th Wonder\", the song went on to finish second in the Final which was won by Marie N from Latvia with the song \"I Wanna\". She represented her country for the second time at Eurovision Song Contest 2016 in Stockholm, Sweden with the song \"Walk on Water\" and finished 11th (Ties with The Netherlands) in the grand final.\n\nHer debut studio album, Someone Else, was released in April 2004. The album includes the singles \"Love Me Or Hate Me\", \"Who I Am\", \"Someone Else\", \"Say Hey\", \"I'm In Love Again\" and \"Must've Been Good\". Her first Remix album, Blends & Remixes of Someone Else, was released in January 2005. Her second studio album, Accident Prone, was released in November 2005. The album includes the singles \"Everyday\", \"Get Out\", \"Don't Wanna Talk About It\", \"Driving One Of Your Cars\", \"Accident Prone\", \"Uh-Oh\" and \"Waking Up To The Light\". Her third studio album, Unmasked, was released in December 2006. The album includes the singles \"Winter Day\" and \"Arms Of The Ones...\". Her fourth studio album, Fortune Teller, was released in June 2008. The album includes the singles \"Something To Talk About\", \"Don't Look Down\", \"Idle Motion\", \"Promises\", \"Elvis Can You Hear Me?\", \"Shoulders of Giants\", \"What's The Matter With You?\" and \"Fortune Teller\". Her second Remix album, Mixed Beats, was released in August 2009. The album includes the singles \"What's The Matter With Your Cabrio\", \"Shoulders of Giants\" and \"Love Song\". Her fifth studio album, The Fire, was released in March 2013. The album includes the singles \"What I'd Give\", \"The Person I Am\", \"Me Luv U Long Time\" and \"The Way It's Meant To Be\".\n\nAlbums\n\nStudio albums\n\nRemix albums\n\nCompilation albums\n\nSingles\n\nAs lead artist\n\nOther appearances\n\nCovers & Re-Makes\n Ira re-made the track \"Say Hey\" featuring aspiring singer Caroline Stapley in 2004. The track was just a radio hit and is not featured in any album or single.\n Michelle Hunziker covered the tracks \"Get Out\", \"Love Me Or Hate Me\" and \"Someone Else\" for her debut album \"Lole\" in 2006.\n \"Accident Prone\" was remixed by DJ Ruby, Thomas Penton & Alex Armes, but wasn't featured in any album.\n Riffs from \"Uh Oh\" were sampled on Kelly Clarkson's track \"Don't Waste Your Time\".\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Official Website\n\nDiscographies of Maltese artists\nPop music discographies", "Else Alfelt (16 September 1910 – 9 August 1974) was a Danish artist who specialized in abstract paintings. She was one of two female members of the CoBrA movement. She was married to Carl-Henning Pedersen, another prominent CoBrA member.\n\nEarly life and education\nAlfelt was born in Copenhagen to the parents Carl Valdemar Ahlefeldt (1882–1954) and Edith Alexandra Regine Julie Thomsen (1893–1938). She began to paint in an early age and remained self-taught as an artist. When her parents divorced while Else was very young, she was sent away to an orphanage by her father’s new wife. Alfelt learned to paint around age 12 by trying to capture staff and other children at the orphanage.\n\nAt age 15, Alfelt attended the Technical School in Copenhagen for two years. Her training worked to prepare her to apply to the Art Academy in Copenhagen where she was ultimately turned down. According to her museum website, “the rejection was made on the grounds that she already possessed the necessary painting skills.”\nIn 1933, when Alfelt was 23 years old, she attended the International Folk High School in Elsinore. There, she met her future husband Carl-Henning Pederson. They married very quickly, and their daughter Vibeke Alfelt was born in 1934. From about 1934 to 1937, the couple struggled financially but felt inspired still, so they would paint over used canvases in order to continue their craft. This was how Pederson allegedly began painting, by being given a used canvas from his wife and instructed to make it his own.\n\nCareer\n\nAhlefeldt submitted her work to the annual Autumn Salon of Danish artists (Kunstnernes Efterårsudstilling) from 1929, but her work was not accepted until 1936, when she exhibited two naturalistic portraits. Soon after this, Alfelt's painting style shifted to a completely abstract idiom of meditative and colorful prismatic compositions.\n\nAlfelt was involved with the major avant-garde art movements in Denmark from the 1930s through the 1950s. She took part in Linien (The Line, 1934-1939), the artists' collective and art journal that was the first conduit of French Surrealism to Denmark. Under the German occupation of Denmark during World War Two, Alfelt was an integral component of Helhesten (The Hell-Horse, 1941-1944), the artists' group and art journal co-founded by Asger Jorn as a harbinger of experimental art and implicit cultural-political resistance. She was also an important member of CoBrA (1948-1951) after the war.\n\nAlfelt's work explored motifs such as spirals, mountains, and spheres, which she linked to expressions of \"inner space\". Alfelt was directly inspired by nature, specifically mountains, which she sought out on her many travels, such as her trip to Lapland 1945 and Japan in 1967. In addition to paintings she also produced several mosaics.\n\nShe was awarded the Tagea Brandt Rejselegat in 1961.\n\nNotable artworks\n\nPosthumous Exhibitions \n“Else Alfelt- The Flower of the Universe” – Carl Henning Pederson og Else Alfelts Museum; 2018.\n\nAlfelt was inspired by travels to Japan to incorporate Zen Buddhism into her artistic style, resulting in 100 meditative paintings all named “Flower of the Universe.” These paintings were all made from Since she created them while traveling to Japan, each piece was composed on paper since it was lightweight and easy to transport.\n\n“Abstract Women- Else Alfelt and Marianne Grønnow” – Carl Henning Pederson og Else Alfelts museum; March 2015-August 2015.\nAbstract women documents two Danish abstract female painters who have gone overlooked by history, and overshadowed by their husbands’ works. While the two artists vary greatly in style and technique, the CHPEA museum brings them together for this exhibition to bring attention to the ways their art challenges established societal norms.\n\nLegacy\n'Carl Henning Pedersen og Else Alfelts Museum' outside Herning. Else Alfelts Vej in the Ørestad district of Copenhagen is named after her. In September 2010, the museum displayed a large-scale exhibition called “Else Alfelt – The Aesthetics of Emptiness.” The exhibition was shown for five months to celebrate what would have been Alfelt’s 100th birthday. The museum page description of the event calls her “one of the most significant women artists in Danish modernism.”\n\nSee also\nList of Danish painters\nList of Danish women artists\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n'Carl Henning Pedersen og Else Alfelts Museum' - Else Alfelt \nElse Alfelt in Kunstindeks Danmark \n\n1910 births\n1974 deaths\n20th-century Danish painters\n20th-century Danish women artists\nAbstract painters\nArtists from Copenhagen\nDanish watercolourists\nDanish women painters\nRecipients of the Thorvaldsen Medal\nWomen watercolorists" ]
[ "Steffi Graf", "Playing style", "What did Steffi play?", "I don't know.", "what was her play style?", "The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork.", "what else represented her play style?", "Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable:" ]	C_d0e9bc4e72184f1fb6ceb489ddce9e70_0	why did she use this style?	4	why did Steffi use inside-out forehand drive style?	Steffi Graf	The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Slozil and Heinz Gunthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to 174 km/h (108 mph), making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. CANNOTANSWER	As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy.	Stefanie Maria "Steffi" Graf ( , ; born 14 June 1969) is a German former professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 1 for a record 377 weeks and won 22 major singles titles, the second-most since the start of the Open Era in 1968 and third-most of all-time behind Margaret Court (24) and Serena Williams (23). In 1988, she became the first tennis player to achieve the Golden Slam by winning all four Grand Slam singles titles and the Olympic gold medal in the same calendar year. Furthermore, she is the only tennis player, male or female, to have won each major at least four times. Graf was ranked singles world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for a record 377 total weeks: the longest period for which any player, male or female, has held the singles number-one ranking since the WTA and the Association of Tennis Professionals began issuing rankings. She won 107 singles titles, which ranks her third on the WTA's all-time list after Martina Navratilova (167 titles) and Chris Evert (157 titles). She and Margaret Court are the only players, male or female, to win three majors in a calendar year five times (1988, 1989, 1993, 1995 and 1996). Notable features of Graf's game were her versatility across all playing surfaces, footwork and powerful forehand drive. Graf's athletic ability and aggressive game played from the baseline have been credited with developing the modern style of play that has come to dominate today's game. She won six French Open singles titles (second to Evert), seven Wimbledon singles titles, four Australian Open titles, and five U.S. Open singles titles. She is the only singles player (male or female) to have achieved a Grand Slam since the hard court was introduced as a playing surface, replacing grass, at the US Open in 1978. Graf's Grand Slam was achieved on grass, clay, and hard court while the previous five singles Grand Slams were achieved on only grass and clay. Graf reached 13 consecutive singles major finals, from the 1987 French Open through to the 1990 French Open, winning nine of them. She won five consecutive singles majors (1988 Australian Open to 1989 Australian Open), and seven out of eight, in two calendar years (1988 Australian Open to 1989 US Open, except 1989 French Open). She reached a total of 31 singles major finals. Graf retired at the age of 30 in 1999 while she was ranked world No. 3. She is regarded as one of the greatest female tennis players of all time. Martina Navratilova included Graf at the top of her list of the greatest players ever. In the year of Graf's retirement, Billie Jean King said, "Steffi [Graf] is definitely the greatest women's tennis player of all time." In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. She married former world No. 1 men's tennis player Andre Agassi in October 2001. They have two children. Graf was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004. Along with Boris Becker, Graf was considered instrumental in popularizing tennis in Germany, where it remains one of the foremost national sports. Early life Stefanie Graf was born on 14 June 1969, in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany, to Heidi Schalk and car-and-insurance salesman Peter Graf (18 June 1938 − 30 November 2013). When she was nine years old, her family moved to the neighboring town of Brühl. She has a younger brother, Michael. Her father, an aspiring tennis coach, first introduced her to the game, teaching his three-year-old daughter how to swing a wooden racket in the family's living room. She began practising on a court at the age of four and played in her first tournament at five. She soon began taking the top prize at junior tournaments with regularity, going on to win the European Championships 12s and 18s in 1982. Career Early career Graf played in her first professional tournament in October 1982 at Filderstadt, Germany. She lost her first round match 6–4, 6–0 to Tracy Austin, a two-time US Open champion and former world No. 1 player. (Twelve years later, Graf defeated Austin 6–0, 6–0 during a second round match at the Evert Cup in Indian Wells, California, which was their second and last match against each other.) At the start of her first full professional year in 1983, Graf was 13 years old and ranked world No. 124. She won no titles during the next three years, but her ranking climbed steadily to world No. 98 in 1983, No. 22 in 1984, and No. 6 in 1985. In 1984, she first gained international attention when she almost upset the tenth seed, Jo Durie of the United Kingdom, in a fourth round Centre Court match at Wimbledon. In August as a 15-year-old (and youngest entrant) representing West Germany, she won the tennis demonstration event at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. No medals were awarded as this was not an official Olympic event. Graf's schedule was closely controlled by her father, who limited her play so that she would not burn out. In 1985, for instance, she played only ten events leading up to the US Open, whereas another up-and-coming star, Gabriela Sabatini of Argentina, who was a year younger than Graf, played 21. Peter Graf also kept a tight rein on Graf's personal life. Social invitations on the tour were often declined as Graf's focus was kept on practicing and match play. Working with her father and then-coach Pavel Složil, Graf typically practiced for up to four hours a day, often heading straight from airports to practice courts. This narrow focus meant that Graf, already shy and retiring by nature, made few friends on the tour in her early years, but it led to a steady improvement in her play. In 1985 and early 1986, Graf emerged as the top challenger to the dominance of Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert. During that period, she lost six times to Evert and three times to Navratilova, all in straight sets. She did not win a tournament but consistently reached tournament finals, semifinals and quarterfinals, with the highlight being her semifinal loss to Navratilova at the US Open. On 13 April 1986, Graf won her first WTA tournament and beat Evert for the first time in the final of the Family Circle Cup in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (She never lost to Evert again, beating her six more times over the next three and a half years.) Graf then won her next three tournaments at Amelia Island, Charleston, and Berlin, culminating in a 6–2, 6–3 defeat of Navratilova in the final of the latter. Illness caused her to miss Wimbledon, and an accident where she broke a toe several weeks later also curtailed her play. She returned to win a small tournament at Mahwah just before the US Open where, in one of the most anticipated matches of the year, she encountered Navratilova in a semifinal. The match was played over two days with Navratilova finally winning after saving three match points 6–1, 6–7, 7–6. Graf then won three consecutive indoor titles at Tokyo, Zurich, and Brighton, before once again contending with Navratilova at the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships in New York. This time, Navratilova beat Graf 7–6, 6–3, 6–2. Breakthrough year: 1987 Graf's Grand Slam tournament breakthrough came in 1987. She started the year strongly, with six tournament victories heading into the French Open, with the highlight being at the tournament in Miami, where she defeated Martina Navratilova in a semifinal and Chris Evert in the final and lost only 20 games in the seven rounds of the tournament. In the French Open final, Graf defeated Navratilova, who was the world No. 1, 6–4, 4–6, 8–6 after beating Sabatini in a three-set semifinal. Graf then lost to Navratilova 7–5, 6–3 in the Wimbledon final, her first loss of the year. However, in the Federation Cup final in Vancouver, Canada, three weeks later, she defeated Evert easily 6–2, 6–1. The US Open ended anti-climactically as Navratilova defeated Graf in the final 7–6, 6–1. Graf had a win-loss record of 75-2 for a 97.4 winning percentage in 1987, both losses coming to Navratilova as they split the four matches they played during the year. On 17 August, after defeating Evert in a straight set final in the Virginia Slims of Los Angeles, Graf overtook Navratilova for the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in her career, a ranking she would hold for the next 186 consecutive weeks, a record (it was tied by Serena Williams in 2016). Graf was the first player other than Navratilova or Evert to hold the top spot since Tracy Austin in 1980. Golden Slam: 1988 Graf started 1988 by winning the Australian Open, defeating Chris Evert in the final 6–1, 7–6. Graf did not lose a set during the tournament and lost a total of only 29 games. Graf lost twice to Sabatini during the spring, once on hardcourts in Boca Raton, Florida, and once on clay at Amelia Island, Florida. Graf, however, won the tournament in San Antonio, Texas, and retained her title in Miami, where she once again defeated Evert in the final. Graf then won the tournament in Berlin, losing only twelve games in five matches. At the French Open, Graf successfully defended her title by defeating Natasha Zvereva 6–0, 6–0 in a 34-minute final. The official time of the match given on the scoresheet was 34 minutes; however, just 32 minutes of that was spent on the court, as a rain break split the match into two periods of play, of nine and 23 minutes. That was the shortest-ever and most one-sided Grand Slam final ever and the only double bagel in a Major final since 1911. Zvereva, who had eliminated Martina Navratilova in the fourth round, won only thirteen points in the match. Next came Wimbledon, where Martina Navratilova had won six straight titles. Graf was trailing Martina Navratilova in the final 7–5, 2–0 before winning the match 5–7, 6–2, 6–1. She then won tournaments in Hamburg and Mahwah (where she lost only eight games all tournament). At the US Open, Graf beat Sabatini in a three-set final to win the Grand Slam by 6–3, 3–6, 6–1, a feat previously performed by only two other women, Maureen Connolly Brinker in 1953 and Margaret Court in 1970. Graf's 1988 Grand Slam remains the only one in history completed on three surfaces (grass, clay, hard court), as all other Grand Slams in tennis history were achieved prior to the introduction of hard court at the US Open in 1978. In reaching and winning all four Grand Slam finals, Graf became the first player in history to contest and win 28 Grand Slam singles matches in a single year; albeit including the unplayed walkover against Evert in the US Open. Even discounting that result, no other player had played and won 27 Grand Slam matches in a single year before and the feat has to date only been matched by Novak Djokovic since, in both 2015 and 2021, when he failed in both bids to win the Grand Slam. Graf then defeated Sabatini 6–3, 6–3 in the gold medal match at the Olympic Games in Seoul and achieved what the media had dubbed the "Golden Slam". Graf also won her only Grand Slam doubles title that year—at Wimbledon partnering Sabatini—and picked up a women's doubles Olympic bronze medal. Graf was the first tennis player to achieve the feat: wheelchair tennis players Diede de Groot and Dylan Alcott achieved the Golden Slam in 2021. At the year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf was upset by Pam Shriver, only her third loss of the year. The loss deprived her of the Golden Super Slam. She was named the 1988 BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year. At the end of the year, the municipality of Brühl, her hometown, gave her the title of honorary citizen. New challengers and personal challenges 1989 Speculation was rife at the beginning of 1989 about the possibility of Graf winning another Grand Slam. Some noted observers, such as Margaret Court, suggested that Graf could achieve the feat a couple more times. And the year began as expected, with Graf extending her Grand Slam tournament winning streak to five events at the Australian Open, defeating Helena Suková in the final. Her 6–3, 6–0 defeat of Gabriela Sabatini in a semifinal was described by veteran observer Ted Tinling as "probably the best tennis I've seen". He went on to add, "I saw what Steffi did to Sabatini at the Australian Open this year, and that was it. She is better than them all." Graf followed this with easy victories in her next four tournaments at Washington, D.C., San Antonio, Texas, Boca Raton, Florida, and Hilton Head. The Washington, D.C. tournament was notable because Graf won the first twenty points of the final against Zina Garrison. In the Boca Raton final, Graf lost the only set she conceded to Chris Evert in their final seven matches. In the subsequent Amelia Island final on clay, Graf lost her first match of the year to Sabatini but returned to European clay with easy victories at Hamburg and Berlin. Graf's Grand Slam tournament winning streak ended at the French Open, where 17-year-old Spaniard Arantxa Sánchez Vicario beat Graf in three sets. Graf served for the match at 5–3 in the third set but lost the game and won only three more points in the match. Suffering from food poisoning, she had struggled to beat Monica Seles in their semifinal 6–3, 3–6, 6–3 and said that she had menstrual cramps in the final. Graf, however, recovered to defeat Martina Navratilova 6–2, 6–7, 6–1 in the Wimbledon final after defeating Monica Seles 6–0, 6–1 in a fourth round match, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in a quarterfinal, and Chris Evert in a semifinal. Graf warmed up for the US Open with easy tournament victories in San Diego and Mahwah. In her semifinal match at the US Open, Graf defeated Sabatini 3–6, 6–4, 6–2. The match was notable for its dramatic ending. Having suffered from leg cramps since the middle of the third set, Graf ran off the court seconds after match point to seek medical treatment. In the final, Navratilova led 6–3, 4–2 before Graf rallied to win 3–6, 7–5, 6–1 for her third Grand Slam singles title of the year. Victories at Zurich and Brighton preceded the Virginia Slims Championships, where Graf cemented her top-ranked status by beating Navratilova in the four-set final. Graf ended 1989 with an 86–2 match record and the loss of only 12 sets. Her 0.977 winning percentage is the second-highest in the open era behind Navratilova. 1990 Graf defeated Mary Joe Fernández in the final of the Australian Open, which was her eighth Grand Slam singles title in the last nine she contested. She survived an intense three-set battle with Helena Sukova in the semis, breaking in the tenth and final game to win the third set 6–4. Her winning streak (unbeaten since the 1989 French Open loss to Arantxa Sánchez) continued with victories in Tokyo, Amelia Island, and Hamburg. Shortly after winning in Tokyo, Graf injured her right thumb while cross-country skiing in Switzerland and subsequently withdrew from the Virginia Slims of Florida and the Lipton Championships. In Berlin, she extended her unbeaten streak to 66 matches (second in WTA history to Navratilova's 74) before losing the final to Monica Seles, 4–6, 3–6. While the Berlin tournament was being played, the largest-circulation German tabloid, Bild, ran a story about an alleged scandal involving Graf's father. The difficulty of answering questions about the matter came to a head at a Wimbledon press conference, where Graf broke down in tears. Wimbledon authorities then threatened to immediately shut down any subsequent press conferences where questions about the issue were asked. Whether this scandal affected Graf's form is open to debate. In an interview with Stern magazine in July 1990, Graf stated, "I could not fight as usual." Graf again lost to Monica Seles in the final of the French Open 6–7, 4–6. Seles was behind 2–6 in the first-set tiebreaker, but then came back to win six points in a row and take the set. At Wimbledon, Graf lost in the semifinals to Zina Garrison, who with this victory broke Graf's string of 13 consecutive major finals. This was a major upset as Garrison had to save a match point to defeat Monica Seles in the quarterfinal, and was expected to easily fall to Graf, whom she had not beaten in four years. After victories in Montreal and San Diego, Graf reached the US Open final, where she lost in straight sets to Sabatini. Graf won four indoor tournaments after the US Open, including a pair of straight-set wins over Sabatini in the finals of Zürich and Worcester. Although Sabatini got the best of Graf in the semifinals of the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf still finished the year as the top-ranked player. 1991 A mixture of injury problems, personal difficulties, and loss of form made 1991 a tough year for Graf. Seles established herself as the new dominant player on the women's tour, winning the Australian Open, French Open, and US Open and, in March, ending Graf's record 186 consecutive-weeks hold on the World No. 1 ranking. Graf briefly regained the top ranking after winning at Wimbledon but lost it again after her loss to Navratilova at the US Open. Graf lost an Australian Open quarterfinal to Jana Novotná, the first time she did not reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament since the 1986 French Open. She then lost to Sabatini in her next three tournaments before winning the U.S. Hardcourt Championships in San Antonio, beating Monica Seles in the final. After losing a fifth straight time to Sabatini in Amelia Island, Florida, Graf again defeated Seles in the Hamburg final. Following her tournament victory in German Open in Berlin, Graf suffered one of the worst defeats of her career in a French Open semifinal where she won only two games against Sánchez Vicario and lost her first 6–0 set since 1984. At Wimbledon, however, Graf captured her third women's crown, this time at Sabatini's expense. Sabatini served for the match twice, and was two points away from her first Wimbledon title. After breaking Sabatini's serve to even the third set at 6–6, Graf defeated Sabatini by winning the next two games to take the match 6–4, 3–6, 8–6. Martina Navratilova then defeated Graf 7–6, 6–7, 6–4 in a US Open semifinal, the first time she had beaten Graf in four years. Graf then won in Leipzig, with her 500th career victory coming in a quarterfinal against Judith Wiesner. After winning two more indoor tournaments at Zurich and Brighton, she failed once again in the Virginia Slims Championships, losing her quarterfinal to Novotná. Soon after, she split with her long-time coach, Pavel Složil. 1992 A bout of rubella forced Graf to miss the first major event of 1992, the Australian Open. Her year continued indifferently with losses in three of her first four tournaments, including a semifinal loss to Jana Novotná in Chicago. It was Graf's second consecutive loss to Novotna, and dating back to their 1991 Australian Open quarterfinal match, Jana had won three of their last five meetings. It would also be the last loss Graf would ever have to Novotna in a match she completed (she did have a loss after withdrawing with injury after the first set of a late 1996 match). Chicago was notable, however, for being the first tournament Graf played with her new coach, former Swiss player Heinz Günthardt. Graf's father had approached Günthardt during the 1991 Virginia Slims Championships. She would work with him for the remainder of her career. In Boca Raton, Florida, Graf reached her first final of the year, where she faced Conchita Martínez for the title. In their five previous head-to-head matches, Graf had defeated Martínez each time. Even though she lost the opening set, Graf went on to prevail in three sets. She lost twice to Sabatini in the early spring at the Lipton International and the Bausch & Lomb Championships, which now brought her to seven losses in her last eight matches against Sabatini; however, the Bausch & Lomb loss would be Graf's final loss to Sabatini, winning her next, and last eight matches against Sabatini. Victories at Hamburg and Berlin (beating Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both) prepared her for the French Open, where she defeated Sánchez Vicario in the semifinals after losing the first set 6–0. Graf then lost a closely contested final to Monica Seles, 2–6, 6–3, 8–10. Seles won the match on her fifth match point; Graf came within two points of winning the match a few games earlier. At Wimbledon, after struggling through early-round three-setters against Mariaan de Swardt and Patty Fendick, she easily defeated Natasha Zvereva in the quarterfinal, Sabatini in the semifinal, and Seles in the final, 6–2, 6–1, with Seles playing in almost complete silence because of widespread media and player criticism of her grunting. Graf then won all five of her Fed Cup matches, helping Germany defeat Spain in the final by defeating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, 6–4, 6–2. At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Graf lost to Jennifer Capriati in the final and claimed the silver medal. At the US Open, Graf was upset in the quarterfinals by Sánchez Vicario 7–6, 6–3. Four consecutive indoor tournament victories in the autumn helped improve her season, but for the third consecutive year, she failed to win the Virginia Slims Championships, where she lost in the first round to Lori McNeil. Second period of dominance 1993 Graf began 1993 with four losses in her first six tournaments of the year: two to Sánchez Vicario and one each to Seles and the 36-year-old Martina Navratilova. Seles defeated Graf at the Australian Open 4–6, 6–3, 6–2. She struggled at the German Open in Berlin where she lost a 6–0 set to the unheralded Sabine Hack before defeating Mary Joe Fernández and Sabatini in three-set matches to claim her seventh title there in eight years. During a quarterfinal match between Seles and Magdalena Maleeva in Hamburg, Seles was stabbed between the shoulder blades by a mentally ill German fan of Graf, Günter Parche. He claimed that he committed the attack to help Graf reclaim the world No. 1 ranking. More than two years elapsed before Seles competed again. Shortly after the stabbing, during a players meeting at the Italian Open in Rome, 17 of the world's top 25 WTA members voted against preserving Seles' world No. 1 ranking while she was sidelined. Since Graf skipped the Italian Open, she did not take part in the vote. During Seles's absence, Graf won 65 of 67 matches, three of four Grand Slam events and the year-end Virginia Slims championships. She won her first French Open title since 1988 with a three-set victory over Mary Joe Fernández in the final. Fernandez had two break points to take a 3–0 and double break lead in the third set. The win elevated Graf to the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in 22 months. At Wimbledon, Graf defeated Jana Novotná to win her third consecutive, and fifth overall, ladies' title. In the third and deciding set, Novotná had a point to go up 5–1 on her serve. After breaking Novotná's serve, Graf won the next four games to take the match 7–6, 1–6, 6–4. Graf had a bone splinter in her right foot during this tournament (and for the next few months), finally resulting in surgery on 4 October. In the meantime, she lost surprisingly to Nicole Bradtke of Australia in a Fed Cup match on clay before winning the Acura Classic in San Diego and the Canadian Open in Toronto in preparation for the US Open. She won there, comfortably beating Helena Suková in the final after needing three sets to eliminate Gabriela Sabatini and Manuela Maleeva-Fragniere in the quarterfinals and semifinals respectively. In the fall, Graf won the Volkswagen Card Cup in Leipzig a day before her foot operation, losing only two games to Jana Novotná in the final. Graf lost to Conchita Martínez in her comeback tournament a month later in Philadelphia. However, she finished her year with a highlight, winning her first Virginia Slims Championships since 1989 by beating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final despite needing painkillers for a back injury. 1994 Seemingly free of injury for the first time in years, Graf began the year by winning the Australian Open, where she defeated Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final with the loss of only two games. Graf later stated it was the best tennis she had ever played in a Grand Slam final. She then won her next four tournaments in Tokyo, Indian Wells, Delray Beach and Miami respectively. In the Miami final, she lost her first set of the year—to Natasha Zvereva—after winning 54 consecutive sets. In the Hamburg final, she lost for the first time in 1994 after 36 consecutive match victories, losing to Sánchez Vicario in three sets. She then won her eighth German Open, but there were signs that her form was worsening as she almost lost to Julie Halard in a quarterfinal. As the defending champion Graf lost in straight sets to Mary Pierce in the French Open semifinal. This was followed by a first-round straight-sets loss at Wimbledon to Lori McNeil, her only loss at Wimbledon between 1991 and 1997 and her first loss in a first round Grand Slam tournament in ten years. Graf still managed to win San Diego the following month but aggravated a long-time back injury in beating Sánchez Vicario in the final. Graf developed a bone spur at the base of her spine due to a congenital condition of the sacroiliac joint. She began to wear a back brace and was unsure about playing the US Open but elected to play while receiving treatment and stretching for two hours before each match. She made it to the final and took the first set against Sánchez Vicario but lost the next two sets — Sanchez Vicario's last victory over Graf. In the middle of the second set, Graf suffered back spasms while reaching for a ball in the ad court. She took the following nine weeks off, returning only for the Virginia Slims Championships where she lost in straight sets to Pierce in the quarterfinal. Although Graf ended the year ranked No. 1 on the computer the ITF named Sanchez Vicario its World Champion for the year, while the WTA backed their official rankings and named Graf. 1995 A strained right calf muscle forced Graf to withdraw from the Australian Open. She came back in February, winning four consecutive tournaments in Paris, Delray Beach, Miami and Houston. She then beat Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both the French Open and Wimbledon. The 1995 Wimbledon final is regarded as one of the most dramatic women's major finals in history as Graf and Sánchez Vicario battled in a tight third set that included a 16-minute long, 13-deuce game on Sanchez Vicario's serve at 5–5. In August Monica Seles made her much anticipated return to tennis at the Canadian Open. It was decided to grant her a joint number-one ranking with Graf who took her first loss of the year in the first round to Amanda Coetzer. The US Open was Monica Seles's first Grand Slam event since the 1993 attack, with much anticipation again around a potential Seles-Graf final. After surviving a scare in a three-setter against Amanda Coetzer in the first round, Graf reached the final with relative ease, while Seles went through her side of the draw in even more convincing fashion. Seles and Graf met in the final, with Graf winning in three sets, saving a set point in the first set. Graf then capped the year by beating countrywoman Anke Huber in a five-set final at the season-ending WTA Championships in 2 hours and 46 minutes. Tax issues In personal terms, 1995 was a difficult year for Graf, as she was accused by German authorities of tax evasion in the early years of her career. In her defense, she stated that her father Peter was her financial manager, and all financial matters relating to her earnings at the time had been under his control. Her father was arrested in August and was sentenced to 45 months in jail. He was eventually released after serving 25 months. Prosecutors dropped their case against Graf in 1997, when she agreed to pay a fine of 1.3 million Deutsche Marks to the government and an unspecified charity. 1996 Graf again missed the Australian Open after undergoing surgery in December 1995 to remove bone splinters from her left foot. Graf came back to the tour in March, winning back to back titles in Indian Wells and Miami, followed by a record ninth title at the German Open in May and a quarterfinal defeat in Rome against Martina Hingis. She then successfully defended the three Grand Slam titles she won the year before. In a close French Open final, Graf again overcame Sánchez Vicario, taking the third set 10–8. Graf had led 4–1 in the second set tiebreak, only to lose six points in a row and force a decider. Twice in the third set Sánchez Vicario served for the championship but was broken each time by Graf. It was the longest French Open women's singles final in history, both in terms of time (3 hours and 3 minutes) and number of games played (40). Graf then had a straight-sets win against Sánchez Vicario in the Wimbledon final. That was the last competitive match Graf and Sánchez Vicario would ever play against one another. In July, a left knee injury forced Graf to withdraw from the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Graf played only one warm-up event ahead of the US Open, the Acura Classic in Manhattan Beach, California, where she lost to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinals. She then successfully defended her title at the US Open, defeating Monica Seles in the final. Her toughest battle came against rising star Martina Hingis in the semifinal, with Hingis unable to convert on five set points. Graf did not lose a set the whole tournament. She also won her fifth and final WTA Tour Championships title with a five set win over Martina Hingis, with Hingis cramping up in the fifth set. In 1988, Graf became only the second tennis player in history to win a Slam on hardcourt, clay, and grass all in the same season. She repeated the feat in 1993, 1995, and 1996. Final years on the tour: 1997–99 The last few years of Graf's career were beset by injuries, particularly to her knees and back. She lost the world No. 1 ranking to Martina Hingis and failed to win a Grand Slam title for the first time in ten years in 1997. That year Graf lost in the fourth round of the Australian Open in straight sets to Amanda Coetzer. She subsequently withdrew from the Pan Pacific Open and had arthroscopic surgery performed on her left knee. After several months injury lay off, Graf returned to play in the German Open in Berlin in front of a home crowd and had the worst defeat of her career in the quarterfinal, when Amanda Coetzer beat her in just 56 minutes 6–0, 6–1. In the French Open Graf was again beaten by Amanda Coetzer in straight sets, 6–1, 6–4. Only one week later, she underwent reconstructive knee surgery in Vienna and subsequently missed the 1997 Wimbledon and US Open championships. The treatment was for a fracture of the cartilage as well as a shortening and partial rupture of the patellar tendon of her left knee. After missing almost half of the tour in 1998, Graf lost in the third round at Wimbledon and in the fourth round at the US Open. Shortly after the US Open, she underwent surgery to remove a bone spur in her right wrist. Upon her return Graf defeated world No. 2 Hingis and world No. 1 Lindsay Davenport en route to the Philadelphia title. At the first round of the season-ending Chase Championships, Graf defeated world No. 3, Jana Novotná, before losing in the semifinal to first-seeded Davenport. At the beginning of 1999 Graf played the warm up event to the Australian Open in Sydney; she defeated Serena Williams in the second round and Venus in the quarterfinals before losing to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinal. Graf then went on to reach the quarterfinals of the Australian Open before losing to Monica Seles in two sets. In Indian Wells Graf lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At the French Open, Graf reached her first Grand Slam final in three years and fought back from a set and twice from a break down in the second set to defeat the top ranked Hingis in three sets for a memorable victory. Graf became the first player in the open era to defeat the first, second, and third ranked players in the same Grand Slam tournament by beating second-ranked Davenport in the quarterfinals and third-ranked Seles in the semifinals. Graf said after the final that it would be her last French Open, fueling speculation about her retirement. Graf then reached her ninth Wimbledon singles final, losing to third-seeded Davenport in straight sets. She had to overcome three difficult three set matches en route to this final, against Mariaan De Swardt in the third round, Venus Williams in the quarterfinals and Mirjana Lučić in the semifinals. On 13 August 1999, shortly after retiring with a strained hamstring from a second round match against Amy Frazier in San Diego, Graf announced her retirement from the women's tour at age 30. She was ranked No. 3 at that time and said, "I have done everything I wanted to do in tennis. I feel I have nothing left to accomplish. The weeks following Wimbledon [in 1999] weren't easy for me. I was not having fun anymore. After Wimbledon, for the first time in my career, I didn't feel like going to a tournament. My motivation wasn't what it was in the past." Doubles career From the beginning of her career until 1990, Graf regularly played doubles events in Grand Slams and other tournaments, winning a total of eleven titles. In 1986, she formed a partnership with rival Gabriela Sabatini. The pair was moderately successful, winning the 1988 Wimbledon Championships together and reaching the finals of the French Open in 1986, 1987 and 1989. The partnership was the subject of much discussion, as the two women, both known to be shy, usually kept communication to a minimum during changeovers and between points, a highly unusual situation in doubles. Sabatini said of the partnership: "doubles is all about communicating with each other, and we didn't communicate that much. We would just say the basic things, but nothing else." The pair played their last major tournament together at the 1990 Wimbledon Championships, losing in the quarterfinals. From 1991 until the end of her career, Graf would only play doubles sporadically, forming short-term partnerships with a variety of players, including Lori McNeil, Anke Huber and her best friends on the tour, Rennae Stubbs, Patricia Tarabini and Ines Gorrochategui. She played her last Grand Slam doubles tournament at the 1999 Australian Open with Gorrochategui, losing in the second round. Graf also occasionally played mixed doubles, although she never won a title. She partnered with doubles specialist Mark Woodforde at the Australian Open in 1994, with Henri Leconte at Wimbledon in 1991 and at the French Open in 1994, and with Charlie Pasarell at the US Open in 1984. In an unusual arrangement, she paired with her coaches Pavel Složil at Wimbledon in 1988 and Heinz Günthardt in 1992 and 1996, also at Wimbledon. At the 1999 Wimbledon Championships, Graf formed a much-publicized partnership with John McEnroe, with whom she reached the semifinals before withdrawing due to concerns that her uncertain hamstring, coupled with a bout of bronchitis, would affect her in the singles final. Post-career exhibition matches In late 1999 and early 2000, as part of her Farewell Tour, Graf played a series of exhibition matches against former rivals in New Zealand, Japan, Spain, Germany and South Africa. She played Jelena Dokic in Christchurch, New Zealand, Amanda Coetzer in Durban, South Africa, and her former rival Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in Zaragoza, Spain. It was Graf and Sánchez Vicario's first head-to-head meeting since 1996. In February 2000, Graf played against Kimiko Date at Nagoya Rainbow Hall in Tokyo, winning in three sets. In September 2004, Graf dispatched her former doubles partner Gabriela Sabatini, in straight sets, in an exhibition match played in Berlin, Germany. She was also in Berlin to host a charity gala, as well as inaugurating a tennis stadium renamed the "Steffi Graf Stadion". Proceeds from her match against Sabatini went to Graf's foundation, "Children for Tomorrow". In July 2005, Graf competed in one tie of World Team Tennis (WTT) on the Houston Wranglers team. She was beaten in two out of three matches, with each match being one set. Graf lost her singles match to Elena Likhovtseva 5–4. She teamed with Ansley Cargill in women's doubles against Anna Kournikova and Likhovtseva but lost 5–2. She was successful, however, in the mixed doubles match. Graf completely ruled out a return to professional tennis. In October, Graf defeated Sabatini in an exhibition match in Mannheim, Germany, winning both of their sets. Like the exhibition match the previous year against Sabatini, proceeds went to "Children for Tomorrow". In 2008 Graf lost an exhibition match against Kimiko Date at Ariake Colosseum in Tokyo. As part of the event, billed as "Dream Match 2008", she defeated Martina Navratilova in a one-set affair 8–7, with Graf winning a tiebreaker 10–5. It was the first time in 14 years Graf had played Navratilova. Graf played a singles exhibition match against Kim Clijsters and a mixed doubles exhibition alongside husband Andre Agassi against Tim Henman and Clijsters as part of a test event and celebration for the newly installed roof over Wimbledon's Centre Court in 2009. She lost a lengthy one-set singles match to Clijsters and also the mixed doubles. In 2010, Graf participated in the WTT Smash Hits exhibition in Washington, D.C. to support the Elton John AIDS Foundation. She and Agassi, her husband, were on Team Elton John, which competed against Team Billie Jean King. Graf played in the celebrity doubles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles before straining her left calf muscle and being replaced by Anna Kournikova. Summary of career Graf won seven singles titles at Wimbledon, six singles titles at the French Open, five singles titles at the US Open, and four singles titles at the Australian Open. Her overall record in 56 Grand Slam events was 278–32 (90 percent) (84–10 at the French Open, 74–7 at Wimbledon, 73–9 at the US Open, and 47–6 at the Australian Open). Her career prize-money earnings totalled US$21,895,277 (a record until Lindsay Davenport surpassed this amount in January 2008). Her singles win/loss record was 900–115 (88.7 percent). She was ranked world No. 1 for 186 consecutive weeks (from August 1987 to March 1991; tied with Serena Williams, a record in the women's game) and a record total 377 weeks overall. Career statistics Grand Slam tournament performance timeline Note: Graf's semifinal match at the 1988 US Open was walkover (so not counted as win) Grand Slam tournament finals Singles: 31 (22 titles, 9 runner-ups) Doubles: 4 (1 title, 3 runner-ups) Records These records were attained in Open Era of tennis. Records in bold indicate Open Era peer-less achievements. Playing style The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fräulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Složil and Heinz Günthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to , making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. Equipment and endorsements Early in her career, Graf wore Dunlop apparel, before signing an endorsement contract with Adidas in 1985. She had an Adidas sneakers line known as the St. Graf Pro line. Early in her career, Graf used the Dunlop Maxpower Pro and Maxpower Kevlar racquets and then played with the Max 200G racquet from 1984 to 1993 before switching to Wilson from 1994 to 1999. She first used the Wilson Pro Staff 7.0 lite, then switched to the Pro Staff 7.5 in 1996 and to the Pro Staff 7.1 in 1998. Graf's racquets were strung at 29 kilograms (64 pounds), significantly above the 50-60 pound range recommended by Wilson. In 2006, she signed an endorsement deal with Head. In 2010, Graf and Agassi collaborated with Head and developed the new line of Star Series tennis racquets. Graf has signed many endorsement deals throughout the years including a ten-year endorsement deal with car manufacturer Opel in 1985, and Rexona from 1994 to 1998. Other companies she has endorsed include Barilla, Apollinaris, Citibank, Danone and Teekanne. She has appeared in many advertisements and television commercials with Andre Agassi including Canon Inc. and Longines in 2008 (Agassi became Longines ambassador in 2007). In 2015, she was appointed as the brand ambassador of Kerala tourism, for promoting Ayurveda in North America and Europe. Personal life In 1997, she left the Catholic Church, citing personal reasons. During her career, Graf divided her time between her hometown of Brühl; Boca Raton, Florida; and New York City where she owned a penthouse in the former Police Headquarters Building in SoHo. From 1992 to 1999, Graf dated racing driver Michael Bartels. She started dating Andre Agassi after the 1999 French Open and they married on 22 October 2001, with only their mothers as witnesses. They have two children, a son born in 2001 and a daughter born in 2003. Agassi has said that he and Graf are not pushing their children toward becoming tennis players. The Graf-Agassi family resides in Summerlin, a community in the Las Vegas Valley. Graf's mother and her brother also live there. In 1991, the Steffi Graf Youth Tennis Center in Leipzig was dedicated to her. She is the founder and chairperson of "Children for Tomorrow", a non-profit foundation established in 1998 for implementing and developing projects to support children who have been traumatized by war or other crises. In 2001, Graf indicated that she preferred to be called Stefanie instead of Steffi. On 30 November 2013, Graf's father Peter died of pancreatic cancer. He was 75 years old. Legacy In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. In March 2012, Tennis Channel picked Graf as the greatest female tennis player ever in their list of 100 greatest tennis players of all time. In November 2018, Tennis.com polled its readers to choose the greatest women's tennis player of all time and Graf came in first. In July 2020, The Guardian polled its readers to determine the greatest female tennis player of the past 50 years, and Steffi was the clear favorite, picking up nearly twice as many votes as any other player. Tennis writer Steve Flink, in his book The Greatest Tennis Matches of the Twentieth Century, named Graf as the best female player of the 20th century. Flink said in 2020 that the jury was still out on (Serena) Williams as the greatest ever, but Williams' consistency over the long span did not match that of Graf or Navratilova. Graf compiled superior career accomplishments over Serena Williams (as of December 2, 2020); 900–115 career record (88.7 win %) versus 843–147 career record (85.2 win %), 107 career tournament victories versus 72 career tournament victories, 377 total weeks ranked as world No. One versus 319 total weeks ranked as world No. One. While Graf's 22 Grand Slam wins is one fewer than Williams' 23 (and two fewer than Margaret Court's 24), Graf's professional career is eight years shorter than Williams, plus Graf also faced much tougher competition during her era (Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Gabriela Sabatini, and Monica Seles) compared to Williams. However, with the stabbing of Monica Seles in 1993, some have questioned its impact on Graf's career statistics and legacy. Awards and honours Graf was voted the ITF World Champion in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1995 and 1996. She was voted the WTA Player of the Year in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996. She was elected as the German Sportsperson of the Year in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1999. In 2004, the Berliner Tennis-Arena was renamed Steffi-Graf-Stadion in honor of Graf. Graf was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004 and the German Sports Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2015, Graf was the recipient of the International Club's Jean Borotra Sportsmanship Award. See also Graf–Navratilova rivalry Graf–Sabatini rivalry Graf–Seles rivalry List of female tennis players List of tennis rivalries Overall tennis records - women's singles Tennis records of the Open Era - women's singles References External links Official Wimbledon profile BBC profile ESPN biography Steffi Graf's victories German female tennis players International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees 1969 births Living people Australian Open (tennis) champions French Open champions German emigrants to the United States Hopman Cup competitors Olympic medalists in tennis Olympic bronze medalists for West Germany Olympic gold medalists for West Germany Olympic silver medalists for Germany Olympic tennis players of Germany Olympic tennis players of West Germany Sportspeople from Mannheim Recipients of the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of Baden-Württemberg Recipients of the Olympic Order Tennis players at the 1984 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1988 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1992 Summer Olympics US Open (tennis) champions West German expatriates in the United States Wimbledon champions World No. 1 tennis players Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's singles Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's doubles Recipients of the Silver Laurel Leaf German philanthropists German women philanthropists Medalists at the 1988 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics People from SoHo, Manhattan Andre Agassi Tennis people from Baden-Württemberg	true	[ "Different Style! is the second album by the British Jamaican reggae band Musical Youth, released in 1983.\n\nBackground\n\nThe album was released one year after the massive success of \"Pass the Dutchie\" and the first album. As The Youth of Today, Different Style! contains ten reggae tracks, however, this time more R&B-influenced, to make it more accessible on the North American market. Unlike the debut release, which was written strictly by Freddie Waite and the band members themselves, Different Style! saw more different musicians contributing to lyrics and music, including major stars Stevie Wonder and Boy George. Tracks sequence varied depending on territory, as did the album cover.\n\nFive singles have been released off the album. \"Tell Me Why?\" appeared long before the album's release and met with modest success. Two following singles, \"007\" and \"Sixteen\", charted only in the United Kingdom and Ireland, making it to the top 30 and top 25. At the same time, North American market opted for \"She's Trouble\" (originally written for Michael Jackson for his monster-selling Thriller album. It was offered to Musical Youth by David \"Hawk\" Wolinski and later recorded by Michael Lovesmith) which became the second single, after \"Pass the Dutchie\", to enter charts in the USA and Canada. In the UK, the song was their lowest-charting single and it happened to be also the very last chart entry for Musical Youth. \"Whatcha Talking 'Bout\" flopped completely in the charts.\n\nDifferent Style! turned out a commercial flop and was overshadowed by the success of the debut album. It failed to enter UK Albums Chart, and only charted in Canada and the United States, peaking at disappointing positions 90 and 144 respectively.\n\nTrack listing\n\nOriginal release\nSide A\n\"007\" (Desmond Dacres) - 3:18\n\"Yard Stylee\" (Musical Youth) - 3:39\n\"Air Taxi\" (Musical Youth) - 3:51\n\"Sixteen\" (Freddie Waite, Lamont Dozier) - 3:51\n\"Incommunicado\" (Bruce Sudano, Carlotta McKee, Gordon Grote) - 3:23\nSide B\n\"Tell Me Why\" (John Holt) - 3:13\n\"She's Trouble\" (Billy Livsey, Terry Britten, Sue Shifrin) - 3:09\n\"Mash It the Youth Man, Mash It\" (Musical Youth) - 4:22\n\"Whatcha Talking 'Bout\" (Stevie Wonder) - 5:06\n\"No Strings\" (Boy, Phil Picket) - 3:00\n\nAlternative track listing\nSide A\n\"Shanty Town (007)\" (Desmond Dacres) - 3:18\n\"She's Trouble\" (Billy Livsey, Terry Britten, Sue Shifrin) - 3:09\n\"Whatcha Talking 'Bout\" (Stevie Wonder) - 5:06\n\"Incommunicado\" (Bruce Sudano, Carlotta McKee, Gordon Grote) - 3:23\n\"No Strings\" (Boy, Phil Picket) - 3:00\nSide B\n\"Tell Me Why\" (John Holt) - 3:13\n\"Sixteen\" (Freddie Waite, Lamont Dozier) - 3:51\n\"Yard Stylee\" (Musical Youth) - 3:39\n\"Air Taxi\" (Musical Youth) - 3:51\n\"Mash It the Youth Man, Mash It\" (Musical Youth) - 4:22\n\nPersonnel\nMusical Youth\nDennis Seaton - vocals, percussion\nFreddie \"Junior\" Waite - drums, vocals\nKelvin Grant - guitars, vocals\nMichael Grant - keyboards, vocals\nPatrick Waite - bass\nwith:\nDonna Summer - uncredited vocals on \"Sixteen\"\nJody Watley - uncredited vocals on \"Incommunicado\"\nTechnical\nJohn \"Aruba\" Arrias - engineer\nPete Hammond - engineer on \"Tell Me Why\"\nJulian Mendelsohn - remixing\nJerry Hey - horn arrangements\nRichard Myhill - horn arrangement on \"Tell Me Why\"\nGavin Cochrane - photography\n\"Thanks to – Bruce Sudano, Donna Summer, Jackie Castellano, Jackie Mittoo, Jody Watley, Lamont Dozier, Melvin \"Wah Wah\" Watson, Stevie Wonder, The Jacksons\"\n\nChart performance\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Different Style! at Discogs\n Different Style! at Rate Your Music\n\n1983 albums\nAlbums produced by Peter Collins (record producer)\nMCA Records albums\nMusical Youth albums", "Beverly Gooden is an African American writer and social activist known for her groundbreaking work in domestic violence, victimology, and women's health, who created the Why I Stayed hashtag (#WhyIStayed) and movement in 2014. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, the U.S. Office on Women's Health, and NBC's Today.\n\nEarly life and education\nBorn in Cleveland, Ohio, Beverly lived in foster care until being adopted by the Gooden family as a child. As a sophomore at Hampton University, she was selected as a media scholar with the Summer Research Opportunities Program at the University of Iowa and researched the connection between alcohol advertisements and teen drinking and driving. During her junior year, she interned with the Scripps Howard Foundation Wire as a reporter on Capitol Hill, covering the Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal and NCAA recruiting reform. In 2005, she graduated with a bachelor's degree in journalism and communications. She went on to attend Loyola University Chicago and graduated with a master's degree in social justice in 2009.\n\nActivism\nOn September 8, 2014, Beverly created the hashtag #WhyIStayed in response to the Ray Rice video released by TMZ. A survivor of domestic violence, she tweeted several reasons why she remained in an abusive marriage as a direct response to widespread victim blaming of Janay Rice.\n\nTwo days later, Gooden was interviewed by Robin Roberts on Good Morning America, where she explained her motivations for creating the Why I Stayed movement. \"The reason that I started the hashtag was to give voice to the people out there who had that voice taken away. I think what bothered me most was that the question was 'why did she stay?' and not 'why did he hit her?'. And we do this across the board with violent situations, we do this with domestic violence by asking 'why did she stay?' and we do this with rape by saying 'why did she wear that?' as if your clothing or your mere presence gives someone the right to hurt you.\"\n\nShe has been featured on Good Morning America, CNN, Time, The Washington Post, HLN, Inside Edition, NBC Nightly News, and more.\n\nWhy I Stayed was listed as one of the top social change hashtags of 2014 by Forbes, and one of the \"top 10 hashtags that started a conversation\" by Time magazine. In March 2015, Why I Stayed was recognized as one of \"8 hashtags that changed the world\".\n\nThe Bolt Bag Project\nIn 2014, Beverly founded the Ella Mae Foundation, which supports \"protection and superior upbringing for children as well as self-actualization and equitable rights for women\". She created the Bolt Bag Project, a program that provides basic necessities to anonymous survivors of relationship violence.\n\nCareer\nGooden served as a development intern at the Chicago Alliance to End Homelessness during graduate school in 2008. Following the financial crisis of 2007–2008, she worked for various government and nonprofit agencies to secure or administer housing and food resources for those affected by the crisis. As a grant recipient of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 funding while serving as continuum of care coordinator, she worked with organizations to find stable and affordable housing for families facing housing insecurity in Chicago; Hampton Roads, Virginia; and northwest Georgia.\n\nAppearances\nIn September 2014, Gooden made guest appearances on the Dr. Phil show and in Verizon's 2014 Domestic Violence Summit at Paramount Studios in Los Angeles. In October 2015, she contributed a piece to the U.S. Office on Women's Health blog. She was also featured in the short film Why We Stayed by Emmy Award-nominated producers of Private Violence. She wrote an article, \"Why We Stayed\", for The New York Times, and appeared in the December 2015 issue of Redbook magazine. She was featured in the August 2016 issue of Glamour magazine; and appeared in a Toyota commercial discussing her work with the Ella Mae Foundation, sponsored by Investigation Discovery. She was featured in the September 2018 issue of Ebony magazine in an article titled \"The Struggle To Get Out\".\n\nHonors and awards\nBeverly was given the \"Digital Champion\" Heart of Courage award by the Mary Kay Foundation in October 2017. She was chosen by Investigation Discovery and Glamour magazine as the 2015 Inspire A Difference \"Everyday Hero\" award winner. She was honored at an event in New York City alongside Angie Harmon, Grace Gealey, and AnnaLynne McCord.\n\nBook\nHer memoir, Surviving: Why We Stay and How We Leave Abusive Relationships, is set for publication in spring 2022 by Rowman & Littlefield.\n\nPersonal life\nGooden plays three musical instruments, and is an avid children's literature reader with a special interest in fantasy and folklore. She speaks openly about having a total hysterectomy after a decade of debilitating uterine fibroids. She lives in Houston, Texas.\n\nExternal links\n\nFacebook\nTwitter\nInstagram\n\nReferences\n\nPeople from Cleveland\nLiving people\nYear of birth missing (living people)" ]
[ "Steffi Graf", "Playing style", "What did Steffi play?", "I don't know.", "what was her play style?", "The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork.", "what else represented her play style?", "Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable:", "why did she use this style?", "As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy." ]	C_d0e9bc4e72184f1fb6ceb489ddce9e70_0	did she break any records?	5	did Steffi break any records?	Steffi Graf	The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Slozil and Heinz Gunthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to 174 km/h (108 mph), making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. CANNOTANSWER	Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam	Stefanie Maria "Steffi" Graf ( , ; born 14 June 1969) is a German former professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 1 for a record 377 weeks and won 22 major singles titles, the second-most since the start of the Open Era in 1968 and third-most of all-time behind Margaret Court (24) and Serena Williams (23). In 1988, she became the first tennis player to achieve the Golden Slam by winning all four Grand Slam singles titles and the Olympic gold medal in the same calendar year. Furthermore, she is the only tennis player, male or female, to have won each major at least four times. Graf was ranked singles world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for a record 377 total weeks: the longest period for which any player, male or female, has held the singles number-one ranking since the WTA and the Association of Tennis Professionals began issuing rankings. She won 107 singles titles, which ranks her third on the WTA's all-time list after Martina Navratilova (167 titles) and Chris Evert (157 titles). She and Margaret Court are the only players, male or female, to win three majors in a calendar year five times (1988, 1989, 1993, 1995 and 1996). Notable features of Graf's game were her versatility across all playing surfaces, footwork and powerful forehand drive. Graf's athletic ability and aggressive game played from the baseline have been credited with developing the modern style of play that has come to dominate today's game. She won six French Open singles titles (second to Evert), seven Wimbledon singles titles, four Australian Open titles, and five U.S. Open singles titles. She is the only singles player (male or female) to have achieved a Grand Slam since the hard court was introduced as a playing surface, replacing grass, at the US Open in 1978. Graf's Grand Slam was achieved on grass, clay, and hard court while the previous five singles Grand Slams were achieved on only grass and clay. Graf reached 13 consecutive singles major finals, from the 1987 French Open through to the 1990 French Open, winning nine of them. She won five consecutive singles majors (1988 Australian Open to 1989 Australian Open), and seven out of eight, in two calendar years (1988 Australian Open to 1989 US Open, except 1989 French Open). She reached a total of 31 singles major finals. Graf retired at the age of 30 in 1999 while she was ranked world No. 3. She is regarded as one of the greatest female tennis players of all time. Martina Navratilova included Graf at the top of her list of the greatest players ever. In the year of Graf's retirement, Billie Jean King said, "Steffi [Graf] is definitely the greatest women's tennis player of all time." In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. She married former world No. 1 men's tennis player Andre Agassi in October 2001. They have two children. Graf was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004. Along with Boris Becker, Graf was considered instrumental in popularizing tennis in Germany, where it remains one of the foremost national sports. Early life Stefanie Graf was born on 14 June 1969, in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany, to Heidi Schalk and car-and-insurance salesman Peter Graf (18 June 1938 − 30 November 2013). When she was nine years old, her family moved to the neighboring town of Brühl. She has a younger brother, Michael. Her father, an aspiring tennis coach, first introduced her to the game, teaching his three-year-old daughter how to swing a wooden racket in the family's living room. She began practising on a court at the age of four and played in her first tournament at five. She soon began taking the top prize at junior tournaments with regularity, going on to win the European Championships 12s and 18s in 1982. Career Early career Graf played in her first professional tournament in October 1982 at Filderstadt, Germany. She lost her first round match 6–4, 6–0 to Tracy Austin, a two-time US Open champion and former world No. 1 player. (Twelve years later, Graf defeated Austin 6–0, 6–0 during a second round match at the Evert Cup in Indian Wells, California, which was their second and last match against each other.) At the start of her first full professional year in 1983, Graf was 13 years old and ranked world No. 124. She won no titles during the next three years, but her ranking climbed steadily to world No. 98 in 1983, No. 22 in 1984, and No. 6 in 1985. In 1984, she first gained international attention when she almost upset the tenth seed, Jo Durie of the United Kingdom, in a fourth round Centre Court match at Wimbledon. In August as a 15-year-old (and youngest entrant) representing West Germany, she won the tennis demonstration event at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. No medals were awarded as this was not an official Olympic event. Graf's schedule was closely controlled by her father, who limited her play so that she would not burn out. In 1985, for instance, she played only ten events leading up to the US Open, whereas another up-and-coming star, Gabriela Sabatini of Argentina, who was a year younger than Graf, played 21. Peter Graf also kept a tight rein on Graf's personal life. Social invitations on the tour were often declined as Graf's focus was kept on practicing and match play. Working with her father and then-coach Pavel Složil, Graf typically practiced for up to four hours a day, often heading straight from airports to practice courts. This narrow focus meant that Graf, already shy and retiring by nature, made few friends on the tour in her early years, but it led to a steady improvement in her play. In 1985 and early 1986, Graf emerged as the top challenger to the dominance of Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert. During that period, she lost six times to Evert and three times to Navratilova, all in straight sets. She did not win a tournament but consistently reached tournament finals, semifinals and quarterfinals, with the highlight being her semifinal loss to Navratilova at the US Open. On 13 April 1986, Graf won her first WTA tournament and beat Evert for the first time in the final of the Family Circle Cup in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (She never lost to Evert again, beating her six more times over the next three and a half years.) Graf then won her next three tournaments at Amelia Island, Charleston, and Berlin, culminating in a 6–2, 6–3 defeat of Navratilova in the final of the latter. Illness caused her to miss Wimbledon, and an accident where she broke a toe several weeks later also curtailed her play. She returned to win a small tournament at Mahwah just before the US Open where, in one of the most anticipated matches of the year, she encountered Navratilova in a semifinal. The match was played over two days with Navratilova finally winning after saving three match points 6–1, 6–7, 7–6. Graf then won three consecutive indoor titles at Tokyo, Zurich, and Brighton, before once again contending with Navratilova at the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships in New York. This time, Navratilova beat Graf 7–6, 6–3, 6–2. Breakthrough year: 1987 Graf's Grand Slam tournament breakthrough came in 1987. She started the year strongly, with six tournament victories heading into the French Open, with the highlight being at the tournament in Miami, where she defeated Martina Navratilova in a semifinal and Chris Evert in the final and lost only 20 games in the seven rounds of the tournament. In the French Open final, Graf defeated Navratilova, who was the world No. 1, 6–4, 4–6, 8–6 after beating Sabatini in a three-set semifinal. Graf then lost to Navratilova 7–5, 6–3 in the Wimbledon final, her first loss of the year. However, in the Federation Cup final in Vancouver, Canada, three weeks later, she defeated Evert easily 6–2, 6–1. The US Open ended anti-climactically as Navratilova defeated Graf in the final 7–6, 6–1. Graf had a win-loss record of 75-2 for a 97.4 winning percentage in 1987, both losses coming to Navratilova as they split the four matches they played during the year. On 17 August, after defeating Evert in a straight set final in the Virginia Slims of Los Angeles, Graf overtook Navratilova for the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in her career, a ranking she would hold for the next 186 consecutive weeks, a record (it was tied by Serena Williams in 2016). Graf was the first player other than Navratilova or Evert to hold the top spot since Tracy Austin in 1980. Golden Slam: 1988 Graf started 1988 by winning the Australian Open, defeating Chris Evert in the final 6–1, 7–6. Graf did not lose a set during the tournament and lost a total of only 29 games. Graf lost twice to Sabatini during the spring, once on hardcourts in Boca Raton, Florida, and once on clay at Amelia Island, Florida. Graf, however, won the tournament in San Antonio, Texas, and retained her title in Miami, where she once again defeated Evert in the final. Graf then won the tournament in Berlin, losing only twelve games in five matches. At the French Open, Graf successfully defended her title by defeating Natasha Zvereva 6–0, 6–0 in a 34-minute final. The official time of the match given on the scoresheet was 34 minutes; however, just 32 minutes of that was spent on the court, as a rain break split the match into two periods of play, of nine and 23 minutes. That was the shortest-ever and most one-sided Grand Slam final ever and the only double bagel in a Major final since 1911. Zvereva, who had eliminated Martina Navratilova in the fourth round, won only thirteen points in the match. Next came Wimbledon, where Martina Navratilova had won six straight titles. Graf was trailing Martina Navratilova in the final 7–5, 2–0 before winning the match 5–7, 6–2, 6–1. She then won tournaments in Hamburg and Mahwah (where she lost only eight games all tournament). At the US Open, Graf beat Sabatini in a three-set final to win the Grand Slam by 6–3, 3–6, 6–1, a feat previously performed by only two other women, Maureen Connolly Brinker in 1953 and Margaret Court in 1970. Graf's 1988 Grand Slam remains the only one in history completed on three surfaces (grass, clay, hard court), as all other Grand Slams in tennis history were achieved prior to the introduction of hard court at the US Open in 1978. In reaching and winning all four Grand Slam finals, Graf became the first player in history to contest and win 28 Grand Slam singles matches in a single year; albeit including the unplayed walkover against Evert in the US Open. Even discounting that result, no other player had played and won 27 Grand Slam matches in a single year before and the feat has to date only been matched by Novak Djokovic since, in both 2015 and 2021, when he failed in both bids to win the Grand Slam. Graf then defeated Sabatini 6–3, 6–3 in the gold medal match at the Olympic Games in Seoul and achieved what the media had dubbed the "Golden Slam". Graf also won her only Grand Slam doubles title that year—at Wimbledon partnering Sabatini—and picked up a women's doubles Olympic bronze medal. Graf was the first tennis player to achieve the feat: wheelchair tennis players Diede de Groot and Dylan Alcott achieved the Golden Slam in 2021. At the year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf was upset by Pam Shriver, only her third loss of the year. The loss deprived her of the Golden Super Slam. She was named the 1988 BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year. At the end of the year, the municipality of Brühl, her hometown, gave her the title of honorary citizen. New challengers and personal challenges 1989 Speculation was rife at the beginning of 1989 about the possibility of Graf winning another Grand Slam. Some noted observers, such as Margaret Court, suggested that Graf could achieve the feat a couple more times. And the year began as expected, with Graf extending her Grand Slam tournament winning streak to five events at the Australian Open, defeating Helena Suková in the final. Her 6–3, 6–0 defeat of Gabriela Sabatini in a semifinal was described by veteran observer Ted Tinling as "probably the best tennis I've seen". He went on to add, "I saw what Steffi did to Sabatini at the Australian Open this year, and that was it. She is better than them all." Graf followed this with easy victories in her next four tournaments at Washington, D.C., San Antonio, Texas, Boca Raton, Florida, and Hilton Head. The Washington, D.C. tournament was notable because Graf won the first twenty points of the final against Zina Garrison. In the Boca Raton final, Graf lost the only set she conceded to Chris Evert in their final seven matches. In the subsequent Amelia Island final on clay, Graf lost her first match of the year to Sabatini but returned to European clay with easy victories at Hamburg and Berlin. Graf's Grand Slam tournament winning streak ended at the French Open, where 17-year-old Spaniard Arantxa Sánchez Vicario beat Graf in three sets. Graf served for the match at 5–3 in the third set but lost the game and won only three more points in the match. Suffering from food poisoning, she had struggled to beat Monica Seles in their semifinal 6–3, 3–6, 6–3 and said that she had menstrual cramps in the final. Graf, however, recovered to defeat Martina Navratilova 6–2, 6–7, 6–1 in the Wimbledon final after defeating Monica Seles 6–0, 6–1 in a fourth round match, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in a quarterfinal, and Chris Evert in a semifinal. Graf warmed up for the US Open with easy tournament victories in San Diego and Mahwah. In her semifinal match at the US Open, Graf defeated Sabatini 3–6, 6–4, 6–2. The match was notable for its dramatic ending. Having suffered from leg cramps since the middle of the third set, Graf ran off the court seconds after match point to seek medical treatment. In the final, Navratilova led 6–3, 4–2 before Graf rallied to win 3–6, 7–5, 6–1 for her third Grand Slam singles title of the year. Victories at Zurich and Brighton preceded the Virginia Slims Championships, where Graf cemented her top-ranked status by beating Navratilova in the four-set final. Graf ended 1989 with an 86–2 match record and the loss of only 12 sets. Her 0.977 winning percentage is the second-highest in the open era behind Navratilova. 1990 Graf defeated Mary Joe Fernández in the final of the Australian Open, which was her eighth Grand Slam singles title in the last nine she contested. She survived an intense three-set battle with Helena Sukova in the semis, breaking in the tenth and final game to win the third set 6–4. Her winning streak (unbeaten since the 1989 French Open loss to Arantxa Sánchez) continued with victories in Tokyo, Amelia Island, and Hamburg. Shortly after winning in Tokyo, Graf injured her right thumb while cross-country skiing in Switzerland and subsequently withdrew from the Virginia Slims of Florida and the Lipton Championships. In Berlin, she extended her unbeaten streak to 66 matches (second in WTA history to Navratilova's 74) before losing the final to Monica Seles, 4–6, 3–6. While the Berlin tournament was being played, the largest-circulation German tabloid, Bild, ran a story about an alleged scandal involving Graf's father. The difficulty of answering questions about the matter came to a head at a Wimbledon press conference, where Graf broke down in tears. Wimbledon authorities then threatened to immediately shut down any subsequent press conferences where questions about the issue were asked. Whether this scandal affected Graf's form is open to debate. In an interview with Stern magazine in July 1990, Graf stated, "I could not fight as usual." Graf again lost to Monica Seles in the final of the French Open 6–7, 4–6. Seles was behind 2–6 in the first-set tiebreaker, but then came back to win six points in a row and take the set. At Wimbledon, Graf lost in the semifinals to Zina Garrison, who with this victory broke Graf's string of 13 consecutive major finals. This was a major upset as Garrison had to save a match point to defeat Monica Seles in the quarterfinal, and was expected to easily fall to Graf, whom she had not beaten in four years. After victories in Montreal and San Diego, Graf reached the US Open final, where she lost in straight sets to Sabatini. Graf won four indoor tournaments after the US Open, including a pair of straight-set wins over Sabatini in the finals of Zürich and Worcester. Although Sabatini got the best of Graf in the semifinals of the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf still finished the year as the top-ranked player. 1991 A mixture of injury problems, personal difficulties, and loss of form made 1991 a tough year for Graf. Seles established herself as the new dominant player on the women's tour, winning the Australian Open, French Open, and US Open and, in March, ending Graf's record 186 consecutive-weeks hold on the World No. 1 ranking. Graf briefly regained the top ranking after winning at Wimbledon but lost it again after her loss to Navratilova at the US Open. Graf lost an Australian Open quarterfinal to Jana Novotná, the first time she did not reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament since the 1986 French Open. She then lost to Sabatini in her next three tournaments before winning the U.S. Hardcourt Championships in San Antonio, beating Monica Seles in the final. After losing a fifth straight time to Sabatini in Amelia Island, Florida, Graf again defeated Seles in the Hamburg final. Following her tournament victory in German Open in Berlin, Graf suffered one of the worst defeats of her career in a French Open semifinal where she won only two games against Sánchez Vicario and lost her first 6–0 set since 1984. At Wimbledon, however, Graf captured her third women's crown, this time at Sabatini's expense. Sabatini served for the match twice, and was two points away from her first Wimbledon title. After breaking Sabatini's serve to even the third set at 6–6, Graf defeated Sabatini by winning the next two games to take the match 6–4, 3–6, 8–6. Martina Navratilova then defeated Graf 7–6, 6–7, 6–4 in a US Open semifinal, the first time she had beaten Graf in four years. Graf then won in Leipzig, with her 500th career victory coming in a quarterfinal against Judith Wiesner. After winning two more indoor tournaments at Zurich and Brighton, she failed once again in the Virginia Slims Championships, losing her quarterfinal to Novotná. Soon after, she split with her long-time coach, Pavel Složil. 1992 A bout of rubella forced Graf to miss the first major event of 1992, the Australian Open. Her year continued indifferently with losses in three of her first four tournaments, including a semifinal loss to Jana Novotná in Chicago. It was Graf's second consecutive loss to Novotna, and dating back to their 1991 Australian Open quarterfinal match, Jana had won three of their last five meetings. It would also be the last loss Graf would ever have to Novotna in a match she completed (she did have a loss after withdrawing with injury after the first set of a late 1996 match). Chicago was notable, however, for being the first tournament Graf played with her new coach, former Swiss player Heinz Günthardt. Graf's father had approached Günthardt during the 1991 Virginia Slims Championships. She would work with him for the remainder of her career. In Boca Raton, Florida, Graf reached her first final of the year, where she faced Conchita Martínez for the title. In their five previous head-to-head matches, Graf had defeated Martínez each time. Even though she lost the opening set, Graf went on to prevail in three sets. She lost twice to Sabatini in the early spring at the Lipton International and the Bausch & Lomb Championships, which now brought her to seven losses in her last eight matches against Sabatini; however, the Bausch & Lomb loss would be Graf's final loss to Sabatini, winning her next, and last eight matches against Sabatini. Victories at Hamburg and Berlin (beating Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both) prepared her for the French Open, where she defeated Sánchez Vicario in the semifinals after losing the first set 6–0. Graf then lost a closely contested final to Monica Seles, 2–6, 6–3, 8–10. Seles won the match on her fifth match point; Graf came within two points of winning the match a few games earlier. At Wimbledon, after struggling through early-round three-setters against Mariaan de Swardt and Patty Fendick, she easily defeated Natasha Zvereva in the quarterfinal, Sabatini in the semifinal, and Seles in the final, 6–2, 6–1, with Seles playing in almost complete silence because of widespread media and player criticism of her grunting. Graf then won all five of her Fed Cup matches, helping Germany defeat Spain in the final by defeating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, 6–4, 6–2. At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Graf lost to Jennifer Capriati in the final and claimed the silver medal. At the US Open, Graf was upset in the quarterfinals by Sánchez Vicario 7–6, 6–3. Four consecutive indoor tournament victories in the autumn helped improve her season, but for the third consecutive year, she failed to win the Virginia Slims Championships, where she lost in the first round to Lori McNeil. Second period of dominance 1993 Graf began 1993 with four losses in her first six tournaments of the year: two to Sánchez Vicario and one each to Seles and the 36-year-old Martina Navratilova. Seles defeated Graf at the Australian Open 4–6, 6–3, 6–2. She struggled at the German Open in Berlin where she lost a 6–0 set to the unheralded Sabine Hack before defeating Mary Joe Fernández and Sabatini in three-set matches to claim her seventh title there in eight years. During a quarterfinal match between Seles and Magdalena Maleeva in Hamburg, Seles was stabbed between the shoulder blades by a mentally ill German fan of Graf, Günter Parche. He claimed that he committed the attack to help Graf reclaim the world No. 1 ranking. More than two years elapsed before Seles competed again. Shortly after the stabbing, during a players meeting at the Italian Open in Rome, 17 of the world's top 25 WTA members voted against preserving Seles' world No. 1 ranking while she was sidelined. Since Graf skipped the Italian Open, she did not take part in the vote. During Seles's absence, Graf won 65 of 67 matches, three of four Grand Slam events and the year-end Virginia Slims championships. She won her first French Open title since 1988 with a three-set victory over Mary Joe Fernández in the final. Fernandez had two break points to take a 3–0 and double break lead in the third set. The win elevated Graf to the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in 22 months. At Wimbledon, Graf defeated Jana Novotná to win her third consecutive, and fifth overall, ladies' title. In the third and deciding set, Novotná had a point to go up 5–1 on her serve. After breaking Novotná's serve, Graf won the next four games to take the match 7–6, 1–6, 6–4. Graf had a bone splinter in her right foot during this tournament (and for the next few months), finally resulting in surgery on 4 October. In the meantime, she lost surprisingly to Nicole Bradtke of Australia in a Fed Cup match on clay before winning the Acura Classic in San Diego and the Canadian Open in Toronto in preparation for the US Open. She won there, comfortably beating Helena Suková in the final after needing three sets to eliminate Gabriela Sabatini and Manuela Maleeva-Fragniere in the quarterfinals and semifinals respectively. In the fall, Graf won the Volkswagen Card Cup in Leipzig a day before her foot operation, losing only two games to Jana Novotná in the final. Graf lost to Conchita Martínez in her comeback tournament a month later in Philadelphia. However, she finished her year with a highlight, winning her first Virginia Slims Championships since 1989 by beating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final despite needing painkillers for a back injury. 1994 Seemingly free of injury for the first time in years, Graf began the year by winning the Australian Open, where she defeated Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final with the loss of only two games. Graf later stated it was the best tennis she had ever played in a Grand Slam final. She then won her next four tournaments in Tokyo, Indian Wells, Delray Beach and Miami respectively. In the Miami final, she lost her first set of the year—to Natasha Zvereva—after winning 54 consecutive sets. In the Hamburg final, she lost for the first time in 1994 after 36 consecutive match victories, losing to Sánchez Vicario in three sets. She then won her eighth German Open, but there were signs that her form was worsening as she almost lost to Julie Halard in a quarterfinal. As the defending champion Graf lost in straight sets to Mary Pierce in the French Open semifinal. This was followed by a first-round straight-sets loss at Wimbledon to Lori McNeil, her only loss at Wimbledon between 1991 and 1997 and her first loss in a first round Grand Slam tournament in ten years. Graf still managed to win San Diego the following month but aggravated a long-time back injury in beating Sánchez Vicario in the final. Graf developed a bone spur at the base of her spine due to a congenital condition of the sacroiliac joint. She began to wear a back brace and was unsure about playing the US Open but elected to play while receiving treatment and stretching for two hours before each match. She made it to the final and took the first set against Sánchez Vicario but lost the next two sets — Sanchez Vicario's last victory over Graf. In the middle of the second set, Graf suffered back spasms while reaching for a ball in the ad court. She took the following nine weeks off, returning only for the Virginia Slims Championships where she lost in straight sets to Pierce in the quarterfinal. Although Graf ended the year ranked No. 1 on the computer the ITF named Sanchez Vicario its World Champion for the year, while the WTA backed their official rankings and named Graf. 1995 A strained right calf muscle forced Graf to withdraw from the Australian Open. She came back in February, winning four consecutive tournaments in Paris, Delray Beach, Miami and Houston. She then beat Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both the French Open and Wimbledon. The 1995 Wimbledon final is regarded as one of the most dramatic women's major finals in history as Graf and Sánchez Vicario battled in a tight third set that included a 16-minute long, 13-deuce game on Sanchez Vicario's serve at 5–5. In August Monica Seles made her much anticipated return to tennis at the Canadian Open. It was decided to grant her a joint number-one ranking with Graf who took her first loss of the year in the first round to Amanda Coetzer. The US Open was Monica Seles's first Grand Slam event since the 1993 attack, with much anticipation again around a potential Seles-Graf final. After surviving a scare in a three-setter against Amanda Coetzer in the first round, Graf reached the final with relative ease, while Seles went through her side of the draw in even more convincing fashion. Seles and Graf met in the final, with Graf winning in three sets, saving a set point in the first set. Graf then capped the year by beating countrywoman Anke Huber in a five-set final at the season-ending WTA Championships in 2 hours and 46 minutes. Tax issues In personal terms, 1995 was a difficult year for Graf, as she was accused by German authorities of tax evasion in the early years of her career. In her defense, she stated that her father Peter was her financial manager, and all financial matters relating to her earnings at the time had been under his control. Her father was arrested in August and was sentenced to 45 months in jail. He was eventually released after serving 25 months. Prosecutors dropped their case against Graf in 1997, when she agreed to pay a fine of 1.3 million Deutsche Marks to the government and an unspecified charity. 1996 Graf again missed the Australian Open after undergoing surgery in December 1995 to remove bone splinters from her left foot. Graf came back to the tour in March, winning back to back titles in Indian Wells and Miami, followed by a record ninth title at the German Open in May and a quarterfinal defeat in Rome against Martina Hingis. She then successfully defended the three Grand Slam titles she won the year before. In a close French Open final, Graf again overcame Sánchez Vicario, taking the third set 10–8. Graf had led 4–1 in the second set tiebreak, only to lose six points in a row and force a decider. Twice in the third set Sánchez Vicario served for the championship but was broken each time by Graf. It was the longest French Open women's singles final in history, both in terms of time (3 hours and 3 minutes) and number of games played (40). Graf then had a straight-sets win against Sánchez Vicario in the Wimbledon final. That was the last competitive match Graf and Sánchez Vicario would ever play against one another. In July, a left knee injury forced Graf to withdraw from the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Graf played only one warm-up event ahead of the US Open, the Acura Classic in Manhattan Beach, California, where she lost to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinals. She then successfully defended her title at the US Open, defeating Monica Seles in the final. Her toughest battle came against rising star Martina Hingis in the semifinal, with Hingis unable to convert on five set points. Graf did not lose a set the whole tournament. She also won her fifth and final WTA Tour Championships title with a five set win over Martina Hingis, with Hingis cramping up in the fifth set. In 1988, Graf became only the second tennis player in history to win a Slam on hardcourt, clay, and grass all in the same season. She repeated the feat in 1993, 1995, and 1996. Final years on the tour: 1997–99 The last few years of Graf's career were beset by injuries, particularly to her knees and back. She lost the world No. 1 ranking to Martina Hingis and failed to win a Grand Slam title for the first time in ten years in 1997. That year Graf lost in the fourth round of the Australian Open in straight sets to Amanda Coetzer. She subsequently withdrew from the Pan Pacific Open and had arthroscopic surgery performed on her left knee. After several months injury lay off, Graf returned to play in the German Open in Berlin in front of a home crowd and had the worst defeat of her career in the quarterfinal, when Amanda Coetzer beat her in just 56 minutes 6–0, 6–1. In the French Open Graf was again beaten by Amanda Coetzer in straight sets, 6–1, 6–4. Only one week later, she underwent reconstructive knee surgery in Vienna and subsequently missed the 1997 Wimbledon and US Open championships. The treatment was for a fracture of the cartilage as well as a shortening and partial rupture of the patellar tendon of her left knee. After missing almost half of the tour in 1998, Graf lost in the third round at Wimbledon and in the fourth round at the US Open. Shortly after the US Open, she underwent surgery to remove a bone spur in her right wrist. Upon her return Graf defeated world No. 2 Hingis and world No. 1 Lindsay Davenport en route to the Philadelphia title. At the first round of the season-ending Chase Championships, Graf defeated world No. 3, Jana Novotná, before losing in the semifinal to first-seeded Davenport. At the beginning of 1999 Graf played the warm up event to the Australian Open in Sydney; she defeated Serena Williams in the second round and Venus in the quarterfinals before losing to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinal. Graf then went on to reach the quarterfinals of the Australian Open before losing to Monica Seles in two sets. In Indian Wells Graf lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At the French Open, Graf reached her first Grand Slam final in three years and fought back from a set and twice from a break down in the second set to defeat the top ranked Hingis in three sets for a memorable victory. Graf became the first player in the open era to defeat the first, second, and third ranked players in the same Grand Slam tournament by beating second-ranked Davenport in the quarterfinals and third-ranked Seles in the semifinals. Graf said after the final that it would be her last French Open, fueling speculation about her retirement. Graf then reached her ninth Wimbledon singles final, losing to third-seeded Davenport in straight sets. She had to overcome three difficult three set matches en route to this final, against Mariaan De Swardt in the third round, Venus Williams in the quarterfinals and Mirjana Lučić in the semifinals. On 13 August 1999, shortly after retiring with a strained hamstring from a second round match against Amy Frazier in San Diego, Graf announced her retirement from the women's tour at age 30. She was ranked No. 3 at that time and said, "I have done everything I wanted to do in tennis. I feel I have nothing left to accomplish. The weeks following Wimbledon [in 1999] weren't easy for me. I was not having fun anymore. After Wimbledon, for the first time in my career, I didn't feel like going to a tournament. My motivation wasn't what it was in the past." Doubles career From the beginning of her career until 1990, Graf regularly played doubles events in Grand Slams and other tournaments, winning a total of eleven titles. In 1986, she formed a partnership with rival Gabriela Sabatini. The pair was moderately successful, winning the 1988 Wimbledon Championships together and reaching the finals of the French Open in 1986, 1987 and 1989. The partnership was the subject of much discussion, as the two women, both known to be shy, usually kept communication to a minimum during changeovers and between points, a highly unusual situation in doubles. Sabatini said of the partnership: "doubles is all about communicating with each other, and we didn't communicate that much. We would just say the basic things, but nothing else." The pair played their last major tournament together at the 1990 Wimbledon Championships, losing in the quarterfinals. From 1991 until the end of her career, Graf would only play doubles sporadically, forming short-term partnerships with a variety of players, including Lori McNeil, Anke Huber and her best friends on the tour, Rennae Stubbs, Patricia Tarabini and Ines Gorrochategui. She played her last Grand Slam doubles tournament at the 1999 Australian Open with Gorrochategui, losing in the second round. Graf also occasionally played mixed doubles, although she never won a title. She partnered with doubles specialist Mark Woodforde at the Australian Open in 1994, with Henri Leconte at Wimbledon in 1991 and at the French Open in 1994, and with Charlie Pasarell at the US Open in 1984. In an unusual arrangement, she paired with her coaches Pavel Složil at Wimbledon in 1988 and Heinz Günthardt in 1992 and 1996, also at Wimbledon. At the 1999 Wimbledon Championships, Graf formed a much-publicized partnership with John McEnroe, with whom she reached the semifinals before withdrawing due to concerns that her uncertain hamstring, coupled with a bout of bronchitis, would affect her in the singles final. Post-career exhibition matches In late 1999 and early 2000, as part of her Farewell Tour, Graf played a series of exhibition matches against former rivals in New Zealand, Japan, Spain, Germany and South Africa. She played Jelena Dokic in Christchurch, New Zealand, Amanda Coetzer in Durban, South Africa, and her former rival Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in Zaragoza, Spain. It was Graf and Sánchez Vicario's first head-to-head meeting since 1996. In February 2000, Graf played against Kimiko Date at Nagoya Rainbow Hall in Tokyo, winning in three sets. In September 2004, Graf dispatched her former doubles partner Gabriela Sabatini, in straight sets, in an exhibition match played in Berlin, Germany. She was also in Berlin to host a charity gala, as well as inaugurating a tennis stadium renamed the "Steffi Graf Stadion". Proceeds from her match against Sabatini went to Graf's foundation, "Children for Tomorrow". In July 2005, Graf competed in one tie of World Team Tennis (WTT) on the Houston Wranglers team. She was beaten in two out of three matches, with each match being one set. Graf lost her singles match to Elena Likhovtseva 5–4. She teamed with Ansley Cargill in women's doubles against Anna Kournikova and Likhovtseva but lost 5–2. She was successful, however, in the mixed doubles match. Graf completely ruled out a return to professional tennis. In October, Graf defeated Sabatini in an exhibition match in Mannheim, Germany, winning both of their sets. Like the exhibition match the previous year against Sabatini, proceeds went to "Children for Tomorrow". In 2008 Graf lost an exhibition match against Kimiko Date at Ariake Colosseum in Tokyo. As part of the event, billed as "Dream Match 2008", she defeated Martina Navratilova in a one-set affair 8–7, with Graf winning a tiebreaker 10–5. It was the first time in 14 years Graf had played Navratilova. Graf played a singles exhibition match against Kim Clijsters and a mixed doubles exhibition alongside husband Andre Agassi against Tim Henman and Clijsters as part of a test event and celebration for the newly installed roof over Wimbledon's Centre Court in 2009. She lost a lengthy one-set singles match to Clijsters and also the mixed doubles. In 2010, Graf participated in the WTT Smash Hits exhibition in Washington, D.C. to support the Elton John AIDS Foundation. She and Agassi, her husband, were on Team Elton John, which competed against Team Billie Jean King. Graf played in the celebrity doubles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles before straining her left calf muscle and being replaced by Anna Kournikova. Summary of career Graf won seven singles titles at Wimbledon, six singles titles at the French Open, five singles titles at the US Open, and four singles titles at the Australian Open. Her overall record in 56 Grand Slam events was 278–32 (90 percent) (84–10 at the French Open, 74–7 at Wimbledon, 73–9 at the US Open, and 47–6 at the Australian Open). Her career prize-money earnings totalled US$21,895,277 (a record until Lindsay Davenport surpassed this amount in January 2008). Her singles win/loss record was 900–115 (88.7 percent). She was ranked world No. 1 for 186 consecutive weeks (from August 1987 to March 1991; tied with Serena Williams, a record in the women's game) and a record total 377 weeks overall. Career statistics Grand Slam tournament performance timeline Note: Graf's semifinal match at the 1988 US Open was walkover (so not counted as win) Grand Slam tournament finals Singles: 31 (22 titles, 9 runner-ups) Doubles: 4 (1 title, 3 runner-ups) Records These records were attained in Open Era of tennis. Records in bold indicate Open Era peer-less achievements. Playing style The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fräulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Složil and Heinz Günthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to , making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. Equipment and endorsements Early in her career, Graf wore Dunlop apparel, before signing an endorsement contract with Adidas in 1985. She had an Adidas sneakers line known as the St. Graf Pro line. Early in her career, Graf used the Dunlop Maxpower Pro and Maxpower Kevlar racquets and then played with the Max 200G racquet from 1984 to 1993 before switching to Wilson from 1994 to 1999. She first used the Wilson Pro Staff 7.0 lite, then switched to the Pro Staff 7.5 in 1996 and to the Pro Staff 7.1 in 1998. Graf's racquets were strung at 29 kilograms (64 pounds), significantly above the 50-60 pound range recommended by Wilson. In 2006, she signed an endorsement deal with Head. In 2010, Graf and Agassi collaborated with Head and developed the new line of Star Series tennis racquets. Graf has signed many endorsement deals throughout the years including a ten-year endorsement deal with car manufacturer Opel in 1985, and Rexona from 1994 to 1998. Other companies she has endorsed include Barilla, Apollinaris, Citibank, Danone and Teekanne. She has appeared in many advertisements and television commercials with Andre Agassi including Canon Inc. and Longines in 2008 (Agassi became Longines ambassador in 2007). In 2015, she was appointed as the brand ambassador of Kerala tourism, for promoting Ayurveda in North America and Europe. Personal life In 1997, she left the Catholic Church, citing personal reasons. During her career, Graf divided her time between her hometown of Brühl; Boca Raton, Florida; and New York City where she owned a penthouse in the former Police Headquarters Building in SoHo. From 1992 to 1999, Graf dated racing driver Michael Bartels. She started dating Andre Agassi after the 1999 French Open and they married on 22 October 2001, with only their mothers as witnesses. They have two children, a son born in 2001 and a daughter born in 2003. Agassi has said that he and Graf are not pushing their children toward becoming tennis players. The Graf-Agassi family resides in Summerlin, a community in the Las Vegas Valley. Graf's mother and her brother also live there. In 1991, the Steffi Graf Youth Tennis Center in Leipzig was dedicated to her. She is the founder and chairperson of "Children for Tomorrow", a non-profit foundation established in 1998 for implementing and developing projects to support children who have been traumatized by war or other crises. In 2001, Graf indicated that she preferred to be called Stefanie instead of Steffi. On 30 November 2013, Graf's father Peter died of pancreatic cancer. He was 75 years old. Legacy In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. In March 2012, Tennis Channel picked Graf as the greatest female tennis player ever in their list of 100 greatest tennis players of all time. In November 2018, Tennis.com polled its readers to choose the greatest women's tennis player of all time and Graf came in first. In July 2020, The Guardian polled its readers to determine the greatest female tennis player of the past 50 years, and Steffi was the clear favorite, picking up nearly twice as many votes as any other player. Tennis writer Steve Flink, in his book The Greatest Tennis Matches of the Twentieth Century, named Graf as the best female player of the 20th century. Flink said in 2020 that the jury was still out on (Serena) Williams as the greatest ever, but Williams' consistency over the long span did not match that of Graf or Navratilova. Graf compiled superior career accomplishments over Serena Williams (as of December 2, 2020); 900–115 career record (88.7 win %) versus 843–147 career record (85.2 win %), 107 career tournament victories versus 72 career tournament victories, 377 total weeks ranked as world No. One versus 319 total weeks ranked as world No. One. While Graf's 22 Grand Slam wins is one fewer than Williams' 23 (and two fewer than Margaret Court's 24), Graf's professional career is eight years shorter than Williams, plus Graf also faced much tougher competition during her era (Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Gabriela Sabatini, and Monica Seles) compared to Williams. However, with the stabbing of Monica Seles in 1993, some have questioned its impact on Graf's career statistics and legacy. Awards and honours Graf was voted the ITF World Champion in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1995 and 1996. She was voted the WTA Player of the Year in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996. She was elected as the German Sportsperson of the Year in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1999. In 2004, the Berliner Tennis-Arena was renamed Steffi-Graf-Stadion in honor of Graf. Graf was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004 and the German Sports Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2015, Graf was the recipient of the International Club's Jean Borotra Sportsmanship Award. See also Graf–Navratilova rivalry Graf–Sabatini rivalry Graf–Seles rivalry List of female tennis players List of tennis rivalries Overall tennis records - women's singles Tennis records of the Open Era - women's singles References External links Official Wimbledon profile BBC profile ESPN biography Steffi Graf's victories German female tennis players International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees 1969 births Living people Australian Open (tennis) champions French Open champions German emigrants to the United States Hopman Cup competitors Olympic medalists in tennis Olympic bronze medalists for West Germany Olympic gold medalists for West Germany Olympic silver medalists for Germany Olympic tennis players of Germany Olympic tennis players of West Germany Sportspeople from Mannheim Recipients of the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of Baden-Württemberg Recipients of the Olympic Order Tennis players at the 1984 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1988 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1992 Summer Olympics US Open (tennis) champions West German expatriates in the United States Wimbledon champions World No. 1 tennis players Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's singles Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's doubles Recipients of the Silver Laurel Leaf German philanthropists German women philanthropists Medalists at the 1988 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics People from SoHo, Manhattan Andre Agassi Tennis people from Baden-Württemberg	true	[ "Burnin' is the second studio album by Canadian country music singer/songwriter Gil Grand. It was released on November 19, 2002 by Royalty Records. Seven singles were released from the album, including \"Break It to Them Gently,\" originally recorded by Burton Cummings in 1978.\n\nTrack listing\n \"There She Goes\" (Odie Blackmon, Gil Grand) - 2:45\n \"Burnin'\" (Grand, Byron Hill) - 3:06\n \"Break It to Them Gently\" (Burton Cummings) - 4:27\n \"Cry a Little\" (Blackmon, Grand) - 3:14\n \"Never Comin' Down\" (Grand, John Reynolds) - 3:34\n \"On Again, Off Again\" (Austin Cunningham, Grand) - 3:23\n \"Nice and Slow\" (Grand) - 3:03\n \"Trouble's Arms\" (Cunningham, Grand) - 4:16\n \"Run\" (Ryan Reynolds) - 3:49\n \"Sometimes She Cries\" (Blackmon, Grand) - 3:29\n \"Any Minute Now\" (Steve Fox, Grand) - 3:43\n\n2002 albums\nGil Grand albums\nRoyalty Records albums", "Donna Cruz Sings Her Greatest Hits is the second compilation album by the Filipino singer Donna Cruz, released in the Philippines in 2001 by Viva Records. The album was Cruz's first album not to receive a PARI certification; all of her studio albums and a previous compilation album, The Best of Donna, were certified either gold or platinum. Though it was labeled as a greatest hits compilation, several songs on the track listing had not been released as singles, and some of Cruz's singles did not appear on the album.\n\nBackground\nReleased during Cruz's break from the entertainment industry, Donna Cruz Sings Her Greatest Hits did not include any newly recorded material. Cruz's version of \"Jubilee Song\", which was not found on any of Cruz's albums (as she never recorded studio albums after Hulog Ng Langit in 1999) was included. It was seen as an updated version of Cruz's greatest hits as it included her latest singles \"Hulog ng Langit\" and \"Ikaw Pala 'Yon\".\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences\n\n2001 compilation albums\nViva Records (Philippines) compilation albums\nDonna Cruz albums" ]
[ "Steffi Graf", "Playing style", "What did Steffi play?", "I don't know.", "what was her play style?", "The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork.", "what else represented her play style?", "Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable:", "why did she use this style?", "As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy.", "did she break any records?", "Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam" ]	C_d0e9bc4e72184f1fb6ceb489ddce9e70_0	what year did she win the Grand Slam?	6	what year did Steffi win the Grand Slam?	Steffi Graf	The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Slozil and Heinz Gunthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to 174 km/h (108 mph), making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. CANNOTANSWER	1990s,	Stefanie Maria "Steffi" Graf ( , ; born 14 June 1969) is a German former professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 1 for a record 377 weeks and won 22 major singles titles, the second-most since the start of the Open Era in 1968 and third-most of all-time behind Margaret Court (24) and Serena Williams (23). In 1988, she became the first tennis player to achieve the Golden Slam by winning all four Grand Slam singles titles and the Olympic gold medal in the same calendar year. Furthermore, she is the only tennis player, male or female, to have won each major at least four times. Graf was ranked singles world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for a record 377 total weeks: the longest period for which any player, male or female, has held the singles number-one ranking since the WTA and the Association of Tennis Professionals began issuing rankings. She won 107 singles titles, which ranks her third on the WTA's all-time list after Martina Navratilova (167 titles) and Chris Evert (157 titles). She and Margaret Court are the only players, male or female, to win three majors in a calendar year five times (1988, 1989, 1993, 1995 and 1996). Notable features of Graf's game were her versatility across all playing surfaces, footwork and powerful forehand drive. Graf's athletic ability and aggressive game played from the baseline have been credited with developing the modern style of play that has come to dominate today's game. She won six French Open singles titles (second to Evert), seven Wimbledon singles titles, four Australian Open titles, and five U.S. Open singles titles. She is the only singles player (male or female) to have achieved a Grand Slam since the hard court was introduced as a playing surface, replacing grass, at the US Open in 1978. Graf's Grand Slam was achieved on grass, clay, and hard court while the previous five singles Grand Slams were achieved on only grass and clay. Graf reached 13 consecutive singles major finals, from the 1987 French Open through to the 1990 French Open, winning nine of them. She won five consecutive singles majors (1988 Australian Open to 1989 Australian Open), and seven out of eight, in two calendar years (1988 Australian Open to 1989 US Open, except 1989 French Open). She reached a total of 31 singles major finals. Graf retired at the age of 30 in 1999 while she was ranked world No. 3. She is regarded as one of the greatest female tennis players of all time. Martina Navratilova included Graf at the top of her list of the greatest players ever. In the year of Graf's retirement, Billie Jean King said, "Steffi [Graf] is definitely the greatest women's tennis player of all time." In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. She married former world No. 1 men's tennis player Andre Agassi in October 2001. They have two children. Graf was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004. Along with Boris Becker, Graf was considered instrumental in popularizing tennis in Germany, where it remains one of the foremost national sports. Early life Stefanie Graf was born on 14 June 1969, in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany, to Heidi Schalk and car-and-insurance salesman Peter Graf (18 June 1938 − 30 November 2013). When she was nine years old, her family moved to the neighboring town of Brühl. She has a younger brother, Michael. Her father, an aspiring tennis coach, first introduced her to the game, teaching his three-year-old daughter how to swing a wooden racket in the family's living room. She began practising on a court at the age of four and played in her first tournament at five. She soon began taking the top prize at junior tournaments with regularity, going on to win the European Championships 12s and 18s in 1982. Career Early career Graf played in her first professional tournament in October 1982 at Filderstadt, Germany. She lost her first round match 6–4, 6–0 to Tracy Austin, a two-time US Open champion and former world No. 1 player. (Twelve years later, Graf defeated Austin 6–0, 6–0 during a second round match at the Evert Cup in Indian Wells, California, which was their second and last match against each other.) At the start of her first full professional year in 1983, Graf was 13 years old and ranked world No. 124. She won no titles during the next three years, but her ranking climbed steadily to world No. 98 in 1983, No. 22 in 1984, and No. 6 in 1985. In 1984, she first gained international attention when she almost upset the tenth seed, Jo Durie of the United Kingdom, in a fourth round Centre Court match at Wimbledon. In August as a 15-year-old (and youngest entrant) representing West Germany, she won the tennis demonstration event at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. No medals were awarded as this was not an official Olympic event. Graf's schedule was closely controlled by her father, who limited her play so that she would not burn out. In 1985, for instance, she played only ten events leading up to the US Open, whereas another up-and-coming star, Gabriela Sabatini of Argentina, who was a year younger than Graf, played 21. Peter Graf also kept a tight rein on Graf's personal life. Social invitations on the tour were often declined as Graf's focus was kept on practicing and match play. Working with her father and then-coach Pavel Složil, Graf typically practiced for up to four hours a day, often heading straight from airports to practice courts. This narrow focus meant that Graf, already shy and retiring by nature, made few friends on the tour in her early years, but it led to a steady improvement in her play. In 1985 and early 1986, Graf emerged as the top challenger to the dominance of Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert. During that period, she lost six times to Evert and three times to Navratilova, all in straight sets. She did not win a tournament but consistently reached tournament finals, semifinals and quarterfinals, with the highlight being her semifinal loss to Navratilova at the US Open. On 13 April 1986, Graf won her first WTA tournament and beat Evert for the first time in the final of the Family Circle Cup in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (She never lost to Evert again, beating her six more times over the next three and a half years.) Graf then won her next three tournaments at Amelia Island, Charleston, and Berlin, culminating in a 6–2, 6–3 defeat of Navratilova in the final of the latter. Illness caused her to miss Wimbledon, and an accident where she broke a toe several weeks later also curtailed her play. She returned to win a small tournament at Mahwah just before the US Open where, in one of the most anticipated matches of the year, she encountered Navratilova in a semifinal. The match was played over two days with Navratilova finally winning after saving three match points 6–1, 6–7, 7–6. Graf then won three consecutive indoor titles at Tokyo, Zurich, and Brighton, before once again contending with Navratilova at the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships in New York. This time, Navratilova beat Graf 7–6, 6–3, 6–2. Breakthrough year: 1987 Graf's Grand Slam tournament breakthrough came in 1987. She started the year strongly, with six tournament victories heading into the French Open, with the highlight being at the tournament in Miami, where she defeated Martina Navratilova in a semifinal and Chris Evert in the final and lost only 20 games in the seven rounds of the tournament. In the French Open final, Graf defeated Navratilova, who was the world No. 1, 6–4, 4–6, 8–6 after beating Sabatini in a three-set semifinal. Graf then lost to Navratilova 7–5, 6–3 in the Wimbledon final, her first loss of the year. However, in the Federation Cup final in Vancouver, Canada, three weeks later, she defeated Evert easily 6–2, 6–1. The US Open ended anti-climactically as Navratilova defeated Graf in the final 7–6, 6–1. Graf had a win-loss record of 75-2 for a 97.4 winning percentage in 1987, both losses coming to Navratilova as they split the four matches they played during the year. On 17 August, after defeating Evert in a straight set final in the Virginia Slims of Los Angeles, Graf overtook Navratilova for the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in her career, a ranking she would hold for the next 186 consecutive weeks, a record (it was tied by Serena Williams in 2016). Graf was the first player other than Navratilova or Evert to hold the top spot since Tracy Austin in 1980. Golden Slam: 1988 Graf started 1988 by winning the Australian Open, defeating Chris Evert in the final 6–1, 7–6. Graf did not lose a set during the tournament and lost a total of only 29 games. Graf lost twice to Sabatini during the spring, once on hardcourts in Boca Raton, Florida, and once on clay at Amelia Island, Florida. Graf, however, won the tournament in San Antonio, Texas, and retained her title in Miami, where she once again defeated Evert in the final. Graf then won the tournament in Berlin, losing only twelve games in five matches. At the French Open, Graf successfully defended her title by defeating Natasha Zvereva 6–0, 6–0 in a 34-minute final. The official time of the match given on the scoresheet was 34 minutes; however, just 32 minutes of that was spent on the court, as a rain break split the match into two periods of play, of nine and 23 minutes. That was the shortest-ever and most one-sided Grand Slam final ever and the only double bagel in a Major final since 1911. Zvereva, who had eliminated Martina Navratilova in the fourth round, won only thirteen points in the match. Next came Wimbledon, where Martina Navratilova had won six straight titles. Graf was trailing Martina Navratilova in the final 7–5, 2–0 before winning the match 5–7, 6–2, 6–1. She then won tournaments in Hamburg and Mahwah (where she lost only eight games all tournament). At the US Open, Graf beat Sabatini in a three-set final to win the Grand Slam by 6–3, 3–6, 6–1, a feat previously performed by only two other women, Maureen Connolly Brinker in 1953 and Margaret Court in 1970. Graf's 1988 Grand Slam remains the only one in history completed on three surfaces (grass, clay, hard court), as all other Grand Slams in tennis history were achieved prior to the introduction of hard court at the US Open in 1978. In reaching and winning all four Grand Slam finals, Graf became the first player in history to contest and win 28 Grand Slam singles matches in a single year; albeit including the unplayed walkover against Evert in the US Open. Even discounting that result, no other player had played and won 27 Grand Slam matches in a single year before and the feat has to date only been matched by Novak Djokovic since, in both 2015 and 2021, when he failed in both bids to win the Grand Slam. Graf then defeated Sabatini 6–3, 6–3 in the gold medal match at the Olympic Games in Seoul and achieved what the media had dubbed the "Golden Slam". Graf also won her only Grand Slam doubles title that year—at Wimbledon partnering Sabatini—and picked up a women's doubles Olympic bronze medal. Graf was the first tennis player to achieve the feat: wheelchair tennis players Diede de Groot and Dylan Alcott achieved the Golden Slam in 2021. At the year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf was upset by Pam Shriver, only her third loss of the year. The loss deprived her of the Golden Super Slam. She was named the 1988 BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year. At the end of the year, the municipality of Brühl, her hometown, gave her the title of honorary citizen. New challengers and personal challenges 1989 Speculation was rife at the beginning of 1989 about the possibility of Graf winning another Grand Slam. Some noted observers, such as Margaret Court, suggested that Graf could achieve the feat a couple more times. And the year began as expected, with Graf extending her Grand Slam tournament winning streak to five events at the Australian Open, defeating Helena Suková in the final. Her 6–3, 6–0 defeat of Gabriela Sabatini in a semifinal was described by veteran observer Ted Tinling as "probably the best tennis I've seen". He went on to add, "I saw what Steffi did to Sabatini at the Australian Open this year, and that was it. She is better than them all." Graf followed this with easy victories in her next four tournaments at Washington, D.C., San Antonio, Texas, Boca Raton, Florida, and Hilton Head. The Washington, D.C. tournament was notable because Graf won the first twenty points of the final against Zina Garrison. In the Boca Raton final, Graf lost the only set she conceded to Chris Evert in their final seven matches. In the subsequent Amelia Island final on clay, Graf lost her first match of the year to Sabatini but returned to European clay with easy victories at Hamburg and Berlin. Graf's Grand Slam tournament winning streak ended at the French Open, where 17-year-old Spaniard Arantxa Sánchez Vicario beat Graf in three sets. Graf served for the match at 5–3 in the third set but lost the game and won only three more points in the match. Suffering from food poisoning, she had struggled to beat Monica Seles in their semifinal 6–3, 3–6, 6–3 and said that she had menstrual cramps in the final. Graf, however, recovered to defeat Martina Navratilova 6–2, 6–7, 6–1 in the Wimbledon final after defeating Monica Seles 6–0, 6–1 in a fourth round match, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in a quarterfinal, and Chris Evert in a semifinal. Graf warmed up for the US Open with easy tournament victories in San Diego and Mahwah. In her semifinal match at the US Open, Graf defeated Sabatini 3–6, 6–4, 6–2. The match was notable for its dramatic ending. Having suffered from leg cramps since the middle of the third set, Graf ran off the court seconds after match point to seek medical treatment. In the final, Navratilova led 6–3, 4–2 before Graf rallied to win 3–6, 7–5, 6–1 for her third Grand Slam singles title of the year. Victories at Zurich and Brighton preceded the Virginia Slims Championships, where Graf cemented her top-ranked status by beating Navratilova in the four-set final. Graf ended 1989 with an 86–2 match record and the loss of only 12 sets. Her 0.977 winning percentage is the second-highest in the open era behind Navratilova. 1990 Graf defeated Mary Joe Fernández in the final of the Australian Open, which was her eighth Grand Slam singles title in the last nine she contested. She survived an intense three-set battle with Helena Sukova in the semis, breaking in the tenth and final game to win the third set 6–4. Her winning streak (unbeaten since the 1989 French Open loss to Arantxa Sánchez) continued with victories in Tokyo, Amelia Island, and Hamburg. Shortly after winning in Tokyo, Graf injured her right thumb while cross-country skiing in Switzerland and subsequently withdrew from the Virginia Slims of Florida and the Lipton Championships. In Berlin, she extended her unbeaten streak to 66 matches (second in WTA history to Navratilova's 74) before losing the final to Monica Seles, 4–6, 3–6. While the Berlin tournament was being played, the largest-circulation German tabloid, Bild, ran a story about an alleged scandal involving Graf's father. The difficulty of answering questions about the matter came to a head at a Wimbledon press conference, where Graf broke down in tears. Wimbledon authorities then threatened to immediately shut down any subsequent press conferences where questions about the issue were asked. Whether this scandal affected Graf's form is open to debate. In an interview with Stern magazine in July 1990, Graf stated, "I could not fight as usual." Graf again lost to Monica Seles in the final of the French Open 6–7, 4–6. Seles was behind 2–6 in the first-set tiebreaker, but then came back to win six points in a row and take the set. At Wimbledon, Graf lost in the semifinals to Zina Garrison, who with this victory broke Graf's string of 13 consecutive major finals. This was a major upset as Garrison had to save a match point to defeat Monica Seles in the quarterfinal, and was expected to easily fall to Graf, whom she had not beaten in four years. After victories in Montreal and San Diego, Graf reached the US Open final, where she lost in straight sets to Sabatini. Graf won four indoor tournaments after the US Open, including a pair of straight-set wins over Sabatini in the finals of Zürich and Worcester. Although Sabatini got the best of Graf in the semifinals of the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf still finished the year as the top-ranked player. 1991 A mixture of injury problems, personal difficulties, and loss of form made 1991 a tough year for Graf. Seles established herself as the new dominant player on the women's tour, winning the Australian Open, French Open, and US Open and, in March, ending Graf's record 186 consecutive-weeks hold on the World No. 1 ranking. Graf briefly regained the top ranking after winning at Wimbledon but lost it again after her loss to Navratilova at the US Open. Graf lost an Australian Open quarterfinal to Jana Novotná, the first time she did not reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament since the 1986 French Open. She then lost to Sabatini in her next three tournaments before winning the U.S. Hardcourt Championships in San Antonio, beating Monica Seles in the final. After losing a fifth straight time to Sabatini in Amelia Island, Florida, Graf again defeated Seles in the Hamburg final. Following her tournament victory in German Open in Berlin, Graf suffered one of the worst defeats of her career in a French Open semifinal where she won only two games against Sánchez Vicario and lost her first 6–0 set since 1984. At Wimbledon, however, Graf captured her third women's crown, this time at Sabatini's expense. Sabatini served for the match twice, and was two points away from her first Wimbledon title. After breaking Sabatini's serve to even the third set at 6–6, Graf defeated Sabatini by winning the next two games to take the match 6–4, 3–6, 8–6. Martina Navratilova then defeated Graf 7–6, 6–7, 6–4 in a US Open semifinal, the first time she had beaten Graf in four years. Graf then won in Leipzig, with her 500th career victory coming in a quarterfinal against Judith Wiesner. After winning two more indoor tournaments at Zurich and Brighton, she failed once again in the Virginia Slims Championships, losing her quarterfinal to Novotná. Soon after, she split with her long-time coach, Pavel Složil. 1992 A bout of rubella forced Graf to miss the first major event of 1992, the Australian Open. Her year continued indifferently with losses in three of her first four tournaments, including a semifinal loss to Jana Novotná in Chicago. It was Graf's second consecutive loss to Novotna, and dating back to their 1991 Australian Open quarterfinal match, Jana had won three of their last five meetings. It would also be the last loss Graf would ever have to Novotna in a match she completed (she did have a loss after withdrawing with injury after the first set of a late 1996 match). Chicago was notable, however, for being the first tournament Graf played with her new coach, former Swiss player Heinz Günthardt. Graf's father had approached Günthardt during the 1991 Virginia Slims Championships. She would work with him for the remainder of her career. In Boca Raton, Florida, Graf reached her first final of the year, where she faced Conchita Martínez for the title. In their five previous head-to-head matches, Graf had defeated Martínez each time. Even though she lost the opening set, Graf went on to prevail in three sets. She lost twice to Sabatini in the early spring at the Lipton International and the Bausch & Lomb Championships, which now brought her to seven losses in her last eight matches against Sabatini; however, the Bausch & Lomb loss would be Graf's final loss to Sabatini, winning her next, and last eight matches against Sabatini. Victories at Hamburg and Berlin (beating Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both) prepared her for the French Open, where she defeated Sánchez Vicario in the semifinals after losing the first set 6–0. Graf then lost a closely contested final to Monica Seles, 2–6, 6–3, 8–10. Seles won the match on her fifth match point; Graf came within two points of winning the match a few games earlier. At Wimbledon, after struggling through early-round three-setters against Mariaan de Swardt and Patty Fendick, she easily defeated Natasha Zvereva in the quarterfinal, Sabatini in the semifinal, and Seles in the final, 6–2, 6–1, with Seles playing in almost complete silence because of widespread media and player criticism of her grunting. Graf then won all five of her Fed Cup matches, helping Germany defeat Spain in the final by defeating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, 6–4, 6–2. At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Graf lost to Jennifer Capriati in the final and claimed the silver medal. At the US Open, Graf was upset in the quarterfinals by Sánchez Vicario 7–6, 6–3. Four consecutive indoor tournament victories in the autumn helped improve her season, but for the third consecutive year, she failed to win the Virginia Slims Championships, where she lost in the first round to Lori McNeil. Second period of dominance 1993 Graf began 1993 with four losses in her first six tournaments of the year: two to Sánchez Vicario and one each to Seles and the 36-year-old Martina Navratilova. Seles defeated Graf at the Australian Open 4–6, 6–3, 6–2. She struggled at the German Open in Berlin where she lost a 6–0 set to the unheralded Sabine Hack before defeating Mary Joe Fernández and Sabatini in three-set matches to claim her seventh title there in eight years. During a quarterfinal match between Seles and Magdalena Maleeva in Hamburg, Seles was stabbed between the shoulder blades by a mentally ill German fan of Graf, Günter Parche. He claimed that he committed the attack to help Graf reclaim the world No. 1 ranking. More than two years elapsed before Seles competed again. Shortly after the stabbing, during a players meeting at the Italian Open in Rome, 17 of the world's top 25 WTA members voted against preserving Seles' world No. 1 ranking while she was sidelined. Since Graf skipped the Italian Open, she did not take part in the vote. During Seles's absence, Graf won 65 of 67 matches, three of four Grand Slam events and the year-end Virginia Slims championships. She won her first French Open title since 1988 with a three-set victory over Mary Joe Fernández in the final. Fernandez had two break points to take a 3–0 and double break lead in the third set. The win elevated Graf to the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in 22 months. At Wimbledon, Graf defeated Jana Novotná to win her third consecutive, and fifth overall, ladies' title. In the third and deciding set, Novotná had a point to go up 5–1 on her serve. After breaking Novotná's serve, Graf won the next four games to take the match 7–6, 1–6, 6–4. Graf had a bone splinter in her right foot during this tournament (and for the next few months), finally resulting in surgery on 4 October. In the meantime, she lost surprisingly to Nicole Bradtke of Australia in a Fed Cup match on clay before winning the Acura Classic in San Diego and the Canadian Open in Toronto in preparation for the US Open. She won there, comfortably beating Helena Suková in the final after needing three sets to eliminate Gabriela Sabatini and Manuela Maleeva-Fragniere in the quarterfinals and semifinals respectively. In the fall, Graf won the Volkswagen Card Cup in Leipzig a day before her foot operation, losing only two games to Jana Novotná in the final. Graf lost to Conchita Martínez in her comeback tournament a month later in Philadelphia. However, she finished her year with a highlight, winning her first Virginia Slims Championships since 1989 by beating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final despite needing painkillers for a back injury. 1994 Seemingly free of injury for the first time in years, Graf began the year by winning the Australian Open, where she defeated Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final with the loss of only two games. Graf later stated it was the best tennis she had ever played in a Grand Slam final. She then won her next four tournaments in Tokyo, Indian Wells, Delray Beach and Miami respectively. In the Miami final, she lost her first set of the year—to Natasha Zvereva—after winning 54 consecutive sets. In the Hamburg final, she lost for the first time in 1994 after 36 consecutive match victories, losing to Sánchez Vicario in three sets. She then won her eighth German Open, but there were signs that her form was worsening as she almost lost to Julie Halard in a quarterfinal. As the defending champion Graf lost in straight sets to Mary Pierce in the French Open semifinal. This was followed by a first-round straight-sets loss at Wimbledon to Lori McNeil, her only loss at Wimbledon between 1991 and 1997 and her first loss in a first round Grand Slam tournament in ten years. Graf still managed to win San Diego the following month but aggravated a long-time back injury in beating Sánchez Vicario in the final. Graf developed a bone spur at the base of her spine due to a congenital condition of the sacroiliac joint. She began to wear a back brace and was unsure about playing the US Open but elected to play while receiving treatment and stretching for two hours before each match. She made it to the final and took the first set against Sánchez Vicario but lost the next two sets — Sanchez Vicario's last victory over Graf. In the middle of the second set, Graf suffered back spasms while reaching for a ball in the ad court. She took the following nine weeks off, returning only for the Virginia Slims Championships where she lost in straight sets to Pierce in the quarterfinal. Although Graf ended the year ranked No. 1 on the computer the ITF named Sanchez Vicario its World Champion for the year, while the WTA backed their official rankings and named Graf. 1995 A strained right calf muscle forced Graf to withdraw from the Australian Open. She came back in February, winning four consecutive tournaments in Paris, Delray Beach, Miami and Houston. She then beat Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both the French Open and Wimbledon. The 1995 Wimbledon final is regarded as one of the most dramatic women's major finals in history as Graf and Sánchez Vicario battled in a tight third set that included a 16-minute long, 13-deuce game on Sanchez Vicario's serve at 5–5. In August Monica Seles made her much anticipated return to tennis at the Canadian Open. It was decided to grant her a joint number-one ranking with Graf who took her first loss of the year in the first round to Amanda Coetzer. The US Open was Monica Seles's first Grand Slam event since the 1993 attack, with much anticipation again around a potential Seles-Graf final. After surviving a scare in a three-setter against Amanda Coetzer in the first round, Graf reached the final with relative ease, while Seles went through her side of the draw in even more convincing fashion. Seles and Graf met in the final, with Graf winning in three sets, saving a set point in the first set. Graf then capped the year by beating countrywoman Anke Huber in a five-set final at the season-ending WTA Championships in 2 hours and 46 minutes. Tax issues In personal terms, 1995 was a difficult year for Graf, as she was accused by German authorities of tax evasion in the early years of her career. In her defense, she stated that her father Peter was her financial manager, and all financial matters relating to her earnings at the time had been under his control. Her father was arrested in August and was sentenced to 45 months in jail. He was eventually released after serving 25 months. Prosecutors dropped their case against Graf in 1997, when she agreed to pay a fine of 1.3 million Deutsche Marks to the government and an unspecified charity. 1996 Graf again missed the Australian Open after undergoing surgery in December 1995 to remove bone splinters from her left foot. Graf came back to the tour in March, winning back to back titles in Indian Wells and Miami, followed by a record ninth title at the German Open in May and a quarterfinal defeat in Rome against Martina Hingis. She then successfully defended the three Grand Slam titles she won the year before. In a close French Open final, Graf again overcame Sánchez Vicario, taking the third set 10–8. Graf had led 4–1 in the second set tiebreak, only to lose six points in a row and force a decider. Twice in the third set Sánchez Vicario served for the championship but was broken each time by Graf. It was the longest French Open women's singles final in history, both in terms of time (3 hours and 3 minutes) and number of games played (40). Graf then had a straight-sets win against Sánchez Vicario in the Wimbledon final. That was the last competitive match Graf and Sánchez Vicario would ever play against one another. In July, a left knee injury forced Graf to withdraw from the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Graf played only one warm-up event ahead of the US Open, the Acura Classic in Manhattan Beach, California, where she lost to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinals. She then successfully defended her title at the US Open, defeating Monica Seles in the final. Her toughest battle came against rising star Martina Hingis in the semifinal, with Hingis unable to convert on five set points. Graf did not lose a set the whole tournament. She also won her fifth and final WTA Tour Championships title with a five set win over Martina Hingis, with Hingis cramping up in the fifth set. In 1988, Graf became only the second tennis player in history to win a Slam on hardcourt, clay, and grass all in the same season. She repeated the feat in 1993, 1995, and 1996. Final years on the tour: 1997–99 The last few years of Graf's career were beset by injuries, particularly to her knees and back. She lost the world No. 1 ranking to Martina Hingis and failed to win a Grand Slam title for the first time in ten years in 1997. That year Graf lost in the fourth round of the Australian Open in straight sets to Amanda Coetzer. She subsequently withdrew from the Pan Pacific Open and had arthroscopic surgery performed on her left knee. After several months injury lay off, Graf returned to play in the German Open in Berlin in front of a home crowd and had the worst defeat of her career in the quarterfinal, when Amanda Coetzer beat her in just 56 minutes 6–0, 6–1. In the French Open Graf was again beaten by Amanda Coetzer in straight sets, 6–1, 6–4. Only one week later, she underwent reconstructive knee surgery in Vienna and subsequently missed the 1997 Wimbledon and US Open championships. The treatment was for a fracture of the cartilage as well as a shortening and partial rupture of the patellar tendon of her left knee. After missing almost half of the tour in 1998, Graf lost in the third round at Wimbledon and in the fourth round at the US Open. Shortly after the US Open, she underwent surgery to remove a bone spur in her right wrist. Upon her return Graf defeated world No. 2 Hingis and world No. 1 Lindsay Davenport en route to the Philadelphia title. At the first round of the season-ending Chase Championships, Graf defeated world No. 3, Jana Novotná, before losing in the semifinal to first-seeded Davenport. At the beginning of 1999 Graf played the warm up event to the Australian Open in Sydney; she defeated Serena Williams in the second round and Venus in the quarterfinals before losing to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinal. Graf then went on to reach the quarterfinals of the Australian Open before losing to Monica Seles in two sets. In Indian Wells Graf lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At the French Open, Graf reached her first Grand Slam final in three years and fought back from a set and twice from a break down in the second set to defeat the top ranked Hingis in three sets for a memorable victory. Graf became the first player in the open era to defeat the first, second, and third ranked players in the same Grand Slam tournament by beating second-ranked Davenport in the quarterfinals and third-ranked Seles in the semifinals. Graf said after the final that it would be her last French Open, fueling speculation about her retirement. Graf then reached her ninth Wimbledon singles final, losing to third-seeded Davenport in straight sets. She had to overcome three difficult three set matches en route to this final, against Mariaan De Swardt in the third round, Venus Williams in the quarterfinals and Mirjana Lučić in the semifinals. On 13 August 1999, shortly after retiring with a strained hamstring from a second round match against Amy Frazier in San Diego, Graf announced her retirement from the women's tour at age 30. She was ranked No. 3 at that time and said, "I have done everything I wanted to do in tennis. I feel I have nothing left to accomplish. The weeks following Wimbledon [in 1999] weren't easy for me. I was not having fun anymore. After Wimbledon, for the first time in my career, I didn't feel like going to a tournament. My motivation wasn't what it was in the past." Doubles career From the beginning of her career until 1990, Graf regularly played doubles events in Grand Slams and other tournaments, winning a total of eleven titles. In 1986, she formed a partnership with rival Gabriela Sabatini. The pair was moderately successful, winning the 1988 Wimbledon Championships together and reaching the finals of the French Open in 1986, 1987 and 1989. The partnership was the subject of much discussion, as the two women, both known to be shy, usually kept communication to a minimum during changeovers and between points, a highly unusual situation in doubles. Sabatini said of the partnership: "doubles is all about communicating with each other, and we didn't communicate that much. We would just say the basic things, but nothing else." The pair played their last major tournament together at the 1990 Wimbledon Championships, losing in the quarterfinals. From 1991 until the end of her career, Graf would only play doubles sporadically, forming short-term partnerships with a variety of players, including Lori McNeil, Anke Huber and her best friends on the tour, Rennae Stubbs, Patricia Tarabini and Ines Gorrochategui. She played her last Grand Slam doubles tournament at the 1999 Australian Open with Gorrochategui, losing in the second round. Graf also occasionally played mixed doubles, although she never won a title. She partnered with doubles specialist Mark Woodforde at the Australian Open in 1994, with Henri Leconte at Wimbledon in 1991 and at the French Open in 1994, and with Charlie Pasarell at the US Open in 1984. In an unusual arrangement, she paired with her coaches Pavel Složil at Wimbledon in 1988 and Heinz Günthardt in 1992 and 1996, also at Wimbledon. At the 1999 Wimbledon Championships, Graf formed a much-publicized partnership with John McEnroe, with whom she reached the semifinals before withdrawing due to concerns that her uncertain hamstring, coupled with a bout of bronchitis, would affect her in the singles final. Post-career exhibition matches In late 1999 and early 2000, as part of her Farewell Tour, Graf played a series of exhibition matches against former rivals in New Zealand, Japan, Spain, Germany and South Africa. She played Jelena Dokic in Christchurch, New Zealand, Amanda Coetzer in Durban, South Africa, and her former rival Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in Zaragoza, Spain. It was Graf and Sánchez Vicario's first head-to-head meeting since 1996. In February 2000, Graf played against Kimiko Date at Nagoya Rainbow Hall in Tokyo, winning in three sets. In September 2004, Graf dispatched her former doubles partner Gabriela Sabatini, in straight sets, in an exhibition match played in Berlin, Germany. She was also in Berlin to host a charity gala, as well as inaugurating a tennis stadium renamed the "Steffi Graf Stadion". Proceeds from her match against Sabatini went to Graf's foundation, "Children for Tomorrow". In July 2005, Graf competed in one tie of World Team Tennis (WTT) on the Houston Wranglers team. She was beaten in two out of three matches, with each match being one set. Graf lost her singles match to Elena Likhovtseva 5–4. She teamed with Ansley Cargill in women's doubles against Anna Kournikova and Likhovtseva but lost 5–2. She was successful, however, in the mixed doubles match. Graf completely ruled out a return to professional tennis. In October, Graf defeated Sabatini in an exhibition match in Mannheim, Germany, winning both of their sets. Like the exhibition match the previous year against Sabatini, proceeds went to "Children for Tomorrow". In 2008 Graf lost an exhibition match against Kimiko Date at Ariake Colosseum in Tokyo. As part of the event, billed as "Dream Match 2008", she defeated Martina Navratilova in a one-set affair 8–7, with Graf winning a tiebreaker 10–5. It was the first time in 14 years Graf had played Navratilova. Graf played a singles exhibition match against Kim Clijsters and a mixed doubles exhibition alongside husband Andre Agassi against Tim Henman and Clijsters as part of a test event and celebration for the newly installed roof over Wimbledon's Centre Court in 2009. She lost a lengthy one-set singles match to Clijsters and also the mixed doubles. In 2010, Graf participated in the WTT Smash Hits exhibition in Washington, D.C. to support the Elton John AIDS Foundation. She and Agassi, her husband, were on Team Elton John, which competed against Team Billie Jean King. Graf played in the celebrity doubles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles before straining her left calf muscle and being replaced by Anna Kournikova. Summary of career Graf won seven singles titles at Wimbledon, six singles titles at the French Open, five singles titles at the US Open, and four singles titles at the Australian Open. Her overall record in 56 Grand Slam events was 278–32 (90 percent) (84–10 at the French Open, 74–7 at Wimbledon, 73–9 at the US Open, and 47–6 at the Australian Open). Her career prize-money earnings totalled US$21,895,277 (a record until Lindsay Davenport surpassed this amount in January 2008). Her singles win/loss record was 900–115 (88.7 percent). She was ranked world No. 1 for 186 consecutive weeks (from August 1987 to March 1991; tied with Serena Williams, a record in the women's game) and a record total 377 weeks overall. Career statistics Grand Slam tournament performance timeline Note: Graf's semifinal match at the 1988 US Open was walkover (so not counted as win) Grand Slam tournament finals Singles: 31 (22 titles, 9 runner-ups) Doubles: 4 (1 title, 3 runner-ups) Records These records were attained in Open Era of tennis. Records in bold indicate Open Era peer-less achievements. Playing style The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fräulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Složil and Heinz Günthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to , making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. Equipment and endorsements Early in her career, Graf wore Dunlop apparel, before signing an endorsement contract with Adidas in 1985. She had an Adidas sneakers line known as the St. Graf Pro line. Early in her career, Graf used the Dunlop Maxpower Pro and Maxpower Kevlar racquets and then played with the Max 200G racquet from 1984 to 1993 before switching to Wilson from 1994 to 1999. She first used the Wilson Pro Staff 7.0 lite, then switched to the Pro Staff 7.5 in 1996 and to the Pro Staff 7.1 in 1998. Graf's racquets were strung at 29 kilograms (64 pounds), significantly above the 50-60 pound range recommended by Wilson. In 2006, she signed an endorsement deal with Head. In 2010, Graf and Agassi collaborated with Head and developed the new line of Star Series tennis racquets. Graf has signed many endorsement deals throughout the years including a ten-year endorsement deal with car manufacturer Opel in 1985, and Rexona from 1994 to 1998. Other companies she has endorsed include Barilla, Apollinaris, Citibank, Danone and Teekanne. She has appeared in many advertisements and television commercials with Andre Agassi including Canon Inc. and Longines in 2008 (Agassi became Longines ambassador in 2007). In 2015, she was appointed as the brand ambassador of Kerala tourism, for promoting Ayurveda in North America and Europe. Personal life In 1997, she left the Catholic Church, citing personal reasons. During her career, Graf divided her time between her hometown of Brühl; Boca Raton, Florida; and New York City where she owned a penthouse in the former Police Headquarters Building in SoHo. From 1992 to 1999, Graf dated racing driver Michael Bartels. She started dating Andre Agassi after the 1999 French Open and they married on 22 October 2001, with only their mothers as witnesses. They have two children, a son born in 2001 and a daughter born in 2003. Agassi has said that he and Graf are not pushing their children toward becoming tennis players. The Graf-Agassi family resides in Summerlin, a community in the Las Vegas Valley. Graf's mother and her brother also live there. In 1991, the Steffi Graf Youth Tennis Center in Leipzig was dedicated to her. She is the founder and chairperson of "Children for Tomorrow", a non-profit foundation established in 1998 for implementing and developing projects to support children who have been traumatized by war or other crises. In 2001, Graf indicated that she preferred to be called Stefanie instead of Steffi. On 30 November 2013, Graf's father Peter died of pancreatic cancer. He was 75 years old. Legacy In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. In March 2012, Tennis Channel picked Graf as the greatest female tennis player ever in their list of 100 greatest tennis players of all time. In November 2018, Tennis.com polled its readers to choose the greatest women's tennis player of all time and Graf came in first. In July 2020, The Guardian polled its readers to determine the greatest female tennis player of the past 50 years, and Steffi was the clear favorite, picking up nearly twice as many votes as any other player. Tennis writer Steve Flink, in his book The Greatest Tennis Matches of the Twentieth Century, named Graf as the best female player of the 20th century. Flink said in 2020 that the jury was still out on (Serena) Williams as the greatest ever, but Williams' consistency over the long span did not match that of Graf or Navratilova. Graf compiled superior career accomplishments over Serena Williams (as of December 2, 2020); 900–115 career record (88.7 win %) versus 843–147 career record (85.2 win %), 107 career tournament victories versus 72 career tournament victories, 377 total weeks ranked as world No. One versus 319 total weeks ranked as world No. One. While Graf's 22 Grand Slam wins is one fewer than Williams' 23 (and two fewer than Margaret Court's 24), Graf's professional career is eight years shorter than Williams, plus Graf also faced much tougher competition during her era (Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Gabriela Sabatini, and Monica Seles) compared to Williams. However, with the stabbing of Monica Seles in 1993, some have questioned its impact on Graf's career statistics and legacy. Awards and honours Graf was voted the ITF World Champion in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1995 and 1996. She was voted the WTA Player of the Year in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996. She was elected as the German Sportsperson of the Year in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1999. In 2004, the Berliner Tennis-Arena was renamed Steffi-Graf-Stadion in honor of Graf. Graf was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004 and the German Sports Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2015, Graf was the recipient of the International Club's Jean Borotra Sportsmanship Award. See also Graf–Navratilova rivalry Graf–Sabatini rivalry Graf–Seles rivalry List of female tennis players List of tennis rivalries Overall tennis records - women's singles Tennis records of the Open Era - women's singles References External links Official Wimbledon profile BBC profile ESPN biography Steffi Graf's victories German female tennis players International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees 1969 births Living people Australian Open (tennis) champions French Open champions German emigrants to the United States Hopman Cup competitors Olympic medalists in tennis Olympic bronze medalists for West Germany Olympic gold medalists for West Germany Olympic silver medalists for Germany Olympic tennis players of Germany Olympic tennis players of West Germany Sportspeople from Mannheim Recipients of the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of Baden-Württemberg Recipients of the Olympic Order Tennis players at the 1984 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1988 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1992 Summer Olympics US Open (tennis) champions West German expatriates in the United States Wimbledon champions World No. 1 tennis players Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's singles Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's doubles Recipients of the Silver Laurel Leaf German philanthropists German women philanthropists Medalists at the 1988 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics People from SoHo, Manhattan Andre Agassi Tennis people from Baden-Württemberg	true	[ "World No. 1 Simona Halep won her first Grand Slam title, defeating Sloane Stephens in the final, 3–6, 6–4, 6–1 to win the women's singles tennis title at the 2018 French Open. She became the second Romanian woman to win a Grand Slam title in Women's Singles after the 1978 French Open champion Virginia Ruzici. She also became the sixth woman to win both the senior and junior title, having won the latter in 2008.\n\nHalep retained the WTA no. 1 singles ranking after defeating fellow contender Garbiñe Muguruza in the semifinals. In addition to Halep and Muguruza, Caroline Wozniacki, Elina Svitolina, Karolína Plíšková and Caroline Garcia were also in contention for the top ranking at the start of the tournament. \n\nJeļena Ostapenko was the defending champion, but was defeated in the first round by Kateryna Kozlova, making her only the second French Open champion (after Anastasia Myskina in 2005) to lose in the first round of her title defense.\n\nThis was the first Grand Slam singles appearance for future French Open champion Barbora Krejčíková.\n\nThis was the final appearance of 2010 champion Francesca Schiavone in a Grand Slam tournament, and she lost to Viktória Kužmová in the first round; she would announce her retirement months later.\n\nThis tournament marked the first time that Agnieszka Radwańska did not play in the main draw of a Grand Slam singles event since her debut at the 2006 Wimbledon Championships, ending a streak of 47 consecutive appearances. \n\nThis was Serena Williams' first Grand Slam appearance since the 2017 Australian Open and giving birth to her daughter in September 2017. She was unseeded in a Grand Slam singles event for the first time since the 2007 Australian Open. Williams was attempting to equal Margaret Court's all-time record of 24 Grand Slam singles titles. She was also attempting to become only the second player, after Steffi Graf, to complete a quadruple career Grand Slam, however she withdrew before her fourth round match against Maria Sharapova due to a pectoral muscle injury, ending her streak of 10 consecutive major quarterfinals dating back to the 2014 US Open (she did not play between the 2017 French Open and 2018 Australian Open due to pregnancy and maternity leave).\n\nThis was also the final French Open appearance of former World No. 1 and two time (2012, 2014) champion Maria Sharapova. She lost to former World No. 1 and the 2016 champion Garbiñe Muguruza in the quarterfinals.\n\nSeeds\n\nQualifying\n\nDraw\n\nFinals\n\nTop half\n\nSection 1\n\nSection 2\n\nSection 3\n\nSection 4\n\nBottom half\n\nSection 5\n\nSection 6\n\nSection 7\n\nSection 8\n\nChampionship match statistics\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n2018 French Open – Women's draws and results at the International Tennis Federation\n\nWomen's Singles\nFrench Open by year – Women's singles\nFrench Open - Women's Singles", "This is a list of the main career statistics of Swiss former professional tennis player Martina Hingis.\n\nSignificant finals\n\nGrand Slam finals\n\nSingles: 12 finals (5 titles, 7 runner-ups)\n\nDoubles: 16 finals (13 titles, 3 runner-ups)\nBy winning the 1998 US Open title, Hingis completed the doubles Career Grand Slam. She became the 17th female player in history to achieve this.\n\nMixed doubles: 7 finals (7 titles)\nBy winning the 2016 French Open title, Hingis completed the mixed doubles Career Grand Slam. She became the 7th female player in history to achieve this.\n\nOlympics\n\nDoubles (1 silver medal)\n\nWTA Tour Championships\n\nSingles: 4 finals (2 titles, 2 runner-ups)\n\n(i) = Indoor\n\nDoubles: 3 finals (3 titles)\n\nTier I / Premier Mandatory & Premier 5 finals\n\nSingles: 27 finals (17 titles, 10 runner-ups)\n\nDoubles: 35 (26 titles, 9 runner-ups)\n\nWTA finals\n\nSingles: 69 (43 titles, 25 runner-ups)\n\nDoubles: 86 (64 titles, 22 runner-ups)\n\nTeam competition: 3 (1 title, 2 runner-ups)\n\nITF Circuit finals\n\nSingles: 3 finals (2 titles, 1 runner-up)\n\nDoubles: 1 final (1 title)\n\nJunior Grand Slam tournament finals\n\nSingles: 4 finals (3 titles, 1 runner-up)\n\nDoubles: 1 final (1 title)\n\nPerformance timelines\n\nSingles \n\n1 Including Fed Cup 2015 (0–2); Fed Cup record at least World Group II: 10–2\n2 If ITF women's circuit (Hardcourt: 12–2; Carpet: 6–1) and Fed Cup (10–2) participations are included, overall win–loss record stands at 548–135.\n\nDoubles\nOnly Main Draw results in WTA Tour, Grand Slam Tournaments and Olympic Games (no Fed Cup) are included in Win–Loss records.\n\nThis table is current through the 2017 WTA Finals.\n\nMixed doubles\n\nFed Cup\nLevels of Fed Cup in which Switzerland did not compete in a particular year are marked \"Not Participating\" or \"NP\".\n\nWTA tour career earnings \n\n*: As of: 20 March 2017\n\nCareer Grand Slam seedings\n\nHead-to-head vs. top 10 ranked players\n\nTop 10 wins\n\nLongest winning streaks\n\n37-match win streak (1997)\n\n26-match Grand Slam win streak (1997-98)\n\nExternal links \n \n \n \n \n\nHingis, Martina" ]
[ "Steffi Graf", "Playing style", "What did Steffi play?", "I don't know.", "what was her play style?", "The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork.", "what else represented her play style?", "Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable:", "why did she use this style?", "As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy.", "did she break any records?", "Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam", "what year did she win the Grand Slam?", "1990s," ]	C_d0e9bc4e72184f1fb6ceb489ddce9e70_0	Did she win any other tournaments?	7	Did Steffi win any other tournaments other than 1990 Grand Slam?	Steffi Graf	The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Slozil and Heinz Gunthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to 174 km/h (108 mph), making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. CANNOTANSWER	she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open.	Stefanie Maria "Steffi" Graf ( , ; born 14 June 1969) is a German former professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 1 for a record 377 weeks and won 22 major singles titles, the second-most since the start of the Open Era in 1968 and third-most of all-time behind Margaret Court (24) and Serena Williams (23). In 1988, she became the first tennis player to achieve the Golden Slam by winning all four Grand Slam singles titles and the Olympic gold medal in the same calendar year. Furthermore, she is the only tennis player, male or female, to have won each major at least four times. Graf was ranked singles world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for a record 377 total weeks: the longest period for which any player, male or female, has held the singles number-one ranking since the WTA and the Association of Tennis Professionals began issuing rankings. She won 107 singles titles, which ranks her third on the WTA's all-time list after Martina Navratilova (167 titles) and Chris Evert (157 titles). She and Margaret Court are the only players, male or female, to win three majors in a calendar year five times (1988, 1989, 1993, 1995 and 1996). Notable features of Graf's game were her versatility across all playing surfaces, footwork and powerful forehand drive. Graf's athletic ability and aggressive game played from the baseline have been credited with developing the modern style of play that has come to dominate today's game. She won six French Open singles titles (second to Evert), seven Wimbledon singles titles, four Australian Open titles, and five U.S. Open singles titles. She is the only singles player (male or female) to have achieved a Grand Slam since the hard court was introduced as a playing surface, replacing grass, at the US Open in 1978. Graf's Grand Slam was achieved on grass, clay, and hard court while the previous five singles Grand Slams were achieved on only grass and clay. Graf reached 13 consecutive singles major finals, from the 1987 French Open through to the 1990 French Open, winning nine of them. She won five consecutive singles majors (1988 Australian Open to 1989 Australian Open), and seven out of eight, in two calendar years (1988 Australian Open to 1989 US Open, except 1989 French Open). She reached a total of 31 singles major finals. Graf retired at the age of 30 in 1999 while she was ranked world No. 3. She is regarded as one of the greatest female tennis players of all time. Martina Navratilova included Graf at the top of her list of the greatest players ever. In the year of Graf's retirement, Billie Jean King said, "Steffi [Graf] is definitely the greatest women's tennis player of all time." In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. She married former world No. 1 men's tennis player Andre Agassi in October 2001. They have two children. Graf was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004. Along with Boris Becker, Graf was considered instrumental in popularizing tennis in Germany, where it remains one of the foremost national sports. Early life Stefanie Graf was born on 14 June 1969, in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany, to Heidi Schalk and car-and-insurance salesman Peter Graf (18 June 1938 − 30 November 2013). When she was nine years old, her family moved to the neighboring town of Brühl. She has a younger brother, Michael. Her father, an aspiring tennis coach, first introduced her to the game, teaching his three-year-old daughter how to swing a wooden racket in the family's living room. She began practising on a court at the age of four and played in her first tournament at five. She soon began taking the top prize at junior tournaments with regularity, going on to win the European Championships 12s and 18s in 1982. Career Early career Graf played in her first professional tournament in October 1982 at Filderstadt, Germany. She lost her first round match 6–4, 6–0 to Tracy Austin, a two-time US Open champion and former world No. 1 player. (Twelve years later, Graf defeated Austin 6–0, 6–0 during a second round match at the Evert Cup in Indian Wells, California, which was their second and last match against each other.) At the start of her first full professional year in 1983, Graf was 13 years old and ranked world No. 124. She won no titles during the next three years, but her ranking climbed steadily to world No. 98 in 1983, No. 22 in 1984, and No. 6 in 1985. In 1984, she first gained international attention when she almost upset the tenth seed, Jo Durie of the United Kingdom, in a fourth round Centre Court match at Wimbledon. In August as a 15-year-old (and youngest entrant) representing West Germany, she won the tennis demonstration event at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. No medals were awarded as this was not an official Olympic event. Graf's schedule was closely controlled by her father, who limited her play so that she would not burn out. In 1985, for instance, she played only ten events leading up to the US Open, whereas another up-and-coming star, Gabriela Sabatini of Argentina, who was a year younger than Graf, played 21. Peter Graf also kept a tight rein on Graf's personal life. Social invitations on the tour were often declined as Graf's focus was kept on practicing and match play. Working with her father and then-coach Pavel Složil, Graf typically practiced for up to four hours a day, often heading straight from airports to practice courts. This narrow focus meant that Graf, already shy and retiring by nature, made few friends on the tour in her early years, but it led to a steady improvement in her play. In 1985 and early 1986, Graf emerged as the top challenger to the dominance of Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert. During that period, she lost six times to Evert and three times to Navratilova, all in straight sets. She did not win a tournament but consistently reached tournament finals, semifinals and quarterfinals, with the highlight being her semifinal loss to Navratilova at the US Open. On 13 April 1986, Graf won her first WTA tournament and beat Evert for the first time in the final of the Family Circle Cup in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (She never lost to Evert again, beating her six more times over the next three and a half years.) Graf then won her next three tournaments at Amelia Island, Charleston, and Berlin, culminating in a 6–2, 6–3 defeat of Navratilova in the final of the latter. Illness caused her to miss Wimbledon, and an accident where she broke a toe several weeks later also curtailed her play. She returned to win a small tournament at Mahwah just before the US Open where, in one of the most anticipated matches of the year, she encountered Navratilova in a semifinal. The match was played over two days with Navratilova finally winning after saving three match points 6–1, 6–7, 7–6. Graf then won three consecutive indoor titles at Tokyo, Zurich, and Brighton, before once again contending with Navratilova at the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships in New York. This time, Navratilova beat Graf 7–6, 6–3, 6–2. Breakthrough year: 1987 Graf's Grand Slam tournament breakthrough came in 1987. She started the year strongly, with six tournament victories heading into the French Open, with the highlight being at the tournament in Miami, where she defeated Martina Navratilova in a semifinal and Chris Evert in the final and lost only 20 games in the seven rounds of the tournament. In the French Open final, Graf defeated Navratilova, who was the world No. 1, 6–4, 4–6, 8–6 after beating Sabatini in a three-set semifinal. Graf then lost to Navratilova 7–5, 6–3 in the Wimbledon final, her first loss of the year. However, in the Federation Cup final in Vancouver, Canada, three weeks later, she defeated Evert easily 6–2, 6–1. The US Open ended anti-climactically as Navratilova defeated Graf in the final 7–6, 6–1. Graf had a win-loss record of 75-2 for a 97.4 winning percentage in 1987, both losses coming to Navratilova as they split the four matches they played during the year. On 17 August, after defeating Evert in a straight set final in the Virginia Slims of Los Angeles, Graf overtook Navratilova for the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in her career, a ranking she would hold for the next 186 consecutive weeks, a record (it was tied by Serena Williams in 2016). Graf was the first player other than Navratilova or Evert to hold the top spot since Tracy Austin in 1980. Golden Slam: 1988 Graf started 1988 by winning the Australian Open, defeating Chris Evert in the final 6–1, 7–6. Graf did not lose a set during the tournament and lost a total of only 29 games. Graf lost twice to Sabatini during the spring, once on hardcourts in Boca Raton, Florida, and once on clay at Amelia Island, Florida. Graf, however, won the tournament in San Antonio, Texas, and retained her title in Miami, where she once again defeated Evert in the final. Graf then won the tournament in Berlin, losing only twelve games in five matches. At the French Open, Graf successfully defended her title by defeating Natasha Zvereva 6–0, 6–0 in a 34-minute final. The official time of the match given on the scoresheet was 34 minutes; however, just 32 minutes of that was spent on the court, as a rain break split the match into two periods of play, of nine and 23 minutes. That was the shortest-ever and most one-sided Grand Slam final ever and the only double bagel in a Major final since 1911. Zvereva, who had eliminated Martina Navratilova in the fourth round, won only thirteen points in the match. Next came Wimbledon, where Martina Navratilova had won six straight titles. Graf was trailing Martina Navratilova in the final 7–5, 2–0 before winning the match 5–7, 6–2, 6–1. She then won tournaments in Hamburg and Mahwah (where she lost only eight games all tournament). At the US Open, Graf beat Sabatini in a three-set final to win the Grand Slam by 6–3, 3–6, 6–1, a feat previously performed by only two other women, Maureen Connolly Brinker in 1953 and Margaret Court in 1970. Graf's 1988 Grand Slam remains the only one in history completed on three surfaces (grass, clay, hard court), as all other Grand Slams in tennis history were achieved prior to the introduction of hard court at the US Open in 1978. In reaching and winning all four Grand Slam finals, Graf became the first player in history to contest and win 28 Grand Slam singles matches in a single year; albeit including the unplayed walkover against Evert in the US Open. Even discounting that result, no other player had played and won 27 Grand Slam matches in a single year before and the feat has to date only been matched by Novak Djokovic since, in both 2015 and 2021, when he failed in both bids to win the Grand Slam. Graf then defeated Sabatini 6–3, 6–3 in the gold medal match at the Olympic Games in Seoul and achieved what the media had dubbed the "Golden Slam". Graf also won her only Grand Slam doubles title that year—at Wimbledon partnering Sabatini—and picked up a women's doubles Olympic bronze medal. Graf was the first tennis player to achieve the feat: wheelchair tennis players Diede de Groot and Dylan Alcott achieved the Golden Slam in 2021. At the year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf was upset by Pam Shriver, only her third loss of the year. The loss deprived her of the Golden Super Slam. She was named the 1988 BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year. At the end of the year, the municipality of Brühl, her hometown, gave her the title of honorary citizen. New challengers and personal challenges 1989 Speculation was rife at the beginning of 1989 about the possibility of Graf winning another Grand Slam. Some noted observers, such as Margaret Court, suggested that Graf could achieve the feat a couple more times. And the year began as expected, with Graf extending her Grand Slam tournament winning streak to five events at the Australian Open, defeating Helena Suková in the final. Her 6–3, 6–0 defeat of Gabriela Sabatini in a semifinal was described by veteran observer Ted Tinling as "probably the best tennis I've seen". He went on to add, "I saw what Steffi did to Sabatini at the Australian Open this year, and that was it. She is better than them all." Graf followed this with easy victories in her next four tournaments at Washington, D.C., San Antonio, Texas, Boca Raton, Florida, and Hilton Head. The Washington, D.C. tournament was notable because Graf won the first twenty points of the final against Zina Garrison. In the Boca Raton final, Graf lost the only set she conceded to Chris Evert in their final seven matches. In the subsequent Amelia Island final on clay, Graf lost her first match of the year to Sabatini but returned to European clay with easy victories at Hamburg and Berlin. Graf's Grand Slam tournament winning streak ended at the French Open, where 17-year-old Spaniard Arantxa Sánchez Vicario beat Graf in three sets. Graf served for the match at 5–3 in the third set but lost the game and won only three more points in the match. Suffering from food poisoning, she had struggled to beat Monica Seles in their semifinal 6–3, 3–6, 6–3 and said that she had menstrual cramps in the final. Graf, however, recovered to defeat Martina Navratilova 6–2, 6–7, 6–1 in the Wimbledon final after defeating Monica Seles 6–0, 6–1 in a fourth round match, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in a quarterfinal, and Chris Evert in a semifinal. Graf warmed up for the US Open with easy tournament victories in San Diego and Mahwah. In her semifinal match at the US Open, Graf defeated Sabatini 3–6, 6–4, 6–2. The match was notable for its dramatic ending. Having suffered from leg cramps since the middle of the third set, Graf ran off the court seconds after match point to seek medical treatment. In the final, Navratilova led 6–3, 4–2 before Graf rallied to win 3–6, 7–5, 6–1 for her third Grand Slam singles title of the year. Victories at Zurich and Brighton preceded the Virginia Slims Championships, where Graf cemented her top-ranked status by beating Navratilova in the four-set final. Graf ended 1989 with an 86–2 match record and the loss of only 12 sets. Her 0.977 winning percentage is the second-highest in the open era behind Navratilova. 1990 Graf defeated Mary Joe Fernández in the final of the Australian Open, which was her eighth Grand Slam singles title in the last nine she contested. She survived an intense three-set battle with Helena Sukova in the semis, breaking in the tenth and final game to win the third set 6–4. Her winning streak (unbeaten since the 1989 French Open loss to Arantxa Sánchez) continued with victories in Tokyo, Amelia Island, and Hamburg. Shortly after winning in Tokyo, Graf injured her right thumb while cross-country skiing in Switzerland and subsequently withdrew from the Virginia Slims of Florida and the Lipton Championships. In Berlin, she extended her unbeaten streak to 66 matches (second in WTA history to Navratilova's 74) before losing the final to Monica Seles, 4–6, 3–6. While the Berlin tournament was being played, the largest-circulation German tabloid, Bild, ran a story about an alleged scandal involving Graf's father. The difficulty of answering questions about the matter came to a head at a Wimbledon press conference, where Graf broke down in tears. Wimbledon authorities then threatened to immediately shut down any subsequent press conferences where questions about the issue were asked. Whether this scandal affected Graf's form is open to debate. In an interview with Stern magazine in July 1990, Graf stated, "I could not fight as usual." Graf again lost to Monica Seles in the final of the French Open 6–7, 4–6. Seles was behind 2–6 in the first-set tiebreaker, but then came back to win six points in a row and take the set. At Wimbledon, Graf lost in the semifinals to Zina Garrison, who with this victory broke Graf's string of 13 consecutive major finals. This was a major upset as Garrison had to save a match point to defeat Monica Seles in the quarterfinal, and was expected to easily fall to Graf, whom she had not beaten in four years. After victories in Montreal and San Diego, Graf reached the US Open final, where she lost in straight sets to Sabatini. Graf won four indoor tournaments after the US Open, including a pair of straight-set wins over Sabatini in the finals of Zürich and Worcester. Although Sabatini got the best of Graf in the semifinals of the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf still finished the year as the top-ranked player. 1991 A mixture of injury problems, personal difficulties, and loss of form made 1991 a tough year for Graf. Seles established herself as the new dominant player on the women's tour, winning the Australian Open, French Open, and US Open and, in March, ending Graf's record 186 consecutive-weeks hold on the World No. 1 ranking. Graf briefly regained the top ranking after winning at Wimbledon but lost it again after her loss to Navratilova at the US Open. Graf lost an Australian Open quarterfinal to Jana Novotná, the first time she did not reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament since the 1986 French Open. She then lost to Sabatini in her next three tournaments before winning the U.S. Hardcourt Championships in San Antonio, beating Monica Seles in the final. After losing a fifth straight time to Sabatini in Amelia Island, Florida, Graf again defeated Seles in the Hamburg final. Following her tournament victory in German Open in Berlin, Graf suffered one of the worst defeats of her career in a French Open semifinal where she won only two games against Sánchez Vicario and lost her first 6–0 set since 1984. At Wimbledon, however, Graf captured her third women's crown, this time at Sabatini's expense. Sabatini served for the match twice, and was two points away from her first Wimbledon title. After breaking Sabatini's serve to even the third set at 6–6, Graf defeated Sabatini by winning the next two games to take the match 6–4, 3–6, 8–6. Martina Navratilova then defeated Graf 7–6, 6–7, 6–4 in a US Open semifinal, the first time she had beaten Graf in four years. Graf then won in Leipzig, with her 500th career victory coming in a quarterfinal against Judith Wiesner. After winning two more indoor tournaments at Zurich and Brighton, she failed once again in the Virginia Slims Championships, losing her quarterfinal to Novotná. Soon after, she split with her long-time coach, Pavel Složil. 1992 A bout of rubella forced Graf to miss the first major event of 1992, the Australian Open. Her year continued indifferently with losses in three of her first four tournaments, including a semifinal loss to Jana Novotná in Chicago. It was Graf's second consecutive loss to Novotna, and dating back to their 1991 Australian Open quarterfinal match, Jana had won three of their last five meetings. It would also be the last loss Graf would ever have to Novotna in a match she completed (she did have a loss after withdrawing with injury after the first set of a late 1996 match). Chicago was notable, however, for being the first tournament Graf played with her new coach, former Swiss player Heinz Günthardt. Graf's father had approached Günthardt during the 1991 Virginia Slims Championships. She would work with him for the remainder of her career. In Boca Raton, Florida, Graf reached her first final of the year, where she faced Conchita Martínez for the title. In their five previous head-to-head matches, Graf had defeated Martínez each time. Even though she lost the opening set, Graf went on to prevail in three sets. She lost twice to Sabatini in the early spring at the Lipton International and the Bausch & Lomb Championships, which now brought her to seven losses in her last eight matches against Sabatini; however, the Bausch & Lomb loss would be Graf's final loss to Sabatini, winning her next, and last eight matches against Sabatini. Victories at Hamburg and Berlin (beating Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both) prepared her for the French Open, where she defeated Sánchez Vicario in the semifinals after losing the first set 6–0. Graf then lost a closely contested final to Monica Seles, 2–6, 6–3, 8–10. Seles won the match on her fifth match point; Graf came within two points of winning the match a few games earlier. At Wimbledon, after struggling through early-round three-setters against Mariaan de Swardt and Patty Fendick, she easily defeated Natasha Zvereva in the quarterfinal, Sabatini in the semifinal, and Seles in the final, 6–2, 6–1, with Seles playing in almost complete silence because of widespread media and player criticism of her grunting. Graf then won all five of her Fed Cup matches, helping Germany defeat Spain in the final by defeating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, 6–4, 6–2. At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Graf lost to Jennifer Capriati in the final and claimed the silver medal. At the US Open, Graf was upset in the quarterfinals by Sánchez Vicario 7–6, 6–3. Four consecutive indoor tournament victories in the autumn helped improve her season, but for the third consecutive year, she failed to win the Virginia Slims Championships, where she lost in the first round to Lori McNeil. Second period of dominance 1993 Graf began 1993 with four losses in her first six tournaments of the year: two to Sánchez Vicario and one each to Seles and the 36-year-old Martina Navratilova. Seles defeated Graf at the Australian Open 4–6, 6–3, 6–2. She struggled at the German Open in Berlin where she lost a 6–0 set to the unheralded Sabine Hack before defeating Mary Joe Fernández and Sabatini in three-set matches to claim her seventh title there in eight years. During a quarterfinal match between Seles and Magdalena Maleeva in Hamburg, Seles was stabbed between the shoulder blades by a mentally ill German fan of Graf, Günter Parche. He claimed that he committed the attack to help Graf reclaim the world No. 1 ranking. More than two years elapsed before Seles competed again. Shortly after the stabbing, during a players meeting at the Italian Open in Rome, 17 of the world's top 25 WTA members voted against preserving Seles' world No. 1 ranking while she was sidelined. Since Graf skipped the Italian Open, she did not take part in the vote. During Seles's absence, Graf won 65 of 67 matches, three of four Grand Slam events and the year-end Virginia Slims championships. She won her first French Open title since 1988 with a three-set victory over Mary Joe Fernández in the final. Fernandez had two break points to take a 3–0 and double break lead in the third set. The win elevated Graf to the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in 22 months. At Wimbledon, Graf defeated Jana Novotná to win her third consecutive, and fifth overall, ladies' title. In the third and deciding set, Novotná had a point to go up 5–1 on her serve. After breaking Novotná's serve, Graf won the next four games to take the match 7–6, 1–6, 6–4. Graf had a bone splinter in her right foot during this tournament (and for the next few months), finally resulting in surgery on 4 October. In the meantime, she lost surprisingly to Nicole Bradtke of Australia in a Fed Cup match on clay before winning the Acura Classic in San Diego and the Canadian Open in Toronto in preparation for the US Open. She won there, comfortably beating Helena Suková in the final after needing three sets to eliminate Gabriela Sabatini and Manuela Maleeva-Fragniere in the quarterfinals and semifinals respectively. In the fall, Graf won the Volkswagen Card Cup in Leipzig a day before her foot operation, losing only two games to Jana Novotná in the final. Graf lost to Conchita Martínez in her comeback tournament a month later in Philadelphia. However, she finished her year with a highlight, winning her first Virginia Slims Championships since 1989 by beating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final despite needing painkillers for a back injury. 1994 Seemingly free of injury for the first time in years, Graf began the year by winning the Australian Open, where she defeated Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final with the loss of only two games. Graf later stated it was the best tennis she had ever played in a Grand Slam final. She then won her next four tournaments in Tokyo, Indian Wells, Delray Beach and Miami respectively. In the Miami final, she lost her first set of the year—to Natasha Zvereva—after winning 54 consecutive sets. In the Hamburg final, she lost for the first time in 1994 after 36 consecutive match victories, losing to Sánchez Vicario in three sets. She then won her eighth German Open, but there were signs that her form was worsening as she almost lost to Julie Halard in a quarterfinal. As the defending champion Graf lost in straight sets to Mary Pierce in the French Open semifinal. This was followed by a first-round straight-sets loss at Wimbledon to Lori McNeil, her only loss at Wimbledon between 1991 and 1997 and her first loss in a first round Grand Slam tournament in ten years. Graf still managed to win San Diego the following month but aggravated a long-time back injury in beating Sánchez Vicario in the final. Graf developed a bone spur at the base of her spine due to a congenital condition of the sacroiliac joint. She began to wear a back brace and was unsure about playing the US Open but elected to play while receiving treatment and stretching for two hours before each match. She made it to the final and took the first set against Sánchez Vicario but lost the next two sets — Sanchez Vicario's last victory over Graf. In the middle of the second set, Graf suffered back spasms while reaching for a ball in the ad court. She took the following nine weeks off, returning only for the Virginia Slims Championships where she lost in straight sets to Pierce in the quarterfinal. Although Graf ended the year ranked No. 1 on the computer the ITF named Sanchez Vicario its World Champion for the year, while the WTA backed their official rankings and named Graf. 1995 A strained right calf muscle forced Graf to withdraw from the Australian Open. She came back in February, winning four consecutive tournaments in Paris, Delray Beach, Miami and Houston. She then beat Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both the French Open and Wimbledon. The 1995 Wimbledon final is regarded as one of the most dramatic women's major finals in history as Graf and Sánchez Vicario battled in a tight third set that included a 16-minute long, 13-deuce game on Sanchez Vicario's serve at 5–5. In August Monica Seles made her much anticipated return to tennis at the Canadian Open. It was decided to grant her a joint number-one ranking with Graf who took her first loss of the year in the first round to Amanda Coetzer. The US Open was Monica Seles's first Grand Slam event since the 1993 attack, with much anticipation again around a potential Seles-Graf final. After surviving a scare in a three-setter against Amanda Coetzer in the first round, Graf reached the final with relative ease, while Seles went through her side of the draw in even more convincing fashion. Seles and Graf met in the final, with Graf winning in three sets, saving a set point in the first set. Graf then capped the year by beating countrywoman Anke Huber in a five-set final at the season-ending WTA Championships in 2 hours and 46 minutes. Tax issues In personal terms, 1995 was a difficult year for Graf, as she was accused by German authorities of tax evasion in the early years of her career. In her defense, she stated that her father Peter was her financial manager, and all financial matters relating to her earnings at the time had been under his control. Her father was arrested in August and was sentenced to 45 months in jail. He was eventually released after serving 25 months. Prosecutors dropped their case against Graf in 1997, when she agreed to pay a fine of 1.3 million Deutsche Marks to the government and an unspecified charity. 1996 Graf again missed the Australian Open after undergoing surgery in December 1995 to remove bone splinters from her left foot. Graf came back to the tour in March, winning back to back titles in Indian Wells and Miami, followed by a record ninth title at the German Open in May and a quarterfinal defeat in Rome against Martina Hingis. She then successfully defended the three Grand Slam titles she won the year before. In a close French Open final, Graf again overcame Sánchez Vicario, taking the third set 10–8. Graf had led 4–1 in the second set tiebreak, only to lose six points in a row and force a decider. Twice in the third set Sánchez Vicario served for the championship but was broken each time by Graf. It was the longest French Open women's singles final in history, both in terms of time (3 hours and 3 minutes) and number of games played (40). Graf then had a straight-sets win against Sánchez Vicario in the Wimbledon final. That was the last competitive match Graf and Sánchez Vicario would ever play against one another. In July, a left knee injury forced Graf to withdraw from the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Graf played only one warm-up event ahead of the US Open, the Acura Classic in Manhattan Beach, California, where she lost to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinals. She then successfully defended her title at the US Open, defeating Monica Seles in the final. Her toughest battle came against rising star Martina Hingis in the semifinal, with Hingis unable to convert on five set points. Graf did not lose a set the whole tournament. She also won her fifth and final WTA Tour Championships title with a five set win over Martina Hingis, with Hingis cramping up in the fifth set. In 1988, Graf became only the second tennis player in history to win a Slam on hardcourt, clay, and grass all in the same season. She repeated the feat in 1993, 1995, and 1996. Final years on the tour: 1997–99 The last few years of Graf's career were beset by injuries, particularly to her knees and back. She lost the world No. 1 ranking to Martina Hingis and failed to win a Grand Slam title for the first time in ten years in 1997. That year Graf lost in the fourth round of the Australian Open in straight sets to Amanda Coetzer. She subsequently withdrew from the Pan Pacific Open and had arthroscopic surgery performed on her left knee. After several months injury lay off, Graf returned to play in the German Open in Berlin in front of a home crowd and had the worst defeat of her career in the quarterfinal, when Amanda Coetzer beat her in just 56 minutes 6–0, 6–1. In the French Open Graf was again beaten by Amanda Coetzer in straight sets, 6–1, 6–4. Only one week later, she underwent reconstructive knee surgery in Vienna and subsequently missed the 1997 Wimbledon and US Open championships. The treatment was for a fracture of the cartilage as well as a shortening and partial rupture of the patellar tendon of her left knee. After missing almost half of the tour in 1998, Graf lost in the third round at Wimbledon and in the fourth round at the US Open. Shortly after the US Open, she underwent surgery to remove a bone spur in her right wrist. Upon her return Graf defeated world No. 2 Hingis and world No. 1 Lindsay Davenport en route to the Philadelphia title. At the first round of the season-ending Chase Championships, Graf defeated world No. 3, Jana Novotná, before losing in the semifinal to first-seeded Davenport. At the beginning of 1999 Graf played the warm up event to the Australian Open in Sydney; she defeated Serena Williams in the second round and Venus in the quarterfinals before losing to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinal. Graf then went on to reach the quarterfinals of the Australian Open before losing to Monica Seles in two sets. In Indian Wells Graf lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At the French Open, Graf reached her first Grand Slam final in three years and fought back from a set and twice from a break down in the second set to defeat the top ranked Hingis in three sets for a memorable victory. Graf became the first player in the open era to defeat the first, second, and third ranked players in the same Grand Slam tournament by beating second-ranked Davenport in the quarterfinals and third-ranked Seles in the semifinals. Graf said after the final that it would be her last French Open, fueling speculation about her retirement. Graf then reached her ninth Wimbledon singles final, losing to third-seeded Davenport in straight sets. She had to overcome three difficult three set matches en route to this final, against Mariaan De Swardt in the third round, Venus Williams in the quarterfinals and Mirjana Lučić in the semifinals. On 13 August 1999, shortly after retiring with a strained hamstring from a second round match against Amy Frazier in San Diego, Graf announced her retirement from the women's tour at age 30. She was ranked No. 3 at that time and said, "I have done everything I wanted to do in tennis. I feel I have nothing left to accomplish. The weeks following Wimbledon [in 1999] weren't easy for me. I was not having fun anymore. After Wimbledon, for the first time in my career, I didn't feel like going to a tournament. My motivation wasn't what it was in the past." Doubles career From the beginning of her career until 1990, Graf regularly played doubles events in Grand Slams and other tournaments, winning a total of eleven titles. In 1986, she formed a partnership with rival Gabriela Sabatini. The pair was moderately successful, winning the 1988 Wimbledon Championships together and reaching the finals of the French Open in 1986, 1987 and 1989. The partnership was the subject of much discussion, as the two women, both known to be shy, usually kept communication to a minimum during changeovers and between points, a highly unusual situation in doubles. Sabatini said of the partnership: "doubles is all about communicating with each other, and we didn't communicate that much. We would just say the basic things, but nothing else." The pair played their last major tournament together at the 1990 Wimbledon Championships, losing in the quarterfinals. From 1991 until the end of her career, Graf would only play doubles sporadically, forming short-term partnerships with a variety of players, including Lori McNeil, Anke Huber and her best friends on the tour, Rennae Stubbs, Patricia Tarabini and Ines Gorrochategui. She played her last Grand Slam doubles tournament at the 1999 Australian Open with Gorrochategui, losing in the second round. Graf also occasionally played mixed doubles, although she never won a title. She partnered with doubles specialist Mark Woodforde at the Australian Open in 1994, with Henri Leconte at Wimbledon in 1991 and at the French Open in 1994, and with Charlie Pasarell at the US Open in 1984. In an unusual arrangement, she paired with her coaches Pavel Složil at Wimbledon in 1988 and Heinz Günthardt in 1992 and 1996, also at Wimbledon. At the 1999 Wimbledon Championships, Graf formed a much-publicized partnership with John McEnroe, with whom she reached the semifinals before withdrawing due to concerns that her uncertain hamstring, coupled with a bout of bronchitis, would affect her in the singles final. Post-career exhibition matches In late 1999 and early 2000, as part of her Farewell Tour, Graf played a series of exhibition matches against former rivals in New Zealand, Japan, Spain, Germany and South Africa. She played Jelena Dokic in Christchurch, New Zealand, Amanda Coetzer in Durban, South Africa, and her former rival Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in Zaragoza, Spain. It was Graf and Sánchez Vicario's first head-to-head meeting since 1996. In February 2000, Graf played against Kimiko Date at Nagoya Rainbow Hall in Tokyo, winning in three sets. In September 2004, Graf dispatched her former doubles partner Gabriela Sabatini, in straight sets, in an exhibition match played in Berlin, Germany. She was also in Berlin to host a charity gala, as well as inaugurating a tennis stadium renamed the "Steffi Graf Stadion". Proceeds from her match against Sabatini went to Graf's foundation, "Children for Tomorrow". In July 2005, Graf competed in one tie of World Team Tennis (WTT) on the Houston Wranglers team. She was beaten in two out of three matches, with each match being one set. Graf lost her singles match to Elena Likhovtseva 5–4. She teamed with Ansley Cargill in women's doubles against Anna Kournikova and Likhovtseva but lost 5–2. She was successful, however, in the mixed doubles match. Graf completely ruled out a return to professional tennis. In October, Graf defeated Sabatini in an exhibition match in Mannheim, Germany, winning both of their sets. Like the exhibition match the previous year against Sabatini, proceeds went to "Children for Tomorrow". In 2008 Graf lost an exhibition match against Kimiko Date at Ariake Colosseum in Tokyo. As part of the event, billed as "Dream Match 2008", she defeated Martina Navratilova in a one-set affair 8–7, with Graf winning a tiebreaker 10–5. It was the first time in 14 years Graf had played Navratilova. Graf played a singles exhibition match against Kim Clijsters and a mixed doubles exhibition alongside husband Andre Agassi against Tim Henman and Clijsters as part of a test event and celebration for the newly installed roof over Wimbledon's Centre Court in 2009. She lost a lengthy one-set singles match to Clijsters and also the mixed doubles. In 2010, Graf participated in the WTT Smash Hits exhibition in Washington, D.C. to support the Elton John AIDS Foundation. She and Agassi, her husband, were on Team Elton John, which competed against Team Billie Jean King. Graf played in the celebrity doubles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles before straining her left calf muscle and being replaced by Anna Kournikova. Summary of career Graf won seven singles titles at Wimbledon, six singles titles at the French Open, five singles titles at the US Open, and four singles titles at the Australian Open. Her overall record in 56 Grand Slam events was 278–32 (90 percent) (84–10 at the French Open, 74–7 at Wimbledon, 73–9 at the US Open, and 47–6 at the Australian Open). Her career prize-money earnings totalled US$21,895,277 (a record until Lindsay Davenport surpassed this amount in January 2008). Her singles win/loss record was 900–115 (88.7 percent). She was ranked world No. 1 for 186 consecutive weeks (from August 1987 to March 1991; tied with Serena Williams, a record in the women's game) and a record total 377 weeks overall. Career statistics Grand Slam tournament performance timeline Note: Graf's semifinal match at the 1988 US Open was walkover (so not counted as win) Grand Slam tournament finals Singles: 31 (22 titles, 9 runner-ups) Doubles: 4 (1 title, 3 runner-ups) Records These records were attained in Open Era of tennis. Records in bold indicate Open Era peer-less achievements. Playing style The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fräulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Složil and Heinz Günthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to , making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. Equipment and endorsements Early in her career, Graf wore Dunlop apparel, before signing an endorsement contract with Adidas in 1985. She had an Adidas sneakers line known as the St. Graf Pro line. Early in her career, Graf used the Dunlop Maxpower Pro and Maxpower Kevlar racquets and then played with the Max 200G racquet from 1984 to 1993 before switching to Wilson from 1994 to 1999. She first used the Wilson Pro Staff 7.0 lite, then switched to the Pro Staff 7.5 in 1996 and to the Pro Staff 7.1 in 1998. Graf's racquets were strung at 29 kilograms (64 pounds), significantly above the 50-60 pound range recommended by Wilson. In 2006, she signed an endorsement deal with Head. In 2010, Graf and Agassi collaborated with Head and developed the new line of Star Series tennis racquets. Graf has signed many endorsement deals throughout the years including a ten-year endorsement deal with car manufacturer Opel in 1985, and Rexona from 1994 to 1998. Other companies she has endorsed include Barilla, Apollinaris, Citibank, Danone and Teekanne. She has appeared in many advertisements and television commercials with Andre Agassi including Canon Inc. and Longines in 2008 (Agassi became Longines ambassador in 2007). In 2015, she was appointed as the brand ambassador of Kerala tourism, for promoting Ayurveda in North America and Europe. Personal life In 1997, she left the Catholic Church, citing personal reasons. During her career, Graf divided her time between her hometown of Brühl; Boca Raton, Florida; and New York City where she owned a penthouse in the former Police Headquarters Building in SoHo. From 1992 to 1999, Graf dated racing driver Michael Bartels. She started dating Andre Agassi after the 1999 French Open and they married on 22 October 2001, with only their mothers as witnesses. They have two children, a son born in 2001 and a daughter born in 2003. Agassi has said that he and Graf are not pushing their children toward becoming tennis players. The Graf-Agassi family resides in Summerlin, a community in the Las Vegas Valley. Graf's mother and her brother also live there. In 1991, the Steffi Graf Youth Tennis Center in Leipzig was dedicated to her. She is the founder and chairperson of "Children for Tomorrow", a non-profit foundation established in 1998 for implementing and developing projects to support children who have been traumatized by war or other crises. In 2001, Graf indicated that she preferred to be called Stefanie instead of Steffi. On 30 November 2013, Graf's father Peter died of pancreatic cancer. He was 75 years old. Legacy In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. In March 2012, Tennis Channel picked Graf as the greatest female tennis player ever in their list of 100 greatest tennis players of all time. In November 2018, Tennis.com polled its readers to choose the greatest women's tennis player of all time and Graf came in first. In July 2020, The Guardian polled its readers to determine the greatest female tennis player of the past 50 years, and Steffi was the clear favorite, picking up nearly twice as many votes as any other player. Tennis writer Steve Flink, in his book The Greatest Tennis Matches of the Twentieth Century, named Graf as the best female player of the 20th century. Flink said in 2020 that the jury was still out on (Serena) Williams as the greatest ever, but Williams' consistency over the long span did not match that of Graf or Navratilova. Graf compiled superior career accomplishments over Serena Williams (as of December 2, 2020); 900–115 career record (88.7 win %) versus 843–147 career record (85.2 win %), 107 career tournament victories versus 72 career tournament victories, 377 total weeks ranked as world No. One versus 319 total weeks ranked as world No. One. While Graf's 22 Grand Slam wins is one fewer than Williams' 23 (and two fewer than Margaret Court's 24), Graf's professional career is eight years shorter than Williams, plus Graf also faced much tougher competition during her era (Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Gabriela Sabatini, and Monica Seles) compared to Williams. However, with the stabbing of Monica Seles in 1993, some have questioned its impact on Graf's career statistics and legacy. Awards and honours Graf was voted the ITF World Champion in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1995 and 1996. She was voted the WTA Player of the Year in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996. She was elected as the German Sportsperson of the Year in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1999. In 2004, the Berliner Tennis-Arena was renamed Steffi-Graf-Stadion in honor of Graf. Graf was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004 and the German Sports Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2015, Graf was the recipient of the International Club's Jean Borotra Sportsmanship Award. See also Graf–Navratilova rivalry Graf–Sabatini rivalry Graf–Seles rivalry List of female tennis players List of tennis rivalries Overall tennis records - women's singles Tennis records of the Open Era - women's singles References External links Official Wimbledon profile BBC profile ESPN biography Steffi Graf's victories German female tennis players International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees 1969 births Living people Australian Open (tennis) champions French Open champions German emigrants to the United States Hopman Cup competitors Olympic medalists in tennis Olympic bronze medalists for West Germany Olympic gold medalists for West Germany Olympic silver medalists for Germany Olympic tennis players of Germany Olympic tennis players of West Germany Sportspeople from Mannheim Recipients of the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of Baden-Württemberg Recipients of the Olympic Order Tennis players at the 1984 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1988 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1992 Summer Olympics US Open (tennis) champions West German expatriates in the United States Wimbledon champions World No. 1 tennis players Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's singles Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's doubles Recipients of the Silver Laurel Leaf German philanthropists German women philanthropists Medalists at the 1988 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics People from SoHo, Manhattan Andre Agassi Tennis people from Baden-Württemberg	true	[ "The North Korea women's national under-20 football team represents the Democratic People's Republic of Korea in international association football competitions in the FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup and the AFC U-19 Women's Championship, as well as any other under-20 women's international football tournaments. It is governed by the DPR Korea Football Association.\n\nThey have won the FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup twice, in 2006 and 2016. Upon the former triumph, they became the first Asian team to win a FIFA women's tournament and the first Asian football team to win any FIFA tournaments since Saudi Arabia's victory in the 1989 FIFA U-16 World Championship.\n\nCompetition History\n\nFIFA U-20 Women's World Cup record\n2002: Did not qualify\n2004: Did not qualify\n2006: Champions\n2008: Runners-up\n2010: Quarter-finals\n2012: Quarter-finals\n2014: Fourth Place\n2016: Champions\n2018: Quarter-finals\n2020: Qualified\n\nAFC U-19 Women's Championship record\n\nAFC U-19 Women's Championship \n\n*Draws include knockout matches decided on penalty kicks.\n\nCurrent squad\nU-20 Women's national team for 2016 FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup from November 13 to December 3.\n\nSee also\n\nNorth Korea women's national football team\nNorth Korea women's national under-17 football team\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \nNorth Korea at the FIFA website\nNorth Korea at the AFC website\n\nWomen's national under-20 association football teams\nunder", "Jessika Ponchet (born 26 September 1996) is a French professional tennis player. She has career-high WTA rankings of 169 in singles (attained on 22 July 2019), and 130 in doubles (achieved on 28 February 2022).\n\nCareer\nPonchet did not play any ITF Junior Circuit tournaments, plunging straight into the ITF Women's Circuit at the age of 14.\n\n2011–2013\nPonchet played the singles events of four tournaments and the doubles event of one tournament on the 2011 ITF Circuit, starting with a $100k tournament held in early July in the French city of Biarritz. She played a total of 11 and 18 ITF tournaments in 2012 and 2013, respectively.\n\n2014–2015\nPonchet played a total of 17 ITF tournaments in 2014. She suffered a major setback when torn knee ligaments forced her to miss tournaments in the first eight months of 2015. She played the singles events of seven tournaments and the doubles event of one tournament on the 2015 ITF Circuit.\n\n2016\nPonchet played a total of 22 ITF tournaments in the 2016 season.\n\n2017\nShe made her Grand Slam singles debut at the French Open after receiving a qualifying wildcard; however, after defeating Dalma Gálfi (the 2015 ITF World Champion in the girls' combined category), she lost to the No. 4 seed Richèl Hogenkamp in the second round.\n\nPonchet made her WTA 125 tournaments debut at the Open de Limoges, entering only its singles event. She received a wildcard for the main draw, where she defeated her compatriot Chloé Paquet in the first round and lost to the No. 7 seed Kaia Kanepi in the second.\n\nPonchet finished 2017 with a final win/loss record of 42–24 for singles matches.\n\n2018\nShe made her Grand Slam and WTA Tour singles main-draw debut at the Australian Open after receiving a wildcard for the main draw, where she lost in the first round to the No. 3 seed Garbiñe Muguruza. Prior to the Australian Open, Ponchet had in her entire career played in the singles main-draw event of just one tournament that was at a higher level than the ITF Women's Circuit (the 2017 Open de Limoges) and had never even faced a player ranked in the top 100 of WTA singles rankings.\n\nPonchet made French Open debut after receiving a wildcard for the singles main draw, where she lost in the first round to the unseeded Lucie Šafářová, in straight sets.\n\n2019\nAt the Australian Open, Ponchet reached the singles main draw where she lost in the first round to 19th-seeded Caroline Garcia, after winning all her three qualifying matches without dropping a set.\n\nOn 9 April, in her first-round match of the $25k tournament in Sunderland, Ponchet was leading Tara Moore 6–0, 5–0 and had a match point to achieve a double bagel, but Moore staged a comeback to win 0–6, 7–6, 6–3.\n\nGrand Slam singles performance timeline\n\nWTA 125 tournament finals\n\nDoubles: 2 (2 runner-ups)\n\nITF Circuit finals\n\nSingles: 11 (6 titles, 5 runner–ups)\n\nDoubles: 16 (11 titles, 5 runner–ups)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n \n\n1996 births\nLiving people\nFrench female tennis players" ]
[ "Steffi Graf", "Playing style", "What did Steffi play?", "I don't know.", "what was her play style?", "The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork.", "what else represented her play style?", "Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable:", "why did she use this style?", "As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy.", "did she break any records?", "Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam", "what year did she win the Grand Slam?", "1990s,", "Did she win any other tournaments?", "she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open." ]	C_d0e9bc4e72184f1fb6ceb489ddce9e70_0	anything else?	8	anything else about Steffi other than grand slam 1990?	Steffi Graf	The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Slozil and Heinz Gunthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to 174 km/h (108 mph), making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. CANNOTANSWER	Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player.	Stefanie Maria "Steffi" Graf ( , ; born 14 June 1969) is a German former professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 1 for a record 377 weeks and won 22 major singles titles, the second-most since the start of the Open Era in 1968 and third-most of all-time behind Margaret Court (24) and Serena Williams (23). In 1988, she became the first tennis player to achieve the Golden Slam by winning all four Grand Slam singles titles and the Olympic gold medal in the same calendar year. Furthermore, she is the only tennis player, male or female, to have won each major at least four times. Graf was ranked singles world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for a record 377 total weeks: the longest period for which any player, male or female, has held the singles number-one ranking since the WTA and the Association of Tennis Professionals began issuing rankings. She won 107 singles titles, which ranks her third on the WTA's all-time list after Martina Navratilova (167 titles) and Chris Evert (157 titles). She and Margaret Court are the only players, male or female, to win three majors in a calendar year five times (1988, 1989, 1993, 1995 and 1996). Notable features of Graf's game were her versatility across all playing surfaces, footwork and powerful forehand drive. Graf's athletic ability and aggressive game played from the baseline have been credited with developing the modern style of play that has come to dominate today's game. She won six French Open singles titles (second to Evert), seven Wimbledon singles titles, four Australian Open titles, and five U.S. Open singles titles. She is the only singles player (male or female) to have achieved a Grand Slam since the hard court was introduced as a playing surface, replacing grass, at the US Open in 1978. Graf's Grand Slam was achieved on grass, clay, and hard court while the previous five singles Grand Slams were achieved on only grass and clay. Graf reached 13 consecutive singles major finals, from the 1987 French Open through to the 1990 French Open, winning nine of them. She won five consecutive singles majors (1988 Australian Open to 1989 Australian Open), and seven out of eight, in two calendar years (1988 Australian Open to 1989 US Open, except 1989 French Open). She reached a total of 31 singles major finals. Graf retired at the age of 30 in 1999 while she was ranked world No. 3. She is regarded as one of the greatest female tennis players of all time. Martina Navratilova included Graf at the top of her list of the greatest players ever. In the year of Graf's retirement, Billie Jean King said, "Steffi [Graf] is definitely the greatest women's tennis player of all time." In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. She married former world No. 1 men's tennis player Andre Agassi in October 2001. They have two children. Graf was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004. Along with Boris Becker, Graf was considered instrumental in popularizing tennis in Germany, where it remains one of the foremost national sports. Early life Stefanie Graf was born on 14 June 1969, in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany, to Heidi Schalk and car-and-insurance salesman Peter Graf (18 June 1938 − 30 November 2013). When she was nine years old, her family moved to the neighboring town of Brühl. She has a younger brother, Michael. Her father, an aspiring tennis coach, first introduced her to the game, teaching his three-year-old daughter how to swing a wooden racket in the family's living room. She began practising on a court at the age of four and played in her first tournament at five. She soon began taking the top prize at junior tournaments with regularity, going on to win the European Championships 12s and 18s in 1982. Career Early career Graf played in her first professional tournament in October 1982 at Filderstadt, Germany. She lost her first round match 6–4, 6–0 to Tracy Austin, a two-time US Open champion and former world No. 1 player. (Twelve years later, Graf defeated Austin 6–0, 6–0 during a second round match at the Evert Cup in Indian Wells, California, which was their second and last match against each other.) At the start of her first full professional year in 1983, Graf was 13 years old and ranked world No. 124. She won no titles during the next three years, but her ranking climbed steadily to world No. 98 in 1983, No. 22 in 1984, and No. 6 in 1985. In 1984, she first gained international attention when she almost upset the tenth seed, Jo Durie of the United Kingdom, in a fourth round Centre Court match at Wimbledon. In August as a 15-year-old (and youngest entrant) representing West Germany, she won the tennis demonstration event at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. No medals were awarded as this was not an official Olympic event. Graf's schedule was closely controlled by her father, who limited her play so that she would not burn out. In 1985, for instance, she played only ten events leading up to the US Open, whereas another up-and-coming star, Gabriela Sabatini of Argentina, who was a year younger than Graf, played 21. Peter Graf also kept a tight rein on Graf's personal life. Social invitations on the tour were often declined as Graf's focus was kept on practicing and match play. Working with her father and then-coach Pavel Složil, Graf typically practiced for up to four hours a day, often heading straight from airports to practice courts. This narrow focus meant that Graf, already shy and retiring by nature, made few friends on the tour in her early years, but it led to a steady improvement in her play. In 1985 and early 1986, Graf emerged as the top challenger to the dominance of Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert. During that period, she lost six times to Evert and three times to Navratilova, all in straight sets. She did not win a tournament but consistently reached tournament finals, semifinals and quarterfinals, with the highlight being her semifinal loss to Navratilova at the US Open. On 13 April 1986, Graf won her first WTA tournament and beat Evert for the first time in the final of the Family Circle Cup in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (She never lost to Evert again, beating her six more times over the next three and a half years.) Graf then won her next three tournaments at Amelia Island, Charleston, and Berlin, culminating in a 6–2, 6–3 defeat of Navratilova in the final of the latter. Illness caused her to miss Wimbledon, and an accident where she broke a toe several weeks later also curtailed her play. She returned to win a small tournament at Mahwah just before the US Open where, in one of the most anticipated matches of the year, she encountered Navratilova in a semifinal. The match was played over two days with Navratilova finally winning after saving three match points 6–1, 6–7, 7–6. Graf then won three consecutive indoor titles at Tokyo, Zurich, and Brighton, before once again contending with Navratilova at the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships in New York. This time, Navratilova beat Graf 7–6, 6–3, 6–2. Breakthrough year: 1987 Graf's Grand Slam tournament breakthrough came in 1987. She started the year strongly, with six tournament victories heading into the French Open, with the highlight being at the tournament in Miami, where she defeated Martina Navratilova in a semifinal and Chris Evert in the final and lost only 20 games in the seven rounds of the tournament. In the French Open final, Graf defeated Navratilova, who was the world No. 1, 6–4, 4–6, 8–6 after beating Sabatini in a three-set semifinal. Graf then lost to Navratilova 7–5, 6–3 in the Wimbledon final, her first loss of the year. However, in the Federation Cup final in Vancouver, Canada, three weeks later, she defeated Evert easily 6–2, 6–1. The US Open ended anti-climactically as Navratilova defeated Graf in the final 7–6, 6–1. Graf had a win-loss record of 75-2 for a 97.4 winning percentage in 1987, both losses coming to Navratilova as they split the four matches they played during the year. On 17 August, after defeating Evert in a straight set final in the Virginia Slims of Los Angeles, Graf overtook Navratilova for the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in her career, a ranking she would hold for the next 186 consecutive weeks, a record (it was tied by Serena Williams in 2016). Graf was the first player other than Navratilova or Evert to hold the top spot since Tracy Austin in 1980. Golden Slam: 1988 Graf started 1988 by winning the Australian Open, defeating Chris Evert in the final 6–1, 7–6. Graf did not lose a set during the tournament and lost a total of only 29 games. Graf lost twice to Sabatini during the spring, once on hardcourts in Boca Raton, Florida, and once on clay at Amelia Island, Florida. Graf, however, won the tournament in San Antonio, Texas, and retained her title in Miami, where she once again defeated Evert in the final. Graf then won the tournament in Berlin, losing only twelve games in five matches. At the French Open, Graf successfully defended her title by defeating Natasha Zvereva 6–0, 6–0 in a 34-minute final. The official time of the match given on the scoresheet was 34 minutes; however, just 32 minutes of that was spent on the court, as a rain break split the match into two periods of play, of nine and 23 minutes. That was the shortest-ever and most one-sided Grand Slam final ever and the only double bagel in a Major final since 1911. Zvereva, who had eliminated Martina Navratilova in the fourth round, won only thirteen points in the match. Next came Wimbledon, where Martina Navratilova had won six straight titles. Graf was trailing Martina Navratilova in the final 7–5, 2–0 before winning the match 5–7, 6–2, 6–1. She then won tournaments in Hamburg and Mahwah (where she lost only eight games all tournament). At the US Open, Graf beat Sabatini in a three-set final to win the Grand Slam by 6–3, 3–6, 6–1, a feat previously performed by only two other women, Maureen Connolly Brinker in 1953 and Margaret Court in 1970. Graf's 1988 Grand Slam remains the only one in history completed on three surfaces (grass, clay, hard court), as all other Grand Slams in tennis history were achieved prior to the introduction of hard court at the US Open in 1978. In reaching and winning all four Grand Slam finals, Graf became the first player in history to contest and win 28 Grand Slam singles matches in a single year; albeit including the unplayed walkover against Evert in the US Open. Even discounting that result, no other player had played and won 27 Grand Slam matches in a single year before and the feat has to date only been matched by Novak Djokovic since, in both 2015 and 2021, when he failed in both bids to win the Grand Slam. Graf then defeated Sabatini 6–3, 6–3 in the gold medal match at the Olympic Games in Seoul and achieved what the media had dubbed the "Golden Slam". Graf also won her only Grand Slam doubles title that year—at Wimbledon partnering Sabatini—and picked up a women's doubles Olympic bronze medal. Graf was the first tennis player to achieve the feat: wheelchair tennis players Diede de Groot and Dylan Alcott achieved the Golden Slam in 2021. At the year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf was upset by Pam Shriver, only her third loss of the year. The loss deprived her of the Golden Super Slam. She was named the 1988 BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year. At the end of the year, the municipality of Brühl, her hometown, gave her the title of honorary citizen. New challengers and personal challenges 1989 Speculation was rife at the beginning of 1989 about the possibility of Graf winning another Grand Slam. Some noted observers, such as Margaret Court, suggested that Graf could achieve the feat a couple more times. And the year began as expected, with Graf extending her Grand Slam tournament winning streak to five events at the Australian Open, defeating Helena Suková in the final. Her 6–3, 6–0 defeat of Gabriela Sabatini in a semifinal was described by veteran observer Ted Tinling as "probably the best tennis I've seen". He went on to add, "I saw what Steffi did to Sabatini at the Australian Open this year, and that was it. She is better than them all." Graf followed this with easy victories in her next four tournaments at Washington, D.C., San Antonio, Texas, Boca Raton, Florida, and Hilton Head. The Washington, D.C. tournament was notable because Graf won the first twenty points of the final against Zina Garrison. In the Boca Raton final, Graf lost the only set she conceded to Chris Evert in their final seven matches. In the subsequent Amelia Island final on clay, Graf lost her first match of the year to Sabatini but returned to European clay with easy victories at Hamburg and Berlin. Graf's Grand Slam tournament winning streak ended at the French Open, where 17-year-old Spaniard Arantxa Sánchez Vicario beat Graf in three sets. Graf served for the match at 5–3 in the third set but lost the game and won only three more points in the match. Suffering from food poisoning, she had struggled to beat Monica Seles in their semifinal 6–3, 3–6, 6–3 and said that she had menstrual cramps in the final. Graf, however, recovered to defeat Martina Navratilova 6–2, 6–7, 6–1 in the Wimbledon final after defeating Monica Seles 6–0, 6–1 in a fourth round match, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in a quarterfinal, and Chris Evert in a semifinal. Graf warmed up for the US Open with easy tournament victories in San Diego and Mahwah. In her semifinal match at the US Open, Graf defeated Sabatini 3–6, 6–4, 6–2. The match was notable for its dramatic ending. Having suffered from leg cramps since the middle of the third set, Graf ran off the court seconds after match point to seek medical treatment. In the final, Navratilova led 6–3, 4–2 before Graf rallied to win 3–6, 7–5, 6–1 for her third Grand Slam singles title of the year. Victories at Zurich and Brighton preceded the Virginia Slims Championships, where Graf cemented her top-ranked status by beating Navratilova in the four-set final. Graf ended 1989 with an 86–2 match record and the loss of only 12 sets. Her 0.977 winning percentage is the second-highest in the open era behind Navratilova. 1990 Graf defeated Mary Joe Fernández in the final of the Australian Open, which was her eighth Grand Slam singles title in the last nine she contested. She survived an intense three-set battle with Helena Sukova in the semis, breaking in the tenth and final game to win the third set 6–4. Her winning streak (unbeaten since the 1989 French Open loss to Arantxa Sánchez) continued with victories in Tokyo, Amelia Island, and Hamburg. Shortly after winning in Tokyo, Graf injured her right thumb while cross-country skiing in Switzerland and subsequently withdrew from the Virginia Slims of Florida and the Lipton Championships. In Berlin, she extended her unbeaten streak to 66 matches (second in WTA history to Navratilova's 74) before losing the final to Monica Seles, 4–6, 3–6. While the Berlin tournament was being played, the largest-circulation German tabloid, Bild, ran a story about an alleged scandal involving Graf's father. The difficulty of answering questions about the matter came to a head at a Wimbledon press conference, where Graf broke down in tears. Wimbledon authorities then threatened to immediately shut down any subsequent press conferences where questions about the issue were asked. Whether this scandal affected Graf's form is open to debate. In an interview with Stern magazine in July 1990, Graf stated, "I could not fight as usual." Graf again lost to Monica Seles in the final of the French Open 6–7, 4–6. Seles was behind 2–6 in the first-set tiebreaker, but then came back to win six points in a row and take the set. At Wimbledon, Graf lost in the semifinals to Zina Garrison, who with this victory broke Graf's string of 13 consecutive major finals. This was a major upset as Garrison had to save a match point to defeat Monica Seles in the quarterfinal, and was expected to easily fall to Graf, whom she had not beaten in four years. After victories in Montreal and San Diego, Graf reached the US Open final, where she lost in straight sets to Sabatini. Graf won four indoor tournaments after the US Open, including a pair of straight-set wins over Sabatini in the finals of Zürich and Worcester. Although Sabatini got the best of Graf in the semifinals of the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf still finished the year as the top-ranked player. 1991 A mixture of injury problems, personal difficulties, and loss of form made 1991 a tough year for Graf. Seles established herself as the new dominant player on the women's tour, winning the Australian Open, French Open, and US Open and, in March, ending Graf's record 186 consecutive-weeks hold on the World No. 1 ranking. Graf briefly regained the top ranking after winning at Wimbledon but lost it again after her loss to Navratilova at the US Open. Graf lost an Australian Open quarterfinal to Jana Novotná, the first time she did not reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament since the 1986 French Open. She then lost to Sabatini in her next three tournaments before winning the U.S. Hardcourt Championships in San Antonio, beating Monica Seles in the final. After losing a fifth straight time to Sabatini in Amelia Island, Florida, Graf again defeated Seles in the Hamburg final. Following her tournament victory in German Open in Berlin, Graf suffered one of the worst defeats of her career in a French Open semifinal where she won only two games against Sánchez Vicario and lost her first 6–0 set since 1984. At Wimbledon, however, Graf captured her third women's crown, this time at Sabatini's expense. Sabatini served for the match twice, and was two points away from her first Wimbledon title. After breaking Sabatini's serve to even the third set at 6–6, Graf defeated Sabatini by winning the next two games to take the match 6–4, 3–6, 8–6. Martina Navratilova then defeated Graf 7–6, 6–7, 6–4 in a US Open semifinal, the first time she had beaten Graf in four years. Graf then won in Leipzig, with her 500th career victory coming in a quarterfinal against Judith Wiesner. After winning two more indoor tournaments at Zurich and Brighton, she failed once again in the Virginia Slims Championships, losing her quarterfinal to Novotná. Soon after, she split with her long-time coach, Pavel Složil. 1992 A bout of rubella forced Graf to miss the first major event of 1992, the Australian Open. Her year continued indifferently with losses in three of her first four tournaments, including a semifinal loss to Jana Novotná in Chicago. It was Graf's second consecutive loss to Novotna, and dating back to their 1991 Australian Open quarterfinal match, Jana had won three of their last five meetings. It would also be the last loss Graf would ever have to Novotna in a match she completed (she did have a loss after withdrawing with injury after the first set of a late 1996 match). Chicago was notable, however, for being the first tournament Graf played with her new coach, former Swiss player Heinz Günthardt. Graf's father had approached Günthardt during the 1991 Virginia Slims Championships. She would work with him for the remainder of her career. In Boca Raton, Florida, Graf reached her first final of the year, where she faced Conchita Martínez for the title. In their five previous head-to-head matches, Graf had defeated Martínez each time. Even though she lost the opening set, Graf went on to prevail in three sets. She lost twice to Sabatini in the early spring at the Lipton International and the Bausch & Lomb Championships, which now brought her to seven losses in her last eight matches against Sabatini; however, the Bausch & Lomb loss would be Graf's final loss to Sabatini, winning her next, and last eight matches against Sabatini. Victories at Hamburg and Berlin (beating Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both) prepared her for the French Open, where she defeated Sánchez Vicario in the semifinals after losing the first set 6–0. Graf then lost a closely contested final to Monica Seles, 2–6, 6–3, 8–10. Seles won the match on her fifth match point; Graf came within two points of winning the match a few games earlier. At Wimbledon, after struggling through early-round three-setters against Mariaan de Swardt and Patty Fendick, she easily defeated Natasha Zvereva in the quarterfinal, Sabatini in the semifinal, and Seles in the final, 6–2, 6–1, with Seles playing in almost complete silence because of widespread media and player criticism of her grunting. Graf then won all five of her Fed Cup matches, helping Germany defeat Spain in the final by defeating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, 6–4, 6–2. At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Graf lost to Jennifer Capriati in the final and claimed the silver medal. At the US Open, Graf was upset in the quarterfinals by Sánchez Vicario 7–6, 6–3. Four consecutive indoor tournament victories in the autumn helped improve her season, but for the third consecutive year, she failed to win the Virginia Slims Championships, where she lost in the first round to Lori McNeil. Second period of dominance 1993 Graf began 1993 with four losses in her first six tournaments of the year: two to Sánchez Vicario and one each to Seles and the 36-year-old Martina Navratilova. Seles defeated Graf at the Australian Open 4–6, 6–3, 6–2. She struggled at the German Open in Berlin where she lost a 6–0 set to the unheralded Sabine Hack before defeating Mary Joe Fernández and Sabatini in three-set matches to claim her seventh title there in eight years. During a quarterfinal match between Seles and Magdalena Maleeva in Hamburg, Seles was stabbed between the shoulder blades by a mentally ill German fan of Graf, Günter Parche. He claimed that he committed the attack to help Graf reclaim the world No. 1 ranking. More than two years elapsed before Seles competed again. Shortly after the stabbing, during a players meeting at the Italian Open in Rome, 17 of the world's top 25 WTA members voted against preserving Seles' world No. 1 ranking while she was sidelined. Since Graf skipped the Italian Open, she did not take part in the vote. During Seles's absence, Graf won 65 of 67 matches, three of four Grand Slam events and the year-end Virginia Slims championships. She won her first French Open title since 1988 with a three-set victory over Mary Joe Fernández in the final. Fernandez had two break points to take a 3–0 and double break lead in the third set. The win elevated Graf to the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in 22 months. At Wimbledon, Graf defeated Jana Novotná to win her third consecutive, and fifth overall, ladies' title. In the third and deciding set, Novotná had a point to go up 5–1 on her serve. After breaking Novotná's serve, Graf won the next four games to take the match 7–6, 1–6, 6–4. Graf had a bone splinter in her right foot during this tournament (and for the next few months), finally resulting in surgery on 4 October. In the meantime, she lost surprisingly to Nicole Bradtke of Australia in a Fed Cup match on clay before winning the Acura Classic in San Diego and the Canadian Open in Toronto in preparation for the US Open. She won there, comfortably beating Helena Suková in the final after needing three sets to eliminate Gabriela Sabatini and Manuela Maleeva-Fragniere in the quarterfinals and semifinals respectively. In the fall, Graf won the Volkswagen Card Cup in Leipzig a day before her foot operation, losing only two games to Jana Novotná in the final. Graf lost to Conchita Martínez in her comeback tournament a month later in Philadelphia. However, she finished her year with a highlight, winning her first Virginia Slims Championships since 1989 by beating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final despite needing painkillers for a back injury. 1994 Seemingly free of injury for the first time in years, Graf began the year by winning the Australian Open, where she defeated Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final with the loss of only two games. Graf later stated it was the best tennis she had ever played in a Grand Slam final. She then won her next four tournaments in Tokyo, Indian Wells, Delray Beach and Miami respectively. In the Miami final, she lost her first set of the year—to Natasha Zvereva—after winning 54 consecutive sets. In the Hamburg final, she lost for the first time in 1994 after 36 consecutive match victories, losing to Sánchez Vicario in three sets. She then won her eighth German Open, but there were signs that her form was worsening as she almost lost to Julie Halard in a quarterfinal. As the defending champion Graf lost in straight sets to Mary Pierce in the French Open semifinal. This was followed by a first-round straight-sets loss at Wimbledon to Lori McNeil, her only loss at Wimbledon between 1991 and 1997 and her first loss in a first round Grand Slam tournament in ten years. Graf still managed to win San Diego the following month but aggravated a long-time back injury in beating Sánchez Vicario in the final. Graf developed a bone spur at the base of her spine due to a congenital condition of the sacroiliac joint. She began to wear a back brace and was unsure about playing the US Open but elected to play while receiving treatment and stretching for two hours before each match. She made it to the final and took the first set against Sánchez Vicario but lost the next two sets — Sanchez Vicario's last victory over Graf. In the middle of the second set, Graf suffered back spasms while reaching for a ball in the ad court. She took the following nine weeks off, returning only for the Virginia Slims Championships where she lost in straight sets to Pierce in the quarterfinal. Although Graf ended the year ranked No. 1 on the computer the ITF named Sanchez Vicario its World Champion for the year, while the WTA backed their official rankings and named Graf. 1995 A strained right calf muscle forced Graf to withdraw from the Australian Open. She came back in February, winning four consecutive tournaments in Paris, Delray Beach, Miami and Houston. She then beat Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both the French Open and Wimbledon. The 1995 Wimbledon final is regarded as one of the most dramatic women's major finals in history as Graf and Sánchez Vicario battled in a tight third set that included a 16-minute long, 13-deuce game on Sanchez Vicario's serve at 5–5. In August Monica Seles made her much anticipated return to tennis at the Canadian Open. It was decided to grant her a joint number-one ranking with Graf who took her first loss of the year in the first round to Amanda Coetzer. The US Open was Monica Seles's first Grand Slam event since the 1993 attack, with much anticipation again around a potential Seles-Graf final. After surviving a scare in a three-setter against Amanda Coetzer in the first round, Graf reached the final with relative ease, while Seles went through her side of the draw in even more convincing fashion. Seles and Graf met in the final, with Graf winning in three sets, saving a set point in the first set. Graf then capped the year by beating countrywoman Anke Huber in a five-set final at the season-ending WTA Championships in 2 hours and 46 minutes. Tax issues In personal terms, 1995 was a difficult year for Graf, as she was accused by German authorities of tax evasion in the early years of her career. In her defense, she stated that her father Peter was her financial manager, and all financial matters relating to her earnings at the time had been under his control. Her father was arrested in August and was sentenced to 45 months in jail. He was eventually released after serving 25 months. Prosecutors dropped their case against Graf in 1997, when she agreed to pay a fine of 1.3 million Deutsche Marks to the government and an unspecified charity. 1996 Graf again missed the Australian Open after undergoing surgery in December 1995 to remove bone splinters from her left foot. Graf came back to the tour in March, winning back to back titles in Indian Wells and Miami, followed by a record ninth title at the German Open in May and a quarterfinal defeat in Rome against Martina Hingis. She then successfully defended the three Grand Slam titles she won the year before. In a close French Open final, Graf again overcame Sánchez Vicario, taking the third set 10–8. Graf had led 4–1 in the second set tiebreak, only to lose six points in a row and force a decider. Twice in the third set Sánchez Vicario served for the championship but was broken each time by Graf. It was the longest French Open women's singles final in history, both in terms of time (3 hours and 3 minutes) and number of games played (40). Graf then had a straight-sets win against Sánchez Vicario in the Wimbledon final. That was the last competitive match Graf and Sánchez Vicario would ever play against one another. In July, a left knee injury forced Graf to withdraw from the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Graf played only one warm-up event ahead of the US Open, the Acura Classic in Manhattan Beach, California, where she lost to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinals. She then successfully defended her title at the US Open, defeating Monica Seles in the final. Her toughest battle came against rising star Martina Hingis in the semifinal, with Hingis unable to convert on five set points. Graf did not lose a set the whole tournament. She also won her fifth and final WTA Tour Championships title with a five set win over Martina Hingis, with Hingis cramping up in the fifth set. In 1988, Graf became only the second tennis player in history to win a Slam on hardcourt, clay, and grass all in the same season. She repeated the feat in 1993, 1995, and 1996. Final years on the tour: 1997–99 The last few years of Graf's career were beset by injuries, particularly to her knees and back. She lost the world No. 1 ranking to Martina Hingis and failed to win a Grand Slam title for the first time in ten years in 1997. That year Graf lost in the fourth round of the Australian Open in straight sets to Amanda Coetzer. She subsequently withdrew from the Pan Pacific Open and had arthroscopic surgery performed on her left knee. After several months injury lay off, Graf returned to play in the German Open in Berlin in front of a home crowd and had the worst defeat of her career in the quarterfinal, when Amanda Coetzer beat her in just 56 minutes 6–0, 6–1. In the French Open Graf was again beaten by Amanda Coetzer in straight sets, 6–1, 6–4. Only one week later, she underwent reconstructive knee surgery in Vienna and subsequently missed the 1997 Wimbledon and US Open championships. The treatment was for a fracture of the cartilage as well as a shortening and partial rupture of the patellar tendon of her left knee. After missing almost half of the tour in 1998, Graf lost in the third round at Wimbledon and in the fourth round at the US Open. Shortly after the US Open, she underwent surgery to remove a bone spur in her right wrist. Upon her return Graf defeated world No. 2 Hingis and world No. 1 Lindsay Davenport en route to the Philadelphia title. At the first round of the season-ending Chase Championships, Graf defeated world No. 3, Jana Novotná, before losing in the semifinal to first-seeded Davenport. At the beginning of 1999 Graf played the warm up event to the Australian Open in Sydney; she defeated Serena Williams in the second round and Venus in the quarterfinals before losing to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinal. Graf then went on to reach the quarterfinals of the Australian Open before losing to Monica Seles in two sets. In Indian Wells Graf lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At the French Open, Graf reached her first Grand Slam final in three years and fought back from a set and twice from a break down in the second set to defeat the top ranked Hingis in three sets for a memorable victory. Graf became the first player in the open era to defeat the first, second, and third ranked players in the same Grand Slam tournament by beating second-ranked Davenport in the quarterfinals and third-ranked Seles in the semifinals. Graf said after the final that it would be her last French Open, fueling speculation about her retirement. Graf then reached her ninth Wimbledon singles final, losing to third-seeded Davenport in straight sets. She had to overcome three difficult three set matches en route to this final, against Mariaan De Swardt in the third round, Venus Williams in the quarterfinals and Mirjana Lučić in the semifinals. On 13 August 1999, shortly after retiring with a strained hamstring from a second round match against Amy Frazier in San Diego, Graf announced her retirement from the women's tour at age 30. She was ranked No. 3 at that time and said, "I have done everything I wanted to do in tennis. I feel I have nothing left to accomplish. The weeks following Wimbledon [in 1999] weren't easy for me. I was not having fun anymore. After Wimbledon, for the first time in my career, I didn't feel like going to a tournament. My motivation wasn't what it was in the past." Doubles career From the beginning of her career until 1990, Graf regularly played doubles events in Grand Slams and other tournaments, winning a total of eleven titles. In 1986, she formed a partnership with rival Gabriela Sabatini. The pair was moderately successful, winning the 1988 Wimbledon Championships together and reaching the finals of the French Open in 1986, 1987 and 1989. The partnership was the subject of much discussion, as the two women, both known to be shy, usually kept communication to a minimum during changeovers and between points, a highly unusual situation in doubles. Sabatini said of the partnership: "doubles is all about communicating with each other, and we didn't communicate that much. We would just say the basic things, but nothing else." The pair played their last major tournament together at the 1990 Wimbledon Championships, losing in the quarterfinals. From 1991 until the end of her career, Graf would only play doubles sporadically, forming short-term partnerships with a variety of players, including Lori McNeil, Anke Huber and her best friends on the tour, Rennae Stubbs, Patricia Tarabini and Ines Gorrochategui. She played her last Grand Slam doubles tournament at the 1999 Australian Open with Gorrochategui, losing in the second round. Graf also occasionally played mixed doubles, although she never won a title. She partnered with doubles specialist Mark Woodforde at the Australian Open in 1994, with Henri Leconte at Wimbledon in 1991 and at the French Open in 1994, and with Charlie Pasarell at the US Open in 1984. In an unusual arrangement, she paired with her coaches Pavel Složil at Wimbledon in 1988 and Heinz Günthardt in 1992 and 1996, also at Wimbledon. At the 1999 Wimbledon Championships, Graf formed a much-publicized partnership with John McEnroe, with whom she reached the semifinals before withdrawing due to concerns that her uncertain hamstring, coupled with a bout of bronchitis, would affect her in the singles final. Post-career exhibition matches In late 1999 and early 2000, as part of her Farewell Tour, Graf played a series of exhibition matches against former rivals in New Zealand, Japan, Spain, Germany and South Africa. She played Jelena Dokic in Christchurch, New Zealand, Amanda Coetzer in Durban, South Africa, and her former rival Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in Zaragoza, Spain. It was Graf and Sánchez Vicario's first head-to-head meeting since 1996. In February 2000, Graf played against Kimiko Date at Nagoya Rainbow Hall in Tokyo, winning in three sets. In September 2004, Graf dispatched her former doubles partner Gabriela Sabatini, in straight sets, in an exhibition match played in Berlin, Germany. She was also in Berlin to host a charity gala, as well as inaugurating a tennis stadium renamed the "Steffi Graf Stadion". Proceeds from her match against Sabatini went to Graf's foundation, "Children for Tomorrow". In July 2005, Graf competed in one tie of World Team Tennis (WTT) on the Houston Wranglers team. She was beaten in two out of three matches, with each match being one set. Graf lost her singles match to Elena Likhovtseva 5–4. She teamed with Ansley Cargill in women's doubles against Anna Kournikova and Likhovtseva but lost 5–2. She was successful, however, in the mixed doubles match. Graf completely ruled out a return to professional tennis. In October, Graf defeated Sabatini in an exhibition match in Mannheim, Germany, winning both of their sets. Like the exhibition match the previous year against Sabatini, proceeds went to "Children for Tomorrow". In 2008 Graf lost an exhibition match against Kimiko Date at Ariake Colosseum in Tokyo. As part of the event, billed as "Dream Match 2008", she defeated Martina Navratilova in a one-set affair 8–7, with Graf winning a tiebreaker 10–5. It was the first time in 14 years Graf had played Navratilova. Graf played a singles exhibition match against Kim Clijsters and a mixed doubles exhibition alongside husband Andre Agassi against Tim Henman and Clijsters as part of a test event and celebration for the newly installed roof over Wimbledon's Centre Court in 2009. She lost a lengthy one-set singles match to Clijsters and also the mixed doubles. In 2010, Graf participated in the WTT Smash Hits exhibition in Washington, D.C. to support the Elton John AIDS Foundation. She and Agassi, her husband, were on Team Elton John, which competed against Team Billie Jean King. Graf played in the celebrity doubles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles before straining her left calf muscle and being replaced by Anna Kournikova. Summary of career Graf won seven singles titles at Wimbledon, six singles titles at the French Open, five singles titles at the US Open, and four singles titles at the Australian Open. Her overall record in 56 Grand Slam events was 278–32 (90 percent) (84–10 at the French Open, 74–7 at Wimbledon, 73–9 at the US Open, and 47–6 at the Australian Open). Her career prize-money earnings totalled US$21,895,277 (a record until Lindsay Davenport surpassed this amount in January 2008). Her singles win/loss record was 900–115 (88.7 percent). She was ranked world No. 1 for 186 consecutive weeks (from August 1987 to March 1991; tied with Serena Williams, a record in the women's game) and a record total 377 weeks overall. Career statistics Grand Slam tournament performance timeline Note: Graf's semifinal match at the 1988 US Open was walkover (so not counted as win) Grand Slam tournament finals Singles: 31 (22 titles, 9 runner-ups) Doubles: 4 (1 title, 3 runner-ups) Records These records were attained in Open Era of tennis. Records in bold indicate Open Era peer-less achievements. Playing style The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fräulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Složil and Heinz Günthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to , making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. Equipment and endorsements Early in her career, Graf wore Dunlop apparel, before signing an endorsement contract with Adidas in 1985. She had an Adidas sneakers line known as the St. Graf Pro line. Early in her career, Graf used the Dunlop Maxpower Pro and Maxpower Kevlar racquets and then played with the Max 200G racquet from 1984 to 1993 before switching to Wilson from 1994 to 1999. She first used the Wilson Pro Staff 7.0 lite, then switched to the Pro Staff 7.5 in 1996 and to the Pro Staff 7.1 in 1998. Graf's racquets were strung at 29 kilograms (64 pounds), significantly above the 50-60 pound range recommended by Wilson. In 2006, she signed an endorsement deal with Head. In 2010, Graf and Agassi collaborated with Head and developed the new line of Star Series tennis racquets. Graf has signed many endorsement deals throughout the years including a ten-year endorsement deal with car manufacturer Opel in 1985, and Rexona from 1994 to 1998. Other companies she has endorsed include Barilla, Apollinaris, Citibank, Danone and Teekanne. She has appeared in many advertisements and television commercials with Andre Agassi including Canon Inc. and Longines in 2008 (Agassi became Longines ambassador in 2007). In 2015, she was appointed as the brand ambassador of Kerala tourism, for promoting Ayurveda in North America and Europe. Personal life In 1997, she left the Catholic Church, citing personal reasons. During her career, Graf divided her time between her hometown of Brühl; Boca Raton, Florida; and New York City where she owned a penthouse in the former Police Headquarters Building in SoHo. From 1992 to 1999, Graf dated racing driver Michael Bartels. She started dating Andre Agassi after the 1999 French Open and they married on 22 October 2001, with only their mothers as witnesses. They have two children, a son born in 2001 and a daughter born in 2003. Agassi has said that he and Graf are not pushing their children toward becoming tennis players. The Graf-Agassi family resides in Summerlin, a community in the Las Vegas Valley. Graf's mother and her brother also live there. In 1991, the Steffi Graf Youth Tennis Center in Leipzig was dedicated to her. She is the founder and chairperson of "Children for Tomorrow", a non-profit foundation established in 1998 for implementing and developing projects to support children who have been traumatized by war or other crises. In 2001, Graf indicated that she preferred to be called Stefanie instead of Steffi. On 30 November 2013, Graf's father Peter died of pancreatic cancer. He was 75 years old. Legacy In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. In March 2012, Tennis Channel picked Graf as the greatest female tennis player ever in their list of 100 greatest tennis players of all time. In November 2018, Tennis.com polled its readers to choose the greatest women's tennis player of all time and Graf came in first. In July 2020, The Guardian polled its readers to determine the greatest female tennis player of the past 50 years, and Steffi was the clear favorite, picking up nearly twice as many votes as any other player. Tennis writer Steve Flink, in his book The Greatest Tennis Matches of the Twentieth Century, named Graf as the best female player of the 20th century. Flink said in 2020 that the jury was still out on (Serena) Williams as the greatest ever, but Williams' consistency over the long span did not match that of Graf or Navratilova. Graf compiled superior career accomplishments over Serena Williams (as of December 2, 2020); 900–115 career record (88.7 win %) versus 843–147 career record (85.2 win %), 107 career tournament victories versus 72 career tournament victories, 377 total weeks ranked as world No. One versus 319 total weeks ranked as world No. One. While Graf's 22 Grand Slam wins is one fewer than Williams' 23 (and two fewer than Margaret Court's 24), Graf's professional career is eight years shorter than Williams, plus Graf also faced much tougher competition during her era (Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Gabriela Sabatini, and Monica Seles) compared to Williams. However, with the stabbing of Monica Seles in 1993, some have questioned its impact on Graf's career statistics and legacy. Awards and honours Graf was voted the ITF World Champion in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1995 and 1996. She was voted the WTA Player of the Year in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996. She was elected as the German Sportsperson of the Year in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1999. In 2004, the Berliner Tennis-Arena was renamed Steffi-Graf-Stadion in honor of Graf. Graf was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004 and the German Sports Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2015, Graf was the recipient of the International Club's Jean Borotra Sportsmanship Award. See also Graf–Navratilova rivalry Graf–Sabatini rivalry Graf–Seles rivalry List of female tennis players List of tennis rivalries Overall tennis records - women's singles Tennis records of the Open Era - women's singles References External links Official Wimbledon profile BBC profile ESPN biography Steffi Graf's victories German female tennis players International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees 1969 births Living people Australian Open (tennis) champions French Open champions German emigrants to the United States Hopman Cup competitors Olympic medalists in tennis Olympic bronze medalists for West Germany Olympic gold medalists for West Germany Olympic silver medalists for Germany Olympic tennis players of Germany Olympic tennis players of West Germany Sportspeople from Mannheim Recipients of the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of Baden-Württemberg Recipients of the Olympic Order Tennis players at the 1984 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1988 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1992 Summer Olympics US Open (tennis) champions West German expatriates in the United States Wimbledon champions World No. 1 tennis players Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's singles Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's doubles Recipients of the Silver Laurel Leaf German philanthropists German women philanthropists Medalists at the 1988 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics People from SoHo, Manhattan Andre Agassi Tennis people from Baden-Württemberg	true	[ "Say Anything may refer to:\n\nFilm and television\n Say Anything..., a 1989 American film by Cameron Crowe\n \"Say Anything\" (BoJack Horseman), a television episode\n\nMusic\n Say Anything (band), an American rock band\n Say Anything (album), a 2009 album by the band\n \"Say Anything\", a 2012 song by Say Anything from Anarchy, My Dear\n \"Say Anything\" (Marianas Trench song), 2006\n \"Say Anything\" (X Japan song), 1991\n \"Say Anything\", a song by Aimee Mann from Whatever, 1993\n \"Say Anything\", a song by the Bouncing Souls from The Bouncing Souls, 1997\n \"Say Anything\", a song by Good Charlotte from The Young and the Hopeless, 2002\n \"Say Anything\", a song by Girl in Red, 2018\n \"Say Anything\", a song by Will Young from Lexicon, 2019\n \"Say Anything (Else)\", a song by Cartel from Chroma, 2005\n\nOther uses\n Say Anything (party game), a 2008 board game published by North Star Games\n \"Say Anything\", a column in YM magazine\n\nSee also\n Say Something (disambiguation)", "In baseball, a fair ball is a batted ball that entitles the batter to attempt to reach first base. By contrast, a foul ball is a batted ball that does not entitle the batter to attempt to reach first base. Whether a batted ball is fair or foul is determined by the location of the ball at the appropriate reference point, as follows:\n\n if the ball leaves the playing field without touching anything, the point where the ball leaves the field;\n else, if the ball first lands past first or third base without touching anything, the point where the ball lands;\n else, if the ball rolls or bounces past first or third base without touching anything other than the ground, the point where the ball passes the base;\n else, if the ball touches anything other than the ground (such as an umpire, a player, or any equipment left on the field) before any of the above happens, the point of such touching;\n else (the ball comes to a rest before reaching first or third base), the point where the ball comes to a rest.\n\nIf any part of the ball is on or above fair territory at the appropriate reference point, it is fair; else it is foul. Fair territory or fair ground is defined as the area of the playing field between the two foul lines, and includes the foul lines themselves and the foul poles. However, certain exceptions exist:\n\n A ball that touches first, second, or third base is always fair.\n Under Rule 5.09(a)(7)-(8), if a batted ball touches the batter or his bat while the batter is in the batter's box and not intentionally interfering with the course of the ball, the ball is foul.\n A ball that hits the foul pole without first having touched anything else off the bat is fair.\n Ground rules may provide whether a ball hitting specific objects (e.g. roof, overhead speaker) is fair or foul.\n\nOn a fair ball, the batter attempts to reach first base or any subsequent base, runners attempt to advance and fielders try to record outs. A fair ball is considered a live ball until the ball becomes dead by leaving the field or any other method.\n\nReferences\n\nBaseball rules" ]
[ "Steffi Graf", "Playing style", "What did Steffi play?", "I don't know.", "what was her play style?", "The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork.", "what else represented her play style?", "Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable:", "why did she use this style?", "As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy.", "did she break any records?", "Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam", "what year did she win the Grand Slam?", "1990s,", "Did she win any other tournaments?", "she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open.", "anything else?", "Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, \"Steffi Graf is the best all-around player." ]	C_d0e9bc4e72184f1fb6ceb489ddce9e70_0	did her husband ever influence her style?	9	did Steffi husband ever influence her style?	Steffi Graf	The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fraulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Slozil and Heinz Gunthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to 174 km/h (108 mph), making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Stefanie Maria "Steffi" Graf ( , ; born 14 June 1969) is a German former professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 1 for a record 377 weeks and won 22 major singles titles, the second-most since the start of the Open Era in 1968 and third-most of all-time behind Margaret Court (24) and Serena Williams (23). In 1988, she became the first tennis player to achieve the Golden Slam by winning all four Grand Slam singles titles and the Olympic gold medal in the same calendar year. Furthermore, she is the only tennis player, male or female, to have won each major at least four times. Graf was ranked singles world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for a record 377 total weeks: the longest period for which any player, male or female, has held the singles number-one ranking since the WTA and the Association of Tennis Professionals began issuing rankings. She won 107 singles titles, which ranks her third on the WTA's all-time list after Martina Navratilova (167 titles) and Chris Evert (157 titles). She and Margaret Court are the only players, male or female, to win three majors in a calendar year five times (1988, 1989, 1993, 1995 and 1996). Notable features of Graf's game were her versatility across all playing surfaces, footwork and powerful forehand drive. Graf's athletic ability and aggressive game played from the baseline have been credited with developing the modern style of play that has come to dominate today's game. She won six French Open singles titles (second to Evert), seven Wimbledon singles titles, four Australian Open titles, and five U.S. Open singles titles. She is the only singles player (male or female) to have achieved a Grand Slam since the hard court was introduced as a playing surface, replacing grass, at the US Open in 1978. Graf's Grand Slam was achieved on grass, clay, and hard court while the previous five singles Grand Slams were achieved on only grass and clay. Graf reached 13 consecutive singles major finals, from the 1987 French Open through to the 1990 French Open, winning nine of them. She won five consecutive singles majors (1988 Australian Open to 1989 Australian Open), and seven out of eight, in two calendar years (1988 Australian Open to 1989 US Open, except 1989 French Open). She reached a total of 31 singles major finals. Graf retired at the age of 30 in 1999 while she was ranked world No. 3. She is regarded as one of the greatest female tennis players of all time. Martina Navratilova included Graf at the top of her list of the greatest players ever. In the year of Graf's retirement, Billie Jean King said, "Steffi [Graf] is definitely the greatest women's tennis player of all time." In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. She married former world No. 1 men's tennis player Andre Agassi in October 2001. They have two children. Graf was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004. Along with Boris Becker, Graf was considered instrumental in popularizing tennis in Germany, where it remains one of the foremost national sports. Early life Stefanie Graf was born on 14 June 1969, in Mannheim, Baden-Württemberg, West Germany, to Heidi Schalk and car-and-insurance salesman Peter Graf (18 June 1938 − 30 November 2013). When she was nine years old, her family moved to the neighboring town of Brühl. She has a younger brother, Michael. Her father, an aspiring tennis coach, first introduced her to the game, teaching his three-year-old daughter how to swing a wooden racket in the family's living room. She began practising on a court at the age of four and played in her first tournament at five. She soon began taking the top prize at junior tournaments with regularity, going on to win the European Championships 12s and 18s in 1982. Career Early career Graf played in her first professional tournament in October 1982 at Filderstadt, Germany. She lost her first round match 6–4, 6–0 to Tracy Austin, a two-time US Open champion and former world No. 1 player. (Twelve years later, Graf defeated Austin 6–0, 6–0 during a second round match at the Evert Cup in Indian Wells, California, which was their second and last match against each other.) At the start of her first full professional year in 1983, Graf was 13 years old and ranked world No. 124. She won no titles during the next three years, but her ranking climbed steadily to world No. 98 in 1983, No. 22 in 1984, and No. 6 in 1985. In 1984, she first gained international attention when she almost upset the tenth seed, Jo Durie of the United Kingdom, in a fourth round Centre Court match at Wimbledon. In August as a 15-year-old (and youngest entrant) representing West Germany, she won the tennis demonstration event at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. No medals were awarded as this was not an official Olympic event. Graf's schedule was closely controlled by her father, who limited her play so that she would not burn out. In 1985, for instance, she played only ten events leading up to the US Open, whereas another up-and-coming star, Gabriela Sabatini of Argentina, who was a year younger than Graf, played 21. Peter Graf also kept a tight rein on Graf's personal life. Social invitations on the tour were often declined as Graf's focus was kept on practicing and match play. Working with her father and then-coach Pavel Složil, Graf typically practiced for up to four hours a day, often heading straight from airports to practice courts. This narrow focus meant that Graf, already shy and retiring by nature, made few friends on the tour in her early years, but it led to a steady improvement in her play. In 1985 and early 1986, Graf emerged as the top challenger to the dominance of Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert. During that period, she lost six times to Evert and three times to Navratilova, all in straight sets. She did not win a tournament but consistently reached tournament finals, semifinals and quarterfinals, with the highlight being her semifinal loss to Navratilova at the US Open. On 13 April 1986, Graf won her first WTA tournament and beat Evert for the first time in the final of the Family Circle Cup in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (She never lost to Evert again, beating her six more times over the next three and a half years.) Graf then won her next three tournaments at Amelia Island, Charleston, and Berlin, culminating in a 6–2, 6–3 defeat of Navratilova in the final of the latter. Illness caused her to miss Wimbledon, and an accident where she broke a toe several weeks later also curtailed her play. She returned to win a small tournament at Mahwah just before the US Open where, in one of the most anticipated matches of the year, she encountered Navratilova in a semifinal. The match was played over two days with Navratilova finally winning after saving three match points 6–1, 6–7, 7–6. Graf then won three consecutive indoor titles at Tokyo, Zurich, and Brighton, before once again contending with Navratilova at the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships in New York. This time, Navratilova beat Graf 7–6, 6–3, 6–2. Breakthrough year: 1987 Graf's Grand Slam tournament breakthrough came in 1987. She started the year strongly, with six tournament victories heading into the French Open, with the highlight being at the tournament in Miami, where she defeated Martina Navratilova in a semifinal and Chris Evert in the final and lost only 20 games in the seven rounds of the tournament. In the French Open final, Graf defeated Navratilova, who was the world No. 1, 6–4, 4–6, 8–6 after beating Sabatini in a three-set semifinal. Graf then lost to Navratilova 7–5, 6–3 in the Wimbledon final, her first loss of the year. However, in the Federation Cup final in Vancouver, Canada, three weeks later, she defeated Evert easily 6–2, 6–1. The US Open ended anti-climactically as Navratilova defeated Graf in the final 7–6, 6–1. Graf had a win-loss record of 75-2 for a 97.4 winning percentage in 1987, both losses coming to Navratilova as they split the four matches they played during the year. On 17 August, after defeating Evert in a straight set final in the Virginia Slims of Los Angeles, Graf overtook Navratilova for the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in her career, a ranking she would hold for the next 186 consecutive weeks, a record (it was tied by Serena Williams in 2016). Graf was the first player other than Navratilova or Evert to hold the top spot since Tracy Austin in 1980. Golden Slam: 1988 Graf started 1988 by winning the Australian Open, defeating Chris Evert in the final 6–1, 7–6. Graf did not lose a set during the tournament and lost a total of only 29 games. Graf lost twice to Sabatini during the spring, once on hardcourts in Boca Raton, Florida, and once on clay at Amelia Island, Florida. Graf, however, won the tournament in San Antonio, Texas, and retained her title in Miami, where she once again defeated Evert in the final. Graf then won the tournament in Berlin, losing only twelve games in five matches. At the French Open, Graf successfully defended her title by defeating Natasha Zvereva 6–0, 6–0 in a 34-minute final. The official time of the match given on the scoresheet was 34 minutes; however, just 32 minutes of that was spent on the court, as a rain break split the match into two periods of play, of nine and 23 minutes. That was the shortest-ever and most one-sided Grand Slam final ever and the only double bagel in a Major final since 1911. Zvereva, who had eliminated Martina Navratilova in the fourth round, won only thirteen points in the match. Next came Wimbledon, where Martina Navratilova had won six straight titles. Graf was trailing Martina Navratilova in the final 7–5, 2–0 before winning the match 5–7, 6–2, 6–1. She then won tournaments in Hamburg and Mahwah (where she lost only eight games all tournament). At the US Open, Graf beat Sabatini in a three-set final to win the Grand Slam by 6–3, 3–6, 6–1, a feat previously performed by only two other women, Maureen Connolly Brinker in 1953 and Margaret Court in 1970. Graf's 1988 Grand Slam remains the only one in history completed on three surfaces (grass, clay, hard court), as all other Grand Slams in tennis history were achieved prior to the introduction of hard court at the US Open in 1978. In reaching and winning all four Grand Slam finals, Graf became the first player in history to contest and win 28 Grand Slam singles matches in a single year; albeit including the unplayed walkover against Evert in the US Open. Even discounting that result, no other player had played and won 27 Grand Slam matches in a single year before and the feat has to date only been matched by Novak Djokovic since, in both 2015 and 2021, when he failed in both bids to win the Grand Slam. Graf then defeated Sabatini 6–3, 6–3 in the gold medal match at the Olympic Games in Seoul and achieved what the media had dubbed the "Golden Slam". Graf also won her only Grand Slam doubles title that year—at Wimbledon partnering Sabatini—and picked up a women's doubles Olympic bronze medal. Graf was the first tennis player to achieve the feat: wheelchair tennis players Diede de Groot and Dylan Alcott achieved the Golden Slam in 2021. At the year-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf was upset by Pam Shriver, only her third loss of the year. The loss deprived her of the Golden Super Slam. She was named the 1988 BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year. At the end of the year, the municipality of Brühl, her hometown, gave her the title of honorary citizen. New challengers and personal challenges 1989 Speculation was rife at the beginning of 1989 about the possibility of Graf winning another Grand Slam. Some noted observers, such as Margaret Court, suggested that Graf could achieve the feat a couple more times. And the year began as expected, with Graf extending her Grand Slam tournament winning streak to five events at the Australian Open, defeating Helena Suková in the final. Her 6–3, 6–0 defeat of Gabriela Sabatini in a semifinal was described by veteran observer Ted Tinling as "probably the best tennis I've seen". He went on to add, "I saw what Steffi did to Sabatini at the Australian Open this year, and that was it. She is better than them all." Graf followed this with easy victories in her next four tournaments at Washington, D.C., San Antonio, Texas, Boca Raton, Florida, and Hilton Head. The Washington, D.C. tournament was notable because Graf won the first twenty points of the final against Zina Garrison. In the Boca Raton final, Graf lost the only set she conceded to Chris Evert in their final seven matches. In the subsequent Amelia Island final on clay, Graf lost her first match of the year to Sabatini but returned to European clay with easy victories at Hamburg and Berlin. Graf's Grand Slam tournament winning streak ended at the French Open, where 17-year-old Spaniard Arantxa Sánchez Vicario beat Graf in three sets. Graf served for the match at 5–3 in the third set but lost the game and won only three more points in the match. Suffering from food poisoning, she had struggled to beat Monica Seles in their semifinal 6–3, 3–6, 6–3 and said that she had menstrual cramps in the final. Graf, however, recovered to defeat Martina Navratilova 6–2, 6–7, 6–1 in the Wimbledon final after defeating Monica Seles 6–0, 6–1 in a fourth round match, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in a quarterfinal, and Chris Evert in a semifinal. Graf warmed up for the US Open with easy tournament victories in San Diego and Mahwah. In her semifinal match at the US Open, Graf defeated Sabatini 3–6, 6–4, 6–2. The match was notable for its dramatic ending. Having suffered from leg cramps since the middle of the third set, Graf ran off the court seconds after match point to seek medical treatment. In the final, Navratilova led 6–3, 4–2 before Graf rallied to win 3–6, 7–5, 6–1 for her third Grand Slam singles title of the year. Victories at Zurich and Brighton preceded the Virginia Slims Championships, where Graf cemented her top-ranked status by beating Navratilova in the four-set final. Graf ended 1989 with an 86–2 match record and the loss of only 12 sets. Her 0.977 winning percentage is the second-highest in the open era behind Navratilova. 1990 Graf defeated Mary Joe Fernández in the final of the Australian Open, which was her eighth Grand Slam singles title in the last nine she contested. She survived an intense three-set battle with Helena Sukova in the semis, breaking in the tenth and final game to win the third set 6–4. Her winning streak (unbeaten since the 1989 French Open loss to Arantxa Sánchez) continued with victories in Tokyo, Amelia Island, and Hamburg. Shortly after winning in Tokyo, Graf injured her right thumb while cross-country skiing in Switzerland and subsequently withdrew from the Virginia Slims of Florida and the Lipton Championships. In Berlin, she extended her unbeaten streak to 66 matches (second in WTA history to Navratilova's 74) before losing the final to Monica Seles, 4–6, 3–6. While the Berlin tournament was being played, the largest-circulation German tabloid, Bild, ran a story about an alleged scandal involving Graf's father. The difficulty of answering questions about the matter came to a head at a Wimbledon press conference, where Graf broke down in tears. Wimbledon authorities then threatened to immediately shut down any subsequent press conferences where questions about the issue were asked. Whether this scandal affected Graf's form is open to debate. In an interview with Stern magazine in July 1990, Graf stated, "I could not fight as usual." Graf again lost to Monica Seles in the final of the French Open 6–7, 4–6. Seles was behind 2–6 in the first-set tiebreaker, but then came back to win six points in a row and take the set. At Wimbledon, Graf lost in the semifinals to Zina Garrison, who with this victory broke Graf's string of 13 consecutive major finals. This was a major upset as Garrison had to save a match point to defeat Monica Seles in the quarterfinal, and was expected to easily fall to Graf, whom she had not beaten in four years. After victories in Montreal and San Diego, Graf reached the US Open final, where she lost in straight sets to Sabatini. Graf won four indoor tournaments after the US Open, including a pair of straight-set wins over Sabatini in the finals of Zürich and Worcester. Although Sabatini got the best of Graf in the semifinals of the season-ending Virginia Slims Championships, Graf still finished the year as the top-ranked player. 1991 A mixture of injury problems, personal difficulties, and loss of form made 1991 a tough year for Graf. Seles established herself as the new dominant player on the women's tour, winning the Australian Open, French Open, and US Open and, in March, ending Graf's record 186 consecutive-weeks hold on the World No. 1 ranking. Graf briefly regained the top ranking after winning at Wimbledon but lost it again after her loss to Navratilova at the US Open. Graf lost an Australian Open quarterfinal to Jana Novotná, the first time she did not reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam singles tournament since the 1986 French Open. She then lost to Sabatini in her next three tournaments before winning the U.S. Hardcourt Championships in San Antonio, beating Monica Seles in the final. After losing a fifth straight time to Sabatini in Amelia Island, Florida, Graf again defeated Seles in the Hamburg final. Following her tournament victory in German Open in Berlin, Graf suffered one of the worst defeats of her career in a French Open semifinal where she won only two games against Sánchez Vicario and lost her first 6–0 set since 1984. At Wimbledon, however, Graf captured her third women's crown, this time at Sabatini's expense. Sabatini served for the match twice, and was two points away from her first Wimbledon title. After breaking Sabatini's serve to even the third set at 6–6, Graf defeated Sabatini by winning the next two games to take the match 6–4, 3–6, 8–6. Martina Navratilova then defeated Graf 7–6, 6–7, 6–4 in a US Open semifinal, the first time she had beaten Graf in four years. Graf then won in Leipzig, with her 500th career victory coming in a quarterfinal against Judith Wiesner. After winning two more indoor tournaments at Zurich and Brighton, she failed once again in the Virginia Slims Championships, losing her quarterfinal to Novotná. Soon after, she split with her long-time coach, Pavel Složil. 1992 A bout of rubella forced Graf to miss the first major event of 1992, the Australian Open. Her year continued indifferently with losses in three of her first four tournaments, including a semifinal loss to Jana Novotná in Chicago. It was Graf's second consecutive loss to Novotna, and dating back to their 1991 Australian Open quarterfinal match, Jana had won three of their last five meetings. It would also be the last loss Graf would ever have to Novotna in a match she completed (she did have a loss after withdrawing with injury after the first set of a late 1996 match). Chicago was notable, however, for being the first tournament Graf played with her new coach, former Swiss player Heinz Günthardt. Graf's father had approached Günthardt during the 1991 Virginia Slims Championships. She would work with him for the remainder of her career. In Boca Raton, Florida, Graf reached her first final of the year, where she faced Conchita Martínez for the title. In their five previous head-to-head matches, Graf had defeated Martínez each time. Even though she lost the opening set, Graf went on to prevail in three sets. She lost twice to Sabatini in the early spring at the Lipton International and the Bausch & Lomb Championships, which now brought her to seven losses in her last eight matches against Sabatini; however, the Bausch & Lomb loss would be Graf's final loss to Sabatini, winning her next, and last eight matches against Sabatini. Victories at Hamburg and Berlin (beating Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both) prepared her for the French Open, where she defeated Sánchez Vicario in the semifinals after losing the first set 6–0. Graf then lost a closely contested final to Monica Seles, 2–6, 6–3, 8–10. Seles won the match on her fifth match point; Graf came within two points of winning the match a few games earlier. At Wimbledon, after struggling through early-round three-setters against Mariaan de Swardt and Patty Fendick, she easily defeated Natasha Zvereva in the quarterfinal, Sabatini in the semifinal, and Seles in the final, 6–2, 6–1, with Seles playing in almost complete silence because of widespread media and player criticism of her grunting. Graf then won all five of her Fed Cup matches, helping Germany defeat Spain in the final by defeating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario, 6–4, 6–2. At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Graf lost to Jennifer Capriati in the final and claimed the silver medal. At the US Open, Graf was upset in the quarterfinals by Sánchez Vicario 7–6, 6–3. Four consecutive indoor tournament victories in the autumn helped improve her season, but for the third consecutive year, she failed to win the Virginia Slims Championships, where she lost in the first round to Lori McNeil. Second period of dominance 1993 Graf began 1993 with four losses in her first six tournaments of the year: two to Sánchez Vicario and one each to Seles and the 36-year-old Martina Navratilova. Seles defeated Graf at the Australian Open 4–6, 6–3, 6–2. She struggled at the German Open in Berlin where she lost a 6–0 set to the unheralded Sabine Hack before defeating Mary Joe Fernández and Sabatini in three-set matches to claim her seventh title there in eight years. During a quarterfinal match between Seles and Magdalena Maleeva in Hamburg, Seles was stabbed between the shoulder blades by a mentally ill German fan of Graf, Günter Parche. He claimed that he committed the attack to help Graf reclaim the world No. 1 ranking. More than two years elapsed before Seles competed again. Shortly after the stabbing, during a players meeting at the Italian Open in Rome, 17 of the world's top 25 WTA members voted against preserving Seles' world No. 1 ranking while she was sidelined. Since Graf skipped the Italian Open, she did not take part in the vote. During Seles's absence, Graf won 65 of 67 matches, three of four Grand Slam events and the year-end Virginia Slims championships. She won her first French Open title since 1988 with a three-set victory over Mary Joe Fernández in the final. Fernandez had two break points to take a 3–0 and double break lead in the third set. The win elevated Graf to the world No. 1 ranking for the first time in 22 months. At Wimbledon, Graf defeated Jana Novotná to win her third consecutive, and fifth overall, ladies' title. In the third and deciding set, Novotná had a point to go up 5–1 on her serve. After breaking Novotná's serve, Graf won the next four games to take the match 7–6, 1–6, 6–4. Graf had a bone splinter in her right foot during this tournament (and for the next few months), finally resulting in surgery on 4 October. In the meantime, she lost surprisingly to Nicole Bradtke of Australia in a Fed Cup match on clay before winning the Acura Classic in San Diego and the Canadian Open in Toronto in preparation for the US Open. She won there, comfortably beating Helena Suková in the final after needing three sets to eliminate Gabriela Sabatini and Manuela Maleeva-Fragniere in the quarterfinals and semifinals respectively. In the fall, Graf won the Volkswagen Card Cup in Leipzig a day before her foot operation, losing only two games to Jana Novotná in the final. Graf lost to Conchita Martínez in her comeback tournament a month later in Philadelphia. However, she finished her year with a highlight, winning her first Virginia Slims Championships since 1989 by beating Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final despite needing painkillers for a back injury. 1994 Seemingly free of injury for the first time in years, Graf began the year by winning the Australian Open, where she defeated Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in the final with the loss of only two games. Graf later stated it was the best tennis she had ever played in a Grand Slam final. She then won her next four tournaments in Tokyo, Indian Wells, Delray Beach and Miami respectively. In the Miami final, she lost her first set of the year—to Natasha Zvereva—after winning 54 consecutive sets. In the Hamburg final, she lost for the first time in 1994 after 36 consecutive match victories, losing to Sánchez Vicario in three sets. She then won her eighth German Open, but there were signs that her form was worsening as she almost lost to Julie Halard in a quarterfinal. As the defending champion Graf lost in straight sets to Mary Pierce in the French Open semifinal. This was followed by a first-round straight-sets loss at Wimbledon to Lori McNeil, her only loss at Wimbledon between 1991 and 1997 and her first loss in a first round Grand Slam tournament in ten years. Graf still managed to win San Diego the following month but aggravated a long-time back injury in beating Sánchez Vicario in the final. Graf developed a bone spur at the base of her spine due to a congenital condition of the sacroiliac joint. She began to wear a back brace and was unsure about playing the US Open but elected to play while receiving treatment and stretching for two hours before each match. She made it to the final and took the first set against Sánchez Vicario but lost the next two sets — Sanchez Vicario's last victory over Graf. In the middle of the second set, Graf suffered back spasms while reaching for a ball in the ad court. She took the following nine weeks off, returning only for the Virginia Slims Championships where she lost in straight sets to Pierce in the quarterfinal. Although Graf ended the year ranked No. 1 on the computer the ITF named Sanchez Vicario its World Champion for the year, while the WTA backed their official rankings and named Graf. 1995 A strained right calf muscle forced Graf to withdraw from the Australian Open. She came back in February, winning four consecutive tournaments in Paris, Delray Beach, Miami and Houston. She then beat Sánchez Vicario in the finals of both the French Open and Wimbledon. The 1995 Wimbledon final is regarded as one of the most dramatic women's major finals in history as Graf and Sánchez Vicario battled in a tight third set that included a 16-minute long, 13-deuce game on Sanchez Vicario's serve at 5–5. In August Monica Seles made her much anticipated return to tennis at the Canadian Open. It was decided to grant her a joint number-one ranking with Graf who took her first loss of the year in the first round to Amanda Coetzer. The US Open was Monica Seles's first Grand Slam event since the 1993 attack, with much anticipation again around a potential Seles-Graf final. After surviving a scare in a three-setter against Amanda Coetzer in the first round, Graf reached the final with relative ease, while Seles went through her side of the draw in even more convincing fashion. Seles and Graf met in the final, with Graf winning in three sets, saving a set point in the first set. Graf then capped the year by beating countrywoman Anke Huber in a five-set final at the season-ending WTA Championships in 2 hours and 46 minutes. Tax issues In personal terms, 1995 was a difficult year for Graf, as she was accused by German authorities of tax evasion in the early years of her career. In her defense, she stated that her father Peter was her financial manager, and all financial matters relating to her earnings at the time had been under his control. Her father was arrested in August and was sentenced to 45 months in jail. He was eventually released after serving 25 months. Prosecutors dropped their case against Graf in 1997, when she agreed to pay a fine of 1.3 million Deutsche Marks to the government and an unspecified charity. 1996 Graf again missed the Australian Open after undergoing surgery in December 1995 to remove bone splinters from her left foot. Graf came back to the tour in March, winning back to back titles in Indian Wells and Miami, followed by a record ninth title at the German Open in May and a quarterfinal defeat in Rome against Martina Hingis. She then successfully defended the three Grand Slam titles she won the year before. In a close French Open final, Graf again overcame Sánchez Vicario, taking the third set 10–8. Graf had led 4–1 in the second set tiebreak, only to lose six points in a row and force a decider. Twice in the third set Sánchez Vicario served for the championship but was broken each time by Graf. It was the longest French Open women's singles final in history, both in terms of time (3 hours and 3 minutes) and number of games played (40). Graf then had a straight-sets win against Sánchez Vicario in the Wimbledon final. That was the last competitive match Graf and Sánchez Vicario would ever play against one another. In July, a left knee injury forced Graf to withdraw from the Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Graf played only one warm-up event ahead of the US Open, the Acura Classic in Manhattan Beach, California, where she lost to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinals. She then successfully defended her title at the US Open, defeating Monica Seles in the final. Her toughest battle came against rising star Martina Hingis in the semifinal, with Hingis unable to convert on five set points. Graf did not lose a set the whole tournament. She also won her fifth and final WTA Tour Championships title with a five set win over Martina Hingis, with Hingis cramping up in the fifth set. In 1988, Graf became only the second tennis player in history to win a Slam on hardcourt, clay, and grass all in the same season. She repeated the feat in 1993, 1995, and 1996. Final years on the tour: 1997–99 The last few years of Graf's career were beset by injuries, particularly to her knees and back. She lost the world No. 1 ranking to Martina Hingis and failed to win a Grand Slam title for the first time in ten years in 1997. That year Graf lost in the fourth round of the Australian Open in straight sets to Amanda Coetzer. She subsequently withdrew from the Pan Pacific Open and had arthroscopic surgery performed on her left knee. After several months injury lay off, Graf returned to play in the German Open in Berlin in front of a home crowd and had the worst defeat of her career in the quarterfinal, when Amanda Coetzer beat her in just 56 minutes 6–0, 6–1. In the French Open Graf was again beaten by Amanda Coetzer in straight sets, 6–1, 6–4. Only one week later, she underwent reconstructive knee surgery in Vienna and subsequently missed the 1997 Wimbledon and US Open championships. The treatment was for a fracture of the cartilage as well as a shortening and partial rupture of the patellar tendon of her left knee. After missing almost half of the tour in 1998, Graf lost in the third round at Wimbledon and in the fourth round at the US Open. Shortly after the US Open, she underwent surgery to remove a bone spur in her right wrist. Upon her return Graf defeated world No. 2 Hingis and world No. 1 Lindsay Davenport en route to the Philadelphia title. At the first round of the season-ending Chase Championships, Graf defeated world No. 3, Jana Novotná, before losing in the semifinal to first-seeded Davenport. At the beginning of 1999 Graf played the warm up event to the Australian Open in Sydney; she defeated Serena Williams in the second round and Venus in the quarterfinals before losing to Lindsay Davenport in the semifinal. Graf then went on to reach the quarterfinals of the Australian Open before losing to Monica Seles in two sets. In Indian Wells Graf lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At the French Open, Graf reached her first Grand Slam final in three years and fought back from a set and twice from a break down in the second set to defeat the top ranked Hingis in three sets for a memorable victory. Graf became the first player in the open era to defeat the first, second, and third ranked players in the same Grand Slam tournament by beating second-ranked Davenport in the quarterfinals and third-ranked Seles in the semifinals. Graf said after the final that it would be her last French Open, fueling speculation about her retirement. Graf then reached her ninth Wimbledon singles final, losing to third-seeded Davenport in straight sets. She had to overcome three difficult three set matches en route to this final, against Mariaan De Swardt in the third round, Venus Williams in the quarterfinals and Mirjana Lučić in the semifinals. On 13 August 1999, shortly after retiring with a strained hamstring from a second round match against Amy Frazier in San Diego, Graf announced her retirement from the women's tour at age 30. She was ranked No. 3 at that time and said, "I have done everything I wanted to do in tennis. I feel I have nothing left to accomplish. The weeks following Wimbledon [in 1999] weren't easy for me. I was not having fun anymore. After Wimbledon, for the first time in my career, I didn't feel like going to a tournament. My motivation wasn't what it was in the past." Doubles career From the beginning of her career until 1990, Graf regularly played doubles events in Grand Slams and other tournaments, winning a total of eleven titles. In 1986, she formed a partnership with rival Gabriela Sabatini. The pair was moderately successful, winning the 1988 Wimbledon Championships together and reaching the finals of the French Open in 1986, 1987 and 1989. The partnership was the subject of much discussion, as the two women, both known to be shy, usually kept communication to a minimum during changeovers and between points, a highly unusual situation in doubles. Sabatini said of the partnership: "doubles is all about communicating with each other, and we didn't communicate that much. We would just say the basic things, but nothing else." The pair played their last major tournament together at the 1990 Wimbledon Championships, losing in the quarterfinals. From 1991 until the end of her career, Graf would only play doubles sporadically, forming short-term partnerships with a variety of players, including Lori McNeil, Anke Huber and her best friends on the tour, Rennae Stubbs, Patricia Tarabini and Ines Gorrochategui. She played her last Grand Slam doubles tournament at the 1999 Australian Open with Gorrochategui, losing in the second round. Graf also occasionally played mixed doubles, although she never won a title. She partnered with doubles specialist Mark Woodforde at the Australian Open in 1994, with Henri Leconte at Wimbledon in 1991 and at the French Open in 1994, and with Charlie Pasarell at the US Open in 1984. In an unusual arrangement, she paired with her coaches Pavel Složil at Wimbledon in 1988 and Heinz Günthardt in 1992 and 1996, also at Wimbledon. At the 1999 Wimbledon Championships, Graf formed a much-publicized partnership with John McEnroe, with whom she reached the semifinals before withdrawing due to concerns that her uncertain hamstring, coupled with a bout of bronchitis, would affect her in the singles final. Post-career exhibition matches In late 1999 and early 2000, as part of her Farewell Tour, Graf played a series of exhibition matches against former rivals in New Zealand, Japan, Spain, Germany and South Africa. She played Jelena Dokic in Christchurch, New Zealand, Amanda Coetzer in Durban, South Africa, and her former rival Arantxa Sánchez Vicario in Zaragoza, Spain. It was Graf and Sánchez Vicario's first head-to-head meeting since 1996. In February 2000, Graf played against Kimiko Date at Nagoya Rainbow Hall in Tokyo, winning in three sets. In September 2004, Graf dispatched her former doubles partner Gabriela Sabatini, in straight sets, in an exhibition match played in Berlin, Germany. She was also in Berlin to host a charity gala, as well as inaugurating a tennis stadium renamed the "Steffi Graf Stadion". Proceeds from her match against Sabatini went to Graf's foundation, "Children for Tomorrow". In July 2005, Graf competed in one tie of World Team Tennis (WTT) on the Houston Wranglers team. She was beaten in two out of three matches, with each match being one set. Graf lost her singles match to Elena Likhovtseva 5–4. She teamed with Ansley Cargill in women's doubles against Anna Kournikova and Likhovtseva but lost 5–2. She was successful, however, in the mixed doubles match. Graf completely ruled out a return to professional tennis. In October, Graf defeated Sabatini in an exhibition match in Mannheim, Germany, winning both of their sets. Like the exhibition match the previous year against Sabatini, proceeds went to "Children for Tomorrow". In 2008 Graf lost an exhibition match against Kimiko Date at Ariake Colosseum in Tokyo. As part of the event, billed as "Dream Match 2008", she defeated Martina Navratilova in a one-set affair 8–7, with Graf winning a tiebreaker 10–5. It was the first time in 14 years Graf had played Navratilova. Graf played a singles exhibition match against Kim Clijsters and a mixed doubles exhibition alongside husband Andre Agassi against Tim Henman and Clijsters as part of a test event and celebration for the newly installed roof over Wimbledon's Centre Court in 2009. She lost a lengthy one-set singles match to Clijsters and also the mixed doubles. In 2010, Graf participated in the WTT Smash Hits exhibition in Washington, D.C. to support the Elton John AIDS Foundation. She and Agassi, her husband, were on Team Elton John, which competed against Team Billie Jean King. Graf played in the celebrity doubles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles before straining her left calf muscle and being replaced by Anna Kournikova. Summary of career Graf won seven singles titles at Wimbledon, six singles titles at the French Open, five singles titles at the US Open, and four singles titles at the Australian Open. Her overall record in 56 Grand Slam events was 278–32 (90 percent) (84–10 at the French Open, 74–7 at Wimbledon, 73–9 at the US Open, and 47–6 at the Australian Open). Her career prize-money earnings totalled US$21,895,277 (a record until Lindsay Davenport surpassed this amount in January 2008). Her singles win/loss record was 900–115 (88.7 percent). She was ranked world No. 1 for 186 consecutive weeks (from August 1987 to March 1991; tied with Serena Williams, a record in the women's game) and a record total 377 weeks overall. Career statistics Grand Slam tournament performance timeline Note: Graf's semifinal match at the 1988 US Open was walkover (so not counted as win) Grand Slam tournament finals Singles: 31 (22 titles, 9 runner-ups) Doubles: 4 (1 title, 3 runner-ups) Records These records were attained in Open Era of tennis. Records in bold indicate Open Era peer-less achievements. Playing style The main weapons in Graf's game were her powerful inside-out forehand drive (which earned her the moniker Fräulein Forehand) and her intricate footwork. She often positioned herself in her backhand corner and although this left her forehand wide open and vulnerable to attack, her court speed meant that only the most accurate shots wide to her forehand caused any trouble. Graf's technique on the forehand was unique and instantly recognizable: generating considerable racquet head speed with her swing, she reached the point of contact late and typically out of the air. As a result, she hit her forehand with exceptional pace and accuracy. According to her coaches Pavel Složil and Heinz Günthardt, Graf's superior sense of timing was the key behind the success of her forehand. Graf also had a powerful backhand drive but over the course of her career tended to use it less frequently, opting more often for an effective backhand slice. Starting in the early 1990s, she used the slice almost exclusively in baseline rallies and mostly limited the topspin backhand to passing shots. Her accuracy with the slice, both cross-court and down the line and her ability to skid the ball and keep it low, enabled her to use it as an offensive weapon to set the ball up for her forehand put-aways. However, Graf admitted in 1995 that she would have preferred having a two-handed backhand in retrospect. She built her powerful and accurate serve up to , making it one of the fastest serves in women's tennis and was a capable volleyer. An exceptionally versatile competitor, Graf remains the only player, male or female, to have won the calendar-year Grand Slam on three surfaces or to have won each Grand Slam at least four times. Eighteen-time Grand Slam champion and former rival Chris Evert opined, "Steffi Graf is the best all-around player. Martina [Navratilova] won more on fast courts and I won more on slow courts, but Steffi came along and won more titles on both surfaces." Her endurance and superior footwork allowed her to excel on clay courts, where, in addition to six French Open titles, she won 26 regular tour events, including a record eight titles at the German Open. Meanwhile, her naturally aggressive style of play, effective backhand slice and speed around the court made her even more dominant on fast surfaces such as hard courts, grass and carpet. Graf stated that grass was her favorite surface to play on, while clay was her least favorite. Equipment and endorsements Early in her career, Graf wore Dunlop apparel, before signing an endorsement contract with Adidas in 1985. She had an Adidas sneakers line known as the St. Graf Pro line. Early in her career, Graf used the Dunlop Maxpower Pro and Maxpower Kevlar racquets and then played with the Max 200G racquet from 1984 to 1993 before switching to Wilson from 1994 to 1999. She first used the Wilson Pro Staff 7.0 lite, then switched to the Pro Staff 7.5 in 1996 and to the Pro Staff 7.1 in 1998. Graf's racquets were strung at 29 kilograms (64 pounds), significantly above the 50-60 pound range recommended by Wilson. In 2006, she signed an endorsement deal with Head. In 2010, Graf and Agassi collaborated with Head and developed the new line of Star Series tennis racquets. Graf has signed many endorsement deals throughout the years including a ten-year endorsement deal with car manufacturer Opel in 1985, and Rexona from 1994 to 1998. Other companies she has endorsed include Barilla, Apollinaris, Citibank, Danone and Teekanne. She has appeared in many advertisements and television commercials with Andre Agassi including Canon Inc. and Longines in 2008 (Agassi became Longines ambassador in 2007). In 2015, she was appointed as the brand ambassador of Kerala tourism, for promoting Ayurveda in North America and Europe. Personal life In 1997, she left the Catholic Church, citing personal reasons. During her career, Graf divided her time between her hometown of Brühl; Boca Raton, Florida; and New York City where she owned a penthouse in the former Police Headquarters Building in SoHo. From 1992 to 1999, Graf dated racing driver Michael Bartels. She started dating Andre Agassi after the 1999 French Open and they married on 22 October 2001, with only their mothers as witnesses. They have two children, a son born in 2001 and a daughter born in 2003. Agassi has said that he and Graf are not pushing their children toward becoming tennis players. The Graf-Agassi family resides in Summerlin, a community in the Las Vegas Valley. Graf's mother and her brother also live there. In 1991, the Steffi Graf Youth Tennis Center in Leipzig was dedicated to her. She is the founder and chairperson of "Children for Tomorrow", a non-profit foundation established in 1998 for implementing and developing projects to support children who have been traumatized by war or other crises. In 2001, Graf indicated that she preferred to be called Stefanie instead of Steffi. On 30 November 2013, Graf's father Peter died of pancreatic cancer. He was 75 years old. Legacy In December 1999, Graf was named the greatest female tennis player of the 20th century by a panel of experts assembled by the Associated Press. In March 2012, Tennis Channel picked Graf as the greatest female tennis player ever in their list of 100 greatest tennis players of all time. In November 2018, Tennis.com polled its readers to choose the greatest women's tennis player of all time and Graf came in first. In July 2020, The Guardian polled its readers to determine the greatest female tennis player of the past 50 years, and Steffi was the clear favorite, picking up nearly twice as many votes as any other player. Tennis writer Steve Flink, in his book The Greatest Tennis Matches of the Twentieth Century, named Graf as the best female player of the 20th century. Flink said in 2020 that the jury was still out on (Serena) Williams as the greatest ever, but Williams' consistency over the long span did not match that of Graf or Navratilova. Graf compiled superior career accomplishments over Serena Williams (as of December 2, 2020); 900–115 career record (88.7 win %) versus 843–147 career record (85.2 win %), 107 career tournament victories versus 72 career tournament victories, 377 total weeks ranked as world No. One versus 319 total weeks ranked as world No. One. While Graf's 22 Grand Slam wins is one fewer than Williams' 23 (and two fewer than Margaret Court's 24), Graf's professional career is eight years shorter than Williams, plus Graf also faced much tougher competition during her era (Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, Gabriela Sabatini, and Monica Seles) compared to Williams. However, with the stabbing of Monica Seles in 1993, some have questioned its impact on Graf's career statistics and legacy. Awards and honours Graf was voted the ITF World Champion in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1995 and 1996. She was voted the WTA Player of the Year in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996. She was elected as the German Sportsperson of the Year in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1999. In 2004, the Berliner Tennis-Arena was renamed Steffi-Graf-Stadion in honor of Graf. Graf was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004 and the German Sports Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2015, Graf was the recipient of the International Club's Jean Borotra Sportsmanship Award. See also Graf–Navratilova rivalry Graf–Sabatini rivalry Graf–Seles rivalry List of female tennis players List of tennis rivalries Overall tennis records - women's singles Tennis records of the Open Era - women's singles References External links Official Wimbledon profile BBC profile ESPN biography Steffi Graf's victories German female tennis players International Tennis Hall of Fame inductees 1969 births Living people Australian Open (tennis) champions French Open champions German emigrants to the United States Hopman Cup competitors Olympic medalists in tennis Olympic bronze medalists for West Germany Olympic gold medalists for West Germany Olympic silver medalists for Germany Olympic tennis players of Germany Olympic tennis players of West Germany Sportspeople from Mannheim Recipients of the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Recipients of the Order of Merit of Baden-Württemberg Recipients of the Olympic Order Tennis players at the 1984 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1988 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 1992 Summer Olympics US Open (tennis) champions West German expatriates in the United States Wimbledon champions World No. 1 tennis players Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's singles Grand Slam (tennis) champions in women's doubles Recipients of the Silver Laurel Leaf German philanthropists German women philanthropists Medalists at the 1988 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics People from SoHo, Manhattan Andre Agassi Tennis people from Baden-Württemberg	false	[ "\"Did I Ever Tell You\" is a duet by American country singers George Jones and Margie Singleton on their 1962 duet album, Duets Country Style. It was released as a single in 1961, peaking at number 15 on the 1961 Billboard Hot Country Songs singles chart.\n\nBackground\nLike Jones, Singleton began her career at Starday Records and released her first single in 1957, \"One Step (Nearer to You)\". Singleton released another single in 1959 called \"Eyes Of Love\". The song gave Singleton her first major hit when it reached the top 20 in 1960. In 1961, she switched to Mercury Records where her husband Shelby Singleton was a producer. With his help, Singleton recorded a duet with George Jones called \"Did I Ever Tell You.\" The song a hit for Singleton, peaking at No. 15 in 1961. The following year, the duo had equal success together with another country hit called \"Waltz of the Angels\". Jones, who had previously recorded duets with Jeanette Hicks and Virginia Spurlock, would record more famous duets with Melba Montgomery and future wife Tammy Wynette in the years ahead.\n\n1961 songs\nGeorge Jones songs\nMargie Singleton songs\nMercury Records singles", "Harriet Louisa Browne (1 July 1829–9 April 1906) was a New Zealand political salon hostess, community leader and letter-writer. She was born in Edinburgh, Midlothian, Scotland.\n\nShe was married to Thomas Robert Gore Browne, governor of New Zealand in 1855–1861 and Tasmania in 1861–1868, and exerted an acknowledged influence over his policy during his office. Browne was over 20 years her husband's junior and was well read, socially accomplished with a pleasant personality, and had an excellent understanding of the political environment in which she and her husband circulated. In addition to her influence over her husband, her hospitality and contribution to the social and cultural life during her husband's placements assisted him in influencing others to support his political views.\n\nHarriet's diaries, scrapbooks, and correspondence with her husband are kept by Archives New Zealand and Alexander Turnbull Library.\n\nReferences\n\n1829 births\n1906 deaths\nScottish emigrants to New Zealand\nNew Zealand salon-holders\n19th-century New Zealand politicians\nNew Zealand political hostesses\n19th-century New Zealand writers\n19th-century New Zealand women writers" ]
[ "Henryk Górecki", "Early modernist works" ]	C_7227ab91d2d64abd85231ff29510146e_1	When were his first performances?	1	When were Henryk Gorecki's first performances?	Henryk Górecki	The first public performances of Gorecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartok. The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Gorecki's music. The event led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival. The Epitafium ("Epitaph") he submitted marked a new phase in his development as a composer, and was described as representing "the most colourful and vibrant expression of the new Polish wave". The Festival announced the composer's arrival on the international scene, and he quickly became a favorite of the West's avant-garde musical elite. Writing in 1991, the music critic James Wierzbicki described how that at this time "Gorecki was seen as a Polish heir to the new aesthetic of post-Webernian serialism; with his taut structures, lean orchestrations and painstaking concern for the logical ordering of pitches". Gorecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the following year. At the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, his Scontri, written for orchestra, caused a sensation among critics due to its use of sharp contrasts and harsh articulations. By 1961, Gorecki was at the forefront of the Polish avant-garde, having absorbed the modernism of Anton Webern, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, and his Symphony No. 1 gained international acclaim at the Paris Biennial Festival of Youth. Gorecki moved to Paris to continue his studies, and while there was influenced by contemporaries including Olivier Messiaen, Roman Palester, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. He began to lecture at the Academy of Music in Katowice in 1968, where he taught score-reading, orchestration and composition. In 1972, he was promoted to assistant professor, and developed a fearsome reputation among his students for his often blunt personality. According to the Polish composer Rafal Augustyn, "When I began to study under Gorecki it felt as if someone had dumped a pail of ice-cold water over my head. He could be ruthless in his opinions. The weak fell by the wayside but those who graduated under him became, without exception, respected composers". Gorecki admits, "For quite a few years, I was a pedagogue, a teacher in the music academy, and my students would ask me many, many things, including how to write and what to write. I always answered this way: If you can live without music for 2 or 3 days, then don't write...It might be better to spend time with a girl or with a beer...If you cannot live without music, then write." Due to his commitments as a teacher and also because of bouts of ill health, he composed only intermittently during this period. CANNOTANSWER	The first public performances of Gorecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartok.	Henryk Mikołaj Górecki ( , ; 6 December 1933 – 12 November 2010) was a Polish composer of contemporary classical music. According to critic Alex Ross, no recent classical composer has had as much commercial success as Górecki. He became a leading figure of the Polish avant-garde during the post-Stalin cultural thaw. His Anton Webern-influenced serialist works of the 1950s and 1960s were characterized by adherence to dissonant modernism and influenced by Luigi Nono, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Krzysztof Penderecki and Kazimierz Serocki. He continued in this direction throughout the 1960s, but by the mid-1970s had changed to a less complex sacred minimalist sound, exemplified by the transitional Symphony No. 2 and the Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs). This later style developed through several other distinct phases, from such works as his 1979 Beatus Vir, to the 1981 choral hymn Miserere, the 1993 Kleines Requiem für eine Polka and his requiem Good Night. Górecki was largely unknown outside Poland until the late 1980s. In 1992, 15 years after it was composed, a recording of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs with soprano Dawn Upshaw and conductor David Zinman, released to commemorate the memory of those lost during the Holocaust, became a worldwide commercial and critical success, selling more than a million copies and vastly exceeding the typical lifetime sales of a recording of symphonic music by a 20th-century composer. Commenting on its popularity, Górecki said, "Perhaps people find something they need in this piece of music [...] somehow I hit the right note, something they were missing. Something somewhere had been lost to them. I feel that I instinctively knew what they needed." This popular acclaim did not generate wide interest in Górecki's other works, and he pointedly resisted the temptation to repeat earlier success, or compose for commercial reward. Nevertheless, his music drew the attention of Australian film director Peter Weir, who used a section of Symphony No 3 in his 1993 film Fearless. Apart from two brief periods studying in Paris and a short time living in Berlin, Górecki spent most of his life in southern Poland. Biography Early years Henryk Górecki was born on 6 December 1933, in the village of Czernica, in present-day Silesian Voivodeship, southwest Poland. His family lived modestly, though both parents had a love of music. His father Roman (1904–1991) worked at the goods office of a local railway station, but was an amateur musician, while his mother Otylia (1909–1935), played piano. Otylia died when her son was just two years old, and many of his early works were dedicated to her memory. Henryk developed an interest in music from an early age, though he was discouraged by both his father and new stepmother to the extent that he was not allowed to play his mother's old piano. He persisted, and in 1943 was allowed to take violin lessons with Paweł Hajduga, a local amateur musician, instrument maker, sculptor, painter, poet and chłopski filozof (peasant philosopher). In 1937, Górecki fell while playing in a neighbor’s yard and dislocated his hip. The resulting suppurative inflammation was misdiagnosed by a local doctor, and delay in proper treatment led to tubercular complications in the bone. The illness went largely untreated for two years, by which time permanent damage had been sustained. He spent the following twenty months in a hospital in Germany, where he underwent four operations. Górecki continued to suffer ill health throughout his life and as a result said he had "talked with death often". In the early 1950s, Górecki studied in the Szafrankowie Brothers State School of Music in Rybnik. Between 1955 and 1960, he studied at the State Higher School of Music in Katowice. In 1965 He joined the faculty of his alma mater in Katowice, where he was made a lecturer in 1968, and then rose to provost before resigning in 1979. Rydułtowy and Katowice Between 1951 and 1953, Górecki taught 10- and 11-year-olds at a school suburb of Rydułtowy, in southern Poland. In 1952, he began a teacher training course at the Intermediate School of Music in Rybnik, where he studied clarinet, violin, piano, and music theory. Through intensive studying, Górecki finished the four-year course in just under three years. During this time, he began to compose his own pieces, mostly songs and piano miniatures. Occasionally, he attempted more ambitious projects—in 1952, he adapted the Adam Mickiewicz ballad Świtezianka, though it was left unfinished. Górecki's life during this time was often difficult. Teaching posts were generally badly paid, while the shortage economy made manuscript paper at times difficult and expensive to acquire. With no access to radio, Górecki kept up to date with music by weekly purchases of such periodicals as Ruch muzyczny (Musical Movement) and Muzyka, and by purchasing at least one score a week. Górecki continued his formal study of music at the Academy of Music in Katowice, where he studied under the composer Bolesław Szabelski, a former student of Karol Szymanowski. Szabelski drew much of his inspiration from Polish highland folklore. He encouraged Górecki's growing confidence and independence by giving him considerable space in which to develop his own ideas and projects; several of Górecki's early pieces were straightforwardly neo-classical, during a period when Górecki was also absorbing the techniques of twelve-tone serialism. He graduated from the Academy with honours in 1960. Professorship In 1975, Górecki was promoted to Professor of Composition at the State Higher School of Music in Katowice, where his students included Eugeniusz Knapik, Andrzej Krzanowski, Rafał Augustyn and his son, Mikołaj. Around this time, he came to believe the Polish Communist authorities were interfering too much in the academy's activities, and called them "little dogs always yapping". As a senior administrator but not a member of the Party, he was in almost perpetual conflict with the authorities in his efforts to protect his school, staff and students from undue political influence. In 1979, he resigned from his post in protest at the government's refusal to allow Pope John Paul II to visit Katowice, and formed a local branch of the "Catholic Intellectuals Club", an organisation devoted to the struggle against the Communist Party (Polish United Workers' Party). In 1981, he composed his Miserere for a large choir in remembrance of police violence against the Solidarity movement. In 1987, he composed Totus Tuus for John Paul II's visit to Poland. Style and compositions Górecki's music covers a variety of styles, but tends towards relative harmonic and rhythmical simplicity. He is considered a founder of the New Polish School. According to Terry Teachout, Górecki's "more conventional array of compositional techniques includes both elaborate counterpoint and the ritualistic repetition of melodic fragments and harmonic patterns." Górecki's first works, dating from the last half of the 1950s, were in the avant-garde style of Webern and other serialists of that time. Some of these twelve-tone and serial pieces include Epitaph (1958), First Symphony (1959), and Scontri (1960) (Mirka 2004, p. 305). At that time, Górecki's reputation was not lagging behind that of Penderecki and his status was confirmed in 1960s when Monologhi won a first prize. Even until 1962, he was firmly ensconced in the minds of the Warsaw Autumn public as a leader of the Polish Modern School, alongside Penderecki. Danuta Mirka has shown that Górecki's compositional techniques in the 1960s were often based on geometry, including axes, figures, one- and two-dimensional patterns, and especially symmetry. She proposes the term "geometrical period" for his works between 1962 and 1970. Building on Krzysztof Droba's classifications, she further divides this period into two phases: "the phase of sonoristic means" (1962–63) and "the phase of reductive constructicism" (1964–70; Mirka 2004, p. 329). During the mid-1960s and early 1970s, Górecki progressively moved away from his early career as radical modernist, and began to compose in a more traditional, romantic mode of expression. His change of style was viewed as an affront to the then avant-garde establishment, and though he continued to receive commissions from various Polish agencies, by the mid-1970s Górecki was no longer regarded as a composer of importance. In the words of one critic, his "new material was no longer cerebral and sparse; rather, it was intensely expressive, persistently rhythmic and often richly colored in the darkest of orchestral hues". Early modernist works The first public performances of Górecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartók. The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Górecki's music. The event led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival. The Epitafium (Epitaph) he submitted marked a new phase in his development, and was said to represent "the most colourful and vibrant expression of the new Polish wave". The festival announced Górecki's arrival on the international scene, and he quickly became a favorite of the West's avant-garde musical elite. In 1991, the music critic James Wierzbicki wrote that at this time "Górecki was seen as a Polish heir to the new aesthetic of post-Webernian serialism, with his taut structures, lean orchestrations and painstaking concern for the logical ordering of pitches". Górecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the next year. At the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, his Scontri for orchestra caused a sensation among critics due to its use of sharp contrasts and harsh articulations. By 1961, Górecki was at the forefront of the Polish avant-garde, having absorbed the modernism of Webern, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, and his Symphony No. 1 gained international acclaim at the Paris Biennial Festival of Youth. He moved to Paris to continue his studies, and while there was influenced by contemporaries including Olivier Messiaen, Roman Palester, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. Górecki began to lecture at the Academy of Music in Katowice in 1968, where he taught score-reading, orchestration and composition. In 1972, he was promoted to assistant professor, and developed a fearsome reputation among his students for his often blunt personality. According to the Polish composer Rafał Augustyn, "When I began to study under Górecki it felt as if someone had dumped a pail of ice-cold water over my head. He could be ruthless in his opinions. The weak fell by the wayside but those who graduated under him became, without exception, respected composers". Górecki admits, "For quite a few years, I was a pedagogue, a teacher in the music academy, and my students would ask me many, many things, including how to write and what to write. I always answered this way: If you can live without music for 2 or 3 days, then don't write...It might be better to spend time with a girl or with a beer...If you cannot live without music, then write.” Due to his commitments as a teacher and also because of bouts of ill health, he composed only intermittently during this period. Move from modernism By the early 1970s, Górecki had begun to move away from his earlier radical modernism, and was working toward a more traditional mode of expression dominated by the human voice. His change of style affronted the avant-garde establishment, and although various Polish agencies continued to commission works from him, Górecki ceased to be viewed as an important composer. One critic later wrote, "Górecki's new material was no longer cerebral and sparse; rather, it was intensely expressive, persistently rhythmic and often richly colored in the darkest of orchestral hues". Górecki progressively rejected the dissonance, serialism and sonorism that had brought him early recognition, and pared and simplified his work. He began to favor large slow gestures and the repetition of small motifs. The Symphony No. 2, "Copernican" (II Symfonia Kopernikowska), was written in 1972 to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the birth of the astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus. Written in a monumental style for solo soprano, baritone, choir and orchestra, it features text from Psalms no. 145, 6 and 135 as well as an excerpt from Copernicus's De revolutionibus orbium coelestium. It is in two movements, and a typical performance lasts 35 minutes. It was commissioned by the Kosciuszko Foundation in New York, and presented an early opportunity for Górecki to reach an audience outside Poland. As was usual, he undertook extensive research on the subject, and was in particular concerned with the philosophical implications of Copernicus's discovery, not all of which he viewed as positive. As the historian Norman Davies commented, "His discovery of the earth's motion round the sun caused the most fundamental revolutions possible in the prevailing concepts of the human predicament". By the mid-1980s, Górecki began to attract a more international audience, and in 1989 the London Sinfonietta held a weekend of concerts in which his work was played alongside that of the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke. In 1990, the American Kronos Quartet commissioned and recorded his First String Quartet, Already It Is Dusk, Op. 62, an occasion that marked the beginning of a long relationship between the quartet and Górecki. Górecki's most popular piece is his Third Symphony, also known as the "Symphony of Sorrowful Songs" (Symfonia pieśni żałosnych). The work is slow and contemplative, and each of its three movements is for orchestra and solo soprano. The libretto for the first movement is taken from a 15th-century lament, while the second movement uses the words of a teenage girl, Helena Błażusiakówna (Helena Błażusiak), which she wrote on the wall of a Gestapo prison cell in Zakopane to invoke the protection of the Virgin Mary. The third uses the text of a Silesian folk song which describes the pain of a mother searching for a son killed in the Silesian uprisings. The symphony's dominant themes are motherhood and separation through war. While the first and third movements are written from the perspective of a parent who has lost a child, the second is from that of a child separated from a parent. The completion of Górecki's Fourth Symphony, subtitled "Tansman Episodes", was delayed for many years, partly by Górecki's unease at his newfound fame. Indeed, it had not even been orchestrated when he died in 2010, and his son Mikołaj completed it after his death from the piano score and notes left behind by his father. It uses similar repetition techniques as the Second and Third Symphonies, but to very different effect; for example, its opening consists of a series of very loud, repeated cells that together spell out the name of the composer Alexandre Tansman via a musical cryptogram, punctuated with heavy strokes on the bass drum and clashing bitonality between the chords of A and E-flat. Later works Despite the Third Symphony's success, Górecki resisted the temptation to compose again in that style, and, according to AllMusic, continued to work, not to further his career or reputation, but largely "in response to inner creative dictates". In February 1994, the Kronos Quartet performed at the Brooklyn Academy of Music four concerts honoring postmodern revival of interest in new music. The first three concerts featured string quartets and the works of three living composers: two Americans (Philip Glass and George Crumb) and one Pole (Górecki). Górecki's later work includes a 1992 commission for the Kronos Quartet, Songs are Sung; Concerto-Cantata (written in 1992 for flute and orchestra); and Kleines Requiem für eine Polka (1993 for piano and 13 instruments). Concerto-Cantata and Kleines Requiem für eine Polka have been recorded by the London Sinfonietta and the Schönberg Ensemble, respectively. Songs are Sung is his third string quartet, inspired by a poem by Velimir Khlebnikov. When asked why it took almost 13 years to finish, he replied, "I continued to hold back from releasing it to the world. I don’t know why." Last decade During the last decade of his life, Górecki suffered from frequent illnesses. His Symphony No. 4 (op. 85, 2006) was due to be premiered in London in 2010 by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, but the event was cancelled due to the composer's ill health. He died on 12 November 2010, in his home city of Katowice, from complications arising from a lung infection. Reacting to his death, the head of the Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music, Professor Eugeniusz Knapik, said "Górecki's work is like a huge boulder that lies in our path and forces us to make a spiritual and emotional effort". Adrian Thomas, Professor of Music at Cardiff University, said, "The strength and startling originality of Górecki's character shone through his music [...] Yet he was an intensely private man, sometimes impossible, with a strong belief in family, a great sense of humour, a physical courage in the face of unrelenting illness, and a capacity for firm friendship". He was married to Jadwiga, a piano teacher. His daughter, Anna Górecka-Stanczyk, is a pianist, and his son, Mikołaj Górecki, is a composer. He was survived by five grandchildren. President of the Republic of Poland Bronisław Komorowski awarded Górecki the Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest honour, a month before his death. The Order was presented by Komorowski's wife in Górecki's hospital bed. Earlier, Górecki received the Order of Polonia Restituta II class and III class and the Order of St. Gregory the Great. The world premiere of his Symphony No. 4 took place on 12 April 2014. It was performed, as originally scheduled in 2010, by the London Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall, London, but with Andrey Boreyko conducting instead of Marin Alsop. Symphony No. 4 is an extensive, 37-minute composition set for an approximately 100-person orchestra with piano and organ obbligato. The composer left a cryptogram that explains the way he built the theme for the symphony using musical letters from the first and last names of Aleksander Tansman. In 2004, Górecki left the piano reduction of Two Tristan Postludes and Chorale for orchestra, which received op. 82. It was orchestrated by his son Mikolaj Górecki and premiered at the Tansman Festival, on October 16, 2016, at the Polish Radio Witold Lutosławski Studio Hall in Warsaw, by Jerzy Maksymiuk and the Sinfonia Varsovia orchestra. Use in film and television Some of Górecki's music has been adapted for film soundtracks, most notably fragments of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs. They are featured in Peter Weir's 1993 film Fearless, Julian Schnabel's 1996 biographical drama film Basquiat, Shona Auerbach's 1996 film Seven, Jaime Marqués's 2007 film Ladrones, Terrence Malick's 2012 experimental romantic drama To the Wonder, Paolo Sorrentino's 2013 art drama film The Great Beauty, Felix van Groeningen's 2018 biographical film Beautiful Boy, and Malick's 2019 historical drama A Hidden Life. It has also appeared on television in numerous TV shows, including the American crime drama television series The Sopranos, American TV series Legion, crime thriller television series The Blacklist, and the historical drama The Crown. Critical opinion When placing Górecki in context, musicologists and critics generally compare his work with such composers as Olivier Messiaen and Charles Ives. He himself said that he also felt kindred with such figures as Bach, Mozart and Haydn, though he felt most affinity with Franz Schubert, particularly in terms of tonal design and treatment of basic materials. In the Dutch documentary film series Toonmeesters, of which episode 4 (1994) is about Górecki, he likened playing Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart every day to eating healthy whole grain bread every day. In the same episode he said that in Mozart and Schubert he found many new things, new musical answers. Since Górecki moved away from serialism and dissonance in the 1970s, he is frequently compared to composers such as Arvo Pärt, John Tavener and Giya Kancheli. Although none have admitted to common influence, the term holy minimalism is often used to group these composers, due to their shared simplified approach to texture, tonality and melody, in works often reflecting deeply held religious beliefs. Górecki's modernist techniques are also compared to those of Igor Stravinsky, Béla Bartók, Paul Hindemith and Dmitri Shostakovich. In 1994, Boguslaw M. Maciejewski published the first biography of Górecki, Górecki – His Music And Our Times. It includes a great deal of detail about his life and work, including that he achieved cult status thanks to valuable exposure on Classic FM. Discussing his audience in a 1994 interview, Górecki said, I do not choose my listeners. What I mean is, I never write for my listeners. I think about my audience, but I am not writing for them. I have something to tell them, but the audience must also put a certain effort into it. But I never wrote for an audience and never will write for because you have to give the listener something and he has to make an effort in order to understand certain things. If I were thinking of my audience and one likes this, one likes that, one likes another thing, I would never know what to write. Let every listener choose that which interests him. I have nothing against one person liking Mozart or Shostakovich or Leonard Bernstein, but doesn't like Górecki. That's fine with me. I, too, like certain things. Górecki received an honorary doctorate from Concordia University, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Concordia professor Wolfgang Bottenberg called him one of the "most renowned and respected composers of our time", and said that Górecki's music "represents the most positive aspects of the closing years of our century, as we try to heal the wounds inflicted by the violence and intolerance of our times. It will endure into the next millennium and inspire other composers". In 2007, Górecki claimed 32nd place on the list of Top 100 Living Geniuses compiled by The Daily Telegraph. In 2008, he received an honorary doctorate from the Academy of Music in Kraków. At the awarding ceremony a selection of his choral works was performed by the choir of the city's Franciscan Church. See also List of Polish composers List of Poles Music of Poland Notes Bibliography Howard, Luke B. "Motherhood, 'Billboard' and the Holocaust: Perceptions and Receptions of Górecki's Symphony No. 3". Musical Quarterly 82, no. 1 (Spring), 1998. 131–59. Jacobson, Bernard. A Polish Renaissance. Twentieth-Century Composers. London: Phaidon, 1996. Maciejewski, B. M. "Gorecki—His Music And Our Times". London: Allegro Press, 1994. . Marek, Tadeusz, and David Drew. "Górecki in Interview (1968)—And 20 Years After". Tempo 168, 1989. 25–28 Markiewicz, Leon. "Conversation with Henryk Górecki. Leon Markiewicz, July 1962". Polish Music Journal, Vol. 6, No. 2, Winter 2003. . Mellers, Wilfrid. "Round and about Górecki's Symphony No.3". Tempo New Series, No. 168, 50th Anniversary 1939–1989. March 1989. 22–24. Mirka, Danuta. "Górecki's Musica Geometrica". The Musical Quarterly 87 (2004): 305—32. Morin, Alexander. Classical Music: The Listener's Companion. San Francisco, CA: Backbeat Books, 2002. . Steinberg, Michael. The Symphony: A Listener's Guide. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995. . Thomas, Adrian. Górecki. Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. . (cloth) . Thomas, Adrian. "Polish Music since Szymanowski". In: Music in the Twentieth Century. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. . Thomas, Adrian. "Górecki, Henryk Mikołaj," The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musician. 2001. Oxford University Press. Thomas, Adrian. "Henryk Gorecki". London: Gresham College, 2009. Thomas, Adrian & Latham, Alison: "Górecki, Henryk (Mikołaj)." The Oxford Companion to Music Online. (Accessed 24 September 2012.) Wright, Stephen. "Arvo Pärt (1935–)". In: Music of the Twentieth-Century Avant-Garde: A Biocritical Sourcebook. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2002. . Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, centennial ed., s.v. "Górecki, Henryk (Mikołaj)." External links Henryk Mikołaj Górecki interview, 24 April 1994 USC Polish Music Center biography Henryk Górecki @ Boosey & Hawkes Polish Music Journal, Vol. 6 No. 2, Winter 2003 – A special edition marking Górecki's 70th birthday, consisting of articles exclusively on Górecki Lerchenmusik, Op. 53, Luna Nova Ensemble (Nobuko Igarashi, clarinet; Craig Hultgren, cello; Andrew Drannon, piano) Alex Ross article in New Yorker 1933 births 2010 deaths People from Rybnik County Polish Roman Catholics Polish classical composers Polish male classical composers Nonesuch Records artists 20th-century classical composers 21st-century classical composers Knights of St. Gregory the Great Commanders with Star of the Order of Polonia Restituta Recipients of the Gold Medal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis International Rostrum of Composers prize-winners Herder Prize recipients Recipients of the Order of the White Eagle (Poland)	false	[ "The first season of La Voz... Argentina began on July 1, 2012 and was broadcast by Telefe. It was hosted by Marley, with model Luli Fernández interviewing the contestants at the backstage.\n\nContestants were also allowed to submit an online application in 2011. For the online auditions, contestants were required to record a song with a webcam.\n\nThis was the second Latin American version in The Voice franchise, after the Mexican version, La Voz... México.\n\nCoaches and presenters\nThe show is hosted by Marley, with model Luli Fernández interviewing the contestants backstage. This will be the second time that Marley will be hosting a singing competition, after hosting the Argentine version of Operación Triunfo, for 4 seasons.\n\nAfter a lot of rumours, the coaches for the show are: Latin pop singer Axel, folk singer Soledad Pastorutti, the vocals of the electro pop band Miranda!, Ale Sergi and Juliana Gattas, and Venezuelan singer José Luis \"Puma\" Rodríguez.\n\nTeams\nColor key\n\nBlind auditions\nColor key\n\nEpisode 1 (July 1)\n\nOther Performances\n\nEpisode 2 (July 9)\n\nOther Performances\n\nEpisode 3 (July 15)\n\nOther Performances\n\nEpisode 4 (July 22)\n\nOther Performances\n\nEpisode 5 (July 29)\n\nOther Performances\n\nEpisode 6 (August 5)\n\nOther Performances\n\nEpisode 7 (August 12)\n\n * During Pamela's Duarte blind audition, Axel was the only coach that pressed his button voluntarily, as he pressed the other judges' buttons. Even with this result, Pamela got the opportunity to choose which team to join. \n Grey charts, indicate that the coach had his team already complete.\n\nBattle rounds\nAfter the Blind auditions, each coach had 17 contestants for the Battle rounds, which aired from August 19. Coaches began narrowing down the playing field by training the contestants with the help of \"trusted advisors\". Each episode featured battles consisting of pairings from within each team, and each battle concluded with the respective coach eliminating one of the two or three contestants; the nine winners for each coach advanced to the Sing-off Round.\n\nColor key\n\nNon competition performances\n\nSing-off\nDuring this round, the 9 contestants in each team, faced a new elimination: 6 of them, advanced to the live shows, while the other 3 sang the same song they sang in the blind auditions. Once they've all done their performances, the coach saved 2 contestants, and 1 was eliminated.\nColor key\n\nLive shows\n\nResults summary\nColor key\nArtist's info\n\nResult details\n\nLive show details\nColor key\n\nWeek 1\n\nRound 1 (October 7, 9, & 11)\n\nNon-competition performances\n\nRound 2 (October 14, 16, & 18)\nThe live performances from the second part of the first round, aired on Sunday, October 14, 2012. The elimination shows were broadcast on October 16 and 18 2012.\n\nNon-competition performance\n\nWeek 2\n\nRound 1 (October 21, 23, & 25)\nThe live performances from the first part of the second round, aired on October 21, 2012. The elimination shows were broadcast on October 23 and 25, 2012.\n\nNon-competition performances\n\nRound 2 (October 28, 30, & November 1)\nThe live performances from the second part of the second round, aired on October 28, 2012. The elimination shows were broadcast on October 30 and on November 1, 2012.\n\nWeek 3 (November 4, 6, & 8)\nThe live performances for the third week was aired on November 4, 2012. The elimination shows were broadcast on November 6 & 8, 2012.\n\nWeek 4: Quarterfinals (November 11, 13, & 15)\nThe live performances from the Quarterfinals, aired on November 11, 2012. The elimination shows were broadcast on November 13 & 15, 2012.\n\nWeek 5: Semifinals (November 18, 22, & 26)\nThe live performances for the Semifinals were aired on November 18, 2012. The elimination shows were broadcast on November 22 & 26, 2012.\n\nNon-competition performances\n\nWeek 6: Finals (December 2)\nThe live performances and results for the Finals, aired on December 2, 2012.\nColor key\n\nNon-competition performances\n\nReferences\n\nArgentina\n2012 Argentine television seasons", "Runs of several thousand performances were familiar in West End theatres in the 21st century. The closure of London theatres in the Covid-19 pandemic halted the continuous runs of eight shows that had been running for more than 4,000 performances. Such long runs were a phenomenon not seen before the late 20th century: in earlier years, much shorter runs were the norm, even for shows considered great successes.\n\nThe ballad opera The Beggar's Opera ran for 62 performances in 1728, and held the record for London's longest run for nearly a century. Another musical show, Tom and Jerry, or Life in London (1821), was the first production to reach 100 consecutive performances.\n\nIn the second half of the 19th century longer runs became familiar. The 1860s saw the first production to reach 300 performances, and in the 1870s came the first runs in excess of 1,000. Among them was the farce Charley's Aunt, which ran for 1,466 performances, a record that remained unbroken for 25 years. The upward trend continued in the 20th century. The first show to reach 2,000 performances was Chu Chin Chow which opened in 1916. It held the record for London's longest run until 1958.\n\nBy far the West End's longest run is that of the murder mystery The Mousetrap, by Agatha Christie. It opened in 1952 and by 1958 was the longest-running stage work seen in London; it was still running in 2020 when the theatres closed. Its record of more than 28,000 continuous performances has not been rivalled by any other production. London's second-longest-running show, and longest-running musical, Les Misérables, totalled 14,156 performances during its run from 1985 to 2020.\n\n18th and 19th centuries\nUntil 1822 no play ran in London for 100 performances. Among the reasons for this advanced by the theatre historian John Parker are that matinée performances, which typically take a show's weekly total performances from six to eight, were scarcely known, and that much of London's theatre was provided by the Patent theatres – the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden (now the Royal Opera House), and the Haymarket Theatre, which were licensed to present spoken drama. Enterprising managers found ways round the law and presented spoken plays in other London venues from time to time, but for the most part, drama was confined to the three authorised theatres. Drury Lane and Covent Garden had eight-month seasons, from October to July; the Haymarket operated during the four months when the other two were closed. All three relied mostly on Shakespeare and other classic dramatists. The familiarity of the repertoire necessitated frequent changes of programmes to attract the public.\n\nThe first stage work to obtain a run of more than fifty nights, was a musical production, The Beggar's Opera by John Gay, at Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre, first given in January 1728, and performed 62 times successively. King George II and Queen Caroline went to see a performance on 7 February. A press reporter wrote on 13 June:\n\nThe first production to run for 100 consecutive performances in London was Tom and Jerry, or Life in London, an adaptation by W. T. Moncrieff of Pierce Egan's prodigiously successful novel Life in London. It opened at the Adelphi Theatre in November 1821 and completed its run of 100 performance on 30 March 1822. Its record stood for five years: a nautical melodrama by W. Bayle Bernard called Casco Bay, produced at the Olympic Theatre in December 1827, was played 140 times. Despite its initial success the piece does not appear to have been revived after the initial run.\n\nThe play that surpassed the record of Casco Bay – Douglas Jerrold's comedy Black-Eyed Susan – had its first run at the Surrey Theatre, starring Thomas Cooke, from June 1829. After the 84th night the theatre announced:\n\nThe run was extended to 150 performances; there followed numerous revivals in London and the provinces. Black-Eyed Susan's record was broken four years later by Edward Fitzball's Jonathan Bradford, or The Murder at the Road-Side Inn, a melodrama at the Surrey, in June 1833. It was performed 161 times in succession, and was revived several times, over many years.\n\n1840s and 1850s\nIn 1843, with the passing of the Theatres Act, new theatres were permitted to present spoken drama, with the result that more new plays were presented. Although it was another 18 years before Jonathan Bradford's record was broken, longer runs were becoming more frequent. In London (and Parisian) theatres of the mid-19th century a run of 100 performances was seen as the touchstone of success. In the 1840s and 1850s eight new plays and one revival achieved what Parker calls \"the coveted 100 nights\" in London: \n\nThe first Shakespeare play to run for 100 nights was Charles Kean's production of King Henry VIII at the Princess's Theatre, with Walter Lacy as the King, Ellen Kean as Queen Katherine and Kean as Cardinal Wolsey. It ran from 16 May 1855 to the end of the season on 14 September. (It opened the next season on 22 October and ran for a further 50 nights).\n\n1860s\n\nIn Parker's view, modern long runs may be said to have begun with the production of Dion Boucicault's melodrama, The Colleen Bawn, given at the Adelphi on 10 September 1860. It played for 165 successive nights in its first run, and for a further 249 performances when revived in 1861 and 1862.\n\nThe first play to run for more than 300 consecutive performances was Peep o' Day by Edmund Falconer, adapted from a novel by John Banim. It was a melodrama, in which, according to The Morning Post, \"everybody betrays everybody else\"; it was produced at the Lyceum on 9 November 1861, starring Hermann Vezin, and ran for 346 nights. Two days after Falconer's play opened, Our American Cousin by Tom Taylor opened at the Haymarket. The Morning Post found the play \"scarcely worthy\" of the talents of its star, Edward Sothern, and The Era thought it \"a sort of dramatic curiosity\". It closed on 21 December 1861 after 36 performances; after this inauspicious start it was revived at the same theatre on 27 January 1862 and ran uninterruptedly until 23 December for 314 successive performances.\n\n1870–1900\n\nThroughout the century, the audience for theatre was growing because of the rapidly expanding British population; improvement in education and the standard of living, especially of the middle class; improving public transport; and installation of street lighting, which made travel home from the theatre safer.\n\nThe first play to have a run of 1,000 successive performances was H. J. Byron's comedy Our Boys, which opened at the Vaudeville Theatre on 16 January 1875. It achieved two records: one for the number of performances – 1,362 – and another for the duration of its run: four years and three months, closing in April 1879. The second record lasted the longer, not broken until 1920. The initial run of Brandon Thomas's Charley's Aunt, which opened in London on 21 December 1892, totalled 1,466 performances, but because there were matinée performances as well as evening ones – something of an innovation – it broke the record in fewer weeks than Our Boys had run. Another long-running comedy of the period was Charles Hawtrey's farce The Private Secretary which opened in 1883 and ran for 785 performances.\n\nIn the musical theatre, there were substantial runs in the late 19th century for many of Gilbert and Sullivan's Savoy Operas, the longest-running of which were H.M.S. Pinafore (571 performances, 1878–1880), Patience (578 performances, 1881–1882), The Mikado (672 performances, 1885–1887), and The Gondoliers (554 performances, 1889–1891). None of the Savoy operas broke box-office records for continuous performances, and their runs were surpassed by those of two other comic operas: Robert Planquette's Les Cloches de Corneville, which opened in London in 1878 and ran for 705 performances, and Alfred Cellier and B.C.Stephenson's Dorothy, which ran for 931 performances in 1886–1889.\n\n1900 to 1945\nBetween 1900 and 1945 fourteen shows ran for more than 1,000 performances:\n\nAt around the turn of the 20th century and during the subsequent two decades musical comedies and operettas were popular. Such shows as San Toy (1899) The Arcadians (1909), The Merry Widow (1907), The Boy (1917) and The Lilac Domino (1918) ran for between 747 and 809 performances. Their runs, though considerable, broke no records. By far the biggest success in musical – or any – theatre to that date came in October 1916 with Chu Chin Chow. It broke Charley's Aunt's record for the greatest number of consecutive performances, and in December 1920 surpassed the record of Our Boys for the longest continuous run. It ran until 22 July 1921, when it was played for the 2,239th time. No musical would surpass this record until Salad Days, which opened in 1954.\n\nDuring the Second World War, after a brief shut-down in the early weeks of the war, London's theatres did good business, but only four shows that opened in the West End during the war years ran for more than 1,000 performances. Three were comedies: Noël Coward's Blithe Spirit, Esther McCracken's Quiet Week-end and Terence Rattigan's While the Sun Shines; the fourth was a musical: Ivor Novello's Perchance to Dream. Coward's comedy held the London record for the run of a non-musical play until overtaken by The Mousetrap in 1957.\n\n1945 to 2020\nIn the post-war era, several shows, mainly musicals, achieved runs of between 2,000 and 4,000 performances between 1945 and 1970:\n\nThe Mousetrap – 28,152 performances\n\nNone of the above productions, nor any that opened subsequently, have approached the length of the run of Agatha Christie's murder mystery The Mousetrap, which after a pre-London tour opened at the Ambassadors Theatre on 25 November 1952 and ran continuously there, and later at the larger St Martin's Theatre, until the closure of London's theatres in 2020. It broke the record for longest running non-musical play in 1957, and passed Chu-Chin-Chow's record as London's longest running show the following year. In February 2020 it had totalled 28,152 performances. A plaque (right) outside the St Martin's commemorates its status as the world's longest-running play.\n\n10,000+ performances\n\nThe longevity of The Mousetrap has eclipsed what would otherwise be the unprecedented run of Les Misérables and three other productions playing for more than 10,000 performances. All but the last of the four were running when the theatres shut in 2020.\n\nOther long runs, 1970–2020\n\nBetween 1970 and 2020, 13 other West End shows ran for more than 4,000 performances:\n\nThe four productions marked * were still running at the time of the 2020 shut-down of the theatres.\n\nNotes, references and sources\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nSources\n \n\n \n \n \n \n \n \n\nTheatre\nTheatre in the United Kingdom" ]
[ "Henryk Górecki", "Early modernist works", "When were his first performances?", "The first public performances of Gorecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartok." ]	C_7227ab91d2d64abd85231ff29510146e_1	What did this event lead to?	2	What did the first public performances of Henryk Gorecki's music lead to?	Henryk Górecki	The first public performances of Gorecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartok. The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Gorecki's music. The event led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival. The Epitafium ("Epitaph") he submitted marked a new phase in his development as a composer, and was described as representing "the most colourful and vibrant expression of the new Polish wave". The Festival announced the composer's arrival on the international scene, and he quickly became a favorite of the West's avant-garde musical elite. Writing in 1991, the music critic James Wierzbicki described how that at this time "Gorecki was seen as a Polish heir to the new aesthetic of post-Webernian serialism; with his taut structures, lean orchestrations and painstaking concern for the logical ordering of pitches". Gorecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the following year. At the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, his Scontri, written for orchestra, caused a sensation among critics due to its use of sharp contrasts and harsh articulations. By 1961, Gorecki was at the forefront of the Polish avant-garde, having absorbed the modernism of Anton Webern, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, and his Symphony No. 1 gained international acclaim at the Paris Biennial Festival of Youth. Gorecki moved to Paris to continue his studies, and while there was influenced by contemporaries including Olivier Messiaen, Roman Palester, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. He began to lecture at the Academy of Music in Katowice in 1968, where he taught score-reading, orchestration and composition. In 1972, he was promoted to assistant professor, and developed a fearsome reputation among his students for his often blunt personality. According to the Polish composer Rafal Augustyn, "When I began to study under Gorecki it felt as if someone had dumped a pail of ice-cold water over my head. He could be ruthless in his opinions. The weak fell by the wayside but those who graduated under him became, without exception, respected composers". Gorecki admits, "For quite a few years, I was a pedagogue, a teacher in the music academy, and my students would ask me many, many things, including how to write and what to write. I always answered this way: If you can live without music for 2 or 3 days, then don't write...It might be better to spend time with a girl or with a beer...If you cannot live without music, then write." Due to his commitments as a teacher and also because of bouts of ill health, he composed only intermittently during this period. CANNOTANSWER	The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Gorecki's music.	Henryk Mikołaj Górecki ( , ; 6 December 1933 – 12 November 2010) was a Polish composer of contemporary classical music. According to critic Alex Ross, no recent classical composer has had as much commercial success as Górecki. He became a leading figure of the Polish avant-garde during the post-Stalin cultural thaw. His Anton Webern-influenced serialist works of the 1950s and 1960s were characterized by adherence to dissonant modernism and influenced by Luigi Nono, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Krzysztof Penderecki and Kazimierz Serocki. He continued in this direction throughout the 1960s, but by the mid-1970s had changed to a less complex sacred minimalist sound, exemplified by the transitional Symphony No. 2 and the Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs). This later style developed through several other distinct phases, from such works as his 1979 Beatus Vir, to the 1981 choral hymn Miserere, the 1993 Kleines Requiem für eine Polka and his requiem Good Night. Górecki was largely unknown outside Poland until the late 1980s. In 1992, 15 years after it was composed, a recording of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs with soprano Dawn Upshaw and conductor David Zinman, released to commemorate the memory of those lost during the Holocaust, became a worldwide commercial and critical success, selling more than a million copies and vastly exceeding the typical lifetime sales of a recording of symphonic music by a 20th-century composer. Commenting on its popularity, Górecki said, "Perhaps people find something they need in this piece of music [...] somehow I hit the right note, something they were missing. Something somewhere had been lost to them. I feel that I instinctively knew what they needed." This popular acclaim did not generate wide interest in Górecki's other works, and he pointedly resisted the temptation to repeat earlier success, or compose for commercial reward. Nevertheless, his music drew the attention of Australian film director Peter Weir, who used a section of Symphony No 3 in his 1993 film Fearless. Apart from two brief periods studying in Paris and a short time living in Berlin, Górecki spent most of his life in southern Poland. Biography Early years Henryk Górecki was born on 6 December 1933, in the village of Czernica, in present-day Silesian Voivodeship, southwest Poland. His family lived modestly, though both parents had a love of music. His father Roman (1904–1991) worked at the goods office of a local railway station, but was an amateur musician, while his mother Otylia (1909–1935), played piano. Otylia died when her son was just two years old, and many of his early works were dedicated to her memory. Henryk developed an interest in music from an early age, though he was discouraged by both his father and new stepmother to the extent that he was not allowed to play his mother's old piano. He persisted, and in 1943 was allowed to take violin lessons with Paweł Hajduga, a local amateur musician, instrument maker, sculptor, painter, poet and chłopski filozof (peasant philosopher). In 1937, Górecki fell while playing in a neighbor’s yard and dislocated his hip. The resulting suppurative inflammation was misdiagnosed by a local doctor, and delay in proper treatment led to tubercular complications in the bone. The illness went largely untreated for two years, by which time permanent damage had been sustained. He spent the following twenty months in a hospital in Germany, where he underwent four operations. Górecki continued to suffer ill health throughout his life and as a result said he had "talked with death often". In the early 1950s, Górecki studied in the Szafrankowie Brothers State School of Music in Rybnik. Between 1955 and 1960, he studied at the State Higher School of Music in Katowice. In 1965 He joined the faculty of his alma mater in Katowice, where he was made a lecturer in 1968, and then rose to provost before resigning in 1979. Rydułtowy and Katowice Between 1951 and 1953, Górecki taught 10- and 11-year-olds at a school suburb of Rydułtowy, in southern Poland. In 1952, he began a teacher training course at the Intermediate School of Music in Rybnik, where he studied clarinet, violin, piano, and music theory. Through intensive studying, Górecki finished the four-year course in just under three years. During this time, he began to compose his own pieces, mostly songs and piano miniatures. Occasionally, he attempted more ambitious projects—in 1952, he adapted the Adam Mickiewicz ballad Świtezianka, though it was left unfinished. Górecki's life during this time was often difficult. Teaching posts were generally badly paid, while the shortage economy made manuscript paper at times difficult and expensive to acquire. With no access to radio, Górecki kept up to date with music by weekly purchases of such periodicals as Ruch muzyczny (Musical Movement) and Muzyka, and by purchasing at least one score a week. Górecki continued his formal study of music at the Academy of Music in Katowice, where he studied under the composer Bolesław Szabelski, a former student of Karol Szymanowski. Szabelski drew much of his inspiration from Polish highland folklore. He encouraged Górecki's growing confidence and independence by giving him considerable space in which to develop his own ideas and projects; several of Górecki's early pieces were straightforwardly neo-classical, during a period when Górecki was also absorbing the techniques of twelve-tone serialism. He graduated from the Academy with honours in 1960. Professorship In 1975, Górecki was promoted to Professor of Composition at the State Higher School of Music in Katowice, where his students included Eugeniusz Knapik, Andrzej Krzanowski, Rafał Augustyn and his son, Mikołaj. Around this time, he came to believe the Polish Communist authorities were interfering too much in the academy's activities, and called them "little dogs always yapping". As a senior administrator but not a member of the Party, he was in almost perpetual conflict with the authorities in his efforts to protect his school, staff and students from undue political influence. In 1979, he resigned from his post in protest at the government's refusal to allow Pope John Paul II to visit Katowice, and formed a local branch of the "Catholic Intellectuals Club", an organisation devoted to the struggle against the Communist Party (Polish United Workers' Party). In 1981, he composed his Miserere for a large choir in remembrance of police violence against the Solidarity movement. In 1987, he composed Totus Tuus for John Paul II's visit to Poland. Style and compositions Górecki's music covers a variety of styles, but tends towards relative harmonic and rhythmical simplicity. He is considered a founder of the New Polish School. According to Terry Teachout, Górecki's "more conventional array of compositional techniques includes both elaborate counterpoint and the ritualistic repetition of melodic fragments and harmonic patterns." Górecki's first works, dating from the last half of the 1950s, were in the avant-garde style of Webern and other serialists of that time. Some of these twelve-tone and serial pieces include Epitaph (1958), First Symphony (1959), and Scontri (1960) (Mirka 2004, p. 305). At that time, Górecki's reputation was not lagging behind that of Penderecki and his status was confirmed in 1960s when Monologhi won a first prize. Even until 1962, he was firmly ensconced in the minds of the Warsaw Autumn public as a leader of the Polish Modern School, alongside Penderecki. Danuta Mirka has shown that Górecki's compositional techniques in the 1960s were often based on geometry, including axes, figures, one- and two-dimensional patterns, and especially symmetry. She proposes the term "geometrical period" for his works between 1962 and 1970. Building on Krzysztof Droba's classifications, she further divides this period into two phases: "the phase of sonoristic means" (1962–63) and "the phase of reductive constructicism" (1964–70; Mirka 2004, p. 329). During the mid-1960s and early 1970s, Górecki progressively moved away from his early career as radical modernist, and began to compose in a more traditional, romantic mode of expression. His change of style was viewed as an affront to the then avant-garde establishment, and though he continued to receive commissions from various Polish agencies, by the mid-1970s Górecki was no longer regarded as a composer of importance. In the words of one critic, his "new material was no longer cerebral and sparse; rather, it was intensely expressive, persistently rhythmic and often richly colored in the darkest of orchestral hues". Early modernist works The first public performances of Górecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartók. The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Górecki's music. The event led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival. The Epitafium (Epitaph) he submitted marked a new phase in his development, and was said to represent "the most colourful and vibrant expression of the new Polish wave". The festival announced Górecki's arrival on the international scene, and he quickly became a favorite of the West's avant-garde musical elite. In 1991, the music critic James Wierzbicki wrote that at this time "Górecki was seen as a Polish heir to the new aesthetic of post-Webernian serialism, with his taut structures, lean orchestrations and painstaking concern for the logical ordering of pitches". Górecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the next year. At the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, his Scontri for orchestra caused a sensation among critics due to its use of sharp contrasts and harsh articulations. By 1961, Górecki was at the forefront of the Polish avant-garde, having absorbed the modernism of Webern, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, and his Symphony No. 1 gained international acclaim at the Paris Biennial Festival of Youth. He moved to Paris to continue his studies, and while there was influenced by contemporaries including Olivier Messiaen, Roman Palester, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. Górecki began to lecture at the Academy of Music in Katowice in 1968, where he taught score-reading, orchestration and composition. In 1972, he was promoted to assistant professor, and developed a fearsome reputation among his students for his often blunt personality. According to the Polish composer Rafał Augustyn, "When I began to study under Górecki it felt as if someone had dumped a pail of ice-cold water over my head. He could be ruthless in his opinions. The weak fell by the wayside but those who graduated under him became, without exception, respected composers". Górecki admits, "For quite a few years, I was a pedagogue, a teacher in the music academy, and my students would ask me many, many things, including how to write and what to write. I always answered this way: If you can live without music for 2 or 3 days, then don't write...It might be better to spend time with a girl or with a beer...If you cannot live without music, then write.” Due to his commitments as a teacher and also because of bouts of ill health, he composed only intermittently during this period. Move from modernism By the early 1970s, Górecki had begun to move away from his earlier radical modernism, and was working toward a more traditional mode of expression dominated by the human voice. His change of style affronted the avant-garde establishment, and although various Polish agencies continued to commission works from him, Górecki ceased to be viewed as an important composer. One critic later wrote, "Górecki's new material was no longer cerebral and sparse; rather, it was intensely expressive, persistently rhythmic and often richly colored in the darkest of orchestral hues". Górecki progressively rejected the dissonance, serialism and sonorism that had brought him early recognition, and pared and simplified his work. He began to favor large slow gestures and the repetition of small motifs. The Symphony No. 2, "Copernican" (II Symfonia Kopernikowska), was written in 1972 to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the birth of the astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus. Written in a monumental style for solo soprano, baritone, choir and orchestra, it features text from Psalms no. 145, 6 and 135 as well as an excerpt from Copernicus's De revolutionibus orbium coelestium. It is in two movements, and a typical performance lasts 35 minutes. It was commissioned by the Kosciuszko Foundation in New York, and presented an early opportunity for Górecki to reach an audience outside Poland. As was usual, he undertook extensive research on the subject, and was in particular concerned with the philosophical implications of Copernicus's discovery, not all of which he viewed as positive. As the historian Norman Davies commented, "His discovery of the earth's motion round the sun caused the most fundamental revolutions possible in the prevailing concepts of the human predicament". By the mid-1980s, Górecki began to attract a more international audience, and in 1989 the London Sinfonietta held a weekend of concerts in which his work was played alongside that of the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke. In 1990, the American Kronos Quartet commissioned and recorded his First String Quartet, Already It Is Dusk, Op. 62, an occasion that marked the beginning of a long relationship between the quartet and Górecki. Górecki's most popular piece is his Third Symphony, also known as the "Symphony of Sorrowful Songs" (Symfonia pieśni żałosnych). The work is slow and contemplative, and each of its three movements is for orchestra and solo soprano. The libretto for the first movement is taken from a 15th-century lament, while the second movement uses the words of a teenage girl, Helena Błażusiakówna (Helena Błażusiak), which she wrote on the wall of a Gestapo prison cell in Zakopane to invoke the protection of the Virgin Mary. The third uses the text of a Silesian folk song which describes the pain of a mother searching for a son killed in the Silesian uprisings. The symphony's dominant themes are motherhood and separation through war. While the first and third movements are written from the perspective of a parent who has lost a child, the second is from that of a child separated from a parent. The completion of Górecki's Fourth Symphony, subtitled "Tansman Episodes", was delayed for many years, partly by Górecki's unease at his newfound fame. Indeed, it had not even been orchestrated when he died in 2010, and his son Mikołaj completed it after his death from the piano score and notes left behind by his father. It uses similar repetition techniques as the Second and Third Symphonies, but to very different effect; for example, its opening consists of a series of very loud, repeated cells that together spell out the name of the composer Alexandre Tansman via a musical cryptogram, punctuated with heavy strokes on the bass drum and clashing bitonality between the chords of A and E-flat. Later works Despite the Third Symphony's success, Górecki resisted the temptation to compose again in that style, and, according to AllMusic, continued to work, not to further his career or reputation, but largely "in response to inner creative dictates". In February 1994, the Kronos Quartet performed at the Brooklyn Academy of Music four concerts honoring postmodern revival of interest in new music. The first three concerts featured string quartets and the works of three living composers: two Americans (Philip Glass and George Crumb) and one Pole (Górecki). Górecki's later work includes a 1992 commission for the Kronos Quartet, Songs are Sung; Concerto-Cantata (written in 1992 for flute and orchestra); and Kleines Requiem für eine Polka (1993 for piano and 13 instruments). Concerto-Cantata and Kleines Requiem für eine Polka have been recorded by the London Sinfonietta and the Schönberg Ensemble, respectively. Songs are Sung is his third string quartet, inspired by a poem by Velimir Khlebnikov. When asked why it took almost 13 years to finish, he replied, "I continued to hold back from releasing it to the world. I don’t know why." Last decade During the last decade of his life, Górecki suffered from frequent illnesses. His Symphony No. 4 (op. 85, 2006) was due to be premiered in London in 2010 by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, but the event was cancelled due to the composer's ill health. He died on 12 November 2010, in his home city of Katowice, from complications arising from a lung infection. Reacting to his death, the head of the Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music, Professor Eugeniusz Knapik, said "Górecki's work is like a huge boulder that lies in our path and forces us to make a spiritual and emotional effort". Adrian Thomas, Professor of Music at Cardiff University, said, "The strength and startling originality of Górecki's character shone through his music [...] Yet he was an intensely private man, sometimes impossible, with a strong belief in family, a great sense of humour, a physical courage in the face of unrelenting illness, and a capacity for firm friendship". He was married to Jadwiga, a piano teacher. His daughter, Anna Górecka-Stanczyk, is a pianist, and his son, Mikołaj Górecki, is a composer. He was survived by five grandchildren. President of the Republic of Poland Bronisław Komorowski awarded Górecki the Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest honour, a month before his death. The Order was presented by Komorowski's wife in Górecki's hospital bed. Earlier, Górecki received the Order of Polonia Restituta II class and III class and the Order of St. Gregory the Great. The world premiere of his Symphony No. 4 took place on 12 April 2014. It was performed, as originally scheduled in 2010, by the London Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall, London, but with Andrey Boreyko conducting instead of Marin Alsop. Symphony No. 4 is an extensive, 37-minute composition set for an approximately 100-person orchestra with piano and organ obbligato. The composer left a cryptogram that explains the way he built the theme for the symphony using musical letters from the first and last names of Aleksander Tansman. In 2004, Górecki left the piano reduction of Two Tristan Postludes and Chorale for orchestra, which received op. 82. It was orchestrated by his son Mikolaj Górecki and premiered at the Tansman Festival, on October 16, 2016, at the Polish Radio Witold Lutosławski Studio Hall in Warsaw, by Jerzy Maksymiuk and the Sinfonia Varsovia orchestra. Use in film and television Some of Górecki's music has been adapted for film soundtracks, most notably fragments of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs. They are featured in Peter Weir's 1993 film Fearless, Julian Schnabel's 1996 biographical drama film Basquiat, Shona Auerbach's 1996 film Seven, Jaime Marqués's 2007 film Ladrones, Terrence Malick's 2012 experimental romantic drama To the Wonder, Paolo Sorrentino's 2013 art drama film The Great Beauty, Felix van Groeningen's 2018 biographical film Beautiful Boy, and Malick's 2019 historical drama A Hidden Life. It has also appeared on television in numerous TV shows, including the American crime drama television series The Sopranos, American TV series Legion, crime thriller television series The Blacklist, and the historical drama The Crown. Critical opinion When placing Górecki in context, musicologists and critics generally compare his work with such composers as Olivier Messiaen and Charles Ives. He himself said that he also felt kindred with such figures as Bach, Mozart and Haydn, though he felt most affinity with Franz Schubert, particularly in terms of tonal design and treatment of basic materials. In the Dutch documentary film series Toonmeesters, of which episode 4 (1994) is about Górecki, he likened playing Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart every day to eating healthy whole grain bread every day. In the same episode he said that in Mozart and Schubert he found many new things, new musical answers. Since Górecki moved away from serialism and dissonance in the 1970s, he is frequently compared to composers such as Arvo Pärt, John Tavener and Giya Kancheli. Although none have admitted to common influence, the term holy minimalism is often used to group these composers, due to their shared simplified approach to texture, tonality and melody, in works often reflecting deeply held religious beliefs. Górecki's modernist techniques are also compared to those of Igor Stravinsky, Béla Bartók, Paul Hindemith and Dmitri Shostakovich. In 1994, Boguslaw M. Maciejewski published the first biography of Górecki, Górecki – His Music And Our Times. It includes a great deal of detail about his life and work, including that he achieved cult status thanks to valuable exposure on Classic FM. Discussing his audience in a 1994 interview, Górecki said, I do not choose my listeners. What I mean is, I never write for my listeners. I think about my audience, but I am not writing for them. I have something to tell them, but the audience must also put a certain effort into it. But I never wrote for an audience and never will write for because you have to give the listener something and he has to make an effort in order to understand certain things. If I were thinking of my audience and one likes this, one likes that, one likes another thing, I would never know what to write. Let every listener choose that which interests him. I have nothing against one person liking Mozart or Shostakovich or Leonard Bernstein, but doesn't like Górecki. That's fine with me. I, too, like certain things. Górecki received an honorary doctorate from Concordia University, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Concordia professor Wolfgang Bottenberg called him one of the "most renowned and respected composers of our time", and said that Górecki's music "represents the most positive aspects of the closing years of our century, as we try to heal the wounds inflicted by the violence and intolerance of our times. It will endure into the next millennium and inspire other composers". In 2007, Górecki claimed 32nd place on the list of Top 100 Living Geniuses compiled by The Daily Telegraph. In 2008, he received an honorary doctorate from the Academy of Music in Kraków. At the awarding ceremony a selection of his choral works was performed by the choir of the city's Franciscan Church. See also List of Polish composers List of Poles Music of Poland Notes Bibliography Howard, Luke B. "Motherhood, 'Billboard' and the Holocaust: Perceptions and Receptions of Górecki's Symphony No. 3". Musical Quarterly 82, no. 1 (Spring), 1998. 131–59. Jacobson, Bernard. A Polish Renaissance. Twentieth-Century Composers. London: Phaidon, 1996. Maciejewski, B. M. "Gorecki—His Music And Our Times". London: Allegro Press, 1994. . Marek, Tadeusz, and David Drew. "Górecki in Interview (1968)—And 20 Years After". Tempo 168, 1989. 25–28 Markiewicz, Leon. "Conversation with Henryk Górecki. Leon Markiewicz, July 1962". Polish Music Journal, Vol. 6, No. 2, Winter 2003. . Mellers, Wilfrid. "Round and about Górecki's Symphony No.3". Tempo New Series, No. 168, 50th Anniversary 1939–1989. March 1989. 22–24. Mirka, Danuta. "Górecki's Musica Geometrica". The Musical Quarterly 87 (2004): 305—32. Morin, Alexander. Classical Music: The Listener's Companion. San Francisco, CA: Backbeat Books, 2002. . Steinberg, Michael. The Symphony: A Listener's Guide. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995. . Thomas, Adrian. Górecki. Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. . (cloth) . Thomas, Adrian. "Polish Music since Szymanowski". In: Music in the Twentieth Century. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. . Thomas, Adrian. "Górecki, Henryk Mikołaj," The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musician. 2001. Oxford University Press. Thomas, Adrian. "Henryk Gorecki". London: Gresham College, 2009. Thomas, Adrian & Latham, Alison: "Górecki, Henryk (Mikołaj)." The Oxford Companion to Music Online. (Accessed 24 September 2012.) Wright, Stephen. "Arvo Pärt (1935–)". In: Music of the Twentieth-Century Avant-Garde: A Biocritical Sourcebook. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2002. . Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, centennial ed., s.v. "Górecki, Henryk (Mikołaj)." External links Henryk Mikołaj Górecki interview, 24 April 1994 USC Polish Music Center biography Henryk Górecki @ Boosey & Hawkes Polish Music Journal, Vol. 6 No. 2, Winter 2003 – A special edition marking Górecki's 70th birthday, consisting of articles exclusively on Górecki Lerchenmusik, Op. 53, Luna Nova Ensemble (Nobuko Igarashi, clarinet; Craig Hultgren, cello; Andrew Drannon, piano) Alex Ross article in New Yorker 1933 births 2010 deaths People from Rybnik County Polish Roman Catholics Polish classical composers Polish male classical composers Nonesuch Records artists 20th-century classical composers 21st-century classical composers Knights of St. Gregory the Great Commanders with Star of the Order of Polonia Restituta Recipients of the Gold Medal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis International Rostrum of Composers prize-winners Herder Prize recipients Recipients of the Order of the White Eagle (Poland)	false	[ "Lead retrieval is a method for capturing and processing sales leads generated at an event, trade show, or conference.\n\nLead retrieval tools connect to a database containing the contact details of event attendees, which the attendees provided when they registered for the event. Event attendees wear a badge during the event, which features a barcode, ID number or QR code. Exhibitors at the event use lead retrieval devices to scan the code or number, to digitally collect that person’s data from the registration database.\n\nLead retrieval provides exhibitors with attendees’ full registration data. As well as their contact details, this often includes job title, company name and company size. This data is predefined by the event organiser, who is responsible for collecting attendee registration data before the event. This means exhibitors receive a lot of data about each attendee, but they cannot choose which data they receive, or to change any questions to make the data more relevant to their needs. Other event lead capture methods provide more flexibility.\n\nEvent organisers send exhibitors the data from the attendees’ badges after the event.\n\nLead retrieval tools \nThere are two common types of lead retrieval tools:\n\n Trade show badge scanner - a handheld device which exhibitors use to scan attendees’ badges. These devices are provided by the event organiser for exhibitors to hire during the event.\n Lead retrieval apps - for some events, the organisers provide a dedicated mobile app for attendees and exhibitors to use. An app can be installed on exhibitors’ own devices, meaning they don’t need to hire additional hardware during the event.\n\nTypes of technology \n\n Barcode\n Magnetic stripe\n Mobile app\n QR Code\n RFID\n\nSee also \n\n Trade fair\n Lead generation\n\nReferences\n\nSales", "This is a list of the Fall 1975 PGA Tour Qualifying School graduates. The event was held at three courses at the Walt Disney World Resort: Magnolia Golf Course, Palm Golf Course, and Cypress Creek Golf Club. 375 players made the finals. \n\nTwo significant international players were in the event. They were Dale Hayes, \"a highly regarded players from Pretoria, South Africa,\" and England's Maurice Bembridge. Hayes opened, well with a 69 (−3), to put himself two back of the lead. Bembridge, however, struggled in the first round with a 76 (+4). Overall, Bobby Stroble and Andy Bean held the joint first round lead at 67 (−5). After the second round, it was Jerry Pate and Sandy Galbraith that were tied for the lead at 139 (−5). Pate went on to earn medallist honors. Among the first round leaders, both Strobble and Bean easily qualified, both finishing in the top ten. Among the international players, Hayes qualified for the tour while Bembridge did not. Meanwhile, Galbraith, the joint leader with Pate after the second round, also qualified.\n\nJim Thorpe also earned playing privileges on the PGA Tour for the first time. In addition, Bill Mallon, a recent graduate of Duke University, also earned playing privileges. Shortly after he graduated he told The Boston Globe, \"I am a touring professional golfer. I did it. Achieved a lifelong dream. I've wanted to be a professional golfer for a long time. I know a lot of good young players who were 15 or 16 and they said this is want they wanted. They want to be a pro when they see Nicklaus or Palmer on TV. Well I said it. And now I've done it. I've got a long way to go to do what I want to do yet. But this is the first step.\" \n\nSource:\n\nReferences \n\n1975 2\nPGA Tour Qualifying School Graduates\nPGA Tour Qualifying School Graduates" ]
[ "Henryk Górecki", "Early modernist works", "When were his first performances?", "The first public performances of Gorecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartok.", "What did this event lead to?", "The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Gorecki's music." ]	C_7227ab91d2d64abd85231ff29510146e_1	Did he perform in any festivals?	3	Did Henryk Gorecki perform in any festivals?	Henryk Górecki	The first public performances of Gorecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartok. The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Gorecki's music. The event led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival. The Epitafium ("Epitaph") he submitted marked a new phase in his development as a composer, and was described as representing "the most colourful and vibrant expression of the new Polish wave". The Festival announced the composer's arrival on the international scene, and he quickly became a favorite of the West's avant-garde musical elite. Writing in 1991, the music critic James Wierzbicki described how that at this time "Gorecki was seen as a Polish heir to the new aesthetic of post-Webernian serialism; with his taut structures, lean orchestrations and painstaking concern for the logical ordering of pitches". Gorecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the following year. At the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, his Scontri, written for orchestra, caused a sensation among critics due to its use of sharp contrasts and harsh articulations. By 1961, Gorecki was at the forefront of the Polish avant-garde, having absorbed the modernism of Anton Webern, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, and his Symphony No. 1 gained international acclaim at the Paris Biennial Festival of Youth. Gorecki moved to Paris to continue his studies, and while there was influenced by contemporaries including Olivier Messiaen, Roman Palester, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. He began to lecture at the Academy of Music in Katowice in 1968, where he taught score-reading, orchestration and composition. In 1972, he was promoted to assistant professor, and developed a fearsome reputation among his students for his often blunt personality. According to the Polish composer Rafal Augustyn, "When I began to study under Gorecki it felt as if someone had dumped a pail of ice-cold water over my head. He could be ruthless in his opinions. The weak fell by the wayside but those who graduated under him became, without exception, respected composers". Gorecki admits, "For quite a few years, I was a pedagogue, a teacher in the music academy, and my students would ask me many, many things, including how to write and what to write. I always answered this way: If you can live without music for 2 or 3 days, then don't write...It might be better to spend time with a girl or with a beer...If you cannot live without music, then write." Due to his commitments as a teacher and also because of bouts of ill health, he composed only intermittently during this period. CANNOTANSWER	led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival.	Henryk Mikołaj Górecki ( , ; 6 December 1933 – 12 November 2010) was a Polish composer of contemporary classical music. According to critic Alex Ross, no recent classical composer has had as much commercial success as Górecki. He became a leading figure of the Polish avant-garde during the post-Stalin cultural thaw. His Anton Webern-influenced serialist works of the 1950s and 1960s were characterized by adherence to dissonant modernism and influenced by Luigi Nono, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Krzysztof Penderecki and Kazimierz Serocki. He continued in this direction throughout the 1960s, but by the mid-1970s had changed to a less complex sacred minimalist sound, exemplified by the transitional Symphony No. 2 and the Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs). This later style developed through several other distinct phases, from such works as his 1979 Beatus Vir, to the 1981 choral hymn Miserere, the 1993 Kleines Requiem für eine Polka and his requiem Good Night. Górecki was largely unknown outside Poland until the late 1980s. In 1992, 15 years after it was composed, a recording of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs with soprano Dawn Upshaw and conductor David Zinman, released to commemorate the memory of those lost during the Holocaust, became a worldwide commercial and critical success, selling more than a million copies and vastly exceeding the typical lifetime sales of a recording of symphonic music by a 20th-century composer. Commenting on its popularity, Górecki said, "Perhaps people find something they need in this piece of music [...] somehow I hit the right note, something they were missing. Something somewhere had been lost to them. I feel that I instinctively knew what they needed." This popular acclaim did not generate wide interest in Górecki's other works, and he pointedly resisted the temptation to repeat earlier success, or compose for commercial reward. Nevertheless, his music drew the attention of Australian film director Peter Weir, who used a section of Symphony No 3 in his 1993 film Fearless. Apart from two brief periods studying in Paris and a short time living in Berlin, Górecki spent most of his life in southern Poland. Biography Early years Henryk Górecki was born on 6 December 1933, in the village of Czernica, in present-day Silesian Voivodeship, southwest Poland. His family lived modestly, though both parents had a love of music. His father Roman (1904–1991) worked at the goods office of a local railway station, but was an amateur musician, while his mother Otylia (1909–1935), played piano. Otylia died when her son was just two years old, and many of his early works were dedicated to her memory. Henryk developed an interest in music from an early age, though he was discouraged by both his father and new stepmother to the extent that he was not allowed to play his mother's old piano. He persisted, and in 1943 was allowed to take violin lessons with Paweł Hajduga, a local amateur musician, instrument maker, sculptor, painter, poet and chłopski filozof (peasant philosopher). In 1937, Górecki fell while playing in a neighbor’s yard and dislocated his hip. The resulting suppurative inflammation was misdiagnosed by a local doctor, and delay in proper treatment led to tubercular complications in the bone. The illness went largely untreated for two years, by which time permanent damage had been sustained. He spent the following twenty months in a hospital in Germany, where he underwent four operations. Górecki continued to suffer ill health throughout his life and as a result said he had "talked with death often". In the early 1950s, Górecki studied in the Szafrankowie Brothers State School of Music in Rybnik. Between 1955 and 1960, he studied at the State Higher School of Music in Katowice. In 1965 He joined the faculty of his alma mater in Katowice, where he was made a lecturer in 1968, and then rose to provost before resigning in 1979. Rydułtowy and Katowice Between 1951 and 1953, Górecki taught 10- and 11-year-olds at a school suburb of Rydułtowy, in southern Poland. In 1952, he began a teacher training course at the Intermediate School of Music in Rybnik, where he studied clarinet, violin, piano, and music theory. Through intensive studying, Górecki finished the four-year course in just under three years. During this time, he began to compose his own pieces, mostly songs and piano miniatures. Occasionally, he attempted more ambitious projects—in 1952, he adapted the Adam Mickiewicz ballad Świtezianka, though it was left unfinished. Górecki's life during this time was often difficult. Teaching posts were generally badly paid, while the shortage economy made manuscript paper at times difficult and expensive to acquire. With no access to radio, Górecki kept up to date with music by weekly purchases of such periodicals as Ruch muzyczny (Musical Movement) and Muzyka, and by purchasing at least one score a week. Górecki continued his formal study of music at the Academy of Music in Katowice, where he studied under the composer Bolesław Szabelski, a former student of Karol Szymanowski. Szabelski drew much of his inspiration from Polish highland folklore. He encouraged Górecki's growing confidence and independence by giving him considerable space in which to develop his own ideas and projects; several of Górecki's early pieces were straightforwardly neo-classical, during a period when Górecki was also absorbing the techniques of twelve-tone serialism. He graduated from the Academy with honours in 1960. Professorship In 1975, Górecki was promoted to Professor of Composition at the State Higher School of Music in Katowice, where his students included Eugeniusz Knapik, Andrzej Krzanowski, Rafał Augustyn and his son, Mikołaj. Around this time, he came to believe the Polish Communist authorities were interfering too much in the academy's activities, and called them "little dogs always yapping". As a senior administrator but not a member of the Party, he was in almost perpetual conflict with the authorities in his efforts to protect his school, staff and students from undue political influence. In 1979, he resigned from his post in protest at the government's refusal to allow Pope John Paul II to visit Katowice, and formed a local branch of the "Catholic Intellectuals Club", an organisation devoted to the struggle against the Communist Party (Polish United Workers' Party). In 1981, he composed his Miserere for a large choir in remembrance of police violence against the Solidarity movement. In 1987, he composed Totus Tuus for John Paul II's visit to Poland. Style and compositions Górecki's music covers a variety of styles, but tends towards relative harmonic and rhythmical simplicity. He is considered a founder of the New Polish School. According to Terry Teachout, Górecki's "more conventional array of compositional techniques includes both elaborate counterpoint and the ritualistic repetition of melodic fragments and harmonic patterns." Górecki's first works, dating from the last half of the 1950s, were in the avant-garde style of Webern and other serialists of that time. Some of these twelve-tone and serial pieces include Epitaph (1958), First Symphony (1959), and Scontri (1960) (Mirka 2004, p. 305). At that time, Górecki's reputation was not lagging behind that of Penderecki and his status was confirmed in 1960s when Monologhi won a first prize. Even until 1962, he was firmly ensconced in the minds of the Warsaw Autumn public as a leader of the Polish Modern School, alongside Penderecki. Danuta Mirka has shown that Górecki's compositional techniques in the 1960s were often based on geometry, including axes, figures, one- and two-dimensional patterns, and especially symmetry. She proposes the term "geometrical period" for his works between 1962 and 1970. Building on Krzysztof Droba's classifications, she further divides this period into two phases: "the phase of sonoristic means" (1962–63) and "the phase of reductive constructicism" (1964–70; Mirka 2004, p. 329). During the mid-1960s and early 1970s, Górecki progressively moved away from his early career as radical modernist, and began to compose in a more traditional, romantic mode of expression. His change of style was viewed as an affront to the then avant-garde establishment, and though he continued to receive commissions from various Polish agencies, by the mid-1970s Górecki was no longer regarded as a composer of importance. In the words of one critic, his "new material was no longer cerebral and sparse; rather, it was intensely expressive, persistently rhythmic and often richly colored in the darkest of orchestral hues". Early modernist works The first public performances of Górecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartók. The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Górecki's music. The event led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival. The Epitafium (Epitaph) he submitted marked a new phase in his development, and was said to represent "the most colourful and vibrant expression of the new Polish wave". The festival announced Górecki's arrival on the international scene, and he quickly became a favorite of the West's avant-garde musical elite. In 1991, the music critic James Wierzbicki wrote that at this time "Górecki was seen as a Polish heir to the new aesthetic of post-Webernian serialism, with his taut structures, lean orchestrations and painstaking concern for the logical ordering of pitches". Górecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the next year. At the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, his Scontri for orchestra caused a sensation among critics due to its use of sharp contrasts and harsh articulations. By 1961, Górecki was at the forefront of the Polish avant-garde, having absorbed the modernism of Webern, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, and his Symphony No. 1 gained international acclaim at the Paris Biennial Festival of Youth. He moved to Paris to continue his studies, and while there was influenced by contemporaries including Olivier Messiaen, Roman Palester, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. Górecki began to lecture at the Academy of Music in Katowice in 1968, where he taught score-reading, orchestration and composition. In 1972, he was promoted to assistant professor, and developed a fearsome reputation among his students for his often blunt personality. According to the Polish composer Rafał Augustyn, "When I began to study under Górecki it felt as if someone had dumped a pail of ice-cold water over my head. He could be ruthless in his opinions. The weak fell by the wayside but those who graduated under him became, without exception, respected composers". Górecki admits, "For quite a few years, I was a pedagogue, a teacher in the music academy, and my students would ask me many, many things, including how to write and what to write. I always answered this way: If you can live without music for 2 or 3 days, then don't write...It might be better to spend time with a girl or with a beer...If you cannot live without music, then write.” Due to his commitments as a teacher and also because of bouts of ill health, he composed only intermittently during this period. Move from modernism By the early 1970s, Górecki had begun to move away from his earlier radical modernism, and was working toward a more traditional mode of expression dominated by the human voice. His change of style affronted the avant-garde establishment, and although various Polish agencies continued to commission works from him, Górecki ceased to be viewed as an important composer. One critic later wrote, "Górecki's new material was no longer cerebral and sparse; rather, it was intensely expressive, persistently rhythmic and often richly colored in the darkest of orchestral hues". Górecki progressively rejected the dissonance, serialism and sonorism that had brought him early recognition, and pared and simplified his work. He began to favor large slow gestures and the repetition of small motifs. The Symphony No. 2, "Copernican" (II Symfonia Kopernikowska), was written in 1972 to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the birth of the astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus. Written in a monumental style for solo soprano, baritone, choir and orchestra, it features text from Psalms no. 145, 6 and 135 as well as an excerpt from Copernicus's De revolutionibus orbium coelestium. It is in two movements, and a typical performance lasts 35 minutes. It was commissioned by the Kosciuszko Foundation in New York, and presented an early opportunity for Górecki to reach an audience outside Poland. As was usual, he undertook extensive research on the subject, and was in particular concerned with the philosophical implications of Copernicus's discovery, not all of which he viewed as positive. As the historian Norman Davies commented, "His discovery of the earth's motion round the sun caused the most fundamental revolutions possible in the prevailing concepts of the human predicament". By the mid-1980s, Górecki began to attract a more international audience, and in 1989 the London Sinfonietta held a weekend of concerts in which his work was played alongside that of the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke. In 1990, the American Kronos Quartet commissioned and recorded his First String Quartet, Already It Is Dusk, Op. 62, an occasion that marked the beginning of a long relationship between the quartet and Górecki. Górecki's most popular piece is his Third Symphony, also known as the "Symphony of Sorrowful Songs" (Symfonia pieśni żałosnych). The work is slow and contemplative, and each of its three movements is for orchestra and solo soprano. The libretto for the first movement is taken from a 15th-century lament, while the second movement uses the words of a teenage girl, Helena Błażusiakówna (Helena Błażusiak), which she wrote on the wall of a Gestapo prison cell in Zakopane to invoke the protection of the Virgin Mary. The third uses the text of a Silesian folk song which describes the pain of a mother searching for a son killed in the Silesian uprisings. The symphony's dominant themes are motherhood and separation through war. While the first and third movements are written from the perspective of a parent who has lost a child, the second is from that of a child separated from a parent. The completion of Górecki's Fourth Symphony, subtitled "Tansman Episodes", was delayed for many years, partly by Górecki's unease at his newfound fame. Indeed, it had not even been orchestrated when he died in 2010, and his son Mikołaj completed it after his death from the piano score and notes left behind by his father. It uses similar repetition techniques as the Second and Third Symphonies, but to very different effect; for example, its opening consists of a series of very loud, repeated cells that together spell out the name of the composer Alexandre Tansman via a musical cryptogram, punctuated with heavy strokes on the bass drum and clashing bitonality between the chords of A and E-flat. Later works Despite the Third Symphony's success, Górecki resisted the temptation to compose again in that style, and, according to AllMusic, continued to work, not to further his career or reputation, but largely "in response to inner creative dictates". In February 1994, the Kronos Quartet performed at the Brooklyn Academy of Music four concerts honoring postmodern revival of interest in new music. The first three concerts featured string quartets and the works of three living composers: two Americans (Philip Glass and George Crumb) and one Pole (Górecki). Górecki's later work includes a 1992 commission for the Kronos Quartet, Songs are Sung; Concerto-Cantata (written in 1992 for flute and orchestra); and Kleines Requiem für eine Polka (1993 for piano and 13 instruments). Concerto-Cantata and Kleines Requiem für eine Polka have been recorded by the London Sinfonietta and the Schönberg Ensemble, respectively. Songs are Sung is his third string quartet, inspired by a poem by Velimir Khlebnikov. When asked why it took almost 13 years to finish, he replied, "I continued to hold back from releasing it to the world. I don’t know why." Last decade During the last decade of his life, Górecki suffered from frequent illnesses. His Symphony No. 4 (op. 85, 2006) was due to be premiered in London in 2010 by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, but the event was cancelled due to the composer's ill health. He died on 12 November 2010, in his home city of Katowice, from complications arising from a lung infection. Reacting to his death, the head of the Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music, Professor Eugeniusz Knapik, said "Górecki's work is like a huge boulder that lies in our path and forces us to make a spiritual and emotional effort". Adrian Thomas, Professor of Music at Cardiff University, said, "The strength and startling originality of Górecki's character shone through his music [...] Yet he was an intensely private man, sometimes impossible, with a strong belief in family, a great sense of humour, a physical courage in the face of unrelenting illness, and a capacity for firm friendship". He was married to Jadwiga, a piano teacher. His daughter, Anna Górecka-Stanczyk, is a pianist, and his son, Mikołaj Górecki, is a composer. He was survived by five grandchildren. President of the Republic of Poland Bronisław Komorowski awarded Górecki the Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest honour, a month before his death. The Order was presented by Komorowski's wife in Górecki's hospital bed. Earlier, Górecki received the Order of Polonia Restituta II class and III class and the Order of St. Gregory the Great. The world premiere of his Symphony No. 4 took place on 12 April 2014. It was performed, as originally scheduled in 2010, by the London Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall, London, but with Andrey Boreyko conducting instead of Marin Alsop. Symphony No. 4 is an extensive, 37-minute composition set for an approximately 100-person orchestra with piano and organ obbligato. The composer left a cryptogram that explains the way he built the theme for the symphony using musical letters from the first and last names of Aleksander Tansman. In 2004, Górecki left the piano reduction of Two Tristan Postludes and Chorale for orchestra, which received op. 82. It was orchestrated by his son Mikolaj Górecki and premiered at the Tansman Festival, on October 16, 2016, at the Polish Radio Witold Lutosławski Studio Hall in Warsaw, by Jerzy Maksymiuk and the Sinfonia Varsovia orchestra. Use in film and television Some of Górecki's music has been adapted for film soundtracks, most notably fragments of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs. They are featured in Peter Weir's 1993 film Fearless, Julian Schnabel's 1996 biographical drama film Basquiat, Shona Auerbach's 1996 film Seven, Jaime Marqués's 2007 film Ladrones, Terrence Malick's 2012 experimental romantic drama To the Wonder, Paolo Sorrentino's 2013 art drama film The Great Beauty, Felix van Groeningen's 2018 biographical film Beautiful Boy, and Malick's 2019 historical drama A Hidden Life. It has also appeared on television in numerous TV shows, including the American crime drama television series The Sopranos, American TV series Legion, crime thriller television series The Blacklist, and the historical drama The Crown. Critical opinion When placing Górecki in context, musicologists and critics generally compare his work with such composers as Olivier Messiaen and Charles Ives. He himself said that he also felt kindred with such figures as Bach, Mozart and Haydn, though he felt most affinity with Franz Schubert, particularly in terms of tonal design and treatment of basic materials. In the Dutch documentary film series Toonmeesters, of which episode 4 (1994) is about Górecki, he likened playing Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart every day to eating healthy whole grain bread every day. In the same episode he said that in Mozart and Schubert he found many new things, new musical answers. Since Górecki moved away from serialism and dissonance in the 1970s, he is frequently compared to composers such as Arvo Pärt, John Tavener and Giya Kancheli. Although none have admitted to common influence, the term holy minimalism is often used to group these composers, due to their shared simplified approach to texture, tonality and melody, in works often reflecting deeply held religious beliefs. Górecki's modernist techniques are also compared to those of Igor Stravinsky, Béla Bartók, Paul Hindemith and Dmitri Shostakovich. In 1994, Boguslaw M. Maciejewski published the first biography of Górecki, Górecki – His Music And Our Times. It includes a great deal of detail about his life and work, including that he achieved cult status thanks to valuable exposure on Classic FM. Discussing his audience in a 1994 interview, Górecki said, I do not choose my listeners. What I mean is, I never write for my listeners. I think about my audience, but I am not writing for them. I have something to tell them, but the audience must also put a certain effort into it. But I never wrote for an audience and never will write for because you have to give the listener something and he has to make an effort in order to understand certain things. If I were thinking of my audience and one likes this, one likes that, one likes another thing, I would never know what to write. Let every listener choose that which interests him. I have nothing against one person liking Mozart or Shostakovich or Leonard Bernstein, but doesn't like Górecki. That's fine with me. I, too, like certain things. Górecki received an honorary doctorate from Concordia University, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Concordia professor Wolfgang Bottenberg called him one of the "most renowned and respected composers of our time", and said that Górecki's music "represents the most positive aspects of the closing years of our century, as we try to heal the wounds inflicted by the violence and intolerance of our times. It will endure into the next millennium and inspire other composers". In 2007, Górecki claimed 32nd place on the list of Top 100 Living Geniuses compiled by The Daily Telegraph. In 2008, he received an honorary doctorate from the Academy of Music in Kraków. At the awarding ceremony a selection of his choral works was performed by the choir of the city's Franciscan Church. See also List of Polish composers List of Poles Music of Poland Notes Bibliography Howard, Luke B. "Motherhood, 'Billboard' and the Holocaust: Perceptions and Receptions of Górecki's Symphony No. 3". Musical Quarterly 82, no. 1 (Spring), 1998. 131–59. Jacobson, Bernard. A Polish Renaissance. Twentieth-Century Composers. London: Phaidon, 1996. Maciejewski, B. M. "Gorecki—His Music And Our Times". London: Allegro Press, 1994. . Marek, Tadeusz, and David Drew. "Górecki in Interview (1968)—And 20 Years After". Tempo 168, 1989. 25–28 Markiewicz, Leon. "Conversation with Henryk Górecki. Leon Markiewicz, July 1962". Polish Music Journal, Vol. 6, No. 2, Winter 2003. . Mellers, Wilfrid. "Round and about Górecki's Symphony No.3". Tempo New Series, No. 168, 50th Anniversary 1939–1989. March 1989. 22–24. Mirka, Danuta. "Górecki's Musica Geometrica". The Musical Quarterly 87 (2004): 305—32. Morin, Alexander. Classical Music: The Listener's Companion. San Francisco, CA: Backbeat Books, 2002. . Steinberg, Michael. The Symphony: A Listener's Guide. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995. . Thomas, Adrian. Górecki. Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. . (cloth) . Thomas, Adrian. "Polish Music since Szymanowski". In: Music in the Twentieth Century. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. . Thomas, Adrian. "Górecki, Henryk Mikołaj," The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musician. 2001. Oxford University Press. Thomas, Adrian. "Henryk Gorecki". London: Gresham College, 2009. Thomas, Adrian & Latham, Alison: "Górecki, Henryk (Mikołaj)." The Oxford Companion to Music Online. (Accessed 24 September 2012.) Wright, Stephen. "Arvo Pärt (1935–)". In: Music of the Twentieth-Century Avant-Garde: A Biocritical Sourcebook. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2002. . Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, centennial ed., s.v. "Górecki, Henryk (Mikołaj)." External links Henryk Mikołaj Górecki interview, 24 April 1994 USC Polish Music Center biography Henryk Górecki @ Boosey & Hawkes Polish Music Journal, Vol. 6 No. 2, Winter 2003 – A special edition marking Górecki's 70th birthday, consisting of articles exclusively on Górecki Lerchenmusik, Op. 53, Luna Nova Ensemble (Nobuko Igarashi, clarinet; Craig Hultgren, cello; Andrew Drannon, piano) Alex Ross article in New Yorker 1933 births 2010 deaths People from Rybnik County Polish Roman Catholics Polish classical composers Polish male classical composers Nonesuch Records artists 20th-century classical composers 21st-century classical composers Knights of St. Gregory the Great Commanders with Star of the Order of Polonia Restituta Recipients of the Gold Medal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis International Rostrum of Composers prize-winners Herder Prize recipients Recipients of the Order of the White Eagle (Poland)	true	[ "Sonic Temple Art & Music Festival is a rock festival currently held in Columbus, Ohio, United States and is produced by Danny Wimmer Presents.\n\nHistory\n\nIn 2018 it was announced that Rock on the Range would be replaced by Danny Wimmer Presents as the Sonic Temple Art & Music Festival. The inaugural festival was held in May 2019 with sold-out crowds of 120,000.\n\nIn December 2019, the full lineup for Sonic Temple 2020 was revealed. Metallica were to headline both Friday and Saturday night, with Slipknot headlining on Saturday. Other performers were to include Deftones, Bring Me the Horizon, Evanescence, Sublime with Rome, Rancid, Dropkick Murphys, Cypress Hill, Pennywise, Royal Blood, The Pretty Reckless, Alter Bridge, Anthrax, Flatbush Zombies, Pop Evil, Hellyeah, Ghostemane, Suicidal Tendencies, Testament, Dance Gavin Dance, Ice Nine Kills, Sleeping with Sirens, The Darkness, Knocked Loose, Code Orange, Power Trip, Saint Asonia, Dirty Honey, Jinjer, City Morgue, Bones UK, Airbourne, Fire from the Gods, Dinosaur Pile-Up, Des Rocs, Counterfeit, Crobot, Cherry Bomb, DED, Goodbye June, Brutus, 3Teeth, BRKN Love, Killstation, Brass Against, Crown Lands, Ego Kill Talent, Dregg, Bloodywood, and Zero 9:36, with more to have been announced.\n\nIn February 2020, it was announced that Metallica would be replaced as headliners by the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Tool, following frontman James Hetfield's entrance into a rehabilitation program for substance abuse. The following month, the festival was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In February 2021, it was announced it would once again be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with plans to return in 2022.\n\nEvents\n\n2019 \n\nMonster Energy Stadium Stage:\n System of a Down\n Ghost\n Halestorm\n Parkway Drive\n Beartooth\n Avatar\n Badflower\n\nEcho Stage:\n Meshuggah\n Black Label Society\n Bad Wolves\n Zeal & Ardor\n Wage War\n SHVPES\n The Jacks\n\nWave Stage:\n Tom Morello\n Pussy Riot\n Ho99o99\n Cleopatrick\n Hands Like Houses\n Radattack\n\nSiriusXM Comedy & Spoken Word Tent:\n Henry Rollins\n Tom Morello\n Shapel Lacy\n Nadya\n\nMonster Energy Stadium Stage:\n Disturbed\n Papa Roach\n Lamb of God\n In This Moment\n Gojira\n Fever 333\n Black Coffee\n\nEcho Stage:\n The Cult\n Killswitch Engage\n Architects\n The Black Dahlia Murder\n While She Sleeps\n Evan Konrad\n The Plot in You\n\nWave Stage:\n Action Bronson (did not perform due to an \"unforeseen knee injury\")\n Mark Lanegan Band\n Don Broco\n Movements\n Boston Manor\n No1Cares\n\nSiriusXM Comedy & Spoken Word Tent:\n Andrew Dice Clay\n Eleanor Kerrigan\n Mark Normand\n Craig Grass\n\nMonster Energy Stadium Stage:\n Foo Fighters\n Bring Me the Horizon (did not perform due to high winds)\n Chevelle (did not perform due to high winds)\n The Distillers (did not perform due to high winds)\n The Struts\n The Glorious Sons\n Amigo the Devil\n\nEcho Stage:\n Joan Jett and the Blackhearts\n The Hives (performance ended early due to high winds)\n The Interrupters\n Yungblud\n Palaye Royale\n Dirty Honey\n Teenage Wrist\n\nWave Stage:\n Scars on Broadway (did not perform due to high winds)\n Refused (did not perform due to high winds)\n Black Pistol Fire (did not perform due to high winds)\n Basement (did not perform due to high winds)\n Scarlxrd (did not perform due to high winds)\n Demob Happy (did not perform due to high winds)\n\nSiriusXM Comedy & Spoken Word Tent:\n Pauly Shore (did not perform due to high winds)\n Carmen Lynch (did not perform due to high winds)\n Joe Deuce (did not perform due to high winds)\n Bill Squire (did not perform due to high winds)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\nHeavy metal festivals in the United States\nMusic festivals established in 2019\nMusic festivals in Ohio\nRock festivals in the United States", "The Vancouver Pop Festival was a rock festival held at the Paradise Valley Resort in Squamish, British Columbia, Canada. The dates of the festival were August 22, 23 and 24, 1969. It was produced by Candi Promotions.\n\nNeither the Grateful Dead nor Strawberry Alarm Clock played. A band named Crow was the surprise hit for those who liked hard rock. Bikers provided an uncomfortable, \"avoid taking hallucinogens\" vibe.\n\nLineup\nDue to problems with paid attendance, only some of the acts listed below performed. It has been claimed that the Grateful Dead did not perform but Jerry Garcia biographer Blair Jackson disputed this, and speculated the Dead took the gig to move on from their poor performance at the Woodstock festival a week earlier. The groups playing at the festival included (in alphabetical order):\n\nSee also\nList of historic rock festivals\nList of music festivals in Canada\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Wolfgang's Vault Event Poster\n\n1969 in Canadian music\nMusic festivals in British Columbia\nRock festivals in Canada\nJam band festivals\nMusic festivals established in 1969\nPop music festivals in Canada\n1969 music festivals" ]
[ "Henryk Górecki", "Early modernist works", "When were his first performances?", "The first public performances of Gorecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartok.", "What did this event lead to?", "The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Gorecki's music.", "Did he perform in any festivals?", "led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival." ]	C_7227ab91d2d64abd85231ff29510146e_1	Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?	4	Aside from information about Henryk Gorecki's early performances, are there any other interesting aspects about this article?	Henryk Górecki	The first public performances of Gorecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartok. The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Gorecki's music. The event led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival. The Epitafium ("Epitaph") he submitted marked a new phase in his development as a composer, and was described as representing "the most colourful and vibrant expression of the new Polish wave". The Festival announced the composer's arrival on the international scene, and he quickly became a favorite of the West's avant-garde musical elite. Writing in 1991, the music critic James Wierzbicki described how that at this time "Gorecki was seen as a Polish heir to the new aesthetic of post-Webernian serialism; with his taut structures, lean orchestrations and painstaking concern for the logical ordering of pitches". Gorecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the following year. At the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, his Scontri, written for orchestra, caused a sensation among critics due to its use of sharp contrasts and harsh articulations. By 1961, Gorecki was at the forefront of the Polish avant-garde, having absorbed the modernism of Anton Webern, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, and his Symphony No. 1 gained international acclaim at the Paris Biennial Festival of Youth. Gorecki moved to Paris to continue his studies, and while there was influenced by contemporaries including Olivier Messiaen, Roman Palester, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. He began to lecture at the Academy of Music in Katowice in 1968, where he taught score-reading, orchestration and composition. In 1972, he was promoted to assistant professor, and developed a fearsome reputation among his students for his often blunt personality. According to the Polish composer Rafal Augustyn, "When I began to study under Gorecki it felt as if someone had dumped a pail of ice-cold water over my head. He could be ruthless in his opinions. The weak fell by the wayside but those who graduated under him became, without exception, respected composers". Gorecki admits, "For quite a few years, I was a pedagogue, a teacher in the music academy, and my students would ask me many, many things, including how to write and what to write. I always answered this way: If you can live without music for 2 or 3 days, then don't write...It might be better to spend time with a girl or with a beer...If you cannot live without music, then write." Due to his commitments as a teacher and also because of bouts of ill health, he composed only intermittently during this period. CANNOTANSWER	Gorecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the following year.	Henryk Mikołaj Górecki ( , ; 6 December 1933 – 12 November 2010) was a Polish composer of contemporary classical music. According to critic Alex Ross, no recent classical composer has had as much commercial success as Górecki. He became a leading figure of the Polish avant-garde during the post-Stalin cultural thaw. His Anton Webern-influenced serialist works of the 1950s and 1960s were characterized by adherence to dissonant modernism and influenced by Luigi Nono, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Krzysztof Penderecki and Kazimierz Serocki. He continued in this direction throughout the 1960s, but by the mid-1970s had changed to a less complex sacred minimalist sound, exemplified by the transitional Symphony No. 2 and the Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs). This later style developed through several other distinct phases, from such works as his 1979 Beatus Vir, to the 1981 choral hymn Miserere, the 1993 Kleines Requiem für eine Polka and his requiem Good Night. Górecki was largely unknown outside Poland until the late 1980s. In 1992, 15 years after it was composed, a recording of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs with soprano Dawn Upshaw and conductor David Zinman, released to commemorate the memory of those lost during the Holocaust, became a worldwide commercial and critical success, selling more than a million copies and vastly exceeding the typical lifetime sales of a recording of symphonic music by a 20th-century composer. Commenting on its popularity, Górecki said, "Perhaps people find something they need in this piece of music [...] somehow I hit the right note, something they were missing. Something somewhere had been lost to them. I feel that I instinctively knew what they needed." This popular acclaim did not generate wide interest in Górecki's other works, and he pointedly resisted the temptation to repeat earlier success, or compose for commercial reward. Nevertheless, his music drew the attention of Australian film director Peter Weir, who used a section of Symphony No 3 in his 1993 film Fearless. Apart from two brief periods studying in Paris and a short time living in Berlin, Górecki spent most of his life in southern Poland. Biography Early years Henryk Górecki was born on 6 December 1933, in the village of Czernica, in present-day Silesian Voivodeship, southwest Poland. His family lived modestly, though both parents had a love of music. His father Roman (1904–1991) worked at the goods office of a local railway station, but was an amateur musician, while his mother Otylia (1909–1935), played piano. Otylia died when her son was just two years old, and many of his early works were dedicated to her memory. Henryk developed an interest in music from an early age, though he was discouraged by both his father and new stepmother to the extent that he was not allowed to play his mother's old piano. He persisted, and in 1943 was allowed to take violin lessons with Paweł Hajduga, a local amateur musician, instrument maker, sculptor, painter, poet and chłopski filozof (peasant philosopher). In 1937, Górecki fell while playing in a neighbor’s yard and dislocated his hip. The resulting suppurative inflammation was misdiagnosed by a local doctor, and delay in proper treatment led to tubercular complications in the bone. The illness went largely untreated for two years, by which time permanent damage had been sustained. He spent the following twenty months in a hospital in Germany, where he underwent four operations. Górecki continued to suffer ill health throughout his life and as a result said he had "talked with death often". In the early 1950s, Górecki studied in the Szafrankowie Brothers State School of Music in Rybnik. Between 1955 and 1960, he studied at the State Higher School of Music in Katowice. In 1965 He joined the faculty of his alma mater in Katowice, where he was made a lecturer in 1968, and then rose to provost before resigning in 1979. Rydułtowy and Katowice Between 1951 and 1953, Górecki taught 10- and 11-year-olds at a school suburb of Rydułtowy, in southern Poland. In 1952, he began a teacher training course at the Intermediate School of Music in Rybnik, where he studied clarinet, violin, piano, and music theory. Through intensive studying, Górecki finished the four-year course in just under three years. During this time, he began to compose his own pieces, mostly songs and piano miniatures. Occasionally, he attempted more ambitious projects—in 1952, he adapted the Adam Mickiewicz ballad Świtezianka, though it was left unfinished. Górecki's life during this time was often difficult. Teaching posts were generally badly paid, while the shortage economy made manuscript paper at times difficult and expensive to acquire. With no access to radio, Górecki kept up to date with music by weekly purchases of such periodicals as Ruch muzyczny (Musical Movement) and Muzyka, and by purchasing at least one score a week. Górecki continued his formal study of music at the Academy of Music in Katowice, where he studied under the composer Bolesław Szabelski, a former student of Karol Szymanowski. Szabelski drew much of his inspiration from Polish highland folklore. He encouraged Górecki's growing confidence and independence by giving him considerable space in which to develop his own ideas and projects; several of Górecki's early pieces were straightforwardly neo-classical, during a period when Górecki was also absorbing the techniques of twelve-tone serialism. He graduated from the Academy with honours in 1960. Professorship In 1975, Górecki was promoted to Professor of Composition at the State Higher School of Music in Katowice, where his students included Eugeniusz Knapik, Andrzej Krzanowski, Rafał Augustyn and his son, Mikołaj. Around this time, he came to believe the Polish Communist authorities were interfering too much in the academy's activities, and called them "little dogs always yapping". As a senior administrator but not a member of the Party, he was in almost perpetual conflict with the authorities in his efforts to protect his school, staff and students from undue political influence. In 1979, he resigned from his post in protest at the government's refusal to allow Pope John Paul II to visit Katowice, and formed a local branch of the "Catholic Intellectuals Club", an organisation devoted to the struggle against the Communist Party (Polish United Workers' Party). In 1981, he composed his Miserere for a large choir in remembrance of police violence against the Solidarity movement. In 1987, he composed Totus Tuus for John Paul II's visit to Poland. Style and compositions Górecki's music covers a variety of styles, but tends towards relative harmonic and rhythmical simplicity. He is considered a founder of the New Polish School. According to Terry Teachout, Górecki's "more conventional array of compositional techniques includes both elaborate counterpoint and the ritualistic repetition of melodic fragments and harmonic patterns." Górecki's first works, dating from the last half of the 1950s, were in the avant-garde style of Webern and other serialists of that time. Some of these twelve-tone and serial pieces include Epitaph (1958), First Symphony (1959), and Scontri (1960) (Mirka 2004, p. 305). At that time, Górecki's reputation was not lagging behind that of Penderecki and his status was confirmed in 1960s when Monologhi won a first prize. Even until 1962, he was firmly ensconced in the minds of the Warsaw Autumn public as a leader of the Polish Modern School, alongside Penderecki. Danuta Mirka has shown that Górecki's compositional techniques in the 1960s were often based on geometry, including axes, figures, one- and two-dimensional patterns, and especially symmetry. She proposes the term "geometrical period" for his works between 1962 and 1970. Building on Krzysztof Droba's classifications, she further divides this period into two phases: "the phase of sonoristic means" (1962–63) and "the phase of reductive constructicism" (1964–70; Mirka 2004, p. 329). During the mid-1960s and early 1970s, Górecki progressively moved away from his early career as radical modernist, and began to compose in a more traditional, romantic mode of expression. His change of style was viewed as an affront to the then avant-garde establishment, and though he continued to receive commissions from various Polish agencies, by the mid-1970s Górecki was no longer regarded as a composer of importance. In the words of one critic, his "new material was no longer cerebral and sparse; rather, it was intensely expressive, persistently rhythmic and often richly colored in the darkest of orchestral hues". Early modernist works The first public performances of Górecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartók. The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Górecki's music. The event led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival. The Epitafium (Epitaph) he submitted marked a new phase in his development, and was said to represent "the most colourful and vibrant expression of the new Polish wave". The festival announced Górecki's arrival on the international scene, and he quickly became a favorite of the West's avant-garde musical elite. In 1991, the music critic James Wierzbicki wrote that at this time "Górecki was seen as a Polish heir to the new aesthetic of post-Webernian serialism, with his taut structures, lean orchestrations and painstaking concern for the logical ordering of pitches". Górecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the next year. At the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, his Scontri for orchestra caused a sensation among critics due to its use of sharp contrasts and harsh articulations. By 1961, Górecki was at the forefront of the Polish avant-garde, having absorbed the modernism of Webern, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, and his Symphony No. 1 gained international acclaim at the Paris Biennial Festival of Youth. He moved to Paris to continue his studies, and while there was influenced by contemporaries including Olivier Messiaen, Roman Palester, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. Górecki began to lecture at the Academy of Music in Katowice in 1968, where he taught score-reading, orchestration and composition. In 1972, he was promoted to assistant professor, and developed a fearsome reputation among his students for his often blunt personality. According to the Polish composer Rafał Augustyn, "When I began to study under Górecki it felt as if someone had dumped a pail of ice-cold water over my head. He could be ruthless in his opinions. The weak fell by the wayside but those who graduated under him became, without exception, respected composers". Górecki admits, "For quite a few years, I was a pedagogue, a teacher in the music academy, and my students would ask me many, many things, including how to write and what to write. I always answered this way: If you can live without music for 2 or 3 days, then don't write...It might be better to spend time with a girl or with a beer...If you cannot live without music, then write.” Due to his commitments as a teacher and also because of bouts of ill health, he composed only intermittently during this period. Move from modernism By the early 1970s, Górecki had begun to move away from his earlier radical modernism, and was working toward a more traditional mode of expression dominated by the human voice. His change of style affronted the avant-garde establishment, and although various Polish agencies continued to commission works from him, Górecki ceased to be viewed as an important composer. One critic later wrote, "Górecki's new material was no longer cerebral and sparse; rather, it was intensely expressive, persistently rhythmic and often richly colored in the darkest of orchestral hues". Górecki progressively rejected the dissonance, serialism and sonorism that had brought him early recognition, and pared and simplified his work. He began to favor large slow gestures and the repetition of small motifs. The Symphony No. 2, "Copernican" (II Symfonia Kopernikowska), was written in 1972 to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the birth of the astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus. Written in a monumental style for solo soprano, baritone, choir and orchestra, it features text from Psalms no. 145, 6 and 135 as well as an excerpt from Copernicus's De revolutionibus orbium coelestium. It is in two movements, and a typical performance lasts 35 minutes. It was commissioned by the Kosciuszko Foundation in New York, and presented an early opportunity for Górecki to reach an audience outside Poland. As was usual, he undertook extensive research on the subject, and was in particular concerned with the philosophical implications of Copernicus's discovery, not all of which he viewed as positive. As the historian Norman Davies commented, "His discovery of the earth's motion round the sun caused the most fundamental revolutions possible in the prevailing concepts of the human predicament". By the mid-1980s, Górecki began to attract a more international audience, and in 1989 the London Sinfonietta held a weekend of concerts in which his work was played alongside that of the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke. In 1990, the American Kronos Quartet commissioned and recorded his First String Quartet, Already It Is Dusk, Op. 62, an occasion that marked the beginning of a long relationship between the quartet and Górecki. Górecki's most popular piece is his Third Symphony, also known as the "Symphony of Sorrowful Songs" (Symfonia pieśni żałosnych). The work is slow and contemplative, and each of its three movements is for orchestra and solo soprano. The libretto for the first movement is taken from a 15th-century lament, while the second movement uses the words of a teenage girl, Helena Błażusiakówna (Helena Błażusiak), which she wrote on the wall of a Gestapo prison cell in Zakopane to invoke the protection of the Virgin Mary. The third uses the text of a Silesian folk song which describes the pain of a mother searching for a son killed in the Silesian uprisings. The symphony's dominant themes are motherhood and separation through war. While the first and third movements are written from the perspective of a parent who has lost a child, the second is from that of a child separated from a parent. The completion of Górecki's Fourth Symphony, subtitled "Tansman Episodes", was delayed for many years, partly by Górecki's unease at his newfound fame. Indeed, it had not even been orchestrated when he died in 2010, and his son Mikołaj completed it after his death from the piano score and notes left behind by his father. It uses similar repetition techniques as the Second and Third Symphonies, but to very different effect; for example, its opening consists of a series of very loud, repeated cells that together spell out the name of the composer Alexandre Tansman via a musical cryptogram, punctuated with heavy strokes on the bass drum and clashing bitonality between the chords of A and E-flat. Later works Despite the Third Symphony's success, Górecki resisted the temptation to compose again in that style, and, according to AllMusic, continued to work, not to further his career or reputation, but largely "in response to inner creative dictates". In February 1994, the Kronos Quartet performed at the Brooklyn Academy of Music four concerts honoring postmodern revival of interest in new music. The first three concerts featured string quartets and the works of three living composers: two Americans (Philip Glass and George Crumb) and one Pole (Górecki). Górecki's later work includes a 1992 commission for the Kronos Quartet, Songs are Sung; Concerto-Cantata (written in 1992 for flute and orchestra); and Kleines Requiem für eine Polka (1993 for piano and 13 instruments). Concerto-Cantata and Kleines Requiem für eine Polka have been recorded by the London Sinfonietta and the Schönberg Ensemble, respectively. Songs are Sung is his third string quartet, inspired by a poem by Velimir Khlebnikov. When asked why it took almost 13 years to finish, he replied, "I continued to hold back from releasing it to the world. I don’t know why." Last decade During the last decade of his life, Górecki suffered from frequent illnesses. His Symphony No. 4 (op. 85, 2006) was due to be premiered in London in 2010 by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, but the event was cancelled due to the composer's ill health. He died on 12 November 2010, in his home city of Katowice, from complications arising from a lung infection. Reacting to his death, the head of the Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music, Professor Eugeniusz Knapik, said "Górecki's work is like a huge boulder that lies in our path and forces us to make a spiritual and emotional effort". Adrian Thomas, Professor of Music at Cardiff University, said, "The strength and startling originality of Górecki's character shone through his music [...] Yet he was an intensely private man, sometimes impossible, with a strong belief in family, a great sense of humour, a physical courage in the face of unrelenting illness, and a capacity for firm friendship". He was married to Jadwiga, a piano teacher. His daughter, Anna Górecka-Stanczyk, is a pianist, and his son, Mikołaj Górecki, is a composer. He was survived by five grandchildren. President of the Republic of Poland Bronisław Komorowski awarded Górecki the Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest honour, a month before his death. The Order was presented by Komorowski's wife in Górecki's hospital bed. Earlier, Górecki received the Order of Polonia Restituta II class and III class and the Order of St. Gregory the Great. The world premiere of his Symphony No. 4 took place on 12 April 2014. It was performed, as originally scheduled in 2010, by the London Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall, London, but with Andrey Boreyko conducting instead of Marin Alsop. Symphony No. 4 is an extensive, 37-minute composition set for an approximately 100-person orchestra with piano and organ obbligato. The composer left a cryptogram that explains the way he built the theme for the symphony using musical letters from the first and last names of Aleksander Tansman. In 2004, Górecki left the piano reduction of Two Tristan Postludes and Chorale for orchestra, which received op. 82. It was orchestrated by his son Mikolaj Górecki and premiered at the Tansman Festival, on October 16, 2016, at the Polish Radio Witold Lutosławski Studio Hall in Warsaw, by Jerzy Maksymiuk and the Sinfonia Varsovia orchestra. Use in film and television Some of Górecki's music has been adapted for film soundtracks, most notably fragments of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs. They are featured in Peter Weir's 1993 film Fearless, Julian Schnabel's 1996 biographical drama film Basquiat, Shona Auerbach's 1996 film Seven, Jaime Marqués's 2007 film Ladrones, Terrence Malick's 2012 experimental romantic drama To the Wonder, Paolo Sorrentino's 2013 art drama film The Great Beauty, Felix van Groeningen's 2018 biographical film Beautiful Boy, and Malick's 2019 historical drama A Hidden Life. It has also appeared on television in numerous TV shows, including the American crime drama television series The Sopranos, American TV series Legion, crime thriller television series The Blacklist, and the historical drama The Crown. Critical opinion When placing Górecki in context, musicologists and critics generally compare his work with such composers as Olivier Messiaen and Charles Ives. He himself said that he also felt kindred with such figures as Bach, Mozart and Haydn, though he felt most affinity with Franz Schubert, particularly in terms of tonal design and treatment of basic materials. In the Dutch documentary film series Toonmeesters, of which episode 4 (1994) is about Górecki, he likened playing Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart every day to eating healthy whole grain bread every day. In the same episode he said that in Mozart and Schubert he found many new things, new musical answers. Since Górecki moved away from serialism and dissonance in the 1970s, he is frequently compared to composers such as Arvo Pärt, John Tavener and Giya Kancheli. Although none have admitted to common influence, the term holy minimalism is often used to group these composers, due to their shared simplified approach to texture, tonality and melody, in works often reflecting deeply held religious beliefs. Górecki's modernist techniques are also compared to those of Igor Stravinsky, Béla Bartók, Paul Hindemith and Dmitri Shostakovich. In 1994, Boguslaw M. Maciejewski published the first biography of Górecki, Górecki – His Music And Our Times. It includes a great deal of detail about his life and work, including that he achieved cult status thanks to valuable exposure on Classic FM. Discussing his audience in a 1994 interview, Górecki said, I do not choose my listeners. What I mean is, I never write for my listeners. I think about my audience, but I am not writing for them. I have something to tell them, but the audience must also put a certain effort into it. But I never wrote for an audience and never will write for because you have to give the listener something and he has to make an effort in order to understand certain things. If I were thinking of my audience and one likes this, one likes that, one likes another thing, I would never know what to write. Let every listener choose that which interests him. I have nothing against one person liking Mozart or Shostakovich or Leonard Bernstein, but doesn't like Górecki. That's fine with me. I, too, like certain things. Górecki received an honorary doctorate from Concordia University, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Concordia professor Wolfgang Bottenberg called him one of the "most renowned and respected composers of our time", and said that Górecki's music "represents the most positive aspects of the closing years of our century, as we try to heal the wounds inflicted by the violence and intolerance of our times. It will endure into the next millennium and inspire other composers". In 2007, Górecki claimed 32nd place on the list of Top 100 Living Geniuses compiled by The Daily Telegraph. In 2008, he received an honorary doctorate from the Academy of Music in Kraków. At the awarding ceremony a selection of his choral works was performed by the choir of the city's Franciscan Church. See also List of Polish composers List of Poles Music of Poland Notes Bibliography Howard, Luke B. "Motherhood, 'Billboard' and the Holocaust: Perceptions and Receptions of Górecki's Symphony No. 3". Musical Quarterly 82, no. 1 (Spring), 1998. 131–59. Jacobson, Bernard. A Polish Renaissance. Twentieth-Century Composers. London: Phaidon, 1996. Maciejewski, B. M. "Gorecki—His Music And Our Times". London: Allegro Press, 1994. . Marek, Tadeusz, and David Drew. "Górecki in Interview (1968)—And 20 Years After". Tempo 168, 1989. 25–28 Markiewicz, Leon. "Conversation with Henryk Górecki. Leon Markiewicz, July 1962". Polish Music Journal, Vol. 6, No. 2, Winter 2003. . Mellers, Wilfrid. "Round and about Górecki's Symphony No.3". Tempo New Series, No. 168, 50th Anniversary 1939–1989. March 1989. 22–24. Mirka, Danuta. "Górecki's Musica Geometrica". The Musical Quarterly 87 (2004): 305—32. Morin, Alexander. Classical Music: The Listener's Companion. San Francisco, CA: Backbeat Books, 2002. . Steinberg, Michael. The Symphony: A Listener's Guide. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995. . Thomas, Adrian. Górecki. Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. . (cloth) . Thomas, Adrian. "Polish Music since Szymanowski". In: Music in the Twentieth Century. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. . Thomas, Adrian. "Górecki, Henryk Mikołaj," The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musician. 2001. Oxford University Press. Thomas, Adrian. "Henryk Gorecki". London: Gresham College, 2009. Thomas, Adrian & Latham, Alison: "Górecki, Henryk (Mikołaj)." The Oxford Companion to Music Online. (Accessed 24 September 2012.) Wright, Stephen. "Arvo Pärt (1935–)". In: Music of the Twentieth-Century Avant-Garde: A Biocritical Sourcebook. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2002. . Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, centennial ed., s.v. "Górecki, Henryk (Mikołaj)." External links Henryk Mikołaj Górecki interview, 24 April 1994 USC Polish Music Center biography Henryk Górecki @ Boosey & Hawkes Polish Music Journal, Vol. 6 No. 2, Winter 2003 – A special edition marking Górecki's 70th birthday, consisting of articles exclusively on Górecki Lerchenmusik, Op. 53, Luna Nova Ensemble (Nobuko Igarashi, clarinet; Craig Hultgren, cello; Andrew Drannon, piano) Alex Ross article in New Yorker 1933 births 2010 deaths People from Rybnik County Polish Roman Catholics Polish classical composers Polish male classical composers Nonesuch Records artists 20th-century classical composers 21st-century classical composers Knights of St. Gregory the Great Commanders with Star of the Order of Polonia Restituta Recipients of the Gold Medal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis International Rostrum of Composers prize-winners Herder Prize recipients Recipients of the Order of the White Eagle (Poland)	false	[ "Přírodní park Třebíčsko (before Oblast klidu Třebíčsko) is a natural park near Třebíč in the Czech Republic. There are many interesting plants. The park was founded in 1983.\n\nKobylinec and Ptáčovský kopeček\n\nKobylinec is a natural monument situated ca 0,5 km from the village of Trnava.\nThe area of this monument is 0,44 ha. Pulsatilla grandis can be found here and in the Ptáčovský kopeček park near Ptáčov near Třebíč. Both monuments are very popular for tourists.\n\nPonds\n\nIn the natural park there are some interesting ponds such as Velký Bor, Malý Bor, Buršík near Přeckov and a brook Březinka. Dams on the brook are examples of European beaver activity.\n\nSyenitové skály near Pocoucov\n\nSyenitové skály (rocks of syenit) near Pocoucov is one of famed locations. There are interesting granite boulders. The area of the reservation is 0,77 ha.\n\nExternal links\nParts of this article or all article was translated from Czech. The original article is :cs:Přírodní park Třebíčsko.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nNature near the village Trnava which is there\n\nTřebíč\nParks in the Czech Republic\nTourist attractions in the Vysočina Region", "Damn Interesting is an independent website founded by Alan Bellows in 2005. The website presents true stories from science, history, and psychology, primarily as long-form articles, often illustrated with original artwork. Works are written by various authors, and published at irregular intervals. The website openly rejects advertising, relying on reader and listener donations to cover operating costs.\n\nAs of October 2012, each article is also published as a podcast under the same name. In November 2019, a second podcast was launched under the title Damn Interesting Week, featuring unscripted commentary on an assortment of news articles featured on the website's \"Curated Links\" section that week. In mid-2020, a third podcast called Damn Interesting Curio Cabinet began highlighting the website's periodic short-form articles in the same radioplay format as the original podcast.\n\nIn July 2009, Damn Interesting published the print book Alien Hand Syndrome through Workman Publishing. It contains some favorites from the site and some exclusive content.\n\nAwards and recognition \nIn August 2007, PC Magazine named Damn Interesting one of the \"Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites\".\nThe article \"The Zero-Armed Bandit\" by Alan Bellows won a 2015 Sidney Award from David Brooks in The New York Times.\nThe article \"Ghoulish Acts and Dastardly Deeds\" by Alan Bellows was cited as \"nonfiction journalism from 2017 that will stand the test of time\" by Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic.\nThe article \"Dupes and Duplicity\" by Jennifer Lee Noonan won a 2020 Sidney Award from David Brooks in the New York Times.\n\nAccusing The Dollop of plagiarism \n\nOn July 9, 2015, Bellows posted an open letter accusing The Dollop, a comedy podcast about history, of plagiarism due to their repeated use of verbatim text from Damn Interesting articles without permission or attribution. Dave Anthony, the writer of The Dollop, responded on reddit, admitting to using Damn Interesting content, but claiming that the use was protected by fair use, and that \"historical facts are not copyrightable.\" In an article about the controversy on Plagiarism Today, Jonathan Bailey concluded, \"Any way one looks at it, The Dollop failed its ethical obligations to all of the people, not just those writing for Damn Interesting, who put in the time, energy and expertise into writing the original content upon which their show is based.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Official website\n\n2005 podcast debuts" ]
[ "Henryk Górecki", "Early modernist works", "When were his first performances?", "The first public performances of Gorecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartok.", "What did this event lead to?", "The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Gorecki's music.", "Did he perform in any festivals?", "led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival.", "Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?", "Gorecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the following year." ]	C_7227ab91d2d64abd85231ff29510146e_1	Did he win any awards?	5	Did Henryk Gorecki win any awards?	Henryk Górecki	The first public performances of Gorecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartok. The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Gorecki's music. The event led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival. The Epitafium ("Epitaph") he submitted marked a new phase in his development as a composer, and was described as representing "the most colourful and vibrant expression of the new Polish wave". The Festival announced the composer's arrival on the international scene, and he quickly became a favorite of the West's avant-garde musical elite. Writing in 1991, the music critic James Wierzbicki described how that at this time "Gorecki was seen as a Polish heir to the new aesthetic of post-Webernian serialism; with his taut structures, lean orchestrations and painstaking concern for the logical ordering of pitches". Gorecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the following year. At the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, his Scontri, written for orchestra, caused a sensation among critics due to its use of sharp contrasts and harsh articulations. By 1961, Gorecki was at the forefront of the Polish avant-garde, having absorbed the modernism of Anton Webern, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, and his Symphony No. 1 gained international acclaim at the Paris Biennial Festival of Youth. Gorecki moved to Paris to continue his studies, and while there was influenced by contemporaries including Olivier Messiaen, Roman Palester, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. He began to lecture at the Academy of Music in Katowice in 1968, where he taught score-reading, orchestration and composition. In 1972, he was promoted to assistant professor, and developed a fearsome reputation among his students for his often blunt personality. According to the Polish composer Rafal Augustyn, "When I began to study under Gorecki it felt as if someone had dumped a pail of ice-cold water over my head. He could be ruthless in his opinions. The weak fell by the wayside but those who graduated under him became, without exception, respected composers". Gorecki admits, "For quite a few years, I was a pedagogue, a teacher in the music academy, and my students would ask me many, many things, including how to write and what to write. I always answered this way: If you can live without music for 2 or 3 days, then don't write...It might be better to spend time with a girl or with a beer...If you cannot live without music, then write." Due to his commitments as a teacher and also because of bouts of ill health, he composed only intermittently during this period. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Henryk Mikołaj Górecki ( , ; 6 December 1933 – 12 November 2010) was a Polish composer of contemporary classical music. According to critic Alex Ross, no recent classical composer has had as much commercial success as Górecki. He became a leading figure of the Polish avant-garde during the post-Stalin cultural thaw. His Anton Webern-influenced serialist works of the 1950s and 1960s were characterized by adherence to dissonant modernism and influenced by Luigi Nono, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Krzysztof Penderecki and Kazimierz Serocki. He continued in this direction throughout the 1960s, but by the mid-1970s had changed to a less complex sacred minimalist sound, exemplified by the transitional Symphony No. 2 and the Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs). This later style developed through several other distinct phases, from such works as his 1979 Beatus Vir, to the 1981 choral hymn Miserere, the 1993 Kleines Requiem für eine Polka and his requiem Good Night. Górecki was largely unknown outside Poland until the late 1980s. In 1992, 15 years after it was composed, a recording of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs with soprano Dawn Upshaw and conductor David Zinman, released to commemorate the memory of those lost during the Holocaust, became a worldwide commercial and critical success, selling more than a million copies and vastly exceeding the typical lifetime sales of a recording of symphonic music by a 20th-century composer. Commenting on its popularity, Górecki said, "Perhaps people find something they need in this piece of music [...] somehow I hit the right note, something they were missing. Something somewhere had been lost to them. I feel that I instinctively knew what they needed." This popular acclaim did not generate wide interest in Górecki's other works, and he pointedly resisted the temptation to repeat earlier success, or compose for commercial reward. Nevertheless, his music drew the attention of Australian film director Peter Weir, who used a section of Symphony No 3 in his 1993 film Fearless. Apart from two brief periods studying in Paris and a short time living in Berlin, Górecki spent most of his life in southern Poland. Biography Early years Henryk Górecki was born on 6 December 1933, in the village of Czernica, in present-day Silesian Voivodeship, southwest Poland. His family lived modestly, though both parents had a love of music. His father Roman (1904–1991) worked at the goods office of a local railway station, but was an amateur musician, while his mother Otylia (1909–1935), played piano. Otylia died when her son was just two years old, and many of his early works were dedicated to her memory. Henryk developed an interest in music from an early age, though he was discouraged by both his father and new stepmother to the extent that he was not allowed to play his mother's old piano. He persisted, and in 1943 was allowed to take violin lessons with Paweł Hajduga, a local amateur musician, instrument maker, sculptor, painter, poet and chłopski filozof (peasant philosopher). In 1937, Górecki fell while playing in a neighbor’s yard and dislocated his hip. The resulting suppurative inflammation was misdiagnosed by a local doctor, and delay in proper treatment led to tubercular complications in the bone. The illness went largely untreated for two years, by which time permanent damage had been sustained. He spent the following twenty months in a hospital in Germany, where he underwent four operations. Górecki continued to suffer ill health throughout his life and as a result said he had "talked with death often". In the early 1950s, Górecki studied in the Szafrankowie Brothers State School of Music in Rybnik. Between 1955 and 1960, he studied at the State Higher School of Music in Katowice. In 1965 He joined the faculty of his alma mater in Katowice, where he was made a lecturer in 1968, and then rose to provost before resigning in 1979. Rydułtowy and Katowice Between 1951 and 1953, Górecki taught 10- and 11-year-olds at a school suburb of Rydułtowy, in southern Poland. In 1952, he began a teacher training course at the Intermediate School of Music in Rybnik, where he studied clarinet, violin, piano, and music theory. Through intensive studying, Górecki finished the four-year course in just under three years. During this time, he began to compose his own pieces, mostly songs and piano miniatures. Occasionally, he attempted more ambitious projects—in 1952, he adapted the Adam Mickiewicz ballad Świtezianka, though it was left unfinished. Górecki's life during this time was often difficult. Teaching posts were generally badly paid, while the shortage economy made manuscript paper at times difficult and expensive to acquire. With no access to radio, Górecki kept up to date with music by weekly purchases of such periodicals as Ruch muzyczny (Musical Movement) and Muzyka, and by purchasing at least one score a week. Górecki continued his formal study of music at the Academy of Music in Katowice, where he studied under the composer Bolesław Szabelski, a former student of Karol Szymanowski. Szabelski drew much of his inspiration from Polish highland folklore. He encouraged Górecki's growing confidence and independence by giving him considerable space in which to develop his own ideas and projects; several of Górecki's early pieces were straightforwardly neo-classical, during a period when Górecki was also absorbing the techniques of twelve-tone serialism. He graduated from the Academy with honours in 1960. Professorship In 1975, Górecki was promoted to Professor of Composition at the State Higher School of Music in Katowice, where his students included Eugeniusz Knapik, Andrzej Krzanowski, Rafał Augustyn and his son, Mikołaj. Around this time, he came to believe the Polish Communist authorities were interfering too much in the academy's activities, and called them "little dogs always yapping". As a senior administrator but not a member of the Party, he was in almost perpetual conflict with the authorities in his efforts to protect his school, staff and students from undue political influence. In 1979, he resigned from his post in protest at the government's refusal to allow Pope John Paul II to visit Katowice, and formed a local branch of the "Catholic Intellectuals Club", an organisation devoted to the struggle against the Communist Party (Polish United Workers' Party). In 1981, he composed his Miserere for a large choir in remembrance of police violence against the Solidarity movement. In 1987, he composed Totus Tuus for John Paul II's visit to Poland. Style and compositions Górecki's music covers a variety of styles, but tends towards relative harmonic and rhythmical simplicity. He is considered a founder of the New Polish School. According to Terry Teachout, Górecki's "more conventional array of compositional techniques includes both elaborate counterpoint and the ritualistic repetition of melodic fragments and harmonic patterns." Górecki's first works, dating from the last half of the 1950s, were in the avant-garde style of Webern and other serialists of that time. Some of these twelve-tone and serial pieces include Epitaph (1958), First Symphony (1959), and Scontri (1960) (Mirka 2004, p. 305). At that time, Górecki's reputation was not lagging behind that of Penderecki and his status was confirmed in 1960s when Monologhi won a first prize. Even until 1962, he was firmly ensconced in the minds of the Warsaw Autumn public as a leader of the Polish Modern School, alongside Penderecki. Danuta Mirka has shown that Górecki's compositional techniques in the 1960s were often based on geometry, including axes, figures, one- and two-dimensional patterns, and especially symmetry. She proposes the term "geometrical period" for his works between 1962 and 1970. Building on Krzysztof Droba's classifications, she further divides this period into two phases: "the phase of sonoristic means" (1962–63) and "the phase of reductive constructicism" (1964–70; Mirka 2004, p. 329). During the mid-1960s and early 1970s, Górecki progressively moved away from his early career as radical modernist, and began to compose in a more traditional, romantic mode of expression. His change of style was viewed as an affront to the then avant-garde establishment, and though he continued to receive commissions from various Polish agencies, by the mid-1970s Górecki was no longer regarded as a composer of importance. In the words of one critic, his "new material was no longer cerebral and sparse; rather, it was intensely expressive, persistently rhythmic and often richly colored in the darkest of orchestral hues". Early modernist works The first public performances of Górecki's music in Katowice in February 1958 programmed works clearly displaying the influence of Szymanowski and Bartók. The Silesian State Philharmonic in Katowice held a concert devoted entirely to the 24-year-old Górecki's music. The event led to a commission to write for the Warsaw Autumn Festival. The Epitafium (Epitaph) he submitted marked a new phase in his development, and was said to represent "the most colourful and vibrant expression of the new Polish wave". The festival announced Górecki's arrival on the international scene, and he quickly became a favorite of the West's avant-garde musical elite. In 1991, the music critic James Wierzbicki wrote that at this time "Górecki was seen as a Polish heir to the new aesthetic of post-Webernian serialism, with his taut structures, lean orchestrations and painstaking concern for the logical ordering of pitches". Górecki wrote his First Symphony in 1959, and graduated with honours from the Academy the next year. At the 1960 Warsaw Autumn Festival, his Scontri for orchestra caused a sensation among critics due to its use of sharp contrasts and harsh articulations. By 1961, Górecki was at the forefront of the Polish avant-garde, having absorbed the modernism of Webern, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, and his Symphony No. 1 gained international acclaim at the Paris Biennial Festival of Youth. He moved to Paris to continue his studies, and while there was influenced by contemporaries including Olivier Messiaen, Roman Palester, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. Górecki began to lecture at the Academy of Music in Katowice in 1968, where he taught score-reading, orchestration and composition. In 1972, he was promoted to assistant professor, and developed a fearsome reputation among his students for his often blunt personality. According to the Polish composer Rafał Augustyn, "When I began to study under Górecki it felt as if someone had dumped a pail of ice-cold water over my head. He could be ruthless in his opinions. The weak fell by the wayside but those who graduated under him became, without exception, respected composers". Górecki admits, "For quite a few years, I was a pedagogue, a teacher in the music academy, and my students would ask me many, many things, including how to write and what to write. I always answered this way: If you can live without music for 2 or 3 days, then don't write...It might be better to spend time with a girl or with a beer...If you cannot live without music, then write.” Due to his commitments as a teacher and also because of bouts of ill health, he composed only intermittently during this period. Move from modernism By the early 1970s, Górecki had begun to move away from his earlier radical modernism, and was working toward a more traditional mode of expression dominated by the human voice. His change of style affronted the avant-garde establishment, and although various Polish agencies continued to commission works from him, Górecki ceased to be viewed as an important composer. One critic later wrote, "Górecki's new material was no longer cerebral and sparse; rather, it was intensely expressive, persistently rhythmic and often richly colored in the darkest of orchestral hues". Górecki progressively rejected the dissonance, serialism and sonorism that had brought him early recognition, and pared and simplified his work. He began to favor large slow gestures and the repetition of small motifs. The Symphony No. 2, "Copernican" (II Symfonia Kopernikowska), was written in 1972 to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the birth of the astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus. Written in a monumental style for solo soprano, baritone, choir and orchestra, it features text from Psalms no. 145, 6 and 135 as well as an excerpt from Copernicus's De revolutionibus orbium coelestium. It is in two movements, and a typical performance lasts 35 minutes. It was commissioned by the Kosciuszko Foundation in New York, and presented an early opportunity for Górecki to reach an audience outside Poland. As was usual, he undertook extensive research on the subject, and was in particular concerned with the philosophical implications of Copernicus's discovery, not all of which he viewed as positive. As the historian Norman Davies commented, "His discovery of the earth's motion round the sun caused the most fundamental revolutions possible in the prevailing concepts of the human predicament". By the mid-1980s, Górecki began to attract a more international audience, and in 1989 the London Sinfonietta held a weekend of concerts in which his work was played alongside that of the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke. In 1990, the American Kronos Quartet commissioned and recorded his First String Quartet, Already It Is Dusk, Op. 62, an occasion that marked the beginning of a long relationship between the quartet and Górecki. Górecki's most popular piece is his Third Symphony, also known as the "Symphony of Sorrowful Songs" (Symfonia pieśni żałosnych). The work is slow and contemplative, and each of its three movements is for orchestra and solo soprano. The libretto for the first movement is taken from a 15th-century lament, while the second movement uses the words of a teenage girl, Helena Błażusiakówna (Helena Błażusiak), which she wrote on the wall of a Gestapo prison cell in Zakopane to invoke the protection of the Virgin Mary. The third uses the text of a Silesian folk song which describes the pain of a mother searching for a son killed in the Silesian uprisings. The symphony's dominant themes are motherhood and separation through war. While the first and third movements are written from the perspective of a parent who has lost a child, the second is from that of a child separated from a parent. The completion of Górecki's Fourth Symphony, subtitled "Tansman Episodes", was delayed for many years, partly by Górecki's unease at his newfound fame. Indeed, it had not even been orchestrated when he died in 2010, and his son Mikołaj completed it after his death from the piano score and notes left behind by his father. It uses similar repetition techniques as the Second and Third Symphonies, but to very different effect; for example, its opening consists of a series of very loud, repeated cells that together spell out the name of the composer Alexandre Tansman via a musical cryptogram, punctuated with heavy strokes on the bass drum and clashing bitonality between the chords of A and E-flat. Later works Despite the Third Symphony's success, Górecki resisted the temptation to compose again in that style, and, according to AllMusic, continued to work, not to further his career or reputation, but largely "in response to inner creative dictates". In February 1994, the Kronos Quartet performed at the Brooklyn Academy of Music four concerts honoring postmodern revival of interest in new music. The first three concerts featured string quartets and the works of three living composers: two Americans (Philip Glass and George Crumb) and one Pole (Górecki). Górecki's later work includes a 1992 commission for the Kronos Quartet, Songs are Sung; Concerto-Cantata (written in 1992 for flute and orchestra); and Kleines Requiem für eine Polka (1993 for piano and 13 instruments). Concerto-Cantata and Kleines Requiem für eine Polka have been recorded by the London Sinfonietta and the Schönberg Ensemble, respectively. Songs are Sung is his third string quartet, inspired by a poem by Velimir Khlebnikov. When asked why it took almost 13 years to finish, he replied, "I continued to hold back from releasing it to the world. I don’t know why." Last decade During the last decade of his life, Górecki suffered from frequent illnesses. His Symphony No. 4 (op. 85, 2006) was due to be premiered in London in 2010 by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, but the event was cancelled due to the composer's ill health. He died on 12 November 2010, in his home city of Katowice, from complications arising from a lung infection. Reacting to his death, the head of the Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music, Professor Eugeniusz Knapik, said "Górecki's work is like a huge boulder that lies in our path and forces us to make a spiritual and emotional effort". Adrian Thomas, Professor of Music at Cardiff University, said, "The strength and startling originality of Górecki's character shone through his music [...] Yet he was an intensely private man, sometimes impossible, with a strong belief in family, a great sense of humour, a physical courage in the face of unrelenting illness, and a capacity for firm friendship". He was married to Jadwiga, a piano teacher. His daughter, Anna Górecka-Stanczyk, is a pianist, and his son, Mikołaj Górecki, is a composer. He was survived by five grandchildren. President of the Republic of Poland Bronisław Komorowski awarded Górecki the Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest honour, a month before his death. The Order was presented by Komorowski's wife in Górecki's hospital bed. Earlier, Górecki received the Order of Polonia Restituta II class and III class and the Order of St. Gregory the Great. The world premiere of his Symphony No. 4 took place on 12 April 2014. It was performed, as originally scheduled in 2010, by the London Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall, London, but with Andrey Boreyko conducting instead of Marin Alsop. Symphony No. 4 is an extensive, 37-minute composition set for an approximately 100-person orchestra with piano and organ obbligato. The composer left a cryptogram that explains the way he built the theme for the symphony using musical letters from the first and last names of Aleksander Tansman. In 2004, Górecki left the piano reduction of Two Tristan Postludes and Chorale for orchestra, which received op. 82. It was orchestrated by his son Mikolaj Górecki and premiered at the Tansman Festival, on October 16, 2016, at the Polish Radio Witold Lutosławski Studio Hall in Warsaw, by Jerzy Maksymiuk and the Sinfonia Varsovia orchestra. Use in film and television Some of Górecki's music has been adapted for film soundtracks, most notably fragments of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs. They are featured in Peter Weir's 1993 film Fearless, Julian Schnabel's 1996 biographical drama film Basquiat, Shona Auerbach's 1996 film Seven, Jaime Marqués's 2007 film Ladrones, Terrence Malick's 2012 experimental romantic drama To the Wonder, Paolo Sorrentino's 2013 art drama film The Great Beauty, Felix van Groeningen's 2018 biographical film Beautiful Boy, and Malick's 2019 historical drama A Hidden Life. It has also appeared on television in numerous TV shows, including the American crime drama television series The Sopranos, American TV series Legion, crime thriller television series The Blacklist, and the historical drama The Crown. Critical opinion When placing Górecki in context, musicologists and critics generally compare his work with such composers as Olivier Messiaen and Charles Ives. He himself said that he also felt kindred with such figures as Bach, Mozart and Haydn, though he felt most affinity with Franz Schubert, particularly in terms of tonal design and treatment of basic materials. In the Dutch documentary film series Toonmeesters, of which episode 4 (1994) is about Górecki, he likened playing Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart every day to eating healthy whole grain bread every day. In the same episode he said that in Mozart and Schubert he found many new things, new musical answers. Since Górecki moved away from serialism and dissonance in the 1970s, he is frequently compared to composers such as Arvo Pärt, John Tavener and Giya Kancheli. Although none have admitted to common influence, the term holy minimalism is often used to group these composers, due to their shared simplified approach to texture, tonality and melody, in works often reflecting deeply held religious beliefs. Górecki's modernist techniques are also compared to those of Igor Stravinsky, Béla Bartók, Paul Hindemith and Dmitri Shostakovich. In 1994, Boguslaw M. Maciejewski published the first biography of Górecki, Górecki – His Music And Our Times. It includes a great deal of detail about his life and work, including that he achieved cult status thanks to valuable exposure on Classic FM. Discussing his audience in a 1994 interview, Górecki said, I do not choose my listeners. What I mean is, I never write for my listeners. I think about my audience, but I am not writing for them. I have something to tell them, but the audience must also put a certain effort into it. But I never wrote for an audience and never will write for because you have to give the listener something and he has to make an effort in order to understand certain things. If I were thinking of my audience and one likes this, one likes that, one likes another thing, I would never know what to write. Let every listener choose that which interests him. I have nothing against one person liking Mozart or Shostakovich or Leonard Bernstein, but doesn't like Górecki. That's fine with me. I, too, like certain things. Górecki received an honorary doctorate from Concordia University, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Concordia professor Wolfgang Bottenberg called him one of the "most renowned and respected composers of our time", and said that Górecki's music "represents the most positive aspects of the closing years of our century, as we try to heal the wounds inflicted by the violence and intolerance of our times. It will endure into the next millennium and inspire other composers". In 2007, Górecki claimed 32nd place on the list of Top 100 Living Geniuses compiled by The Daily Telegraph. In 2008, he received an honorary doctorate from the Academy of Music in Kraków. At the awarding ceremony a selection of his choral works was performed by the choir of the city's Franciscan Church. See also List of Polish composers List of Poles Music of Poland Notes Bibliography Howard, Luke B. "Motherhood, 'Billboard' and the Holocaust: Perceptions and Receptions of Górecki's Symphony No. 3". Musical Quarterly 82, no. 1 (Spring), 1998. 131–59. Jacobson, Bernard. A Polish Renaissance. Twentieth-Century Composers. London: Phaidon, 1996. Maciejewski, B. M. "Gorecki—His Music And Our Times". London: Allegro Press, 1994. . Marek, Tadeusz, and David Drew. "Górecki in Interview (1968)—And 20 Years After". Tempo 168, 1989. 25–28 Markiewicz, Leon. "Conversation with Henryk Górecki. Leon Markiewicz, July 1962". Polish Music Journal, Vol. 6, No. 2, Winter 2003. . Mellers, Wilfrid. "Round and about Górecki's Symphony No.3". Tempo New Series, No. 168, 50th Anniversary 1939–1989. March 1989. 22–24. Mirka, Danuta. "Górecki's Musica Geometrica". The Musical Quarterly 87 (2004): 305—32. Morin, Alexander. Classical Music: The Listener's Companion. San Francisco, CA: Backbeat Books, 2002. . Steinberg, Michael. The Symphony: A Listener's Guide. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995. . Thomas, Adrian. Górecki. Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. . (cloth) . Thomas, Adrian. "Polish Music since Szymanowski". In: Music in the Twentieth Century. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. . Thomas, Adrian. "Górecki, Henryk Mikołaj," The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musician. 2001. Oxford University Press. Thomas, Adrian. "Henryk Gorecki". London: Gresham College, 2009. Thomas, Adrian & Latham, Alison: "Górecki, Henryk (Mikołaj)." The Oxford Companion to Music Online. (Accessed 24 September 2012.) Wright, Stephen. "Arvo Pärt (1935–)". In: Music of the Twentieth-Century Avant-Garde: A Biocritical Sourcebook. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2002. . Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, centennial ed., s.v. "Górecki, Henryk (Mikołaj)." External links Henryk Mikołaj Górecki interview, 24 April 1994 USC Polish Music Center biography Henryk Górecki @ Boosey & Hawkes Polish Music Journal, Vol. 6 No. 2, Winter 2003 – A special edition marking Górecki's 70th birthday, consisting of articles exclusively on Górecki Lerchenmusik, Op. 53, Luna Nova Ensemble (Nobuko Igarashi, clarinet; Craig Hultgren, cello; Andrew Drannon, piano) Alex Ross article in New Yorker 1933 births 2010 deaths People from Rybnik County Polish Roman Catholics Polish classical composers Polish male classical composers Nonesuch Records artists 20th-century classical composers 21st-century classical composers Knights of St. Gregory the Great Commanders with Star of the Order of Polonia Restituta Recipients of the Gold Medal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis International Rostrum of Composers prize-winners Herder Prize recipients Recipients of the Order of the White Eagle (Poland)	false	[ "Le Cousin is a 1997 French film directed by Alain Corneau.\n\nPlot \nThe film deals with the relationship of the police and an informant in the drug scene.\n\nAwards and nominations\nLe Cousin was nominated for 5 César Awards but did not win in any category.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1997 films\n1997 crime films\nFilms about drugs\nFilms directed by Alain Corneau\nFrench crime films\nFrench films\nFrench-language films", "The 23rd Fangoria Chainsaw Awards is an award ceremony presented for horror films that were released in 2020. The nominees were announced on January 20, 2021. The film The Invisible Man won five of its five nominations, including Best Wide Release, as well as the write-in poll of Best Kill. Color Out Of Space and Possessor each took two awards. His House did not win any of its seven nominations. The ceremony was exclusively livestreamed for the first time on the SHUDDER horror streaming service.\n\nWinners and nominees\n\nReferences\n\nFangoria Chainsaw Awards" ]
[ "Rohingya people", "Demographics" ]	C_af72bf4729054b89b3bc329a5569f6e3_0	What are some of the demographics?	1	What are some of the demographics of the Rohingya people?	Rohingya people	Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80-98% of the population. A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases. Rohingyas have 46% more children than Myanmar's national average. As of 2014, about 1.3 million Rohingyas live in Myanmar and an estimated 1 million overseas. They form 40% of Rakhine State's population or 60% if overseas population is included. As of December 2016, 1 in 7 stateless persons worldwide are Rohingya per United Nations figures, and the Rohingya are the world's largest stateless community. Prior to the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was around 1.1 to 1.3 million They reside mainly in the northern Rakhine townships, where they form 80-98% of the population. Many Rohingyas have fled to southeastern Bangladesh, where there are over 900,000 refugees, as well as to India, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar live in camps for internally displaced persons, and the authorities do not allow them to leave. The following table shows the statistics of Muslim population in Arakan. The data is for all Muslims in Arakan (Rakhine), regardless of ethnicity. The data for Burmese 1802 census is taken from a book by J. S. Furnivall. The British censuses classified immigrants from Chittagong as Bengalis. There were a small number of immigrants from other parts of India. The 1941 census was lost during the war. The 1983 census conducted under the Ne Win's government omitted people in volatile regions. It is unclear how many were missed. British era censuses can be found at Digital Library of India. CANNOTANSWER	Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80-98% of the population.	The Rohingya people () are a stateless Indo-Aryan ethnic group who predominantly follow Islam and reside in Rakhine State, Myanmar (previously known as Burma). Before the Rohingya genocide in 2017, when over 740,000 fled to Bangladesh, an estimated 1.4 million Rohingya lived in Myanmar. Described by journalists and news outlets as one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, the Rohingya are denied citizenship under the 1982 Myanmar nationality law. There are also restrictions on their freedom of movement, access to state education and civil service jobs. The legal conditions faced by the Rohingya in Myanmar have been compared to apartheid by some academics, analysts and political figures, including Nobel laureate Bishop Desmond Tutu, a South African anti-apartheid activist. The most recent mass displacement of Rohingya in 2017 led the International Criminal Court investigating crimes against humanity, and led to the International Court of Justice investigating genocide. The Rohingya maintain they are indigenous to western Myanmar with a heritage of over a millennium and influence from the Arabs, Mughals and Portuguese. The community claims it is descended from people in precolonial Arakan and colonial Arakan; historically, the region was an independent kingdom between Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent. The Myanmar government considers the Rohingya as colonial and postcolonial migrants from neighbouring Chittagong/East Bengal respectively Bangladesh. It argues that a distinct precolonial Muslim population is recognized as Kaman, and that the Rohingya conflate their history with the history of Arakan Muslims in general to advance a separatist agenda. In addition, Myanmar's government does not recognise the term "Rohingya" and prefers to refer to the community as "Bengali". Rohingya campaign groups and human rights organizations demand the right to "self-determination within Myanmar". Various armed insurrections by the Rohingya have taken place since the 1940s and the population as a whole has faced military crackdowns in 1978, 1991–1992, 2012, 2015, and particularly in 2016-2018, when most of the Rohingya population of Myanmar was driven out of the country, into neighbouring Bangladesh. By December 2017, an estimated 625,000 refugees from Rakhine, Myanmar, had crossed the border into Bangladesh since August 2017. UN officials and Human Rights Watch have described Myanmar's persecution of the Rohingya as ethnic cleansing. The UN human rights envoy to Myanmar reported "the long history of discrimination and persecution against the Rohingya community... could amount to crimes against humanity", and there have been warnings of an unfolding genocide. Probes by the UN have found evidence of increasing incitement of hatred and religious intolerance by "ultra-nationalist Buddhists" against Rohingyas while the Myanmar security forces have been conducting "summary executions, enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrests and detentions, torture and ill-treatment, and forced labour" against the community. Before the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was close to 1.4 million, chiefly in the northern Rakhine townships, which were 80–98% Rohingya. Since 2015, over 900,000 Rohingya refugees have fled to south-eastern Bangladesh alone, and more to other surrounding countries, and major Muslim nations. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar are confined in camps for internally displaced persons. Shortly before a Rohingya rebel attack that killed 12 security forces on 25 August 2017, the Myanmar military launched "clearance operations" against the Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine state that, according to NGOs, the Bangladeshi government and international news media, left many dead, and many more injured, tortured or raped, with villages burned. The government of Myanmar has denied the allegations. Nomenclature The modern term Rohingya emerged from colonial and pre-colonial terms Rooinga and Rwangya. The Rohingya refer to themselves as Ruáingga . In Burmese they are known as rui hang gya (following the MLC Transcription System) ( ) while in Bengali they are called Rohingga ( ). The term "Rohingya" may come from Rakhanga or Roshanga, the words for the state of Arakan. The word Rohingya would then mean "inhabitant of Rohang", which was the early Muslim name for Arakan. The usage of the term Rohingya has been historically documented prior to the British Raj. In 1799, Francis Buchanan wrote an article called "A Comparative Vocabulary of Some of the Languages Spoken in the Burma Empire", which was found and republished by Michael Charney in the SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research in 2003. Among the native groups of Arakan, he wrote are the: "Mohammedans, who have long settled in Arakan, and who call themselves Rooinga, or natives of Arakan." The Classical Journal of 1811 identified "Rooinga" as one of the languages spoken in the "Burmah Empire". In 1815, Johann Severin Vater listed "Ruinga" as an ethnic group with a distinct language in a compendium of languages published in German. In 1936, when Burma was still under British rule, the "Rohingya Jam’iyyat al Ulama" was founded in Arakan. According to Jacques Leider, the Rohingya were referred to as "Chittagonians" during the British colonial period, and it was not controversial to refer to them as "Bengalis" until the 1990s. Leider also states that "there is no international consensus" on the use of the term Rohingya, as they are often called "Rohingya Muslims", "Muslim Arakanese" and "Burmese Muslims". Others, such as anthropologist Christina Fink, use Rohingya not as an ethnic identifier but as a political one. Leider believes the Rohingya is a political movement that started in the 1950s to create "an autonomous Muslim zone" in Rakhine. The government of Prime Minister U Nu, when Burma was a democracy from 1948 to 1962, used the term "Rohingya" in radio addresses as a part of peace-building effort in Mayu Frontier Region. The term was broadcast on Burmese radio and was used in the speeches of Burmese rulers. A UNHCR report on refugees caused by Operation King Dragon referred to the victims as "Bengali Muslims (called Rohingyas)". Nevertheless, the term Rohingya wasn't widely used until the 1990s. Today the use of the name "Rohingya" is polarised. The government of Myanmar refuses to use the name. In the 2014 census, the Myanmar government forced the Rohingya to identify themselves as "Bengali". Many Rohingya see the denial of their name similar to denying their basic rights, and the U.N. Special Rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar has agreed. Jacques Leider writes that many Muslims in Rakhine simply prefer to call themselves "Muslim Arakanese" or "Muslims coming from Rakhine" instead of "Rohingya". The United States embassy in Yangon continues to use the name "Rohingya". History Early history The Rohingya population is concentrated in the historical region of Arakan, an old coastal country in Southeast Asia. It is not clear who the original settlers of Arakan were. Burmese traditional history claims that the Rakhine have inhabited Arakan since 3000 BCE but there is no archaeological evidence to support the claim. By the 4th century, Arakan became one of the earliest Indianized kingdoms in Southeast Asia. The first Arakanese state flourished in Dhanyawadi. Power then shifted to the city of Waithali. Sanskrit inscriptions in the region indicate that the founders of the first Arakanese states were Indian. Arakan was ruled by the Chandra dynasty. The British historian Daniel George Edward Hall stated that "The Burmese do not seem to have settled in Arakan until possibly as late as the tenth century CE. Hence earlier dynasties are thought to have been Indian, ruling over a population similar to that of Bengal. All the capitals known to history have been in the north near modern Akyab". Arrival of Islam Due to its coastline on the Bay of Bengal, Arakan was a key centre of maritime trade and cultural exchange between Burma and the outside world, since the time of the Indian Mauryan Empire. According to Syed Islam, a political science scholar, Arab merchants had been in contact with Arakan since the third century, using the Bay of Bengal to reach Arakan. A southern branch of the Silk Road connected India, Burma, and China since the neolithic period. Arab traders are recorded in the coastal areas of southeast Bengal, bordering Arakan, since the 9th century. The Rohingya population trace their history to this period. According to Syed Islam, the earliest Muslim settlements in the Arakan region began in the 7th-century. The Arab traders were also missionaries and they began converting the local Buddhist population to Islam by about 788 CE, states Syed Islam. Besides these locals converting to Islam, Arab merchants married local women and later settled in Arakan. As a result of intermarriage and conversion, the Muslim population in Arakan grew. This claim by Sayed Islam saying that, by 788 CE, locals in Arakan were being converted into Muslims clearly contradicts historian Yegar's findings which say, even in 1203, Bengal is the easternmost point of Islamic expansion, not to say further into Arakan. The alternate view contests that Islam arrived in the Arakan region in the 1st-millennium. According to this view, this Rohingya history is not based on any evidence, rather is based on "fictitious stories, myths and legends". According to Southeast Asian Buddhism history scholar and an ordained Buddhist monk Ashon Nyanuttara, there is scant historical data and archaeological evidence about the early political and religious history of the Arakan people and the Rakhaing region. The limited evidence available suggests that Buddhism, possibly the Mahayana tradition, was well established by the 4th-century in the region under the Candra Buddhist dynasty. Muslim community's expansion and the growth of Islam into the region came much later with Bengali Muslims from the region that is now a part of Bangladesh. Further, the term "Rohingya" does not appear in any regional text of this period and much later. That term was adopted by "a few Bengali Muslim intellectuals who were direct descendants of immigrants from Chittagong district [Bengal]" in the 20th-century, states historian Aye Chan. Kingdom of Mrauk U The Rakhines were one of the tribes of the Burmese Pyu city-states. The Rakhines began migrating to Arakan through the Arakan Mountains in the 9th century. The Rakhines established numerous cities in the valley of the Lemro River. These included Sambawak I, Pyinsa, Parein, Hkrit, Sambawak II, Myohaung, Toungoo and Launggret. Burmese forces invaded the Rakhine cities in 1406. The Burmese invasion forced Rakhine rulers to seek help and refuge from neighbouring Bengal in the north. Early evidence of Bengali Muslim settlements in Arakan date back to the time of Min Saw Mon (1430–34) of the Kingdom of Mrauk U. After 24 years of exile in Bengal, he regained control of the Arakanese throne in 1430 with military assistance from the Bengal Sultanate. The Bengalis who came with him formed their own settlements in the region. The Santikan Mosque built in the 1430s, features a court which "measures from north to south and from east to west; the shrine is a rectangular structure measuring ." King Min Saw Mon ceded some territory to the Sultan of Bengal and recognised his sovereignty over the areas. In recognition of his kingdom's vassal status, the Buddhist kings of Arakan received Islamic titles and used the Bengali gold dinar within the kingdom. Min Saw Mon minted his own coins with the Burmese alphabet on one side and the Persian alphabet on the other. Arakan's vassalage to Bengal was brief. After Sultan Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah's death in 1433, Narameikhla's successors invaded Bengal and occupied Ramu in 1437 and Chittagong in 1459. Arakan would hold Chittagong until 1666. Even after independence from the Sultans of Bengal, the Arakanese kings continued the custom of maintaining Muslim titles. The Buddhist kings compared themselves to Sultans and fashioned themselves after Mughal rulers. They also continued to employ Muslims in prestigious positions within the royal administration. Some of them worked as Bengali, Persian and Arabic scribes in the Arakanese courts, which, despite remaining Buddhist, adopted Islamic fashions from the neighbouring Bengal Sultanate. The population increased in the 17th century, as slaves were brought in by Arakanese raiders and Portuguese settlers following raids into Bengal. Slaves included members of the Mughal nobility. A notable royal slave was Alaol, a renowned poet in the Arakanese court. The slave population were employed in a variety of workforces, including in the king's army, commerce and agriculture. In 1660, Prince Shah Shuja, the governor of Mughal Bengal and a claimant of the Peacock Throne, fled to Arakan with his family after being defeated by his brother Emperor Aurangzeb during the Battle of Khajwa. Shuja and his entourage arrived in Arakan on 26 August 1660. He was granted asylum by King Sanda Thudhamma. In December 1660, the Arakanese king confiscated Shuja's gold and jewellery, leading to an insurrection by the royal Mughal refugees. According to varying accounts, Shuja's family was killed by the Arakanese, while Shuja himself may have fled to a kingdom in Manipur. However, members of Shuja's entourage remained in Arakan and were recruited by the royal army, including as archers and court guards. They were king makers in Arakan until the Burmese conquest. The Arakanese continued their raids of Mughal Bengal. Dhaka was raided in 1625. Emperor Aurangzeb gave orders to his governor in Mughal Bengal, Shaista Khan, to end what the Mughals saw as Arakanese-Portuguese piracy. In 1666, Shaista Khan led a army and 288 warships to seize Chittagong from the Kingdom of Mrauk U. The Mughal expedition continued up till the Kaladan River. The Mughals placed the northern part of Arakan under its administration and vassalage. Burmese conquest Following the Konbaung Dynasty's conquest of Arakan in 1785, as many as 35,000 people of the Rakhine State fled to the neighbouring Chittagong region of British Bengal in 1799 to escape persecution by the Bamar and to seek protection under the British Raj. The Bamar executed thousands of men and deported a considerable portion of the population to central Burma, leaving Arakan a scarcely populated area by the time the British occupied it. According to an article on the "Burma Empire" published by the British Francis Buchanan-Hamilton in 1799, "the Mohammedans, who have long settled in Arakan", "call themselves Rooinga, or natives of Arakan". However, according to Derek Tokin, Hamilton no longer used the term to refer to the Muslims in Arakan in his later publications. Sir Henry Yule saw many Muslims serving as eunuchs in Konbaung while on a diplomatic mission to the Burmese capital, Ava. British colonial rule British policy encouraged Bengali inhabitants from adjacent regions to migrate into the then lightly populated and fertile valleys of Arakan as farm labourers. The East India Company extended the Bengal Presidency to Arakan. There was no international boundary between Bengal and Arakan and no restrictions on migration between the regions. In the early 19th century, thousands of Bengalis from the Chittagong region settled in Arakan seeking work. It is hard to know whether these new Bengal migrants were the same population that was deported by force to Bengal's Chittagong during the Burmese conquest in the 18th century and later returned to Arakan as a result of British policy or they were a new migrant population with no ancestral roots to Arakan. The British census of 1872 reported 58,255 Muslims in Akyab District. By 1911, the Muslim population had increased to 178,647. The waves of migration were primarily due to the requirement of cheap labour from British India to work in the paddy fields. Immigrants from Bengal, mainly from the Chittagong region, "moved en masse into western townships of Arakan". Albeit Indian immigration to Burma was a nationwide phenomenon, not just restricted to Arakan. For these reasons historians believed that most Rohingyas arrived with the British colonialists in the 19th and 20th centuries with some tracing their ancestry much further. According to Thant Myint-U, historian and adviser to President Thein Sein, "At the beginning of the 20th century, Indians were arriving in Burma at the rate of no less than a quarter million per year. The numbers rose steadily until the peak year of 1927, immigration reached 480,000 people, with Rangoon exceeding New York City as the greatest immigration port in the world. This was out of a total population of only 13 million; it was equivalent to the United Kingdom today taking 2 million people a year." By then, in most of the largest cities in Burma, Rangoon, Akyab, Bassein and Moulmein, the Indian immigrants formed a majority of the population. All of Burma was officially a Province within the British Indian Empire ('the Raj') from November 1885 until 1937, when Burma became a separate Crown colony within the British Empire. The Burmese under British rule felt helpless, and reacted with a "racism that combined feelings of superiority and fear". Professor Andrew Selth of Griffith University writes that although a few Rohingya trace their ancestry to Muslims who lived in Arakan in the 15th and 16h centuries, most Rohingyas arrived with the British colonialists in the 19th and 20th centuries. Most have argued that Rohingya existed from the four waves of Muslim migrations from the ancient times to medieval, to the British colony. Gutman (1976) and Ibrahim (2016) claiming that the Muslim population dates before the arrival of ethnic Rakhine in the 9th to 10th century. Suggesting the Rohingya are descendants of the of a pre-Arakan population who existed for 3 thousand years and waves of Muslim who intermingled forming modern Rohingya. The impact of this immigration was particularly acute in Arakan. Although it boosted the colonial economy, local Arakanese bitterly resented it. According to historian Clive J. Christie, "The issue became a focus for grass-roots Burmese nationalism, and in the years 1930–31 there were serious anti-Indian disturbances in Lower Burma, while 1938 saw riots specifically directed against the Indian Muslim community. As Burmese nationalism increasingly asserted itself before the Second World War, the 'alien' Indian presence inevitably came under attack, along with the religion that the Indian Muslims imported. The Muslims of northern Arakan were to be caught in the crossfire of this conflict." In the 1931 census, the Muslim population of Burma was 584,839, 4% of the total population of 14,647,470 at the time. 396,504 were Indian Muslims and 1,474 Chinese Muslims, while 186,861 were Burmese Muslims. The census found a growth in the number of Indian Muslims born in Burma, primarily due to their permanent settlement in Akyab. 41% of Muslims of Burma lived in Arakan at that time. Shipping Due to the terrain of the Arakan Mountains, the Arakan region was mostly accessible by sea. In British Arakan Division, the port of Akyab had ferry services and a thriving trade with the ports of Chittagong, Narayanganj, Dacca and Calcutta in British India; as well as with Rangoon. Akyab was one of the leading rice ports in the world, hosting ship fleets from Europe and China. Many Indians settled in Akyab and dominated its seaport and hinterland. The 1931 census found 500,000 Indians living in Akyab. Legislators Several Rohingyas were elected to Burmese native seats in the Legislative Council of Burma and Legislature of Burma. During the 1936 Burmese general election, Advocate U Pho Khaine was elected from Akyab West and Gani Markan was elected from Maungdaw-Buthidaung. In 1939, U Tanvy Markan was elected from Maungdaw-Buthidaung. Their elections in the Burmese native category set them apart from immigrant Indian legislators. World War II During World War II, the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) invaded British-controlled Burma. The British forces retreated and in the power vacuum left behind, considerable inter-communal violence erupted between Arakanese and Muslim villagers. The British armed Muslims in northern Arakan in order to create a buffer zone that would protect the region from a Japanese invasion when they retreated and to counteract the largely pro-Japanese ethnic Rakhines. The period also witnessed violence between groups loyal to the British and the Burmese nationalists. The Arakan massacres in 1942 involved communal violence between British-armed V Force Rohingya recruits and , polarising the region along ethnic lines. Tensions boiling in Arakan before the war erupted during the Japanese invasion of Southeast Asia and Arakan became the frontline in the conflict. The war resulted in a complete breakdown of civil administration and consequent development of habits of lawlessness exacerbated by the availability of modern firearms. The Japanese advance triggered an inter-communal conflict between Muslims and Buddhists. The Muslims fled towards British-controlled Muslim-dominated northern Arakan from Japanese-controlled Buddhist-majority areas. This stimulated a "reverse ethnic cleansing" in British-controlled areas, particularly around Maungdaw. Failure of a British counter-offensive, attempted from December 1942 to April 1943, resulted in the abandonment of even more of the Muslim population as well as an increase in inter-communal violence. Moshe Yegar, a research fellow at Truman Institute, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, noted that hostility had developed between the Muslims and the Buddhists who had brought about a similar hostility in other parts of Burma. This tension was let loose with the retreat of the British. With the approach of the Japanese into Arakan, the Buddhists instigated cruel measures against the Muslims. Thousands, though the exact number is unknown, fled from Buddhist-majority regions to eastern Bengal and northern Arakan with many being killed or dying of starvation. The Muslims in response conducted retaliatory raids from British-controlled areas, causing Buddhists to flee to southern Arakan. Aye Chan, a historian at Kanda University in Japan, has written that as a consequence of acquiring arms from the British during World War II, Rohingyas tried to destroy the Arakanese villages instead of resisting the Japanese. Chan agrees that hundreds of Muslims fled to northern Arakan, though states that the accounts of atrocities on them were exaggerated. In March 1942, Rohingyas from northern Arakan killed around 20,000 Arakanese. In return, around 5,000 Muslims in the Minbya and Mrauk-U Townships were killed by Rakhines and Red Karens. As in the rest of Burma, the IJA committed acts of rape, murder and torture against Muslims in Arakan. During this period, some 22,000 Muslims in Arakan were believed to have crossed the border into Bengal, then part of British India, to escape the violence. The exodus was not restricted to Muslims in Arakan. Thousands of Burmese Indians, Anglo-Burmese and British who settled during the colonial period emigrated en masse to India. To facilitate their reentry into Burma, the British formed Volunteer Forces with Rohingya. Over the three years during which the Allies and Japanese fought over the Mayu peninsula, the Rohingya recruits of the V-Force, engaged in a campaign against Arakanese communities, using weapons provided by V-Force. According to the secretary of the British governor, the V Force, instead of fighting the Japanese, destroyed Buddhist monasteries, pagodas, and houses, and committed atrocities in northern Arakan. The British Army's liaison officer, Anthony Irwin, on the other hand, praised the role of the V Force. Pakistan Movement During the Pakistan Movement in the 1940s, Rohingya Muslims in western Burma organised a separatist movement to merge the region into East Pakistan. The commitments of the British regarding the status of Muslims after the war are not clear. V Force officers like Andrew Irwin felt that Muslims along with other minorities must be rewarded for their loyalty. Muslim leaders believed that the British had promised them a "Muslim National Area" in Maungdaw region. They were also apprehensive of a future Buddhist-dominated government. In 1946, calls were made for annexation of the territory by Pakistan as well as of an independent state. Before the independence of Burma in January 1948, Muslim leaders from Arakan addressed themselves to Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, and asked his assistance in incorporating the Mayu region to Pakistan considering their religious affinity and geographical proximity with East Pakistan. The North Arakan Muslim League was founded in Akyab (modern Sittwe) two months later. The proposal never materialised since it was reportedly turned down by Jinnah, saying that he was not in a position to interfere in Burmese matters. Post-WWII migration The numbers and the extent of post-independence immigration from Bangladesh are subject to controversy and debate. In a 1955 study published by Stanford University, the authors Virginia Thompson and Richard Adloff write, "The post-war (World War II) illegal immigration of Chittagonians into that area was on a vast scale, and in the Maungdaw and Buthidaung areas they replaced the Arakanese." The authors further argue that the term Rohingya, in the form of Rwangya, first appeared to distinguish settled population from newcomers: "The newcomers were called Mujahids (crusaders), in contrast to the Rwangya or settled Chittagonian population." According to the International Crisis Group (ICG), these immigrants were actually the Rohingyas who were displaced by World War II and began to return to Arakan after the independence of Burma but were rendered as illegal immigrants, while many were not allowed to return. ICG adds that there were "some 17,000" refugees from the Bangladesh liberation war who "subsequently returned home". Burmese independence On 25 September 1954, the then Prime Minister U Nu in his radio address to the nation talked about Rohingya Muslims’ political loyalty to predominantly Buddhist Burma. This usage of the term ‘Rohingya’ is important in the sense that today Myanmar denies to accept this category altogether and calls them ’Bengali’. During the same time a separate administrative zone May Yu was established comprising most of the present North Rakhine State, which had Rohingya as its majority ethnic group. One of the objectives of this Muslim majority zone was to ‘strive for peace with Pakistan’. Brigadier Aung Gyi, one of the deputies of General Ne Win, in 1961 explained Rohingya as; “On the west, May Yu district borders with Pakistan. As is the case with all borderlands communities, there are Muslims on both sides of the borders. Those who are on Pakistan’s side are known as Pakistani while the Muslims on our Burmese side of the borders are referred to as ‘Rohingya’. But since Burma's military junta took control of the country in 1962, the Rohingya have been systematically deprived of their political rights. In 1962 military dictator General Ne Win, took over the government and started implementing a Nationalist agenda, which had its roots in racial discrimination. In 1978 military government launched operation Nagamin to separate nationals from non-nationals. This was the first concerted large scale violent attack on Rohingya. National Registration Cards (NRC) were taken away by state actors never to be replaced. Violence that followed forced 200,000 Rohingya to flee to Bangladesh. Bangladesh denied Rohingya admission into her territory and blocked food rations leading to death of 12,000 of them. After bilateral negotiations Rohingya were repatriated. Rohingya political participation in Burma In the prelude to independence, two Rohingyas were elected to the Constituent Assembly of Burma in 1947, M. A. Gaffar and Sultan Ahmed. After Burma became independent in 1948, M. A. Gaffar presented a memorandum of appeal to the Government of the Union of Burma calling for the recognition of the term "Rohingya", based on local Indian names of Arakan (Rohan and Rohang), as the official name of the ethnicity. Sultan Ahmed, who served as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Minorities, was a member of the Justice Sir Ba U Commission charged with exploring whether Arakan Division should be granted statehood. During the 1951 Burmese general election, five Rohingyas were elected to the Parliament of Burma, including one of the country's first two female MPs, Zura Begum. Six MPs were elected during the 1956 Burmese general election and subsequent by-elections. Sultan Mahmud, a former politician in British India, became Minister of Health in the cabinet of Prime Minister of Burma U Nu. In 1960, Mahmud suggested that either Rohingya-majority northern Arakan remain under the central government or be made a separate province. However, during the 1960 Burmese general election, Prime Minister U Nu's pledges included making all of Arakan into one province. The 1962 Burmese coup d'état ended the country's Westminster-style political system. The 1982 Burmese citizenship law stripped most of the Rohingyas of their stake in citizenship. Rohingya community leaders were supportive of the 8888 uprising for democracy. During the 1990 Burmese general election, the Rohingya-led National Democratic Party for Human Rights won four seats in the Burmese parliament. The four Rohingya MPs included Shamsul Anwarul Huq, Chit Lwin Ebrahim, Fazal Ahmed and Nur Ahmed. The election was won by the National League for Democracy led by Aung San Suu Kyi, who was placed under house arrest and not permitted to become prime minister. The Burmese military junta banned the National Democratic Party for Human Rights in 1992. Its leaders were arrested, jailed and tortured. Rohingya politicians have been jailed to disbar them from contesting elections. In 2005, Shamsul Anwarul Huq was charged under Section 18 of the controversial 1982 Burmese citizenship law and sentenced to 47 years in prison. In 2015, a ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party MP Shwe Maung was disbarred from the 2015 Burmese general election, on grounds that his parents were not Burmese citizens under the 1982 citizenship law. As of 2017, Burma does not have a single Rohingya MP and the Rohingya population have no voting rights. Mayu Frontier District A separate administrative zone for the Rohingya-majority northern areas of Arakan existed between 1961 and 1964. Known as the Mayu Frontier District, the zone was set up by Prime Minister U Nu after the 1960 Burmese general election, on the advice of his health minister Sultan Mahmud. The zone was administered directly from Rangoon by the national government. After the Burmese military coup in 1962, the zone was administered by the Burmese army. It was transferred to the Ministry of Home Affairs in 1964 by the Union Revolutionary Council. The socialist military government inducted the zone into Arakan State in 1974. Expulsion of Burmese Indians Racism towards people with links to the Indian subcontinent increased after the 1962 Burmese coup. The socialist military government nationalised all property, including many enterprises of the white collar Burmese Indian community. Between 1962 and 1964, 320,000 Burmese Indians were forced to leave the country. Refugee crisis of 1978 As a result of Operation King Dragon by the Burmese junta, the first wave of Rohingya refugees entered Bangladesh in 1978. An estimated 200,000 Rohingyas took shelter in Cox's Bazaar. Diplomatic initiatives over 16 months resulted in a repatriation agreement, which allowed the return of most refugees under a process facilitated by UNHCR. The return of refugees to Burma has been the second largest repatriation process in Asia after the return of Cambodian refugees from Thailand. 1982 Citizenship Law In 1982, the citizenship law enacted by the Burmese military junta did not list the Rohingya as one of the 135 "national races" of Burma. This made much of the Rohingya population in Burma stateless in their historical homeland of Arakan. General Ne Win drafted Citizenship Act in 1982, which denied citizenship rights to any community/group that was not listed in a survey conducted by British in 1824. All other ethnic groups were considered aliens to the land or invaders. Eight major ethnicities Arakan, Chin, Kachin, Karen, Kayah, Mon, Shan, and Burmese were broken into 135 small ethnic groups. Groups like Rohingya who do not belong to any of these 135 ethnicities were denied citizenship rights. Taking into account just one survey for defining the history of a group of people is highly problematic. It overlooks the fact that Rohingya were mentioned in records earlier to this survey. Scholars like Maung Zarni have argued that Burmese military ‘encoded its anti-Indian and anti-Muslim racism in its laws and policies’. He further argues; “The 1982 Citizenship Act serves as the state’s legal and ideological foundation on which all forms of violence, execution, restrictions, and human rights crimes are justified and committed with state impunity if carried out horizontally by the local ultra-nationalist Rakhine Buddhists. In light of the on-the-ground link between the legalised removal of citizenship from the Rohingya and the implementation of a permanent set of draconian laws and policies—as opposed to periodic “anti-immigration” operations—amount to the infliction on the Rohingya of conditions of life designed to bring about serious bodily and mental harm and to destroy the group in whole or in part. As such, the illegalisation of the Rohingya in Myanmar is an indication of the intent of the State to both remove the Rohingya permanently from their homeland and to destroy the Rohingya as a group.” Refugee crisis of 1991–1992 After Burmese military junta began persecuting the political opposition following Aung San Suu Kyi's victory in the 1990 election and the earlier 1988 Uprising, military operations targeting Muslims (who strongly favoured the pro-democracy movement) began in Arakan State. The Rohingya-led NDPHR political party was banned and its leaders were jailed. Suu Kyi herself was placed under house arrest by the junta led by General Than Shwe. As the Burmese military increased its operations across the country, the Maungdaw, Buthidaung and Rathedaung townships in northern Arakan became centers of persecution. The 23rd and 24th regiments of the Tatmadaw (Myanmar Army) were responsible for promoting forced labour, rape, the confiscation of houses, land and farm animals, the destruction of mosques, a ban on religious activities and the harassment of the religious priests. An estimated 250,000 refugees crossed over into Bangladesh. In Bangladesh, the refugee influx was a challenge for the newly elected government of the country's first female prime minister Khaleda Zia (who headed the first parliamentary government since 1975). Both Bangladesh and Burma mobilised thousands of troops along the border during the crisis. The government of Bangladesh emphasised a peaceful resolution of the crisis. After diplomatic negotiations, a repatriation agreement was put in place to allow the return of refugees to Burma under a UNHCR-supervised process. Name change from Arakan to Rakhine State In 1989, the junta officially changed the name of Burma to Myanmar. In the 1990s, the junta changed the name of the province of Arakan to Rakhine State, which showed a bias towards the Rakhine community, even though the Rohingya formed a substantial part of the population. The name of the region was historically known as Arakan for centuries. Denial of the "Rohingya" term The colloquial term Rohingya can be traced back to the pre-colonial period. The Rohingya community have also been known as Arakanese Indians and Arakanese Muslims. Since the 1982 citizenship law, Burmese juntas and governments have strongly objected to the usage of the term of Rohingya, preferring to label the community as "bengali illegal immigrants". The derogatory slur kalar is widely used in Myanmar against the Rohingya. Myanmar's government has often pressured diplomats and foreign delegates against uttering the term Rohingya. Conflict in Arakan The Rakhine for their part felt discriminated against by the governments in Rangoon dominated by the ethnic Burmese with one Rakhine politician saying, "we are therefore the victims of Muslimisation and Burmese chauvinism." The Economist wrote in 2015 that from the 1940s on and right to this day, the Burmens have seen and see themselves as victims of the British Empire while the Rakhine see themselves as victims of the British and the Burmens; both groups were and are so intent upon seeing themselves as victims that neither has much sympathy for the Rohingyas. After Jinnah's refusal to accept northern Arakan into the Dominion of Pakistan, some Rohingya elders who supported a jihad movement, founded the Mujahid party in northern Arakan in 1947. The aim of the Mujahid party was to create an autonomous Islamic state in Arakan. By the 1950s, they began to use the term "Rohingya" which may be a continuation of the term Rooinga to establish a distinct identity and identify themselves as indigenous. They were much more active before the 1962 Burmese coup d'état by General Ne Win, a Burmese general who began his military career fighting for the Japanese in World War II. Ne Win carried out military operations against them over a period of two decades. The prominent one was Operation King Dragon, which took place in 1978; as a result, many Muslims in the region fled to neighbouring Bangladesh as refugees. In addition to Bangladesh, a large number of Rohingyas also migrated to Karachi, Pakistan. Rohingya mujahideen are still active within the remote areas of Arakan. From 1971 to 1978, a number of Rakhine monks and Buddhists staged hunger strikes in Sittwe to force the government to tackle immigration issues which they believed to be causing a demographic shift in the region. Ne Win's government requested UN to repatriate the war refugees and launched military operations which drove off around 200,000 people to Bangladesh. In 1978, the Bangladesh government protested against the Burmese government concerning "the expulsion by force of thousands of Burmese Muslim citizens to Bangladesh". The Burmese government responded that those expelled were Bangladesh citizens who had resided illegally in Burma. In July 1978, after intensive negotiations mediated by UN, Ne Win's government agreed to take back 200,000 refugees who settled in Arakan. In the same year as well as in 1992, a joint statement by governments of Myanmar and Bangladesh "acknowledged that the Rohingya were lawful Burmese residents". In 1982, the Burmese government enacted the citizenship law and declared the "Bengalis" are foreigners. There are widespread beliefs among Rakhine people that significant number of immigrants arrived even after the 1980s when the border was relatively unguarded. However, there is no documentation proof for these claims as the last census was conducted in 1983. Successive Burmese governments have fortified the border and built up border guard forces. After 1988 Burmese pro-democracy uprising Since the 1990s, a new 'Rohingya' movement which is distinct from the 1950s armed rebellion has emerged. The new movement is characterised by lobbying internationally by overseas diaspora, establishing indigenous claims by Rohingya scholars, publicising the term "Rohingya" and denying Bengali origins by Rohingya politicians. Rohingya scholars have claimed that Rakhine was previously an Islamic state for a millennium, or that Muslims were king-makers of Rakhine kings for 350 years. They often traced the origin of Rohingyas to Arab seafarers. These claims have been rejected as "newly invented myths" in academic circles. Some Rohingya politicians have labelled Burmese and international historians as "Rakhine sympathizers" for rejecting the purported historical origins. The movement has garnered sharp criticisms from ethnic Rakhines and Kamans, the latter of whom are a recognised Muslim ethnic group in Rakhine. Kaman leaders support citizenship for Muslims in northern Rakhine but believe that the new movement is aimed at achieving a self-administered area or Rohang State as a separate Islamic state carved out of Rakhine, and condemn the movement. Rakhines' views are more critical. Citing Bangladesh's overpopulation and density, Rakhines perceive the Rohingyas as "the vanguard of an unstoppable wave of people that will inevitably engulf Rakhine". However, for moderate Rohingyas, the aim may have been no more than to gain citizenship status. Moderate Rohingya politicians agree to compromise on the term Rohingya if citizenship is provided under an alternative identity that is neither "Bengali" nor "Rohingya". Various alternatives including "Rakhine Muslims", "Myanmar Muslims" or simply "Myanmar" have been proposed. Burmese juntas (1990–2011) The military junta that ruled Myanmar for half a century relied heavily on mixing Burmese nationalism and Theravada Buddhism to bolster its rule, and, in the view of the US government, heavily discriminated against minorities like the Rohingyas. Some pro-democracy dissidents from Myanmar's ethnic Bamar majority do not consider the Rohingyas compatriots. Successive Burmese governments have been accused of provoking riots led by Buddhist monks against ethnic minorities like the Rohingyas In the 1990s, more than 250,000 Rohingya fled to refugee camps in Bangladesh. In the early 2000s, all but 20,000 of them were repatriated to Myanmar, some against their will. In 2009, a senior Burmese envoy to Hong Kong branded the Rohingyas "ugly as ogres" and a people that are alien to Myanmar. Under the 2008 constitution, the Myanmar military still control much of the country's government, including the ministries of home, defence and border affairs, 25% of seats in parliament and one vice-president. Rakhine State conflicts and refugees (2012–present) 2012 Rakhine State riots The 2012 Rakhine State riots were a series of conflicts between Rohingya Muslims who form the majority in the northern Rakhine and ethnic Rakhines who form the majority in the south. Before the riots, there were widespread fears among the Buddhist Rakhines that they would soon become a minority in their ancestral state. The riots occurred after weeks of sectarian disputes, including a gang rape and murder of a Rakhine woman by Rohingyas and killing of ten Burmese Muslims by Rakhines. There is evidence that the pogroms in 2012 were incited by the government asking the Rakhine men to defend their "race and religion". The Rakhine men were said to have been given knives and free food, and bused in from Sittwe. The Burmese government denied having organised the pogroms, but has never prosecuted anyone for the attacks against the Rohingyas. The Economist argued that since the transition to democracy in Burma in 2011, the military has been seeking to retain its privileged position, forming the motivation for it to encourage the riots in 2012 and allowing it to pose as the defender of Buddhism against Muslim Rohingya. On both sides, entire villages were "decimated". According to the Burmese authorities, the violence between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims left 78 people dead, 87 injured, and up to 140,000 people displaced. The government has responded by imposing curfews and deploying troops in the region. On 10 June 2012, a state of emergency was declared in Rakhine, allowing the military to participate in the administration of the region. Rohingya NGOs abroad have accused the Burmese army and police of targeting Rohingya Muslims through arrests and participating in violence. A field observation conducted by the International Crisis Group concluded that both communities were grateful for the protection provided by the military. A number of monks' organisations have taken measures to boycott NGOs which they believe helped only Rohingyas in the past decades even though Rakhines were equally poor. In July 2012, the Burmese Government did not include the Rohingya minority group in the census—classified as stateless Bengali Muslims from Bangladesh since 1982. About 140,000 Rohingya in Myanmar remain confined in IDP camps. 2015 refugee crisis In 2015, the Simon-Skjodt Centre of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum stated in a press statement the Rohingyas are "at grave risk of additional mass atrocities and even genocide". In 2015, to escape violence and persecution, thousands of Rohingyas migrated from Myanmar and Bangladesh, collectively dubbed as 'boat people' by international media, to Southeast Asian countries including Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand by rickety boats via the waters of the Strait of Malacca and the Andaman Sea. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates about 25,000 people have been taken to boats from January to March in 2015. There are claims that around 100 people died in Indonesia, 200 in Malaysia, and 10 in Thailand during the journey. An estimated 3,000 refugees from Myanmar and Bangladesh have been rescued or swum to shore and several thousand more are believed to remain trapped on boats at sea with little food or water. A Malaysian newspaper claimed crisis has been sparked by smugglers. However, the Economist in an article in June 2015 wrote the only reason why the Rohingyas were willing to pay to be taken out of Burma in squalid, overcrowded, fetid boats as "... it is the terrible conditions at home in Rakhine that force the Rohingyas out to sea in the first place." Autumn 2016 – Summer 2017 On 9 October 2016, insurgents attacked three Burmese border posts along Myanmar's border with Bangladesh. According to government officials in the mainly Rohingya border town of Maungdaw, the attackers brandished knives, machetes and homemade slingshots that fired metal bolts. Several dozen firearms and boxes of ammunition were looted by the attackers from the border posts. The attack resulted in the deaths of nine border officers. On 11 October 2016, four soldiers were killed on the third day of fighting. Following the attacks, reports emerged of several human rights violations allegedly perpetrated by Burmese security forces in their crackdown on suspected Rohingya insurgents. Shortly after, the Myanmar military forces and extremist Buddhists started a major crackdown on the Rohingya Muslims in the country's western region of Rakhine State in response to attacks on border police camps by unidentified insurgents. The crackdown resulted in wide-scale human rights violations at the hands of security forces, including extrajudicial killings, gang rapes, arsons, and other brutalities. The military crackdown on Rohingyas drew criticism from various quarters including the United Nations, human rights group Amnesty International, the US Department of State, and the government of Malaysia. The de facto head of government Aung San Suu Kyi has particularly been criticised for her inaction and silence over the issue and for doing little to prevent military abuses. Government officials in Rakhine State originally blamed the Rohingya Solidarity Organisation (RSO), an Islamist insurgent group mainly active in the 1980s and 1990s, for the attacks; however, on 17 October 2016, a group calling itself the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) claimed responsibility. In the following days, six other groups released statements, all citing the same leader. The Myanmar Army announced on 15 November 2016 that 69 Rohingya insurgents and 17 security forces (10 policemen, 7 soldiers) had been killed in recent clashes in northern Rakhine State, bringing the death toll to 134 (102 insurgents and 32 security forces). It was also announced that 234 people suspected of being connected to the attack were arrested. A police document obtained by Reuters in March 2017 listed 423 Rohingyas detained by the police since 9 October 2016, 13 of whom were children, the youngest being ten years old. Two police captains in Maungdaw verified the document and justified the arrests, with one of them saying, "We, the police, have to arrest those who collaborated with the attackers, children or not, but the court will decide if they are guilty; we are not the ones who decide." Myanmar police also claimed that the children had confessed to their alleged crimes during interrogations, and that they were not beaten or pressured during questioning. The average age of those detained is 34, the youngest is 10, and the oldest is 75. The Myanmar Armed Forces (Tatmadaw) stated on 1 September 2017 that the death toll had risen to 370 insurgents, 13 security personnel, 2 government officials and 14 civilians. The United Nations believes over 1,000 people have been killed since October 2016, which contradicts the death toll provided by the Myanmar government. Autumn 2017 crisis Starting in early August 2017, the Myanmar security forces began "clearance operations" against the Rohingya in northern Rakhine state. Following an attack by Rohingya militants of Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) against several security forces' outposts, 25 August, the operations escalated radically—killing thousands of Rohingya, brutalising thousands more, and driving hundreds of thousands out of the country into neighbouring Bangladesh while their villages burned—with the Myanmar military claiming that their actions were solely attacks on rebels in response to the ARSA attack. However, subsequent reports from various international organisations have indicated that the military operations were widespread indiscriminate attacks on the Rohingya population, already underway before the ARSA attacks, to purge northern Rakhine state of Rohingya, through "ethnic cleansing" and/or "genocide." In August 2018, study estimated that more than 24,000+ Rohingya people were killed by the Myanmar military and the local Buddhists since the "clearance operations" started on 25 August 2017. The study also estimated that 18,000+ the Rohingya Muslim women and girls were raped, 116,000 Rohingya were beaten, 36,000 Rohingya were thrown into fire Precipitating events According to BBC reporters, during the summer of 2017, the Myanmar military began arming and training Rakhine Buddhist natives in northern Rakhine state, and in late summer advised that any ethnic Rakhines "wishing to protect their state" would be given the opportunity to join "the local armed police." Matthew Smith, chief executive of human rights organisation Fortify Rights says that arming the Rakhines "was a decision made to effectively perpetrate atrocity crimes against the civilian population." At the same time, northern Rakhine state faced food shortages, and, starting in mid-August, the government cut off all food supply to the area. On 10 August, the military flew in a battalion of reinforcements to the area, triggering a public warning from the resident United Nations human rights representative to Myanmar, who urged Myanmar authorities to restrain themselves. A few weeks later, on 24 August 2017, the Rakhine Commission (chaired by former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan)—established by the new civilian Myanmar government to recommend solutions to the ethnic conflict and related issues in Rakhine state—released its recommendations for alleviating the suffering of minorities (especially the Rohingya), calling for measures that would improve security in Myanmar for the Rohingya, but not calling for all measures sought by various Rohingya factions. The following morning, according to Myanmar military officials, a Rohingya rebel group (ARSA, or Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army) led multiple coordinated attacks on 30 police outposts and border guards, killing a dozen government forces, at the cost of over 50 dead among the rebels. Conflict escalation Almost immediately the Myanmar military—apparently teaming with local authorities with mobs of Rakhine Buddhist civilians—launched massive reprisals that it described as its anti-terrorist "clearance operations" (which, UN investigators and BBC reporters later determined, had actually begun earlier)—attacking Rohingya villages throughout northern Rakhine state. Within the first three weeks, the military reported over 400 dead (whom it described as mostly "militants" and "terrorists")—the U.N. estimated over 1,000 dead (mostly civilians), and other sources initially suggested as many as 3,000—in the first four weeks of the reprisals. However, in December 2017, following a detailed survey of Rohingya refugees, a humanitarian organisation serving refugees, Médecins Sans Frontières calculated that at least 6,700 Rohingya men, women and children were killed in the first month of the major attacks, including at least 750 children (that number later revised to "over 1,000"). MSF estimated that 69% were killed by gunshots, 9% were burnt to death (including 15% of children killed), and 5% beaten to death. However, MSF cautioned "The numbers of deaths are likely to be an underestimation, as we have not surveyed all refugee settlements in Bangladesh and because the surveys don't account for the families who never made it out of Myanmar." Refugees reported numerous civilians—including women and children—being indiscriminately beaten, raped, tortured, shot, hacked to death or burned alive. and whole villages being burnt down by authorities and Buddhist mobs. Human Rights Watch released satellite photos showing the villages burning, but the Myanmar government insisted the fires were lit by Rohingya, themselves, or specifically Rohingya militants—though the authorities offered no proof of the allegation, and refused or tightly controlled all media and foreign access to the area. Myanmar's presidential spokesman reported that 176 ethnic Rohingya villages—out of the original a total of 471 Rohingya villages in three townships—had become empty. In addition to the 176 "abandoned" villages, some residents reportedly fled from at least 34 other villages. In the first four weeks of the conflict, over 400,000 Rohingya refugees (approximately 40% of the remaining Rohingya in Myanmar) fled the country on foot or by boat (chiefly to Bangladesh—the only other country bordering the Rakhine state area under attack) creating a major humanitarian crisis. In addition, 12,000 Rakhine Buddhists, and other non-Muslim Rakhine state residents were displaced within the country. On 10 September 2017, ARSA declared a temporary unilateral ceasefire to allow aid groups to work in the region. Its statement read that "ARSA strongly encourages all concerned humanitarian actors resume their humanitarian assistance to all victims of the humanitarian crisis, irrespective of ethnic or religious background during the ceasefire period." However, the Myanmar government dismissed the gesture, saying "we don't negotiate with terrorists." The violence and humanitarian 'catastrophe,' inflamed international tensions, especially in the region, and throughout the Muslim world. 13 September, Myanmar's presidential spokesman announced Myanmar would establish a new commission to implement some recommendations of Annan's Rakhine Commission, in their August 2017 report. The United Nations initially reported in early September 2017 that more than 120,000 Rohingya people had fled Myanmar for Bangladesh due to a recent rise in violence against them. The UNHCR, on 4 September, estimated 123,000 refugees have escaped western Myanmar since 25 August 2017. (By 15 September, that number had surpassed 400,000) The situation was expected to exacerbate the current refugee crisis as more than 400,000 Rohingya without citizenship were trapped in overcrowded camps and in conflict regions in Western Myanmar. Myanmar's de facto civilian leader and Nobel Laureate, Aung San Suu Kyi, criticised the media's reporting on the crisis, saying that her government is protecting everyone in Rakhine state, and argued that the reporting was misinformation that benefitted the aims of terrorists. Some reports suggest that the Myanmar military has ceded some border outposts to rebels armed with wooden clubs as part of encouraging Rohingyas to leave the country. A Holy See diplomat stated that at least 3000 people were killed by Myanmar security forces in August and September 2017. The U.N. Secretary General issued a statement, 13 September 2017, implying that the situation facing the Rohingya in Rakhine state was "ethnic cleansing." He urged Myanmar authorities to suspend military action and stop the violence—insisting that Myanmar's government uphold the rule of law, and (noting that "380,000" Rohingya had recently fled to Bangladesh) recognise the refugees' right to return to their homes. The same day, the U.N. Security Council issued a separate, unanimous statement, on the crisis following a closed-door meeting about Myanmar. In a semi-official press statement (its first statement on the situation in Myanmar in nine years)—the Council expressed "concern" about reported excessive violence in Myanmar's security operations, called for de-escalating the situation, reestablishing law and order, protecting civilians, and resolution of the refugee problem. On 19 September 2017, Myanmar's civilian leader, State Councillor Aung San Suu Kyi, made a major televised speech on the crisis—in English—stating "We condemn all human rights violations and unlawful violence," and indicated a desire to know why the Rohingya were fleeing. But Suu Kyi largely defended her prior position supporting the Myanmar military and its actions, and deflected international criticism by saying most Rohingya villages remained intact, and conflict had not broken out everywhere. Expressing no criticism of the Myanmar military, and denying that it had engaged in any "armed clashes or clearance operations" since 5 September, she added, "We are committed to the restoration of peace and stability and rule of law throughout the state," and that the country was "committed to a sustainable solution… for all communities in this state", but was vague as to how that would be achieved. By the end of September, conflicts between Rohingya Muslims and outnumbered Hindus, became apparent—including the killing of around 100 Hindu villagers in Rakhine state, around late August—according to the Myanmar military who claimed to have found the bodies of 20 women and eight boys in mass graves, 24 September, after a search near Ye Baw Kya village, in northern Rakhine state. The search was reportedly in response to a refugee in Bangladesh who contacted a local Hindu leader in Myanmar. Authorities quoted the refugee as saying about 300 ARSA militants, on 25 August, marched about 100 people out of the Hindu village and killed them. ARSA denied involvement, saying it was committed to not killing civilians. International news media were not immediately allowed free access to the area to verify the reports. In other cases, in Myanmar and in Bangladeshi refugee camps Hindu (particularly women) are reported to have faced kidnapping, religious abuse and "forced conversions" by Muslim Rohingyas. By the end of September 2017, UN, Bangladesh and other entities were reporting that—in addition to 200,000-300,000 Rohingya refugees already in Bangladesh after fleeing prior attacks in Myanmar—the current conflict, since late August 2017, had driven 500,000 more Rohingya from Myanmar into Bangladesh, creating what UN Secretary General António Guterres described as "the world's fastest-developing refugee emergency ... a humanitarian nightmare." In November 2017 Myanmar and Bangladesh signed a memorandum of understanding for the return home of Rohingya refugees. In April 2018 the first group of Rohingya refugees returned to Myanmar from Bangladesh. Relocation to Bhasan Char island In January 2016, the government of Bangladesh initiated a plan to relocate tens of thousands of forcibly displaced Rohingyas, who had fled to the country following persecution in Myanmar. The refugees are to be relocated to the island of Bhasan Char. The move has received substantial opposition. Human rights groups have seen the plan as a forced relocation. Additionally, concerns have been raised about living conditions on the island, which is low-lying and prone to flooding. The island has been described as "only accessible during winter and a haven for pirates". It is nine hours away from the camps in which the Rohingya currently live. In October 2019, Bangladeshi authorities again announced plans to relocate refugees to the island. On 9 July 2020, HRW urged Bangladeshi authorities to immediately move over 300 Rohingya refugees, including children, from the silt island of Bhasan Char to the Cox's Bazar refugee camps to let them reside with their families. Families in Cox's Bazar told HRW that relatives on Bhasan Char are being held without freedom of movement or adequate access to food or medical care, and face severe shortages of safe drinking water. Genocide In 2015, an assessment by the Yale Law School concluded that the government of Myanmar was waging a concerted campaign against the Rohingya, a campaign which could be classified as genocide under international law. An investigation by the media channel Al Jazeera English, along with the group Fortify Rights, found that the Myanmar military was systematically targeting the Rohingya population because of its ethnicity and religion. The International State Crime Initiative of the University of London issued a report stating that a genocide is taking place against the Rohingya. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees has used the term ethnic cleansing to describe the exodus of Rohingya from Myanmar. In December 2017, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, dismissed the Myanmar government's claims that its operations were merely a response to rebel attacks, and it also indicated that "for us, it was clear... that these operations were organised and planned," and could amount to "genocide." On 24 August 2018, the day before the anniversary of the eruption of extreme violence that came to be known as the "Rohingya Crisis," the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights issued a report (which was not made public until 27 August) which summarised its findings after an investigation was completed into the events of August–September 2017. It declared that the events constituted cause for the Myanmar government—particularly the Myanmar military (the "Tatmadaw") and its commanding officers—to be brought before the International Criminal Court and charged with "crimes against humanity", including "ethnic cleansing" and "genocide." Myanmar officials immediately rejected the charges. Demographics Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80–98% of the population. A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases. Rohingyas have 46% more children than Myanmar's national average. In 2018, 48,000 Rohingya babies were born in Bangladesh, out of a total population of 120,000 fertile women. As of 2014, about 1.3 million Rohingyas lived in Myanmar and an estimated 1 million lived overseas. They constitute 40% of Rakhine State's total population or 60% of it if the overseas Rohingya population is included. As of December 2016, 1/7th stateless of the entire world's stateless population is Rohingya according to United Nations figures. Prior to the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was around 1.1 to 1.3 million They reside mainly in the northern Rakhine townships, where they form 80–98% of the population. Many Rohingyas have fled to southeastern Bangladesh, where there are over 900,000 refugees, as well as to India, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar live in camps for internally displaced persons, and the authorities do not allow them to leave. The following table shows the statistics of Muslim population in Arakan. The data is for all Muslims in Arakan (Rakhine), regardless of ethnicity. The data for Burmese 1802 census is taken from a book by J. S. Furnivall. The British censuses classified immigrants from Chittagong as Bengalis. There were a small number of immigrants from other parts of India. The 1941 census was lost during the war. The 1983 census conducted under the Ne Win's government omitted people in volatile regions. It is unclear how many were missed. British era censuses can be found at Digital Library of India. Culture Rohingya culture shares many similarities to that of other ethnic groups in the region. The clothing worn by most Rohingyas is indistinguishable from those worn by other groups in Myanmar. Men wear bazu (long sleeved shirts) and longgi or doothi (loincloths) covering down to the ankles. Religious scholars prefer wearing kurutha, jubba or panjabi (long tops). In special occasions, Rohingya men sometimes wear taikpon (collarless jackets) on top of their shirts. Lucifica is a type of flat bread regularly eaten by Rohingyas, while bola fica is a popular traditional snack made of rice noodles. Betel leaves, colloquially known as faan, are also popular amongst Rohingyas. Language The Rohingya language is part of the Indo-Aryan sub-branch of the greater Indo-European language family and is related to the Chittagonian language spoken in the southernmost part of Bangladesh bordering Myanmar. While both Rohingya and Chittagonian are related to Bengali, they are not mutually intelligible with the latter. Rohingyas do not speak Burmese, the lingua franca of Myanmar, and face problems in integration. Rohingya scholars have written the Rohingya language in various scripts including the Arabic, Hanifi, Urdu, Roman, and Burmese alphabets, where Hanifi is a newly developed alphabet derived from Arabic with the addition of four characters from Latin and Burmese. More recently, a Latin alphabet has been developed using all 26 English letters A to Z and two additional Latin letters Ç (for retroflex R) and Ñ (for nasal sound). To accurately represent Rohingya phonology, this alphabet also uses five accented vowels (áéíóú). It has been recognised by ISO with ISO 639-3 "rhg" code. Religion Due to the fact that members of Burma's Rohingya Muslim population are not considered citizens of the country, they are not protected against discrimination by the Burmese government. Therefore, concerns exist with regard to the community's lack of religious freedom, especially in the legal and political sphere. The overwhelming majority of Rohingya people practice Islam, including a blend of Sunni Islam and Sufism and about 2.5% of Rohingya are Hindu. The government restricts their educational opportunities; so many of them pursue fundamental Islamic studies as their only option. Mosques and madrasas are present in most villages. Traditionally, men pray in congregations and women pray at home. Muslims have often faced obstacles and struggled to practice their religion in the same way as other individuals in Burma. These struggles have manifested themselves in the form of difficulty in receiving approval for the construction of places of worship, whether they be informal or formal. In the past, they have also been arrested for teaching and practising their religious beliefs. Health The Rohingya face discrimination and barriers to health care. According to a 2016 study published in the medical journal The Lancet, Rohingya children in Myanmar face low birth weight, malnutrition, diarrhoea, and barriers to reproduction on reaching adulthood. Rohingya have a child mortality rate of up to 224 deaths per 1,000 live births, more than 4 times the rate for the rest of Myanmar (52 per 1,000 live births), and 3 times rate of rest non-Rohingya areas of Rakhine state (77 per 1,000 live births). The paper also found that 40% of Rohingya children suffer from diarrhoea in internally displaced persons camp within Myanmar at a rate five times that of diarrhoeal illness among children in the rest of Rakhine. Human rights and refugee status The Rohingya people have been described as "one of the world's least wanted minorities" and "some of the world's most persecuted people". Médecins Sans Frontières claimed that the discrimination and human rights challenges which the Rohingya people have faced at the hands of the country's government and military are "among the world's top ten most under-reported stories of 2007." In February 1992, Myanmar's Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated in a press release, "In actual fact, although there are (135) national races living in Myanmar today, the so-called Rohingya people is not one of them. Historically, there has never been a 'Rohingya' race in Myanmar." The Rohingya are denied freedom of movement as well as the right to receive a higher education. They have been denied Burmese citizenship since the 1982 nationality law was enacted. Post the 1982 law, Burma has had different types of citizenship. Citizens possessed red identity cards; Rohingyas were given white identity cards which essentially classified them as foreigners who were living in Burma. Limitations and restrictions imposed on Rohingya are facilitated by this difference in citizenship. For example, Rohingyas cannot enlist in the army or participate in the government, and they are potentially faced with the issue of illegal immigration. The citizenship law also significantly underlies the human rights violations against the Rohingya by the military. They are not allowed to travel without official permission and they were previously required to sign a commitment not to have more than two children, though the law was not strictly enforced. They are subjected to routine forced labour. (Typically, a Rohingya man has to work on military or government projects one day a week, and perform sentry duty one night a week.) The Rohingya have also lost a lot of arable land, which has been confiscated by the military and given to Buddhist settlers who have moved there from elsewhere in Myanmar. The military is partially responsible for the human rights violations which have been committed against the Rohingya. These violations include destruction of property and forced relocation to another country. One such violation was committed when the military forced Rohingyas in Rakhine to move to Bangladesh. Other human rights violations against Rohingya Muslims include physical violence and sexual violence. The country's military officials rationalised these violations by stating that they were required as part of a census that was going to be conducted in Burma and the military needed to perform these acts in order to find out what the Rohingya Muslims's nationality was. According to Amnesty International, the Rohingya have been subjected to human rights violations by Burma's military dictatorship since 1978, and many of them have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh as a result. The dislocation of the Rohingya Muslims from their homes to other areas can be attributed to factors such as how isolated and undeveloped Rakhine is, the conflict between the Rohingya Muslims and the Buddhists, and the discrimination which they have been subjected to by the government. Members of the Rohingya community were displaced to Bangladesh where the government of the country, non-governmental organisations and the UNHCR gave aid to the refugees by providing them with homes and food. These external organisations (other than those which were controlled by the government) were important because the immigration of the Rohingyas was massive due to the number of people who needed help. In 2005, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees helped the Bangladeshi government repatriate Rohingyas from Bangladesh, but allegations of human rights abuses inside the refugee camps threatened this effort. In 2015, 140,000 Rohingyas were still living in IDP camps, three years after fleeing communal riots in 2012. Despite earlier repatriation efforts by the UN, the vast majority of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh are unable to return to Myanmar due to the communal violence which occurred there in 2012 and their fear of persecution. The Bangladeshi government has reduced the amount of support it allocates to the Rohingyas in order to prevent an outflow of Rohingya refugees into Bangladesh. In February 2009, many Rohingya refugees were rescued by Acehnese sailors in the Strait of Malacca, after 21 days at sea. Thousands of Rohingyas have also fled to Thailand. There have been charges that Rohingyas were shipped and towed out to the open sea from Thailand. In February 2009, evidence showing the Thai army towing a boatload of 190 Rohingya refugees out to sea surfaced. A group of refugees who were rescued by Indonesian authorities stated that they were captured and beaten by the Thai military, and then abandoned at sea. Steps to repatriate Rohingya refugees began in 2005. In 2009, the government of Bangladesh announced that it would repatriate around 9,000 Rohingyas who were living in refugee camps inside the country back to Myanmar, after a meeting with Burmese diplomats. On 16 October 2011, the new government of Myanmar agreed to take back registered Rohingya refugees. However, these repatriation efforts were hampered by the Rakhine riots in 2012. On 29 March 2014, the Burmese government banned the word "Rohingya" and asked that members of the minority group be registered as "Bengalis" in the 2014 Myanmar Census, the first census to be held in three decades. On 7 May 2014, the United States House of Representatives passed the United States House resolution on persecution of the Rohingya people in Burma that called on the government of Myanmar to end the discrimination and persecution. Researchers from the International State Crime Initiative at Queen Mary University of London suggest that the Myanmar government is in the final stages of an organised process of genocide against the Rohingya. In November 2016, a senior UN official in Bangladesh accused Myanmar of ethnic cleansing of Rohingyas. However, Charles Petrie, a former top UN official in Myanmar, said that "Today using the term, aside from being divisive and potentially incorrect, will only ensure that opportunities and options to try to resolve the issue to be addressed will not be available. In September 2020, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, has warned that the killing and abductions of Rohingyas have not stopped, despite the International Court of Justice ordering Myanmar's leadership to prevent genocide and stop the killings in December 2019. Some countries like Malaysia have rejected the resettlement of Rohingya refugees and sent them back to sea because of economic difficulties and the Coronavirus pandemic. Malaysian authorities have also expressed concern that militant Rohingya groups have been raising funds by extorting money from Rohingya refugees in the country. See also International reactions to the Rohingya genocide Kamein List of ethnic groups in Myanmar Min Aung Hlaing Persecution of Muslims Notes References Citations General sources (in alphabetical order) "Burma's Western Border as Reported by the Diplomatic Correspondence (1947–1975)" by Aye Chan "Burma's Western Border as Reported by the Diplomatic Correspondence (1947–1975)" by Aye Chan International Center for Transitional Justice, Myanmar External links Ethnic groups in Bangladesh Ethnic groups in Myanmar Ethnic groups in Pakistan Indo-Aryan peoples Islam in Myanmar Muslim ethnoreligious groups Refugees in Indonesia Refugees in Malaysia Stateless nationalism in Asia Stateless people	false	[ "Demographic marketers use demographics in marketing research, and the assessment of the changing trends of consumer behavior. Demographics can be called a science and demographic marketers can be called scientists. A demographic is used to describe individuals who are from a particular area. It can also be used to describe individuals who would rely on purchasing a particular product or service. Using demographics, a marketing manager can try to grasp what certain people think and what they are willing to buy.\n\nBy understanding how various characteristics of the population reflect their tastes, demographic marketers get an idea of the probability of the sales returns of a launched product in a given area. For any type of business, knowing who the customers are most likely to be through demographic analysis will make it easier to market effectively.\n\nExternal links\n Demographics Reports\n\nDemographics\nMarket research\nBusiness occupations\nScience occupations", "The list below outlines the distribution of the nationalities of China among provinces and province-level entities of the People's Republic of China (P.R.C.) according to the census of 2000. The provinces and province-level entities are listed by region. The classification of ethnic groups follows the official classification of the PRC.\n\nSome ethnic groups, for instance, Mosuo people, although classified as Nakhi, do not regard themselves as part of any of the 56 groups identified by the PRC government. Some scholars made hypothesis that they are descendants of Mongols.\n\nExcluded from this list is the Republic of China, which administers Taiwan and a fraction of Fujian Provinces. Please refer to Demographics of Taiwan for more information. The two special administrative regions (S.A.R.) of the P.R.C., namely Hong Kong and Macau, are not part of mainland China are also excluded. Please refer to Demographics of Hong Kong and Demographics of Macau.\n\nAutonomous regions are marked with an asterisk (*).\n\nNorthern\n\nNortheast\n\nEastern\n\nCentral-Southern\n\nSouthwest\n\nNorthwest\n\nSee also\nAutonomous regions of China\nEthnic groups of China\nTaiwanese aborigine\n\nReferences\nNational Bureau of Statistics\n\n \nEthnic group\nEthnic group" ]
[ "Rohingya people", "Demographics", "What are some of the demographics?", "Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80-98% of the population." ]	C_af72bf4729054b89b3bc329a5569f6e3_0	What else is notable?	2	What else is notable about the Rohingya people other than the borders?	Rohingya people	Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80-98% of the population. A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases. Rohingyas have 46% more children than Myanmar's national average. As of 2014, about 1.3 million Rohingyas live in Myanmar and an estimated 1 million overseas. They form 40% of Rakhine State's population or 60% if overseas population is included. As of December 2016, 1 in 7 stateless persons worldwide are Rohingya per United Nations figures, and the Rohingya are the world's largest stateless community. Prior to the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was around 1.1 to 1.3 million They reside mainly in the northern Rakhine townships, where they form 80-98% of the population. Many Rohingyas have fled to southeastern Bangladesh, where there are over 900,000 refugees, as well as to India, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar live in camps for internally displaced persons, and the authorities do not allow them to leave. The following table shows the statistics of Muslim population in Arakan. The data is for all Muslims in Arakan (Rakhine), regardless of ethnicity. The data for Burmese 1802 census is taken from a book by J. S. Furnivall. The British censuses classified immigrants from Chittagong as Bengalis. There were a small number of immigrants from other parts of India. The 1941 census was lost during the war. The 1983 census conducted under the Ne Win's government omitted people in volatile regions. It is unclear how many were missed. British era censuses can be found at Digital Library of India. CANNOTANSWER	A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases.	The Rohingya people () are a stateless Indo-Aryan ethnic group who predominantly follow Islam and reside in Rakhine State, Myanmar (previously known as Burma). Before the Rohingya genocide in 2017, when over 740,000 fled to Bangladesh, an estimated 1.4 million Rohingya lived in Myanmar. Described by journalists and news outlets as one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, the Rohingya are denied citizenship under the 1982 Myanmar nationality law. There are also restrictions on their freedom of movement, access to state education and civil service jobs. The legal conditions faced by the Rohingya in Myanmar have been compared to apartheid by some academics, analysts and political figures, including Nobel laureate Bishop Desmond Tutu, a South African anti-apartheid activist. The most recent mass displacement of Rohingya in 2017 led the International Criminal Court investigating crimes against humanity, and led to the International Court of Justice investigating genocide. The Rohingya maintain they are indigenous to western Myanmar with a heritage of over a millennium and influence from the Arabs, Mughals and Portuguese. The community claims it is descended from people in precolonial Arakan and colonial Arakan; historically, the region was an independent kingdom between Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent. The Myanmar government considers the Rohingya as colonial and postcolonial migrants from neighbouring Chittagong/East Bengal respectively Bangladesh. It argues that a distinct precolonial Muslim population is recognized as Kaman, and that the Rohingya conflate their history with the history of Arakan Muslims in general to advance a separatist agenda. In addition, Myanmar's government does not recognise the term "Rohingya" and prefers to refer to the community as "Bengali". Rohingya campaign groups and human rights organizations demand the right to "self-determination within Myanmar". Various armed insurrections by the Rohingya have taken place since the 1940s and the population as a whole has faced military crackdowns in 1978, 1991–1992, 2012, 2015, and particularly in 2016-2018, when most of the Rohingya population of Myanmar was driven out of the country, into neighbouring Bangladesh. By December 2017, an estimated 625,000 refugees from Rakhine, Myanmar, had crossed the border into Bangladesh since August 2017. UN officials and Human Rights Watch have described Myanmar's persecution of the Rohingya as ethnic cleansing. The UN human rights envoy to Myanmar reported "the long history of discrimination and persecution against the Rohingya community... could amount to crimes against humanity", and there have been warnings of an unfolding genocide. Probes by the UN have found evidence of increasing incitement of hatred and religious intolerance by "ultra-nationalist Buddhists" against Rohingyas while the Myanmar security forces have been conducting "summary executions, enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrests and detentions, torture and ill-treatment, and forced labour" against the community. Before the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was close to 1.4 million, chiefly in the northern Rakhine townships, which were 80–98% Rohingya. Since 2015, over 900,000 Rohingya refugees have fled to south-eastern Bangladesh alone, and more to other surrounding countries, and major Muslim nations. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar are confined in camps for internally displaced persons. Shortly before a Rohingya rebel attack that killed 12 security forces on 25 August 2017, the Myanmar military launched "clearance operations" against the Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine state that, according to NGOs, the Bangladeshi government and international news media, left many dead, and many more injured, tortured or raped, with villages burned. The government of Myanmar has denied the allegations. Nomenclature The modern term Rohingya emerged from colonial and pre-colonial terms Rooinga and Rwangya. The Rohingya refer to themselves as Ruáingga . In Burmese they are known as rui hang gya (following the MLC Transcription System) ( ) while in Bengali they are called Rohingga ( ). The term "Rohingya" may come from Rakhanga or Roshanga, the words for the state of Arakan. The word Rohingya would then mean "inhabitant of Rohang", which was the early Muslim name for Arakan. The usage of the term Rohingya has been historically documented prior to the British Raj. In 1799, Francis Buchanan wrote an article called "A Comparative Vocabulary of Some of the Languages Spoken in the Burma Empire", which was found and republished by Michael Charney in the SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research in 2003. Among the native groups of Arakan, he wrote are the: "Mohammedans, who have long settled in Arakan, and who call themselves Rooinga, or natives of Arakan." The Classical Journal of 1811 identified "Rooinga" as one of the languages spoken in the "Burmah Empire". In 1815, Johann Severin Vater listed "Ruinga" as an ethnic group with a distinct language in a compendium of languages published in German. In 1936, when Burma was still under British rule, the "Rohingya Jam’iyyat al Ulama" was founded in Arakan. According to Jacques Leider, the Rohingya were referred to as "Chittagonians" during the British colonial period, and it was not controversial to refer to them as "Bengalis" until the 1990s. Leider also states that "there is no international consensus" on the use of the term Rohingya, as they are often called "Rohingya Muslims", "Muslim Arakanese" and "Burmese Muslims". Others, such as anthropologist Christina Fink, use Rohingya not as an ethnic identifier but as a political one. Leider believes the Rohingya is a political movement that started in the 1950s to create "an autonomous Muslim zone" in Rakhine. The government of Prime Minister U Nu, when Burma was a democracy from 1948 to 1962, used the term "Rohingya" in radio addresses as a part of peace-building effort in Mayu Frontier Region. The term was broadcast on Burmese radio and was used in the speeches of Burmese rulers. A UNHCR report on refugees caused by Operation King Dragon referred to the victims as "Bengali Muslims (called Rohingyas)". Nevertheless, the term Rohingya wasn't widely used until the 1990s. Today the use of the name "Rohingya" is polarised. The government of Myanmar refuses to use the name. In the 2014 census, the Myanmar government forced the Rohingya to identify themselves as "Bengali". Many Rohingya see the denial of their name similar to denying their basic rights, and the U.N. Special Rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar has agreed. Jacques Leider writes that many Muslims in Rakhine simply prefer to call themselves "Muslim Arakanese" or "Muslims coming from Rakhine" instead of "Rohingya". The United States embassy in Yangon continues to use the name "Rohingya". History Early history The Rohingya population is concentrated in the historical region of Arakan, an old coastal country in Southeast Asia. It is not clear who the original settlers of Arakan were. Burmese traditional history claims that the Rakhine have inhabited Arakan since 3000 BCE but there is no archaeological evidence to support the claim. By the 4th century, Arakan became one of the earliest Indianized kingdoms in Southeast Asia. The first Arakanese state flourished in Dhanyawadi. Power then shifted to the city of Waithali. Sanskrit inscriptions in the region indicate that the founders of the first Arakanese states were Indian. Arakan was ruled by the Chandra dynasty. The British historian Daniel George Edward Hall stated that "The Burmese do not seem to have settled in Arakan until possibly as late as the tenth century CE. Hence earlier dynasties are thought to have been Indian, ruling over a population similar to that of Bengal. All the capitals known to history have been in the north near modern Akyab". Arrival of Islam Due to its coastline on the Bay of Bengal, Arakan was a key centre of maritime trade and cultural exchange between Burma and the outside world, since the time of the Indian Mauryan Empire. According to Syed Islam, a political science scholar, Arab merchants had been in contact with Arakan since the third century, using the Bay of Bengal to reach Arakan. A southern branch of the Silk Road connected India, Burma, and China since the neolithic period. Arab traders are recorded in the coastal areas of southeast Bengal, bordering Arakan, since the 9th century. The Rohingya population trace their history to this period. According to Syed Islam, the earliest Muslim settlements in the Arakan region began in the 7th-century. The Arab traders were also missionaries and they began converting the local Buddhist population to Islam by about 788 CE, states Syed Islam. Besides these locals converting to Islam, Arab merchants married local women and later settled in Arakan. As a result of intermarriage and conversion, the Muslim population in Arakan grew. This claim by Sayed Islam saying that, by 788 CE, locals in Arakan were being converted into Muslims clearly contradicts historian Yegar's findings which say, even in 1203, Bengal is the easternmost point of Islamic expansion, not to say further into Arakan. The alternate view contests that Islam arrived in the Arakan region in the 1st-millennium. According to this view, this Rohingya history is not based on any evidence, rather is based on "fictitious stories, myths and legends". According to Southeast Asian Buddhism history scholar and an ordained Buddhist monk Ashon Nyanuttara, there is scant historical data and archaeological evidence about the early political and religious history of the Arakan people and the Rakhaing region. The limited evidence available suggests that Buddhism, possibly the Mahayana tradition, was well established by the 4th-century in the region under the Candra Buddhist dynasty. Muslim community's expansion and the growth of Islam into the region came much later with Bengali Muslims from the region that is now a part of Bangladesh. Further, the term "Rohingya" does not appear in any regional text of this period and much later. That term was adopted by "a few Bengali Muslim intellectuals who were direct descendants of immigrants from Chittagong district [Bengal]" in the 20th-century, states historian Aye Chan. Kingdom of Mrauk U The Rakhines were one of the tribes of the Burmese Pyu city-states. The Rakhines began migrating to Arakan through the Arakan Mountains in the 9th century. The Rakhines established numerous cities in the valley of the Lemro River. These included Sambawak I, Pyinsa, Parein, Hkrit, Sambawak II, Myohaung, Toungoo and Launggret. Burmese forces invaded the Rakhine cities in 1406. The Burmese invasion forced Rakhine rulers to seek help and refuge from neighbouring Bengal in the north. Early evidence of Bengali Muslim settlements in Arakan date back to the time of Min Saw Mon (1430–34) of the Kingdom of Mrauk U. After 24 years of exile in Bengal, he regained control of the Arakanese throne in 1430 with military assistance from the Bengal Sultanate. The Bengalis who came with him formed their own settlements in the region. The Santikan Mosque built in the 1430s, features a court which "measures from north to south and from east to west; the shrine is a rectangular structure measuring ." King Min Saw Mon ceded some territory to the Sultan of Bengal and recognised his sovereignty over the areas. In recognition of his kingdom's vassal status, the Buddhist kings of Arakan received Islamic titles and used the Bengali gold dinar within the kingdom. Min Saw Mon minted his own coins with the Burmese alphabet on one side and the Persian alphabet on the other. Arakan's vassalage to Bengal was brief. After Sultan Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah's death in 1433, Narameikhla's successors invaded Bengal and occupied Ramu in 1437 and Chittagong in 1459. Arakan would hold Chittagong until 1666. Even after independence from the Sultans of Bengal, the Arakanese kings continued the custom of maintaining Muslim titles. The Buddhist kings compared themselves to Sultans and fashioned themselves after Mughal rulers. They also continued to employ Muslims in prestigious positions within the royal administration. Some of them worked as Bengali, Persian and Arabic scribes in the Arakanese courts, which, despite remaining Buddhist, adopted Islamic fashions from the neighbouring Bengal Sultanate. The population increased in the 17th century, as slaves were brought in by Arakanese raiders and Portuguese settlers following raids into Bengal. Slaves included members of the Mughal nobility. A notable royal slave was Alaol, a renowned poet in the Arakanese court. The slave population were employed in a variety of workforces, including in the king's army, commerce and agriculture. In 1660, Prince Shah Shuja, the governor of Mughal Bengal and a claimant of the Peacock Throne, fled to Arakan with his family after being defeated by his brother Emperor Aurangzeb during the Battle of Khajwa. Shuja and his entourage arrived in Arakan on 26 August 1660. He was granted asylum by King Sanda Thudhamma. In December 1660, the Arakanese king confiscated Shuja's gold and jewellery, leading to an insurrection by the royal Mughal refugees. According to varying accounts, Shuja's family was killed by the Arakanese, while Shuja himself may have fled to a kingdom in Manipur. However, members of Shuja's entourage remained in Arakan and were recruited by the royal army, including as archers and court guards. They were king makers in Arakan until the Burmese conquest. The Arakanese continued their raids of Mughal Bengal. Dhaka was raided in 1625. Emperor Aurangzeb gave orders to his governor in Mughal Bengal, Shaista Khan, to end what the Mughals saw as Arakanese-Portuguese piracy. In 1666, Shaista Khan led a army and 288 warships to seize Chittagong from the Kingdom of Mrauk U. The Mughal expedition continued up till the Kaladan River. The Mughals placed the northern part of Arakan under its administration and vassalage. Burmese conquest Following the Konbaung Dynasty's conquest of Arakan in 1785, as many as 35,000 people of the Rakhine State fled to the neighbouring Chittagong region of British Bengal in 1799 to escape persecution by the Bamar and to seek protection under the British Raj. The Bamar executed thousands of men and deported a considerable portion of the population to central Burma, leaving Arakan a scarcely populated area by the time the British occupied it. According to an article on the "Burma Empire" published by the British Francis Buchanan-Hamilton in 1799, "the Mohammedans, who have long settled in Arakan", "call themselves Rooinga, or natives of Arakan". However, according to Derek Tokin, Hamilton no longer used the term to refer to the Muslims in Arakan in his later publications. Sir Henry Yule saw many Muslims serving as eunuchs in Konbaung while on a diplomatic mission to the Burmese capital, Ava. British colonial rule British policy encouraged Bengali inhabitants from adjacent regions to migrate into the then lightly populated and fertile valleys of Arakan as farm labourers. The East India Company extended the Bengal Presidency to Arakan. There was no international boundary between Bengal and Arakan and no restrictions on migration between the regions. In the early 19th century, thousands of Bengalis from the Chittagong region settled in Arakan seeking work. It is hard to know whether these new Bengal migrants were the same population that was deported by force to Bengal's Chittagong during the Burmese conquest in the 18th century and later returned to Arakan as a result of British policy or they were a new migrant population with no ancestral roots to Arakan. The British census of 1872 reported 58,255 Muslims in Akyab District. By 1911, the Muslim population had increased to 178,647. The waves of migration were primarily due to the requirement of cheap labour from British India to work in the paddy fields. Immigrants from Bengal, mainly from the Chittagong region, "moved en masse into western townships of Arakan". Albeit Indian immigration to Burma was a nationwide phenomenon, not just restricted to Arakan. For these reasons historians believed that most Rohingyas arrived with the British colonialists in the 19th and 20th centuries with some tracing their ancestry much further. According to Thant Myint-U, historian and adviser to President Thein Sein, "At the beginning of the 20th century, Indians were arriving in Burma at the rate of no less than a quarter million per year. The numbers rose steadily until the peak year of 1927, immigration reached 480,000 people, with Rangoon exceeding New York City as the greatest immigration port in the world. This was out of a total population of only 13 million; it was equivalent to the United Kingdom today taking 2 million people a year." By then, in most of the largest cities in Burma, Rangoon, Akyab, Bassein and Moulmein, the Indian immigrants formed a majority of the population. All of Burma was officially a Province within the British Indian Empire ('the Raj') from November 1885 until 1937, when Burma became a separate Crown colony within the British Empire. The Burmese under British rule felt helpless, and reacted with a "racism that combined feelings of superiority and fear". Professor Andrew Selth of Griffith University writes that although a few Rohingya trace their ancestry to Muslims who lived in Arakan in the 15th and 16h centuries, most Rohingyas arrived with the British colonialists in the 19th and 20th centuries. Most have argued that Rohingya existed from the four waves of Muslim migrations from the ancient times to medieval, to the British colony. Gutman (1976) and Ibrahim (2016) claiming that the Muslim population dates before the arrival of ethnic Rakhine in the 9th to 10th century. Suggesting the Rohingya are descendants of the of a pre-Arakan population who existed for 3 thousand years and waves of Muslim who intermingled forming modern Rohingya. The impact of this immigration was particularly acute in Arakan. Although it boosted the colonial economy, local Arakanese bitterly resented it. According to historian Clive J. Christie, "The issue became a focus for grass-roots Burmese nationalism, and in the years 1930–31 there were serious anti-Indian disturbances in Lower Burma, while 1938 saw riots specifically directed against the Indian Muslim community. As Burmese nationalism increasingly asserted itself before the Second World War, the 'alien' Indian presence inevitably came under attack, along with the religion that the Indian Muslims imported. The Muslims of northern Arakan were to be caught in the crossfire of this conflict." In the 1931 census, the Muslim population of Burma was 584,839, 4% of the total population of 14,647,470 at the time. 396,504 were Indian Muslims and 1,474 Chinese Muslims, while 186,861 were Burmese Muslims. The census found a growth in the number of Indian Muslims born in Burma, primarily due to their permanent settlement in Akyab. 41% of Muslims of Burma lived in Arakan at that time. Shipping Due to the terrain of the Arakan Mountains, the Arakan region was mostly accessible by sea. In British Arakan Division, the port of Akyab had ferry services and a thriving trade with the ports of Chittagong, Narayanganj, Dacca and Calcutta in British India; as well as with Rangoon. Akyab was one of the leading rice ports in the world, hosting ship fleets from Europe and China. Many Indians settled in Akyab and dominated its seaport and hinterland. The 1931 census found 500,000 Indians living in Akyab. Legislators Several Rohingyas were elected to Burmese native seats in the Legislative Council of Burma and Legislature of Burma. During the 1936 Burmese general election, Advocate U Pho Khaine was elected from Akyab West and Gani Markan was elected from Maungdaw-Buthidaung. In 1939, U Tanvy Markan was elected from Maungdaw-Buthidaung. Their elections in the Burmese native category set them apart from immigrant Indian legislators. World War II During World War II, the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) invaded British-controlled Burma. The British forces retreated and in the power vacuum left behind, considerable inter-communal violence erupted between Arakanese and Muslim villagers. The British armed Muslims in northern Arakan in order to create a buffer zone that would protect the region from a Japanese invasion when they retreated and to counteract the largely pro-Japanese ethnic Rakhines. The period also witnessed violence between groups loyal to the British and the Burmese nationalists. The Arakan massacres in 1942 involved communal violence between British-armed V Force Rohingya recruits and , polarising the region along ethnic lines. Tensions boiling in Arakan before the war erupted during the Japanese invasion of Southeast Asia and Arakan became the frontline in the conflict. The war resulted in a complete breakdown of civil administration and consequent development of habits of lawlessness exacerbated by the availability of modern firearms. The Japanese advance triggered an inter-communal conflict between Muslims and Buddhists. The Muslims fled towards British-controlled Muslim-dominated northern Arakan from Japanese-controlled Buddhist-majority areas. This stimulated a "reverse ethnic cleansing" in British-controlled areas, particularly around Maungdaw. Failure of a British counter-offensive, attempted from December 1942 to April 1943, resulted in the abandonment of even more of the Muslim population as well as an increase in inter-communal violence. Moshe Yegar, a research fellow at Truman Institute, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, noted that hostility had developed between the Muslims and the Buddhists who had brought about a similar hostility in other parts of Burma. This tension was let loose with the retreat of the British. With the approach of the Japanese into Arakan, the Buddhists instigated cruel measures against the Muslims. Thousands, though the exact number is unknown, fled from Buddhist-majority regions to eastern Bengal and northern Arakan with many being killed or dying of starvation. The Muslims in response conducted retaliatory raids from British-controlled areas, causing Buddhists to flee to southern Arakan. Aye Chan, a historian at Kanda University in Japan, has written that as a consequence of acquiring arms from the British during World War II, Rohingyas tried to destroy the Arakanese villages instead of resisting the Japanese. Chan agrees that hundreds of Muslims fled to northern Arakan, though states that the accounts of atrocities on them were exaggerated. In March 1942, Rohingyas from northern Arakan killed around 20,000 Arakanese. In return, around 5,000 Muslims in the Minbya and Mrauk-U Townships were killed by Rakhines and Red Karens. As in the rest of Burma, the IJA committed acts of rape, murder and torture against Muslims in Arakan. During this period, some 22,000 Muslims in Arakan were believed to have crossed the border into Bengal, then part of British India, to escape the violence. The exodus was not restricted to Muslims in Arakan. Thousands of Burmese Indians, Anglo-Burmese and British who settled during the colonial period emigrated en masse to India. To facilitate their reentry into Burma, the British formed Volunteer Forces with Rohingya. Over the three years during which the Allies and Japanese fought over the Mayu peninsula, the Rohingya recruits of the V-Force, engaged in a campaign against Arakanese communities, using weapons provided by V-Force. According to the secretary of the British governor, the V Force, instead of fighting the Japanese, destroyed Buddhist monasteries, pagodas, and houses, and committed atrocities in northern Arakan. The British Army's liaison officer, Anthony Irwin, on the other hand, praised the role of the V Force. Pakistan Movement During the Pakistan Movement in the 1940s, Rohingya Muslims in western Burma organised a separatist movement to merge the region into East Pakistan. The commitments of the British regarding the status of Muslims after the war are not clear. V Force officers like Andrew Irwin felt that Muslims along with other minorities must be rewarded for their loyalty. Muslim leaders believed that the British had promised them a "Muslim National Area" in Maungdaw region. They were also apprehensive of a future Buddhist-dominated government. In 1946, calls were made for annexation of the territory by Pakistan as well as of an independent state. Before the independence of Burma in January 1948, Muslim leaders from Arakan addressed themselves to Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, and asked his assistance in incorporating the Mayu region to Pakistan considering their religious affinity and geographical proximity with East Pakistan. The North Arakan Muslim League was founded in Akyab (modern Sittwe) two months later. The proposal never materialised since it was reportedly turned down by Jinnah, saying that he was not in a position to interfere in Burmese matters. Post-WWII migration The numbers and the extent of post-independence immigration from Bangladesh are subject to controversy and debate. In a 1955 study published by Stanford University, the authors Virginia Thompson and Richard Adloff write, "The post-war (World War II) illegal immigration of Chittagonians into that area was on a vast scale, and in the Maungdaw and Buthidaung areas they replaced the Arakanese." The authors further argue that the term Rohingya, in the form of Rwangya, first appeared to distinguish settled population from newcomers: "The newcomers were called Mujahids (crusaders), in contrast to the Rwangya or settled Chittagonian population." According to the International Crisis Group (ICG), these immigrants were actually the Rohingyas who were displaced by World War II and began to return to Arakan after the independence of Burma but were rendered as illegal immigrants, while many were not allowed to return. ICG adds that there were "some 17,000" refugees from the Bangladesh liberation war who "subsequently returned home". Burmese independence On 25 September 1954, the then Prime Minister U Nu in his radio address to the nation talked about Rohingya Muslims’ political loyalty to predominantly Buddhist Burma. This usage of the term ‘Rohingya’ is important in the sense that today Myanmar denies to accept this category altogether and calls them ’Bengali’. During the same time a separate administrative zone May Yu was established comprising most of the present North Rakhine State, which had Rohingya as its majority ethnic group. One of the objectives of this Muslim majority zone was to ‘strive for peace with Pakistan’. Brigadier Aung Gyi, one of the deputies of General Ne Win, in 1961 explained Rohingya as; “On the west, May Yu district borders with Pakistan. As is the case with all borderlands communities, there are Muslims on both sides of the borders. Those who are on Pakistan’s side are known as Pakistani while the Muslims on our Burmese side of the borders are referred to as ‘Rohingya’. But since Burma's military junta took control of the country in 1962, the Rohingya have been systematically deprived of their political rights. In 1962 military dictator General Ne Win, took over the government and started implementing a Nationalist agenda, which had its roots in racial discrimination. In 1978 military government launched operation Nagamin to separate nationals from non-nationals. This was the first concerted large scale violent attack on Rohingya. National Registration Cards (NRC) were taken away by state actors never to be replaced. Violence that followed forced 200,000 Rohingya to flee to Bangladesh. Bangladesh denied Rohingya admission into her territory and blocked food rations leading to death of 12,000 of them. After bilateral negotiations Rohingya were repatriated. Rohingya political participation in Burma In the prelude to independence, two Rohingyas were elected to the Constituent Assembly of Burma in 1947, M. A. Gaffar and Sultan Ahmed. After Burma became independent in 1948, M. A. Gaffar presented a memorandum of appeal to the Government of the Union of Burma calling for the recognition of the term "Rohingya", based on local Indian names of Arakan (Rohan and Rohang), as the official name of the ethnicity. Sultan Ahmed, who served as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Minorities, was a member of the Justice Sir Ba U Commission charged with exploring whether Arakan Division should be granted statehood. During the 1951 Burmese general election, five Rohingyas were elected to the Parliament of Burma, including one of the country's first two female MPs, Zura Begum. Six MPs were elected during the 1956 Burmese general election and subsequent by-elections. Sultan Mahmud, a former politician in British India, became Minister of Health in the cabinet of Prime Minister of Burma U Nu. In 1960, Mahmud suggested that either Rohingya-majority northern Arakan remain under the central government or be made a separate province. However, during the 1960 Burmese general election, Prime Minister U Nu's pledges included making all of Arakan into one province. The 1962 Burmese coup d'état ended the country's Westminster-style political system. The 1982 Burmese citizenship law stripped most of the Rohingyas of their stake in citizenship. Rohingya community leaders were supportive of the 8888 uprising for democracy. During the 1990 Burmese general election, the Rohingya-led National Democratic Party for Human Rights won four seats in the Burmese parliament. The four Rohingya MPs included Shamsul Anwarul Huq, Chit Lwin Ebrahim, Fazal Ahmed and Nur Ahmed. The election was won by the National League for Democracy led by Aung San Suu Kyi, who was placed under house arrest and not permitted to become prime minister. The Burmese military junta banned the National Democratic Party for Human Rights in 1992. Its leaders were arrested, jailed and tortured. Rohingya politicians have been jailed to disbar them from contesting elections. In 2005, Shamsul Anwarul Huq was charged under Section 18 of the controversial 1982 Burmese citizenship law and sentenced to 47 years in prison. In 2015, a ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party MP Shwe Maung was disbarred from the 2015 Burmese general election, on grounds that his parents were not Burmese citizens under the 1982 citizenship law. As of 2017, Burma does not have a single Rohingya MP and the Rohingya population have no voting rights. Mayu Frontier District A separate administrative zone for the Rohingya-majority northern areas of Arakan existed between 1961 and 1964. Known as the Mayu Frontier District, the zone was set up by Prime Minister U Nu after the 1960 Burmese general election, on the advice of his health minister Sultan Mahmud. The zone was administered directly from Rangoon by the national government. After the Burmese military coup in 1962, the zone was administered by the Burmese army. It was transferred to the Ministry of Home Affairs in 1964 by the Union Revolutionary Council. The socialist military government inducted the zone into Arakan State in 1974. Expulsion of Burmese Indians Racism towards people with links to the Indian subcontinent increased after the 1962 Burmese coup. The socialist military government nationalised all property, including many enterprises of the white collar Burmese Indian community. Between 1962 and 1964, 320,000 Burmese Indians were forced to leave the country. Refugee crisis of 1978 As a result of Operation King Dragon by the Burmese junta, the first wave of Rohingya refugees entered Bangladesh in 1978. An estimated 200,000 Rohingyas took shelter in Cox's Bazaar. Diplomatic initiatives over 16 months resulted in a repatriation agreement, which allowed the return of most refugees under a process facilitated by UNHCR. The return of refugees to Burma has been the second largest repatriation process in Asia after the return of Cambodian refugees from Thailand. 1982 Citizenship Law In 1982, the citizenship law enacted by the Burmese military junta did not list the Rohingya as one of the 135 "national races" of Burma. This made much of the Rohingya population in Burma stateless in their historical homeland of Arakan. General Ne Win drafted Citizenship Act in 1982, which denied citizenship rights to any community/group that was not listed in a survey conducted by British in 1824. All other ethnic groups were considered aliens to the land or invaders. Eight major ethnicities Arakan, Chin, Kachin, Karen, Kayah, Mon, Shan, and Burmese were broken into 135 small ethnic groups. Groups like Rohingya who do not belong to any of these 135 ethnicities were denied citizenship rights. Taking into account just one survey for defining the history of a group of people is highly problematic. It overlooks the fact that Rohingya were mentioned in records earlier to this survey. Scholars like Maung Zarni have argued that Burmese military ‘encoded its anti-Indian and anti-Muslim racism in its laws and policies’. He further argues; “The 1982 Citizenship Act serves as the state’s legal and ideological foundation on which all forms of violence, execution, restrictions, and human rights crimes are justified and committed with state impunity if carried out horizontally by the local ultra-nationalist Rakhine Buddhists. In light of the on-the-ground link between the legalised removal of citizenship from the Rohingya and the implementation of a permanent set of draconian laws and policies—as opposed to periodic “anti-immigration” operations—amount to the infliction on the Rohingya of conditions of life designed to bring about serious bodily and mental harm and to destroy the group in whole or in part. As such, the illegalisation of the Rohingya in Myanmar is an indication of the intent of the State to both remove the Rohingya permanently from their homeland and to destroy the Rohingya as a group.” Refugee crisis of 1991–1992 After Burmese military junta began persecuting the political opposition following Aung San Suu Kyi's victory in the 1990 election and the earlier 1988 Uprising, military operations targeting Muslims (who strongly favoured the pro-democracy movement) began in Arakan State. The Rohingya-led NDPHR political party was banned and its leaders were jailed. Suu Kyi herself was placed under house arrest by the junta led by General Than Shwe. As the Burmese military increased its operations across the country, the Maungdaw, Buthidaung and Rathedaung townships in northern Arakan became centers of persecution. The 23rd and 24th regiments of the Tatmadaw (Myanmar Army) were responsible for promoting forced labour, rape, the confiscation of houses, land and farm animals, the destruction of mosques, a ban on religious activities and the harassment of the religious priests. An estimated 250,000 refugees crossed over into Bangladesh. In Bangladesh, the refugee influx was a challenge for the newly elected government of the country's first female prime minister Khaleda Zia (who headed the first parliamentary government since 1975). Both Bangladesh and Burma mobilised thousands of troops along the border during the crisis. The government of Bangladesh emphasised a peaceful resolution of the crisis. After diplomatic negotiations, a repatriation agreement was put in place to allow the return of refugees to Burma under a UNHCR-supervised process. Name change from Arakan to Rakhine State In 1989, the junta officially changed the name of Burma to Myanmar. In the 1990s, the junta changed the name of the province of Arakan to Rakhine State, which showed a bias towards the Rakhine community, even though the Rohingya formed a substantial part of the population. The name of the region was historically known as Arakan for centuries. Denial of the "Rohingya" term The colloquial term Rohingya can be traced back to the pre-colonial period. The Rohingya community have also been known as Arakanese Indians and Arakanese Muslims. Since the 1982 citizenship law, Burmese juntas and governments have strongly objected to the usage of the term of Rohingya, preferring to label the community as "bengali illegal immigrants". The derogatory slur kalar is widely used in Myanmar against the Rohingya. Myanmar's government has often pressured diplomats and foreign delegates against uttering the term Rohingya. Conflict in Arakan The Rakhine for their part felt discriminated against by the governments in Rangoon dominated by the ethnic Burmese with one Rakhine politician saying, "we are therefore the victims of Muslimisation and Burmese chauvinism." The Economist wrote in 2015 that from the 1940s on and right to this day, the Burmens have seen and see themselves as victims of the British Empire while the Rakhine see themselves as victims of the British and the Burmens; both groups were and are so intent upon seeing themselves as victims that neither has much sympathy for the Rohingyas. After Jinnah's refusal to accept northern Arakan into the Dominion of Pakistan, some Rohingya elders who supported a jihad movement, founded the Mujahid party in northern Arakan in 1947. The aim of the Mujahid party was to create an autonomous Islamic state in Arakan. By the 1950s, they began to use the term "Rohingya" which may be a continuation of the term Rooinga to establish a distinct identity and identify themselves as indigenous. They were much more active before the 1962 Burmese coup d'état by General Ne Win, a Burmese general who began his military career fighting for the Japanese in World War II. Ne Win carried out military operations against them over a period of two decades. The prominent one was Operation King Dragon, which took place in 1978; as a result, many Muslims in the region fled to neighbouring Bangladesh as refugees. In addition to Bangladesh, a large number of Rohingyas also migrated to Karachi, Pakistan. Rohingya mujahideen are still active within the remote areas of Arakan. From 1971 to 1978, a number of Rakhine monks and Buddhists staged hunger strikes in Sittwe to force the government to tackle immigration issues which they believed to be causing a demographic shift in the region. Ne Win's government requested UN to repatriate the war refugees and launched military operations which drove off around 200,000 people to Bangladesh. In 1978, the Bangladesh government protested against the Burmese government concerning "the expulsion by force of thousands of Burmese Muslim citizens to Bangladesh". The Burmese government responded that those expelled were Bangladesh citizens who had resided illegally in Burma. In July 1978, after intensive negotiations mediated by UN, Ne Win's government agreed to take back 200,000 refugees who settled in Arakan. In the same year as well as in 1992, a joint statement by governments of Myanmar and Bangladesh "acknowledged that the Rohingya were lawful Burmese residents". In 1982, the Burmese government enacted the citizenship law and declared the "Bengalis" are foreigners. There are widespread beliefs among Rakhine people that significant number of immigrants arrived even after the 1980s when the border was relatively unguarded. However, there is no documentation proof for these claims as the last census was conducted in 1983. Successive Burmese governments have fortified the border and built up border guard forces. After 1988 Burmese pro-democracy uprising Since the 1990s, a new 'Rohingya' movement which is distinct from the 1950s armed rebellion has emerged. The new movement is characterised by lobbying internationally by overseas diaspora, establishing indigenous claims by Rohingya scholars, publicising the term "Rohingya" and denying Bengali origins by Rohingya politicians. Rohingya scholars have claimed that Rakhine was previously an Islamic state for a millennium, or that Muslims were king-makers of Rakhine kings for 350 years. They often traced the origin of Rohingyas to Arab seafarers. These claims have been rejected as "newly invented myths" in academic circles. Some Rohingya politicians have labelled Burmese and international historians as "Rakhine sympathizers" for rejecting the purported historical origins. The movement has garnered sharp criticisms from ethnic Rakhines and Kamans, the latter of whom are a recognised Muslim ethnic group in Rakhine. Kaman leaders support citizenship for Muslims in northern Rakhine but believe that the new movement is aimed at achieving a self-administered area or Rohang State as a separate Islamic state carved out of Rakhine, and condemn the movement. Rakhines' views are more critical. Citing Bangladesh's overpopulation and density, Rakhines perceive the Rohingyas as "the vanguard of an unstoppable wave of people that will inevitably engulf Rakhine". However, for moderate Rohingyas, the aim may have been no more than to gain citizenship status. Moderate Rohingya politicians agree to compromise on the term Rohingya if citizenship is provided under an alternative identity that is neither "Bengali" nor "Rohingya". Various alternatives including "Rakhine Muslims", "Myanmar Muslims" or simply "Myanmar" have been proposed. Burmese juntas (1990–2011) The military junta that ruled Myanmar for half a century relied heavily on mixing Burmese nationalism and Theravada Buddhism to bolster its rule, and, in the view of the US government, heavily discriminated against minorities like the Rohingyas. Some pro-democracy dissidents from Myanmar's ethnic Bamar majority do not consider the Rohingyas compatriots. Successive Burmese governments have been accused of provoking riots led by Buddhist monks against ethnic minorities like the Rohingyas In the 1990s, more than 250,000 Rohingya fled to refugee camps in Bangladesh. In the early 2000s, all but 20,000 of them were repatriated to Myanmar, some against their will. In 2009, a senior Burmese envoy to Hong Kong branded the Rohingyas "ugly as ogres" and a people that are alien to Myanmar. Under the 2008 constitution, the Myanmar military still control much of the country's government, including the ministries of home, defence and border affairs, 25% of seats in parliament and one vice-president. Rakhine State conflicts and refugees (2012–present) 2012 Rakhine State riots The 2012 Rakhine State riots were a series of conflicts between Rohingya Muslims who form the majority in the northern Rakhine and ethnic Rakhines who form the majority in the south. Before the riots, there were widespread fears among the Buddhist Rakhines that they would soon become a minority in their ancestral state. The riots occurred after weeks of sectarian disputes, including a gang rape and murder of a Rakhine woman by Rohingyas and killing of ten Burmese Muslims by Rakhines. There is evidence that the pogroms in 2012 were incited by the government asking the Rakhine men to defend their "race and religion". The Rakhine men were said to have been given knives and free food, and bused in from Sittwe. The Burmese government denied having organised the pogroms, but has never prosecuted anyone for the attacks against the Rohingyas. The Economist argued that since the transition to democracy in Burma in 2011, the military has been seeking to retain its privileged position, forming the motivation for it to encourage the riots in 2012 and allowing it to pose as the defender of Buddhism against Muslim Rohingya. On both sides, entire villages were "decimated". According to the Burmese authorities, the violence between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims left 78 people dead, 87 injured, and up to 140,000 people displaced. The government has responded by imposing curfews and deploying troops in the region. On 10 June 2012, a state of emergency was declared in Rakhine, allowing the military to participate in the administration of the region. Rohingya NGOs abroad have accused the Burmese army and police of targeting Rohingya Muslims through arrests and participating in violence. A field observation conducted by the International Crisis Group concluded that both communities were grateful for the protection provided by the military. A number of monks' organisations have taken measures to boycott NGOs which they believe helped only Rohingyas in the past decades even though Rakhines were equally poor. In July 2012, the Burmese Government did not include the Rohingya minority group in the census—classified as stateless Bengali Muslims from Bangladesh since 1982. About 140,000 Rohingya in Myanmar remain confined in IDP camps. 2015 refugee crisis In 2015, the Simon-Skjodt Centre of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum stated in a press statement the Rohingyas are "at grave risk of additional mass atrocities and even genocide". In 2015, to escape violence and persecution, thousands of Rohingyas migrated from Myanmar and Bangladesh, collectively dubbed as 'boat people' by international media, to Southeast Asian countries including Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand by rickety boats via the waters of the Strait of Malacca and the Andaman Sea. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates about 25,000 people have been taken to boats from January to March in 2015. There are claims that around 100 people died in Indonesia, 200 in Malaysia, and 10 in Thailand during the journey. An estimated 3,000 refugees from Myanmar and Bangladesh have been rescued or swum to shore and several thousand more are believed to remain trapped on boats at sea with little food or water. A Malaysian newspaper claimed crisis has been sparked by smugglers. However, the Economist in an article in June 2015 wrote the only reason why the Rohingyas were willing to pay to be taken out of Burma in squalid, overcrowded, fetid boats as "... it is the terrible conditions at home in Rakhine that force the Rohingyas out to sea in the first place." Autumn 2016 – Summer 2017 On 9 October 2016, insurgents attacked three Burmese border posts along Myanmar's border with Bangladesh. According to government officials in the mainly Rohingya border town of Maungdaw, the attackers brandished knives, machetes and homemade slingshots that fired metal bolts. Several dozen firearms and boxes of ammunition were looted by the attackers from the border posts. The attack resulted in the deaths of nine border officers. On 11 October 2016, four soldiers were killed on the third day of fighting. Following the attacks, reports emerged of several human rights violations allegedly perpetrated by Burmese security forces in their crackdown on suspected Rohingya insurgents. Shortly after, the Myanmar military forces and extremist Buddhists started a major crackdown on the Rohingya Muslims in the country's western region of Rakhine State in response to attacks on border police camps by unidentified insurgents. The crackdown resulted in wide-scale human rights violations at the hands of security forces, including extrajudicial killings, gang rapes, arsons, and other brutalities. The military crackdown on Rohingyas drew criticism from various quarters including the United Nations, human rights group Amnesty International, the US Department of State, and the government of Malaysia. The de facto head of government Aung San Suu Kyi has particularly been criticised for her inaction and silence over the issue and for doing little to prevent military abuses. Government officials in Rakhine State originally blamed the Rohingya Solidarity Organisation (RSO), an Islamist insurgent group mainly active in the 1980s and 1990s, for the attacks; however, on 17 October 2016, a group calling itself the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) claimed responsibility. In the following days, six other groups released statements, all citing the same leader. The Myanmar Army announced on 15 November 2016 that 69 Rohingya insurgents and 17 security forces (10 policemen, 7 soldiers) had been killed in recent clashes in northern Rakhine State, bringing the death toll to 134 (102 insurgents and 32 security forces). It was also announced that 234 people suspected of being connected to the attack were arrested. A police document obtained by Reuters in March 2017 listed 423 Rohingyas detained by the police since 9 October 2016, 13 of whom were children, the youngest being ten years old. Two police captains in Maungdaw verified the document and justified the arrests, with one of them saying, "We, the police, have to arrest those who collaborated with the attackers, children or not, but the court will decide if they are guilty; we are not the ones who decide." Myanmar police also claimed that the children had confessed to their alleged crimes during interrogations, and that they were not beaten or pressured during questioning. The average age of those detained is 34, the youngest is 10, and the oldest is 75. The Myanmar Armed Forces (Tatmadaw) stated on 1 September 2017 that the death toll had risen to 370 insurgents, 13 security personnel, 2 government officials and 14 civilians. The United Nations believes over 1,000 people have been killed since October 2016, which contradicts the death toll provided by the Myanmar government. Autumn 2017 crisis Starting in early August 2017, the Myanmar security forces began "clearance operations" against the Rohingya in northern Rakhine state. Following an attack by Rohingya militants of Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) against several security forces' outposts, 25 August, the operations escalated radically—killing thousands of Rohingya, brutalising thousands more, and driving hundreds of thousands out of the country into neighbouring Bangladesh while their villages burned—with the Myanmar military claiming that their actions were solely attacks on rebels in response to the ARSA attack. However, subsequent reports from various international organisations have indicated that the military operations were widespread indiscriminate attacks on the Rohingya population, already underway before the ARSA attacks, to purge northern Rakhine state of Rohingya, through "ethnic cleansing" and/or "genocide." In August 2018, study estimated that more than 24,000+ Rohingya people were killed by the Myanmar military and the local Buddhists since the "clearance operations" started on 25 August 2017. The study also estimated that 18,000+ the Rohingya Muslim women and girls were raped, 116,000 Rohingya were beaten, 36,000 Rohingya were thrown into fire Precipitating events According to BBC reporters, during the summer of 2017, the Myanmar military began arming and training Rakhine Buddhist natives in northern Rakhine state, and in late summer advised that any ethnic Rakhines "wishing to protect their state" would be given the opportunity to join "the local armed police." Matthew Smith, chief executive of human rights organisation Fortify Rights says that arming the Rakhines "was a decision made to effectively perpetrate atrocity crimes against the civilian population." At the same time, northern Rakhine state faced food shortages, and, starting in mid-August, the government cut off all food supply to the area. On 10 August, the military flew in a battalion of reinforcements to the area, triggering a public warning from the resident United Nations human rights representative to Myanmar, who urged Myanmar authorities to restrain themselves. A few weeks later, on 24 August 2017, the Rakhine Commission (chaired by former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan)—established by the new civilian Myanmar government to recommend solutions to the ethnic conflict and related issues in Rakhine state—released its recommendations for alleviating the suffering of minorities (especially the Rohingya), calling for measures that would improve security in Myanmar for the Rohingya, but not calling for all measures sought by various Rohingya factions. The following morning, according to Myanmar military officials, a Rohingya rebel group (ARSA, or Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army) led multiple coordinated attacks on 30 police outposts and border guards, killing a dozen government forces, at the cost of over 50 dead among the rebels. Conflict escalation Almost immediately the Myanmar military—apparently teaming with local authorities with mobs of Rakhine Buddhist civilians—launched massive reprisals that it described as its anti-terrorist "clearance operations" (which, UN investigators and BBC reporters later determined, had actually begun earlier)—attacking Rohingya villages throughout northern Rakhine state. Within the first three weeks, the military reported over 400 dead (whom it described as mostly "militants" and "terrorists")—the U.N. estimated over 1,000 dead (mostly civilians), and other sources initially suggested as many as 3,000—in the first four weeks of the reprisals. However, in December 2017, following a detailed survey of Rohingya refugees, a humanitarian organisation serving refugees, Médecins Sans Frontières calculated that at least 6,700 Rohingya men, women and children were killed in the first month of the major attacks, including at least 750 children (that number later revised to "over 1,000"). MSF estimated that 69% were killed by gunshots, 9% were burnt to death (including 15% of children killed), and 5% beaten to death. However, MSF cautioned "The numbers of deaths are likely to be an underestimation, as we have not surveyed all refugee settlements in Bangladesh and because the surveys don't account for the families who never made it out of Myanmar." Refugees reported numerous civilians—including women and children—being indiscriminately beaten, raped, tortured, shot, hacked to death or burned alive. and whole villages being burnt down by authorities and Buddhist mobs. Human Rights Watch released satellite photos showing the villages burning, but the Myanmar government insisted the fires were lit by Rohingya, themselves, or specifically Rohingya militants—though the authorities offered no proof of the allegation, and refused or tightly controlled all media and foreign access to the area. Myanmar's presidential spokesman reported that 176 ethnic Rohingya villages—out of the original a total of 471 Rohingya villages in three townships—had become empty. In addition to the 176 "abandoned" villages, some residents reportedly fled from at least 34 other villages. In the first four weeks of the conflict, over 400,000 Rohingya refugees (approximately 40% of the remaining Rohingya in Myanmar) fled the country on foot or by boat (chiefly to Bangladesh—the only other country bordering the Rakhine state area under attack) creating a major humanitarian crisis. In addition, 12,000 Rakhine Buddhists, and other non-Muslim Rakhine state residents were displaced within the country. On 10 September 2017, ARSA declared a temporary unilateral ceasefire to allow aid groups to work in the region. Its statement read that "ARSA strongly encourages all concerned humanitarian actors resume their humanitarian assistance to all victims of the humanitarian crisis, irrespective of ethnic or religious background during the ceasefire period." However, the Myanmar government dismissed the gesture, saying "we don't negotiate with terrorists." The violence and humanitarian 'catastrophe,' inflamed international tensions, especially in the region, and throughout the Muslim world. 13 September, Myanmar's presidential spokesman announced Myanmar would establish a new commission to implement some recommendations of Annan's Rakhine Commission, in their August 2017 report. The United Nations initially reported in early September 2017 that more than 120,000 Rohingya people had fled Myanmar for Bangladesh due to a recent rise in violence against them. The UNHCR, on 4 September, estimated 123,000 refugees have escaped western Myanmar since 25 August 2017. (By 15 September, that number had surpassed 400,000) The situation was expected to exacerbate the current refugee crisis as more than 400,000 Rohingya without citizenship were trapped in overcrowded camps and in conflict regions in Western Myanmar. Myanmar's de facto civilian leader and Nobel Laureate, Aung San Suu Kyi, criticised the media's reporting on the crisis, saying that her government is protecting everyone in Rakhine state, and argued that the reporting was misinformation that benefitted the aims of terrorists. Some reports suggest that the Myanmar military has ceded some border outposts to rebels armed with wooden clubs as part of encouraging Rohingyas to leave the country. A Holy See diplomat stated that at least 3000 people were killed by Myanmar security forces in August and September 2017. The U.N. Secretary General issued a statement, 13 September 2017, implying that the situation facing the Rohingya in Rakhine state was "ethnic cleansing." He urged Myanmar authorities to suspend military action and stop the violence—insisting that Myanmar's government uphold the rule of law, and (noting that "380,000" Rohingya had recently fled to Bangladesh) recognise the refugees' right to return to their homes. The same day, the U.N. Security Council issued a separate, unanimous statement, on the crisis following a closed-door meeting about Myanmar. In a semi-official press statement (its first statement on the situation in Myanmar in nine years)—the Council expressed "concern" about reported excessive violence in Myanmar's security operations, called for de-escalating the situation, reestablishing law and order, protecting civilians, and resolution of the refugee problem. On 19 September 2017, Myanmar's civilian leader, State Councillor Aung San Suu Kyi, made a major televised speech on the crisis—in English—stating "We condemn all human rights violations and unlawful violence," and indicated a desire to know why the Rohingya were fleeing. But Suu Kyi largely defended her prior position supporting the Myanmar military and its actions, and deflected international criticism by saying most Rohingya villages remained intact, and conflict had not broken out everywhere. Expressing no criticism of the Myanmar military, and denying that it had engaged in any "armed clashes or clearance operations" since 5 September, she added, "We are committed to the restoration of peace and stability and rule of law throughout the state," and that the country was "committed to a sustainable solution… for all communities in this state", but was vague as to how that would be achieved. By the end of September, conflicts between Rohingya Muslims and outnumbered Hindus, became apparent—including the killing of around 100 Hindu villagers in Rakhine state, around late August—according to the Myanmar military who claimed to have found the bodies of 20 women and eight boys in mass graves, 24 September, after a search near Ye Baw Kya village, in northern Rakhine state. The search was reportedly in response to a refugee in Bangladesh who contacted a local Hindu leader in Myanmar. Authorities quoted the refugee as saying about 300 ARSA militants, on 25 August, marched about 100 people out of the Hindu village and killed them. ARSA denied involvement, saying it was committed to not killing civilians. International news media were not immediately allowed free access to the area to verify the reports. In other cases, in Myanmar and in Bangladeshi refugee camps Hindu (particularly women) are reported to have faced kidnapping, religious abuse and "forced conversions" by Muslim Rohingyas. By the end of September 2017, UN, Bangladesh and other entities were reporting that—in addition to 200,000-300,000 Rohingya refugees already in Bangladesh after fleeing prior attacks in Myanmar—the current conflict, since late August 2017, had driven 500,000 more Rohingya from Myanmar into Bangladesh, creating what UN Secretary General António Guterres described as "the world's fastest-developing refugee emergency ... a humanitarian nightmare." In November 2017 Myanmar and Bangladesh signed a memorandum of understanding for the return home of Rohingya refugees. In April 2018 the first group of Rohingya refugees returned to Myanmar from Bangladesh. Relocation to Bhasan Char island In January 2016, the government of Bangladesh initiated a plan to relocate tens of thousands of forcibly displaced Rohingyas, who had fled to the country following persecution in Myanmar. The refugees are to be relocated to the island of Bhasan Char. The move has received substantial opposition. Human rights groups have seen the plan as a forced relocation. Additionally, concerns have been raised about living conditions on the island, which is low-lying and prone to flooding. The island has been described as "only accessible during winter and a haven for pirates". It is nine hours away from the camps in which the Rohingya currently live. In October 2019, Bangladeshi authorities again announced plans to relocate refugees to the island. On 9 July 2020, HRW urged Bangladeshi authorities to immediately move over 300 Rohingya refugees, including children, from the silt island of Bhasan Char to the Cox's Bazar refugee camps to let them reside with their families. Families in Cox's Bazar told HRW that relatives on Bhasan Char are being held without freedom of movement or adequate access to food or medical care, and face severe shortages of safe drinking water. Genocide In 2015, an assessment by the Yale Law School concluded that the government of Myanmar was waging a concerted campaign against the Rohingya, a campaign which could be classified as genocide under international law. An investigation by the media channel Al Jazeera English, along with the group Fortify Rights, found that the Myanmar military was systematically targeting the Rohingya population because of its ethnicity and religion. The International State Crime Initiative of the University of London issued a report stating that a genocide is taking place against the Rohingya. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees has used the term ethnic cleansing to describe the exodus of Rohingya from Myanmar. In December 2017, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, dismissed the Myanmar government's claims that its operations were merely a response to rebel attacks, and it also indicated that "for us, it was clear... that these operations were organised and planned," and could amount to "genocide." On 24 August 2018, the day before the anniversary of the eruption of extreme violence that came to be known as the "Rohingya Crisis," the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights issued a report (which was not made public until 27 August) which summarised its findings after an investigation was completed into the events of August–September 2017. It declared that the events constituted cause for the Myanmar government—particularly the Myanmar military (the "Tatmadaw") and its commanding officers—to be brought before the International Criminal Court and charged with "crimes against humanity", including "ethnic cleansing" and "genocide." Myanmar officials immediately rejected the charges. Demographics Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80–98% of the population. A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases. Rohingyas have 46% more children than Myanmar's national average. In 2018, 48,000 Rohingya babies were born in Bangladesh, out of a total population of 120,000 fertile women. As of 2014, about 1.3 million Rohingyas lived in Myanmar and an estimated 1 million lived overseas. They constitute 40% of Rakhine State's total population or 60% of it if the overseas Rohingya population is included. As of December 2016, 1/7th stateless of the entire world's stateless population is Rohingya according to United Nations figures. Prior to the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was around 1.1 to 1.3 million They reside mainly in the northern Rakhine townships, where they form 80–98% of the population. Many Rohingyas have fled to southeastern Bangladesh, where there are over 900,000 refugees, as well as to India, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar live in camps for internally displaced persons, and the authorities do not allow them to leave. The following table shows the statistics of Muslim population in Arakan. The data is for all Muslims in Arakan (Rakhine), regardless of ethnicity. The data for Burmese 1802 census is taken from a book by J. S. Furnivall. The British censuses classified immigrants from Chittagong as Bengalis. There were a small number of immigrants from other parts of India. The 1941 census was lost during the war. The 1983 census conducted under the Ne Win's government omitted people in volatile regions. It is unclear how many were missed. British era censuses can be found at Digital Library of India. Culture Rohingya culture shares many similarities to that of other ethnic groups in the region. The clothing worn by most Rohingyas is indistinguishable from those worn by other groups in Myanmar. Men wear bazu (long sleeved shirts) and longgi or doothi (loincloths) covering down to the ankles. Religious scholars prefer wearing kurutha, jubba or panjabi (long tops). In special occasions, Rohingya men sometimes wear taikpon (collarless jackets) on top of their shirts. Lucifica is a type of flat bread regularly eaten by Rohingyas, while bola fica is a popular traditional snack made of rice noodles. Betel leaves, colloquially known as faan, are also popular amongst Rohingyas. Language The Rohingya language is part of the Indo-Aryan sub-branch of the greater Indo-European language family and is related to the Chittagonian language spoken in the southernmost part of Bangladesh bordering Myanmar. While both Rohingya and Chittagonian are related to Bengali, they are not mutually intelligible with the latter. Rohingyas do not speak Burmese, the lingua franca of Myanmar, and face problems in integration. Rohingya scholars have written the Rohingya language in various scripts including the Arabic, Hanifi, Urdu, Roman, and Burmese alphabets, where Hanifi is a newly developed alphabet derived from Arabic with the addition of four characters from Latin and Burmese. More recently, a Latin alphabet has been developed using all 26 English letters A to Z and two additional Latin letters Ç (for retroflex R) and Ñ (for nasal sound). To accurately represent Rohingya phonology, this alphabet also uses five accented vowels (áéíóú). It has been recognised by ISO with ISO 639-3 "rhg" code. Religion Due to the fact that members of Burma's Rohingya Muslim population are not considered citizens of the country, they are not protected against discrimination by the Burmese government. Therefore, concerns exist with regard to the community's lack of religious freedom, especially in the legal and political sphere. The overwhelming majority of Rohingya people practice Islam, including a blend of Sunni Islam and Sufism and about 2.5% of Rohingya are Hindu. The government restricts their educational opportunities; so many of them pursue fundamental Islamic studies as their only option. Mosques and madrasas are present in most villages. Traditionally, men pray in congregations and women pray at home. Muslims have often faced obstacles and struggled to practice their religion in the same way as other individuals in Burma. These struggles have manifested themselves in the form of difficulty in receiving approval for the construction of places of worship, whether they be informal or formal. In the past, they have also been arrested for teaching and practising their religious beliefs. Health The Rohingya face discrimination and barriers to health care. According to a 2016 study published in the medical journal The Lancet, Rohingya children in Myanmar face low birth weight, malnutrition, diarrhoea, and barriers to reproduction on reaching adulthood. Rohingya have a child mortality rate of up to 224 deaths per 1,000 live births, more than 4 times the rate for the rest of Myanmar (52 per 1,000 live births), and 3 times rate of rest non-Rohingya areas of Rakhine state (77 per 1,000 live births). The paper also found that 40% of Rohingya children suffer from diarrhoea in internally displaced persons camp within Myanmar at a rate five times that of diarrhoeal illness among children in the rest of Rakhine. Human rights and refugee status The Rohingya people have been described as "one of the world's least wanted minorities" and "some of the world's most persecuted people". Médecins Sans Frontières claimed that the discrimination and human rights challenges which the Rohingya people have faced at the hands of the country's government and military are "among the world's top ten most under-reported stories of 2007." In February 1992, Myanmar's Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated in a press release, "In actual fact, although there are (135) national races living in Myanmar today, the so-called Rohingya people is not one of them. Historically, there has never been a 'Rohingya' race in Myanmar." The Rohingya are denied freedom of movement as well as the right to receive a higher education. They have been denied Burmese citizenship since the 1982 nationality law was enacted. Post the 1982 law, Burma has had different types of citizenship. Citizens possessed red identity cards; Rohingyas were given white identity cards which essentially classified them as foreigners who were living in Burma. Limitations and restrictions imposed on Rohingya are facilitated by this difference in citizenship. For example, Rohingyas cannot enlist in the army or participate in the government, and they are potentially faced with the issue of illegal immigration. The citizenship law also significantly underlies the human rights violations against the Rohingya by the military. They are not allowed to travel without official permission and they were previously required to sign a commitment not to have more than two children, though the law was not strictly enforced. They are subjected to routine forced labour. (Typically, a Rohingya man has to work on military or government projects one day a week, and perform sentry duty one night a week.) The Rohingya have also lost a lot of arable land, which has been confiscated by the military and given to Buddhist settlers who have moved there from elsewhere in Myanmar. The military is partially responsible for the human rights violations which have been committed against the Rohingya. These violations include destruction of property and forced relocation to another country. One such violation was committed when the military forced Rohingyas in Rakhine to move to Bangladesh. Other human rights violations against Rohingya Muslims include physical violence and sexual violence. The country's military officials rationalised these violations by stating that they were required as part of a census that was going to be conducted in Burma and the military needed to perform these acts in order to find out what the Rohingya Muslims's nationality was. According to Amnesty International, the Rohingya have been subjected to human rights violations by Burma's military dictatorship since 1978, and many of them have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh as a result. The dislocation of the Rohingya Muslims from their homes to other areas can be attributed to factors such as how isolated and undeveloped Rakhine is, the conflict between the Rohingya Muslims and the Buddhists, and the discrimination which they have been subjected to by the government. Members of the Rohingya community were displaced to Bangladesh where the government of the country, non-governmental organisations and the UNHCR gave aid to the refugees by providing them with homes and food. These external organisations (other than those which were controlled by the government) were important because the immigration of the Rohingyas was massive due to the number of people who needed help. In 2005, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees helped the Bangladeshi government repatriate Rohingyas from Bangladesh, but allegations of human rights abuses inside the refugee camps threatened this effort. In 2015, 140,000 Rohingyas were still living in IDP camps, three years after fleeing communal riots in 2012. Despite earlier repatriation efforts by the UN, the vast majority of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh are unable to return to Myanmar due to the communal violence which occurred there in 2012 and their fear of persecution. The Bangladeshi government has reduced the amount of support it allocates to the Rohingyas in order to prevent an outflow of Rohingya refugees into Bangladesh. In February 2009, many Rohingya refugees were rescued by Acehnese sailors in the Strait of Malacca, after 21 days at sea. Thousands of Rohingyas have also fled to Thailand. There have been charges that Rohingyas were shipped and towed out to the open sea from Thailand. In February 2009, evidence showing the Thai army towing a boatload of 190 Rohingya refugees out to sea surfaced. A group of refugees who were rescued by Indonesian authorities stated that they were captured and beaten by the Thai military, and then abandoned at sea. Steps to repatriate Rohingya refugees began in 2005. In 2009, the government of Bangladesh announced that it would repatriate around 9,000 Rohingyas who were living in refugee camps inside the country back to Myanmar, after a meeting with Burmese diplomats. On 16 October 2011, the new government of Myanmar agreed to take back registered Rohingya refugees. However, these repatriation efforts were hampered by the Rakhine riots in 2012. On 29 March 2014, the Burmese government banned the word "Rohingya" and asked that members of the minority group be registered as "Bengalis" in the 2014 Myanmar Census, the first census to be held in three decades. On 7 May 2014, the United States House of Representatives passed the United States House resolution on persecution of the Rohingya people in Burma that called on the government of Myanmar to end the discrimination and persecution. Researchers from the International State Crime Initiative at Queen Mary University of London suggest that the Myanmar government is in the final stages of an organised process of genocide against the Rohingya. In November 2016, a senior UN official in Bangladesh accused Myanmar of ethnic cleansing of Rohingyas. However, Charles Petrie, a former top UN official in Myanmar, said that "Today using the term, aside from being divisive and potentially incorrect, will only ensure that opportunities and options to try to resolve the issue to be addressed will not be available. In September 2020, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, has warned that the killing and abductions of Rohingyas have not stopped, despite the International Court of Justice ordering Myanmar's leadership to prevent genocide and stop the killings in December 2019. Some countries like Malaysia have rejected the resettlement of Rohingya refugees and sent them back to sea because of economic difficulties and the Coronavirus pandemic. Malaysian authorities have also expressed concern that militant Rohingya groups have been raising funds by extorting money from Rohingya refugees in the country. See also International reactions to the Rohingya genocide Kamein List of ethnic groups in Myanmar Min Aung Hlaing Persecution of Muslims Notes References Citations General sources (in alphabetical order) "Burma's Western Border as Reported by the Diplomatic Correspondence (1947–1975)" by Aye Chan "Burma's Western Border as Reported by the Diplomatic Correspondence (1947–1975)" by Aye Chan International Center for Transitional Justice, Myanmar External links Ethnic groups in Bangladesh Ethnic groups in Myanmar Ethnic groups in Pakistan Indo-Aryan peoples Islam in Myanmar Muslim ethnoreligious groups Refugees in Indonesia Refugees in Malaysia Stateless nationalism in Asia Stateless people	true	[ "\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer", "Else-Marie is a compound given name, composed of Else and Marie. Notable people with the name include:\n\n Else Marie Jakobsen (1927–2012), Norwegian designer and textile artist\n Else-Marie Lindgren (born 1949), Swedish politician\n Else-Marie Ljungdahl (born 1942), Swedish sprint canoer\n\nCompound given names" ]
[ "Rohingya people", "Demographics", "What are some of the demographics?", "Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80-98% of the population.", "What else is notable?", "A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases." ]	C_af72bf4729054b89b3bc329a5569f6e3_0	What other interesting demographics are discussed?	3	What other interesting demographics are discussed about the Rohingya people other than their family size?	Rohingya people	Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80-98% of the population. A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases. Rohingyas have 46% more children than Myanmar's national average. As of 2014, about 1.3 million Rohingyas live in Myanmar and an estimated 1 million overseas. They form 40% of Rakhine State's population or 60% if overseas population is included. As of December 2016, 1 in 7 stateless persons worldwide are Rohingya per United Nations figures, and the Rohingya are the world's largest stateless community. Prior to the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was around 1.1 to 1.3 million They reside mainly in the northern Rakhine townships, where they form 80-98% of the population. Many Rohingyas have fled to southeastern Bangladesh, where there are over 900,000 refugees, as well as to India, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar live in camps for internally displaced persons, and the authorities do not allow them to leave. The following table shows the statistics of Muslim population in Arakan. The data is for all Muslims in Arakan (Rakhine), regardless of ethnicity. The data for Burmese 1802 census is taken from a book by J. S. Furnivall. The British censuses classified immigrants from Chittagong as Bengalis. There were a small number of immigrants from other parts of India. The 1941 census was lost during the war. The 1983 census conducted under the Ne Win's government omitted people in volatile regions. It is unclear how many were missed. British era censuses can be found at Digital Library of India. CANNOTANSWER	Rohingyas have 46% more children than Myanmar's national average. As of 2014, about 1.3 million Rohingyas live in Myanmar and an estimated 1 million overseas.	The Rohingya people () are a stateless Indo-Aryan ethnic group who predominantly follow Islam and reside in Rakhine State, Myanmar (previously known as Burma). Before the Rohingya genocide in 2017, when over 740,000 fled to Bangladesh, an estimated 1.4 million Rohingya lived in Myanmar. Described by journalists and news outlets as one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, the Rohingya are denied citizenship under the 1982 Myanmar nationality law. There are also restrictions on their freedom of movement, access to state education and civil service jobs. The legal conditions faced by the Rohingya in Myanmar have been compared to apartheid by some academics, analysts and political figures, including Nobel laureate Bishop Desmond Tutu, a South African anti-apartheid activist. The most recent mass displacement of Rohingya in 2017 led the International Criminal Court investigating crimes against humanity, and led to the International Court of Justice investigating genocide. The Rohingya maintain they are indigenous to western Myanmar with a heritage of over a millennium and influence from the Arabs, Mughals and Portuguese. The community claims it is descended from people in precolonial Arakan and colonial Arakan; historically, the region was an independent kingdom between Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent. The Myanmar government considers the Rohingya as colonial and postcolonial migrants from neighbouring Chittagong/East Bengal respectively Bangladesh. It argues that a distinct precolonial Muslim population is recognized as Kaman, and that the Rohingya conflate their history with the history of Arakan Muslims in general to advance a separatist agenda. In addition, Myanmar's government does not recognise the term "Rohingya" and prefers to refer to the community as "Bengali". Rohingya campaign groups and human rights organizations demand the right to "self-determination within Myanmar". Various armed insurrections by the Rohingya have taken place since the 1940s and the population as a whole has faced military crackdowns in 1978, 1991–1992, 2012, 2015, and particularly in 2016-2018, when most of the Rohingya population of Myanmar was driven out of the country, into neighbouring Bangladesh. By December 2017, an estimated 625,000 refugees from Rakhine, Myanmar, had crossed the border into Bangladesh since August 2017. UN officials and Human Rights Watch have described Myanmar's persecution of the Rohingya as ethnic cleansing. The UN human rights envoy to Myanmar reported "the long history of discrimination and persecution against the Rohingya community... could amount to crimes against humanity", and there have been warnings of an unfolding genocide. Probes by the UN have found evidence of increasing incitement of hatred and religious intolerance by "ultra-nationalist Buddhists" against Rohingyas while the Myanmar security forces have been conducting "summary executions, enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrests and detentions, torture and ill-treatment, and forced labour" against the community. Before the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was close to 1.4 million, chiefly in the northern Rakhine townships, which were 80–98% Rohingya. Since 2015, over 900,000 Rohingya refugees have fled to south-eastern Bangladesh alone, and more to other surrounding countries, and major Muslim nations. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar are confined in camps for internally displaced persons. Shortly before a Rohingya rebel attack that killed 12 security forces on 25 August 2017, the Myanmar military launched "clearance operations" against the Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine state that, according to NGOs, the Bangladeshi government and international news media, left many dead, and many more injured, tortured or raped, with villages burned. The government of Myanmar has denied the allegations. Nomenclature The modern term Rohingya emerged from colonial and pre-colonial terms Rooinga and Rwangya. The Rohingya refer to themselves as Ruáingga . In Burmese they are known as rui hang gya (following the MLC Transcription System) ( ) while in Bengali they are called Rohingga ( ). The term "Rohingya" may come from Rakhanga or Roshanga, the words for the state of Arakan. The word Rohingya would then mean "inhabitant of Rohang", which was the early Muslim name for Arakan. The usage of the term Rohingya has been historically documented prior to the British Raj. In 1799, Francis Buchanan wrote an article called "A Comparative Vocabulary of Some of the Languages Spoken in the Burma Empire", which was found and republished by Michael Charney in the SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research in 2003. Among the native groups of Arakan, he wrote are the: "Mohammedans, who have long settled in Arakan, and who call themselves Rooinga, or natives of Arakan." The Classical Journal of 1811 identified "Rooinga" as one of the languages spoken in the "Burmah Empire". In 1815, Johann Severin Vater listed "Ruinga" as an ethnic group with a distinct language in a compendium of languages published in German. In 1936, when Burma was still under British rule, the "Rohingya Jam’iyyat al Ulama" was founded in Arakan. According to Jacques Leider, the Rohingya were referred to as "Chittagonians" during the British colonial period, and it was not controversial to refer to them as "Bengalis" until the 1990s. Leider also states that "there is no international consensus" on the use of the term Rohingya, as they are often called "Rohingya Muslims", "Muslim Arakanese" and "Burmese Muslims". Others, such as anthropologist Christina Fink, use Rohingya not as an ethnic identifier but as a political one. Leider believes the Rohingya is a political movement that started in the 1950s to create "an autonomous Muslim zone" in Rakhine. The government of Prime Minister U Nu, when Burma was a democracy from 1948 to 1962, used the term "Rohingya" in radio addresses as a part of peace-building effort in Mayu Frontier Region. The term was broadcast on Burmese radio and was used in the speeches of Burmese rulers. A UNHCR report on refugees caused by Operation King Dragon referred to the victims as "Bengali Muslims (called Rohingyas)". Nevertheless, the term Rohingya wasn't widely used until the 1990s. Today the use of the name "Rohingya" is polarised. The government of Myanmar refuses to use the name. In the 2014 census, the Myanmar government forced the Rohingya to identify themselves as "Bengali". Many Rohingya see the denial of their name similar to denying their basic rights, and the U.N. Special Rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar has agreed. Jacques Leider writes that many Muslims in Rakhine simply prefer to call themselves "Muslim Arakanese" or "Muslims coming from Rakhine" instead of "Rohingya". The United States embassy in Yangon continues to use the name "Rohingya". History Early history The Rohingya population is concentrated in the historical region of Arakan, an old coastal country in Southeast Asia. It is not clear who the original settlers of Arakan were. Burmese traditional history claims that the Rakhine have inhabited Arakan since 3000 BCE but there is no archaeological evidence to support the claim. By the 4th century, Arakan became one of the earliest Indianized kingdoms in Southeast Asia. The first Arakanese state flourished in Dhanyawadi. Power then shifted to the city of Waithali. Sanskrit inscriptions in the region indicate that the founders of the first Arakanese states were Indian. Arakan was ruled by the Chandra dynasty. The British historian Daniel George Edward Hall stated that "The Burmese do not seem to have settled in Arakan until possibly as late as the tenth century CE. Hence earlier dynasties are thought to have been Indian, ruling over a population similar to that of Bengal. All the capitals known to history have been in the north near modern Akyab". Arrival of Islam Due to its coastline on the Bay of Bengal, Arakan was a key centre of maritime trade and cultural exchange between Burma and the outside world, since the time of the Indian Mauryan Empire. According to Syed Islam, a political science scholar, Arab merchants had been in contact with Arakan since the third century, using the Bay of Bengal to reach Arakan. A southern branch of the Silk Road connected India, Burma, and China since the neolithic period. Arab traders are recorded in the coastal areas of southeast Bengal, bordering Arakan, since the 9th century. The Rohingya population trace their history to this period. According to Syed Islam, the earliest Muslim settlements in the Arakan region began in the 7th-century. The Arab traders were also missionaries and they began converting the local Buddhist population to Islam by about 788 CE, states Syed Islam. Besides these locals converting to Islam, Arab merchants married local women and later settled in Arakan. As a result of intermarriage and conversion, the Muslim population in Arakan grew. This claim by Sayed Islam saying that, by 788 CE, locals in Arakan were being converted into Muslims clearly contradicts historian Yegar's findings which say, even in 1203, Bengal is the easternmost point of Islamic expansion, not to say further into Arakan. The alternate view contests that Islam arrived in the Arakan region in the 1st-millennium. According to this view, this Rohingya history is not based on any evidence, rather is based on "fictitious stories, myths and legends". According to Southeast Asian Buddhism history scholar and an ordained Buddhist monk Ashon Nyanuttara, there is scant historical data and archaeological evidence about the early political and religious history of the Arakan people and the Rakhaing region. The limited evidence available suggests that Buddhism, possibly the Mahayana tradition, was well established by the 4th-century in the region under the Candra Buddhist dynasty. Muslim community's expansion and the growth of Islam into the region came much later with Bengali Muslims from the region that is now a part of Bangladesh. Further, the term "Rohingya" does not appear in any regional text of this period and much later. That term was adopted by "a few Bengali Muslim intellectuals who were direct descendants of immigrants from Chittagong district [Bengal]" in the 20th-century, states historian Aye Chan. Kingdom of Mrauk U The Rakhines were one of the tribes of the Burmese Pyu city-states. The Rakhines began migrating to Arakan through the Arakan Mountains in the 9th century. The Rakhines established numerous cities in the valley of the Lemro River. These included Sambawak I, Pyinsa, Parein, Hkrit, Sambawak II, Myohaung, Toungoo and Launggret. Burmese forces invaded the Rakhine cities in 1406. The Burmese invasion forced Rakhine rulers to seek help and refuge from neighbouring Bengal in the north. Early evidence of Bengali Muslim settlements in Arakan date back to the time of Min Saw Mon (1430–34) of the Kingdom of Mrauk U. After 24 years of exile in Bengal, he regained control of the Arakanese throne in 1430 with military assistance from the Bengal Sultanate. The Bengalis who came with him formed their own settlements in the region. The Santikan Mosque built in the 1430s, features a court which "measures from north to south and from east to west; the shrine is a rectangular structure measuring ." King Min Saw Mon ceded some territory to the Sultan of Bengal and recognised his sovereignty over the areas. In recognition of his kingdom's vassal status, the Buddhist kings of Arakan received Islamic titles and used the Bengali gold dinar within the kingdom. Min Saw Mon minted his own coins with the Burmese alphabet on one side and the Persian alphabet on the other. Arakan's vassalage to Bengal was brief. After Sultan Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah's death in 1433, Narameikhla's successors invaded Bengal and occupied Ramu in 1437 and Chittagong in 1459. Arakan would hold Chittagong until 1666. Even after independence from the Sultans of Bengal, the Arakanese kings continued the custom of maintaining Muslim titles. The Buddhist kings compared themselves to Sultans and fashioned themselves after Mughal rulers. They also continued to employ Muslims in prestigious positions within the royal administration. Some of them worked as Bengali, Persian and Arabic scribes in the Arakanese courts, which, despite remaining Buddhist, adopted Islamic fashions from the neighbouring Bengal Sultanate. The population increased in the 17th century, as slaves were brought in by Arakanese raiders and Portuguese settlers following raids into Bengal. Slaves included members of the Mughal nobility. A notable royal slave was Alaol, a renowned poet in the Arakanese court. The slave population were employed in a variety of workforces, including in the king's army, commerce and agriculture. In 1660, Prince Shah Shuja, the governor of Mughal Bengal and a claimant of the Peacock Throne, fled to Arakan with his family after being defeated by his brother Emperor Aurangzeb during the Battle of Khajwa. Shuja and his entourage arrived in Arakan on 26 August 1660. He was granted asylum by King Sanda Thudhamma. In December 1660, the Arakanese king confiscated Shuja's gold and jewellery, leading to an insurrection by the royal Mughal refugees. According to varying accounts, Shuja's family was killed by the Arakanese, while Shuja himself may have fled to a kingdom in Manipur. However, members of Shuja's entourage remained in Arakan and were recruited by the royal army, including as archers and court guards. They were king makers in Arakan until the Burmese conquest. The Arakanese continued their raids of Mughal Bengal. Dhaka was raided in 1625. Emperor Aurangzeb gave orders to his governor in Mughal Bengal, Shaista Khan, to end what the Mughals saw as Arakanese-Portuguese piracy. In 1666, Shaista Khan led a army and 288 warships to seize Chittagong from the Kingdom of Mrauk U. The Mughal expedition continued up till the Kaladan River. The Mughals placed the northern part of Arakan under its administration and vassalage. Burmese conquest Following the Konbaung Dynasty's conquest of Arakan in 1785, as many as 35,000 people of the Rakhine State fled to the neighbouring Chittagong region of British Bengal in 1799 to escape persecution by the Bamar and to seek protection under the British Raj. The Bamar executed thousands of men and deported a considerable portion of the population to central Burma, leaving Arakan a scarcely populated area by the time the British occupied it. According to an article on the "Burma Empire" published by the British Francis Buchanan-Hamilton in 1799, "the Mohammedans, who have long settled in Arakan", "call themselves Rooinga, or natives of Arakan". However, according to Derek Tokin, Hamilton no longer used the term to refer to the Muslims in Arakan in his later publications. Sir Henry Yule saw many Muslims serving as eunuchs in Konbaung while on a diplomatic mission to the Burmese capital, Ava. British colonial rule British policy encouraged Bengali inhabitants from adjacent regions to migrate into the then lightly populated and fertile valleys of Arakan as farm labourers. The East India Company extended the Bengal Presidency to Arakan. There was no international boundary between Bengal and Arakan and no restrictions on migration between the regions. In the early 19th century, thousands of Bengalis from the Chittagong region settled in Arakan seeking work. It is hard to know whether these new Bengal migrants were the same population that was deported by force to Bengal's Chittagong during the Burmese conquest in the 18th century and later returned to Arakan as a result of British policy or they were a new migrant population with no ancestral roots to Arakan. The British census of 1872 reported 58,255 Muslims in Akyab District. By 1911, the Muslim population had increased to 178,647. The waves of migration were primarily due to the requirement of cheap labour from British India to work in the paddy fields. Immigrants from Bengal, mainly from the Chittagong region, "moved en masse into western townships of Arakan". Albeit Indian immigration to Burma was a nationwide phenomenon, not just restricted to Arakan. For these reasons historians believed that most Rohingyas arrived with the British colonialists in the 19th and 20th centuries with some tracing their ancestry much further. According to Thant Myint-U, historian and adviser to President Thein Sein, "At the beginning of the 20th century, Indians were arriving in Burma at the rate of no less than a quarter million per year. The numbers rose steadily until the peak year of 1927, immigration reached 480,000 people, with Rangoon exceeding New York City as the greatest immigration port in the world. This was out of a total population of only 13 million; it was equivalent to the United Kingdom today taking 2 million people a year." By then, in most of the largest cities in Burma, Rangoon, Akyab, Bassein and Moulmein, the Indian immigrants formed a majority of the population. All of Burma was officially a Province within the British Indian Empire ('the Raj') from November 1885 until 1937, when Burma became a separate Crown colony within the British Empire. The Burmese under British rule felt helpless, and reacted with a "racism that combined feelings of superiority and fear". Professor Andrew Selth of Griffith University writes that although a few Rohingya trace their ancestry to Muslims who lived in Arakan in the 15th and 16h centuries, most Rohingyas arrived with the British colonialists in the 19th and 20th centuries. Most have argued that Rohingya existed from the four waves of Muslim migrations from the ancient times to medieval, to the British colony. Gutman (1976) and Ibrahim (2016) claiming that the Muslim population dates before the arrival of ethnic Rakhine in the 9th to 10th century. Suggesting the Rohingya are descendants of the of a pre-Arakan population who existed for 3 thousand years and waves of Muslim who intermingled forming modern Rohingya. The impact of this immigration was particularly acute in Arakan. Although it boosted the colonial economy, local Arakanese bitterly resented it. According to historian Clive J. Christie, "The issue became a focus for grass-roots Burmese nationalism, and in the years 1930–31 there were serious anti-Indian disturbances in Lower Burma, while 1938 saw riots specifically directed against the Indian Muslim community. As Burmese nationalism increasingly asserted itself before the Second World War, the 'alien' Indian presence inevitably came under attack, along with the religion that the Indian Muslims imported. The Muslims of northern Arakan were to be caught in the crossfire of this conflict." In the 1931 census, the Muslim population of Burma was 584,839, 4% of the total population of 14,647,470 at the time. 396,504 were Indian Muslims and 1,474 Chinese Muslims, while 186,861 were Burmese Muslims. The census found a growth in the number of Indian Muslims born in Burma, primarily due to their permanent settlement in Akyab. 41% of Muslims of Burma lived in Arakan at that time. Shipping Due to the terrain of the Arakan Mountains, the Arakan region was mostly accessible by sea. In British Arakan Division, the port of Akyab had ferry services and a thriving trade with the ports of Chittagong, Narayanganj, Dacca and Calcutta in British India; as well as with Rangoon. Akyab was one of the leading rice ports in the world, hosting ship fleets from Europe and China. Many Indians settled in Akyab and dominated its seaport and hinterland. The 1931 census found 500,000 Indians living in Akyab. Legislators Several Rohingyas were elected to Burmese native seats in the Legislative Council of Burma and Legislature of Burma. During the 1936 Burmese general election, Advocate U Pho Khaine was elected from Akyab West and Gani Markan was elected from Maungdaw-Buthidaung. In 1939, U Tanvy Markan was elected from Maungdaw-Buthidaung. Their elections in the Burmese native category set them apart from immigrant Indian legislators. World War II During World War II, the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) invaded British-controlled Burma. The British forces retreated and in the power vacuum left behind, considerable inter-communal violence erupted between Arakanese and Muslim villagers. The British armed Muslims in northern Arakan in order to create a buffer zone that would protect the region from a Japanese invasion when they retreated and to counteract the largely pro-Japanese ethnic Rakhines. The period also witnessed violence between groups loyal to the British and the Burmese nationalists. The Arakan massacres in 1942 involved communal violence between British-armed V Force Rohingya recruits and , polarising the region along ethnic lines. Tensions boiling in Arakan before the war erupted during the Japanese invasion of Southeast Asia and Arakan became the frontline in the conflict. The war resulted in a complete breakdown of civil administration and consequent development of habits of lawlessness exacerbated by the availability of modern firearms. The Japanese advance triggered an inter-communal conflict between Muslims and Buddhists. The Muslims fled towards British-controlled Muslim-dominated northern Arakan from Japanese-controlled Buddhist-majority areas. This stimulated a "reverse ethnic cleansing" in British-controlled areas, particularly around Maungdaw. Failure of a British counter-offensive, attempted from December 1942 to April 1943, resulted in the abandonment of even more of the Muslim population as well as an increase in inter-communal violence. Moshe Yegar, a research fellow at Truman Institute, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, noted that hostility had developed between the Muslims and the Buddhists who had brought about a similar hostility in other parts of Burma. This tension was let loose with the retreat of the British. With the approach of the Japanese into Arakan, the Buddhists instigated cruel measures against the Muslims. Thousands, though the exact number is unknown, fled from Buddhist-majority regions to eastern Bengal and northern Arakan with many being killed or dying of starvation. The Muslims in response conducted retaliatory raids from British-controlled areas, causing Buddhists to flee to southern Arakan. Aye Chan, a historian at Kanda University in Japan, has written that as a consequence of acquiring arms from the British during World War II, Rohingyas tried to destroy the Arakanese villages instead of resisting the Japanese. Chan agrees that hundreds of Muslims fled to northern Arakan, though states that the accounts of atrocities on them were exaggerated. In March 1942, Rohingyas from northern Arakan killed around 20,000 Arakanese. In return, around 5,000 Muslims in the Minbya and Mrauk-U Townships were killed by Rakhines and Red Karens. As in the rest of Burma, the IJA committed acts of rape, murder and torture against Muslims in Arakan. During this period, some 22,000 Muslims in Arakan were believed to have crossed the border into Bengal, then part of British India, to escape the violence. The exodus was not restricted to Muslims in Arakan. Thousands of Burmese Indians, Anglo-Burmese and British who settled during the colonial period emigrated en masse to India. To facilitate their reentry into Burma, the British formed Volunteer Forces with Rohingya. Over the three years during which the Allies and Japanese fought over the Mayu peninsula, the Rohingya recruits of the V-Force, engaged in a campaign against Arakanese communities, using weapons provided by V-Force. According to the secretary of the British governor, the V Force, instead of fighting the Japanese, destroyed Buddhist monasteries, pagodas, and houses, and committed atrocities in northern Arakan. The British Army's liaison officer, Anthony Irwin, on the other hand, praised the role of the V Force. Pakistan Movement During the Pakistan Movement in the 1940s, Rohingya Muslims in western Burma organised a separatist movement to merge the region into East Pakistan. The commitments of the British regarding the status of Muslims after the war are not clear. V Force officers like Andrew Irwin felt that Muslims along with other minorities must be rewarded for their loyalty. Muslim leaders believed that the British had promised them a "Muslim National Area" in Maungdaw region. They were also apprehensive of a future Buddhist-dominated government. In 1946, calls were made for annexation of the territory by Pakistan as well as of an independent state. Before the independence of Burma in January 1948, Muslim leaders from Arakan addressed themselves to Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, and asked his assistance in incorporating the Mayu region to Pakistan considering their religious affinity and geographical proximity with East Pakistan. The North Arakan Muslim League was founded in Akyab (modern Sittwe) two months later. The proposal never materialised since it was reportedly turned down by Jinnah, saying that he was not in a position to interfere in Burmese matters. Post-WWII migration The numbers and the extent of post-independence immigration from Bangladesh are subject to controversy and debate. In a 1955 study published by Stanford University, the authors Virginia Thompson and Richard Adloff write, "The post-war (World War II) illegal immigration of Chittagonians into that area was on a vast scale, and in the Maungdaw and Buthidaung areas they replaced the Arakanese." The authors further argue that the term Rohingya, in the form of Rwangya, first appeared to distinguish settled population from newcomers: "The newcomers were called Mujahids (crusaders), in contrast to the Rwangya or settled Chittagonian population." According to the International Crisis Group (ICG), these immigrants were actually the Rohingyas who were displaced by World War II and began to return to Arakan after the independence of Burma but were rendered as illegal immigrants, while many were not allowed to return. ICG adds that there were "some 17,000" refugees from the Bangladesh liberation war who "subsequently returned home". Burmese independence On 25 September 1954, the then Prime Minister U Nu in his radio address to the nation talked about Rohingya Muslims’ political loyalty to predominantly Buddhist Burma. This usage of the term ‘Rohingya’ is important in the sense that today Myanmar denies to accept this category altogether and calls them ’Bengali’. During the same time a separate administrative zone May Yu was established comprising most of the present North Rakhine State, which had Rohingya as its majority ethnic group. One of the objectives of this Muslim majority zone was to ‘strive for peace with Pakistan’. Brigadier Aung Gyi, one of the deputies of General Ne Win, in 1961 explained Rohingya as; “On the west, May Yu district borders with Pakistan. As is the case with all borderlands communities, there are Muslims on both sides of the borders. Those who are on Pakistan’s side are known as Pakistani while the Muslims on our Burmese side of the borders are referred to as ‘Rohingya’. But since Burma's military junta took control of the country in 1962, the Rohingya have been systematically deprived of their political rights. In 1962 military dictator General Ne Win, took over the government and started implementing a Nationalist agenda, which had its roots in racial discrimination. In 1978 military government launched operation Nagamin to separate nationals from non-nationals. This was the first concerted large scale violent attack on Rohingya. National Registration Cards (NRC) were taken away by state actors never to be replaced. Violence that followed forced 200,000 Rohingya to flee to Bangladesh. Bangladesh denied Rohingya admission into her territory and blocked food rations leading to death of 12,000 of them. After bilateral negotiations Rohingya were repatriated. Rohingya political participation in Burma In the prelude to independence, two Rohingyas were elected to the Constituent Assembly of Burma in 1947, M. A. Gaffar and Sultan Ahmed. After Burma became independent in 1948, M. A. Gaffar presented a memorandum of appeal to the Government of the Union of Burma calling for the recognition of the term "Rohingya", based on local Indian names of Arakan (Rohan and Rohang), as the official name of the ethnicity. Sultan Ahmed, who served as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Minorities, was a member of the Justice Sir Ba U Commission charged with exploring whether Arakan Division should be granted statehood. During the 1951 Burmese general election, five Rohingyas were elected to the Parliament of Burma, including one of the country's first two female MPs, Zura Begum. Six MPs were elected during the 1956 Burmese general election and subsequent by-elections. Sultan Mahmud, a former politician in British India, became Minister of Health in the cabinet of Prime Minister of Burma U Nu. In 1960, Mahmud suggested that either Rohingya-majority northern Arakan remain under the central government or be made a separate province. However, during the 1960 Burmese general election, Prime Minister U Nu's pledges included making all of Arakan into one province. The 1962 Burmese coup d'état ended the country's Westminster-style political system. The 1982 Burmese citizenship law stripped most of the Rohingyas of their stake in citizenship. Rohingya community leaders were supportive of the 8888 uprising for democracy. During the 1990 Burmese general election, the Rohingya-led National Democratic Party for Human Rights won four seats in the Burmese parliament. The four Rohingya MPs included Shamsul Anwarul Huq, Chit Lwin Ebrahim, Fazal Ahmed and Nur Ahmed. The election was won by the National League for Democracy led by Aung San Suu Kyi, who was placed under house arrest and not permitted to become prime minister. The Burmese military junta banned the National Democratic Party for Human Rights in 1992. Its leaders were arrested, jailed and tortured. Rohingya politicians have been jailed to disbar them from contesting elections. In 2005, Shamsul Anwarul Huq was charged under Section 18 of the controversial 1982 Burmese citizenship law and sentenced to 47 years in prison. In 2015, a ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party MP Shwe Maung was disbarred from the 2015 Burmese general election, on grounds that his parents were not Burmese citizens under the 1982 citizenship law. As of 2017, Burma does not have a single Rohingya MP and the Rohingya population have no voting rights. Mayu Frontier District A separate administrative zone for the Rohingya-majority northern areas of Arakan existed between 1961 and 1964. Known as the Mayu Frontier District, the zone was set up by Prime Minister U Nu after the 1960 Burmese general election, on the advice of his health minister Sultan Mahmud. The zone was administered directly from Rangoon by the national government. After the Burmese military coup in 1962, the zone was administered by the Burmese army. It was transferred to the Ministry of Home Affairs in 1964 by the Union Revolutionary Council. The socialist military government inducted the zone into Arakan State in 1974. Expulsion of Burmese Indians Racism towards people with links to the Indian subcontinent increased after the 1962 Burmese coup. The socialist military government nationalised all property, including many enterprises of the white collar Burmese Indian community. Between 1962 and 1964, 320,000 Burmese Indians were forced to leave the country. Refugee crisis of 1978 As a result of Operation King Dragon by the Burmese junta, the first wave of Rohingya refugees entered Bangladesh in 1978. An estimated 200,000 Rohingyas took shelter in Cox's Bazaar. Diplomatic initiatives over 16 months resulted in a repatriation agreement, which allowed the return of most refugees under a process facilitated by UNHCR. The return of refugees to Burma has been the second largest repatriation process in Asia after the return of Cambodian refugees from Thailand. 1982 Citizenship Law In 1982, the citizenship law enacted by the Burmese military junta did not list the Rohingya as one of the 135 "national races" of Burma. This made much of the Rohingya population in Burma stateless in their historical homeland of Arakan. General Ne Win drafted Citizenship Act in 1982, which denied citizenship rights to any community/group that was not listed in a survey conducted by British in 1824. All other ethnic groups were considered aliens to the land or invaders. Eight major ethnicities Arakan, Chin, Kachin, Karen, Kayah, Mon, Shan, and Burmese were broken into 135 small ethnic groups. Groups like Rohingya who do not belong to any of these 135 ethnicities were denied citizenship rights. Taking into account just one survey for defining the history of a group of people is highly problematic. It overlooks the fact that Rohingya were mentioned in records earlier to this survey. Scholars like Maung Zarni have argued that Burmese military ‘encoded its anti-Indian and anti-Muslim racism in its laws and policies’. He further argues; “The 1982 Citizenship Act serves as the state’s legal and ideological foundation on which all forms of violence, execution, restrictions, and human rights crimes are justified and committed with state impunity if carried out horizontally by the local ultra-nationalist Rakhine Buddhists. In light of the on-the-ground link between the legalised removal of citizenship from the Rohingya and the implementation of a permanent set of draconian laws and policies—as opposed to periodic “anti-immigration” operations—amount to the infliction on the Rohingya of conditions of life designed to bring about serious bodily and mental harm and to destroy the group in whole or in part. As such, the illegalisation of the Rohingya in Myanmar is an indication of the intent of the State to both remove the Rohingya permanently from their homeland and to destroy the Rohingya as a group.” Refugee crisis of 1991–1992 After Burmese military junta began persecuting the political opposition following Aung San Suu Kyi's victory in the 1990 election and the earlier 1988 Uprising, military operations targeting Muslims (who strongly favoured the pro-democracy movement) began in Arakan State. The Rohingya-led NDPHR political party was banned and its leaders were jailed. Suu Kyi herself was placed under house arrest by the junta led by General Than Shwe. As the Burmese military increased its operations across the country, the Maungdaw, Buthidaung and Rathedaung townships in northern Arakan became centers of persecution. The 23rd and 24th regiments of the Tatmadaw (Myanmar Army) were responsible for promoting forced labour, rape, the confiscation of houses, land and farm animals, the destruction of mosques, a ban on religious activities and the harassment of the religious priests. An estimated 250,000 refugees crossed over into Bangladesh. In Bangladesh, the refugee influx was a challenge for the newly elected government of the country's first female prime minister Khaleda Zia (who headed the first parliamentary government since 1975). Both Bangladesh and Burma mobilised thousands of troops along the border during the crisis. The government of Bangladesh emphasised a peaceful resolution of the crisis. After diplomatic negotiations, a repatriation agreement was put in place to allow the return of refugees to Burma under a UNHCR-supervised process. Name change from Arakan to Rakhine State In 1989, the junta officially changed the name of Burma to Myanmar. In the 1990s, the junta changed the name of the province of Arakan to Rakhine State, which showed a bias towards the Rakhine community, even though the Rohingya formed a substantial part of the population. The name of the region was historically known as Arakan for centuries. Denial of the "Rohingya" term The colloquial term Rohingya can be traced back to the pre-colonial period. The Rohingya community have also been known as Arakanese Indians and Arakanese Muslims. Since the 1982 citizenship law, Burmese juntas and governments have strongly objected to the usage of the term of Rohingya, preferring to label the community as "bengali illegal immigrants". The derogatory slur kalar is widely used in Myanmar against the Rohingya. Myanmar's government has often pressured diplomats and foreign delegates against uttering the term Rohingya. Conflict in Arakan The Rakhine for their part felt discriminated against by the governments in Rangoon dominated by the ethnic Burmese with one Rakhine politician saying, "we are therefore the victims of Muslimisation and Burmese chauvinism." The Economist wrote in 2015 that from the 1940s on and right to this day, the Burmens have seen and see themselves as victims of the British Empire while the Rakhine see themselves as victims of the British and the Burmens; both groups were and are so intent upon seeing themselves as victims that neither has much sympathy for the Rohingyas. After Jinnah's refusal to accept northern Arakan into the Dominion of Pakistan, some Rohingya elders who supported a jihad movement, founded the Mujahid party in northern Arakan in 1947. The aim of the Mujahid party was to create an autonomous Islamic state in Arakan. By the 1950s, they began to use the term "Rohingya" which may be a continuation of the term Rooinga to establish a distinct identity and identify themselves as indigenous. They were much more active before the 1962 Burmese coup d'état by General Ne Win, a Burmese general who began his military career fighting for the Japanese in World War II. Ne Win carried out military operations against them over a period of two decades. The prominent one was Operation King Dragon, which took place in 1978; as a result, many Muslims in the region fled to neighbouring Bangladesh as refugees. In addition to Bangladesh, a large number of Rohingyas also migrated to Karachi, Pakistan. Rohingya mujahideen are still active within the remote areas of Arakan. From 1971 to 1978, a number of Rakhine monks and Buddhists staged hunger strikes in Sittwe to force the government to tackle immigration issues which they believed to be causing a demographic shift in the region. Ne Win's government requested UN to repatriate the war refugees and launched military operations which drove off around 200,000 people to Bangladesh. In 1978, the Bangladesh government protested against the Burmese government concerning "the expulsion by force of thousands of Burmese Muslim citizens to Bangladesh". The Burmese government responded that those expelled were Bangladesh citizens who had resided illegally in Burma. In July 1978, after intensive negotiations mediated by UN, Ne Win's government agreed to take back 200,000 refugees who settled in Arakan. In the same year as well as in 1992, a joint statement by governments of Myanmar and Bangladesh "acknowledged that the Rohingya were lawful Burmese residents". In 1982, the Burmese government enacted the citizenship law and declared the "Bengalis" are foreigners. There are widespread beliefs among Rakhine people that significant number of immigrants arrived even after the 1980s when the border was relatively unguarded. However, there is no documentation proof for these claims as the last census was conducted in 1983. Successive Burmese governments have fortified the border and built up border guard forces. After 1988 Burmese pro-democracy uprising Since the 1990s, a new 'Rohingya' movement which is distinct from the 1950s armed rebellion has emerged. The new movement is characterised by lobbying internationally by overseas diaspora, establishing indigenous claims by Rohingya scholars, publicising the term "Rohingya" and denying Bengali origins by Rohingya politicians. Rohingya scholars have claimed that Rakhine was previously an Islamic state for a millennium, or that Muslims were king-makers of Rakhine kings for 350 years. They often traced the origin of Rohingyas to Arab seafarers. These claims have been rejected as "newly invented myths" in academic circles. Some Rohingya politicians have labelled Burmese and international historians as "Rakhine sympathizers" for rejecting the purported historical origins. The movement has garnered sharp criticisms from ethnic Rakhines and Kamans, the latter of whom are a recognised Muslim ethnic group in Rakhine. Kaman leaders support citizenship for Muslims in northern Rakhine but believe that the new movement is aimed at achieving a self-administered area or Rohang State as a separate Islamic state carved out of Rakhine, and condemn the movement. Rakhines' views are more critical. Citing Bangladesh's overpopulation and density, Rakhines perceive the Rohingyas as "the vanguard of an unstoppable wave of people that will inevitably engulf Rakhine". However, for moderate Rohingyas, the aim may have been no more than to gain citizenship status. Moderate Rohingya politicians agree to compromise on the term Rohingya if citizenship is provided under an alternative identity that is neither "Bengali" nor "Rohingya". Various alternatives including "Rakhine Muslims", "Myanmar Muslims" or simply "Myanmar" have been proposed. Burmese juntas (1990–2011) The military junta that ruled Myanmar for half a century relied heavily on mixing Burmese nationalism and Theravada Buddhism to bolster its rule, and, in the view of the US government, heavily discriminated against minorities like the Rohingyas. Some pro-democracy dissidents from Myanmar's ethnic Bamar majority do not consider the Rohingyas compatriots. Successive Burmese governments have been accused of provoking riots led by Buddhist monks against ethnic minorities like the Rohingyas In the 1990s, more than 250,000 Rohingya fled to refugee camps in Bangladesh. In the early 2000s, all but 20,000 of them were repatriated to Myanmar, some against their will. In 2009, a senior Burmese envoy to Hong Kong branded the Rohingyas "ugly as ogres" and a people that are alien to Myanmar. Under the 2008 constitution, the Myanmar military still control much of the country's government, including the ministries of home, defence and border affairs, 25% of seats in parliament and one vice-president. Rakhine State conflicts and refugees (2012–present) 2012 Rakhine State riots The 2012 Rakhine State riots were a series of conflicts between Rohingya Muslims who form the majority in the northern Rakhine and ethnic Rakhines who form the majority in the south. Before the riots, there were widespread fears among the Buddhist Rakhines that they would soon become a minority in their ancestral state. The riots occurred after weeks of sectarian disputes, including a gang rape and murder of a Rakhine woman by Rohingyas and killing of ten Burmese Muslims by Rakhines. There is evidence that the pogroms in 2012 were incited by the government asking the Rakhine men to defend their "race and religion". The Rakhine men were said to have been given knives and free food, and bused in from Sittwe. The Burmese government denied having organised the pogroms, but has never prosecuted anyone for the attacks against the Rohingyas. The Economist argued that since the transition to democracy in Burma in 2011, the military has been seeking to retain its privileged position, forming the motivation for it to encourage the riots in 2012 and allowing it to pose as the defender of Buddhism against Muslim Rohingya. On both sides, entire villages were "decimated". According to the Burmese authorities, the violence between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims left 78 people dead, 87 injured, and up to 140,000 people displaced. The government has responded by imposing curfews and deploying troops in the region. On 10 June 2012, a state of emergency was declared in Rakhine, allowing the military to participate in the administration of the region. Rohingya NGOs abroad have accused the Burmese army and police of targeting Rohingya Muslims through arrests and participating in violence. A field observation conducted by the International Crisis Group concluded that both communities were grateful for the protection provided by the military. A number of monks' organisations have taken measures to boycott NGOs which they believe helped only Rohingyas in the past decades even though Rakhines were equally poor. In July 2012, the Burmese Government did not include the Rohingya minority group in the census—classified as stateless Bengali Muslims from Bangladesh since 1982. About 140,000 Rohingya in Myanmar remain confined in IDP camps. 2015 refugee crisis In 2015, the Simon-Skjodt Centre of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum stated in a press statement the Rohingyas are "at grave risk of additional mass atrocities and even genocide". In 2015, to escape violence and persecution, thousands of Rohingyas migrated from Myanmar and Bangladesh, collectively dubbed as 'boat people' by international media, to Southeast Asian countries including Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand by rickety boats via the waters of the Strait of Malacca and the Andaman Sea. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates about 25,000 people have been taken to boats from January to March in 2015. There are claims that around 100 people died in Indonesia, 200 in Malaysia, and 10 in Thailand during the journey. An estimated 3,000 refugees from Myanmar and Bangladesh have been rescued or swum to shore and several thousand more are believed to remain trapped on boats at sea with little food or water. A Malaysian newspaper claimed crisis has been sparked by smugglers. However, the Economist in an article in June 2015 wrote the only reason why the Rohingyas were willing to pay to be taken out of Burma in squalid, overcrowded, fetid boats as "... it is the terrible conditions at home in Rakhine that force the Rohingyas out to sea in the first place." Autumn 2016 – Summer 2017 On 9 October 2016, insurgents attacked three Burmese border posts along Myanmar's border with Bangladesh. According to government officials in the mainly Rohingya border town of Maungdaw, the attackers brandished knives, machetes and homemade slingshots that fired metal bolts. Several dozen firearms and boxes of ammunition were looted by the attackers from the border posts. The attack resulted in the deaths of nine border officers. On 11 October 2016, four soldiers were killed on the third day of fighting. Following the attacks, reports emerged of several human rights violations allegedly perpetrated by Burmese security forces in their crackdown on suspected Rohingya insurgents. Shortly after, the Myanmar military forces and extremist Buddhists started a major crackdown on the Rohingya Muslims in the country's western region of Rakhine State in response to attacks on border police camps by unidentified insurgents. The crackdown resulted in wide-scale human rights violations at the hands of security forces, including extrajudicial killings, gang rapes, arsons, and other brutalities. The military crackdown on Rohingyas drew criticism from various quarters including the United Nations, human rights group Amnesty International, the US Department of State, and the government of Malaysia. The de facto head of government Aung San Suu Kyi has particularly been criticised for her inaction and silence over the issue and for doing little to prevent military abuses. Government officials in Rakhine State originally blamed the Rohingya Solidarity Organisation (RSO), an Islamist insurgent group mainly active in the 1980s and 1990s, for the attacks; however, on 17 October 2016, a group calling itself the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) claimed responsibility. In the following days, six other groups released statements, all citing the same leader. The Myanmar Army announced on 15 November 2016 that 69 Rohingya insurgents and 17 security forces (10 policemen, 7 soldiers) had been killed in recent clashes in northern Rakhine State, bringing the death toll to 134 (102 insurgents and 32 security forces). It was also announced that 234 people suspected of being connected to the attack were arrested. A police document obtained by Reuters in March 2017 listed 423 Rohingyas detained by the police since 9 October 2016, 13 of whom were children, the youngest being ten years old. Two police captains in Maungdaw verified the document and justified the arrests, with one of them saying, "We, the police, have to arrest those who collaborated with the attackers, children or not, but the court will decide if they are guilty; we are not the ones who decide." Myanmar police also claimed that the children had confessed to their alleged crimes during interrogations, and that they were not beaten or pressured during questioning. The average age of those detained is 34, the youngest is 10, and the oldest is 75. The Myanmar Armed Forces (Tatmadaw) stated on 1 September 2017 that the death toll had risen to 370 insurgents, 13 security personnel, 2 government officials and 14 civilians. The United Nations believes over 1,000 people have been killed since October 2016, which contradicts the death toll provided by the Myanmar government. Autumn 2017 crisis Starting in early August 2017, the Myanmar security forces began "clearance operations" against the Rohingya in northern Rakhine state. Following an attack by Rohingya militants of Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) against several security forces' outposts, 25 August, the operations escalated radically—killing thousands of Rohingya, brutalising thousands more, and driving hundreds of thousands out of the country into neighbouring Bangladesh while their villages burned—with the Myanmar military claiming that their actions were solely attacks on rebels in response to the ARSA attack. However, subsequent reports from various international organisations have indicated that the military operations were widespread indiscriminate attacks on the Rohingya population, already underway before the ARSA attacks, to purge northern Rakhine state of Rohingya, through "ethnic cleansing" and/or "genocide." In August 2018, study estimated that more than 24,000+ Rohingya people were killed by the Myanmar military and the local Buddhists since the "clearance operations" started on 25 August 2017. The study also estimated that 18,000+ the Rohingya Muslim women and girls were raped, 116,000 Rohingya were beaten, 36,000 Rohingya were thrown into fire Precipitating events According to BBC reporters, during the summer of 2017, the Myanmar military began arming and training Rakhine Buddhist natives in northern Rakhine state, and in late summer advised that any ethnic Rakhines "wishing to protect their state" would be given the opportunity to join "the local armed police." Matthew Smith, chief executive of human rights organisation Fortify Rights says that arming the Rakhines "was a decision made to effectively perpetrate atrocity crimes against the civilian population." At the same time, northern Rakhine state faced food shortages, and, starting in mid-August, the government cut off all food supply to the area. On 10 August, the military flew in a battalion of reinforcements to the area, triggering a public warning from the resident United Nations human rights representative to Myanmar, who urged Myanmar authorities to restrain themselves. A few weeks later, on 24 August 2017, the Rakhine Commission (chaired by former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan)—established by the new civilian Myanmar government to recommend solutions to the ethnic conflict and related issues in Rakhine state—released its recommendations for alleviating the suffering of minorities (especially the Rohingya), calling for measures that would improve security in Myanmar for the Rohingya, but not calling for all measures sought by various Rohingya factions. The following morning, according to Myanmar military officials, a Rohingya rebel group (ARSA, or Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army) led multiple coordinated attacks on 30 police outposts and border guards, killing a dozen government forces, at the cost of over 50 dead among the rebels. Conflict escalation Almost immediately the Myanmar military—apparently teaming with local authorities with mobs of Rakhine Buddhist civilians—launched massive reprisals that it described as its anti-terrorist "clearance operations" (which, UN investigators and BBC reporters later determined, had actually begun earlier)—attacking Rohingya villages throughout northern Rakhine state. Within the first three weeks, the military reported over 400 dead (whom it described as mostly "militants" and "terrorists")—the U.N. estimated over 1,000 dead (mostly civilians), and other sources initially suggested as many as 3,000—in the first four weeks of the reprisals. However, in December 2017, following a detailed survey of Rohingya refugees, a humanitarian organisation serving refugees, Médecins Sans Frontières calculated that at least 6,700 Rohingya men, women and children were killed in the first month of the major attacks, including at least 750 children (that number later revised to "over 1,000"). MSF estimated that 69% were killed by gunshots, 9% were burnt to death (including 15% of children killed), and 5% beaten to death. However, MSF cautioned "The numbers of deaths are likely to be an underestimation, as we have not surveyed all refugee settlements in Bangladesh and because the surveys don't account for the families who never made it out of Myanmar." Refugees reported numerous civilians—including women and children—being indiscriminately beaten, raped, tortured, shot, hacked to death or burned alive. and whole villages being burnt down by authorities and Buddhist mobs. Human Rights Watch released satellite photos showing the villages burning, but the Myanmar government insisted the fires were lit by Rohingya, themselves, or specifically Rohingya militants—though the authorities offered no proof of the allegation, and refused or tightly controlled all media and foreign access to the area. Myanmar's presidential spokesman reported that 176 ethnic Rohingya villages—out of the original a total of 471 Rohingya villages in three townships—had become empty. In addition to the 176 "abandoned" villages, some residents reportedly fled from at least 34 other villages. In the first four weeks of the conflict, over 400,000 Rohingya refugees (approximately 40% of the remaining Rohingya in Myanmar) fled the country on foot or by boat (chiefly to Bangladesh—the only other country bordering the Rakhine state area under attack) creating a major humanitarian crisis. In addition, 12,000 Rakhine Buddhists, and other non-Muslim Rakhine state residents were displaced within the country. On 10 September 2017, ARSA declared a temporary unilateral ceasefire to allow aid groups to work in the region. Its statement read that "ARSA strongly encourages all concerned humanitarian actors resume their humanitarian assistance to all victims of the humanitarian crisis, irrespective of ethnic or religious background during the ceasefire period." However, the Myanmar government dismissed the gesture, saying "we don't negotiate with terrorists." The violence and humanitarian 'catastrophe,' inflamed international tensions, especially in the region, and throughout the Muslim world. 13 September, Myanmar's presidential spokesman announced Myanmar would establish a new commission to implement some recommendations of Annan's Rakhine Commission, in their August 2017 report. The United Nations initially reported in early September 2017 that more than 120,000 Rohingya people had fled Myanmar for Bangladesh due to a recent rise in violence against them. The UNHCR, on 4 September, estimated 123,000 refugees have escaped western Myanmar since 25 August 2017. (By 15 September, that number had surpassed 400,000) The situation was expected to exacerbate the current refugee crisis as more than 400,000 Rohingya without citizenship were trapped in overcrowded camps and in conflict regions in Western Myanmar. Myanmar's de facto civilian leader and Nobel Laureate, Aung San Suu Kyi, criticised the media's reporting on the crisis, saying that her government is protecting everyone in Rakhine state, and argued that the reporting was misinformation that benefitted the aims of terrorists. Some reports suggest that the Myanmar military has ceded some border outposts to rebels armed with wooden clubs as part of encouraging Rohingyas to leave the country. A Holy See diplomat stated that at least 3000 people were killed by Myanmar security forces in August and September 2017. The U.N. Secretary General issued a statement, 13 September 2017, implying that the situation facing the Rohingya in Rakhine state was "ethnic cleansing." He urged Myanmar authorities to suspend military action and stop the violence—insisting that Myanmar's government uphold the rule of law, and (noting that "380,000" Rohingya had recently fled to Bangladesh) recognise the refugees' right to return to their homes. The same day, the U.N. Security Council issued a separate, unanimous statement, on the crisis following a closed-door meeting about Myanmar. In a semi-official press statement (its first statement on the situation in Myanmar in nine years)—the Council expressed "concern" about reported excessive violence in Myanmar's security operations, called for de-escalating the situation, reestablishing law and order, protecting civilians, and resolution of the refugee problem. On 19 September 2017, Myanmar's civilian leader, State Councillor Aung San Suu Kyi, made a major televised speech on the crisis—in English—stating "We condemn all human rights violations and unlawful violence," and indicated a desire to know why the Rohingya were fleeing. But Suu Kyi largely defended her prior position supporting the Myanmar military and its actions, and deflected international criticism by saying most Rohingya villages remained intact, and conflict had not broken out everywhere. Expressing no criticism of the Myanmar military, and denying that it had engaged in any "armed clashes or clearance operations" since 5 September, she added, "We are committed to the restoration of peace and stability and rule of law throughout the state," and that the country was "committed to a sustainable solution… for all communities in this state", but was vague as to how that would be achieved. By the end of September, conflicts between Rohingya Muslims and outnumbered Hindus, became apparent—including the killing of around 100 Hindu villagers in Rakhine state, around late August—according to the Myanmar military who claimed to have found the bodies of 20 women and eight boys in mass graves, 24 September, after a search near Ye Baw Kya village, in northern Rakhine state. The search was reportedly in response to a refugee in Bangladesh who contacted a local Hindu leader in Myanmar. Authorities quoted the refugee as saying about 300 ARSA militants, on 25 August, marched about 100 people out of the Hindu village and killed them. ARSA denied involvement, saying it was committed to not killing civilians. International news media were not immediately allowed free access to the area to verify the reports. In other cases, in Myanmar and in Bangladeshi refugee camps Hindu (particularly women) are reported to have faced kidnapping, religious abuse and "forced conversions" by Muslim Rohingyas. By the end of September 2017, UN, Bangladesh and other entities were reporting that—in addition to 200,000-300,000 Rohingya refugees already in Bangladesh after fleeing prior attacks in Myanmar—the current conflict, since late August 2017, had driven 500,000 more Rohingya from Myanmar into Bangladesh, creating what UN Secretary General António Guterres described as "the world's fastest-developing refugee emergency ... a humanitarian nightmare." In November 2017 Myanmar and Bangladesh signed a memorandum of understanding for the return home of Rohingya refugees. In April 2018 the first group of Rohingya refugees returned to Myanmar from Bangladesh. Relocation to Bhasan Char island In January 2016, the government of Bangladesh initiated a plan to relocate tens of thousands of forcibly displaced Rohingyas, who had fled to the country following persecution in Myanmar. The refugees are to be relocated to the island of Bhasan Char. The move has received substantial opposition. Human rights groups have seen the plan as a forced relocation. Additionally, concerns have been raised about living conditions on the island, which is low-lying and prone to flooding. The island has been described as "only accessible during winter and a haven for pirates". It is nine hours away from the camps in which the Rohingya currently live. In October 2019, Bangladeshi authorities again announced plans to relocate refugees to the island. On 9 July 2020, HRW urged Bangladeshi authorities to immediately move over 300 Rohingya refugees, including children, from the silt island of Bhasan Char to the Cox's Bazar refugee camps to let them reside with their families. Families in Cox's Bazar told HRW that relatives on Bhasan Char are being held without freedom of movement or adequate access to food or medical care, and face severe shortages of safe drinking water. Genocide In 2015, an assessment by the Yale Law School concluded that the government of Myanmar was waging a concerted campaign against the Rohingya, a campaign which could be classified as genocide under international law. An investigation by the media channel Al Jazeera English, along with the group Fortify Rights, found that the Myanmar military was systematically targeting the Rohingya population because of its ethnicity and religion. The International State Crime Initiative of the University of London issued a report stating that a genocide is taking place against the Rohingya. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees has used the term ethnic cleansing to describe the exodus of Rohingya from Myanmar. In December 2017, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, dismissed the Myanmar government's claims that its operations were merely a response to rebel attacks, and it also indicated that "for us, it was clear... that these operations were organised and planned," and could amount to "genocide." On 24 August 2018, the day before the anniversary of the eruption of extreme violence that came to be known as the "Rohingya Crisis," the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights issued a report (which was not made public until 27 August) which summarised its findings after an investigation was completed into the events of August–September 2017. It declared that the events constituted cause for the Myanmar government—particularly the Myanmar military (the "Tatmadaw") and its commanding officers—to be brought before the International Criminal Court and charged with "crimes against humanity", including "ethnic cleansing" and "genocide." Myanmar officials immediately rejected the charges. Demographics Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80–98% of the population. A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases. Rohingyas have 46% more children than Myanmar's national average. In 2018, 48,000 Rohingya babies were born in Bangladesh, out of a total population of 120,000 fertile women. As of 2014, about 1.3 million Rohingyas lived in Myanmar and an estimated 1 million lived overseas. They constitute 40% of Rakhine State's total population or 60% of it if the overseas Rohingya population is included. As of December 2016, 1/7th stateless of the entire world's stateless population is Rohingya according to United Nations figures. Prior to the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was around 1.1 to 1.3 million They reside mainly in the northern Rakhine townships, where they form 80–98% of the population. Many Rohingyas have fled to southeastern Bangladesh, where there are over 900,000 refugees, as well as to India, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar live in camps for internally displaced persons, and the authorities do not allow them to leave. The following table shows the statistics of Muslim population in Arakan. The data is for all Muslims in Arakan (Rakhine), regardless of ethnicity. The data for Burmese 1802 census is taken from a book by J. S. Furnivall. The British censuses classified immigrants from Chittagong as Bengalis. There were a small number of immigrants from other parts of India. The 1941 census was lost during the war. The 1983 census conducted under the Ne Win's government omitted people in volatile regions. It is unclear how many were missed. British era censuses can be found at Digital Library of India. Culture Rohingya culture shares many similarities to that of other ethnic groups in the region. The clothing worn by most Rohingyas is indistinguishable from those worn by other groups in Myanmar. Men wear bazu (long sleeved shirts) and longgi or doothi (loincloths) covering down to the ankles. Religious scholars prefer wearing kurutha, jubba or panjabi (long tops). In special occasions, Rohingya men sometimes wear taikpon (collarless jackets) on top of their shirts. Lucifica is a type of flat bread regularly eaten by Rohingyas, while bola fica is a popular traditional snack made of rice noodles. Betel leaves, colloquially known as faan, are also popular amongst Rohingyas. Language The Rohingya language is part of the Indo-Aryan sub-branch of the greater Indo-European language family and is related to the Chittagonian language spoken in the southernmost part of Bangladesh bordering Myanmar. While both Rohingya and Chittagonian are related to Bengali, they are not mutually intelligible with the latter. Rohingyas do not speak Burmese, the lingua franca of Myanmar, and face problems in integration. Rohingya scholars have written the Rohingya language in various scripts including the Arabic, Hanifi, Urdu, Roman, and Burmese alphabets, where Hanifi is a newly developed alphabet derived from Arabic with the addition of four characters from Latin and Burmese. More recently, a Latin alphabet has been developed using all 26 English letters A to Z and two additional Latin letters Ç (for retroflex R) and Ñ (for nasal sound). To accurately represent Rohingya phonology, this alphabet also uses five accented vowels (áéíóú). It has been recognised by ISO with ISO 639-3 "rhg" code. Religion Due to the fact that members of Burma's Rohingya Muslim population are not considered citizens of the country, they are not protected against discrimination by the Burmese government. Therefore, concerns exist with regard to the community's lack of religious freedom, especially in the legal and political sphere. The overwhelming majority of Rohingya people practice Islam, including a blend of Sunni Islam and Sufism and about 2.5% of Rohingya are Hindu. The government restricts their educational opportunities; so many of them pursue fundamental Islamic studies as their only option. Mosques and madrasas are present in most villages. Traditionally, men pray in congregations and women pray at home. Muslims have often faced obstacles and struggled to practice their religion in the same way as other individuals in Burma. These struggles have manifested themselves in the form of difficulty in receiving approval for the construction of places of worship, whether they be informal or formal. In the past, they have also been arrested for teaching and practising their religious beliefs. Health The Rohingya face discrimination and barriers to health care. According to a 2016 study published in the medical journal The Lancet, Rohingya children in Myanmar face low birth weight, malnutrition, diarrhoea, and barriers to reproduction on reaching adulthood. Rohingya have a child mortality rate of up to 224 deaths per 1,000 live births, more than 4 times the rate for the rest of Myanmar (52 per 1,000 live births), and 3 times rate of rest non-Rohingya areas of Rakhine state (77 per 1,000 live births). The paper also found that 40% of Rohingya children suffer from diarrhoea in internally displaced persons camp within Myanmar at a rate five times that of diarrhoeal illness among children in the rest of Rakhine. Human rights and refugee status The Rohingya people have been described as "one of the world's least wanted minorities" and "some of the world's most persecuted people". Médecins Sans Frontières claimed that the discrimination and human rights challenges which the Rohingya people have faced at the hands of the country's government and military are "among the world's top ten most under-reported stories of 2007." In February 1992, Myanmar's Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated in a press release, "In actual fact, although there are (135) national races living in Myanmar today, the so-called Rohingya people is not one of them. Historically, there has never been a 'Rohingya' race in Myanmar." The Rohingya are denied freedom of movement as well as the right to receive a higher education. They have been denied Burmese citizenship since the 1982 nationality law was enacted. Post the 1982 law, Burma has had different types of citizenship. Citizens possessed red identity cards; Rohingyas were given white identity cards which essentially classified them as foreigners who were living in Burma. Limitations and restrictions imposed on Rohingya are facilitated by this difference in citizenship. For example, Rohingyas cannot enlist in the army or participate in the government, and they are potentially faced with the issue of illegal immigration. The citizenship law also significantly underlies the human rights violations against the Rohingya by the military. They are not allowed to travel without official permission and they were previously required to sign a commitment not to have more than two children, though the law was not strictly enforced. They are subjected to routine forced labour. (Typically, a Rohingya man has to work on military or government projects one day a week, and perform sentry duty one night a week.) The Rohingya have also lost a lot of arable land, which has been confiscated by the military and given to Buddhist settlers who have moved there from elsewhere in Myanmar. The military is partially responsible for the human rights violations which have been committed against the Rohingya. These violations include destruction of property and forced relocation to another country. One such violation was committed when the military forced Rohingyas in Rakhine to move to Bangladesh. Other human rights violations against Rohingya Muslims include physical violence and sexual violence. The country's military officials rationalised these violations by stating that they were required as part of a census that was going to be conducted in Burma and the military needed to perform these acts in order to find out what the Rohingya Muslims's nationality was. According to Amnesty International, the Rohingya have been subjected to human rights violations by Burma's military dictatorship since 1978, and many of them have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh as a result. The dislocation of the Rohingya Muslims from their homes to other areas can be attributed to factors such as how isolated and undeveloped Rakhine is, the conflict between the Rohingya Muslims and the Buddhists, and the discrimination which they have been subjected to by the government. Members of the Rohingya community were displaced to Bangladesh where the government of the country, non-governmental organisations and the UNHCR gave aid to the refugees by providing them with homes and food. These external organisations (other than those which were controlled by the government) were important because the immigration of the Rohingyas was massive due to the number of people who needed help. In 2005, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees helped the Bangladeshi government repatriate Rohingyas from Bangladesh, but allegations of human rights abuses inside the refugee camps threatened this effort. In 2015, 140,000 Rohingyas were still living in IDP camps, three years after fleeing communal riots in 2012. Despite earlier repatriation efforts by the UN, the vast majority of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh are unable to return to Myanmar due to the communal violence which occurred there in 2012 and their fear of persecution. The Bangladeshi government has reduced the amount of support it allocates to the Rohingyas in order to prevent an outflow of Rohingya refugees into Bangladesh. In February 2009, many Rohingya refugees were rescued by Acehnese sailors in the Strait of Malacca, after 21 days at sea. Thousands of Rohingyas have also fled to Thailand. There have been charges that Rohingyas were shipped and towed out to the open sea from Thailand. In February 2009, evidence showing the Thai army towing a boatload of 190 Rohingya refugees out to sea surfaced. A group of refugees who were rescued by Indonesian authorities stated that they were captured and beaten by the Thai military, and then abandoned at sea. Steps to repatriate Rohingya refugees began in 2005. In 2009, the government of Bangladesh announced that it would repatriate around 9,000 Rohingyas who were living in refugee camps inside the country back to Myanmar, after a meeting with Burmese diplomats. On 16 October 2011, the new government of Myanmar agreed to take back registered Rohingya refugees. However, these repatriation efforts were hampered by the Rakhine riots in 2012. On 29 March 2014, the Burmese government banned the word "Rohingya" and asked that members of the minority group be registered as "Bengalis" in the 2014 Myanmar Census, the first census to be held in three decades. On 7 May 2014, the United States House of Representatives passed the United States House resolution on persecution of the Rohingya people in Burma that called on the government of Myanmar to end the discrimination and persecution. Researchers from the International State Crime Initiative at Queen Mary University of London suggest that the Myanmar government is in the final stages of an organised process of genocide against the Rohingya. In November 2016, a senior UN official in Bangladesh accused Myanmar of ethnic cleansing of Rohingyas. However, Charles Petrie, a former top UN official in Myanmar, said that "Today using the term, aside from being divisive and potentially incorrect, will only ensure that opportunities and options to try to resolve the issue to be addressed will not be available. In September 2020, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, has warned that the killing and abductions of Rohingyas have not stopped, despite the International Court of Justice ordering Myanmar's leadership to prevent genocide and stop the killings in December 2019. Some countries like Malaysia have rejected the resettlement of Rohingya refugees and sent them back to sea because of economic difficulties and the Coronavirus pandemic. Malaysian authorities have also expressed concern that militant Rohingya groups have been raising funds by extorting money from Rohingya refugees in the country. See also International reactions to the Rohingya genocide Kamein List of ethnic groups in Myanmar Min Aung Hlaing Persecution of Muslims Notes References Citations General sources (in alphabetical order) "Burma's Western Border as Reported by the Diplomatic Correspondence (1947–1975)" by Aye Chan "Burma's Western Border as Reported by the Diplomatic Correspondence (1947–1975)" by Aye Chan International Center for Transitional Justice, Myanmar External links Ethnic groups in Bangladesh Ethnic groups in Myanmar Ethnic groups in Pakistan Indo-Aryan peoples Islam in Myanmar Muslim ethnoreligious groups Refugees in Indonesia Refugees in Malaysia Stateless nationalism in Asia Stateless people	false	[ "The MAGIC criteria are a set of guidelines put forth by Robert Abelson in his book Statistics as Principled Argument. In this book he posits that the goal of statistical analysis should be to make compelling claims about the world and he presents the MAGIC criteria as a way to do that.\n\nWhat are the MAGIC criteria? \n\nMAGIC is a backronym for:\n Magnitude – How big is the effect? Large effects are more compelling than small ones.\n Articulation – How specific is it? Precise statements are more compelling than imprecise ones. \n Generality – How generally does it apply? More general effects are more compelling than less general ones. Claims that would interest a more general audience are more compelling.\n Interestingness – interesting effects are those that \"have the potential, through empirical analysis, to change what people believe about an important issue\". More interesting effects are more compelling than less interesting ones. In addition, more surprising effects are more compelling than ones that merely confirm what is already known.\n Credibility – Credible claims are more compelling than incredible ones. The researcher must show that the claims made are credible. Results that contradict previously established ones are less credible.\n\nReviews and applications of the MAGIC criteria \n\nSong Qian noted that the MAGIC criteria could be of use to ecologists. Claudia Stanny discussed them in a course on psychology. Anne Boomsma noted that they are useful when presenting results of complex statistical methods such as structural equation modelling.\n\nSee also\n\nReferences \n\nStatistical theory", "In American slang, the term inside baseball refers to the minutiae and detailed inner workings of a system that are only interesting to, or appreciated by, experts, insiders, and aficionados. The phrase was originally used as a sports metaphor in political contexts, but has expanded to discussions of other topics as well. Language commentator William Safire wrote that the term refers to details about a subject that require such a specific knowledge about what is being discussed that the nuances are not understood or appreciated by outsiders.\n\nEtymology\nThe term originated in the 1890s referring to a particular style of playing the game which relied on singles, walks, bunts, and stolen bases rather than power hitting. Within a few decades the term was being used to mean highly specialized knowledge about baseball, and by the 1950s it was being applied to politics.\n\nReferences\n\nEnglish phrases\nAmerican slang\nPolitical terminology of the United States" ]
[ "Rohingya people", "Demographics", "What are some of the demographics?", "Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80-98% of the population.", "What else is notable?", "A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases.", "What other interesting demographics are discussed?", "Rohingyas have 46% more children than Myanmar's national average. As of 2014, about 1.3 million Rohingyas live in Myanmar and an estimated 1 million overseas." ]	C_af72bf4729054b89b3bc329a5569f6e3_0	What else is significant?	4	What else is significant about the Rohingya people other than than having more children than Myanmar's national average?	Rohingya people	Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80-98% of the population. A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases. Rohingyas have 46% more children than Myanmar's national average. As of 2014, about 1.3 million Rohingyas live in Myanmar and an estimated 1 million overseas. They form 40% of Rakhine State's population or 60% if overseas population is included. As of December 2016, 1 in 7 stateless persons worldwide are Rohingya per United Nations figures, and the Rohingya are the world's largest stateless community. Prior to the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was around 1.1 to 1.3 million They reside mainly in the northern Rakhine townships, where they form 80-98% of the population. Many Rohingyas have fled to southeastern Bangladesh, where there are over 900,000 refugees, as well as to India, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar live in camps for internally displaced persons, and the authorities do not allow them to leave. The following table shows the statistics of Muslim population in Arakan. The data is for all Muslims in Arakan (Rakhine), regardless of ethnicity. The data for Burmese 1802 census is taken from a book by J. S. Furnivall. The British censuses classified immigrants from Chittagong as Bengalis. There were a small number of immigrants from other parts of India. The 1941 census was lost during the war. The 1983 census conducted under the Ne Win's government omitted people in volatile regions. It is unclear how many were missed. British era censuses can be found at Digital Library of India. CANNOTANSWER	They form 40% of Rakhine State's population or 60% if overseas population is included. As of December 2016, 1 in 7 stateless persons worldwide are Rohingya per United Nations figures,	The Rohingya people () are a stateless Indo-Aryan ethnic group who predominantly follow Islam and reside in Rakhine State, Myanmar (previously known as Burma). Before the Rohingya genocide in 2017, when over 740,000 fled to Bangladesh, an estimated 1.4 million Rohingya lived in Myanmar. Described by journalists and news outlets as one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, the Rohingya are denied citizenship under the 1982 Myanmar nationality law. There are also restrictions on their freedom of movement, access to state education and civil service jobs. The legal conditions faced by the Rohingya in Myanmar have been compared to apartheid by some academics, analysts and political figures, including Nobel laureate Bishop Desmond Tutu, a South African anti-apartheid activist. The most recent mass displacement of Rohingya in 2017 led the International Criminal Court investigating crimes against humanity, and led to the International Court of Justice investigating genocide. The Rohingya maintain they are indigenous to western Myanmar with a heritage of over a millennium and influence from the Arabs, Mughals and Portuguese. The community claims it is descended from people in precolonial Arakan and colonial Arakan; historically, the region was an independent kingdom between Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent. The Myanmar government considers the Rohingya as colonial and postcolonial migrants from neighbouring Chittagong/East Bengal respectively Bangladesh. It argues that a distinct precolonial Muslim population is recognized as Kaman, and that the Rohingya conflate their history with the history of Arakan Muslims in general to advance a separatist agenda. In addition, Myanmar's government does not recognise the term "Rohingya" and prefers to refer to the community as "Bengali". Rohingya campaign groups and human rights organizations demand the right to "self-determination within Myanmar". Various armed insurrections by the Rohingya have taken place since the 1940s and the population as a whole has faced military crackdowns in 1978, 1991–1992, 2012, 2015, and particularly in 2016-2018, when most of the Rohingya population of Myanmar was driven out of the country, into neighbouring Bangladesh. By December 2017, an estimated 625,000 refugees from Rakhine, Myanmar, had crossed the border into Bangladesh since August 2017. UN officials and Human Rights Watch have described Myanmar's persecution of the Rohingya as ethnic cleansing. The UN human rights envoy to Myanmar reported "the long history of discrimination and persecution against the Rohingya community... could amount to crimes against humanity", and there have been warnings of an unfolding genocide. Probes by the UN have found evidence of increasing incitement of hatred and religious intolerance by "ultra-nationalist Buddhists" against Rohingyas while the Myanmar security forces have been conducting "summary executions, enforced disappearances, arbitrary arrests and detentions, torture and ill-treatment, and forced labour" against the community. Before the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was close to 1.4 million, chiefly in the northern Rakhine townships, which were 80–98% Rohingya. Since 2015, over 900,000 Rohingya refugees have fled to south-eastern Bangladesh alone, and more to other surrounding countries, and major Muslim nations. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar are confined in camps for internally displaced persons. Shortly before a Rohingya rebel attack that killed 12 security forces on 25 August 2017, the Myanmar military launched "clearance operations" against the Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine state that, according to NGOs, the Bangladeshi government and international news media, left many dead, and many more injured, tortured or raped, with villages burned. The government of Myanmar has denied the allegations. Nomenclature The modern term Rohingya emerged from colonial and pre-colonial terms Rooinga and Rwangya. The Rohingya refer to themselves as Ruáingga . In Burmese they are known as rui hang gya (following the MLC Transcription System) ( ) while in Bengali they are called Rohingga ( ). The term "Rohingya" may come from Rakhanga or Roshanga, the words for the state of Arakan. The word Rohingya would then mean "inhabitant of Rohang", which was the early Muslim name for Arakan. The usage of the term Rohingya has been historically documented prior to the British Raj. In 1799, Francis Buchanan wrote an article called "A Comparative Vocabulary of Some of the Languages Spoken in the Burma Empire", which was found and republished by Michael Charney in the SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research in 2003. Among the native groups of Arakan, he wrote are the: "Mohammedans, who have long settled in Arakan, and who call themselves Rooinga, or natives of Arakan." The Classical Journal of 1811 identified "Rooinga" as one of the languages spoken in the "Burmah Empire". In 1815, Johann Severin Vater listed "Ruinga" as an ethnic group with a distinct language in a compendium of languages published in German. In 1936, when Burma was still under British rule, the "Rohingya Jam’iyyat al Ulama" was founded in Arakan. According to Jacques Leider, the Rohingya were referred to as "Chittagonians" during the British colonial period, and it was not controversial to refer to them as "Bengalis" until the 1990s. Leider also states that "there is no international consensus" on the use of the term Rohingya, as they are often called "Rohingya Muslims", "Muslim Arakanese" and "Burmese Muslims". Others, such as anthropologist Christina Fink, use Rohingya not as an ethnic identifier but as a political one. Leider believes the Rohingya is a political movement that started in the 1950s to create "an autonomous Muslim zone" in Rakhine. The government of Prime Minister U Nu, when Burma was a democracy from 1948 to 1962, used the term "Rohingya" in radio addresses as a part of peace-building effort in Mayu Frontier Region. The term was broadcast on Burmese radio and was used in the speeches of Burmese rulers. A UNHCR report on refugees caused by Operation King Dragon referred to the victims as "Bengali Muslims (called Rohingyas)". Nevertheless, the term Rohingya wasn't widely used until the 1990s. Today the use of the name "Rohingya" is polarised. The government of Myanmar refuses to use the name. In the 2014 census, the Myanmar government forced the Rohingya to identify themselves as "Bengali". Many Rohingya see the denial of their name similar to denying their basic rights, and the U.N. Special Rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar has agreed. Jacques Leider writes that many Muslims in Rakhine simply prefer to call themselves "Muslim Arakanese" or "Muslims coming from Rakhine" instead of "Rohingya". The United States embassy in Yangon continues to use the name "Rohingya". History Early history The Rohingya population is concentrated in the historical region of Arakan, an old coastal country in Southeast Asia. It is not clear who the original settlers of Arakan were. Burmese traditional history claims that the Rakhine have inhabited Arakan since 3000 BCE but there is no archaeological evidence to support the claim. By the 4th century, Arakan became one of the earliest Indianized kingdoms in Southeast Asia. The first Arakanese state flourished in Dhanyawadi. Power then shifted to the city of Waithali. Sanskrit inscriptions in the region indicate that the founders of the first Arakanese states were Indian. Arakan was ruled by the Chandra dynasty. The British historian Daniel George Edward Hall stated that "The Burmese do not seem to have settled in Arakan until possibly as late as the tenth century CE. Hence earlier dynasties are thought to have been Indian, ruling over a population similar to that of Bengal. All the capitals known to history have been in the north near modern Akyab". Arrival of Islam Due to its coastline on the Bay of Bengal, Arakan was a key centre of maritime trade and cultural exchange between Burma and the outside world, since the time of the Indian Mauryan Empire. According to Syed Islam, a political science scholar, Arab merchants had been in contact with Arakan since the third century, using the Bay of Bengal to reach Arakan. A southern branch of the Silk Road connected India, Burma, and China since the neolithic period. Arab traders are recorded in the coastal areas of southeast Bengal, bordering Arakan, since the 9th century. The Rohingya population trace their history to this period. According to Syed Islam, the earliest Muslim settlements in the Arakan region began in the 7th-century. The Arab traders were also missionaries and they began converting the local Buddhist population to Islam by about 788 CE, states Syed Islam. Besides these locals converting to Islam, Arab merchants married local women and later settled in Arakan. As a result of intermarriage and conversion, the Muslim population in Arakan grew. This claim by Sayed Islam saying that, by 788 CE, locals in Arakan were being converted into Muslims clearly contradicts historian Yegar's findings which say, even in 1203, Bengal is the easternmost point of Islamic expansion, not to say further into Arakan. The alternate view contests that Islam arrived in the Arakan region in the 1st-millennium. According to this view, this Rohingya history is not based on any evidence, rather is based on "fictitious stories, myths and legends". According to Southeast Asian Buddhism history scholar and an ordained Buddhist monk Ashon Nyanuttara, there is scant historical data and archaeological evidence about the early political and religious history of the Arakan people and the Rakhaing region. The limited evidence available suggests that Buddhism, possibly the Mahayana tradition, was well established by the 4th-century in the region under the Candra Buddhist dynasty. Muslim community's expansion and the growth of Islam into the region came much later with Bengali Muslims from the region that is now a part of Bangladesh. Further, the term "Rohingya" does not appear in any regional text of this period and much later. That term was adopted by "a few Bengali Muslim intellectuals who were direct descendants of immigrants from Chittagong district [Bengal]" in the 20th-century, states historian Aye Chan. Kingdom of Mrauk U The Rakhines were one of the tribes of the Burmese Pyu city-states. The Rakhines began migrating to Arakan through the Arakan Mountains in the 9th century. The Rakhines established numerous cities in the valley of the Lemro River. These included Sambawak I, Pyinsa, Parein, Hkrit, Sambawak II, Myohaung, Toungoo and Launggret. Burmese forces invaded the Rakhine cities in 1406. The Burmese invasion forced Rakhine rulers to seek help and refuge from neighbouring Bengal in the north. Early evidence of Bengali Muslim settlements in Arakan date back to the time of Min Saw Mon (1430–34) of the Kingdom of Mrauk U. After 24 years of exile in Bengal, he regained control of the Arakanese throne in 1430 with military assistance from the Bengal Sultanate. The Bengalis who came with him formed their own settlements in the region. The Santikan Mosque built in the 1430s, features a court which "measures from north to south and from east to west; the shrine is a rectangular structure measuring ." King Min Saw Mon ceded some territory to the Sultan of Bengal and recognised his sovereignty over the areas. In recognition of his kingdom's vassal status, the Buddhist kings of Arakan received Islamic titles and used the Bengali gold dinar within the kingdom. Min Saw Mon minted his own coins with the Burmese alphabet on one side and the Persian alphabet on the other. Arakan's vassalage to Bengal was brief. After Sultan Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah's death in 1433, Narameikhla's successors invaded Bengal and occupied Ramu in 1437 and Chittagong in 1459. Arakan would hold Chittagong until 1666. Even after independence from the Sultans of Bengal, the Arakanese kings continued the custom of maintaining Muslim titles. The Buddhist kings compared themselves to Sultans and fashioned themselves after Mughal rulers. They also continued to employ Muslims in prestigious positions within the royal administration. Some of them worked as Bengali, Persian and Arabic scribes in the Arakanese courts, which, despite remaining Buddhist, adopted Islamic fashions from the neighbouring Bengal Sultanate. The population increased in the 17th century, as slaves were brought in by Arakanese raiders and Portuguese settlers following raids into Bengal. Slaves included members of the Mughal nobility. A notable royal slave was Alaol, a renowned poet in the Arakanese court. The slave population were employed in a variety of workforces, including in the king's army, commerce and agriculture. In 1660, Prince Shah Shuja, the governor of Mughal Bengal and a claimant of the Peacock Throne, fled to Arakan with his family after being defeated by his brother Emperor Aurangzeb during the Battle of Khajwa. Shuja and his entourage arrived in Arakan on 26 August 1660. He was granted asylum by King Sanda Thudhamma. In December 1660, the Arakanese king confiscated Shuja's gold and jewellery, leading to an insurrection by the royal Mughal refugees. According to varying accounts, Shuja's family was killed by the Arakanese, while Shuja himself may have fled to a kingdom in Manipur. However, members of Shuja's entourage remained in Arakan and were recruited by the royal army, including as archers and court guards. They were king makers in Arakan until the Burmese conquest. The Arakanese continued their raids of Mughal Bengal. Dhaka was raided in 1625. Emperor Aurangzeb gave orders to his governor in Mughal Bengal, Shaista Khan, to end what the Mughals saw as Arakanese-Portuguese piracy. In 1666, Shaista Khan led a army and 288 warships to seize Chittagong from the Kingdom of Mrauk U. The Mughal expedition continued up till the Kaladan River. The Mughals placed the northern part of Arakan under its administration and vassalage. Burmese conquest Following the Konbaung Dynasty's conquest of Arakan in 1785, as many as 35,000 people of the Rakhine State fled to the neighbouring Chittagong region of British Bengal in 1799 to escape persecution by the Bamar and to seek protection under the British Raj. The Bamar executed thousands of men and deported a considerable portion of the population to central Burma, leaving Arakan a scarcely populated area by the time the British occupied it. According to an article on the "Burma Empire" published by the British Francis Buchanan-Hamilton in 1799, "the Mohammedans, who have long settled in Arakan", "call themselves Rooinga, or natives of Arakan". However, according to Derek Tokin, Hamilton no longer used the term to refer to the Muslims in Arakan in his later publications. Sir Henry Yule saw many Muslims serving as eunuchs in Konbaung while on a diplomatic mission to the Burmese capital, Ava. British colonial rule British policy encouraged Bengali inhabitants from adjacent regions to migrate into the then lightly populated and fertile valleys of Arakan as farm labourers. The East India Company extended the Bengal Presidency to Arakan. There was no international boundary between Bengal and Arakan and no restrictions on migration between the regions. In the early 19th century, thousands of Bengalis from the Chittagong region settled in Arakan seeking work. It is hard to know whether these new Bengal migrants were the same population that was deported by force to Bengal's Chittagong during the Burmese conquest in the 18th century and later returned to Arakan as a result of British policy or they were a new migrant population with no ancestral roots to Arakan. The British census of 1872 reported 58,255 Muslims in Akyab District. By 1911, the Muslim population had increased to 178,647. The waves of migration were primarily due to the requirement of cheap labour from British India to work in the paddy fields. Immigrants from Bengal, mainly from the Chittagong region, "moved en masse into western townships of Arakan". Albeit Indian immigration to Burma was a nationwide phenomenon, not just restricted to Arakan. For these reasons historians believed that most Rohingyas arrived with the British colonialists in the 19th and 20th centuries with some tracing their ancestry much further. According to Thant Myint-U, historian and adviser to President Thein Sein, "At the beginning of the 20th century, Indians were arriving in Burma at the rate of no less than a quarter million per year. The numbers rose steadily until the peak year of 1927, immigration reached 480,000 people, with Rangoon exceeding New York City as the greatest immigration port in the world. This was out of a total population of only 13 million; it was equivalent to the United Kingdom today taking 2 million people a year." By then, in most of the largest cities in Burma, Rangoon, Akyab, Bassein and Moulmein, the Indian immigrants formed a majority of the population. All of Burma was officially a Province within the British Indian Empire ('the Raj') from November 1885 until 1937, when Burma became a separate Crown colony within the British Empire. The Burmese under British rule felt helpless, and reacted with a "racism that combined feelings of superiority and fear". Professor Andrew Selth of Griffith University writes that although a few Rohingya trace their ancestry to Muslims who lived in Arakan in the 15th and 16h centuries, most Rohingyas arrived with the British colonialists in the 19th and 20th centuries. Most have argued that Rohingya existed from the four waves of Muslim migrations from the ancient times to medieval, to the British colony. Gutman (1976) and Ibrahim (2016) claiming that the Muslim population dates before the arrival of ethnic Rakhine in the 9th to 10th century. Suggesting the Rohingya are descendants of the of a pre-Arakan population who existed for 3 thousand years and waves of Muslim who intermingled forming modern Rohingya. The impact of this immigration was particularly acute in Arakan. Although it boosted the colonial economy, local Arakanese bitterly resented it. According to historian Clive J. Christie, "The issue became a focus for grass-roots Burmese nationalism, and in the years 1930–31 there were serious anti-Indian disturbances in Lower Burma, while 1938 saw riots specifically directed against the Indian Muslim community. As Burmese nationalism increasingly asserted itself before the Second World War, the 'alien' Indian presence inevitably came under attack, along with the religion that the Indian Muslims imported. The Muslims of northern Arakan were to be caught in the crossfire of this conflict." In the 1931 census, the Muslim population of Burma was 584,839, 4% of the total population of 14,647,470 at the time. 396,504 were Indian Muslims and 1,474 Chinese Muslims, while 186,861 were Burmese Muslims. The census found a growth in the number of Indian Muslims born in Burma, primarily due to their permanent settlement in Akyab. 41% of Muslims of Burma lived in Arakan at that time. Shipping Due to the terrain of the Arakan Mountains, the Arakan region was mostly accessible by sea. In British Arakan Division, the port of Akyab had ferry services and a thriving trade with the ports of Chittagong, Narayanganj, Dacca and Calcutta in British India; as well as with Rangoon. Akyab was one of the leading rice ports in the world, hosting ship fleets from Europe and China. Many Indians settled in Akyab and dominated its seaport and hinterland. The 1931 census found 500,000 Indians living in Akyab. Legislators Several Rohingyas were elected to Burmese native seats in the Legislative Council of Burma and Legislature of Burma. During the 1936 Burmese general election, Advocate U Pho Khaine was elected from Akyab West and Gani Markan was elected from Maungdaw-Buthidaung. In 1939, U Tanvy Markan was elected from Maungdaw-Buthidaung. Their elections in the Burmese native category set them apart from immigrant Indian legislators. World War II During World War II, the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) invaded British-controlled Burma. The British forces retreated and in the power vacuum left behind, considerable inter-communal violence erupted between Arakanese and Muslim villagers. The British armed Muslims in northern Arakan in order to create a buffer zone that would protect the region from a Japanese invasion when they retreated and to counteract the largely pro-Japanese ethnic Rakhines. The period also witnessed violence between groups loyal to the British and the Burmese nationalists. The Arakan massacres in 1942 involved communal violence between British-armed V Force Rohingya recruits and , polarising the region along ethnic lines. Tensions boiling in Arakan before the war erupted during the Japanese invasion of Southeast Asia and Arakan became the frontline in the conflict. The war resulted in a complete breakdown of civil administration and consequent development of habits of lawlessness exacerbated by the availability of modern firearms. The Japanese advance triggered an inter-communal conflict between Muslims and Buddhists. The Muslims fled towards British-controlled Muslim-dominated northern Arakan from Japanese-controlled Buddhist-majority areas. This stimulated a "reverse ethnic cleansing" in British-controlled areas, particularly around Maungdaw. Failure of a British counter-offensive, attempted from December 1942 to April 1943, resulted in the abandonment of even more of the Muslim population as well as an increase in inter-communal violence. Moshe Yegar, a research fellow at Truman Institute, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, noted that hostility had developed between the Muslims and the Buddhists who had brought about a similar hostility in other parts of Burma. This tension was let loose with the retreat of the British. With the approach of the Japanese into Arakan, the Buddhists instigated cruel measures against the Muslims. Thousands, though the exact number is unknown, fled from Buddhist-majority regions to eastern Bengal and northern Arakan with many being killed or dying of starvation. The Muslims in response conducted retaliatory raids from British-controlled areas, causing Buddhists to flee to southern Arakan. Aye Chan, a historian at Kanda University in Japan, has written that as a consequence of acquiring arms from the British during World War II, Rohingyas tried to destroy the Arakanese villages instead of resisting the Japanese. Chan agrees that hundreds of Muslims fled to northern Arakan, though states that the accounts of atrocities on them were exaggerated. In March 1942, Rohingyas from northern Arakan killed around 20,000 Arakanese. In return, around 5,000 Muslims in the Minbya and Mrauk-U Townships were killed by Rakhines and Red Karens. As in the rest of Burma, the IJA committed acts of rape, murder and torture against Muslims in Arakan. During this period, some 22,000 Muslims in Arakan were believed to have crossed the border into Bengal, then part of British India, to escape the violence. The exodus was not restricted to Muslims in Arakan. Thousands of Burmese Indians, Anglo-Burmese and British who settled during the colonial period emigrated en masse to India. To facilitate their reentry into Burma, the British formed Volunteer Forces with Rohingya. Over the three years during which the Allies and Japanese fought over the Mayu peninsula, the Rohingya recruits of the V-Force, engaged in a campaign against Arakanese communities, using weapons provided by V-Force. According to the secretary of the British governor, the V Force, instead of fighting the Japanese, destroyed Buddhist monasteries, pagodas, and houses, and committed atrocities in northern Arakan. The British Army's liaison officer, Anthony Irwin, on the other hand, praised the role of the V Force. Pakistan Movement During the Pakistan Movement in the 1940s, Rohingya Muslims in western Burma organised a separatist movement to merge the region into East Pakistan. The commitments of the British regarding the status of Muslims after the war are not clear. V Force officers like Andrew Irwin felt that Muslims along with other minorities must be rewarded for their loyalty. Muslim leaders believed that the British had promised them a "Muslim National Area" in Maungdaw region. They were also apprehensive of a future Buddhist-dominated government. In 1946, calls were made for annexation of the territory by Pakistan as well as of an independent state. Before the independence of Burma in January 1948, Muslim leaders from Arakan addressed themselves to Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, and asked his assistance in incorporating the Mayu region to Pakistan considering their religious affinity and geographical proximity with East Pakistan. The North Arakan Muslim League was founded in Akyab (modern Sittwe) two months later. The proposal never materialised since it was reportedly turned down by Jinnah, saying that he was not in a position to interfere in Burmese matters. Post-WWII migration The numbers and the extent of post-independence immigration from Bangladesh are subject to controversy and debate. In a 1955 study published by Stanford University, the authors Virginia Thompson and Richard Adloff write, "The post-war (World War II) illegal immigration of Chittagonians into that area was on a vast scale, and in the Maungdaw and Buthidaung areas they replaced the Arakanese." The authors further argue that the term Rohingya, in the form of Rwangya, first appeared to distinguish settled population from newcomers: "The newcomers were called Mujahids (crusaders), in contrast to the Rwangya or settled Chittagonian population." According to the International Crisis Group (ICG), these immigrants were actually the Rohingyas who were displaced by World War II and began to return to Arakan after the independence of Burma but were rendered as illegal immigrants, while many were not allowed to return. ICG adds that there were "some 17,000" refugees from the Bangladesh liberation war who "subsequently returned home". Burmese independence On 25 September 1954, the then Prime Minister U Nu in his radio address to the nation talked about Rohingya Muslims’ political loyalty to predominantly Buddhist Burma. This usage of the term ‘Rohingya’ is important in the sense that today Myanmar denies to accept this category altogether and calls them ’Bengali’. During the same time a separate administrative zone May Yu was established comprising most of the present North Rakhine State, which had Rohingya as its majority ethnic group. One of the objectives of this Muslim majority zone was to ‘strive for peace with Pakistan’. Brigadier Aung Gyi, one of the deputies of General Ne Win, in 1961 explained Rohingya as; “On the west, May Yu district borders with Pakistan. As is the case with all borderlands communities, there are Muslims on both sides of the borders. Those who are on Pakistan’s side are known as Pakistani while the Muslims on our Burmese side of the borders are referred to as ‘Rohingya’. But since Burma's military junta took control of the country in 1962, the Rohingya have been systematically deprived of their political rights. In 1962 military dictator General Ne Win, took over the government and started implementing a Nationalist agenda, which had its roots in racial discrimination. In 1978 military government launched operation Nagamin to separate nationals from non-nationals. This was the first concerted large scale violent attack on Rohingya. National Registration Cards (NRC) were taken away by state actors never to be replaced. Violence that followed forced 200,000 Rohingya to flee to Bangladesh. Bangladesh denied Rohingya admission into her territory and blocked food rations leading to death of 12,000 of them. After bilateral negotiations Rohingya were repatriated. Rohingya political participation in Burma In the prelude to independence, two Rohingyas were elected to the Constituent Assembly of Burma in 1947, M. A. Gaffar and Sultan Ahmed. After Burma became independent in 1948, M. A. Gaffar presented a memorandum of appeal to the Government of the Union of Burma calling for the recognition of the term "Rohingya", based on local Indian names of Arakan (Rohan and Rohang), as the official name of the ethnicity. Sultan Ahmed, who served as Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Minorities, was a member of the Justice Sir Ba U Commission charged with exploring whether Arakan Division should be granted statehood. During the 1951 Burmese general election, five Rohingyas were elected to the Parliament of Burma, including one of the country's first two female MPs, Zura Begum. Six MPs were elected during the 1956 Burmese general election and subsequent by-elections. Sultan Mahmud, a former politician in British India, became Minister of Health in the cabinet of Prime Minister of Burma U Nu. In 1960, Mahmud suggested that either Rohingya-majority northern Arakan remain under the central government or be made a separate province. However, during the 1960 Burmese general election, Prime Minister U Nu's pledges included making all of Arakan into one province. The 1962 Burmese coup d'état ended the country's Westminster-style political system. The 1982 Burmese citizenship law stripped most of the Rohingyas of their stake in citizenship. Rohingya community leaders were supportive of the 8888 uprising for democracy. During the 1990 Burmese general election, the Rohingya-led National Democratic Party for Human Rights won four seats in the Burmese parliament. The four Rohingya MPs included Shamsul Anwarul Huq, Chit Lwin Ebrahim, Fazal Ahmed and Nur Ahmed. The election was won by the National League for Democracy led by Aung San Suu Kyi, who was placed under house arrest and not permitted to become prime minister. The Burmese military junta banned the National Democratic Party for Human Rights in 1992. Its leaders were arrested, jailed and tortured. Rohingya politicians have been jailed to disbar them from contesting elections. In 2005, Shamsul Anwarul Huq was charged under Section 18 of the controversial 1982 Burmese citizenship law and sentenced to 47 years in prison. In 2015, a ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party MP Shwe Maung was disbarred from the 2015 Burmese general election, on grounds that his parents were not Burmese citizens under the 1982 citizenship law. As of 2017, Burma does not have a single Rohingya MP and the Rohingya population have no voting rights. Mayu Frontier District A separate administrative zone for the Rohingya-majority northern areas of Arakan existed between 1961 and 1964. Known as the Mayu Frontier District, the zone was set up by Prime Minister U Nu after the 1960 Burmese general election, on the advice of his health minister Sultan Mahmud. The zone was administered directly from Rangoon by the national government. After the Burmese military coup in 1962, the zone was administered by the Burmese army. It was transferred to the Ministry of Home Affairs in 1964 by the Union Revolutionary Council. The socialist military government inducted the zone into Arakan State in 1974. Expulsion of Burmese Indians Racism towards people with links to the Indian subcontinent increased after the 1962 Burmese coup. The socialist military government nationalised all property, including many enterprises of the white collar Burmese Indian community. Between 1962 and 1964, 320,000 Burmese Indians were forced to leave the country. Refugee crisis of 1978 As a result of Operation King Dragon by the Burmese junta, the first wave of Rohingya refugees entered Bangladesh in 1978. An estimated 200,000 Rohingyas took shelter in Cox's Bazaar. Diplomatic initiatives over 16 months resulted in a repatriation agreement, which allowed the return of most refugees under a process facilitated by UNHCR. The return of refugees to Burma has been the second largest repatriation process in Asia after the return of Cambodian refugees from Thailand. 1982 Citizenship Law In 1982, the citizenship law enacted by the Burmese military junta did not list the Rohingya as one of the 135 "national races" of Burma. This made much of the Rohingya population in Burma stateless in their historical homeland of Arakan. General Ne Win drafted Citizenship Act in 1982, which denied citizenship rights to any community/group that was not listed in a survey conducted by British in 1824. All other ethnic groups were considered aliens to the land or invaders. Eight major ethnicities Arakan, Chin, Kachin, Karen, Kayah, Mon, Shan, and Burmese were broken into 135 small ethnic groups. Groups like Rohingya who do not belong to any of these 135 ethnicities were denied citizenship rights. Taking into account just one survey for defining the history of a group of people is highly problematic. It overlooks the fact that Rohingya were mentioned in records earlier to this survey. Scholars like Maung Zarni have argued that Burmese military ‘encoded its anti-Indian and anti-Muslim racism in its laws and policies’. He further argues; “The 1982 Citizenship Act serves as the state’s legal and ideological foundation on which all forms of violence, execution, restrictions, and human rights crimes are justified and committed with state impunity if carried out horizontally by the local ultra-nationalist Rakhine Buddhists. In light of the on-the-ground link between the legalised removal of citizenship from the Rohingya and the implementation of a permanent set of draconian laws and policies—as opposed to periodic “anti-immigration” operations—amount to the infliction on the Rohingya of conditions of life designed to bring about serious bodily and mental harm and to destroy the group in whole or in part. As such, the illegalisation of the Rohingya in Myanmar is an indication of the intent of the State to both remove the Rohingya permanently from their homeland and to destroy the Rohingya as a group.” Refugee crisis of 1991–1992 After Burmese military junta began persecuting the political opposition following Aung San Suu Kyi's victory in the 1990 election and the earlier 1988 Uprising, military operations targeting Muslims (who strongly favoured the pro-democracy movement) began in Arakan State. The Rohingya-led NDPHR political party was banned and its leaders were jailed. Suu Kyi herself was placed under house arrest by the junta led by General Than Shwe. As the Burmese military increased its operations across the country, the Maungdaw, Buthidaung and Rathedaung townships in northern Arakan became centers of persecution. The 23rd and 24th regiments of the Tatmadaw (Myanmar Army) were responsible for promoting forced labour, rape, the confiscation of houses, land and farm animals, the destruction of mosques, a ban on religious activities and the harassment of the religious priests. An estimated 250,000 refugees crossed over into Bangladesh. In Bangladesh, the refugee influx was a challenge for the newly elected government of the country's first female prime minister Khaleda Zia (who headed the first parliamentary government since 1975). Both Bangladesh and Burma mobilised thousands of troops along the border during the crisis. The government of Bangladesh emphasised a peaceful resolution of the crisis. After diplomatic negotiations, a repatriation agreement was put in place to allow the return of refugees to Burma under a UNHCR-supervised process. Name change from Arakan to Rakhine State In 1989, the junta officially changed the name of Burma to Myanmar. In the 1990s, the junta changed the name of the province of Arakan to Rakhine State, which showed a bias towards the Rakhine community, even though the Rohingya formed a substantial part of the population. The name of the region was historically known as Arakan for centuries. Denial of the "Rohingya" term The colloquial term Rohingya can be traced back to the pre-colonial period. The Rohingya community have also been known as Arakanese Indians and Arakanese Muslims. Since the 1982 citizenship law, Burmese juntas and governments have strongly objected to the usage of the term of Rohingya, preferring to label the community as "bengali illegal immigrants". The derogatory slur kalar is widely used in Myanmar against the Rohingya. Myanmar's government has often pressured diplomats and foreign delegates against uttering the term Rohingya. Conflict in Arakan The Rakhine for their part felt discriminated against by the governments in Rangoon dominated by the ethnic Burmese with one Rakhine politician saying, "we are therefore the victims of Muslimisation and Burmese chauvinism." The Economist wrote in 2015 that from the 1940s on and right to this day, the Burmens have seen and see themselves as victims of the British Empire while the Rakhine see themselves as victims of the British and the Burmens; both groups were and are so intent upon seeing themselves as victims that neither has much sympathy for the Rohingyas. After Jinnah's refusal to accept northern Arakan into the Dominion of Pakistan, some Rohingya elders who supported a jihad movement, founded the Mujahid party in northern Arakan in 1947. The aim of the Mujahid party was to create an autonomous Islamic state in Arakan. By the 1950s, they began to use the term "Rohingya" which may be a continuation of the term Rooinga to establish a distinct identity and identify themselves as indigenous. They were much more active before the 1962 Burmese coup d'état by General Ne Win, a Burmese general who began his military career fighting for the Japanese in World War II. Ne Win carried out military operations against them over a period of two decades. The prominent one was Operation King Dragon, which took place in 1978; as a result, many Muslims in the region fled to neighbouring Bangladesh as refugees. In addition to Bangladesh, a large number of Rohingyas also migrated to Karachi, Pakistan. Rohingya mujahideen are still active within the remote areas of Arakan. From 1971 to 1978, a number of Rakhine monks and Buddhists staged hunger strikes in Sittwe to force the government to tackle immigration issues which they believed to be causing a demographic shift in the region. Ne Win's government requested UN to repatriate the war refugees and launched military operations which drove off around 200,000 people to Bangladesh. In 1978, the Bangladesh government protested against the Burmese government concerning "the expulsion by force of thousands of Burmese Muslim citizens to Bangladesh". The Burmese government responded that those expelled were Bangladesh citizens who had resided illegally in Burma. In July 1978, after intensive negotiations mediated by UN, Ne Win's government agreed to take back 200,000 refugees who settled in Arakan. In the same year as well as in 1992, a joint statement by governments of Myanmar and Bangladesh "acknowledged that the Rohingya were lawful Burmese residents". In 1982, the Burmese government enacted the citizenship law and declared the "Bengalis" are foreigners. There are widespread beliefs among Rakhine people that significant number of immigrants arrived even after the 1980s when the border was relatively unguarded. However, there is no documentation proof for these claims as the last census was conducted in 1983. Successive Burmese governments have fortified the border and built up border guard forces. After 1988 Burmese pro-democracy uprising Since the 1990s, a new 'Rohingya' movement which is distinct from the 1950s armed rebellion has emerged. The new movement is characterised by lobbying internationally by overseas diaspora, establishing indigenous claims by Rohingya scholars, publicising the term "Rohingya" and denying Bengali origins by Rohingya politicians. Rohingya scholars have claimed that Rakhine was previously an Islamic state for a millennium, or that Muslims were king-makers of Rakhine kings for 350 years. They often traced the origin of Rohingyas to Arab seafarers. These claims have been rejected as "newly invented myths" in academic circles. Some Rohingya politicians have labelled Burmese and international historians as "Rakhine sympathizers" for rejecting the purported historical origins. The movement has garnered sharp criticisms from ethnic Rakhines and Kamans, the latter of whom are a recognised Muslim ethnic group in Rakhine. Kaman leaders support citizenship for Muslims in northern Rakhine but believe that the new movement is aimed at achieving a self-administered area or Rohang State as a separate Islamic state carved out of Rakhine, and condemn the movement. Rakhines' views are more critical. Citing Bangladesh's overpopulation and density, Rakhines perceive the Rohingyas as "the vanguard of an unstoppable wave of people that will inevitably engulf Rakhine". However, for moderate Rohingyas, the aim may have been no more than to gain citizenship status. Moderate Rohingya politicians agree to compromise on the term Rohingya if citizenship is provided under an alternative identity that is neither "Bengali" nor "Rohingya". Various alternatives including "Rakhine Muslims", "Myanmar Muslims" or simply "Myanmar" have been proposed. Burmese juntas (1990–2011) The military junta that ruled Myanmar for half a century relied heavily on mixing Burmese nationalism and Theravada Buddhism to bolster its rule, and, in the view of the US government, heavily discriminated against minorities like the Rohingyas. Some pro-democracy dissidents from Myanmar's ethnic Bamar majority do not consider the Rohingyas compatriots. Successive Burmese governments have been accused of provoking riots led by Buddhist monks against ethnic minorities like the Rohingyas In the 1990s, more than 250,000 Rohingya fled to refugee camps in Bangladesh. In the early 2000s, all but 20,000 of them were repatriated to Myanmar, some against their will. In 2009, a senior Burmese envoy to Hong Kong branded the Rohingyas "ugly as ogres" and a people that are alien to Myanmar. Under the 2008 constitution, the Myanmar military still control much of the country's government, including the ministries of home, defence and border affairs, 25% of seats in parliament and one vice-president. Rakhine State conflicts and refugees (2012–present) 2012 Rakhine State riots The 2012 Rakhine State riots were a series of conflicts between Rohingya Muslims who form the majority in the northern Rakhine and ethnic Rakhines who form the majority in the south. Before the riots, there were widespread fears among the Buddhist Rakhines that they would soon become a minority in their ancestral state. The riots occurred after weeks of sectarian disputes, including a gang rape and murder of a Rakhine woman by Rohingyas and killing of ten Burmese Muslims by Rakhines. There is evidence that the pogroms in 2012 were incited by the government asking the Rakhine men to defend their "race and religion". The Rakhine men were said to have been given knives and free food, and bused in from Sittwe. The Burmese government denied having organised the pogroms, but has never prosecuted anyone for the attacks against the Rohingyas. The Economist argued that since the transition to democracy in Burma in 2011, the military has been seeking to retain its privileged position, forming the motivation for it to encourage the riots in 2012 and allowing it to pose as the defender of Buddhism against Muslim Rohingya. On both sides, entire villages were "decimated". According to the Burmese authorities, the violence between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims left 78 people dead, 87 injured, and up to 140,000 people displaced. The government has responded by imposing curfews and deploying troops in the region. On 10 June 2012, a state of emergency was declared in Rakhine, allowing the military to participate in the administration of the region. Rohingya NGOs abroad have accused the Burmese army and police of targeting Rohingya Muslims through arrests and participating in violence. A field observation conducted by the International Crisis Group concluded that both communities were grateful for the protection provided by the military. A number of monks' organisations have taken measures to boycott NGOs which they believe helped only Rohingyas in the past decades even though Rakhines were equally poor. In July 2012, the Burmese Government did not include the Rohingya minority group in the census—classified as stateless Bengali Muslims from Bangladesh since 1982. About 140,000 Rohingya in Myanmar remain confined in IDP camps. 2015 refugee crisis In 2015, the Simon-Skjodt Centre of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum stated in a press statement the Rohingyas are "at grave risk of additional mass atrocities and even genocide". In 2015, to escape violence and persecution, thousands of Rohingyas migrated from Myanmar and Bangladesh, collectively dubbed as 'boat people' by international media, to Southeast Asian countries including Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand by rickety boats via the waters of the Strait of Malacca and the Andaman Sea. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates about 25,000 people have been taken to boats from January to March in 2015. There are claims that around 100 people died in Indonesia, 200 in Malaysia, and 10 in Thailand during the journey. An estimated 3,000 refugees from Myanmar and Bangladesh have been rescued or swum to shore and several thousand more are believed to remain trapped on boats at sea with little food or water. A Malaysian newspaper claimed crisis has been sparked by smugglers. However, the Economist in an article in June 2015 wrote the only reason why the Rohingyas were willing to pay to be taken out of Burma in squalid, overcrowded, fetid boats as "... it is the terrible conditions at home in Rakhine that force the Rohingyas out to sea in the first place." Autumn 2016 – Summer 2017 On 9 October 2016, insurgents attacked three Burmese border posts along Myanmar's border with Bangladesh. According to government officials in the mainly Rohingya border town of Maungdaw, the attackers brandished knives, machetes and homemade slingshots that fired metal bolts. Several dozen firearms and boxes of ammunition were looted by the attackers from the border posts. The attack resulted in the deaths of nine border officers. On 11 October 2016, four soldiers were killed on the third day of fighting. Following the attacks, reports emerged of several human rights violations allegedly perpetrated by Burmese security forces in their crackdown on suspected Rohingya insurgents. Shortly after, the Myanmar military forces and extremist Buddhists started a major crackdown on the Rohingya Muslims in the country's western region of Rakhine State in response to attacks on border police camps by unidentified insurgents. The crackdown resulted in wide-scale human rights violations at the hands of security forces, including extrajudicial killings, gang rapes, arsons, and other brutalities. The military crackdown on Rohingyas drew criticism from various quarters including the United Nations, human rights group Amnesty International, the US Department of State, and the government of Malaysia. The de facto head of government Aung San Suu Kyi has particularly been criticised for her inaction and silence over the issue and for doing little to prevent military abuses. Government officials in Rakhine State originally blamed the Rohingya Solidarity Organisation (RSO), an Islamist insurgent group mainly active in the 1980s and 1990s, for the attacks; however, on 17 October 2016, a group calling itself the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) claimed responsibility. In the following days, six other groups released statements, all citing the same leader. The Myanmar Army announced on 15 November 2016 that 69 Rohingya insurgents and 17 security forces (10 policemen, 7 soldiers) had been killed in recent clashes in northern Rakhine State, bringing the death toll to 134 (102 insurgents and 32 security forces). It was also announced that 234 people suspected of being connected to the attack were arrested. A police document obtained by Reuters in March 2017 listed 423 Rohingyas detained by the police since 9 October 2016, 13 of whom were children, the youngest being ten years old. Two police captains in Maungdaw verified the document and justified the arrests, with one of them saying, "We, the police, have to arrest those who collaborated with the attackers, children or not, but the court will decide if they are guilty; we are not the ones who decide." Myanmar police also claimed that the children had confessed to their alleged crimes during interrogations, and that they were not beaten or pressured during questioning. The average age of those detained is 34, the youngest is 10, and the oldest is 75. The Myanmar Armed Forces (Tatmadaw) stated on 1 September 2017 that the death toll had risen to 370 insurgents, 13 security personnel, 2 government officials and 14 civilians. The United Nations believes over 1,000 people have been killed since October 2016, which contradicts the death toll provided by the Myanmar government. Autumn 2017 crisis Starting in early August 2017, the Myanmar security forces began "clearance operations" against the Rohingya in northern Rakhine state. Following an attack by Rohingya militants of Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) against several security forces' outposts, 25 August, the operations escalated radically—killing thousands of Rohingya, brutalising thousands more, and driving hundreds of thousands out of the country into neighbouring Bangladesh while their villages burned—with the Myanmar military claiming that their actions were solely attacks on rebels in response to the ARSA attack. However, subsequent reports from various international organisations have indicated that the military operations were widespread indiscriminate attacks on the Rohingya population, already underway before the ARSA attacks, to purge northern Rakhine state of Rohingya, through "ethnic cleansing" and/or "genocide." In August 2018, study estimated that more than 24,000+ Rohingya people were killed by the Myanmar military and the local Buddhists since the "clearance operations" started on 25 August 2017. The study also estimated that 18,000+ the Rohingya Muslim women and girls were raped, 116,000 Rohingya were beaten, 36,000 Rohingya were thrown into fire Precipitating events According to BBC reporters, during the summer of 2017, the Myanmar military began arming and training Rakhine Buddhist natives in northern Rakhine state, and in late summer advised that any ethnic Rakhines "wishing to protect their state" would be given the opportunity to join "the local armed police." Matthew Smith, chief executive of human rights organisation Fortify Rights says that arming the Rakhines "was a decision made to effectively perpetrate atrocity crimes against the civilian population." At the same time, northern Rakhine state faced food shortages, and, starting in mid-August, the government cut off all food supply to the area. On 10 August, the military flew in a battalion of reinforcements to the area, triggering a public warning from the resident United Nations human rights representative to Myanmar, who urged Myanmar authorities to restrain themselves. A few weeks later, on 24 August 2017, the Rakhine Commission (chaired by former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan)—established by the new civilian Myanmar government to recommend solutions to the ethnic conflict and related issues in Rakhine state—released its recommendations for alleviating the suffering of minorities (especially the Rohingya), calling for measures that would improve security in Myanmar for the Rohingya, but not calling for all measures sought by various Rohingya factions. The following morning, according to Myanmar military officials, a Rohingya rebel group (ARSA, or Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army) led multiple coordinated attacks on 30 police outposts and border guards, killing a dozen government forces, at the cost of over 50 dead among the rebels. Conflict escalation Almost immediately the Myanmar military—apparently teaming with local authorities with mobs of Rakhine Buddhist civilians—launched massive reprisals that it described as its anti-terrorist "clearance operations" (which, UN investigators and BBC reporters later determined, had actually begun earlier)—attacking Rohingya villages throughout northern Rakhine state. Within the first three weeks, the military reported over 400 dead (whom it described as mostly "militants" and "terrorists")—the U.N. estimated over 1,000 dead (mostly civilians), and other sources initially suggested as many as 3,000—in the first four weeks of the reprisals. However, in December 2017, following a detailed survey of Rohingya refugees, a humanitarian organisation serving refugees, Médecins Sans Frontières calculated that at least 6,700 Rohingya men, women and children were killed in the first month of the major attacks, including at least 750 children (that number later revised to "over 1,000"). MSF estimated that 69% were killed by gunshots, 9% were burnt to death (including 15% of children killed), and 5% beaten to death. However, MSF cautioned "The numbers of deaths are likely to be an underestimation, as we have not surveyed all refugee settlements in Bangladesh and because the surveys don't account for the families who never made it out of Myanmar." Refugees reported numerous civilians—including women and children—being indiscriminately beaten, raped, tortured, shot, hacked to death or burned alive. and whole villages being burnt down by authorities and Buddhist mobs. Human Rights Watch released satellite photos showing the villages burning, but the Myanmar government insisted the fires were lit by Rohingya, themselves, or specifically Rohingya militants—though the authorities offered no proof of the allegation, and refused or tightly controlled all media and foreign access to the area. Myanmar's presidential spokesman reported that 176 ethnic Rohingya villages—out of the original a total of 471 Rohingya villages in three townships—had become empty. In addition to the 176 "abandoned" villages, some residents reportedly fled from at least 34 other villages. In the first four weeks of the conflict, over 400,000 Rohingya refugees (approximately 40% of the remaining Rohingya in Myanmar) fled the country on foot or by boat (chiefly to Bangladesh—the only other country bordering the Rakhine state area under attack) creating a major humanitarian crisis. In addition, 12,000 Rakhine Buddhists, and other non-Muslim Rakhine state residents were displaced within the country. On 10 September 2017, ARSA declared a temporary unilateral ceasefire to allow aid groups to work in the region. Its statement read that "ARSA strongly encourages all concerned humanitarian actors resume their humanitarian assistance to all victims of the humanitarian crisis, irrespective of ethnic or religious background during the ceasefire period." However, the Myanmar government dismissed the gesture, saying "we don't negotiate with terrorists." The violence and humanitarian 'catastrophe,' inflamed international tensions, especially in the region, and throughout the Muslim world. 13 September, Myanmar's presidential spokesman announced Myanmar would establish a new commission to implement some recommendations of Annan's Rakhine Commission, in their August 2017 report. The United Nations initially reported in early September 2017 that more than 120,000 Rohingya people had fled Myanmar for Bangladesh due to a recent rise in violence against them. The UNHCR, on 4 September, estimated 123,000 refugees have escaped western Myanmar since 25 August 2017. (By 15 September, that number had surpassed 400,000) The situation was expected to exacerbate the current refugee crisis as more than 400,000 Rohingya without citizenship were trapped in overcrowded camps and in conflict regions in Western Myanmar. Myanmar's de facto civilian leader and Nobel Laureate, Aung San Suu Kyi, criticised the media's reporting on the crisis, saying that her government is protecting everyone in Rakhine state, and argued that the reporting was misinformation that benefitted the aims of terrorists. Some reports suggest that the Myanmar military has ceded some border outposts to rebels armed with wooden clubs as part of encouraging Rohingyas to leave the country. A Holy See diplomat stated that at least 3000 people were killed by Myanmar security forces in August and September 2017. The U.N. Secretary General issued a statement, 13 September 2017, implying that the situation facing the Rohingya in Rakhine state was "ethnic cleansing." He urged Myanmar authorities to suspend military action and stop the violence—insisting that Myanmar's government uphold the rule of law, and (noting that "380,000" Rohingya had recently fled to Bangladesh) recognise the refugees' right to return to their homes. The same day, the U.N. Security Council issued a separate, unanimous statement, on the crisis following a closed-door meeting about Myanmar. In a semi-official press statement (its first statement on the situation in Myanmar in nine years)—the Council expressed "concern" about reported excessive violence in Myanmar's security operations, called for de-escalating the situation, reestablishing law and order, protecting civilians, and resolution of the refugee problem. On 19 September 2017, Myanmar's civilian leader, State Councillor Aung San Suu Kyi, made a major televised speech on the crisis—in English—stating "We condemn all human rights violations and unlawful violence," and indicated a desire to know why the Rohingya were fleeing. But Suu Kyi largely defended her prior position supporting the Myanmar military and its actions, and deflected international criticism by saying most Rohingya villages remained intact, and conflict had not broken out everywhere. Expressing no criticism of the Myanmar military, and denying that it had engaged in any "armed clashes or clearance operations" since 5 September, she added, "We are committed to the restoration of peace and stability and rule of law throughout the state," and that the country was "committed to a sustainable solution… for all communities in this state", but was vague as to how that would be achieved. By the end of September, conflicts between Rohingya Muslims and outnumbered Hindus, became apparent—including the killing of around 100 Hindu villagers in Rakhine state, around late August—according to the Myanmar military who claimed to have found the bodies of 20 women and eight boys in mass graves, 24 September, after a search near Ye Baw Kya village, in northern Rakhine state. The search was reportedly in response to a refugee in Bangladesh who contacted a local Hindu leader in Myanmar. Authorities quoted the refugee as saying about 300 ARSA militants, on 25 August, marched about 100 people out of the Hindu village and killed them. ARSA denied involvement, saying it was committed to not killing civilians. International news media were not immediately allowed free access to the area to verify the reports. In other cases, in Myanmar and in Bangladeshi refugee camps Hindu (particularly women) are reported to have faced kidnapping, religious abuse and "forced conversions" by Muslim Rohingyas. By the end of September 2017, UN, Bangladesh and other entities were reporting that—in addition to 200,000-300,000 Rohingya refugees already in Bangladesh after fleeing prior attacks in Myanmar—the current conflict, since late August 2017, had driven 500,000 more Rohingya from Myanmar into Bangladesh, creating what UN Secretary General António Guterres described as "the world's fastest-developing refugee emergency ... a humanitarian nightmare." In November 2017 Myanmar and Bangladesh signed a memorandum of understanding for the return home of Rohingya refugees. In April 2018 the first group of Rohingya refugees returned to Myanmar from Bangladesh. Relocation to Bhasan Char island In January 2016, the government of Bangladesh initiated a plan to relocate tens of thousands of forcibly displaced Rohingyas, who had fled to the country following persecution in Myanmar. The refugees are to be relocated to the island of Bhasan Char. The move has received substantial opposition. Human rights groups have seen the plan as a forced relocation. Additionally, concerns have been raised about living conditions on the island, which is low-lying and prone to flooding. The island has been described as "only accessible during winter and a haven for pirates". It is nine hours away from the camps in which the Rohingya currently live. In October 2019, Bangladeshi authorities again announced plans to relocate refugees to the island. On 9 July 2020, HRW urged Bangladeshi authorities to immediately move over 300 Rohingya refugees, including children, from the silt island of Bhasan Char to the Cox's Bazar refugee camps to let them reside with their families. Families in Cox's Bazar told HRW that relatives on Bhasan Char are being held without freedom of movement or adequate access to food or medical care, and face severe shortages of safe drinking water. Genocide In 2015, an assessment by the Yale Law School concluded that the government of Myanmar was waging a concerted campaign against the Rohingya, a campaign which could be classified as genocide under international law. An investigation by the media channel Al Jazeera English, along with the group Fortify Rights, found that the Myanmar military was systematically targeting the Rohingya population because of its ethnicity and religion. The International State Crime Initiative of the University of London issued a report stating that a genocide is taking place against the Rohingya. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees has used the term ethnic cleansing to describe the exodus of Rohingya from Myanmar. In December 2017, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, dismissed the Myanmar government's claims that its operations were merely a response to rebel attacks, and it also indicated that "for us, it was clear... that these operations were organised and planned," and could amount to "genocide." On 24 August 2018, the day before the anniversary of the eruption of extreme violence that came to be known as the "Rohingya Crisis," the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights issued a report (which was not made public until 27 August) which summarised its findings after an investigation was completed into the events of August–September 2017. It declared that the events constituted cause for the Myanmar government—particularly the Myanmar military (the "Tatmadaw") and its commanding officers—to be brought before the International Criminal Court and charged with "crimes against humanity", including "ethnic cleansing" and "genocide." Myanmar officials immediately rejected the charges. Demographics Those who identify as Rohingyas typically reside in the northernmost townships of Arakan bordering Bangladesh where they form 80–98% of the population. A typical Rohingya family has four or five surviving children but numbers up to twenty eight have been recorded in rare cases. Rohingyas have 46% more children than Myanmar's national average. In 2018, 48,000 Rohingya babies were born in Bangladesh, out of a total population of 120,000 fertile women. As of 2014, about 1.3 million Rohingyas lived in Myanmar and an estimated 1 million lived overseas. They constitute 40% of Rakhine State's total population or 60% of it if the overseas Rohingya population is included. As of December 2016, 1/7th stateless of the entire world's stateless population is Rohingya according to United Nations figures. Prior to the 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis and the military crackdown in 2016 and 2017, the Rohingya population in Myanmar was around 1.1 to 1.3 million They reside mainly in the northern Rakhine townships, where they form 80–98% of the population. Many Rohingyas have fled to southeastern Bangladesh, where there are over 900,000 refugees, as well as to India, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. More than 100,000 Rohingyas in Myanmar live in camps for internally displaced persons, and the authorities do not allow them to leave. The following table shows the statistics of Muslim population in Arakan. The data is for all Muslims in Arakan (Rakhine), regardless of ethnicity. The data for Burmese 1802 census is taken from a book by J. S. Furnivall. The British censuses classified immigrants from Chittagong as Bengalis. There were a small number of immigrants from other parts of India. The 1941 census was lost during the war. The 1983 census conducted under the Ne Win's government omitted people in volatile regions. It is unclear how many were missed. British era censuses can be found at Digital Library of India. Culture Rohingya culture shares many similarities to that of other ethnic groups in the region. The clothing worn by most Rohingyas is indistinguishable from those worn by other groups in Myanmar. Men wear bazu (long sleeved shirts) and longgi or doothi (loincloths) covering down to the ankles. Religious scholars prefer wearing kurutha, jubba or panjabi (long tops). In special occasions, Rohingya men sometimes wear taikpon (collarless jackets) on top of their shirts. Lucifica is a type of flat bread regularly eaten by Rohingyas, while bola fica is a popular traditional snack made of rice noodles. Betel leaves, colloquially known as faan, are also popular amongst Rohingyas. Language The Rohingya language is part of the Indo-Aryan sub-branch of the greater Indo-European language family and is related to the Chittagonian language spoken in the southernmost part of Bangladesh bordering Myanmar. While both Rohingya and Chittagonian are related to Bengali, they are not mutually intelligible with the latter. Rohingyas do not speak Burmese, the lingua franca of Myanmar, and face problems in integration. Rohingya scholars have written the Rohingya language in various scripts including the Arabic, Hanifi, Urdu, Roman, and Burmese alphabets, where Hanifi is a newly developed alphabet derived from Arabic with the addition of four characters from Latin and Burmese. More recently, a Latin alphabet has been developed using all 26 English letters A to Z and two additional Latin letters Ç (for retroflex R) and Ñ (for nasal sound). To accurately represent Rohingya phonology, this alphabet also uses five accented vowels (áéíóú). It has been recognised by ISO with ISO 639-3 "rhg" code. Religion Due to the fact that members of Burma's Rohingya Muslim population are not considered citizens of the country, they are not protected against discrimination by the Burmese government. Therefore, concerns exist with regard to the community's lack of religious freedom, especially in the legal and political sphere. The overwhelming majority of Rohingya people practice Islam, including a blend of Sunni Islam and Sufism and about 2.5% of Rohingya are Hindu. The government restricts their educational opportunities; so many of them pursue fundamental Islamic studies as their only option. Mosques and madrasas are present in most villages. Traditionally, men pray in congregations and women pray at home. Muslims have often faced obstacles and struggled to practice their religion in the same way as other individuals in Burma. These struggles have manifested themselves in the form of difficulty in receiving approval for the construction of places of worship, whether they be informal or formal. In the past, they have also been arrested for teaching and practising their religious beliefs. Health The Rohingya face discrimination and barriers to health care. According to a 2016 study published in the medical journal The Lancet, Rohingya children in Myanmar face low birth weight, malnutrition, diarrhoea, and barriers to reproduction on reaching adulthood. Rohingya have a child mortality rate of up to 224 deaths per 1,000 live births, more than 4 times the rate for the rest of Myanmar (52 per 1,000 live births), and 3 times rate of rest non-Rohingya areas of Rakhine state (77 per 1,000 live births). The paper also found that 40% of Rohingya children suffer from diarrhoea in internally displaced persons camp within Myanmar at a rate five times that of diarrhoeal illness among children in the rest of Rakhine. Human rights and refugee status The Rohingya people have been described as "one of the world's least wanted minorities" and "some of the world's most persecuted people". Médecins Sans Frontières claimed that the discrimination and human rights challenges which the Rohingya people have faced at the hands of the country's government and military are "among the world's top ten most under-reported stories of 2007." In February 1992, Myanmar's Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated in a press release, "In actual fact, although there are (135) national races living in Myanmar today, the so-called Rohingya people is not one of them. Historically, there has never been a 'Rohingya' race in Myanmar." The Rohingya are denied freedom of movement as well as the right to receive a higher education. They have been denied Burmese citizenship since the 1982 nationality law was enacted. Post the 1982 law, Burma has had different types of citizenship. Citizens possessed red identity cards; Rohingyas were given white identity cards which essentially classified them as foreigners who were living in Burma. Limitations and restrictions imposed on Rohingya are facilitated by this difference in citizenship. For example, Rohingyas cannot enlist in the army or participate in the government, and they are potentially faced with the issue of illegal immigration. The citizenship law also significantly underlies the human rights violations against the Rohingya by the military. They are not allowed to travel without official permission and they were previously required to sign a commitment not to have more than two children, though the law was not strictly enforced. They are subjected to routine forced labour. (Typically, a Rohingya man has to work on military or government projects one day a week, and perform sentry duty one night a week.) The Rohingya have also lost a lot of arable land, which has been confiscated by the military and given to Buddhist settlers who have moved there from elsewhere in Myanmar. The military is partially responsible for the human rights violations which have been committed against the Rohingya. These violations include destruction of property and forced relocation to another country. One such violation was committed when the military forced Rohingyas in Rakhine to move to Bangladesh. Other human rights violations against Rohingya Muslims include physical violence and sexual violence. The country's military officials rationalised these violations by stating that they were required as part of a census that was going to be conducted in Burma and the military needed to perform these acts in order to find out what the Rohingya Muslims's nationality was. According to Amnesty International, the Rohingya have been subjected to human rights violations by Burma's military dictatorship since 1978, and many of them have fled to neighbouring Bangladesh as a result. The dislocation of the Rohingya Muslims from their homes to other areas can be attributed to factors such as how isolated and undeveloped Rakhine is, the conflict between the Rohingya Muslims and the Buddhists, and the discrimination which they have been subjected to by the government. Members of the Rohingya community were displaced to Bangladesh where the government of the country, non-governmental organisations and the UNHCR gave aid to the refugees by providing them with homes and food. These external organisations (other than those which were controlled by the government) were important because the immigration of the Rohingyas was massive due to the number of people who needed help. In 2005, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees helped the Bangladeshi government repatriate Rohingyas from Bangladesh, but allegations of human rights abuses inside the refugee camps threatened this effort. In 2015, 140,000 Rohingyas were still living in IDP camps, three years after fleeing communal riots in 2012. Despite earlier repatriation efforts by the UN, the vast majority of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh are unable to return to Myanmar due to the communal violence which occurred there in 2012 and their fear of persecution. The Bangladeshi government has reduced the amount of support it allocates to the Rohingyas in order to prevent an outflow of Rohingya refugees into Bangladesh. In February 2009, many Rohingya refugees were rescued by Acehnese sailors in the Strait of Malacca, after 21 days at sea. Thousands of Rohingyas have also fled to Thailand. There have been charges that Rohingyas were shipped and towed out to the open sea from Thailand. In February 2009, evidence showing the Thai army towing a boatload of 190 Rohingya refugees out to sea surfaced. A group of refugees who were rescued by Indonesian authorities stated that they were captured and beaten by the Thai military, and then abandoned at sea. Steps to repatriate Rohingya refugees began in 2005. In 2009, the government of Bangladesh announced that it would repatriate around 9,000 Rohingyas who were living in refugee camps inside the country back to Myanmar, after a meeting with Burmese diplomats. On 16 October 2011, the new government of Myanmar agreed to take back registered Rohingya refugees. However, these repatriation efforts were hampered by the Rakhine riots in 2012. On 29 March 2014, the Burmese government banned the word "Rohingya" and asked that members of the minority group be registered as "Bengalis" in the 2014 Myanmar Census, the first census to be held in three decades. On 7 May 2014, the United States House of Representatives passed the United States House resolution on persecution of the Rohingya people in Burma that called on the government of Myanmar to end the discrimination and persecution. Researchers from the International State Crime Initiative at Queen Mary University of London suggest that the Myanmar government is in the final stages of an organised process of genocide against the Rohingya. In November 2016, a senior UN official in Bangladesh accused Myanmar of ethnic cleansing of Rohingyas. However, Charles Petrie, a former top UN official in Myanmar, said that "Today using the term, aside from being divisive and potentially incorrect, will only ensure that opportunities and options to try to resolve the issue to be addressed will not be available. In September 2020, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, has warned that the killing and abductions of Rohingyas have not stopped, despite the International Court of Justice ordering Myanmar's leadership to prevent genocide and stop the killings in December 2019. Some countries like Malaysia have rejected the resettlement of Rohingya refugees and sent them back to sea because of economic difficulties and the Coronavirus pandemic. Malaysian authorities have also expressed concern that militant Rohingya groups have been raising funds by extorting money from Rohingya refugees in the country. See also International reactions to the Rohingya genocide Kamein List of ethnic groups in Myanmar Min Aung Hlaing Persecution of Muslims Notes References Citations General sources (in alphabetical order) "Burma's Western Border as Reported by the Diplomatic Correspondence (1947–1975)" by Aye Chan "Burma's Western Border as Reported by the Diplomatic Correspondence (1947–1975)" by Aye Chan International Center for Transitional Justice, Myanmar External links Ethnic groups in Bangladesh Ethnic groups in Myanmar Ethnic groups in Pakistan Indo-Aryan peoples Islam in Myanmar Muslim ethnoreligious groups Refugees in Indonesia Refugees in Malaysia Stateless nationalism in Asia Stateless people	false	[ "\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer", "What Else Do You Do? (A Compilation of Quiet Music) is a various artists compilation album, released in 1990 by Shimmy Disc.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel \nAdapted from the What Else Do You Do? (A Compilation of Quiet Music) liner notes.\n Kramer – production, engineering\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n \n\n1990 compilation albums\nAlbums produced by Kramer (musician)\nShimmy Disc compilation albums" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature" ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	What happened in 2005?	1	What did Goldfrapp do in 2005?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	true	[ "Don Juan Manuel's Tales of Count Lucanor, in Spanish Libro de los ejemplos del conde Lucanor y de Patronio (Book of the Examples of Count Lucanor and of Patronio), also commonly known as El Conde Lucanor, Libro de Patronio, or Libro de los ejemplos (original Old Castilian: Libro de los enxiemplos del Conde Lucanor et de Patronio), is one of the earliest works of prose in Castilian Spanish. It was first written in 1335.\n\nThe book is divided into four parts. The first and most well-known part is a series of 51 short stories (some no more than a page or two) drawn from various sources, such as Aesop and other classical writers, and Arabic folktales.\n\nTales of Count Lucanor was first printed in 1575 when it was published at Seville under the auspices of Argote de Molina. It was again printed at Madrid in 1642, after which it lay forgotten for nearly two centuries.\n\nPurpose and structure\n\nA didactic, moralistic purpose, which would color so much of the Spanish literature to follow (see Novela picaresca), is the mark of this book. Count Lucanor engages in conversation with his advisor Patronio, putting to him a problem (\"Some man has made me a proposition...\" or \"I fear that such and such person intends to...\") and asking for advice. Patronio responds always with the greatest humility, claiming not to wish to offer advice to so illustrious a person as the Count, but offering to tell him a story of which the Count's problem reminds him. (Thus, the stories are \"examples\" [ejemplos] of wise action.) At the end he advises the Count to do as the protagonist of his story did.\n\nEach chapter ends in more or less the same way, with slight variations on: \"And this pleased the Count greatly and he did just so, and found it well. And Don Johán (Juan) saw that this example was very good, and had it written in this book, and composed the following verses.\" A rhymed couplet closes, giving the moral of the story.\n\nOrigin of stories and influence on later literature\nMany of the stories written in the book are the first examples written in a modern European language of various stories, which many other writers would use in the proceeding centuries. Many of the stories he included were themselves derived from other stories, coming from western and Arab sources.\n\nShakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew has the basic elements of Tale 35, \"What Happened to a Young Man Who Married a Strong and Ill-tempered Woman\".\n\nTale 32, \"What Happened to the King and the Tricksters Who Made Cloth\" tells the story that Hans Christian Andersen made popular as The Emperor's New Clothes.\n\nStory 7, \"What Happened to a Woman Named Truhana\", a version of Aesop's The Milkmaid and Her Pail, was claimed by Max Müller to originate in the Hindu cycle Panchatantra.\n\nTale 2, \"What happened to a good Man and his Son, leading a beast to market,\" is the familiar fable The miller, his son and the donkey.\n\nIn 2016, Baroque Decay released a game under the name \"The Count Lucanor\". As well as some protagonists' names, certain events from the books inspired past events in the game.\n\nThe stories\n\nThe book opens with a prologue which introduces the characters of the Count and Patronio. The titles in the following list are those given in Keller and Keating's 1977 translation into English. James York's 1868 translation into English gives a significantly different ordering of the stories and omits the fifty-first.\n\n What Happened to a King and His Favorite \n What Happened to a Good Man and His Son \n How King Richard of England Leapt into the Sea against the Moors\n What a Genoese Said to His Soul When He Was about to Die \n What Happened to a Fox and a Crow Who Had a Piece of Cheese in His Beak\n How the Swallow Warned the Other Birds When She Saw Flax Being Sown \n What Happened to a Woman Named Truhana \n What Happened to a Man Whose Liver Had to Be Washed \n What Happened to Two Horses Which Were Thrown to the Lion \n What Happened to a Man Who on Account of Poverty and Lack of Other Food Was Eating Bitter Lentils \n What Happened to a Dean of Santiago de Compostela and Don Yllán, the Grand Master of Toledo\n What Happened to the Fox and the Rooster \n What Happened to a Man Who Was Hunting Partridges \n The Miracle of Saint Dominick When He Preached against the Usurer \n What Happened to Lorenzo Suárez at the Siege of Seville \n The Reply that count Fernán González Gave to His Relative Núño Laynes \n What Happened to a Very Hungry Man Who Was Half-heartedly Invited to Dinner \n What Happened to Pero Meléndez de Valdés When He Broke His Leg \n What Happened to the Crows and the Owls \n What Happened to a King for Whom a Man Promised to Perform Alchemy \n What Happened to a Young King and a Philosopher to Whom his Father Commended Him \n What Happened to the Lion and the Bull \n How the Ants Provide for Themselves \n What Happened to the King Who Wanted to Test His Three Sons \n What Happened to the Count of Provence and How He Was Freed from Prison by the Advice of Saladin\n What Happened to the Tree of Lies \n What Happened to an Emperor and to Don Alvarfáñez Minaya and Their Wives \n What Happened in Granada to Don Lorenzo Suárez Gallinato When He Beheaded the Renegade Chaplain \n What Happened to a Fox Who Lay down in the Street to Play Dead \n What Happened to King Abenabet of Seville and Ramayquía His Wife \n How a Cardinal Judged between the Canons of Paris and the Friars Minor \n What Happened to the King and the Tricksters Who Made Cloth \n What Happened to Don Juan Manuel's Saker Falcon and an Eagle and a Heron \n What Happened to a Blind Man Who Was Leading Another \n What Happened to a Young Man Who Married a Strong and Ill-tempered Woman\n What Happened to a Merchant When He Found His Son and His Wife Sleeping Together \n What Happened to Count Fernán González with His Men after He Had Won the Battle of Hacinas \n What Happened to a Man Who Was Loaded down with Precious Stones and Drowned in the River \n What Happened to a Man and a Swallow and a Sparrow \n Why the Seneschal of Carcassonne Lost His Soul \n What Happened to a King of Córdova Named Al-Haquem \n What Happened to a Woman of Sham Piety \n What Happened to Good and Evil and the Wise Man and the Madman \n What Happened to Don Pero Núñez the Loyal, to Don Ruy González de Zavallos, and to Don Gutier Roiz de Blaguiello with Don Rodrigo the Generous \n What Happened to a Man Who Became the Devil's Friend and Vassal \n What Happened to a Philosopher who by Accident Went down a Street Where Prostitutes Lived \n What Befell a Moor and His Sister Who Pretended That She Was Timid \n What Happened to a Man Who Tested His Friends \n What Happened to the Man Whom They Cast out Naked on an Island When They Took away from Him the Kingdom He Ruled \n What Happened to Saladin and a Lady, the Wife of a Knight Who Was His Vassal \n What Happened to a Christian King Who Was Very Powerful and Haughty\n\nReferences\n\nNotes\n\nBibliography\n\n Sturm, Harlan\n\n Wacks, David\n\nExternal links\n\nThe Internet Archive provides free access to the 1868 translation by James York.\nJSTOR has the to the 1977 translation by Keller and Keating.\nSelections in English and Spanish (pedagogical edition) with introduction, notes, and bibliography in Open Iberia/América (open access teaching anthology)\n\n14th-century books\nSpanish literature\n1335 books", "\"What Happened to Us\" is a song by Australian recording artist Jessica Mauboy, featuring English recording artist Jay Sean. It was written by Sean, Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim and Israel Cruz. \"What Happened to Us\" was leaked online in October 2010, and was released on 10 March 2011, as the third single from Mauboy's second studio album, Get 'Em Girls (2010). The song received positive reviews from critics.\n\nA remix of \"What Happened to Us\" made by production team OFM, was released on 11 April 2011. A different version of the song which features Stan Walker, was released on 29 May 2011. \"What Happened to Us\" charted on the ARIA Singles Chart at number 14 and was certified platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA). An accompanying music video was directed by Mark Alston, and reminisces on a former relationship between Mauboy and Sean.\n\nProduction and release\n\n\"What Happened to Us\" was written by Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim, Israel Cruz and Jay Sean. It was produced by Skaller, Cruz, Rohaim and Bobby Bass. The song uses C, D, and B minor chords in the chorus. \"What Happened to Us\" was sent to contemporary hit radio in Australia on 14 February 2011. The cover art for the song was revealed on 22 February on Mauboy's official Facebook page. A CD release was available for purchase via her official website on 10 March, for one week only. It was released digitally the following day.\n\nReception\nMajhid Heath from ABC Online Indigenous called the song a \"Jordin Sparks-esque duet\", and wrote that it \"has a nice innocence to it that rings true to the experience of losing a first love.\" Chris Urankar from Nine to Five wrote that it as a \"mid-tempo duet ballad\" which signifies Mauboy's strength as a global player. On 21 March 2011, \"What Happened to Us\" debuted at number 30 on the ARIA Singles Chart, and peaked at number 14 the following week. The song was certified platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA), for selling 70,000 copies. \"What Happened to Us\" spent a total of ten weeks in the ARIA top fifty.\n\nMusic video\n\nBackground\nThe music video for the song was shot in the Elizabeth Bay House in Sydney on 26 November 2010. The video was shot during Sean's visit to Australia for the Summerbeatz tour. During an interview with The Daily Telegraph while on the set of the video, Sean said \"the song is sick! ... Jessica's voice is amazing and we're shooting [the video] in this ridiculously beautiful mansion overlooking the harbour.\" The video was directed by Mark Alston, who had previously directed the video for Mauboy's single \"Let Me Be Me\" (2009). It premiered on YouTube on 10 February 2011.\n\nSynopsis and reception\nThe video begins showing Mauboy who appears to be sitting on a yellow antique couch in a mansion, wearing a purple dress. As the video progresses, scenes of memories are displayed of Mauboy and her love interest, played by Sean, spending time there previously. It then cuts to the scenes where Sean appears in the main entrance room of the mansion. The final scene shows Mauboy outdoors in a gold dress, surrounded by green grass and trees. She is later joined by Sean who appears in a black suit and a white shirt, and together they sing the chorus of the song to each other. David Lim of Feed Limmy wrote that the video is \"easily the best thing our R&B princess has committed to film – ever\" and praised the \"mansion and wondrous interior décor\". He also commended Mauboy for choosing Australian talent to direct the video instead of American directors, which she had used for her previous two music videos. Since its release, the video has received over two million views on Vevo.\n\nLive performances\nMauboy performed \"What Happened to Us\" live for the first time during her YouTube Live Sessions program on 4 December 2010. She also appeared on Adam Hills in Gordon Street Tonight on 23 February 2011 for an interview and later performed the song. On 15 March 2011, Mauboy performed \"What Happened to Us\" on Sunrise. She also performed the song with Stan Walker during the Australian leg of Chris Brown's F.A.M.E. Tour in April 2011. Mauboy and Walker later performed \"What Happened to Us\" on Dancing with the Stars Australia on 29 May 2011. From November 2013 to February 2014, \"What Happened to Us\" was part of the set list of the To the End of the Earth Tour, Mauboy's second headlining tour of Australia, with Nathaniel Willemse singing Sean's part.\n\nTrack listing\n\nDigital download\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean – 3:19\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Sgt Slick Remix) – 6:33\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Just Witness Remix) – 3:45\n\nCD single\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Album Version) – 3:19\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Sgt Slick Remix) – 6:33\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (OFM Remix) – 3:39\n\nDigital download – Remix\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (OFM Remix) – 3:38\n\nDigital download\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Stan Walker – 3:20\n\nPersonnel\nSongwriting – Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim, Israel Cruz, Jay Sean\nProduction – Jeremy Skaller, Bobby Bass\nAdditional production – Israel Cruz, Khaled Rohaim\nLead vocals – Jessica Mauboy, Jay Sean\nMixing – Phil Tan\nAdditional mixing – Damien Lewis\nMastering – Tom Coyne \nSource:\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly chart\n\nYear-end chart\n\nCertification\n\nRadio dates and release history\n\nReferences\n\n2010 songs\n2011 singles\nJessica Mauboy songs\nJay Sean songs\nSongs written by Billy Steinberg\nSongs written by Jay Sean\nSongs written by Josh Alexander\nSongs written by Israel Cruz\nVocal duets\nSony Music Australia singles\nSongs written by Khaled Rohaim" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005." ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	What happened in 2006?	2	What did Goldfrapp do in 2006?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature.	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	true	[ "Don Juan Manuel's Tales of Count Lucanor, in Spanish Libro de los ejemplos del conde Lucanor y de Patronio (Book of the Examples of Count Lucanor and of Patronio), also commonly known as El Conde Lucanor, Libro de Patronio, or Libro de los ejemplos (original Old Castilian: Libro de los enxiemplos del Conde Lucanor et de Patronio), is one of the earliest works of prose in Castilian Spanish. It was first written in 1335.\n\nThe book is divided into four parts. The first and most well-known part is a series of 51 short stories (some no more than a page or two) drawn from various sources, such as Aesop and other classical writers, and Arabic folktales.\n\nTales of Count Lucanor was first printed in 1575 when it was published at Seville under the auspices of Argote de Molina. It was again printed at Madrid in 1642, after which it lay forgotten for nearly two centuries.\n\nPurpose and structure\n\nA didactic, moralistic purpose, which would color so much of the Spanish literature to follow (see Novela picaresca), is the mark of this book. Count Lucanor engages in conversation with his advisor Patronio, putting to him a problem (\"Some man has made me a proposition...\" or \"I fear that such and such person intends to...\") and asking for advice. Patronio responds always with the greatest humility, claiming not to wish to offer advice to so illustrious a person as the Count, but offering to tell him a story of which the Count's problem reminds him. (Thus, the stories are \"examples\" [ejemplos] of wise action.) At the end he advises the Count to do as the protagonist of his story did.\n\nEach chapter ends in more or less the same way, with slight variations on: \"And this pleased the Count greatly and he did just so, and found it well. And Don Johán (Juan) saw that this example was very good, and had it written in this book, and composed the following verses.\" A rhymed couplet closes, giving the moral of the story.\n\nOrigin of stories and influence on later literature\nMany of the stories written in the book are the first examples written in a modern European language of various stories, which many other writers would use in the proceeding centuries. Many of the stories he included were themselves derived from other stories, coming from western and Arab sources.\n\nShakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew has the basic elements of Tale 35, \"What Happened to a Young Man Who Married a Strong and Ill-tempered Woman\".\n\nTale 32, \"What Happened to the King and the Tricksters Who Made Cloth\" tells the story that Hans Christian Andersen made popular as The Emperor's New Clothes.\n\nStory 7, \"What Happened to a Woman Named Truhana\", a version of Aesop's The Milkmaid and Her Pail, was claimed by Max Müller to originate in the Hindu cycle Panchatantra.\n\nTale 2, \"What happened to a good Man and his Son, leading a beast to market,\" is the familiar fable The miller, his son and the donkey.\n\nIn 2016, Baroque Decay released a game under the name \"The Count Lucanor\". As well as some protagonists' names, certain events from the books inspired past events in the game.\n\nThe stories\n\nThe book opens with a prologue which introduces the characters of the Count and Patronio. The titles in the following list are those given in Keller and Keating's 1977 translation into English. James York's 1868 translation into English gives a significantly different ordering of the stories and omits the fifty-first.\n\n What Happened to a King and His Favorite \n What Happened to a Good Man and His Son \n How King Richard of England Leapt into the Sea against the Moors\n What a Genoese Said to His Soul When He Was about to Die \n What Happened to a Fox and a Crow Who Had a Piece of Cheese in His Beak\n How the Swallow Warned the Other Birds When She Saw Flax Being Sown \n What Happened to a Woman Named Truhana \n What Happened to a Man Whose Liver Had to Be Washed \n What Happened to Two Horses Which Were Thrown to the Lion \n What Happened to a Man Who on Account of Poverty and Lack of Other Food Was Eating Bitter Lentils \n What Happened to a Dean of Santiago de Compostela and Don Yllán, the Grand Master of Toledo\n What Happened to the Fox and the Rooster \n What Happened to a Man Who Was Hunting Partridges \n The Miracle of Saint Dominick When He Preached against the Usurer \n What Happened to Lorenzo Suárez at the Siege of Seville \n The Reply that count Fernán González Gave to His Relative Núño Laynes \n What Happened to a Very Hungry Man Who Was Half-heartedly Invited to Dinner \n What Happened to Pero Meléndez de Valdés When He Broke His Leg \n What Happened to the Crows and the Owls \n What Happened to a King for Whom a Man Promised to Perform Alchemy \n What Happened to a Young King and a Philosopher to Whom his Father Commended Him \n What Happened to the Lion and the Bull \n How the Ants Provide for Themselves \n What Happened to the King Who Wanted to Test His Three Sons \n What Happened to the Count of Provence and How He Was Freed from Prison by the Advice of Saladin\n What Happened to the Tree of Lies \n What Happened to an Emperor and to Don Alvarfáñez Minaya and Their Wives \n What Happened in Granada to Don Lorenzo Suárez Gallinato When He Beheaded the Renegade Chaplain \n What Happened to a Fox Who Lay down in the Street to Play Dead \n What Happened to King Abenabet of Seville and Ramayquía His Wife \n How a Cardinal Judged between the Canons of Paris and the Friars Minor \n What Happened to the King and the Tricksters Who Made Cloth \n What Happened to Don Juan Manuel's Saker Falcon and an Eagle and a Heron \n What Happened to a Blind Man Who Was Leading Another \n What Happened to a Young Man Who Married a Strong and Ill-tempered Woman\n What Happened to a Merchant When He Found His Son and His Wife Sleeping Together \n What Happened to Count Fernán González with His Men after He Had Won the Battle of Hacinas \n What Happened to a Man Who Was Loaded down with Precious Stones and Drowned in the River \n What Happened to a Man and a Swallow and a Sparrow \n Why the Seneschal of Carcassonne Lost His Soul \n What Happened to a King of Córdova Named Al-Haquem \n What Happened to a Woman of Sham Piety \n What Happened to Good and Evil and the Wise Man and the Madman \n What Happened to Don Pero Núñez the Loyal, to Don Ruy González de Zavallos, and to Don Gutier Roiz de Blaguiello with Don Rodrigo the Generous \n What Happened to a Man Who Became the Devil's Friend and Vassal \n What Happened to a Philosopher who by Accident Went down a Street Where Prostitutes Lived \n What Befell a Moor and His Sister Who Pretended That She Was Timid \n What Happened to a Man Who Tested His Friends \n What Happened to the Man Whom They Cast out Naked on an Island When They Took away from Him the Kingdom He Ruled \n What Happened to Saladin and a Lady, the Wife of a Knight Who Was His Vassal \n What Happened to a Christian King Who Was Very Powerful and Haughty\n\nReferences\n\nNotes\n\nBibliography\n\n Sturm, Harlan\n\n Wacks, David\n\nExternal links\n\nThe Internet Archive provides free access to the 1868 translation by James York.\nJSTOR has the to the 1977 translation by Keller and Keating.\nSelections in English and Spanish (pedagogical edition) with introduction, notes, and bibliography in Open Iberia/América (open access teaching anthology)\n\n14th-century books\nSpanish literature\n1335 books", "\"What Happened to Us\" is a song by Australian recording artist Jessica Mauboy, featuring English recording artist Jay Sean. It was written by Sean, Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim and Israel Cruz. \"What Happened to Us\" was leaked online in October 2010, and was released on 10 March 2011, as the third single from Mauboy's second studio album, Get 'Em Girls (2010). The song received positive reviews from critics.\n\nA remix of \"What Happened to Us\" made by production team OFM, was released on 11 April 2011. A different version of the song which features Stan Walker, was released on 29 May 2011. \"What Happened to Us\" charted on the ARIA Singles Chart at number 14 and was certified platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA). An accompanying music video was directed by Mark Alston, and reminisces on a former relationship between Mauboy and Sean.\n\nProduction and release\n\n\"What Happened to Us\" was written by Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim, Israel Cruz and Jay Sean. It was produced by Skaller, Cruz, Rohaim and Bobby Bass. The song uses C, D, and B minor chords in the chorus. \"What Happened to Us\" was sent to contemporary hit radio in Australia on 14 February 2011. The cover art for the song was revealed on 22 February on Mauboy's official Facebook page. A CD release was available for purchase via her official website on 10 March, for one week only. It was released digitally the following day.\n\nReception\nMajhid Heath from ABC Online Indigenous called the song a \"Jordin Sparks-esque duet\", and wrote that it \"has a nice innocence to it that rings true to the experience of losing a first love.\" Chris Urankar from Nine to Five wrote that it as a \"mid-tempo duet ballad\" which signifies Mauboy's strength as a global player. On 21 March 2011, \"What Happened to Us\" debuted at number 30 on the ARIA Singles Chart, and peaked at number 14 the following week. The song was certified platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA), for selling 70,000 copies. \"What Happened to Us\" spent a total of ten weeks in the ARIA top fifty.\n\nMusic video\n\nBackground\nThe music video for the song was shot in the Elizabeth Bay House in Sydney on 26 November 2010. The video was shot during Sean's visit to Australia for the Summerbeatz tour. During an interview with The Daily Telegraph while on the set of the video, Sean said \"the song is sick! ... Jessica's voice is amazing and we're shooting [the video] in this ridiculously beautiful mansion overlooking the harbour.\" The video was directed by Mark Alston, who had previously directed the video for Mauboy's single \"Let Me Be Me\" (2009). It premiered on YouTube on 10 February 2011.\n\nSynopsis and reception\nThe video begins showing Mauboy who appears to be sitting on a yellow antique couch in a mansion, wearing a purple dress. As the video progresses, scenes of memories are displayed of Mauboy and her love interest, played by Sean, spending time there previously. It then cuts to the scenes where Sean appears in the main entrance room of the mansion. The final scene shows Mauboy outdoors in a gold dress, surrounded by green grass and trees. She is later joined by Sean who appears in a black suit and a white shirt, and together they sing the chorus of the song to each other. David Lim of Feed Limmy wrote that the video is \"easily the best thing our R&B princess has committed to film – ever\" and praised the \"mansion and wondrous interior décor\". He also commended Mauboy for choosing Australian talent to direct the video instead of American directors, which she had used for her previous two music videos. Since its release, the video has received over two million views on Vevo.\n\nLive performances\nMauboy performed \"What Happened to Us\" live for the first time during her YouTube Live Sessions program on 4 December 2010. She also appeared on Adam Hills in Gordon Street Tonight on 23 February 2011 for an interview and later performed the song. On 15 March 2011, Mauboy performed \"What Happened to Us\" on Sunrise. She also performed the song with Stan Walker during the Australian leg of Chris Brown's F.A.M.E. Tour in April 2011. Mauboy and Walker later performed \"What Happened to Us\" on Dancing with the Stars Australia on 29 May 2011. From November 2013 to February 2014, \"What Happened to Us\" was part of the set list of the To the End of the Earth Tour, Mauboy's second headlining tour of Australia, with Nathaniel Willemse singing Sean's part.\n\nTrack listing\n\nDigital download\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean – 3:19\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Sgt Slick Remix) – 6:33\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Just Witness Remix) – 3:45\n\nCD single\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Album Version) – 3:19\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Sgt Slick Remix) – 6:33\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (OFM Remix) – 3:39\n\nDigital download – Remix\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (OFM Remix) – 3:38\n\nDigital download\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Stan Walker – 3:20\n\nPersonnel\nSongwriting – Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim, Israel Cruz, Jay Sean\nProduction – Jeremy Skaller, Bobby Bass\nAdditional production – Israel Cruz, Khaled Rohaim\nLead vocals – Jessica Mauboy, Jay Sean\nMixing – Phil Tan\nAdditional mixing – Damien Lewis\nMastering – Tom Coyne \nSource:\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly chart\n\nYear-end chart\n\nCertification\n\nRadio dates and release history\n\nReferences\n\n2010 songs\n2011 singles\nJessica Mauboy songs\nJay Sean songs\nSongs written by Billy Steinberg\nSongs written by Jay Sean\nSongs written by Josh Alexander\nSongs written by Israel Cruz\nVocal duets\nSony Music Australia singles\nSongs written by Khaled Rohaim" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.", "What happened in 2006?", "In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature." ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	What songs are on the Supernature album?	3	What songs are on the Supernature album by Goldfrapp?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	"Ooh La La", the album's lead single,	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	true	[ "Supernature is the third studio album by English electronic music duo Goldfrapp, released on 17 August 2005 by Mute Records. The album received generally favourable reviews, with most critics complimenting its blend of pop and electronic music. It debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart with first-week sales of 52,976 copies, and has been certified platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). Supernature has sold one million copies worldwide.\n\nThe album's lead single, \"Ooh La La\", reached number four on the UK Singles Chart, becoming the duo's highest-peaking single to date. The album spawned three further singles: \"Number 1\", \"Ride a White Horse\" and \"Fly Me Away\". In North America, where \"Number 1\" was promoted as the first single, the album was released on 7 March 2006 and reached number 138 on the charts. Supernature was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2007.\n\nRecording and production\n\nSupernature contains music in the same pop and electronic dance styles featured on Goldfrapp's previous studio album, Black Cherry (2003)—especially its singles \"Strict Machine\" and \"Twist\"—although it focuses on subtle hooks instead of large choruses. Lead singer Alison Goldfrapp described the album's writing process as \"an electronic/glam cross between Berlin, New York and North-East Somerset\".\n\nGoldfrapp and Will Gregory recorded the bulk of Supernature in late 2004 in the countryside near Bath, England—the same place they recorded Black Cherry. They had rented a small house and spent some months writing music; they later explained that the unpopulated location kept them from distractions and that the majority of the process was \"very basic\". Goldfrapp called their writing relationship a \"democracy\", playing off one another while in the recording studio. The lyrical content of the song \"Number 1\", which became the album's second single, is about the importance and meaning of relationships, even though they do not necessarily last.\n\nIn an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Goldfrapp explained that they had never intended to create pop music. However, the singles released from Black Cherry became successes across nightclubs in North America, and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Although this made the duo nervous, \"Ooh La La\" was the group's first song to feature the electric guitar. Before its composition, the duo avoided the use of the guitar because of the guitar's overly recognisable rhythm. Four-on-the-floor bass drums are also present on several of the album's tracks, and the piano ballad \"Let It Take You\" features evening-effects composed on a synthesiser. \"You Never Know\" begins with Alison Goldfrapp executing a synthesised voice, supported by both pads and synthesisers. Goldfrapp and Gregory have cited \"Satin Chic\" as their favourite song on Supernature.\n\nAlison Goldfrapp named the Roland String synth as one of her favourite keyboards. \"Number 1\" features an old synth and a bass arrangement that the group began to use frequently after recording the song. Another Roland keyboard, the SH-09 monophonic synthesiser first produced in 1979, is another favourite; she played the duo's song \"Train\" (2003) on it and enjoys the sounds that it makes. Goldfrapp was also impressed by a Russian synth, enamored with its Russian-language writing.\n\nComposition and music\n\n\"Ooh La La\", Supernatures opening track, inspired by T. Rex, was chosen as its lead single \"because it was up and in your face and it carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album\". It was the duo's first song to feature the electric guitar, and received positive reviews, often being noted as a highlight of the album. \"Ooh La La\" became Goldfrapp's most successful single on the UK Singles Chart to date when it peaked at number four, while topping the Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart in the United States. The second track, \"Lovely 2 C U\", received mixed reviews from critics, with one reviewer stating that it was the \"worst offender of sounding by-numbers, its lazy glam affectations sounding all the worse amid a chorus striking only in its complete dullness\".\n\n\"Ride a White Horse\", the third single, was inspired by the disco era. Like previous singles from the album, the song was another top-20 single in the UK, where it peaked at number 15. The ballads \"You Never Know\" and \"Let It Take You\" have minimal background electronics, and were generally well received by critics, who drew comparisons to Goldfrapp's debut album Felt Mountain. Goldfrapp's performance on \"You Never Know\" was described as \"chameleonic\" with odes to Debbie Harry and Siouxsie Sioux. \"Fly Me Away\", another synth ballad, had an accompanying music video which featured Goldfrapp as an animated doll; the video, however, was never released. Serving as the fourth and final single from Supernature, the song was not heavily promoted and was less commercially successful than the other singles, peaking at number 26 on the UK chart. \"Slide In\", an electroclash song about sex, and \"Koko\" were compared to Gary Numan's early compositions.\n\n\"Satin Chic\" is a disco song with glam rock and cabaret influences, similar to early Elton John. Cited by Goldfrapp and Gregory as their favourite song on Supernature, it was remixed by The Flaming Lips, and issued as a limited-edition single on 4 September 2006. The 10th track, \"Time Out from the World\", features an orchestra and whispered vocals by Goldfrapp. Critics liked the song, writing that it was an \"exception to the prevailing style of Supernature\" due to its \"haunting, yet glamorous, atmospherics\". The album's closing track and second single \"Number 1\" is about the importance and meanings of relationships. The song, which is based around a synth and bass arrangement, reached number nine on the UK Singles Chart and number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart.\n\nRelease and artwork\nThe album was released in two versions: a single-disc version, which used Opendisc technology to offer extra contents via a website, and a double-disc version which included the album in surround sound on both discs. The first disc is a hybrid SACD with 5.1 multichannel SACD audio, stereo SACD audio and stereo CD audio. The second disc, a DVD-Video, contains the multichannel version of the album in DTS 96/24 as well as a documentary and music videos for \"Ooh La La\" and \"Number 1\".\n\nThe album cover, photographed by Ross Kirton, is a rear-view shot of Alison against a sparkly black backdrop, looking over her shoulder while covering her breast with her hand. The regular edition cover shows her from the waist up, whereas the US special edition shows the cover art in its entirety, with Alison wearing a long plume of peacock feathers and golden platform shoes. In late 2005, the album ranked number eight on the annual Best Art Vinyl poll.\n\nCritical reception\n\nSupernature received favourable reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 79, based on 27 reviews. Dorian Lynskey of The Guardian said that the album was \"a brash, beautiful celebration of love and dancing\". In a review for PopMatters, Adrien Begrand said that \"[a]lthough Supernature lacks the imagination of Felt Mountain and the saucy brilliance of Black Cherry, it doesn't pander to the pop crowd.\" Lauren Gitlin of Rolling Stone said the album was \"[t]oxic and delicious\" and that \"Supernature will make you do bad things—and like it.\" However, Pitchfork reviewer Nitsuh Abebe was less impressed, and wrote that the album's songs \"keep feeling like exercises: too thick and melodic to work like dance music, but with melodies that refuse to stick as satisfyingly as pop.\" Michael Hubbard of musicOMH wrote a review for every song on Supernature, and although he felt that it was a \"curious, rather than classic, record\", he criticised it for \"fading out early on, with poor, low quality songs at the end which leave the listener feeling cheated\". AllMusic critic Heather Phares called Supernature \"Goldfrapp's most accessible album\" and named \"Ooh La La\" as its best song.\n\nIn a review for Canadian-based website Jam!, Andrew Carver praised the different sounds on Supernature, which range from \"a blend of future noise\" to \"crushed velvet corruption\"; he described the album as \"one sharp recording\". Jessica Suarez of Spin magazine compared \"Ooh La La\" to Black Cherry'''s \"Strict Machine\", saying that \"Ooh La La\" sounds \"so simplistic that [its] minimalist repetition occasionally teeters over into redundancy\". She praised \"Ride a White Horse\" and \"Fly Me Away\" for featuring Alison Goldfrapp's \"velvet-soft vocals, which stay that way even when heavily processed\". A less favourable reception came from Stylus Magazine reviewer Edward Oculicz, who stated \"Supernature is not a great album\" and called several of its tracks too \"dull\".Rolling Stone magazine ranked the album at number 32 on its list of The Top 50 Albums of 2006. In January 2008, the album was included on The Daily Telegraphs list of the 120 essential pop albums. At the 2007 Grammy Awards, Goldfrapp received nominations for Best Electronic/Dance Album and Best Dance Recording for \"Ooh La La\".\n\nCommercial performance\nSupernature debuted on the UK Albums Chart at number two (blocked from the top position by James Blunt's Back to Bedlam), selling 52,976 copies in its first week. The album was certified platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) on 13 January 2006. By 20 December 2010, the album had sold 500,000 copies in the United Kingdom. The album attained moderate success across Europe, reaching the top 10 in Ireland, the top 20 in Belgium, the top 30 in Germany and Switzerland, and the top 40 in Austria, Italy, the Netherlands and Norway. In Oceania, it peaked at number 23 in Australia and number 35 in New Zealand.\n\nSupernature became Goldfrapp's first album to appear on the Billboard 200 in the United States, where it peaked at number 138. It reached number three on the Top Heatseekers chart and number five on the Top Electronic Albums chart. The album had sold 49,000 copies in the US as of August 2006. Supernature was also the duo's first release in Canada, reaching number 88 on the Canadian Albums Chart. The album had sold one million copies worldwide as of February 2008.\n\nTrack listingEuropean special edition bonus DVDSupernature in 5.1 & Stereo\nLittle Bits of Goldfrapp: Documentary\nJakko & the Poet in Frappworld – animation by Andreas Nilsson\nPhoto galleryUS special edition bonus DVD'Supernature in 5.1 & Stereo (excluding bonus track \"Beautiful\")\nLittle Bits of Goldfrapp: Documentary\nJakko & the Poet in Frappworld – animation by Andreas Nilsson\n\"Ooh La La\" (video)\n\"Number 1\" (video)\n\"Ride a White Horse\" (live in London)\n\"Satin Chic\" (special performance film)\n\"Ooh La La\": Little Pictures\nPhoto gallery\n\nPersonnel\nCredits adapted from the liner notes of Supernature''.\n\nGoldfrapp\n Alison Goldfrapp – vocals, arrangements, synths\n Will Gregory – arrangements, synths\n\nAdditional musicians\n\n Charlie Jones – bass \n Adrian Utley – guitar ; bass \n Nick Batt – synth ; additional programming \n Daniel Miller – synth \n Dave Power – additional drums \n Ewan Pearson – additional programming \n Nick Ingman – string orchestration, string conducting\n Gavyn Wright – string leader\n\nTechnical\n\n Alison Goldfrapp – recording, production\n Will Gregory – recording, production\n Mark \"Spike\" Stent – mixing \n Jeremy Wheatley – mixing \n David Bascombe – mixing ; vocal arrangement mixing \n Alex Dromgoole – engineering assistance \n David Emery – engineering assistance \n Richard Edgeler – engineering assistance \n Tim Roe – engineering assistance \n Steve Evans – additional recording engineering \n Lee Groves – additional mix programming \n Gary Thomasat – recording\n Mat Bartram – engineering assistance\n Ted Jensen – mastering\n\nArtwork\n\n Alison Goldfrapp – art direction\n Mat Maitland – art direction, design\n Gerard Saint – art direction\n Rachel Thomas – set design\n Ross Kirton – photography\n Danny Emmett – digital imaging\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCertifications\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2005 albums\nGlam rock albums by English artists\nGoldfrapp albums\nMute Records albums", "\"Satin Boys, Flaming Chic\" is a limited edition 7\" vinyl picture single by British duo Goldfrapp. The single features a remix of the band's song \"Satin Chic\" from their third album Supernature (2005) and a cover version of The Ordinary Boys' \"Boys Will Be Boys\", as performed on BBC Radio 1's Live Lounge on 27 April 2006. The single was released in the United Kingdom on 4 September 2006.\n\nFormats and track listings\nThese are the formats and track listings of major single releases of \"Satin Boys, Flaming Chic\".\n\n UK 7\" picture disc / digital download\n \"Satin Chic\" (Through the Mystic Mix, Dimension 11 by The Flaming Lips) - 3:20\n \"Boys Will Be Boys\" - 2:55\n\nNotes\n\n2006 singles\nElectronic songs\nGoldfrapp songs\nMute Records singles\n2005 songs\nSongs written by Alison Goldfrapp\nSongs written by Will Gregory" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.", "What happened in 2006?", "In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature.", "What songs are on the Supernature album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single," ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	Are there any other songs on the Supernature album?	4	other than Ooh La La, are there any other songs on the Supernature album?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	"Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors.	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	true	[ "Supernature is the third studio album by English electronic music duo Goldfrapp, released on 17 August 2005 by Mute Records. The album received generally favourable reviews, with most critics complimenting its blend of pop and electronic music. It debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart with first-week sales of 52,976 copies, and has been certified platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). Supernature has sold one million copies worldwide.\n\nThe album's lead single, \"Ooh La La\", reached number four on the UK Singles Chart, becoming the duo's highest-peaking single to date. The album spawned three further singles: \"Number 1\", \"Ride a White Horse\" and \"Fly Me Away\". In North America, where \"Number 1\" was promoted as the first single, the album was released on 7 March 2006 and reached number 138 on the charts. Supernature was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2007.\n\nRecording and production\n\nSupernature contains music in the same pop and electronic dance styles featured on Goldfrapp's previous studio album, Black Cherry (2003)—especially its singles \"Strict Machine\" and \"Twist\"—although it focuses on subtle hooks instead of large choruses. Lead singer Alison Goldfrapp described the album's writing process as \"an electronic/glam cross between Berlin, New York and North-East Somerset\".\n\nGoldfrapp and Will Gregory recorded the bulk of Supernature in late 2004 in the countryside near Bath, England—the same place they recorded Black Cherry. They had rented a small house and spent some months writing music; they later explained that the unpopulated location kept them from distractions and that the majority of the process was \"very basic\". Goldfrapp called their writing relationship a \"democracy\", playing off one another while in the recording studio. The lyrical content of the song \"Number 1\", which became the album's second single, is about the importance and meaning of relationships, even though they do not necessarily last.\n\nIn an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Goldfrapp explained that they had never intended to create pop music. However, the singles released from Black Cherry became successes across nightclubs in North America, and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Although this made the duo nervous, \"Ooh La La\" was the group's first song to feature the electric guitar. Before its composition, the duo avoided the use of the guitar because of the guitar's overly recognisable rhythm. Four-on-the-floor bass drums are also present on several of the album's tracks, and the piano ballad \"Let It Take You\" features evening-effects composed on a synthesiser. \"You Never Know\" begins with Alison Goldfrapp executing a synthesised voice, supported by both pads and synthesisers. Goldfrapp and Gregory have cited \"Satin Chic\" as their favourite song on Supernature.\n\nAlison Goldfrapp named the Roland String synth as one of her favourite keyboards. \"Number 1\" features an old synth and a bass arrangement that the group began to use frequently after recording the song. Another Roland keyboard, the SH-09 monophonic synthesiser first produced in 1979, is another favourite; she played the duo's song \"Train\" (2003) on it and enjoys the sounds that it makes. Goldfrapp was also impressed by a Russian synth, enamored with its Russian-language writing.\n\nComposition and music\n\n\"Ooh La La\", Supernatures opening track, inspired by T. Rex, was chosen as its lead single \"because it was up and in your face and it carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album\". It was the duo's first song to feature the electric guitar, and received positive reviews, often being noted as a highlight of the album. \"Ooh La La\" became Goldfrapp's most successful single on the UK Singles Chart to date when it peaked at number four, while topping the Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart in the United States. The second track, \"Lovely 2 C U\", received mixed reviews from critics, with one reviewer stating that it was the \"worst offender of sounding by-numbers, its lazy glam affectations sounding all the worse amid a chorus striking only in its complete dullness\".\n\n\"Ride a White Horse\", the third single, was inspired by the disco era. Like previous singles from the album, the song was another top-20 single in the UK, where it peaked at number 15. The ballads \"You Never Know\" and \"Let It Take You\" have minimal background electronics, and were generally well received by critics, who drew comparisons to Goldfrapp's debut album Felt Mountain. Goldfrapp's performance on \"You Never Know\" was described as \"chameleonic\" with odes to Debbie Harry and Siouxsie Sioux. \"Fly Me Away\", another synth ballad, had an accompanying music video which featured Goldfrapp as an animated doll; the video, however, was never released. Serving as the fourth and final single from Supernature, the song was not heavily promoted and was less commercially successful than the other singles, peaking at number 26 on the UK chart. \"Slide In\", an electroclash song about sex, and \"Koko\" were compared to Gary Numan's early compositions.\n\n\"Satin Chic\" is a disco song with glam rock and cabaret influences, similar to early Elton John. Cited by Goldfrapp and Gregory as their favourite song on Supernature, it was remixed by The Flaming Lips, and issued as a limited-edition single on 4 September 2006. The 10th track, \"Time Out from the World\", features an orchestra and whispered vocals by Goldfrapp. Critics liked the song, writing that it was an \"exception to the prevailing style of Supernature\" due to its \"haunting, yet glamorous, atmospherics\". The album's closing track and second single \"Number 1\" is about the importance and meanings of relationships. The song, which is based around a synth and bass arrangement, reached number nine on the UK Singles Chart and number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart.\n\nRelease and artwork\nThe album was released in two versions: a single-disc version, which used Opendisc technology to offer extra contents via a website, and a double-disc version which included the album in surround sound on both discs. The first disc is a hybrid SACD with 5.1 multichannel SACD audio, stereo SACD audio and stereo CD audio. The second disc, a DVD-Video, contains the multichannel version of the album in DTS 96/24 as well as a documentary and music videos for \"Ooh La La\" and \"Number 1\".\n\nThe album cover, photographed by Ross Kirton, is a rear-view shot of Alison against a sparkly black backdrop, looking over her shoulder while covering her breast with her hand. The regular edition cover shows her from the waist up, whereas the US special edition shows the cover art in its entirety, with Alison wearing a long plume of peacock feathers and golden platform shoes. In late 2005, the album ranked number eight on the annual Best Art Vinyl poll.\n\nCritical reception\n\nSupernature received favourable reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 79, based on 27 reviews. Dorian Lynskey of The Guardian said that the album was \"a brash, beautiful celebration of love and dancing\". In a review for PopMatters, Adrien Begrand said that \"[a]lthough Supernature lacks the imagination of Felt Mountain and the saucy brilliance of Black Cherry, it doesn't pander to the pop crowd.\" Lauren Gitlin of Rolling Stone said the album was \"[t]oxic and delicious\" and that \"Supernature will make you do bad things—and like it.\" However, Pitchfork reviewer Nitsuh Abebe was less impressed, and wrote that the album's songs \"keep feeling like exercises: too thick and melodic to work like dance music, but with melodies that refuse to stick as satisfyingly as pop.\" Michael Hubbard of musicOMH wrote a review for every song on Supernature, and although he felt that it was a \"curious, rather than classic, record\", he criticised it for \"fading out early on, with poor, low quality songs at the end which leave the listener feeling cheated\". AllMusic critic Heather Phares called Supernature \"Goldfrapp's most accessible album\" and named \"Ooh La La\" as its best song.\n\nIn a review for Canadian-based website Jam!, Andrew Carver praised the different sounds on Supernature, which range from \"a blend of future noise\" to \"crushed velvet corruption\"; he described the album as \"one sharp recording\". Jessica Suarez of Spin magazine compared \"Ooh La La\" to Black Cherry'''s \"Strict Machine\", saying that \"Ooh La La\" sounds \"so simplistic that [its] minimalist repetition occasionally teeters over into redundancy\". She praised \"Ride a White Horse\" and \"Fly Me Away\" for featuring Alison Goldfrapp's \"velvet-soft vocals, which stay that way even when heavily processed\". A less favourable reception came from Stylus Magazine reviewer Edward Oculicz, who stated \"Supernature is not a great album\" and called several of its tracks too \"dull\".Rolling Stone magazine ranked the album at number 32 on its list of The Top 50 Albums of 2006. In January 2008, the album was included on The Daily Telegraphs list of the 120 essential pop albums. At the 2007 Grammy Awards, Goldfrapp received nominations for Best Electronic/Dance Album and Best Dance Recording for \"Ooh La La\".\n\nCommercial performance\nSupernature debuted on the UK Albums Chart at number two (blocked from the top position by James Blunt's Back to Bedlam), selling 52,976 copies in its first week. The album was certified platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) on 13 January 2006. By 20 December 2010, the album had sold 500,000 copies in the United Kingdom. The album attained moderate success across Europe, reaching the top 10 in Ireland, the top 20 in Belgium, the top 30 in Germany and Switzerland, and the top 40 in Austria, Italy, the Netherlands and Norway. In Oceania, it peaked at number 23 in Australia and number 35 in New Zealand.\n\nSupernature became Goldfrapp's first album to appear on the Billboard 200 in the United States, where it peaked at number 138. It reached number three on the Top Heatseekers chart and number five on the Top Electronic Albums chart. The album had sold 49,000 copies in the US as of August 2006. Supernature was also the duo's first release in Canada, reaching number 88 on the Canadian Albums Chart. The album had sold one million copies worldwide as of February 2008.\n\nTrack listingEuropean special edition bonus DVDSupernature in 5.1 & Stereo\nLittle Bits of Goldfrapp: Documentary\nJakko & the Poet in Frappworld – animation by Andreas Nilsson\nPhoto galleryUS special edition bonus DVD'Supernature in 5.1 & Stereo (excluding bonus track \"Beautiful\")\nLittle Bits of Goldfrapp: Documentary\nJakko & the Poet in Frappworld – animation by Andreas Nilsson\n\"Ooh La La\" (video)\n\"Number 1\" (video)\n\"Ride a White Horse\" (live in London)\n\"Satin Chic\" (special performance film)\n\"Ooh La La\": Little Pictures\nPhoto gallery\n\nPersonnel\nCredits adapted from the liner notes of Supernature''.\n\nGoldfrapp\n Alison Goldfrapp – vocals, arrangements, synths\n Will Gregory – arrangements, synths\n\nAdditional musicians\n\n Charlie Jones – bass \n Adrian Utley – guitar ; bass \n Nick Batt – synth ; additional programming \n Daniel Miller – synth \n Dave Power – additional drums \n Ewan Pearson – additional programming \n Nick Ingman – string orchestration, string conducting\n Gavyn Wright – string leader\n\nTechnical\n\n Alison Goldfrapp – recording, production\n Will Gregory – recording, production\n Mark \"Spike\" Stent – mixing \n Jeremy Wheatley – mixing \n David Bascombe – mixing ; vocal arrangement mixing \n Alex Dromgoole – engineering assistance \n David Emery – engineering assistance \n Richard Edgeler – engineering assistance \n Tim Roe – engineering assistance \n Steve Evans – additional recording engineering \n Lee Groves – additional mix programming \n Gary Thomasat – recording\n Mat Bartram – engineering assistance\n Ted Jensen – mastering\n\nArtwork\n\n Alison Goldfrapp – art direction\n Mat Maitland – art direction, design\n Gerard Saint – art direction\n Rachel Thomas – set design\n Ross Kirton – photography\n Danny Emmett – digital imaging\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCertifications\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2005 albums\nGlam rock albums by English artists\nGoldfrapp albums\nMute Records albums", "\"Satin Boys, Flaming Chic\" is a limited edition 7\" vinyl picture single by British duo Goldfrapp. The single features a remix of the band's song \"Satin Chic\" from their third album Supernature (2005) and a cover version of The Ordinary Boys' \"Boys Will Be Boys\", as performed on BBC Radio 1's Live Lounge on 27 April 2006. The single was released in the United Kingdom on 4 September 2006.\n\nFormats and track listings\nThese are the formats and track listings of major single releases of \"Satin Boys, Flaming Chic\".\n\n UK 7\" picture disc / digital download\n \"Satin Chic\" (Through the Mystic Mix, Dimension 11 by The Flaming Lips) - 3:20\n \"Boys Will Be Boys\" - 2:55\n\nNotes\n\n2006 singles\nElectronic songs\nGoldfrapp songs\nMute Records singles\n2005 songs\nSongs written by Alison Goldfrapp\nSongs written by Will Gregory" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.", "What happened in 2006?", "In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature.", "What songs are on the Supernature album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single,", "Are there any other songs on the Supernature album?", "\"Fly Me Away\" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors." ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	How many songs are on Supernature album?	5	How many songs are on Goldfrapp's Supernature album?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	false	[ "Recorded at the London Arena on 11 December 1989 as part of the tour of their \"Wild!\" album and released in 1990 on VHS video, Wild! (live) is Erasure's third concert video. With 23 tracks and a running time of almost 90 minutes, it is the first of Erasure's live videos to feature an entire concert, except in the US where a much abridged 15-track version was released. In 1992 the concert was also released in the US on LaserDisc, still with only 15 tracks. In 2016 it was announced that the video will be released on DVD, exclusively as part of the From Moscow To Mars box set.\n\nThe concert included 9 of the 10 songs from \"Wild!\", as well as songs from all 3 of Erasure's previous albums, songs from the \"Crackers International\" EP and a cover version of Cerrone's \"Supernature\", a studio version of which featured as a b-side on the \"You Surround Me\" single.\n\nTrack listing\n\nUK release\n\n UK VHS Video: 790407\n\n \"Piano Song\"\n \"How Many Times\"\n \"You Surround Me\"\n \"Knocking on Your Door\"\n \"Brother and Sister\"\n \"Crown of Thorns\"\n \"Star\"\n \"Chains of Love\"\n \"Hideaway\"\n \"Supernature\"\n \"Who Needs Love Like That\"\n \"Stop\"\n \"Victim of Love\"\n \"La Gloria\"\n \"Ship of Fools\"\n \"It Doesn't Have to Be\"\n \"Blue Savannah\"\n \"Sometimes\"\n \"The Hardest Part\"\n \"Oh L'amour\"\n \"Drama!\"\n \"A Little Respect\"\n \"Spiralling\"\n\nNorth American release\n\n US VHS video: 38170-3\n US Laser Disc: LVD-9263\n\n Piano Song\n You Surround Me\n Chains of Love\n Star\n Crown of Thorns\n Supernature\n Who Needs Love Like That\n Stop!\n Victim of Love\n La Gloria\n Blue Savannah\n Sometimes\n The Hardest Part\n Drama!\n A Little Respect\n\nReferences \n\nErasure live albums\n1990 live albums\nMute Records live albums\n1990 video albums\nLive video albums\nMute Records video albums\nElectropop video albums\nLive electropop albums", "Supernature is the third studio album by English electronic music duo Goldfrapp, released on 17 August 2005 by Mute Records. The album received generally favourable reviews, with most critics complimenting its blend of pop and electronic music. It debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart with first-week sales of 52,976 copies, and has been certified platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). Supernature has sold one million copies worldwide.\n\nThe album's lead single, \"Ooh La La\", reached number four on the UK Singles Chart, becoming the duo's highest-peaking single to date. The album spawned three further singles: \"Number 1\", \"Ride a White Horse\" and \"Fly Me Away\". In North America, where \"Number 1\" was promoted as the first single, the album was released on 7 March 2006 and reached number 138 on the charts. Supernature was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2007.\n\nRecording and production\n\nSupernature contains music in the same pop and electronic dance styles featured on Goldfrapp's previous studio album, Black Cherry (2003)—especially its singles \"Strict Machine\" and \"Twist\"—although it focuses on subtle hooks instead of large choruses. Lead singer Alison Goldfrapp described the album's writing process as \"an electronic/glam cross between Berlin, New York and North-East Somerset\".\n\nGoldfrapp and Will Gregory recorded the bulk of Supernature in late 2004 in the countryside near Bath, England—the same place they recorded Black Cherry. They had rented a small house and spent some months writing music; they later explained that the unpopulated location kept them from distractions and that the majority of the process was \"very basic\". Goldfrapp called their writing relationship a \"democracy\", playing off one another while in the recording studio. The lyrical content of the song \"Number 1\", which became the album's second single, is about the importance and meaning of relationships, even though they do not necessarily last.\n\nIn an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Goldfrapp explained that they had never intended to create pop music. However, the singles released from Black Cherry became successes across nightclubs in North America, and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Although this made the duo nervous, \"Ooh La La\" was the group's first song to feature the electric guitar. Before its composition, the duo avoided the use of the guitar because of the guitar's overly recognisable rhythm. Four-on-the-floor bass drums are also present on several of the album's tracks, and the piano ballad \"Let It Take You\" features evening-effects composed on a synthesiser. \"You Never Know\" begins with Alison Goldfrapp executing a synthesised voice, supported by both pads and synthesisers. Goldfrapp and Gregory have cited \"Satin Chic\" as their favourite song on Supernature.\n\nAlison Goldfrapp named the Roland String synth as one of her favourite keyboards. \"Number 1\" features an old synth and a bass arrangement that the group began to use frequently after recording the song. Another Roland keyboard, the SH-09 monophonic synthesiser first produced in 1979, is another favourite; she played the duo's song \"Train\" (2003) on it and enjoys the sounds that it makes. Goldfrapp was also impressed by a Russian synth, enamored with its Russian-language writing.\n\nComposition and music\n\n\"Ooh La La\", Supernatures opening track, inspired by T. Rex, was chosen as its lead single \"because it was up and in your face and it carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album\". It was the duo's first song to feature the electric guitar, and received positive reviews, often being noted as a highlight of the album. \"Ooh La La\" became Goldfrapp's most successful single on the UK Singles Chart to date when it peaked at number four, while topping the Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart in the United States. The second track, \"Lovely 2 C U\", received mixed reviews from critics, with one reviewer stating that it was the \"worst offender of sounding by-numbers, its lazy glam affectations sounding all the worse amid a chorus striking only in its complete dullness\".\n\n\"Ride a White Horse\", the third single, was inspired by the disco era. Like previous singles from the album, the song was another top-20 single in the UK, where it peaked at number 15. The ballads \"You Never Know\" and \"Let It Take You\" have minimal background electronics, and were generally well received by critics, who drew comparisons to Goldfrapp's debut album Felt Mountain. Goldfrapp's performance on \"You Never Know\" was described as \"chameleonic\" with odes to Debbie Harry and Siouxsie Sioux. \"Fly Me Away\", another synth ballad, had an accompanying music video which featured Goldfrapp as an animated doll; the video, however, was never released. Serving as the fourth and final single from Supernature, the song was not heavily promoted and was less commercially successful than the other singles, peaking at number 26 on the UK chart. \"Slide In\", an electroclash song about sex, and \"Koko\" were compared to Gary Numan's early compositions.\n\n\"Satin Chic\" is a disco song with glam rock and cabaret influences, similar to early Elton John. Cited by Goldfrapp and Gregory as their favourite song on Supernature, it was remixed by The Flaming Lips, and issued as a limited-edition single on 4 September 2006. The 10th track, \"Time Out from the World\", features an orchestra and whispered vocals by Goldfrapp. Critics liked the song, writing that it was an \"exception to the prevailing style of Supernature\" due to its \"haunting, yet glamorous, atmospherics\". The album's closing track and second single \"Number 1\" is about the importance and meanings of relationships. The song, which is based around a synth and bass arrangement, reached number nine on the UK Singles Chart and number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart.\n\nRelease and artwork\nThe album was released in two versions: a single-disc version, which used Opendisc technology to offer extra contents via a website, and a double-disc version which included the album in surround sound on both discs. The first disc is a hybrid SACD with 5.1 multichannel SACD audio, stereo SACD audio and stereo CD audio. The second disc, a DVD-Video, contains the multichannel version of the album in DTS 96/24 as well as a documentary and music videos for \"Ooh La La\" and \"Number 1\".\n\nThe album cover, photographed by Ross Kirton, is a rear-view shot of Alison against a sparkly black backdrop, looking over her shoulder while covering her breast with her hand. The regular edition cover shows her from the waist up, whereas the US special edition shows the cover art in its entirety, with Alison wearing a long plume of peacock feathers and golden platform shoes. In late 2005, the album ranked number eight on the annual Best Art Vinyl poll.\n\nCritical reception\n\nSupernature received favourable reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 79, based on 27 reviews. Dorian Lynskey of The Guardian said that the album was \"a brash, beautiful celebration of love and dancing\". In a review for PopMatters, Adrien Begrand said that \"[a]lthough Supernature lacks the imagination of Felt Mountain and the saucy brilliance of Black Cherry, it doesn't pander to the pop crowd.\" Lauren Gitlin of Rolling Stone said the album was \"[t]oxic and delicious\" and that \"Supernature will make you do bad things—and like it.\" However, Pitchfork reviewer Nitsuh Abebe was less impressed, and wrote that the album's songs \"keep feeling like exercises: too thick and melodic to work like dance music, but with melodies that refuse to stick as satisfyingly as pop.\" Michael Hubbard of musicOMH wrote a review for every song on Supernature, and although he felt that it was a \"curious, rather than classic, record\", he criticised it for \"fading out early on, with poor, low quality songs at the end which leave the listener feeling cheated\". AllMusic critic Heather Phares called Supernature \"Goldfrapp's most accessible album\" and named \"Ooh La La\" as its best song.\n\nIn a review for Canadian-based website Jam!, Andrew Carver praised the different sounds on Supernature, which range from \"a blend of future noise\" to \"crushed velvet corruption\"; he described the album as \"one sharp recording\". Jessica Suarez of Spin magazine compared \"Ooh La La\" to Black Cherry'''s \"Strict Machine\", saying that \"Ooh La La\" sounds \"so simplistic that [its] minimalist repetition occasionally teeters over into redundancy\". She praised \"Ride a White Horse\" and \"Fly Me Away\" for featuring Alison Goldfrapp's \"velvet-soft vocals, which stay that way even when heavily processed\". A less favourable reception came from Stylus Magazine reviewer Edward Oculicz, who stated \"Supernature is not a great album\" and called several of its tracks too \"dull\".Rolling Stone magazine ranked the album at number 32 on its list of The Top 50 Albums of 2006. In January 2008, the album was included on The Daily Telegraphs list of the 120 essential pop albums. At the 2007 Grammy Awards, Goldfrapp received nominations for Best Electronic/Dance Album and Best Dance Recording for \"Ooh La La\".\n\nCommercial performance\nSupernature debuted on the UK Albums Chart at number two (blocked from the top position by James Blunt's Back to Bedlam), selling 52,976 copies in its first week. The album was certified platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) on 13 January 2006. By 20 December 2010, the album had sold 500,000 copies in the United Kingdom. The album attained moderate success across Europe, reaching the top 10 in Ireland, the top 20 in Belgium, the top 30 in Germany and Switzerland, and the top 40 in Austria, Italy, the Netherlands and Norway. In Oceania, it peaked at number 23 in Australia and number 35 in New Zealand.\n\nSupernature became Goldfrapp's first album to appear on the Billboard 200 in the United States, where it peaked at number 138. It reached number three on the Top Heatseekers chart and number five on the Top Electronic Albums chart. The album had sold 49,000 copies in the US as of August 2006. Supernature was also the duo's first release in Canada, reaching number 88 on the Canadian Albums Chart. The album had sold one million copies worldwide as of February 2008.\n\nTrack listingEuropean special edition bonus DVDSupernature in 5.1 & Stereo\nLittle Bits of Goldfrapp: Documentary\nJakko & the Poet in Frappworld – animation by Andreas Nilsson\nPhoto galleryUS special edition bonus DVD'Supernature in 5.1 & Stereo (excluding bonus track \"Beautiful\")\nLittle Bits of Goldfrapp: Documentary\nJakko & the Poet in Frappworld – animation by Andreas Nilsson\n\"Ooh La La\" (video)\n\"Number 1\" (video)\n\"Ride a White Horse\" (live in London)\n\"Satin Chic\" (special performance film)\n\"Ooh La La\": Little Pictures\nPhoto gallery\n\nPersonnel\nCredits adapted from the liner notes of Supernature''.\n\nGoldfrapp\n Alison Goldfrapp – vocals, arrangements, synths\n Will Gregory – arrangements, synths\n\nAdditional musicians\n\n Charlie Jones – bass \n Adrian Utley – guitar ; bass \n Nick Batt – synth ; additional programming \n Daniel Miller – synth \n Dave Power – additional drums \n Ewan Pearson – additional programming \n Nick Ingman – string orchestration, string conducting\n Gavyn Wright – string leader\n\nTechnical\n\n Alison Goldfrapp – recording, production\n Will Gregory – recording, production\n Mark \"Spike\" Stent – mixing \n Jeremy Wheatley – mixing \n David Bascombe – mixing ; vocal arrangement mixing \n Alex Dromgoole – engineering assistance \n David Emery – engineering assistance \n Richard Edgeler – engineering assistance \n Tim Roe – engineering assistance \n Steve Evans – additional recording engineering \n Lee Groves – additional mix programming \n Gary Thomasat – recording\n Mat Bartram – engineering assistance\n Ted Jensen – mastering\n\nArtwork\n\n Alison Goldfrapp – art direction\n Mat Maitland – art direction, design\n Gerard Saint – art direction\n Rachel Thomas – set design\n Ross Kirton – photography\n Danny Emmett – digital imaging\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCertifications\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2005 albums\nGlam rock albums by English artists\nGoldfrapp albums\nMute Records albums" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.", "What happened in 2006?", "In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature.", "What songs are on the Supernature album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single,", "Are there any other songs on the Supernature album?", "\"Fly Me Away\" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors.", "How many songs are on Supernature album?", "I don't know." ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	What aspects of this article interest you?	6	What aspect about Goldfrapp's activities in 2005-06 interest you?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide.	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	true	[ "National symbols of Peru are the symbols that are used in Peru to represent what is unique about the nation, reflecting different aspects of the cultural life and history. The national symbols of Peru are established by law and part of the Political Constitution of Peru (Article 49).\n\nOfficial symbols\nThe official symbols of Peru are established by law and part of the Political Constitution of Peru (Article 49).\n\nUnofficial symbols\n\nPeruvian icons\nIcons of Peruvian culture.\n\nSee also\n List of national animals\n List of national anthems\n List of national birds\n List of national flowers\n\nReferences", "The Theory of Interstellar Trade is a paper written in 1978 by the economist Paul Krugman. The paper was first published in March 2010 in the journal Economic Inquiry. He described the paper as something he wrote to cheer himself up when he was an \"oppressed assistant professor\" caught up in the academic rat race.\n\nKrugman analyzed the question of\n How should interest rates on goods in transit be computed when the goods travel at close to the speed of light? This is a problem because the time taken in transit will appear less to an observer traveling with the goods than to a stationary observer.\n\nKrugman emphasized that in spite of its farcical subject matter, the economic analysis in the paper is correctly done. In his own words,\n while the subject of this paper is silly, the analysis actually does make sense. This paper, then, is a serious analysis of a ridiculous subject, which is of course the opposite of what is usual in economics.\n\nCommentary\nResponding to the paper, the economist Tyler Cowen speculated on how time travel affects time preference discounting.\n My own puzzling focuses on the determinants of real interest rates, given how time dilation changes the meaning of time preference. As you approach the speed of light you move into the future relative to more stationary observers. So can you not leave a penny in a savings account, take a very rapid spaceflight, and come back to earth \"many years later\" as a billionaire? Hardly any time has passed for you. In essence we are abolishing time preference, or at least allowing people to lower their time preference by spending money on fuel. I believe that in such worlds the real interest rate cannot exceed the costs at which more fuel can \"propel you into the future through time dilation.\"\n \n\nAssume you have a spaceship that can approach lightspeed and thus you can make, say 1,000 years, seem like 10 years. If you can gain the time value of money 100 times faster, that effectively makes the interest rate 100x higher for you. Thus time preference is meaningless. This is a problem for economic theory. Krugman's solution is to force the interest rate to correspond to the cost of making the trip.\n\nHere is the standard compound interest formula:\n FV = PV(1+i)n\n\nFuel costs for the above trip are $X. Let us say you have $1,000 to invest and wonder whether it is worth taking a near-lightspeed voyage to increase your return 10 subjective years from now.\n\nStay on earth:\n A = $1000(1 + i)10\nTake trip:\n B = ($1000(1 + i)1000) – $X\n\nKrugman says that it is necessarily true that A=B, for time preference theory to stay consistent; thus it will be driven by X. In the future, given a free market, spaceship fuel costs will be the primary determinant of interest rates. The less the fuel cost, the less the interest rate, and vice versa.\n\nRelated theories and publications\nIn 2004, Espen Gaarder Haug published a theory he titled \"SpaceTime-Finance\" in Wilmott magazine to show how a series of finance calculations had to be adjusted to avoid arbitrage when hypothetically traveling at very high velocities relative to other observers (traders). He illustrated how such necessary adjustments already could be measurable at the speed of the space shuttle, but also that such calculations and adjustments were of little or no practical relevance today since we all are moving at the nearly same speed relative to the enormous speed of light.\n\nIn 2008, John Hickman at Berry College in Georgia (USA) published in the Journal of Astro Politics an article related to the political and cultural obstacles that could be related to hypothetical interstellar trade. A 2009 article explored tax implications.\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n Espen Gaarder Haug. \"SpaceTime Finance\" in the book 'Derivatives Models on Models', John Wiley & Sons, 2007\n John Hickman. \"Problems of Interplanetary and Interstellar Trade\". Journal of Astro Politics, Vol.6, No. 1. (January 2008). pp. 95–104.\n \"Trading with Aliens\", Charter Magazine, Dec 2013,\n\n1978 documents\nEconomic theories\nWorks by Paul Krugman" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.", "What happened in 2006?", "In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature.", "What songs are on the Supernature album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single,", "Are there any other songs on the Supernature album?", "\"Fly Me Away\" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors.", "How many songs are on Supernature album?", "I don't know.", "What aspects of this article interest you?", "As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide." ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	What sold more than one million copies worldwide?	7	Which of Goldfrapp's albums sold more than one million copies worldwide?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album,	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	true	[ "Survival () is a South Korean Manhwa series. The series have sold more than 28 million copies worldwide.\n\nReferences\n\nManhwa titles\nBooks about survival skills", "Colours is the second studio album of the Danish soft rock band Michael Learns to Rock. It was released in October 1993. As of 1995, the album had sold 1.2 million copies worldwide. In Denmark the album sold 40,000 copies. Colours sold more than 300,000 copies in Thailand, becoming the second best-selling album of all time there (behind Michael Jackson's Thriller).\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences\n\n1993 albums\nMichael Learns to Rock albums" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.", "What happened in 2006?", "In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature.", "What songs are on the Supernature album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single,", "Are there any other songs on the Supernature album?", "\"Fly Me Away\" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors.", "How many songs are on Supernature album?", "I don't know.", "What aspects of this article interest you?", "As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide.", "What sold more than one million copies worldwide?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album," ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	What song is the highest rated on album?	8	What song is the highest rated on Goldfrapp's album Supernature?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	"Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single.	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	true	[ "Creation/Destruction (stylized as Creation \| Destruction) is the second studio album by American metalcore band Fit for a King. It was released on March 12, 2013 through Solid State Records and was produced by Andreas Magnusson. The album attracted both commercial successes and positive criticism.\n\nCritical reception\n\nCreation/Destruction garnered significantly positive reception from eight music critics ratings and reviews. At HM, Jef Cunningham rated the album four stars out of five, stating it is a \"solid release\". Graeme Crawford of Cross Rhythms rated it a perfect ten squares, writing that \"On this form they deserve to be in the highest league of Christian metal bands\". At Jesus Freak Hideout, Michael Weaver rated the album four stars out of five, saying that because of this album and others \"Solid State is poised to reclaim their title as Christian metal kings.\" Scott Fryberger of Jesus Freak Hideout rated the album four stars out of five, stating that \"It's a little generic, and they probably could have done a lot more as far as creativity to give each song more of a distinct flair, but I think they could pull that off with another album or two under their belts.\" At Indie Vision Music, Brody B rated the album four stars out of five, writing that \"While Fit For A King are still young, they manage to create what is simply excellent metalcore.\" Gregory Heaney of AllMusic rated the album three stars out of five, saying that it is a \"promising debut\". At ChristCore, Anthony Ibarra rated the album a perfect five stars, stating that this is a \"must have\". Anthony Peronto of Christian Music Zine rated it 4.25 out of five, writing that the band \"have proven themselves worthy\" with this release. At Mind Equals Blown, Austin Gordon rated the album a 6.5 out of ten, saying that \"When you're in the mood for it, simple is good.\"\n\nCommercial performance\nFor the Billboard charting week of March 30, 2013, Creation/Destruction charted at No. 175 on the Billboard 200, No. 17 on the Christian Albums chart, No. 43 on the Top Rock Albums chart, No. 6 on the Hard Rock Albums, and No. 3 on the Heatseekers Albums chart. The album sold more that 3,100 copies in its first week of sales.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\nCredits adapted from AllMusic.\n\nFit for a King\n Ryan Kirby – unclean vocals\n Bobby Lynge – guitars, backing vocals\n Justin Hamra – guitars\n Aaron \"Olan\" Kadura – bass, clean vocals\n Jared Easterling – drums, clean vocals\n\nAdditional personnel\n Andreas Magnusson – production, engineering, mixing\n Brandon Ebel – executive production\n Troy Glessner – mastering\n Adam Skatula – A&R\n Ryan Clark – design\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2013 albums\nSolid State Records albums\nFit for a King (band) albums", "\"Go That Far\" is a song written by Bret Michaels, and was recorded by Michaels as the first single for his compilation album, Rock My World released in 2008. \"Go That Far\" is the theme song for VH1's highest rated reality series \"Rock of Love with Bret Michaels\"\nand the album \"Rock My World\" is the soundtrack to the series. The album charted at number 40 on The Billboard 200, number 4 on the Top Independent Albums, number 4 on the Top Hard Rock Albums and number 16 on the Top Rock Albums chart.\n\nBret Michaels won a 2008 BMI Award for \"Go That Far\".\n\nMusic video\nDirected by Shane Stanley \"Go That Far\" features a music video which reached #1 on VH1. The music video features three different versions, Standard, with Rock of Love clips and with live concert clips.\n\nGuitar Hero\n\"Go That Far\" is included in the game Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock as a bonus song.\n\nAlternate version\nA new version of \"Go That Far\" was released on the Bret Michaels studio album Custom Built, and was titled \"Go That Far (Club Mix)\", the song was mixed by Jason C. Miller of Godhead.\n\nReferences\n\n2007 singles\nBret Michaels songs\n2007 songs\nSongs written by Bret Michaels" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.", "What happened in 2006?", "In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature.", "What songs are on the Supernature album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single,", "Are there any other songs on the Supernature album?", "\"Fly Me Away\" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors.", "How many songs are on Supernature album?", "I don't know.", "What aspects of this article interest you?", "As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide.", "What sold more than one million copies worldwide?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album,", "What song is the highest rated on album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single." ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	What else in the UK top five singles?	9	Besides "Ooh La La" what other Goldfrapp songs are in the UK top five singles?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	"Number 1" was released as the album's second single.	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	true	[ "\"Somewhere Else\" is a song by English indie rock band Razorlight, and was featured as a bonus track on the 2005 re-release of their debut album, Up All Night. It was their first new material following that album and became their biggest hit to date in the United Kingdom at the time when released as a single, debuting at number two in the UK Singles Chart, only to be bettered by \"America\", which charted at number one in October 2006. In 2007, the lyrics: \"and I met a girl/She asked me my name/I told her what it was\", were voted the third worst lyrics of all time.\n\nMusic video\nThe video features Johnny Borrell walking around various place in London, before returning to where he started at the beginning. A large portion of the video was filmed inside and outside the Northumberland Arms pub.\n\nTrack listings\n\nUK 7-inch vinyl\nA. \"Somewhere Else\"\nB. \"Dub the Right Profile\"\n\nUK CD single\n \"Somewhere Else\"\n \"Keep the Right Profile\"\n\nUK enhanced CD single\n \"Somewhere Else\"\n \"Hang By, Hang By\"\n \"Up All Night\" (live in California)\n Enhanced section: link to download five free live tracks\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCertifications\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2004 songs\n2005 singles\nRazorlight songs\nSongs written by Johnny Borrell\nUniversal Records singles\nVertigo Records singles", "\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.", "What happened in 2006?", "In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature.", "What songs are on the Supernature album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single,", "Are there any other songs on the Supernature album?", "\"Fly Me Away\" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors.", "How many songs are on Supernature album?", "I don't know.", "What aspects of this article interest you?", "As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide.", "What sold more than one million copies worldwide?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album,", "What song is the highest rated on album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single.", "What else in the UK top five singles?", "\"Number 1\" was released as the album's second single." ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	Supernature is produced by?	10	Who produced Goldfrapp's album Supernature?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	false	[ "Supernature is Cerrone's third album, released in September 1977. It was released in France by Malligator Label. It is known also as Cerrone III, since it is the third album by Cerrone, who labeled his albums with a number.\n\nTrack listing\n\n\"Supernature\" 10:20\n\"Sweet Drums\" 3:30\n\"In The Smoke\" 4:40\n\"Give Me Love\" 6:10\n\"Love Is Here\" 5:20\n\"Love Is The Answer\" 6:00\nNote: these times apply to the vinyl edition, since the CD timings have different values.\n\nIt has also been released in CD format in Europe and the US.\n\nAll the songs are written by Alain Wisniak and Marc Cerrone, except the instrumental \"Sweet Drums\" written by Cerrone alone.\n\nIn the inner sleeve disco producer Don Ray (Raymond Donnez), co-writer Alain Wisniak and singer Lene Lovich are thanked “for their kindness, talent & comprehension”.\n\nFrom this album two singles were released: \"Supernature\" and \"Give Me Love\". Both are also featured in Cerrone's compilation album of greatest hits Culture.\n\n\"Supernature\" is one of Cerrone's best known tracks. It was remixed in 1996 by Danny Tenaglia into his traditional deep progressive Twilo sound. The track \"Love is the Answer\" was re-edited by Liquid People, and released in the \"Africanism\" volume. 1 Africanism All Stars (Yellow Productions).\n\nReferences\n\n1977 albums\nCerrone albums\nAlbums recorded at Trident Studios", "\"You Surround Me\" is a song by Erasure that was issued in 1989 by Mute Records as the second single from the band's fourth studio album Wild!. Written by Erasure members Vince Clarke and Andy Bell, it is a heavily synthesized ballad with a dramatic chorus featuring Bell's falsetto. Clarke has stated that this song was his attempt at writing a James Bond film theme. Upon release, \"You Surround Me\" became Erasure's tenth consecutive Top 20 hit on the UK Singles Chart, peaking at #15. It reached #10 on the Irish singles chart, and became a Top 40 hit in Germany, where it reached #38. The song was not released as a single in the United States.\n\nB-sides\nThis release has become more notable for the B-sides that were included with \"You Surround Me\". First was a cover version of Cerrone's environmental anthem \"Supernature\". The song, also previously recorded by Lene Lovich, led to a collaboration between Erasure and Lovich for the song \"Rage\", which later appeared on a PETA benefit album. Erasure's recording was remixed by William Orbit and became a popular hit in dance clubs. Also included on the single as a B-side is \"91 Steps\", an instrumental with complex synthesizer programming and unusual time signature that, upon playing, may cause some listeners to think that the disc is skipping. The track utilises repeating cycles in which the first seven bars use a 7/4 time signature, followed by one bar in 3/4 time.\n\nCritical reception\nNed Raggett from AllMusic commented that \"You Surround Me\" \"is another flat-out winner -- it's another slow ballad, but with big, echoing backing that adds a sense of extra theatricality.\" The Daily Vault's Michael R. Smith stated that it is \"a techno ballad to die for and is just as intense as \"Drama\".\" He added, \"It contains a cascading melody that simply glows. File this one under Overlooked Masterpieces.\" Chris Gerard from Metro Weekly wrote that it is \"one of the duo's all-time great ballads\", noting that \"it has real heart and feeling; it's unabashedly sentimental, but it feels completely genuine.\" Christopher Smith from TalkAboutPopMusic described the song as \"a brooding number with Vince turning on the synths at maximum level while Andy remains in subdued restraint for the most part.\"\n\nMusic video\nA music video was made to accompany the song. It features Clarke and Bell performing on a three-level circular stage set, with cityscapes superimposed at various points during the song through a mixture of chroma key and ordinary vision mixing.\n\nTrack listings\n\n 7\" single (MUTE99) / Cassette single (CMUTE99)\n \"You Surround Me\"\n \"91 Steps\"\n\n 12\" single (12MUTE99) / CD single (CDMUTE99)\n \"You Surround Me\" (Syrinx Mix)\n \"Supernature\"\n \"91 Steps\" (+24 Mix)\n\n Limited 12\" single (L12MUTE99) / Limited CD single (LCDMUTE99)\n \"You Surround Me\" (Remix)\n \"Supernature\" (William Orbit Mix)\n \"91 Steps\" (6 Pianos Mix)\n\n Limited \"Supernature\" 12\" single (XL12MUTE99)\n \"Supernature\" (Daniel Miller & Phil Legg Mix)\n \"You Surround Me\" (Gareth Jones Mix)\n \"Supernature\" (Mark Saunders Mix)\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n1989 singles\nErasure songs\nSongs written by Vince Clarke\nSongs written by Andy Bell (singer)\nSong recordings produced by Gareth Jones\nSong recordings produced by Mark Saunders\nMute Records singles\nSire Records singles\n1989 songs" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.", "What happened in 2006?", "In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature.", "What songs are on the Supernature album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single,", "Are there any other songs on the Supernature album?", "\"Fly Me Away\" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors.", "How many songs are on Supernature album?", "I don't know.", "What aspects of this article interest you?", "As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide.", "What sold more than one million copies worldwide?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album,", "What song is the highest rated on album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single.", "What else in the UK top five singles?", "\"Number 1\" was released as the album's second single.", "Supernature is produced by?", "I don't know." ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	Who is in Supernature?	11	Who from the band Goldfrapp is in Supernature?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry,	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	true	[ "Supernature is Cerrone's third album, released in September 1977. It was released in France by Malligator Label. It is known also as Cerrone III, since it is the third album by Cerrone, who labeled his albums with a number.\n\nTrack listing\n\n\"Supernature\" 10:20\n\"Sweet Drums\" 3:30\n\"In The Smoke\" 4:40\n\"Give Me Love\" 6:10\n\"Love Is Here\" 5:20\n\"Love Is The Answer\" 6:00\nNote: these times apply to the vinyl edition, since the CD timings have different values.\n\nIt has also been released in CD format in Europe and the US.\n\nAll the songs are written by Alain Wisniak and Marc Cerrone, except the instrumental \"Sweet Drums\" written by Cerrone alone.\n\nIn the inner sleeve disco producer Don Ray (Raymond Donnez), co-writer Alain Wisniak and singer Lene Lovich are thanked “for their kindness, talent & comprehension”.\n\nFrom this album two singles were released: \"Supernature\" and \"Give Me Love\". Both are also featured in Cerrone's compilation album of greatest hits Culture.\n\n\"Supernature\" is one of Cerrone's best known tracks. It was remixed in 1996 by Danny Tenaglia into his traditional deep progressive Twilo sound. The track \"Love is the Answer\" was re-edited by Liquid People, and released in the \"Africanism\" volume. 1 Africanism All Stars (Yellow Productions).\n\nReferences\n\n1977 albums\nCerrone albums\nAlbums recorded at Trident Studios", "Life in the Air is a three-part BBC nature documentary series narrated by Suranne Jones, first broadcast in the United Kingdom from 3 April 2016 on BBC One and rebroadcast in the U.S. under the title \"SuperNature - Wild Flyers\" on PBS.\n\nEpisodes\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n SuperNature - Wild Flyers on PBS\n \n\n2016 British television series debuts\n2016 British television series endings\nBBC television documentaries\nBBC high definition shows\nDocumentary films about nature\nEnglish-language television shows" ]
[ "Goldfrapp", "2005-06: Supernature", "What happened in 2005?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005.", "What happened in 2006?", "In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature.", "What songs are on the Supernature album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single,", "Are there any other songs on the Supernature album?", "\"Fly Me Away\" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors.", "How many songs are on Supernature album?", "I don't know.", "What aspects of this article interest you?", "As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide.", "What sold more than one million copies worldwide?", "Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album,", "What song is the highest rated on album?", " \"Ooh La La\", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single.", "What else in the UK top five singles?", "\"Number 1\" was released as the album's second single.", "Supernature is produced by?", "I don't know.", "Who is in Supernature?", "The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry," ]	C_5aa9f7af12bb4d8daebce5cd8e14fd2f_0	Is Supernature a pop and electronic dance music album?	12	Is Supernature by Goldfrapp a pop and electronic dance music album?	Goldfrapp	Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. CANNOTANSWER	The album comprises pop and electronic dance music	Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp (vocals, synthesiser) and Will Gregory (synthesiser). Despite favourable reviews and a short-listing for the Mercury Prize, their 2000 début studio album Felt Mountain<ref name="Last.FM:FeltMountain:tagging"></ref> did not chart highly. Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry, which incorporated glam rock and synth-pop sounds into their music, was released in 2003. The album influenced the same dance-oriented sound of their third album Supernature. Supernature took Goldfrapp's work further into dance music, and enjoyed international chart success. The album produced three number-one US dance singles, and was nominated for Best Electronic/Dance Album at the 49th Grammy Awards. Their fourth album Seventh Tree placed a greater emphasis on ambient and downtempo music, drawing inspiration from nature and paganism, while their fifth album, Head First, found the group exploring 1980s-influenced synth-pop. Head First also earned the duo their second Grammy Award nomination for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2010. Goldfrapp released their critically acclaimed sixth studio album, the folktronica-influenced Tales of Us, in September 2013. Goldfrapp released their seventh studio album, Silver Eye, in March 2017, which debuted at number six on the UK Albums Chart. History 1999: Formation Alison Goldfrapp began her musical career performing with Dance Company Catherine Massin throughout the Netherlands during her early twenties. Afterwards, she attended Middlesex University, where she studied fine art and started creating live performance pieces. In the early 1990s, Goldfrapp served as a guest vocalist with the electronic band Orbital and trip hop artist Tricky. In 1999, she was introduced to composer Will Gregory after he listened to an early version of the song "Human". Gregory and Goldfrapp felt a mutual connection and wrote the track "Lovely Head". Following several months of phone calls, they decided to form a band and began performing under the name Goldfrapp. In August 1999, Goldfrapp signed a recording contract with London-based record label Mute Records. They recorded their debut album over six months, beginning in September 1999, in a rented bungalow in the Wiltshire countryside. The recording process was difficult, as they were disturbed by the mice and insects in the bungalow. 2000–2002: Felt Mountain Goldfrapp's début album Felt Mountain was released in September 2000 and produced the singles "Lovely Head", "Utopia", "Pilots (On a Star)" and "Human". It featured Alison Goldfrapp's vocals over cinematic soundscapes and is influenced by a variety of music styles including cabaret, folk and electronic music. The album was well received by music critics, including Pitchfork Media who described its sound as "simultaneously smarmy and seductive, yet elegant and graceful". It reached number 57 on the UK Albums Chart, and was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry. In 2001, Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, an annual music prize awarded for the best British or Irish album from the previous year. The lyrics on Felt Mountain were written by Alison Goldfrapp and are abstract obsessional tales inspired by films and her childhood. The song "Oompa Radar" was inspired by Roman Polanski's film Cul-de-sac, while "Pilots" describes travellers floating in the atmosphere above the earth. To promote Felt Mountain, Goldfrapp toured the U.K., Europe and North America, supporting the alternative music bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Doves. The band found it difficult to perform songs from the album live because of their complex arrangements which required up to forty musicians. They eventually settled on performing with violinist Davide Rossi, drummer Rowan Oliver and keyboardist Andy Davies. 2003–2004: Black Cherry Goldfrapp's second album Black Cherry was released in April 2003. The band recorded the album in a darkened studio in Bath, England. The album focused more heavily on dance music and glam rock-inspired synths than its predecessor. Alison Goldfrapp commented that the album differed from Felt Mountain because the band "felt that we really didn't want to repeat what we had done...we kind of wanted to do something that felt equally as fresh to us as the first one felt fresh to us, and we wanted to put more kind of "oomph" in it." The album received positive reviews from critics. The Guardian found it to be an "unexpected delight" and About.com called it a "rare electronica album of warmth and depth...the ultimate chillout pleasure". Black Cherry peaked at number 19 on the UK Albums Chart and number four on the Billboard Top Electronic Albums chart in the United States. It sold well, reaching platinum status in the UK and selling 52,000 copies in the U.S. as of August 2006. The first single released from the album was "Train", which reached number 23 on the UK Singles Chart. The song's lyrics discuss obsession and overindulgence and were inspired by Goldfrapp's visit to Los Angeles while touring in support of Felt Mountain. "Strict Machine" was released as the album's second single. The song proved successful on several formats, and reached number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. In 2004, "Strict Machine" won an Ivor Novello Award for "Best Dance Single". The third single released from Black Cherry was "Twist", a song inspired by a fantasy that Goldfrapp had about a boy who worked in a fairground. The title track was released as the album's fourth single and reached number 28 in the UK. In 2003, Alison Goldfrapp modified her image, from a sophisticated Marlene Dietrich inspired look to that of a new wave diva. The reinvented image included false eyelashes, customised T-shirts, military uniforms and fishnet stockings. Starting in March 2003, the band toured the album, with a concert series entitled Black Cherry Tour. In 2004, the band further toured Australia, Japan, Europe and North America and embarked on the Wonderful Electric Tour. Sections of the stage show featured Goldfrapp in a white dress wearing a horse tail and dancers with deer heads, and were inspired by Goldfrapp's interest in animals and mythology. 2005–2006: Supernature Supernature, Goldfrapp's third album, was released in August 2005. The album comprises pop and electronic dance music prominently featured on Black Cherry, but focuses more on subtle hooks instead of the large choruses that made up its predecessor. The band never intended to create dance music, however, previous releases were popular across nightclubs in North America and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Supernature débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart and was certified platinum in the UK. As of February 2008, it had sold one million copies worldwide. The album received a Grammy Award nomination in 2007 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Ooh La La" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The song was used for the iPhone 5S's commercial in 2013. "Ooh La La", the album's lead single, became Goldfrapp's first UK top five single. The song was chosen as the lead single "because it was up and in your face and carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album". "Ooh La La" became the first song performed by the band to feature the electric guitar and was cited as a highlight of the album by Allmusic. "Number 1" was released as the album's second single. Constructed around a synthesiser and bass arrangement, it was written about the importance of relationships. The album's third single "Ride a White Horse" was inspired by the disco era and reached number 15 in the UK. "Fly Me Away" was released as the album's fourth single, but did not perform as well as its predecessors. In 2006, Goldfrapp released We Are Glitter, a North American-only compilation of remixes from Supernature. It included a Flaming Lips remix of "Satin Chic", the band's favourite song from the album. 2006–2008: Seventh Tree Goldfrapp began writing and recording their fourth album at the end of 2006 in Bath, England. Seventh Tree, their fourth album, was released in February 2008, and débuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart. The album is a departure from the pop and electronic-dance music featured on Supernature, and features ambient and downtempo music. The band were inspired by an acoustic radio session they had performed, which led the duo to incorporate acoustic guitars into their music to create "warm" and "delicate" sounds. The album's lead single, "A&E", reached number ten in the UK. The single received positive reviews from critics, musicOMH found it to be "a beautifully paced ballad" and Digital Spy called it "lush, folky and organic". "Happiness", the album's second single, reached number 25 in the UK. The third single, "Caravan Girl", which describes the story of a girl that suffers from amnesia, reached number 54 in the UK. In 2008, Alison Goldfrapp took inspiration from the character of Pierrot and English Folk. The artwork for Seventh Tree featured her dressed as a clown because it is an "iconic image" with "so many different connotations". Goldfrapp chose to tone down her overtly sexual image because she felt that it was taking over the music. Her new image, inspired by Paganism, featured her dressed in white or natural-coloured flowing gowns with loose, curly blond hair. 2009–2012: Head First and The Singles Goldfrapp's fifth album, Head First, was released in March 2010. Recorded over a six-month period, it was a return to the dance oriented sound on previous albums. The album took inspiration from 1980s pop music and bands such as Van Halen and The Pointer Sisters. Alison Goldfrapp described its sound as "optimistic and vibrant." The album received positive reviews from critics, with Allmusic describing it as "a love letter to the frothy, fleeting, but very vital joys of pop music." Head First peaked at number six on the UK Albums Chart and number 45 on the US Billboard 200. The album earned Goldfrapp a Grammy Award nomination in 2011 for Best Electronic/Dance Album and "Rocket" was nominated for Best Dance Recording. The album's first single was "Rocket", a song about an unfaithful lover. Musically, The Times and Spin have compared the song to "Jump" by American rock band Van Halen. In the US, "Rocket" peaked at number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart. "Alive" was released as the album's second single. The song's music video featured Alison Goldfrapp as a 1980s inspired aerobics instructor who leads a group of black metal fans and vampires through a fitness routine. The album's third single "Believer" featured remixes by Vince Clarke and Davide Rossi. In February 2012, Goldfrapp released the compilation album The Singles. The album contained previously released material as well as two newly recorded songs. 2013–2014: Tales of Us In mid-June, Goldfrapp announced their forthcoming sixth album, Tales of Us, to be released 9 September 2013. The album features ten tracks. All the track titles, with the exception of "Stranger", are given people's names. Goldfrapp confirmed via Twitter that the sound of the album focuses on their softer sounds similar to that of their début piece Felt Mountain as well as their 2008 release Seventh Tree. Accompanying this announcement was the re-launch of the duo's website which features a trailer video directed by Lisa Gunning with the first dates announced for their Tales of Us Tour. "Drew", the first single from the album, was released on 2 September 2013 with an accompanying film directed by Gunning, the first of five films subsequently released to promote the album. Preceding the album's release, Goldfrapp performed the album in its entirety with a 24-piece orchestra and choir over two nights at the Manchester International Festival. Tales of Us was nominally successful upon release, charting in the top 20 in over 15 countries. In March 2014, the Tales of Us worldwide cinema event took place, featuring the full Tales of Us film and a live performance from Air Studios in London. Further singles from the album included "Annabel" and "Stranger". 2015–present: Silver Eye In July 2015, Alison Goldfrapp announced on Twitter that the group had returned to the studio to work on music for the forthcoming seventh album, but as far as a release date she could only state it would be "sometime in 2017". in December 2016 Goldfrapp posted on their Instagram page the covers of their first six studio albums. On 23 December 2016 Goldfrapp posted an image of two topless figures holding each other's heads, with bleached blonde hair covering their faces, and a black substance slicked across their forearms, along with the hashtag #goldfrapp7. The social media upload was initially assumed to be the seventh album's cover art. This turned out not to be the case. The title of the album was confirmed as Silver Eye. The first track to be played from the album, titled "Anymore", was premiered on Lauren Laverne's BBC 6 Music show on 23 January 2017. Silver Eye was eventually released on 31 March 2017. Silver Eye: Deluxe Edition was released on 6 July 2018. This was the original Silver Eye album with an additional eight remixes, including a collaboration with Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode on the track "Ocean". In September 2021, Goldfrapp were awarded the Ivor Novello inspiration award, which celebrates "peer recognition for the excellence of Goldfrapp songwriting catalogue and in particular how it has inspired the creative talent of other creators". Musical style Although Goldfrapp's musical style has changed over time, they are considered to be an electronic music act. Goldfrapp has explored a range of musical styles in their songs, although many songs are characterised by Alison Goldfrapp's distinctive breathy, soft soprano vocals and Will Gregory's multi-layered synthesiser / string arrangements. Pitchfork described Goldfrapp's voice as "a cross between Kylie Minogue and PJ Harvey, between Annie [Lennox] and Siouxsie Sioux, between Rachel Stevens and Beth Gibbons". Album style and genre progression The band's sound has progressed from electronic in Felt Mountain, through synth-pop in Black Cherry to a more glam rock-influenced sound in Supernature, and to a blend of ambient, folk, and electronic sounds in Seventh Tree and a 1980s synth-pop influence in Head First. However, they have experimented with other genres of music, such as cabaret ("Cologne Cerrone Houdini", "Human", "Oompa Radar"), operatic pop ("Utopia" and "Pilots"), folktronica ("A&E"), and trip hop ("Little Bird" and "Lovely Head"). Musical, cinematic, and other inspiration Alison Goldfrapp listened to Kate Bush, Prince, T. Rex, Donna Summer, and Iggy Pop and The Stooges as a teenager. In the early 1990s, while working in Belgium and travelling Europe, she discovered Serge Gainsbourg, 1970s Polish disco music, and Weimar cabaret. Gregory's musical background was in classical music and has cited Ennio Morricone as his main influence. Other media, including film, have influenced Goldfrapp; Alison Goldfrapp cites Roman Polanski's psychological thriller Cul-de-sac and the cult film The Wicker Man as influences. They also draw inspiration from surrealism and nature, both of which are reflected in the band's album artwork, which Goldfrapp designs in collaboration with Big Active. Collaboration and composition technique All the band's songs are composed jointly by Goldfrapp and Gregory, although they have collaborated with Nick Batt on several tracks. They have called their writing relationship a "democracy", playing off one another while in the recording studio. While writing, Goldfrapp uses her vocals to create melodies and drumbeats. Gregory composes on vintage keyboards. The band believe that "music is a visual experience" and often visualise their songs before writing them. Discography Felt Mountain (2000) Black Cherry (2003) Supernature (2005) Seventh Tree (2008) Head First (2010) Tales of Us (2013) Silver Eye (2017) See also List of ambient music artists List of awards and nominations received by Goldfrapp References External links Goldfrapp statistics, tagging and previews at Last.FM 1999 establishments in England Astralwerks artists British ambient music groups English electronic music duos English synth-pop groups English techno music groups Ivor Novello Award winners Musical groups established in 1999 Musical groups from London Mute Records artists Remixers Trip hop groups MTV Europe Music Award winners Parlophone artists Male–female musical duos Folktronica musicians	true	[ "Supernature is the third studio album by English electronic music duo Goldfrapp, released on 17 August 2005 by Mute Records. The album received generally favourable reviews, with most critics complimenting its blend of pop and electronic music. It debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart with first-week sales of 52,976 copies, and has been certified platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). Supernature has sold one million copies worldwide.\n\nThe album's lead single, \"Ooh La La\", reached number four on the UK Singles Chart, becoming the duo's highest-peaking single to date. The album spawned three further singles: \"Number 1\", \"Ride a White Horse\" and \"Fly Me Away\". In North America, where \"Number 1\" was promoted as the first single, the album was released on 7 March 2006 and reached number 138 on the charts. Supernature was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album in 2007.\n\nRecording and production\n\nSupernature contains music in the same pop and electronic dance styles featured on Goldfrapp's previous studio album, Black Cherry (2003)—especially its singles \"Strict Machine\" and \"Twist\"—although it focuses on subtle hooks instead of large choruses. Lead singer Alison Goldfrapp described the album's writing process as \"an electronic/glam cross between Berlin, New York and North-East Somerset\".\n\nGoldfrapp and Will Gregory recorded the bulk of Supernature in late 2004 in the countryside near Bath, England—the same place they recorded Black Cherry. They had rented a small house and spent some months writing music; they later explained that the unpopulated location kept them from distractions and that the majority of the process was \"very basic\". Goldfrapp called their writing relationship a \"democracy\", playing off one another while in the recording studio. The lyrical content of the song \"Number 1\", which became the album's second single, is about the importance and meaning of relationships, even though they do not necessarily last.\n\nIn an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Goldfrapp explained that they had never intended to create pop music. However, the singles released from Black Cherry became successes across nightclubs in North America, and as a result, they decided to write a more dance-oriented album. Although this made the duo nervous, \"Ooh La La\" was the group's first song to feature the electric guitar. Before its composition, the duo avoided the use of the guitar because of the guitar's overly recognisable rhythm. Four-on-the-floor bass drums are also present on several of the album's tracks, and the piano ballad \"Let It Take You\" features evening-effects composed on a synthesiser. \"You Never Know\" begins with Alison Goldfrapp executing a synthesised voice, supported by both pads and synthesisers. Goldfrapp and Gregory have cited \"Satin Chic\" as their favourite song on Supernature.\n\nAlison Goldfrapp named the Roland String synth as one of her favourite keyboards. \"Number 1\" features an old synth and a bass arrangement that the group began to use frequently after recording the song. Another Roland keyboard, the SH-09 monophonic synthesiser first produced in 1979, is another favourite; she played the duo's song \"Train\" (2003) on it and enjoys the sounds that it makes. Goldfrapp was also impressed by a Russian synth, enamored with its Russian-language writing.\n\nComposition and music\n\n\"Ooh La La\", Supernatures opening track, inspired by T. Rex, was chosen as its lead single \"because it was up and in your face and it carried on the theme of the glammy, discoey beat from the last album\". It was the duo's first song to feature the electric guitar, and received positive reviews, often being noted as a highlight of the album. \"Ooh La La\" became Goldfrapp's most successful single on the UK Singles Chart to date when it peaked at number four, while topping the Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart in the United States. The second track, \"Lovely 2 C U\", received mixed reviews from critics, with one reviewer stating that it was the \"worst offender of sounding by-numbers, its lazy glam affectations sounding all the worse amid a chorus striking only in its complete dullness\".\n\n\"Ride a White Horse\", the third single, was inspired by the disco era. Like previous singles from the album, the song was another top-20 single in the UK, where it peaked at number 15. The ballads \"You Never Know\" and \"Let It Take You\" have minimal background electronics, and were generally well received by critics, who drew comparisons to Goldfrapp's debut album Felt Mountain. Goldfrapp's performance on \"You Never Know\" was described as \"chameleonic\" with odes to Debbie Harry and Siouxsie Sioux. \"Fly Me Away\", another synth ballad, had an accompanying music video which featured Goldfrapp as an animated doll; the video, however, was never released. Serving as the fourth and final single from Supernature, the song was not heavily promoted and was less commercially successful than the other singles, peaking at number 26 on the UK chart. \"Slide In\", an electroclash song about sex, and \"Koko\" were compared to Gary Numan's early compositions.\n\n\"Satin Chic\" is a disco song with glam rock and cabaret influences, similar to early Elton John. Cited by Goldfrapp and Gregory as their favourite song on Supernature, it was remixed by The Flaming Lips, and issued as a limited-edition single on 4 September 2006. The 10th track, \"Time Out from the World\", features an orchestra and whispered vocals by Goldfrapp. Critics liked the song, writing that it was an \"exception to the prevailing style of Supernature\" due to its \"haunting, yet glamorous, atmospherics\". The album's closing track and second single \"Number 1\" is about the importance and meanings of relationships. The song, which is based around a synth and bass arrangement, reached number nine on the UK Singles Chart and number one on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart.\n\nRelease and artwork\nThe album was released in two versions: a single-disc version, which used Opendisc technology to offer extra contents via a website, and a double-disc version which included the album in surround sound on both discs. The first disc is a hybrid SACD with 5.1 multichannel SACD audio, stereo SACD audio and stereo CD audio. The second disc, a DVD-Video, contains the multichannel version of the album in DTS 96/24 as well as a documentary and music videos for \"Ooh La La\" and \"Number 1\".\n\nThe album cover, photographed by Ross Kirton, is a rear-view shot of Alison against a sparkly black backdrop, looking over her shoulder while covering her breast with her hand. The regular edition cover shows her from the waist up, whereas the US special edition shows the cover art in its entirety, with Alison wearing a long plume of peacock feathers and golden platform shoes. In late 2005, the album ranked number eight on the annual Best Art Vinyl poll.\n\nCritical reception\n\nSupernature received favourable reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 79, based on 27 reviews. Dorian Lynskey of The Guardian said that the album was \"a brash, beautiful celebration of love and dancing\". In a review for PopMatters, Adrien Begrand said that \"[a]lthough Supernature lacks the imagination of Felt Mountain and the saucy brilliance of Black Cherry, it doesn't pander to the pop crowd.\" Lauren Gitlin of Rolling Stone said the album was \"[t]oxic and delicious\" and that \"Supernature will make you do bad things—and like it.\" However, Pitchfork reviewer Nitsuh Abebe was less impressed, and wrote that the album's songs \"keep feeling like exercises: too thick and melodic to work like dance music, but with melodies that refuse to stick as satisfyingly as pop.\" Michael Hubbard of musicOMH wrote a review for every song on Supernature, and although he felt that it was a \"curious, rather than classic, record\", he criticised it for \"fading out early on, with poor, low quality songs at the end which leave the listener feeling cheated\". AllMusic critic Heather Phares called Supernature \"Goldfrapp's most accessible album\" and named \"Ooh La La\" as its best song.\n\nIn a review for Canadian-based website Jam!, Andrew Carver praised the different sounds on Supernature, which range from \"a blend of future noise\" to \"crushed velvet corruption\"; he described the album as \"one sharp recording\". Jessica Suarez of Spin magazine compared \"Ooh La La\" to Black Cherry'''s \"Strict Machine\", saying that \"Ooh La La\" sounds \"so simplistic that [its] minimalist repetition occasionally teeters over into redundancy\". She praised \"Ride a White Horse\" and \"Fly Me Away\" for featuring Alison Goldfrapp's \"velvet-soft vocals, which stay that way even when heavily processed\". A less favourable reception came from Stylus Magazine reviewer Edward Oculicz, who stated \"Supernature is not a great album\" and called several of its tracks too \"dull\".Rolling Stone magazine ranked the album at number 32 on its list of The Top 50 Albums of 2006. In January 2008, the album was included on The Daily Telegraphs list of the 120 essential pop albums. At the 2007 Grammy Awards, Goldfrapp received nominations for Best Electronic/Dance Album and Best Dance Recording for \"Ooh La La\".\n\nCommercial performance\nSupernature debuted on the UK Albums Chart at number two (blocked from the top position by James Blunt's Back to Bedlam), selling 52,976 copies in its first week. The album was certified platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) on 13 January 2006. By 20 December 2010, the album had sold 500,000 copies in the United Kingdom. The album attained moderate success across Europe, reaching the top 10 in Ireland, the top 20 in Belgium, the top 30 in Germany and Switzerland, and the top 40 in Austria, Italy, the Netherlands and Norway. In Oceania, it peaked at number 23 in Australia and number 35 in New Zealand.\n\nSupernature became Goldfrapp's first album to appear on the Billboard 200 in the United States, where it peaked at number 138. It reached number three on the Top Heatseekers chart and number five on the Top Electronic Albums chart. The album had sold 49,000 copies in the US as of August 2006. Supernature was also the duo's first release in Canada, reaching number 88 on the Canadian Albums Chart. The album had sold one million copies worldwide as of February 2008.\n\nTrack listingEuropean special edition bonus DVDSupernature in 5.1 & Stereo\nLittle Bits of Goldfrapp: Documentary\nJakko & the Poet in Frappworld – animation by Andreas Nilsson\nPhoto galleryUS special edition bonus DVD'Supernature in 5.1 & Stereo (excluding bonus track \"Beautiful\")\nLittle Bits of Goldfrapp: Documentary\nJakko & the Poet in Frappworld – animation by Andreas Nilsson\n\"Ooh La La\" (video)\n\"Number 1\" (video)\n\"Ride a White Horse\" (live in London)\n\"Satin Chic\" (special performance film)\n\"Ooh La La\": Little Pictures\nPhoto gallery\n\nPersonnel\nCredits adapted from the liner notes of Supernature''.\n\nGoldfrapp\n Alison Goldfrapp – vocals, arrangements, synths\n Will Gregory – arrangements, synths\n\nAdditional musicians\n\n Charlie Jones – bass \n Adrian Utley – guitar ; bass \n Nick Batt – synth ; additional programming \n Daniel Miller – synth \n Dave Power – additional drums \n Ewan Pearson – additional programming \n Nick Ingman – string orchestration, string conducting\n Gavyn Wright – string leader\n\nTechnical\n\n Alison Goldfrapp – recording, production\n Will Gregory – recording, production\n Mark \"Spike\" Stent – mixing \n Jeremy Wheatley – mixing \n David Bascombe – mixing ; vocal arrangement mixing \n Alex Dromgoole – engineering assistance \n David Emery – engineering assistance \n Richard Edgeler – engineering assistance \n Tim Roe – engineering assistance \n Steve Evans – additional recording engineering \n Lee Groves – additional mix programming \n Gary Thomasat – recording\n Mat Bartram – engineering assistance\n Ted Jensen – mastering\n\nArtwork\n\n Alison Goldfrapp – art direction\n Mat Maitland – art direction, design\n Gerard Saint – art direction\n Rachel Thomas – set design\n Ross Kirton – photography\n Danny Emmett – digital imaging\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCertifications\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2005 albums\nGlam rock albums by English artists\nGoldfrapp albums\nMute Records albums", "Goldfrapp are an English electronic music duo that formed in London in 1999. The group gained prominence after their debut studio album Felt Mountain was shortlisted for the 2001 Mercury Prize in the United Kingdom. They have released five studio albums: Felt Mountain (2000), Black Cherry (2003), Supernature (2005), Seventh Tree (2008) and Head First (2010). The group's remix album, We Are Glitter was released in the United States in October 2006 and the compilation album The Singles was released internationally in February 2012.\n\nBlack Cherry was released through Mute Records in April 2003. Singles from the album included \"Train\", \"Strict Machine\" and \"Twist\". Black Cherry earned the group two awards, including an Ivor Novello Award (The Ivors Dance Award) for the song \"Strict Machine\". Supernature was released through the same label in August 2005. The album earned Goldfrapp two Grammy Award nominations in the dance category. Their fourth album, Seventh Tree, was released in February 2008. Singles included \"A&E\", \"Happiness\" and \"Caravan Girl\". The music video for \"Happiness\" earned Goldfrapp and director Dougal Wilson a nomination for Best Pop Video at the UK Music Video Awards. Head First was released in March 2010. The album earned the group two additional Grammy Award nominations.\n\nOther recognitions include the inclusion of Supernature on Rolling Stone magazine's \"Top 50 Albums of 2006\" list. Goldfrapp have also been recognized by the ASCAP/PRS Awards, BT Digital Music Awards, International Dance Music Awards, MTV Europe Music Awards and the Q Awards. Overall, Goldfrapp have received two awards from 15 nominations.\n\nAIM Independent Music Awards\nAIM is a trade body established in 1999 to provide a collective voice for the UK's independent music industry.\n\n\|- \n\| 2017\n\| \"Anymore\"\n\| Independent Track of the Year\n\|\n\nASCAP/PRS Awards\nThe ASCAP/PRS Awards are presented annually by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) to British writer and publisher members of the PRS for Music (PRS) for significant performances of their works in the United States. Goldfrapp have received one award from one nomination.\n\nBest Art Vinyl\nThe Best Art Vinyl Awards are yearly awards established in 2005 by Art Vinyl Ltd to celebrate the best album artwork of the past year. \n{\| class=\"wikitable\"\n\|-\n!Year\n!width=\"250\"\|Nominated work\n!width=\"325\"\|Award\n!width=\"65\"\|Result\n!Ref.\n\|-\n\| align=\"center\"\|2005\n\| Supernature\n\| rowspan=2\|Best Vinyl Art\n\| \n\| \n\|-\n\| align=\"center\"\|2008\n\| Seventh Tree\n\| \n\|\n\nBrit Awards\nThe Brit Awards are the British Phonographic Industry's (BPI) annual pop music awards. Goldfrapp have been nominated twice.\n\nBT Digital Music Awards\nCreated in 2001, the BT Digital Music Awards are awarded annually by the British telecommunications company BT. Goldfrapp have been nominated twice.\n\nD&AD Awards\nDesign and Art Direction (D&AD) is a British educational charity which exists to promote excellence in design and advertising.\n\n\|-\n\| 2004\n\| \"Strict Machine\"\n\| Animation\n\| style=\"background:#BF8040\"\| Wood Pencil\n\|-\n\| 2009\n\| \"Happiness\"\n\| Music Video \n\| style=\"background:#8a8b89\"\| Graphite Pencil\n\nDanceStar USA Awards\n\n!Ref.\n\|-\n\| 2004\n\| Black Cherry\n\| Best New Artist Album\n\| \n\|\n\nGLAAD Media Awards\n\nThe GLAAD Media Awards were created in 1990 by the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation to \"recognize and honor media for their fair, accurate and inclusive representations of the LGBT community and the issues that affect their lives.\"\n\n\|-\n\| 2014\n\| Tales of Us\n\| Outstanding Music Artist\n\|\n\nGay Music Chart Awards\n{\| class=\"wikitable\"\n\|-\n!Year\n!width=\"250\"\|Nominated work\n!width=\"325\"\|Award\n!width=\"65\"\|Result\n!Ref.\n\|-\n\| align=\"center\"\|2017\n\| \"Systemagic\"\n\| Best Queer Music Video\n\| \n\|\n\nGrammy Awards\nThe Grammy Awards are awarded annually by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States for outstanding achievements in the record industry. Often considered the highest music honor, the awards were established in 1958. Goldfrapp have received four nominations.\n\nIbiza Music Video Festival\n\nIbiza Music Video Festival is a global and interactive music video festival.\n\n\|-\n\| 2017\n\| \"Systemagic\"\n\| Best Choreography \n\|\n\nInternational Dance Music Awards\nThe International Dance Music Awards, which take place during the annual Winter Music Conference, recognize achievements in the electronic dance music industry. Goldfrapp have received three nominations.\n\nIvor Novello Awards\nThe Ivor Novello Awards, named after the Cardiff-born entertainer Ivor Novello, are awards for songwriting and composing. Goldfrapp have received two awards from two nominations.\n\nMercury Prize\nThe Mercury Prize is an annual music prize awarded for the best album from the United Kingdom and Ireland. Goldfrapp have been nominated once.\n\nMusic Week Awards\nFounded by British music magazine Music Week, the Music Week Awards are presented annually.\n\nMTV Europe Music Awards\nThe MTV Europe Music Awards were established in 1994 by MTV Europe to celebrate the most popular music videos in Europe. Goldfrapp have been nominated once.\n\nMuso Awards\nThe Muso Awards is a charity music award ceremony held in London, England, that began in September 2002. The awards are voted \"by musicians, for musicians\", and the ceremony features live performances by a variety of artists. The 2005 event was held at Koko, in Camden Town, very few winners were present to receive their awards.\n\n!Ref.\n\|-\n\| 2005\n\| Alison Goldfrapp\n\| Best Female Vocal\n\| \n\|\n\nPLUG Awards\nThe PLUG Awards are given in support of indie music.\n\n\|-\n\| 2007\n\| We Are Glitter\n\| Electronic/Dance Album of the Year\n\|\n\nQ Awards\nThe Q Awards are the UK's annual pop music awards run by the music magazine Q magazine to honor musical excellence. Winners are voted by readers of Q.\n\n\|-\n\| 2001\n\| rowspan=\"2\" \| Themselves \n\| Best New Act \n\| \n\|-\n\| 2003\n\| Q Innovation in Sound \n\| \n\|-\n\| 2005\n\| Supernature\n\| Best Album\n\| \n\|-\n\| 2008\n\| \"Happiness\" \n\| Best Video\n\|\n\nPopjustice 20 Quid Music Prize\n\nThe Popjustice £20 Music Prize, also known as the Popjustice Twenty Quid Prize, is an annual prize awarded by music website Popjustice to recognise the best British pop single of the previous year. The prize was conceived by Popjustice founder Peter Robinson in 2003 as a reaction to what he perceived as the pompous and elitist nature of the existing Mercury Prize, which recognises the best album of the previous year, and in particular its exclusion of pop music acts in favour of those from more esoteric genres. The shortlist for the Popjustice prize is announced in September of each year and the winner named the following month, to coincide with the presentation of the Mercury Prize. Popjustice gives a token prize of £20 to the winner of its award, in contrast to the £20,000 given to the winner of the Mercury Prize.\n\n\|-\n\| 2005\n\| \"Ooh La La\"\n\| rowspan=\"3\" \| Best British Pop Single\n\| \n\|-\n\| 2006\n\| \"Number 1\"\n\| \n\|-\n\| 2008\n\| \"A&E\"\n\|\n\nUK Music Video Awards\nThe UK Music Video Awards recognize \"creativity and technical excellence\" in music videos made within the United Kingdom. Goldfrapp have been nominated once.\n\nMusic Producers Guild Awards\nThe Music Producers Guild Awards are awarded annually by the Music Producers Guild, a UK Music not-for-profit company run by volunteers from the membership.\n\nOther recognitions\n2006 – Rolling Stone magazine ranked Supernature number 32 on their \"Top 50 Albums of 2006\" list\n2009 – Seventh Tree was ranked at number 19 by Q in their list of \"50 Best Albums of 2008\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nOfficial website\n\nAwards\nGoldfrapp" ]
[ "Carousel (musical)", "Musical treatment" ]	C_8decf249a7ee4c6bb84aa0f61f4f4d6c_0	What was important with Carousel?	1	What was important about the musical Carousel?	Carousel (musical)	The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut--as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made. A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousel's songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. CANNOTANSWER	The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s,	Carousel is the second musical by the team of Richard Rodgers (music) and Oscar Hammerstein II (book and lyrics). The 1945 work was adapted from Ferenc Molnár's 1909 play Liliom, transplanting its Budapest setting to the Maine coastline. The story revolves around carousel barker Billy Bigelow, whose romance with millworker Julie Jordan comes at the price of both their jobs. He participates in a robbery to provide for Julie and their unborn child; after it goes tragically wrong, he is given a chance to make things right. A secondary plot line deals with millworker Carrie Pipperidge and her romance with ambitious fisherman Enoch Snow. The show includes the well-known songs "If I Loved You", "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" and "You'll Never Walk Alone". Richard Rodgers later wrote that Carousel was his favorite of all his musicals. Following the spectacular success of the first Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Oklahoma! (1943), the pair sought to collaborate on another piece, knowing that any resulting work would be compared with Oklahoma!, most likely unfavorably. They were initially reluctant to seek the rights to Liliom; Molnár had refused permission for the work to be adapted in the past, and the original ending was considered too depressing for the musical theatre. After acquiring the rights, the team created a work with lengthy sequences of music and made the ending more hopeful. The musical required considerable modification during out-of-town tryouts, but once it opened on Broadway on April 19, 1945, it was an immediate hit with both critics and audiences. Carousel initially ran for 890 performances and duplicated its success in the West End in 1950. Though it has never achieved as much commercial success as Oklahoma!, the piece has been repeatedly revived, recorded several times and was filmed in 1956. A production by Nicholas Hytner enjoyed success in 1992 in London, in 1994 in New York and on tour. Another Broadway revival opened in 2018. In 1999, Time magazine named Carousel the best musical of the 20th century. Background Liliom Ferenc Molnár's Hungarian-language drama, Liliom, premiered in Budapest in 1909. The audience was puzzled by the work, and it lasted only thirty-odd performances before being withdrawn, the first shadow on Molnár's successful career as a playwright. Liliom was not presented again until after World War I. When it reappeared on the Budapest stage, it was a tremendous hit. Except for the ending, the plots of Liliom and Carousel are very similar. Andreas Zavocky (nicknamed Liliom, the Hungarian word for "lily", a slang term for "tough guy"), a carnival barker, falls in love with Julie Zeller, a servant girl, and they begin living together. With both discharged from their jobs, Liliom is discontented and contemplates leaving Julie, but decides not to do so on learning that she is pregnant. A subplot involves Julie's friend Marie, who has fallen in love with Wolf Biefeld, a hotel porter—after the two marry, he becomes the owner of the hotel. Desperate to make money so that he, Julie and their child can escape to America and a better life, Liliom conspires with lowlife Ficsur to commit a robbery, but it goes badly, and Liliom stabs himself. He dies, and his spirit is taken to heaven's police court. As Ficsur suggested while the two waited to commit the crime, would-be robbers like them do not come before God Himself. Liliom is told by the magistrate that he may go back to Earth for one day to attempt to redeem the wrongs he has done to his family, but must first spend sixteen years in a fiery purgatory. On his return to Earth, Liliom encounters his daughter, Louise, who like her mother is now a factory worker. Saying that he knew her father, he tries to give her a star he stole from the heavens. When Louise refuses to take it, he strikes her. Not realizing who he is, Julie confronts him, but finds herself unable to be angry with him. Liliom is ushered off to his fate, presumably Hell, and Louise asks her mother if it is possible to feel a hard slap as if it was a kiss. Julie reminiscently tells her daughter that it is very possible for that to happen. An English translation of Liliom was credited to Benjamin "Barney" Glazer, though there is a story that the actual translator, uncredited, was Rodgers' first major partner Lorenz Hart. The Theatre Guild presented it in New York City in 1921, with Joseph Schildkraut as Liliom, and the play was a success, running 300 performances. A 1940 revival with Burgess Meredith and Ingrid Bergman was seen by both Hammerstein and Rodgers. Glazer, in introducing the English translation of Liliom, wrote of the play's appeal: And where in modern dramatic literature can such pearls be matched—Julie incoherently confessing to her dead lover the love she had always been ashamed to tell; Liliom crying out to the distant carousel the glad news that he is to be a father; the two thieves gambling for the spoils of their prospective robbery; Marie and Wolf posing for their portrait while the broken-hearted Julie stands looking after the vanishing Liliom, the thieves' song ringing in her ears; the two policemen grousing about pay and pensions while Liliom lies bleeding to death; Liliom furtively proffering his daughter the star he has stolen for her in heaven. ... The temptation to count the whole scintillating string is difficult to resist. Inception In the 1920s and 1930s, Rodgers and Hammerstein both became well known for creating Broadway hits with other partners. Rodgers, with Lorenz Hart, had produced a string of over two dozen musicals, including such popular successes as Babes in Arms (1937), The Boys from Syracuse (1938) and Pal Joey (1940). Some of Rodgers' work with Hart broke new ground in musical theatre: On Your Toes was the first use of ballet to sustain the plot (in the "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue" scene), while Pal Joey flouted Broadway tradition by presenting a knave as its hero. Hammerstein had written or co-written the words for such hits as Rose-Marie (1924), The Desert Song (1926), The New Moon (1927) and Show Boat (1927). Though less productive in the 1930s, he wrote material for musicals and films, sharing an Oscar for his song with Jerome Kern, "The Last Time I Saw Paris", which was included in the 1941 film Lady Be Good. By the early 1940s, Hart had sunk into alcoholism and emotional turmoil, becoming unreliable and prompting Rodgers to approach Hammerstein to ask if he would consider working with him. Hammerstein was eager to do so, and their first collaboration was Oklahoma! (1943). Thomas Hischak states, in his The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, that Oklahoma! is "the single most influential work in the American musical theatre. In fact, the history of the Broadway musical can accurately be divided into what came before Oklahoma! and what came after it." An innovation for its time in integrating song, character, plot and dance, Oklahoma! would serve, according to Hischak, as "the model for Broadway shows for decades", and proved a huge popular and financial success. Once it was well-launched, what to do as an encore was a daunting challenge for the pair. Film producer Samuel Goldwyn saw Oklahoma! and advised Rodgers to shoot himself, which according to Rodgers "was Sam's blunt but funny way of telling me that I'd never create another show as good as Oklahoma!" As they considered new projects, Hammerstein wrote, "We're such fools. No matter what we do, everyone is bound to say, 'This is not another Oklahoma! " Oklahoma! had been a struggle to finance and produce. Hammerstein and Rodgers met weekly in 1943 with Theresa Helburn and Lawrence Langner of the Theatre Guild, producers of the blockbuster musical, who together formed what they termed "the Gloat Club". At one such luncheon, Helburn and Langner proposed to Rodgers and Hammerstein that they turn Molnár's Liliom into a musical. Both men refused—they had no feeling for the Budapest setting and thought that the unhappy ending was unsuitable for musical theatre. In addition, given the unstable wartime political situation, they might need to change the setting from Hungary while in rehearsal. At the next luncheon, Helburn and Langner again proposed Liliom, suggesting that they move the setting to Louisiana and make Liliom a Creole. Rodgers and Hammerstein played with the idea over the next few weeks, but decided that Creole dialect, filled with "zis" and "zose", would sound corny and would make it difficult to write effective lyrics. A breakthrough came when Rodgers, who owned a house in Connecticut, proposed a New England setting. Hammerstein wrote of this suggestion in 1945, I began to see an attractive ensemble—sailors, whalers, girls who worked in the mills up the river, clambakes on near-by islands, an amusement park on the seaboard, things people could do in crowds, people who were strong and alive and lusty, people who had always been depicted on the stage as thin-lipped puritans—a libel I was anxious to refute ... as for the two leading characters, Julie with her courage and inner strength and outward simplicity seemed more indigenous to Maine than to Budapest. Liliom is, of course, an international character, indigenous to nowhere. Rodgers and Hammerstein were also concerned about what they termed "the tunnel" of Molnár's second act—a series of gloomy scenes leading up to Liliom's suicide—followed by a dark ending. They also felt it would be difficult to set Liliom's motivation for the robbery to music. Molnár's opposition to having his works adapted was also an issue; he had famously turned down Giacomo Puccini when the great composer wished to transform Liliom into an opera, stating that he wanted the piece to be remembered as his, not Puccini's. In 1937, Molnár, who had recently emigrated to the United States, had declined another offer from Kurt Weill to adapt the play into a musical. The pair continued to work on the preliminary ideas for a Liliom adaptation while pursuing other projects in late 1943 and early 1944—writing the film musical State Fair and producing I Remember Mama on Broadway. Meanwhile, the Theatre Guild took Molnár to see Oklahoma! Molnár stated that if Rodgers and Hammerstein could adapt Liliom as beautifully as they had modified Green Grow the Lilacs into Oklahoma!, he would be pleased to have them do it. The Guild obtained the rights from Molnár in October 1943. The playwright received one percent of the gross and $2,500 for "personal services". The duo insisted, as part of the contract, that Molnár permit them to make changes in the plot. At first, the playwright refused, but eventually yielded. Hammerstein later stated that if this point had not been won, "we could never have made Carousel." In seeking to establish through song Liliom's motivation for the robbery, Rodgers remembered that he and Hart had a similar problem in Pal Joey. Rodgers and Hart had overcome the problem with a song that Joey sings to himself, "I'm Talking to My Pal". This inspired "Soliloquy". Both partners later told a story that "Soliloquy" was only intended to be a song about Liliom's dreams of a son, but that Rodgers, who had two daughters, insisted that Liliom consider that Julie might have a girl. However, the notes taken at their meeting of December 7, 1943 state: "Mr. Rodgers suggested a fine musical number for the end of the scene where Liliom discovers he is to be a father, in which he sings first with pride of the growth of a boy, and then suddenly realizes it might be a girl and changes completely." Hammerstein and Rodgers returned to the Liliom project in mid-1944. Hammerstein was uneasy as he worked, fearing that no matter what they did, Molnár would disapprove of the results. Green Grow the Lilacs had been a little-known work; Liliom was a theatrical standard. Molnár's text also contained considerable commentary on the Hungarian politics of 1909 and the rigidity of that society. A dismissed carnival barker who hits his wife, attempts a robbery and commits suicide seemed an unlikely central character for a musical comedy. Hammerstein decided to use the words and story to make the audience sympathize with the lovers. He also built up the secondary couple, who are incidental to the plot in Liliom; they became Enoch Snow and Carrie Pipperidge. "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" was repurposed from a song, "A Real Nice Hayride", written for Oklahoma! but not used. Molnár's ending was unsuitable, and after a couple of false starts, Hammerstein conceived the graduation scene that ends the musical. According to Frederick Nolan in his book on the team's works: "From that scene the song "You'll Never Walk Alone" sprang almost naturally." In spite of Hammerstein's simple lyrics for "You'll Never Walk Alone", Rodgers had great difficulty in setting it to music. Rodgers explained his rationale for the changed ending, Liliom was a tragedy about a man who cannot learn to live with other people. The way Molnár wrote it, the man ends up hitting his daughter and then having to go back to purgatory, leaving his daughter helpless and hopeless. We couldn't accept that. The way we ended Carousel it may still be a tragedy but it's a hopeful one because in the final scene it is clear that the child has at last learned how to express herself and communicate with others. When the pair decided to make "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" into an ensemble number, Hammerstein realized he had no idea what a clambake was like, and researched the matter. Based on his initial findings, he wrote the line, "First came codfish chowder". However, further research convinced him the proper term was "codhead chowder", a term unfamiliar to many playgoers. He decided to keep it as "codfish". When the song proceeded to discuss the lobsters consumed at the feast, Hammerstein wrote the line "We slit 'em down the back/And peppered 'em good". He was grieved to hear from a friend that lobsters are always slit down the front. The lyricist sent a researcher to a seafood restaurant and heard back that lobsters are always slit down the back. Hammerstein concluded that there is disagreement about which side of a lobster is the back. One error not caught involved the song "June Is Bustin' Out All Over", in which sheep are depicted as seeking to mate in late spring—they actually do so in the winter. Whenever this was brought to Hammerstein's attention, he told his informant that 1873 was a special year, in which sheep mated in the spring. Rodgers early decided to dispense with an overture, feeling that the music was hard to hear over the banging of seats as latecomers settled themselves. In his autobiography, Rodgers complained that only the brass section can be heard during an overture because there are never enough strings in a musical's small orchestra. He determined to force the audience to concentrate from the beginning by opening with a pantomime scene accompanied by what became known as "The Carousel Waltz". The pantomime paralleled one in the Molnár play, which was also used to introduce the characters and situation to the audience. Author Ethan Mordden described the effectiveness of this opening: Other characters catch our notice—Mr. Bascombe, the pompous mill owner, Mrs. Mullin, the widow who runs the carousel and, apparently, Billy; a dancing bear; an acrobat. But what draws us in is the intensity with which Julie regards Billy—the way she stands frozen, staring at him, while everyone else at the fair is swaying to the rhythm of Billy's spiel. And as Julie and Billy ride together on the swirling carousel, and the stage picture surges with the excitement of the crowd, and the orchestra storms to a climax, and the curtain falls, we realize that R & H have not only skipped the overture and the opening number but the exposition as well. They have plunged into the story, right into the middle of it, in the most intense first scene any musical ever had. Casting and out-of-town tryouts The casting for Carousel began when Oklahoma!s production team, including Rodgers and Hammerstein, was seeking a replacement for the part of Curly (the male lead in Oklahoma!). Lawrence Langner had heard, through a relative, of a California singer named John Raitt, who might be suitable for the part. Langner went to hear Raitt, then urged the others to bring Raitt to New York for an audition. Raitt asked to sing "Largo al factotum", Figaro's aria from The Barber of Seville, to warm up. The warmup was sufficient to convince the producers that not only had they found a Curly, they had found a Liliom (or Billy Bigelow, as the part was renamed). Theresa Helburn made another California discovery, Jan Clayton, a singer/actress who had made a few minor films for MGM. She was brought east and successfully auditioned for the part of Julie. The producers sought to cast unknowns. Though many had played in previous Hammerstein or Rodgers works, only one, Jean Casto (cast as carousel owner Mrs. Mullin, and a veteran of Pal Joey), had ever played on Broadway before. It proved harder to cast the ensemble than the leads, due to the war—Rodgers told his casting director, John Fearnley, that the sole qualification for a dancing boy was that he be alive. Rodgers and Hammerstein reassembled much of the creative team that had made Oklahoma! a success, including director Rouben Mamoulian and choreographer Agnes de Mille. Miles White was the costume designer while Jo Mielziner (who had not worked on Oklahoma!) was the scenic and lighting designer. Even though Oklahoma! orchestrator Russell Bennett had informed Rodgers that he was unavailable to work on Carousel due to a radio contract, Rodgers insisted he do the work in his spare time. He orchestrated "The Carousel Waltz" and "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" before finally being replaced by Don Walker. A new member of the creative team was Trude Rittmann, who arranged the dance music. Rittmann initially felt that Rodgers mistrusted her because she was a woman, and found him difficult to work with, but the two worked together on Rodgers' shows until the 1970s. Rehearsals began in January 1945; either Rodgers or Hammerstein was always present. Raitt was presented with the lyrics for "Soliloquy" on a five-foot long sheet of paper—the piece ran nearly eight minutes. Staging such a long solo number presented problems, and Raitt later stated that he felt that they were never fully addressed. At some point during rehearsals, Molnár came to see what they had done to his play. There are a number of variations on the story.Fordin, pp. 231–32 As Rodgers told it, while watching rehearsals with Hammerstein, the composer spotted Molnár in the rear of the theatre and whispered the news to his partner. Both sweated through an afternoon of rehearsal in which nothing seemed to go right. At the end, the two walked to the back of the theatre, expecting an angry reaction from Molnár. Instead, the playwright said enthusiastically, "What you have done is so beautiful. And you know what I like best? The ending!" Hammerstein wrote that Molnár became a regular attendee at rehearsals after that. Like most of the pair's works, Carousel contains a lengthy ballet, "Billy Makes a Journey", in the second act, as Billy looks down to the Earth from "Up There" and observes his daughter. In the original production the ballet was choreographed by de Mille. It began with Billy looking down from heaven at his wife in labor, with the village women gathered for a "birthing". The ballet involved every character in the play, some of whom spoke lines of dialogue, and contained a number of subplots. The focus was on Louise, played by Bambi Linn, who at first almost soars in her dance, expressing the innocence of childhood. She is teased and mocked by her schoolmates, and Louise becomes attracted to the rough carnival people, who symbolize Billy's world. A youth from the carnival attempts to seduce Louise, as she discovers her own sexuality, but he decides she is more girl than woman, and he leaves her. After Julie comforts her, Louise goes to a children's party, where she is shunned. The carnival people reappear and form a ring around the children's party, with Louise lost between the two groups. At the end, the performers form a huge carousel with their bodies. The play opened for tryouts in New Haven, Connecticut on March 22, 1945. The first act was well-received; the second act was not. Casto recalled that the second act finished about 1:30 a.m. The staff immediately sat down for a two-hour conference. Five scenes, half the ballet, and two songs were cut from the show as the result. John Fearnley commented, "Now I see why these people have hits. I never witnessed anything so brisk and brave in my life." De Mille said of this conference, "not three minutes had been wasted pleading for something cherished. Nor was there any idle joking. ... We cut and cut and cut and then we went to bed." By the time the company left New Haven, de Mille's ballet was down to forty minutes. A major concern with the second act was the effectiveness of the characters He and She (later called by Rodgers "Mr. and Mrs. God"), before whom Billy appeared after his death. Mr. and Mrs. God were depicted as a New England minister and his wife, seen in their parlor.Block (ed.), p. 129. At this time, according to the cast sheet distributed during the Boston run, Dr. Seldon was listed as the "Minister". The couple was still part of the show at the Boston opening. Rodgers said to Hammerstein, "We've got to get God out of that parlor". When Hammerstein inquired where he should put the deity, Rodgers replied, "I don't care where you put Him. Put Him on a ladder for all I care, only get Him out of that parlor!" Hammerstein duly put Mr. God (renamed the Starkeeper) atop a ladder, and Mrs. God was removed from the show. Rodgers biographer Meryle Secrest terms this change a mistake, leading to a more fantastic afterlife, which was later criticized by The New Republic as "a Rotarian atmosphere congenial to audiences who seek not reality but escape from reality, not truth but escape from truth". Hammerstein wrote that Molnár's advice, to combine two scenes into one, was key to pulling together the second act and represented "a more radical departure from the original than any change we had made". A reprise of "If I Loved You" was added in the second act, which Rodgers felt needed more music. Three weeks of tryouts in Boston followed the brief New Haven run, and the audience there gave the musical a warm reception. An even shorter version of the ballet was presented the final two weeks in Boston, but on the final night there, de Mille expanded it back to forty minutes, and it brought the house down, causing both Rodgers and Hammerstein to embrace her. Synopsis Act 1 Two young female millworkers in 1873 Maine visit the town's carousel after work. One of them, Julie Jordan, attracts the attention of the barker, Billy Bigelow ("The Carousel Waltz"). When Julie lets Billy put his arm around her during the ride, Mrs. Mullin, the widowed owner of the carousel, tells Julie never to return. Julie and her friend, Carrie Pipperidge, argue with Mrs. Mullin. Billy arrives and, seeing that Mrs. Mullin is jealous, mocks her; he is fired from his job. Billy, unconcerned, invites Julie to join him for a drink. As he goes to get his belongings, Carrie presses Julie about her feelings toward him, but Julie is evasive ("You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan"). Carrie has a beau too, fisherman Enoch Snow ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow"), to whom she is newly engaged. Billy returns for Julie as the departing Carrie warns that staying out late means the loss of Julie's job. Mr. Bascombe, owner of the mill, happens by along with a policeman, and offers to escort Julie to her home, but she refuses and is fired. Left alone, she and Billy talk about what life might be like if they were in love, but neither quite confesses to the growing attraction they feel for each other ("If I Loved You"). Over a month passes, and preparations for the summer clambake are under way ("June Is Bustin' Out All Over"). Julie and Billy, now married, live at Julie's cousin Nettie's spa. Julie confides in Carrie that Billy, frustrated over being unemployed, hit her. Carrie has happier news—she is engaged to Enoch, who enters as she discusses him ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow (reprise))". Billy arrives with his ne'er-do-well whaler friend, Jigger. The former barker is openly rude to Enoch and Julie, then leaves with Jigger, followed by a distraught Julie. Enoch tells Carrie that he expects to become rich selling herring and to have a large family, larger perhaps than Carrie is comfortable having ("When the Children Are Asleep"). Jigger and his shipmates, joined by Billy, then sing about life on the sea ("Blow High, Blow Low"). The whaler tries to recruit Billy to help with a robbery, but Billy declines, as the victim—Julie's former boss, Mr. Bascombe—might have to be killed. Mrs. Mullin enters and tries to tempt Billy back to the carousel (and to her). He would have to abandon Julie; a married barker cannot evoke the same sexual tension as one who is single. Billy reluctantly mulls it over as Julie arrives and the others leave. She tells him that she is pregnant, and Billy is overwhelmed with happiness, ending all thoughts of returning to the carousel. Once alone, Billy imagines the fun he will have with Bill Jr.—until he realizes that his child might be a girl, and reflects soberly that "you've got to be a father to a girl" ("Soliloquy"). Determined to provide financially for his future child, whatever the means, Billy decides to be Jigger's accomplice. The whole town leaves for the clambake. Billy, who had earlier refused to go, agrees to join in, to Julie's delight, as he realizes that being seen at the clambake is integral to his and Jigger's alibi ("Act I Finale"). Act 2 Everyone reminisces about the huge meal and much fun ("This Was a Real Nice Clambake"). Jigger tries to seduce Carrie; Enoch walks in at the wrong moment, and declares that he is finished with her ("Geraniums In the Winder"), as Jigger jeers ("There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman"). The girls try to comfort Carrie, but for Julie all that matters is that "he's your feller and you love him" ("What's the Use of Wond'rin'?"). Julie sees Billy trying to sneak away with Jigger and, trying to stop him, feels the knife hidden in his shirt. She begs him to give it to her, but he refuses and leaves to commit the robbery. As they wait, Jigger and Billy gamble with cards. They stake their shares of the anticipated robbery spoils. Billy loses: his participation is now pointless. Unknown to Billy and Jigger, Mr. Bascombe, the intended victim, has already deposited the mill's money. The robbery fails: Bascombe pulls a gun on Billy while Jigger escapes. Billy stabs himself with his knife; Julie arrives just in time for him to say his last words to her and die. Julie strokes his hair, finally able to tell him that she loved him. Carrie and Enoch, reunited by the crisis, attempt to console Julie; Nettie arrives and gives Julie the resolve to keep going despite her despair ("You'll Never Walk Alone"). Billy's defiant spirit ("The Highest Judge of All") is taken Up There to see the Starkeeper, a heavenly official. The Starkeeper tells Billy that the good he did in life was not enough to get into heaven, but so long as there is a person alive who remembers him, he can return for a day to try to do good to redeem himself. He informs Billy that fifteen years have passed on Earth since his suicide, and suggests that Billy can get himself into heaven if he helps his daughter, Louise. He helps Billy look down from heaven to see her (instrumental ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey"). Louise has grown up to be lonely and bitter. The local children ostracize her because her father was a thief and a wife-beater. In the dance, a young ruffian, much like her father at that age, flirts with her and abandons her as too young. The dance concludes, and Billy is anxious to return to Earth and help his daughter. He steals a star to take with him, as the Starkeeper pretends not to notice. Outside Julie's cottage, Carrie describes her visit to New York with the now-wealthy Enoch. Carrie's husband and their many children enter to fetch her—the family must get ready for the high school graduation later that day. Enoch Jr., the oldest son, remains behind to talk with Louise, as Billy and the Heavenly Friend escorting him enter, invisible to the other characters. Louise confides in Enoch Jr. that she plans to run away from home with an acting troupe. He says that he will stop her by marrying her, but that his father will think her an unsuitable match. Louise is outraged: each insults the other's father, and Louise orders Enoch Jr. to go away. Billy, able to make himself visible at will, reveals himself to the sobbing Louise, pretending to be a friend of her father. He offers her a gift—the star he stole from heaven. She refuses it and, frustrated, he slaps her hand. He makes himself invisible, and Louise tells Julie what happened, stating that the slap miraculously felt like a kiss, not a blow—and Julie understands her perfectly. Louise retreats to the house, as Julie notices the star that Billy dropped; she picks it up and seems to feel Billy's presence ("If I Loved You (Reprise)"). Billy invisibly attends Louise's graduation, hoping for one last chance to help his daughter and redeem himself. The beloved town physician, Dr. Seldon (who resembles the Starkeeper) advises the graduating class not to rely on their parents' success or be held back by their failure (words directed at Louise). Seldon prompts everyone to sing an old song, "You'll Never Walk Alone". Billy, still invisible, whispers to Louise, telling her to believe Seldon's words, and when she tentatively reaches out to another girl, she learns she does not have to be an outcast. Billy goes to Julie, telling her at last that he loved her. As his widow and daughter join in the singing, Billy is taken to his heavenly reward. Principal roles and notable performers ° denotes original Broadway cast Musical numbers Act I"List of Songs", Carousel at the IBDB Database. Retrieved July 18, 2012 "The Carousel Waltz" – Orchestra "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan" – Carrie Pipperidge and Julie Jordan "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" – Carrie "If I Loved You" – Billy Bigelow and Julie "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" – Nettie Fowler and Chorus "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" (reprise) – Carrie, Enoch Snow and Female Chorus "When the Children Are Asleep" – Enoch and Carrie "Blow High, Blow Low" – Jigger Craigin, Billy and Male Chorus "Soliloquy" – BillyAct II "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" – Carrie, Nettie, Julie, Enoch and Chorus "Geraniums in the Winder" – Enoch * "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" – Jigger and Chorus "What's the Use of Wond'rin'?" – Julie "You'll Never Walk Alone" – Nettie "The Highest Judge of All" – Billy Ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey" – Orchestra "If I Loved You" (reprise) – Billy Finale: "You'll Never Walk Alone" (reprise) – Company Productions Early productions The original Broadway production opened at the Majestic Theatre on April 19, 1945. The dress rehearsal the day before had gone badly, and the pair feared the new work would not be well received. One successful last-minute change was to have de Mille choreograph the pantomime. The movement of the carnival crowd in the pantomime had been entrusted to Mamoulian, and his version was not working. Rodgers had injured his back the previous week, and he watched the opening from a stretcher propped in a box behind the curtain. Sedated with morphine, he could see only part of the stage. As he could not hear the audience's applause and laughter, he assumed the show was a failure. It was not until friends congratulated him later that evening that he realized that the curtain had been met by wild applause. Bambi Linn, who played Louise, was so enthusiastically received by the audience during her ballet that she was forced to break character, when she next appeared, and bow. Rodgers' daughter Mary caught sight of her friend, Stephen Sondheim, both teenagers then, across several rows; both had eyes wet with tears. The original production ran for 890 performances, closing on May 24, 1947. The original cast included John Raitt (Billy), Jan Clayton (Julie), Jean Darling (Carrie), Eric Mattson (Enoch Snow), Christine Johnson (Nettie Fowler), Murvyn Vye (Jigger), Bambi Linn (Louise) and Russell Collins (Starkeeper). In December 1945, Clayton left to star in the Broadway revival of Show Boat and was replaced by Iva Withers; Raitt was replaced by Henry Michel in January 1947; Darling was replaced by Margot Moser.Hischak, p. 62 After closing on Broadway, the show went on a national tour for two years. It played for five months in Chicago alone, visited twenty states and two Canadian cities, covered and played to nearly two million people. The touring company had a four-week run at New York City Center in January 1949. Following the City Center run, the show was moved back to the Majestic Theatre in the hopes of filling the theatre until South Pacific opened in early April. However, ticket sales were mediocre, and the show closed almost a month early. The musical premiered in the West End, London, at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on June 7, 1950. The production was restaged by Jerome Whyte, with a cast that included Stephen Douglass (Billy), Iva Withers (Julie) and Margot Moser (Carrie). Carousel ran in London for 566 performances, remaining there for over a year and a half. Subsequent productions Carousel was revived in 1954 and 1957 at City Center, presented by the New York City Center Light Opera Company. Both times, the production featured Barbara Cook, though she played Carrie in 1954 and Julie in 1957 (playing alongside Howard Keel as Billy). The production was then taken to Belgium to be performed at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair, with David Atkinson as Billy, Ruth Kobart as Nettie, and Clayton reprising the role of Julie, which she had originated. In August 1965, Rodgers and the Music Theater of Lincoln Center produced Carousel for 47 performances. John Raitt reprised the role of Billy, with Jerry Orbach as Jigger and Reid Shelton as Enoch Snow. The roles of the Starkeeper and Dr. Seldon were played by Edward Everett Horton in his final stage appearance. The following year, New York City Center Light Opera Company brought Carousel back to City Center for 22 performances, with Bruce Yarnell as Billy and Constance Towers as Julie. Nicholas Hytner directed a new production of Carousel in 1992, at London's Royal National Theatre, with choreography by Sir Kenneth MacMillan and designs by Bob Crowley. In this staging, the story begins at the mill, where Julie and Carrie work, with the music slowed down to emphasize the drudgery. After work ends, they move to the shipyards and then to the carnival. As they proceed on a revolving stage, carnival characters appear, and at last the carousel is assembled onstage for the girls to ride.Block, p. 175 Louise is seduced by the ruffian boy during her Act 2 ballet, set around the ruins of a carousel. Michael Hayden played Billy not as a large, gruff man, but as a frustrated smaller one, a time bomb waiting to explode. Hayden, Joanna Riding (Julie) and Janie Dee (Carrie) all won Olivier Awards for their performances. Patricia Routledge played Nettie. Enoch and Carrie were cast as an interracial couple whose eight children, according to the review in The New York Times, looked like "a walking United Colors of Benetton ad". Clive Rowe, as Enoch, was nominated for an Olivier Award. The production's limited run from December 1992 through March 1993 was a sellout. It re-opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London in September 1993, presented by Cameron Mackintosh, where it continued until May 1994. The Hytner production moved to New York's Vivian Beaumont Theater, where it opened on March 24, 1994, and ran for 322 performances. This won five Tony Awards, including best musical revival, as well as awards for Hytner, MacMillan, Crowley and Audra McDonald (as Carrie). The cast also included Sally Murphy as Julie, Shirley Verrett as Nettie, Fisher Stevens as Jigger and Eddie Korbich as Enoch. One change made from the London to the New York production was to have Billy strike Louise across the face, rather than on the hand. According to Hayden, "He does the one unpardonable thing, the thing we can't forgive. It's a challenge for the audience to like him after that." The Hytner Carousel was presented in Japan in May 1995. A U.S. national tour with a scaled-down production began in February 1996 in Houston and closed in May 1997 in Providence, Rhode Island. Producers sought to feature young talent on the tour, with Patrick Wilson as Billy and Sarah Uriarte Berry, and later Jennifer Laura Thompson, as Julie. A revival opened at London's Savoy Theatre on December 2, 2008, after a week of previews, starring Jeremiah James (Billy), Alexandra Silber (Julie) and Lesley Garrett (Nettie). The production received warm to mixed reviews. It closed in June 2009, a month early. Michael Coveney, writing in The Independent, admired Rodgers' music but stated, "Lindsay Posner's efficient revival doesn't hold a candle to the National Theatre 1992 version". A production at Theater Basel, Switzerland, in 2016 to 2017, with German dialogue, was directed by Alexander Charim and choreographed by Teresa Rotemberg. Bryony Dwyer, Christian Miedl and Cheryl Studer starred, respectively, as Julie Jordan, Billy Bigelow and Nettie Fowler.<ref>[http://operabase.com/diary.cgi?lang=en&code=wsba&date=20161215 "Richard Rodgers: Carousel"] , Diary: Theater Basel, Operabase.com. Retrieved on March 8, 2018</ref> A semi-staged revival by the English National Opera opened at the London Coliseum in 2017. The production was directed by Lonny Price, conducted by David Charles Abell, and starred Alfie Boe as Billy, Katherine Jenkins as Julie and Nicholas Lyndhurst as the Starkeeper. The production received mixed to positive reviews. The third Broadway revival began previews in February 2018 at the Imperial Theatre and officially opened on April 12. It closed on September 16, 2018. The production starred Jessie Mueller, Joshua Henry, Renée Fleming, Lindsay Mendez and Alexander Gemignani. The production was directed by Jack O'Brien and choreographed by Justin Peck. The songs "Geraniums in the Winder" and "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" were cut from this revival. Ben Brantley wrote in The New York Times, "The tragic inevitability of Carousel has seldom come across as warmly or as chillingly as it does in this vividly reimagined revival. ... [W]ith thoughtful and powerful performances by Mr. Henry and Ms. Mueller, the love story at the show's center has never seemed quite as ill-starred or, at the same time, as sexy. ... [T]he Starkeeper ... assumes new visibility throughout, taking on the role of Billy's angelic supervisor." Brantley strongly praised the choreography, all the performances and the designers. He was unconvinced, however, by the "mother-daughter dialogue that falls so abrasively on contemporary ears", where Julie tries to justify loving an abusive man, and other scenes in Act 2, particularly those set in heaven, and the optimism of the final scene. Most of the reviewers agreed that while the choreography and performances (especially the singing) were excellent, characterizing the production as sexy and sumptuous, O'Brien's direction did little to help the show deal with modern sensibilities about men's treatment of women, instead indulging in nostalgia. From July to September 2021 the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre in London is presenting a staging by its artistic director Timothy Sheader, with choreography by Drew McOnie. The cast includes Carly Bawden as Julie, Declan Bennett as Billy and Joanna Riding as Nettie. Film, television and concert versions [[File:Boothbay Harbor in Summer.jpg\|thumb\|upright=1.2\|Boothbay Harbor, Maine, where the location shots for Carousels movie version were filmed]] A film version of the musical was made in 1956, starring Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones. It follows the musical's story fairly closely, although a prologue, set in the Starkeeper's heaven, was added. The film was released only a few months after the release of the film version of Oklahoma! It garnered some good reviews, and the soundtrack recording was a best seller. As the same stars appeared in both pictures, however, the two films were often compared, generally to the disadvantage of Carousel. Thomas Hischak, in The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, later wondered "if the smaller number of Carousel stage revivals is the product of this often-lumbering [film] musical". There was also an abridged (100 minute) 1967 network television version that starred Robert Goulet, with choreography by Edward Villella. The New York Philharmonic presented a staged concert version of the musical from February 28 to March 2, 2013, at Avery Fisher Hall. Kelli O'Hara played Julie, with Nathan Gunn as Billy, Stephanie Blythe as Nettie, Jessie Mueller as Carrie, Jason Danieley as Enoch, Shuler Hensley as Jigger, John Cullum as the Starkeeper, and Kate Burton as Mrs. Mullin. Tiler Peck danced the role of Louise to choreography by Warren Carlyle. The production was directed by John Rando and conducted by Rob Fisher. Charles Isherwood of The New York Times wrote, "this is as gorgeously sung a production of this sublime 1945 Broadway musical as you are ever likely to hear." It was broadcast as part of the PBS Live from Lincoln Center series, premiering on April 26, 2013. Music and recordings Musical treatment Rodgers designed Carousel to be an almost continuous stream of music, especially in Act 1. In later years, Rodgers was asked if he had considered writing an opera. He stated that he had been sorely tempted to, but saw Carousel in operatic terms. He remembered, "We came very close to opera in the Majestic Theatre. ... There's much that is operatic in the music." Rodgers uses music in Carousel in subtle ways to differentiate characters and tell the audience of their emotional state. In "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan", the music for the placid Carrie is characterized by even eighth-note rhythms, whereas the emotionally restless Julie's music is marked by dotted eighths and sixteenths; this rhythm will characterize her throughout the show. When Billy whistles a snatch of the song, he selects Julie's dotted notes rather than Carrie's. Reflecting the close association in the music between Julie and the as-yet unborn Louise, when Billy sings in "Soliloquy" of his daughter, who "gets hungry every night", he uses Julie's dotted rhythms. Such rhythms also characterize Julie's Act 2 song, "What's the Use of Wond'rin'". The stable love between Enoch and Carrie is strengthened by her willingness to let Enoch not only plan his entire life, but hers as well. This is reflected in "When the Children Are Asleep", where the two sing in close harmony, but Enoch musically interrupts his intended's turn at the chorus with the words "Dreams that won't be interrupted". Rodgers biographer Geoffrey Block, in his book on the Broadway musical, points out that though Billy may strike his wife, he allows her musical themes to become a part of him and never interrupts her music. Block suggests that, as reprehensible as Billy may be for his actions, Enoch requiring Carrie to act as "the little woman", and his having nine children with her (more than she had found acceptable in "When the Children are Asleep") can be considered to be even more abusive. The twelve-minute "bench scene", in which Billy and Julie get to know each other and which culminates with "If I Loved You", according to Hischak, "is considered the most completely integrated piece of music-drama in the American musical theatre". The scene is almost entirely drawn from Molnár and is one extended musical piece; Stephen Sondheim described it as "probably the single most important moment in the revolution of contemporary musicals". "If I Loved You" has been recorded many times, by such diverse artists as Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Sammy Davis Jr., Mario Lanza and Chad and Jeremy. The D-flat major theme that dominates the music for the second act ballet seems like a new melody to many audience members. It is, however, a greatly expanded development of a theme heard during "Soliloquy" at the line "I guess he'll call me 'The old man' ". When the pair discussed the song that would become "Soliloquy", Rodgers improvised at the piano to give Hammerstein an idea of how he envisioned the song. When Hammerstein presented his collaborator with the lyrics after two weeks of work (Hammerstein always wrote the words first, then Rodgers would write the melodies), Rodgers wrote the music for the eight-minute song in two hours. "What's the Use of Wond'rin' ", one of Julie's songs, worked well in the show but was never as popular on the radio or for recording, and Hammerstein believed that the lack of popularity was because he had concluded the final line, "And all the rest is talk" with a hard consonant, which does not allow the singer a vocal climax. Irving Berlin later stated that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had the same sort of effect on him as the 23rd Psalm. When singer Mel Tormé told Rodgers that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had made him cry, Rodgers nodded impatiently. "You're supposed to." The frequently recorded song has become a widely accepted hymn.Rodgers, p. 240 The cast recording of Carousel proved popular in Liverpool, like many Broadway albums, and in 1963, the Brian Epstein-managed band, Gerry and the Pacemakers had a number-one hit with the song. At the time, the top ten hits were played before Liverpool F.C. home matches; even after "You'll Never Walk Alone" dropped out of the top ten, fans continued to sing it, and it has become closely associated with the soccer team and the city of Liverpool. A BBC program, Soul Music, ranked it alongside "Silent Night" and "Abide With Me" in terms of its emotional impact and iconic status. Recordings The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut—as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made.Fick, David. "The Best Carousel Recording", June 11, 2009. Retrieved on April 7, 2016 A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousels songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. Critical reception and legacy The musical received almost unanimous rave reviews after its opening in 1945. According to Hischak, reviews were not as exuberant as for Oklahoma! as the critics were not taken by surprise this time. John Chapman of the Daily News termed it "one of the finest musical plays I have ever seen and I shall remember it always". The New York Times's reviewer, Lewis Nichols, stated that "Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein 2d, who can do no wrong, have continued doing no wrong in adapting Liliom into a musical play. Their Carousel is on the whole delightful." Wilella Waldorf of the New York Post, however, complained, "Carousel seemed to us a rather long evening. The Oklahoma! formula is becoming a bit monotonous and so are Miss de Mille's ballets. All right, go ahead and shoot!"Suskin, Steven. Opening Night on Broadway. Schirmer Trade Books, 1990, p. 147. . Dance Magazine gave Linn plaudits for her role as Louise, stating, "Bambi doesn't come on until twenty minutes before eleven, and for the next forty minutes, she practically holds the audience in her hand". Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune also applauded the dancing: "It has waited for Miss de Mille to come through with peculiarly American dance patterns for a musical show to become as much a dance as a song show." When the musical returned to New York in 1949, The New York Times reviewer Brooks Atkinson described Carousel as "a conspicuously superior musical play ... Carousel, which was warmly appreciated when it opened, seems like nothing less than a masterpiece now." In 1954, when Carousel was revived at City Center, Atkinson discussed the musical in his review: Carousel has no comment to make on anything of topical importance. The theme is timeless and universal: the devotion of two people who love each other through thick and thin, complicated in this case by the wayward personality of the man, who cannot fulfill the responsibilities he has assumed. ... Billy is a bum, but Carousel recognizes the decency of his motives and admires his independence. There are no slick solutions in Carousel. Stephen Sondheim noted the duo's ability to take the innovations of Oklahoma! and apply them to a serious setting: "Oklahoma! is about a picnic, Carousel is about life and death." Critic Eric Bentley, on the other hand, wrote that "the last scene of Carousel is an impertinence: I refuse to be lectured to by a musical comedy scriptwriter on the education of children, the nature of the good life, and the contribution of the American small town to the salvation of souls."New York Times critic Frank Rich said of the 1992 London production: "What is remarkable about Mr. Hytner's direction, aside from its unorthodox faith in the virtues of simplicity and stillness, is its ability to make a 1992 audience believe in Hammerstein's vision of redemption, which has it that a dead sinner can return to Earth to do godly good." The Hytner production in New York was hailed by many critics as a grittier Carousel, which they deemed more appropriate for the 1990s. Clive Barnes of the New York Post called it a "defining Carousel—hard-nosed, imaginative, and exciting." Critic Michael Billington has commented that "lyrically [Carousel] comes perilously close to acceptance of the inevitability of domestic violence." BroadwayWorld.com stated in 2013 that Carousel is now "considered somewhat controversial in terms of its attitudes on domestic violence" because Julie chooses to stay with Billy despite the abuse; actress Kelli O'Hara noted that the domestic violence that Julie "chooses to deal with – is a real, existing and very complicated thing. And exploring it is an important part of healing it." Rodgers considered Carousel his favorite of all his musicals and wrote, "it affects me deeply every time I see it performed". In 1999, Time magazine, in its "Best of the Century" list, named Carousel the Best Musical of the 20th century, writing that Rodgers and Hammerstein "set the standards for the 20th century musical, and this show features their most beautiful score and the most skillful and affecting example of their musical storytelling". Hammerstein's grandson, Oscar Andrew Hammerstein, in his book about his family, suggested that the wartime situation made Carousel's ending especially poignant to its original viewers, "Every American grieved the loss of a brother, son, father, or friend ... the audience empathized with [Billy's] all-too-human efforts to offer advice, to seek forgiveness, to complete an unfinished life, and to bid a proper good-bye from beyond the grave." Author and composer Ethan Mordden agreed with that perspective: If Oklahoma! developed the moral argument for sending American boys overseas, Carousel offered consolation to those wives and mothers whose boys would only return in spirit. The meaning lay not in the tragedy of the present, but in the hope for a future where no one walks alone. Awards and nominations Original 1945 Broadway productionNote: The Tony Awards were not established until 1947, and so Carousel was not eligible to win any Tonys at its premiere. 1957 revival 1992 London revival 1994 Broadway revival 2018 Broadway revival References Bibliography Block, Geoffrey. Enchanted Evenings: The Broadway Musical from Show Boat to Sondheim. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2004. . Block, Geoffrey (ed.) The Richard Rodgers Reader. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2006. . Bradley, Ian. You've Got to Have a Dream: The Message of the Broadway Musical. Louisville, Ky., Westminster John Knox Press, 2005. 978-0-664-22854-5. Easton, Carol. No Intermission: The Life of Agnes DeMille. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 2000 (1st DaCapo Press edition). . Fordin, Hugh. Getting to Know Him: A Biography of Oscar Hammerstein II. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 1995 reprint of 1986 edition. . Hammerstein, Oscar Andrew. The Hammersteins: A Musical Theatre Family. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 2010. . Hischak, Thomas S. The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2007. . Hyland, William G. Richard Rodgers. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1998. . Molnár, Ferenc. Liliom: A Legend in Seven Scenes and a Prologue. New York: Boni and Liveright, 1921. Mordden, Ethan. "Rodgers & Hammerstein". New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1992. . Nolan, Frederick. The Sound of Their Music: The Story of Rodgers and Hammerstein. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2002. . Rodgers, Richard. Musical Stages: An Autobiography. Jefferson, N.C. Da Capo Press, 2002 reprint of 1975 edition. . Secrest, Meryle. Somewhere for Me: A Biography of Richard Rodgers. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2001. . External links Carousel at guidetomusicaltheatre.com Carousel info page on StageAgent.com – Carousel plot summary and character descriptions (1967 TV adaptation) 1945 musicals Broadway musicals Musicals by Rodgers and Hammerstein West End musicals Musicals based on plays Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients Maine in fiction Fiction set in 1873 Fiction about the afterlife Plays set in Maine Plays set in the 19th century Tony Award-winning musicals	true	[ "The Stoomcarrousel is an attraction of the Efteling amusement park in the Netherlands. It is an indoor carousel situated in what is now known as the \"Carousel Palace\" (in Dutch \"Carrouselpaleis\"; formerly \"De Efteling Stoomcarrousel\" (\"Efteling Steam Carousel\") and originally \"Janvier's Stoomcaroussel\" (\"Janvier's Steam Carousel\").\n\nHistory\n\nThe carousel, dating from 1895, was bought by Efteling from Hendrik Janvier, who had toured with it to local funfairs, and has been operating in the park since 11 May 1956. Hendrik Janvier (1868-1932), considered to be the founding father of the salon carousel, sold the Carousel because of the high costs and declining income. Building the ride up took 4 days and it had to be transported with 25 train carriages and trucks.\n\nRumour has it that Anton Pieck, the most important creative designer of Efteling, pushed for the purchase, because he rode the carousel as a child in Haarlem.\n\nThere also is a bar area within the salon carousel. The area surrounding these carousels was normally used for entertainment, eating and dancing in past times. \n\nIn 1956 the carousel was the only attraction in the building, but in 1966 the Water Organ, in 1971 the Diorama and in 1972 the Victorian Theater were also set up in the Carousel Palace.\n\nThe ride\n\nAlthough the mechanics are still visible, the carousel was only powered by a König steam centre engine (under license from Savages) until the 1970s; nowadays it is powered by electricity. The seats of the carousel are in the form of animals, such as 22 Hübner horses and 2 Karl Müller carved pigs (with clown thumbing his nose at the riders behind), and 4 carved Moulina gondolas and coaches, all turning to the music of an original Gavioli organ (only 5 remaining worldwide). The steps for mounting the horses and entering the gondola are fixed to the ride platform. The ride moves on a rail track under the platform, with cams to rock the animals and swing the gondolas.\n\nRide length: 2 minutes \nRide capacity: 750 passengers/ hour\n\nExternal links\nEfteling site\nFansite\nNational Carousel Association\n\nCarousels\nEfteling\nAmusement rides introduced in 1895", "The Paragon Park Carousel (PTC #85) is a historic carousel at 1 Wharf Avenue in Hull, Massachusetts. Built in 1928 by the Philadelphia Toboggan Company, it is one of the state's only surviving four-wide carousels, and is the only surviving element of the Paragon Park amusement park. The carousel was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999.\n\nDescription and history\nThe Paragon Park Carousel is located in southern Hull, on a parcel bounded by Nantasket Avenue, George Washington Boulevard, and Wharf Avenue. Across Nantasket Avenue is Nantasket Beach, a recreation area that has been a well-known summer getaway destination since the 19th century. The carousel is in a stucco-walled single-story twelve-sided building, with a broad bellcast roof. The roof has deep eaves, with exposed rafters. Each face of the building has a garage-style lifting door, above which is a band of four windows. The shape of the building's roof was custom-designed to house the carousel, which has an unusual scalloped top with barrel vaults. The interior of these vaults is painted with a cloud-dotted sky, with the rim decorated with cherubs, cartouches, and international scenery. The carousel consists of a series of wooden sweeps, braced by brackets. All of the horses mounted on the outside rank are stationary, while there are a combination of fixed and moving horses on the inner ranks. There are two Roman-style chariots, each \"pulled\" by two horses. There are a total of 66 horses, of which 42 move.\n\nThe first carousel at Paragon Park was built in 1920 by the Philadelphia Toboggan Company (PTC). The present carousel was also built by the PTC, in 1928. It is believed to contain elements manufactured by the Dentzel Carousel Company, whose assets were purchased by PTC in 1928. It is one of 18 four-wide carousels manufactured by the company, and one of only two four-wide pre-1950 carousels in the state. A Wurlitzer #146-B Band Organ with a Wurlitzer #153 facade provides the carousel’s music and it is owned by Bill Luca. Of the Paragon Park rides, it is the only still on what were the park grounds; the Giant Coaster still survives as The Wild One at Six Flags America in Maryland.\n\nThe carousel was operated as part of Paragon Park until the park closed in 1984. Its parts were auctioned off, but most were purchased by a locally organized preservation committee. In 1986 it was moved a short distance to its present location. It is now operated by the Friends of the Paragon Carousel.\n\nSee also\nNational Register of Historic Places listings in Plymouth County, Massachusetts\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nOfficial Site of the Paragon Park Carousel\n\nCarousels in Massachusetts\nAmusement rides introduced in 1928\nHull, Massachusetts\nBuildings and structures in Plymouth County, Massachusetts\nTourist attractions in Plymouth County, Massachusetts\nNational Register of Historic Places in Plymouth County, Massachusetts\n1928 establishments in Massachusetts\nCarousels on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts" ]
[ "Carousel (musical)", "Musical treatment", "What was important with Carousel?", "The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s," ]	C_8decf249a7ee4c6bb84aa0f61f4f4d6c_0	What kind of music was used?	2	What kind of music was used in the musical Carousel?	Carousel (musical)	The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut--as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made. A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousel's songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. CANNOTANSWER	The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars,	Carousel is the second musical by the team of Richard Rodgers (music) and Oscar Hammerstein II (book and lyrics). The 1945 work was adapted from Ferenc Molnár's 1909 play Liliom, transplanting its Budapest setting to the Maine coastline. The story revolves around carousel barker Billy Bigelow, whose romance with millworker Julie Jordan comes at the price of both their jobs. He participates in a robbery to provide for Julie and their unborn child; after it goes tragically wrong, he is given a chance to make things right. A secondary plot line deals with millworker Carrie Pipperidge and her romance with ambitious fisherman Enoch Snow. The show includes the well-known songs "If I Loved You", "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" and "You'll Never Walk Alone". Richard Rodgers later wrote that Carousel was his favorite of all his musicals. Following the spectacular success of the first Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Oklahoma! (1943), the pair sought to collaborate on another piece, knowing that any resulting work would be compared with Oklahoma!, most likely unfavorably. They were initially reluctant to seek the rights to Liliom; Molnár had refused permission for the work to be adapted in the past, and the original ending was considered too depressing for the musical theatre. After acquiring the rights, the team created a work with lengthy sequences of music and made the ending more hopeful. The musical required considerable modification during out-of-town tryouts, but once it opened on Broadway on April 19, 1945, it was an immediate hit with both critics and audiences. Carousel initially ran for 890 performances and duplicated its success in the West End in 1950. Though it has never achieved as much commercial success as Oklahoma!, the piece has been repeatedly revived, recorded several times and was filmed in 1956. A production by Nicholas Hytner enjoyed success in 1992 in London, in 1994 in New York and on tour. Another Broadway revival opened in 2018. In 1999, Time magazine named Carousel the best musical of the 20th century. Background Liliom Ferenc Molnár's Hungarian-language drama, Liliom, premiered in Budapest in 1909. The audience was puzzled by the work, and it lasted only thirty-odd performances before being withdrawn, the first shadow on Molnár's successful career as a playwright. Liliom was not presented again until after World War I. When it reappeared on the Budapest stage, it was a tremendous hit. Except for the ending, the plots of Liliom and Carousel are very similar. Andreas Zavocky (nicknamed Liliom, the Hungarian word for "lily", a slang term for "tough guy"), a carnival barker, falls in love with Julie Zeller, a servant girl, and they begin living together. With both discharged from their jobs, Liliom is discontented and contemplates leaving Julie, but decides not to do so on learning that she is pregnant. A subplot involves Julie's friend Marie, who has fallen in love with Wolf Biefeld, a hotel porter—after the two marry, he becomes the owner of the hotel. Desperate to make money so that he, Julie and their child can escape to America and a better life, Liliom conspires with lowlife Ficsur to commit a robbery, but it goes badly, and Liliom stabs himself. He dies, and his spirit is taken to heaven's police court. As Ficsur suggested while the two waited to commit the crime, would-be robbers like them do not come before God Himself. Liliom is told by the magistrate that he may go back to Earth for one day to attempt to redeem the wrongs he has done to his family, but must first spend sixteen years in a fiery purgatory. On his return to Earth, Liliom encounters his daughter, Louise, who like her mother is now a factory worker. Saying that he knew her father, he tries to give her a star he stole from the heavens. When Louise refuses to take it, he strikes her. Not realizing who he is, Julie confronts him, but finds herself unable to be angry with him. Liliom is ushered off to his fate, presumably Hell, and Louise asks her mother if it is possible to feel a hard slap as if it was a kiss. Julie reminiscently tells her daughter that it is very possible for that to happen. An English translation of Liliom was credited to Benjamin "Barney" Glazer, though there is a story that the actual translator, uncredited, was Rodgers' first major partner Lorenz Hart. The Theatre Guild presented it in New York City in 1921, with Joseph Schildkraut as Liliom, and the play was a success, running 300 performances. A 1940 revival with Burgess Meredith and Ingrid Bergman was seen by both Hammerstein and Rodgers. Glazer, in introducing the English translation of Liliom, wrote of the play's appeal: And where in modern dramatic literature can such pearls be matched—Julie incoherently confessing to her dead lover the love she had always been ashamed to tell; Liliom crying out to the distant carousel the glad news that he is to be a father; the two thieves gambling for the spoils of their prospective robbery; Marie and Wolf posing for their portrait while the broken-hearted Julie stands looking after the vanishing Liliom, the thieves' song ringing in her ears; the two policemen grousing about pay and pensions while Liliom lies bleeding to death; Liliom furtively proffering his daughter the star he has stolen for her in heaven. ... The temptation to count the whole scintillating string is difficult to resist. Inception In the 1920s and 1930s, Rodgers and Hammerstein both became well known for creating Broadway hits with other partners. Rodgers, with Lorenz Hart, had produced a string of over two dozen musicals, including such popular successes as Babes in Arms (1937), The Boys from Syracuse (1938) and Pal Joey (1940). Some of Rodgers' work with Hart broke new ground in musical theatre: On Your Toes was the first use of ballet to sustain the plot (in the "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue" scene), while Pal Joey flouted Broadway tradition by presenting a knave as its hero. Hammerstein had written or co-written the words for such hits as Rose-Marie (1924), The Desert Song (1926), The New Moon (1927) and Show Boat (1927). Though less productive in the 1930s, he wrote material for musicals and films, sharing an Oscar for his song with Jerome Kern, "The Last Time I Saw Paris", which was included in the 1941 film Lady Be Good. By the early 1940s, Hart had sunk into alcoholism and emotional turmoil, becoming unreliable and prompting Rodgers to approach Hammerstein to ask if he would consider working with him. Hammerstein was eager to do so, and their first collaboration was Oklahoma! (1943). Thomas Hischak states, in his The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, that Oklahoma! is "the single most influential work in the American musical theatre. In fact, the history of the Broadway musical can accurately be divided into what came before Oklahoma! and what came after it." An innovation for its time in integrating song, character, plot and dance, Oklahoma! would serve, according to Hischak, as "the model for Broadway shows for decades", and proved a huge popular and financial success. Once it was well-launched, what to do as an encore was a daunting challenge for the pair. Film producer Samuel Goldwyn saw Oklahoma! and advised Rodgers to shoot himself, which according to Rodgers "was Sam's blunt but funny way of telling me that I'd never create another show as good as Oklahoma!" As they considered new projects, Hammerstein wrote, "We're such fools. No matter what we do, everyone is bound to say, 'This is not another Oklahoma! " Oklahoma! had been a struggle to finance and produce. Hammerstein and Rodgers met weekly in 1943 with Theresa Helburn and Lawrence Langner of the Theatre Guild, producers of the blockbuster musical, who together formed what they termed "the Gloat Club". At one such luncheon, Helburn and Langner proposed to Rodgers and Hammerstein that they turn Molnár's Liliom into a musical. Both men refused—they had no feeling for the Budapest setting and thought that the unhappy ending was unsuitable for musical theatre. In addition, given the unstable wartime political situation, they might need to change the setting from Hungary while in rehearsal. At the next luncheon, Helburn and Langner again proposed Liliom, suggesting that they move the setting to Louisiana and make Liliom a Creole. Rodgers and Hammerstein played with the idea over the next few weeks, but decided that Creole dialect, filled with "zis" and "zose", would sound corny and would make it difficult to write effective lyrics. A breakthrough came when Rodgers, who owned a house in Connecticut, proposed a New England setting. Hammerstein wrote of this suggestion in 1945, I began to see an attractive ensemble—sailors, whalers, girls who worked in the mills up the river, clambakes on near-by islands, an amusement park on the seaboard, things people could do in crowds, people who were strong and alive and lusty, people who had always been depicted on the stage as thin-lipped puritans—a libel I was anxious to refute ... as for the two leading characters, Julie with her courage and inner strength and outward simplicity seemed more indigenous to Maine than to Budapest. Liliom is, of course, an international character, indigenous to nowhere. Rodgers and Hammerstein were also concerned about what they termed "the tunnel" of Molnár's second act—a series of gloomy scenes leading up to Liliom's suicide—followed by a dark ending. They also felt it would be difficult to set Liliom's motivation for the robbery to music. Molnár's opposition to having his works adapted was also an issue; he had famously turned down Giacomo Puccini when the great composer wished to transform Liliom into an opera, stating that he wanted the piece to be remembered as his, not Puccini's. In 1937, Molnár, who had recently emigrated to the United States, had declined another offer from Kurt Weill to adapt the play into a musical. The pair continued to work on the preliminary ideas for a Liliom adaptation while pursuing other projects in late 1943 and early 1944—writing the film musical State Fair and producing I Remember Mama on Broadway. Meanwhile, the Theatre Guild took Molnár to see Oklahoma! Molnár stated that if Rodgers and Hammerstein could adapt Liliom as beautifully as they had modified Green Grow the Lilacs into Oklahoma!, he would be pleased to have them do it. The Guild obtained the rights from Molnár in October 1943. The playwright received one percent of the gross and $2,500 for "personal services". The duo insisted, as part of the contract, that Molnár permit them to make changes in the plot. At first, the playwright refused, but eventually yielded. Hammerstein later stated that if this point had not been won, "we could never have made Carousel." In seeking to establish through song Liliom's motivation for the robbery, Rodgers remembered that he and Hart had a similar problem in Pal Joey. Rodgers and Hart had overcome the problem with a song that Joey sings to himself, "I'm Talking to My Pal". This inspired "Soliloquy". Both partners later told a story that "Soliloquy" was only intended to be a song about Liliom's dreams of a son, but that Rodgers, who had two daughters, insisted that Liliom consider that Julie might have a girl. However, the notes taken at their meeting of December 7, 1943 state: "Mr. Rodgers suggested a fine musical number for the end of the scene where Liliom discovers he is to be a father, in which he sings first with pride of the growth of a boy, and then suddenly realizes it might be a girl and changes completely." Hammerstein and Rodgers returned to the Liliom project in mid-1944. Hammerstein was uneasy as he worked, fearing that no matter what they did, Molnár would disapprove of the results. Green Grow the Lilacs had been a little-known work; Liliom was a theatrical standard. Molnár's text also contained considerable commentary on the Hungarian politics of 1909 and the rigidity of that society. A dismissed carnival barker who hits his wife, attempts a robbery and commits suicide seemed an unlikely central character for a musical comedy. Hammerstein decided to use the words and story to make the audience sympathize with the lovers. He also built up the secondary couple, who are incidental to the plot in Liliom; they became Enoch Snow and Carrie Pipperidge. "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" was repurposed from a song, "A Real Nice Hayride", written for Oklahoma! but not used. Molnár's ending was unsuitable, and after a couple of false starts, Hammerstein conceived the graduation scene that ends the musical. According to Frederick Nolan in his book on the team's works: "From that scene the song "You'll Never Walk Alone" sprang almost naturally." In spite of Hammerstein's simple lyrics for "You'll Never Walk Alone", Rodgers had great difficulty in setting it to music. Rodgers explained his rationale for the changed ending, Liliom was a tragedy about a man who cannot learn to live with other people. The way Molnár wrote it, the man ends up hitting his daughter and then having to go back to purgatory, leaving his daughter helpless and hopeless. We couldn't accept that. The way we ended Carousel it may still be a tragedy but it's a hopeful one because in the final scene it is clear that the child has at last learned how to express herself and communicate with others. When the pair decided to make "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" into an ensemble number, Hammerstein realized he had no idea what a clambake was like, and researched the matter. Based on his initial findings, he wrote the line, "First came codfish chowder". However, further research convinced him the proper term was "codhead chowder", a term unfamiliar to many playgoers. He decided to keep it as "codfish". When the song proceeded to discuss the lobsters consumed at the feast, Hammerstein wrote the line "We slit 'em down the back/And peppered 'em good". He was grieved to hear from a friend that lobsters are always slit down the front. The lyricist sent a researcher to a seafood restaurant and heard back that lobsters are always slit down the back. Hammerstein concluded that there is disagreement about which side of a lobster is the back. One error not caught involved the song "June Is Bustin' Out All Over", in which sheep are depicted as seeking to mate in late spring—they actually do so in the winter. Whenever this was brought to Hammerstein's attention, he told his informant that 1873 was a special year, in which sheep mated in the spring. Rodgers early decided to dispense with an overture, feeling that the music was hard to hear over the banging of seats as latecomers settled themselves. In his autobiography, Rodgers complained that only the brass section can be heard during an overture because there are never enough strings in a musical's small orchestra. He determined to force the audience to concentrate from the beginning by opening with a pantomime scene accompanied by what became known as "The Carousel Waltz". The pantomime paralleled one in the Molnár play, which was also used to introduce the characters and situation to the audience. Author Ethan Mordden described the effectiveness of this opening: Other characters catch our notice—Mr. Bascombe, the pompous mill owner, Mrs. Mullin, the widow who runs the carousel and, apparently, Billy; a dancing bear; an acrobat. But what draws us in is the intensity with which Julie regards Billy—the way she stands frozen, staring at him, while everyone else at the fair is swaying to the rhythm of Billy's spiel. And as Julie and Billy ride together on the swirling carousel, and the stage picture surges with the excitement of the crowd, and the orchestra storms to a climax, and the curtain falls, we realize that R & H have not only skipped the overture and the opening number but the exposition as well. They have plunged into the story, right into the middle of it, in the most intense first scene any musical ever had. Casting and out-of-town tryouts The casting for Carousel began when Oklahoma!s production team, including Rodgers and Hammerstein, was seeking a replacement for the part of Curly (the male lead in Oklahoma!). Lawrence Langner had heard, through a relative, of a California singer named John Raitt, who might be suitable for the part. Langner went to hear Raitt, then urged the others to bring Raitt to New York for an audition. Raitt asked to sing "Largo al factotum", Figaro's aria from The Barber of Seville, to warm up. The warmup was sufficient to convince the producers that not only had they found a Curly, they had found a Liliom (or Billy Bigelow, as the part was renamed). Theresa Helburn made another California discovery, Jan Clayton, a singer/actress who had made a few minor films for MGM. She was brought east and successfully auditioned for the part of Julie. The producers sought to cast unknowns. Though many had played in previous Hammerstein or Rodgers works, only one, Jean Casto (cast as carousel owner Mrs. Mullin, and a veteran of Pal Joey), had ever played on Broadway before. It proved harder to cast the ensemble than the leads, due to the war—Rodgers told his casting director, John Fearnley, that the sole qualification for a dancing boy was that he be alive. Rodgers and Hammerstein reassembled much of the creative team that had made Oklahoma! a success, including director Rouben Mamoulian and choreographer Agnes de Mille. Miles White was the costume designer while Jo Mielziner (who had not worked on Oklahoma!) was the scenic and lighting designer. Even though Oklahoma! orchestrator Russell Bennett had informed Rodgers that he was unavailable to work on Carousel due to a radio contract, Rodgers insisted he do the work in his spare time. He orchestrated "The Carousel Waltz" and "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" before finally being replaced by Don Walker. A new member of the creative team was Trude Rittmann, who arranged the dance music. Rittmann initially felt that Rodgers mistrusted her because she was a woman, and found him difficult to work with, but the two worked together on Rodgers' shows until the 1970s. Rehearsals began in January 1945; either Rodgers or Hammerstein was always present. Raitt was presented with the lyrics for "Soliloquy" on a five-foot long sheet of paper—the piece ran nearly eight minutes. Staging such a long solo number presented problems, and Raitt later stated that he felt that they were never fully addressed. At some point during rehearsals, Molnár came to see what they had done to his play. There are a number of variations on the story.Fordin, pp. 231–32 As Rodgers told it, while watching rehearsals with Hammerstein, the composer spotted Molnár in the rear of the theatre and whispered the news to his partner. Both sweated through an afternoon of rehearsal in which nothing seemed to go right. At the end, the two walked to the back of the theatre, expecting an angry reaction from Molnár. Instead, the playwright said enthusiastically, "What you have done is so beautiful. And you know what I like best? The ending!" Hammerstein wrote that Molnár became a regular attendee at rehearsals after that. Like most of the pair's works, Carousel contains a lengthy ballet, "Billy Makes a Journey", in the second act, as Billy looks down to the Earth from "Up There" and observes his daughter. In the original production the ballet was choreographed by de Mille. It began with Billy looking down from heaven at his wife in labor, with the village women gathered for a "birthing". The ballet involved every character in the play, some of whom spoke lines of dialogue, and contained a number of subplots. The focus was on Louise, played by Bambi Linn, who at first almost soars in her dance, expressing the innocence of childhood. She is teased and mocked by her schoolmates, and Louise becomes attracted to the rough carnival people, who symbolize Billy's world. A youth from the carnival attempts to seduce Louise, as she discovers her own sexuality, but he decides she is more girl than woman, and he leaves her. After Julie comforts her, Louise goes to a children's party, where she is shunned. The carnival people reappear and form a ring around the children's party, with Louise lost between the two groups. At the end, the performers form a huge carousel with their bodies. The play opened for tryouts in New Haven, Connecticut on March 22, 1945. The first act was well-received; the second act was not. Casto recalled that the second act finished about 1:30 a.m. The staff immediately sat down for a two-hour conference. Five scenes, half the ballet, and two songs were cut from the show as the result. John Fearnley commented, "Now I see why these people have hits. I never witnessed anything so brisk and brave in my life." De Mille said of this conference, "not three minutes had been wasted pleading for something cherished. Nor was there any idle joking. ... We cut and cut and cut and then we went to bed." By the time the company left New Haven, de Mille's ballet was down to forty minutes. A major concern with the second act was the effectiveness of the characters He and She (later called by Rodgers "Mr. and Mrs. God"), before whom Billy appeared after his death. Mr. and Mrs. God were depicted as a New England minister and his wife, seen in their parlor.Block (ed.), p. 129. At this time, according to the cast sheet distributed during the Boston run, Dr. Seldon was listed as the "Minister". The couple was still part of the show at the Boston opening. Rodgers said to Hammerstein, "We've got to get God out of that parlor". When Hammerstein inquired where he should put the deity, Rodgers replied, "I don't care where you put Him. Put Him on a ladder for all I care, only get Him out of that parlor!" Hammerstein duly put Mr. God (renamed the Starkeeper) atop a ladder, and Mrs. God was removed from the show. Rodgers biographer Meryle Secrest terms this change a mistake, leading to a more fantastic afterlife, which was later criticized by The New Republic as "a Rotarian atmosphere congenial to audiences who seek not reality but escape from reality, not truth but escape from truth". Hammerstein wrote that Molnár's advice, to combine two scenes into one, was key to pulling together the second act and represented "a more radical departure from the original than any change we had made". A reprise of "If I Loved You" was added in the second act, which Rodgers felt needed more music. Three weeks of tryouts in Boston followed the brief New Haven run, and the audience there gave the musical a warm reception. An even shorter version of the ballet was presented the final two weeks in Boston, but on the final night there, de Mille expanded it back to forty minutes, and it brought the house down, causing both Rodgers and Hammerstein to embrace her. Synopsis Act 1 Two young female millworkers in 1873 Maine visit the town's carousel after work. One of them, Julie Jordan, attracts the attention of the barker, Billy Bigelow ("The Carousel Waltz"). When Julie lets Billy put his arm around her during the ride, Mrs. Mullin, the widowed owner of the carousel, tells Julie never to return. Julie and her friend, Carrie Pipperidge, argue with Mrs. Mullin. Billy arrives and, seeing that Mrs. Mullin is jealous, mocks her; he is fired from his job. Billy, unconcerned, invites Julie to join him for a drink. As he goes to get his belongings, Carrie presses Julie about her feelings toward him, but Julie is evasive ("You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan"). Carrie has a beau too, fisherman Enoch Snow ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow"), to whom she is newly engaged. Billy returns for Julie as the departing Carrie warns that staying out late means the loss of Julie's job. Mr. Bascombe, owner of the mill, happens by along with a policeman, and offers to escort Julie to her home, but she refuses and is fired. Left alone, she and Billy talk about what life might be like if they were in love, but neither quite confesses to the growing attraction they feel for each other ("If I Loved You"). Over a month passes, and preparations for the summer clambake are under way ("June Is Bustin' Out All Over"). Julie and Billy, now married, live at Julie's cousin Nettie's spa. Julie confides in Carrie that Billy, frustrated over being unemployed, hit her. Carrie has happier news—she is engaged to Enoch, who enters as she discusses him ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow (reprise))". Billy arrives with his ne'er-do-well whaler friend, Jigger. The former barker is openly rude to Enoch and Julie, then leaves with Jigger, followed by a distraught Julie. Enoch tells Carrie that he expects to become rich selling herring and to have a large family, larger perhaps than Carrie is comfortable having ("When the Children Are Asleep"). Jigger and his shipmates, joined by Billy, then sing about life on the sea ("Blow High, Blow Low"). The whaler tries to recruit Billy to help with a robbery, but Billy declines, as the victim—Julie's former boss, Mr. Bascombe—might have to be killed. Mrs. Mullin enters and tries to tempt Billy back to the carousel (and to her). He would have to abandon Julie; a married barker cannot evoke the same sexual tension as one who is single. Billy reluctantly mulls it over as Julie arrives and the others leave. She tells him that she is pregnant, and Billy is overwhelmed with happiness, ending all thoughts of returning to the carousel. Once alone, Billy imagines the fun he will have with Bill Jr.—until he realizes that his child might be a girl, and reflects soberly that "you've got to be a father to a girl" ("Soliloquy"). Determined to provide financially for his future child, whatever the means, Billy decides to be Jigger's accomplice. The whole town leaves for the clambake. Billy, who had earlier refused to go, agrees to join in, to Julie's delight, as he realizes that being seen at the clambake is integral to his and Jigger's alibi ("Act I Finale"). Act 2 Everyone reminisces about the huge meal and much fun ("This Was a Real Nice Clambake"). Jigger tries to seduce Carrie; Enoch walks in at the wrong moment, and declares that he is finished with her ("Geraniums In the Winder"), as Jigger jeers ("There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman"). The girls try to comfort Carrie, but for Julie all that matters is that "he's your feller and you love him" ("What's the Use of Wond'rin'?"). Julie sees Billy trying to sneak away with Jigger and, trying to stop him, feels the knife hidden in his shirt. She begs him to give it to her, but he refuses and leaves to commit the robbery. As they wait, Jigger and Billy gamble with cards. They stake their shares of the anticipated robbery spoils. Billy loses: his participation is now pointless. Unknown to Billy and Jigger, Mr. Bascombe, the intended victim, has already deposited the mill's money. The robbery fails: Bascombe pulls a gun on Billy while Jigger escapes. Billy stabs himself with his knife; Julie arrives just in time for him to say his last words to her and die. Julie strokes his hair, finally able to tell him that she loved him. Carrie and Enoch, reunited by the crisis, attempt to console Julie; Nettie arrives and gives Julie the resolve to keep going despite her despair ("You'll Never Walk Alone"). Billy's defiant spirit ("The Highest Judge of All") is taken Up There to see the Starkeeper, a heavenly official. The Starkeeper tells Billy that the good he did in life was not enough to get into heaven, but so long as there is a person alive who remembers him, he can return for a day to try to do good to redeem himself. He informs Billy that fifteen years have passed on Earth since his suicide, and suggests that Billy can get himself into heaven if he helps his daughter, Louise. He helps Billy look down from heaven to see her (instrumental ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey"). Louise has grown up to be lonely and bitter. The local children ostracize her because her father was a thief and a wife-beater. In the dance, a young ruffian, much like her father at that age, flirts with her and abandons her as too young. The dance concludes, and Billy is anxious to return to Earth and help his daughter. He steals a star to take with him, as the Starkeeper pretends not to notice. Outside Julie's cottage, Carrie describes her visit to New York with the now-wealthy Enoch. Carrie's husband and their many children enter to fetch her—the family must get ready for the high school graduation later that day. Enoch Jr., the oldest son, remains behind to talk with Louise, as Billy and the Heavenly Friend escorting him enter, invisible to the other characters. Louise confides in Enoch Jr. that she plans to run away from home with an acting troupe. He says that he will stop her by marrying her, but that his father will think her an unsuitable match. Louise is outraged: each insults the other's father, and Louise orders Enoch Jr. to go away. Billy, able to make himself visible at will, reveals himself to the sobbing Louise, pretending to be a friend of her father. He offers her a gift—the star he stole from heaven. She refuses it and, frustrated, he slaps her hand. He makes himself invisible, and Louise tells Julie what happened, stating that the slap miraculously felt like a kiss, not a blow—and Julie understands her perfectly. Louise retreats to the house, as Julie notices the star that Billy dropped; she picks it up and seems to feel Billy's presence ("If I Loved You (Reprise)"). Billy invisibly attends Louise's graduation, hoping for one last chance to help his daughter and redeem himself. The beloved town physician, Dr. Seldon (who resembles the Starkeeper) advises the graduating class not to rely on their parents' success or be held back by their failure (words directed at Louise). Seldon prompts everyone to sing an old song, "You'll Never Walk Alone". Billy, still invisible, whispers to Louise, telling her to believe Seldon's words, and when she tentatively reaches out to another girl, she learns she does not have to be an outcast. Billy goes to Julie, telling her at last that he loved her. As his widow and daughter join in the singing, Billy is taken to his heavenly reward. Principal roles and notable performers ° denotes original Broadway cast Musical numbers Act I"List of Songs", Carousel at the IBDB Database. Retrieved July 18, 2012 "The Carousel Waltz" – Orchestra "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan" – Carrie Pipperidge and Julie Jordan "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" – Carrie "If I Loved You" – Billy Bigelow and Julie "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" – Nettie Fowler and Chorus "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" (reprise) – Carrie, Enoch Snow and Female Chorus "When the Children Are Asleep" – Enoch and Carrie "Blow High, Blow Low" – Jigger Craigin, Billy and Male Chorus "Soliloquy" – BillyAct II "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" – Carrie, Nettie, Julie, Enoch and Chorus "Geraniums in the Winder" – Enoch * "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" – Jigger and Chorus "What's the Use of Wond'rin'?" – Julie "You'll Never Walk Alone" – Nettie "The Highest Judge of All" – Billy Ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey" – Orchestra "If I Loved You" (reprise) – Billy Finale: "You'll Never Walk Alone" (reprise) – Company Productions Early productions The original Broadway production opened at the Majestic Theatre on April 19, 1945. The dress rehearsal the day before had gone badly, and the pair feared the new work would not be well received. One successful last-minute change was to have de Mille choreograph the pantomime. The movement of the carnival crowd in the pantomime had been entrusted to Mamoulian, and his version was not working. Rodgers had injured his back the previous week, and he watched the opening from a stretcher propped in a box behind the curtain. Sedated with morphine, he could see only part of the stage. As he could not hear the audience's applause and laughter, he assumed the show was a failure. It was not until friends congratulated him later that evening that he realized that the curtain had been met by wild applause. Bambi Linn, who played Louise, was so enthusiastically received by the audience during her ballet that she was forced to break character, when she next appeared, and bow. Rodgers' daughter Mary caught sight of her friend, Stephen Sondheim, both teenagers then, across several rows; both had eyes wet with tears. The original production ran for 890 performances, closing on May 24, 1947. The original cast included John Raitt (Billy), Jan Clayton (Julie), Jean Darling (Carrie), Eric Mattson (Enoch Snow), Christine Johnson (Nettie Fowler), Murvyn Vye (Jigger), Bambi Linn (Louise) and Russell Collins (Starkeeper). In December 1945, Clayton left to star in the Broadway revival of Show Boat and was replaced by Iva Withers; Raitt was replaced by Henry Michel in January 1947; Darling was replaced by Margot Moser.Hischak, p. 62 After closing on Broadway, the show went on a national tour for two years. It played for five months in Chicago alone, visited twenty states and two Canadian cities, covered and played to nearly two million people. The touring company had a four-week run at New York City Center in January 1949. Following the City Center run, the show was moved back to the Majestic Theatre in the hopes of filling the theatre until South Pacific opened in early April. However, ticket sales were mediocre, and the show closed almost a month early. The musical premiered in the West End, London, at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on June 7, 1950. The production was restaged by Jerome Whyte, with a cast that included Stephen Douglass (Billy), Iva Withers (Julie) and Margot Moser (Carrie). Carousel ran in London for 566 performances, remaining there for over a year and a half. Subsequent productions Carousel was revived in 1954 and 1957 at City Center, presented by the New York City Center Light Opera Company. Both times, the production featured Barbara Cook, though she played Carrie in 1954 and Julie in 1957 (playing alongside Howard Keel as Billy). The production was then taken to Belgium to be performed at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair, with David Atkinson as Billy, Ruth Kobart as Nettie, and Clayton reprising the role of Julie, which she had originated. In August 1965, Rodgers and the Music Theater of Lincoln Center produced Carousel for 47 performances. John Raitt reprised the role of Billy, with Jerry Orbach as Jigger and Reid Shelton as Enoch Snow. The roles of the Starkeeper and Dr. Seldon were played by Edward Everett Horton in his final stage appearance. The following year, New York City Center Light Opera Company brought Carousel back to City Center for 22 performances, with Bruce Yarnell as Billy and Constance Towers as Julie. Nicholas Hytner directed a new production of Carousel in 1992, at London's Royal National Theatre, with choreography by Sir Kenneth MacMillan and designs by Bob Crowley. In this staging, the story begins at the mill, where Julie and Carrie work, with the music slowed down to emphasize the drudgery. After work ends, they move to the shipyards and then to the carnival. As they proceed on a revolving stage, carnival characters appear, and at last the carousel is assembled onstage for the girls to ride.Block, p. 175 Louise is seduced by the ruffian boy during her Act 2 ballet, set around the ruins of a carousel. Michael Hayden played Billy not as a large, gruff man, but as a frustrated smaller one, a time bomb waiting to explode. Hayden, Joanna Riding (Julie) and Janie Dee (Carrie) all won Olivier Awards for their performances. Patricia Routledge played Nettie. Enoch and Carrie were cast as an interracial couple whose eight children, according to the review in The New York Times, looked like "a walking United Colors of Benetton ad". Clive Rowe, as Enoch, was nominated for an Olivier Award. The production's limited run from December 1992 through March 1993 was a sellout. It re-opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London in September 1993, presented by Cameron Mackintosh, where it continued until May 1994. The Hytner production moved to New York's Vivian Beaumont Theater, where it opened on March 24, 1994, and ran for 322 performances. This won five Tony Awards, including best musical revival, as well as awards for Hytner, MacMillan, Crowley and Audra McDonald (as Carrie). The cast also included Sally Murphy as Julie, Shirley Verrett as Nettie, Fisher Stevens as Jigger and Eddie Korbich as Enoch. One change made from the London to the New York production was to have Billy strike Louise across the face, rather than on the hand. According to Hayden, "He does the one unpardonable thing, the thing we can't forgive. It's a challenge for the audience to like him after that." The Hytner Carousel was presented in Japan in May 1995. A U.S. national tour with a scaled-down production began in February 1996 in Houston and closed in May 1997 in Providence, Rhode Island. Producers sought to feature young talent on the tour, with Patrick Wilson as Billy and Sarah Uriarte Berry, and later Jennifer Laura Thompson, as Julie. A revival opened at London's Savoy Theatre on December 2, 2008, after a week of previews, starring Jeremiah James (Billy), Alexandra Silber (Julie) and Lesley Garrett (Nettie). The production received warm to mixed reviews. It closed in June 2009, a month early. Michael Coveney, writing in The Independent, admired Rodgers' music but stated, "Lindsay Posner's efficient revival doesn't hold a candle to the National Theatre 1992 version". A production at Theater Basel, Switzerland, in 2016 to 2017, with German dialogue, was directed by Alexander Charim and choreographed by Teresa Rotemberg. Bryony Dwyer, Christian Miedl and Cheryl Studer starred, respectively, as Julie Jordan, Billy Bigelow and Nettie Fowler.<ref>[http://operabase.com/diary.cgi?lang=en&code=wsba&date=20161215 "Richard Rodgers: Carousel"] , Diary: Theater Basel, Operabase.com. Retrieved on March 8, 2018</ref> A semi-staged revival by the English National Opera opened at the London Coliseum in 2017. The production was directed by Lonny Price, conducted by David Charles Abell, and starred Alfie Boe as Billy, Katherine Jenkins as Julie and Nicholas Lyndhurst as the Starkeeper. The production received mixed to positive reviews. The third Broadway revival began previews in February 2018 at the Imperial Theatre and officially opened on April 12. It closed on September 16, 2018. The production starred Jessie Mueller, Joshua Henry, Renée Fleming, Lindsay Mendez and Alexander Gemignani. The production was directed by Jack O'Brien and choreographed by Justin Peck. The songs "Geraniums in the Winder" and "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" were cut from this revival. Ben Brantley wrote in The New York Times, "The tragic inevitability of Carousel has seldom come across as warmly or as chillingly as it does in this vividly reimagined revival. ... [W]ith thoughtful and powerful performances by Mr. Henry and Ms. Mueller, the love story at the show's center has never seemed quite as ill-starred or, at the same time, as sexy. ... [T]he Starkeeper ... assumes new visibility throughout, taking on the role of Billy's angelic supervisor." Brantley strongly praised the choreography, all the performances and the designers. He was unconvinced, however, by the "mother-daughter dialogue that falls so abrasively on contemporary ears", where Julie tries to justify loving an abusive man, and other scenes in Act 2, particularly those set in heaven, and the optimism of the final scene. Most of the reviewers agreed that while the choreography and performances (especially the singing) were excellent, characterizing the production as sexy and sumptuous, O'Brien's direction did little to help the show deal with modern sensibilities about men's treatment of women, instead indulging in nostalgia. From July to September 2021 the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre in London is presenting a staging by its artistic director Timothy Sheader, with choreography by Drew McOnie. The cast includes Carly Bawden as Julie, Declan Bennett as Billy and Joanna Riding as Nettie. Film, television and concert versions [[File:Boothbay Harbor in Summer.jpg\|thumb\|upright=1.2\|Boothbay Harbor, Maine, where the location shots for Carousels movie version were filmed]] A film version of the musical was made in 1956, starring Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones. It follows the musical's story fairly closely, although a prologue, set in the Starkeeper's heaven, was added. The film was released only a few months after the release of the film version of Oklahoma! It garnered some good reviews, and the soundtrack recording was a best seller. As the same stars appeared in both pictures, however, the two films were often compared, generally to the disadvantage of Carousel. Thomas Hischak, in The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, later wondered "if the smaller number of Carousel stage revivals is the product of this often-lumbering [film] musical". There was also an abridged (100 minute) 1967 network television version that starred Robert Goulet, with choreography by Edward Villella. The New York Philharmonic presented a staged concert version of the musical from February 28 to March 2, 2013, at Avery Fisher Hall. Kelli O'Hara played Julie, with Nathan Gunn as Billy, Stephanie Blythe as Nettie, Jessie Mueller as Carrie, Jason Danieley as Enoch, Shuler Hensley as Jigger, John Cullum as the Starkeeper, and Kate Burton as Mrs. Mullin. Tiler Peck danced the role of Louise to choreography by Warren Carlyle. The production was directed by John Rando and conducted by Rob Fisher. Charles Isherwood of The New York Times wrote, "this is as gorgeously sung a production of this sublime 1945 Broadway musical as you are ever likely to hear." It was broadcast as part of the PBS Live from Lincoln Center series, premiering on April 26, 2013. Music and recordings Musical treatment Rodgers designed Carousel to be an almost continuous stream of music, especially in Act 1. In later years, Rodgers was asked if he had considered writing an opera. He stated that he had been sorely tempted to, but saw Carousel in operatic terms. He remembered, "We came very close to opera in the Majestic Theatre. ... There's much that is operatic in the music." Rodgers uses music in Carousel in subtle ways to differentiate characters and tell the audience of their emotional state. In "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan", the music for the placid Carrie is characterized by even eighth-note rhythms, whereas the emotionally restless Julie's music is marked by dotted eighths and sixteenths; this rhythm will characterize her throughout the show. When Billy whistles a snatch of the song, he selects Julie's dotted notes rather than Carrie's. Reflecting the close association in the music between Julie and the as-yet unborn Louise, when Billy sings in "Soliloquy" of his daughter, who "gets hungry every night", he uses Julie's dotted rhythms. Such rhythms also characterize Julie's Act 2 song, "What's the Use of Wond'rin'". The stable love between Enoch and Carrie is strengthened by her willingness to let Enoch not only plan his entire life, but hers as well. This is reflected in "When the Children Are Asleep", where the two sing in close harmony, but Enoch musically interrupts his intended's turn at the chorus with the words "Dreams that won't be interrupted". Rodgers biographer Geoffrey Block, in his book on the Broadway musical, points out that though Billy may strike his wife, he allows her musical themes to become a part of him and never interrupts her music. Block suggests that, as reprehensible as Billy may be for his actions, Enoch requiring Carrie to act as "the little woman", and his having nine children with her (more than she had found acceptable in "When the Children are Asleep") can be considered to be even more abusive. The twelve-minute "bench scene", in which Billy and Julie get to know each other and which culminates with "If I Loved You", according to Hischak, "is considered the most completely integrated piece of music-drama in the American musical theatre". The scene is almost entirely drawn from Molnár and is one extended musical piece; Stephen Sondheim described it as "probably the single most important moment in the revolution of contemporary musicals". "If I Loved You" has been recorded many times, by such diverse artists as Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Sammy Davis Jr., Mario Lanza and Chad and Jeremy. The D-flat major theme that dominates the music for the second act ballet seems like a new melody to many audience members. It is, however, a greatly expanded development of a theme heard during "Soliloquy" at the line "I guess he'll call me 'The old man' ". When the pair discussed the song that would become "Soliloquy", Rodgers improvised at the piano to give Hammerstein an idea of how he envisioned the song. When Hammerstein presented his collaborator with the lyrics after two weeks of work (Hammerstein always wrote the words first, then Rodgers would write the melodies), Rodgers wrote the music for the eight-minute song in two hours. "What's the Use of Wond'rin' ", one of Julie's songs, worked well in the show but was never as popular on the radio or for recording, and Hammerstein believed that the lack of popularity was because he had concluded the final line, "And all the rest is talk" with a hard consonant, which does not allow the singer a vocal climax. Irving Berlin later stated that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had the same sort of effect on him as the 23rd Psalm. When singer Mel Tormé told Rodgers that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had made him cry, Rodgers nodded impatiently. "You're supposed to." The frequently recorded song has become a widely accepted hymn.Rodgers, p. 240 The cast recording of Carousel proved popular in Liverpool, like many Broadway albums, and in 1963, the Brian Epstein-managed band, Gerry and the Pacemakers had a number-one hit with the song. At the time, the top ten hits were played before Liverpool F.C. home matches; even after "You'll Never Walk Alone" dropped out of the top ten, fans continued to sing it, and it has become closely associated with the soccer team and the city of Liverpool. A BBC program, Soul Music, ranked it alongside "Silent Night" and "Abide With Me" in terms of its emotional impact and iconic status. Recordings The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut—as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made.Fick, David. "The Best Carousel Recording", June 11, 2009. Retrieved on April 7, 2016 A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousels songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. Critical reception and legacy The musical received almost unanimous rave reviews after its opening in 1945. According to Hischak, reviews were not as exuberant as for Oklahoma! as the critics were not taken by surprise this time. John Chapman of the Daily News termed it "one of the finest musical plays I have ever seen and I shall remember it always". The New York Times's reviewer, Lewis Nichols, stated that "Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein 2d, who can do no wrong, have continued doing no wrong in adapting Liliom into a musical play. Their Carousel is on the whole delightful." Wilella Waldorf of the New York Post, however, complained, "Carousel seemed to us a rather long evening. The Oklahoma! formula is becoming a bit monotonous and so are Miss de Mille's ballets. All right, go ahead and shoot!"Suskin, Steven. Opening Night on Broadway. Schirmer Trade Books, 1990, p. 147. . Dance Magazine gave Linn plaudits for her role as Louise, stating, "Bambi doesn't come on until twenty minutes before eleven, and for the next forty minutes, she practically holds the audience in her hand". Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune also applauded the dancing: "It has waited for Miss de Mille to come through with peculiarly American dance patterns for a musical show to become as much a dance as a song show." When the musical returned to New York in 1949, The New York Times reviewer Brooks Atkinson described Carousel as "a conspicuously superior musical play ... Carousel, which was warmly appreciated when it opened, seems like nothing less than a masterpiece now." In 1954, when Carousel was revived at City Center, Atkinson discussed the musical in his review: Carousel has no comment to make on anything of topical importance. The theme is timeless and universal: the devotion of two people who love each other through thick and thin, complicated in this case by the wayward personality of the man, who cannot fulfill the responsibilities he has assumed. ... Billy is a bum, but Carousel recognizes the decency of his motives and admires his independence. There are no slick solutions in Carousel. Stephen Sondheim noted the duo's ability to take the innovations of Oklahoma! and apply them to a serious setting: "Oklahoma! is about a picnic, Carousel is about life and death." Critic Eric Bentley, on the other hand, wrote that "the last scene of Carousel is an impertinence: I refuse to be lectured to by a musical comedy scriptwriter on the education of children, the nature of the good life, and the contribution of the American small town to the salvation of souls."New York Times critic Frank Rich said of the 1992 London production: "What is remarkable about Mr. Hytner's direction, aside from its unorthodox faith in the virtues of simplicity and stillness, is its ability to make a 1992 audience believe in Hammerstein's vision of redemption, which has it that a dead sinner can return to Earth to do godly good." The Hytner production in New York was hailed by many critics as a grittier Carousel, which they deemed more appropriate for the 1990s. Clive Barnes of the New York Post called it a "defining Carousel—hard-nosed, imaginative, and exciting." Critic Michael Billington has commented that "lyrically [Carousel] comes perilously close to acceptance of the inevitability of domestic violence." BroadwayWorld.com stated in 2013 that Carousel is now "considered somewhat controversial in terms of its attitudes on domestic violence" because Julie chooses to stay with Billy despite the abuse; actress Kelli O'Hara noted that the domestic violence that Julie "chooses to deal with – is a real, existing and very complicated thing. And exploring it is an important part of healing it." Rodgers considered Carousel his favorite of all his musicals and wrote, "it affects me deeply every time I see it performed". In 1999, Time magazine, in its "Best of the Century" list, named Carousel the Best Musical of the 20th century, writing that Rodgers and Hammerstein "set the standards for the 20th century musical, and this show features their most beautiful score and the most skillful and affecting example of their musical storytelling". Hammerstein's grandson, Oscar Andrew Hammerstein, in his book about his family, suggested that the wartime situation made Carousel's ending especially poignant to its original viewers, "Every American grieved the loss of a brother, son, father, or friend ... the audience empathized with [Billy's] all-too-human efforts to offer advice, to seek forgiveness, to complete an unfinished life, and to bid a proper good-bye from beyond the grave." Author and composer Ethan Mordden agreed with that perspective: If Oklahoma! developed the moral argument for sending American boys overseas, Carousel offered consolation to those wives and mothers whose boys would only return in spirit. The meaning lay not in the tragedy of the present, but in the hope for a future where no one walks alone. Awards and nominations Original 1945 Broadway productionNote: The Tony Awards were not established until 1947, and so Carousel was not eligible to win any Tonys at its premiere. 1957 revival 1992 London revival 1994 Broadway revival 2018 Broadway revival References Bibliography Block, Geoffrey. Enchanted Evenings: The Broadway Musical from Show Boat to Sondheim. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2004. . Block, Geoffrey (ed.) The Richard Rodgers Reader. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2006. . Bradley, Ian. You've Got to Have a Dream: The Message of the Broadway Musical. Louisville, Ky., Westminster John Knox Press, 2005. 978-0-664-22854-5. Easton, Carol. No Intermission: The Life of Agnes DeMille. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 2000 (1st DaCapo Press edition). . Fordin, Hugh. Getting to Know Him: A Biography of Oscar Hammerstein II. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 1995 reprint of 1986 edition. . Hammerstein, Oscar Andrew. The Hammersteins: A Musical Theatre Family. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 2010. . Hischak, Thomas S. The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2007. . Hyland, William G. Richard Rodgers. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1998. . Molnár, Ferenc. Liliom: A Legend in Seven Scenes and a Prologue. New York: Boni and Liveright, 1921. Mordden, Ethan. "Rodgers & Hammerstein". New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1992. . Nolan, Frederick. The Sound of Their Music: The Story of Rodgers and Hammerstein. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2002. . Rodgers, Richard. Musical Stages: An Autobiography. Jefferson, N.C. Da Capo Press, 2002 reprint of 1975 edition. . Secrest, Meryle. Somewhere for Me: A Biography of Richard Rodgers. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2001. . External links Carousel at guidetomusicaltheatre.com Carousel info page on StageAgent.com – Carousel plot summary and character descriptions (1967 TV adaptation) 1945 musicals Broadway musicals Musicals by Rodgers and Hammerstein West End musicals Musicals based on plays Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients Maine in fiction Fiction set in 1873 Fiction about the afterlife Plays set in Maine Plays set in the 19th century Tony Award-winning musicals	true	[ "\"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\" is a song recorded by Australian recording artist Kylie Minogue, released as the lead single from her first greatest hits album Greatest Hits (1992). The song was written by Mike Stock, Minogue and Pete Waterman, and produced by Stock and Waterman.\n\nIt was Minogue's last original single to be released from the record label PWL, as although \"Celebration\" was released as the last single, it was a cover version, not an original single. The single was released on 10 August 1992 as a CD single and had received positive reception from music critics, many praising it as a good last single from PWL. The song peaked at number seventeen and fourteen in Australia and the United Kingdom, respectively.\n\nBackground\nThe song was taken from Minogue's first compilation album Greatest Hits as the first single and last original single to be released by her label PWL, but her second single from the album, \"Celebration\", was taken as the last single. The song was written by Stock and Waterman, as well as Minogue contributing in the lyrics and was produced by Stock and Waterman.\n\nThe cover featured Minogue photographed by close friend Katrina Jebb whilst on holiday in early 1992.\n\nReception\n\nCritical response\nThe song received generally mixed reviews from music critics. Some compared the song with \"I Should Be So Lucky\" and \"Better the Devil You Know\", but many suggested the song was regressive in comparison to Minogue's more mature work from the previous two years. Music Week commented, \"Typically bright and breezy, it is however a little slight of melody and hooks when compared to some ofher previous work – but that won't stop it from continuing her unbroken sequence of Top 20 hits.\" Tom Doyle from Smash Hits called it a \"tweety dance anthem\".\n \nMinogue admitted in an interview with the Australian Sunday Telegraph in October 2008, that she was not fond of the song: \"There's plenty I've cringed about,\" she says. \"There's one track I really didn't like called 'What Kind of Fool'. But I realised you can run, but you can't hide, so I embraced 'I Should Be So Lucky' and the rest of them.\" It also became one of Minogue's least performed tracks. It made its debut, as a short sample only on her 2005 tour Showgirl: The Greatest Hits Tour, and again in sample form on her North American Tour 2009. Minogue has also performed a chorus of the song on impromptu occasions during her 2012 Anti Tour and 2014's Kiss Me Once Tour.\n\nChart performance\nThe song did not receive great commercial attention, although became a moderate hit in the UK and Australia where it debuted at number thirty-seven (after five weeks it climbed and peaked at number seventeen.) The song debuted at number sixteen on the UK Singles Chart. later climbing to number fourteen where it peaked, staying in the charts for five weeks.\nThe song debuted at number twenty-two on the Irish Singles Chart, but became unsuccessful, falling off the charts after two weeks.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video features Minogue sunbathing in front of a blanket, while a male actor is behind it with a rose. It later showed the male and Minogue having an argument in a bedroom. In the bridge, it shows Minogue in a blue plaid dress dancing under a spotlight. She later teases her lover and dances atop a table. The music video later ends with Minogue kissing him and she walks out the room, while the man sits on a chair left alone. The song's reception itself became one of Minogue's least successful singles to date. The single's video recreated scenes made famous by Brigitte Bardot in the 1956 film And God Created Woman. The song was featured on MTV Classics channel in 2011 and was listed at number thirty-four on Evolution of... Kylie Minogue.\n\nFormats and track listings\nThese are the formats and track listings of major single releases of \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\".\n\nCD single\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\"\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\" [No Tech No Logical Remix]\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\" [Tech No Logical Remix]\n \"Things Can Only Get Better\" [Original 7\" Mix]\n\n7\" vinyl\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\"\n \"Things Can Only Get Better\" [Original 7\" Mix]\n\n12\" vinyl\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\" [No Tech No Logical Remix]\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\" [Tech No Logical Remix]\n \"Things Can Only Get Better\" [Original 12\" Mix]\n\nCassette single\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\"\n \"Things Can Only Get Better\" [Original 7\" Mix]\n\nDigital EP \n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\"\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\" [No Tech No Logical Remix]\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\" [Tech No Logical Remix]\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\" [12\" Master Mix]\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\" [Instrumental]\n \"What Kind of Fool (Heard All That Before)\" [Backing Track]\n \"Things Can Only Get Better\" [Original 7\" Mix]\n \"Things Can Only Get Better\" [Original 12\" Mix]\n \"Things Can Only Get Better\" [Original Instrumental]\n \"Things Can Only Get Better\" [Original Backing Track]\n\nLive performances\nMinogue performed the song on the following concert tours:\n Showgirl: The Greatest Hits Tour (excerpt during \"Smiley Kylie Medley\")\n Showgirl: The Homecoming Tour (excerpt during \"Everything Taboo Medley\")\n For You, for Me (excerpt during \"Everything Taboo Medley\")\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n1992 singles\n1992 songs\nKylie Minogue songs\nPete Waterman Entertainment singles\nSongs written by Kylie Minogue\nSongs written by Mike Stock (musician)\nSongs written by Pete Waterman", "What Kind of an American are you?, also known as What Kind of American are you?, is a World War I era song released in 1917. Albert Von Tilzer composed the music. Lew Brown and Charles R. McCarron wrote the lyrics. The song was published by Broadway Music Co. of New York, New York. On the cover is a gray drawing of Uncle Sam pointing. A map of the United States is featured on the lower half of the cover. The song was written for voice and piano.\n\nThe sheet music can be found at Pritzker Military Museum & Library.\n\nAnalysis\nThe song urges Americans (specifically immigrants) to use this war to prove their loyalty to the United States; whether that may be by fighting or by simply standing behind the US's actions. For those who show no support, this question is posed: \"What are you doing over here?\" It upholds the \"us-against-them\" mentality; the \"them\" in this case is Germany. The chorus is as follows:\nWhat kind of an American are you?\nIt's time to show what you intend to do\nIf they trample on Old Glory will you think that they are right,\nOr will you stand behind your land and fight with all your might?\nWhat kind of an American are you?\nThat's a question you'll have to answer to\nIf the Star Spangled Banner don't make you stand and cheer,\nThen what are you doing over here?\n\nExternal links\nWhat Kind of an American are You? at Wolfsonian FIU\nWhat Kind of an American are You? at Acumen\n\nReferences\n\nSongs about the United States\nAmerican patriotic songs\n1917 songs\nSongs of World War I\nSongs written by Albert Von Tilzer\nSongs with lyrics by Lew Brown\nSongs with music by Charles McCarron" ]
[ "Carousel (musical)", "Musical treatment", "What was important with Carousel?", "The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s,", "What kind of music was used?", "The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars," ]	C_8decf249a7ee4c6bb84aa0f61f4f4d6c_0	How was music incorporated into the production?	3	How was music incorporated into the production of the musical Carousel?	Carousel (musical)	The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut--as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made. A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousel's songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. CANNOTANSWER	the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format,	Carousel is the second musical by the team of Richard Rodgers (music) and Oscar Hammerstein II (book and lyrics). The 1945 work was adapted from Ferenc Molnár's 1909 play Liliom, transplanting its Budapest setting to the Maine coastline. The story revolves around carousel barker Billy Bigelow, whose romance with millworker Julie Jordan comes at the price of both their jobs. He participates in a robbery to provide for Julie and their unborn child; after it goes tragically wrong, he is given a chance to make things right. A secondary plot line deals with millworker Carrie Pipperidge and her romance with ambitious fisherman Enoch Snow. The show includes the well-known songs "If I Loved You", "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" and "You'll Never Walk Alone". Richard Rodgers later wrote that Carousel was his favorite of all his musicals. Following the spectacular success of the first Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Oklahoma! (1943), the pair sought to collaborate on another piece, knowing that any resulting work would be compared with Oklahoma!, most likely unfavorably. They were initially reluctant to seek the rights to Liliom; Molnár had refused permission for the work to be adapted in the past, and the original ending was considered too depressing for the musical theatre. After acquiring the rights, the team created a work with lengthy sequences of music and made the ending more hopeful. The musical required considerable modification during out-of-town tryouts, but once it opened on Broadway on April 19, 1945, it was an immediate hit with both critics and audiences. Carousel initially ran for 890 performances and duplicated its success in the West End in 1950. Though it has never achieved as much commercial success as Oklahoma!, the piece has been repeatedly revived, recorded several times and was filmed in 1956. A production by Nicholas Hytner enjoyed success in 1992 in London, in 1994 in New York and on tour. Another Broadway revival opened in 2018. In 1999, Time magazine named Carousel the best musical of the 20th century. Background Liliom Ferenc Molnár's Hungarian-language drama, Liliom, premiered in Budapest in 1909. The audience was puzzled by the work, and it lasted only thirty-odd performances before being withdrawn, the first shadow on Molnár's successful career as a playwright. Liliom was not presented again until after World War I. When it reappeared on the Budapest stage, it was a tremendous hit. Except for the ending, the plots of Liliom and Carousel are very similar. Andreas Zavocky (nicknamed Liliom, the Hungarian word for "lily", a slang term for "tough guy"), a carnival barker, falls in love with Julie Zeller, a servant girl, and they begin living together. With both discharged from their jobs, Liliom is discontented and contemplates leaving Julie, but decides not to do so on learning that she is pregnant. A subplot involves Julie's friend Marie, who has fallen in love with Wolf Biefeld, a hotel porter—after the two marry, he becomes the owner of the hotel. Desperate to make money so that he, Julie and their child can escape to America and a better life, Liliom conspires with lowlife Ficsur to commit a robbery, but it goes badly, and Liliom stabs himself. He dies, and his spirit is taken to heaven's police court. As Ficsur suggested while the two waited to commit the crime, would-be robbers like them do not come before God Himself. Liliom is told by the magistrate that he may go back to Earth for one day to attempt to redeem the wrongs he has done to his family, but must first spend sixteen years in a fiery purgatory. On his return to Earth, Liliom encounters his daughter, Louise, who like her mother is now a factory worker. Saying that he knew her father, he tries to give her a star he stole from the heavens. When Louise refuses to take it, he strikes her. Not realizing who he is, Julie confronts him, but finds herself unable to be angry with him. Liliom is ushered off to his fate, presumably Hell, and Louise asks her mother if it is possible to feel a hard slap as if it was a kiss. Julie reminiscently tells her daughter that it is very possible for that to happen. An English translation of Liliom was credited to Benjamin "Barney" Glazer, though there is a story that the actual translator, uncredited, was Rodgers' first major partner Lorenz Hart. The Theatre Guild presented it in New York City in 1921, with Joseph Schildkraut as Liliom, and the play was a success, running 300 performances. A 1940 revival with Burgess Meredith and Ingrid Bergman was seen by both Hammerstein and Rodgers. Glazer, in introducing the English translation of Liliom, wrote of the play's appeal: And where in modern dramatic literature can such pearls be matched—Julie incoherently confessing to her dead lover the love she had always been ashamed to tell; Liliom crying out to the distant carousel the glad news that he is to be a father; the two thieves gambling for the spoils of their prospective robbery; Marie and Wolf posing for their portrait while the broken-hearted Julie stands looking after the vanishing Liliom, the thieves' song ringing in her ears; the two policemen grousing about pay and pensions while Liliom lies bleeding to death; Liliom furtively proffering his daughter the star he has stolen for her in heaven. ... The temptation to count the whole scintillating string is difficult to resist. Inception In the 1920s and 1930s, Rodgers and Hammerstein both became well known for creating Broadway hits with other partners. Rodgers, with Lorenz Hart, had produced a string of over two dozen musicals, including such popular successes as Babes in Arms (1937), The Boys from Syracuse (1938) and Pal Joey (1940). Some of Rodgers' work with Hart broke new ground in musical theatre: On Your Toes was the first use of ballet to sustain the plot (in the "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue" scene), while Pal Joey flouted Broadway tradition by presenting a knave as its hero. Hammerstein had written or co-written the words for such hits as Rose-Marie (1924), The Desert Song (1926), The New Moon (1927) and Show Boat (1927). Though less productive in the 1930s, he wrote material for musicals and films, sharing an Oscar for his song with Jerome Kern, "The Last Time I Saw Paris", which was included in the 1941 film Lady Be Good. By the early 1940s, Hart had sunk into alcoholism and emotional turmoil, becoming unreliable and prompting Rodgers to approach Hammerstein to ask if he would consider working with him. Hammerstein was eager to do so, and their first collaboration was Oklahoma! (1943). Thomas Hischak states, in his The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, that Oklahoma! is "the single most influential work in the American musical theatre. In fact, the history of the Broadway musical can accurately be divided into what came before Oklahoma! and what came after it." An innovation for its time in integrating song, character, plot and dance, Oklahoma! would serve, according to Hischak, as "the model for Broadway shows for decades", and proved a huge popular and financial success. Once it was well-launched, what to do as an encore was a daunting challenge for the pair. Film producer Samuel Goldwyn saw Oklahoma! and advised Rodgers to shoot himself, which according to Rodgers "was Sam's blunt but funny way of telling me that I'd never create another show as good as Oklahoma!" As they considered new projects, Hammerstein wrote, "We're such fools. No matter what we do, everyone is bound to say, 'This is not another Oklahoma! " Oklahoma! had been a struggle to finance and produce. Hammerstein and Rodgers met weekly in 1943 with Theresa Helburn and Lawrence Langner of the Theatre Guild, producers of the blockbuster musical, who together formed what they termed "the Gloat Club". At one such luncheon, Helburn and Langner proposed to Rodgers and Hammerstein that they turn Molnár's Liliom into a musical. Both men refused—they had no feeling for the Budapest setting and thought that the unhappy ending was unsuitable for musical theatre. In addition, given the unstable wartime political situation, they might need to change the setting from Hungary while in rehearsal. At the next luncheon, Helburn and Langner again proposed Liliom, suggesting that they move the setting to Louisiana and make Liliom a Creole. Rodgers and Hammerstein played with the idea over the next few weeks, but decided that Creole dialect, filled with "zis" and "zose", would sound corny and would make it difficult to write effective lyrics. A breakthrough came when Rodgers, who owned a house in Connecticut, proposed a New England setting. Hammerstein wrote of this suggestion in 1945, I began to see an attractive ensemble—sailors, whalers, girls who worked in the mills up the river, clambakes on near-by islands, an amusement park on the seaboard, things people could do in crowds, people who were strong and alive and lusty, people who had always been depicted on the stage as thin-lipped puritans—a libel I was anxious to refute ... as for the two leading characters, Julie with her courage and inner strength and outward simplicity seemed more indigenous to Maine than to Budapest. Liliom is, of course, an international character, indigenous to nowhere. Rodgers and Hammerstein were also concerned about what they termed "the tunnel" of Molnár's second act—a series of gloomy scenes leading up to Liliom's suicide—followed by a dark ending. They also felt it would be difficult to set Liliom's motivation for the robbery to music. Molnár's opposition to having his works adapted was also an issue; he had famously turned down Giacomo Puccini when the great composer wished to transform Liliom into an opera, stating that he wanted the piece to be remembered as his, not Puccini's. In 1937, Molnár, who had recently emigrated to the United States, had declined another offer from Kurt Weill to adapt the play into a musical. The pair continued to work on the preliminary ideas for a Liliom adaptation while pursuing other projects in late 1943 and early 1944—writing the film musical State Fair and producing I Remember Mama on Broadway. Meanwhile, the Theatre Guild took Molnár to see Oklahoma! Molnár stated that if Rodgers and Hammerstein could adapt Liliom as beautifully as they had modified Green Grow the Lilacs into Oklahoma!, he would be pleased to have them do it. The Guild obtained the rights from Molnár in October 1943. The playwright received one percent of the gross and $2,500 for "personal services". The duo insisted, as part of the contract, that Molnár permit them to make changes in the plot. At first, the playwright refused, but eventually yielded. Hammerstein later stated that if this point had not been won, "we could never have made Carousel." In seeking to establish through song Liliom's motivation for the robbery, Rodgers remembered that he and Hart had a similar problem in Pal Joey. Rodgers and Hart had overcome the problem with a song that Joey sings to himself, "I'm Talking to My Pal". This inspired "Soliloquy". Both partners later told a story that "Soliloquy" was only intended to be a song about Liliom's dreams of a son, but that Rodgers, who had two daughters, insisted that Liliom consider that Julie might have a girl. However, the notes taken at their meeting of December 7, 1943 state: "Mr. Rodgers suggested a fine musical number for the end of the scene where Liliom discovers he is to be a father, in which he sings first with pride of the growth of a boy, and then suddenly realizes it might be a girl and changes completely." Hammerstein and Rodgers returned to the Liliom project in mid-1944. Hammerstein was uneasy as he worked, fearing that no matter what they did, Molnár would disapprove of the results. Green Grow the Lilacs had been a little-known work; Liliom was a theatrical standard. Molnár's text also contained considerable commentary on the Hungarian politics of 1909 and the rigidity of that society. A dismissed carnival barker who hits his wife, attempts a robbery and commits suicide seemed an unlikely central character for a musical comedy. Hammerstein decided to use the words and story to make the audience sympathize with the lovers. He also built up the secondary couple, who are incidental to the plot in Liliom; they became Enoch Snow and Carrie Pipperidge. "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" was repurposed from a song, "A Real Nice Hayride", written for Oklahoma! but not used. Molnár's ending was unsuitable, and after a couple of false starts, Hammerstein conceived the graduation scene that ends the musical. According to Frederick Nolan in his book on the team's works: "From that scene the song "You'll Never Walk Alone" sprang almost naturally." In spite of Hammerstein's simple lyrics for "You'll Never Walk Alone", Rodgers had great difficulty in setting it to music. Rodgers explained his rationale for the changed ending, Liliom was a tragedy about a man who cannot learn to live with other people. The way Molnár wrote it, the man ends up hitting his daughter and then having to go back to purgatory, leaving his daughter helpless and hopeless. We couldn't accept that. The way we ended Carousel it may still be a tragedy but it's a hopeful one because in the final scene it is clear that the child has at last learned how to express herself and communicate with others. When the pair decided to make "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" into an ensemble number, Hammerstein realized he had no idea what a clambake was like, and researched the matter. Based on his initial findings, he wrote the line, "First came codfish chowder". However, further research convinced him the proper term was "codhead chowder", a term unfamiliar to many playgoers. He decided to keep it as "codfish". When the song proceeded to discuss the lobsters consumed at the feast, Hammerstein wrote the line "We slit 'em down the back/And peppered 'em good". He was grieved to hear from a friend that lobsters are always slit down the front. The lyricist sent a researcher to a seafood restaurant and heard back that lobsters are always slit down the back. Hammerstein concluded that there is disagreement about which side of a lobster is the back. One error not caught involved the song "June Is Bustin' Out All Over", in which sheep are depicted as seeking to mate in late spring—they actually do so in the winter. Whenever this was brought to Hammerstein's attention, he told his informant that 1873 was a special year, in which sheep mated in the spring. Rodgers early decided to dispense with an overture, feeling that the music was hard to hear over the banging of seats as latecomers settled themselves. In his autobiography, Rodgers complained that only the brass section can be heard during an overture because there are never enough strings in a musical's small orchestra. He determined to force the audience to concentrate from the beginning by opening with a pantomime scene accompanied by what became known as "The Carousel Waltz". The pantomime paralleled one in the Molnár play, which was also used to introduce the characters and situation to the audience. Author Ethan Mordden described the effectiveness of this opening: Other characters catch our notice—Mr. Bascombe, the pompous mill owner, Mrs. Mullin, the widow who runs the carousel and, apparently, Billy; a dancing bear; an acrobat. But what draws us in is the intensity with which Julie regards Billy—the way she stands frozen, staring at him, while everyone else at the fair is swaying to the rhythm of Billy's spiel. And as Julie and Billy ride together on the swirling carousel, and the stage picture surges with the excitement of the crowd, and the orchestra storms to a climax, and the curtain falls, we realize that R & H have not only skipped the overture and the opening number but the exposition as well. They have plunged into the story, right into the middle of it, in the most intense first scene any musical ever had. Casting and out-of-town tryouts The casting for Carousel began when Oklahoma!s production team, including Rodgers and Hammerstein, was seeking a replacement for the part of Curly (the male lead in Oklahoma!). Lawrence Langner had heard, through a relative, of a California singer named John Raitt, who might be suitable for the part. Langner went to hear Raitt, then urged the others to bring Raitt to New York for an audition. Raitt asked to sing "Largo al factotum", Figaro's aria from The Barber of Seville, to warm up. The warmup was sufficient to convince the producers that not only had they found a Curly, they had found a Liliom (or Billy Bigelow, as the part was renamed). Theresa Helburn made another California discovery, Jan Clayton, a singer/actress who had made a few minor films for MGM. She was brought east and successfully auditioned for the part of Julie. The producers sought to cast unknowns. Though many had played in previous Hammerstein or Rodgers works, only one, Jean Casto (cast as carousel owner Mrs. Mullin, and a veteran of Pal Joey), had ever played on Broadway before. It proved harder to cast the ensemble than the leads, due to the war—Rodgers told his casting director, John Fearnley, that the sole qualification for a dancing boy was that he be alive. Rodgers and Hammerstein reassembled much of the creative team that had made Oklahoma! a success, including director Rouben Mamoulian and choreographer Agnes de Mille. Miles White was the costume designer while Jo Mielziner (who had not worked on Oklahoma!) was the scenic and lighting designer. Even though Oklahoma! orchestrator Russell Bennett had informed Rodgers that he was unavailable to work on Carousel due to a radio contract, Rodgers insisted he do the work in his spare time. He orchestrated "The Carousel Waltz" and "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" before finally being replaced by Don Walker. A new member of the creative team was Trude Rittmann, who arranged the dance music. Rittmann initially felt that Rodgers mistrusted her because she was a woman, and found him difficult to work with, but the two worked together on Rodgers' shows until the 1970s. Rehearsals began in January 1945; either Rodgers or Hammerstein was always present. Raitt was presented with the lyrics for "Soliloquy" on a five-foot long sheet of paper—the piece ran nearly eight minutes. Staging such a long solo number presented problems, and Raitt later stated that he felt that they were never fully addressed. At some point during rehearsals, Molnár came to see what they had done to his play. There are a number of variations on the story.Fordin, pp. 231–32 As Rodgers told it, while watching rehearsals with Hammerstein, the composer spotted Molnár in the rear of the theatre and whispered the news to his partner. Both sweated through an afternoon of rehearsal in which nothing seemed to go right. At the end, the two walked to the back of the theatre, expecting an angry reaction from Molnár. Instead, the playwright said enthusiastically, "What you have done is so beautiful. And you know what I like best? The ending!" Hammerstein wrote that Molnár became a regular attendee at rehearsals after that. Like most of the pair's works, Carousel contains a lengthy ballet, "Billy Makes a Journey", in the second act, as Billy looks down to the Earth from "Up There" and observes his daughter. In the original production the ballet was choreographed by de Mille. It began with Billy looking down from heaven at his wife in labor, with the village women gathered for a "birthing". The ballet involved every character in the play, some of whom spoke lines of dialogue, and contained a number of subplots. The focus was on Louise, played by Bambi Linn, who at first almost soars in her dance, expressing the innocence of childhood. She is teased and mocked by her schoolmates, and Louise becomes attracted to the rough carnival people, who symbolize Billy's world. A youth from the carnival attempts to seduce Louise, as she discovers her own sexuality, but he decides she is more girl than woman, and he leaves her. After Julie comforts her, Louise goes to a children's party, where she is shunned. The carnival people reappear and form a ring around the children's party, with Louise lost between the two groups. At the end, the performers form a huge carousel with their bodies. The play opened for tryouts in New Haven, Connecticut on March 22, 1945. The first act was well-received; the second act was not. Casto recalled that the second act finished about 1:30 a.m. The staff immediately sat down for a two-hour conference. Five scenes, half the ballet, and two songs were cut from the show as the result. John Fearnley commented, "Now I see why these people have hits. I never witnessed anything so brisk and brave in my life." De Mille said of this conference, "not three minutes had been wasted pleading for something cherished. Nor was there any idle joking. ... We cut and cut and cut and then we went to bed." By the time the company left New Haven, de Mille's ballet was down to forty minutes. A major concern with the second act was the effectiveness of the characters He and She (later called by Rodgers "Mr. and Mrs. God"), before whom Billy appeared after his death. Mr. and Mrs. God were depicted as a New England minister and his wife, seen in their parlor.Block (ed.), p. 129. At this time, according to the cast sheet distributed during the Boston run, Dr. Seldon was listed as the "Minister". The couple was still part of the show at the Boston opening. Rodgers said to Hammerstein, "We've got to get God out of that parlor". When Hammerstein inquired where he should put the deity, Rodgers replied, "I don't care where you put Him. Put Him on a ladder for all I care, only get Him out of that parlor!" Hammerstein duly put Mr. God (renamed the Starkeeper) atop a ladder, and Mrs. God was removed from the show. Rodgers biographer Meryle Secrest terms this change a mistake, leading to a more fantastic afterlife, which was later criticized by The New Republic as "a Rotarian atmosphere congenial to audiences who seek not reality but escape from reality, not truth but escape from truth". Hammerstein wrote that Molnár's advice, to combine two scenes into one, was key to pulling together the second act and represented "a more radical departure from the original than any change we had made". A reprise of "If I Loved You" was added in the second act, which Rodgers felt needed more music. Three weeks of tryouts in Boston followed the brief New Haven run, and the audience there gave the musical a warm reception. An even shorter version of the ballet was presented the final two weeks in Boston, but on the final night there, de Mille expanded it back to forty minutes, and it brought the house down, causing both Rodgers and Hammerstein to embrace her. Synopsis Act 1 Two young female millworkers in 1873 Maine visit the town's carousel after work. One of them, Julie Jordan, attracts the attention of the barker, Billy Bigelow ("The Carousel Waltz"). When Julie lets Billy put his arm around her during the ride, Mrs. Mullin, the widowed owner of the carousel, tells Julie never to return. Julie and her friend, Carrie Pipperidge, argue with Mrs. Mullin. Billy arrives and, seeing that Mrs. Mullin is jealous, mocks her; he is fired from his job. Billy, unconcerned, invites Julie to join him for a drink. As he goes to get his belongings, Carrie presses Julie about her feelings toward him, but Julie is evasive ("You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan"). Carrie has a beau too, fisherman Enoch Snow ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow"), to whom she is newly engaged. Billy returns for Julie as the departing Carrie warns that staying out late means the loss of Julie's job. Mr. Bascombe, owner of the mill, happens by along with a policeman, and offers to escort Julie to her home, but she refuses and is fired. Left alone, she and Billy talk about what life might be like if they were in love, but neither quite confesses to the growing attraction they feel for each other ("If I Loved You"). Over a month passes, and preparations for the summer clambake are under way ("June Is Bustin' Out All Over"). Julie and Billy, now married, live at Julie's cousin Nettie's spa. Julie confides in Carrie that Billy, frustrated over being unemployed, hit her. Carrie has happier news—she is engaged to Enoch, who enters as she discusses him ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow (reprise))". Billy arrives with his ne'er-do-well whaler friend, Jigger. The former barker is openly rude to Enoch and Julie, then leaves with Jigger, followed by a distraught Julie. Enoch tells Carrie that he expects to become rich selling herring and to have a large family, larger perhaps than Carrie is comfortable having ("When the Children Are Asleep"). Jigger and his shipmates, joined by Billy, then sing about life on the sea ("Blow High, Blow Low"). The whaler tries to recruit Billy to help with a robbery, but Billy declines, as the victim—Julie's former boss, Mr. Bascombe—might have to be killed. Mrs. Mullin enters and tries to tempt Billy back to the carousel (and to her). He would have to abandon Julie; a married barker cannot evoke the same sexual tension as one who is single. Billy reluctantly mulls it over as Julie arrives and the others leave. She tells him that she is pregnant, and Billy is overwhelmed with happiness, ending all thoughts of returning to the carousel. Once alone, Billy imagines the fun he will have with Bill Jr.—until he realizes that his child might be a girl, and reflects soberly that "you've got to be a father to a girl" ("Soliloquy"). Determined to provide financially for his future child, whatever the means, Billy decides to be Jigger's accomplice. The whole town leaves for the clambake. Billy, who had earlier refused to go, agrees to join in, to Julie's delight, as he realizes that being seen at the clambake is integral to his and Jigger's alibi ("Act I Finale"). Act 2 Everyone reminisces about the huge meal and much fun ("This Was a Real Nice Clambake"). Jigger tries to seduce Carrie; Enoch walks in at the wrong moment, and declares that he is finished with her ("Geraniums In the Winder"), as Jigger jeers ("There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman"). The girls try to comfort Carrie, but for Julie all that matters is that "he's your feller and you love him" ("What's the Use of Wond'rin'?"). Julie sees Billy trying to sneak away with Jigger and, trying to stop him, feels the knife hidden in his shirt. She begs him to give it to her, but he refuses and leaves to commit the robbery. As they wait, Jigger and Billy gamble with cards. They stake their shares of the anticipated robbery spoils. Billy loses: his participation is now pointless. Unknown to Billy and Jigger, Mr. Bascombe, the intended victim, has already deposited the mill's money. The robbery fails: Bascombe pulls a gun on Billy while Jigger escapes. Billy stabs himself with his knife; Julie arrives just in time for him to say his last words to her and die. Julie strokes his hair, finally able to tell him that she loved him. Carrie and Enoch, reunited by the crisis, attempt to console Julie; Nettie arrives and gives Julie the resolve to keep going despite her despair ("You'll Never Walk Alone"). Billy's defiant spirit ("The Highest Judge of All") is taken Up There to see the Starkeeper, a heavenly official. The Starkeeper tells Billy that the good he did in life was not enough to get into heaven, but so long as there is a person alive who remembers him, he can return for a day to try to do good to redeem himself. He informs Billy that fifteen years have passed on Earth since his suicide, and suggests that Billy can get himself into heaven if he helps his daughter, Louise. He helps Billy look down from heaven to see her (instrumental ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey"). Louise has grown up to be lonely and bitter. The local children ostracize her because her father was a thief and a wife-beater. In the dance, a young ruffian, much like her father at that age, flirts with her and abandons her as too young. The dance concludes, and Billy is anxious to return to Earth and help his daughter. He steals a star to take with him, as the Starkeeper pretends not to notice. Outside Julie's cottage, Carrie describes her visit to New York with the now-wealthy Enoch. Carrie's husband and their many children enter to fetch her—the family must get ready for the high school graduation later that day. Enoch Jr., the oldest son, remains behind to talk with Louise, as Billy and the Heavenly Friend escorting him enter, invisible to the other characters. Louise confides in Enoch Jr. that she plans to run away from home with an acting troupe. He says that he will stop her by marrying her, but that his father will think her an unsuitable match. Louise is outraged: each insults the other's father, and Louise orders Enoch Jr. to go away. Billy, able to make himself visible at will, reveals himself to the sobbing Louise, pretending to be a friend of her father. He offers her a gift—the star he stole from heaven. She refuses it and, frustrated, he slaps her hand. He makes himself invisible, and Louise tells Julie what happened, stating that the slap miraculously felt like a kiss, not a blow—and Julie understands her perfectly. Louise retreats to the house, as Julie notices the star that Billy dropped; she picks it up and seems to feel Billy's presence ("If I Loved You (Reprise)"). Billy invisibly attends Louise's graduation, hoping for one last chance to help his daughter and redeem himself. The beloved town physician, Dr. Seldon (who resembles the Starkeeper) advises the graduating class not to rely on their parents' success or be held back by their failure (words directed at Louise). Seldon prompts everyone to sing an old song, "You'll Never Walk Alone". Billy, still invisible, whispers to Louise, telling her to believe Seldon's words, and when she tentatively reaches out to another girl, she learns she does not have to be an outcast. Billy goes to Julie, telling her at last that he loved her. As his widow and daughter join in the singing, Billy is taken to his heavenly reward. Principal roles and notable performers ° denotes original Broadway cast Musical numbers Act I"List of Songs", Carousel at the IBDB Database. Retrieved July 18, 2012 "The Carousel Waltz" – Orchestra "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan" – Carrie Pipperidge and Julie Jordan "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" – Carrie "If I Loved You" – Billy Bigelow and Julie "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" – Nettie Fowler and Chorus "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" (reprise) – Carrie, Enoch Snow and Female Chorus "When the Children Are Asleep" – Enoch and Carrie "Blow High, Blow Low" – Jigger Craigin, Billy and Male Chorus "Soliloquy" – BillyAct II "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" – Carrie, Nettie, Julie, Enoch and Chorus "Geraniums in the Winder" – Enoch * "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" – Jigger and Chorus "What's the Use of Wond'rin'?" – Julie "You'll Never Walk Alone" – Nettie "The Highest Judge of All" – Billy Ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey" – Orchestra "If I Loved You" (reprise) – Billy Finale: "You'll Never Walk Alone" (reprise) – Company Productions Early productions The original Broadway production opened at the Majestic Theatre on April 19, 1945. The dress rehearsal the day before had gone badly, and the pair feared the new work would not be well received. One successful last-minute change was to have de Mille choreograph the pantomime. The movement of the carnival crowd in the pantomime had been entrusted to Mamoulian, and his version was not working. Rodgers had injured his back the previous week, and he watched the opening from a stretcher propped in a box behind the curtain. Sedated with morphine, he could see only part of the stage. As he could not hear the audience's applause and laughter, he assumed the show was a failure. It was not until friends congratulated him later that evening that he realized that the curtain had been met by wild applause. Bambi Linn, who played Louise, was so enthusiastically received by the audience during her ballet that she was forced to break character, when she next appeared, and bow. Rodgers' daughter Mary caught sight of her friend, Stephen Sondheim, both teenagers then, across several rows; both had eyes wet with tears. The original production ran for 890 performances, closing on May 24, 1947. The original cast included John Raitt (Billy), Jan Clayton (Julie), Jean Darling (Carrie), Eric Mattson (Enoch Snow), Christine Johnson (Nettie Fowler), Murvyn Vye (Jigger), Bambi Linn (Louise) and Russell Collins (Starkeeper). In December 1945, Clayton left to star in the Broadway revival of Show Boat and was replaced by Iva Withers; Raitt was replaced by Henry Michel in January 1947; Darling was replaced by Margot Moser.Hischak, p. 62 After closing on Broadway, the show went on a national tour for two years. It played for five months in Chicago alone, visited twenty states and two Canadian cities, covered and played to nearly two million people. The touring company had a four-week run at New York City Center in January 1949. Following the City Center run, the show was moved back to the Majestic Theatre in the hopes of filling the theatre until South Pacific opened in early April. However, ticket sales were mediocre, and the show closed almost a month early. The musical premiered in the West End, London, at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on June 7, 1950. The production was restaged by Jerome Whyte, with a cast that included Stephen Douglass (Billy), Iva Withers (Julie) and Margot Moser (Carrie). Carousel ran in London for 566 performances, remaining there for over a year and a half. Subsequent productions Carousel was revived in 1954 and 1957 at City Center, presented by the New York City Center Light Opera Company. Both times, the production featured Barbara Cook, though she played Carrie in 1954 and Julie in 1957 (playing alongside Howard Keel as Billy). The production was then taken to Belgium to be performed at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair, with David Atkinson as Billy, Ruth Kobart as Nettie, and Clayton reprising the role of Julie, which she had originated. In August 1965, Rodgers and the Music Theater of Lincoln Center produced Carousel for 47 performances. John Raitt reprised the role of Billy, with Jerry Orbach as Jigger and Reid Shelton as Enoch Snow. The roles of the Starkeeper and Dr. Seldon were played by Edward Everett Horton in his final stage appearance. The following year, New York City Center Light Opera Company brought Carousel back to City Center for 22 performances, with Bruce Yarnell as Billy and Constance Towers as Julie. Nicholas Hytner directed a new production of Carousel in 1992, at London's Royal National Theatre, with choreography by Sir Kenneth MacMillan and designs by Bob Crowley. In this staging, the story begins at the mill, where Julie and Carrie work, with the music slowed down to emphasize the drudgery. After work ends, they move to the shipyards and then to the carnival. As they proceed on a revolving stage, carnival characters appear, and at last the carousel is assembled onstage for the girls to ride.Block, p. 175 Louise is seduced by the ruffian boy during her Act 2 ballet, set around the ruins of a carousel. Michael Hayden played Billy not as a large, gruff man, but as a frustrated smaller one, a time bomb waiting to explode. Hayden, Joanna Riding (Julie) and Janie Dee (Carrie) all won Olivier Awards for their performances. Patricia Routledge played Nettie. Enoch and Carrie were cast as an interracial couple whose eight children, according to the review in The New York Times, looked like "a walking United Colors of Benetton ad". Clive Rowe, as Enoch, was nominated for an Olivier Award. The production's limited run from December 1992 through March 1993 was a sellout. It re-opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London in September 1993, presented by Cameron Mackintosh, where it continued until May 1994. The Hytner production moved to New York's Vivian Beaumont Theater, where it opened on March 24, 1994, and ran for 322 performances. This won five Tony Awards, including best musical revival, as well as awards for Hytner, MacMillan, Crowley and Audra McDonald (as Carrie). The cast also included Sally Murphy as Julie, Shirley Verrett as Nettie, Fisher Stevens as Jigger and Eddie Korbich as Enoch. One change made from the London to the New York production was to have Billy strike Louise across the face, rather than on the hand. According to Hayden, "He does the one unpardonable thing, the thing we can't forgive. It's a challenge for the audience to like him after that." The Hytner Carousel was presented in Japan in May 1995. A U.S. national tour with a scaled-down production began in February 1996 in Houston and closed in May 1997 in Providence, Rhode Island. Producers sought to feature young talent on the tour, with Patrick Wilson as Billy and Sarah Uriarte Berry, and later Jennifer Laura Thompson, as Julie. A revival opened at London's Savoy Theatre on December 2, 2008, after a week of previews, starring Jeremiah James (Billy), Alexandra Silber (Julie) and Lesley Garrett (Nettie). The production received warm to mixed reviews. It closed in June 2009, a month early. Michael Coveney, writing in The Independent, admired Rodgers' music but stated, "Lindsay Posner's efficient revival doesn't hold a candle to the National Theatre 1992 version". A production at Theater Basel, Switzerland, in 2016 to 2017, with German dialogue, was directed by Alexander Charim and choreographed by Teresa Rotemberg. Bryony Dwyer, Christian Miedl and Cheryl Studer starred, respectively, as Julie Jordan, Billy Bigelow and Nettie Fowler.<ref>[http://operabase.com/diary.cgi?lang=en&code=wsba&date=20161215 "Richard Rodgers: Carousel"] , Diary: Theater Basel, Operabase.com. Retrieved on March 8, 2018</ref> A semi-staged revival by the English National Opera opened at the London Coliseum in 2017. The production was directed by Lonny Price, conducted by David Charles Abell, and starred Alfie Boe as Billy, Katherine Jenkins as Julie and Nicholas Lyndhurst as the Starkeeper. The production received mixed to positive reviews. The third Broadway revival began previews in February 2018 at the Imperial Theatre and officially opened on April 12. It closed on September 16, 2018. The production starred Jessie Mueller, Joshua Henry, Renée Fleming, Lindsay Mendez and Alexander Gemignani. The production was directed by Jack O'Brien and choreographed by Justin Peck. The songs "Geraniums in the Winder" and "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" were cut from this revival. Ben Brantley wrote in The New York Times, "The tragic inevitability of Carousel has seldom come across as warmly or as chillingly as it does in this vividly reimagined revival. ... [W]ith thoughtful and powerful performances by Mr. Henry and Ms. Mueller, the love story at the show's center has never seemed quite as ill-starred or, at the same time, as sexy. ... [T]he Starkeeper ... assumes new visibility throughout, taking on the role of Billy's angelic supervisor." Brantley strongly praised the choreography, all the performances and the designers. He was unconvinced, however, by the "mother-daughter dialogue that falls so abrasively on contemporary ears", where Julie tries to justify loving an abusive man, and other scenes in Act 2, particularly those set in heaven, and the optimism of the final scene. Most of the reviewers agreed that while the choreography and performances (especially the singing) were excellent, characterizing the production as sexy and sumptuous, O'Brien's direction did little to help the show deal with modern sensibilities about men's treatment of women, instead indulging in nostalgia. From July to September 2021 the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre in London is presenting a staging by its artistic director Timothy Sheader, with choreography by Drew McOnie. The cast includes Carly Bawden as Julie, Declan Bennett as Billy and Joanna Riding as Nettie. Film, television and concert versions [[File:Boothbay Harbor in Summer.jpg\|thumb\|upright=1.2\|Boothbay Harbor, Maine, where the location shots for Carousels movie version were filmed]] A film version of the musical was made in 1956, starring Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones. It follows the musical's story fairly closely, although a prologue, set in the Starkeeper's heaven, was added. The film was released only a few months after the release of the film version of Oklahoma! It garnered some good reviews, and the soundtrack recording was a best seller. As the same stars appeared in both pictures, however, the two films were often compared, generally to the disadvantage of Carousel. Thomas Hischak, in The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, later wondered "if the smaller number of Carousel stage revivals is the product of this often-lumbering [film] musical". There was also an abridged (100 minute) 1967 network television version that starred Robert Goulet, with choreography by Edward Villella. The New York Philharmonic presented a staged concert version of the musical from February 28 to March 2, 2013, at Avery Fisher Hall. Kelli O'Hara played Julie, with Nathan Gunn as Billy, Stephanie Blythe as Nettie, Jessie Mueller as Carrie, Jason Danieley as Enoch, Shuler Hensley as Jigger, John Cullum as the Starkeeper, and Kate Burton as Mrs. Mullin. Tiler Peck danced the role of Louise to choreography by Warren Carlyle. The production was directed by John Rando and conducted by Rob Fisher. Charles Isherwood of The New York Times wrote, "this is as gorgeously sung a production of this sublime 1945 Broadway musical as you are ever likely to hear." It was broadcast as part of the PBS Live from Lincoln Center series, premiering on April 26, 2013. Music and recordings Musical treatment Rodgers designed Carousel to be an almost continuous stream of music, especially in Act 1. In later years, Rodgers was asked if he had considered writing an opera. He stated that he had been sorely tempted to, but saw Carousel in operatic terms. He remembered, "We came very close to opera in the Majestic Theatre. ... There's much that is operatic in the music." Rodgers uses music in Carousel in subtle ways to differentiate characters and tell the audience of their emotional state. In "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan", the music for the placid Carrie is characterized by even eighth-note rhythms, whereas the emotionally restless Julie's music is marked by dotted eighths and sixteenths; this rhythm will characterize her throughout the show. When Billy whistles a snatch of the song, he selects Julie's dotted notes rather than Carrie's. Reflecting the close association in the music between Julie and the as-yet unborn Louise, when Billy sings in "Soliloquy" of his daughter, who "gets hungry every night", he uses Julie's dotted rhythms. Such rhythms also characterize Julie's Act 2 song, "What's the Use of Wond'rin'". The stable love between Enoch and Carrie is strengthened by her willingness to let Enoch not only plan his entire life, but hers as well. This is reflected in "When the Children Are Asleep", where the two sing in close harmony, but Enoch musically interrupts his intended's turn at the chorus with the words "Dreams that won't be interrupted". Rodgers biographer Geoffrey Block, in his book on the Broadway musical, points out that though Billy may strike his wife, he allows her musical themes to become a part of him and never interrupts her music. Block suggests that, as reprehensible as Billy may be for his actions, Enoch requiring Carrie to act as "the little woman", and his having nine children with her (more than she had found acceptable in "When the Children are Asleep") can be considered to be even more abusive. The twelve-minute "bench scene", in which Billy and Julie get to know each other and which culminates with "If I Loved You", according to Hischak, "is considered the most completely integrated piece of music-drama in the American musical theatre". The scene is almost entirely drawn from Molnár and is one extended musical piece; Stephen Sondheim described it as "probably the single most important moment in the revolution of contemporary musicals". "If I Loved You" has been recorded many times, by such diverse artists as Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Sammy Davis Jr., Mario Lanza and Chad and Jeremy. The D-flat major theme that dominates the music for the second act ballet seems like a new melody to many audience members. It is, however, a greatly expanded development of a theme heard during "Soliloquy" at the line "I guess he'll call me 'The old man' ". When the pair discussed the song that would become "Soliloquy", Rodgers improvised at the piano to give Hammerstein an idea of how he envisioned the song. When Hammerstein presented his collaborator with the lyrics after two weeks of work (Hammerstein always wrote the words first, then Rodgers would write the melodies), Rodgers wrote the music for the eight-minute song in two hours. "What's the Use of Wond'rin' ", one of Julie's songs, worked well in the show but was never as popular on the radio or for recording, and Hammerstein believed that the lack of popularity was because he had concluded the final line, "And all the rest is talk" with a hard consonant, which does not allow the singer a vocal climax. Irving Berlin later stated that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had the same sort of effect on him as the 23rd Psalm. When singer Mel Tormé told Rodgers that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had made him cry, Rodgers nodded impatiently. "You're supposed to." The frequently recorded song has become a widely accepted hymn.Rodgers, p. 240 The cast recording of Carousel proved popular in Liverpool, like many Broadway albums, and in 1963, the Brian Epstein-managed band, Gerry and the Pacemakers had a number-one hit with the song. At the time, the top ten hits were played before Liverpool F.C. home matches; even after "You'll Never Walk Alone" dropped out of the top ten, fans continued to sing it, and it has become closely associated with the soccer team and the city of Liverpool. A BBC program, Soul Music, ranked it alongside "Silent Night" and "Abide With Me" in terms of its emotional impact and iconic status. Recordings The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut—as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made.Fick, David. "The Best Carousel Recording", June 11, 2009. Retrieved on April 7, 2016 A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousels songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. Critical reception and legacy The musical received almost unanimous rave reviews after its opening in 1945. According to Hischak, reviews were not as exuberant as for Oklahoma! as the critics were not taken by surprise this time. John Chapman of the Daily News termed it "one of the finest musical plays I have ever seen and I shall remember it always". The New York Times's reviewer, Lewis Nichols, stated that "Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein 2d, who can do no wrong, have continued doing no wrong in adapting Liliom into a musical play. Their Carousel is on the whole delightful." Wilella Waldorf of the New York Post, however, complained, "Carousel seemed to us a rather long evening. The Oklahoma! formula is becoming a bit monotonous and so are Miss de Mille's ballets. All right, go ahead and shoot!"Suskin, Steven. Opening Night on Broadway. Schirmer Trade Books, 1990, p. 147. . Dance Magazine gave Linn plaudits for her role as Louise, stating, "Bambi doesn't come on until twenty minutes before eleven, and for the next forty minutes, she practically holds the audience in her hand". Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune also applauded the dancing: "It has waited for Miss de Mille to come through with peculiarly American dance patterns for a musical show to become as much a dance as a song show." When the musical returned to New York in 1949, The New York Times reviewer Brooks Atkinson described Carousel as "a conspicuously superior musical play ... Carousel, which was warmly appreciated when it opened, seems like nothing less than a masterpiece now." In 1954, when Carousel was revived at City Center, Atkinson discussed the musical in his review: Carousel has no comment to make on anything of topical importance. The theme is timeless and universal: the devotion of two people who love each other through thick and thin, complicated in this case by the wayward personality of the man, who cannot fulfill the responsibilities he has assumed. ... Billy is a bum, but Carousel recognizes the decency of his motives and admires his independence. There are no slick solutions in Carousel. Stephen Sondheim noted the duo's ability to take the innovations of Oklahoma! and apply them to a serious setting: "Oklahoma! is about a picnic, Carousel is about life and death." Critic Eric Bentley, on the other hand, wrote that "the last scene of Carousel is an impertinence: I refuse to be lectured to by a musical comedy scriptwriter on the education of children, the nature of the good life, and the contribution of the American small town to the salvation of souls."New York Times critic Frank Rich said of the 1992 London production: "What is remarkable about Mr. Hytner's direction, aside from its unorthodox faith in the virtues of simplicity and stillness, is its ability to make a 1992 audience believe in Hammerstein's vision of redemption, which has it that a dead sinner can return to Earth to do godly good." The Hytner production in New York was hailed by many critics as a grittier Carousel, which they deemed more appropriate for the 1990s. Clive Barnes of the New York Post called it a "defining Carousel—hard-nosed, imaginative, and exciting." Critic Michael Billington has commented that "lyrically [Carousel] comes perilously close to acceptance of the inevitability of domestic violence." BroadwayWorld.com stated in 2013 that Carousel is now "considered somewhat controversial in terms of its attitudes on domestic violence" because Julie chooses to stay with Billy despite the abuse; actress Kelli O'Hara noted that the domestic violence that Julie "chooses to deal with – is a real, existing and very complicated thing. And exploring it is an important part of healing it." Rodgers considered Carousel his favorite of all his musicals and wrote, "it affects me deeply every time I see it performed". In 1999, Time magazine, in its "Best of the Century" list, named Carousel the Best Musical of the 20th century, writing that Rodgers and Hammerstein "set the standards for the 20th century musical, and this show features their most beautiful score and the most skillful and affecting example of their musical storytelling". Hammerstein's grandson, Oscar Andrew Hammerstein, in his book about his family, suggested that the wartime situation made Carousel's ending especially poignant to its original viewers, "Every American grieved the loss of a brother, son, father, or friend ... the audience empathized with [Billy's] all-too-human efforts to offer advice, to seek forgiveness, to complete an unfinished life, and to bid a proper good-bye from beyond the grave." Author and composer Ethan Mordden agreed with that perspective: If Oklahoma! developed the moral argument for sending American boys overseas, Carousel offered consolation to those wives and mothers whose boys would only return in spirit. The meaning lay not in the tragedy of the present, but in the hope for a future where no one walks alone. Awards and nominations Original 1945 Broadway productionNote: The Tony Awards were not established until 1947, and so Carousel was not eligible to win any Tonys at its premiere. 1957 revival 1992 London revival 1994 Broadway revival 2018 Broadway revival References Bibliography Block, Geoffrey. Enchanted Evenings: The Broadway Musical from Show Boat to Sondheim. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2004. . Block, Geoffrey (ed.) The Richard Rodgers Reader. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2006. . Bradley, Ian. You've Got to Have a Dream: The Message of the Broadway Musical. Louisville, Ky., Westminster John Knox Press, 2005. 978-0-664-22854-5. Easton, Carol. No Intermission: The Life of Agnes DeMille. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 2000 (1st DaCapo Press edition). . Fordin, Hugh. Getting to Know Him: A Biography of Oscar Hammerstein II. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 1995 reprint of 1986 edition. . Hammerstein, Oscar Andrew. The Hammersteins: A Musical Theatre Family. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 2010. . Hischak, Thomas S. The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2007. . Hyland, William G. Richard Rodgers. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1998. . Molnár, Ferenc. Liliom: A Legend in Seven Scenes and a Prologue. New York: Boni and Liveright, 1921. Mordden, Ethan. "Rodgers & Hammerstein". New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1992. . Nolan, Frederick. The Sound of Their Music: The Story of Rodgers and Hammerstein. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2002. . Rodgers, Richard. Musical Stages: An Autobiography. Jefferson, N.C. Da Capo Press, 2002 reprint of 1975 edition. . Secrest, Meryle. Somewhere for Me: A Biography of Richard Rodgers. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2001. . External links Carousel at guidetomusicaltheatre.com Carousel info page on StageAgent.com – Carousel plot summary and character descriptions (1967 TV adaptation) 1945 musicals Broadway musicals Musicals by Rodgers and Hammerstein West End musicals Musicals based on plays Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients Maine in fiction Fiction set in 1873 Fiction about the afterlife Plays set in Maine Plays set in the 19th century Tony Award-winning musicals	true	[ "EP2 is the second extended play (EP) by English singer FKA Twigs. It was released on 17 September 2013 by Young. The song \"Water Me\" was released as a promotional single in 2013. There are three different versions of the album cover; the first clearly shows Twigs' necklace, a second where it is blurred, and a third where it has been erased.\n\nMusic videos\nEP2 has a music video for every song appearing on the EP. The music videos were released between May and September 2013.\n\n\"How's That\"\n\"How's That\" is the first music video released from EP2. The video was released on 3 May 2013. The video depicts a computer generated body falling apart in thin air. The visuals were made by Jesse Kanda.\n\n\"Water Me\"\n\"Water Me\" is the second music video released from EP2. The video was released on 1 August 2013. The video consists of a close up of FKA twigs' face, bobbing frantically. She begins to cry and it \"waters\" her, causing her eyes to grow larger. The video went viral, reaching over sixteen million views on YouTube.\n\n\"Water Me\" was directed by Jesse Kanda and FKA twigs. The executive producer was Juliette Larthe, and the head of production was Margo Mars, both from Prettybird. The producer was Shimmy. The cinematographer was Sy Turnbull. The stylist was Jean Paul Paula, and the makeup was by Bea Sweet.\n\n\"Papi Pacify\"\n\"Papi Pacify\" is the third music video released from EP2. The video was released on 13 September 2013. The video consists of FKA twigs and an uncredited male in various poses. The video was directed by Tom Beard and FKA twigs. It was edited by Ben Crook and produced by Cherise Payne. The cinematographer is Katie Swan. The makeup was done by Bea Sweet, the hair was done by Lok Lau, the nails were done by Michelle Humphrey, and the stylist was Jean Paul Paula.\n\n\"Ultraviolet\"\n\"Ultraviolet\" is the fourth and last music video released from EP2. The video was released 20 September 2013. Though it is classified as a music video, it is only an image of a kaleidoscope-view of FKA Twigs' mouth.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\nCredits adapted from the liner notes of EP2.\n\n Twigs – vocals ; production \n Arca – production ; vocal production \n Matt Colton – mastering\n Liam Howe – vocal production\n\nCharts\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2013 EPs\nAlbums produced by Arca (musician)\nFKA Twigs albums\nYoung Turks (record label) albums", "TuneBuilder was an early digital music editor that automatically recombined segments of digital audio files to create variations of new musical performances of different duration and order.\n\nThe software was designed to replace standard physical music editing techniques in industries using commercial music catalogs, including soundtrack temping, radio and television advertising, film/video sound scoring, and theme production.\n\nManual editing labor was reduced from a typical time involvement of several minutes per edit by a skilled editor performing a multiplicity of edits per selection, to just a few seconds for an unskilled user to perform all edits required to re-length or re-order the music selection.\n\nThe program consisted of several modules including an automatic editor interface (TuneBuilder), a control file production module (AutoBlade), a search utility (TuneFinder), and audio file format exchanges (S/Link).\n\nTuneBuilder's technology was invented by Darryl Goede with a U.S. patent granted in 1998. The TuneBuilder patent was further cited in twenty-three subsequent patents. The patent describes the technology as the creation and storage of a mapping/descriptive file that located sections of music stored as digital files. Then in a subsequent process, the mapping file then directed a processor to produce an audio output stream consisting of a new sequence of the sections.\n\nThere were 18,000 commercial music selections mapped to work under TuneBuilder, drawn from libraries including Bertelsmann Music Group (BMG), Killer Tracks, and KPM Musichouse.\n\nAs an editing software, TuneBuilder was commercialized and marketed from 1996 to 1999 by AirWorks Media Incorporated, a Canadian company.\n\nEditing systems were initially developed for DOS, Mac, and Amiga.\n\nA Windows 95 version was released in mid-1996 that incorporated software purchased by AirWorks in late 1995 from SOC Associates who had acquired the software in the breakup of New England Digital, developers of the Synclavier.\n\nThe components of TuneBuilder were being re-integrated in 1999 into a sound handling suite called \"SoundHouse\" when AirWorks Media ceased operations.\n\nSee also\n List of music software\n\nReferences\n\nPublications\nThe Handbook of Digital Publishing, Volume II by Michael L. Kleper, Tim Moore (Editor)\n\nExternal links\n AirWorks website on Internet Archive WayBack Machine\n US Patent, TuneBuilder\n S/Link Purchase\n\nMusic software" ]
[ "Carousel (musical)", "Musical treatment", "What was important with Carousel?", "The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s,", "What kind of music was used?", "The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars,", "How was music incorporated into the production?", "the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format," ]	C_8decf249a7ee4c6bb84aa0f61f4f4d6c_0	What songs did they sing?	4	What songs did the cast sing in the musical Carousel?	Carousel (musical)	The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut--as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made. A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousel's songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Carousel is the second musical by the team of Richard Rodgers (music) and Oscar Hammerstein II (book and lyrics). The 1945 work was adapted from Ferenc Molnár's 1909 play Liliom, transplanting its Budapest setting to the Maine coastline. The story revolves around carousel barker Billy Bigelow, whose romance with millworker Julie Jordan comes at the price of both their jobs. He participates in a robbery to provide for Julie and their unborn child; after it goes tragically wrong, he is given a chance to make things right. A secondary plot line deals with millworker Carrie Pipperidge and her romance with ambitious fisherman Enoch Snow. The show includes the well-known songs "If I Loved You", "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" and "You'll Never Walk Alone". Richard Rodgers later wrote that Carousel was his favorite of all his musicals. Following the spectacular success of the first Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Oklahoma! (1943), the pair sought to collaborate on another piece, knowing that any resulting work would be compared with Oklahoma!, most likely unfavorably. They were initially reluctant to seek the rights to Liliom; Molnár had refused permission for the work to be adapted in the past, and the original ending was considered too depressing for the musical theatre. After acquiring the rights, the team created a work with lengthy sequences of music and made the ending more hopeful. The musical required considerable modification during out-of-town tryouts, but once it opened on Broadway on April 19, 1945, it was an immediate hit with both critics and audiences. Carousel initially ran for 890 performances and duplicated its success in the West End in 1950. Though it has never achieved as much commercial success as Oklahoma!, the piece has been repeatedly revived, recorded several times and was filmed in 1956. A production by Nicholas Hytner enjoyed success in 1992 in London, in 1994 in New York and on tour. Another Broadway revival opened in 2018. In 1999, Time magazine named Carousel the best musical of the 20th century. Background Liliom Ferenc Molnár's Hungarian-language drama, Liliom, premiered in Budapest in 1909. The audience was puzzled by the work, and it lasted only thirty-odd performances before being withdrawn, the first shadow on Molnár's successful career as a playwright. Liliom was not presented again until after World War I. When it reappeared on the Budapest stage, it was a tremendous hit. Except for the ending, the plots of Liliom and Carousel are very similar. Andreas Zavocky (nicknamed Liliom, the Hungarian word for "lily", a slang term for "tough guy"), a carnival barker, falls in love with Julie Zeller, a servant girl, and they begin living together. With both discharged from their jobs, Liliom is discontented and contemplates leaving Julie, but decides not to do so on learning that she is pregnant. A subplot involves Julie's friend Marie, who has fallen in love with Wolf Biefeld, a hotel porter—after the two marry, he becomes the owner of the hotel. Desperate to make money so that he, Julie and their child can escape to America and a better life, Liliom conspires with lowlife Ficsur to commit a robbery, but it goes badly, and Liliom stabs himself. He dies, and his spirit is taken to heaven's police court. As Ficsur suggested while the two waited to commit the crime, would-be robbers like them do not come before God Himself. Liliom is told by the magistrate that he may go back to Earth for one day to attempt to redeem the wrongs he has done to his family, but must first spend sixteen years in a fiery purgatory. On his return to Earth, Liliom encounters his daughter, Louise, who like her mother is now a factory worker. Saying that he knew her father, he tries to give her a star he stole from the heavens. When Louise refuses to take it, he strikes her. Not realizing who he is, Julie confronts him, but finds herself unable to be angry with him. Liliom is ushered off to his fate, presumably Hell, and Louise asks her mother if it is possible to feel a hard slap as if it was a kiss. Julie reminiscently tells her daughter that it is very possible for that to happen. An English translation of Liliom was credited to Benjamin "Barney" Glazer, though there is a story that the actual translator, uncredited, was Rodgers' first major partner Lorenz Hart. The Theatre Guild presented it in New York City in 1921, with Joseph Schildkraut as Liliom, and the play was a success, running 300 performances. A 1940 revival with Burgess Meredith and Ingrid Bergman was seen by both Hammerstein and Rodgers. Glazer, in introducing the English translation of Liliom, wrote of the play's appeal: And where in modern dramatic literature can such pearls be matched—Julie incoherently confessing to her dead lover the love she had always been ashamed to tell; Liliom crying out to the distant carousel the glad news that he is to be a father; the two thieves gambling for the spoils of their prospective robbery; Marie and Wolf posing for their portrait while the broken-hearted Julie stands looking after the vanishing Liliom, the thieves' song ringing in her ears; the two policemen grousing about pay and pensions while Liliom lies bleeding to death; Liliom furtively proffering his daughter the star he has stolen for her in heaven. ... The temptation to count the whole scintillating string is difficult to resist. Inception In the 1920s and 1930s, Rodgers and Hammerstein both became well known for creating Broadway hits with other partners. Rodgers, with Lorenz Hart, had produced a string of over two dozen musicals, including such popular successes as Babes in Arms (1937), The Boys from Syracuse (1938) and Pal Joey (1940). Some of Rodgers' work with Hart broke new ground in musical theatre: On Your Toes was the first use of ballet to sustain the plot (in the "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue" scene), while Pal Joey flouted Broadway tradition by presenting a knave as its hero. Hammerstein had written or co-written the words for such hits as Rose-Marie (1924), The Desert Song (1926), The New Moon (1927) and Show Boat (1927). Though less productive in the 1930s, he wrote material for musicals and films, sharing an Oscar for his song with Jerome Kern, "The Last Time I Saw Paris", which was included in the 1941 film Lady Be Good. By the early 1940s, Hart had sunk into alcoholism and emotional turmoil, becoming unreliable and prompting Rodgers to approach Hammerstein to ask if he would consider working with him. Hammerstein was eager to do so, and their first collaboration was Oklahoma! (1943). Thomas Hischak states, in his The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, that Oklahoma! is "the single most influential work in the American musical theatre. In fact, the history of the Broadway musical can accurately be divided into what came before Oklahoma! and what came after it." An innovation for its time in integrating song, character, plot and dance, Oklahoma! would serve, according to Hischak, as "the model for Broadway shows for decades", and proved a huge popular and financial success. Once it was well-launched, what to do as an encore was a daunting challenge for the pair. Film producer Samuel Goldwyn saw Oklahoma! and advised Rodgers to shoot himself, which according to Rodgers "was Sam's blunt but funny way of telling me that I'd never create another show as good as Oklahoma!" As they considered new projects, Hammerstein wrote, "We're such fools. No matter what we do, everyone is bound to say, 'This is not another Oklahoma! " Oklahoma! had been a struggle to finance and produce. Hammerstein and Rodgers met weekly in 1943 with Theresa Helburn and Lawrence Langner of the Theatre Guild, producers of the blockbuster musical, who together formed what they termed "the Gloat Club". At one such luncheon, Helburn and Langner proposed to Rodgers and Hammerstein that they turn Molnár's Liliom into a musical. Both men refused—they had no feeling for the Budapest setting and thought that the unhappy ending was unsuitable for musical theatre. In addition, given the unstable wartime political situation, they might need to change the setting from Hungary while in rehearsal. At the next luncheon, Helburn and Langner again proposed Liliom, suggesting that they move the setting to Louisiana and make Liliom a Creole. Rodgers and Hammerstein played with the idea over the next few weeks, but decided that Creole dialect, filled with "zis" and "zose", would sound corny and would make it difficult to write effective lyrics. A breakthrough came when Rodgers, who owned a house in Connecticut, proposed a New England setting. Hammerstein wrote of this suggestion in 1945, I began to see an attractive ensemble—sailors, whalers, girls who worked in the mills up the river, clambakes on near-by islands, an amusement park on the seaboard, things people could do in crowds, people who were strong and alive and lusty, people who had always been depicted on the stage as thin-lipped puritans—a libel I was anxious to refute ... as for the two leading characters, Julie with her courage and inner strength and outward simplicity seemed more indigenous to Maine than to Budapest. Liliom is, of course, an international character, indigenous to nowhere. Rodgers and Hammerstein were also concerned about what they termed "the tunnel" of Molnár's second act—a series of gloomy scenes leading up to Liliom's suicide—followed by a dark ending. They also felt it would be difficult to set Liliom's motivation for the robbery to music. Molnár's opposition to having his works adapted was also an issue; he had famously turned down Giacomo Puccini when the great composer wished to transform Liliom into an opera, stating that he wanted the piece to be remembered as his, not Puccini's. In 1937, Molnár, who had recently emigrated to the United States, had declined another offer from Kurt Weill to adapt the play into a musical. The pair continued to work on the preliminary ideas for a Liliom adaptation while pursuing other projects in late 1943 and early 1944—writing the film musical State Fair and producing I Remember Mama on Broadway. Meanwhile, the Theatre Guild took Molnár to see Oklahoma! Molnár stated that if Rodgers and Hammerstein could adapt Liliom as beautifully as they had modified Green Grow the Lilacs into Oklahoma!, he would be pleased to have them do it. The Guild obtained the rights from Molnár in October 1943. The playwright received one percent of the gross and $2,500 for "personal services". The duo insisted, as part of the contract, that Molnár permit them to make changes in the plot. At first, the playwright refused, but eventually yielded. Hammerstein later stated that if this point had not been won, "we could never have made Carousel." In seeking to establish through song Liliom's motivation for the robbery, Rodgers remembered that he and Hart had a similar problem in Pal Joey. Rodgers and Hart had overcome the problem with a song that Joey sings to himself, "I'm Talking to My Pal". This inspired "Soliloquy". Both partners later told a story that "Soliloquy" was only intended to be a song about Liliom's dreams of a son, but that Rodgers, who had two daughters, insisted that Liliom consider that Julie might have a girl. However, the notes taken at their meeting of December 7, 1943 state: "Mr. Rodgers suggested a fine musical number for the end of the scene where Liliom discovers he is to be a father, in which he sings first with pride of the growth of a boy, and then suddenly realizes it might be a girl and changes completely." Hammerstein and Rodgers returned to the Liliom project in mid-1944. Hammerstein was uneasy as he worked, fearing that no matter what they did, Molnár would disapprove of the results. Green Grow the Lilacs had been a little-known work; Liliom was a theatrical standard. Molnár's text also contained considerable commentary on the Hungarian politics of 1909 and the rigidity of that society. A dismissed carnival barker who hits his wife, attempts a robbery and commits suicide seemed an unlikely central character for a musical comedy. Hammerstein decided to use the words and story to make the audience sympathize with the lovers. He also built up the secondary couple, who are incidental to the plot in Liliom; they became Enoch Snow and Carrie Pipperidge. "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" was repurposed from a song, "A Real Nice Hayride", written for Oklahoma! but not used. Molnár's ending was unsuitable, and after a couple of false starts, Hammerstein conceived the graduation scene that ends the musical. According to Frederick Nolan in his book on the team's works: "From that scene the song "You'll Never Walk Alone" sprang almost naturally." In spite of Hammerstein's simple lyrics for "You'll Never Walk Alone", Rodgers had great difficulty in setting it to music. Rodgers explained his rationale for the changed ending, Liliom was a tragedy about a man who cannot learn to live with other people. The way Molnár wrote it, the man ends up hitting his daughter and then having to go back to purgatory, leaving his daughter helpless and hopeless. We couldn't accept that. The way we ended Carousel it may still be a tragedy but it's a hopeful one because in the final scene it is clear that the child has at last learned how to express herself and communicate with others. When the pair decided to make "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" into an ensemble number, Hammerstein realized he had no idea what a clambake was like, and researched the matter. Based on his initial findings, he wrote the line, "First came codfish chowder". However, further research convinced him the proper term was "codhead chowder", a term unfamiliar to many playgoers. He decided to keep it as "codfish". When the song proceeded to discuss the lobsters consumed at the feast, Hammerstein wrote the line "We slit 'em down the back/And peppered 'em good". He was grieved to hear from a friend that lobsters are always slit down the front. The lyricist sent a researcher to a seafood restaurant and heard back that lobsters are always slit down the back. Hammerstein concluded that there is disagreement about which side of a lobster is the back. One error not caught involved the song "June Is Bustin' Out All Over", in which sheep are depicted as seeking to mate in late spring—they actually do so in the winter. Whenever this was brought to Hammerstein's attention, he told his informant that 1873 was a special year, in which sheep mated in the spring. Rodgers early decided to dispense with an overture, feeling that the music was hard to hear over the banging of seats as latecomers settled themselves. In his autobiography, Rodgers complained that only the brass section can be heard during an overture because there are never enough strings in a musical's small orchestra. He determined to force the audience to concentrate from the beginning by opening with a pantomime scene accompanied by what became known as "The Carousel Waltz". The pantomime paralleled one in the Molnár play, which was also used to introduce the characters and situation to the audience. Author Ethan Mordden described the effectiveness of this opening: Other characters catch our notice—Mr. Bascombe, the pompous mill owner, Mrs. Mullin, the widow who runs the carousel and, apparently, Billy; a dancing bear; an acrobat. But what draws us in is the intensity with which Julie regards Billy—the way she stands frozen, staring at him, while everyone else at the fair is swaying to the rhythm of Billy's spiel. And as Julie and Billy ride together on the swirling carousel, and the stage picture surges with the excitement of the crowd, and the orchestra storms to a climax, and the curtain falls, we realize that R & H have not only skipped the overture and the opening number but the exposition as well. They have plunged into the story, right into the middle of it, in the most intense first scene any musical ever had. Casting and out-of-town tryouts The casting for Carousel began when Oklahoma!s production team, including Rodgers and Hammerstein, was seeking a replacement for the part of Curly (the male lead in Oklahoma!). Lawrence Langner had heard, through a relative, of a California singer named John Raitt, who might be suitable for the part. Langner went to hear Raitt, then urged the others to bring Raitt to New York for an audition. Raitt asked to sing "Largo al factotum", Figaro's aria from The Barber of Seville, to warm up. The warmup was sufficient to convince the producers that not only had they found a Curly, they had found a Liliom (or Billy Bigelow, as the part was renamed). Theresa Helburn made another California discovery, Jan Clayton, a singer/actress who had made a few minor films for MGM. She was brought east and successfully auditioned for the part of Julie. The producers sought to cast unknowns. Though many had played in previous Hammerstein or Rodgers works, only one, Jean Casto (cast as carousel owner Mrs. Mullin, and a veteran of Pal Joey), had ever played on Broadway before. It proved harder to cast the ensemble than the leads, due to the war—Rodgers told his casting director, John Fearnley, that the sole qualification for a dancing boy was that he be alive. Rodgers and Hammerstein reassembled much of the creative team that had made Oklahoma! a success, including director Rouben Mamoulian and choreographer Agnes de Mille. Miles White was the costume designer while Jo Mielziner (who had not worked on Oklahoma!) was the scenic and lighting designer. Even though Oklahoma! orchestrator Russell Bennett had informed Rodgers that he was unavailable to work on Carousel due to a radio contract, Rodgers insisted he do the work in his spare time. He orchestrated "The Carousel Waltz" and "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" before finally being replaced by Don Walker. A new member of the creative team was Trude Rittmann, who arranged the dance music. Rittmann initially felt that Rodgers mistrusted her because she was a woman, and found him difficult to work with, but the two worked together on Rodgers' shows until the 1970s. Rehearsals began in January 1945; either Rodgers or Hammerstein was always present. Raitt was presented with the lyrics for "Soliloquy" on a five-foot long sheet of paper—the piece ran nearly eight minutes. Staging such a long solo number presented problems, and Raitt later stated that he felt that they were never fully addressed. At some point during rehearsals, Molnár came to see what they had done to his play. There are a number of variations on the story.Fordin, pp. 231–32 As Rodgers told it, while watching rehearsals with Hammerstein, the composer spotted Molnár in the rear of the theatre and whispered the news to his partner. Both sweated through an afternoon of rehearsal in which nothing seemed to go right. At the end, the two walked to the back of the theatre, expecting an angry reaction from Molnár. Instead, the playwright said enthusiastically, "What you have done is so beautiful. And you know what I like best? The ending!" Hammerstein wrote that Molnár became a regular attendee at rehearsals after that. Like most of the pair's works, Carousel contains a lengthy ballet, "Billy Makes a Journey", in the second act, as Billy looks down to the Earth from "Up There" and observes his daughter. In the original production the ballet was choreographed by de Mille. It began with Billy looking down from heaven at his wife in labor, with the village women gathered for a "birthing". The ballet involved every character in the play, some of whom spoke lines of dialogue, and contained a number of subplots. The focus was on Louise, played by Bambi Linn, who at first almost soars in her dance, expressing the innocence of childhood. She is teased and mocked by her schoolmates, and Louise becomes attracted to the rough carnival people, who symbolize Billy's world. A youth from the carnival attempts to seduce Louise, as she discovers her own sexuality, but he decides she is more girl than woman, and he leaves her. After Julie comforts her, Louise goes to a children's party, where she is shunned. The carnival people reappear and form a ring around the children's party, with Louise lost between the two groups. At the end, the performers form a huge carousel with their bodies. The play opened for tryouts in New Haven, Connecticut on March 22, 1945. The first act was well-received; the second act was not. Casto recalled that the second act finished about 1:30 a.m. The staff immediately sat down for a two-hour conference. Five scenes, half the ballet, and two songs were cut from the show as the result. John Fearnley commented, "Now I see why these people have hits. I never witnessed anything so brisk and brave in my life." De Mille said of this conference, "not three minutes had been wasted pleading for something cherished. Nor was there any idle joking. ... We cut and cut and cut and then we went to bed." By the time the company left New Haven, de Mille's ballet was down to forty minutes. A major concern with the second act was the effectiveness of the characters He and She (later called by Rodgers "Mr. and Mrs. God"), before whom Billy appeared after his death. Mr. and Mrs. God were depicted as a New England minister and his wife, seen in their parlor.Block (ed.), p. 129. At this time, according to the cast sheet distributed during the Boston run, Dr. Seldon was listed as the "Minister". The couple was still part of the show at the Boston opening. Rodgers said to Hammerstein, "We've got to get God out of that parlor". When Hammerstein inquired where he should put the deity, Rodgers replied, "I don't care where you put Him. Put Him on a ladder for all I care, only get Him out of that parlor!" Hammerstein duly put Mr. God (renamed the Starkeeper) atop a ladder, and Mrs. God was removed from the show. Rodgers biographer Meryle Secrest terms this change a mistake, leading to a more fantastic afterlife, which was later criticized by The New Republic as "a Rotarian atmosphere congenial to audiences who seek not reality but escape from reality, not truth but escape from truth". Hammerstein wrote that Molnár's advice, to combine two scenes into one, was key to pulling together the second act and represented "a more radical departure from the original than any change we had made". A reprise of "If I Loved You" was added in the second act, which Rodgers felt needed more music. Three weeks of tryouts in Boston followed the brief New Haven run, and the audience there gave the musical a warm reception. An even shorter version of the ballet was presented the final two weeks in Boston, but on the final night there, de Mille expanded it back to forty minutes, and it brought the house down, causing both Rodgers and Hammerstein to embrace her. Synopsis Act 1 Two young female millworkers in 1873 Maine visit the town's carousel after work. One of them, Julie Jordan, attracts the attention of the barker, Billy Bigelow ("The Carousel Waltz"). When Julie lets Billy put his arm around her during the ride, Mrs. Mullin, the widowed owner of the carousel, tells Julie never to return. Julie and her friend, Carrie Pipperidge, argue with Mrs. Mullin. Billy arrives and, seeing that Mrs. Mullin is jealous, mocks her; he is fired from his job. Billy, unconcerned, invites Julie to join him for a drink. As he goes to get his belongings, Carrie presses Julie about her feelings toward him, but Julie is evasive ("You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan"). Carrie has a beau too, fisherman Enoch Snow ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow"), to whom she is newly engaged. Billy returns for Julie as the departing Carrie warns that staying out late means the loss of Julie's job. Mr. Bascombe, owner of the mill, happens by along with a policeman, and offers to escort Julie to her home, but she refuses and is fired. Left alone, she and Billy talk about what life might be like if they were in love, but neither quite confesses to the growing attraction they feel for each other ("If I Loved You"). Over a month passes, and preparations for the summer clambake are under way ("June Is Bustin' Out All Over"). Julie and Billy, now married, live at Julie's cousin Nettie's spa. Julie confides in Carrie that Billy, frustrated over being unemployed, hit her. Carrie has happier news—she is engaged to Enoch, who enters as she discusses him ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow (reprise))". Billy arrives with his ne'er-do-well whaler friend, Jigger. The former barker is openly rude to Enoch and Julie, then leaves with Jigger, followed by a distraught Julie. Enoch tells Carrie that he expects to become rich selling herring and to have a large family, larger perhaps than Carrie is comfortable having ("When the Children Are Asleep"). Jigger and his shipmates, joined by Billy, then sing about life on the sea ("Blow High, Blow Low"). The whaler tries to recruit Billy to help with a robbery, but Billy declines, as the victim—Julie's former boss, Mr. Bascombe—might have to be killed. Mrs. Mullin enters and tries to tempt Billy back to the carousel (and to her). He would have to abandon Julie; a married barker cannot evoke the same sexual tension as one who is single. Billy reluctantly mulls it over as Julie arrives and the others leave. She tells him that she is pregnant, and Billy is overwhelmed with happiness, ending all thoughts of returning to the carousel. Once alone, Billy imagines the fun he will have with Bill Jr.—until he realizes that his child might be a girl, and reflects soberly that "you've got to be a father to a girl" ("Soliloquy"). Determined to provide financially for his future child, whatever the means, Billy decides to be Jigger's accomplice. The whole town leaves for the clambake. Billy, who had earlier refused to go, agrees to join in, to Julie's delight, as he realizes that being seen at the clambake is integral to his and Jigger's alibi ("Act I Finale"). Act 2 Everyone reminisces about the huge meal and much fun ("This Was a Real Nice Clambake"). Jigger tries to seduce Carrie; Enoch walks in at the wrong moment, and declares that he is finished with her ("Geraniums In the Winder"), as Jigger jeers ("There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman"). The girls try to comfort Carrie, but for Julie all that matters is that "he's your feller and you love him" ("What's the Use of Wond'rin'?"). Julie sees Billy trying to sneak away with Jigger and, trying to stop him, feels the knife hidden in his shirt. She begs him to give it to her, but he refuses and leaves to commit the robbery. As they wait, Jigger and Billy gamble with cards. They stake their shares of the anticipated robbery spoils. Billy loses: his participation is now pointless. Unknown to Billy and Jigger, Mr. Bascombe, the intended victim, has already deposited the mill's money. The robbery fails: Bascombe pulls a gun on Billy while Jigger escapes. Billy stabs himself with his knife; Julie arrives just in time for him to say his last words to her and die. Julie strokes his hair, finally able to tell him that she loved him. Carrie and Enoch, reunited by the crisis, attempt to console Julie; Nettie arrives and gives Julie the resolve to keep going despite her despair ("You'll Never Walk Alone"). Billy's defiant spirit ("The Highest Judge of All") is taken Up There to see the Starkeeper, a heavenly official. The Starkeeper tells Billy that the good he did in life was not enough to get into heaven, but so long as there is a person alive who remembers him, he can return for a day to try to do good to redeem himself. He informs Billy that fifteen years have passed on Earth since his suicide, and suggests that Billy can get himself into heaven if he helps his daughter, Louise. He helps Billy look down from heaven to see her (instrumental ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey"). Louise has grown up to be lonely and bitter. The local children ostracize her because her father was a thief and a wife-beater. In the dance, a young ruffian, much like her father at that age, flirts with her and abandons her as too young. The dance concludes, and Billy is anxious to return to Earth and help his daughter. He steals a star to take with him, as the Starkeeper pretends not to notice. Outside Julie's cottage, Carrie describes her visit to New York with the now-wealthy Enoch. Carrie's husband and their many children enter to fetch her—the family must get ready for the high school graduation later that day. Enoch Jr., the oldest son, remains behind to talk with Louise, as Billy and the Heavenly Friend escorting him enter, invisible to the other characters. Louise confides in Enoch Jr. that she plans to run away from home with an acting troupe. He says that he will stop her by marrying her, but that his father will think her an unsuitable match. Louise is outraged: each insults the other's father, and Louise orders Enoch Jr. to go away. Billy, able to make himself visible at will, reveals himself to the sobbing Louise, pretending to be a friend of her father. He offers her a gift—the star he stole from heaven. She refuses it and, frustrated, he slaps her hand. He makes himself invisible, and Louise tells Julie what happened, stating that the slap miraculously felt like a kiss, not a blow—and Julie understands her perfectly. Louise retreats to the house, as Julie notices the star that Billy dropped; she picks it up and seems to feel Billy's presence ("If I Loved You (Reprise)"). Billy invisibly attends Louise's graduation, hoping for one last chance to help his daughter and redeem himself. The beloved town physician, Dr. Seldon (who resembles the Starkeeper) advises the graduating class not to rely on their parents' success or be held back by their failure (words directed at Louise). Seldon prompts everyone to sing an old song, "You'll Never Walk Alone". Billy, still invisible, whispers to Louise, telling her to believe Seldon's words, and when she tentatively reaches out to another girl, she learns she does not have to be an outcast. Billy goes to Julie, telling her at last that he loved her. As his widow and daughter join in the singing, Billy is taken to his heavenly reward. Principal roles and notable performers ° denotes original Broadway cast Musical numbers Act I"List of Songs", Carousel at the IBDB Database. Retrieved July 18, 2012 "The Carousel Waltz" – Orchestra "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan" – Carrie Pipperidge and Julie Jordan "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" – Carrie "If I Loved You" – Billy Bigelow and Julie "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" – Nettie Fowler and Chorus "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" (reprise) – Carrie, Enoch Snow and Female Chorus "When the Children Are Asleep" – Enoch and Carrie "Blow High, Blow Low" – Jigger Craigin, Billy and Male Chorus "Soliloquy" – BillyAct II "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" – Carrie, Nettie, Julie, Enoch and Chorus "Geraniums in the Winder" – Enoch * "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" – Jigger and Chorus "What's the Use of Wond'rin'?" – Julie "You'll Never Walk Alone" – Nettie "The Highest Judge of All" – Billy Ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey" – Orchestra "If I Loved You" (reprise) – Billy Finale: "You'll Never Walk Alone" (reprise) – Company Productions Early productions The original Broadway production opened at the Majestic Theatre on April 19, 1945. The dress rehearsal the day before had gone badly, and the pair feared the new work would not be well received. One successful last-minute change was to have de Mille choreograph the pantomime. The movement of the carnival crowd in the pantomime had been entrusted to Mamoulian, and his version was not working. Rodgers had injured his back the previous week, and he watched the opening from a stretcher propped in a box behind the curtain. Sedated with morphine, he could see only part of the stage. As he could not hear the audience's applause and laughter, he assumed the show was a failure. It was not until friends congratulated him later that evening that he realized that the curtain had been met by wild applause. Bambi Linn, who played Louise, was so enthusiastically received by the audience during her ballet that she was forced to break character, when she next appeared, and bow. Rodgers' daughter Mary caught sight of her friend, Stephen Sondheim, both teenagers then, across several rows; both had eyes wet with tears. The original production ran for 890 performances, closing on May 24, 1947. The original cast included John Raitt (Billy), Jan Clayton (Julie), Jean Darling (Carrie), Eric Mattson (Enoch Snow), Christine Johnson (Nettie Fowler), Murvyn Vye (Jigger), Bambi Linn (Louise) and Russell Collins (Starkeeper). In December 1945, Clayton left to star in the Broadway revival of Show Boat and was replaced by Iva Withers; Raitt was replaced by Henry Michel in January 1947; Darling was replaced by Margot Moser.Hischak, p. 62 After closing on Broadway, the show went on a national tour for two years. It played for five months in Chicago alone, visited twenty states and two Canadian cities, covered and played to nearly two million people. The touring company had a four-week run at New York City Center in January 1949. Following the City Center run, the show was moved back to the Majestic Theatre in the hopes of filling the theatre until South Pacific opened in early April. However, ticket sales were mediocre, and the show closed almost a month early. The musical premiered in the West End, London, at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on June 7, 1950. The production was restaged by Jerome Whyte, with a cast that included Stephen Douglass (Billy), Iva Withers (Julie) and Margot Moser (Carrie). Carousel ran in London for 566 performances, remaining there for over a year and a half. Subsequent productions Carousel was revived in 1954 and 1957 at City Center, presented by the New York City Center Light Opera Company. Both times, the production featured Barbara Cook, though she played Carrie in 1954 and Julie in 1957 (playing alongside Howard Keel as Billy). The production was then taken to Belgium to be performed at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair, with David Atkinson as Billy, Ruth Kobart as Nettie, and Clayton reprising the role of Julie, which she had originated. In August 1965, Rodgers and the Music Theater of Lincoln Center produced Carousel for 47 performances. John Raitt reprised the role of Billy, with Jerry Orbach as Jigger and Reid Shelton as Enoch Snow. The roles of the Starkeeper and Dr. Seldon were played by Edward Everett Horton in his final stage appearance. The following year, New York City Center Light Opera Company brought Carousel back to City Center for 22 performances, with Bruce Yarnell as Billy and Constance Towers as Julie. Nicholas Hytner directed a new production of Carousel in 1992, at London's Royal National Theatre, with choreography by Sir Kenneth MacMillan and designs by Bob Crowley. In this staging, the story begins at the mill, where Julie and Carrie work, with the music slowed down to emphasize the drudgery. After work ends, they move to the shipyards and then to the carnival. As they proceed on a revolving stage, carnival characters appear, and at last the carousel is assembled onstage for the girls to ride.Block, p. 175 Louise is seduced by the ruffian boy during her Act 2 ballet, set around the ruins of a carousel. Michael Hayden played Billy not as a large, gruff man, but as a frustrated smaller one, a time bomb waiting to explode. Hayden, Joanna Riding (Julie) and Janie Dee (Carrie) all won Olivier Awards for their performances. Patricia Routledge played Nettie. Enoch and Carrie were cast as an interracial couple whose eight children, according to the review in The New York Times, looked like "a walking United Colors of Benetton ad". Clive Rowe, as Enoch, was nominated for an Olivier Award. The production's limited run from December 1992 through March 1993 was a sellout. It re-opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London in September 1993, presented by Cameron Mackintosh, where it continued until May 1994. The Hytner production moved to New York's Vivian Beaumont Theater, where it opened on March 24, 1994, and ran for 322 performances. This won five Tony Awards, including best musical revival, as well as awards for Hytner, MacMillan, Crowley and Audra McDonald (as Carrie). The cast also included Sally Murphy as Julie, Shirley Verrett as Nettie, Fisher Stevens as Jigger and Eddie Korbich as Enoch. One change made from the London to the New York production was to have Billy strike Louise across the face, rather than on the hand. According to Hayden, "He does the one unpardonable thing, the thing we can't forgive. It's a challenge for the audience to like him after that." The Hytner Carousel was presented in Japan in May 1995. A U.S. national tour with a scaled-down production began in February 1996 in Houston and closed in May 1997 in Providence, Rhode Island. Producers sought to feature young talent on the tour, with Patrick Wilson as Billy and Sarah Uriarte Berry, and later Jennifer Laura Thompson, as Julie. A revival opened at London's Savoy Theatre on December 2, 2008, after a week of previews, starring Jeremiah James (Billy), Alexandra Silber (Julie) and Lesley Garrett (Nettie). The production received warm to mixed reviews. It closed in June 2009, a month early. Michael Coveney, writing in The Independent, admired Rodgers' music but stated, "Lindsay Posner's efficient revival doesn't hold a candle to the National Theatre 1992 version". A production at Theater Basel, Switzerland, in 2016 to 2017, with German dialogue, was directed by Alexander Charim and choreographed by Teresa Rotemberg. Bryony Dwyer, Christian Miedl and Cheryl Studer starred, respectively, as Julie Jordan, Billy Bigelow and Nettie Fowler.<ref>[http://operabase.com/diary.cgi?lang=en&code=wsba&date=20161215 "Richard Rodgers: Carousel"] , Diary: Theater Basel, Operabase.com. Retrieved on March 8, 2018</ref> A semi-staged revival by the English National Opera opened at the London Coliseum in 2017. The production was directed by Lonny Price, conducted by David Charles Abell, and starred Alfie Boe as Billy, Katherine Jenkins as Julie and Nicholas Lyndhurst as the Starkeeper. The production received mixed to positive reviews. The third Broadway revival began previews in February 2018 at the Imperial Theatre and officially opened on April 12. It closed on September 16, 2018. The production starred Jessie Mueller, Joshua Henry, Renée Fleming, Lindsay Mendez and Alexander Gemignani. The production was directed by Jack O'Brien and choreographed by Justin Peck. The songs "Geraniums in the Winder" and "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" were cut from this revival. Ben Brantley wrote in The New York Times, "The tragic inevitability of Carousel has seldom come across as warmly or as chillingly as it does in this vividly reimagined revival. ... [W]ith thoughtful and powerful performances by Mr. Henry and Ms. Mueller, the love story at the show's center has never seemed quite as ill-starred or, at the same time, as sexy. ... [T]he Starkeeper ... assumes new visibility throughout, taking on the role of Billy's angelic supervisor." Brantley strongly praised the choreography, all the performances and the designers. He was unconvinced, however, by the "mother-daughter dialogue that falls so abrasively on contemporary ears", where Julie tries to justify loving an abusive man, and other scenes in Act 2, particularly those set in heaven, and the optimism of the final scene. Most of the reviewers agreed that while the choreography and performances (especially the singing) were excellent, characterizing the production as sexy and sumptuous, O'Brien's direction did little to help the show deal with modern sensibilities about men's treatment of women, instead indulging in nostalgia. From July to September 2021 the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre in London is presenting a staging by its artistic director Timothy Sheader, with choreography by Drew McOnie. The cast includes Carly Bawden as Julie, Declan Bennett as Billy and Joanna Riding as Nettie. Film, television and concert versions [[File:Boothbay Harbor in Summer.jpg\|thumb\|upright=1.2\|Boothbay Harbor, Maine, where the location shots for Carousels movie version were filmed]] A film version of the musical was made in 1956, starring Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones. It follows the musical's story fairly closely, although a prologue, set in the Starkeeper's heaven, was added. The film was released only a few months after the release of the film version of Oklahoma! It garnered some good reviews, and the soundtrack recording was a best seller. As the same stars appeared in both pictures, however, the two films were often compared, generally to the disadvantage of Carousel. Thomas Hischak, in The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, later wondered "if the smaller number of Carousel stage revivals is the product of this often-lumbering [film] musical". There was also an abridged (100 minute) 1967 network television version that starred Robert Goulet, with choreography by Edward Villella. The New York Philharmonic presented a staged concert version of the musical from February 28 to March 2, 2013, at Avery Fisher Hall. Kelli O'Hara played Julie, with Nathan Gunn as Billy, Stephanie Blythe as Nettie, Jessie Mueller as Carrie, Jason Danieley as Enoch, Shuler Hensley as Jigger, John Cullum as the Starkeeper, and Kate Burton as Mrs. Mullin. Tiler Peck danced the role of Louise to choreography by Warren Carlyle. The production was directed by John Rando and conducted by Rob Fisher. Charles Isherwood of The New York Times wrote, "this is as gorgeously sung a production of this sublime 1945 Broadway musical as you are ever likely to hear." It was broadcast as part of the PBS Live from Lincoln Center series, premiering on April 26, 2013. Music and recordings Musical treatment Rodgers designed Carousel to be an almost continuous stream of music, especially in Act 1. In later years, Rodgers was asked if he had considered writing an opera. He stated that he had been sorely tempted to, but saw Carousel in operatic terms. He remembered, "We came very close to opera in the Majestic Theatre. ... There's much that is operatic in the music." Rodgers uses music in Carousel in subtle ways to differentiate characters and tell the audience of their emotional state. In "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan", the music for the placid Carrie is characterized by even eighth-note rhythms, whereas the emotionally restless Julie's music is marked by dotted eighths and sixteenths; this rhythm will characterize her throughout the show. When Billy whistles a snatch of the song, he selects Julie's dotted notes rather than Carrie's. Reflecting the close association in the music between Julie and the as-yet unborn Louise, when Billy sings in "Soliloquy" of his daughter, who "gets hungry every night", he uses Julie's dotted rhythms. Such rhythms also characterize Julie's Act 2 song, "What's the Use of Wond'rin'". The stable love between Enoch and Carrie is strengthened by her willingness to let Enoch not only plan his entire life, but hers as well. This is reflected in "When the Children Are Asleep", where the two sing in close harmony, but Enoch musically interrupts his intended's turn at the chorus with the words "Dreams that won't be interrupted". Rodgers biographer Geoffrey Block, in his book on the Broadway musical, points out that though Billy may strike his wife, he allows her musical themes to become a part of him and never interrupts her music. Block suggests that, as reprehensible as Billy may be for his actions, Enoch requiring Carrie to act as "the little woman", and his having nine children with her (more than she had found acceptable in "When the Children are Asleep") can be considered to be even more abusive. The twelve-minute "bench scene", in which Billy and Julie get to know each other and which culminates with "If I Loved You", according to Hischak, "is considered the most completely integrated piece of music-drama in the American musical theatre". The scene is almost entirely drawn from Molnár and is one extended musical piece; Stephen Sondheim described it as "probably the single most important moment in the revolution of contemporary musicals". "If I Loved You" has been recorded many times, by such diverse artists as Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Sammy Davis Jr., Mario Lanza and Chad and Jeremy. The D-flat major theme that dominates the music for the second act ballet seems like a new melody to many audience members. It is, however, a greatly expanded development of a theme heard during "Soliloquy" at the line "I guess he'll call me 'The old man' ". When the pair discussed the song that would become "Soliloquy", Rodgers improvised at the piano to give Hammerstein an idea of how he envisioned the song. When Hammerstein presented his collaborator with the lyrics after two weeks of work (Hammerstein always wrote the words first, then Rodgers would write the melodies), Rodgers wrote the music for the eight-minute song in two hours. "What's the Use of Wond'rin' ", one of Julie's songs, worked well in the show but was never as popular on the radio or for recording, and Hammerstein believed that the lack of popularity was because he had concluded the final line, "And all the rest is talk" with a hard consonant, which does not allow the singer a vocal climax. Irving Berlin later stated that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had the same sort of effect on him as the 23rd Psalm. When singer Mel Tormé told Rodgers that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had made him cry, Rodgers nodded impatiently. "You're supposed to." The frequently recorded song has become a widely accepted hymn.Rodgers, p. 240 The cast recording of Carousel proved popular in Liverpool, like many Broadway albums, and in 1963, the Brian Epstein-managed band, Gerry and the Pacemakers had a number-one hit with the song. At the time, the top ten hits were played before Liverpool F.C. home matches; even after "You'll Never Walk Alone" dropped out of the top ten, fans continued to sing it, and it has become closely associated with the soccer team and the city of Liverpool. A BBC program, Soul Music, ranked it alongside "Silent Night" and "Abide With Me" in terms of its emotional impact and iconic status. Recordings The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut—as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made.Fick, David. "The Best Carousel Recording", June 11, 2009. Retrieved on April 7, 2016 A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousels songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. Critical reception and legacy The musical received almost unanimous rave reviews after its opening in 1945. According to Hischak, reviews were not as exuberant as for Oklahoma! as the critics were not taken by surprise this time. John Chapman of the Daily News termed it "one of the finest musical plays I have ever seen and I shall remember it always". The New York Times's reviewer, Lewis Nichols, stated that "Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein 2d, who can do no wrong, have continued doing no wrong in adapting Liliom into a musical play. Their Carousel is on the whole delightful." Wilella Waldorf of the New York Post, however, complained, "Carousel seemed to us a rather long evening. The Oklahoma! formula is becoming a bit monotonous and so are Miss de Mille's ballets. All right, go ahead and shoot!"Suskin, Steven. Opening Night on Broadway. Schirmer Trade Books, 1990, p. 147. . Dance Magazine gave Linn plaudits for her role as Louise, stating, "Bambi doesn't come on until twenty minutes before eleven, and for the next forty minutes, she practically holds the audience in her hand". Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune also applauded the dancing: "It has waited for Miss de Mille to come through with peculiarly American dance patterns for a musical show to become as much a dance as a song show." When the musical returned to New York in 1949, The New York Times reviewer Brooks Atkinson described Carousel as "a conspicuously superior musical play ... Carousel, which was warmly appreciated when it opened, seems like nothing less than a masterpiece now." In 1954, when Carousel was revived at City Center, Atkinson discussed the musical in his review: Carousel has no comment to make on anything of topical importance. The theme is timeless and universal: the devotion of two people who love each other through thick and thin, complicated in this case by the wayward personality of the man, who cannot fulfill the responsibilities he has assumed. ... Billy is a bum, but Carousel recognizes the decency of his motives and admires his independence. There are no slick solutions in Carousel. Stephen Sondheim noted the duo's ability to take the innovations of Oklahoma! and apply them to a serious setting: "Oklahoma! is about a picnic, Carousel is about life and death." Critic Eric Bentley, on the other hand, wrote that "the last scene of Carousel is an impertinence: I refuse to be lectured to by a musical comedy scriptwriter on the education of children, the nature of the good life, and the contribution of the American small town to the salvation of souls."New York Times critic Frank Rich said of the 1992 London production: "What is remarkable about Mr. Hytner's direction, aside from its unorthodox faith in the virtues of simplicity and stillness, is its ability to make a 1992 audience believe in Hammerstein's vision of redemption, which has it that a dead sinner can return to Earth to do godly good." The Hytner production in New York was hailed by many critics as a grittier Carousel, which they deemed more appropriate for the 1990s. Clive Barnes of the New York Post called it a "defining Carousel—hard-nosed, imaginative, and exciting." Critic Michael Billington has commented that "lyrically [Carousel] comes perilously close to acceptance of the inevitability of domestic violence." BroadwayWorld.com stated in 2013 that Carousel is now "considered somewhat controversial in terms of its attitudes on domestic violence" because Julie chooses to stay with Billy despite the abuse; actress Kelli O'Hara noted that the domestic violence that Julie "chooses to deal with – is a real, existing and very complicated thing. And exploring it is an important part of healing it." Rodgers considered Carousel his favorite of all his musicals and wrote, "it affects me deeply every time I see it performed". In 1999, Time magazine, in its "Best of the Century" list, named Carousel the Best Musical of the 20th century, writing that Rodgers and Hammerstein "set the standards for the 20th century musical, and this show features their most beautiful score and the most skillful and affecting example of their musical storytelling". Hammerstein's grandson, Oscar Andrew Hammerstein, in his book about his family, suggested that the wartime situation made Carousel's ending especially poignant to its original viewers, "Every American grieved the loss of a brother, son, father, or friend ... the audience empathized with [Billy's] all-too-human efforts to offer advice, to seek forgiveness, to complete an unfinished life, and to bid a proper good-bye from beyond the grave." Author and composer Ethan Mordden agreed with that perspective: If Oklahoma! developed the moral argument for sending American boys overseas, Carousel offered consolation to those wives and mothers whose boys would only return in spirit. The meaning lay not in the tragedy of the present, but in the hope for a future where no one walks alone. Awards and nominations Original 1945 Broadway productionNote: The Tony Awards were not established until 1947, and so Carousel was not eligible to win any Tonys at its premiere. 1957 revival 1992 London revival 1994 Broadway revival 2018 Broadway revival References Bibliography Block, Geoffrey. Enchanted Evenings: The Broadway Musical from Show Boat to Sondheim. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2004. . Block, Geoffrey (ed.) The Richard Rodgers Reader. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2006. . Bradley, Ian. You've Got to Have a Dream: The Message of the Broadway Musical. Louisville, Ky., Westminster John Knox Press, 2005. 978-0-664-22854-5. Easton, Carol. No Intermission: The Life of Agnes DeMille. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 2000 (1st DaCapo Press edition). . Fordin, Hugh. Getting to Know Him: A Biography of Oscar Hammerstein II. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 1995 reprint of 1986 edition. . Hammerstein, Oscar Andrew. The Hammersteins: A Musical Theatre Family. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 2010. . Hischak, Thomas S. The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2007. . Hyland, William G. Richard Rodgers. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1998. . Molnár, Ferenc. Liliom: A Legend in Seven Scenes and a Prologue. New York: Boni and Liveright, 1921. Mordden, Ethan. "Rodgers & Hammerstein". New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1992. . Nolan, Frederick. The Sound of Their Music: The Story of Rodgers and Hammerstein. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2002. . Rodgers, Richard. Musical Stages: An Autobiography. Jefferson, N.C. Da Capo Press, 2002 reprint of 1975 edition. . Secrest, Meryle. Somewhere for Me: A Biography of Richard Rodgers. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2001. . External links Carousel at guidetomusicaltheatre.com Carousel info page on StageAgent.com – Carousel plot summary and character descriptions (1967 TV adaptation) 1945 musicals Broadway musicals Musicals by Rodgers and Hammerstein West End musicals Musicals based on plays Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients Maine in fiction Fiction set in 1873 Fiction about the afterlife Plays set in Maine Plays set in the 19th century Tony Award-winning musicals	false	[ "I Love to Sing the Songs I Sing is the self-produced ninth album by American R&B singer Barry White, released in 1979 on the 20th Century-Fox Records label.\n\nI Love to Sing the Songs I Sing fulfilled White's 20th Century-Fox Records contract. White was increasingly dissatisfied with that label's management when Russ Regan left the label to form Millennium Records and felt that he was being ignored in terms of promotion at the time. He then left the company and signed a custom label contract with CBS Records to release future material under his own Unlimited Gold imprint. White's first album on his new label, The Message Is Love, was released seven months and six days after I Love to Sing the Songs I Sing. With attention and interest focused on his well-publicized CBS deal, I Love to Sing the Songs I Sing passed by largely unnoticed. It was the least successful album of his 20th Century career, only reaching #40 on the R&B chart, which six of his eight previous albums had topped. None of the single releases made any impact either.\n\nTrack listing \n \"I Love to Sing the Songs I Sing\" (Barry White, Paul Politi, Frank Wilson) - 2:50\n \"Girl, What's Your Name\" (White, Danny Pearson, Wilson) - 4:08\n \"Once Upon a Time (You Were a Friend of Mine)\" (Rahn Coleman) - 6:01\n \"Oh Me, Oh My (I'm Such a Lucky Guy)\" (White, Wilson, Politi, Raymond Cooksey) - 5:04\n \"I Can't Leave You Alone\" (White, Tony Sepe, Wilson) - 3:25\n \"Call Me Baby\" (Coleman) - 8:04\n \"How Did You Know It Was Me?\" (Coleman) - 6:47\n\nPersonnel\nBarry White - lead vocals, arranger\nJohn Roberts, Ronald Coleman - orchestration \nTechnical\nFrank Kejmar, Paul Elmore - engineer\nGlen Christensen - art direction, design\n\nSingles \n \"I Love to Sing the Songs I Sing\" (US R&B #53)\n \"How Did You Know It Was Me?\" (US R&B #64)\n\nReferences\n\nBarry White albums\n1979 albums\n20th Century Fox Records albums", "Sarah Vaughan Sings George Gershwin is a 1958 studio album by Sarah Vaughan, of the music of George Gershwin.\n\nVaughan would release another all-Gershwin album, Gershwin Live!, in 1982.\n\nTrack listing\n \"Isn't It a Pity?\" – 3:53\n \"Of Thee I Sing\" – 3:10\n \"I'll Build a Stairway to Paradise\" (Buddy De Sylva, George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin) – 2:39\n \"Someone to Watch over Me\" – 3:58\n \"Bidin' My Time\" – 3:01\n \"The Man I Love\" – 3:34\n \"How Long Has This Been Going On?\" – 3:58\n \"My One and Only (What Am I Gonna Do?)\" – 3:13\n \"Lorelei\" – 2:32\n \"I've Got a Crush on You\" – 4:00\n \"Summertime\" (G. Gershwin, I. Gershwin, DuBose Heyward) – 2:51\n \"Aren't You Kinda Glad We Did?\" – 3:27\n \"They All Laughed\" – 2:23\n \"Looking For a Boy\" – 3:38\n \"He Loves and She Loves\" – 3:24\n \"My Man's Gone Now\" (G. Gershwin, I. Gershwin, Heyward) – 4:22\n \"I Won't Say I Will\" (DeSylva, G. Gershwin, I. Gershwin) – 3:24\n \"A Foggy Day\" – 3:24\n \"Let's Call the Whole Thing Off\" – 2:22\n \"Things Are Looking Up\" – 3:33\n \"Do It Again\" (DeSylva, I. Gershwin) – 3:13\n \"Love Walked In\" – 3:06\n 1999 Cd reissue bonus tracks not included on the original 1958 release:\n \"Of Thee I Sing\" – 3:23\n \"Summertime\" \t\n \"Things Are Looking Up\" – 3:21\n \"I Won't Say I Will\" (Buddy DeSylva, G. Gershwin, I. Gershwin) – 0:18\n \"I Won't Say I Will\" – 3:21\n \"I Won't Say I Will\" – 1:21\n \"I Won't Say I Will\" – 2:50\n \"I Won't Say I Will\" – 7:49\n \"Of Thee I Sing\" – 1:35\n \"Of Thee I Sing\" – 2:25\n \"Of Thee I Sing\" – 2:16\n \"Of Thee I Sing\" – 4:02\n \"My One and Only (What Am I Gonna Do?)\" – 1:47\n \"My One and Only (What Am I Gonna Do?)\" – 3:11\n \"My One and Only (What Am I Gonna Do?)\" – 4:34\n\nAll songs composed by George Gershwin with lyrics by Ira Gershwin, unless otherwise indicated.\n\nPersonnel \n Sarah Vaughan – vocals\n Hal Mooney – arranger\n\nReferences\n\n1958 albums\nSarah Vaughan albums\nAlbums arranged by Hal Mooney\nEmArcy Records albums\nAlbums produced by Bob Shad" ]
[ "Carousel (musical)", "Musical treatment", "What was important with Carousel?", "The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s,", "What kind of music was used?", "The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars,", "How was music incorporated into the production?", "the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format,", "What songs did they sing?", "I don't know." ]	C_8decf249a7ee4c6bb84aa0f61f4f4d6c_0	What songs were in the production?	5	What songs were in the production of the musical Carousel?	Carousel (musical)	The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut--as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made. A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousel's songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. CANNOTANSWER	there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording,	Carousel is the second musical by the team of Richard Rodgers (music) and Oscar Hammerstein II (book and lyrics). The 1945 work was adapted from Ferenc Molnár's 1909 play Liliom, transplanting its Budapest setting to the Maine coastline. The story revolves around carousel barker Billy Bigelow, whose romance with millworker Julie Jordan comes at the price of both their jobs. He participates in a robbery to provide for Julie and their unborn child; after it goes tragically wrong, he is given a chance to make things right. A secondary plot line deals with millworker Carrie Pipperidge and her romance with ambitious fisherman Enoch Snow. The show includes the well-known songs "If I Loved You", "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" and "You'll Never Walk Alone". Richard Rodgers later wrote that Carousel was his favorite of all his musicals. Following the spectacular success of the first Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Oklahoma! (1943), the pair sought to collaborate on another piece, knowing that any resulting work would be compared with Oklahoma!, most likely unfavorably. They were initially reluctant to seek the rights to Liliom; Molnár had refused permission for the work to be adapted in the past, and the original ending was considered too depressing for the musical theatre. After acquiring the rights, the team created a work with lengthy sequences of music and made the ending more hopeful. The musical required considerable modification during out-of-town tryouts, but once it opened on Broadway on April 19, 1945, it was an immediate hit with both critics and audiences. Carousel initially ran for 890 performances and duplicated its success in the West End in 1950. Though it has never achieved as much commercial success as Oklahoma!, the piece has been repeatedly revived, recorded several times and was filmed in 1956. A production by Nicholas Hytner enjoyed success in 1992 in London, in 1994 in New York and on tour. Another Broadway revival opened in 2018. In 1999, Time magazine named Carousel the best musical of the 20th century. Background Liliom Ferenc Molnár's Hungarian-language drama, Liliom, premiered in Budapest in 1909. The audience was puzzled by the work, and it lasted only thirty-odd performances before being withdrawn, the first shadow on Molnár's successful career as a playwright. Liliom was not presented again until after World War I. When it reappeared on the Budapest stage, it was a tremendous hit. Except for the ending, the plots of Liliom and Carousel are very similar. Andreas Zavocky (nicknamed Liliom, the Hungarian word for "lily", a slang term for "tough guy"), a carnival barker, falls in love with Julie Zeller, a servant girl, and they begin living together. With both discharged from their jobs, Liliom is discontented and contemplates leaving Julie, but decides not to do so on learning that she is pregnant. A subplot involves Julie's friend Marie, who has fallen in love with Wolf Biefeld, a hotel porter—after the two marry, he becomes the owner of the hotel. Desperate to make money so that he, Julie and their child can escape to America and a better life, Liliom conspires with lowlife Ficsur to commit a robbery, but it goes badly, and Liliom stabs himself. He dies, and his spirit is taken to heaven's police court. As Ficsur suggested while the two waited to commit the crime, would-be robbers like them do not come before God Himself. Liliom is told by the magistrate that he may go back to Earth for one day to attempt to redeem the wrongs he has done to his family, but must first spend sixteen years in a fiery purgatory. On his return to Earth, Liliom encounters his daughter, Louise, who like her mother is now a factory worker. Saying that he knew her father, he tries to give her a star he stole from the heavens. When Louise refuses to take it, he strikes her. Not realizing who he is, Julie confronts him, but finds herself unable to be angry with him. Liliom is ushered off to his fate, presumably Hell, and Louise asks her mother if it is possible to feel a hard slap as if it was a kiss. Julie reminiscently tells her daughter that it is very possible for that to happen. An English translation of Liliom was credited to Benjamin "Barney" Glazer, though there is a story that the actual translator, uncredited, was Rodgers' first major partner Lorenz Hart. The Theatre Guild presented it in New York City in 1921, with Joseph Schildkraut as Liliom, and the play was a success, running 300 performances. A 1940 revival with Burgess Meredith and Ingrid Bergman was seen by both Hammerstein and Rodgers. Glazer, in introducing the English translation of Liliom, wrote of the play's appeal: And where in modern dramatic literature can such pearls be matched—Julie incoherently confessing to her dead lover the love she had always been ashamed to tell; Liliom crying out to the distant carousel the glad news that he is to be a father; the two thieves gambling for the spoils of their prospective robbery; Marie and Wolf posing for their portrait while the broken-hearted Julie stands looking after the vanishing Liliom, the thieves' song ringing in her ears; the two policemen grousing about pay and pensions while Liliom lies bleeding to death; Liliom furtively proffering his daughter the star he has stolen for her in heaven. ... The temptation to count the whole scintillating string is difficult to resist. Inception In the 1920s and 1930s, Rodgers and Hammerstein both became well known for creating Broadway hits with other partners. Rodgers, with Lorenz Hart, had produced a string of over two dozen musicals, including such popular successes as Babes in Arms (1937), The Boys from Syracuse (1938) and Pal Joey (1940). Some of Rodgers' work with Hart broke new ground in musical theatre: On Your Toes was the first use of ballet to sustain the plot (in the "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue" scene), while Pal Joey flouted Broadway tradition by presenting a knave as its hero. Hammerstein had written or co-written the words for such hits as Rose-Marie (1924), The Desert Song (1926), The New Moon (1927) and Show Boat (1927). Though less productive in the 1930s, he wrote material for musicals and films, sharing an Oscar for his song with Jerome Kern, "The Last Time I Saw Paris", which was included in the 1941 film Lady Be Good. By the early 1940s, Hart had sunk into alcoholism and emotional turmoil, becoming unreliable and prompting Rodgers to approach Hammerstein to ask if he would consider working with him. Hammerstein was eager to do so, and their first collaboration was Oklahoma! (1943). Thomas Hischak states, in his The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, that Oklahoma! is "the single most influential work in the American musical theatre. In fact, the history of the Broadway musical can accurately be divided into what came before Oklahoma! and what came after it." An innovation for its time in integrating song, character, plot and dance, Oklahoma! would serve, according to Hischak, as "the model for Broadway shows for decades", and proved a huge popular and financial success. Once it was well-launched, what to do as an encore was a daunting challenge for the pair. Film producer Samuel Goldwyn saw Oklahoma! and advised Rodgers to shoot himself, which according to Rodgers "was Sam's blunt but funny way of telling me that I'd never create another show as good as Oklahoma!" As they considered new projects, Hammerstein wrote, "We're such fools. No matter what we do, everyone is bound to say, 'This is not another Oklahoma! " Oklahoma! had been a struggle to finance and produce. Hammerstein and Rodgers met weekly in 1943 with Theresa Helburn and Lawrence Langner of the Theatre Guild, producers of the blockbuster musical, who together formed what they termed "the Gloat Club". At one such luncheon, Helburn and Langner proposed to Rodgers and Hammerstein that they turn Molnár's Liliom into a musical. Both men refused—they had no feeling for the Budapest setting and thought that the unhappy ending was unsuitable for musical theatre. In addition, given the unstable wartime political situation, they might need to change the setting from Hungary while in rehearsal. At the next luncheon, Helburn and Langner again proposed Liliom, suggesting that they move the setting to Louisiana and make Liliom a Creole. Rodgers and Hammerstein played with the idea over the next few weeks, but decided that Creole dialect, filled with "zis" and "zose", would sound corny and would make it difficult to write effective lyrics. A breakthrough came when Rodgers, who owned a house in Connecticut, proposed a New England setting. Hammerstein wrote of this suggestion in 1945, I began to see an attractive ensemble—sailors, whalers, girls who worked in the mills up the river, clambakes on near-by islands, an amusement park on the seaboard, things people could do in crowds, people who were strong and alive and lusty, people who had always been depicted on the stage as thin-lipped puritans—a libel I was anxious to refute ... as for the two leading characters, Julie with her courage and inner strength and outward simplicity seemed more indigenous to Maine than to Budapest. Liliom is, of course, an international character, indigenous to nowhere. Rodgers and Hammerstein were also concerned about what they termed "the tunnel" of Molnár's second act—a series of gloomy scenes leading up to Liliom's suicide—followed by a dark ending. They also felt it would be difficult to set Liliom's motivation for the robbery to music. Molnár's opposition to having his works adapted was also an issue; he had famously turned down Giacomo Puccini when the great composer wished to transform Liliom into an opera, stating that he wanted the piece to be remembered as his, not Puccini's. In 1937, Molnár, who had recently emigrated to the United States, had declined another offer from Kurt Weill to adapt the play into a musical. The pair continued to work on the preliminary ideas for a Liliom adaptation while pursuing other projects in late 1943 and early 1944—writing the film musical State Fair and producing I Remember Mama on Broadway. Meanwhile, the Theatre Guild took Molnár to see Oklahoma! Molnár stated that if Rodgers and Hammerstein could adapt Liliom as beautifully as they had modified Green Grow the Lilacs into Oklahoma!, he would be pleased to have them do it. The Guild obtained the rights from Molnár in October 1943. The playwright received one percent of the gross and $2,500 for "personal services". The duo insisted, as part of the contract, that Molnár permit them to make changes in the plot. At first, the playwright refused, but eventually yielded. Hammerstein later stated that if this point had not been won, "we could never have made Carousel." In seeking to establish through song Liliom's motivation for the robbery, Rodgers remembered that he and Hart had a similar problem in Pal Joey. Rodgers and Hart had overcome the problem with a song that Joey sings to himself, "I'm Talking to My Pal". This inspired "Soliloquy". Both partners later told a story that "Soliloquy" was only intended to be a song about Liliom's dreams of a son, but that Rodgers, who had two daughters, insisted that Liliom consider that Julie might have a girl. However, the notes taken at their meeting of December 7, 1943 state: "Mr. Rodgers suggested a fine musical number for the end of the scene where Liliom discovers he is to be a father, in which he sings first with pride of the growth of a boy, and then suddenly realizes it might be a girl and changes completely." Hammerstein and Rodgers returned to the Liliom project in mid-1944. Hammerstein was uneasy as he worked, fearing that no matter what they did, Molnár would disapprove of the results. Green Grow the Lilacs had been a little-known work; Liliom was a theatrical standard. Molnár's text also contained considerable commentary on the Hungarian politics of 1909 and the rigidity of that society. A dismissed carnival barker who hits his wife, attempts a robbery and commits suicide seemed an unlikely central character for a musical comedy. Hammerstein decided to use the words and story to make the audience sympathize with the lovers. He also built up the secondary couple, who are incidental to the plot in Liliom; they became Enoch Snow and Carrie Pipperidge. "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" was repurposed from a song, "A Real Nice Hayride", written for Oklahoma! but not used. Molnár's ending was unsuitable, and after a couple of false starts, Hammerstein conceived the graduation scene that ends the musical. According to Frederick Nolan in his book on the team's works: "From that scene the song "You'll Never Walk Alone" sprang almost naturally." In spite of Hammerstein's simple lyrics for "You'll Never Walk Alone", Rodgers had great difficulty in setting it to music. Rodgers explained his rationale for the changed ending, Liliom was a tragedy about a man who cannot learn to live with other people. The way Molnár wrote it, the man ends up hitting his daughter and then having to go back to purgatory, leaving his daughter helpless and hopeless. We couldn't accept that. The way we ended Carousel it may still be a tragedy but it's a hopeful one because in the final scene it is clear that the child has at last learned how to express herself and communicate with others. When the pair decided to make "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" into an ensemble number, Hammerstein realized he had no idea what a clambake was like, and researched the matter. Based on his initial findings, he wrote the line, "First came codfish chowder". However, further research convinced him the proper term was "codhead chowder", a term unfamiliar to many playgoers. He decided to keep it as "codfish". When the song proceeded to discuss the lobsters consumed at the feast, Hammerstein wrote the line "We slit 'em down the back/And peppered 'em good". He was grieved to hear from a friend that lobsters are always slit down the front. The lyricist sent a researcher to a seafood restaurant and heard back that lobsters are always slit down the back. Hammerstein concluded that there is disagreement about which side of a lobster is the back. One error not caught involved the song "June Is Bustin' Out All Over", in which sheep are depicted as seeking to mate in late spring—they actually do so in the winter. Whenever this was brought to Hammerstein's attention, he told his informant that 1873 was a special year, in which sheep mated in the spring. Rodgers early decided to dispense with an overture, feeling that the music was hard to hear over the banging of seats as latecomers settled themselves. In his autobiography, Rodgers complained that only the brass section can be heard during an overture because there are never enough strings in a musical's small orchestra. He determined to force the audience to concentrate from the beginning by opening with a pantomime scene accompanied by what became known as "The Carousel Waltz". The pantomime paralleled one in the Molnár play, which was also used to introduce the characters and situation to the audience. Author Ethan Mordden described the effectiveness of this opening: Other characters catch our notice—Mr. Bascombe, the pompous mill owner, Mrs. Mullin, the widow who runs the carousel and, apparently, Billy; a dancing bear; an acrobat. But what draws us in is the intensity with which Julie regards Billy—the way she stands frozen, staring at him, while everyone else at the fair is swaying to the rhythm of Billy's spiel. And as Julie and Billy ride together on the swirling carousel, and the stage picture surges with the excitement of the crowd, and the orchestra storms to a climax, and the curtain falls, we realize that R & H have not only skipped the overture and the opening number but the exposition as well. They have plunged into the story, right into the middle of it, in the most intense first scene any musical ever had. Casting and out-of-town tryouts The casting for Carousel began when Oklahoma!s production team, including Rodgers and Hammerstein, was seeking a replacement for the part of Curly (the male lead in Oklahoma!). Lawrence Langner had heard, through a relative, of a California singer named John Raitt, who might be suitable for the part. Langner went to hear Raitt, then urged the others to bring Raitt to New York for an audition. Raitt asked to sing "Largo al factotum", Figaro's aria from The Barber of Seville, to warm up. The warmup was sufficient to convince the producers that not only had they found a Curly, they had found a Liliom (or Billy Bigelow, as the part was renamed). Theresa Helburn made another California discovery, Jan Clayton, a singer/actress who had made a few minor films for MGM. She was brought east and successfully auditioned for the part of Julie. The producers sought to cast unknowns. Though many had played in previous Hammerstein or Rodgers works, only one, Jean Casto (cast as carousel owner Mrs. Mullin, and a veteran of Pal Joey), had ever played on Broadway before. It proved harder to cast the ensemble than the leads, due to the war—Rodgers told his casting director, John Fearnley, that the sole qualification for a dancing boy was that he be alive. Rodgers and Hammerstein reassembled much of the creative team that had made Oklahoma! a success, including director Rouben Mamoulian and choreographer Agnes de Mille. Miles White was the costume designer while Jo Mielziner (who had not worked on Oklahoma!) was the scenic and lighting designer. Even though Oklahoma! orchestrator Russell Bennett had informed Rodgers that he was unavailable to work on Carousel due to a radio contract, Rodgers insisted he do the work in his spare time. He orchestrated "The Carousel Waltz" and "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" before finally being replaced by Don Walker. A new member of the creative team was Trude Rittmann, who arranged the dance music. Rittmann initially felt that Rodgers mistrusted her because she was a woman, and found him difficult to work with, but the two worked together on Rodgers' shows until the 1970s. Rehearsals began in January 1945; either Rodgers or Hammerstein was always present. Raitt was presented with the lyrics for "Soliloquy" on a five-foot long sheet of paper—the piece ran nearly eight minutes. Staging such a long solo number presented problems, and Raitt later stated that he felt that they were never fully addressed. At some point during rehearsals, Molnár came to see what they had done to his play. There are a number of variations on the story.Fordin, pp. 231–32 As Rodgers told it, while watching rehearsals with Hammerstein, the composer spotted Molnár in the rear of the theatre and whispered the news to his partner. Both sweated through an afternoon of rehearsal in which nothing seemed to go right. At the end, the two walked to the back of the theatre, expecting an angry reaction from Molnár. Instead, the playwright said enthusiastically, "What you have done is so beautiful. And you know what I like best? The ending!" Hammerstein wrote that Molnár became a regular attendee at rehearsals after that. Like most of the pair's works, Carousel contains a lengthy ballet, "Billy Makes a Journey", in the second act, as Billy looks down to the Earth from "Up There" and observes his daughter. In the original production the ballet was choreographed by de Mille. It began with Billy looking down from heaven at his wife in labor, with the village women gathered for a "birthing". The ballet involved every character in the play, some of whom spoke lines of dialogue, and contained a number of subplots. The focus was on Louise, played by Bambi Linn, who at first almost soars in her dance, expressing the innocence of childhood. She is teased and mocked by her schoolmates, and Louise becomes attracted to the rough carnival people, who symbolize Billy's world. A youth from the carnival attempts to seduce Louise, as she discovers her own sexuality, but he decides she is more girl than woman, and he leaves her. After Julie comforts her, Louise goes to a children's party, where she is shunned. The carnival people reappear and form a ring around the children's party, with Louise lost between the two groups. At the end, the performers form a huge carousel with their bodies. The play opened for tryouts in New Haven, Connecticut on March 22, 1945. The first act was well-received; the second act was not. Casto recalled that the second act finished about 1:30 a.m. The staff immediately sat down for a two-hour conference. Five scenes, half the ballet, and two songs were cut from the show as the result. John Fearnley commented, "Now I see why these people have hits. I never witnessed anything so brisk and brave in my life." De Mille said of this conference, "not three minutes had been wasted pleading for something cherished. Nor was there any idle joking. ... We cut and cut and cut and then we went to bed." By the time the company left New Haven, de Mille's ballet was down to forty minutes. A major concern with the second act was the effectiveness of the characters He and She (later called by Rodgers "Mr. and Mrs. God"), before whom Billy appeared after his death. Mr. and Mrs. God were depicted as a New England minister and his wife, seen in their parlor.Block (ed.), p. 129. At this time, according to the cast sheet distributed during the Boston run, Dr. Seldon was listed as the "Minister". The couple was still part of the show at the Boston opening. Rodgers said to Hammerstein, "We've got to get God out of that parlor". When Hammerstein inquired where he should put the deity, Rodgers replied, "I don't care where you put Him. Put Him on a ladder for all I care, only get Him out of that parlor!" Hammerstein duly put Mr. God (renamed the Starkeeper) atop a ladder, and Mrs. God was removed from the show. Rodgers biographer Meryle Secrest terms this change a mistake, leading to a more fantastic afterlife, which was later criticized by The New Republic as "a Rotarian atmosphere congenial to audiences who seek not reality but escape from reality, not truth but escape from truth". Hammerstein wrote that Molnár's advice, to combine two scenes into one, was key to pulling together the second act and represented "a more radical departure from the original than any change we had made". A reprise of "If I Loved You" was added in the second act, which Rodgers felt needed more music. Three weeks of tryouts in Boston followed the brief New Haven run, and the audience there gave the musical a warm reception. An even shorter version of the ballet was presented the final two weeks in Boston, but on the final night there, de Mille expanded it back to forty minutes, and it brought the house down, causing both Rodgers and Hammerstein to embrace her. Synopsis Act 1 Two young female millworkers in 1873 Maine visit the town's carousel after work. One of them, Julie Jordan, attracts the attention of the barker, Billy Bigelow ("The Carousel Waltz"). When Julie lets Billy put his arm around her during the ride, Mrs. Mullin, the widowed owner of the carousel, tells Julie never to return. Julie and her friend, Carrie Pipperidge, argue with Mrs. Mullin. Billy arrives and, seeing that Mrs. Mullin is jealous, mocks her; he is fired from his job. Billy, unconcerned, invites Julie to join him for a drink. As he goes to get his belongings, Carrie presses Julie about her feelings toward him, but Julie is evasive ("You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan"). Carrie has a beau too, fisherman Enoch Snow ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow"), to whom she is newly engaged. Billy returns for Julie as the departing Carrie warns that staying out late means the loss of Julie's job. Mr. Bascombe, owner of the mill, happens by along with a policeman, and offers to escort Julie to her home, but she refuses and is fired. Left alone, she and Billy talk about what life might be like if they were in love, but neither quite confesses to the growing attraction they feel for each other ("If I Loved You"). Over a month passes, and preparations for the summer clambake are under way ("June Is Bustin' Out All Over"). Julie and Billy, now married, live at Julie's cousin Nettie's spa. Julie confides in Carrie that Billy, frustrated over being unemployed, hit her. Carrie has happier news—she is engaged to Enoch, who enters as she discusses him ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow (reprise))". Billy arrives with his ne'er-do-well whaler friend, Jigger. The former barker is openly rude to Enoch and Julie, then leaves with Jigger, followed by a distraught Julie. Enoch tells Carrie that he expects to become rich selling herring and to have a large family, larger perhaps than Carrie is comfortable having ("When the Children Are Asleep"). Jigger and his shipmates, joined by Billy, then sing about life on the sea ("Blow High, Blow Low"). The whaler tries to recruit Billy to help with a robbery, but Billy declines, as the victim—Julie's former boss, Mr. Bascombe—might have to be killed. Mrs. Mullin enters and tries to tempt Billy back to the carousel (and to her). He would have to abandon Julie; a married barker cannot evoke the same sexual tension as one who is single. Billy reluctantly mulls it over as Julie arrives and the others leave. She tells him that she is pregnant, and Billy is overwhelmed with happiness, ending all thoughts of returning to the carousel. Once alone, Billy imagines the fun he will have with Bill Jr.—until he realizes that his child might be a girl, and reflects soberly that "you've got to be a father to a girl" ("Soliloquy"). Determined to provide financially for his future child, whatever the means, Billy decides to be Jigger's accomplice. The whole town leaves for the clambake. Billy, who had earlier refused to go, agrees to join in, to Julie's delight, as he realizes that being seen at the clambake is integral to his and Jigger's alibi ("Act I Finale"). Act 2 Everyone reminisces about the huge meal and much fun ("This Was a Real Nice Clambake"). Jigger tries to seduce Carrie; Enoch walks in at the wrong moment, and declares that he is finished with her ("Geraniums In the Winder"), as Jigger jeers ("There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman"). The girls try to comfort Carrie, but for Julie all that matters is that "he's your feller and you love him" ("What's the Use of Wond'rin'?"). Julie sees Billy trying to sneak away with Jigger and, trying to stop him, feels the knife hidden in his shirt. She begs him to give it to her, but he refuses and leaves to commit the robbery. As they wait, Jigger and Billy gamble with cards. They stake their shares of the anticipated robbery spoils. Billy loses: his participation is now pointless. Unknown to Billy and Jigger, Mr. Bascombe, the intended victim, has already deposited the mill's money. The robbery fails: Bascombe pulls a gun on Billy while Jigger escapes. Billy stabs himself with his knife; Julie arrives just in time for him to say his last words to her and die. Julie strokes his hair, finally able to tell him that she loved him. Carrie and Enoch, reunited by the crisis, attempt to console Julie; Nettie arrives and gives Julie the resolve to keep going despite her despair ("You'll Never Walk Alone"). Billy's defiant spirit ("The Highest Judge of All") is taken Up There to see the Starkeeper, a heavenly official. The Starkeeper tells Billy that the good he did in life was not enough to get into heaven, but so long as there is a person alive who remembers him, he can return for a day to try to do good to redeem himself. He informs Billy that fifteen years have passed on Earth since his suicide, and suggests that Billy can get himself into heaven if he helps his daughter, Louise. He helps Billy look down from heaven to see her (instrumental ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey"). Louise has grown up to be lonely and bitter. The local children ostracize her because her father was a thief and a wife-beater. In the dance, a young ruffian, much like her father at that age, flirts with her and abandons her as too young. The dance concludes, and Billy is anxious to return to Earth and help his daughter. He steals a star to take with him, as the Starkeeper pretends not to notice. Outside Julie's cottage, Carrie describes her visit to New York with the now-wealthy Enoch. Carrie's husband and their many children enter to fetch her—the family must get ready for the high school graduation later that day. Enoch Jr., the oldest son, remains behind to talk with Louise, as Billy and the Heavenly Friend escorting him enter, invisible to the other characters. Louise confides in Enoch Jr. that she plans to run away from home with an acting troupe. He says that he will stop her by marrying her, but that his father will think her an unsuitable match. Louise is outraged: each insults the other's father, and Louise orders Enoch Jr. to go away. Billy, able to make himself visible at will, reveals himself to the sobbing Louise, pretending to be a friend of her father. He offers her a gift—the star he stole from heaven. She refuses it and, frustrated, he slaps her hand. He makes himself invisible, and Louise tells Julie what happened, stating that the slap miraculously felt like a kiss, not a blow—and Julie understands her perfectly. Louise retreats to the house, as Julie notices the star that Billy dropped; she picks it up and seems to feel Billy's presence ("If I Loved You (Reprise)"). Billy invisibly attends Louise's graduation, hoping for one last chance to help his daughter and redeem himself. The beloved town physician, Dr. Seldon (who resembles the Starkeeper) advises the graduating class not to rely on their parents' success or be held back by their failure (words directed at Louise). Seldon prompts everyone to sing an old song, "You'll Never Walk Alone". Billy, still invisible, whispers to Louise, telling her to believe Seldon's words, and when she tentatively reaches out to another girl, she learns she does not have to be an outcast. Billy goes to Julie, telling her at last that he loved her. As his widow and daughter join in the singing, Billy is taken to his heavenly reward. Principal roles and notable performers ° denotes original Broadway cast Musical numbers Act I"List of Songs", Carousel at the IBDB Database. Retrieved July 18, 2012 "The Carousel Waltz" – Orchestra "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan" – Carrie Pipperidge and Julie Jordan "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" – Carrie "If I Loved You" – Billy Bigelow and Julie "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" – Nettie Fowler and Chorus "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" (reprise) – Carrie, Enoch Snow and Female Chorus "When the Children Are Asleep" – Enoch and Carrie "Blow High, Blow Low" – Jigger Craigin, Billy and Male Chorus "Soliloquy" – BillyAct II "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" – Carrie, Nettie, Julie, Enoch and Chorus "Geraniums in the Winder" – Enoch * "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" – Jigger and Chorus "What's the Use of Wond'rin'?" – Julie "You'll Never Walk Alone" – Nettie "The Highest Judge of All" – Billy Ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey" – Orchestra "If I Loved You" (reprise) – Billy Finale: "You'll Never Walk Alone" (reprise) – Company Productions Early productions The original Broadway production opened at the Majestic Theatre on April 19, 1945. The dress rehearsal the day before had gone badly, and the pair feared the new work would not be well received. One successful last-minute change was to have de Mille choreograph the pantomime. The movement of the carnival crowd in the pantomime had been entrusted to Mamoulian, and his version was not working. Rodgers had injured his back the previous week, and he watched the opening from a stretcher propped in a box behind the curtain. Sedated with morphine, he could see only part of the stage. As he could not hear the audience's applause and laughter, he assumed the show was a failure. It was not until friends congratulated him later that evening that he realized that the curtain had been met by wild applause. Bambi Linn, who played Louise, was so enthusiastically received by the audience during her ballet that she was forced to break character, when she next appeared, and bow. Rodgers' daughter Mary caught sight of her friend, Stephen Sondheim, both teenagers then, across several rows; both had eyes wet with tears. The original production ran for 890 performances, closing on May 24, 1947. The original cast included John Raitt (Billy), Jan Clayton (Julie), Jean Darling (Carrie), Eric Mattson (Enoch Snow), Christine Johnson (Nettie Fowler), Murvyn Vye (Jigger), Bambi Linn (Louise) and Russell Collins (Starkeeper). In December 1945, Clayton left to star in the Broadway revival of Show Boat and was replaced by Iva Withers; Raitt was replaced by Henry Michel in January 1947; Darling was replaced by Margot Moser.Hischak, p. 62 After closing on Broadway, the show went on a national tour for two years. It played for five months in Chicago alone, visited twenty states and two Canadian cities, covered and played to nearly two million people. The touring company had a four-week run at New York City Center in January 1949. Following the City Center run, the show was moved back to the Majestic Theatre in the hopes of filling the theatre until South Pacific opened in early April. However, ticket sales were mediocre, and the show closed almost a month early. The musical premiered in the West End, London, at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on June 7, 1950. The production was restaged by Jerome Whyte, with a cast that included Stephen Douglass (Billy), Iva Withers (Julie) and Margot Moser (Carrie). Carousel ran in London for 566 performances, remaining there for over a year and a half. Subsequent productions Carousel was revived in 1954 and 1957 at City Center, presented by the New York City Center Light Opera Company. Both times, the production featured Barbara Cook, though she played Carrie in 1954 and Julie in 1957 (playing alongside Howard Keel as Billy). The production was then taken to Belgium to be performed at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair, with David Atkinson as Billy, Ruth Kobart as Nettie, and Clayton reprising the role of Julie, which she had originated. In August 1965, Rodgers and the Music Theater of Lincoln Center produced Carousel for 47 performances. John Raitt reprised the role of Billy, with Jerry Orbach as Jigger and Reid Shelton as Enoch Snow. The roles of the Starkeeper and Dr. Seldon were played by Edward Everett Horton in his final stage appearance. The following year, New York City Center Light Opera Company brought Carousel back to City Center for 22 performances, with Bruce Yarnell as Billy and Constance Towers as Julie. Nicholas Hytner directed a new production of Carousel in 1992, at London's Royal National Theatre, with choreography by Sir Kenneth MacMillan and designs by Bob Crowley. In this staging, the story begins at the mill, where Julie and Carrie work, with the music slowed down to emphasize the drudgery. After work ends, they move to the shipyards and then to the carnival. As they proceed on a revolving stage, carnival characters appear, and at last the carousel is assembled onstage for the girls to ride.Block, p. 175 Louise is seduced by the ruffian boy during her Act 2 ballet, set around the ruins of a carousel. Michael Hayden played Billy not as a large, gruff man, but as a frustrated smaller one, a time bomb waiting to explode. Hayden, Joanna Riding (Julie) and Janie Dee (Carrie) all won Olivier Awards for their performances. Patricia Routledge played Nettie. Enoch and Carrie were cast as an interracial couple whose eight children, according to the review in The New York Times, looked like "a walking United Colors of Benetton ad". Clive Rowe, as Enoch, was nominated for an Olivier Award. The production's limited run from December 1992 through March 1993 was a sellout. It re-opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London in September 1993, presented by Cameron Mackintosh, where it continued until May 1994. The Hytner production moved to New York's Vivian Beaumont Theater, where it opened on March 24, 1994, and ran for 322 performances. This won five Tony Awards, including best musical revival, as well as awards for Hytner, MacMillan, Crowley and Audra McDonald (as Carrie). The cast also included Sally Murphy as Julie, Shirley Verrett as Nettie, Fisher Stevens as Jigger and Eddie Korbich as Enoch. One change made from the London to the New York production was to have Billy strike Louise across the face, rather than on the hand. According to Hayden, "He does the one unpardonable thing, the thing we can't forgive. It's a challenge for the audience to like him after that." The Hytner Carousel was presented in Japan in May 1995. A U.S. national tour with a scaled-down production began in February 1996 in Houston and closed in May 1997 in Providence, Rhode Island. Producers sought to feature young talent on the tour, with Patrick Wilson as Billy and Sarah Uriarte Berry, and later Jennifer Laura Thompson, as Julie. A revival opened at London's Savoy Theatre on December 2, 2008, after a week of previews, starring Jeremiah James (Billy), Alexandra Silber (Julie) and Lesley Garrett (Nettie). The production received warm to mixed reviews. It closed in June 2009, a month early. Michael Coveney, writing in The Independent, admired Rodgers' music but stated, "Lindsay Posner's efficient revival doesn't hold a candle to the National Theatre 1992 version". A production at Theater Basel, Switzerland, in 2016 to 2017, with German dialogue, was directed by Alexander Charim and choreographed by Teresa Rotemberg. Bryony Dwyer, Christian Miedl and Cheryl Studer starred, respectively, as Julie Jordan, Billy Bigelow and Nettie Fowler.<ref>[http://operabase.com/diary.cgi?lang=en&code=wsba&date=20161215 "Richard Rodgers: Carousel"] , Diary: Theater Basel, Operabase.com. Retrieved on March 8, 2018</ref> A semi-staged revival by the English National Opera opened at the London Coliseum in 2017. The production was directed by Lonny Price, conducted by David Charles Abell, and starred Alfie Boe as Billy, Katherine Jenkins as Julie and Nicholas Lyndhurst as the Starkeeper. The production received mixed to positive reviews. The third Broadway revival began previews in February 2018 at the Imperial Theatre and officially opened on April 12. It closed on September 16, 2018. The production starred Jessie Mueller, Joshua Henry, Renée Fleming, Lindsay Mendez and Alexander Gemignani. The production was directed by Jack O'Brien and choreographed by Justin Peck. The songs "Geraniums in the Winder" and "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" were cut from this revival. Ben Brantley wrote in The New York Times, "The tragic inevitability of Carousel has seldom come across as warmly or as chillingly as it does in this vividly reimagined revival. ... [W]ith thoughtful and powerful performances by Mr. Henry and Ms. Mueller, the love story at the show's center has never seemed quite as ill-starred or, at the same time, as sexy. ... [T]he Starkeeper ... assumes new visibility throughout, taking on the role of Billy's angelic supervisor." Brantley strongly praised the choreography, all the performances and the designers. He was unconvinced, however, by the "mother-daughter dialogue that falls so abrasively on contemporary ears", where Julie tries to justify loving an abusive man, and other scenes in Act 2, particularly those set in heaven, and the optimism of the final scene. Most of the reviewers agreed that while the choreography and performances (especially the singing) were excellent, characterizing the production as sexy and sumptuous, O'Brien's direction did little to help the show deal with modern sensibilities about men's treatment of women, instead indulging in nostalgia. From July to September 2021 the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre in London is presenting a staging by its artistic director Timothy Sheader, with choreography by Drew McOnie. The cast includes Carly Bawden as Julie, Declan Bennett as Billy and Joanna Riding as Nettie. Film, television and concert versions [[File:Boothbay Harbor in Summer.jpg\|thumb\|upright=1.2\|Boothbay Harbor, Maine, where the location shots for Carousels movie version were filmed]] A film version of the musical was made in 1956, starring Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones. It follows the musical's story fairly closely, although a prologue, set in the Starkeeper's heaven, was added. The film was released only a few months after the release of the film version of Oklahoma! It garnered some good reviews, and the soundtrack recording was a best seller. As the same stars appeared in both pictures, however, the two films were often compared, generally to the disadvantage of Carousel. Thomas Hischak, in The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, later wondered "if the smaller number of Carousel stage revivals is the product of this often-lumbering [film] musical". There was also an abridged (100 minute) 1967 network television version that starred Robert Goulet, with choreography by Edward Villella. The New York Philharmonic presented a staged concert version of the musical from February 28 to March 2, 2013, at Avery Fisher Hall. Kelli O'Hara played Julie, with Nathan Gunn as Billy, Stephanie Blythe as Nettie, Jessie Mueller as Carrie, Jason Danieley as Enoch, Shuler Hensley as Jigger, John Cullum as the Starkeeper, and Kate Burton as Mrs. Mullin. Tiler Peck danced the role of Louise to choreography by Warren Carlyle. The production was directed by John Rando and conducted by Rob Fisher. Charles Isherwood of The New York Times wrote, "this is as gorgeously sung a production of this sublime 1945 Broadway musical as you are ever likely to hear." It was broadcast as part of the PBS Live from Lincoln Center series, premiering on April 26, 2013. Music and recordings Musical treatment Rodgers designed Carousel to be an almost continuous stream of music, especially in Act 1. In later years, Rodgers was asked if he had considered writing an opera. He stated that he had been sorely tempted to, but saw Carousel in operatic terms. He remembered, "We came very close to opera in the Majestic Theatre. ... There's much that is operatic in the music." Rodgers uses music in Carousel in subtle ways to differentiate characters and tell the audience of their emotional state. In "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan", the music for the placid Carrie is characterized by even eighth-note rhythms, whereas the emotionally restless Julie's music is marked by dotted eighths and sixteenths; this rhythm will characterize her throughout the show. When Billy whistles a snatch of the song, he selects Julie's dotted notes rather than Carrie's. Reflecting the close association in the music between Julie and the as-yet unborn Louise, when Billy sings in "Soliloquy" of his daughter, who "gets hungry every night", he uses Julie's dotted rhythms. Such rhythms also characterize Julie's Act 2 song, "What's the Use of Wond'rin'". The stable love between Enoch and Carrie is strengthened by her willingness to let Enoch not only plan his entire life, but hers as well. This is reflected in "When the Children Are Asleep", where the two sing in close harmony, but Enoch musically interrupts his intended's turn at the chorus with the words "Dreams that won't be interrupted". Rodgers biographer Geoffrey Block, in his book on the Broadway musical, points out that though Billy may strike his wife, he allows her musical themes to become a part of him and never interrupts her music. Block suggests that, as reprehensible as Billy may be for his actions, Enoch requiring Carrie to act as "the little woman", and his having nine children with her (more than she had found acceptable in "When the Children are Asleep") can be considered to be even more abusive. The twelve-minute "bench scene", in which Billy and Julie get to know each other and which culminates with "If I Loved You", according to Hischak, "is considered the most completely integrated piece of music-drama in the American musical theatre". The scene is almost entirely drawn from Molnár and is one extended musical piece; Stephen Sondheim described it as "probably the single most important moment in the revolution of contemporary musicals". "If I Loved You" has been recorded many times, by such diverse artists as Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Sammy Davis Jr., Mario Lanza and Chad and Jeremy. The D-flat major theme that dominates the music for the second act ballet seems like a new melody to many audience members. It is, however, a greatly expanded development of a theme heard during "Soliloquy" at the line "I guess he'll call me 'The old man' ". When the pair discussed the song that would become "Soliloquy", Rodgers improvised at the piano to give Hammerstein an idea of how he envisioned the song. When Hammerstein presented his collaborator with the lyrics after two weeks of work (Hammerstein always wrote the words first, then Rodgers would write the melodies), Rodgers wrote the music for the eight-minute song in two hours. "What's the Use of Wond'rin' ", one of Julie's songs, worked well in the show but was never as popular on the radio or for recording, and Hammerstein believed that the lack of popularity was because he had concluded the final line, "And all the rest is talk" with a hard consonant, which does not allow the singer a vocal climax. Irving Berlin later stated that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had the same sort of effect on him as the 23rd Psalm. When singer Mel Tormé told Rodgers that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had made him cry, Rodgers nodded impatiently. "You're supposed to." The frequently recorded song has become a widely accepted hymn.Rodgers, p. 240 The cast recording of Carousel proved popular in Liverpool, like many Broadway albums, and in 1963, the Brian Epstein-managed band, Gerry and the Pacemakers had a number-one hit with the song. At the time, the top ten hits were played before Liverpool F.C. home matches; even after "You'll Never Walk Alone" dropped out of the top ten, fans continued to sing it, and it has become closely associated with the soccer team and the city of Liverpool. A BBC program, Soul Music, ranked it alongside "Silent Night" and "Abide With Me" in terms of its emotional impact and iconic status. Recordings The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut—as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made.Fick, David. "The Best Carousel Recording", June 11, 2009. Retrieved on April 7, 2016 A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousels songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. Critical reception and legacy The musical received almost unanimous rave reviews after its opening in 1945. According to Hischak, reviews were not as exuberant as for Oklahoma! as the critics were not taken by surprise this time. John Chapman of the Daily News termed it "one of the finest musical plays I have ever seen and I shall remember it always". The New York Times's reviewer, Lewis Nichols, stated that "Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein 2d, who can do no wrong, have continued doing no wrong in adapting Liliom into a musical play. Their Carousel is on the whole delightful." Wilella Waldorf of the New York Post, however, complained, "Carousel seemed to us a rather long evening. The Oklahoma! formula is becoming a bit monotonous and so are Miss de Mille's ballets. All right, go ahead and shoot!"Suskin, Steven. Opening Night on Broadway. Schirmer Trade Books, 1990, p. 147. . Dance Magazine gave Linn plaudits for her role as Louise, stating, "Bambi doesn't come on until twenty minutes before eleven, and for the next forty minutes, she practically holds the audience in her hand". Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune also applauded the dancing: "It has waited for Miss de Mille to come through with peculiarly American dance patterns for a musical show to become as much a dance as a song show." When the musical returned to New York in 1949, The New York Times reviewer Brooks Atkinson described Carousel as "a conspicuously superior musical play ... Carousel, which was warmly appreciated when it opened, seems like nothing less than a masterpiece now." In 1954, when Carousel was revived at City Center, Atkinson discussed the musical in his review: Carousel has no comment to make on anything of topical importance. The theme is timeless and universal: the devotion of two people who love each other through thick and thin, complicated in this case by the wayward personality of the man, who cannot fulfill the responsibilities he has assumed. ... Billy is a bum, but Carousel recognizes the decency of his motives and admires his independence. There are no slick solutions in Carousel. Stephen Sondheim noted the duo's ability to take the innovations of Oklahoma! and apply them to a serious setting: "Oklahoma! is about a picnic, Carousel is about life and death." Critic Eric Bentley, on the other hand, wrote that "the last scene of Carousel is an impertinence: I refuse to be lectured to by a musical comedy scriptwriter on the education of children, the nature of the good life, and the contribution of the American small town to the salvation of souls."New York Times critic Frank Rich said of the 1992 London production: "What is remarkable about Mr. Hytner's direction, aside from its unorthodox faith in the virtues of simplicity and stillness, is its ability to make a 1992 audience believe in Hammerstein's vision of redemption, which has it that a dead sinner can return to Earth to do godly good." The Hytner production in New York was hailed by many critics as a grittier Carousel, which they deemed more appropriate for the 1990s. Clive Barnes of the New York Post called it a "defining Carousel—hard-nosed, imaginative, and exciting." Critic Michael Billington has commented that "lyrically [Carousel] comes perilously close to acceptance of the inevitability of domestic violence." BroadwayWorld.com stated in 2013 that Carousel is now "considered somewhat controversial in terms of its attitudes on domestic violence" because Julie chooses to stay with Billy despite the abuse; actress Kelli O'Hara noted that the domestic violence that Julie "chooses to deal with – is a real, existing and very complicated thing. And exploring it is an important part of healing it." Rodgers considered Carousel his favorite of all his musicals and wrote, "it affects me deeply every time I see it performed". In 1999, Time magazine, in its "Best of the Century" list, named Carousel the Best Musical of the 20th century, writing that Rodgers and Hammerstein "set the standards for the 20th century musical, and this show features their most beautiful score and the most skillful and affecting example of their musical storytelling". Hammerstein's grandson, Oscar Andrew Hammerstein, in his book about his family, suggested that the wartime situation made Carousel's ending especially poignant to its original viewers, "Every American grieved the loss of a brother, son, father, or friend ... the audience empathized with [Billy's] all-too-human efforts to offer advice, to seek forgiveness, to complete an unfinished life, and to bid a proper good-bye from beyond the grave." Author and composer Ethan Mordden agreed with that perspective: If Oklahoma! developed the moral argument for sending American boys overseas, Carousel offered consolation to those wives and mothers whose boys would only return in spirit. The meaning lay not in the tragedy of the present, but in the hope for a future where no one walks alone. Awards and nominations Original 1945 Broadway productionNote: The Tony Awards were not established until 1947, and so Carousel was not eligible to win any Tonys at its premiere. 1957 revival 1992 London revival 1994 Broadway revival 2018 Broadway revival References Bibliography Block, Geoffrey. Enchanted Evenings: The Broadway Musical from Show Boat to Sondheim. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2004. . Block, Geoffrey (ed.) The Richard Rodgers Reader. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2006. . Bradley, Ian. You've Got to Have a Dream: The Message of the Broadway Musical. Louisville, Ky., Westminster John Knox Press, 2005. 978-0-664-22854-5. Easton, Carol. No Intermission: The Life of Agnes DeMille. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 2000 (1st DaCapo Press edition). . Fordin, Hugh. Getting to Know Him: A Biography of Oscar Hammerstein II. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 1995 reprint of 1986 edition. . Hammerstein, Oscar Andrew. The Hammersteins: A Musical Theatre Family. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 2010. . Hischak, Thomas S. The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2007. . Hyland, William G. Richard Rodgers. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1998. . Molnár, Ferenc. Liliom: A Legend in Seven Scenes and a Prologue. New York: Boni and Liveright, 1921. Mordden, Ethan. "Rodgers & Hammerstein". New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1992. . Nolan, Frederick. The Sound of Their Music: The Story of Rodgers and Hammerstein. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2002. . Rodgers, Richard. Musical Stages: An Autobiography. Jefferson, N.C. Da Capo Press, 2002 reprint of 1975 edition. . Secrest, Meryle. Somewhere for Me: A Biography of Richard Rodgers. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2001. . External links Carousel at guidetomusicaltheatre.com Carousel info page on StageAgent.com – Carousel plot summary and character descriptions (1967 TV adaptation) 1945 musicals Broadway musicals Musicals by Rodgers and Hammerstein West End musicals Musicals based on plays Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients Maine in fiction Fiction set in 1873 Fiction about the afterlife Plays set in Maine Plays set in the 19th century Tony Award-winning musicals	true	[ "\"Zzyzx Rd.\" is the fifth single from Stone Sour's second album Come What(ever) May. The two-track promo single for the song released strictly to radio in 2007.\n\nBackground\n\n\"Zzyzx Rd.\" is a love song written to Taylor's wife for helping him in his struggles against alcoholism and contemplation of suicide, a theme he returns to across the album. The road referenced in the title is a , part-paved rural collector road in the Mojave Desert, leading from Interstate 15 to Zzyzx, California, approximately southwest of Las Vegas, Nevada.\n\nBefore the album tracklist was finalized, Corey Taylor mentioned the song in an interview with Revolver, saying:\n\nTrack listing\n\nChart positions\n\nPersonnel\nStone Sour\nCorey Taylor – vocals, acoustic guitar, production\nJames Root – lead guitar, production\nJosh Rand – rhythm guitar, production\nShawn Economaki – bass, production\nJoel Ekman – drums, production\nAdditional personnel\n Rami Jaffee – piano\n\nReferences\n\n2007 singles\nStone Sour songs\n2006 songs\nRoadrunner Records singles\nSongs written by Corey Taylor\nSongs written by Roy Mayorga\nSongs written by Josh Rand\nSongs written by Jim Root\nSong recordings produced by Nick Raskulinecz", "\"What's Luv?\" is a song by American rapper Fat Joe, released as the second single from his fourth studio album, Jealous Ones Still Envy (J.O.S.E.) (2001). The song features additional vocals from singer Ashanti and from rapper Ja Rule on the remix and album version on the song. \"What's Luv\" was produced by Irv Gotti and Chink Santana. The lyrics of the song's chorus are based in part on the title refrain of the 1984 Tina Turner hit \"What's Love Got to Do with It\". The song additionally includes a lyric (\"I'm not a hater, I just crush a lot\") that references the 1997 song \"Still Not a Player\" by Big Pun. Fat Joe, Ja Rule, and the song's two producers are credited as the writers of \"What's Luv\", as are Big Pun and the lyricist of \"What's Love Got to Do with It\", Terry Britten.\n\n\"What's Luv?\", released in the United States on February 4, 2002, peaked at number two on the Billboard Hot 100 chart that April. The single stayed on the chart for 20 weeks, giving Ashanti her second top-10 single, Fat Joe his first, and Ja Rule his seventh. The song additionally topped the Billboard Hot Rap Songs and Rhythmic charts. \"What's Luv?\" made Ashanti the first female artist to simultaneously occupy the top two positions on the Hot 100. The single was also a success internationally, reaching the top five in Australia, New Zealand, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.\n\nProduction\nFat Joe claimed that Ashanti recorded vocals for the demo, with the plan being to replace her on the record with Jennifer Lopez to appeal to the Latin market. When Joe heard the demo, he insisted on doing the record with Ashanti instead.\n\nMusic video\nThe video for \"What's Luv?\" was filmed in New York City, at Fordham University. The music video features cameo appearances from DJ Kay Slay, Capone, Young Noble, Kastro, Treach, Fat Joe's son, Maia Campbell as Joe's love interest, and Terror Squad members Tony Sunshine, Prospect, Armageddon, and Remy Ma. Tommy Davidson and Miguel Núñez, Jr. also appear in the video since the song was included in the 2002 film Juwanna Mann, in which Davidson and Núñez star.\n\nIn the video, Joe starts dancing with some backup dancers, and also at times with Ashanti. One scene shows him attending a basketball game with two women as they watch from the stands. A scene with Ashanti shows her walking into a men's locker room, and rounding up with some men as she sings her verses from the song.\n\nTrack listings\nUK CD single\n \"What's Luv?\" (clean version featuring Ashanti) — 3:51\n \"What's Luv?\" (explicit version featuring Ashanti) — 3:51\n \"Hustlin'\" (featuring Armageddon) — 3:34\n \"What's Luv?\" (video—clean version featuring Ashanti) — 3:51\n\nUK 12-inch single and Australian CD single\n \"What's Luv?\" (clean version featuring Ashanti) — 3:51\n \"What's Luv?\" (explicit version featuring Ashanti) — 3:51\n \"Hustlin'\" (featuring Armageddon) — 3:34\n\nEuropean CD single\n \"What's Luv?\" (explicit version featuring Ashanti)\n \"Hustlin'\" (featuring Armageddon)\n\nCredits and personnel\nCredits are lifted from the European CD single liner notes.\n\nStudio\n Recorded at the Crackhouse Studios (New York City)\n\nPersonnel\n\n Fat Joe – writing (as Joseph Cartagena), vocals, executive production\n Ja Rule – writing (as Jeffrey Atkins), vocals\n Christopher Rios – writing\n Irv Gotti – writing (as Irving Lorenzo), production, mixing\n Chink Santana – writing (as Andre Parker), production\n Terry Britten – lyricist of \"What's Love Got to Do with It\"\n\n Ashanti – vocals\n Armageddon – co-executive production\n Rob \"Reef\" Tewlow – co-executive production\n Milwaukee Buck – recording\n Thomas Bricker – art direction and design\n Piotr Sikora – photography\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCertifications\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2001 singles\n2001 songs\nAshanti (singer) songs\nAtlantic Records singles\nFat Joe songs\nJa Rule songs\nMusic videos directed by Bille Woodruff\nSongs written by Chink Santana\nSongs written by Fat Joe\nSongs written by Graham Lyle\nSongs written by Irv Gotti\nSongs written by Ja Rule\nSongs written by Terry Britten" ]
[ "Carousel (musical)", "Musical treatment", "What was important with Carousel?", "The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s,", "What kind of music was used?", "The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars,", "How was music incorporated into the production?", "the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format,", "What songs did they sing?", "I don't know.", "What songs were in the production?", "there is a small part of \"Soliloquy\" found on no other recording," ]	C_8decf249a7ee4c6bb84aa0f61f4f4d6c_0	What did Rodgers say about the music?	6	What did Rodgers say about the music in the musical Carousel?	Carousel (musical)	The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut--as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made. A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousel's songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. CANNOTANSWER	Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made.	Carousel is the second musical by the team of Richard Rodgers (music) and Oscar Hammerstein II (book and lyrics). The 1945 work was adapted from Ferenc Molnár's 1909 play Liliom, transplanting its Budapest setting to the Maine coastline. The story revolves around carousel barker Billy Bigelow, whose romance with millworker Julie Jordan comes at the price of both their jobs. He participates in a robbery to provide for Julie and their unborn child; after it goes tragically wrong, he is given a chance to make things right. A secondary plot line deals with millworker Carrie Pipperidge and her romance with ambitious fisherman Enoch Snow. The show includes the well-known songs "If I Loved You", "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" and "You'll Never Walk Alone". Richard Rodgers later wrote that Carousel was his favorite of all his musicals. Following the spectacular success of the first Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Oklahoma! (1943), the pair sought to collaborate on another piece, knowing that any resulting work would be compared with Oklahoma!, most likely unfavorably. They were initially reluctant to seek the rights to Liliom; Molnár had refused permission for the work to be adapted in the past, and the original ending was considered too depressing for the musical theatre. After acquiring the rights, the team created a work with lengthy sequences of music and made the ending more hopeful. The musical required considerable modification during out-of-town tryouts, but once it opened on Broadway on April 19, 1945, it was an immediate hit with both critics and audiences. Carousel initially ran for 890 performances and duplicated its success in the West End in 1950. Though it has never achieved as much commercial success as Oklahoma!, the piece has been repeatedly revived, recorded several times and was filmed in 1956. A production by Nicholas Hytner enjoyed success in 1992 in London, in 1994 in New York and on tour. Another Broadway revival opened in 2018. In 1999, Time magazine named Carousel the best musical of the 20th century. Background Liliom Ferenc Molnár's Hungarian-language drama, Liliom, premiered in Budapest in 1909. The audience was puzzled by the work, and it lasted only thirty-odd performances before being withdrawn, the first shadow on Molnár's successful career as a playwright. Liliom was not presented again until after World War I. When it reappeared on the Budapest stage, it was a tremendous hit. Except for the ending, the plots of Liliom and Carousel are very similar. Andreas Zavocky (nicknamed Liliom, the Hungarian word for "lily", a slang term for "tough guy"), a carnival barker, falls in love with Julie Zeller, a servant girl, and they begin living together. With both discharged from their jobs, Liliom is discontented and contemplates leaving Julie, but decides not to do so on learning that she is pregnant. A subplot involves Julie's friend Marie, who has fallen in love with Wolf Biefeld, a hotel porter—after the two marry, he becomes the owner of the hotel. Desperate to make money so that he, Julie and their child can escape to America and a better life, Liliom conspires with lowlife Ficsur to commit a robbery, but it goes badly, and Liliom stabs himself. He dies, and his spirit is taken to heaven's police court. As Ficsur suggested while the two waited to commit the crime, would-be robbers like them do not come before God Himself. Liliom is told by the magistrate that he may go back to Earth for one day to attempt to redeem the wrongs he has done to his family, but must first spend sixteen years in a fiery purgatory. On his return to Earth, Liliom encounters his daughter, Louise, who like her mother is now a factory worker. Saying that he knew her father, he tries to give her a star he stole from the heavens. When Louise refuses to take it, he strikes her. Not realizing who he is, Julie confronts him, but finds herself unable to be angry with him. Liliom is ushered off to his fate, presumably Hell, and Louise asks her mother if it is possible to feel a hard slap as if it was a kiss. Julie reminiscently tells her daughter that it is very possible for that to happen. An English translation of Liliom was credited to Benjamin "Barney" Glazer, though there is a story that the actual translator, uncredited, was Rodgers' first major partner Lorenz Hart. The Theatre Guild presented it in New York City in 1921, with Joseph Schildkraut as Liliom, and the play was a success, running 300 performances. A 1940 revival with Burgess Meredith and Ingrid Bergman was seen by both Hammerstein and Rodgers. Glazer, in introducing the English translation of Liliom, wrote of the play's appeal: And where in modern dramatic literature can such pearls be matched—Julie incoherently confessing to her dead lover the love she had always been ashamed to tell; Liliom crying out to the distant carousel the glad news that he is to be a father; the two thieves gambling for the spoils of their prospective robbery; Marie and Wolf posing for their portrait while the broken-hearted Julie stands looking after the vanishing Liliom, the thieves' song ringing in her ears; the two policemen grousing about pay and pensions while Liliom lies bleeding to death; Liliom furtively proffering his daughter the star he has stolen for her in heaven. ... The temptation to count the whole scintillating string is difficult to resist. Inception In the 1920s and 1930s, Rodgers and Hammerstein both became well known for creating Broadway hits with other partners. Rodgers, with Lorenz Hart, had produced a string of over two dozen musicals, including such popular successes as Babes in Arms (1937), The Boys from Syracuse (1938) and Pal Joey (1940). Some of Rodgers' work with Hart broke new ground in musical theatre: On Your Toes was the first use of ballet to sustain the plot (in the "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue" scene), while Pal Joey flouted Broadway tradition by presenting a knave as its hero. Hammerstein had written or co-written the words for such hits as Rose-Marie (1924), The Desert Song (1926), The New Moon (1927) and Show Boat (1927). Though less productive in the 1930s, he wrote material for musicals and films, sharing an Oscar for his song with Jerome Kern, "The Last Time I Saw Paris", which was included in the 1941 film Lady Be Good. By the early 1940s, Hart had sunk into alcoholism and emotional turmoil, becoming unreliable and prompting Rodgers to approach Hammerstein to ask if he would consider working with him. Hammerstein was eager to do so, and their first collaboration was Oklahoma! (1943). Thomas Hischak states, in his The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, that Oklahoma! is "the single most influential work in the American musical theatre. In fact, the history of the Broadway musical can accurately be divided into what came before Oklahoma! and what came after it." An innovation for its time in integrating song, character, plot and dance, Oklahoma! would serve, according to Hischak, as "the model for Broadway shows for decades", and proved a huge popular and financial success. Once it was well-launched, what to do as an encore was a daunting challenge for the pair. Film producer Samuel Goldwyn saw Oklahoma! and advised Rodgers to shoot himself, which according to Rodgers "was Sam's blunt but funny way of telling me that I'd never create another show as good as Oklahoma!" As they considered new projects, Hammerstein wrote, "We're such fools. No matter what we do, everyone is bound to say, 'This is not another Oklahoma! " Oklahoma! had been a struggle to finance and produce. Hammerstein and Rodgers met weekly in 1943 with Theresa Helburn and Lawrence Langner of the Theatre Guild, producers of the blockbuster musical, who together formed what they termed "the Gloat Club". At one such luncheon, Helburn and Langner proposed to Rodgers and Hammerstein that they turn Molnár's Liliom into a musical. Both men refused—they had no feeling for the Budapest setting and thought that the unhappy ending was unsuitable for musical theatre. In addition, given the unstable wartime political situation, they might need to change the setting from Hungary while in rehearsal. At the next luncheon, Helburn and Langner again proposed Liliom, suggesting that they move the setting to Louisiana and make Liliom a Creole. Rodgers and Hammerstein played with the idea over the next few weeks, but decided that Creole dialect, filled with "zis" and "zose", would sound corny and would make it difficult to write effective lyrics. A breakthrough came when Rodgers, who owned a house in Connecticut, proposed a New England setting. Hammerstein wrote of this suggestion in 1945, I began to see an attractive ensemble—sailors, whalers, girls who worked in the mills up the river, clambakes on near-by islands, an amusement park on the seaboard, things people could do in crowds, people who were strong and alive and lusty, people who had always been depicted on the stage as thin-lipped puritans—a libel I was anxious to refute ... as for the two leading characters, Julie with her courage and inner strength and outward simplicity seemed more indigenous to Maine than to Budapest. Liliom is, of course, an international character, indigenous to nowhere. Rodgers and Hammerstein were also concerned about what they termed "the tunnel" of Molnár's second act—a series of gloomy scenes leading up to Liliom's suicide—followed by a dark ending. They also felt it would be difficult to set Liliom's motivation for the robbery to music. Molnár's opposition to having his works adapted was also an issue; he had famously turned down Giacomo Puccini when the great composer wished to transform Liliom into an opera, stating that he wanted the piece to be remembered as his, not Puccini's. In 1937, Molnár, who had recently emigrated to the United States, had declined another offer from Kurt Weill to adapt the play into a musical. The pair continued to work on the preliminary ideas for a Liliom adaptation while pursuing other projects in late 1943 and early 1944—writing the film musical State Fair and producing I Remember Mama on Broadway. Meanwhile, the Theatre Guild took Molnár to see Oklahoma! Molnár stated that if Rodgers and Hammerstein could adapt Liliom as beautifully as they had modified Green Grow the Lilacs into Oklahoma!, he would be pleased to have them do it. The Guild obtained the rights from Molnár in October 1943. The playwright received one percent of the gross and $2,500 for "personal services". The duo insisted, as part of the contract, that Molnár permit them to make changes in the plot. At first, the playwright refused, but eventually yielded. Hammerstein later stated that if this point had not been won, "we could never have made Carousel." In seeking to establish through song Liliom's motivation for the robbery, Rodgers remembered that he and Hart had a similar problem in Pal Joey. Rodgers and Hart had overcome the problem with a song that Joey sings to himself, "I'm Talking to My Pal". This inspired "Soliloquy". Both partners later told a story that "Soliloquy" was only intended to be a song about Liliom's dreams of a son, but that Rodgers, who had two daughters, insisted that Liliom consider that Julie might have a girl. However, the notes taken at their meeting of December 7, 1943 state: "Mr. Rodgers suggested a fine musical number for the end of the scene where Liliom discovers he is to be a father, in which he sings first with pride of the growth of a boy, and then suddenly realizes it might be a girl and changes completely." Hammerstein and Rodgers returned to the Liliom project in mid-1944. Hammerstein was uneasy as he worked, fearing that no matter what they did, Molnár would disapprove of the results. Green Grow the Lilacs had been a little-known work; Liliom was a theatrical standard. Molnár's text also contained considerable commentary on the Hungarian politics of 1909 and the rigidity of that society. A dismissed carnival barker who hits his wife, attempts a robbery and commits suicide seemed an unlikely central character for a musical comedy. Hammerstein decided to use the words and story to make the audience sympathize with the lovers. He also built up the secondary couple, who are incidental to the plot in Liliom; they became Enoch Snow and Carrie Pipperidge. "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" was repurposed from a song, "A Real Nice Hayride", written for Oklahoma! but not used. Molnár's ending was unsuitable, and after a couple of false starts, Hammerstein conceived the graduation scene that ends the musical. According to Frederick Nolan in his book on the team's works: "From that scene the song "You'll Never Walk Alone" sprang almost naturally." In spite of Hammerstein's simple lyrics for "You'll Never Walk Alone", Rodgers had great difficulty in setting it to music. Rodgers explained his rationale for the changed ending, Liliom was a tragedy about a man who cannot learn to live with other people. The way Molnár wrote it, the man ends up hitting his daughter and then having to go back to purgatory, leaving his daughter helpless and hopeless. We couldn't accept that. The way we ended Carousel it may still be a tragedy but it's a hopeful one because in the final scene it is clear that the child has at last learned how to express herself and communicate with others. When the pair decided to make "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" into an ensemble number, Hammerstein realized he had no idea what a clambake was like, and researched the matter. Based on his initial findings, he wrote the line, "First came codfish chowder". However, further research convinced him the proper term was "codhead chowder", a term unfamiliar to many playgoers. He decided to keep it as "codfish". When the song proceeded to discuss the lobsters consumed at the feast, Hammerstein wrote the line "We slit 'em down the back/And peppered 'em good". He was grieved to hear from a friend that lobsters are always slit down the front. The lyricist sent a researcher to a seafood restaurant and heard back that lobsters are always slit down the back. Hammerstein concluded that there is disagreement about which side of a lobster is the back. One error not caught involved the song "June Is Bustin' Out All Over", in which sheep are depicted as seeking to mate in late spring—they actually do so in the winter. Whenever this was brought to Hammerstein's attention, he told his informant that 1873 was a special year, in which sheep mated in the spring. Rodgers early decided to dispense with an overture, feeling that the music was hard to hear over the banging of seats as latecomers settled themselves. In his autobiography, Rodgers complained that only the brass section can be heard during an overture because there are never enough strings in a musical's small orchestra. He determined to force the audience to concentrate from the beginning by opening with a pantomime scene accompanied by what became known as "The Carousel Waltz". The pantomime paralleled one in the Molnár play, which was also used to introduce the characters and situation to the audience. Author Ethan Mordden described the effectiveness of this opening: Other characters catch our notice—Mr. Bascombe, the pompous mill owner, Mrs. Mullin, the widow who runs the carousel and, apparently, Billy; a dancing bear; an acrobat. But what draws us in is the intensity with which Julie regards Billy—the way she stands frozen, staring at him, while everyone else at the fair is swaying to the rhythm of Billy's spiel. And as Julie and Billy ride together on the swirling carousel, and the stage picture surges with the excitement of the crowd, and the orchestra storms to a climax, and the curtain falls, we realize that R & H have not only skipped the overture and the opening number but the exposition as well. They have plunged into the story, right into the middle of it, in the most intense first scene any musical ever had. Casting and out-of-town tryouts The casting for Carousel began when Oklahoma!s production team, including Rodgers and Hammerstein, was seeking a replacement for the part of Curly (the male lead in Oklahoma!). Lawrence Langner had heard, through a relative, of a California singer named John Raitt, who might be suitable for the part. Langner went to hear Raitt, then urged the others to bring Raitt to New York for an audition. Raitt asked to sing "Largo al factotum", Figaro's aria from The Barber of Seville, to warm up. The warmup was sufficient to convince the producers that not only had they found a Curly, they had found a Liliom (or Billy Bigelow, as the part was renamed). Theresa Helburn made another California discovery, Jan Clayton, a singer/actress who had made a few minor films for MGM. She was brought east and successfully auditioned for the part of Julie. The producers sought to cast unknowns. Though many had played in previous Hammerstein or Rodgers works, only one, Jean Casto (cast as carousel owner Mrs. Mullin, and a veteran of Pal Joey), had ever played on Broadway before. It proved harder to cast the ensemble than the leads, due to the war—Rodgers told his casting director, John Fearnley, that the sole qualification for a dancing boy was that he be alive. Rodgers and Hammerstein reassembled much of the creative team that had made Oklahoma! a success, including director Rouben Mamoulian and choreographer Agnes de Mille. Miles White was the costume designer while Jo Mielziner (who had not worked on Oklahoma!) was the scenic and lighting designer. Even though Oklahoma! orchestrator Russell Bennett had informed Rodgers that he was unavailable to work on Carousel due to a radio contract, Rodgers insisted he do the work in his spare time. He orchestrated "The Carousel Waltz" and "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" before finally being replaced by Don Walker. A new member of the creative team was Trude Rittmann, who arranged the dance music. Rittmann initially felt that Rodgers mistrusted her because she was a woman, and found him difficult to work with, but the two worked together on Rodgers' shows until the 1970s. Rehearsals began in January 1945; either Rodgers or Hammerstein was always present. Raitt was presented with the lyrics for "Soliloquy" on a five-foot long sheet of paper—the piece ran nearly eight minutes. Staging such a long solo number presented problems, and Raitt later stated that he felt that they were never fully addressed. At some point during rehearsals, Molnár came to see what they had done to his play. There are a number of variations on the story.Fordin, pp. 231–32 As Rodgers told it, while watching rehearsals with Hammerstein, the composer spotted Molnár in the rear of the theatre and whispered the news to his partner. Both sweated through an afternoon of rehearsal in which nothing seemed to go right. At the end, the two walked to the back of the theatre, expecting an angry reaction from Molnár. Instead, the playwright said enthusiastically, "What you have done is so beautiful. And you know what I like best? The ending!" Hammerstein wrote that Molnár became a regular attendee at rehearsals after that. Like most of the pair's works, Carousel contains a lengthy ballet, "Billy Makes a Journey", in the second act, as Billy looks down to the Earth from "Up There" and observes his daughter. In the original production the ballet was choreographed by de Mille. It began with Billy looking down from heaven at his wife in labor, with the village women gathered for a "birthing". The ballet involved every character in the play, some of whom spoke lines of dialogue, and contained a number of subplots. The focus was on Louise, played by Bambi Linn, who at first almost soars in her dance, expressing the innocence of childhood. She is teased and mocked by her schoolmates, and Louise becomes attracted to the rough carnival people, who symbolize Billy's world. A youth from the carnival attempts to seduce Louise, as she discovers her own sexuality, but he decides she is more girl than woman, and he leaves her. After Julie comforts her, Louise goes to a children's party, where she is shunned. The carnival people reappear and form a ring around the children's party, with Louise lost between the two groups. At the end, the performers form a huge carousel with their bodies. The play opened for tryouts in New Haven, Connecticut on March 22, 1945. The first act was well-received; the second act was not. Casto recalled that the second act finished about 1:30 a.m. The staff immediately sat down for a two-hour conference. Five scenes, half the ballet, and two songs were cut from the show as the result. John Fearnley commented, "Now I see why these people have hits. I never witnessed anything so brisk and brave in my life." De Mille said of this conference, "not three minutes had been wasted pleading for something cherished. Nor was there any idle joking. ... We cut and cut and cut and then we went to bed." By the time the company left New Haven, de Mille's ballet was down to forty minutes. A major concern with the second act was the effectiveness of the characters He and She (later called by Rodgers "Mr. and Mrs. God"), before whom Billy appeared after his death. Mr. and Mrs. God were depicted as a New England minister and his wife, seen in their parlor.Block (ed.), p. 129. At this time, according to the cast sheet distributed during the Boston run, Dr. Seldon was listed as the "Minister". The couple was still part of the show at the Boston opening. Rodgers said to Hammerstein, "We've got to get God out of that parlor". When Hammerstein inquired where he should put the deity, Rodgers replied, "I don't care where you put Him. Put Him on a ladder for all I care, only get Him out of that parlor!" Hammerstein duly put Mr. God (renamed the Starkeeper) atop a ladder, and Mrs. God was removed from the show. Rodgers biographer Meryle Secrest terms this change a mistake, leading to a more fantastic afterlife, which was later criticized by The New Republic as "a Rotarian atmosphere congenial to audiences who seek not reality but escape from reality, not truth but escape from truth". Hammerstein wrote that Molnár's advice, to combine two scenes into one, was key to pulling together the second act and represented "a more radical departure from the original than any change we had made". A reprise of "If I Loved You" was added in the second act, which Rodgers felt needed more music. Three weeks of tryouts in Boston followed the brief New Haven run, and the audience there gave the musical a warm reception. An even shorter version of the ballet was presented the final two weeks in Boston, but on the final night there, de Mille expanded it back to forty minutes, and it brought the house down, causing both Rodgers and Hammerstein to embrace her. Synopsis Act 1 Two young female millworkers in 1873 Maine visit the town's carousel after work. One of them, Julie Jordan, attracts the attention of the barker, Billy Bigelow ("The Carousel Waltz"). When Julie lets Billy put his arm around her during the ride, Mrs. Mullin, the widowed owner of the carousel, tells Julie never to return. Julie and her friend, Carrie Pipperidge, argue with Mrs. Mullin. Billy arrives and, seeing that Mrs. Mullin is jealous, mocks her; he is fired from his job. Billy, unconcerned, invites Julie to join him for a drink. As he goes to get his belongings, Carrie presses Julie about her feelings toward him, but Julie is evasive ("You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan"). Carrie has a beau too, fisherman Enoch Snow ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow"), to whom she is newly engaged. Billy returns for Julie as the departing Carrie warns that staying out late means the loss of Julie's job. Mr. Bascombe, owner of the mill, happens by along with a policeman, and offers to escort Julie to her home, but she refuses and is fired. Left alone, she and Billy talk about what life might be like if they were in love, but neither quite confesses to the growing attraction they feel for each other ("If I Loved You"). Over a month passes, and preparations for the summer clambake are under way ("June Is Bustin' Out All Over"). Julie and Billy, now married, live at Julie's cousin Nettie's spa. Julie confides in Carrie that Billy, frustrated over being unemployed, hit her. Carrie has happier news—she is engaged to Enoch, who enters as she discusses him ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow (reprise))". Billy arrives with his ne'er-do-well whaler friend, Jigger. The former barker is openly rude to Enoch and Julie, then leaves with Jigger, followed by a distraught Julie. Enoch tells Carrie that he expects to become rich selling herring and to have a large family, larger perhaps than Carrie is comfortable having ("When the Children Are Asleep"). Jigger and his shipmates, joined by Billy, then sing about life on the sea ("Blow High, Blow Low"). The whaler tries to recruit Billy to help with a robbery, but Billy declines, as the victim—Julie's former boss, Mr. Bascombe—might have to be killed. Mrs. Mullin enters and tries to tempt Billy back to the carousel (and to her). He would have to abandon Julie; a married barker cannot evoke the same sexual tension as one who is single. Billy reluctantly mulls it over as Julie arrives and the others leave. She tells him that she is pregnant, and Billy is overwhelmed with happiness, ending all thoughts of returning to the carousel. Once alone, Billy imagines the fun he will have with Bill Jr.—until he realizes that his child might be a girl, and reflects soberly that "you've got to be a father to a girl" ("Soliloquy"). Determined to provide financially for his future child, whatever the means, Billy decides to be Jigger's accomplice. The whole town leaves for the clambake. Billy, who had earlier refused to go, agrees to join in, to Julie's delight, as he realizes that being seen at the clambake is integral to his and Jigger's alibi ("Act I Finale"). Act 2 Everyone reminisces about the huge meal and much fun ("This Was a Real Nice Clambake"). Jigger tries to seduce Carrie; Enoch walks in at the wrong moment, and declares that he is finished with her ("Geraniums In the Winder"), as Jigger jeers ("There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman"). The girls try to comfort Carrie, but for Julie all that matters is that "he's your feller and you love him" ("What's the Use of Wond'rin'?"). Julie sees Billy trying to sneak away with Jigger and, trying to stop him, feels the knife hidden in his shirt. She begs him to give it to her, but he refuses and leaves to commit the robbery. As they wait, Jigger and Billy gamble with cards. They stake their shares of the anticipated robbery spoils. Billy loses: his participation is now pointless. Unknown to Billy and Jigger, Mr. Bascombe, the intended victim, has already deposited the mill's money. The robbery fails: Bascombe pulls a gun on Billy while Jigger escapes. Billy stabs himself with his knife; Julie arrives just in time for him to say his last words to her and die. Julie strokes his hair, finally able to tell him that she loved him. Carrie and Enoch, reunited by the crisis, attempt to console Julie; Nettie arrives and gives Julie the resolve to keep going despite her despair ("You'll Never Walk Alone"). Billy's defiant spirit ("The Highest Judge of All") is taken Up There to see the Starkeeper, a heavenly official. The Starkeeper tells Billy that the good he did in life was not enough to get into heaven, but so long as there is a person alive who remembers him, he can return for a day to try to do good to redeem himself. He informs Billy that fifteen years have passed on Earth since his suicide, and suggests that Billy can get himself into heaven if he helps his daughter, Louise. He helps Billy look down from heaven to see her (instrumental ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey"). Louise has grown up to be lonely and bitter. The local children ostracize her because her father was a thief and a wife-beater. In the dance, a young ruffian, much like her father at that age, flirts with her and abandons her as too young. The dance concludes, and Billy is anxious to return to Earth and help his daughter. He steals a star to take with him, as the Starkeeper pretends not to notice. Outside Julie's cottage, Carrie describes her visit to New York with the now-wealthy Enoch. Carrie's husband and their many children enter to fetch her—the family must get ready for the high school graduation later that day. Enoch Jr., the oldest son, remains behind to talk with Louise, as Billy and the Heavenly Friend escorting him enter, invisible to the other characters. Louise confides in Enoch Jr. that she plans to run away from home with an acting troupe. He says that he will stop her by marrying her, but that his father will think her an unsuitable match. Louise is outraged: each insults the other's father, and Louise orders Enoch Jr. to go away. Billy, able to make himself visible at will, reveals himself to the sobbing Louise, pretending to be a friend of her father. He offers her a gift—the star he stole from heaven. She refuses it and, frustrated, he slaps her hand. He makes himself invisible, and Louise tells Julie what happened, stating that the slap miraculously felt like a kiss, not a blow—and Julie understands her perfectly. Louise retreats to the house, as Julie notices the star that Billy dropped; she picks it up and seems to feel Billy's presence ("If I Loved You (Reprise)"). Billy invisibly attends Louise's graduation, hoping for one last chance to help his daughter and redeem himself. The beloved town physician, Dr. Seldon (who resembles the Starkeeper) advises the graduating class not to rely on their parents' success or be held back by their failure (words directed at Louise). Seldon prompts everyone to sing an old song, "You'll Never Walk Alone". Billy, still invisible, whispers to Louise, telling her to believe Seldon's words, and when she tentatively reaches out to another girl, she learns she does not have to be an outcast. Billy goes to Julie, telling her at last that he loved her. As his widow and daughter join in the singing, Billy is taken to his heavenly reward. Principal roles and notable performers ° denotes original Broadway cast Musical numbers Act I"List of Songs", Carousel at the IBDB Database. Retrieved July 18, 2012 "The Carousel Waltz" – Orchestra "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan" – Carrie Pipperidge and Julie Jordan "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" – Carrie "If I Loved You" – Billy Bigelow and Julie "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" – Nettie Fowler and Chorus "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" (reprise) – Carrie, Enoch Snow and Female Chorus "When the Children Are Asleep" – Enoch and Carrie "Blow High, Blow Low" – Jigger Craigin, Billy and Male Chorus "Soliloquy" – BillyAct II "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" – Carrie, Nettie, Julie, Enoch and Chorus "Geraniums in the Winder" – Enoch * "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" – Jigger and Chorus "What's the Use of Wond'rin'?" – Julie "You'll Never Walk Alone" – Nettie "The Highest Judge of All" – Billy Ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey" – Orchestra "If I Loved You" (reprise) – Billy Finale: "You'll Never Walk Alone" (reprise) – Company Productions Early productions The original Broadway production opened at the Majestic Theatre on April 19, 1945. The dress rehearsal the day before had gone badly, and the pair feared the new work would not be well received. One successful last-minute change was to have de Mille choreograph the pantomime. The movement of the carnival crowd in the pantomime had been entrusted to Mamoulian, and his version was not working. Rodgers had injured his back the previous week, and he watched the opening from a stretcher propped in a box behind the curtain. Sedated with morphine, he could see only part of the stage. As he could not hear the audience's applause and laughter, he assumed the show was a failure. It was not until friends congratulated him later that evening that he realized that the curtain had been met by wild applause. Bambi Linn, who played Louise, was so enthusiastically received by the audience during her ballet that she was forced to break character, when she next appeared, and bow. Rodgers' daughter Mary caught sight of her friend, Stephen Sondheim, both teenagers then, across several rows; both had eyes wet with tears. The original production ran for 890 performances, closing on May 24, 1947. The original cast included John Raitt (Billy), Jan Clayton (Julie), Jean Darling (Carrie), Eric Mattson (Enoch Snow), Christine Johnson (Nettie Fowler), Murvyn Vye (Jigger), Bambi Linn (Louise) and Russell Collins (Starkeeper). In December 1945, Clayton left to star in the Broadway revival of Show Boat and was replaced by Iva Withers; Raitt was replaced by Henry Michel in January 1947; Darling was replaced by Margot Moser.Hischak, p. 62 After closing on Broadway, the show went on a national tour for two years. It played for five months in Chicago alone, visited twenty states and two Canadian cities, covered and played to nearly two million people. The touring company had a four-week run at New York City Center in January 1949. Following the City Center run, the show was moved back to the Majestic Theatre in the hopes of filling the theatre until South Pacific opened in early April. However, ticket sales were mediocre, and the show closed almost a month early. The musical premiered in the West End, London, at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on June 7, 1950. The production was restaged by Jerome Whyte, with a cast that included Stephen Douglass (Billy), Iva Withers (Julie) and Margot Moser (Carrie). Carousel ran in London for 566 performances, remaining there for over a year and a half. Subsequent productions Carousel was revived in 1954 and 1957 at City Center, presented by the New York City Center Light Opera Company. Both times, the production featured Barbara Cook, though she played Carrie in 1954 and Julie in 1957 (playing alongside Howard Keel as Billy). The production was then taken to Belgium to be performed at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair, with David Atkinson as Billy, Ruth Kobart as Nettie, and Clayton reprising the role of Julie, which she had originated. In August 1965, Rodgers and the Music Theater of Lincoln Center produced Carousel for 47 performances. John Raitt reprised the role of Billy, with Jerry Orbach as Jigger and Reid Shelton as Enoch Snow. The roles of the Starkeeper and Dr. Seldon were played by Edward Everett Horton in his final stage appearance. The following year, New York City Center Light Opera Company brought Carousel back to City Center for 22 performances, with Bruce Yarnell as Billy and Constance Towers as Julie. Nicholas Hytner directed a new production of Carousel in 1992, at London's Royal National Theatre, with choreography by Sir Kenneth MacMillan and designs by Bob Crowley. In this staging, the story begins at the mill, where Julie and Carrie work, with the music slowed down to emphasize the drudgery. After work ends, they move to the shipyards and then to the carnival. As they proceed on a revolving stage, carnival characters appear, and at last the carousel is assembled onstage for the girls to ride.Block, p. 175 Louise is seduced by the ruffian boy during her Act 2 ballet, set around the ruins of a carousel. Michael Hayden played Billy not as a large, gruff man, but as a frustrated smaller one, a time bomb waiting to explode. Hayden, Joanna Riding (Julie) and Janie Dee (Carrie) all won Olivier Awards for their performances. Patricia Routledge played Nettie. Enoch and Carrie were cast as an interracial couple whose eight children, according to the review in The New York Times, looked like "a walking United Colors of Benetton ad". Clive Rowe, as Enoch, was nominated for an Olivier Award. The production's limited run from December 1992 through March 1993 was a sellout. It re-opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London in September 1993, presented by Cameron Mackintosh, where it continued until May 1994. The Hytner production moved to New York's Vivian Beaumont Theater, where it opened on March 24, 1994, and ran for 322 performances. This won five Tony Awards, including best musical revival, as well as awards for Hytner, MacMillan, Crowley and Audra McDonald (as Carrie). The cast also included Sally Murphy as Julie, Shirley Verrett as Nettie, Fisher Stevens as Jigger and Eddie Korbich as Enoch. One change made from the London to the New York production was to have Billy strike Louise across the face, rather than on the hand. According to Hayden, "He does the one unpardonable thing, the thing we can't forgive. It's a challenge for the audience to like him after that." The Hytner Carousel was presented in Japan in May 1995. A U.S. national tour with a scaled-down production began in February 1996 in Houston and closed in May 1997 in Providence, Rhode Island. Producers sought to feature young talent on the tour, with Patrick Wilson as Billy and Sarah Uriarte Berry, and later Jennifer Laura Thompson, as Julie. A revival opened at London's Savoy Theatre on December 2, 2008, after a week of previews, starring Jeremiah James (Billy), Alexandra Silber (Julie) and Lesley Garrett (Nettie). The production received warm to mixed reviews. It closed in June 2009, a month early. Michael Coveney, writing in The Independent, admired Rodgers' music but stated, "Lindsay Posner's efficient revival doesn't hold a candle to the National Theatre 1992 version". A production at Theater Basel, Switzerland, in 2016 to 2017, with German dialogue, was directed by Alexander Charim and choreographed by Teresa Rotemberg. Bryony Dwyer, Christian Miedl and Cheryl Studer starred, respectively, as Julie Jordan, Billy Bigelow and Nettie Fowler.<ref>[http://operabase.com/diary.cgi?lang=en&code=wsba&date=20161215 "Richard Rodgers: Carousel"] , Diary: Theater Basel, Operabase.com. Retrieved on March 8, 2018</ref> A semi-staged revival by the English National Opera opened at the London Coliseum in 2017. The production was directed by Lonny Price, conducted by David Charles Abell, and starred Alfie Boe as Billy, Katherine Jenkins as Julie and Nicholas Lyndhurst as the Starkeeper. The production received mixed to positive reviews. The third Broadway revival began previews in February 2018 at the Imperial Theatre and officially opened on April 12. It closed on September 16, 2018. The production starred Jessie Mueller, Joshua Henry, Renée Fleming, Lindsay Mendez and Alexander Gemignani. The production was directed by Jack O'Brien and choreographed by Justin Peck. The songs "Geraniums in the Winder" and "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" were cut from this revival. Ben Brantley wrote in The New York Times, "The tragic inevitability of Carousel has seldom come across as warmly or as chillingly as it does in this vividly reimagined revival. ... [W]ith thoughtful and powerful performances by Mr. Henry and Ms. Mueller, the love story at the show's center has never seemed quite as ill-starred or, at the same time, as sexy. ... [T]he Starkeeper ... assumes new visibility throughout, taking on the role of Billy's angelic supervisor." Brantley strongly praised the choreography, all the performances and the designers. He was unconvinced, however, by the "mother-daughter dialogue that falls so abrasively on contemporary ears", where Julie tries to justify loving an abusive man, and other scenes in Act 2, particularly those set in heaven, and the optimism of the final scene. Most of the reviewers agreed that while the choreography and performances (especially the singing) were excellent, characterizing the production as sexy and sumptuous, O'Brien's direction did little to help the show deal with modern sensibilities about men's treatment of women, instead indulging in nostalgia. From July to September 2021 the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre in London is presenting a staging by its artistic director Timothy Sheader, with choreography by Drew McOnie. The cast includes Carly Bawden as Julie, Declan Bennett as Billy and Joanna Riding as Nettie. Film, television and concert versions [[File:Boothbay Harbor in Summer.jpg\|thumb\|upright=1.2\|Boothbay Harbor, Maine, where the location shots for Carousels movie version were filmed]] A film version of the musical was made in 1956, starring Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones. It follows the musical's story fairly closely, although a prologue, set in the Starkeeper's heaven, was added. The film was released only a few months after the release of the film version of Oklahoma! It garnered some good reviews, and the soundtrack recording was a best seller. As the same stars appeared in both pictures, however, the two films were often compared, generally to the disadvantage of Carousel. Thomas Hischak, in The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, later wondered "if the smaller number of Carousel stage revivals is the product of this often-lumbering [film] musical". There was also an abridged (100 minute) 1967 network television version that starred Robert Goulet, with choreography by Edward Villella. The New York Philharmonic presented a staged concert version of the musical from February 28 to March 2, 2013, at Avery Fisher Hall. Kelli O'Hara played Julie, with Nathan Gunn as Billy, Stephanie Blythe as Nettie, Jessie Mueller as Carrie, Jason Danieley as Enoch, Shuler Hensley as Jigger, John Cullum as the Starkeeper, and Kate Burton as Mrs. Mullin. Tiler Peck danced the role of Louise to choreography by Warren Carlyle. The production was directed by John Rando and conducted by Rob Fisher. Charles Isherwood of The New York Times wrote, "this is as gorgeously sung a production of this sublime 1945 Broadway musical as you are ever likely to hear." It was broadcast as part of the PBS Live from Lincoln Center series, premiering on April 26, 2013. Music and recordings Musical treatment Rodgers designed Carousel to be an almost continuous stream of music, especially in Act 1. In later years, Rodgers was asked if he had considered writing an opera. He stated that he had been sorely tempted to, but saw Carousel in operatic terms. He remembered, "We came very close to opera in the Majestic Theatre. ... There's much that is operatic in the music." Rodgers uses music in Carousel in subtle ways to differentiate characters and tell the audience of their emotional state. In "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan", the music for the placid Carrie is characterized by even eighth-note rhythms, whereas the emotionally restless Julie's music is marked by dotted eighths and sixteenths; this rhythm will characterize her throughout the show. When Billy whistles a snatch of the song, he selects Julie's dotted notes rather than Carrie's. Reflecting the close association in the music between Julie and the as-yet unborn Louise, when Billy sings in "Soliloquy" of his daughter, who "gets hungry every night", he uses Julie's dotted rhythms. Such rhythms also characterize Julie's Act 2 song, "What's the Use of Wond'rin'". The stable love between Enoch and Carrie is strengthened by her willingness to let Enoch not only plan his entire life, but hers as well. This is reflected in "When the Children Are Asleep", where the two sing in close harmony, but Enoch musically interrupts his intended's turn at the chorus with the words "Dreams that won't be interrupted". Rodgers biographer Geoffrey Block, in his book on the Broadway musical, points out that though Billy may strike his wife, he allows her musical themes to become a part of him and never interrupts her music. Block suggests that, as reprehensible as Billy may be for his actions, Enoch requiring Carrie to act as "the little woman", and his having nine children with her (more than she had found acceptable in "When the Children are Asleep") can be considered to be even more abusive. The twelve-minute "bench scene", in which Billy and Julie get to know each other and which culminates with "If I Loved You", according to Hischak, "is considered the most completely integrated piece of music-drama in the American musical theatre". The scene is almost entirely drawn from Molnár and is one extended musical piece; Stephen Sondheim described it as "probably the single most important moment in the revolution of contemporary musicals". "If I Loved You" has been recorded many times, by such diverse artists as Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Sammy Davis Jr., Mario Lanza and Chad and Jeremy. The D-flat major theme that dominates the music for the second act ballet seems like a new melody to many audience members. It is, however, a greatly expanded development of a theme heard during "Soliloquy" at the line "I guess he'll call me 'The old man' ". When the pair discussed the song that would become "Soliloquy", Rodgers improvised at the piano to give Hammerstein an idea of how he envisioned the song. When Hammerstein presented his collaborator with the lyrics after two weeks of work (Hammerstein always wrote the words first, then Rodgers would write the melodies), Rodgers wrote the music for the eight-minute song in two hours. "What's the Use of Wond'rin' ", one of Julie's songs, worked well in the show but was never as popular on the radio or for recording, and Hammerstein believed that the lack of popularity was because he had concluded the final line, "And all the rest is talk" with a hard consonant, which does not allow the singer a vocal climax. Irving Berlin later stated that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had the same sort of effect on him as the 23rd Psalm. When singer Mel Tormé told Rodgers that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had made him cry, Rodgers nodded impatiently. "You're supposed to." The frequently recorded song has become a widely accepted hymn.Rodgers, p. 240 The cast recording of Carousel proved popular in Liverpool, like many Broadway albums, and in 1963, the Brian Epstein-managed band, Gerry and the Pacemakers had a number-one hit with the song. At the time, the top ten hits were played before Liverpool F.C. home matches; even after "You'll Never Walk Alone" dropped out of the top ten, fans continued to sing it, and it has become closely associated with the soccer team and the city of Liverpool. A BBC program, Soul Music, ranked it alongside "Silent Night" and "Abide With Me" in terms of its emotional impact and iconic status. Recordings The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut—as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made.Fick, David. "The Best Carousel Recording", June 11, 2009. Retrieved on April 7, 2016 A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousels songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. Critical reception and legacy The musical received almost unanimous rave reviews after its opening in 1945. According to Hischak, reviews were not as exuberant as for Oklahoma! as the critics were not taken by surprise this time. John Chapman of the Daily News termed it "one of the finest musical plays I have ever seen and I shall remember it always". The New York Times's reviewer, Lewis Nichols, stated that "Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein 2d, who can do no wrong, have continued doing no wrong in adapting Liliom into a musical play. Their Carousel is on the whole delightful." Wilella Waldorf of the New York Post, however, complained, "Carousel seemed to us a rather long evening. The Oklahoma! formula is becoming a bit monotonous and so are Miss de Mille's ballets. All right, go ahead and shoot!"Suskin, Steven. Opening Night on Broadway. Schirmer Trade Books, 1990, p. 147. . Dance Magazine gave Linn plaudits for her role as Louise, stating, "Bambi doesn't come on until twenty minutes before eleven, and for the next forty minutes, she practically holds the audience in her hand". Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune also applauded the dancing: "It has waited for Miss de Mille to come through with peculiarly American dance patterns for a musical show to become as much a dance as a song show." When the musical returned to New York in 1949, The New York Times reviewer Brooks Atkinson described Carousel as "a conspicuously superior musical play ... Carousel, which was warmly appreciated when it opened, seems like nothing less than a masterpiece now." In 1954, when Carousel was revived at City Center, Atkinson discussed the musical in his review: Carousel has no comment to make on anything of topical importance. The theme is timeless and universal: the devotion of two people who love each other through thick and thin, complicated in this case by the wayward personality of the man, who cannot fulfill the responsibilities he has assumed. ... Billy is a bum, but Carousel recognizes the decency of his motives and admires his independence. There are no slick solutions in Carousel. Stephen Sondheim noted the duo's ability to take the innovations of Oklahoma! and apply them to a serious setting: "Oklahoma! is about a picnic, Carousel is about life and death." Critic Eric Bentley, on the other hand, wrote that "the last scene of Carousel is an impertinence: I refuse to be lectured to by a musical comedy scriptwriter on the education of children, the nature of the good life, and the contribution of the American small town to the salvation of souls."New York Times critic Frank Rich said of the 1992 London production: "What is remarkable about Mr. Hytner's direction, aside from its unorthodox faith in the virtues of simplicity and stillness, is its ability to make a 1992 audience believe in Hammerstein's vision of redemption, which has it that a dead sinner can return to Earth to do godly good." The Hytner production in New York was hailed by many critics as a grittier Carousel, which they deemed more appropriate for the 1990s. Clive Barnes of the New York Post called it a "defining Carousel—hard-nosed, imaginative, and exciting." Critic Michael Billington has commented that "lyrically [Carousel] comes perilously close to acceptance of the inevitability of domestic violence." BroadwayWorld.com stated in 2013 that Carousel is now "considered somewhat controversial in terms of its attitudes on domestic violence" because Julie chooses to stay with Billy despite the abuse; actress Kelli O'Hara noted that the domestic violence that Julie "chooses to deal with – is a real, existing and very complicated thing. And exploring it is an important part of healing it." Rodgers considered Carousel his favorite of all his musicals and wrote, "it affects me deeply every time I see it performed". In 1999, Time magazine, in its "Best of the Century" list, named Carousel the Best Musical of the 20th century, writing that Rodgers and Hammerstein "set the standards for the 20th century musical, and this show features their most beautiful score and the most skillful and affecting example of their musical storytelling". Hammerstein's grandson, Oscar Andrew Hammerstein, in his book about his family, suggested that the wartime situation made Carousel's ending especially poignant to its original viewers, "Every American grieved the loss of a brother, son, father, or friend ... the audience empathized with [Billy's] all-too-human efforts to offer advice, to seek forgiveness, to complete an unfinished life, and to bid a proper good-bye from beyond the grave." Author and composer Ethan Mordden agreed with that perspective: If Oklahoma! developed the moral argument for sending American boys overseas, Carousel offered consolation to those wives and mothers whose boys would only return in spirit. The meaning lay not in the tragedy of the present, but in the hope for a future where no one walks alone. Awards and nominations Original 1945 Broadway productionNote: The Tony Awards were not established until 1947, and so Carousel was not eligible to win any Tonys at its premiere. 1957 revival 1992 London revival 1994 Broadway revival 2018 Broadway revival References Bibliography Block, Geoffrey. Enchanted Evenings: The Broadway Musical from Show Boat to Sondheim. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2004. . Block, Geoffrey (ed.) The Richard Rodgers Reader. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2006. . Bradley, Ian. You've Got to Have a Dream: The Message of the Broadway Musical. Louisville, Ky., Westminster John Knox Press, 2005. 978-0-664-22854-5. Easton, Carol. No Intermission: The Life of Agnes DeMille. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 2000 (1st DaCapo Press edition). . Fordin, Hugh. Getting to Know Him: A Biography of Oscar Hammerstein II. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 1995 reprint of 1986 edition. . Hammerstein, Oscar Andrew. The Hammersteins: A Musical Theatre Family. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 2010. . Hischak, Thomas S. The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2007. . Hyland, William G. Richard Rodgers. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1998. . Molnár, Ferenc. Liliom: A Legend in Seven Scenes and a Prologue. New York: Boni and Liveright, 1921. Mordden, Ethan. "Rodgers & Hammerstein". New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1992. . Nolan, Frederick. The Sound of Their Music: The Story of Rodgers and Hammerstein. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2002. . Rodgers, Richard. Musical Stages: An Autobiography. Jefferson, N.C. Da Capo Press, 2002 reprint of 1975 edition. . Secrest, Meryle. Somewhere for Me: A Biography of Richard Rodgers. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2001. . External links Carousel at guidetomusicaltheatre.com Carousel info page on StageAgent.com – Carousel plot summary and character descriptions (1967 TV adaptation) 1945 musicals Broadway musicals Musicals by Rodgers and Hammerstein West End musicals Musicals based on plays Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients Maine in fiction Fiction set in 1873 Fiction about the afterlife Plays set in Maine Plays set in the 19th century Tony Award-winning musicals	true	[ "\"I Cain't Say No\" is a song from the 1943 musical play Oklahoma! written by composer Richard Rodgers and lyricist/librettist Oscar Hammerstein II, initially performed by Celeste Holm.\n\nIn the song Ado Annie Carnes describes her sexual awakening (albeit in highly euphemistic terms) and the conflicts that it brings. One of two female leads, Ado Annie has a pair of principal suitors, a Persian traveling salesman Ali Hakim and the cowboy Will Parker, recently returned from an excursion to Kansas City. She describes to her friend Laurey the attention she is now receiving from men \"since she filled out\" and her inability to say \"no\" to their advances.\n\nSample lyrics:\nIt ain't so much a question of not knowing what to do.\nI knowed what's right and wrong since I was ten.\nI heared a lot of stories and I reckon they are true\nAbout how girls're put upon by men.\nI know I mustn't fall into the pit\nBut when I'm with a feller,\nI fergit!\n\nI'm just a girl who cain't say no\nI'm in a terrible fix\nI always say \"come on, let's go!\"\nJist when I orta say nix...\n\nReferences\n\nSee also\n\"All Er Nuthin'\", near the end of the musical where Will extracts a promise of fidelity from Annie, and vice versa.\n\n1943 songs\nComedy songs\nSongs about sexuality\nSongs from Oklahoma!\nSongs with music by Richard Rodgers\nSongs with lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II", "\"No Matter What They Say\" is a song by Lil' Kim, released as the first single from her second album The Notorious K.I.M., released in 2000. It reached number 60 on the Billboard Hot 100, and number 35 on the UK Singles Chart.\n\nBackground\n\"No Matter What They Say\" was not Kim's first choice as the lead single from the album. Kim did not want the song released as she felt the Spanish sound had already been done so many times due to the Latin pop explosion of the late 90s. Instead Kim wanted \"The Queen\", one of the songs that leaked prior to the album's release, as her first single. The record label didn't agree with Kim and insisted on releasing \"No Matter What They Say\". With time running out and not wanting her first week album sales to suffer, Kim agreed with her label to release the song. \"The Queen\" never made it on the album's final track listing.\n\nSamples\nThis song sampled many other songs, including:\n\"Esto es el Guaguanco\" by Cheo Feliciano\n\"I Got It Made\" by Special Ed\n\"I Know You Got Soul\" by Eric B. & Rakim\n\"Rapper's Delight\" by The Sugarhill Gang\n\nThe song also samples the line 'I'm just tryna be me, doing what I gotta do' from \"Top of the World\" by Brandy as well as \"This is how it should be done\" from Roxanne's On A Roll by The Real Roxanne.\n\nMusic video \nThe accompanying music video for \"No Matter What They Say\" was filmed in Los Angeles and directed by Marcus Raboy in early June 2000. It features cameo appearances from Puff Daddy, Mary J. Blige, Missy Elliott, Method Man & Redman, Xzibit, Junior M.A.F.I.A. and Carmen Electra. The video needed some digital retouches, such was \"nipple fixes\" for when Kim wiggles out of her Versace bustiers and computer-edited T-shirts for her backup girls (they were altered to \"itty girls\"). Cameo dancer Carmen Electra had her underwear altered as well. \"It's not like you could really see anything. It's just the freeze-frame factor you have to consider\", said director Marcus Raboy. The music video premiered on Total Request Live (TRL) on June 20, 2000.\n\nTrack listings\n\nUS Promo CD\n\"No Matter What They Say\" (Radio Edit) - 4:19\n\"No Matter What They Say\" (Album Version) - 5:35\n\"No Matter What They Say\" (Instrumental) - 4:21\n\nEurope CD single\n\"No Matter What They Say\" (Radio Edit) - 4:18\n\"No Matter What They Say\" (Album Version) - 4:14\n\"No Matter What They Say\" (Instrumental) - 4:19\n\"No Matter What They Say\" (Acappella) - 4:26\n\nCredits and personnel\nCredits for \"No Matter What They Say\" are taken from the single's liner notes.\n\nRecording\nRecorded at Daddy's House Recording Studios.\nRecorded by Stephen Dent\n\nPersonnel\n Lil' Kim – lead vocals\n K. Jones, D. Henson, J. Feliciano, Eric B. & Rakim, E. Archer, R. Beavers, J. Hill, P. Jovner, D. Taylor, H. Thomas, N. Rodgers, B. Edwards – songwriting\n Darren \"Limitless\" Henson – producer\n Rich Travali – mixing\n Chris Athens – audio mastering\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences\n\n2000 singles\nLil' Kim songs\nMusic videos directed by Marcus Raboy\n1999 songs\nAtlantic Records singles\nSongs written by Lil' Kim\nSongs written by Bernard Edwards\nSongs written by Nile Rodgers" ]
[ "Carousel (musical)", "Musical treatment", "What was important with Carousel?", "The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s,", "What kind of music was used?", "The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars,", "How was music incorporated into the production?", "the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format,", "What songs did they sing?", "I don't know.", "What songs were in the production?", "there is a small part of \"Soliloquy\" found on no other recording,", "What did Rodgers say about the music?", "Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made." ]	C_8decf249a7ee4c6bb84aa0f61f4f4d6c_0	Is there anything else interesting?	7	In addition to the kind of music used, is there anything else interesting about the musical Carousel??	Carousel (musical)	The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut--as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made. A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousel's songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. CANNOTANSWER	the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy.	Carousel is the second musical by the team of Richard Rodgers (music) and Oscar Hammerstein II (book and lyrics). The 1945 work was adapted from Ferenc Molnár's 1909 play Liliom, transplanting its Budapest setting to the Maine coastline. The story revolves around carousel barker Billy Bigelow, whose romance with millworker Julie Jordan comes at the price of both their jobs. He participates in a robbery to provide for Julie and their unborn child; after it goes tragically wrong, he is given a chance to make things right. A secondary plot line deals with millworker Carrie Pipperidge and her romance with ambitious fisherman Enoch Snow. The show includes the well-known songs "If I Loved You", "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" and "You'll Never Walk Alone". Richard Rodgers later wrote that Carousel was his favorite of all his musicals. Following the spectacular success of the first Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Oklahoma! (1943), the pair sought to collaborate on another piece, knowing that any resulting work would be compared with Oklahoma!, most likely unfavorably. They were initially reluctant to seek the rights to Liliom; Molnár had refused permission for the work to be adapted in the past, and the original ending was considered too depressing for the musical theatre. After acquiring the rights, the team created a work with lengthy sequences of music and made the ending more hopeful. The musical required considerable modification during out-of-town tryouts, but once it opened on Broadway on April 19, 1945, it was an immediate hit with both critics and audiences. Carousel initially ran for 890 performances and duplicated its success in the West End in 1950. Though it has never achieved as much commercial success as Oklahoma!, the piece has been repeatedly revived, recorded several times and was filmed in 1956. A production by Nicholas Hytner enjoyed success in 1992 in London, in 1994 in New York and on tour. Another Broadway revival opened in 2018. In 1999, Time magazine named Carousel the best musical of the 20th century. Background Liliom Ferenc Molnár's Hungarian-language drama, Liliom, premiered in Budapest in 1909. The audience was puzzled by the work, and it lasted only thirty-odd performances before being withdrawn, the first shadow on Molnár's successful career as a playwright. Liliom was not presented again until after World War I. When it reappeared on the Budapest stage, it was a tremendous hit. Except for the ending, the plots of Liliom and Carousel are very similar. Andreas Zavocky (nicknamed Liliom, the Hungarian word for "lily", a slang term for "tough guy"), a carnival barker, falls in love with Julie Zeller, a servant girl, and they begin living together. With both discharged from their jobs, Liliom is discontented and contemplates leaving Julie, but decides not to do so on learning that she is pregnant. A subplot involves Julie's friend Marie, who has fallen in love with Wolf Biefeld, a hotel porter—after the two marry, he becomes the owner of the hotel. Desperate to make money so that he, Julie and their child can escape to America and a better life, Liliom conspires with lowlife Ficsur to commit a robbery, but it goes badly, and Liliom stabs himself. He dies, and his spirit is taken to heaven's police court. As Ficsur suggested while the two waited to commit the crime, would-be robbers like them do not come before God Himself. Liliom is told by the magistrate that he may go back to Earth for one day to attempt to redeem the wrongs he has done to his family, but must first spend sixteen years in a fiery purgatory. On his return to Earth, Liliom encounters his daughter, Louise, who like her mother is now a factory worker. Saying that he knew her father, he tries to give her a star he stole from the heavens. When Louise refuses to take it, he strikes her. Not realizing who he is, Julie confronts him, but finds herself unable to be angry with him. Liliom is ushered off to his fate, presumably Hell, and Louise asks her mother if it is possible to feel a hard slap as if it was a kiss. Julie reminiscently tells her daughter that it is very possible for that to happen. An English translation of Liliom was credited to Benjamin "Barney" Glazer, though there is a story that the actual translator, uncredited, was Rodgers' first major partner Lorenz Hart. The Theatre Guild presented it in New York City in 1921, with Joseph Schildkraut as Liliom, and the play was a success, running 300 performances. A 1940 revival with Burgess Meredith and Ingrid Bergman was seen by both Hammerstein and Rodgers. Glazer, in introducing the English translation of Liliom, wrote of the play's appeal: And where in modern dramatic literature can such pearls be matched—Julie incoherently confessing to her dead lover the love she had always been ashamed to tell; Liliom crying out to the distant carousel the glad news that he is to be a father; the two thieves gambling for the spoils of their prospective robbery; Marie and Wolf posing for their portrait while the broken-hearted Julie stands looking after the vanishing Liliom, the thieves' song ringing in her ears; the two policemen grousing about pay and pensions while Liliom lies bleeding to death; Liliom furtively proffering his daughter the star he has stolen for her in heaven. ... The temptation to count the whole scintillating string is difficult to resist. Inception In the 1920s and 1930s, Rodgers and Hammerstein both became well known for creating Broadway hits with other partners. Rodgers, with Lorenz Hart, had produced a string of over two dozen musicals, including such popular successes as Babes in Arms (1937), The Boys from Syracuse (1938) and Pal Joey (1940). Some of Rodgers' work with Hart broke new ground in musical theatre: On Your Toes was the first use of ballet to sustain the plot (in the "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue" scene), while Pal Joey flouted Broadway tradition by presenting a knave as its hero. Hammerstein had written or co-written the words for such hits as Rose-Marie (1924), The Desert Song (1926), The New Moon (1927) and Show Boat (1927). Though less productive in the 1930s, he wrote material for musicals and films, sharing an Oscar for his song with Jerome Kern, "The Last Time I Saw Paris", which was included in the 1941 film Lady Be Good. By the early 1940s, Hart had sunk into alcoholism and emotional turmoil, becoming unreliable and prompting Rodgers to approach Hammerstein to ask if he would consider working with him. Hammerstein was eager to do so, and their first collaboration was Oklahoma! (1943). Thomas Hischak states, in his The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, that Oklahoma! is "the single most influential work in the American musical theatre. In fact, the history of the Broadway musical can accurately be divided into what came before Oklahoma! and what came after it." An innovation for its time in integrating song, character, plot and dance, Oklahoma! would serve, according to Hischak, as "the model for Broadway shows for decades", and proved a huge popular and financial success. Once it was well-launched, what to do as an encore was a daunting challenge for the pair. Film producer Samuel Goldwyn saw Oklahoma! and advised Rodgers to shoot himself, which according to Rodgers "was Sam's blunt but funny way of telling me that I'd never create another show as good as Oklahoma!" As they considered new projects, Hammerstein wrote, "We're such fools. No matter what we do, everyone is bound to say, 'This is not another Oklahoma! " Oklahoma! had been a struggle to finance and produce. Hammerstein and Rodgers met weekly in 1943 with Theresa Helburn and Lawrence Langner of the Theatre Guild, producers of the blockbuster musical, who together formed what they termed "the Gloat Club". At one such luncheon, Helburn and Langner proposed to Rodgers and Hammerstein that they turn Molnár's Liliom into a musical. Both men refused—they had no feeling for the Budapest setting and thought that the unhappy ending was unsuitable for musical theatre. In addition, given the unstable wartime political situation, they might need to change the setting from Hungary while in rehearsal. At the next luncheon, Helburn and Langner again proposed Liliom, suggesting that they move the setting to Louisiana and make Liliom a Creole. Rodgers and Hammerstein played with the idea over the next few weeks, but decided that Creole dialect, filled with "zis" and "zose", would sound corny and would make it difficult to write effective lyrics. A breakthrough came when Rodgers, who owned a house in Connecticut, proposed a New England setting. Hammerstein wrote of this suggestion in 1945, I began to see an attractive ensemble—sailors, whalers, girls who worked in the mills up the river, clambakes on near-by islands, an amusement park on the seaboard, things people could do in crowds, people who were strong and alive and lusty, people who had always been depicted on the stage as thin-lipped puritans—a libel I was anxious to refute ... as for the two leading characters, Julie with her courage and inner strength and outward simplicity seemed more indigenous to Maine than to Budapest. Liliom is, of course, an international character, indigenous to nowhere. Rodgers and Hammerstein were also concerned about what they termed "the tunnel" of Molnár's second act—a series of gloomy scenes leading up to Liliom's suicide—followed by a dark ending. They also felt it would be difficult to set Liliom's motivation for the robbery to music. Molnár's opposition to having his works adapted was also an issue; he had famously turned down Giacomo Puccini when the great composer wished to transform Liliom into an opera, stating that he wanted the piece to be remembered as his, not Puccini's. In 1937, Molnár, who had recently emigrated to the United States, had declined another offer from Kurt Weill to adapt the play into a musical. The pair continued to work on the preliminary ideas for a Liliom adaptation while pursuing other projects in late 1943 and early 1944—writing the film musical State Fair and producing I Remember Mama on Broadway. Meanwhile, the Theatre Guild took Molnár to see Oklahoma! Molnár stated that if Rodgers and Hammerstein could adapt Liliom as beautifully as they had modified Green Grow the Lilacs into Oklahoma!, he would be pleased to have them do it. The Guild obtained the rights from Molnár in October 1943. The playwright received one percent of the gross and $2,500 for "personal services". The duo insisted, as part of the contract, that Molnár permit them to make changes in the plot. At first, the playwright refused, but eventually yielded. Hammerstein later stated that if this point had not been won, "we could never have made Carousel." In seeking to establish through song Liliom's motivation for the robbery, Rodgers remembered that he and Hart had a similar problem in Pal Joey. Rodgers and Hart had overcome the problem with a song that Joey sings to himself, "I'm Talking to My Pal". This inspired "Soliloquy". Both partners later told a story that "Soliloquy" was only intended to be a song about Liliom's dreams of a son, but that Rodgers, who had two daughters, insisted that Liliom consider that Julie might have a girl. However, the notes taken at their meeting of December 7, 1943 state: "Mr. Rodgers suggested a fine musical number for the end of the scene where Liliom discovers he is to be a father, in which he sings first with pride of the growth of a boy, and then suddenly realizes it might be a girl and changes completely." Hammerstein and Rodgers returned to the Liliom project in mid-1944. Hammerstein was uneasy as he worked, fearing that no matter what they did, Molnár would disapprove of the results. Green Grow the Lilacs had been a little-known work; Liliom was a theatrical standard. Molnár's text also contained considerable commentary on the Hungarian politics of 1909 and the rigidity of that society. A dismissed carnival barker who hits his wife, attempts a robbery and commits suicide seemed an unlikely central character for a musical comedy. Hammerstein decided to use the words and story to make the audience sympathize with the lovers. He also built up the secondary couple, who are incidental to the plot in Liliom; they became Enoch Snow and Carrie Pipperidge. "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" was repurposed from a song, "A Real Nice Hayride", written for Oklahoma! but not used. Molnár's ending was unsuitable, and after a couple of false starts, Hammerstein conceived the graduation scene that ends the musical. According to Frederick Nolan in his book on the team's works: "From that scene the song "You'll Never Walk Alone" sprang almost naturally." In spite of Hammerstein's simple lyrics for "You'll Never Walk Alone", Rodgers had great difficulty in setting it to music. Rodgers explained his rationale for the changed ending, Liliom was a tragedy about a man who cannot learn to live with other people. The way Molnár wrote it, the man ends up hitting his daughter and then having to go back to purgatory, leaving his daughter helpless and hopeless. We couldn't accept that. The way we ended Carousel it may still be a tragedy but it's a hopeful one because in the final scene it is clear that the child has at last learned how to express herself and communicate with others. When the pair decided to make "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" into an ensemble number, Hammerstein realized he had no idea what a clambake was like, and researched the matter. Based on his initial findings, he wrote the line, "First came codfish chowder". However, further research convinced him the proper term was "codhead chowder", a term unfamiliar to many playgoers. He decided to keep it as "codfish". When the song proceeded to discuss the lobsters consumed at the feast, Hammerstein wrote the line "We slit 'em down the back/And peppered 'em good". He was grieved to hear from a friend that lobsters are always slit down the front. The lyricist sent a researcher to a seafood restaurant and heard back that lobsters are always slit down the back. Hammerstein concluded that there is disagreement about which side of a lobster is the back. One error not caught involved the song "June Is Bustin' Out All Over", in which sheep are depicted as seeking to mate in late spring—they actually do so in the winter. Whenever this was brought to Hammerstein's attention, he told his informant that 1873 was a special year, in which sheep mated in the spring. Rodgers early decided to dispense with an overture, feeling that the music was hard to hear over the banging of seats as latecomers settled themselves. In his autobiography, Rodgers complained that only the brass section can be heard during an overture because there are never enough strings in a musical's small orchestra. He determined to force the audience to concentrate from the beginning by opening with a pantomime scene accompanied by what became known as "The Carousel Waltz". The pantomime paralleled one in the Molnár play, which was also used to introduce the characters and situation to the audience. Author Ethan Mordden described the effectiveness of this opening: Other characters catch our notice—Mr. Bascombe, the pompous mill owner, Mrs. Mullin, the widow who runs the carousel and, apparently, Billy; a dancing bear; an acrobat. But what draws us in is the intensity with which Julie regards Billy—the way she stands frozen, staring at him, while everyone else at the fair is swaying to the rhythm of Billy's spiel. And as Julie and Billy ride together on the swirling carousel, and the stage picture surges with the excitement of the crowd, and the orchestra storms to a climax, and the curtain falls, we realize that R & H have not only skipped the overture and the opening number but the exposition as well. They have plunged into the story, right into the middle of it, in the most intense first scene any musical ever had. Casting and out-of-town tryouts The casting for Carousel began when Oklahoma!s production team, including Rodgers and Hammerstein, was seeking a replacement for the part of Curly (the male lead in Oklahoma!). Lawrence Langner had heard, through a relative, of a California singer named John Raitt, who might be suitable for the part. Langner went to hear Raitt, then urged the others to bring Raitt to New York for an audition. Raitt asked to sing "Largo al factotum", Figaro's aria from The Barber of Seville, to warm up. The warmup was sufficient to convince the producers that not only had they found a Curly, they had found a Liliom (or Billy Bigelow, as the part was renamed). Theresa Helburn made another California discovery, Jan Clayton, a singer/actress who had made a few minor films for MGM. She was brought east and successfully auditioned for the part of Julie. The producers sought to cast unknowns. Though many had played in previous Hammerstein or Rodgers works, only one, Jean Casto (cast as carousel owner Mrs. Mullin, and a veteran of Pal Joey), had ever played on Broadway before. It proved harder to cast the ensemble than the leads, due to the war—Rodgers told his casting director, John Fearnley, that the sole qualification for a dancing boy was that he be alive. Rodgers and Hammerstein reassembled much of the creative team that had made Oklahoma! a success, including director Rouben Mamoulian and choreographer Agnes de Mille. Miles White was the costume designer while Jo Mielziner (who had not worked on Oklahoma!) was the scenic and lighting designer. Even though Oklahoma! orchestrator Russell Bennett had informed Rodgers that he was unavailable to work on Carousel due to a radio contract, Rodgers insisted he do the work in his spare time. He orchestrated "The Carousel Waltz" and "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" before finally being replaced by Don Walker. A new member of the creative team was Trude Rittmann, who arranged the dance music. Rittmann initially felt that Rodgers mistrusted her because she was a woman, and found him difficult to work with, but the two worked together on Rodgers' shows until the 1970s. Rehearsals began in January 1945; either Rodgers or Hammerstein was always present. Raitt was presented with the lyrics for "Soliloquy" on a five-foot long sheet of paper—the piece ran nearly eight minutes. Staging such a long solo number presented problems, and Raitt later stated that he felt that they were never fully addressed. At some point during rehearsals, Molnár came to see what they had done to his play. There are a number of variations on the story.Fordin, pp. 231–32 As Rodgers told it, while watching rehearsals with Hammerstein, the composer spotted Molnár in the rear of the theatre and whispered the news to his partner. Both sweated through an afternoon of rehearsal in which nothing seemed to go right. At the end, the two walked to the back of the theatre, expecting an angry reaction from Molnár. Instead, the playwright said enthusiastically, "What you have done is so beautiful. And you know what I like best? The ending!" Hammerstein wrote that Molnár became a regular attendee at rehearsals after that. Like most of the pair's works, Carousel contains a lengthy ballet, "Billy Makes a Journey", in the second act, as Billy looks down to the Earth from "Up There" and observes his daughter. In the original production the ballet was choreographed by de Mille. It began with Billy looking down from heaven at his wife in labor, with the village women gathered for a "birthing". The ballet involved every character in the play, some of whom spoke lines of dialogue, and contained a number of subplots. The focus was on Louise, played by Bambi Linn, who at first almost soars in her dance, expressing the innocence of childhood. She is teased and mocked by her schoolmates, and Louise becomes attracted to the rough carnival people, who symbolize Billy's world. A youth from the carnival attempts to seduce Louise, as she discovers her own sexuality, but he decides she is more girl than woman, and he leaves her. After Julie comforts her, Louise goes to a children's party, where she is shunned. The carnival people reappear and form a ring around the children's party, with Louise lost between the two groups. At the end, the performers form a huge carousel with their bodies. The play opened for tryouts in New Haven, Connecticut on March 22, 1945. The first act was well-received; the second act was not. Casto recalled that the second act finished about 1:30 a.m. The staff immediately sat down for a two-hour conference. Five scenes, half the ballet, and two songs were cut from the show as the result. John Fearnley commented, "Now I see why these people have hits. I never witnessed anything so brisk and brave in my life." De Mille said of this conference, "not three minutes had been wasted pleading for something cherished. Nor was there any idle joking. ... We cut and cut and cut and then we went to bed." By the time the company left New Haven, de Mille's ballet was down to forty minutes. A major concern with the second act was the effectiveness of the characters He and She (later called by Rodgers "Mr. and Mrs. God"), before whom Billy appeared after his death. Mr. and Mrs. God were depicted as a New England minister and his wife, seen in their parlor.Block (ed.), p. 129. At this time, according to the cast sheet distributed during the Boston run, Dr. Seldon was listed as the "Minister". The couple was still part of the show at the Boston opening. Rodgers said to Hammerstein, "We've got to get God out of that parlor". When Hammerstein inquired where he should put the deity, Rodgers replied, "I don't care where you put Him. Put Him on a ladder for all I care, only get Him out of that parlor!" Hammerstein duly put Mr. God (renamed the Starkeeper) atop a ladder, and Mrs. God was removed from the show. Rodgers biographer Meryle Secrest terms this change a mistake, leading to a more fantastic afterlife, which was later criticized by The New Republic as "a Rotarian atmosphere congenial to audiences who seek not reality but escape from reality, not truth but escape from truth". Hammerstein wrote that Molnár's advice, to combine two scenes into one, was key to pulling together the second act and represented "a more radical departure from the original than any change we had made". A reprise of "If I Loved You" was added in the second act, which Rodgers felt needed more music. Three weeks of tryouts in Boston followed the brief New Haven run, and the audience there gave the musical a warm reception. An even shorter version of the ballet was presented the final two weeks in Boston, but on the final night there, de Mille expanded it back to forty minutes, and it brought the house down, causing both Rodgers and Hammerstein to embrace her. Synopsis Act 1 Two young female millworkers in 1873 Maine visit the town's carousel after work. One of them, Julie Jordan, attracts the attention of the barker, Billy Bigelow ("The Carousel Waltz"). When Julie lets Billy put his arm around her during the ride, Mrs. Mullin, the widowed owner of the carousel, tells Julie never to return. Julie and her friend, Carrie Pipperidge, argue with Mrs. Mullin. Billy arrives and, seeing that Mrs. Mullin is jealous, mocks her; he is fired from his job. Billy, unconcerned, invites Julie to join him for a drink. As he goes to get his belongings, Carrie presses Julie about her feelings toward him, but Julie is evasive ("You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan"). Carrie has a beau too, fisherman Enoch Snow ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow"), to whom she is newly engaged. Billy returns for Julie as the departing Carrie warns that staying out late means the loss of Julie's job. Mr. Bascombe, owner of the mill, happens by along with a policeman, and offers to escort Julie to her home, but she refuses and is fired. Left alone, she and Billy talk about what life might be like if they were in love, but neither quite confesses to the growing attraction they feel for each other ("If I Loved You"). Over a month passes, and preparations for the summer clambake are under way ("June Is Bustin' Out All Over"). Julie and Billy, now married, live at Julie's cousin Nettie's spa. Julie confides in Carrie that Billy, frustrated over being unemployed, hit her. Carrie has happier news—she is engaged to Enoch, who enters as she discusses him ("(When I Marry) Mister Snow (reprise))". Billy arrives with his ne'er-do-well whaler friend, Jigger. The former barker is openly rude to Enoch and Julie, then leaves with Jigger, followed by a distraught Julie. Enoch tells Carrie that he expects to become rich selling herring and to have a large family, larger perhaps than Carrie is comfortable having ("When the Children Are Asleep"). Jigger and his shipmates, joined by Billy, then sing about life on the sea ("Blow High, Blow Low"). The whaler tries to recruit Billy to help with a robbery, but Billy declines, as the victim—Julie's former boss, Mr. Bascombe—might have to be killed. Mrs. Mullin enters and tries to tempt Billy back to the carousel (and to her). He would have to abandon Julie; a married barker cannot evoke the same sexual tension as one who is single. Billy reluctantly mulls it over as Julie arrives and the others leave. She tells him that she is pregnant, and Billy is overwhelmed with happiness, ending all thoughts of returning to the carousel. Once alone, Billy imagines the fun he will have with Bill Jr.—until he realizes that his child might be a girl, and reflects soberly that "you've got to be a father to a girl" ("Soliloquy"). Determined to provide financially for his future child, whatever the means, Billy decides to be Jigger's accomplice. The whole town leaves for the clambake. Billy, who had earlier refused to go, agrees to join in, to Julie's delight, as he realizes that being seen at the clambake is integral to his and Jigger's alibi ("Act I Finale"). Act 2 Everyone reminisces about the huge meal and much fun ("This Was a Real Nice Clambake"). Jigger tries to seduce Carrie; Enoch walks in at the wrong moment, and declares that he is finished with her ("Geraniums In the Winder"), as Jigger jeers ("There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman"). The girls try to comfort Carrie, but for Julie all that matters is that "he's your feller and you love him" ("What's the Use of Wond'rin'?"). Julie sees Billy trying to sneak away with Jigger and, trying to stop him, feels the knife hidden in his shirt. She begs him to give it to her, but he refuses and leaves to commit the robbery. As they wait, Jigger and Billy gamble with cards. They stake their shares of the anticipated robbery spoils. Billy loses: his participation is now pointless. Unknown to Billy and Jigger, Mr. Bascombe, the intended victim, has already deposited the mill's money. The robbery fails: Bascombe pulls a gun on Billy while Jigger escapes. Billy stabs himself with his knife; Julie arrives just in time for him to say his last words to her and die. Julie strokes his hair, finally able to tell him that she loved him. Carrie and Enoch, reunited by the crisis, attempt to console Julie; Nettie arrives and gives Julie the resolve to keep going despite her despair ("You'll Never Walk Alone"). Billy's defiant spirit ("The Highest Judge of All") is taken Up There to see the Starkeeper, a heavenly official. The Starkeeper tells Billy that the good he did in life was not enough to get into heaven, but so long as there is a person alive who remembers him, he can return for a day to try to do good to redeem himself. He informs Billy that fifteen years have passed on Earth since his suicide, and suggests that Billy can get himself into heaven if he helps his daughter, Louise. He helps Billy look down from heaven to see her (instrumental ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey"). Louise has grown up to be lonely and bitter. The local children ostracize her because her father was a thief and a wife-beater. In the dance, a young ruffian, much like her father at that age, flirts with her and abandons her as too young. The dance concludes, and Billy is anxious to return to Earth and help his daughter. He steals a star to take with him, as the Starkeeper pretends not to notice. Outside Julie's cottage, Carrie describes her visit to New York with the now-wealthy Enoch. Carrie's husband and their many children enter to fetch her—the family must get ready for the high school graduation later that day. Enoch Jr., the oldest son, remains behind to talk with Louise, as Billy and the Heavenly Friend escorting him enter, invisible to the other characters. Louise confides in Enoch Jr. that she plans to run away from home with an acting troupe. He says that he will stop her by marrying her, but that his father will think her an unsuitable match. Louise is outraged: each insults the other's father, and Louise orders Enoch Jr. to go away. Billy, able to make himself visible at will, reveals himself to the sobbing Louise, pretending to be a friend of her father. He offers her a gift—the star he stole from heaven. She refuses it and, frustrated, he slaps her hand. He makes himself invisible, and Louise tells Julie what happened, stating that the slap miraculously felt like a kiss, not a blow—and Julie understands her perfectly. Louise retreats to the house, as Julie notices the star that Billy dropped; she picks it up and seems to feel Billy's presence ("If I Loved You (Reprise)"). Billy invisibly attends Louise's graduation, hoping for one last chance to help his daughter and redeem himself. The beloved town physician, Dr. Seldon (who resembles the Starkeeper) advises the graduating class not to rely on their parents' success or be held back by their failure (words directed at Louise). Seldon prompts everyone to sing an old song, "You'll Never Walk Alone". Billy, still invisible, whispers to Louise, telling her to believe Seldon's words, and when she tentatively reaches out to another girl, she learns she does not have to be an outcast. Billy goes to Julie, telling her at last that he loved her. As his widow and daughter join in the singing, Billy is taken to his heavenly reward. Principal roles and notable performers ° denotes original Broadway cast Musical numbers Act I"List of Songs", Carousel at the IBDB Database. Retrieved July 18, 2012 "The Carousel Waltz" – Orchestra "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan" – Carrie Pipperidge and Julie Jordan "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" – Carrie "If I Loved You" – Billy Bigelow and Julie "June Is Bustin' Out All Over" – Nettie Fowler and Chorus "(When I Marry) Mister Snow" (reprise) – Carrie, Enoch Snow and Female Chorus "When the Children Are Asleep" – Enoch and Carrie "Blow High, Blow Low" – Jigger Craigin, Billy and Male Chorus "Soliloquy" – BillyAct II "This Was a Real Nice Clambake" – Carrie, Nettie, Julie, Enoch and Chorus "Geraniums in the Winder" – Enoch * "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" – Jigger and Chorus "What's the Use of Wond'rin'?" – Julie "You'll Never Walk Alone" – Nettie "The Highest Judge of All" – Billy Ballet: "Billy Makes a Journey" – Orchestra "If I Loved You" (reprise) – Billy Finale: "You'll Never Walk Alone" (reprise) – Company Productions Early productions The original Broadway production opened at the Majestic Theatre on April 19, 1945. The dress rehearsal the day before had gone badly, and the pair feared the new work would not be well received. One successful last-minute change was to have de Mille choreograph the pantomime. The movement of the carnival crowd in the pantomime had been entrusted to Mamoulian, and his version was not working. Rodgers had injured his back the previous week, and he watched the opening from a stretcher propped in a box behind the curtain. Sedated with morphine, he could see only part of the stage. As he could not hear the audience's applause and laughter, he assumed the show was a failure. It was not until friends congratulated him later that evening that he realized that the curtain had been met by wild applause. Bambi Linn, who played Louise, was so enthusiastically received by the audience during her ballet that she was forced to break character, when she next appeared, and bow. Rodgers' daughter Mary caught sight of her friend, Stephen Sondheim, both teenagers then, across several rows; both had eyes wet with tears. The original production ran for 890 performances, closing on May 24, 1947. The original cast included John Raitt (Billy), Jan Clayton (Julie), Jean Darling (Carrie), Eric Mattson (Enoch Snow), Christine Johnson (Nettie Fowler), Murvyn Vye (Jigger), Bambi Linn (Louise) and Russell Collins (Starkeeper). In December 1945, Clayton left to star in the Broadway revival of Show Boat and was replaced by Iva Withers; Raitt was replaced by Henry Michel in January 1947; Darling was replaced by Margot Moser.Hischak, p. 62 After closing on Broadway, the show went on a national tour for two years. It played for five months in Chicago alone, visited twenty states and two Canadian cities, covered and played to nearly two million people. The touring company had a four-week run at New York City Center in January 1949. Following the City Center run, the show was moved back to the Majestic Theatre in the hopes of filling the theatre until South Pacific opened in early April. However, ticket sales were mediocre, and the show closed almost a month early. The musical premiered in the West End, London, at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on June 7, 1950. The production was restaged by Jerome Whyte, with a cast that included Stephen Douglass (Billy), Iva Withers (Julie) and Margot Moser (Carrie). Carousel ran in London for 566 performances, remaining there for over a year and a half. Subsequent productions Carousel was revived in 1954 and 1957 at City Center, presented by the New York City Center Light Opera Company. Both times, the production featured Barbara Cook, though she played Carrie in 1954 and Julie in 1957 (playing alongside Howard Keel as Billy). The production was then taken to Belgium to be performed at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair, with David Atkinson as Billy, Ruth Kobart as Nettie, and Clayton reprising the role of Julie, which she had originated. In August 1965, Rodgers and the Music Theater of Lincoln Center produced Carousel for 47 performances. John Raitt reprised the role of Billy, with Jerry Orbach as Jigger and Reid Shelton as Enoch Snow. The roles of the Starkeeper and Dr. Seldon were played by Edward Everett Horton in his final stage appearance. The following year, New York City Center Light Opera Company brought Carousel back to City Center for 22 performances, with Bruce Yarnell as Billy and Constance Towers as Julie. Nicholas Hytner directed a new production of Carousel in 1992, at London's Royal National Theatre, with choreography by Sir Kenneth MacMillan and designs by Bob Crowley. In this staging, the story begins at the mill, where Julie and Carrie work, with the music slowed down to emphasize the drudgery. After work ends, they move to the shipyards and then to the carnival. As they proceed on a revolving stage, carnival characters appear, and at last the carousel is assembled onstage for the girls to ride.Block, p. 175 Louise is seduced by the ruffian boy during her Act 2 ballet, set around the ruins of a carousel. Michael Hayden played Billy not as a large, gruff man, but as a frustrated smaller one, a time bomb waiting to explode. Hayden, Joanna Riding (Julie) and Janie Dee (Carrie) all won Olivier Awards for their performances. Patricia Routledge played Nettie. Enoch and Carrie were cast as an interracial couple whose eight children, according to the review in The New York Times, looked like "a walking United Colors of Benetton ad". Clive Rowe, as Enoch, was nominated for an Olivier Award. The production's limited run from December 1992 through March 1993 was a sellout. It re-opened at the Shaftesbury Theatre in London in September 1993, presented by Cameron Mackintosh, where it continued until May 1994. The Hytner production moved to New York's Vivian Beaumont Theater, where it opened on March 24, 1994, and ran for 322 performances. This won five Tony Awards, including best musical revival, as well as awards for Hytner, MacMillan, Crowley and Audra McDonald (as Carrie). The cast also included Sally Murphy as Julie, Shirley Verrett as Nettie, Fisher Stevens as Jigger and Eddie Korbich as Enoch. One change made from the London to the New York production was to have Billy strike Louise across the face, rather than on the hand. According to Hayden, "He does the one unpardonable thing, the thing we can't forgive. It's a challenge for the audience to like him after that." The Hytner Carousel was presented in Japan in May 1995. A U.S. national tour with a scaled-down production began in February 1996 in Houston and closed in May 1997 in Providence, Rhode Island. Producers sought to feature young talent on the tour, with Patrick Wilson as Billy and Sarah Uriarte Berry, and later Jennifer Laura Thompson, as Julie. A revival opened at London's Savoy Theatre on December 2, 2008, after a week of previews, starring Jeremiah James (Billy), Alexandra Silber (Julie) and Lesley Garrett (Nettie). The production received warm to mixed reviews. It closed in June 2009, a month early. Michael Coveney, writing in The Independent, admired Rodgers' music but stated, "Lindsay Posner's efficient revival doesn't hold a candle to the National Theatre 1992 version". A production at Theater Basel, Switzerland, in 2016 to 2017, with German dialogue, was directed by Alexander Charim and choreographed by Teresa Rotemberg. Bryony Dwyer, Christian Miedl and Cheryl Studer starred, respectively, as Julie Jordan, Billy Bigelow and Nettie Fowler.<ref>[http://operabase.com/diary.cgi?lang=en&code=wsba&date=20161215 "Richard Rodgers: Carousel"] , Diary: Theater Basel, Operabase.com. Retrieved on March 8, 2018</ref> A semi-staged revival by the English National Opera opened at the London Coliseum in 2017. The production was directed by Lonny Price, conducted by David Charles Abell, and starred Alfie Boe as Billy, Katherine Jenkins as Julie and Nicholas Lyndhurst as the Starkeeper. The production received mixed to positive reviews. The third Broadway revival began previews in February 2018 at the Imperial Theatre and officially opened on April 12. It closed on September 16, 2018. The production starred Jessie Mueller, Joshua Henry, Renée Fleming, Lindsay Mendez and Alexander Gemignani. The production was directed by Jack O'Brien and choreographed by Justin Peck. The songs "Geraniums in the Winder" and "There's Nothin' So Bad for a Woman" were cut from this revival. Ben Brantley wrote in The New York Times, "The tragic inevitability of Carousel has seldom come across as warmly or as chillingly as it does in this vividly reimagined revival. ... [W]ith thoughtful and powerful performances by Mr. Henry and Ms. Mueller, the love story at the show's center has never seemed quite as ill-starred or, at the same time, as sexy. ... [T]he Starkeeper ... assumes new visibility throughout, taking on the role of Billy's angelic supervisor." Brantley strongly praised the choreography, all the performances and the designers. He was unconvinced, however, by the "mother-daughter dialogue that falls so abrasively on contemporary ears", where Julie tries to justify loving an abusive man, and other scenes in Act 2, particularly those set in heaven, and the optimism of the final scene. Most of the reviewers agreed that while the choreography and performances (especially the singing) were excellent, characterizing the production as sexy and sumptuous, O'Brien's direction did little to help the show deal with modern sensibilities about men's treatment of women, instead indulging in nostalgia. From July to September 2021 the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre in London is presenting a staging by its artistic director Timothy Sheader, with choreography by Drew McOnie. The cast includes Carly Bawden as Julie, Declan Bennett as Billy and Joanna Riding as Nettie. Film, television and concert versions [[File:Boothbay Harbor in Summer.jpg\|thumb\|upright=1.2\|Boothbay Harbor, Maine, where the location shots for Carousels movie version were filmed]] A film version of the musical was made in 1956, starring Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones. It follows the musical's story fairly closely, although a prologue, set in the Starkeeper's heaven, was added. The film was released only a few months after the release of the film version of Oklahoma! It garnered some good reviews, and the soundtrack recording was a best seller. As the same stars appeared in both pictures, however, the two films were often compared, generally to the disadvantage of Carousel. Thomas Hischak, in The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia, later wondered "if the smaller number of Carousel stage revivals is the product of this often-lumbering [film] musical". There was also an abridged (100 minute) 1967 network television version that starred Robert Goulet, with choreography by Edward Villella. The New York Philharmonic presented a staged concert version of the musical from February 28 to March 2, 2013, at Avery Fisher Hall. Kelli O'Hara played Julie, with Nathan Gunn as Billy, Stephanie Blythe as Nettie, Jessie Mueller as Carrie, Jason Danieley as Enoch, Shuler Hensley as Jigger, John Cullum as the Starkeeper, and Kate Burton as Mrs. Mullin. Tiler Peck danced the role of Louise to choreography by Warren Carlyle. The production was directed by John Rando and conducted by Rob Fisher. Charles Isherwood of The New York Times wrote, "this is as gorgeously sung a production of this sublime 1945 Broadway musical as you are ever likely to hear." It was broadcast as part of the PBS Live from Lincoln Center series, premiering on April 26, 2013. Music and recordings Musical treatment Rodgers designed Carousel to be an almost continuous stream of music, especially in Act 1. In later years, Rodgers was asked if he had considered writing an opera. He stated that he had been sorely tempted to, but saw Carousel in operatic terms. He remembered, "We came very close to opera in the Majestic Theatre. ... There's much that is operatic in the music." Rodgers uses music in Carousel in subtle ways to differentiate characters and tell the audience of their emotional state. In "You're a Queer One, Julie Jordan", the music for the placid Carrie is characterized by even eighth-note rhythms, whereas the emotionally restless Julie's music is marked by dotted eighths and sixteenths; this rhythm will characterize her throughout the show. When Billy whistles a snatch of the song, he selects Julie's dotted notes rather than Carrie's. Reflecting the close association in the music between Julie and the as-yet unborn Louise, when Billy sings in "Soliloquy" of his daughter, who "gets hungry every night", he uses Julie's dotted rhythms. Such rhythms also characterize Julie's Act 2 song, "What's the Use of Wond'rin'". The stable love between Enoch and Carrie is strengthened by her willingness to let Enoch not only plan his entire life, but hers as well. This is reflected in "When the Children Are Asleep", where the two sing in close harmony, but Enoch musically interrupts his intended's turn at the chorus with the words "Dreams that won't be interrupted". Rodgers biographer Geoffrey Block, in his book on the Broadway musical, points out that though Billy may strike his wife, he allows her musical themes to become a part of him and never interrupts her music. Block suggests that, as reprehensible as Billy may be for his actions, Enoch requiring Carrie to act as "the little woman", and his having nine children with her (more than she had found acceptable in "When the Children are Asleep") can be considered to be even more abusive. The twelve-minute "bench scene", in which Billy and Julie get to know each other and which culminates with "If I Loved You", according to Hischak, "is considered the most completely integrated piece of music-drama in the American musical theatre". The scene is almost entirely drawn from Molnár and is one extended musical piece; Stephen Sondheim described it as "probably the single most important moment in the revolution of contemporary musicals". "If I Loved You" has been recorded many times, by such diverse artists as Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Sammy Davis Jr., Mario Lanza and Chad and Jeremy. The D-flat major theme that dominates the music for the second act ballet seems like a new melody to many audience members. It is, however, a greatly expanded development of a theme heard during "Soliloquy" at the line "I guess he'll call me 'The old man' ". When the pair discussed the song that would become "Soliloquy", Rodgers improvised at the piano to give Hammerstein an idea of how he envisioned the song. When Hammerstein presented his collaborator with the lyrics after two weeks of work (Hammerstein always wrote the words first, then Rodgers would write the melodies), Rodgers wrote the music for the eight-minute song in two hours. "What's the Use of Wond'rin' ", one of Julie's songs, worked well in the show but was never as popular on the radio or for recording, and Hammerstein believed that the lack of popularity was because he had concluded the final line, "And all the rest is talk" with a hard consonant, which does not allow the singer a vocal climax. Irving Berlin later stated that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had the same sort of effect on him as the 23rd Psalm. When singer Mel Tormé told Rodgers that "You'll Never Walk Alone" had made him cry, Rodgers nodded impatiently. "You're supposed to." The frequently recorded song has become a widely accepted hymn.Rodgers, p. 240 The cast recording of Carousel proved popular in Liverpool, like many Broadway albums, and in 1963, the Brian Epstein-managed band, Gerry and the Pacemakers had a number-one hit with the song. At the time, the top ten hits were played before Liverpool F.C. home matches; even after "You'll Never Walk Alone" dropped out of the top ten, fans continued to sing it, and it has become closely associated with the soccer team and the city of Liverpool. A BBC program, Soul Music, ranked it alongside "Silent Night" and "Abide With Me" in terms of its emotional impact and iconic status. Recordings The cast album of the 1945 Broadway production was issued on 78s, and the score was significantly cut—as was the 1950 London cast recording. Theatre historian John Kenrick notes of the 1945 recording that a number of songs had to be abridged to fit the 78 format, but that there is a small part of "Soliloquy" found on no other recording, as Rodgers cut it from the score immediately after the studio recording was made.Fick, David. "The Best Carousel Recording", June 11, 2009. Retrieved on April 7, 2016 A number of songs were cut for the 1956 film, but two of the deleted numbers had been recorded and were ultimately retained on the soundtrack album. The expanded CD version of the soundtrack, issued in 2001, contains all of the singing recorded for the film, including the cut portions, and nearly all of the dance music. The recording of the 1965 Lincoln Center revival featured Raitt reprising the role of Billy. Studio recordings of Carousels songs were released in 1956 (with Robert Merrill as Billy, Patrice Munsel as Julie, and Florence Henderson as Carrie), 1962 and 1987. The 1987 version featured a mix of opera and musical stars, including Samuel Ramey, Barbara Cook and Sarah Brightman. Kenrick recommends the 1962 studio recording for its outstanding cast, including Alfred Drake, Roberta Peters, Claramae Turner, Lee Venora, and Norman Treigle. Both the London (1993) and New York (1994) cast albums of the Hytner production contain portions of dialogue that, according to Hischak, speak to the power of Michael Hayden's portrayal of Billy. Kenrick judges the 1994 recording the best all-around performance of Carousel on disc, despite uneven singing by Hayden, due to Sally Murphy's Julie and the strong supporting cast (calling Audra McDonald the best Carrie he has heard). The Stratford Festival issued a recording in 2015. Critical reception and legacy The musical received almost unanimous rave reviews after its opening in 1945. According to Hischak, reviews were not as exuberant as for Oklahoma! as the critics were not taken by surprise this time. John Chapman of the Daily News termed it "one of the finest musical plays I have ever seen and I shall remember it always". The New York Times's reviewer, Lewis Nichols, stated that "Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein 2d, who can do no wrong, have continued doing no wrong in adapting Liliom into a musical play. Their Carousel is on the whole delightful." Wilella Waldorf of the New York Post, however, complained, "Carousel seemed to us a rather long evening. The Oklahoma! formula is becoming a bit monotonous and so are Miss de Mille's ballets. All right, go ahead and shoot!"Suskin, Steven. Opening Night on Broadway. Schirmer Trade Books, 1990, p. 147. . Dance Magazine gave Linn plaudits for her role as Louise, stating, "Bambi doesn't come on until twenty minutes before eleven, and for the next forty minutes, she practically holds the audience in her hand". Howard Barnes in the New York Herald Tribune also applauded the dancing: "It has waited for Miss de Mille to come through with peculiarly American dance patterns for a musical show to become as much a dance as a song show." When the musical returned to New York in 1949, The New York Times reviewer Brooks Atkinson described Carousel as "a conspicuously superior musical play ... Carousel, which was warmly appreciated when it opened, seems like nothing less than a masterpiece now." In 1954, when Carousel was revived at City Center, Atkinson discussed the musical in his review: Carousel has no comment to make on anything of topical importance. The theme is timeless and universal: the devotion of two people who love each other through thick and thin, complicated in this case by the wayward personality of the man, who cannot fulfill the responsibilities he has assumed. ... Billy is a bum, but Carousel recognizes the decency of his motives and admires his independence. There are no slick solutions in Carousel. Stephen Sondheim noted the duo's ability to take the innovations of Oklahoma! and apply them to a serious setting: "Oklahoma! is about a picnic, Carousel is about life and death." Critic Eric Bentley, on the other hand, wrote that "the last scene of Carousel is an impertinence: I refuse to be lectured to by a musical comedy scriptwriter on the education of children, the nature of the good life, and the contribution of the American small town to the salvation of souls."New York Times critic Frank Rich said of the 1992 London production: "What is remarkable about Mr. Hytner's direction, aside from its unorthodox faith in the virtues of simplicity and stillness, is its ability to make a 1992 audience believe in Hammerstein's vision of redemption, which has it that a dead sinner can return to Earth to do godly good." The Hytner production in New York was hailed by many critics as a grittier Carousel, which they deemed more appropriate for the 1990s. Clive Barnes of the New York Post called it a "defining Carousel—hard-nosed, imaginative, and exciting." Critic Michael Billington has commented that "lyrically [Carousel] comes perilously close to acceptance of the inevitability of domestic violence." BroadwayWorld.com stated in 2013 that Carousel is now "considered somewhat controversial in terms of its attitudes on domestic violence" because Julie chooses to stay with Billy despite the abuse; actress Kelli O'Hara noted that the domestic violence that Julie "chooses to deal with – is a real, existing and very complicated thing. And exploring it is an important part of healing it." Rodgers considered Carousel his favorite of all his musicals and wrote, "it affects me deeply every time I see it performed". In 1999, Time magazine, in its "Best of the Century" list, named Carousel the Best Musical of the 20th century, writing that Rodgers and Hammerstein "set the standards for the 20th century musical, and this show features their most beautiful score and the most skillful and affecting example of their musical storytelling". Hammerstein's grandson, Oscar Andrew Hammerstein, in his book about his family, suggested that the wartime situation made Carousel's ending especially poignant to its original viewers, "Every American grieved the loss of a brother, son, father, or friend ... the audience empathized with [Billy's] all-too-human efforts to offer advice, to seek forgiveness, to complete an unfinished life, and to bid a proper good-bye from beyond the grave." Author and composer Ethan Mordden agreed with that perspective: If Oklahoma! developed the moral argument for sending American boys overseas, Carousel offered consolation to those wives and mothers whose boys would only return in spirit. The meaning lay not in the tragedy of the present, but in the hope for a future where no one walks alone. Awards and nominations Original 1945 Broadway productionNote: The Tony Awards were not established until 1947, and so Carousel was not eligible to win any Tonys at its premiere. 1957 revival 1992 London revival 1994 Broadway revival 2018 Broadway revival References Bibliography Block, Geoffrey. Enchanted Evenings: The Broadway Musical from Show Boat to Sondheim. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2004. . Block, Geoffrey (ed.) The Richard Rodgers Reader. New York: Oxford University Press US, 2006. . Bradley, Ian. You've Got to Have a Dream: The Message of the Broadway Musical. Louisville, Ky., Westminster John Knox Press, 2005. 978-0-664-22854-5. Easton, Carol. No Intermission: The Life of Agnes DeMille. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 2000 (1st DaCapo Press edition). . Fordin, Hugh. Getting to Know Him: A Biography of Oscar Hammerstein II. Jefferson, N.C.: Da Capo Press, 1995 reprint of 1986 edition. . Hammerstein, Oscar Andrew. The Hammersteins: A Musical Theatre Family. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 2010. . Hischak, Thomas S. The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2007. . Hyland, William G. Richard Rodgers. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1998. . Molnár, Ferenc. Liliom: A Legend in Seven Scenes and a Prologue. New York: Boni and Liveright, 1921. Mordden, Ethan. "Rodgers & Hammerstein". New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1992. . Nolan, Frederick. The Sound of Their Music: The Story of Rodgers and Hammerstein. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2002. . Rodgers, Richard. Musical Stages: An Autobiography. Jefferson, N.C. Da Capo Press, 2002 reprint of 1975 edition. . Secrest, Meryle. Somewhere for Me: A Biography of Richard Rodgers. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2001. . External links Carousel at guidetomusicaltheatre.com Carousel info page on StageAgent.com – Carousel plot summary and character descriptions (1967 TV adaptation) 1945 musicals Broadway musicals Musicals by Rodgers and Hammerstein West End musicals Musicals based on plays Grammy Hall of Fame Award recipients Maine in fiction Fiction set in 1873 Fiction about the afterlife Plays set in Maine Plays set in the 19th century Tony Award-winning musicals	true	[ "\"How Interesting: A Tiny Man\" is a 2010 science fiction/magical realism short story by American writer Harlan Ellison. It was first published in Realms of Fantasy.\n\nPlot summary\nA scientist creates a tiny man. The tiny man is initially very popular, but then draws the hatred of the world, and so the tiny man must flee, together with the scientist (who is now likewise hated, for having created the tiny man).\n\nReception\n\"How Interesting: A Tiny Man\" won the 2010 Nebula Award for Best Short Story, tied with Kij Johnson's \"Ponies\". It was Ellison's final Nebula nomination and win, of his record-setting eight nominations and three wins.\n\nTor.com calls the story \"deceptively simple\", with \"execution (that) is flawless\" and a \"Geppetto-like\" narrator, while Publishers Weekly describes it as \"memorably depict(ing) humanity's smallness of spirit\". The SF Site, however, felt it was \"contrived and less than profound\".\n\nNick Mamatas compared \"How Interesting: A Tiny Man\" negatively to Ellison's other Nebula-winning short stories, and stated that the story's two mutually exclusive endings (in one, the tiny man is killed; in the other, he becomes God) are evocative of the process of writing short stories. Ben Peek considered it to be \"more allegory than (...) anything else\", and interpreted it as being about how the media \"give(s) everyone a voice\", and also about how Ellison was treated by science fiction fandom.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nAudio version of ''How Interesting: A Tiny Man, at StarShipSofa\nHow Interesting: A Tiny Man, at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database\n\nNebula Award for Best Short Story-winning works\nShort stories by Harlan Ellison", "In baseball, a fair ball is a batted ball that entitles the batter to attempt to reach first base. By contrast, a foul ball is a batted ball that does not entitle the batter to attempt to reach first base. Whether a batted ball is fair or foul is determined by the location of the ball at the appropriate reference point, as follows:\n\n if the ball leaves the playing field without touching anything, the point where the ball leaves the field;\n else, if the ball first lands past first or third base without touching anything, the point where the ball lands;\n else, if the ball rolls or bounces past first or third base without touching anything other than the ground, the point where the ball passes the base;\n else, if the ball touches anything other than the ground (such as an umpire, a player, or any equipment left on the field) before any of the above happens, the point of such touching;\n else (the ball comes to a rest before reaching first or third base), the point where the ball comes to a rest.\n\nIf any part of the ball is on or above fair territory at the appropriate reference point, it is fair; else it is foul. Fair territory or fair ground is defined as the area of the playing field between the two foul lines, and includes the foul lines themselves and the foul poles. However, certain exceptions exist:\n\n A ball that touches first, second, or third base is always fair.\n Under Rule 5.09(a)(7)-(8), if a batted ball touches the batter or his bat while the batter is in the batter's box and not intentionally interfering with the course of the ball, the ball is foul.\n A ball that hits the foul pole without first having touched anything else off the bat is fair.\n Ground rules may provide whether a ball hitting specific objects (e.g. roof, overhead speaker) is fair or foul.\n\nOn a fair ball, the batter attempts to reach first base or any subsequent base, runners attempt to advance and fielders try to record outs. A fair ball is considered a live ball until the ball becomes dead by leaving the field or any other method.\n\nReferences\n\nBaseball rules" ]
[ "Mary Todd Lincoln", "White House years" ]	C_ed9d0d46d8f54e95b205e13572de60c9_0	What was it like during the White house years?	1	What was it like during the Mary Todd Lincoln White house years?	Mary Todd Lincoln	During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern and southern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. A physician has also posited that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. CANNOTANSWER	A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending,	Mary Ann Todd Lincoln (December 13, 1818 – July 16, 1882) was First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865 as the wife of President Abraham Lincoln. Mary Lincoln was a member of a wealthy and large, slave-owning Kentucky family, and was well educated. Born Mary Ann Todd, she dropped the name Ann after her younger sister, Ann Todd (later Clark), was born. After finishing school during her teens, she moved to Springfield, Illinois, where she lived with her married sister Elizabeth Edwards. Before she married Abraham Lincoln, she was courted by his long-time political opponent Stephen A. Douglas. The Lincolns had four sons of whom only the eldest, Robert, survived both parents. Their family home and neighborhood in Springfield is preserved at the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. Lincoln staunchly supported her husband throughout his presidency and was active in keeping national morale high during the Civil War. She acted as the White House social coordinator, throwing lavish balls and redecorating the White House at great expense; her spending was the source of much consternation. She was seated next to Abraham when he was assassinated in the President's Box at Ford's Theatre on Tenth Street in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865. The deaths of her husband and three of her sons weighed heavily on her. Lincoln suffered from numerous physical and mental health issues during her life. She had frequent migraines, which were exacerbated by a head injury in 1863. She was depressed for much of her life; some historians think she may have had bipolar disorder. She was briefly institutionalized for psychiatric disease in 1875, but later retired to the home of her sister. She died of a stroke in 1882 at age 63. Early life and education Mary was born in Lexington, Kentucky, as the fourth of seven children of Robert Smith Todd, a banker, and Elizabeth "Eliza" (Parker) Todd. Her family were slaveholders, and Mary was raised in comfort and refinement. When Mary was six, her mother died in childbirth. Two years later, her father married Elizabeth "Betsy" Humphreys and they had nine children together. Mary had a difficult relationship with her stepmother. From 1832, Mary and her family lived in what is now known as the Mary Todd Lincoln House, an elegant 14-room residence at 578 West Main Street in Lexington, Kentucky. Mary's paternal great-grandfather, David Levi Todd, was born in County Longford, Ireland, and immigrated through Pennsylvania to Kentucky. Another great-grandfather, Andrew Porter, was the son of an Irish immigrant to New Hampshire and later Pennsylvania. Her great-great maternal grandfather Samuel McDowell was born in Scotland, and emigrated to Pennsylvania. Other Todd ancestors came from England. At an early age Mary was sent to Madame Mentelle's finishing school, where the curriculum concentrated on French and literature. She learned to speak French fluently and studied dance, drama, music, and social graces. By age 20, she was regarded as witty and gregarious with a grasp of politics. Like her family, she was a Whig. Mary began living with her sister Elizabeth Porter Edwards in Springfield, Illinois, in October 1839. Elizabeth was married to Ninian W. Edwards, son of a former governor. He served as Mary's guardian. Mary was popular among the gentry of Springfield, and though she was courted by the rising young lawyer and Democratic Party politician Stephen A. Douglas and others, she chose Abraham Lincoln, a fellow Whig. Marriage and family Mary Todd married Abraham Lincoln on November 4, 1842, at her sister Elizabeth's home in Springfield, Illinois. She was 23 years old and he was 33 years of age. Their four sons, all born in Springfield, were: Robert Todd Lincoln (1843–1926), lawyer, diplomat (U.S. Secretary of War), businessman Edward Baker Lincoln, known as "Eddie" (1846–1850), died of tuberculosis William Wallace Lincoln, known as "Willie" (1850–1862), died of typhoid fever while Lincoln was President Thomas Lincoln, known as "Tad" (1853–1871), died at age 18 (either from pleurisy, pneumonia, congestive heart failure, or tuberculosis) Robert and Tad (Thomas) survived to adulthood and the death of their father, and only Robert outlived his mother. Lincoln's career and home life While Lincoln pursued his increasingly successful career as a Springfield lawyer, Mary supervised their growing household. Their house, where they resided from 1844 until 1861, still stands in Springfield, and has been designated the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. During Lincoln's years as an Illinois circuit lawyer, Mary was often left alone for months at a time to raise their children and run the household. Mary supported her husband socially and politically, not least when Lincoln was elected president in 1860. Mary cooked for Lincoln often during his presidency. Raised by a wealthy family, her cooking was simple, but satisfied Lincoln's tastes, which included imported oysters. First Lady of the United States During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary also was a frequent purchaser of fine jewelry and on many occasions bought jewelry on credit from the local Galt & Bro. jewelers. Upon President Lincoln's death, she had a large amount of debt with the jeweler, which was subsequently waived and much of the jewelry was returned. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. Another theory holds that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. Mary Lincoln's grief over Willie's death was so devastating that she took to her bed for three weeks, so desolated that she could not attend his funeral or look after Tad. Mary was so distraught for many months that Lincoln had to employ a nurse to look after her. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. Assassination of Abraham Lincoln As the Civil War ended, Mrs. Lincoln expected to continue as the First Lady of a nation at peace. President Lincoln awoke on the morning of April 14, 1865, in a pleasant mood. Robert E. Lee had surrendered several days before to Ulysses Grant, and now the President was awaiting word from North Carolina on the surrender of Joseph E. Johnston. The morning papers carried the announcement that the President and his wife would be attending the theater that evening. At one point, Mary developed a headache and was inclined to stay home, but Lincoln told her he must attend because newspapers had announced that he would. She sat with her husband watching the comic play Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre, along with their guests Henry Rathbone and Clara Harris. During the third act, the President and Mrs. Lincoln drew closer together, holding hands while enjoying the play. Mary whispered to her husband, who was holding her hand, "What will Miss Harris think of my hanging on to you so?" The president smiled and replied, "She won't think anything about it". That was the last conversation the Lincolns ever had. Five minutes later, at about 10:15 pm, President Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth. She was holding Abraham's hand when Booth's bullet struck the back of his head. Mrs. Lincoln accompanied her mortally wounded husband across the street to the Petersen House, where he was taken to a back bedroom and laid crosswise on the bed there, where Lincoln's Cabinet was summoned, except William Seward, who had been seriously attacked by Lewis Powell, just as Booth was about to carry out his assassination at Ford's Theater, several minutes earlier. Their oldest son, Robert, sat with Lincoln throughout the night and to the following morning– Saturday, April 15, 1865. At one point, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton ordered Mary from the room as she was so unhinged with grief. President Lincoln remained in a coma for approximately nine hours. He died at 7:22 a.m., at the age of 56. Shortly before 7a.m. Mary was allowed to return to Lincoln's side, and, as Dixon reported, "she again seated herself by the President, kissing him and calling him every endearing name." As he died his breathing grew quieter, his face more calm. According to some accounts, at his last drawn breath, on the morning after the assassination, he smiled broadly and then expired. Historians, most notably author Lee Davis have emphasized Lincoln's peaceful appearance when and after he died: "It was the first time in four years, probably, that a peaceful expression crossed his face." Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Lincoln Administration, Maunsell Bradhurst Field wrote, "I had never seen upon the President's face an expression more genial and pleasing." The President's secretary, John Hay, said, "A look of unspeakable peace came upon his worn features". Later life and death After her husband's death, she received messages of condolence from all over the world, many of which she attempted to answer personally. To Queen Victoria she wrote: I have received the letter which Your Majesty has had the kindness to write. I am deeply grateful for this expression of tender sympathy, coming as they do, from a heart which from its own sorrow, can appreciate the intense grief I now endure.Victoria had suffered the loss of her husband, Prince Albert, four years earlier. As a widow, Mrs. Lincoln returned to Illinois and lived in Chicago with her sons. In 1868, her former modiste (dressmaker) and confidante, Elizabeth Keckley (1818–1907), published Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. She had been born into slavery, purchased her freedom and that of her son, and became a successful businesswoman in Washington, D.C. Although this book provides valuable insight into the character and life of Mary Todd Lincoln, at the time the former First Lady (and much of the public and press) regarded it as a breach of friendship and confidentiality. Keckley was widely criticized for her book, especially as her editor had published letters from Mary Lincoln to her. It has now been gratefully accepted by many historians and biographers and been used to flesh out the President and First Lady's personalities behind the scenes in the Executive Mansion and been used as the basis for several motion pictures and TV mini-series during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. In an act approved by a low margin on July 14, 1870, the United States Congress granted Mrs. Lincoln a life pension of $3,000 a year ($ in dollars). Mary had lobbied hard for such a pension, writing numerous letters to Congress and urging patrons such as Simon Cameron to petition on her behalf. She insisted that she deserved a pension just as much as the widows of soldiers, as she portrayed her husband as a fallen commander. At the time it was unusual for widows of presidents, and Mary Lincoln had alienated many congressmen, making it difficult for her to gain approval. The death of her son Thomas (Tad) in July 1871, following the deaths of two of her other sons and her husband, brought on an overpowering grief and depression. Her surviving son, Robert Lincoln, a rising young Chicago lawyer, was alarmed at his mother's increasingly erratic behavior. In March 1875, during a visit to Jacksonville, Florida, Mary became unshakably convinced that Robert was deathly ill; hurrying to Chicago, she found him healthy. During her visit with him, she told him that someone had tried to poison her on the train and that a "wandering Jew" had taken her pocketbook but returned it later. She also spent large amounts of money there on items she never used, such as draperies and elaborate dresses (she wore only black after her husband's assassination). She walked around the city with $56,000 in government bonds sewn into her petticoats (underskirts). Despite this large amount of money and the $3,000-a-year stipend from Congress, Mrs. Lincoln had an irrational fear of poverty. In 1872, she went to spiritualist photographer, William H. Mumler, who produced a photograph of her that appears to faintly show Lincoln's ghost behind her (photo in Allen County Public Library, Fort Wayne, Indiana). The College of Psychic Studies, referencing notes belonging to William Stainton Moses, claims that the photo was taken in the early 1870s, that Lincoln had assumed the name of 'Mrs. Lindall', and that Lincoln had to be encouraged by Mumler's wife to identify her husband on the photo. P.T. Barnum, testifying against Mumler in his eventual fraud trial, presented a photo featuring himself with the 'ghost' of Abraham Lincoln, demonstrating for the court how easy it was to make one of Mumler's images. The image is recognized now as a hoax created via double exposure (by inserting a previously prepared positive glass plate featuring the image of the "deceased" into the camera in front of an unused sensitive glass plate). Due to her erratic behavior, Robert initiated proceedings to have her institutionalized. On May 20, 1875, following a trial, a jury committed her to a private asylum in Batavia, Illinois. After the court proceedings, she was so despondent that she attempted suicide. She went to several pharmacies and ordered enough laudanum to kill herself, but an alert pharmacist frustrated her attempts and finally gave her a placebo. Three months after being committed to Bellevue Place, she devised her escape: She smuggled letters to her lawyer, James B. Bradwell, and his wife Myra Bradwell, who was not only her friend but also a feminist lawyer. She also wrote to the editor of the Chicago Times. Soon, the public embarrassments that Robert had hoped to avoid were looming, and his character and motives were in question, as he controlled his mother's finances. The director of Bellevue at Mary's trial had assured the jury she would benefit from treatment at his facility. In the face of potentially damaging publicity, he declared her well enough to go to Springfield to live with her sister Elizabeth as she desired. Mary Lincoln was released into the custody of her sister in Springfield. In 1876 she was declared competent to manage her own affairs. The earlier committal proceedings had resulted in Mary being profoundly estranged from her son Robert, and they did not see each other again until shortly before her death. Mrs. Lincoln spent the next four years traveling throughout Europe and took up residence in Pau, France. Her final years were marked by declining health. She suffered from severe cataracts that reduced her eyesight; this condition may have contributed to her increasing susceptibility to falls. In 1879, she suffered spinal cord injuries in a fall from a stepladder. She traveled to New York in 1881 and lobbied for an increased pension after the assassination of President Garfield raised the issue of provisions for his family. She faced a difficult battle, due to negative press over her spending habits and rumors about her handling of her personal finances, including $56,000 in government bonds left to her by her husband. Congress eventually granted the increase, along with an additional monetary gift. During the early 1880s, Mary Lincoln was confined to the Springfield, Illinois, residence of her sister Elizabeth Edwards. On July 15, 1882, exactly eleven years after her youngest son died, she collapsed at her sister's home, lapsed into a coma, and died the next morning of a stroke at age 63. Her funeral service was held at First Presbyterian Church, Springfield, Illinois. In popular culture Biographies have been written about Mary Lincoln as well as her husband. Barbara Hambly's The Emancipator's Wife (2005) is considered a well-researched historical novel that provides context for her use of over-the-counter drugs containing alcohol and opium, which were frequently given to women of her era. Janis Cooke Newman's historical novel Mary: Mrs. A. Lincoln (2007), in which Mary tells her own story after incarceration in the asylum in an effort to maintain and prove her sanity, is considered by Mary's recent biographer, Jean H. Baker, to be 'close to life' in its depiction of Mary Lincoln's life. The grief experienced through her widowhood is a theme of Andrew Holleran's 2006 novel, Grief. Mary Lincoln has been portrayed by several actresses in film, including Kay Hammond in Abraham Lincoln (1930) directed by D.W. Griffith; Ruth Gordon in Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940); Julie Harris in The Last of Mrs. Lincoln, a 1976 television adaptation of the stage play; Mary Tyler Moore in the 1988 television mini-series Lincoln; Donna Murphy in the 1998 movie The Day Lincoln Was Shot; Sally Field in Steven Spielberg's 2012 film Lincoln; Penelope Ann Miller in Saving Lincoln (2012); and Mary Elizabeth Winstead in Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012), set during the Civil War. Mezzo-soprano Elaine Bonazzi portrayed Mary in Thomas Pasatieri's Emmy Award winning opera The Trial of Mary Lincoln in 1972. In 1955, Vivi Janiss played the historical Mary Todd Lincoln in "How Chance Made Lincoln President" in the anthology television series, TV Reader's Digest. Richard Gaines was cast as Abraham Lincoln, and Ken Hardison played their son, Robert Todd Lincoln. In 2005, Sufjan Stevens referenced Mary Todd Lincoln in the instrumental track "A Short Reprise for Mary Todd, Who Went Insane, but for Very Good Reasons" from his album Illinois, which is themed around the state where she resided the majority of her life. Family Her sister Elizabeth Todd married Ninian Edwards Jr., the son of the Illinois Governor Ninian Edwards. Their daughter Julia Edwards married Edward L. Baker, Jr., editor of the Illinois State Journal and son of Edward L. Baker, Sr. Their daughter, Mary Todd Lincoln's grandniece Mary Edwards Brown, served as custodian of the Lincoln Homestead, as did her own daughter. Mary's half-sister Emilie Todd married Benjamin Hardin Helm, CSA general and son of the Kentucky Governor John L. Helm. Another half-sister Elodie Todd married CSA Brig. General Nathaniel H. R. Dawson, later the third U.S. Commissioner of Education. One of Mary Todd's cousins was Dakota Territory Congressman/US General John Blair Smith Todd. See also Lincoln family tree References Bibliography Further reading Baker, Jean. Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography (2008) excerpt and text search Michael Burlingame, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln (University of Illinois Press, 1994) Michael Burlingame, An American Marriage: The Untold Story of Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd (Pegasus Books, 2021) Catherine Clinton, Mrs. Lincoln: A Life (Harper Perennial, 2010) Emerson, Jason (2007). The Madness of Mary Lincoln. Carbondale, Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. pp. 20–22. . Daniel Mark Epstein, The Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage (Ballantine Books, 2008) King, C.J. Four Marys and a Jessie: The Story of the Lincoln Women (Hildene, 2015) Neely, Mark E. Jr. and R. Gerald McMurtry. The Insanity File: The Case of Mary Todd Lincoln (1993) excerpt and text search Ruth Painter Randall, Mary Lincoln: Biography of a Marriage (Little, Brown & Co., 1953) Williams, Frank J. and Burkhimer, Michael, eds. The Mary Lincoln Enigma: Historians on America's Most Controversial First Lady (Southern Illinois University Press, 2012) 392 pages; scholarly essays on her childhood in Kentucky, the early years of her marriage, her political relationship with her husband, and her relationship with her son Robert. External links White House profile Mrs. Abraham Lincoln: A Study of Her Personality and Her Influence on Lincoln By W. A. Evans Lincoln children Mary Todd Lincoln Quotes Original Manuscript Letters: Mary Todd Lincoln Shapell Manuscript Foundation Mary Lincoln at C-SPAN's First Ladies: Influence & Image Mary Todd Lincoln's Seed-pearl Necklace and Matching Bracelets. (A gift from Abraham Lincoln to Mary Todd Lincoln and worn at his second Inaugural Ball. See featured picture at the top of the page.) From the Collections at the Library of Congress 1818 births 1882 deaths 19th-century American women 19th-century Presbyterians American people of English descent American people of Irish descent American people of Scottish descent American Presbyterians Burials at Oak Ridge Cemetery First Ladies of the United States Lincoln family People associated with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln People from Lexington, Kentucky People from Springfield, Illinois People with bipolar disorder Spouses of Illinois politicians	true	[ "The White-Overton-Callander House is a historic house museum at 492 Main Street in Portland, Connecticut. Built in the 1710s, it is one of the community's oldest surviving buildings, built by Nathaniel White, one of the first proprietors of Middletown. Owned since 1997 by the local historical society, it is open for tours on some Sundays. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2013.\n\nDescription and history\nThe White-Overton-Callander House is located northeast of the town center of Portland, on the northwest side of Main Street (Connecticut Route 17A) near its junction with William Street. It is a -story wood-frame structure, with a gabled roof, central chimney, and clapboarded exterior. Its main facade is four bays wide, with an asymmetrical placement that has the main entrance near the center of the facade, flanked by one bay on the left and two on the right. Trim elements are simple, except for the Colonial Revival gable-roofed portico sheltering the entrance. Architectural evidence suggests that the building was once symmetrical, with the rightmost bay a later addition. A single-story hip-roof ell extends to the rear.\n\nNathaniel White was one of the first English colonists to arrive in the area that is now Portland and Middletown, settling in 1650 in the \"Upper Houses\" of Middletown that is now Cromwell. Early settlement was on the west side of the Connecticut River, and in 1653 the proprietors began allocating land on the east side of the river for agricultural use. White was granted land in 1693 that had originally formed part of reservation land for Native Americans, and it is there that this house was built by his grandson, Nathaniel White II. It is believed to be the fourth house built in what is now Portland, and it was probably built in the years immediately after the elder White's death in 1711. Like his grandfather, the younger White was also active in civic affairs.\n\nThe house remained in the hands of White's descendants until 1918. One prominent late 18th-century owner was Seth Overton, who was active in procuring supplies for the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, and oversaw the construction of the USS Connecticut in 1799. The house was bequeathed to the Portland Historical Society by Ruth Ryan Callander on her death in 1997.\n\nSee also\nNational Register of Historic Places listings in Middlesex County, Connecticut\n\nReferences\n\nNational Register of Historic Places in Middlesex County, Connecticut\nHouses on the National Register of Historic Places in Connecticut\nGeorgian architecture in Connecticut\nHouses completed in 1714\nPortland, Connecticut", "The Queens' Bedroom is on the second floor of the White House, part of a guest suite of rooms that includes the Queens' Sitting Room.\n\nFurnishings \nThe room has been furnished in 1868 Federal style since the Truman reconstruction. The bed thought to have belonged to Andrew Jackson is used here. It was donated in 1902 and first used in what is today the Lincoln Bedroom.\n\nHistory \nBefore the construction of the West Wing in 1902, it was the usual bedroom and office for presidential private secretaries. Many male relatives, including sons of presidents, used the room as their bedroom. The room became a regular bedroom suite when the president's staff moved into the West Wing. When the White House was gutted and rebuilt during the Truman administration, this room was rebuilt as a guest suite with its own bathroom.\n\nWinston Churchill stayed in the room when he visited Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman before and after World War II. Mamie Eisenhower once had her son, John, and his wife, Barbara, move to another room because she felt that only queens and similar state guests should stay in this room. Jacqueline Kennedy considered taking the room for herself in 1961, but settled instead on the traditional master suite.\n\nBetween 1902 and 1963, the room was known as the Rose Room. Anna Roosevelt, daughter of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, moved into the room in 1944 and served as the President's assistant and White House hostess during her mother's frequent absences. President and Mrs. Kennedy used the Queens' Bedroom while the master suite was being decorated in their first weeks in the house.\n\nReferences and notes \n\nAnthony, Carl Sferrazza. America's First Families: An Inside View of 200 Years of Private Life in the White House. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2000.\n\nExternal links \n White House Museum: The Queens' Bedroom\n White House Museum: Franklin Roosevelt to Winston Churchill\n\nRooms in the White House" ]
[ "Mary Todd Lincoln", "White House years", "What was it like during the White house years?", "A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending," ]	C_ed9d0d46d8f54e95b205e13572de60c9_0	Why was she rebelling?	2	Why was Mary Todd Lincoln rebelling?	Mary Todd Lincoln	During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern and southern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. A physician has also posited that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. CANNOTANSWER	has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder.	Mary Ann Todd Lincoln (December 13, 1818 – July 16, 1882) was First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865 as the wife of President Abraham Lincoln. Mary Lincoln was a member of a wealthy and large, slave-owning Kentucky family, and was well educated. Born Mary Ann Todd, she dropped the name Ann after her younger sister, Ann Todd (later Clark), was born. After finishing school during her teens, she moved to Springfield, Illinois, where she lived with her married sister Elizabeth Edwards. Before she married Abraham Lincoln, she was courted by his long-time political opponent Stephen A. Douglas. The Lincolns had four sons of whom only the eldest, Robert, survived both parents. Their family home and neighborhood in Springfield is preserved at the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. Lincoln staunchly supported her husband throughout his presidency and was active in keeping national morale high during the Civil War. She acted as the White House social coordinator, throwing lavish balls and redecorating the White House at great expense; her spending was the source of much consternation. She was seated next to Abraham when he was assassinated in the President's Box at Ford's Theatre on Tenth Street in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865. The deaths of her husband and three of her sons weighed heavily on her. Lincoln suffered from numerous physical and mental health issues during her life. She had frequent migraines, which were exacerbated by a head injury in 1863. She was depressed for much of her life; some historians think she may have had bipolar disorder. She was briefly institutionalized for psychiatric disease in 1875, but later retired to the home of her sister. She died of a stroke in 1882 at age 63. Early life and education Mary was born in Lexington, Kentucky, as the fourth of seven children of Robert Smith Todd, a banker, and Elizabeth "Eliza" (Parker) Todd. Her family were slaveholders, and Mary was raised in comfort and refinement. When Mary was six, her mother died in childbirth. Two years later, her father married Elizabeth "Betsy" Humphreys and they had nine children together. Mary had a difficult relationship with her stepmother. From 1832, Mary and her family lived in what is now known as the Mary Todd Lincoln House, an elegant 14-room residence at 578 West Main Street in Lexington, Kentucky. Mary's paternal great-grandfather, David Levi Todd, was born in County Longford, Ireland, and immigrated through Pennsylvania to Kentucky. Another great-grandfather, Andrew Porter, was the son of an Irish immigrant to New Hampshire and later Pennsylvania. Her great-great maternal grandfather Samuel McDowell was born in Scotland, and emigrated to Pennsylvania. Other Todd ancestors came from England. At an early age Mary was sent to Madame Mentelle's finishing school, where the curriculum concentrated on French and literature. She learned to speak French fluently and studied dance, drama, music, and social graces. By age 20, she was regarded as witty and gregarious with a grasp of politics. Like her family, she was a Whig. Mary began living with her sister Elizabeth Porter Edwards in Springfield, Illinois, in October 1839. Elizabeth was married to Ninian W. Edwards, son of a former governor. He served as Mary's guardian. Mary was popular among the gentry of Springfield, and though she was courted by the rising young lawyer and Democratic Party politician Stephen A. Douglas and others, she chose Abraham Lincoln, a fellow Whig. Marriage and family Mary Todd married Abraham Lincoln on November 4, 1842, at her sister Elizabeth's home in Springfield, Illinois. She was 23 years old and he was 33 years of age. Their four sons, all born in Springfield, were: Robert Todd Lincoln (1843–1926), lawyer, diplomat (U.S. Secretary of War), businessman Edward Baker Lincoln, known as "Eddie" (1846–1850), died of tuberculosis William Wallace Lincoln, known as "Willie" (1850–1862), died of typhoid fever while Lincoln was President Thomas Lincoln, known as "Tad" (1853–1871), died at age 18 (either from pleurisy, pneumonia, congestive heart failure, or tuberculosis) Robert and Tad (Thomas) survived to adulthood and the death of their father, and only Robert outlived his mother. Lincoln's career and home life While Lincoln pursued his increasingly successful career as a Springfield lawyer, Mary supervised their growing household. Their house, where they resided from 1844 until 1861, still stands in Springfield, and has been designated the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. During Lincoln's years as an Illinois circuit lawyer, Mary was often left alone for months at a time to raise their children and run the household. Mary supported her husband socially and politically, not least when Lincoln was elected president in 1860. Mary cooked for Lincoln often during his presidency. Raised by a wealthy family, her cooking was simple, but satisfied Lincoln's tastes, which included imported oysters. First Lady of the United States During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary also was a frequent purchaser of fine jewelry and on many occasions bought jewelry on credit from the local Galt & Bro. jewelers. Upon President Lincoln's death, she had a large amount of debt with the jeweler, which was subsequently waived and much of the jewelry was returned. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. Another theory holds that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. Mary Lincoln's grief over Willie's death was so devastating that she took to her bed for three weeks, so desolated that she could not attend his funeral or look after Tad. Mary was so distraught for many months that Lincoln had to employ a nurse to look after her. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. Assassination of Abraham Lincoln As the Civil War ended, Mrs. Lincoln expected to continue as the First Lady of a nation at peace. President Lincoln awoke on the morning of April 14, 1865, in a pleasant mood. Robert E. Lee had surrendered several days before to Ulysses Grant, and now the President was awaiting word from North Carolina on the surrender of Joseph E. Johnston. The morning papers carried the announcement that the President and his wife would be attending the theater that evening. At one point, Mary developed a headache and was inclined to stay home, but Lincoln told her he must attend because newspapers had announced that he would. She sat with her husband watching the comic play Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre, along with their guests Henry Rathbone and Clara Harris. During the third act, the President and Mrs. Lincoln drew closer together, holding hands while enjoying the play. Mary whispered to her husband, who was holding her hand, "What will Miss Harris think of my hanging on to you so?" The president smiled and replied, "She won't think anything about it". That was the last conversation the Lincolns ever had. Five minutes later, at about 10:15 pm, President Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth. She was holding Abraham's hand when Booth's bullet struck the back of his head. Mrs. Lincoln accompanied her mortally wounded husband across the street to the Petersen House, where he was taken to a back bedroom and laid crosswise on the bed there, where Lincoln's Cabinet was summoned, except William Seward, who had been seriously attacked by Lewis Powell, just as Booth was about to carry out his assassination at Ford's Theater, several minutes earlier. Their oldest son, Robert, sat with Lincoln throughout the night and to the following morning– Saturday, April 15, 1865. At one point, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton ordered Mary from the room as she was so unhinged with grief. President Lincoln remained in a coma for approximately nine hours. He died at 7:22 a.m., at the age of 56. Shortly before 7a.m. Mary was allowed to return to Lincoln's side, and, as Dixon reported, "she again seated herself by the President, kissing him and calling him every endearing name." As he died his breathing grew quieter, his face more calm. According to some accounts, at his last drawn breath, on the morning after the assassination, he smiled broadly and then expired. Historians, most notably author Lee Davis have emphasized Lincoln's peaceful appearance when and after he died: "It was the first time in four years, probably, that a peaceful expression crossed his face." Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Lincoln Administration, Maunsell Bradhurst Field wrote, "I had never seen upon the President's face an expression more genial and pleasing." The President's secretary, John Hay, said, "A look of unspeakable peace came upon his worn features". Later life and death After her husband's death, she received messages of condolence from all over the world, many of which she attempted to answer personally. To Queen Victoria she wrote: I have received the letter which Your Majesty has had the kindness to write. I am deeply grateful for this expression of tender sympathy, coming as they do, from a heart which from its own sorrow, can appreciate the intense grief I now endure.Victoria had suffered the loss of her husband, Prince Albert, four years earlier. As a widow, Mrs. Lincoln returned to Illinois and lived in Chicago with her sons. In 1868, her former modiste (dressmaker) and confidante, Elizabeth Keckley (1818–1907), published Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. She had been born into slavery, purchased her freedom and that of her son, and became a successful businesswoman in Washington, D.C. Although this book provides valuable insight into the character and life of Mary Todd Lincoln, at the time the former First Lady (and much of the public and press) regarded it as a breach of friendship and confidentiality. Keckley was widely criticized for her book, especially as her editor had published letters from Mary Lincoln to her. It has now been gratefully accepted by many historians and biographers and been used to flesh out the President and First Lady's personalities behind the scenes in the Executive Mansion and been used as the basis for several motion pictures and TV mini-series during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. In an act approved by a low margin on July 14, 1870, the United States Congress granted Mrs. Lincoln a life pension of $3,000 a year ($ in dollars). Mary had lobbied hard for such a pension, writing numerous letters to Congress and urging patrons such as Simon Cameron to petition on her behalf. She insisted that she deserved a pension just as much as the widows of soldiers, as she portrayed her husband as a fallen commander. At the time it was unusual for widows of presidents, and Mary Lincoln had alienated many congressmen, making it difficult for her to gain approval. The death of her son Thomas (Tad) in July 1871, following the deaths of two of her other sons and her husband, brought on an overpowering grief and depression. Her surviving son, Robert Lincoln, a rising young Chicago lawyer, was alarmed at his mother's increasingly erratic behavior. In March 1875, during a visit to Jacksonville, Florida, Mary became unshakably convinced that Robert was deathly ill; hurrying to Chicago, she found him healthy. During her visit with him, she told him that someone had tried to poison her on the train and that a "wandering Jew" had taken her pocketbook but returned it later. She also spent large amounts of money there on items she never used, such as draperies and elaborate dresses (she wore only black after her husband's assassination). She walked around the city with $56,000 in government bonds sewn into her petticoats (underskirts). Despite this large amount of money and the $3,000-a-year stipend from Congress, Mrs. Lincoln had an irrational fear of poverty. In 1872, she went to spiritualist photographer, William H. Mumler, who produced a photograph of her that appears to faintly show Lincoln's ghost behind her (photo in Allen County Public Library, Fort Wayne, Indiana). The College of Psychic Studies, referencing notes belonging to William Stainton Moses, claims that the photo was taken in the early 1870s, that Lincoln had assumed the name of 'Mrs. Lindall', and that Lincoln had to be encouraged by Mumler's wife to identify her husband on the photo. P.T. Barnum, testifying against Mumler in his eventual fraud trial, presented a photo featuring himself with the 'ghost' of Abraham Lincoln, demonstrating for the court how easy it was to make one of Mumler's images. The image is recognized now as a hoax created via double exposure (by inserting a previously prepared positive glass plate featuring the image of the "deceased" into the camera in front of an unused sensitive glass plate). Due to her erratic behavior, Robert initiated proceedings to have her institutionalized. On May 20, 1875, following a trial, a jury committed her to a private asylum in Batavia, Illinois. After the court proceedings, she was so despondent that she attempted suicide. She went to several pharmacies and ordered enough laudanum to kill herself, but an alert pharmacist frustrated her attempts and finally gave her a placebo. Three months after being committed to Bellevue Place, she devised her escape: She smuggled letters to her lawyer, James B. Bradwell, and his wife Myra Bradwell, who was not only her friend but also a feminist lawyer. She also wrote to the editor of the Chicago Times. Soon, the public embarrassments that Robert had hoped to avoid were looming, and his character and motives were in question, as he controlled his mother's finances. The director of Bellevue at Mary's trial had assured the jury she would benefit from treatment at his facility. In the face of potentially damaging publicity, he declared her well enough to go to Springfield to live with her sister Elizabeth as she desired. Mary Lincoln was released into the custody of her sister in Springfield. In 1876 she was declared competent to manage her own affairs. The earlier committal proceedings had resulted in Mary being profoundly estranged from her son Robert, and they did not see each other again until shortly before her death. Mrs. Lincoln spent the next four years traveling throughout Europe and took up residence in Pau, France. Her final years were marked by declining health. She suffered from severe cataracts that reduced her eyesight; this condition may have contributed to her increasing susceptibility to falls. In 1879, she suffered spinal cord injuries in a fall from a stepladder. She traveled to New York in 1881 and lobbied for an increased pension after the assassination of President Garfield raised the issue of provisions for his family. She faced a difficult battle, due to negative press over her spending habits and rumors about her handling of her personal finances, including $56,000 in government bonds left to her by her husband. Congress eventually granted the increase, along with an additional monetary gift. During the early 1880s, Mary Lincoln was confined to the Springfield, Illinois, residence of her sister Elizabeth Edwards. On July 15, 1882, exactly eleven years after her youngest son died, she collapsed at her sister's home, lapsed into a coma, and died the next morning of a stroke at age 63. Her funeral service was held at First Presbyterian Church, Springfield, Illinois. In popular culture Biographies have been written about Mary Lincoln as well as her husband. Barbara Hambly's The Emancipator's Wife (2005) is considered a well-researched historical novel that provides context for her use of over-the-counter drugs containing alcohol and opium, which were frequently given to women of her era. Janis Cooke Newman's historical novel Mary: Mrs. A. Lincoln (2007), in which Mary tells her own story after incarceration in the asylum in an effort to maintain and prove her sanity, is considered by Mary's recent biographer, Jean H. Baker, to be 'close to life' in its depiction of Mary Lincoln's life. The grief experienced through her widowhood is a theme of Andrew Holleran's 2006 novel, Grief. Mary Lincoln has been portrayed by several actresses in film, including Kay Hammond in Abraham Lincoln (1930) directed by D.W. Griffith; Ruth Gordon in Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940); Julie Harris in The Last of Mrs. Lincoln, a 1976 television adaptation of the stage play; Mary Tyler Moore in the 1988 television mini-series Lincoln; Donna Murphy in the 1998 movie The Day Lincoln Was Shot; Sally Field in Steven Spielberg's 2012 film Lincoln; Penelope Ann Miller in Saving Lincoln (2012); and Mary Elizabeth Winstead in Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012), set during the Civil War. Mezzo-soprano Elaine Bonazzi portrayed Mary in Thomas Pasatieri's Emmy Award winning opera The Trial of Mary Lincoln in 1972. In 1955, Vivi Janiss played the historical Mary Todd Lincoln in "How Chance Made Lincoln President" in the anthology television series, TV Reader's Digest. Richard Gaines was cast as Abraham Lincoln, and Ken Hardison played their son, Robert Todd Lincoln. In 2005, Sufjan Stevens referenced Mary Todd Lincoln in the instrumental track "A Short Reprise for Mary Todd, Who Went Insane, but for Very Good Reasons" from his album Illinois, which is themed around the state where she resided the majority of her life. Family Her sister Elizabeth Todd married Ninian Edwards Jr., the son of the Illinois Governor Ninian Edwards. Their daughter Julia Edwards married Edward L. Baker, Jr., editor of the Illinois State Journal and son of Edward L. Baker, Sr. Their daughter, Mary Todd Lincoln's grandniece Mary Edwards Brown, served as custodian of the Lincoln Homestead, as did her own daughter. Mary's half-sister Emilie Todd married Benjamin Hardin Helm, CSA general and son of the Kentucky Governor John L. Helm. Another half-sister Elodie Todd married CSA Brig. General Nathaniel H. R. Dawson, later the third U.S. Commissioner of Education. One of Mary Todd's cousins was Dakota Territory Congressman/US General John Blair Smith Todd. See also Lincoln family tree References Bibliography Further reading Baker, Jean. Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography (2008) excerpt and text search Michael Burlingame, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln (University of Illinois Press, 1994) Michael Burlingame, An American Marriage: The Untold Story of Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd (Pegasus Books, 2021) Catherine Clinton, Mrs. Lincoln: A Life (Harper Perennial, 2010) Emerson, Jason (2007). The Madness of Mary Lincoln. Carbondale, Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. pp. 20–22. . Daniel Mark Epstein, The Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage (Ballantine Books, 2008) King, C.J. Four Marys and a Jessie: The Story of the Lincoln Women (Hildene, 2015) Neely, Mark E. Jr. and R. Gerald McMurtry. The Insanity File: The Case of Mary Todd Lincoln (1993) excerpt and text search Ruth Painter Randall, Mary Lincoln: Biography of a Marriage (Little, Brown & Co., 1953) Williams, Frank J. and Burkhimer, Michael, eds. The Mary Lincoln Enigma: Historians on America's Most Controversial First Lady (Southern Illinois University Press, 2012) 392 pages; scholarly essays on her childhood in Kentucky, the early years of her marriage, her political relationship with her husband, and her relationship with her son Robert. External links White House profile Mrs. Abraham Lincoln: A Study of Her Personality and Her Influence on Lincoln By W. A. Evans Lincoln children Mary Todd Lincoln Quotes Original Manuscript Letters: Mary Todd Lincoln Shapell Manuscript Foundation Mary Lincoln at C-SPAN's First Ladies: Influence & Image Mary Todd Lincoln's Seed-pearl Necklace and Matching Bracelets. (A gift from Abraham Lincoln to Mary Todd Lincoln and worn at his second Inaugural Ball. See featured picture at the top of the page.) From the Collections at the Library of Congress 1818 births 1882 deaths 19th-century American women 19th-century Presbyterians American people of English descent American people of Irish descent American people of Scottish descent American Presbyterians Burials at Oak Ridge Cemetery First Ladies of the United States Lincoln family People associated with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln People from Lexington, Kentucky People from Springfield, Illinois People with bipolar disorder Spouses of Illinois politicians	true	[ "Boniface IV Frederick (died July 1055) was the only son of Boniface III of Tuscany and Beatrice of Bar. He was young when his father died on 6 May 1052 and he inherited the great north Italian margraviate.\n\nHis mother served as his regent until 1054, when she married Godfrey, former duke of Lower Lorraine. Godfrey was a traitor to Henry III, Holy Roman Emperor, and thus the marriage was considered traitorous. In 1055, Henry held a court at Florence and arrested Beatrice, while Godfrey was rebelling in Lorraine. Henry bade Frederick come, but the child refused. It was no matter, for he died a few days thence and the margraviate passed to his sister Matilda.\n\nSources\nBonifaz II. Markgraf von Canossa-Tuszien (1052–1055).\n\n1055 deaths\nMargraves of Tuscany\nHouse of Canossa\nYear of birth unknown\nMatilda of Tuscany", "Taylor's Wall is a 2001 television film directed by Craig Ross Jr., written by Cheryl McKay and starring Sam Doumit and Lukas Behnken.\n\nPlot \nA teenage girl, whose brother was the second victim of two shootings on her campus, starts painting the wall in an attempt to end such school violence. The wall also becomes a point of healing and unity for the students as other students, friends of both the shooters and the victims, start helping Taylor paint the wall. A girl's despair...a teacher's challenge. Taylor wonders why her brother had to die. Her world no longer makes sense. Rebelling against the system, she is nearly suspended from school. A charismatic substitute teacher is her only hope. The teacher and his students share powerful journal entries and Taylor decides she can make a difference by finding a creative outlet for her pain. Taylor's brother, before his death, and eventually Taylor herself work to provide a solution to the root causes of random violence and other crimes committed by teens.\n\nCast\n\nExternal links\nFamily Theater Productions\n\n2001 television films\n2001 films\nAmerican television films\nAmerican films\nEnglish-language films\nReligious education" ]
[ "Mary Todd Lincoln", "White House years", "What was it like during the White house years?", "A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending,", "Why was she rebelling?", "has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder." ]	C_ed9d0d46d8f54e95b205e13572de60c9_0	Was she ever placed in a mental institution?	3	Was Mary Todd Lincoln ever placed in a mental institution?	Mary Todd Lincoln	During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern and southern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. A physician has also posited that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. CANNOTANSWER	she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers.	Mary Ann Todd Lincoln (December 13, 1818 – July 16, 1882) was First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865 as the wife of President Abraham Lincoln. Mary Lincoln was a member of a wealthy and large, slave-owning Kentucky family, and was well educated. Born Mary Ann Todd, she dropped the name Ann after her younger sister, Ann Todd (later Clark), was born. After finishing school during her teens, she moved to Springfield, Illinois, where she lived with her married sister Elizabeth Edwards. Before she married Abraham Lincoln, she was courted by his long-time political opponent Stephen A. Douglas. The Lincolns had four sons of whom only the eldest, Robert, survived both parents. Their family home and neighborhood in Springfield is preserved at the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. Lincoln staunchly supported her husband throughout his presidency and was active in keeping national morale high during the Civil War. She acted as the White House social coordinator, throwing lavish balls and redecorating the White House at great expense; her spending was the source of much consternation. She was seated next to Abraham when he was assassinated in the President's Box at Ford's Theatre on Tenth Street in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865. The deaths of her husband and three of her sons weighed heavily on her. Lincoln suffered from numerous physical and mental health issues during her life. She had frequent migraines, which were exacerbated by a head injury in 1863. She was depressed for much of her life; some historians think she may have had bipolar disorder. She was briefly institutionalized for psychiatric disease in 1875, but later retired to the home of her sister. She died of a stroke in 1882 at age 63. Early life and education Mary was born in Lexington, Kentucky, as the fourth of seven children of Robert Smith Todd, a banker, and Elizabeth "Eliza" (Parker) Todd. Her family were slaveholders, and Mary was raised in comfort and refinement. When Mary was six, her mother died in childbirth. Two years later, her father married Elizabeth "Betsy" Humphreys and they had nine children together. Mary had a difficult relationship with her stepmother. From 1832, Mary and her family lived in what is now known as the Mary Todd Lincoln House, an elegant 14-room residence at 578 West Main Street in Lexington, Kentucky. Mary's paternal great-grandfather, David Levi Todd, was born in County Longford, Ireland, and immigrated through Pennsylvania to Kentucky. Another great-grandfather, Andrew Porter, was the son of an Irish immigrant to New Hampshire and later Pennsylvania. Her great-great maternal grandfather Samuel McDowell was born in Scotland, and emigrated to Pennsylvania. Other Todd ancestors came from England. At an early age Mary was sent to Madame Mentelle's finishing school, where the curriculum concentrated on French and literature. She learned to speak French fluently and studied dance, drama, music, and social graces. By age 20, she was regarded as witty and gregarious with a grasp of politics. Like her family, she was a Whig. Mary began living with her sister Elizabeth Porter Edwards in Springfield, Illinois, in October 1839. Elizabeth was married to Ninian W. Edwards, son of a former governor. He served as Mary's guardian. Mary was popular among the gentry of Springfield, and though she was courted by the rising young lawyer and Democratic Party politician Stephen A. Douglas and others, she chose Abraham Lincoln, a fellow Whig. Marriage and family Mary Todd married Abraham Lincoln on November 4, 1842, at her sister Elizabeth's home in Springfield, Illinois. She was 23 years old and he was 33 years of age. Their four sons, all born in Springfield, were: Robert Todd Lincoln (1843–1926), lawyer, diplomat (U.S. Secretary of War), businessman Edward Baker Lincoln, known as "Eddie" (1846–1850), died of tuberculosis William Wallace Lincoln, known as "Willie" (1850–1862), died of typhoid fever while Lincoln was President Thomas Lincoln, known as "Tad" (1853–1871), died at age 18 (either from pleurisy, pneumonia, congestive heart failure, or tuberculosis) Robert and Tad (Thomas) survived to adulthood and the death of their father, and only Robert outlived his mother. Lincoln's career and home life While Lincoln pursued his increasingly successful career as a Springfield lawyer, Mary supervised their growing household. Their house, where they resided from 1844 until 1861, still stands in Springfield, and has been designated the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. During Lincoln's years as an Illinois circuit lawyer, Mary was often left alone for months at a time to raise their children and run the household. Mary supported her husband socially and politically, not least when Lincoln was elected president in 1860. Mary cooked for Lincoln often during his presidency. Raised by a wealthy family, her cooking was simple, but satisfied Lincoln's tastes, which included imported oysters. First Lady of the United States During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary also was a frequent purchaser of fine jewelry and on many occasions bought jewelry on credit from the local Galt & Bro. jewelers. Upon President Lincoln's death, she had a large amount of debt with the jeweler, which was subsequently waived and much of the jewelry was returned. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. Another theory holds that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. Mary Lincoln's grief over Willie's death was so devastating that she took to her bed for three weeks, so desolated that she could not attend his funeral or look after Tad. Mary was so distraught for many months that Lincoln had to employ a nurse to look after her. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. Assassination of Abraham Lincoln As the Civil War ended, Mrs. Lincoln expected to continue as the First Lady of a nation at peace. President Lincoln awoke on the morning of April 14, 1865, in a pleasant mood. Robert E. Lee had surrendered several days before to Ulysses Grant, and now the President was awaiting word from North Carolina on the surrender of Joseph E. Johnston. The morning papers carried the announcement that the President and his wife would be attending the theater that evening. At one point, Mary developed a headache and was inclined to stay home, but Lincoln told her he must attend because newspapers had announced that he would. She sat with her husband watching the comic play Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre, along with their guests Henry Rathbone and Clara Harris. During the third act, the President and Mrs. Lincoln drew closer together, holding hands while enjoying the play. Mary whispered to her husband, who was holding her hand, "What will Miss Harris think of my hanging on to you so?" The president smiled and replied, "She won't think anything about it". That was the last conversation the Lincolns ever had. Five minutes later, at about 10:15 pm, President Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth. She was holding Abraham's hand when Booth's bullet struck the back of his head. Mrs. Lincoln accompanied her mortally wounded husband across the street to the Petersen House, where he was taken to a back bedroom and laid crosswise on the bed there, where Lincoln's Cabinet was summoned, except William Seward, who had been seriously attacked by Lewis Powell, just as Booth was about to carry out his assassination at Ford's Theater, several minutes earlier. Their oldest son, Robert, sat with Lincoln throughout the night and to the following morning– Saturday, April 15, 1865. At one point, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton ordered Mary from the room as she was so unhinged with grief. President Lincoln remained in a coma for approximately nine hours. He died at 7:22 a.m., at the age of 56. Shortly before 7a.m. Mary was allowed to return to Lincoln's side, and, as Dixon reported, "she again seated herself by the President, kissing him and calling him every endearing name." As he died his breathing grew quieter, his face more calm. According to some accounts, at his last drawn breath, on the morning after the assassination, he smiled broadly and then expired. Historians, most notably author Lee Davis have emphasized Lincoln's peaceful appearance when and after he died: "It was the first time in four years, probably, that a peaceful expression crossed his face." Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Lincoln Administration, Maunsell Bradhurst Field wrote, "I had never seen upon the President's face an expression more genial and pleasing." The President's secretary, John Hay, said, "A look of unspeakable peace came upon his worn features". Later life and death After her husband's death, she received messages of condolence from all over the world, many of which she attempted to answer personally. To Queen Victoria she wrote: I have received the letter which Your Majesty has had the kindness to write. I am deeply grateful for this expression of tender sympathy, coming as they do, from a heart which from its own sorrow, can appreciate the intense grief I now endure.Victoria had suffered the loss of her husband, Prince Albert, four years earlier. As a widow, Mrs. Lincoln returned to Illinois and lived in Chicago with her sons. In 1868, her former modiste (dressmaker) and confidante, Elizabeth Keckley (1818–1907), published Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. She had been born into slavery, purchased her freedom and that of her son, and became a successful businesswoman in Washington, D.C. Although this book provides valuable insight into the character and life of Mary Todd Lincoln, at the time the former First Lady (and much of the public and press) regarded it as a breach of friendship and confidentiality. Keckley was widely criticized for her book, especially as her editor had published letters from Mary Lincoln to her. It has now been gratefully accepted by many historians and biographers and been used to flesh out the President and First Lady's personalities behind the scenes in the Executive Mansion and been used as the basis for several motion pictures and TV mini-series during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. In an act approved by a low margin on July 14, 1870, the United States Congress granted Mrs. Lincoln a life pension of $3,000 a year ($ in dollars). Mary had lobbied hard for such a pension, writing numerous letters to Congress and urging patrons such as Simon Cameron to petition on her behalf. She insisted that she deserved a pension just as much as the widows of soldiers, as she portrayed her husband as a fallen commander. At the time it was unusual for widows of presidents, and Mary Lincoln had alienated many congressmen, making it difficult for her to gain approval. The death of her son Thomas (Tad) in July 1871, following the deaths of two of her other sons and her husband, brought on an overpowering grief and depression. Her surviving son, Robert Lincoln, a rising young Chicago lawyer, was alarmed at his mother's increasingly erratic behavior. In March 1875, during a visit to Jacksonville, Florida, Mary became unshakably convinced that Robert was deathly ill; hurrying to Chicago, she found him healthy. During her visit with him, she told him that someone had tried to poison her on the train and that a "wandering Jew" had taken her pocketbook but returned it later. She also spent large amounts of money there on items she never used, such as draperies and elaborate dresses (she wore only black after her husband's assassination). She walked around the city with $56,000 in government bonds sewn into her petticoats (underskirts). Despite this large amount of money and the $3,000-a-year stipend from Congress, Mrs. Lincoln had an irrational fear of poverty. In 1872, she went to spiritualist photographer, William H. Mumler, who produced a photograph of her that appears to faintly show Lincoln's ghost behind her (photo in Allen County Public Library, Fort Wayne, Indiana). The College of Psychic Studies, referencing notes belonging to William Stainton Moses, claims that the photo was taken in the early 1870s, that Lincoln had assumed the name of 'Mrs. Lindall', and that Lincoln had to be encouraged by Mumler's wife to identify her husband on the photo. P.T. Barnum, testifying against Mumler in his eventual fraud trial, presented a photo featuring himself with the 'ghost' of Abraham Lincoln, demonstrating for the court how easy it was to make one of Mumler's images. The image is recognized now as a hoax created via double exposure (by inserting a previously prepared positive glass plate featuring the image of the "deceased" into the camera in front of an unused sensitive glass plate). Due to her erratic behavior, Robert initiated proceedings to have her institutionalized. On May 20, 1875, following a trial, a jury committed her to a private asylum in Batavia, Illinois. After the court proceedings, she was so despondent that she attempted suicide. She went to several pharmacies and ordered enough laudanum to kill herself, but an alert pharmacist frustrated her attempts and finally gave her a placebo. Three months after being committed to Bellevue Place, she devised her escape: She smuggled letters to her lawyer, James B. Bradwell, and his wife Myra Bradwell, who was not only her friend but also a feminist lawyer. She also wrote to the editor of the Chicago Times. Soon, the public embarrassments that Robert had hoped to avoid were looming, and his character and motives were in question, as he controlled his mother's finances. The director of Bellevue at Mary's trial had assured the jury she would benefit from treatment at his facility. In the face of potentially damaging publicity, he declared her well enough to go to Springfield to live with her sister Elizabeth as she desired. Mary Lincoln was released into the custody of her sister in Springfield. In 1876 she was declared competent to manage her own affairs. The earlier committal proceedings had resulted in Mary being profoundly estranged from her son Robert, and they did not see each other again until shortly before her death. Mrs. Lincoln spent the next four years traveling throughout Europe and took up residence in Pau, France. Her final years were marked by declining health. She suffered from severe cataracts that reduced her eyesight; this condition may have contributed to her increasing susceptibility to falls. In 1879, she suffered spinal cord injuries in a fall from a stepladder. She traveled to New York in 1881 and lobbied for an increased pension after the assassination of President Garfield raised the issue of provisions for his family. She faced a difficult battle, due to negative press over her spending habits and rumors about her handling of her personal finances, including $56,000 in government bonds left to her by her husband. Congress eventually granted the increase, along with an additional monetary gift. During the early 1880s, Mary Lincoln was confined to the Springfield, Illinois, residence of her sister Elizabeth Edwards. On July 15, 1882, exactly eleven years after her youngest son died, she collapsed at her sister's home, lapsed into a coma, and died the next morning of a stroke at age 63. Her funeral service was held at First Presbyterian Church, Springfield, Illinois. In popular culture Biographies have been written about Mary Lincoln as well as her husband. Barbara Hambly's The Emancipator's Wife (2005) is considered a well-researched historical novel that provides context for her use of over-the-counter drugs containing alcohol and opium, which were frequently given to women of her era. Janis Cooke Newman's historical novel Mary: Mrs. A. Lincoln (2007), in which Mary tells her own story after incarceration in the asylum in an effort to maintain and prove her sanity, is considered by Mary's recent biographer, Jean H. Baker, to be 'close to life' in its depiction of Mary Lincoln's life. The grief experienced through her widowhood is a theme of Andrew Holleran's 2006 novel, Grief. Mary Lincoln has been portrayed by several actresses in film, including Kay Hammond in Abraham Lincoln (1930) directed by D.W. Griffith; Ruth Gordon in Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940); Julie Harris in The Last of Mrs. Lincoln, a 1976 television adaptation of the stage play; Mary Tyler Moore in the 1988 television mini-series Lincoln; Donna Murphy in the 1998 movie The Day Lincoln Was Shot; Sally Field in Steven Spielberg's 2012 film Lincoln; Penelope Ann Miller in Saving Lincoln (2012); and Mary Elizabeth Winstead in Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012), set during the Civil War. Mezzo-soprano Elaine Bonazzi portrayed Mary in Thomas Pasatieri's Emmy Award winning opera The Trial of Mary Lincoln in 1972. In 1955, Vivi Janiss played the historical Mary Todd Lincoln in "How Chance Made Lincoln President" in the anthology television series, TV Reader's Digest. Richard Gaines was cast as Abraham Lincoln, and Ken Hardison played their son, Robert Todd Lincoln. In 2005, Sufjan Stevens referenced Mary Todd Lincoln in the instrumental track "A Short Reprise for Mary Todd, Who Went Insane, but for Very Good Reasons" from his album Illinois, which is themed around the state where she resided the majority of her life. Family Her sister Elizabeth Todd married Ninian Edwards Jr., the son of the Illinois Governor Ninian Edwards. Their daughter Julia Edwards married Edward L. Baker, Jr., editor of the Illinois State Journal and son of Edward L. Baker, Sr. Their daughter, Mary Todd Lincoln's grandniece Mary Edwards Brown, served as custodian of the Lincoln Homestead, as did her own daughter. Mary's half-sister Emilie Todd married Benjamin Hardin Helm, CSA general and son of the Kentucky Governor John L. Helm. Another half-sister Elodie Todd married CSA Brig. General Nathaniel H. R. Dawson, later the third U.S. Commissioner of Education. One of Mary Todd's cousins was Dakota Territory Congressman/US General John Blair Smith Todd. See also Lincoln family tree References Bibliography Further reading Baker, Jean. Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography (2008) excerpt and text search Michael Burlingame, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln (University of Illinois Press, 1994) Michael Burlingame, An American Marriage: The Untold Story of Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd (Pegasus Books, 2021) Catherine Clinton, Mrs. Lincoln: A Life (Harper Perennial, 2010) Emerson, Jason (2007). The Madness of Mary Lincoln. Carbondale, Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. pp. 20–22. . Daniel Mark Epstein, The Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage (Ballantine Books, 2008) King, C.J. Four Marys and a Jessie: The Story of the Lincoln Women (Hildene, 2015) Neely, Mark E. Jr. and R. Gerald McMurtry. The Insanity File: The Case of Mary Todd Lincoln (1993) excerpt and text search Ruth Painter Randall, Mary Lincoln: Biography of a Marriage (Little, Brown & Co., 1953) Williams, Frank J. and Burkhimer, Michael, eds. The Mary Lincoln Enigma: Historians on America's Most Controversial First Lady (Southern Illinois University Press, 2012) 392 pages; scholarly essays on her childhood in Kentucky, the early years of her marriage, her political relationship with her husband, and her relationship with her son Robert. External links White House profile Mrs. Abraham Lincoln: A Study of Her Personality and Her Influence on Lincoln By W. A. Evans Lincoln children Mary Todd Lincoln Quotes Original Manuscript Letters: Mary Todd Lincoln Shapell Manuscript Foundation Mary Lincoln at C-SPAN's First Ladies: Influence & Image Mary Todd Lincoln's Seed-pearl Necklace and Matching Bracelets. (A gift from Abraham Lincoln to Mary Todd Lincoln and worn at his second Inaugural Ball. See featured picture at the top of the page.) From the Collections at the Library of Congress 1818 births 1882 deaths 19th-century American women 19th-century Presbyterians American people of English descent American people of Irish descent American people of Scottish descent American Presbyterians Burials at Oak Ridge Cemetery First Ladies of the United States Lincoln family People associated with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln People from Lexington, Kentucky People from Springfield, Illinois People with bipolar disorder Spouses of Illinois politicians	true	[ "The Chester Mental Health Center is the only State of Illinois' maximum security forensic mental health facility for those committed via a court order or deemed an escape risk. The facility is operated by the State of Illinois in Chester, Illinois and is a part of the Illinois Department of Human Services, formerly the Illinois Department of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities. It is adjacent to the Menard Correctional Center. The other secure mental health center in Illinois is Elgin Mental Health Center, which houses women as well as men. Chester Mental Health Center is a men's facility.\n\nHistory\nThe Board of Charities recommended a separate institution for the criminally insane as early as 1878. In 1879, the legislature authorized such a facility, but the appropriation was not used for this. In 1883, the governor again tried to fund a new institution, but there was disagreement over the site with both Springfield and Joliet as possibilities. In 1889, the legislature established the Asylum for Insane Criminals, and it received its first patients on November 2, 1891. W.T. Patterson transferred from the staff of Elgin State Hospital to become its first Superintendent. Control of the institution was placed with the Commissioners of the Southern Penitentiary at Menard. The original building on the penitentiary grounds was poorly constructed and was eventually torn down. A replacement was built on a separate campus near Chester, Illinois. When the Board of State Commissioners of Public Charities was abolished in 1909, the institute was reorganized and renamed Chester State Hospital effective January 1, 1910. In 1917, the Department of Public Welfare assumed responsibility for Chester State Hospital and retained control until the creation of the Department of Mental Health in 1961 (L. 1961, p. 2666). In 1975, the hospital changed its name to the Chester Mental Health Center.\n\nThe center was the second secure psychiatric facility in the United States to be accredited by the then Joint Commission of Hospitals, now the Joint Commission of Healthcare Operations (JACHO). It was the first such facility to be accredited in Illinois. This was accomplished while Terry B. Brelje, Ph.D. was the superintendent.\n\nToday\nThe hospital is primarily used to care for forensic patients who have been found not guilty by reason of insanity, those persons found unfit to stand trial, and those who cannot be housed in a less secure setting. The patients (not convicts, as they have not been sentenced to a correctional facility) are required by Illinois law to remain confined in a mental hospital for a period of time.\n\nAttempted Closing\n\nIn late 2011 Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn attempted to close down this facility, citing cost as the reason. However, it was decided that Chester Mental Health must remain open because there is no other maximum security mental facility to house people found unfit to stand trial or not guilty by reason of insanity in the state of Illinois.\n\nReferences\n\nHospital buildings completed in 1891\n1889 establishments in Illinois\nBuildings and structures in Randolph County, Illinois\nHospitals established in 1889\nHospitals in Illinois\nPsychiatric hospitals in Illinois", "John Doe No. 24 (born , died November 28, 1993) was the name given to a deaf and later blind man in Jacksonville, Illinois, who was put in a mental institution in 1945 as a teenager. He spent 30 years at the Lincoln Developmental Center, and was transferred several times, eventually to a senior center in Peoria. He died in 1993 at the estimated age of 64. His life is covered by the biography God Knows His Name: The True Story of John Doe No. 24 by journalist David Bakke. Musician Mary Chapin Carpenter wrote a song about him, titled 'John Doe No. 24'.\n\nLife \nIn the early morning hours of October 11, 1945, two police officers found a black teenager wandering on the streets of Jacksonville, Illinois. He was quickly determined to be deaf and unable to communicate. Upon asking why he was wandering the streets, he could only write \"Lewis\", which is believed to be his name. No information could be found about him or his relatives. As such, a judge placed him in the Illinois mental health system, where he became known as John Doe No. 24. His name was later legally changed to John Doe Boyd in 1978 to allow him to apply for Social Security.\n\nAfter spending years in mental health institutions, during which he slowly became blind, Boyd was transferred to the Smiley Living Center in Peoria in 1987. He died of a stroke on November 28, 1993, at the estimated age of 64.\n\nLegacy\nWhen American singer Mary Chapin Carpenter learned of Doe's life, she purchased a tombstone and placed it over his unmarked grave. Carpenter also wrote a song titled \"John Doe No. 24\" on the album Stones in the Road which was released in October 1994.\n\nBooks\n\nReferences \n\n1929 births\n1993 deaths\nPeople from Jacksonville, Illinois\nUnidentified people\nDeafblind people from the United States\nYear of birth uncertain" ]
[ "Mary Todd Lincoln", "White House years", "What was it like during the White house years?", "A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending,", "Why was she rebelling?", "has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder.", "Was she ever placed in a mental institution?", "she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers." ]	C_ed9d0d46d8f54e95b205e13572de60c9_0	Was she ever arrested?	4	Was Mary Todd Lincoln ever arrested?	Mary Todd Lincoln	During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern and southern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. A physician has also posited that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. CANNOTANSWER	Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation.	Mary Ann Todd Lincoln (December 13, 1818 – July 16, 1882) was First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865 as the wife of President Abraham Lincoln. Mary Lincoln was a member of a wealthy and large, slave-owning Kentucky family, and was well educated. Born Mary Ann Todd, she dropped the name Ann after her younger sister, Ann Todd (later Clark), was born. After finishing school during her teens, she moved to Springfield, Illinois, where she lived with her married sister Elizabeth Edwards. Before she married Abraham Lincoln, she was courted by his long-time political opponent Stephen A. Douglas. The Lincolns had four sons of whom only the eldest, Robert, survived both parents. Their family home and neighborhood in Springfield is preserved at the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. Lincoln staunchly supported her husband throughout his presidency and was active in keeping national morale high during the Civil War. She acted as the White House social coordinator, throwing lavish balls and redecorating the White House at great expense; her spending was the source of much consternation. She was seated next to Abraham when he was assassinated in the President's Box at Ford's Theatre on Tenth Street in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865. The deaths of her husband and three of her sons weighed heavily on her. Lincoln suffered from numerous physical and mental health issues during her life. She had frequent migraines, which were exacerbated by a head injury in 1863. She was depressed for much of her life; some historians think she may have had bipolar disorder. She was briefly institutionalized for psychiatric disease in 1875, but later retired to the home of her sister. She died of a stroke in 1882 at age 63. Early life and education Mary was born in Lexington, Kentucky, as the fourth of seven children of Robert Smith Todd, a banker, and Elizabeth "Eliza" (Parker) Todd. Her family were slaveholders, and Mary was raised in comfort and refinement. When Mary was six, her mother died in childbirth. Two years later, her father married Elizabeth "Betsy" Humphreys and they had nine children together. Mary had a difficult relationship with her stepmother. From 1832, Mary and her family lived in what is now known as the Mary Todd Lincoln House, an elegant 14-room residence at 578 West Main Street in Lexington, Kentucky. Mary's paternal great-grandfather, David Levi Todd, was born in County Longford, Ireland, and immigrated through Pennsylvania to Kentucky. Another great-grandfather, Andrew Porter, was the son of an Irish immigrant to New Hampshire and later Pennsylvania. Her great-great maternal grandfather Samuel McDowell was born in Scotland, and emigrated to Pennsylvania. Other Todd ancestors came from England. At an early age Mary was sent to Madame Mentelle's finishing school, where the curriculum concentrated on French and literature. She learned to speak French fluently and studied dance, drama, music, and social graces. By age 20, she was regarded as witty and gregarious with a grasp of politics. Like her family, she was a Whig. Mary began living with her sister Elizabeth Porter Edwards in Springfield, Illinois, in October 1839. Elizabeth was married to Ninian W. Edwards, son of a former governor. He served as Mary's guardian. Mary was popular among the gentry of Springfield, and though she was courted by the rising young lawyer and Democratic Party politician Stephen A. Douglas and others, she chose Abraham Lincoln, a fellow Whig. Marriage and family Mary Todd married Abraham Lincoln on November 4, 1842, at her sister Elizabeth's home in Springfield, Illinois. She was 23 years old and he was 33 years of age. Their four sons, all born in Springfield, were: Robert Todd Lincoln (1843–1926), lawyer, diplomat (U.S. Secretary of War), businessman Edward Baker Lincoln, known as "Eddie" (1846–1850), died of tuberculosis William Wallace Lincoln, known as "Willie" (1850–1862), died of typhoid fever while Lincoln was President Thomas Lincoln, known as "Tad" (1853–1871), died at age 18 (either from pleurisy, pneumonia, congestive heart failure, or tuberculosis) Robert and Tad (Thomas) survived to adulthood and the death of their father, and only Robert outlived his mother. Lincoln's career and home life While Lincoln pursued his increasingly successful career as a Springfield lawyer, Mary supervised their growing household. Their house, where they resided from 1844 until 1861, still stands in Springfield, and has been designated the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. During Lincoln's years as an Illinois circuit lawyer, Mary was often left alone for months at a time to raise their children and run the household. Mary supported her husband socially and politically, not least when Lincoln was elected president in 1860. Mary cooked for Lincoln often during his presidency. Raised by a wealthy family, her cooking was simple, but satisfied Lincoln's tastes, which included imported oysters. First Lady of the United States During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary also was a frequent purchaser of fine jewelry and on many occasions bought jewelry on credit from the local Galt & Bro. jewelers. Upon President Lincoln's death, she had a large amount of debt with the jeweler, which was subsequently waived and much of the jewelry was returned. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. Another theory holds that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. Mary Lincoln's grief over Willie's death was so devastating that she took to her bed for three weeks, so desolated that she could not attend his funeral or look after Tad. Mary was so distraught for many months that Lincoln had to employ a nurse to look after her. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. Assassination of Abraham Lincoln As the Civil War ended, Mrs. Lincoln expected to continue as the First Lady of a nation at peace. President Lincoln awoke on the morning of April 14, 1865, in a pleasant mood. Robert E. Lee had surrendered several days before to Ulysses Grant, and now the President was awaiting word from North Carolina on the surrender of Joseph E. Johnston. The morning papers carried the announcement that the President and his wife would be attending the theater that evening. At one point, Mary developed a headache and was inclined to stay home, but Lincoln told her he must attend because newspapers had announced that he would. She sat with her husband watching the comic play Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre, along with their guests Henry Rathbone and Clara Harris. During the third act, the President and Mrs. Lincoln drew closer together, holding hands while enjoying the play. Mary whispered to her husband, who was holding her hand, "What will Miss Harris think of my hanging on to you so?" The president smiled and replied, "She won't think anything about it". That was the last conversation the Lincolns ever had. Five minutes later, at about 10:15 pm, President Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth. She was holding Abraham's hand when Booth's bullet struck the back of his head. Mrs. Lincoln accompanied her mortally wounded husband across the street to the Petersen House, where he was taken to a back bedroom and laid crosswise on the bed there, where Lincoln's Cabinet was summoned, except William Seward, who had been seriously attacked by Lewis Powell, just as Booth was about to carry out his assassination at Ford's Theater, several minutes earlier. Their oldest son, Robert, sat with Lincoln throughout the night and to the following morning– Saturday, April 15, 1865. At one point, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton ordered Mary from the room as she was so unhinged with grief. President Lincoln remained in a coma for approximately nine hours. He died at 7:22 a.m., at the age of 56. Shortly before 7a.m. Mary was allowed to return to Lincoln's side, and, as Dixon reported, "she again seated herself by the President, kissing him and calling him every endearing name." As he died his breathing grew quieter, his face more calm. According to some accounts, at his last drawn breath, on the morning after the assassination, he smiled broadly and then expired. Historians, most notably author Lee Davis have emphasized Lincoln's peaceful appearance when and after he died: "It was the first time in four years, probably, that a peaceful expression crossed his face." Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Lincoln Administration, Maunsell Bradhurst Field wrote, "I had never seen upon the President's face an expression more genial and pleasing." The President's secretary, John Hay, said, "A look of unspeakable peace came upon his worn features". Later life and death After her husband's death, she received messages of condolence from all over the world, many of which she attempted to answer personally. To Queen Victoria she wrote: I have received the letter which Your Majesty has had the kindness to write. I am deeply grateful for this expression of tender sympathy, coming as they do, from a heart which from its own sorrow, can appreciate the intense grief I now endure.Victoria had suffered the loss of her husband, Prince Albert, four years earlier. As a widow, Mrs. Lincoln returned to Illinois and lived in Chicago with her sons. In 1868, her former modiste (dressmaker) and confidante, Elizabeth Keckley (1818–1907), published Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. She had been born into slavery, purchased her freedom and that of her son, and became a successful businesswoman in Washington, D.C. Although this book provides valuable insight into the character and life of Mary Todd Lincoln, at the time the former First Lady (and much of the public and press) regarded it as a breach of friendship and confidentiality. Keckley was widely criticized for her book, especially as her editor had published letters from Mary Lincoln to her. It has now been gratefully accepted by many historians and biographers and been used to flesh out the President and First Lady's personalities behind the scenes in the Executive Mansion and been used as the basis for several motion pictures and TV mini-series during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. In an act approved by a low margin on July 14, 1870, the United States Congress granted Mrs. Lincoln a life pension of $3,000 a year ($ in dollars). Mary had lobbied hard for such a pension, writing numerous letters to Congress and urging patrons such as Simon Cameron to petition on her behalf. She insisted that she deserved a pension just as much as the widows of soldiers, as she portrayed her husband as a fallen commander. At the time it was unusual for widows of presidents, and Mary Lincoln had alienated many congressmen, making it difficult for her to gain approval. The death of her son Thomas (Tad) in July 1871, following the deaths of two of her other sons and her husband, brought on an overpowering grief and depression. Her surviving son, Robert Lincoln, a rising young Chicago lawyer, was alarmed at his mother's increasingly erratic behavior. In March 1875, during a visit to Jacksonville, Florida, Mary became unshakably convinced that Robert was deathly ill; hurrying to Chicago, she found him healthy. During her visit with him, she told him that someone had tried to poison her on the train and that a "wandering Jew" had taken her pocketbook but returned it later. She also spent large amounts of money there on items she never used, such as draperies and elaborate dresses (she wore only black after her husband's assassination). She walked around the city with $56,000 in government bonds sewn into her petticoats (underskirts). Despite this large amount of money and the $3,000-a-year stipend from Congress, Mrs. Lincoln had an irrational fear of poverty. In 1872, she went to spiritualist photographer, William H. Mumler, who produced a photograph of her that appears to faintly show Lincoln's ghost behind her (photo in Allen County Public Library, Fort Wayne, Indiana). The College of Psychic Studies, referencing notes belonging to William Stainton Moses, claims that the photo was taken in the early 1870s, that Lincoln had assumed the name of 'Mrs. Lindall', and that Lincoln had to be encouraged by Mumler's wife to identify her husband on the photo. P.T. Barnum, testifying against Mumler in his eventual fraud trial, presented a photo featuring himself with the 'ghost' of Abraham Lincoln, demonstrating for the court how easy it was to make one of Mumler's images. The image is recognized now as a hoax created via double exposure (by inserting a previously prepared positive glass plate featuring the image of the "deceased" into the camera in front of an unused sensitive glass plate). Due to her erratic behavior, Robert initiated proceedings to have her institutionalized. On May 20, 1875, following a trial, a jury committed her to a private asylum in Batavia, Illinois. After the court proceedings, she was so despondent that she attempted suicide. She went to several pharmacies and ordered enough laudanum to kill herself, but an alert pharmacist frustrated her attempts and finally gave her a placebo. Three months after being committed to Bellevue Place, she devised her escape: She smuggled letters to her lawyer, James B. Bradwell, and his wife Myra Bradwell, who was not only her friend but also a feminist lawyer. She also wrote to the editor of the Chicago Times. Soon, the public embarrassments that Robert had hoped to avoid were looming, and his character and motives were in question, as he controlled his mother's finances. The director of Bellevue at Mary's trial had assured the jury she would benefit from treatment at his facility. In the face of potentially damaging publicity, he declared her well enough to go to Springfield to live with her sister Elizabeth as she desired. Mary Lincoln was released into the custody of her sister in Springfield. In 1876 she was declared competent to manage her own affairs. The earlier committal proceedings had resulted in Mary being profoundly estranged from her son Robert, and they did not see each other again until shortly before her death. Mrs. Lincoln spent the next four years traveling throughout Europe and took up residence in Pau, France. Her final years were marked by declining health. She suffered from severe cataracts that reduced her eyesight; this condition may have contributed to her increasing susceptibility to falls. In 1879, she suffered spinal cord injuries in a fall from a stepladder. She traveled to New York in 1881 and lobbied for an increased pension after the assassination of President Garfield raised the issue of provisions for his family. She faced a difficult battle, due to negative press over her spending habits and rumors about her handling of her personal finances, including $56,000 in government bonds left to her by her husband. Congress eventually granted the increase, along with an additional monetary gift. During the early 1880s, Mary Lincoln was confined to the Springfield, Illinois, residence of her sister Elizabeth Edwards. On July 15, 1882, exactly eleven years after her youngest son died, she collapsed at her sister's home, lapsed into a coma, and died the next morning of a stroke at age 63. Her funeral service was held at First Presbyterian Church, Springfield, Illinois. In popular culture Biographies have been written about Mary Lincoln as well as her husband. Barbara Hambly's The Emancipator's Wife (2005) is considered a well-researched historical novel that provides context for her use of over-the-counter drugs containing alcohol and opium, which were frequently given to women of her era. Janis Cooke Newman's historical novel Mary: Mrs. A. Lincoln (2007), in which Mary tells her own story after incarceration in the asylum in an effort to maintain and prove her sanity, is considered by Mary's recent biographer, Jean H. Baker, to be 'close to life' in its depiction of Mary Lincoln's life. The grief experienced through her widowhood is a theme of Andrew Holleran's 2006 novel, Grief. Mary Lincoln has been portrayed by several actresses in film, including Kay Hammond in Abraham Lincoln (1930) directed by D.W. Griffith; Ruth Gordon in Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940); Julie Harris in The Last of Mrs. Lincoln, a 1976 television adaptation of the stage play; Mary Tyler Moore in the 1988 television mini-series Lincoln; Donna Murphy in the 1998 movie The Day Lincoln Was Shot; Sally Field in Steven Spielberg's 2012 film Lincoln; Penelope Ann Miller in Saving Lincoln (2012); and Mary Elizabeth Winstead in Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012), set during the Civil War. Mezzo-soprano Elaine Bonazzi portrayed Mary in Thomas Pasatieri's Emmy Award winning opera The Trial of Mary Lincoln in 1972. In 1955, Vivi Janiss played the historical Mary Todd Lincoln in "How Chance Made Lincoln President" in the anthology television series, TV Reader's Digest. Richard Gaines was cast as Abraham Lincoln, and Ken Hardison played their son, Robert Todd Lincoln. In 2005, Sufjan Stevens referenced Mary Todd Lincoln in the instrumental track "A Short Reprise for Mary Todd, Who Went Insane, but for Very Good Reasons" from his album Illinois, which is themed around the state where she resided the majority of her life. Family Her sister Elizabeth Todd married Ninian Edwards Jr., the son of the Illinois Governor Ninian Edwards. Their daughter Julia Edwards married Edward L. Baker, Jr., editor of the Illinois State Journal and son of Edward L. Baker, Sr. Their daughter, Mary Todd Lincoln's grandniece Mary Edwards Brown, served as custodian of the Lincoln Homestead, as did her own daughter. Mary's half-sister Emilie Todd married Benjamin Hardin Helm, CSA general and son of the Kentucky Governor John L. Helm. Another half-sister Elodie Todd married CSA Brig. General Nathaniel H. R. Dawson, later the third U.S. Commissioner of Education. One of Mary Todd's cousins was Dakota Territory Congressman/US General John Blair Smith Todd. See also Lincoln family tree References Bibliography Further reading Baker, Jean. Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography (2008) excerpt and text search Michael Burlingame, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln (University of Illinois Press, 1994) Michael Burlingame, An American Marriage: The Untold Story of Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd (Pegasus Books, 2021) Catherine Clinton, Mrs. Lincoln: A Life (Harper Perennial, 2010) Emerson, Jason (2007). The Madness of Mary Lincoln. Carbondale, Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. pp. 20–22. . Daniel Mark Epstein, The Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage (Ballantine Books, 2008) King, C.J. Four Marys and a Jessie: The Story of the Lincoln Women (Hildene, 2015) Neely, Mark E. Jr. and R. Gerald McMurtry. The Insanity File: The Case of Mary Todd Lincoln (1993) excerpt and text search Ruth Painter Randall, Mary Lincoln: Biography of a Marriage (Little, Brown & Co., 1953) Williams, Frank J. and Burkhimer, Michael, eds. The Mary Lincoln Enigma: Historians on America's Most Controversial First Lady (Southern Illinois University Press, 2012) 392 pages; scholarly essays on her childhood in Kentucky, the early years of her marriage, her political relationship with her husband, and her relationship with her son Robert. External links White House profile Mrs. Abraham Lincoln: A Study of Her Personality and Her Influence on Lincoln By W. A. Evans Lincoln children Mary Todd Lincoln Quotes Original Manuscript Letters: Mary Todd Lincoln Shapell Manuscript Foundation Mary Lincoln at C-SPAN's First Ladies: Influence & Image Mary Todd Lincoln's Seed-pearl Necklace and Matching Bracelets. (A gift from Abraham Lincoln to Mary Todd Lincoln and worn at his second Inaugural Ball. See featured picture at the top of the page.) From the Collections at the Library of Congress 1818 births 1882 deaths 19th-century American women 19th-century Presbyterians American people of English descent American people of Irish descent American people of Scottish descent American Presbyterians Burials at Oak Ridge Cemetery First Ladies of the United States Lincoln family People associated with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln People from Lexington, Kentucky People from Springfield, Illinois People with bipolar disorder Spouses of Illinois politicians	true	[ "Daniella Weiss (; born August 30, 1945) is an Israeli Orthodox settlement movement activist, and a former mayor of Kedumim, an Israeli settlement located in the West Bank. She was first elected mayor of Kedumim in September 1996, and was re-elected for a second term in November 2001.\n\nBiography\nDaniella Weiss was born in Bnei Brak in 1945. Her parents, Jewish immigrants from the United States, were members of Lehi and took part in underground activities. She attended a religious high school in Ramat Gan, and studied as part of the Atuda program. She studied English literature and political science at Bar-Ilan University.\n\nSince the 1970s, Weiss has been a notable figure in the Gush Emunim settlement movement, active in the establishment of many new communities in the occupied West Bank.\n\nIn May 1987, she was arrested and convicted with respect to rioting by Israeli settlers in the Palestinian city of Qalqiliya. She was sentenced to a fine and a suspended sentence.\n\nIn June 2007, she was charged with obstructing a police officer in the line of duty and assaulting a police officer. She was sentenced to 5 months probation. \n\nOn October 3, 2008, she was arrested and charged with assaulting a police officer, interfering with a police investigation, and hindering a police officer in the performance of his duty. She was released from house arrest pending trial on October 6, 2008. \n\nShe was arrested, and promptly released, in December 2008 in Hebron.\n\nIn May 2009, Daniella was arrested with respect to assaulting a police officer and obstruction of an investigation. She was sentenced to two days under house arrest .\n\nDaniella Weiss rejects the Price tag policy, saying that it had diverted settlers from what she considered to be their most important task - setting up additional caravans and tents to lay claim to ever more hilltops in the West Bank. She has stated that the only \"price tag\" action acceptable to her is the establishment of a new outpost in response to every outpost that had been demolished by Israeli authorities.\n\nReferences\n\nSee also\nStone Cold Justice, by John Lyons, for Australian Broadcasting Corporation\n\n1945 births\n20th-century Israeli women politicians\nIsraeli activists\nIsraeli women activists\nIsraeli Orthodox Jews\nIsraeli settlers\nLiving people\nMayors of places in the State of Palestine\n21st-century Israeli women politicians", "Gizella Bodnár (18 October 1926 – 6 February 2019) known as Repülős Gizi (“Airplane Gizi”) was a Hungarian burglar, who became known in the early 1950s. According to the media, she was infamous for using the then-frequent domestic flights to travel to different cities, break into houses there, then fly home, avoiding suspicion, since police would not suspect someone living that far away from the crime scene.\n\nLife\nShe was the fourth of six children of a railroad engineer father and a housewife mother. She began to steal smaller things while still a child; she attributed her kleptomania to meningitis she survived at the age of six. Later she studied in Kassa, when World War II broke out; it was stress that was said to have brought out her kleptomania again.\n\nIn the early 1950s, when Malév, the national airline company used to provide domestic flights between cities in Hungary, Bodnár often flew from Budapest to Miskolc, Debrecen, Szeged, Pécs and Szombathely, broke into houses, then flew back to the capital with the evening flight; although she herself always denied ever flying in a plane. She also committed break-ins abroad, in Amsterdam, London and Paris. Part of her modus operandi was to go to a neighbour in the morning and borrow some condiments for cooking, which she would return in the evening, providing herself an alibi for two distinct parts of a day in a different town.\n\nShe was arrested twenty-one times between 1948 and 2006, stood trial over 20 times and was convicted to a total of 40 years in prison. She spent a total of 16 years and 7 months in prison. Later she moved to the town of Komárom, where she was arrested in January 2009, at the age of 82, for breaking into a house. Late in her life, she was diagnosed with kleptomania: she admitted liking \"shiny things\" and claimed that she mostly gave away her loot to other people instead of selling it, a claim supported by the fact that at the time of her death she had no possessions to her name.\n\nShe published her memoirs in 2007, with the title Repülős Gizi – A tolvajok királynője (“Airplane Gizi, Queen of Thieves”). She was arrested twice in Hungary in 2015, in June and September; in the latter instance, she was found in a cupboard, where she claimed she hid from the rain outside. She was arrested in February 2016 in Sukoró, then in August 2017 in Tatabánya.\n\nBodnár died on 6 February 2019, aged 92.\n\nSources\n\nFurther reading \n Repülős Gizi – A tolvajok királynője (Broadway Invest Kft., 2007) \n Horkai József – Martinkó Károly: Repülős Gizi (Népszava, 1989) \n\nHungarian criminals\nPeople convicted of burglary\n1926 births\n2019 deaths\nFemale criminals\nPeople from Miskolc" ]
[ "Mary Todd Lincoln", "White House years", "What was it like during the White house years?", "A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending,", "Why was she rebelling?", "has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder.", "Was she ever placed in a mental institution?", "she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers.", "Was she ever arrested?", "Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation." ]	C_ed9d0d46d8f54e95b205e13572de60c9_0	Was Lincoln embarrassed by her?	5	Was Abraham Lincoln embarrassed by Mary Todd Lincoln?	Mary Todd Lincoln	During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern and southern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. A physician has also posited that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. CANNOTANSWER	which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost,	Mary Ann Todd Lincoln (December 13, 1818 – July 16, 1882) was First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865 as the wife of President Abraham Lincoln. Mary Lincoln was a member of a wealthy and large, slave-owning Kentucky family, and was well educated. Born Mary Ann Todd, she dropped the name Ann after her younger sister, Ann Todd (later Clark), was born. After finishing school during her teens, she moved to Springfield, Illinois, where she lived with her married sister Elizabeth Edwards. Before she married Abraham Lincoln, she was courted by his long-time political opponent Stephen A. Douglas. The Lincolns had four sons of whom only the eldest, Robert, survived both parents. Their family home and neighborhood in Springfield is preserved at the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. Lincoln staunchly supported her husband throughout his presidency and was active in keeping national morale high during the Civil War. She acted as the White House social coordinator, throwing lavish balls and redecorating the White House at great expense; her spending was the source of much consternation. She was seated next to Abraham when he was assassinated in the President's Box at Ford's Theatre on Tenth Street in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865. The deaths of her husband and three of her sons weighed heavily on her. Lincoln suffered from numerous physical and mental health issues during her life. She had frequent migraines, which were exacerbated by a head injury in 1863. She was depressed for much of her life; some historians think she may have had bipolar disorder. She was briefly institutionalized for psychiatric disease in 1875, but later retired to the home of her sister. She died of a stroke in 1882 at age 63. Early life and education Mary was born in Lexington, Kentucky, as the fourth of seven children of Robert Smith Todd, a banker, and Elizabeth "Eliza" (Parker) Todd. Her family were slaveholders, and Mary was raised in comfort and refinement. When Mary was six, her mother died in childbirth. Two years later, her father married Elizabeth "Betsy" Humphreys and they had nine children together. Mary had a difficult relationship with her stepmother. From 1832, Mary and her family lived in what is now known as the Mary Todd Lincoln House, an elegant 14-room residence at 578 West Main Street in Lexington, Kentucky. Mary's paternal great-grandfather, David Levi Todd, was born in County Longford, Ireland, and immigrated through Pennsylvania to Kentucky. Another great-grandfather, Andrew Porter, was the son of an Irish immigrant to New Hampshire and later Pennsylvania. Her great-great maternal grandfather Samuel McDowell was born in Scotland, and emigrated to Pennsylvania. Other Todd ancestors came from England. At an early age Mary was sent to Madame Mentelle's finishing school, where the curriculum concentrated on French and literature. She learned to speak French fluently and studied dance, drama, music, and social graces. By age 20, she was regarded as witty and gregarious with a grasp of politics. Like her family, she was a Whig. Mary began living with her sister Elizabeth Porter Edwards in Springfield, Illinois, in October 1839. Elizabeth was married to Ninian W. Edwards, son of a former governor. He served as Mary's guardian. Mary was popular among the gentry of Springfield, and though she was courted by the rising young lawyer and Democratic Party politician Stephen A. Douglas and others, she chose Abraham Lincoln, a fellow Whig. Marriage and family Mary Todd married Abraham Lincoln on November 4, 1842, at her sister Elizabeth's home in Springfield, Illinois. She was 23 years old and he was 33 years of age. Their four sons, all born in Springfield, were: Robert Todd Lincoln (1843–1926), lawyer, diplomat (U.S. Secretary of War), businessman Edward Baker Lincoln, known as "Eddie" (1846–1850), died of tuberculosis William Wallace Lincoln, known as "Willie" (1850–1862), died of typhoid fever while Lincoln was President Thomas Lincoln, known as "Tad" (1853–1871), died at age 18 (either from pleurisy, pneumonia, congestive heart failure, or tuberculosis) Robert and Tad (Thomas) survived to adulthood and the death of their father, and only Robert outlived his mother. Lincoln's career and home life While Lincoln pursued his increasingly successful career as a Springfield lawyer, Mary supervised their growing household. Their house, where they resided from 1844 until 1861, still stands in Springfield, and has been designated the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. During Lincoln's years as an Illinois circuit lawyer, Mary was often left alone for months at a time to raise their children and run the household. Mary supported her husband socially and politically, not least when Lincoln was elected president in 1860. Mary cooked for Lincoln often during his presidency. Raised by a wealthy family, her cooking was simple, but satisfied Lincoln's tastes, which included imported oysters. First Lady of the United States During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary also was a frequent purchaser of fine jewelry and on many occasions bought jewelry on credit from the local Galt & Bro. jewelers. Upon President Lincoln's death, she had a large amount of debt with the jeweler, which was subsequently waived and much of the jewelry was returned. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. Another theory holds that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. Mary Lincoln's grief over Willie's death was so devastating that she took to her bed for three weeks, so desolated that she could not attend his funeral or look after Tad. Mary was so distraught for many months that Lincoln had to employ a nurse to look after her. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. Assassination of Abraham Lincoln As the Civil War ended, Mrs. Lincoln expected to continue as the First Lady of a nation at peace. President Lincoln awoke on the morning of April 14, 1865, in a pleasant mood. Robert E. Lee had surrendered several days before to Ulysses Grant, and now the President was awaiting word from North Carolina on the surrender of Joseph E. Johnston. The morning papers carried the announcement that the President and his wife would be attending the theater that evening. At one point, Mary developed a headache and was inclined to stay home, but Lincoln told her he must attend because newspapers had announced that he would. She sat with her husband watching the comic play Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre, along with their guests Henry Rathbone and Clara Harris. During the third act, the President and Mrs. Lincoln drew closer together, holding hands while enjoying the play. Mary whispered to her husband, who was holding her hand, "What will Miss Harris think of my hanging on to you so?" The president smiled and replied, "She won't think anything about it". That was the last conversation the Lincolns ever had. Five minutes later, at about 10:15 pm, President Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth. She was holding Abraham's hand when Booth's bullet struck the back of his head. Mrs. Lincoln accompanied her mortally wounded husband across the street to the Petersen House, where he was taken to a back bedroom and laid crosswise on the bed there, where Lincoln's Cabinet was summoned, except William Seward, who had been seriously attacked by Lewis Powell, just as Booth was about to carry out his assassination at Ford's Theater, several minutes earlier. Their oldest son, Robert, sat with Lincoln throughout the night and to the following morning– Saturday, April 15, 1865. At one point, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton ordered Mary from the room as she was so unhinged with grief. President Lincoln remained in a coma for approximately nine hours. He died at 7:22 a.m., at the age of 56. Shortly before 7a.m. Mary was allowed to return to Lincoln's side, and, as Dixon reported, "she again seated herself by the President, kissing him and calling him every endearing name." As he died his breathing grew quieter, his face more calm. According to some accounts, at his last drawn breath, on the morning after the assassination, he smiled broadly and then expired. Historians, most notably author Lee Davis have emphasized Lincoln's peaceful appearance when and after he died: "It was the first time in four years, probably, that a peaceful expression crossed his face." Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Lincoln Administration, Maunsell Bradhurst Field wrote, "I had never seen upon the President's face an expression more genial and pleasing." The President's secretary, John Hay, said, "A look of unspeakable peace came upon his worn features". Later life and death After her husband's death, she received messages of condolence from all over the world, many of which she attempted to answer personally. To Queen Victoria she wrote: I have received the letter which Your Majesty has had the kindness to write. I am deeply grateful for this expression of tender sympathy, coming as they do, from a heart which from its own sorrow, can appreciate the intense grief I now endure.Victoria had suffered the loss of her husband, Prince Albert, four years earlier. As a widow, Mrs. Lincoln returned to Illinois and lived in Chicago with her sons. In 1868, her former modiste (dressmaker) and confidante, Elizabeth Keckley (1818–1907), published Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. She had been born into slavery, purchased her freedom and that of her son, and became a successful businesswoman in Washington, D.C. Although this book provides valuable insight into the character and life of Mary Todd Lincoln, at the time the former First Lady (and much of the public and press) regarded it as a breach of friendship and confidentiality. Keckley was widely criticized for her book, especially as her editor had published letters from Mary Lincoln to her. It has now been gratefully accepted by many historians and biographers and been used to flesh out the President and First Lady's personalities behind the scenes in the Executive Mansion and been used as the basis for several motion pictures and TV mini-series during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. In an act approved by a low margin on July 14, 1870, the United States Congress granted Mrs. Lincoln a life pension of $3,000 a year ($ in dollars). Mary had lobbied hard for such a pension, writing numerous letters to Congress and urging patrons such as Simon Cameron to petition on her behalf. She insisted that she deserved a pension just as much as the widows of soldiers, as she portrayed her husband as a fallen commander. At the time it was unusual for widows of presidents, and Mary Lincoln had alienated many congressmen, making it difficult for her to gain approval. The death of her son Thomas (Tad) in July 1871, following the deaths of two of her other sons and her husband, brought on an overpowering grief and depression. Her surviving son, Robert Lincoln, a rising young Chicago lawyer, was alarmed at his mother's increasingly erratic behavior. In March 1875, during a visit to Jacksonville, Florida, Mary became unshakably convinced that Robert was deathly ill; hurrying to Chicago, she found him healthy. During her visit with him, she told him that someone had tried to poison her on the train and that a "wandering Jew" had taken her pocketbook but returned it later. She also spent large amounts of money there on items she never used, such as draperies and elaborate dresses (she wore only black after her husband's assassination). She walked around the city with $56,000 in government bonds sewn into her petticoats (underskirts). Despite this large amount of money and the $3,000-a-year stipend from Congress, Mrs. Lincoln had an irrational fear of poverty. In 1872, she went to spiritualist photographer, William H. Mumler, who produced a photograph of her that appears to faintly show Lincoln's ghost behind her (photo in Allen County Public Library, Fort Wayne, Indiana). The College of Psychic Studies, referencing notes belonging to William Stainton Moses, claims that the photo was taken in the early 1870s, that Lincoln had assumed the name of 'Mrs. Lindall', and that Lincoln had to be encouraged by Mumler's wife to identify her husband on the photo. P.T. Barnum, testifying against Mumler in his eventual fraud trial, presented a photo featuring himself with the 'ghost' of Abraham Lincoln, demonstrating for the court how easy it was to make one of Mumler's images. The image is recognized now as a hoax created via double exposure (by inserting a previously prepared positive glass plate featuring the image of the "deceased" into the camera in front of an unused sensitive glass plate). Due to her erratic behavior, Robert initiated proceedings to have her institutionalized. On May 20, 1875, following a trial, a jury committed her to a private asylum in Batavia, Illinois. After the court proceedings, she was so despondent that she attempted suicide. She went to several pharmacies and ordered enough laudanum to kill herself, but an alert pharmacist frustrated her attempts and finally gave her a placebo. Three months after being committed to Bellevue Place, she devised her escape: She smuggled letters to her lawyer, James B. Bradwell, and his wife Myra Bradwell, who was not only her friend but also a feminist lawyer. She also wrote to the editor of the Chicago Times. Soon, the public embarrassments that Robert had hoped to avoid were looming, and his character and motives were in question, as he controlled his mother's finances. The director of Bellevue at Mary's trial had assured the jury she would benefit from treatment at his facility. In the face of potentially damaging publicity, he declared her well enough to go to Springfield to live with her sister Elizabeth as she desired. Mary Lincoln was released into the custody of her sister in Springfield. In 1876 she was declared competent to manage her own affairs. The earlier committal proceedings had resulted in Mary being profoundly estranged from her son Robert, and they did not see each other again until shortly before her death. Mrs. Lincoln spent the next four years traveling throughout Europe and took up residence in Pau, France. Her final years were marked by declining health. She suffered from severe cataracts that reduced her eyesight; this condition may have contributed to her increasing susceptibility to falls. In 1879, she suffered spinal cord injuries in a fall from a stepladder. She traveled to New York in 1881 and lobbied for an increased pension after the assassination of President Garfield raised the issue of provisions for his family. She faced a difficult battle, due to negative press over her spending habits and rumors about her handling of her personal finances, including $56,000 in government bonds left to her by her husband. Congress eventually granted the increase, along with an additional monetary gift. During the early 1880s, Mary Lincoln was confined to the Springfield, Illinois, residence of her sister Elizabeth Edwards. On July 15, 1882, exactly eleven years after her youngest son died, she collapsed at her sister's home, lapsed into a coma, and died the next morning of a stroke at age 63. Her funeral service was held at First Presbyterian Church, Springfield, Illinois. In popular culture Biographies have been written about Mary Lincoln as well as her husband. Barbara Hambly's The Emancipator's Wife (2005) is considered a well-researched historical novel that provides context for her use of over-the-counter drugs containing alcohol and opium, which were frequently given to women of her era. Janis Cooke Newman's historical novel Mary: Mrs. A. Lincoln (2007), in which Mary tells her own story after incarceration in the asylum in an effort to maintain and prove her sanity, is considered by Mary's recent biographer, Jean H. Baker, to be 'close to life' in its depiction of Mary Lincoln's life. The grief experienced through her widowhood is a theme of Andrew Holleran's 2006 novel, Grief. Mary Lincoln has been portrayed by several actresses in film, including Kay Hammond in Abraham Lincoln (1930) directed by D.W. Griffith; Ruth Gordon in Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940); Julie Harris in The Last of Mrs. Lincoln, a 1976 television adaptation of the stage play; Mary Tyler Moore in the 1988 television mini-series Lincoln; Donna Murphy in the 1998 movie The Day Lincoln Was Shot; Sally Field in Steven Spielberg's 2012 film Lincoln; Penelope Ann Miller in Saving Lincoln (2012); and Mary Elizabeth Winstead in Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012), set during the Civil War. Mezzo-soprano Elaine Bonazzi portrayed Mary in Thomas Pasatieri's Emmy Award winning opera The Trial of Mary Lincoln in 1972. In 1955, Vivi Janiss played the historical Mary Todd Lincoln in "How Chance Made Lincoln President" in the anthology television series, TV Reader's Digest. Richard Gaines was cast as Abraham Lincoln, and Ken Hardison played their son, Robert Todd Lincoln. In 2005, Sufjan Stevens referenced Mary Todd Lincoln in the instrumental track "A Short Reprise for Mary Todd, Who Went Insane, but for Very Good Reasons" from his album Illinois, which is themed around the state where she resided the majority of her life. Family Her sister Elizabeth Todd married Ninian Edwards Jr., the son of the Illinois Governor Ninian Edwards. Their daughter Julia Edwards married Edward L. Baker, Jr., editor of the Illinois State Journal and son of Edward L. Baker, Sr. Their daughter, Mary Todd Lincoln's grandniece Mary Edwards Brown, served as custodian of the Lincoln Homestead, as did her own daughter. Mary's half-sister Emilie Todd married Benjamin Hardin Helm, CSA general and son of the Kentucky Governor John L. Helm. Another half-sister Elodie Todd married CSA Brig. General Nathaniel H. R. Dawson, later the third U.S. Commissioner of Education. One of Mary Todd's cousins was Dakota Territory Congressman/US General John Blair Smith Todd. See also Lincoln family tree References Bibliography Further reading Baker, Jean. Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography (2008) excerpt and text search Michael Burlingame, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln (University of Illinois Press, 1994) Michael Burlingame, An American Marriage: The Untold Story of Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd (Pegasus Books, 2021) Catherine Clinton, Mrs. Lincoln: A Life (Harper Perennial, 2010) Emerson, Jason (2007). The Madness of Mary Lincoln. Carbondale, Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. pp. 20–22. . Daniel Mark Epstein, The Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage (Ballantine Books, 2008) King, C.J. Four Marys and a Jessie: The Story of the Lincoln Women (Hildene, 2015) Neely, Mark E. Jr. and R. Gerald McMurtry. The Insanity File: The Case of Mary Todd Lincoln (1993) excerpt and text search Ruth Painter Randall, Mary Lincoln: Biography of a Marriage (Little, Brown & Co., 1953) Williams, Frank J. and Burkhimer, Michael, eds. The Mary Lincoln Enigma: Historians on America's Most Controversial First Lady (Southern Illinois University Press, 2012) 392 pages; scholarly essays on her childhood in Kentucky, the early years of her marriage, her political relationship with her husband, and her relationship with her son Robert. External links White House profile Mrs. Abraham Lincoln: A Study of Her Personality and Her Influence on Lincoln By W. A. Evans Lincoln children Mary Todd Lincoln Quotes Original Manuscript Letters: Mary Todd Lincoln Shapell Manuscript Foundation Mary Lincoln at C-SPAN's First Ladies: Influence & Image Mary Todd Lincoln's Seed-pearl Necklace and Matching Bracelets. (A gift from Abraham Lincoln to Mary Todd Lincoln and worn at his second Inaugural Ball. See featured picture at the top of the page.) From the Collections at the Library of Congress 1818 births 1882 deaths 19th-century American women 19th-century Presbyterians American people of English descent American people of Irish descent American people of Scottish descent American Presbyterians Burials at Oak Ridge Cemetery First Ladies of the United States Lincoln family People associated with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln People from Lexington, Kentucky People from Springfield, Illinois People with bipolar disorder Spouses of Illinois politicians	true	[ "Mary Lincoln Beckwith (August 22, 1898 – July 10, 1975) was a prominent descendant of Abraham Lincoln. Beckwith was one of the last two descendants of Abraham Lincoln, along with her younger brother Robert.\n\nEarly life\n\nBeckwith was born to Jessie Harlan Lincoln and Warren Wallace Beckwith on August 22, 1898, in Mount Pleasant, Iowa. She got the nickname \"Peggy\" from her grandfather Robert Todd Lincoln, who described her hair as \"flying in the sun\" when he wrote to his Aunt Emile Todd Helm. People who were close to her called her \"Peggy.\"\n\nRaised with her brother in Manchester, VT at the home of her grandfather, Robert Todd Lincoln, at a farm known as Hildene, the family estate in Vermont, she later grew up in Washington, D.C., and was said to have become \"a squat, fair-haired, blue-eyed, chain smoker who golfed and dabbled in oil painting and sculpture.\" Beckwith attended Miss Madeira's school, a private prep school, but she did not go on to college afterwards.\n\nPrior to World War I, she was a representative on the committee on public information in Cuba. In 1918, she returned to the family farm to fill positions left by men who had gone to war. Beckwith took an agricultural course at Cornell, and wanted to organize young women to work the farm.\n\nBeckwith was interested in aviation. Her first time flying was to ask for a ride in a plane at the Curtiss airport in Baltimore in 1930 and afterwards \"she announced without any further formalities that she would like to learn to fly by herself.\" She earned her private pilot's license by 1931. In the 1930s, she built a private landing strip in Manchester VT,and purchased a number of airplanes. One of them was a three-seat sports plane. She also owned a Cutliss Gypsy Moth and a Traveler. During this time she was living at Hildene with her grandmother, Mary Harlan Lincoln.\n\nBy 1938, Beckwith was operating a 1,000 acre dairy farm at Hildene. She had inherited this property following the death of her grandmother, Mary Harlan Lincoln in 1938.\n\nLater life\nBeckwith later in life became an eccentric recluse at Hildene. She never married or had children.\n\nBeckwith ran the estate \"as a farm\" and dabbled in art and sculpture. Despite her desire to eschew publicity, she was well-known by the local farm community. She was known to conduct errands in the town around Hildene \"dressed in blue jeans overalls, with a shirt and a man's cap.\"\n\nBeckwith christened the submarine Abraham Lincoln on May 14, 1960.\n\nShe died on July 10, 1975 at around 2:15 a.m. at Rutland Hospital in Rutland, Vermont. She had requested that her ashes be spread over her estate; this request was granted and there was no funeral or memorial service held. Upon her death, her brother Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith became the last living descendant of Abraham Lincoln.\n\nSee also\nLincoln family tree\n\nReferences\n\nNotes\nDallas Morning News obituary, July 12, 1975 gave her name as \"Miss Mary Todd Lincoln Beckwith\".\n\n1898 births\n1975 deaths\nLincoln family\nPeople from Mount Pleasant, Iowa\nAmerican aviators\nAmerican women aviators\nAviators from Iowa\nPeople from Henry County, Iowa\n20th-century American women", "Mary Todd \"Mamie\" Lincoln Isham (October 15, 1869 – November 21, 1938) was a granddaughter of Abraham Lincoln, the first daughter of Robert Todd Lincoln and the mother of Lincoln Isham.\n\nEarly life\nMamie was born Mary Todd Lincoln to Mary Eunice Harlan and Robert Todd Lincoln at the Robert Lincoln home in Chicago, Illinois. As a child, she was called by the nickname of \"Little Mamie\". Her father would often bring Mamie to visit his mother, Mary Todd Lincoln. It is believed that Robert addressed Mamie as Mary's \"favorite grandchild\". On one visit, Mary Lincoln gave her grandchild two very expensive dolls.\n\nMamie and her siblings were described as \"bright, natural, unpretentious children, well liked by the people of the town\". Mamie and her sister, Jessie, were piano students in the summer session of Iowa Wesleyan in 1886. \n\nMamie later became a member of the Mount Pleasant Chapter A of the P.E.O. Sisterhood one month before her birthday, on September 17, 1884. Her sister Jessie was later accepted by the same organization on December 31, 1895, more than 11 years later.\n\nPersonal life\nMamie Lincoln became engaged in London and then married Charles Bradford Isham, the son of merchant and banker William Bradley Isham, on September 2, 1891, and bought a place in Manchester, Vermont, known as the 1811 house. In 1892, she had her only child in New York City:\n\n Lincoln Isham (1892–1971), who married Leahalma Correa (1892–1960), the daughter of the Spaniard Carlos Correa and the Englishwoman Mary Gooding in August 1919. They did not have any children together.\n\nShe lived the rest of her life in New York City including the address 19 East 72nd Street, where she was a choir mother of Grace Church on Broadway. On June 9, 1919, her husband died, leaving her a widow, but she continued to live in New York City for the next 19 years until she became gravely ill herself in 1938. She died in NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital on November 21, 1938, at around 10:05 a.m. at the age of 69. She is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, New York City.\n\nAt the time of her death, Isham was the owner of the Healy Portrait of Lincoln, which had been left to her by her mother. It was given to the White House collection when she died.\n\nSee also\nLincoln family tree\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1869 births\n1938 deaths\nLincoln family\nPeople from Manchester, Vermont\nBurials at Woodlawn Cemetery (Bronx, New York)" ]
[ "Mary Todd Lincoln", "White House years", "What was it like during the White house years?", "A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending,", "Why was she rebelling?", "has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder.", "Was she ever placed in a mental institution?", "she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers.", "Was she ever arrested?", "Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation.", "Was Lincoln embarrassed by her?", "which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost," ]	C_ed9d0d46d8f54e95b205e13572de60c9_0	How long did she live in the white house?	6	How long did Mary Todd Lincoln live in the white house?	Mary Todd Lincoln	During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern and southern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. A physician has also posited that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Mary Ann Todd Lincoln (December 13, 1818 – July 16, 1882) was First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865 as the wife of President Abraham Lincoln. Mary Lincoln was a member of a wealthy and large, slave-owning Kentucky family, and was well educated. Born Mary Ann Todd, she dropped the name Ann after her younger sister, Ann Todd (later Clark), was born. After finishing school during her teens, she moved to Springfield, Illinois, where she lived with her married sister Elizabeth Edwards. Before she married Abraham Lincoln, she was courted by his long-time political opponent Stephen A. Douglas. The Lincolns had four sons of whom only the eldest, Robert, survived both parents. Their family home and neighborhood in Springfield is preserved at the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. Lincoln staunchly supported her husband throughout his presidency and was active in keeping national morale high during the Civil War. She acted as the White House social coordinator, throwing lavish balls and redecorating the White House at great expense; her spending was the source of much consternation. She was seated next to Abraham when he was assassinated in the President's Box at Ford's Theatre on Tenth Street in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865. The deaths of her husband and three of her sons weighed heavily on her. Lincoln suffered from numerous physical and mental health issues during her life. She had frequent migraines, which were exacerbated by a head injury in 1863. She was depressed for much of her life; some historians think she may have had bipolar disorder. She was briefly institutionalized for psychiatric disease in 1875, but later retired to the home of her sister. She died of a stroke in 1882 at age 63. Early life and education Mary was born in Lexington, Kentucky, as the fourth of seven children of Robert Smith Todd, a banker, and Elizabeth "Eliza" (Parker) Todd. Her family were slaveholders, and Mary was raised in comfort and refinement. When Mary was six, her mother died in childbirth. Two years later, her father married Elizabeth "Betsy" Humphreys and they had nine children together. Mary had a difficult relationship with her stepmother. From 1832, Mary and her family lived in what is now known as the Mary Todd Lincoln House, an elegant 14-room residence at 578 West Main Street in Lexington, Kentucky. Mary's paternal great-grandfather, David Levi Todd, was born in County Longford, Ireland, and immigrated through Pennsylvania to Kentucky. Another great-grandfather, Andrew Porter, was the son of an Irish immigrant to New Hampshire and later Pennsylvania. Her great-great maternal grandfather Samuel McDowell was born in Scotland, and emigrated to Pennsylvania. Other Todd ancestors came from England. At an early age Mary was sent to Madame Mentelle's finishing school, where the curriculum concentrated on French and literature. She learned to speak French fluently and studied dance, drama, music, and social graces. By age 20, she was regarded as witty and gregarious with a grasp of politics. Like her family, she was a Whig. Mary began living with her sister Elizabeth Porter Edwards in Springfield, Illinois, in October 1839. Elizabeth was married to Ninian W. Edwards, son of a former governor. He served as Mary's guardian. Mary was popular among the gentry of Springfield, and though she was courted by the rising young lawyer and Democratic Party politician Stephen A. Douglas and others, she chose Abraham Lincoln, a fellow Whig. Marriage and family Mary Todd married Abraham Lincoln on November 4, 1842, at her sister Elizabeth's home in Springfield, Illinois. She was 23 years old and he was 33 years of age. Their four sons, all born in Springfield, were: Robert Todd Lincoln (1843–1926), lawyer, diplomat (U.S. Secretary of War), businessman Edward Baker Lincoln, known as "Eddie" (1846–1850), died of tuberculosis William Wallace Lincoln, known as "Willie" (1850–1862), died of typhoid fever while Lincoln was President Thomas Lincoln, known as "Tad" (1853–1871), died at age 18 (either from pleurisy, pneumonia, congestive heart failure, or tuberculosis) Robert and Tad (Thomas) survived to adulthood and the death of their father, and only Robert outlived his mother. Lincoln's career and home life While Lincoln pursued his increasingly successful career as a Springfield lawyer, Mary supervised their growing household. Their house, where they resided from 1844 until 1861, still stands in Springfield, and has been designated the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. During Lincoln's years as an Illinois circuit lawyer, Mary was often left alone for months at a time to raise their children and run the household. Mary supported her husband socially and politically, not least when Lincoln was elected president in 1860. Mary cooked for Lincoln often during his presidency. Raised by a wealthy family, her cooking was simple, but satisfied Lincoln's tastes, which included imported oysters. First Lady of the United States During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary also was a frequent purchaser of fine jewelry and on many occasions bought jewelry on credit from the local Galt & Bro. jewelers. Upon President Lincoln's death, she had a large amount of debt with the jeweler, which was subsequently waived and much of the jewelry was returned. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. Another theory holds that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. Mary Lincoln's grief over Willie's death was so devastating that she took to her bed for three weeks, so desolated that she could not attend his funeral or look after Tad. Mary was so distraught for many months that Lincoln had to employ a nurse to look after her. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. Assassination of Abraham Lincoln As the Civil War ended, Mrs. Lincoln expected to continue as the First Lady of a nation at peace. President Lincoln awoke on the morning of April 14, 1865, in a pleasant mood. Robert E. Lee had surrendered several days before to Ulysses Grant, and now the President was awaiting word from North Carolina on the surrender of Joseph E. Johnston. The morning papers carried the announcement that the President and his wife would be attending the theater that evening. At one point, Mary developed a headache and was inclined to stay home, but Lincoln told her he must attend because newspapers had announced that he would. She sat with her husband watching the comic play Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre, along with their guests Henry Rathbone and Clara Harris. During the third act, the President and Mrs. Lincoln drew closer together, holding hands while enjoying the play. Mary whispered to her husband, who was holding her hand, "What will Miss Harris think of my hanging on to you so?" The president smiled and replied, "She won't think anything about it". That was the last conversation the Lincolns ever had. Five minutes later, at about 10:15 pm, President Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth. She was holding Abraham's hand when Booth's bullet struck the back of his head. Mrs. Lincoln accompanied her mortally wounded husband across the street to the Petersen House, where he was taken to a back bedroom and laid crosswise on the bed there, where Lincoln's Cabinet was summoned, except William Seward, who had been seriously attacked by Lewis Powell, just as Booth was about to carry out his assassination at Ford's Theater, several minutes earlier. Their oldest son, Robert, sat with Lincoln throughout the night and to the following morning– Saturday, April 15, 1865. At one point, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton ordered Mary from the room as she was so unhinged with grief. President Lincoln remained in a coma for approximately nine hours. He died at 7:22 a.m., at the age of 56. Shortly before 7a.m. Mary was allowed to return to Lincoln's side, and, as Dixon reported, "she again seated herself by the President, kissing him and calling him every endearing name." As he died his breathing grew quieter, his face more calm. According to some accounts, at his last drawn breath, on the morning after the assassination, he smiled broadly and then expired. Historians, most notably author Lee Davis have emphasized Lincoln's peaceful appearance when and after he died: "It was the first time in four years, probably, that a peaceful expression crossed his face." Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Lincoln Administration, Maunsell Bradhurst Field wrote, "I had never seen upon the President's face an expression more genial and pleasing." The President's secretary, John Hay, said, "A look of unspeakable peace came upon his worn features". Later life and death After her husband's death, she received messages of condolence from all over the world, many of which she attempted to answer personally. To Queen Victoria she wrote: I have received the letter which Your Majesty has had the kindness to write. I am deeply grateful for this expression of tender sympathy, coming as they do, from a heart which from its own sorrow, can appreciate the intense grief I now endure.Victoria had suffered the loss of her husband, Prince Albert, four years earlier. As a widow, Mrs. Lincoln returned to Illinois and lived in Chicago with her sons. In 1868, her former modiste (dressmaker) and confidante, Elizabeth Keckley (1818–1907), published Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. She had been born into slavery, purchased her freedom and that of her son, and became a successful businesswoman in Washington, D.C. Although this book provides valuable insight into the character and life of Mary Todd Lincoln, at the time the former First Lady (and much of the public and press) regarded it as a breach of friendship and confidentiality. Keckley was widely criticized for her book, especially as her editor had published letters from Mary Lincoln to her. It has now been gratefully accepted by many historians and biographers and been used to flesh out the President and First Lady's personalities behind the scenes in the Executive Mansion and been used as the basis for several motion pictures and TV mini-series during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. In an act approved by a low margin on July 14, 1870, the United States Congress granted Mrs. Lincoln a life pension of $3,000 a year ($ in dollars). Mary had lobbied hard for such a pension, writing numerous letters to Congress and urging patrons such as Simon Cameron to petition on her behalf. She insisted that she deserved a pension just as much as the widows of soldiers, as she portrayed her husband as a fallen commander. At the time it was unusual for widows of presidents, and Mary Lincoln had alienated many congressmen, making it difficult for her to gain approval. The death of her son Thomas (Tad) in July 1871, following the deaths of two of her other sons and her husband, brought on an overpowering grief and depression. Her surviving son, Robert Lincoln, a rising young Chicago lawyer, was alarmed at his mother's increasingly erratic behavior. In March 1875, during a visit to Jacksonville, Florida, Mary became unshakably convinced that Robert was deathly ill; hurrying to Chicago, she found him healthy. During her visit with him, she told him that someone had tried to poison her on the train and that a "wandering Jew" had taken her pocketbook but returned it later. She also spent large amounts of money there on items she never used, such as draperies and elaborate dresses (she wore only black after her husband's assassination). She walked around the city with $56,000 in government bonds sewn into her petticoats (underskirts). Despite this large amount of money and the $3,000-a-year stipend from Congress, Mrs. Lincoln had an irrational fear of poverty. In 1872, she went to spiritualist photographer, William H. Mumler, who produced a photograph of her that appears to faintly show Lincoln's ghost behind her (photo in Allen County Public Library, Fort Wayne, Indiana). The College of Psychic Studies, referencing notes belonging to William Stainton Moses, claims that the photo was taken in the early 1870s, that Lincoln had assumed the name of 'Mrs. Lindall', and that Lincoln had to be encouraged by Mumler's wife to identify her husband on the photo. P.T. Barnum, testifying against Mumler in his eventual fraud trial, presented a photo featuring himself with the 'ghost' of Abraham Lincoln, demonstrating for the court how easy it was to make one of Mumler's images. The image is recognized now as a hoax created via double exposure (by inserting a previously prepared positive glass plate featuring the image of the "deceased" into the camera in front of an unused sensitive glass plate). Due to her erratic behavior, Robert initiated proceedings to have her institutionalized. On May 20, 1875, following a trial, a jury committed her to a private asylum in Batavia, Illinois. After the court proceedings, she was so despondent that she attempted suicide. She went to several pharmacies and ordered enough laudanum to kill herself, but an alert pharmacist frustrated her attempts and finally gave her a placebo. Three months after being committed to Bellevue Place, she devised her escape: She smuggled letters to her lawyer, James B. Bradwell, and his wife Myra Bradwell, who was not only her friend but also a feminist lawyer. She also wrote to the editor of the Chicago Times. Soon, the public embarrassments that Robert had hoped to avoid were looming, and his character and motives were in question, as he controlled his mother's finances. The director of Bellevue at Mary's trial had assured the jury she would benefit from treatment at his facility. In the face of potentially damaging publicity, he declared her well enough to go to Springfield to live with her sister Elizabeth as she desired. Mary Lincoln was released into the custody of her sister in Springfield. In 1876 she was declared competent to manage her own affairs. The earlier committal proceedings had resulted in Mary being profoundly estranged from her son Robert, and they did not see each other again until shortly before her death. Mrs. Lincoln spent the next four years traveling throughout Europe and took up residence in Pau, France. Her final years were marked by declining health. She suffered from severe cataracts that reduced her eyesight; this condition may have contributed to her increasing susceptibility to falls. In 1879, she suffered spinal cord injuries in a fall from a stepladder. She traveled to New York in 1881 and lobbied for an increased pension after the assassination of President Garfield raised the issue of provisions for his family. She faced a difficult battle, due to negative press over her spending habits and rumors about her handling of her personal finances, including $56,000 in government bonds left to her by her husband. Congress eventually granted the increase, along with an additional monetary gift. During the early 1880s, Mary Lincoln was confined to the Springfield, Illinois, residence of her sister Elizabeth Edwards. On July 15, 1882, exactly eleven years after her youngest son died, she collapsed at her sister's home, lapsed into a coma, and died the next morning of a stroke at age 63. Her funeral service was held at First Presbyterian Church, Springfield, Illinois. In popular culture Biographies have been written about Mary Lincoln as well as her husband. Barbara Hambly's The Emancipator's Wife (2005) is considered a well-researched historical novel that provides context for her use of over-the-counter drugs containing alcohol and opium, which were frequently given to women of her era. Janis Cooke Newman's historical novel Mary: Mrs. A. Lincoln (2007), in which Mary tells her own story after incarceration in the asylum in an effort to maintain and prove her sanity, is considered by Mary's recent biographer, Jean H. Baker, to be 'close to life' in its depiction of Mary Lincoln's life. The grief experienced through her widowhood is a theme of Andrew Holleran's 2006 novel, Grief. Mary Lincoln has been portrayed by several actresses in film, including Kay Hammond in Abraham Lincoln (1930) directed by D.W. Griffith; Ruth Gordon in Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940); Julie Harris in The Last of Mrs. Lincoln, a 1976 television adaptation of the stage play; Mary Tyler Moore in the 1988 television mini-series Lincoln; Donna Murphy in the 1998 movie The Day Lincoln Was Shot; Sally Field in Steven Spielberg's 2012 film Lincoln; Penelope Ann Miller in Saving Lincoln (2012); and Mary Elizabeth Winstead in Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012), set during the Civil War. Mezzo-soprano Elaine Bonazzi portrayed Mary in Thomas Pasatieri's Emmy Award winning opera The Trial of Mary Lincoln in 1972. In 1955, Vivi Janiss played the historical Mary Todd Lincoln in "How Chance Made Lincoln President" in the anthology television series, TV Reader's Digest. Richard Gaines was cast as Abraham Lincoln, and Ken Hardison played their son, Robert Todd Lincoln. In 2005, Sufjan Stevens referenced Mary Todd Lincoln in the instrumental track "A Short Reprise for Mary Todd, Who Went Insane, but for Very Good Reasons" from his album Illinois, which is themed around the state where she resided the majority of her life. Family Her sister Elizabeth Todd married Ninian Edwards Jr., the son of the Illinois Governor Ninian Edwards. Their daughter Julia Edwards married Edward L. Baker, Jr., editor of the Illinois State Journal and son of Edward L. Baker, Sr. Their daughter, Mary Todd Lincoln's grandniece Mary Edwards Brown, served as custodian of the Lincoln Homestead, as did her own daughter. Mary's half-sister Emilie Todd married Benjamin Hardin Helm, CSA general and son of the Kentucky Governor John L. Helm. Another half-sister Elodie Todd married CSA Brig. General Nathaniel H. R. Dawson, later the third U.S. Commissioner of Education. One of Mary Todd's cousins was Dakota Territory Congressman/US General John Blair Smith Todd. See also Lincoln family tree References Bibliography Further reading Baker, Jean. Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography (2008) excerpt and text search Michael Burlingame, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln (University of Illinois Press, 1994) Michael Burlingame, An American Marriage: The Untold Story of Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd (Pegasus Books, 2021) Catherine Clinton, Mrs. Lincoln: A Life (Harper Perennial, 2010) Emerson, Jason (2007). The Madness of Mary Lincoln. Carbondale, Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. pp. 20–22. . Daniel Mark Epstein, The Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage (Ballantine Books, 2008) King, C.J. Four Marys and a Jessie: The Story of the Lincoln Women (Hildene, 2015) Neely, Mark E. Jr. and R. Gerald McMurtry. The Insanity File: The Case of Mary Todd Lincoln (1993) excerpt and text search Ruth Painter Randall, Mary Lincoln: Biography of a Marriage (Little, Brown & Co., 1953) Williams, Frank J. and Burkhimer, Michael, eds. The Mary Lincoln Enigma: Historians on America's Most Controversial First Lady (Southern Illinois University Press, 2012) 392 pages; scholarly essays on her childhood in Kentucky, the early years of her marriage, her political relationship with her husband, and her relationship with her son Robert. External links White House profile Mrs. Abraham Lincoln: A Study of Her Personality and Her Influence on Lincoln By W. A. Evans Lincoln children Mary Todd Lincoln Quotes Original Manuscript Letters: Mary Todd Lincoln Shapell Manuscript Foundation Mary Lincoln at C-SPAN's First Ladies: Influence & Image Mary Todd Lincoln's Seed-pearl Necklace and Matching Bracelets. (A gift from Abraham Lincoln to Mary Todd Lincoln and worn at his second Inaugural Ball. See featured picture at the top of the page.) From the Collections at the Library of Congress 1818 births 1882 deaths 19th-century American women 19th-century Presbyterians American people of English descent American people of Irish descent American people of Scottish descent American Presbyterians Burials at Oak Ridge Cemetery First Ladies of the United States Lincoln family People associated with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln People from Lexington, Kentucky People from Springfield, Illinois People with bipolar disorder Spouses of Illinois politicians	false	[ "Laura Schwartz is an American professional speaker, author and television commentator. She served as an on-air contributor for the Fox News Channel from 2004 to 2007 and as a special correspondent for CNN’s Larry King Live during the presidential primaries from the fall of 2007 to the summer of 2008. She covered the 2008 presidential election for the CBS Early Show and gives frequent commentary on the BBC and Sir David Frost’s Frost Over The World.\n\nSchwartz worked for the Clinton Administration for eight years, beginning as a volunteer and eventually becoming the White House Director of Events. Her most notable positions were as the Midwest Press Secretary, Director of Television and White House Director of Events.\n\nEarly life and education\n\nSchwartz was born and raised in Plymouth, Wisconsin and attended Plymouth High School where she graduated in 1991. Her parents owned a photography studio in town and the family’s life was spent working in the studio and being active in the community. She attended St. Norbert College and the American University.\n\nWhite House years\n\nSchwartz began volunteering at the White House in the Clinton administration the day after his inauguration in 1993. She was 19 years of age at the time and attending American University She answered telephones in the press office and was hired late that summer as a Staff Assistant and the youngest woman to be appointed to a position within the administration. Subsequently she became the Midwest Press Secretary, Director of Television, and Director of Events. During her time as the Director of Events, she was responsible for over 1,000 White House events, including the 50th Anniversary Celebration of NATO. She finished her last few months in the White House as the Special Advisor to the Chief of Staff. She worked all eight years of the Clinton Administration.\n\n 1993: Staff Assistant, Office of the Press Secretary\n 1994–1995: Midwest Press Secretary, Office of the Press Secretary\n 1995–1998: Director of Television, Office of the Press Secretary \n 1998–2000: Director of Events, White House Social Office\n 2000–2001: Special Advisor to the White House Chief of Staff, Office of the Chief of Staff\n\nAfter the White House, Schwartz traveled with President Clinton for his lecture series and foundation work, and she began speaking professionally and appearing on television. She founded her company White House Strategies in Chicago in 2001. She also served as a senior advisor to the 2004 Presidential campaign of former Senator John Kerry and Trip Director to Teresa Kerry.\n\nTelevision\nSchwartz is an international television commentator having been a contributor at the Fox News Channel, CBS News and The Early Show, and CNN’s Larry King Live. She also appears on the BBC and Sir David Frost’s Frost Over the World.\n\nFrom 2004 through 2007, Schwartz was an on-air contributor for the Fox News Channel. She appeared weekly on different Fox News Channel programs including The O'Reilly Factor, Hannity & Colmes and The Cost of Freedom. In 2007, Schwartz went to CNN as a special correspondent for Larry King Live. She covered the presidential primary elections through the summer of 2008. After CNN, Schwartz was a contributor to the CBS Early Show with her segment Trail Mix for the 2008 Presidential election and covered the inauguration of President Barack Obama.\n\nAuthor and professional speaker\n\nSchwartz is the author of the book Eat, Drink, and Succeed. Published in 2010 by the Black Ox Press, the book gives specific examples of how a business can use networking opportunities to advance their business. In the book, Schwartz draws on her experience in the White House and the lessons that she learned during her time in the administration and growing up in a family business. Schwartz is also a well-known professional speaker. She presents before audiences of Fortune 500 companies, professional industry associations and annual conferences in the US and abroad.\n\nAwards and recognitions\n\nSchwartz has been the recipient of numerous awards and recognitions over her career. She was named as one of the 100 Most Influential Women in Chicago by Today’s Chicago Woman Magazine in 2011 and also one of Chicago’s 5 Most Bold and Beautiful by Chicago Magazine in 2010. She was honored by American University in 2007 with the Leadership in Education Award. In 2009, she was invited to speak at the Oxford Union where she discussed foreign policy and the role of women in the world and in 2012 she was the recipient of the Steve Kemble Leadership Foundation Award. She was honored on September 28, 2012 when she was formally inducted into the Plymouth School District Hall of Fame.\n\nPersonal life\n\nSchwartz is involved in various forms of philanthropy including the giving of her time and money to various organizations. In 2012, she donated her fee for writing a column for the Chicago Sun-Times to Clean the World. She serves on the advocacy board of the American Heart Association and emcees their Chicago Heart Walks and Go Red Luncheons. She also volunteers her time with the YWCA and the United Way. She serves on the board for the Illinois Institute of Art and Event Solutions Magazine and is also involved in Step Up Women’s Network and the Ronald McDonald House Charities.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n White House Strategies Homepage\n Eat, Drink and Succeed Homepage\n\nLiving people\n1973 births\nAssistants to the President of the United States\nClinton administration personnel\nSt. Norbert College alumni", "Patsy Widakuswara is a radio and broadcast journalist in the United States who covers the White House and U.S. politics. She is the White House Bureau Chief of Voice of America.\n\nEducation \nWidakuswara studied International Relations at the University of Indonesia and completed a master's in Journalism from Goldsmiths College, University of London.\n\nCareer \n\nWidakuswara's has worked in broadcasting and radio in Indonesia, the United Kingdom, and the United States for since the 1990s. She began working at Voice of America (VOA) in 2003 as a producer and on-air reporter for the Indonesian Service.\n\nIn early 2021, Widakuswara covered the Trump administration for VOA. On January 11, 2021, after VOA news director Robert R. Reilly interviewed Pompeo but did not allow reporters to ask questions, Widakuswara asked Pompeo several questions as he left the building. Reilly responded she \"obviously [didn't] know how to behave,\" and that \"she wasn't 'authorized' to be there to ask questions.\" She was hours later removed from the prestigious White House beat and then reassigned to VOA Indonesian service.\n\nThe Coalition For Women In Journalism issued a statement condemning the reassignment. The White House Press Association also condemned Widakuswara's removal from the White House beat and leaders of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee issued a press release stating they asked for more information from the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) and Voice of America, and Chairman Gregory Meeks and ranking member Michael McCaul stated, \"Absent a legitimate reason for this move, which has not been provided, we believe she should be reinstated\". Widakuswara was reinstated on January 22, 2021.\n\nReferences \n\nYear of birth missing (living people)\nLiving people\nAmerican women journalists\nAmerican radio reporters and correspondents\nCreated via preloaddraft\n21st-century American women" ]
[ "Mary Todd Lincoln", "White House years", "What was it like during the White house years?", "A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending,", "Why was she rebelling?", "has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder.", "Was she ever placed in a mental institution?", "she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers.", "Was she ever arrested?", "Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation.", "Was Lincoln embarrassed by her?", "which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost,", "How long did she live in the white house?", "I don't know." ]	C_ed9d0d46d8f54e95b205e13572de60c9_0	Was she happy in the white house?	7	Was Mary Todd Lincoln happy in the white house?	Mary Todd Lincoln	During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern and southern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. A physician has also posited that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. CANNOTANSWER	She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers	Mary Ann Todd Lincoln (December 13, 1818 – July 16, 1882) was First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865 as the wife of President Abraham Lincoln. Mary Lincoln was a member of a wealthy and large, slave-owning Kentucky family, and was well educated. Born Mary Ann Todd, she dropped the name Ann after her younger sister, Ann Todd (later Clark), was born. After finishing school during her teens, she moved to Springfield, Illinois, where she lived with her married sister Elizabeth Edwards. Before she married Abraham Lincoln, she was courted by his long-time political opponent Stephen A. Douglas. The Lincolns had four sons of whom only the eldest, Robert, survived both parents. Their family home and neighborhood in Springfield is preserved at the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. Lincoln staunchly supported her husband throughout his presidency and was active in keeping national morale high during the Civil War. She acted as the White House social coordinator, throwing lavish balls and redecorating the White House at great expense; her spending was the source of much consternation. She was seated next to Abraham when he was assassinated in the President's Box at Ford's Theatre on Tenth Street in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865. The deaths of her husband and three of her sons weighed heavily on her. Lincoln suffered from numerous physical and mental health issues during her life. She had frequent migraines, which were exacerbated by a head injury in 1863. She was depressed for much of her life; some historians think she may have had bipolar disorder. She was briefly institutionalized for psychiatric disease in 1875, but later retired to the home of her sister. She died of a stroke in 1882 at age 63. Early life and education Mary was born in Lexington, Kentucky, as the fourth of seven children of Robert Smith Todd, a banker, and Elizabeth "Eliza" (Parker) Todd. Her family were slaveholders, and Mary was raised in comfort and refinement. When Mary was six, her mother died in childbirth. Two years later, her father married Elizabeth "Betsy" Humphreys and they had nine children together. Mary had a difficult relationship with her stepmother. From 1832, Mary and her family lived in what is now known as the Mary Todd Lincoln House, an elegant 14-room residence at 578 West Main Street in Lexington, Kentucky. Mary's paternal great-grandfather, David Levi Todd, was born in County Longford, Ireland, and immigrated through Pennsylvania to Kentucky. Another great-grandfather, Andrew Porter, was the son of an Irish immigrant to New Hampshire and later Pennsylvania. Her great-great maternal grandfather Samuel McDowell was born in Scotland, and emigrated to Pennsylvania. Other Todd ancestors came from England. At an early age Mary was sent to Madame Mentelle's finishing school, where the curriculum concentrated on French and literature. She learned to speak French fluently and studied dance, drama, music, and social graces. By age 20, she was regarded as witty and gregarious with a grasp of politics. Like her family, she was a Whig. Mary began living with her sister Elizabeth Porter Edwards in Springfield, Illinois, in October 1839. Elizabeth was married to Ninian W. Edwards, son of a former governor. He served as Mary's guardian. Mary was popular among the gentry of Springfield, and though she was courted by the rising young lawyer and Democratic Party politician Stephen A. Douglas and others, she chose Abraham Lincoln, a fellow Whig. Marriage and family Mary Todd married Abraham Lincoln on November 4, 1842, at her sister Elizabeth's home in Springfield, Illinois. She was 23 years old and he was 33 years of age. Their four sons, all born in Springfield, were: Robert Todd Lincoln (1843–1926), lawyer, diplomat (U.S. Secretary of War), businessman Edward Baker Lincoln, known as "Eddie" (1846–1850), died of tuberculosis William Wallace Lincoln, known as "Willie" (1850–1862), died of typhoid fever while Lincoln was President Thomas Lincoln, known as "Tad" (1853–1871), died at age 18 (either from pleurisy, pneumonia, congestive heart failure, or tuberculosis) Robert and Tad (Thomas) survived to adulthood and the death of their father, and only Robert outlived his mother. Lincoln's career and home life While Lincoln pursued his increasingly successful career as a Springfield lawyer, Mary supervised their growing household. Their house, where they resided from 1844 until 1861, still stands in Springfield, and has been designated the Lincoln Home National Historic Site. During Lincoln's years as an Illinois circuit lawyer, Mary was often left alone for months at a time to raise their children and run the household. Mary supported her husband socially and politically, not least when Lincoln was elected president in 1860. Mary cooked for Lincoln often during his presidency. Raised by a wealthy family, her cooking was simple, but satisfied Lincoln's tastes, which included imported oysters. First Lady of the United States During her White House years, Mary Lincoln faced many personal difficulties generated by political divisions within the nation. Her family was from a border state where slavery was permitted. Several of her half-brothers served in the Confederate Army and were killed in action, and one brother served the Confederacy as a surgeon. Mary staunchly supported her husband in his quest to save the Union and was strictly loyal to his policies. Considered a "westerner" although she had grown up in the more refined Upper South city of Lexington, Mary worked hard to serve as her husband's First Lady in Washington, D.C., a political center dominated by eastern culture. Lincoln was regarded as the first "western" president, and critics described Mary's manners as coarse and pretentious. She had difficulty negotiating White House social responsibilities and rivalries, spoils-seeking solicitors, and baiting newspapers in a climate of high national intrigue in Civil War Washington. She refurbished the White House, which included extensive redecorating of all the public and private rooms as well as the purchase of new china, which led to extensive overspending. The president was very angry over the cost, even though Congress eventually passed two additional appropriations to cover these expenses. Mary also was a frequent purchaser of fine jewelry and on many occasions bought jewelry on credit from the local Galt & Bro. jewelers. Upon President Lincoln's death, she had a large amount of debt with the jeweler, which was subsequently waived and much of the jewelry was returned. Mary suffered from severe headaches, described as migraines, throughout her adult life, as well as protracted depression. Her headaches seemed to become more frequent after she suffered a head injury in a carriage accident during her White House years. A history of mood swings, fierce temper, public outbursts throughout Lincoln's presidency, as well as excessive spending, has led some historians and psychologists to argue that Mary suffered from bipolar disorder. Another theory holds that Mary's manic and depressive episodes, as well as many of her physical symptoms, could be explained as manifestations of pernicious anemia. Mary Lincoln's grief over Willie's death was so devastating that she took to her bed for three weeks, so desolated that she could not attend his funeral or look after Tad. Mary was so distraught for many months that Lincoln had to employ a nurse to look after her. During her White House years, she often visited hospitals around Washington to give flowers and fruit to wounded soldiers. She took the time to write letters for them to send to their loved ones. From time to time, she accompanied Lincoln on military visits to the field. Responsible for hosting many social functions, she has often been blamed by historians for spending too much money on the White House. Assassination of Abraham Lincoln As the Civil War ended, Mrs. Lincoln expected to continue as the First Lady of a nation at peace. President Lincoln awoke on the morning of April 14, 1865, in a pleasant mood. Robert E. Lee had surrendered several days before to Ulysses Grant, and now the President was awaiting word from North Carolina on the surrender of Joseph E. Johnston. The morning papers carried the announcement that the President and his wife would be attending the theater that evening. At one point, Mary developed a headache and was inclined to stay home, but Lincoln told her he must attend because newspapers had announced that he would. She sat with her husband watching the comic play Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre, along with their guests Henry Rathbone and Clara Harris. During the third act, the President and Mrs. Lincoln drew closer together, holding hands while enjoying the play. Mary whispered to her husband, who was holding her hand, "What will Miss Harris think of my hanging on to you so?" The president smiled and replied, "She won't think anything about it". That was the last conversation the Lincolns ever had. Five minutes later, at about 10:15 pm, President Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth. She was holding Abraham's hand when Booth's bullet struck the back of his head. Mrs. Lincoln accompanied her mortally wounded husband across the street to the Petersen House, where he was taken to a back bedroom and laid crosswise on the bed there, where Lincoln's Cabinet was summoned, except William Seward, who had been seriously attacked by Lewis Powell, just as Booth was about to carry out his assassination at Ford's Theater, several minutes earlier. Their oldest son, Robert, sat with Lincoln throughout the night and to the following morning– Saturday, April 15, 1865. At one point, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton ordered Mary from the room as she was so unhinged with grief. President Lincoln remained in a coma for approximately nine hours. He died at 7:22 a.m., at the age of 56. Shortly before 7a.m. Mary was allowed to return to Lincoln's side, and, as Dixon reported, "she again seated herself by the President, kissing him and calling him every endearing name." As he died his breathing grew quieter, his face more calm. According to some accounts, at his last drawn breath, on the morning after the assassination, he smiled broadly and then expired. Historians, most notably author Lee Davis have emphasized Lincoln's peaceful appearance when and after he died: "It was the first time in four years, probably, that a peaceful expression crossed his face." Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Lincoln Administration, Maunsell Bradhurst Field wrote, "I had never seen upon the President's face an expression more genial and pleasing." The President's secretary, John Hay, said, "A look of unspeakable peace came upon his worn features". Later life and death After her husband's death, she received messages of condolence from all over the world, many of which she attempted to answer personally. To Queen Victoria she wrote: I have received the letter which Your Majesty has had the kindness to write. I am deeply grateful for this expression of tender sympathy, coming as they do, from a heart which from its own sorrow, can appreciate the intense grief I now endure.Victoria had suffered the loss of her husband, Prince Albert, four years earlier. As a widow, Mrs. Lincoln returned to Illinois and lived in Chicago with her sons. In 1868, her former modiste (dressmaker) and confidante, Elizabeth Keckley (1818–1907), published Behind the Scenes, or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. She had been born into slavery, purchased her freedom and that of her son, and became a successful businesswoman in Washington, D.C. Although this book provides valuable insight into the character and life of Mary Todd Lincoln, at the time the former First Lady (and much of the public and press) regarded it as a breach of friendship and confidentiality. Keckley was widely criticized for her book, especially as her editor had published letters from Mary Lincoln to her. It has now been gratefully accepted by many historians and biographers and been used to flesh out the President and First Lady's personalities behind the scenes in the Executive Mansion and been used as the basis for several motion pictures and TV mini-series during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. In an act approved by a low margin on July 14, 1870, the United States Congress granted Mrs. Lincoln a life pension of $3,000 a year ($ in dollars). Mary had lobbied hard for such a pension, writing numerous letters to Congress and urging patrons such as Simon Cameron to petition on her behalf. She insisted that she deserved a pension just as much as the widows of soldiers, as she portrayed her husband as a fallen commander. At the time it was unusual for widows of presidents, and Mary Lincoln had alienated many congressmen, making it difficult for her to gain approval. The death of her son Thomas (Tad) in July 1871, following the deaths of two of her other sons and her husband, brought on an overpowering grief and depression. Her surviving son, Robert Lincoln, a rising young Chicago lawyer, was alarmed at his mother's increasingly erratic behavior. In March 1875, during a visit to Jacksonville, Florida, Mary became unshakably convinced that Robert was deathly ill; hurrying to Chicago, she found him healthy. During her visit with him, she told him that someone had tried to poison her on the train and that a "wandering Jew" had taken her pocketbook but returned it later. She also spent large amounts of money there on items she never used, such as draperies and elaborate dresses (she wore only black after her husband's assassination). She walked around the city with $56,000 in government bonds sewn into her petticoats (underskirts). Despite this large amount of money and the $3,000-a-year stipend from Congress, Mrs. Lincoln had an irrational fear of poverty. In 1872, she went to spiritualist photographer, William H. Mumler, who produced a photograph of her that appears to faintly show Lincoln's ghost behind her (photo in Allen County Public Library, Fort Wayne, Indiana). The College of Psychic Studies, referencing notes belonging to William Stainton Moses, claims that the photo was taken in the early 1870s, that Lincoln had assumed the name of 'Mrs. Lindall', and that Lincoln had to be encouraged by Mumler's wife to identify her husband on the photo. P.T. Barnum, testifying against Mumler in his eventual fraud trial, presented a photo featuring himself with the 'ghost' of Abraham Lincoln, demonstrating for the court how easy it was to make one of Mumler's images. The image is recognized now as a hoax created via double exposure (by inserting a previously prepared positive glass plate featuring the image of the "deceased" into the camera in front of an unused sensitive glass plate). Due to her erratic behavior, Robert initiated proceedings to have her institutionalized. On May 20, 1875, following a trial, a jury committed her to a private asylum in Batavia, Illinois. After the court proceedings, she was so despondent that she attempted suicide. She went to several pharmacies and ordered enough laudanum to kill herself, but an alert pharmacist frustrated her attempts and finally gave her a placebo. Three months after being committed to Bellevue Place, she devised her escape: She smuggled letters to her lawyer, James B. Bradwell, and his wife Myra Bradwell, who was not only her friend but also a feminist lawyer. She also wrote to the editor of the Chicago Times. Soon, the public embarrassments that Robert had hoped to avoid were looming, and his character and motives were in question, as he controlled his mother's finances. The director of Bellevue at Mary's trial had assured the jury she would benefit from treatment at his facility. In the face of potentially damaging publicity, he declared her well enough to go to Springfield to live with her sister Elizabeth as she desired. Mary Lincoln was released into the custody of her sister in Springfield. In 1876 she was declared competent to manage her own affairs. The earlier committal proceedings had resulted in Mary being profoundly estranged from her son Robert, and they did not see each other again until shortly before her death. Mrs. Lincoln spent the next four years traveling throughout Europe and took up residence in Pau, France. Her final years were marked by declining health. She suffered from severe cataracts that reduced her eyesight; this condition may have contributed to her increasing susceptibility to falls. In 1879, she suffered spinal cord injuries in a fall from a stepladder. She traveled to New York in 1881 and lobbied for an increased pension after the assassination of President Garfield raised the issue of provisions for his family. She faced a difficult battle, due to negative press over her spending habits and rumors about her handling of her personal finances, including $56,000 in government bonds left to her by her husband. Congress eventually granted the increase, along with an additional monetary gift. During the early 1880s, Mary Lincoln was confined to the Springfield, Illinois, residence of her sister Elizabeth Edwards. On July 15, 1882, exactly eleven years after her youngest son died, she collapsed at her sister's home, lapsed into a coma, and died the next morning of a stroke at age 63. Her funeral service was held at First Presbyterian Church, Springfield, Illinois. In popular culture Biographies have been written about Mary Lincoln as well as her husband. Barbara Hambly's The Emancipator's Wife (2005) is considered a well-researched historical novel that provides context for her use of over-the-counter drugs containing alcohol and opium, which were frequently given to women of her era. Janis Cooke Newman's historical novel Mary: Mrs. A. Lincoln (2007), in which Mary tells her own story after incarceration in the asylum in an effort to maintain and prove her sanity, is considered by Mary's recent biographer, Jean H. Baker, to be 'close to life' in its depiction of Mary Lincoln's life. The grief experienced through her widowhood is a theme of Andrew Holleran's 2006 novel, Grief. Mary Lincoln has been portrayed by several actresses in film, including Kay Hammond in Abraham Lincoln (1930) directed by D.W. Griffith; Ruth Gordon in Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940); Julie Harris in The Last of Mrs. Lincoln, a 1976 television adaptation of the stage play; Mary Tyler Moore in the 1988 television mini-series Lincoln; Donna Murphy in the 1998 movie The Day Lincoln Was Shot; Sally Field in Steven Spielberg's 2012 film Lincoln; Penelope Ann Miller in Saving Lincoln (2012); and Mary Elizabeth Winstead in Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012), set during the Civil War. Mezzo-soprano Elaine Bonazzi portrayed Mary in Thomas Pasatieri's Emmy Award winning opera The Trial of Mary Lincoln in 1972. In 1955, Vivi Janiss played the historical Mary Todd Lincoln in "How Chance Made Lincoln President" in the anthology television series, TV Reader's Digest. Richard Gaines was cast as Abraham Lincoln, and Ken Hardison played their son, Robert Todd Lincoln. In 2005, Sufjan Stevens referenced Mary Todd Lincoln in the instrumental track "A Short Reprise for Mary Todd, Who Went Insane, but for Very Good Reasons" from his album Illinois, which is themed around the state where she resided the majority of her life. Family Her sister Elizabeth Todd married Ninian Edwards Jr., the son of the Illinois Governor Ninian Edwards. Their daughter Julia Edwards married Edward L. Baker, Jr., editor of the Illinois State Journal and son of Edward L. Baker, Sr. Their daughter, Mary Todd Lincoln's grandniece Mary Edwards Brown, served as custodian of the Lincoln Homestead, as did her own daughter. Mary's half-sister Emilie Todd married Benjamin Hardin Helm, CSA general and son of the Kentucky Governor John L. Helm. Another half-sister Elodie Todd married CSA Brig. General Nathaniel H. R. Dawson, later the third U.S. Commissioner of Education. One of Mary Todd's cousins was Dakota Territory Congressman/US General John Blair Smith Todd. See also Lincoln family tree References Bibliography Further reading Baker, Jean. Mary Todd Lincoln: A Biography (2008) excerpt and text search Michael Burlingame, The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln (University of Illinois Press, 1994) Michael Burlingame, An American Marriage: The Untold Story of Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd (Pegasus Books, 2021) Catherine Clinton, Mrs. Lincoln: A Life (Harper Perennial, 2010) Emerson, Jason (2007). The Madness of Mary Lincoln. Carbondale, Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. pp. 20–22. . Daniel Mark Epstein, The Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage (Ballantine Books, 2008) King, C.J. Four Marys and a Jessie: The Story of the Lincoln Women (Hildene, 2015) Neely, Mark E. Jr. and R. Gerald McMurtry. The Insanity File: The Case of Mary Todd Lincoln (1993) excerpt and text search Ruth Painter Randall, Mary Lincoln: Biography of a Marriage (Little, Brown & Co., 1953) Williams, Frank J. and Burkhimer, Michael, eds. The Mary Lincoln Enigma: Historians on America's Most Controversial First Lady (Southern Illinois University Press, 2012) 392 pages; scholarly essays on her childhood in Kentucky, the early years of her marriage, her political relationship with her husband, and her relationship with her son Robert. External links White House profile Mrs. Abraham Lincoln: A Study of Her Personality and Her Influence on Lincoln By W. A. Evans Lincoln children Mary Todd Lincoln Quotes Original Manuscript Letters: Mary Todd Lincoln Shapell Manuscript Foundation Mary Lincoln at C-SPAN's First Ladies: Influence & Image Mary Todd Lincoln's Seed-pearl Necklace and Matching Bracelets. (A gift from Abraham Lincoln to Mary Todd Lincoln and worn at his second Inaugural Ball. See featured picture at the top of the page.) From the Collections at the Library of Congress 1818 births 1882 deaths 19th-century American women 19th-century Presbyterians American people of English descent American people of Irish descent American people of Scottish descent American Presbyterians Burials at Oak Ridge Cemetery First Ladies of the United States Lincoln family People associated with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln People from Lexington, Kentucky People from Springfield, Illinois People with bipolar disorder Spouses of Illinois politicians	true	[ "Margita White (born Ulla Margareta Eklund; June 27, 1937 – November 20, 2002) was an American White House press official under Presidents Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford. She was the first female Communications Director serving under President Ford from August 15, 1975 to July 12, 1976. She was later commissioner with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the president of a lobbying group for new television technologies. She was a founding member of Executive Women in Government. White died of cancer on November 20, 2002.\n\nEarly life \nMargita White was born Ulla Margareta Eklund in Sweden. She immigrated to the U.S. with her family in 1948 at the age of ten. After, she grew up in Southern California and was always called Margita.\n\nEducation \nWhite attended the University of Redlands in California. She started as an economics major, but changed to a government major after spending a semester in Washington, D.C. She graduated magna sum laude in 1959. It was at the University of Redlands that she decided to devote her life to public service. She continued her studies at Rutgers University in New Jersey. She was a Woodrow Wilson National Fellow and received her M.A. in political science in 1960.\n\nLife and career \nWhite worked in both Nixon's 1960 presidential run and Goldwater's 1964 run. Briefly, between the two campaigns, White lived in Hawaii to marry her husband, Stuart C. White (later divorced) who was stationed there with the Navy. While in Hawaii, White worked for a Senate campaign and in the office for a U.S. House Representative.\n\nIn 1968 she tried again and worked in the 1968 Nixon campaign. With his victory, she was appointed to the position of assistant to the Communications Director in the White House. Herbert G. Klein was the White House Communications Director at the time.\n\nShe was invited to work as the Assistant Director for Public Information at the U.S. Information Agency in 1973. She worked there for two years until she was appointed as the Assistant Press Secretary under Ford in 1975. She was assigned to the position with the understanding that she would take over the Communications Office in six months, which she did and became the first female Communications Director in 1975.\n\nIn 1976, White was appointed to a two-year term on the Federal Communications Commission. After her term, she moved on to work in the private sector.\n\nWhite had two children, Suzanne Morgan and Stuart White.\n\nControversy \nIn her first appointment to the White House as Assistant to the Communications Director, White was paid $36,000, which was less than her predecessor. Additionally, she was not given the deputy title that was the norm for her position. The Ford Administration rejected the claim that both the lesser pay and title were because she was a woman.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1937 births\n2002 deaths\nAmerican company founders\nAmerican women company founders\nDeaths from cancer in Virginia\nFederal Communications Commission personnel\nFord administration personnel\nNixon administration personnel\nWhite House Communications Directors", "Claudia L. Gordon is the first deaf Black female attorney in the United States. She currently works in the U.S. Department of Labor's Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs. Previously she held a position in the White House Office of Public Engagement as the Public Engagement Advisor to the Disability Community for less than a year. She is also the first deaf person to work at the White House in an detailee capacity. In an interview she makes a point that there was a deaf intern working in the White House before her, and that there are currently other deaf people working in less prestigious positions in the White House.\n\nEarly life \nClaudia L. Gordon was born in Jamaica.On May 14, 1972. After having sharp pains in her ears, her aunt, who took care of her at the time, took her to a small clinic, as there were no hospitals. She was deaf at the age of eight. She didn't believe she was deaf because she had been reading peoples lip and thought she was hearing their voice. She faced discrimination in Jamaica because she was deaf. When she was 11, she moved to the United States and enrolled at the Lexington School for the Deaf in New York. She was happy to move there because she wasn't receiving any education in Jamaica.\n\nEducation and career\nGordon graduated from Howard University in 1995 with a bachelor of arts in political science. At Howard, she was a Patricia Robert Harris Public Affairs Fellow, member of the Golden Keys National Honor Society, and member of the Political Science Honor Society.\n\nShe received the Skadden Fellowship for law graduates working with disabled people. This paid for her to work at the National Association of the Deaf Law and Advocacy Center. This allowed her to provide, \"Direct representation and advocacy for poor deaf persons with a particular emphasis on outreach to those who are members of minority groups.\" Next, she became a consultant to the National Council on Disability and joined the Department of Homeland Security. At Homeland Security Gordon was the senior policy advisor for the Department of Homeland Security, the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties.\n\nAdvocacy\nClaudia Gordon has been active in both the black deaf community and the disability community. She was the vice president of the National Black Deaf Advocates. She is also associated with the National Coalition for Disability Rights.\n\nAwards \nIn 2004, she was named secretary of the Board for the Lexington Board of Directors.\nPaul G. Hearne Leadership Award from the American Association of People with Disabilities - 2003\n\nSee also \n List of first women lawyers and judges in the United States\n\nReferences \n\nLiving people\nJamaican emigrants to the United States\nDeaf lawyers\nYear of birth missing (living people)\nAmerican women lawyers\nDeaf people from the United States\n21st-century American women" ]
[ "Recep Tayyip Erdoğan", "Armenian Genocide" ]	C_4d6e38301a82483cab0ff9378b6a238e_1	What happened in the genocide?	1	What happened in the Armenian genocide?	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan	Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province. His parents are Ahmet Erdogan and Tenzile Erdogan. Erdogan reportedly said in 2003, "I'm a Georgian, my family is a Georgian family which migrated from Batumi to Rize." But in a 2014 televised interview on the NTV news network, he said, "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian... forgive me for saying this... even much uglier things, they have even called me an Armenian, but I am Turkish." In an account based on registry records, his genealogy was tracked to an ethnic Turkish family. Erdogan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father Ahmet Erdogan (1905 - 1988) was a Captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. Erdogan had a brother Mustafa (b. 1958) and sister Vesile (b. 1965). His summer holidays were mostly spent in Guneysu, Rize, where his family originates from. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdogan was 13 years old. As a teenager, he sold lemonade and sesame buns (simit) on the streets of the city's rougher districts to earn extra money. Brought up in an observant Muslim family, Erdogan graduated from Kasimpasa Piyale primary school in 1965, and Imam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. He received his high school diploma from Eyup High School. He subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences, now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences--although several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated. In his youth, Erdogan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahce wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasimpasa S.K. is named after him. Erdogan married Emine Gulbaran (born 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons; Ahmet Burak and Necmettin Bilal, and two daughters, Esra and Sumeyye. His father, Ahmet Erdogan, died in 1988 and his 88-year-old mother, Tenzile Erdogan, died in 2011. He is a member of the Community of Iskenderpasa, a Turkish sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. In 2001, Erdogan established the Justice and Development Party (AKP). The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdogan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yilmaz and Ciller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdogan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gul became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdogan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdogan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gul handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdogan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as President, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdogan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gul as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Canakkale, and one million in Izmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdogan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdogan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdogan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdogan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdogan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious." He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem." In December 2008, Erdogan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken." In November 2009, he said, "it's not possible for a Muslim to commit genocide." In 2011, Erdogan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish-Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdogan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdogan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences - such as relocation - during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". CANNOTANSWER	mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician serving as the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as prime minister of Turkey from 2003 to 2014 and as mayor of Istanbul from 1994 to 1998. He founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2001, leading it to election victories in 2002, 2007, and 2011 general elections before being required to stand down upon his election as President in 2014. He later returned to the AKP leadership in 2017 following the constitutional referendum that year. Coming from an Islamist political background and self-describing as a conservative democrat, he has promoted socially conservative and populist policies during his administration. Following the 1994 local elections, Erdoğan was elected mayor of Istanbul as the candidate of the Islamist Welfare Party. He was later stripped of his position, banned from political office, and imprisoned for four months for inciting religious hatred, due to his recitation of a poem by Ziya Gökalp. Erdoğan subsequently abandoned openly Islamist politics, establishing the moderate conservative AKP in 2001, which he went on to lead to a landslide victory in 2002. With Erdoğan still technically prohibited from holding office, the AKP's co-founder, Abdullah Gül, instead became prime minister, and later annulled Erdoğan's political ban. After winning a by-election in Siirt in 2003, Erdoğan replaced Gül as prime minister, with Gül instead becoming the AKP's candidate for the presidency. Erdoğan led the AKP to two more election victories in 2007 and 2011. The early years of Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister saw advances in negotiations for Turkey's membership of the European Union, an economic recovery following a economic crisis in 2001 and investments in infrastructure including roads, airports, and a high-speed train network. He also won two successful constitutional referendums in 2007 and 2010. However, his government remained controversial for its close links with Fethullah Gülen and his Gülen Movement (since designated as a terrorist organisation by the Turkish state) with whom the AKP was accused of orchestrating purges against secular bureaucrats and military officers through the Balyoz and Ergenekon trials. In late 2012, his government began peace negotiations with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to end the Kurdish–Turkish conflict (1978–present). The ceasefire broke down in 2015, leading to a renewed escalation in conflict. Erdoğan's foreign policy has been described as Neo-Ottoman and has led to the Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, with its focus on preventing the Syrian Democratic Forces from gaining ground on the Syria–Turkey border during the Syrian Civil War. In the more recent years of Erdoğan's rule, Turkey has experienced democratic backsliding and corruption. Starting with the anti-government protests in 2013, his government imposed growing censorship on the press and social media, temporarily restricting access to sites such as YouTube, Twitter and Wikipedia. This stalled negotiations related to Turkey's EU membership. A US$100 billion corruption scandal in 2013 led to the arrests of Erdoğan's close allies, and incriminated Erdoğan. After 11 years as head of government (Prime Minister), Erdoğan decided to run for President in 2014. At the time, the presidency was a somewhat ceremonial function. Following the 2014 elections, Erdoğan became the first popularly elected president of Turkey. The souring in relations with Gülen continued, as the government proceeded to purge his supporters from judicial, bureaucratic and military positions. A failed military coup d'état attempt in July 2016 resulted in further purges and a temporary state of emergency. The government claimed that the coup leaders were linked to Gülen, but he has denied any role in it. Erdoğan's rule has been marked with increasing authoritarianism, expansionism, censorship and banning of parties or dissent. Erdoğan supported the 2017 referendum which changed Turkey's parliamentary system into a presidential system, thus setting for the first time in Turkish history a term limit for the head of government (two full five-year terms). This new system of government formally came into place after the 2018 general election, where Erdoğan became an executive president. His party however lost the majority in the parliament and is currently in a coalition (People's Alliance) with the Turkish nationalist MHP. Erdoğan has since been tackling, but also accused of contributing to, the Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018, which has caused a significant decline in his popularity and is widely believed to have contributed to the results of the 2019 local elections, in which his party lost power in big cities like Ankara and Istanbul to opposition parties for the first time in 15 years. Family and personal life Early life Erdoğan was born in Kasımpaşa, a poor neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province in the 1930s. Erdoğan's tribe is originally from Adjara, a region in Georgia. His parents were Ahmet Erdoğan (1905–88) and Tenzile Erdoğan (née Mutlu; 1924–2011). Erdoğan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father was a captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. His summer holidays were mostly spent in Güneysu, Rize, where his family originates. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdoğan was 13 years old. As a teenager, Erdoğan's father provided him with a weekly allowance of 2.5 Turkish lira, less than a dollar. With it, Erdoğan bought postcards and resold them on the street. He sold bottles of water to drivers stuck in traffic. Erdoğan also worked as a street vendor selling simit (sesame bread rings), wearing a white gown and selling the simit from a red three-wheel cart with the rolls stacked behind glass. In his youth, Erdoğan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahçe wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasımpaşa S.K. is named after him. Erdoğan is a member of the Community of İskenderpaşa, a Turkish Sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. Education Erdoğan graduated from Kasımpaşa Piyale primary school in 1965, and İmam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. The same educational path was followed by other co-founders of the AKP party. One quarter of the curriculum of İmam Hatip schools involves study of the Qurʼān, the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and the Arabic language. Erdoğan studied the Qurʼān at an İmam Hatip, where his classmates began calling him "hoca" ("Muslim teacher"). Erdoğan attended a meeting of the nationalist student group National Turkish Student Union (Milli Türk Talebe Birliği), who sought to raise a conservative cohort of young people to counter the rising movement of leftists in Turkey. Within the group, Erdoğan was distinguished by his oratorical skills, developing a penchant for public speaking and excelling in front of an audience. He won first place in a poetry-reading competition organized by the Community of Turkish Technical Painters, and began preparing for speeches through reading and research. Erdoğan would later comment on these competitions as "enhancing our courage to speak in front of the masses". Erdoğan wanted to pursue advanced studies at Mekteb-i Mülkiye, but Mülkiye accepted only students with regular high school diplomas, and not İmam Hatip graduates. Mülkiye was known for its political science department, which trained many statesmen and politicians in Turkey. Erdoğan was then admitted to Eyüp High School, a regular state school, and eventually received his high school diploma from Eyüp. According to his official biography, he subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences (), now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. Several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated, or even attended at all. Family Erdoğan married Emine Gülbaran (b. 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons, Ahmet Burak (b. 1979) and Necmettin Bilal (b. 1981), and two daughters, Esra (b. 1983) and Sümeyye (b. 1985). His father, Ahmet Erdoğan, died in 1988 and his mother, Tenzile Erdoğan, died in 2011 at the age of 88. Erdoğan has a brother, Mustafa (b. 1958), and a sister, Vesile (b. 1965). From his father's first marriage to Havuli Erdoğan (d. 1980), he had two half-brothers: Mehmet (1926–1988) and Hasan (1929–2006). Early political career In 1976, Erdoğan engaged in politics by joining the National Turkish Student Union, an anti-communist action group. In the same year, he became the head of the Beyoğlu youth branch of the Islamist National Salvation Party (MSP), and was later promoted to chair of the Istanbul youth branch of the party. Holding this position until 1980, he served as consultant and senior executive in the private sector during the era following the 1980 military coup when political parties were closed down. In 1983, Erdoğan followed most of Necmettin Erbakan's followers into the Islamist Welfare Party. He became the party's Beyoğlu district chair in 1984, and in 1985 he became the chair of the Istanbul city branch. He was elected to parliament in 1991, but was barred from taking his seat. Mayor of Istanbul (1994–1998) In the local elections of 27 March 1994, Erdoğan was elected Mayor of Istanbul with 25.19% of the popular vote. Erdoğan was a 40-year-old dark horse candidate who had been mocked by the mainstream media and treated as a country bumpkin by his opponents. He was pragmatic in office, tackling many chronic problems in Istanbul including water shortage, pollution and traffic chaos. The water shortage problem was solved with the laying of hundreds of kilometers of new pipelines. The garbage problem was solved with the establishment of state-of-the-art recycling facilities. While Erdoğan was in office, air pollution was reduced through a plan developed to switch to natural gas. He changed the public buses to environmentally friendly ones. The city's traffic and transportation jams were reduced with more than fifty bridges, viaducts, and highways built. He took precautions to prevent corruption, using measures to ensure that municipal funds were used prudently. He paid back a major portion of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality's two-billion-dollar debt and invested four billion dollars in the city. Erdoğan initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors. A seven-member international jury from the United Nations unanimously awarded Erdoğan the UN-Habitat award. Imprisonment In 1998, the fundamentalist Welfare Party was declared unconstitutional on the grounds of threatening the secularism of Turkey and was shut down by the Turkish constitutional court. Erdoğan became a prominent speaker at demonstrations held by his party colleagues. In December 1997 in Siirt, Erdoğan recited a poem from a work written by Ziya Gökalp, a pan-Turkish activist of the early 20th century. His recitation included verses translated as "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers...." which are not in the original version of the poem. Erdoğan said the poem had been approved by the education ministry to be published in textbooks. Under article 312/2 of the Turkish penal code his recitation was regarded as an incitement to violence and religious or racial hatred. He was given a ten-month prison sentence of which he served four months, from 24 March 1999 to 27 July 1999. Due to his conviction, Erdoğan was forced to give up his mayoral position. The conviction also stipulated a political ban, which prevented him from participating in parliamentary elections. He had appealed for the sentence to be converted to a monetary fine, but it was reduced to 120 days instead. In 2017, this period of Erdoğan's life was made into a film titled Reis. Justice and Development Party Erdoğan was member of political parties that kept getting banned by the army or judges. Within his Virtue Party, there was a dispute about the appropriate discourse of the party between traditional politicians and pro-reform politicians. The latter envisioned a party that could operate within the limits of the system, and thus not getting banned as its predecessors like National Order Party, National Salvation Party and Welfare Party. They wanted to give the group the character of an ordinary conservative party following the example of the European Christian democratic parties. When the Virtue Party was also banned in 2001, a definitive split took place: the followers of Necmettin Erbakan founded the Felicity Party (SP) and the reformers founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) under the leadership of Abdullah Gül and Erdoğan. The pro-reform politicians realized that a strictly Islamic party would never be accepted as a governing party by the state apparatus and they believed that an Islamic party did not appeal to more than about 20 percent of the Turkish electorate. The AK party emphatically placed itself as a broad democratic conservative party with new politicians from the political center (like Ali Babacan and Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu), while respecting Islamic norms and values, but without an explicit religious program. This turned out to be successful as the new party won 34% of the vote in the general elections of 2002. Erdoğan became prime minister in March 2003 after the Gül government ended his political ban. Premiership (2003–2014) General elections The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdoğan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yılmaz and Çiller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdoğan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gül became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdoğan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdoğan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gül handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdoğan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as president, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdoğan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gül as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Çanakkale, and one million in İzmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdoğan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdoğan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdoğan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdoğan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Referendums After the opposition parties deadlocked the 2007 presidential election by boycotting the parliament, the ruling AKP proposed a constitutional reform package. The reform package was first vetoed by president Sezer. Then he applied to the Turkish constitutional court about the reform package, because the president is unable to veto amendments for the second time. The Turkish constitutional court did not find any problems in the packet and 68.95% of the voters supported the constitutional changes. The reforms consisted of electing the president by popular vote instead of by parliament; reducing the presidential term from seven years to five; allowing the president to stand for re-election for a second term; holding general elections every four years instead of five; and reducing from 367 to 184 the quorum of lawmakers needed for parliamentary decisions. Reforming the Constitution was one of the main pledges of the AKP during the 2007 election campaign. The main opposition party CHP was not interested in altering the Constitution on a big scale, making it impossible to form a Constitutional Commission (Anayasa Uzlaşma Komisyonu). The amendments lacked the two-thirds majority needed to become law instantly, but secured 336 votes in the 550-seat parliament – enough to put the proposals to a referendum. The reform package included a number of issues such as the right of individuals to appeal to the highest court, the creation of the ombudsman's office; the possibility to negotiate a nationwide labour contract; gender equality; the ability of civilian courts to convict members of the military; the right of civil servants to go on strike; a privacy law; and the structure of the Constitutional Court. The referendum was agreed by a majority of 58%. Domestic Policy Kurdish issue In 2009, Prime Minister Erdoğan's government announced a plan to help end the quarter-century-long Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict that had cost more than 40,000 lives. The government's plan, supported by the European Union, intended to allow the Kurdish language to be used in all broadcast media and political campaigns, and restored Kurdish names to cities and towns that had been given Turkish ones. Erdoğan said, "We took a courageous step to resolve chronic issues that constitute an obstacle along Turkey's development, progression and empowerment". Erdoğan passed a partial amnesty to reduce penalties faced by many members of the Kurdish guerrilla movement PKK who had surrendered to the government. On 23 November 2011, during a televised meeting of his party in Ankara, he apologised on behalf of the state for the Dersim massacre, where many Alevis and Zazas were killed. In 2013 the government of Erdoğan began a peace process between the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Turkish Government, mediated by parliamentarians of the Peoples' Democratic party (HDP). In 2015 he decided that the peace process was over and supported the lift of the parliamentary immunity of the HDP parliamentarians. During his presidency a law was introduced which banned the use of the word Kurdistan in parliament and in a speech he held for the local election of 2019 he told the HDP politicians that if there is no Kurdistan in Turkey and if they looked for one they should go to Northern Iraq. Armenian genocide Prime Minister Erdoğan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdoğan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious". He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem". In December 2008, Erdoğan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken". In November 2009, he said, "it is not possible for those who belong to the Muslim faith to carry out genocide". In 2011, Erdoğan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish–Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdoğan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdoğan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences – such as relocation – during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". The Ottoman Parliament of 1915 had previously used the term "relocation" to describe the purpose of the Tehcir Law, which resulted in the deaths of anywhere between 800,000 and over 1,800,000 Armenian civilians in what is commonly referred to as the Armenian Genocide. Pope Francis in April 2015, at a special mass in St. Peter's Basilica marking the centenary of the events, described atrocities against Armenian civilians in 1915–1922 as "the first genocide of the 20th century". In protest, Erdoğan recalled the Turkish ambassador from the Vatican, and summoned the Vatican's ambassador, to express "disappointment" at what he called a discriminatory message. He later stated "we don’t carry a stain or a shadow like genocide". US President Barack Obama called for a "full, frank and just acknowledgement of the facts", but again stopped short of labelling it "genocide", despite his campaign promise to do so. Human rights During Erdoğan's time as Prime Minister, the far-reaching powers of the 1991 Anti-Terror Law were reduced and the Democratic initiative process was initiated, with the goal to improve democratic standards in general and the rights of ethnic and religious minorities in particular. However, after Turkey's bid to join the European Union stalled, European officials noted a return to more authoritarian ways, notably on freedom of speech, freedom of the press and Kurdish minority rights. Demands by activists for the recognition of LGBT rights were publicly rejected by government members, and members of the Turkish LGBT community were insulted by cabinet members. Reporters Without Borders observed a continuous decrease in Freedom of the Press during Erdoğan's later terms, with a rank of around 100 on the Press Freedom Index during his first term and a rank of 153 out of a total of 179 countries in 2021. Freedom House saw a slight recovery in later years and awarded Turkey a Press Freedom Score of 55/100 in 2012 after a low point of 48/100 in 2006. In 2011, Erdoğan's government made legal reforms to return properties of Christian and Jewish minorities which were seized by the Turkish government in the 1930s. The total value of the properties returned reached $2 billion (USD). Under Erdoğan, the Turkish government tightened the laws on the sale and consumption of alcohol, banning all advertising and increasing the tax on alcoholic beverages. Economy In 2002, Erdoğan inherited a Turkish economy that was beginning to recover from a recession as a result of reforms implemented by Kemal Derviş. Erdoğan supported Finance Minister Ali Babacan in enforcing macro-economic policies. Erdoğan tried to attract more foreign investors to Turkey and lifted many government regulations. The cash-flow into the Turkish economy between 2002 and 2012 caused a growth of 64% in real GDP and a 43% increase in GDP per capita; considerably higher numbers were commonly advertised but these did not account for the inflation of the US dollar between 2002 and 2012. The average annual growth in GDP per capita was 3.6%. The growth in real GDP between 2002 and 2012 was higher than the values from developed countries, but was close to average when developing countries are also taken into account. The ranking of the Turkish economy in terms of GDP moved slightly from 17 to 16 during this decade. A major consequence of the policies between 2002 and 2012 was the widening of the current account deficit from US$600 million to US$58 billion (2013 est.) Since 1961, Turkey has signed 19 IMF loan accords. Erdoğan's government satisfied the budgetary and market requirements of the two during his administration and received every loan installment, the only time any Turkish government has done so. Erdoğan inherited a debt of $23.5 billion to the IMF, which was reduced to $0.9 billion in 2012. He decided not to sign a new deal. Turkey's debt to the IMF was thus declared to be completely paid and he announced that the IMF could borrow from Turkey. In 2010, five-year credit default swaps for Turkey's sovereign debt were trading at a record low of 1.17%, below those of nine EU member countries and Russia. In 2002, the Turkish Central Bank had $26.5 billion in reserves. This amount reached $92.2 billion in 2011. During Erdoğan's leadership, inflation fell from 32% to 9.0% in 2004. Since then, Turkish inflation has continued to fluctuate around 9% and is still one of the highest inflation rates in the world. The Turkish public debt as a percentage of annual GDP declined from 74% in 2002 to 39% in 2009. In 2012, Turkey had a lower ratio of public debt to GDP than 21 of 27 members of the European Union and a lower budget deficit to GDP ratio than 23 of them. In 2003, Erdoğan's government pushed through the Labor Act, a comprehensive reform of Turkey's labor laws. The law greatly expanded the rights of employees, establishing a 45-hour workweek and limiting overtime work to 270 hours a year, provided legal protection against discrimination due to sex, religion, or political affiliation, prohibited discrimination between permanent and temporary workers, entitled employees terminated without "valid cause" to compensation, and mandated written contracts for employment arrangements lasting a year or more. Education Erdoğan increased the budget of the Ministry of Education from 7.5 billion lira in 2002 to 34 billion lira in 2011, the highest share of the national budget given to one ministry. Before his prime ministership the military received the highest share of the national budget. Compulsory education was increased from eight years to twelve. In 2003, the Turkish government, together with UNICEF, initiated a campaign called "Come on girls, [let's go] to school!" (). The goal of this campaign was to close the gender gap in primary school enrollment through the provision of a quality basic education for all girls, especially in southeast Turkey. In 2005, the parliament granted amnesty to students expelled from universities before 2003. The amnesty applied to students dismissed on academic or disciplinary grounds. In 2004, textbooks became free of charge and since 2008 every province in Turkey has its own university. During Erdoğan's Premiership, the number of universities in Turkey nearly doubled, from 98 in 2002 to 186 in October 2012. The Prime Minister kept his campaign promises by starting the Fatih project in which all state schools, from preschool to high school level, received a total of 620,000 smart boards, while tablet computers were distributed to 17 million students and approximately one million teachers and administrators. In June 2017 a draft proposal by the ministry of education was approved by Erdoğan, in which the curriculum for schools excluded the teaching of the theory of evolution of Charles Darwin by 2019. From then on the teaching will be postponed and start at undergraduate level. Infrastructure Under Erdoğan's government, the number of airports in Turkey increased from 26 to 50 in the period of 10 years. Between the founding of the Republic of Turkey in 1923 and 2002, there had been 6,000 km of dual carriageway roads created. Between 2002 and 2011, another 13,500 km of expressway were built. Due to these measures, the number of motor accidents fell by 50 percent. For the first time in Turkish history, high speed railway lines were constructed, and the country's high-speed train service began in 2009. In 8 years, 1,076 km of railway were built and 5,449 km of railway renewed. The construction of Marmaray, an undersea rail tunnel under the Bosphorus strait, started in 2004. It was inaugurated on the 90th anniversary of the Turkish Republic 29 October 2013. The inauguration of the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge, the third bridge over the Bosphorus, was on 26 August 2016. Justice In March 2006, the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) held a press conference to publicly protest the obstruction of the appointment of judges to the high courts for over 10 months. The HSYK said Erdoğan wanted to fill the vacant posts with his own appointees. Erdoğan was accused of creating a rift with Turkey's highest court of appeal, the Yargıtay, and high administrative court, the Danıştay. Erdoğan stated that the constitution gave the power to assign these posts to his elected party. In May 2007, the head of Turkey's High Court asked prosecutors to consider whether Erdoğan should be charged over critical comments regarding the election of Abdullah Gül as president. Erdoğan said the ruling was "a disgrace to the justice system", and criticized the Constitutional Court which had invalidated a presidential vote because a boycott by other parties meant there was no quorum. Prosecutors investigated his earlier comments, including saying it had fired a "bullet at democracy". Tülay Tuğcu, head of the Constitutional Court, condemned Erdoğan for "threats, insults and hostility" towards the justice system. Civil–military relations The Turkish military has had a record of intervening in politics, having removed elected governments four times in the past. During the Erdoğan government, civil–military relationship moved towards normalization in which the influence of the military in politics was significantly reduced. The ruling Justice and Development Party has often faced off against the military, gaining political power by challenging a pillar of the country's laicistic establishment. The most significant issue that caused deep fissures between the army and the government was the midnight e-memorandum posted on the military's website objecting to the selection of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül as the ruling party's candidate for the Presidency in 2007. The military argued that the election of Gül, whose wife wears an Islamic headscarf, could undermine the laicistic order of the country. Contrary to expectations, the government responded harshly to former Chief of General Staff Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt's e-memorandum, stating the military had nothing to do with the selection of the presidential candidate. Health care After assuming power in 2003, Erdoğan's government embarked on a sweeping reform program of the Turkish healthcare system, called the Health Transformation Program (HTP), to greatly increase the quality of healthcare and protect all citizens from financial risks. Its introduction coincided with the period of sustained economic growth, allowing the Turkish government to put greater investments into the healthcare system. As part of the reforms, the "Green Card" program, which provides health benefits to the poor, was expanded in 2004. The reform program aimed at increasing the ratio of private to state-run healthcare, which, along with long queues in state-run hospitals, resulted in the rise of private medical care in Turkey, forcing state-run hospitals to compete by increasing quality. In April 2006, Erdoğan unveiled a social security reform package demanded by the International Monetary Fund under a loan deal. The move, which Erdoğan called one of the most radical reforms ever, was passed with fierce opposition. Turkey's three social security bodies were united under one roof, bringing equal health services and retirement benefits for members of all three bodies. The previous system had been criticized for reserving the best healthcare for civil servants and relegating others to wait in long queues. Under the second bill, everyone under the age of 18 years was entitled to free health services, irrespective of whether they pay premiums to any social security organization. The bill also envisages a gradual increase in the retirement age: starting from 2036, the retirement age will increase to 65 by 2048 for both women and men. In January 2008, the Turkish Parliament adopted a law to prohibit smoking in most public places. Erdoğan is outspokenly anti-smoking. Foreign policy Turkish foreign policy during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister has been associated with the name of Ahmet Davutoğlu. Davutoğlu was the chief foreign policy advisor of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan before he was appointed foreign minister in 2009. The basis of Erdoğan's foreign policy is based on the principle of "don't make enemies, make friends" and the pursuit of "zero problems" with neighboring countries. Erdoğan is co-founder of United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (AOC). The initiative seeks to galvanize international action against extremism through the forging of international, intercultural and inter-religious dialogue and cooperation. European Union When Erdoğan came to power, he continued Turkey's long ambition of joining the European Union. On 3 October 2005 negotiations began for Turkey's accession to the European Union. Erdoğan was named "The European of the Year 2004" by the newspaper European Voice for the reforms in his country in order to accomplish the accession of Turkey to the European Union. He said in a comment that "Turkey's accession shows that Europe is a continent where civilisations reconcile and not clash." On 3 October 2005, the negotiations for Turkey's accession to the EU formally started during Erdoğan's tenure as Prime Minister. The European Commission generally supports Erdoğan's reforms, but remains critical of his policies. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize EU member state Cyprus. Greece and Cyprus dispute Relations between Greece and Turkey were normalized during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister. In May 2004, Erdoğan became the first Turkish Prime Minister to visit Greece since 1988, and the first to visit the Turkish minority of Thrace since 1952. In 2007, Erdoğan and Greek Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis inaugurated the Greek-Turkish natural gas pipeline giving Caspian gas its first direct Western outlet. Turkey and Greece signed an agreement to create a Combined Joint Operational Unit within the framework of NATO to participate in Peace Support Operations. Erdoğan and his party strongly supported the EU-backed referendum to reunify Cyprus in 2004. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships as a consequence of the economic isolation of the internationally unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the failure of the EU to end the isolation, as it had promised in 2004. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize the Republic of Cyprus. Armenia Armenia is Turkey's only neighbor which Erdoğan has not visited during his premiership. The Turkish-Armenian border has been closed since 1993 because of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with Turkey's close ally Azerbaijan. Diplomatic efforts resulted in the signing of protocols between Turkish and Armenian Foreign Ministers in Switzerland to improve relations between the two countries. One of the points of the agreement was the creation of a joint commission on the issue. The Armenian Constitutional Court decided that the commission contradicts the Armenian constitution. Turkey responded saying that Armenian court's ruling on the protocols is not acceptable, resulting in a suspension of the rectification process by the Turkish side. Erdoğan has said that Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan should apologize for calling on school children to re-occupy eastern Turkey. When asked by a student at a literature contest ceremony if Armenians will be able to get back their "western territories" along with Mt. Ararat, Sarksyan said, "This is the task of your generation". Russia In December 2004, President Putin visited Turkey, making it the first presidential visit in the history of Turkish-Russian relations besides that of the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Nikolai Podgorny in 1972. In November 2005, Putin attended the inauguration of a jointly constructed Blue Stream natural gas pipeline in Turkey. This sequence of top-level visits has brought several important bilateral issues to the forefront. The two countries consider it their strategic goal to achieve "multidimensional co-operation", especially in the fields of energy, transport and the military. Specifically, Russia aims to invest in Turkey's fuel and energy industries, and it also expects to participate in tenders for the modernisation of Turkey's military. The relations during this time are described by President Medvedev as "Turkey is one of our most important partners with respect to regional and international issues. We can confidently say that Russian-Turkish relations have advanced to the level of a multidimensional strategic partnership". In May 2010, Turkey and Russia signed 17 agreements to enhance cooperation in energy and other fields, including pacts to build Turkey's first nuclear power plant and further plans for an oil pipeline from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. The leaders of both countries also signed an agreement on visa-free travel, enabling tourists to get into the other country for free and stay there for up to 30 days. United States When Barack Obama became President of United States, he made his first overseas bilateral meeting to Turkey in April 2009. At a joint news conference in Turkey, Obama said: "I'm trying to make a statement about the importance of Turkey, not just to the United States but to the world. I think that where there's the most promise of building stronger U.S.-Turkish relations is in the recognition that Turkey and the United States can build a model partnership in which a predominantly Christian nation, a predominantly Muslim nation – a Western nation and a nation that straddles two continents," he continued, "that we can create a modern international community that is respectful, that is secure, that is prosperous, that there are not tensions – inevitable tensions between cultures – which I think is extraordinarily important." Iraq Turkey under Erdoğan was named by the Bush Administration as a part of the "coalition of the willing" that was central to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. On 1 March 2003, a motion allowing Turkish military to participate in the U.S-led coalition's invasion of Iraq, along with the permission for foreign troops to be stationed in Turkey for this purpose, was overruled by the Turkish Parliament. After the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iraq and Turkey signed 48 trade agreements on issues including security, energy, and water. The Turkish government attempted to mend relations with Iraqi Kurdistan by opening a Turkish university in Erbil, and a Turkish consulate in Mosul. Erdoğan's government fostered economic and political relations with Irbil, and Turkey began to consider the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq as an ally against Maliki's government. Israel Erdoğan visited Israel on 1 May 2005, a gesture unusual for a leader of a Muslim majority country. During his trip, Erdoğan visited the Yad Vashem, Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. The President of Israel Shimon Peres addressed the Turkish parliament during a visit in 2007, the first time an Israeli leader had addressed the legislature of a predominantly Muslim nation. Their relationship worsened at the 2009 World Economic Forum conference over Israel's actions during the Gaza War. Erdoğan was interrupted by the moderator while he was responding to Peres. Erdoğan stated: "Mister Peres, you are older than I am. Maybe you are feeling guilty and that is why you are raising your voice. When it comes to killing you know it too well. I remember how you killed the children on beaches..." Upon the moderator's reminder that they needed to adjourn for dinner, Erdoğan left the panel, accusing the moderator of giving Peres more time than all the other panelists combined. Tensions increased further following the Gaza flotilla raid in May 2010. Erdoğan strongly condemned the raid, describing it as "state terrorism", and demanded an Israeli apology. In February 2013, Erdoğan called Zionism a "crime against humanity", comparing it to Islamophobia, antisemitism, and fascism. He later retracted the statement, saying he had been misinterpreted. He said "everyone should know" that his comments were directed at "Israeli policies", especially as regards to "Gaza and the settlements." Erdoğan's statements were criticized by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, among others. In August 2013, the Hürriyet reported that Erdoğan had claimed to have evidence of Israel's responsibility for the removal of Morsi from office in Egypt. The Israeli and Egyptian governments dismissed the suggestion. In response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. He also stated that "If Israel continues with this attitude, it will definitely be tried at international courts." Syria During Erdoğan's term of office, diplomatic relations between Turkey and Syria significantly deteriorated. In 2004, President Bashar al-Assad arrived in Turkey for the first official visit by a Syrian President in 57 years. In late 2004, Erdoğan signed a free trade agreement with Syria. Visa restrictions between the two countries were lifted in 2009, which caused an economic boom in the regions near the Syrian border. However, in 2011 the relationship between the two countries was strained following the outbreak of conflict in Syria. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he was trying to "cultivate a favorable relationship with whatever government would take the place of Assad". However, he began to support the opposition in Syria, after demonstrations turned violent, creating a serious Syrian refugee problem in Turkey. Erdoğan's policy of providing military training for anti-Damascus fighters has also created conflict with Syria's ally and a neighbour of Turkey, Iran. Saudi Arabia In August 2006, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz as-Saud made a visit to Turkey. This was the first visit by a Saudi monarch to Turkey in the last four decades. The monarch made a second visit, on 9 November 2007. Turk-Saudi trade volume has exceeded 3.2 billion in 2006, almost double the figure achieved in 2003. In 2009, this amount reached 5.5 billion and the goal for the year 2010 was 10 billion. Erdoğan condemned the Saudi-led intervention in Bahrain and characterized the Saudi movement as "a new Karbala." He demanded withdrawal of Saudi forces from Bahrain. Egypt Erdoğan had made his first official visit to Egypt on 12 September 2011, accompanied by six ministers and 200 businessmen. This visit was made very soon after Turkey had ejected Israeli ambassadors, cutting off all diplomatic relations with Israel because Israel refused to apologize for the Gaza flotilla raid which killed eight Turkish and one Turco-American. Erdoğan's visit to Egypt was met with much enthusiasm by Egyptians. CNN reported some Egyptians saying "We consider him as the Islamic leader in the Middle East", while others were appreciative of his role in supporting Gaza. Erdoğan was later honored in Tahrir Square by members of the Egyptian Revolution Youth Union, and members of the Turkish embassy were presented with a coat of arms in acknowledgment of the Prime Minister's support of the Egyptian Revolution. Erdoğan stated in a 2011 interview that he supported secularism for Egypt, which generated an angry reaction among Islamic movements, especially the Freedom and Justice Party, which was the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, commentators suggest that by forming an alliance with the military junta during Egypt's transition to democracy, Erdoğan may have tipped the balance in favor of an authoritarian government. Erdoğan condemned the sit-in dispersals conducted by Egyptian police on 14 August 2013 at the Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda squares, where violent clashes between police officers and pro-Morsi Islamist protesters led to hundreds of deaths, mostly protesters. In July 2014, one year after the removal of Mohamed Morsi from office, Erdoğan described Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as an "illegitimate tyrant". Somalia Erdoğan's administration maintains strong ties with the Somali government. During the drought of 2011, Erdoğan's government contributed over $201 million to humanitarian relief efforts in the impacted parts of Somalia. Following a greatly improved security situation in Mogadishu in mid-2011, the Turkish government also re-opened its foreign embassy with the intention of more effectively assisting in the post-conflict development process. It was among the first foreign governments to resume formal diplomatic relations with Somalia after the civil war. In May 2010, the Turkish and Somali governments signed a military training agreement, in keeping with the provisions outlined in the Djibouti Peace Process. Turkish Airlines became the first long-distance international commercial airline in two decades to resume flights to and from Mogadishu's Aden Adde International Airport. Turkey also launched various development and infrastructure projects in Somalia including building several hospitals and helping renovate the National Assembly building. Protests 2013 Gezi Park protests against the perceived authoritarianism of Erdoğan and his policies, starting from a small sit-in in Istanbul in defense of a city park. After the police's intense reaction with tear gas, the protests grew each day. Faced by the largest mass protest in a decade, Erdoğan made this controversial remark in a televised speech: "The police were there yesterday, they are there today, and they will be there tomorrow". After weeks of clashes in the streets of Istanbul, his government at first apologized to the protestors and called for a plebiscite, but then ordered a crackdown on the protesters. Presidency (2014–present) Erdoğan took the oath of office on 28 August 2014 and became the 12th president of Turkey. He administered the new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu's oath on 29 August. When asked about his lower-than-expected 51.79% share of the vote, he allegedly responded, "there were even those who did not like the Prophet. I, however, won 52%". Assuming the role of President, Erdoğan was criticized for openly stating that he would not maintain the tradition of presidential neutrality. Erdoğan has also stated his intention to pursue a more active role as president, such as utilising the President's rarely used cabinet-calling powers. The political opposition has argued that Erdoğan will continue to pursue his own political agenda, controlling the government, while his new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu would be docile and submissive. Furthermore, the domination of loyal Erdoğan supporters in Davutoğlu's cabinet fuelled speculation that Erdoğan intended to exercise substantial control over the government. Presidential elections On 1 July 2014, Erdoğan was named the AKP's presidential candidate in the Turkish presidential election. His candidacy was announced by the Deputy President of the AKP, Mehmet Ali Şahin. Erdoğan made a speech after the announcement and used the 'Erdoğan logo' for the first time. The logo was criticised because it was very similar to the logo that U.S. President Barack Obama used in the 2008 presidential election. Erdoğan was elected as the President of Turkey in the first round of the election with 51.79% of the vote, obviating the need for a run-off by winning over 50%. The joint candidate of the CHP, MHP and 13 other opposition parties, former Organisation of Islamic Co-operation general secretary Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu won 38.44% of the vote. The pro-Kurdish HDP candidate Selahattin Demirtaş won 9.76%. The 2018 Turkish presidential election took place as part of the 2018 general election, alongside parliamentary elections on the same day. Following the approval of constitutional changes in a referendum held in 2017, the elected President will be both the head of state and head of government of Turkey, taking over the latter role from the to-be-abolished office of the Prime Minister. Incumbent president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declared his candidacy for the People's Alliance (Turkish: Cumhur İttifakı) on 27 April 2018. Erdoğan's main opposition, the Republican People's Party, nominated Muharrem İnce, a member of the parliament known for his combative opposition and spirited speeches against Erdoğan. Besides these candidates, Meral Akşener, the founder and leader of İyi Party, Temel Karamollaoğlu, the leader of the Felicity Party and Doğu Perinçek, the leader of the Patriotic Party, have announced their candidacies and collected the 100,000 signatures required for nomination. The alliance which Erdoğan was candidate for won 52.59% of the popular vote. Referendum In April 2017, a constitutional referendum was held, where the voters in Turkey (and Turkish citizens abroad) approved a set of 18 proposed amendments to the Constitution of Turkey. The amendments included the replacement of the existing parliamentary system with a presidential system. The post of Prime Minister would be abolished, and the presidency would become an executive post vested with broad executive powers. The parliament seats would be increased from 550 to 600 and the age of candidacy to the parliament was lowered from 25 to 18. The referendum also called for changes to the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors. Local elections In the 2019 local elections, the ruling party AKP lost control of Istanbul and Ankara for the first time in 25 years, as well as 5 of Turkey's 6 largest cities. The loss has been widely attributed to Erdoğan's mismanagement of the Turkish economic crisis, rising authoritarianism as well as the alleged government inaction on the Syrian refugee crisis. Soon after the elections, Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey ordered a re-election in Istanbul, cancelling Ekrem İmamoğlu's mayoral certificate. The decision led to a significant decrease of Erdoğan's and AKP's popularity and his party lost the elections again in June with a greater margin. The result was seen as a huge blow to Erdoğan, who had once said that if his party 'lost Istanbul, we would lose Turkey. The opposition's victory was characterised as 'the beginning of the end' for Erdoğan', with international commentators calling the re-run a huge government miscalculation that led to a potential İmamoğlu candidacy in the next scheduled presidential election. It is suspected that the scale of the government's defeat could provoke a cabinet reshuffle and early general elections, currently scheduled for June 2023. The New Zealand and Australian governments and opposition CHP party have criticized Erdoğan after he repeatedly showed video taken by the Christchurch mosque shooter to his supporters at campaign rallies for 31 March local elections and said Australians and New Zealanders who came to Turkey with anti-Muslim sentiments "would be sent back in coffins like their grandfathers" at Gallipoli. Domestic policy Presidential palace Erdoğan has also received criticism for the construction of a new palace called Ak Saray (pure white palace), which occupies approximately 50 acres of Atatürk Forest Farm (AOÇ) in Ankara. Since the AOÇ is protected land, several court orders were issued to halt the construction of the new palace, though building work went on nonetheless. The opposition described the move as a clear disregard for the rule of law. The project was subject to heavy criticism and allegations were made; of corruption during the construction process, wildlife destruction and the complete obliteration of the zoo in the AOÇ in order to make way for the new compound. The fact that the palace is technically illegal has led to it being branded as the 'Kaç-Ak Saray', the word kaçak in Turkish meaning 'illegal'. Ak Saray was originally designed as a new office for the Prime Minister. However, upon assuming the presidency, Erdoğan announced that the palace would become the new Presidential Palace, while the Çankaya Mansion will be used by the Prime Minister instead. The move was seen as a historic change since the Çankaya Mansion had been used as the iconic office of the presidency ever since its inception. The Ak Saray has almost 1,000 rooms and cost $350 million (€270 million), leading to huge criticism at a time when mining accidents and workers' rights had been dominating the agenda. On 29 October 2014, Erdoğan was due to hold a Republic Day reception in the new palace to commemorate the 91st anniversary of the Republic of Turkey and to officially inaugurate the Presidential Palace. However, after most invited participants announced that they would boycott the event and a mining accident occurred in the district of Ermenek in Karaman, the reception was cancelled. The media President Erdoğan and his government continue to press for court action against the remaining free press in Turkey. The latest newspaper that has been seized is Zaman, in March 2016. After the seizure Morton Abramowitz and Eric Edelman, former U.S. ambassadors to Turkey, condemned President Erdoğan's actions in an opinion piece published by The Washington Post: "Clearly, democracy cannot flourish under Erdoğan now". "The overall pace of reforms in Turkey has not only slowed down but in some key areas, such as freedom of expression and the independence of the judiciary, there has been a regression, which is particularly worrying", rapporteur Kati Piri said in April 2016 after the European Parliament passed its annual progress report on Turkey. On 22 June 2016, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that he considered himself successful in "destroying" Turkish civil groups "working against the state", a conclusion that had been confirmed some days earlier by Sedat Laçiner, Professor of International Relations and rector of the Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University: "Outlawing unarmed and peaceful opposition, sentencing people to unfair punishment under erroneous terror accusations, will feed genuine terrorism in Erdoğan’s Turkey. Guns and violence will become the sole alternative for legally expressing free thought". After the coup attempt, over 200 journalists were arrested and over 120 media outlets were closed. Cumhuriyet journalists were detained in November 2016 after a long-standing crackdown on the newspaper. Subsequently, Reporters Without Borders called Erdoğan an "enemy of press freedom" and said that he "hides his aggressive dictatorship under a veneer of democracy". In April 2017, Turkey blocked all access to Wikipedia over a content dispute. The Turkish government lifted a two-and-a-half-year ban on Wikipedia on 15 January 2020, restoring access to the online encyclopedia a month after Turkey's top court ruled that blocking Wikipedia was unconstitutional. On 1 July 2020, in a statement made to his party members, Erdoğan announced that the government would introduce new measures and regulations to control or shut down social media platforms such as YouTube, Twitter and Netflix. Through these new measures, each company would be required to appoint an official representative in the country to respond to legal concerns. The decision comes after a number of Twitter users insulted his daughter Esra after she welcomed her fourth child. State of emergency and purges On 20 July 2016, President Erdoğan declared the state of emergency, citing the coup d'état attempt as justification. It was first scheduled to last three months. The Turkish parliament approved this measure. The state of emergency was later extended for another three months, amidst the ongoing 2016 Turkish purges including comprehensive purges of independent media and detention of tens of thousands of Turkish citizens politically opposed to Erdoğan. More than 50,000 people have been arrested and over 160,000 fired from their jobs by March 2018. In August 2016, Erdoğan began rounding up journalists who had been publishing, or who were about to publish articles questioning corruption within the Erdoğan administration, and incarcerating them. The number of Turkish journalists jailed by Turkey is higher than any other country, including all of those journalists currently jailed in North Korea, Cuba, Russia, and China combined. In the wake of the coup attempt of July 2016 the Erdoğan administration began rounding up tens of thousands of individuals, both from within the government, and from the public sector, and incarcerating them on charges of alleged "terrorism". As a result of these arrests, many in the international community complained about the lack of proper judicial process in the incarceration of Erdoğan's opposition. In April 2017 Erdoğan successfully sponsored legislation effectively making it illegal for the Turkish legislative branch to investigate his executive branch of government. Without the checks and balances of freedom of speech, and the freedom of the Turkish legislature to hold him accountable for his actions, many have likened Turkey's current form of government to a dictatorship with only nominal forms of democracy in practice. At the time of Erdoğan's successful passing of the most recent legislation silencing his opposition, United States President Donald Trump called Erdoğan to congratulate him for his "recent referendum victory". On 29 April 2017 Erdoğan's administration began an internal Internet block of all of the Wikipedia online encyclopedia site via Turkey's domestic Internet filtering system. This blocking action took place after the government had first made a request for Wikipedia to remove what it referred to as "offensive content". In response, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales replied via a post on Twitter stating, "Access to information is a fundamental human right. Turkish people, I will always stand with you and fight for this right." In January 2016, more than a thousand academics signed a petition criticizing Turkey's military crackdown on ethnic Kurdish towns and neighborhoods in the east of the country, such as Sur (a district of Diyarbakır), Silvan, Nusaybin, Cizre and Silopi, and asking an end to violence. Erdoğan accused those who signed the petition of "terrorist propaganda", calling them "the darkest of people". He called for action by institutions and universities, stating, "Everyone who benefits from this state but is now an enemy of the state must be punished without further delay". Within days, over 30 of the signatories were arrested, many in dawn-time raids on their homes. Although all were quickly released, nearly half were fired from their jobs, eliciting a denunciation from Turkey's Science Academy for such "wrong and disturbing" treatment. Erdoğan vowed that the academics would pay the price for "falling into a pit of treachery". On 8 July 2018, Erdoğan sacked 18,000 officials for alleged ties to US based cleric Fethullah Gülen, shortly before renewing his term as an executive president. Of those removed, 9000 were police officers with 5000 from the armed forces with the addition of hundreds of academics. Foreign policy Europe In February 2016, Erdoğan threatened to send the millions of refugees in Turkey to EU member states, saying: "We can open the doors to Greece and Bulgaria anytime and we can put the refugees on buses ... So how will you deal with refugees if you don't get a deal?" In an interview to the news magazine Der Spiegel, German minister of defence Ursula von der Leyen said on 11 March 2016 that the refugee crisis had made good cooperation between EU and Turkey an "existentially important" issue. "Therefore it is right to advance now negotiations on Turkey's EU accession". In its resolution "The functioning of democratic institutions in Turkey" from 22 June 2016, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe warned that "recent developments in Turkey pertaining to freedom of the media and of expression, erosion of the rule of law and the human rights violations in relation to anti-terrorism security operations in south-east Turkey have ... raised serious questions about the functioning of its democratic institutions". On 20 August 2016, Erdoğan told his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko that Turkey would not recognize the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea; calling it "Crimea's occupation". In January 2017, Erdoğan said that the withdrawal of Turkish troops from Northern Cyprus is "out of the question" and Turkey will be in Cyprus "forever". There is a long-standing dispute between Turkey and Greece in the Aegean Sea. Erdoğan warned that Greece will pay a "heavy price" if Turkey's gas exploration vessel – in what Turkey said are disputed waters – is attacked. In September 2020, Erdoğan declared his government's support for Azerbaijan following clashes between Armenian and Azeri forces over a disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. He dismissed demands for a ceasefire. Diaspora In March 2017, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated to the Turks in Europe, "Make not three, but five children. Because you are the future of Europe. That will be the best response to the injustices against you." This has been interpreted as an imperialist call for demographic warfare. According to The Economist, Erdoğan is the first Turkish leader to take the Turkish diaspora seriously, which has created friction within these diaspora communities and between the Turkish government and several of its European counterparts. The Balkans In February 2018, President Erdoğan expressed Turkish support of the Republic of Macedonia's position during negotiations over the Macedonia naming dispute saying that Greece's position is wrong. In March 2018, President Erdoğan criticized the Kosovan Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj for dismissing his Interior Minister and Intelligence Chief for failing to inform him of an unauthorized and illegal secret operation conducted by the National Intelligence Organization of Turkey on Kosovo's territory that led to the arrest of six people allegedly associated with the Gülen movement. On 26 November 2019, an earthquake struck the Durrës region of Albania. President Erdoğan expressed his condolences. and citing close Albanian-Turkish relations, he committed Turkey to reconstructing 500 earthquake destroyed homes and other civic structures in Laç, Albania. In Istanbul, Erdoğan organised and attended a donors conference (8 December) to assist Albania that included Turkish businessmen, investors and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama. United Kingdom In May 2018, British Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed Erdoğan to the United Kingdom for a three-day state visit. Erdoğan declared that the United Kingdom is "an ally and a strategic partner, but also a real friend. The cooperation we have is well beyond any mechanism that we have established with other partners." Israel Relations between Turkey and Israel began to normalize after Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu officially apologized for the death of the nine Turkish activists during the Gaza flotilla raid. However, in response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of being "more barbaric than Hitler", and conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. In December 2017, President Erdoğan issued a warning to Donald Trump, after the U.S. President acknowledged Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Erdoğan stated, "Jerusalem is a red line for Muslims", indicating that naming Jerusalem as Israel's capital would alienate Palestinians and other Muslims from the city, undermining hopes at a future capital of a Palestinian State. Erdoğan called Israel a "terrorist state". Naftali Bennett dismissed the threats, claiming "Erdoğan does not miss an opportunity to attack Israel". In April 2019, Erdoğan said the West Bank belongs to Palestinians, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would annex Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories if he is re-elected. Erdoğan condemned the Israel–UAE peace agreement, stating that Turkey was considering suspending or cutting off diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates in retaliation. Syrian Civil War Amid allegations of Turkish collaboration with the Islamic State, the 2014 Kobanî protests broke out near the Syrian border city of Kobanî, in protest against the government's perceived facilitation of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant during the Siege of Kobanî. 42 protestors were killed during a brutal police crackdown. Asserting that aid to the Kurdish-majority People's Protection Units (YPG) fighters in Syria would assist the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) (then on ceasefire) in Turkey, Erdoğan held bilateral talks with Barack Obama regarding IS during the 5–6 September 2014 NATO summit in Newport, Wales. In early October, United States Vice President Joe Biden criticised the Turkish government for supplying jihadists in Syria and said Erdoğan had expressed regret to him about letting foreign jihadists transit through Turkey en route to Syria. Erdoğan angrily responded, "Biden has to apologize for his statements" adding that if no apology is made, Biden would become "history to me." Biden subsequently apologised. In response to the U.S. request to use İncirlik Air Base to conduct air strikes against IS, Erdoğan demanded that Bashar al-Assad be removed from power first. Turkey lost its bid for a Security Council seat in the United Nations during the 2014 election; the unexpected result is believed to have been a reaction to Erdoğan's hostile treatment of the Kurds fighting ISIS on the Syrian border and a rebuke of his willingness to support IS-aligned insurgents opposed to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. In 2015, there were consistent allegations that Erdoğan maintained financial links with the Islamic State, including allegation of his son-in-law Berat Albayrak's involvement with oil production and smuggling in ISIL. Revelations that the state was supplying arms to militant groups in Syria in the 2014 National Intelligence Organisation lorry scandal led to accusations of high treason. In July 2015, Turkey became involved in the international military intervention against ISIL, simultaneously launching airstrikes against PKK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan. As of 2015, Turkey began openly supporting the Army of Conquest, a coalition of Syrian rebel groups that included al-Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham. In late November 2016, Erdoğan said that the Turkish military launched its operations in Syria to end Assad's rule, but retracted this statement shortly afterwards. In January 2018, the Turkish military and its Syrian National Army and Sham Legion allies began the Turkish military operation in Afrin in the Kurdish-majority Afrin Canton in Northern Syria, against the YPG. On 10 April, Erdoğan rejected a Russian demand to return Afrin to Syrian government control. In October 2019, after Erdoğan spoke to him, U.S. President Donald Trump gave the go-ahead to the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria, despite recently agreeing to a Northern Syria Buffer Zone. U.S. troops in northern Syria were withdrawn from the border to avoid interference with the Turkish operation. After the U.S. pullout, Turkey proceeded to attack the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria. Rejecting criticism of the invasion, Erdoğan claimed that NATO and European Union countries "sided with terrorists, and all of them attacked us". China Bilateral trade between Turkey and China increased from $1 billion a year in 2002 to $27 billion annually in 2017. Erdoğan has stated that Turkey might consider joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation instead of the European Union. Qatar blockade In June 2017 during a speech, Erdoğan called the isolation of Qatar as "inhumane and against Islamic values" and that "victimising Qatar through smear campaigns serves no purpose". Myanmar In September 2017, Erdoğan condemned the persecution of Muslims in Myanmar and accused Myanmar of "genocide" against the Muslim minority. United States Over time, Turkey began to look for ways to buy its own missile defense system and also to use that procurement to build up its own capacity to manufacture and sell an air and missile defense system. Turkey got serious about acquiring a missile defense system early in the first Obama administration when it opened a competition between the Raytheon Patriot PAC 2 system and systems from Europe, Russia, and even China. Taking advantage of the new low in U.S.-Turkish relations, Putin saw his chance to use an S-400 sale to Turkey, so in July 2017, he offered the air defense system to Turkey. In the months that followed, the United States warned Turkey that a S-400 purchase jeopardized Turkey's F-35 purchase. Integration of the Russian system into the NATO air defense net was also out of the question. Administration officials, including Mark Esper, warned that Turkey had to choose between the S-400 and the F-35. That they couldn't have both. The S-400 deliveries to Turkey began on 12 July. On 16 July, Trump mentioned to reporters that withholding the F-35 from Turkey was unfair. Said the president, "So what happens is we have a situation where Turkey is very good with us, very good, and we are now telling Turkey that because you have really been forced to buy another missile system, we’re not going to sell you the F-35 fighter jets". The U.S. Congress has made clear on a bipartisan basis that it expects the president to sanction Turkey for buying Russian equipment. Out of the F-35, Turkey now considers buying Russian fifth-generation jet fighter Su-57. On 1 August 2018, the U.S. Department of Treasury sanctioned two senior Turkish government ministers who were involved in the detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson. Erdoğan said that the U.S. behavior will force Turkey to look for new friends and allies. The U.S.–Turkey tensions appear to be the most serious diplomatic crisis between the NATO allies in years. Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton claimed that President Donald Trump told Erdoğan he would 'take care' of investigation against Turkey's state-owned bank Halkbank accused of bank fraud charges and laundering up to $20 billion on behalf of Iranian entities. Turkey criticized Bolton's book, saying it included misleading accounts of conversations between Trump and Erdoğan. In August 2020, the former vice president and presidential candidate Joe Biden called for a new U.S. approach to the "autocrat" President Erdoğan and support for Turkish opposition parties. In September 2020, Biden demanded that Erdoğan "stay out" of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, in which Turkey has supported the Azeris. Venezuela Relations with Venezuela were strengthened with recent developments and high level mutual visits. The first official visit between the two countries at presidential level was in October 2017 when Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro visited Turkey. In December 2018, Erdoğan visited Venezuela for the first time and expressed his will to build strong relations with Venezuela and expressed hope that high-level visits "will increasingly continue." Reuters reported that in 2018 23 tons of mined gold were taken from Venezuela to Istanbul. In the first nine months of 2018, Venezuela's gold exports to Turkey rose from zero in the previous year to US$900 million. During the Venezuelan presidential crisis, Erdoğan voiced solidarity with Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro and criticized U.S. sanctions against Venezuela, saying that "political problems cannot be resolved by punishing an entire nation." Following the 2019 Venezuelan uprising attempt, Erdoğan condemned the actions of lawmaker Juan Guaidó, tweeting "Those who are in an effort to appoint a postmodern colonial governor to Venezuela, where the President was appointed by elections and where the people rule, should know that only democratic elections can determine how a country is governed". Events Coup d'état attempt On 15 July 2016, a coup d'état was attempted by the military, with aims to remove Erdoğan from government. By the next day, Erdoğan's government managed to reassert effective control in the country. Reportedly, no government official was arrested or harmed, which, among other factors, raised the suspicion of a false flag event staged by the government itself. Erdoğan, as well as other government officials, has blamed an exiled cleric, and a former ally of Erdoğan, Fethullah Gülen, for staging the coup attempt. Süleyman Soylu, Minister of Labor in Erdoğan's government, accused the US of planning a coup to oust Erdoğan. Erdoğan, as well as other high-ranking Turkish government officials, has issued repeated demands to the US to extradite Gülen. Following the coup attempt, there has been a significant deterioration in Turkey-US relations. European and other world leaders have expressed their concerns over the situation in Turkey, with many of them warning Erdoğan not to use the coup attempt as an excuse to crack down on his opponents. The rise of ISIS and the collapse of the Kurdish peace process had led to a sharp rise in terror incidents in Turkey until 2016. Erdoğan was accused by his critics of having a 'soft corner' for ISIS. However, after the attempted coup, Erdoğan ordered the Turkish military into Syria to combat ISIS and Kurdish militant groups. Erdoğan's critics have decried purges in the education system and judiciary as undermining the rule of law however Erdoğan supporters argue this is a necessary measure as Gulen-linked schools cheated on entrance exams, requiring a purge in the education system and of the Gulen followers who then entered the judiciary. Erdoğan's plan is "to reconstitute Turkey as a presidential system. The plan would create a centralized system that would enable him to better tackle Turkey's internal and external threats. One of the main hurdles allegedly standing in his way is Fethullah Gulen's movement ..." In the aftermath of the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt, a groundswell of national unity and consensus emerged for cracking down on the coup plotters with a National Unity rally held in Turkey that included Islamists, secularists, liberals and nationalists. Erdoğan has used this consensus to remove Gulen's followers from the bureaucracy, curtail their role in NGOs, Turkey's Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Turkish military, with 149 Generals discharged. In a foreign policy shift Erdoğan ordered the Turkish Armed Forces into battle in Syria and has liberated towns from IS control. As relations with Europe soured over in the aftermath of the attempted coup, Erdoğan developed alternative relationships with Russia, Saudi Arabia and a "strategic partnership" with Pakistan, with plans to cultivate relations through free trade agreements and deepening military relations for mutual co-operation with Turkey's regional allies. 2018 currency and debt crisis The Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018 was caused by the Turkish economy's excessive current account deficit and foreign-currency debt, in combination with Erdoğan's increasing authoritarianism and his unorthodox ideas about interest rate policy. Economist Paul Krugman described the unfolding crisis as "a classic currency-and-debt crisis, of a kind we’ve seen many times", adding: "At such a time, the quality of leadership suddenly matters a great deal. You need officials who understand what's happening, can devise a response and have enough credibility that markets give them the benefit of the doubt. Some emerging markets have those things, and they are riding out the turmoil fairly well. The Erdoğan regime has none of that". Ideology and public image Early during his premiership, Erdoğan was praised as a role model for emerging Middle Eastern nations due to several reform packages initiated by his government which expanded religious freedoms and minority rights as part of accession negotiations with the European Union. However, his government underwent several crises including the Sledgehammer coup and the Ergenekon trials, corruption scandals, accusations of media intimidation, as well as the pursuit of an increasingly polarizing political agenda; the opposition accused the government of inciting political hatred throughout the country. Critics say that Erdoğan's government legitimizes homophobia, as Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". Neo-Ottomanism As President, Erdoğan has overseen a revival of Ottoman tradition, greeting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas with an Ottoman-style ceremony in the new presidential palace, with guards dressed in costumes representing founders of 16 Great Turkish Empires in history. While serving as the Prime Minister of Turkey, Erdoğan's AKP made references to the Ottoman era during election campaigns, such as calling their supporters 'grandsons of Ottomans' (Osmanlı torunu). This proved controversial, since it was perceived to be an open attack against the republican nature of modern Turkey founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. In 2015, Erdoğan made a statement in which he endorsed the old Ottoman term külliye to refer to university campuses rather than the standard Turkish word kampüs. Many critics have thus accused Erdoğan of wanting to become an Ottoman sultan and abandon the secular and democratic credentials of the Republic. One of the most cited scholars alive, Noam Chomsky, said that "Erdogan in Turkey is basically trying to create something like the Ottoman Caliphate, with him as caliph, supreme leader, throwing his weight around all over the place, and destroying the remnants of democracy in Turkey at the same time". When pressed on this issue in January 2015, Erdoğan denied these claims and said that he would aim to be more like Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom rather than like an Ottoman sultan. In July 2020, after the Council of State annulled the Cabinet's 1934 decision to establish the Hagia Sophia as museum and revoking the monument's status, Erdoğan ordered its reclassification as a mosque. The 1934 decree was ruled to be unlawful under both Ottoman and Turkish law as Hagia Sophia's waqf, endowed by Sultan Mehmed II, had designated the site a mosque; proponents of the decision argued the Hagia Sophia was the personal property of the sultan. This redesignation is controversial, invoking condemnation from the Turkish opposition, UNESCO, the World Council of Churches, the Holy See, and many other international leaders. In August 2020, he also signed the order that transferred the administration of the Chora Church to the Directorate of Religious Affairs to open it for worship as a mosque. Initially converted to a mosque by the Ottomans, the building had then been designated as a museum by the government since 1934. Authoritarianism Erdoğan has served as the de facto leader of Turkey since 2002. In response to criticism, Erdoğan made a speech in May 2014 denouncing allegations of dictatorship, saying that the leader of the opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who was there at the speech, would not be able to "roam the streets" freely if he were a dictator. Kılıçdaroğlu responded that political tensions would cease to exist if Erdoğan stopped making his polarising speeches for three days. One observer said it was a measure of the state of Turkish democracy that Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu could openly threaten, on 20 December 2015, that, if his party did not win the election, Turkish Kurds would endure a repeat of the era of the "white Toros", the Turkish name for the Renault 12, "a car associated with the gendarmarie’s fearsome intelligence agents, who carried out thousands of extrajudicial executions of Kurdish nationalists during the 1990s". In February 2015, a 13-year-old was charged by a prosecutor after allegedly insulting Erdoğan on Facebook. In 2016, a waiter was arrested for insulting Erdoğan by allegedly saying "If Erdoğan comes here, I will not even serve tea to him.". In April 2014, the President of the Constitutional Court, Haşim Kılıç, accused Erdoğan of damaging the credibility of the judiciary, labelling Erdoğan's attempts to increase political control over the courts as 'desperate'. During the chaotic 2007 presidential election, the military issued an E-memorandum warning the government to keep within the boundaries of secularism when choosing a candidate. Regardless, Erdoğan's close relations with Fethullah Gülen and his Cemaat Movement allowed his government to maintain a degree of influence within the judiciary through Gülen's supporters in high judicial and bureaucratic offices. Shortly after, an alleged coup plot codenamed Sledgehammer became public and resulted in the imprisonment of 300 military officers including İbrahim Fırtına, Çetin Doğan and Engin Alan. Several opposition politicians, journalists and military officers also went on trial for allegedly being part of an ultra-nationalist organisation called Ergenekon. Both cases were marred by irregularities and were condemned as a joint attempt by Erdoğan and Gülen to curb opposition to the AKP. The original Sledgehammer document containing the coup plans, allegedly written in 2003, was found to have been written using Microsoft Word 2007. Despite both domestic and international calls for these irregularities to be addressed in order to guarantee a fair trial, Erdoğan instead praised his government for bringing the coup plots to light. When Gülen publicly withdrew support and openly attacked Erdoğan in late 2013, several imprisoned military officers and journalists were released, with the government admitting that the judicial proceedings were unfair. When Gülen withdrew support from the AKP government in late 2013, a government corruption scandal broke out, leading to the arrest of several family members of cabinet ministers. Erdoğan accused Gülen of co-ordinating a "parallel state" within the judiciary in an attempt to topple him from power. He then removed or reassigned several judicial officials in an attempt to remove Gülen's supporters from office. Erdoğan's 'purge' was widely questioned and criticised by the European Union. In early 2014, a new law was passed by parliament giving the government greater control over the judiciary, which sparked public protest throughout the country. International organisations perceived the law to be a danger to the separation of powers. Several judicial officials removed from their posts said that they had been removed due to their secularist credentials. The political opposition accused Erdoğan of not only attempting to remove Gülen supporters, but supporters of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's principles as well, in order to pave the way for increased politicisation of the judiciary. Several family members of Erdoğan's ministers who had been arrested as a result of the 2013 corruption scandal were released, and a judicial order to question Erdoğan's son Bilal Erdoğan was annulled. Controversy erupted when it emerged that many of the newly appointed judicial officials were actually AKP supporters. İslam Çiçek, a judge who ejected the cases of five ministers' relatives accused of corruption, was accused of being an AKP supporter and an official investigation was launched into his political affiliations. On 1 September 2014, the courts dissolved the cases of 96 suspects, which included Bilal Erdoğan. During a televised press conference he was asked if he believed a presidential system was possible in a unitary state. Erdoğan affirmed this and cited Nazi Germany (among other examples) as a case where such a combination existed. However, the Turkish president's office said that Erdoğan was not advocating a Hitler-style government when he called for a state system with a strong executive, and added that the Turkish president had declared the "Holocaust, anti-semitism and Islamophobia" as crimes against humanity and that it was out of the question for him to cite Hitler's Germany as a good example. Suppression of dissent Erdoğan has been criticised for his politicisation of the media, especially after the 2013 protests. The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) alleged that over 1,863 journalists lost their jobs due to their anti-government views in 12 years of AKP rule. Opposition politicians have also alleged that intimidation in the media is due to the government's attempt to restructure the ownership of private media corporations. Journalists from the Cihan News Agency and the Gülenist Zaman newspaper were repeatedly barred from attending government press conferences or asking questions. Several opposition journalists such as Soner Yalçın were controversially arrested as part of the Ergenekon trials and Sledgehammer coup investigation. Veli Ağbaba, a CHP politician, has called the AKP the 'biggest media boss in Turkey.' In 2015, 74 US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to state their concern over what they saw as deviations from the basic principles of democracy in Turkey and oppressions of Erdoğan over media. Notable cases of media censorship occurred during the 2013 anti-government protests, when the mainstream media did not broadcast any news regarding the demonstrations for three days after they began. The lack of media coverage was symbolised by CNN International covering the protests while CNN Türk broadcast a documentary about penguins at the same time. The Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK) controversially issued a fine to pro-opposition news channels including Halk TV and Ulusal Kanal for their coverage of the protests, accusing them of broadcasting footage that could be morally, physically and mentally destabilising to children. Erdoğan was criticised for not responding to the accusations of media intimidation, and caused international outrage after telling a female journalist (Amberin Zaman of The Economist) to know her place and calling her a 'shameless militant' during his 2014 presidential election campaign. While the 2014 presidential election was not subject to substantial electoral fraud, Erdoğan was again criticised for receiving disproportionate media attention in comparison to his rivals. The British newspaper The Times commented that between 2 and 4 July, the state-owned media channel TRT gave 204 minutes of coverage to Erdoğan's campaign and less than a total of 3 minutes to both his rivals. Erdoğan also tightened controls over the Internet, signing into law a bill which allows the government to block websites without prior court order on 12 September 2014. His government blocked Twitter and YouTube in late March 2014 following the release of a recording of a conversation between him and his son Bilal, where Erdoğan allegedly warned his family to 'nullify' all cash reserves at their home amid the 2013 corruption scandal. Erdoğan has undertaken a media campaign that attempts to portray the presidential family as frugal and simple-living; their palace electricity-bill is estimated at $500,000 per month. In May 2016, former Miss Turkey model Merve Büyüksaraç was sentenced to more than a year in prison for allegedly insulting the president. In a 2016 news story, Bloomberg reported, "more than 2,000 cases have been opened against journalists, cartoonists, teachers, a former Miss Turkey, and even schoolchildren in the past two years". In November 2016, the Turkish government blocked access to social media in all of Turkey as well as sought to completely block Internet access for the citizens in the southeast of the country. Mehmet Aksoy lawsuit In 2009, Turkish sculptor Mehmet Aksoy created the Statue of Humanity in Kars to promote reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia. When visiting the city in 2011, Erdoğan deemed the statue a "freak", and months later it was demolished. Aksoy sued Erdoğan for "moral indemnities", although his lawyer said that his statement was a critique rather than an insult. In March 2015, a judge ordered Erdoğan to pay 10,000 liras. Erdoğanism Erdoğan has produced many aphorisms and catch-phrases known as Erdoğanisms. The term Erdoğanism first emerged shortly after Erdoğan's 2011 general election victory, where it was predominantly described as the AKP's liberal economic and conservative democratic ideals fused with Erdoğan demagoguery and cult of personality. Views on minorities LGBT In 2002, Erdoğan said that "homosexuals must be legally protected within the framework of their rights and freedoms. From time to time, we do not find the treatment they get on some television screens humane", he said. However, in 2017 Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Turkey's top Muslim scholar and President of Religious Affairs, Ali Erbaş, said in a Friday Ramadan announcement that country condemns homosexuality because it "brings illness," insinuating that same sex relations are responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan backed Erbaş, saying that what Erbaş "said was totally right." Jews While Erdoğan has declared several times being against antisemitism, he has been accused of invoking antisemitic stereotypes in public statements. According to Erdoğan, he had been inspired by novelist and Islamist ideologue Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, a publisher (among others) of antisemitic literature. Others During a live interview in 2014, he said: "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian. Excuse me, but they have said even uglier things. They have called me Armenian, but I am Turkish." Honours and accolades Foreign honours Russia: Medal "In Commemoration of the 1000th Anniversary of Kazan" (1 June 2006) Pakistan: Nishan-e-Pakistan, the highest civilian award in Pakistan (26 October 2009) Georgia: Order of Golden Fleece, awarded for his contribution to development of bilateral relations (17 May 2010) Kyrgyzstan: Danaker Order in Bishkek (2 February 2011) Azerbaijan: Heydar Aliyev Order (3 September 2014) Belgium: Grand Cordon in the Order of Leopold (5 October 2015) Madagascar: Knight Grand Cross in the national Order (25 January 2017) Gagauzia: Order of Gagauz-Yeri in Comrat (18 October 2018) Venezuela: Order of the Liberator, Grand Cordon (3 December 2018) Ukraine: Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise (16 October 2020) Other awards 29 January 2004: Profile of Courage Award from the American Jewish Congress, for promoting peace between cultures. Returned at the request of the A.J.C. in July 2014. 13 June 2004: Golden Plate award from the Academy of Achievement during the conference in Chicago. 3 October 2004: German Quadriga prize for improving relationships between different cultures. 2 September 2005: Mediterranean Award for Institutions (). This was awarded by the Fondazione Mediterraneo. 8 August 2006: Caspian Energy Integration Award from the Caspian Integration Business Club. 1 November 2006: Outstanding Service award from the Turkish humanitarian organization Red Crescent. 2 February 2007: Dialogue Between Cultures Award from the President of Tatarstan Mintimer Shaimiev. 15 April 2007: Crystal Hermes Award from the German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the opening of the Hannover Industrial Fair. 11 July 2007: highest award of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the Agricola Medal, in recognition of his contribution to agricultural and social development in Turkey. 11 May 2009: Avicenna award from the Avicenna Foundation in Frankfurt, Germany. 9 June 2009: guest of honor at the 20th Crans Montana Forum in Brussels and received the Prix de la Fondation, for democracy and freedom. 25 June 2009: Key to the City of Tirana on the occasion of his state visit to Albania. 29 December 2009: Award for Contribution to World Peace from the Turgut Özal Thought and Move Association. 12 January 2010: King Faisal International Prize for "service to Islam" from the King Faisal Foundation. 23 February 2010: Nodo Culture Award from the mayor of Seville for his efforts to launch the Alliance of Civilizations initiative. 1 March 2010: United Nations–HABITAT award in memorial of Rafik Hariri. A seven-member international jury unanimously found Erdoğan deserving of the award because of his "excellent achievement and commendable conduct in the area of leadership, statesmanship and good governance. Erdoğan also initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors." 27 May 2010: medal of honor from the Brazilian Federation of Industry for the State of São Paulo (FIESP) for his contributions to industry 31 May 2010: World Health Organization 2010 World No Tobacco Award for "his dedicated leadership on tobacco control in Turkey." 29 June 2010: 2010 World Family Award from the World Family Organization which operates under the umbrella of the United Nations. 4 November 2010: Golden Medal of Independence, an award conferred upon Kosovo citizens and foreigners that have contributed to the independence of Kosovo. 25 November 2010: "Leader of the Year" award presented by the Union of Arab Banks in Lebanon. 11 January 2011: "Outstanding Personality in the Islamic World Award" of the Sheikh Fahad al-Ahmad International Award for Charity in Kuwait. 25 October 2011: Palestinian International Award for Excellence and Creativity (PIA) 2011 for his support to the Palestinian people and cause. 21 January 2012: 'Gold Statue 2012 Special Award' by the Polish Business Center Club (BCC). Erdoğan was awarded for his systematic effort to clear barriers on the way to economic growth, striving to build democracy and free market relations. 2020: Ig Nobel Prize "for using the COVID-19 viral pandemic to teach the world that politicians can have a more immediate effect on life and death than scientists and doctors can." See also List of international presidential trips made by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Leadership approval polling for the 2023 Turkish general election The 500 Most Influential Muslims Notes References Further reading Cagaptay, Soner. The new sultan: Erdogan and the crisis of modern Turkey (2nd ed. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020). online review Cagaptay, Soner. "Making Turkey Great Again." Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 43 (2019): 169–78. online Kirişci, Kemal, and Amanda Sloat. "The rise and fall of liberal democracy in Turkey: Implications for the West" Foreign Policy at Brookings (2019) online Tziarras, Zenonas. "Erdoganist authoritarianism and the 'new' Turkey." Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 18.4 (2018): 593–598. online Yavuz, M. Hakan. "A framework for understanding the Intra-Islamist conflict between the AK party and the Gülen movement." Politics, Religion & Ideology 19.1 (2018): 11–32. online Yesil, Bilge. Media in New Turkey: The Origins of an Authoritarian Neoliberal State (University of Illinois Press, 2016) online review External links Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Instagram. Archived from the original. Welcome to demokrasi: how Erdoğan got more popular than ever by The Guardian 1954 births Living people 21st-century presidents of Turkey 21st-century prime ministers of Turkey Deniers of the Armenian genocide Deputies of Istanbul Deputies of Siirt Recep Tayyip Imam Hatip school alumni Justice and Development Party (Turkey) politicians Leaders of political parties in Turkey Marmara University alumni Mayors of Istanbul Members of the 22nd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 23rd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 24th Parliament of Turkey Naqshbandi order People from Istanbul Politicians arrested in Turkey Presidents of Turkey Prime Ministers of Turkey Recipients of the Heydar Aliyev Order Recipients of the Order of the Golden Fleece (Georgia) Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 1st class Turkish Islamists Turkish Sunni Muslims Chairmen of the Organization of Turkic States Recipients of the Gagauz-Yeri Order Foreign recipients of the Nishan-e-Pakistan	false	[ "The National Commission for the Fight against Genocide (CNLG) is a Rwandan organisation that is concerned with the 1994 Rwanda genocide. They are involved with studying what happened. Their mission is to preserve the memory of the crimes and to study how it can be avoided. The organisation is mandated by section 179 of the Constitution of Rwanda.\n\nOne of their actions was to create the Kigali Genocide Memorial Centre which they achieved in collaboration with the City's council and the Aegis Trust. The Aegis Trust now manage the centre.\n\nMission \nTo prevent and fight against Genocide, its ideology and overcoming its consequences.\n\nExternal Links \n\n National Commission for the Fight Against Genocide (CNLG) website\n\nReferences\n\nConstitution of Rwanda\nRwandan genocide\nBuildings and structures in Kigali", "The Wales Genocide Memorial is a monument in the garden of the Temple of Peace in Cardiff, Wales, dedicated to the victims of the Armenian genocide that took place in Ottoman Empire carried out by the Turkish government against the Armenian population from 1915 to 1922.\n\nUnveiling \nThe memorial was erected and unveiled on November 2, 2007, at an initiative of Wales-Armenian Society. The opening of the monument was consecrated in a service conducted by Bishop Nathan Hovhannisian, Primate of the Armenian Apostolic Church of Great Britain. The ceremony was attended by Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas Presiding Officer of the National Assembly of Wales, David Yeoman, the Assistant Bishop of Llandaff, and Vahe Gabrielyan, Armenian Ambassador to the UK.\n\nOver 300 people attended the opening ceremony. Members of the Turkish community protested, saying the genocide never happened.\n\nDesecration \n\nIn the early hours of January 27, 2008 the ornate Armenian Cross was smashed by a hammer, which was found at the scene. Eilian Williams of Wales Armenia Solidarity condemned the attack, which happened just hours before a memorial service could take place in remembrance of Holocaust, Armenian genocide and Hrant Dink.\n\nEilian Williams has said \"We shall repair the cross again and again, no matter how often it is desecrated. We also challenge the UK government and the Turkish Embassy to condemn this racist attack.\"\n\nSee also \n Armenian genocide\n List of Armenian genocide memorials\n Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day\n\nExternal links\n Armenia-Wales.org\n Armenian Community and Church Council of Great Britain\n Armenian Genocide Monument in Wales Smashed on UK's Holocaust Memorial Day\n\nReferences \n\n2007 sculptures\nArmenian genocide denial\nArmenian genocide memorials\nBuildings and structures in Cardiff\nMonuments and memorials in Cardiff\nVandalized works of art in the United Kingdom" ]
[ "Recep Tayyip Erdoğan", "Armenian Genocide", "What happened in the genocide?", "mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I" ]	C_4d6e38301a82483cab0ff9378b6a238e_1	Who was responsible for this?	2	Who was responsible for the Armenian genocide?	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan	Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province. His parents are Ahmet Erdogan and Tenzile Erdogan. Erdogan reportedly said in 2003, "I'm a Georgian, my family is a Georgian family which migrated from Batumi to Rize." But in a 2014 televised interview on the NTV news network, he said, "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian... forgive me for saying this... even much uglier things, they have even called me an Armenian, but I am Turkish." In an account based on registry records, his genealogy was tracked to an ethnic Turkish family. Erdogan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father Ahmet Erdogan (1905 - 1988) was a Captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. Erdogan had a brother Mustafa (b. 1958) and sister Vesile (b. 1965). His summer holidays were mostly spent in Guneysu, Rize, where his family originates from. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdogan was 13 years old. As a teenager, he sold lemonade and sesame buns (simit) on the streets of the city's rougher districts to earn extra money. Brought up in an observant Muslim family, Erdogan graduated from Kasimpasa Piyale primary school in 1965, and Imam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. He received his high school diploma from Eyup High School. He subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences, now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences--although several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated. In his youth, Erdogan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahce wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasimpasa S.K. is named after him. Erdogan married Emine Gulbaran (born 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons; Ahmet Burak and Necmettin Bilal, and two daughters, Esra and Sumeyye. His father, Ahmet Erdogan, died in 1988 and his 88-year-old mother, Tenzile Erdogan, died in 2011. He is a member of the Community of Iskenderpasa, a Turkish sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. In 2001, Erdogan established the Justice and Development Party (AKP). The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdogan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yilmaz and Ciller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdogan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gul became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdogan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdogan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gul handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdogan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as President, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdogan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gul as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Canakkale, and one million in Izmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdogan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdogan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdogan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdogan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdogan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious." He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem." In December 2008, Erdogan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken." In November 2009, he said, "it's not possible for a Muslim to commit genocide." In 2011, Erdogan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish-Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdogan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdogan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences - such as relocation - during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". CANNOTANSWER	Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician serving as the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as prime minister of Turkey from 2003 to 2014 and as mayor of Istanbul from 1994 to 1998. He founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2001, leading it to election victories in 2002, 2007, and 2011 general elections before being required to stand down upon his election as President in 2014. He later returned to the AKP leadership in 2017 following the constitutional referendum that year. Coming from an Islamist political background and self-describing as a conservative democrat, he has promoted socially conservative and populist policies during his administration. Following the 1994 local elections, Erdoğan was elected mayor of Istanbul as the candidate of the Islamist Welfare Party. He was later stripped of his position, banned from political office, and imprisoned for four months for inciting religious hatred, due to his recitation of a poem by Ziya Gökalp. Erdoğan subsequently abandoned openly Islamist politics, establishing the moderate conservative AKP in 2001, which he went on to lead to a landslide victory in 2002. With Erdoğan still technically prohibited from holding office, the AKP's co-founder, Abdullah Gül, instead became prime minister, and later annulled Erdoğan's political ban. After winning a by-election in Siirt in 2003, Erdoğan replaced Gül as prime minister, with Gül instead becoming the AKP's candidate for the presidency. Erdoğan led the AKP to two more election victories in 2007 and 2011. The early years of Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister saw advances in negotiations for Turkey's membership of the European Union, an economic recovery following a economic crisis in 2001 and investments in infrastructure including roads, airports, and a high-speed train network. He also won two successful constitutional referendums in 2007 and 2010. However, his government remained controversial for its close links with Fethullah Gülen and his Gülen Movement (since designated as a terrorist organisation by the Turkish state) with whom the AKP was accused of orchestrating purges against secular bureaucrats and military officers through the Balyoz and Ergenekon trials. In late 2012, his government began peace negotiations with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to end the Kurdish–Turkish conflict (1978–present). The ceasefire broke down in 2015, leading to a renewed escalation in conflict. Erdoğan's foreign policy has been described as Neo-Ottoman and has led to the Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, with its focus on preventing the Syrian Democratic Forces from gaining ground on the Syria–Turkey border during the Syrian Civil War. In the more recent years of Erdoğan's rule, Turkey has experienced democratic backsliding and corruption. Starting with the anti-government protests in 2013, his government imposed growing censorship on the press and social media, temporarily restricting access to sites such as YouTube, Twitter and Wikipedia. This stalled negotiations related to Turkey's EU membership. A US$100 billion corruption scandal in 2013 led to the arrests of Erdoğan's close allies, and incriminated Erdoğan. After 11 years as head of government (Prime Minister), Erdoğan decided to run for President in 2014. At the time, the presidency was a somewhat ceremonial function. Following the 2014 elections, Erdoğan became the first popularly elected president of Turkey. The souring in relations with Gülen continued, as the government proceeded to purge his supporters from judicial, bureaucratic and military positions. A failed military coup d'état attempt in July 2016 resulted in further purges and a temporary state of emergency. The government claimed that the coup leaders were linked to Gülen, but he has denied any role in it. Erdoğan's rule has been marked with increasing authoritarianism, expansionism, censorship and banning of parties or dissent. Erdoğan supported the 2017 referendum which changed Turkey's parliamentary system into a presidential system, thus setting for the first time in Turkish history a term limit for the head of government (two full five-year terms). This new system of government formally came into place after the 2018 general election, where Erdoğan became an executive president. His party however lost the majority in the parliament and is currently in a coalition (People's Alliance) with the Turkish nationalist MHP. Erdoğan has since been tackling, but also accused of contributing to, the Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018, which has caused a significant decline in his popularity and is widely believed to have contributed to the results of the 2019 local elections, in which his party lost power in big cities like Ankara and Istanbul to opposition parties for the first time in 15 years. Family and personal life Early life Erdoğan was born in Kasımpaşa, a poor neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province in the 1930s. Erdoğan's tribe is originally from Adjara, a region in Georgia. His parents were Ahmet Erdoğan (1905–88) and Tenzile Erdoğan (née Mutlu; 1924–2011). Erdoğan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father was a captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. His summer holidays were mostly spent in Güneysu, Rize, where his family originates. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdoğan was 13 years old. As a teenager, Erdoğan's father provided him with a weekly allowance of 2.5 Turkish lira, less than a dollar. With it, Erdoğan bought postcards and resold them on the street. He sold bottles of water to drivers stuck in traffic. Erdoğan also worked as a street vendor selling simit (sesame bread rings), wearing a white gown and selling the simit from a red three-wheel cart with the rolls stacked behind glass. In his youth, Erdoğan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahçe wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasımpaşa S.K. is named after him. Erdoğan is a member of the Community of İskenderpaşa, a Turkish Sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. Education Erdoğan graduated from Kasımpaşa Piyale primary school in 1965, and İmam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. The same educational path was followed by other co-founders of the AKP party. One quarter of the curriculum of İmam Hatip schools involves study of the Qurʼān, the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and the Arabic language. Erdoğan studied the Qurʼān at an İmam Hatip, where his classmates began calling him "hoca" ("Muslim teacher"). Erdoğan attended a meeting of the nationalist student group National Turkish Student Union (Milli Türk Talebe Birliği), who sought to raise a conservative cohort of young people to counter the rising movement of leftists in Turkey. Within the group, Erdoğan was distinguished by his oratorical skills, developing a penchant for public speaking and excelling in front of an audience. He won first place in a poetry-reading competition organized by the Community of Turkish Technical Painters, and began preparing for speeches through reading and research. Erdoğan would later comment on these competitions as "enhancing our courage to speak in front of the masses". Erdoğan wanted to pursue advanced studies at Mekteb-i Mülkiye, but Mülkiye accepted only students with regular high school diplomas, and not İmam Hatip graduates. Mülkiye was known for its political science department, which trained many statesmen and politicians in Turkey. Erdoğan was then admitted to Eyüp High School, a regular state school, and eventually received his high school diploma from Eyüp. According to his official biography, he subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences (), now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. Several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated, or even attended at all. Family Erdoğan married Emine Gülbaran (b. 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons, Ahmet Burak (b. 1979) and Necmettin Bilal (b. 1981), and two daughters, Esra (b. 1983) and Sümeyye (b. 1985). His father, Ahmet Erdoğan, died in 1988 and his mother, Tenzile Erdoğan, died in 2011 at the age of 88. Erdoğan has a brother, Mustafa (b. 1958), and a sister, Vesile (b. 1965). From his father's first marriage to Havuli Erdoğan (d. 1980), he had two half-brothers: Mehmet (1926–1988) and Hasan (1929–2006). Early political career In 1976, Erdoğan engaged in politics by joining the National Turkish Student Union, an anti-communist action group. In the same year, he became the head of the Beyoğlu youth branch of the Islamist National Salvation Party (MSP), and was later promoted to chair of the Istanbul youth branch of the party. Holding this position until 1980, he served as consultant and senior executive in the private sector during the era following the 1980 military coup when political parties were closed down. In 1983, Erdoğan followed most of Necmettin Erbakan's followers into the Islamist Welfare Party. He became the party's Beyoğlu district chair in 1984, and in 1985 he became the chair of the Istanbul city branch. He was elected to parliament in 1991, but was barred from taking his seat. Mayor of Istanbul (1994–1998) In the local elections of 27 March 1994, Erdoğan was elected Mayor of Istanbul with 25.19% of the popular vote. Erdoğan was a 40-year-old dark horse candidate who had been mocked by the mainstream media and treated as a country bumpkin by his opponents. He was pragmatic in office, tackling many chronic problems in Istanbul including water shortage, pollution and traffic chaos. The water shortage problem was solved with the laying of hundreds of kilometers of new pipelines. The garbage problem was solved with the establishment of state-of-the-art recycling facilities. While Erdoğan was in office, air pollution was reduced through a plan developed to switch to natural gas. He changed the public buses to environmentally friendly ones. The city's traffic and transportation jams were reduced with more than fifty bridges, viaducts, and highways built. He took precautions to prevent corruption, using measures to ensure that municipal funds were used prudently. He paid back a major portion of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality's two-billion-dollar debt and invested four billion dollars in the city. Erdoğan initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors. A seven-member international jury from the United Nations unanimously awarded Erdoğan the UN-Habitat award. Imprisonment In 1998, the fundamentalist Welfare Party was declared unconstitutional on the grounds of threatening the secularism of Turkey and was shut down by the Turkish constitutional court. Erdoğan became a prominent speaker at demonstrations held by his party colleagues. In December 1997 in Siirt, Erdoğan recited a poem from a work written by Ziya Gökalp, a pan-Turkish activist of the early 20th century. His recitation included verses translated as "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers...." which are not in the original version of the poem. Erdoğan said the poem had been approved by the education ministry to be published in textbooks. Under article 312/2 of the Turkish penal code his recitation was regarded as an incitement to violence and religious or racial hatred. He was given a ten-month prison sentence of which he served four months, from 24 March 1999 to 27 July 1999. Due to his conviction, Erdoğan was forced to give up his mayoral position. The conviction also stipulated a political ban, which prevented him from participating in parliamentary elections. He had appealed for the sentence to be converted to a monetary fine, but it was reduced to 120 days instead. In 2017, this period of Erdoğan's life was made into a film titled Reis. Justice and Development Party Erdoğan was member of political parties that kept getting banned by the army or judges. Within his Virtue Party, there was a dispute about the appropriate discourse of the party between traditional politicians and pro-reform politicians. The latter envisioned a party that could operate within the limits of the system, and thus not getting banned as its predecessors like National Order Party, National Salvation Party and Welfare Party. They wanted to give the group the character of an ordinary conservative party following the example of the European Christian democratic parties. When the Virtue Party was also banned in 2001, a definitive split took place: the followers of Necmettin Erbakan founded the Felicity Party (SP) and the reformers founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) under the leadership of Abdullah Gül and Erdoğan. The pro-reform politicians realized that a strictly Islamic party would never be accepted as a governing party by the state apparatus and they believed that an Islamic party did not appeal to more than about 20 percent of the Turkish electorate. The AK party emphatically placed itself as a broad democratic conservative party with new politicians from the political center (like Ali Babacan and Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu), while respecting Islamic norms and values, but without an explicit religious program. This turned out to be successful as the new party won 34% of the vote in the general elections of 2002. Erdoğan became prime minister in March 2003 after the Gül government ended his political ban. Premiership (2003–2014) General elections The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdoğan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yılmaz and Çiller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdoğan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gül became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdoğan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdoğan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gül handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdoğan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as president, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdoğan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gül as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Çanakkale, and one million in İzmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdoğan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdoğan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdoğan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdoğan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Referendums After the opposition parties deadlocked the 2007 presidential election by boycotting the parliament, the ruling AKP proposed a constitutional reform package. The reform package was first vetoed by president Sezer. Then he applied to the Turkish constitutional court about the reform package, because the president is unable to veto amendments for the second time. The Turkish constitutional court did not find any problems in the packet and 68.95% of the voters supported the constitutional changes. The reforms consisted of electing the president by popular vote instead of by parliament; reducing the presidential term from seven years to five; allowing the president to stand for re-election for a second term; holding general elections every four years instead of five; and reducing from 367 to 184 the quorum of lawmakers needed for parliamentary decisions. Reforming the Constitution was one of the main pledges of the AKP during the 2007 election campaign. The main opposition party CHP was not interested in altering the Constitution on a big scale, making it impossible to form a Constitutional Commission (Anayasa Uzlaşma Komisyonu). The amendments lacked the two-thirds majority needed to become law instantly, but secured 336 votes in the 550-seat parliament – enough to put the proposals to a referendum. The reform package included a number of issues such as the right of individuals to appeal to the highest court, the creation of the ombudsman's office; the possibility to negotiate a nationwide labour contract; gender equality; the ability of civilian courts to convict members of the military; the right of civil servants to go on strike; a privacy law; and the structure of the Constitutional Court. The referendum was agreed by a majority of 58%. Domestic Policy Kurdish issue In 2009, Prime Minister Erdoğan's government announced a plan to help end the quarter-century-long Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict that had cost more than 40,000 lives. The government's plan, supported by the European Union, intended to allow the Kurdish language to be used in all broadcast media and political campaigns, and restored Kurdish names to cities and towns that had been given Turkish ones. Erdoğan said, "We took a courageous step to resolve chronic issues that constitute an obstacle along Turkey's development, progression and empowerment". Erdoğan passed a partial amnesty to reduce penalties faced by many members of the Kurdish guerrilla movement PKK who had surrendered to the government. On 23 November 2011, during a televised meeting of his party in Ankara, he apologised on behalf of the state for the Dersim massacre, where many Alevis and Zazas were killed. In 2013 the government of Erdoğan began a peace process between the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Turkish Government, mediated by parliamentarians of the Peoples' Democratic party (HDP). In 2015 he decided that the peace process was over and supported the lift of the parliamentary immunity of the HDP parliamentarians. During his presidency a law was introduced which banned the use of the word Kurdistan in parliament and in a speech he held for the local election of 2019 he told the HDP politicians that if there is no Kurdistan in Turkey and if they looked for one they should go to Northern Iraq. Armenian genocide Prime Minister Erdoğan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdoğan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious". He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem". In December 2008, Erdoğan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken". In November 2009, he said, "it is not possible for those who belong to the Muslim faith to carry out genocide". In 2011, Erdoğan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish–Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdoğan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdoğan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences – such as relocation – during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". The Ottoman Parliament of 1915 had previously used the term "relocation" to describe the purpose of the Tehcir Law, which resulted in the deaths of anywhere between 800,000 and over 1,800,000 Armenian civilians in what is commonly referred to as the Armenian Genocide. Pope Francis in April 2015, at a special mass in St. Peter's Basilica marking the centenary of the events, described atrocities against Armenian civilians in 1915–1922 as "the first genocide of the 20th century". In protest, Erdoğan recalled the Turkish ambassador from the Vatican, and summoned the Vatican's ambassador, to express "disappointment" at what he called a discriminatory message. He later stated "we don’t carry a stain or a shadow like genocide". US President Barack Obama called for a "full, frank and just acknowledgement of the facts", but again stopped short of labelling it "genocide", despite his campaign promise to do so. Human rights During Erdoğan's time as Prime Minister, the far-reaching powers of the 1991 Anti-Terror Law were reduced and the Democratic initiative process was initiated, with the goal to improve democratic standards in general and the rights of ethnic and religious minorities in particular. However, after Turkey's bid to join the European Union stalled, European officials noted a return to more authoritarian ways, notably on freedom of speech, freedom of the press and Kurdish minority rights. Demands by activists for the recognition of LGBT rights were publicly rejected by government members, and members of the Turkish LGBT community were insulted by cabinet members. Reporters Without Borders observed a continuous decrease in Freedom of the Press during Erdoğan's later terms, with a rank of around 100 on the Press Freedom Index during his first term and a rank of 153 out of a total of 179 countries in 2021. Freedom House saw a slight recovery in later years and awarded Turkey a Press Freedom Score of 55/100 in 2012 after a low point of 48/100 in 2006. In 2011, Erdoğan's government made legal reforms to return properties of Christian and Jewish minorities which were seized by the Turkish government in the 1930s. The total value of the properties returned reached $2 billion (USD). Under Erdoğan, the Turkish government tightened the laws on the sale and consumption of alcohol, banning all advertising and increasing the tax on alcoholic beverages. Economy In 2002, Erdoğan inherited a Turkish economy that was beginning to recover from a recession as a result of reforms implemented by Kemal Derviş. Erdoğan supported Finance Minister Ali Babacan in enforcing macro-economic policies. Erdoğan tried to attract more foreign investors to Turkey and lifted many government regulations. The cash-flow into the Turkish economy between 2002 and 2012 caused a growth of 64% in real GDP and a 43% increase in GDP per capita; considerably higher numbers were commonly advertised but these did not account for the inflation of the US dollar between 2002 and 2012. The average annual growth in GDP per capita was 3.6%. The growth in real GDP between 2002 and 2012 was higher than the values from developed countries, but was close to average when developing countries are also taken into account. The ranking of the Turkish economy in terms of GDP moved slightly from 17 to 16 during this decade. A major consequence of the policies between 2002 and 2012 was the widening of the current account deficit from US$600 million to US$58 billion (2013 est.) Since 1961, Turkey has signed 19 IMF loan accords. Erdoğan's government satisfied the budgetary and market requirements of the two during his administration and received every loan installment, the only time any Turkish government has done so. Erdoğan inherited a debt of $23.5 billion to the IMF, which was reduced to $0.9 billion in 2012. He decided not to sign a new deal. Turkey's debt to the IMF was thus declared to be completely paid and he announced that the IMF could borrow from Turkey. In 2010, five-year credit default swaps for Turkey's sovereign debt were trading at a record low of 1.17%, below those of nine EU member countries and Russia. In 2002, the Turkish Central Bank had $26.5 billion in reserves. This amount reached $92.2 billion in 2011. During Erdoğan's leadership, inflation fell from 32% to 9.0% in 2004. Since then, Turkish inflation has continued to fluctuate around 9% and is still one of the highest inflation rates in the world. The Turkish public debt as a percentage of annual GDP declined from 74% in 2002 to 39% in 2009. In 2012, Turkey had a lower ratio of public debt to GDP than 21 of 27 members of the European Union and a lower budget deficit to GDP ratio than 23 of them. In 2003, Erdoğan's government pushed through the Labor Act, a comprehensive reform of Turkey's labor laws. The law greatly expanded the rights of employees, establishing a 45-hour workweek and limiting overtime work to 270 hours a year, provided legal protection against discrimination due to sex, religion, or political affiliation, prohibited discrimination between permanent and temporary workers, entitled employees terminated without "valid cause" to compensation, and mandated written contracts for employment arrangements lasting a year or more. Education Erdoğan increased the budget of the Ministry of Education from 7.5 billion lira in 2002 to 34 billion lira in 2011, the highest share of the national budget given to one ministry. Before his prime ministership the military received the highest share of the national budget. Compulsory education was increased from eight years to twelve. In 2003, the Turkish government, together with UNICEF, initiated a campaign called "Come on girls, [let's go] to school!" (). The goal of this campaign was to close the gender gap in primary school enrollment through the provision of a quality basic education for all girls, especially in southeast Turkey. In 2005, the parliament granted amnesty to students expelled from universities before 2003. The amnesty applied to students dismissed on academic or disciplinary grounds. In 2004, textbooks became free of charge and since 2008 every province in Turkey has its own university. During Erdoğan's Premiership, the number of universities in Turkey nearly doubled, from 98 in 2002 to 186 in October 2012. The Prime Minister kept his campaign promises by starting the Fatih project in which all state schools, from preschool to high school level, received a total of 620,000 smart boards, while tablet computers were distributed to 17 million students and approximately one million teachers and administrators. In June 2017 a draft proposal by the ministry of education was approved by Erdoğan, in which the curriculum for schools excluded the teaching of the theory of evolution of Charles Darwin by 2019. From then on the teaching will be postponed and start at undergraduate level. Infrastructure Under Erdoğan's government, the number of airports in Turkey increased from 26 to 50 in the period of 10 years. Between the founding of the Republic of Turkey in 1923 and 2002, there had been 6,000 km of dual carriageway roads created. Between 2002 and 2011, another 13,500 km of expressway were built. Due to these measures, the number of motor accidents fell by 50 percent. For the first time in Turkish history, high speed railway lines were constructed, and the country's high-speed train service began in 2009. In 8 years, 1,076 km of railway were built and 5,449 km of railway renewed. The construction of Marmaray, an undersea rail tunnel under the Bosphorus strait, started in 2004. It was inaugurated on the 90th anniversary of the Turkish Republic 29 October 2013. The inauguration of the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge, the third bridge over the Bosphorus, was on 26 August 2016. Justice In March 2006, the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) held a press conference to publicly protest the obstruction of the appointment of judges to the high courts for over 10 months. The HSYK said Erdoğan wanted to fill the vacant posts with his own appointees. Erdoğan was accused of creating a rift with Turkey's highest court of appeal, the Yargıtay, and high administrative court, the Danıştay. Erdoğan stated that the constitution gave the power to assign these posts to his elected party. In May 2007, the head of Turkey's High Court asked prosecutors to consider whether Erdoğan should be charged over critical comments regarding the election of Abdullah Gül as president. Erdoğan said the ruling was "a disgrace to the justice system", and criticized the Constitutional Court which had invalidated a presidential vote because a boycott by other parties meant there was no quorum. Prosecutors investigated his earlier comments, including saying it had fired a "bullet at democracy". Tülay Tuğcu, head of the Constitutional Court, condemned Erdoğan for "threats, insults and hostility" towards the justice system. Civil–military relations The Turkish military has had a record of intervening in politics, having removed elected governments four times in the past. During the Erdoğan government, civil–military relationship moved towards normalization in which the influence of the military in politics was significantly reduced. The ruling Justice and Development Party has often faced off against the military, gaining political power by challenging a pillar of the country's laicistic establishment. The most significant issue that caused deep fissures between the army and the government was the midnight e-memorandum posted on the military's website objecting to the selection of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül as the ruling party's candidate for the Presidency in 2007. The military argued that the election of Gül, whose wife wears an Islamic headscarf, could undermine the laicistic order of the country. Contrary to expectations, the government responded harshly to former Chief of General Staff Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt's e-memorandum, stating the military had nothing to do with the selection of the presidential candidate. Health care After assuming power in 2003, Erdoğan's government embarked on a sweeping reform program of the Turkish healthcare system, called the Health Transformation Program (HTP), to greatly increase the quality of healthcare and protect all citizens from financial risks. Its introduction coincided with the period of sustained economic growth, allowing the Turkish government to put greater investments into the healthcare system. As part of the reforms, the "Green Card" program, which provides health benefits to the poor, was expanded in 2004. The reform program aimed at increasing the ratio of private to state-run healthcare, which, along with long queues in state-run hospitals, resulted in the rise of private medical care in Turkey, forcing state-run hospitals to compete by increasing quality. In April 2006, Erdoğan unveiled a social security reform package demanded by the International Monetary Fund under a loan deal. The move, which Erdoğan called one of the most radical reforms ever, was passed with fierce opposition. Turkey's three social security bodies were united under one roof, bringing equal health services and retirement benefits for members of all three bodies. The previous system had been criticized for reserving the best healthcare for civil servants and relegating others to wait in long queues. Under the second bill, everyone under the age of 18 years was entitled to free health services, irrespective of whether they pay premiums to any social security organization. The bill also envisages a gradual increase in the retirement age: starting from 2036, the retirement age will increase to 65 by 2048 for both women and men. In January 2008, the Turkish Parliament adopted a law to prohibit smoking in most public places. Erdoğan is outspokenly anti-smoking. Foreign policy Turkish foreign policy during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister has been associated with the name of Ahmet Davutoğlu. Davutoğlu was the chief foreign policy advisor of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan before he was appointed foreign minister in 2009. The basis of Erdoğan's foreign policy is based on the principle of "don't make enemies, make friends" and the pursuit of "zero problems" with neighboring countries. Erdoğan is co-founder of United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (AOC). The initiative seeks to galvanize international action against extremism through the forging of international, intercultural and inter-religious dialogue and cooperation. European Union When Erdoğan came to power, he continued Turkey's long ambition of joining the European Union. On 3 October 2005 negotiations began for Turkey's accession to the European Union. Erdoğan was named "The European of the Year 2004" by the newspaper European Voice for the reforms in his country in order to accomplish the accession of Turkey to the European Union. He said in a comment that "Turkey's accession shows that Europe is a continent where civilisations reconcile and not clash." On 3 October 2005, the negotiations for Turkey's accession to the EU formally started during Erdoğan's tenure as Prime Minister. The European Commission generally supports Erdoğan's reforms, but remains critical of his policies. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize EU member state Cyprus. Greece and Cyprus dispute Relations between Greece and Turkey were normalized during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister. In May 2004, Erdoğan became the first Turkish Prime Minister to visit Greece since 1988, and the first to visit the Turkish minority of Thrace since 1952. In 2007, Erdoğan and Greek Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis inaugurated the Greek-Turkish natural gas pipeline giving Caspian gas its first direct Western outlet. Turkey and Greece signed an agreement to create a Combined Joint Operational Unit within the framework of NATO to participate in Peace Support Operations. Erdoğan and his party strongly supported the EU-backed referendum to reunify Cyprus in 2004. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships as a consequence of the economic isolation of the internationally unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the failure of the EU to end the isolation, as it had promised in 2004. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize the Republic of Cyprus. Armenia Armenia is Turkey's only neighbor which Erdoğan has not visited during his premiership. The Turkish-Armenian border has been closed since 1993 because of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with Turkey's close ally Azerbaijan. Diplomatic efforts resulted in the signing of protocols between Turkish and Armenian Foreign Ministers in Switzerland to improve relations between the two countries. One of the points of the agreement was the creation of a joint commission on the issue. The Armenian Constitutional Court decided that the commission contradicts the Armenian constitution. Turkey responded saying that Armenian court's ruling on the protocols is not acceptable, resulting in a suspension of the rectification process by the Turkish side. Erdoğan has said that Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan should apologize for calling on school children to re-occupy eastern Turkey. When asked by a student at a literature contest ceremony if Armenians will be able to get back their "western territories" along with Mt. Ararat, Sarksyan said, "This is the task of your generation". Russia In December 2004, President Putin visited Turkey, making it the first presidential visit in the history of Turkish-Russian relations besides that of the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Nikolai Podgorny in 1972. In November 2005, Putin attended the inauguration of a jointly constructed Blue Stream natural gas pipeline in Turkey. This sequence of top-level visits has brought several important bilateral issues to the forefront. The two countries consider it their strategic goal to achieve "multidimensional co-operation", especially in the fields of energy, transport and the military. Specifically, Russia aims to invest in Turkey's fuel and energy industries, and it also expects to participate in tenders for the modernisation of Turkey's military. The relations during this time are described by President Medvedev as "Turkey is one of our most important partners with respect to regional and international issues. We can confidently say that Russian-Turkish relations have advanced to the level of a multidimensional strategic partnership". In May 2010, Turkey and Russia signed 17 agreements to enhance cooperation in energy and other fields, including pacts to build Turkey's first nuclear power plant and further plans for an oil pipeline from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. The leaders of both countries also signed an agreement on visa-free travel, enabling tourists to get into the other country for free and stay there for up to 30 days. United States When Barack Obama became President of United States, he made his first overseas bilateral meeting to Turkey in April 2009. At a joint news conference in Turkey, Obama said: "I'm trying to make a statement about the importance of Turkey, not just to the United States but to the world. I think that where there's the most promise of building stronger U.S.-Turkish relations is in the recognition that Turkey and the United States can build a model partnership in which a predominantly Christian nation, a predominantly Muslim nation – a Western nation and a nation that straddles two continents," he continued, "that we can create a modern international community that is respectful, that is secure, that is prosperous, that there are not tensions – inevitable tensions between cultures – which I think is extraordinarily important." Iraq Turkey under Erdoğan was named by the Bush Administration as a part of the "coalition of the willing" that was central to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. On 1 March 2003, a motion allowing Turkish military to participate in the U.S-led coalition's invasion of Iraq, along with the permission for foreign troops to be stationed in Turkey for this purpose, was overruled by the Turkish Parliament. After the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iraq and Turkey signed 48 trade agreements on issues including security, energy, and water. The Turkish government attempted to mend relations with Iraqi Kurdistan by opening a Turkish university in Erbil, and a Turkish consulate in Mosul. Erdoğan's government fostered economic and political relations with Irbil, and Turkey began to consider the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq as an ally against Maliki's government. Israel Erdoğan visited Israel on 1 May 2005, a gesture unusual for a leader of a Muslim majority country. During his trip, Erdoğan visited the Yad Vashem, Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. The President of Israel Shimon Peres addressed the Turkish parliament during a visit in 2007, the first time an Israeli leader had addressed the legislature of a predominantly Muslim nation. Their relationship worsened at the 2009 World Economic Forum conference over Israel's actions during the Gaza War. Erdoğan was interrupted by the moderator while he was responding to Peres. Erdoğan stated: "Mister Peres, you are older than I am. Maybe you are feeling guilty and that is why you are raising your voice. When it comes to killing you know it too well. I remember how you killed the children on beaches..." Upon the moderator's reminder that they needed to adjourn for dinner, Erdoğan left the panel, accusing the moderator of giving Peres more time than all the other panelists combined. Tensions increased further following the Gaza flotilla raid in May 2010. Erdoğan strongly condemned the raid, describing it as "state terrorism", and demanded an Israeli apology. In February 2013, Erdoğan called Zionism a "crime against humanity", comparing it to Islamophobia, antisemitism, and fascism. He later retracted the statement, saying he had been misinterpreted. He said "everyone should know" that his comments were directed at "Israeli policies", especially as regards to "Gaza and the settlements." Erdoğan's statements were criticized by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, among others. In August 2013, the Hürriyet reported that Erdoğan had claimed to have evidence of Israel's responsibility for the removal of Morsi from office in Egypt. The Israeli and Egyptian governments dismissed the suggestion. In response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. He also stated that "If Israel continues with this attitude, it will definitely be tried at international courts." Syria During Erdoğan's term of office, diplomatic relations between Turkey and Syria significantly deteriorated. In 2004, President Bashar al-Assad arrived in Turkey for the first official visit by a Syrian President in 57 years. In late 2004, Erdoğan signed a free trade agreement with Syria. Visa restrictions between the two countries were lifted in 2009, which caused an economic boom in the regions near the Syrian border. However, in 2011 the relationship between the two countries was strained following the outbreak of conflict in Syria. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he was trying to "cultivate a favorable relationship with whatever government would take the place of Assad". However, he began to support the opposition in Syria, after demonstrations turned violent, creating a serious Syrian refugee problem in Turkey. Erdoğan's policy of providing military training for anti-Damascus fighters has also created conflict with Syria's ally and a neighbour of Turkey, Iran. Saudi Arabia In August 2006, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz as-Saud made a visit to Turkey. This was the first visit by a Saudi monarch to Turkey in the last four decades. The monarch made a second visit, on 9 November 2007. Turk-Saudi trade volume has exceeded 3.2 billion in 2006, almost double the figure achieved in 2003. In 2009, this amount reached 5.5 billion and the goal for the year 2010 was 10 billion. Erdoğan condemned the Saudi-led intervention in Bahrain and characterized the Saudi movement as "a new Karbala." He demanded withdrawal of Saudi forces from Bahrain. Egypt Erdoğan had made his first official visit to Egypt on 12 September 2011, accompanied by six ministers and 200 businessmen. This visit was made very soon after Turkey had ejected Israeli ambassadors, cutting off all diplomatic relations with Israel because Israel refused to apologize for the Gaza flotilla raid which killed eight Turkish and one Turco-American. Erdoğan's visit to Egypt was met with much enthusiasm by Egyptians. CNN reported some Egyptians saying "We consider him as the Islamic leader in the Middle East", while others were appreciative of his role in supporting Gaza. Erdoğan was later honored in Tahrir Square by members of the Egyptian Revolution Youth Union, and members of the Turkish embassy were presented with a coat of arms in acknowledgment of the Prime Minister's support of the Egyptian Revolution. Erdoğan stated in a 2011 interview that he supported secularism for Egypt, which generated an angry reaction among Islamic movements, especially the Freedom and Justice Party, which was the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, commentators suggest that by forming an alliance with the military junta during Egypt's transition to democracy, Erdoğan may have tipped the balance in favor of an authoritarian government. Erdoğan condemned the sit-in dispersals conducted by Egyptian police on 14 August 2013 at the Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda squares, where violent clashes between police officers and pro-Morsi Islamist protesters led to hundreds of deaths, mostly protesters. In July 2014, one year after the removal of Mohamed Morsi from office, Erdoğan described Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as an "illegitimate tyrant". Somalia Erdoğan's administration maintains strong ties with the Somali government. During the drought of 2011, Erdoğan's government contributed over $201 million to humanitarian relief efforts in the impacted parts of Somalia. Following a greatly improved security situation in Mogadishu in mid-2011, the Turkish government also re-opened its foreign embassy with the intention of more effectively assisting in the post-conflict development process. It was among the first foreign governments to resume formal diplomatic relations with Somalia after the civil war. In May 2010, the Turkish and Somali governments signed a military training agreement, in keeping with the provisions outlined in the Djibouti Peace Process. Turkish Airlines became the first long-distance international commercial airline in two decades to resume flights to and from Mogadishu's Aden Adde International Airport. Turkey also launched various development and infrastructure projects in Somalia including building several hospitals and helping renovate the National Assembly building. Protests 2013 Gezi Park protests against the perceived authoritarianism of Erdoğan and his policies, starting from a small sit-in in Istanbul in defense of a city park. After the police's intense reaction with tear gas, the protests grew each day. Faced by the largest mass protest in a decade, Erdoğan made this controversial remark in a televised speech: "The police were there yesterday, they are there today, and they will be there tomorrow". After weeks of clashes in the streets of Istanbul, his government at first apologized to the protestors and called for a plebiscite, but then ordered a crackdown on the protesters. Presidency (2014–present) Erdoğan took the oath of office on 28 August 2014 and became the 12th president of Turkey. He administered the new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu's oath on 29 August. When asked about his lower-than-expected 51.79% share of the vote, he allegedly responded, "there were even those who did not like the Prophet. I, however, won 52%". Assuming the role of President, Erdoğan was criticized for openly stating that he would not maintain the tradition of presidential neutrality. Erdoğan has also stated his intention to pursue a more active role as president, such as utilising the President's rarely used cabinet-calling powers. The political opposition has argued that Erdoğan will continue to pursue his own political agenda, controlling the government, while his new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu would be docile and submissive. Furthermore, the domination of loyal Erdoğan supporters in Davutoğlu's cabinet fuelled speculation that Erdoğan intended to exercise substantial control over the government. Presidential elections On 1 July 2014, Erdoğan was named the AKP's presidential candidate in the Turkish presidential election. His candidacy was announced by the Deputy President of the AKP, Mehmet Ali Şahin. Erdoğan made a speech after the announcement and used the 'Erdoğan logo' for the first time. The logo was criticised because it was very similar to the logo that U.S. President Barack Obama used in the 2008 presidential election. Erdoğan was elected as the President of Turkey in the first round of the election with 51.79% of the vote, obviating the need for a run-off by winning over 50%. The joint candidate of the CHP, MHP and 13 other opposition parties, former Organisation of Islamic Co-operation general secretary Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu won 38.44% of the vote. The pro-Kurdish HDP candidate Selahattin Demirtaş won 9.76%. The 2018 Turkish presidential election took place as part of the 2018 general election, alongside parliamentary elections on the same day. Following the approval of constitutional changes in a referendum held in 2017, the elected President will be both the head of state and head of government of Turkey, taking over the latter role from the to-be-abolished office of the Prime Minister. Incumbent president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declared his candidacy for the People's Alliance (Turkish: Cumhur İttifakı) on 27 April 2018. Erdoğan's main opposition, the Republican People's Party, nominated Muharrem İnce, a member of the parliament known for his combative opposition and spirited speeches against Erdoğan. Besides these candidates, Meral Akşener, the founder and leader of İyi Party, Temel Karamollaoğlu, the leader of the Felicity Party and Doğu Perinçek, the leader of the Patriotic Party, have announced their candidacies and collected the 100,000 signatures required for nomination. The alliance which Erdoğan was candidate for won 52.59% of the popular vote. Referendum In April 2017, a constitutional referendum was held, where the voters in Turkey (and Turkish citizens abroad) approved a set of 18 proposed amendments to the Constitution of Turkey. The amendments included the replacement of the existing parliamentary system with a presidential system. The post of Prime Minister would be abolished, and the presidency would become an executive post vested with broad executive powers. The parliament seats would be increased from 550 to 600 and the age of candidacy to the parliament was lowered from 25 to 18. The referendum also called for changes to the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors. Local elections In the 2019 local elections, the ruling party AKP lost control of Istanbul and Ankara for the first time in 25 years, as well as 5 of Turkey's 6 largest cities. The loss has been widely attributed to Erdoğan's mismanagement of the Turkish economic crisis, rising authoritarianism as well as the alleged government inaction on the Syrian refugee crisis. Soon after the elections, Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey ordered a re-election in Istanbul, cancelling Ekrem İmamoğlu's mayoral certificate. The decision led to a significant decrease of Erdoğan's and AKP's popularity and his party lost the elections again in June with a greater margin. The result was seen as a huge blow to Erdoğan, who had once said that if his party 'lost Istanbul, we would lose Turkey. The opposition's victory was characterised as 'the beginning of the end' for Erdoğan', with international commentators calling the re-run a huge government miscalculation that led to a potential İmamoğlu candidacy in the next scheduled presidential election. It is suspected that the scale of the government's defeat could provoke a cabinet reshuffle and early general elections, currently scheduled for June 2023. The New Zealand and Australian governments and opposition CHP party have criticized Erdoğan after he repeatedly showed video taken by the Christchurch mosque shooter to his supporters at campaign rallies for 31 March local elections and said Australians and New Zealanders who came to Turkey with anti-Muslim sentiments "would be sent back in coffins like their grandfathers" at Gallipoli. Domestic policy Presidential palace Erdoğan has also received criticism for the construction of a new palace called Ak Saray (pure white palace), which occupies approximately 50 acres of Atatürk Forest Farm (AOÇ) in Ankara. Since the AOÇ is protected land, several court orders were issued to halt the construction of the new palace, though building work went on nonetheless. The opposition described the move as a clear disregard for the rule of law. The project was subject to heavy criticism and allegations were made; of corruption during the construction process, wildlife destruction and the complete obliteration of the zoo in the AOÇ in order to make way for the new compound. The fact that the palace is technically illegal has led to it being branded as the 'Kaç-Ak Saray', the word kaçak in Turkish meaning 'illegal'. Ak Saray was originally designed as a new office for the Prime Minister. However, upon assuming the presidency, Erdoğan announced that the palace would become the new Presidential Palace, while the Çankaya Mansion will be used by the Prime Minister instead. The move was seen as a historic change since the Çankaya Mansion had been used as the iconic office of the presidency ever since its inception. The Ak Saray has almost 1,000 rooms and cost $350 million (€270 million), leading to huge criticism at a time when mining accidents and workers' rights had been dominating the agenda. On 29 October 2014, Erdoğan was due to hold a Republic Day reception in the new palace to commemorate the 91st anniversary of the Republic of Turkey and to officially inaugurate the Presidential Palace. However, after most invited participants announced that they would boycott the event and a mining accident occurred in the district of Ermenek in Karaman, the reception was cancelled. The media President Erdoğan and his government continue to press for court action against the remaining free press in Turkey. The latest newspaper that has been seized is Zaman, in March 2016. After the seizure Morton Abramowitz and Eric Edelman, former U.S. ambassadors to Turkey, condemned President Erdoğan's actions in an opinion piece published by The Washington Post: "Clearly, democracy cannot flourish under Erdoğan now". "The overall pace of reforms in Turkey has not only slowed down but in some key areas, such as freedom of expression and the independence of the judiciary, there has been a regression, which is particularly worrying", rapporteur Kati Piri said in April 2016 after the European Parliament passed its annual progress report on Turkey. On 22 June 2016, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that he considered himself successful in "destroying" Turkish civil groups "working against the state", a conclusion that had been confirmed some days earlier by Sedat Laçiner, Professor of International Relations and rector of the Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University: "Outlawing unarmed and peaceful opposition, sentencing people to unfair punishment under erroneous terror accusations, will feed genuine terrorism in Erdoğan’s Turkey. Guns and violence will become the sole alternative for legally expressing free thought". After the coup attempt, over 200 journalists were arrested and over 120 media outlets were closed. Cumhuriyet journalists were detained in November 2016 after a long-standing crackdown on the newspaper. Subsequently, Reporters Without Borders called Erdoğan an "enemy of press freedom" and said that he "hides his aggressive dictatorship under a veneer of democracy". In April 2017, Turkey blocked all access to Wikipedia over a content dispute. The Turkish government lifted a two-and-a-half-year ban on Wikipedia on 15 January 2020, restoring access to the online encyclopedia a month after Turkey's top court ruled that blocking Wikipedia was unconstitutional. On 1 July 2020, in a statement made to his party members, Erdoğan announced that the government would introduce new measures and regulations to control or shut down social media platforms such as YouTube, Twitter and Netflix. Through these new measures, each company would be required to appoint an official representative in the country to respond to legal concerns. The decision comes after a number of Twitter users insulted his daughter Esra after she welcomed her fourth child. State of emergency and purges On 20 July 2016, President Erdoğan declared the state of emergency, citing the coup d'état attempt as justification. It was first scheduled to last three months. The Turkish parliament approved this measure. The state of emergency was later extended for another three months, amidst the ongoing 2016 Turkish purges including comprehensive purges of independent media and detention of tens of thousands of Turkish citizens politically opposed to Erdoğan. More than 50,000 people have been arrested and over 160,000 fired from their jobs by March 2018. In August 2016, Erdoğan began rounding up journalists who had been publishing, or who were about to publish articles questioning corruption within the Erdoğan administration, and incarcerating them. The number of Turkish journalists jailed by Turkey is higher than any other country, including all of those journalists currently jailed in North Korea, Cuba, Russia, and China combined. In the wake of the coup attempt of July 2016 the Erdoğan administration began rounding up tens of thousands of individuals, both from within the government, and from the public sector, and incarcerating them on charges of alleged "terrorism". As a result of these arrests, many in the international community complained about the lack of proper judicial process in the incarceration of Erdoğan's opposition. In April 2017 Erdoğan successfully sponsored legislation effectively making it illegal for the Turkish legislative branch to investigate his executive branch of government. Without the checks and balances of freedom of speech, and the freedom of the Turkish legislature to hold him accountable for his actions, many have likened Turkey's current form of government to a dictatorship with only nominal forms of democracy in practice. At the time of Erdoğan's successful passing of the most recent legislation silencing his opposition, United States President Donald Trump called Erdoğan to congratulate him for his "recent referendum victory". On 29 April 2017 Erdoğan's administration began an internal Internet block of all of the Wikipedia online encyclopedia site via Turkey's domestic Internet filtering system. This blocking action took place after the government had first made a request for Wikipedia to remove what it referred to as "offensive content". In response, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales replied via a post on Twitter stating, "Access to information is a fundamental human right. Turkish people, I will always stand with you and fight for this right." In January 2016, more than a thousand academics signed a petition criticizing Turkey's military crackdown on ethnic Kurdish towns and neighborhoods in the east of the country, such as Sur (a district of Diyarbakır), Silvan, Nusaybin, Cizre and Silopi, and asking an end to violence. Erdoğan accused those who signed the petition of "terrorist propaganda", calling them "the darkest of people". He called for action by institutions and universities, stating, "Everyone who benefits from this state but is now an enemy of the state must be punished without further delay". Within days, over 30 of the signatories were arrested, many in dawn-time raids on their homes. Although all were quickly released, nearly half were fired from their jobs, eliciting a denunciation from Turkey's Science Academy for such "wrong and disturbing" treatment. Erdoğan vowed that the academics would pay the price for "falling into a pit of treachery". On 8 July 2018, Erdoğan sacked 18,000 officials for alleged ties to US based cleric Fethullah Gülen, shortly before renewing his term as an executive president. Of those removed, 9000 were police officers with 5000 from the armed forces with the addition of hundreds of academics. Foreign policy Europe In February 2016, Erdoğan threatened to send the millions of refugees in Turkey to EU member states, saying: "We can open the doors to Greece and Bulgaria anytime and we can put the refugees on buses ... So how will you deal with refugees if you don't get a deal?" In an interview to the news magazine Der Spiegel, German minister of defence Ursula von der Leyen said on 11 March 2016 that the refugee crisis had made good cooperation between EU and Turkey an "existentially important" issue. "Therefore it is right to advance now negotiations on Turkey's EU accession". In its resolution "The functioning of democratic institutions in Turkey" from 22 June 2016, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe warned that "recent developments in Turkey pertaining to freedom of the media and of expression, erosion of the rule of law and the human rights violations in relation to anti-terrorism security operations in south-east Turkey have ... raised serious questions about the functioning of its democratic institutions". On 20 August 2016, Erdoğan told his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko that Turkey would not recognize the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea; calling it "Crimea's occupation". In January 2017, Erdoğan said that the withdrawal of Turkish troops from Northern Cyprus is "out of the question" and Turkey will be in Cyprus "forever". There is a long-standing dispute between Turkey and Greece in the Aegean Sea. Erdoğan warned that Greece will pay a "heavy price" if Turkey's gas exploration vessel – in what Turkey said are disputed waters – is attacked. In September 2020, Erdoğan declared his government's support for Azerbaijan following clashes between Armenian and Azeri forces over a disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. He dismissed demands for a ceasefire. Diaspora In March 2017, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated to the Turks in Europe, "Make not three, but five children. Because you are the future of Europe. That will be the best response to the injustices against you." This has been interpreted as an imperialist call for demographic warfare. According to The Economist, Erdoğan is the first Turkish leader to take the Turkish diaspora seriously, which has created friction within these diaspora communities and between the Turkish government and several of its European counterparts. The Balkans In February 2018, President Erdoğan expressed Turkish support of the Republic of Macedonia's position during negotiations over the Macedonia naming dispute saying that Greece's position is wrong. In March 2018, President Erdoğan criticized the Kosovan Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj for dismissing his Interior Minister and Intelligence Chief for failing to inform him of an unauthorized and illegal secret operation conducted by the National Intelligence Organization of Turkey on Kosovo's territory that led to the arrest of six people allegedly associated with the Gülen movement. On 26 November 2019, an earthquake struck the Durrës region of Albania. President Erdoğan expressed his condolences. and citing close Albanian-Turkish relations, he committed Turkey to reconstructing 500 earthquake destroyed homes and other civic structures in Laç, Albania. In Istanbul, Erdoğan organised and attended a donors conference (8 December) to assist Albania that included Turkish businessmen, investors and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama. United Kingdom In May 2018, British Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed Erdoğan to the United Kingdom for a three-day state visit. Erdoğan declared that the United Kingdom is "an ally and a strategic partner, but also a real friend. The cooperation we have is well beyond any mechanism that we have established with other partners." Israel Relations between Turkey and Israel began to normalize after Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu officially apologized for the death of the nine Turkish activists during the Gaza flotilla raid. However, in response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of being "more barbaric than Hitler", and conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. In December 2017, President Erdoğan issued a warning to Donald Trump, after the U.S. President acknowledged Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Erdoğan stated, "Jerusalem is a red line for Muslims", indicating that naming Jerusalem as Israel's capital would alienate Palestinians and other Muslims from the city, undermining hopes at a future capital of a Palestinian State. Erdoğan called Israel a "terrorist state". Naftali Bennett dismissed the threats, claiming "Erdoğan does not miss an opportunity to attack Israel". In April 2019, Erdoğan said the West Bank belongs to Palestinians, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would annex Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories if he is re-elected. Erdoğan condemned the Israel–UAE peace agreement, stating that Turkey was considering suspending or cutting off diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates in retaliation. Syrian Civil War Amid allegations of Turkish collaboration with the Islamic State, the 2014 Kobanî protests broke out near the Syrian border city of Kobanî, in protest against the government's perceived facilitation of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant during the Siege of Kobanî. 42 protestors were killed during a brutal police crackdown. Asserting that aid to the Kurdish-majority People's Protection Units (YPG) fighters in Syria would assist the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) (then on ceasefire) in Turkey, Erdoğan held bilateral talks with Barack Obama regarding IS during the 5–6 September 2014 NATO summit in Newport, Wales. In early October, United States Vice President Joe Biden criticised the Turkish government for supplying jihadists in Syria and said Erdoğan had expressed regret to him about letting foreign jihadists transit through Turkey en route to Syria. Erdoğan angrily responded, "Biden has to apologize for his statements" adding that if no apology is made, Biden would become "history to me." Biden subsequently apologised. In response to the U.S. request to use İncirlik Air Base to conduct air strikes against IS, Erdoğan demanded that Bashar al-Assad be removed from power first. Turkey lost its bid for a Security Council seat in the United Nations during the 2014 election; the unexpected result is believed to have been a reaction to Erdoğan's hostile treatment of the Kurds fighting ISIS on the Syrian border and a rebuke of his willingness to support IS-aligned insurgents opposed to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. In 2015, there were consistent allegations that Erdoğan maintained financial links with the Islamic State, including allegation of his son-in-law Berat Albayrak's involvement with oil production and smuggling in ISIL. Revelations that the state was supplying arms to militant groups in Syria in the 2014 National Intelligence Organisation lorry scandal led to accusations of high treason. In July 2015, Turkey became involved in the international military intervention against ISIL, simultaneously launching airstrikes against PKK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan. As of 2015, Turkey began openly supporting the Army of Conquest, a coalition of Syrian rebel groups that included al-Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham. In late November 2016, Erdoğan said that the Turkish military launched its operations in Syria to end Assad's rule, but retracted this statement shortly afterwards. In January 2018, the Turkish military and its Syrian National Army and Sham Legion allies began the Turkish military operation in Afrin in the Kurdish-majority Afrin Canton in Northern Syria, against the YPG. On 10 April, Erdoğan rejected a Russian demand to return Afrin to Syrian government control. In October 2019, after Erdoğan spoke to him, U.S. President Donald Trump gave the go-ahead to the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria, despite recently agreeing to a Northern Syria Buffer Zone. U.S. troops in northern Syria were withdrawn from the border to avoid interference with the Turkish operation. After the U.S. pullout, Turkey proceeded to attack the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria. Rejecting criticism of the invasion, Erdoğan claimed that NATO and European Union countries "sided with terrorists, and all of them attacked us". China Bilateral trade between Turkey and China increased from $1 billion a year in 2002 to $27 billion annually in 2017. Erdoğan has stated that Turkey might consider joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation instead of the European Union. Qatar blockade In June 2017 during a speech, Erdoğan called the isolation of Qatar as "inhumane and against Islamic values" and that "victimising Qatar through smear campaigns serves no purpose". Myanmar In September 2017, Erdoğan condemned the persecution of Muslims in Myanmar and accused Myanmar of "genocide" against the Muslim minority. United States Over time, Turkey began to look for ways to buy its own missile defense system and also to use that procurement to build up its own capacity to manufacture and sell an air and missile defense system. Turkey got serious about acquiring a missile defense system early in the first Obama administration when it opened a competition between the Raytheon Patriot PAC 2 system and systems from Europe, Russia, and even China. Taking advantage of the new low in U.S.-Turkish relations, Putin saw his chance to use an S-400 sale to Turkey, so in July 2017, he offered the air defense system to Turkey. In the months that followed, the United States warned Turkey that a S-400 purchase jeopardized Turkey's F-35 purchase. Integration of the Russian system into the NATO air defense net was also out of the question. Administration officials, including Mark Esper, warned that Turkey had to choose between the S-400 and the F-35. That they couldn't have both. The S-400 deliveries to Turkey began on 12 July. On 16 July, Trump mentioned to reporters that withholding the F-35 from Turkey was unfair. Said the president, "So what happens is we have a situation where Turkey is very good with us, very good, and we are now telling Turkey that because you have really been forced to buy another missile system, we’re not going to sell you the F-35 fighter jets". The U.S. Congress has made clear on a bipartisan basis that it expects the president to sanction Turkey for buying Russian equipment. Out of the F-35, Turkey now considers buying Russian fifth-generation jet fighter Su-57. On 1 August 2018, the U.S. Department of Treasury sanctioned two senior Turkish government ministers who were involved in the detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson. Erdoğan said that the U.S. behavior will force Turkey to look for new friends and allies. The U.S.–Turkey tensions appear to be the most serious diplomatic crisis between the NATO allies in years. Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton claimed that President Donald Trump told Erdoğan he would 'take care' of investigation against Turkey's state-owned bank Halkbank accused of bank fraud charges and laundering up to $20 billion on behalf of Iranian entities. Turkey criticized Bolton's book, saying it included misleading accounts of conversations between Trump and Erdoğan. In August 2020, the former vice president and presidential candidate Joe Biden called for a new U.S. approach to the "autocrat" President Erdoğan and support for Turkish opposition parties. In September 2020, Biden demanded that Erdoğan "stay out" of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, in which Turkey has supported the Azeris. Venezuela Relations with Venezuela were strengthened with recent developments and high level mutual visits. The first official visit between the two countries at presidential level was in October 2017 when Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro visited Turkey. In December 2018, Erdoğan visited Venezuela for the first time and expressed his will to build strong relations with Venezuela and expressed hope that high-level visits "will increasingly continue." Reuters reported that in 2018 23 tons of mined gold were taken from Venezuela to Istanbul. In the first nine months of 2018, Venezuela's gold exports to Turkey rose from zero in the previous year to US$900 million. During the Venezuelan presidential crisis, Erdoğan voiced solidarity with Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro and criticized U.S. sanctions against Venezuela, saying that "political problems cannot be resolved by punishing an entire nation." Following the 2019 Venezuelan uprising attempt, Erdoğan condemned the actions of lawmaker Juan Guaidó, tweeting "Those who are in an effort to appoint a postmodern colonial governor to Venezuela, where the President was appointed by elections and where the people rule, should know that only democratic elections can determine how a country is governed". Events Coup d'état attempt On 15 July 2016, a coup d'état was attempted by the military, with aims to remove Erdoğan from government. By the next day, Erdoğan's government managed to reassert effective control in the country. Reportedly, no government official was arrested or harmed, which, among other factors, raised the suspicion of a false flag event staged by the government itself. Erdoğan, as well as other government officials, has blamed an exiled cleric, and a former ally of Erdoğan, Fethullah Gülen, for staging the coup attempt. Süleyman Soylu, Minister of Labor in Erdoğan's government, accused the US of planning a coup to oust Erdoğan. Erdoğan, as well as other high-ranking Turkish government officials, has issued repeated demands to the US to extradite Gülen. Following the coup attempt, there has been a significant deterioration in Turkey-US relations. European and other world leaders have expressed their concerns over the situation in Turkey, with many of them warning Erdoğan not to use the coup attempt as an excuse to crack down on his opponents. The rise of ISIS and the collapse of the Kurdish peace process had led to a sharp rise in terror incidents in Turkey until 2016. Erdoğan was accused by his critics of having a 'soft corner' for ISIS. However, after the attempted coup, Erdoğan ordered the Turkish military into Syria to combat ISIS and Kurdish militant groups. Erdoğan's critics have decried purges in the education system and judiciary as undermining the rule of law however Erdoğan supporters argue this is a necessary measure as Gulen-linked schools cheated on entrance exams, requiring a purge in the education system and of the Gulen followers who then entered the judiciary. Erdoğan's plan is "to reconstitute Turkey as a presidential system. The plan would create a centralized system that would enable him to better tackle Turkey's internal and external threats. One of the main hurdles allegedly standing in his way is Fethullah Gulen's movement ..." In the aftermath of the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt, a groundswell of national unity and consensus emerged for cracking down on the coup plotters with a National Unity rally held in Turkey that included Islamists, secularists, liberals and nationalists. Erdoğan has used this consensus to remove Gulen's followers from the bureaucracy, curtail their role in NGOs, Turkey's Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Turkish military, with 149 Generals discharged. In a foreign policy shift Erdoğan ordered the Turkish Armed Forces into battle in Syria and has liberated towns from IS control. As relations with Europe soured over in the aftermath of the attempted coup, Erdoğan developed alternative relationships with Russia, Saudi Arabia and a "strategic partnership" with Pakistan, with plans to cultivate relations through free trade agreements and deepening military relations for mutual co-operation with Turkey's regional allies. 2018 currency and debt crisis The Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018 was caused by the Turkish economy's excessive current account deficit and foreign-currency debt, in combination with Erdoğan's increasing authoritarianism and his unorthodox ideas about interest rate policy. Economist Paul Krugman described the unfolding crisis as "a classic currency-and-debt crisis, of a kind we’ve seen many times", adding: "At such a time, the quality of leadership suddenly matters a great deal. You need officials who understand what's happening, can devise a response and have enough credibility that markets give them the benefit of the doubt. Some emerging markets have those things, and they are riding out the turmoil fairly well. The Erdoğan regime has none of that". Ideology and public image Early during his premiership, Erdoğan was praised as a role model for emerging Middle Eastern nations due to several reform packages initiated by his government which expanded religious freedoms and minority rights as part of accession negotiations with the European Union. However, his government underwent several crises including the Sledgehammer coup and the Ergenekon trials, corruption scandals, accusations of media intimidation, as well as the pursuit of an increasingly polarizing political agenda; the opposition accused the government of inciting political hatred throughout the country. Critics say that Erdoğan's government legitimizes homophobia, as Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". Neo-Ottomanism As President, Erdoğan has overseen a revival of Ottoman tradition, greeting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas with an Ottoman-style ceremony in the new presidential palace, with guards dressed in costumes representing founders of 16 Great Turkish Empires in history. While serving as the Prime Minister of Turkey, Erdoğan's AKP made references to the Ottoman era during election campaigns, such as calling their supporters 'grandsons of Ottomans' (Osmanlı torunu). This proved controversial, since it was perceived to be an open attack against the republican nature of modern Turkey founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. In 2015, Erdoğan made a statement in which he endorsed the old Ottoman term külliye to refer to university campuses rather than the standard Turkish word kampüs. Many critics have thus accused Erdoğan of wanting to become an Ottoman sultan and abandon the secular and democratic credentials of the Republic. One of the most cited scholars alive, Noam Chomsky, said that "Erdogan in Turkey is basically trying to create something like the Ottoman Caliphate, with him as caliph, supreme leader, throwing his weight around all over the place, and destroying the remnants of democracy in Turkey at the same time". When pressed on this issue in January 2015, Erdoğan denied these claims and said that he would aim to be more like Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom rather than like an Ottoman sultan. In July 2020, after the Council of State annulled the Cabinet's 1934 decision to establish the Hagia Sophia as museum and revoking the monument's status, Erdoğan ordered its reclassification as a mosque. The 1934 decree was ruled to be unlawful under both Ottoman and Turkish law as Hagia Sophia's waqf, endowed by Sultan Mehmed II, had designated the site a mosque; proponents of the decision argued the Hagia Sophia was the personal property of the sultan. This redesignation is controversial, invoking condemnation from the Turkish opposition, UNESCO, the World Council of Churches, the Holy See, and many other international leaders. In August 2020, he also signed the order that transferred the administration of the Chora Church to the Directorate of Religious Affairs to open it for worship as a mosque. Initially converted to a mosque by the Ottomans, the building had then been designated as a museum by the government since 1934. Authoritarianism Erdoğan has served as the de facto leader of Turkey since 2002. In response to criticism, Erdoğan made a speech in May 2014 denouncing allegations of dictatorship, saying that the leader of the opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who was there at the speech, would not be able to "roam the streets" freely if he were a dictator. Kılıçdaroğlu responded that political tensions would cease to exist if Erdoğan stopped making his polarising speeches for three days. One observer said it was a measure of the state of Turkish democracy that Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu could openly threaten, on 20 December 2015, that, if his party did not win the election, Turkish Kurds would endure a repeat of the era of the "white Toros", the Turkish name for the Renault 12, "a car associated with the gendarmarie’s fearsome intelligence agents, who carried out thousands of extrajudicial executions of Kurdish nationalists during the 1990s". In February 2015, a 13-year-old was charged by a prosecutor after allegedly insulting Erdoğan on Facebook. In 2016, a waiter was arrested for insulting Erdoğan by allegedly saying "If Erdoğan comes here, I will not even serve tea to him.". In April 2014, the President of the Constitutional Court, Haşim Kılıç, accused Erdoğan of damaging the credibility of the judiciary, labelling Erdoğan's attempts to increase political control over the courts as 'desperate'. During the chaotic 2007 presidential election, the military issued an E-memorandum warning the government to keep within the boundaries of secularism when choosing a candidate. Regardless, Erdoğan's close relations with Fethullah Gülen and his Cemaat Movement allowed his government to maintain a degree of influence within the judiciary through Gülen's supporters in high judicial and bureaucratic offices. Shortly after, an alleged coup plot codenamed Sledgehammer became public and resulted in the imprisonment of 300 military officers including İbrahim Fırtına, Çetin Doğan and Engin Alan. Several opposition politicians, journalists and military officers also went on trial for allegedly being part of an ultra-nationalist organisation called Ergenekon. Both cases were marred by irregularities and were condemned as a joint attempt by Erdoğan and Gülen to curb opposition to the AKP. The original Sledgehammer document containing the coup plans, allegedly written in 2003, was found to have been written using Microsoft Word 2007. Despite both domestic and international calls for these irregularities to be addressed in order to guarantee a fair trial, Erdoğan instead praised his government for bringing the coup plots to light. When Gülen publicly withdrew support and openly attacked Erdoğan in late 2013, several imprisoned military officers and journalists were released, with the government admitting that the judicial proceedings were unfair. When Gülen withdrew support from the AKP government in late 2013, a government corruption scandal broke out, leading to the arrest of several family members of cabinet ministers. Erdoğan accused Gülen of co-ordinating a "parallel state" within the judiciary in an attempt to topple him from power. He then removed or reassigned several judicial officials in an attempt to remove Gülen's supporters from office. Erdoğan's 'purge' was widely questioned and criticised by the European Union. In early 2014, a new law was passed by parliament giving the government greater control over the judiciary, which sparked public protest throughout the country. International organisations perceived the law to be a danger to the separation of powers. Several judicial officials removed from their posts said that they had been removed due to their secularist credentials. The political opposition accused Erdoğan of not only attempting to remove Gülen supporters, but supporters of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's principles as well, in order to pave the way for increased politicisation of the judiciary. Several family members of Erdoğan's ministers who had been arrested as a result of the 2013 corruption scandal were released, and a judicial order to question Erdoğan's son Bilal Erdoğan was annulled. Controversy erupted when it emerged that many of the newly appointed judicial officials were actually AKP supporters. İslam Çiçek, a judge who ejected the cases of five ministers' relatives accused of corruption, was accused of being an AKP supporter and an official investigation was launched into his political affiliations. On 1 September 2014, the courts dissolved the cases of 96 suspects, which included Bilal Erdoğan. During a televised press conference he was asked if he believed a presidential system was possible in a unitary state. Erdoğan affirmed this and cited Nazi Germany (among other examples) as a case where such a combination existed. However, the Turkish president's office said that Erdoğan was not advocating a Hitler-style government when he called for a state system with a strong executive, and added that the Turkish president had declared the "Holocaust, anti-semitism and Islamophobia" as crimes against humanity and that it was out of the question for him to cite Hitler's Germany as a good example. Suppression of dissent Erdoğan has been criticised for his politicisation of the media, especially after the 2013 protests. The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) alleged that over 1,863 journalists lost their jobs due to their anti-government views in 12 years of AKP rule. Opposition politicians have also alleged that intimidation in the media is due to the government's attempt to restructure the ownership of private media corporations. Journalists from the Cihan News Agency and the Gülenist Zaman newspaper were repeatedly barred from attending government press conferences or asking questions. Several opposition journalists such as Soner Yalçın were controversially arrested as part of the Ergenekon trials and Sledgehammer coup investigation. Veli Ağbaba, a CHP politician, has called the AKP the 'biggest media boss in Turkey.' In 2015, 74 US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to state their concern over what they saw as deviations from the basic principles of democracy in Turkey and oppressions of Erdoğan over media. Notable cases of media censorship occurred during the 2013 anti-government protests, when the mainstream media did not broadcast any news regarding the demonstrations for three days after they began. The lack of media coverage was symbolised by CNN International covering the protests while CNN Türk broadcast a documentary about penguins at the same time. The Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK) controversially issued a fine to pro-opposition news channels including Halk TV and Ulusal Kanal for their coverage of the protests, accusing them of broadcasting footage that could be morally, physically and mentally destabilising to children. Erdoğan was criticised for not responding to the accusations of media intimidation, and caused international outrage after telling a female journalist (Amberin Zaman of The Economist) to know her place and calling her a 'shameless militant' during his 2014 presidential election campaign. While the 2014 presidential election was not subject to substantial electoral fraud, Erdoğan was again criticised for receiving disproportionate media attention in comparison to his rivals. The British newspaper The Times commented that between 2 and 4 July, the state-owned media channel TRT gave 204 minutes of coverage to Erdoğan's campaign and less than a total of 3 minutes to both his rivals. Erdoğan also tightened controls over the Internet, signing into law a bill which allows the government to block websites without prior court order on 12 September 2014. His government blocked Twitter and YouTube in late March 2014 following the release of a recording of a conversation between him and his son Bilal, where Erdoğan allegedly warned his family to 'nullify' all cash reserves at their home amid the 2013 corruption scandal. Erdoğan has undertaken a media campaign that attempts to portray the presidential family as frugal and simple-living; their palace electricity-bill is estimated at $500,000 per month. In May 2016, former Miss Turkey model Merve Büyüksaraç was sentenced to more than a year in prison for allegedly insulting the president. In a 2016 news story, Bloomberg reported, "more than 2,000 cases have been opened against journalists, cartoonists, teachers, a former Miss Turkey, and even schoolchildren in the past two years". In November 2016, the Turkish government blocked access to social media in all of Turkey as well as sought to completely block Internet access for the citizens in the southeast of the country. Mehmet Aksoy lawsuit In 2009, Turkish sculptor Mehmet Aksoy created the Statue of Humanity in Kars to promote reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia. When visiting the city in 2011, Erdoğan deemed the statue a "freak", and months later it was demolished. Aksoy sued Erdoğan for "moral indemnities", although his lawyer said that his statement was a critique rather than an insult. In March 2015, a judge ordered Erdoğan to pay 10,000 liras. Erdoğanism Erdoğan has produced many aphorisms and catch-phrases known as Erdoğanisms. The term Erdoğanism first emerged shortly after Erdoğan's 2011 general election victory, where it was predominantly described as the AKP's liberal economic and conservative democratic ideals fused with Erdoğan demagoguery and cult of personality. Views on minorities LGBT In 2002, Erdoğan said that "homosexuals must be legally protected within the framework of their rights and freedoms. From time to time, we do not find the treatment they get on some television screens humane", he said. However, in 2017 Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Turkey's top Muslim scholar and President of Religious Affairs, Ali Erbaş, said in a Friday Ramadan announcement that country condemns homosexuality because it "brings illness," insinuating that same sex relations are responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan backed Erbaş, saying that what Erbaş "said was totally right." Jews While Erdoğan has declared several times being against antisemitism, he has been accused of invoking antisemitic stereotypes in public statements. According to Erdoğan, he had been inspired by novelist and Islamist ideologue Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, a publisher (among others) of antisemitic literature. Others During a live interview in 2014, he said: "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian. Excuse me, but they have said even uglier things. They have called me Armenian, but I am Turkish." Honours and accolades Foreign honours Russia: Medal "In Commemoration of the 1000th Anniversary of Kazan" (1 June 2006) Pakistan: Nishan-e-Pakistan, the highest civilian award in Pakistan (26 October 2009) Georgia: Order of Golden Fleece, awarded for his contribution to development of bilateral relations (17 May 2010) Kyrgyzstan: Danaker Order in Bishkek (2 February 2011) Azerbaijan: Heydar Aliyev Order (3 September 2014) Belgium: Grand Cordon in the Order of Leopold (5 October 2015) Madagascar: Knight Grand Cross in the national Order (25 January 2017) Gagauzia: Order of Gagauz-Yeri in Comrat (18 October 2018) Venezuela: Order of the Liberator, Grand Cordon (3 December 2018) Ukraine: Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise (16 October 2020) Other awards 29 January 2004: Profile of Courage Award from the American Jewish Congress, for promoting peace between cultures. Returned at the request of the A.J.C. in July 2014. 13 June 2004: Golden Plate award from the Academy of Achievement during the conference in Chicago. 3 October 2004: German Quadriga prize for improving relationships between different cultures. 2 September 2005: Mediterranean Award for Institutions (). This was awarded by the Fondazione Mediterraneo. 8 August 2006: Caspian Energy Integration Award from the Caspian Integration Business Club. 1 November 2006: Outstanding Service award from the Turkish humanitarian organization Red Crescent. 2 February 2007: Dialogue Between Cultures Award from the President of Tatarstan Mintimer Shaimiev. 15 April 2007: Crystal Hermes Award from the German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the opening of the Hannover Industrial Fair. 11 July 2007: highest award of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the Agricola Medal, in recognition of his contribution to agricultural and social development in Turkey. 11 May 2009: Avicenna award from the Avicenna Foundation in Frankfurt, Germany. 9 June 2009: guest of honor at the 20th Crans Montana Forum in Brussels and received the Prix de la Fondation, for democracy and freedom. 25 June 2009: Key to the City of Tirana on the occasion of his state visit to Albania. 29 December 2009: Award for Contribution to World Peace from the Turgut Özal Thought and Move Association. 12 January 2010: King Faisal International Prize for "service to Islam" from the King Faisal Foundation. 23 February 2010: Nodo Culture Award from the mayor of Seville for his efforts to launch the Alliance of Civilizations initiative. 1 March 2010: United Nations–HABITAT award in memorial of Rafik Hariri. A seven-member international jury unanimously found Erdoğan deserving of the award because of his "excellent achievement and commendable conduct in the area of leadership, statesmanship and good governance. Erdoğan also initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors." 27 May 2010: medal of honor from the Brazilian Federation of Industry for the State of São Paulo (FIESP) for his contributions to industry 31 May 2010: World Health Organization 2010 World No Tobacco Award for "his dedicated leadership on tobacco control in Turkey." 29 June 2010: 2010 World Family Award from the World Family Organization which operates under the umbrella of the United Nations. 4 November 2010: Golden Medal of Independence, an award conferred upon Kosovo citizens and foreigners that have contributed to the independence of Kosovo. 25 November 2010: "Leader of the Year" award presented by the Union of Arab Banks in Lebanon. 11 January 2011: "Outstanding Personality in the Islamic World Award" of the Sheikh Fahad al-Ahmad International Award for Charity in Kuwait. 25 October 2011: Palestinian International Award for Excellence and Creativity (PIA) 2011 for his support to the Palestinian people and cause. 21 January 2012: 'Gold Statue 2012 Special Award' by the Polish Business Center Club (BCC). Erdoğan was awarded for his systematic effort to clear barriers on the way to economic growth, striving to build democracy and free market relations. 2020: Ig Nobel Prize "for using the COVID-19 viral pandemic to teach the world that politicians can have a more immediate effect on life and death than scientists and doctors can." See also List of international presidential trips made by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Leadership approval polling for the 2023 Turkish general election The 500 Most Influential Muslims Notes References Further reading Cagaptay, Soner. The new sultan: Erdogan and the crisis of modern Turkey (2nd ed. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020). online review Cagaptay, Soner. "Making Turkey Great Again." Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 43 (2019): 169–78. online Kirişci, Kemal, and Amanda Sloat. "The rise and fall of liberal democracy in Turkey: Implications for the West" Foreign Policy at Brookings (2019) online Tziarras, Zenonas. "Erdoganist authoritarianism and the 'new' Turkey." Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 18.4 (2018): 593–598. online Yavuz, M. Hakan. "A framework for understanding the Intra-Islamist conflict between the AK party and the Gülen movement." Politics, Religion & Ideology 19.1 (2018): 11–32. online Yesil, Bilge. Media in New Turkey: The Origins of an Authoritarian Neoliberal State (University of Illinois Press, 2016) online review External links Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Instagram. Archived from the original. Welcome to demokrasi: how Erdoğan got more popular than ever by The Guardian 1954 births Living people 21st-century presidents of Turkey 21st-century prime ministers of Turkey Deniers of the Armenian genocide Deputies of Istanbul Deputies of Siirt Recep Tayyip Imam Hatip school alumni Justice and Development Party (Turkey) politicians Leaders of political parties in Turkey Marmara University alumni Mayors of Istanbul Members of the 22nd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 23rd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 24th Parliament of Turkey Naqshbandi order People from Istanbul Politicians arrested in Turkey Presidents of Turkey Prime Ministers of Turkey Recipients of the Heydar Aliyev Order Recipients of the Order of the Golden Fleece (Georgia) Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 1st class Turkish Islamists Turkish Sunni Muslims Chairmen of the Organization of Turkic States Recipients of the Gagauz-Yeri Order Foreign recipients of the Nishan-e-Pakistan	false	[ "On February 3, 1993, Ontario premier Bob Rae appointed six ministers without portfolio in the Ontario government. These were not full members of cabinet but rather provided policy assistance to cabinet ministers. They were generally described as \"junior ministers.\"\n\nThe only one of the original six ministers without portfolio who was assigned a specific job responsibility was Richard Allen, who oversaw international trade. The others did not have formally defined responsibilities. Some opposition politicians argued that these positions were unnecessary and duplicated the responsibilities of parliamentary assistants.\n\nThe positions were eliminated in 1995 by the government of Mike Harris.\n\nMinister responsible for Economic Development\nRichard Allen held this position from February 3, 1993, to August 18, 1994, when he was promoted to a full cabinet position. His replacement was Bob Huget, who served until June 26, 1995.\n\nMinister responsible for Finance\nBrad Ward held this position from February 3, 1993, to June 26, 1995, providing assistance to Finance Minister Floyd Laughren. He was given responsibility for overseeing public pre-budgetary consultations in 1994.\n\nMinister responsible for Culture, Tourism and Recreation\nShirley Coppen held this position from February 3, 1993, to October 21, 1994, when she was promoted to a full cabinet position. Her replacement was Irene Mathyssen, who served until June 26, 1995.\n\nMinister responsible for Health\nKaren Haslam held this position from February 3 to June 14, 1993, when she resigned to protest the Rae government's Social Contact legislation. Her replacement was Shelley Wark-Martyn, who served until June 26, 1995.\n\nMinister responsible for Municipal Affairs\nAllan Pilkey held this position from February 3, 1993, to June 26, 1995.\n\nMinister responsible for Education and Training\nShelley Wark-Martyn held this position from February 3 until June 17, 1993, when she was reassigned as Minister without portfolio responsible for Health. Her replacement was Mike Farnan, who served until his promotion to a full cabinet portfolio on October 21, 1994. Farnan, in turn, was replaced by Steve Owens, who served until June 26, 1995.\n\nOther\nChief Government Whip Fred Wilson was also designated as a minister without portfolio in February 1993. His responsibilities were distinct from the other ministers without portfolio, and he was not considered a \"junior minister.\"\n\nPolitical history of Ontario\n1993 in Ontario\n1994 in Ontario\n1995 in Ontario\n1993 in Canadian politics\n1994 in Canadian politics\n1995 in Canadian politics\nMinisters without portfolio", "The Anti-Drug Secretariat was a provincial government agency in Ontario, Canada, from 1989 to 1992. It was led by a member of the Executive Council of Ontario, who was styled as the Minister responsible for the provincial anti-drug strategy.\n\nThe first minister to hold this position was Ken Black, who also served as Minister of Tourism and Recreation in the government of David Peterson. Black had previously authored a report on the province's anti-drug strategy and served as the premier's advisor on drug issues. Following his appointment, he was responsible for coordinating anti-drug strategies within seven government ministries.\n\nThe agency was restructured as the Office of Substance Abuse Strategy in 1992. It appears to have been quietly phased out in 1993, with most of its responsibilities transferred to the Ministry of Health.\n\nMinisters responsible for the provincial anti-drug strategy\n\nMinisters responsible for the substance abuse strategy\n\nReferences\n\nDefunct Ontario government departments and agencies\n1989 establishments in Ontario\n1993 disestablishments in Ontario" ]
[ "Recep Tayyip Erdoğan", "Armenian Genocide", "What happened in the genocide?", "mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I", "Who was responsible for this?", "Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings" ]	C_4d6e38301a82483cab0ff9378b6a238e_1	When did this happen?	3	When did the Armenian genocide happen?	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan	Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province. His parents are Ahmet Erdogan and Tenzile Erdogan. Erdogan reportedly said in 2003, "I'm a Georgian, my family is a Georgian family which migrated from Batumi to Rize." But in a 2014 televised interview on the NTV news network, he said, "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian... forgive me for saying this... even much uglier things, they have even called me an Armenian, but I am Turkish." In an account based on registry records, his genealogy was tracked to an ethnic Turkish family. Erdogan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father Ahmet Erdogan (1905 - 1988) was a Captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. Erdogan had a brother Mustafa (b. 1958) and sister Vesile (b. 1965). His summer holidays were mostly spent in Guneysu, Rize, where his family originates from. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdogan was 13 years old. As a teenager, he sold lemonade and sesame buns (simit) on the streets of the city's rougher districts to earn extra money. Brought up in an observant Muslim family, Erdogan graduated from Kasimpasa Piyale primary school in 1965, and Imam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. He received his high school diploma from Eyup High School. He subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences, now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences--although several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated. In his youth, Erdogan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahce wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasimpasa S.K. is named after him. Erdogan married Emine Gulbaran (born 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons; Ahmet Burak and Necmettin Bilal, and two daughters, Esra and Sumeyye. His father, Ahmet Erdogan, died in 1988 and his 88-year-old mother, Tenzile Erdogan, died in 2011. He is a member of the Community of Iskenderpasa, a Turkish sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. In 2001, Erdogan established the Justice and Development Party (AKP). The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdogan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yilmaz and Ciller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdogan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gul became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdogan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdogan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gul handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdogan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as President, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdogan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gul as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Canakkale, and one million in Izmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdogan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdogan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdogan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdogan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdogan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious." He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem." In December 2008, Erdogan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken." In November 2009, he said, "it's not possible for a Muslim to commit genocide." In 2011, Erdogan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish-Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdogan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdogan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences - such as relocation - during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician serving as the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as prime minister of Turkey from 2003 to 2014 and as mayor of Istanbul from 1994 to 1998. He founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2001, leading it to election victories in 2002, 2007, and 2011 general elections before being required to stand down upon his election as President in 2014. He later returned to the AKP leadership in 2017 following the constitutional referendum that year. Coming from an Islamist political background and self-describing as a conservative democrat, he has promoted socially conservative and populist policies during his administration. Following the 1994 local elections, Erdoğan was elected mayor of Istanbul as the candidate of the Islamist Welfare Party. He was later stripped of his position, banned from political office, and imprisoned for four months for inciting religious hatred, due to his recitation of a poem by Ziya Gökalp. Erdoğan subsequently abandoned openly Islamist politics, establishing the moderate conservative AKP in 2001, which he went on to lead to a landslide victory in 2002. With Erdoğan still technically prohibited from holding office, the AKP's co-founder, Abdullah Gül, instead became prime minister, and later annulled Erdoğan's political ban. After winning a by-election in Siirt in 2003, Erdoğan replaced Gül as prime minister, with Gül instead becoming the AKP's candidate for the presidency. Erdoğan led the AKP to two more election victories in 2007 and 2011. The early years of Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister saw advances in negotiations for Turkey's membership of the European Union, an economic recovery following a economic crisis in 2001 and investments in infrastructure including roads, airports, and a high-speed train network. He also won two successful constitutional referendums in 2007 and 2010. However, his government remained controversial for its close links with Fethullah Gülen and his Gülen Movement (since designated as a terrorist organisation by the Turkish state) with whom the AKP was accused of orchestrating purges against secular bureaucrats and military officers through the Balyoz and Ergenekon trials. In late 2012, his government began peace negotiations with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to end the Kurdish–Turkish conflict (1978–present). The ceasefire broke down in 2015, leading to a renewed escalation in conflict. Erdoğan's foreign policy has been described as Neo-Ottoman and has led to the Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, with its focus on preventing the Syrian Democratic Forces from gaining ground on the Syria–Turkey border during the Syrian Civil War. In the more recent years of Erdoğan's rule, Turkey has experienced democratic backsliding and corruption. Starting with the anti-government protests in 2013, his government imposed growing censorship on the press and social media, temporarily restricting access to sites such as YouTube, Twitter and Wikipedia. This stalled negotiations related to Turkey's EU membership. A US$100 billion corruption scandal in 2013 led to the arrests of Erdoğan's close allies, and incriminated Erdoğan. After 11 years as head of government (Prime Minister), Erdoğan decided to run for President in 2014. At the time, the presidency was a somewhat ceremonial function. Following the 2014 elections, Erdoğan became the first popularly elected president of Turkey. The souring in relations with Gülen continued, as the government proceeded to purge his supporters from judicial, bureaucratic and military positions. A failed military coup d'état attempt in July 2016 resulted in further purges and a temporary state of emergency. The government claimed that the coup leaders were linked to Gülen, but he has denied any role in it. Erdoğan's rule has been marked with increasing authoritarianism, expansionism, censorship and banning of parties or dissent. Erdoğan supported the 2017 referendum which changed Turkey's parliamentary system into a presidential system, thus setting for the first time in Turkish history a term limit for the head of government (two full five-year terms). This new system of government formally came into place after the 2018 general election, where Erdoğan became an executive president. His party however lost the majority in the parliament and is currently in a coalition (People's Alliance) with the Turkish nationalist MHP. Erdoğan has since been tackling, but also accused of contributing to, the Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018, which has caused a significant decline in his popularity and is widely believed to have contributed to the results of the 2019 local elections, in which his party lost power in big cities like Ankara and Istanbul to opposition parties for the first time in 15 years. Family and personal life Early life Erdoğan was born in Kasımpaşa, a poor neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province in the 1930s. Erdoğan's tribe is originally from Adjara, a region in Georgia. His parents were Ahmet Erdoğan (1905–88) and Tenzile Erdoğan (née Mutlu; 1924–2011). Erdoğan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father was a captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. His summer holidays were mostly spent in Güneysu, Rize, where his family originates. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdoğan was 13 years old. As a teenager, Erdoğan's father provided him with a weekly allowance of 2.5 Turkish lira, less than a dollar. With it, Erdoğan bought postcards and resold them on the street. He sold bottles of water to drivers stuck in traffic. Erdoğan also worked as a street vendor selling simit (sesame bread rings), wearing a white gown and selling the simit from a red three-wheel cart with the rolls stacked behind glass. In his youth, Erdoğan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahçe wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasımpaşa S.K. is named after him. Erdoğan is a member of the Community of İskenderpaşa, a Turkish Sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. Education Erdoğan graduated from Kasımpaşa Piyale primary school in 1965, and İmam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. The same educational path was followed by other co-founders of the AKP party. One quarter of the curriculum of İmam Hatip schools involves study of the Qurʼān, the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and the Arabic language. Erdoğan studied the Qurʼān at an İmam Hatip, where his classmates began calling him "hoca" ("Muslim teacher"). Erdoğan attended a meeting of the nationalist student group National Turkish Student Union (Milli Türk Talebe Birliği), who sought to raise a conservative cohort of young people to counter the rising movement of leftists in Turkey. Within the group, Erdoğan was distinguished by his oratorical skills, developing a penchant for public speaking and excelling in front of an audience. He won first place in a poetry-reading competition organized by the Community of Turkish Technical Painters, and began preparing for speeches through reading and research. Erdoğan would later comment on these competitions as "enhancing our courage to speak in front of the masses". Erdoğan wanted to pursue advanced studies at Mekteb-i Mülkiye, but Mülkiye accepted only students with regular high school diplomas, and not İmam Hatip graduates. Mülkiye was known for its political science department, which trained many statesmen and politicians in Turkey. Erdoğan was then admitted to Eyüp High School, a regular state school, and eventually received his high school diploma from Eyüp. According to his official biography, he subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences (), now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. Several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated, or even attended at all. Family Erdoğan married Emine Gülbaran (b. 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons, Ahmet Burak (b. 1979) and Necmettin Bilal (b. 1981), and two daughters, Esra (b. 1983) and Sümeyye (b. 1985). His father, Ahmet Erdoğan, died in 1988 and his mother, Tenzile Erdoğan, died in 2011 at the age of 88. Erdoğan has a brother, Mustafa (b. 1958), and a sister, Vesile (b. 1965). From his father's first marriage to Havuli Erdoğan (d. 1980), he had two half-brothers: Mehmet (1926–1988) and Hasan (1929–2006). Early political career In 1976, Erdoğan engaged in politics by joining the National Turkish Student Union, an anti-communist action group. In the same year, he became the head of the Beyoğlu youth branch of the Islamist National Salvation Party (MSP), and was later promoted to chair of the Istanbul youth branch of the party. Holding this position until 1980, he served as consultant and senior executive in the private sector during the era following the 1980 military coup when political parties were closed down. In 1983, Erdoğan followed most of Necmettin Erbakan's followers into the Islamist Welfare Party. He became the party's Beyoğlu district chair in 1984, and in 1985 he became the chair of the Istanbul city branch. He was elected to parliament in 1991, but was barred from taking his seat. Mayor of Istanbul (1994–1998) In the local elections of 27 March 1994, Erdoğan was elected Mayor of Istanbul with 25.19% of the popular vote. Erdoğan was a 40-year-old dark horse candidate who had been mocked by the mainstream media and treated as a country bumpkin by his opponents. He was pragmatic in office, tackling many chronic problems in Istanbul including water shortage, pollution and traffic chaos. The water shortage problem was solved with the laying of hundreds of kilometers of new pipelines. The garbage problem was solved with the establishment of state-of-the-art recycling facilities. While Erdoğan was in office, air pollution was reduced through a plan developed to switch to natural gas. He changed the public buses to environmentally friendly ones. The city's traffic and transportation jams were reduced with more than fifty bridges, viaducts, and highways built. He took precautions to prevent corruption, using measures to ensure that municipal funds were used prudently. He paid back a major portion of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality's two-billion-dollar debt and invested four billion dollars in the city. Erdoğan initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors. A seven-member international jury from the United Nations unanimously awarded Erdoğan the UN-Habitat award. Imprisonment In 1998, the fundamentalist Welfare Party was declared unconstitutional on the grounds of threatening the secularism of Turkey and was shut down by the Turkish constitutional court. Erdoğan became a prominent speaker at demonstrations held by his party colleagues. In December 1997 in Siirt, Erdoğan recited a poem from a work written by Ziya Gökalp, a pan-Turkish activist of the early 20th century. His recitation included verses translated as "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers...." which are not in the original version of the poem. Erdoğan said the poem had been approved by the education ministry to be published in textbooks. Under article 312/2 of the Turkish penal code his recitation was regarded as an incitement to violence and religious or racial hatred. He was given a ten-month prison sentence of which he served four months, from 24 March 1999 to 27 July 1999. Due to his conviction, Erdoğan was forced to give up his mayoral position. The conviction also stipulated a political ban, which prevented him from participating in parliamentary elections. He had appealed for the sentence to be converted to a monetary fine, but it was reduced to 120 days instead. In 2017, this period of Erdoğan's life was made into a film titled Reis. Justice and Development Party Erdoğan was member of political parties that kept getting banned by the army or judges. Within his Virtue Party, there was a dispute about the appropriate discourse of the party between traditional politicians and pro-reform politicians. The latter envisioned a party that could operate within the limits of the system, and thus not getting banned as its predecessors like National Order Party, National Salvation Party and Welfare Party. They wanted to give the group the character of an ordinary conservative party following the example of the European Christian democratic parties. When the Virtue Party was also banned in 2001, a definitive split took place: the followers of Necmettin Erbakan founded the Felicity Party (SP) and the reformers founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) under the leadership of Abdullah Gül and Erdoğan. The pro-reform politicians realized that a strictly Islamic party would never be accepted as a governing party by the state apparatus and they believed that an Islamic party did not appeal to more than about 20 percent of the Turkish electorate. The AK party emphatically placed itself as a broad democratic conservative party with new politicians from the political center (like Ali Babacan and Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu), while respecting Islamic norms and values, but without an explicit religious program. This turned out to be successful as the new party won 34% of the vote in the general elections of 2002. Erdoğan became prime minister in March 2003 after the Gül government ended his political ban. Premiership (2003–2014) General elections The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdoğan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yılmaz and Çiller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdoğan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gül became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdoğan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdoğan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gül handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdoğan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as president, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdoğan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gül as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Çanakkale, and one million in İzmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdoğan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdoğan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdoğan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdoğan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Referendums After the opposition parties deadlocked the 2007 presidential election by boycotting the parliament, the ruling AKP proposed a constitutional reform package. The reform package was first vetoed by president Sezer. Then he applied to the Turkish constitutional court about the reform package, because the president is unable to veto amendments for the second time. The Turkish constitutional court did not find any problems in the packet and 68.95% of the voters supported the constitutional changes. The reforms consisted of electing the president by popular vote instead of by parliament; reducing the presidential term from seven years to five; allowing the president to stand for re-election for a second term; holding general elections every four years instead of five; and reducing from 367 to 184 the quorum of lawmakers needed for parliamentary decisions. Reforming the Constitution was one of the main pledges of the AKP during the 2007 election campaign. The main opposition party CHP was not interested in altering the Constitution on a big scale, making it impossible to form a Constitutional Commission (Anayasa Uzlaşma Komisyonu). The amendments lacked the two-thirds majority needed to become law instantly, but secured 336 votes in the 550-seat parliament – enough to put the proposals to a referendum. The reform package included a number of issues such as the right of individuals to appeal to the highest court, the creation of the ombudsman's office; the possibility to negotiate a nationwide labour contract; gender equality; the ability of civilian courts to convict members of the military; the right of civil servants to go on strike; a privacy law; and the structure of the Constitutional Court. The referendum was agreed by a majority of 58%. Domestic Policy Kurdish issue In 2009, Prime Minister Erdoğan's government announced a plan to help end the quarter-century-long Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict that had cost more than 40,000 lives. The government's plan, supported by the European Union, intended to allow the Kurdish language to be used in all broadcast media and political campaigns, and restored Kurdish names to cities and towns that had been given Turkish ones. Erdoğan said, "We took a courageous step to resolve chronic issues that constitute an obstacle along Turkey's development, progression and empowerment". Erdoğan passed a partial amnesty to reduce penalties faced by many members of the Kurdish guerrilla movement PKK who had surrendered to the government. On 23 November 2011, during a televised meeting of his party in Ankara, he apologised on behalf of the state for the Dersim massacre, where many Alevis and Zazas were killed. In 2013 the government of Erdoğan began a peace process between the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Turkish Government, mediated by parliamentarians of the Peoples' Democratic party (HDP). In 2015 he decided that the peace process was over and supported the lift of the parliamentary immunity of the HDP parliamentarians. During his presidency a law was introduced which banned the use of the word Kurdistan in parliament and in a speech he held for the local election of 2019 he told the HDP politicians that if there is no Kurdistan in Turkey and if they looked for one they should go to Northern Iraq. Armenian genocide Prime Minister Erdoğan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdoğan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious". He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem". In December 2008, Erdoğan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken". In November 2009, he said, "it is not possible for those who belong to the Muslim faith to carry out genocide". In 2011, Erdoğan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish–Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdoğan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdoğan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences – such as relocation – during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". The Ottoman Parliament of 1915 had previously used the term "relocation" to describe the purpose of the Tehcir Law, which resulted in the deaths of anywhere between 800,000 and over 1,800,000 Armenian civilians in what is commonly referred to as the Armenian Genocide. Pope Francis in April 2015, at a special mass in St. Peter's Basilica marking the centenary of the events, described atrocities against Armenian civilians in 1915–1922 as "the first genocide of the 20th century". In protest, Erdoğan recalled the Turkish ambassador from the Vatican, and summoned the Vatican's ambassador, to express "disappointment" at what he called a discriminatory message. He later stated "we don’t carry a stain or a shadow like genocide". US President Barack Obama called for a "full, frank and just acknowledgement of the facts", but again stopped short of labelling it "genocide", despite his campaign promise to do so. Human rights During Erdoğan's time as Prime Minister, the far-reaching powers of the 1991 Anti-Terror Law were reduced and the Democratic initiative process was initiated, with the goal to improve democratic standards in general and the rights of ethnic and religious minorities in particular. However, after Turkey's bid to join the European Union stalled, European officials noted a return to more authoritarian ways, notably on freedom of speech, freedom of the press and Kurdish minority rights. Demands by activists for the recognition of LGBT rights were publicly rejected by government members, and members of the Turkish LGBT community were insulted by cabinet members. Reporters Without Borders observed a continuous decrease in Freedom of the Press during Erdoğan's later terms, with a rank of around 100 on the Press Freedom Index during his first term and a rank of 153 out of a total of 179 countries in 2021. Freedom House saw a slight recovery in later years and awarded Turkey a Press Freedom Score of 55/100 in 2012 after a low point of 48/100 in 2006. In 2011, Erdoğan's government made legal reforms to return properties of Christian and Jewish minorities which were seized by the Turkish government in the 1930s. The total value of the properties returned reached $2 billion (USD). Under Erdoğan, the Turkish government tightened the laws on the sale and consumption of alcohol, banning all advertising and increasing the tax on alcoholic beverages. Economy In 2002, Erdoğan inherited a Turkish economy that was beginning to recover from a recession as a result of reforms implemented by Kemal Derviş. Erdoğan supported Finance Minister Ali Babacan in enforcing macro-economic policies. Erdoğan tried to attract more foreign investors to Turkey and lifted many government regulations. The cash-flow into the Turkish economy between 2002 and 2012 caused a growth of 64% in real GDP and a 43% increase in GDP per capita; considerably higher numbers were commonly advertised but these did not account for the inflation of the US dollar between 2002 and 2012. The average annual growth in GDP per capita was 3.6%. The growth in real GDP between 2002 and 2012 was higher than the values from developed countries, but was close to average when developing countries are also taken into account. The ranking of the Turkish economy in terms of GDP moved slightly from 17 to 16 during this decade. A major consequence of the policies between 2002 and 2012 was the widening of the current account deficit from US$600 million to US$58 billion (2013 est.) Since 1961, Turkey has signed 19 IMF loan accords. Erdoğan's government satisfied the budgetary and market requirements of the two during his administration and received every loan installment, the only time any Turkish government has done so. Erdoğan inherited a debt of $23.5 billion to the IMF, which was reduced to $0.9 billion in 2012. He decided not to sign a new deal. Turkey's debt to the IMF was thus declared to be completely paid and he announced that the IMF could borrow from Turkey. In 2010, five-year credit default swaps for Turkey's sovereign debt were trading at a record low of 1.17%, below those of nine EU member countries and Russia. In 2002, the Turkish Central Bank had $26.5 billion in reserves. This amount reached $92.2 billion in 2011. During Erdoğan's leadership, inflation fell from 32% to 9.0% in 2004. Since then, Turkish inflation has continued to fluctuate around 9% and is still one of the highest inflation rates in the world. The Turkish public debt as a percentage of annual GDP declined from 74% in 2002 to 39% in 2009. In 2012, Turkey had a lower ratio of public debt to GDP than 21 of 27 members of the European Union and a lower budget deficit to GDP ratio than 23 of them. In 2003, Erdoğan's government pushed through the Labor Act, a comprehensive reform of Turkey's labor laws. The law greatly expanded the rights of employees, establishing a 45-hour workweek and limiting overtime work to 270 hours a year, provided legal protection against discrimination due to sex, religion, or political affiliation, prohibited discrimination between permanent and temporary workers, entitled employees terminated without "valid cause" to compensation, and mandated written contracts for employment arrangements lasting a year or more. Education Erdoğan increased the budget of the Ministry of Education from 7.5 billion lira in 2002 to 34 billion lira in 2011, the highest share of the national budget given to one ministry. Before his prime ministership the military received the highest share of the national budget. Compulsory education was increased from eight years to twelve. In 2003, the Turkish government, together with UNICEF, initiated a campaign called "Come on girls, [let's go] to school!" (). The goal of this campaign was to close the gender gap in primary school enrollment through the provision of a quality basic education for all girls, especially in southeast Turkey. In 2005, the parliament granted amnesty to students expelled from universities before 2003. The amnesty applied to students dismissed on academic or disciplinary grounds. In 2004, textbooks became free of charge and since 2008 every province in Turkey has its own university. During Erdoğan's Premiership, the number of universities in Turkey nearly doubled, from 98 in 2002 to 186 in October 2012. The Prime Minister kept his campaign promises by starting the Fatih project in which all state schools, from preschool to high school level, received a total of 620,000 smart boards, while tablet computers were distributed to 17 million students and approximately one million teachers and administrators. In June 2017 a draft proposal by the ministry of education was approved by Erdoğan, in which the curriculum for schools excluded the teaching of the theory of evolution of Charles Darwin by 2019. From then on the teaching will be postponed and start at undergraduate level. Infrastructure Under Erdoğan's government, the number of airports in Turkey increased from 26 to 50 in the period of 10 years. Between the founding of the Republic of Turkey in 1923 and 2002, there had been 6,000 km of dual carriageway roads created. Between 2002 and 2011, another 13,500 km of expressway were built. Due to these measures, the number of motor accidents fell by 50 percent. For the first time in Turkish history, high speed railway lines were constructed, and the country's high-speed train service began in 2009. In 8 years, 1,076 km of railway were built and 5,449 km of railway renewed. The construction of Marmaray, an undersea rail tunnel under the Bosphorus strait, started in 2004. It was inaugurated on the 90th anniversary of the Turkish Republic 29 October 2013. The inauguration of the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge, the third bridge over the Bosphorus, was on 26 August 2016. Justice In March 2006, the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) held a press conference to publicly protest the obstruction of the appointment of judges to the high courts for over 10 months. The HSYK said Erdoğan wanted to fill the vacant posts with his own appointees. Erdoğan was accused of creating a rift with Turkey's highest court of appeal, the Yargıtay, and high administrative court, the Danıştay. Erdoğan stated that the constitution gave the power to assign these posts to his elected party. In May 2007, the head of Turkey's High Court asked prosecutors to consider whether Erdoğan should be charged over critical comments regarding the election of Abdullah Gül as president. Erdoğan said the ruling was "a disgrace to the justice system", and criticized the Constitutional Court which had invalidated a presidential vote because a boycott by other parties meant there was no quorum. Prosecutors investigated his earlier comments, including saying it had fired a "bullet at democracy". Tülay Tuğcu, head of the Constitutional Court, condemned Erdoğan for "threats, insults and hostility" towards the justice system. Civil–military relations The Turkish military has had a record of intervening in politics, having removed elected governments four times in the past. During the Erdoğan government, civil–military relationship moved towards normalization in which the influence of the military in politics was significantly reduced. The ruling Justice and Development Party has often faced off against the military, gaining political power by challenging a pillar of the country's laicistic establishment. The most significant issue that caused deep fissures between the army and the government was the midnight e-memorandum posted on the military's website objecting to the selection of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül as the ruling party's candidate for the Presidency in 2007. The military argued that the election of Gül, whose wife wears an Islamic headscarf, could undermine the laicistic order of the country. Contrary to expectations, the government responded harshly to former Chief of General Staff Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt's e-memorandum, stating the military had nothing to do with the selection of the presidential candidate. Health care After assuming power in 2003, Erdoğan's government embarked on a sweeping reform program of the Turkish healthcare system, called the Health Transformation Program (HTP), to greatly increase the quality of healthcare and protect all citizens from financial risks. Its introduction coincided with the period of sustained economic growth, allowing the Turkish government to put greater investments into the healthcare system. As part of the reforms, the "Green Card" program, which provides health benefits to the poor, was expanded in 2004. The reform program aimed at increasing the ratio of private to state-run healthcare, which, along with long queues in state-run hospitals, resulted in the rise of private medical care in Turkey, forcing state-run hospitals to compete by increasing quality. In April 2006, Erdoğan unveiled a social security reform package demanded by the International Monetary Fund under a loan deal. The move, which Erdoğan called one of the most radical reforms ever, was passed with fierce opposition. Turkey's three social security bodies were united under one roof, bringing equal health services and retirement benefits for members of all three bodies. The previous system had been criticized for reserving the best healthcare for civil servants and relegating others to wait in long queues. Under the second bill, everyone under the age of 18 years was entitled to free health services, irrespective of whether they pay premiums to any social security organization. The bill also envisages a gradual increase in the retirement age: starting from 2036, the retirement age will increase to 65 by 2048 for both women and men. In January 2008, the Turkish Parliament adopted a law to prohibit smoking in most public places. Erdoğan is outspokenly anti-smoking. Foreign policy Turkish foreign policy during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister has been associated with the name of Ahmet Davutoğlu. Davutoğlu was the chief foreign policy advisor of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan before he was appointed foreign minister in 2009. The basis of Erdoğan's foreign policy is based on the principle of "don't make enemies, make friends" and the pursuit of "zero problems" with neighboring countries. Erdoğan is co-founder of United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (AOC). The initiative seeks to galvanize international action against extremism through the forging of international, intercultural and inter-religious dialogue and cooperation. European Union When Erdoğan came to power, he continued Turkey's long ambition of joining the European Union. On 3 October 2005 negotiations began for Turkey's accession to the European Union. Erdoğan was named "The European of the Year 2004" by the newspaper European Voice for the reforms in his country in order to accomplish the accession of Turkey to the European Union. He said in a comment that "Turkey's accession shows that Europe is a continent where civilisations reconcile and not clash." On 3 October 2005, the negotiations for Turkey's accession to the EU formally started during Erdoğan's tenure as Prime Minister. The European Commission generally supports Erdoğan's reforms, but remains critical of his policies. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize EU member state Cyprus. Greece and Cyprus dispute Relations between Greece and Turkey were normalized during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister. In May 2004, Erdoğan became the first Turkish Prime Minister to visit Greece since 1988, and the first to visit the Turkish minority of Thrace since 1952. In 2007, Erdoğan and Greek Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis inaugurated the Greek-Turkish natural gas pipeline giving Caspian gas its first direct Western outlet. Turkey and Greece signed an agreement to create a Combined Joint Operational Unit within the framework of NATO to participate in Peace Support Operations. Erdoğan and his party strongly supported the EU-backed referendum to reunify Cyprus in 2004. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships as a consequence of the economic isolation of the internationally unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the failure of the EU to end the isolation, as it had promised in 2004. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize the Republic of Cyprus. Armenia Armenia is Turkey's only neighbor which Erdoğan has not visited during his premiership. The Turkish-Armenian border has been closed since 1993 because of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with Turkey's close ally Azerbaijan. Diplomatic efforts resulted in the signing of protocols between Turkish and Armenian Foreign Ministers in Switzerland to improve relations between the two countries. One of the points of the agreement was the creation of a joint commission on the issue. The Armenian Constitutional Court decided that the commission contradicts the Armenian constitution. Turkey responded saying that Armenian court's ruling on the protocols is not acceptable, resulting in a suspension of the rectification process by the Turkish side. Erdoğan has said that Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan should apologize for calling on school children to re-occupy eastern Turkey. When asked by a student at a literature contest ceremony if Armenians will be able to get back their "western territories" along with Mt. Ararat, Sarksyan said, "This is the task of your generation". Russia In December 2004, President Putin visited Turkey, making it the first presidential visit in the history of Turkish-Russian relations besides that of the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Nikolai Podgorny in 1972. In November 2005, Putin attended the inauguration of a jointly constructed Blue Stream natural gas pipeline in Turkey. This sequence of top-level visits has brought several important bilateral issues to the forefront. The two countries consider it their strategic goal to achieve "multidimensional co-operation", especially in the fields of energy, transport and the military. Specifically, Russia aims to invest in Turkey's fuel and energy industries, and it also expects to participate in tenders for the modernisation of Turkey's military. The relations during this time are described by President Medvedev as "Turkey is one of our most important partners with respect to regional and international issues. We can confidently say that Russian-Turkish relations have advanced to the level of a multidimensional strategic partnership". In May 2010, Turkey and Russia signed 17 agreements to enhance cooperation in energy and other fields, including pacts to build Turkey's first nuclear power plant and further plans for an oil pipeline from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. The leaders of both countries also signed an agreement on visa-free travel, enabling tourists to get into the other country for free and stay there for up to 30 days. United States When Barack Obama became President of United States, he made his first overseas bilateral meeting to Turkey in April 2009. At a joint news conference in Turkey, Obama said: "I'm trying to make a statement about the importance of Turkey, not just to the United States but to the world. I think that where there's the most promise of building stronger U.S.-Turkish relations is in the recognition that Turkey and the United States can build a model partnership in which a predominantly Christian nation, a predominantly Muslim nation – a Western nation and a nation that straddles two continents," he continued, "that we can create a modern international community that is respectful, that is secure, that is prosperous, that there are not tensions – inevitable tensions between cultures – which I think is extraordinarily important." Iraq Turkey under Erdoğan was named by the Bush Administration as a part of the "coalition of the willing" that was central to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. On 1 March 2003, a motion allowing Turkish military to participate in the U.S-led coalition's invasion of Iraq, along with the permission for foreign troops to be stationed in Turkey for this purpose, was overruled by the Turkish Parliament. After the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iraq and Turkey signed 48 trade agreements on issues including security, energy, and water. The Turkish government attempted to mend relations with Iraqi Kurdistan by opening a Turkish university in Erbil, and a Turkish consulate in Mosul. Erdoğan's government fostered economic and political relations with Irbil, and Turkey began to consider the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq as an ally against Maliki's government. Israel Erdoğan visited Israel on 1 May 2005, a gesture unusual for a leader of a Muslim majority country. During his trip, Erdoğan visited the Yad Vashem, Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. The President of Israel Shimon Peres addressed the Turkish parliament during a visit in 2007, the first time an Israeli leader had addressed the legislature of a predominantly Muslim nation. Their relationship worsened at the 2009 World Economic Forum conference over Israel's actions during the Gaza War. Erdoğan was interrupted by the moderator while he was responding to Peres. Erdoğan stated: "Mister Peres, you are older than I am. Maybe you are feeling guilty and that is why you are raising your voice. When it comes to killing you know it too well. I remember how you killed the children on beaches..." Upon the moderator's reminder that they needed to adjourn for dinner, Erdoğan left the panel, accusing the moderator of giving Peres more time than all the other panelists combined. Tensions increased further following the Gaza flotilla raid in May 2010. Erdoğan strongly condemned the raid, describing it as "state terrorism", and demanded an Israeli apology. In February 2013, Erdoğan called Zionism a "crime against humanity", comparing it to Islamophobia, antisemitism, and fascism. He later retracted the statement, saying he had been misinterpreted. He said "everyone should know" that his comments were directed at "Israeli policies", especially as regards to "Gaza and the settlements." Erdoğan's statements were criticized by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, among others. In August 2013, the Hürriyet reported that Erdoğan had claimed to have evidence of Israel's responsibility for the removal of Morsi from office in Egypt. The Israeli and Egyptian governments dismissed the suggestion. In response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. He also stated that "If Israel continues with this attitude, it will definitely be tried at international courts." Syria During Erdoğan's term of office, diplomatic relations between Turkey and Syria significantly deteriorated. In 2004, President Bashar al-Assad arrived in Turkey for the first official visit by a Syrian President in 57 years. In late 2004, Erdoğan signed a free trade agreement with Syria. Visa restrictions between the two countries were lifted in 2009, which caused an economic boom in the regions near the Syrian border. However, in 2011 the relationship between the two countries was strained following the outbreak of conflict in Syria. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he was trying to "cultivate a favorable relationship with whatever government would take the place of Assad". However, he began to support the opposition in Syria, after demonstrations turned violent, creating a serious Syrian refugee problem in Turkey. Erdoğan's policy of providing military training for anti-Damascus fighters has also created conflict with Syria's ally and a neighbour of Turkey, Iran. Saudi Arabia In August 2006, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz as-Saud made a visit to Turkey. This was the first visit by a Saudi monarch to Turkey in the last four decades. The monarch made a second visit, on 9 November 2007. Turk-Saudi trade volume has exceeded 3.2 billion in 2006, almost double the figure achieved in 2003. In 2009, this amount reached 5.5 billion and the goal for the year 2010 was 10 billion. Erdoğan condemned the Saudi-led intervention in Bahrain and characterized the Saudi movement as "a new Karbala." He demanded withdrawal of Saudi forces from Bahrain. Egypt Erdoğan had made his first official visit to Egypt on 12 September 2011, accompanied by six ministers and 200 businessmen. This visit was made very soon after Turkey had ejected Israeli ambassadors, cutting off all diplomatic relations with Israel because Israel refused to apologize for the Gaza flotilla raid which killed eight Turkish and one Turco-American. Erdoğan's visit to Egypt was met with much enthusiasm by Egyptians. CNN reported some Egyptians saying "We consider him as the Islamic leader in the Middle East", while others were appreciative of his role in supporting Gaza. Erdoğan was later honored in Tahrir Square by members of the Egyptian Revolution Youth Union, and members of the Turkish embassy were presented with a coat of arms in acknowledgment of the Prime Minister's support of the Egyptian Revolution. Erdoğan stated in a 2011 interview that he supported secularism for Egypt, which generated an angry reaction among Islamic movements, especially the Freedom and Justice Party, which was the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, commentators suggest that by forming an alliance with the military junta during Egypt's transition to democracy, Erdoğan may have tipped the balance in favor of an authoritarian government. Erdoğan condemned the sit-in dispersals conducted by Egyptian police on 14 August 2013 at the Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda squares, where violent clashes between police officers and pro-Morsi Islamist protesters led to hundreds of deaths, mostly protesters. In July 2014, one year after the removal of Mohamed Morsi from office, Erdoğan described Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as an "illegitimate tyrant". Somalia Erdoğan's administration maintains strong ties with the Somali government. During the drought of 2011, Erdoğan's government contributed over $201 million to humanitarian relief efforts in the impacted parts of Somalia. Following a greatly improved security situation in Mogadishu in mid-2011, the Turkish government also re-opened its foreign embassy with the intention of more effectively assisting in the post-conflict development process. It was among the first foreign governments to resume formal diplomatic relations with Somalia after the civil war. In May 2010, the Turkish and Somali governments signed a military training agreement, in keeping with the provisions outlined in the Djibouti Peace Process. Turkish Airlines became the first long-distance international commercial airline in two decades to resume flights to and from Mogadishu's Aden Adde International Airport. Turkey also launched various development and infrastructure projects in Somalia including building several hospitals and helping renovate the National Assembly building. Protests 2013 Gezi Park protests against the perceived authoritarianism of Erdoğan and his policies, starting from a small sit-in in Istanbul in defense of a city park. After the police's intense reaction with tear gas, the protests grew each day. Faced by the largest mass protest in a decade, Erdoğan made this controversial remark in a televised speech: "The police were there yesterday, they are there today, and they will be there tomorrow". After weeks of clashes in the streets of Istanbul, his government at first apologized to the protestors and called for a plebiscite, but then ordered a crackdown on the protesters. Presidency (2014–present) Erdoğan took the oath of office on 28 August 2014 and became the 12th president of Turkey. He administered the new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu's oath on 29 August. When asked about his lower-than-expected 51.79% share of the vote, he allegedly responded, "there were even those who did not like the Prophet. I, however, won 52%". Assuming the role of President, Erdoğan was criticized for openly stating that he would not maintain the tradition of presidential neutrality. Erdoğan has also stated his intention to pursue a more active role as president, such as utilising the President's rarely used cabinet-calling powers. The political opposition has argued that Erdoğan will continue to pursue his own political agenda, controlling the government, while his new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu would be docile and submissive. Furthermore, the domination of loyal Erdoğan supporters in Davutoğlu's cabinet fuelled speculation that Erdoğan intended to exercise substantial control over the government. Presidential elections On 1 July 2014, Erdoğan was named the AKP's presidential candidate in the Turkish presidential election. His candidacy was announced by the Deputy President of the AKP, Mehmet Ali Şahin. Erdoğan made a speech after the announcement and used the 'Erdoğan logo' for the first time. The logo was criticised because it was very similar to the logo that U.S. President Barack Obama used in the 2008 presidential election. Erdoğan was elected as the President of Turkey in the first round of the election with 51.79% of the vote, obviating the need for a run-off by winning over 50%. The joint candidate of the CHP, MHP and 13 other opposition parties, former Organisation of Islamic Co-operation general secretary Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu won 38.44% of the vote. The pro-Kurdish HDP candidate Selahattin Demirtaş won 9.76%. The 2018 Turkish presidential election took place as part of the 2018 general election, alongside parliamentary elections on the same day. Following the approval of constitutional changes in a referendum held in 2017, the elected President will be both the head of state and head of government of Turkey, taking over the latter role from the to-be-abolished office of the Prime Minister. Incumbent president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declared his candidacy for the People's Alliance (Turkish: Cumhur İttifakı) on 27 April 2018. Erdoğan's main opposition, the Republican People's Party, nominated Muharrem İnce, a member of the parliament known for his combative opposition and spirited speeches against Erdoğan. Besides these candidates, Meral Akşener, the founder and leader of İyi Party, Temel Karamollaoğlu, the leader of the Felicity Party and Doğu Perinçek, the leader of the Patriotic Party, have announced their candidacies and collected the 100,000 signatures required for nomination. The alliance which Erdoğan was candidate for won 52.59% of the popular vote. Referendum In April 2017, a constitutional referendum was held, where the voters in Turkey (and Turkish citizens abroad) approved a set of 18 proposed amendments to the Constitution of Turkey. The amendments included the replacement of the existing parliamentary system with a presidential system. The post of Prime Minister would be abolished, and the presidency would become an executive post vested with broad executive powers. The parliament seats would be increased from 550 to 600 and the age of candidacy to the parliament was lowered from 25 to 18. The referendum also called for changes to the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors. Local elections In the 2019 local elections, the ruling party AKP lost control of Istanbul and Ankara for the first time in 25 years, as well as 5 of Turkey's 6 largest cities. The loss has been widely attributed to Erdoğan's mismanagement of the Turkish economic crisis, rising authoritarianism as well as the alleged government inaction on the Syrian refugee crisis. Soon after the elections, Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey ordered a re-election in Istanbul, cancelling Ekrem İmamoğlu's mayoral certificate. The decision led to a significant decrease of Erdoğan's and AKP's popularity and his party lost the elections again in June with a greater margin. The result was seen as a huge blow to Erdoğan, who had once said that if his party 'lost Istanbul, we would lose Turkey. The opposition's victory was characterised as 'the beginning of the end' for Erdoğan', with international commentators calling the re-run a huge government miscalculation that led to a potential İmamoğlu candidacy in the next scheduled presidential election. It is suspected that the scale of the government's defeat could provoke a cabinet reshuffle and early general elections, currently scheduled for June 2023. The New Zealand and Australian governments and opposition CHP party have criticized Erdoğan after he repeatedly showed video taken by the Christchurch mosque shooter to his supporters at campaign rallies for 31 March local elections and said Australians and New Zealanders who came to Turkey with anti-Muslim sentiments "would be sent back in coffins like their grandfathers" at Gallipoli. Domestic policy Presidential palace Erdoğan has also received criticism for the construction of a new palace called Ak Saray (pure white palace), which occupies approximately 50 acres of Atatürk Forest Farm (AOÇ) in Ankara. Since the AOÇ is protected land, several court orders were issued to halt the construction of the new palace, though building work went on nonetheless. The opposition described the move as a clear disregard for the rule of law. The project was subject to heavy criticism and allegations were made; of corruption during the construction process, wildlife destruction and the complete obliteration of the zoo in the AOÇ in order to make way for the new compound. The fact that the palace is technically illegal has led to it being branded as the 'Kaç-Ak Saray', the word kaçak in Turkish meaning 'illegal'. Ak Saray was originally designed as a new office for the Prime Minister. However, upon assuming the presidency, Erdoğan announced that the palace would become the new Presidential Palace, while the Çankaya Mansion will be used by the Prime Minister instead. The move was seen as a historic change since the Çankaya Mansion had been used as the iconic office of the presidency ever since its inception. The Ak Saray has almost 1,000 rooms and cost $350 million (€270 million), leading to huge criticism at a time when mining accidents and workers' rights had been dominating the agenda. On 29 October 2014, Erdoğan was due to hold a Republic Day reception in the new palace to commemorate the 91st anniversary of the Republic of Turkey and to officially inaugurate the Presidential Palace. However, after most invited participants announced that they would boycott the event and a mining accident occurred in the district of Ermenek in Karaman, the reception was cancelled. The media President Erdoğan and his government continue to press for court action against the remaining free press in Turkey. The latest newspaper that has been seized is Zaman, in March 2016. After the seizure Morton Abramowitz and Eric Edelman, former U.S. ambassadors to Turkey, condemned President Erdoğan's actions in an opinion piece published by The Washington Post: "Clearly, democracy cannot flourish under Erdoğan now". "The overall pace of reforms in Turkey has not only slowed down but in some key areas, such as freedom of expression and the independence of the judiciary, there has been a regression, which is particularly worrying", rapporteur Kati Piri said in April 2016 after the European Parliament passed its annual progress report on Turkey. On 22 June 2016, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that he considered himself successful in "destroying" Turkish civil groups "working against the state", a conclusion that had been confirmed some days earlier by Sedat Laçiner, Professor of International Relations and rector of the Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University: "Outlawing unarmed and peaceful opposition, sentencing people to unfair punishment under erroneous terror accusations, will feed genuine terrorism in Erdoğan’s Turkey. Guns and violence will become the sole alternative for legally expressing free thought". After the coup attempt, over 200 journalists were arrested and over 120 media outlets were closed. Cumhuriyet journalists were detained in November 2016 after a long-standing crackdown on the newspaper. Subsequently, Reporters Without Borders called Erdoğan an "enemy of press freedom" and said that he "hides his aggressive dictatorship under a veneer of democracy". In April 2017, Turkey blocked all access to Wikipedia over a content dispute. The Turkish government lifted a two-and-a-half-year ban on Wikipedia on 15 January 2020, restoring access to the online encyclopedia a month after Turkey's top court ruled that blocking Wikipedia was unconstitutional. On 1 July 2020, in a statement made to his party members, Erdoğan announced that the government would introduce new measures and regulations to control or shut down social media platforms such as YouTube, Twitter and Netflix. Through these new measures, each company would be required to appoint an official representative in the country to respond to legal concerns. The decision comes after a number of Twitter users insulted his daughter Esra after she welcomed her fourth child. State of emergency and purges On 20 July 2016, President Erdoğan declared the state of emergency, citing the coup d'état attempt as justification. It was first scheduled to last three months. The Turkish parliament approved this measure. The state of emergency was later extended for another three months, amidst the ongoing 2016 Turkish purges including comprehensive purges of independent media and detention of tens of thousands of Turkish citizens politically opposed to Erdoğan. More than 50,000 people have been arrested and over 160,000 fired from their jobs by March 2018. In August 2016, Erdoğan began rounding up journalists who had been publishing, or who were about to publish articles questioning corruption within the Erdoğan administration, and incarcerating them. The number of Turkish journalists jailed by Turkey is higher than any other country, including all of those journalists currently jailed in North Korea, Cuba, Russia, and China combined. In the wake of the coup attempt of July 2016 the Erdoğan administration began rounding up tens of thousands of individuals, both from within the government, and from the public sector, and incarcerating them on charges of alleged "terrorism". As a result of these arrests, many in the international community complained about the lack of proper judicial process in the incarceration of Erdoğan's opposition. In April 2017 Erdoğan successfully sponsored legislation effectively making it illegal for the Turkish legislative branch to investigate his executive branch of government. Without the checks and balances of freedom of speech, and the freedom of the Turkish legislature to hold him accountable for his actions, many have likened Turkey's current form of government to a dictatorship with only nominal forms of democracy in practice. At the time of Erdoğan's successful passing of the most recent legislation silencing his opposition, United States President Donald Trump called Erdoğan to congratulate him for his "recent referendum victory". On 29 April 2017 Erdoğan's administration began an internal Internet block of all of the Wikipedia online encyclopedia site via Turkey's domestic Internet filtering system. This blocking action took place after the government had first made a request for Wikipedia to remove what it referred to as "offensive content". In response, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales replied via a post on Twitter stating, "Access to information is a fundamental human right. Turkish people, I will always stand with you and fight for this right." In January 2016, more than a thousand academics signed a petition criticizing Turkey's military crackdown on ethnic Kurdish towns and neighborhoods in the east of the country, such as Sur (a district of Diyarbakır), Silvan, Nusaybin, Cizre and Silopi, and asking an end to violence. Erdoğan accused those who signed the petition of "terrorist propaganda", calling them "the darkest of people". He called for action by institutions and universities, stating, "Everyone who benefits from this state but is now an enemy of the state must be punished without further delay". Within days, over 30 of the signatories were arrested, many in dawn-time raids on their homes. Although all were quickly released, nearly half were fired from their jobs, eliciting a denunciation from Turkey's Science Academy for such "wrong and disturbing" treatment. Erdoğan vowed that the academics would pay the price for "falling into a pit of treachery". On 8 July 2018, Erdoğan sacked 18,000 officials for alleged ties to US based cleric Fethullah Gülen, shortly before renewing his term as an executive president. Of those removed, 9000 were police officers with 5000 from the armed forces with the addition of hundreds of academics. Foreign policy Europe In February 2016, Erdoğan threatened to send the millions of refugees in Turkey to EU member states, saying: "We can open the doors to Greece and Bulgaria anytime and we can put the refugees on buses ... So how will you deal with refugees if you don't get a deal?" In an interview to the news magazine Der Spiegel, German minister of defence Ursula von der Leyen said on 11 March 2016 that the refugee crisis had made good cooperation between EU and Turkey an "existentially important" issue. "Therefore it is right to advance now negotiations on Turkey's EU accession". In its resolution "The functioning of democratic institutions in Turkey" from 22 June 2016, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe warned that "recent developments in Turkey pertaining to freedom of the media and of expression, erosion of the rule of law and the human rights violations in relation to anti-terrorism security operations in south-east Turkey have ... raised serious questions about the functioning of its democratic institutions". On 20 August 2016, Erdoğan told his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko that Turkey would not recognize the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea; calling it "Crimea's occupation". In January 2017, Erdoğan said that the withdrawal of Turkish troops from Northern Cyprus is "out of the question" and Turkey will be in Cyprus "forever". There is a long-standing dispute between Turkey and Greece in the Aegean Sea. Erdoğan warned that Greece will pay a "heavy price" if Turkey's gas exploration vessel – in what Turkey said are disputed waters – is attacked. In September 2020, Erdoğan declared his government's support for Azerbaijan following clashes between Armenian and Azeri forces over a disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. He dismissed demands for a ceasefire. Diaspora In March 2017, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated to the Turks in Europe, "Make not three, but five children. Because you are the future of Europe. That will be the best response to the injustices against you." This has been interpreted as an imperialist call for demographic warfare. According to The Economist, Erdoğan is the first Turkish leader to take the Turkish diaspora seriously, which has created friction within these diaspora communities and between the Turkish government and several of its European counterparts. The Balkans In February 2018, President Erdoğan expressed Turkish support of the Republic of Macedonia's position during negotiations over the Macedonia naming dispute saying that Greece's position is wrong. In March 2018, President Erdoğan criticized the Kosovan Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj for dismissing his Interior Minister and Intelligence Chief for failing to inform him of an unauthorized and illegal secret operation conducted by the National Intelligence Organization of Turkey on Kosovo's territory that led to the arrest of six people allegedly associated with the Gülen movement. On 26 November 2019, an earthquake struck the Durrës region of Albania. President Erdoğan expressed his condolences. and citing close Albanian-Turkish relations, he committed Turkey to reconstructing 500 earthquake destroyed homes and other civic structures in Laç, Albania. In Istanbul, Erdoğan organised and attended a donors conference (8 December) to assist Albania that included Turkish businessmen, investors and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama. United Kingdom In May 2018, British Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed Erdoğan to the United Kingdom for a three-day state visit. Erdoğan declared that the United Kingdom is "an ally and a strategic partner, but also a real friend. The cooperation we have is well beyond any mechanism that we have established with other partners." Israel Relations between Turkey and Israel began to normalize after Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu officially apologized for the death of the nine Turkish activists during the Gaza flotilla raid. However, in response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of being "more barbaric than Hitler", and conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. In December 2017, President Erdoğan issued a warning to Donald Trump, after the U.S. President acknowledged Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Erdoğan stated, "Jerusalem is a red line for Muslims", indicating that naming Jerusalem as Israel's capital would alienate Palestinians and other Muslims from the city, undermining hopes at a future capital of a Palestinian State. Erdoğan called Israel a "terrorist state". Naftali Bennett dismissed the threats, claiming "Erdoğan does not miss an opportunity to attack Israel". In April 2019, Erdoğan said the West Bank belongs to Palestinians, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would annex Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories if he is re-elected. Erdoğan condemned the Israel–UAE peace agreement, stating that Turkey was considering suspending or cutting off diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates in retaliation. Syrian Civil War Amid allegations of Turkish collaboration with the Islamic State, the 2014 Kobanî protests broke out near the Syrian border city of Kobanî, in protest against the government's perceived facilitation of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant during the Siege of Kobanî. 42 protestors were killed during a brutal police crackdown. Asserting that aid to the Kurdish-majority People's Protection Units (YPG) fighters in Syria would assist the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) (then on ceasefire) in Turkey, Erdoğan held bilateral talks with Barack Obama regarding IS during the 5–6 September 2014 NATO summit in Newport, Wales. In early October, United States Vice President Joe Biden criticised the Turkish government for supplying jihadists in Syria and said Erdoğan had expressed regret to him about letting foreign jihadists transit through Turkey en route to Syria. Erdoğan angrily responded, "Biden has to apologize for his statements" adding that if no apology is made, Biden would become "history to me." Biden subsequently apologised. In response to the U.S. request to use İncirlik Air Base to conduct air strikes against IS, Erdoğan demanded that Bashar al-Assad be removed from power first. Turkey lost its bid for a Security Council seat in the United Nations during the 2014 election; the unexpected result is believed to have been a reaction to Erdoğan's hostile treatment of the Kurds fighting ISIS on the Syrian border and a rebuke of his willingness to support IS-aligned insurgents opposed to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. In 2015, there were consistent allegations that Erdoğan maintained financial links with the Islamic State, including allegation of his son-in-law Berat Albayrak's involvement with oil production and smuggling in ISIL. Revelations that the state was supplying arms to militant groups in Syria in the 2014 National Intelligence Organisation lorry scandal led to accusations of high treason. In July 2015, Turkey became involved in the international military intervention against ISIL, simultaneously launching airstrikes against PKK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan. As of 2015, Turkey began openly supporting the Army of Conquest, a coalition of Syrian rebel groups that included al-Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham. In late November 2016, Erdoğan said that the Turkish military launched its operations in Syria to end Assad's rule, but retracted this statement shortly afterwards. In January 2018, the Turkish military and its Syrian National Army and Sham Legion allies began the Turkish military operation in Afrin in the Kurdish-majority Afrin Canton in Northern Syria, against the YPG. On 10 April, Erdoğan rejected a Russian demand to return Afrin to Syrian government control. In October 2019, after Erdoğan spoke to him, U.S. President Donald Trump gave the go-ahead to the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria, despite recently agreeing to a Northern Syria Buffer Zone. U.S. troops in northern Syria were withdrawn from the border to avoid interference with the Turkish operation. After the U.S. pullout, Turkey proceeded to attack the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria. Rejecting criticism of the invasion, Erdoğan claimed that NATO and European Union countries "sided with terrorists, and all of them attacked us". China Bilateral trade between Turkey and China increased from $1 billion a year in 2002 to $27 billion annually in 2017. Erdoğan has stated that Turkey might consider joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation instead of the European Union. Qatar blockade In June 2017 during a speech, Erdoğan called the isolation of Qatar as "inhumane and against Islamic values" and that "victimising Qatar through smear campaigns serves no purpose". Myanmar In September 2017, Erdoğan condemned the persecution of Muslims in Myanmar and accused Myanmar of "genocide" against the Muslim minority. United States Over time, Turkey began to look for ways to buy its own missile defense system and also to use that procurement to build up its own capacity to manufacture and sell an air and missile defense system. Turkey got serious about acquiring a missile defense system early in the first Obama administration when it opened a competition between the Raytheon Patriot PAC 2 system and systems from Europe, Russia, and even China. Taking advantage of the new low in U.S.-Turkish relations, Putin saw his chance to use an S-400 sale to Turkey, so in July 2017, he offered the air defense system to Turkey. In the months that followed, the United States warned Turkey that a S-400 purchase jeopardized Turkey's F-35 purchase. Integration of the Russian system into the NATO air defense net was also out of the question. Administration officials, including Mark Esper, warned that Turkey had to choose between the S-400 and the F-35. That they couldn't have both. The S-400 deliveries to Turkey began on 12 July. On 16 July, Trump mentioned to reporters that withholding the F-35 from Turkey was unfair. Said the president, "So what happens is we have a situation where Turkey is very good with us, very good, and we are now telling Turkey that because you have really been forced to buy another missile system, we’re not going to sell you the F-35 fighter jets". The U.S. Congress has made clear on a bipartisan basis that it expects the president to sanction Turkey for buying Russian equipment. Out of the F-35, Turkey now considers buying Russian fifth-generation jet fighter Su-57. On 1 August 2018, the U.S. Department of Treasury sanctioned two senior Turkish government ministers who were involved in the detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson. Erdoğan said that the U.S. behavior will force Turkey to look for new friends and allies. The U.S.–Turkey tensions appear to be the most serious diplomatic crisis between the NATO allies in years. Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton claimed that President Donald Trump told Erdoğan he would 'take care' of investigation against Turkey's state-owned bank Halkbank accused of bank fraud charges and laundering up to $20 billion on behalf of Iranian entities. Turkey criticized Bolton's book, saying it included misleading accounts of conversations between Trump and Erdoğan. In August 2020, the former vice president and presidential candidate Joe Biden called for a new U.S. approach to the "autocrat" President Erdoğan and support for Turkish opposition parties. In September 2020, Biden demanded that Erdoğan "stay out" of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, in which Turkey has supported the Azeris. Venezuela Relations with Venezuela were strengthened with recent developments and high level mutual visits. The first official visit between the two countries at presidential level was in October 2017 when Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro visited Turkey. In December 2018, Erdoğan visited Venezuela for the first time and expressed his will to build strong relations with Venezuela and expressed hope that high-level visits "will increasingly continue." Reuters reported that in 2018 23 tons of mined gold were taken from Venezuela to Istanbul. In the first nine months of 2018, Venezuela's gold exports to Turkey rose from zero in the previous year to US$900 million. During the Venezuelan presidential crisis, Erdoğan voiced solidarity with Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro and criticized U.S. sanctions against Venezuela, saying that "political problems cannot be resolved by punishing an entire nation." Following the 2019 Venezuelan uprising attempt, Erdoğan condemned the actions of lawmaker Juan Guaidó, tweeting "Those who are in an effort to appoint a postmodern colonial governor to Venezuela, where the President was appointed by elections and where the people rule, should know that only democratic elections can determine how a country is governed". Events Coup d'état attempt On 15 July 2016, a coup d'état was attempted by the military, with aims to remove Erdoğan from government. By the next day, Erdoğan's government managed to reassert effective control in the country. Reportedly, no government official was arrested or harmed, which, among other factors, raised the suspicion of a false flag event staged by the government itself. Erdoğan, as well as other government officials, has blamed an exiled cleric, and a former ally of Erdoğan, Fethullah Gülen, for staging the coup attempt. Süleyman Soylu, Minister of Labor in Erdoğan's government, accused the US of planning a coup to oust Erdoğan. Erdoğan, as well as other high-ranking Turkish government officials, has issued repeated demands to the US to extradite Gülen. Following the coup attempt, there has been a significant deterioration in Turkey-US relations. European and other world leaders have expressed their concerns over the situation in Turkey, with many of them warning Erdoğan not to use the coup attempt as an excuse to crack down on his opponents. The rise of ISIS and the collapse of the Kurdish peace process had led to a sharp rise in terror incidents in Turkey until 2016. Erdoğan was accused by his critics of having a 'soft corner' for ISIS. However, after the attempted coup, Erdoğan ordered the Turkish military into Syria to combat ISIS and Kurdish militant groups. Erdoğan's critics have decried purges in the education system and judiciary as undermining the rule of law however Erdoğan supporters argue this is a necessary measure as Gulen-linked schools cheated on entrance exams, requiring a purge in the education system and of the Gulen followers who then entered the judiciary. Erdoğan's plan is "to reconstitute Turkey as a presidential system. The plan would create a centralized system that would enable him to better tackle Turkey's internal and external threats. One of the main hurdles allegedly standing in his way is Fethullah Gulen's movement ..." In the aftermath of the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt, a groundswell of national unity and consensus emerged for cracking down on the coup plotters with a National Unity rally held in Turkey that included Islamists, secularists, liberals and nationalists. Erdoğan has used this consensus to remove Gulen's followers from the bureaucracy, curtail their role in NGOs, Turkey's Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Turkish military, with 149 Generals discharged. In a foreign policy shift Erdoğan ordered the Turkish Armed Forces into battle in Syria and has liberated towns from IS control. As relations with Europe soured over in the aftermath of the attempted coup, Erdoğan developed alternative relationships with Russia, Saudi Arabia and a "strategic partnership" with Pakistan, with plans to cultivate relations through free trade agreements and deepening military relations for mutual co-operation with Turkey's regional allies. 2018 currency and debt crisis The Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018 was caused by the Turkish economy's excessive current account deficit and foreign-currency debt, in combination with Erdoğan's increasing authoritarianism and his unorthodox ideas about interest rate policy. Economist Paul Krugman described the unfolding crisis as "a classic currency-and-debt crisis, of a kind we’ve seen many times", adding: "At such a time, the quality of leadership suddenly matters a great deal. You need officials who understand what's happening, can devise a response and have enough credibility that markets give them the benefit of the doubt. Some emerging markets have those things, and they are riding out the turmoil fairly well. The Erdoğan regime has none of that". Ideology and public image Early during his premiership, Erdoğan was praised as a role model for emerging Middle Eastern nations due to several reform packages initiated by his government which expanded religious freedoms and minority rights as part of accession negotiations with the European Union. However, his government underwent several crises including the Sledgehammer coup and the Ergenekon trials, corruption scandals, accusations of media intimidation, as well as the pursuit of an increasingly polarizing political agenda; the opposition accused the government of inciting political hatred throughout the country. Critics say that Erdoğan's government legitimizes homophobia, as Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". Neo-Ottomanism As President, Erdoğan has overseen a revival of Ottoman tradition, greeting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas with an Ottoman-style ceremony in the new presidential palace, with guards dressed in costumes representing founders of 16 Great Turkish Empires in history. While serving as the Prime Minister of Turkey, Erdoğan's AKP made references to the Ottoman era during election campaigns, such as calling their supporters 'grandsons of Ottomans' (Osmanlı torunu). This proved controversial, since it was perceived to be an open attack against the republican nature of modern Turkey founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. In 2015, Erdoğan made a statement in which he endorsed the old Ottoman term külliye to refer to university campuses rather than the standard Turkish word kampüs. Many critics have thus accused Erdoğan of wanting to become an Ottoman sultan and abandon the secular and democratic credentials of the Republic. One of the most cited scholars alive, Noam Chomsky, said that "Erdogan in Turkey is basically trying to create something like the Ottoman Caliphate, with him as caliph, supreme leader, throwing his weight around all over the place, and destroying the remnants of democracy in Turkey at the same time". When pressed on this issue in January 2015, Erdoğan denied these claims and said that he would aim to be more like Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom rather than like an Ottoman sultan. In July 2020, after the Council of State annulled the Cabinet's 1934 decision to establish the Hagia Sophia as museum and revoking the monument's status, Erdoğan ordered its reclassification as a mosque. The 1934 decree was ruled to be unlawful under both Ottoman and Turkish law as Hagia Sophia's waqf, endowed by Sultan Mehmed II, had designated the site a mosque; proponents of the decision argued the Hagia Sophia was the personal property of the sultan. This redesignation is controversial, invoking condemnation from the Turkish opposition, UNESCO, the World Council of Churches, the Holy See, and many other international leaders. In August 2020, he also signed the order that transferred the administration of the Chora Church to the Directorate of Religious Affairs to open it for worship as a mosque. Initially converted to a mosque by the Ottomans, the building had then been designated as a museum by the government since 1934. Authoritarianism Erdoğan has served as the de facto leader of Turkey since 2002. In response to criticism, Erdoğan made a speech in May 2014 denouncing allegations of dictatorship, saying that the leader of the opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who was there at the speech, would not be able to "roam the streets" freely if he were a dictator. Kılıçdaroğlu responded that political tensions would cease to exist if Erdoğan stopped making his polarising speeches for three days. One observer said it was a measure of the state of Turkish democracy that Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu could openly threaten, on 20 December 2015, that, if his party did not win the election, Turkish Kurds would endure a repeat of the era of the "white Toros", the Turkish name for the Renault 12, "a car associated with the gendarmarie’s fearsome intelligence agents, who carried out thousands of extrajudicial executions of Kurdish nationalists during the 1990s". In February 2015, a 13-year-old was charged by a prosecutor after allegedly insulting Erdoğan on Facebook. In 2016, a waiter was arrested for insulting Erdoğan by allegedly saying "If Erdoğan comes here, I will not even serve tea to him.". In April 2014, the President of the Constitutional Court, Haşim Kılıç, accused Erdoğan of damaging the credibility of the judiciary, labelling Erdoğan's attempts to increase political control over the courts as 'desperate'. During the chaotic 2007 presidential election, the military issued an E-memorandum warning the government to keep within the boundaries of secularism when choosing a candidate. Regardless, Erdoğan's close relations with Fethullah Gülen and his Cemaat Movement allowed his government to maintain a degree of influence within the judiciary through Gülen's supporters in high judicial and bureaucratic offices. Shortly after, an alleged coup plot codenamed Sledgehammer became public and resulted in the imprisonment of 300 military officers including İbrahim Fırtına, Çetin Doğan and Engin Alan. Several opposition politicians, journalists and military officers also went on trial for allegedly being part of an ultra-nationalist organisation called Ergenekon. Both cases were marred by irregularities and were condemned as a joint attempt by Erdoğan and Gülen to curb opposition to the AKP. The original Sledgehammer document containing the coup plans, allegedly written in 2003, was found to have been written using Microsoft Word 2007. Despite both domestic and international calls for these irregularities to be addressed in order to guarantee a fair trial, Erdoğan instead praised his government for bringing the coup plots to light. When Gülen publicly withdrew support and openly attacked Erdoğan in late 2013, several imprisoned military officers and journalists were released, with the government admitting that the judicial proceedings were unfair. When Gülen withdrew support from the AKP government in late 2013, a government corruption scandal broke out, leading to the arrest of several family members of cabinet ministers. Erdoğan accused Gülen of co-ordinating a "parallel state" within the judiciary in an attempt to topple him from power. He then removed or reassigned several judicial officials in an attempt to remove Gülen's supporters from office. Erdoğan's 'purge' was widely questioned and criticised by the European Union. In early 2014, a new law was passed by parliament giving the government greater control over the judiciary, which sparked public protest throughout the country. International organisations perceived the law to be a danger to the separation of powers. Several judicial officials removed from their posts said that they had been removed due to their secularist credentials. The political opposition accused Erdoğan of not only attempting to remove Gülen supporters, but supporters of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's principles as well, in order to pave the way for increased politicisation of the judiciary. Several family members of Erdoğan's ministers who had been arrested as a result of the 2013 corruption scandal were released, and a judicial order to question Erdoğan's son Bilal Erdoğan was annulled. Controversy erupted when it emerged that many of the newly appointed judicial officials were actually AKP supporters. İslam Çiçek, a judge who ejected the cases of five ministers' relatives accused of corruption, was accused of being an AKP supporter and an official investigation was launched into his political affiliations. On 1 September 2014, the courts dissolved the cases of 96 suspects, which included Bilal Erdoğan. During a televised press conference he was asked if he believed a presidential system was possible in a unitary state. Erdoğan affirmed this and cited Nazi Germany (among other examples) as a case where such a combination existed. However, the Turkish president's office said that Erdoğan was not advocating a Hitler-style government when he called for a state system with a strong executive, and added that the Turkish president had declared the "Holocaust, anti-semitism and Islamophobia" as crimes against humanity and that it was out of the question for him to cite Hitler's Germany as a good example. Suppression of dissent Erdoğan has been criticised for his politicisation of the media, especially after the 2013 protests. The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) alleged that over 1,863 journalists lost their jobs due to their anti-government views in 12 years of AKP rule. Opposition politicians have also alleged that intimidation in the media is due to the government's attempt to restructure the ownership of private media corporations. Journalists from the Cihan News Agency and the Gülenist Zaman newspaper were repeatedly barred from attending government press conferences or asking questions. Several opposition journalists such as Soner Yalçın were controversially arrested as part of the Ergenekon trials and Sledgehammer coup investigation. Veli Ağbaba, a CHP politician, has called the AKP the 'biggest media boss in Turkey.' In 2015, 74 US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to state their concern over what they saw as deviations from the basic principles of democracy in Turkey and oppressions of Erdoğan over media. Notable cases of media censorship occurred during the 2013 anti-government protests, when the mainstream media did not broadcast any news regarding the demonstrations for three days after they began. The lack of media coverage was symbolised by CNN International covering the protests while CNN Türk broadcast a documentary about penguins at the same time. The Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK) controversially issued a fine to pro-opposition news channels including Halk TV and Ulusal Kanal for their coverage of the protests, accusing them of broadcasting footage that could be morally, physically and mentally destabilising to children. Erdoğan was criticised for not responding to the accusations of media intimidation, and caused international outrage after telling a female journalist (Amberin Zaman of The Economist) to know her place and calling her a 'shameless militant' during his 2014 presidential election campaign. While the 2014 presidential election was not subject to substantial electoral fraud, Erdoğan was again criticised for receiving disproportionate media attention in comparison to his rivals. The British newspaper The Times commented that between 2 and 4 July, the state-owned media channel TRT gave 204 minutes of coverage to Erdoğan's campaign and less than a total of 3 minutes to both his rivals. Erdoğan also tightened controls over the Internet, signing into law a bill which allows the government to block websites without prior court order on 12 September 2014. His government blocked Twitter and YouTube in late March 2014 following the release of a recording of a conversation between him and his son Bilal, where Erdoğan allegedly warned his family to 'nullify' all cash reserves at their home amid the 2013 corruption scandal. Erdoğan has undertaken a media campaign that attempts to portray the presidential family as frugal and simple-living; their palace electricity-bill is estimated at $500,000 per month. In May 2016, former Miss Turkey model Merve Büyüksaraç was sentenced to more than a year in prison for allegedly insulting the president. In a 2016 news story, Bloomberg reported, "more than 2,000 cases have been opened against journalists, cartoonists, teachers, a former Miss Turkey, and even schoolchildren in the past two years". In November 2016, the Turkish government blocked access to social media in all of Turkey as well as sought to completely block Internet access for the citizens in the southeast of the country. Mehmet Aksoy lawsuit In 2009, Turkish sculptor Mehmet Aksoy created the Statue of Humanity in Kars to promote reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia. When visiting the city in 2011, Erdoğan deemed the statue a "freak", and months later it was demolished. Aksoy sued Erdoğan for "moral indemnities", although his lawyer said that his statement was a critique rather than an insult. In March 2015, a judge ordered Erdoğan to pay 10,000 liras. Erdoğanism Erdoğan has produced many aphorisms and catch-phrases known as Erdoğanisms. The term Erdoğanism first emerged shortly after Erdoğan's 2011 general election victory, where it was predominantly described as the AKP's liberal economic and conservative democratic ideals fused with Erdoğan demagoguery and cult of personality. Views on minorities LGBT In 2002, Erdoğan said that "homosexuals must be legally protected within the framework of their rights and freedoms. From time to time, we do not find the treatment they get on some television screens humane", he said. However, in 2017 Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Turkey's top Muslim scholar and President of Religious Affairs, Ali Erbaş, said in a Friday Ramadan announcement that country condemns homosexuality because it "brings illness," insinuating that same sex relations are responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan backed Erbaş, saying that what Erbaş "said was totally right." Jews While Erdoğan has declared several times being against antisemitism, he has been accused of invoking antisemitic stereotypes in public statements. According to Erdoğan, he had been inspired by novelist and Islamist ideologue Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, a publisher (among others) of antisemitic literature. Others During a live interview in 2014, he said: "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian. Excuse me, but they have said even uglier things. They have called me Armenian, but I am Turkish." Honours and accolades Foreign honours Russia: Medal "In Commemoration of the 1000th Anniversary of Kazan" (1 June 2006) Pakistan: Nishan-e-Pakistan, the highest civilian award in Pakistan (26 October 2009) Georgia: Order of Golden Fleece, awarded for his contribution to development of bilateral relations (17 May 2010) Kyrgyzstan: Danaker Order in Bishkek (2 February 2011) Azerbaijan: Heydar Aliyev Order (3 September 2014) Belgium: Grand Cordon in the Order of Leopold (5 October 2015) Madagascar: Knight Grand Cross in the national Order (25 January 2017) Gagauzia: Order of Gagauz-Yeri in Comrat (18 October 2018) Venezuela: Order of the Liberator, Grand Cordon (3 December 2018) Ukraine: Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise (16 October 2020) Other awards 29 January 2004: Profile of Courage Award from the American Jewish Congress, for promoting peace between cultures. Returned at the request of the A.J.C. in July 2014. 13 June 2004: Golden Plate award from the Academy of Achievement during the conference in Chicago. 3 October 2004: German Quadriga prize for improving relationships between different cultures. 2 September 2005: Mediterranean Award for Institutions (). This was awarded by the Fondazione Mediterraneo. 8 August 2006: Caspian Energy Integration Award from the Caspian Integration Business Club. 1 November 2006: Outstanding Service award from the Turkish humanitarian organization Red Crescent. 2 February 2007: Dialogue Between Cultures Award from the President of Tatarstan Mintimer Shaimiev. 15 April 2007: Crystal Hermes Award from the German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the opening of the Hannover Industrial Fair. 11 July 2007: highest award of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the Agricola Medal, in recognition of his contribution to agricultural and social development in Turkey. 11 May 2009: Avicenna award from the Avicenna Foundation in Frankfurt, Germany. 9 June 2009: guest of honor at the 20th Crans Montana Forum in Brussels and received the Prix de la Fondation, for democracy and freedom. 25 June 2009: Key to the City of Tirana on the occasion of his state visit to Albania. 29 December 2009: Award for Contribution to World Peace from the Turgut Özal Thought and Move Association. 12 January 2010: King Faisal International Prize for "service to Islam" from the King Faisal Foundation. 23 February 2010: Nodo Culture Award from the mayor of Seville for his efforts to launch the Alliance of Civilizations initiative. 1 March 2010: United Nations–HABITAT award in memorial of Rafik Hariri. A seven-member international jury unanimously found Erdoğan deserving of the award because of his "excellent achievement and commendable conduct in the area of leadership, statesmanship and good governance. Erdoğan also initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors." 27 May 2010: medal of honor from the Brazilian Federation of Industry for the State of São Paulo (FIESP) for his contributions to industry 31 May 2010: World Health Organization 2010 World No Tobacco Award for "his dedicated leadership on tobacco control in Turkey." 29 June 2010: 2010 World Family Award from the World Family Organization which operates under the umbrella of the United Nations. 4 November 2010: Golden Medal of Independence, an award conferred upon Kosovo citizens and foreigners that have contributed to the independence of Kosovo. 25 November 2010: "Leader of the Year" award presented by the Union of Arab Banks in Lebanon. 11 January 2011: "Outstanding Personality in the Islamic World Award" of the Sheikh Fahad al-Ahmad International Award for Charity in Kuwait. 25 October 2011: Palestinian International Award for Excellence and Creativity (PIA) 2011 for his support to the Palestinian people and cause. 21 January 2012: 'Gold Statue 2012 Special Award' by the Polish Business Center Club (BCC). Erdoğan was awarded for his systematic effort to clear barriers on the way to economic growth, striving to build democracy and free market relations. 2020: Ig Nobel Prize "for using the COVID-19 viral pandemic to teach the world that politicians can have a more immediate effect on life and death than scientists and doctors can." See also List of international presidential trips made by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Leadership approval polling for the 2023 Turkish general election The 500 Most Influential Muslims Notes References Further reading Cagaptay, Soner. The new sultan: Erdogan and the crisis of modern Turkey (2nd ed. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020). online review Cagaptay, Soner. "Making Turkey Great Again." Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 43 (2019): 169–78. online Kirişci, Kemal, and Amanda Sloat. "The rise and fall of liberal democracy in Turkey: Implications for the West" Foreign Policy at Brookings (2019) online Tziarras, Zenonas. "Erdoganist authoritarianism and the 'new' Turkey." Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 18.4 (2018): 593–598. online Yavuz, M. Hakan. "A framework for understanding the Intra-Islamist conflict between the AK party and the Gülen movement." Politics, Religion & Ideology 19.1 (2018): 11–32. online Yesil, Bilge. Media in New Turkey: The Origins of an Authoritarian Neoliberal State (University of Illinois Press, 2016) online review External links Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Instagram. Archived from the original. Welcome to demokrasi: how Erdoğan got more popular than ever by The Guardian 1954 births Living people 21st-century presidents of Turkey 21st-century prime ministers of Turkey Deniers of the Armenian genocide Deputies of Istanbul Deputies of Siirt Recep Tayyip Imam Hatip school alumni Justice and Development Party (Turkey) politicians Leaders of political parties in Turkey Marmara University alumni Mayors of Istanbul Members of the 22nd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 23rd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 24th Parliament of Turkey Naqshbandi order People from Istanbul Politicians arrested in Turkey Presidents of Turkey Prime Ministers of Turkey Recipients of the Heydar Aliyev Order Recipients of the Order of the Golden Fleece (Georgia) Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 1st class Turkish Islamists Turkish Sunni Muslims Chairmen of the Organization of Turkic States Recipients of the Gagauz-Yeri Order Foreign recipients of the Nishan-e-Pakistan	false	[ "What Did You Think Was Going to Happen? is the debut studio album from Los Angeles band 2AM Club. It was released September 14, 2010 by RCA Records.\n\nCritical reception\n\nMatt Collar of AllMusic stated that with this album \"2AM Club reveal themselves as the best and brightest of the nu-eyed-soul set\".\n\nTrack listing\n\nOn May 31, the band released a song named \"Baseline\" that was a bonus track on What Did You Think Was Going to Happen? (sold on iTunes). It was advertised by them via Twitter, and was available for free download through a file sharing website, Hulk Share.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2010 albums\nPop rock albums by American artists", "Friend Public Schools is a school district headquartered in Friend, Nebraska.\n\nIt operates Friend Elementary School and Friend Junior-Senior High School.\n\nIn 2017 a Twitter account criticizing officials and using the logo of the district had appeared. The district board asked for the owner to contact them. When this did not happen, the district filed a lawsuit to find the identity of the owner in 2019.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Friend Public Schools\n \n\nEducation in Saline County, Nebraska\nSchool districts in Nebraska" ]
[ "Recep Tayyip Erdoğan", "Armenian Genocide", "What happened in the genocide?", "mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I", "Who was responsible for this?", "Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings", "When did this happen?", "I don't know." ]	C_4d6e38301a82483cab0ff9378b6a238e_1	Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?	4	In addition to the Armenian genocide, are there any other interesting aspects about this article?	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan	Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province. His parents are Ahmet Erdogan and Tenzile Erdogan. Erdogan reportedly said in 2003, "I'm a Georgian, my family is a Georgian family which migrated from Batumi to Rize." But in a 2014 televised interview on the NTV news network, he said, "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian... forgive me for saying this... even much uglier things, they have even called me an Armenian, but I am Turkish." In an account based on registry records, his genealogy was tracked to an ethnic Turkish family. Erdogan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father Ahmet Erdogan (1905 - 1988) was a Captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. Erdogan had a brother Mustafa (b. 1958) and sister Vesile (b. 1965). His summer holidays were mostly spent in Guneysu, Rize, where his family originates from. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdogan was 13 years old. As a teenager, he sold lemonade and sesame buns (simit) on the streets of the city's rougher districts to earn extra money. Brought up in an observant Muslim family, Erdogan graduated from Kasimpasa Piyale primary school in 1965, and Imam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. He received his high school diploma from Eyup High School. He subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences, now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences--although several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated. In his youth, Erdogan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahce wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasimpasa S.K. is named after him. Erdogan married Emine Gulbaran (born 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons; Ahmet Burak and Necmettin Bilal, and two daughters, Esra and Sumeyye. His father, Ahmet Erdogan, died in 1988 and his 88-year-old mother, Tenzile Erdogan, died in 2011. He is a member of the Community of Iskenderpasa, a Turkish sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. In 2001, Erdogan established the Justice and Development Party (AKP). The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdogan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yilmaz and Ciller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdogan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gul became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdogan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdogan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gul handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdogan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as President, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdogan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gul as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Canakkale, and one million in Izmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdogan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdogan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdogan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdogan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdogan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious." He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem." In December 2008, Erdogan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken." In November 2009, he said, "it's not possible for a Muslim to commit genocide." In 2011, Erdogan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish-Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdogan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdogan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences - such as relocation - during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". CANNOTANSWER	Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul,	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician serving as the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as prime minister of Turkey from 2003 to 2014 and as mayor of Istanbul from 1994 to 1998. He founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2001, leading it to election victories in 2002, 2007, and 2011 general elections before being required to stand down upon his election as President in 2014. He later returned to the AKP leadership in 2017 following the constitutional referendum that year. Coming from an Islamist political background and self-describing as a conservative democrat, he has promoted socially conservative and populist policies during his administration. Following the 1994 local elections, Erdoğan was elected mayor of Istanbul as the candidate of the Islamist Welfare Party. He was later stripped of his position, banned from political office, and imprisoned for four months for inciting religious hatred, due to his recitation of a poem by Ziya Gökalp. Erdoğan subsequently abandoned openly Islamist politics, establishing the moderate conservative AKP in 2001, which he went on to lead to a landslide victory in 2002. With Erdoğan still technically prohibited from holding office, the AKP's co-founder, Abdullah Gül, instead became prime minister, and later annulled Erdoğan's political ban. After winning a by-election in Siirt in 2003, Erdoğan replaced Gül as prime minister, with Gül instead becoming the AKP's candidate for the presidency. Erdoğan led the AKP to two more election victories in 2007 and 2011. The early years of Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister saw advances in negotiations for Turkey's membership of the European Union, an economic recovery following a economic crisis in 2001 and investments in infrastructure including roads, airports, and a high-speed train network. He also won two successful constitutional referendums in 2007 and 2010. However, his government remained controversial for its close links with Fethullah Gülen and his Gülen Movement (since designated as a terrorist organisation by the Turkish state) with whom the AKP was accused of orchestrating purges against secular bureaucrats and military officers through the Balyoz and Ergenekon trials. In late 2012, his government began peace negotiations with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to end the Kurdish–Turkish conflict (1978–present). The ceasefire broke down in 2015, leading to a renewed escalation in conflict. Erdoğan's foreign policy has been described as Neo-Ottoman and has led to the Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, with its focus on preventing the Syrian Democratic Forces from gaining ground on the Syria–Turkey border during the Syrian Civil War. In the more recent years of Erdoğan's rule, Turkey has experienced democratic backsliding and corruption. Starting with the anti-government protests in 2013, his government imposed growing censorship on the press and social media, temporarily restricting access to sites such as YouTube, Twitter and Wikipedia. This stalled negotiations related to Turkey's EU membership. A US$100 billion corruption scandal in 2013 led to the arrests of Erdoğan's close allies, and incriminated Erdoğan. After 11 years as head of government (Prime Minister), Erdoğan decided to run for President in 2014. At the time, the presidency was a somewhat ceremonial function. Following the 2014 elections, Erdoğan became the first popularly elected president of Turkey. The souring in relations with Gülen continued, as the government proceeded to purge his supporters from judicial, bureaucratic and military positions. A failed military coup d'état attempt in July 2016 resulted in further purges and a temporary state of emergency. The government claimed that the coup leaders were linked to Gülen, but he has denied any role in it. Erdoğan's rule has been marked with increasing authoritarianism, expansionism, censorship and banning of parties or dissent. Erdoğan supported the 2017 referendum which changed Turkey's parliamentary system into a presidential system, thus setting for the first time in Turkish history a term limit for the head of government (two full five-year terms). This new system of government formally came into place after the 2018 general election, where Erdoğan became an executive president. His party however lost the majority in the parliament and is currently in a coalition (People's Alliance) with the Turkish nationalist MHP. Erdoğan has since been tackling, but also accused of contributing to, the Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018, which has caused a significant decline in his popularity and is widely believed to have contributed to the results of the 2019 local elections, in which his party lost power in big cities like Ankara and Istanbul to opposition parties for the first time in 15 years. Family and personal life Early life Erdoğan was born in Kasımpaşa, a poor neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province in the 1930s. Erdoğan's tribe is originally from Adjara, a region in Georgia. His parents were Ahmet Erdoğan (1905–88) and Tenzile Erdoğan (née Mutlu; 1924–2011). Erdoğan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father was a captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. His summer holidays were mostly spent in Güneysu, Rize, where his family originates. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdoğan was 13 years old. As a teenager, Erdoğan's father provided him with a weekly allowance of 2.5 Turkish lira, less than a dollar. With it, Erdoğan bought postcards and resold them on the street. He sold bottles of water to drivers stuck in traffic. Erdoğan also worked as a street vendor selling simit (sesame bread rings), wearing a white gown and selling the simit from a red three-wheel cart with the rolls stacked behind glass. In his youth, Erdoğan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahçe wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasımpaşa S.K. is named after him. Erdoğan is a member of the Community of İskenderpaşa, a Turkish Sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. Education Erdoğan graduated from Kasımpaşa Piyale primary school in 1965, and İmam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. The same educational path was followed by other co-founders of the AKP party. One quarter of the curriculum of İmam Hatip schools involves study of the Qurʼān, the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and the Arabic language. Erdoğan studied the Qurʼān at an İmam Hatip, where his classmates began calling him "hoca" ("Muslim teacher"). Erdoğan attended a meeting of the nationalist student group National Turkish Student Union (Milli Türk Talebe Birliği), who sought to raise a conservative cohort of young people to counter the rising movement of leftists in Turkey. Within the group, Erdoğan was distinguished by his oratorical skills, developing a penchant for public speaking and excelling in front of an audience. He won first place in a poetry-reading competition organized by the Community of Turkish Technical Painters, and began preparing for speeches through reading and research. Erdoğan would later comment on these competitions as "enhancing our courage to speak in front of the masses". Erdoğan wanted to pursue advanced studies at Mekteb-i Mülkiye, but Mülkiye accepted only students with regular high school diplomas, and not İmam Hatip graduates. Mülkiye was known for its political science department, which trained many statesmen and politicians in Turkey. Erdoğan was then admitted to Eyüp High School, a regular state school, and eventually received his high school diploma from Eyüp. According to his official biography, he subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences (), now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. Several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated, or even attended at all. Family Erdoğan married Emine Gülbaran (b. 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons, Ahmet Burak (b. 1979) and Necmettin Bilal (b. 1981), and two daughters, Esra (b. 1983) and Sümeyye (b. 1985). His father, Ahmet Erdoğan, died in 1988 and his mother, Tenzile Erdoğan, died in 2011 at the age of 88. Erdoğan has a brother, Mustafa (b. 1958), and a sister, Vesile (b. 1965). From his father's first marriage to Havuli Erdoğan (d. 1980), he had two half-brothers: Mehmet (1926–1988) and Hasan (1929–2006). Early political career In 1976, Erdoğan engaged in politics by joining the National Turkish Student Union, an anti-communist action group. In the same year, he became the head of the Beyoğlu youth branch of the Islamist National Salvation Party (MSP), and was later promoted to chair of the Istanbul youth branch of the party. Holding this position until 1980, he served as consultant and senior executive in the private sector during the era following the 1980 military coup when political parties were closed down. In 1983, Erdoğan followed most of Necmettin Erbakan's followers into the Islamist Welfare Party. He became the party's Beyoğlu district chair in 1984, and in 1985 he became the chair of the Istanbul city branch. He was elected to parliament in 1991, but was barred from taking his seat. Mayor of Istanbul (1994–1998) In the local elections of 27 March 1994, Erdoğan was elected Mayor of Istanbul with 25.19% of the popular vote. Erdoğan was a 40-year-old dark horse candidate who had been mocked by the mainstream media and treated as a country bumpkin by his opponents. He was pragmatic in office, tackling many chronic problems in Istanbul including water shortage, pollution and traffic chaos. The water shortage problem was solved with the laying of hundreds of kilometers of new pipelines. The garbage problem was solved with the establishment of state-of-the-art recycling facilities. While Erdoğan was in office, air pollution was reduced through a plan developed to switch to natural gas. He changed the public buses to environmentally friendly ones. The city's traffic and transportation jams were reduced with more than fifty bridges, viaducts, and highways built. He took precautions to prevent corruption, using measures to ensure that municipal funds were used prudently. He paid back a major portion of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality's two-billion-dollar debt and invested four billion dollars in the city. Erdoğan initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors. A seven-member international jury from the United Nations unanimously awarded Erdoğan the UN-Habitat award. Imprisonment In 1998, the fundamentalist Welfare Party was declared unconstitutional on the grounds of threatening the secularism of Turkey and was shut down by the Turkish constitutional court. Erdoğan became a prominent speaker at demonstrations held by his party colleagues. In December 1997 in Siirt, Erdoğan recited a poem from a work written by Ziya Gökalp, a pan-Turkish activist of the early 20th century. His recitation included verses translated as "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers...." which are not in the original version of the poem. Erdoğan said the poem had been approved by the education ministry to be published in textbooks. Under article 312/2 of the Turkish penal code his recitation was regarded as an incitement to violence and religious or racial hatred. He was given a ten-month prison sentence of which he served four months, from 24 March 1999 to 27 July 1999. Due to his conviction, Erdoğan was forced to give up his mayoral position. The conviction also stipulated a political ban, which prevented him from participating in parliamentary elections. He had appealed for the sentence to be converted to a monetary fine, but it was reduced to 120 days instead. In 2017, this period of Erdoğan's life was made into a film titled Reis. Justice and Development Party Erdoğan was member of political parties that kept getting banned by the army or judges. Within his Virtue Party, there was a dispute about the appropriate discourse of the party between traditional politicians and pro-reform politicians. The latter envisioned a party that could operate within the limits of the system, and thus not getting banned as its predecessors like National Order Party, National Salvation Party and Welfare Party. They wanted to give the group the character of an ordinary conservative party following the example of the European Christian democratic parties. When the Virtue Party was also banned in 2001, a definitive split took place: the followers of Necmettin Erbakan founded the Felicity Party (SP) and the reformers founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) under the leadership of Abdullah Gül and Erdoğan. The pro-reform politicians realized that a strictly Islamic party would never be accepted as a governing party by the state apparatus and they believed that an Islamic party did not appeal to more than about 20 percent of the Turkish electorate. The AK party emphatically placed itself as a broad democratic conservative party with new politicians from the political center (like Ali Babacan and Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu), while respecting Islamic norms and values, but without an explicit religious program. This turned out to be successful as the new party won 34% of the vote in the general elections of 2002. Erdoğan became prime minister in March 2003 after the Gül government ended his political ban. Premiership (2003–2014) General elections The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdoğan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yılmaz and Çiller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdoğan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gül became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdoğan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdoğan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gül handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdoğan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as president, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdoğan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gül as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Çanakkale, and one million in İzmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdoğan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdoğan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdoğan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdoğan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Referendums After the opposition parties deadlocked the 2007 presidential election by boycotting the parliament, the ruling AKP proposed a constitutional reform package. The reform package was first vetoed by president Sezer. Then he applied to the Turkish constitutional court about the reform package, because the president is unable to veto amendments for the second time. The Turkish constitutional court did not find any problems in the packet and 68.95% of the voters supported the constitutional changes. The reforms consisted of electing the president by popular vote instead of by parliament; reducing the presidential term from seven years to five; allowing the president to stand for re-election for a second term; holding general elections every four years instead of five; and reducing from 367 to 184 the quorum of lawmakers needed for parliamentary decisions. Reforming the Constitution was one of the main pledges of the AKP during the 2007 election campaign. The main opposition party CHP was not interested in altering the Constitution on a big scale, making it impossible to form a Constitutional Commission (Anayasa Uzlaşma Komisyonu). The amendments lacked the two-thirds majority needed to become law instantly, but secured 336 votes in the 550-seat parliament – enough to put the proposals to a referendum. The reform package included a number of issues such as the right of individuals to appeal to the highest court, the creation of the ombudsman's office; the possibility to negotiate a nationwide labour contract; gender equality; the ability of civilian courts to convict members of the military; the right of civil servants to go on strike; a privacy law; and the structure of the Constitutional Court. The referendum was agreed by a majority of 58%. Domestic Policy Kurdish issue In 2009, Prime Minister Erdoğan's government announced a plan to help end the quarter-century-long Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict that had cost more than 40,000 lives. The government's plan, supported by the European Union, intended to allow the Kurdish language to be used in all broadcast media and political campaigns, and restored Kurdish names to cities and towns that had been given Turkish ones. Erdoğan said, "We took a courageous step to resolve chronic issues that constitute an obstacle along Turkey's development, progression and empowerment". Erdoğan passed a partial amnesty to reduce penalties faced by many members of the Kurdish guerrilla movement PKK who had surrendered to the government. On 23 November 2011, during a televised meeting of his party in Ankara, he apologised on behalf of the state for the Dersim massacre, where many Alevis and Zazas were killed. In 2013 the government of Erdoğan began a peace process between the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Turkish Government, mediated by parliamentarians of the Peoples' Democratic party (HDP). In 2015 he decided that the peace process was over and supported the lift of the parliamentary immunity of the HDP parliamentarians. During his presidency a law was introduced which banned the use of the word Kurdistan in parliament and in a speech he held for the local election of 2019 he told the HDP politicians that if there is no Kurdistan in Turkey and if they looked for one they should go to Northern Iraq. Armenian genocide Prime Minister Erdoğan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdoğan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious". He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem". In December 2008, Erdoğan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken". In November 2009, he said, "it is not possible for those who belong to the Muslim faith to carry out genocide". In 2011, Erdoğan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish–Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdoğan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdoğan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences – such as relocation – during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". The Ottoman Parliament of 1915 had previously used the term "relocation" to describe the purpose of the Tehcir Law, which resulted in the deaths of anywhere between 800,000 and over 1,800,000 Armenian civilians in what is commonly referred to as the Armenian Genocide. Pope Francis in April 2015, at a special mass in St. Peter's Basilica marking the centenary of the events, described atrocities against Armenian civilians in 1915–1922 as "the first genocide of the 20th century". In protest, Erdoğan recalled the Turkish ambassador from the Vatican, and summoned the Vatican's ambassador, to express "disappointment" at what he called a discriminatory message. He later stated "we don’t carry a stain or a shadow like genocide". US President Barack Obama called for a "full, frank and just acknowledgement of the facts", but again stopped short of labelling it "genocide", despite his campaign promise to do so. Human rights During Erdoğan's time as Prime Minister, the far-reaching powers of the 1991 Anti-Terror Law were reduced and the Democratic initiative process was initiated, with the goal to improve democratic standards in general and the rights of ethnic and religious minorities in particular. However, after Turkey's bid to join the European Union stalled, European officials noted a return to more authoritarian ways, notably on freedom of speech, freedom of the press and Kurdish minority rights. Demands by activists for the recognition of LGBT rights were publicly rejected by government members, and members of the Turkish LGBT community were insulted by cabinet members. Reporters Without Borders observed a continuous decrease in Freedom of the Press during Erdoğan's later terms, with a rank of around 100 on the Press Freedom Index during his first term and a rank of 153 out of a total of 179 countries in 2021. Freedom House saw a slight recovery in later years and awarded Turkey a Press Freedom Score of 55/100 in 2012 after a low point of 48/100 in 2006. In 2011, Erdoğan's government made legal reforms to return properties of Christian and Jewish minorities which were seized by the Turkish government in the 1930s. The total value of the properties returned reached $2 billion (USD). Under Erdoğan, the Turkish government tightened the laws on the sale and consumption of alcohol, banning all advertising and increasing the tax on alcoholic beverages. Economy In 2002, Erdoğan inherited a Turkish economy that was beginning to recover from a recession as a result of reforms implemented by Kemal Derviş. Erdoğan supported Finance Minister Ali Babacan in enforcing macro-economic policies. Erdoğan tried to attract more foreign investors to Turkey and lifted many government regulations. The cash-flow into the Turkish economy between 2002 and 2012 caused a growth of 64% in real GDP and a 43% increase in GDP per capita; considerably higher numbers were commonly advertised but these did not account for the inflation of the US dollar between 2002 and 2012. The average annual growth in GDP per capita was 3.6%. The growth in real GDP between 2002 and 2012 was higher than the values from developed countries, but was close to average when developing countries are also taken into account. The ranking of the Turkish economy in terms of GDP moved slightly from 17 to 16 during this decade. A major consequence of the policies between 2002 and 2012 was the widening of the current account deficit from US$600 million to US$58 billion (2013 est.) Since 1961, Turkey has signed 19 IMF loan accords. Erdoğan's government satisfied the budgetary and market requirements of the two during his administration and received every loan installment, the only time any Turkish government has done so. Erdoğan inherited a debt of $23.5 billion to the IMF, which was reduced to $0.9 billion in 2012. He decided not to sign a new deal. Turkey's debt to the IMF was thus declared to be completely paid and he announced that the IMF could borrow from Turkey. In 2010, five-year credit default swaps for Turkey's sovereign debt were trading at a record low of 1.17%, below those of nine EU member countries and Russia. In 2002, the Turkish Central Bank had $26.5 billion in reserves. This amount reached $92.2 billion in 2011. During Erdoğan's leadership, inflation fell from 32% to 9.0% in 2004. Since then, Turkish inflation has continued to fluctuate around 9% and is still one of the highest inflation rates in the world. The Turkish public debt as a percentage of annual GDP declined from 74% in 2002 to 39% in 2009. In 2012, Turkey had a lower ratio of public debt to GDP than 21 of 27 members of the European Union and a lower budget deficit to GDP ratio than 23 of them. In 2003, Erdoğan's government pushed through the Labor Act, a comprehensive reform of Turkey's labor laws. The law greatly expanded the rights of employees, establishing a 45-hour workweek and limiting overtime work to 270 hours a year, provided legal protection against discrimination due to sex, religion, or political affiliation, prohibited discrimination between permanent and temporary workers, entitled employees terminated without "valid cause" to compensation, and mandated written contracts for employment arrangements lasting a year or more. Education Erdoğan increased the budget of the Ministry of Education from 7.5 billion lira in 2002 to 34 billion lira in 2011, the highest share of the national budget given to one ministry. Before his prime ministership the military received the highest share of the national budget. Compulsory education was increased from eight years to twelve. In 2003, the Turkish government, together with UNICEF, initiated a campaign called "Come on girls, [let's go] to school!" (). The goal of this campaign was to close the gender gap in primary school enrollment through the provision of a quality basic education for all girls, especially in southeast Turkey. In 2005, the parliament granted amnesty to students expelled from universities before 2003. The amnesty applied to students dismissed on academic or disciplinary grounds. In 2004, textbooks became free of charge and since 2008 every province in Turkey has its own university. During Erdoğan's Premiership, the number of universities in Turkey nearly doubled, from 98 in 2002 to 186 in October 2012. The Prime Minister kept his campaign promises by starting the Fatih project in which all state schools, from preschool to high school level, received a total of 620,000 smart boards, while tablet computers were distributed to 17 million students and approximately one million teachers and administrators. In June 2017 a draft proposal by the ministry of education was approved by Erdoğan, in which the curriculum for schools excluded the teaching of the theory of evolution of Charles Darwin by 2019. From then on the teaching will be postponed and start at undergraduate level. Infrastructure Under Erdoğan's government, the number of airports in Turkey increased from 26 to 50 in the period of 10 years. Between the founding of the Republic of Turkey in 1923 and 2002, there had been 6,000 km of dual carriageway roads created. Between 2002 and 2011, another 13,500 km of expressway were built. Due to these measures, the number of motor accidents fell by 50 percent. For the first time in Turkish history, high speed railway lines were constructed, and the country's high-speed train service began in 2009. In 8 years, 1,076 km of railway were built and 5,449 km of railway renewed. The construction of Marmaray, an undersea rail tunnel under the Bosphorus strait, started in 2004. It was inaugurated on the 90th anniversary of the Turkish Republic 29 October 2013. The inauguration of the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge, the third bridge over the Bosphorus, was on 26 August 2016. Justice In March 2006, the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) held a press conference to publicly protest the obstruction of the appointment of judges to the high courts for over 10 months. The HSYK said Erdoğan wanted to fill the vacant posts with his own appointees. Erdoğan was accused of creating a rift with Turkey's highest court of appeal, the Yargıtay, and high administrative court, the Danıştay. Erdoğan stated that the constitution gave the power to assign these posts to his elected party. In May 2007, the head of Turkey's High Court asked prosecutors to consider whether Erdoğan should be charged over critical comments regarding the election of Abdullah Gül as president. Erdoğan said the ruling was "a disgrace to the justice system", and criticized the Constitutional Court which had invalidated a presidential vote because a boycott by other parties meant there was no quorum. Prosecutors investigated his earlier comments, including saying it had fired a "bullet at democracy". Tülay Tuğcu, head of the Constitutional Court, condemned Erdoğan for "threats, insults and hostility" towards the justice system. Civil–military relations The Turkish military has had a record of intervening in politics, having removed elected governments four times in the past. During the Erdoğan government, civil–military relationship moved towards normalization in which the influence of the military in politics was significantly reduced. The ruling Justice and Development Party has often faced off against the military, gaining political power by challenging a pillar of the country's laicistic establishment. The most significant issue that caused deep fissures between the army and the government was the midnight e-memorandum posted on the military's website objecting to the selection of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül as the ruling party's candidate for the Presidency in 2007. The military argued that the election of Gül, whose wife wears an Islamic headscarf, could undermine the laicistic order of the country. Contrary to expectations, the government responded harshly to former Chief of General Staff Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt's e-memorandum, stating the military had nothing to do with the selection of the presidential candidate. Health care After assuming power in 2003, Erdoğan's government embarked on a sweeping reform program of the Turkish healthcare system, called the Health Transformation Program (HTP), to greatly increase the quality of healthcare and protect all citizens from financial risks. Its introduction coincided with the period of sustained economic growth, allowing the Turkish government to put greater investments into the healthcare system. As part of the reforms, the "Green Card" program, which provides health benefits to the poor, was expanded in 2004. The reform program aimed at increasing the ratio of private to state-run healthcare, which, along with long queues in state-run hospitals, resulted in the rise of private medical care in Turkey, forcing state-run hospitals to compete by increasing quality. In April 2006, Erdoğan unveiled a social security reform package demanded by the International Monetary Fund under a loan deal. The move, which Erdoğan called one of the most radical reforms ever, was passed with fierce opposition. Turkey's three social security bodies were united under one roof, bringing equal health services and retirement benefits for members of all three bodies. The previous system had been criticized for reserving the best healthcare for civil servants and relegating others to wait in long queues. Under the second bill, everyone under the age of 18 years was entitled to free health services, irrespective of whether they pay premiums to any social security organization. The bill also envisages a gradual increase in the retirement age: starting from 2036, the retirement age will increase to 65 by 2048 for both women and men. In January 2008, the Turkish Parliament adopted a law to prohibit smoking in most public places. Erdoğan is outspokenly anti-smoking. Foreign policy Turkish foreign policy during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister has been associated with the name of Ahmet Davutoğlu. Davutoğlu was the chief foreign policy advisor of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan before he was appointed foreign minister in 2009. The basis of Erdoğan's foreign policy is based on the principle of "don't make enemies, make friends" and the pursuit of "zero problems" with neighboring countries. Erdoğan is co-founder of United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (AOC). The initiative seeks to galvanize international action against extremism through the forging of international, intercultural and inter-religious dialogue and cooperation. European Union When Erdoğan came to power, he continued Turkey's long ambition of joining the European Union. On 3 October 2005 negotiations began for Turkey's accession to the European Union. Erdoğan was named "The European of the Year 2004" by the newspaper European Voice for the reforms in his country in order to accomplish the accession of Turkey to the European Union. He said in a comment that "Turkey's accession shows that Europe is a continent where civilisations reconcile and not clash." On 3 October 2005, the negotiations for Turkey's accession to the EU formally started during Erdoğan's tenure as Prime Minister. The European Commission generally supports Erdoğan's reforms, but remains critical of his policies. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize EU member state Cyprus. Greece and Cyprus dispute Relations between Greece and Turkey were normalized during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister. In May 2004, Erdoğan became the first Turkish Prime Minister to visit Greece since 1988, and the first to visit the Turkish minority of Thrace since 1952. In 2007, Erdoğan and Greek Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis inaugurated the Greek-Turkish natural gas pipeline giving Caspian gas its first direct Western outlet. Turkey and Greece signed an agreement to create a Combined Joint Operational Unit within the framework of NATO to participate in Peace Support Operations. Erdoğan and his party strongly supported the EU-backed referendum to reunify Cyprus in 2004. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships as a consequence of the economic isolation of the internationally unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the failure of the EU to end the isolation, as it had promised in 2004. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize the Republic of Cyprus. Armenia Armenia is Turkey's only neighbor which Erdoğan has not visited during his premiership. The Turkish-Armenian border has been closed since 1993 because of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with Turkey's close ally Azerbaijan. Diplomatic efforts resulted in the signing of protocols between Turkish and Armenian Foreign Ministers in Switzerland to improve relations between the two countries. One of the points of the agreement was the creation of a joint commission on the issue. The Armenian Constitutional Court decided that the commission contradicts the Armenian constitution. Turkey responded saying that Armenian court's ruling on the protocols is not acceptable, resulting in a suspension of the rectification process by the Turkish side. Erdoğan has said that Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan should apologize for calling on school children to re-occupy eastern Turkey. When asked by a student at a literature contest ceremony if Armenians will be able to get back their "western territories" along with Mt. Ararat, Sarksyan said, "This is the task of your generation". Russia In December 2004, President Putin visited Turkey, making it the first presidential visit in the history of Turkish-Russian relations besides that of the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Nikolai Podgorny in 1972. In November 2005, Putin attended the inauguration of a jointly constructed Blue Stream natural gas pipeline in Turkey. This sequence of top-level visits has brought several important bilateral issues to the forefront. The two countries consider it their strategic goal to achieve "multidimensional co-operation", especially in the fields of energy, transport and the military. Specifically, Russia aims to invest in Turkey's fuel and energy industries, and it also expects to participate in tenders for the modernisation of Turkey's military. The relations during this time are described by President Medvedev as "Turkey is one of our most important partners with respect to regional and international issues. We can confidently say that Russian-Turkish relations have advanced to the level of a multidimensional strategic partnership". In May 2010, Turkey and Russia signed 17 agreements to enhance cooperation in energy and other fields, including pacts to build Turkey's first nuclear power plant and further plans for an oil pipeline from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. The leaders of both countries also signed an agreement on visa-free travel, enabling tourists to get into the other country for free and stay there for up to 30 days. United States When Barack Obama became President of United States, he made his first overseas bilateral meeting to Turkey in April 2009. At a joint news conference in Turkey, Obama said: "I'm trying to make a statement about the importance of Turkey, not just to the United States but to the world. I think that where there's the most promise of building stronger U.S.-Turkish relations is in the recognition that Turkey and the United States can build a model partnership in which a predominantly Christian nation, a predominantly Muslim nation – a Western nation and a nation that straddles two continents," he continued, "that we can create a modern international community that is respectful, that is secure, that is prosperous, that there are not tensions – inevitable tensions between cultures – which I think is extraordinarily important." Iraq Turkey under Erdoğan was named by the Bush Administration as a part of the "coalition of the willing" that was central to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. On 1 March 2003, a motion allowing Turkish military to participate in the U.S-led coalition's invasion of Iraq, along with the permission for foreign troops to be stationed in Turkey for this purpose, was overruled by the Turkish Parliament. After the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iraq and Turkey signed 48 trade agreements on issues including security, energy, and water. The Turkish government attempted to mend relations with Iraqi Kurdistan by opening a Turkish university in Erbil, and a Turkish consulate in Mosul. Erdoğan's government fostered economic and political relations with Irbil, and Turkey began to consider the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq as an ally against Maliki's government. Israel Erdoğan visited Israel on 1 May 2005, a gesture unusual for a leader of a Muslim majority country. During his trip, Erdoğan visited the Yad Vashem, Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. The President of Israel Shimon Peres addressed the Turkish parliament during a visit in 2007, the first time an Israeli leader had addressed the legislature of a predominantly Muslim nation. Their relationship worsened at the 2009 World Economic Forum conference over Israel's actions during the Gaza War. Erdoğan was interrupted by the moderator while he was responding to Peres. Erdoğan stated: "Mister Peres, you are older than I am. Maybe you are feeling guilty and that is why you are raising your voice. When it comes to killing you know it too well. I remember how you killed the children on beaches..." Upon the moderator's reminder that they needed to adjourn for dinner, Erdoğan left the panel, accusing the moderator of giving Peres more time than all the other panelists combined. Tensions increased further following the Gaza flotilla raid in May 2010. Erdoğan strongly condemned the raid, describing it as "state terrorism", and demanded an Israeli apology. In February 2013, Erdoğan called Zionism a "crime against humanity", comparing it to Islamophobia, antisemitism, and fascism. He later retracted the statement, saying he had been misinterpreted. He said "everyone should know" that his comments were directed at "Israeli policies", especially as regards to "Gaza and the settlements." Erdoğan's statements were criticized by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, among others. In August 2013, the Hürriyet reported that Erdoğan had claimed to have evidence of Israel's responsibility for the removal of Morsi from office in Egypt. The Israeli and Egyptian governments dismissed the suggestion. In response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. He also stated that "If Israel continues with this attitude, it will definitely be tried at international courts." Syria During Erdoğan's term of office, diplomatic relations between Turkey and Syria significantly deteriorated. In 2004, President Bashar al-Assad arrived in Turkey for the first official visit by a Syrian President in 57 years. In late 2004, Erdoğan signed a free trade agreement with Syria. Visa restrictions between the two countries were lifted in 2009, which caused an economic boom in the regions near the Syrian border. However, in 2011 the relationship between the two countries was strained following the outbreak of conflict in Syria. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he was trying to "cultivate a favorable relationship with whatever government would take the place of Assad". However, he began to support the opposition in Syria, after demonstrations turned violent, creating a serious Syrian refugee problem in Turkey. Erdoğan's policy of providing military training for anti-Damascus fighters has also created conflict with Syria's ally and a neighbour of Turkey, Iran. Saudi Arabia In August 2006, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz as-Saud made a visit to Turkey. This was the first visit by a Saudi monarch to Turkey in the last four decades. The monarch made a second visit, on 9 November 2007. Turk-Saudi trade volume has exceeded 3.2 billion in 2006, almost double the figure achieved in 2003. In 2009, this amount reached 5.5 billion and the goal for the year 2010 was 10 billion. Erdoğan condemned the Saudi-led intervention in Bahrain and characterized the Saudi movement as "a new Karbala." He demanded withdrawal of Saudi forces from Bahrain. Egypt Erdoğan had made his first official visit to Egypt on 12 September 2011, accompanied by six ministers and 200 businessmen. This visit was made very soon after Turkey had ejected Israeli ambassadors, cutting off all diplomatic relations with Israel because Israel refused to apologize for the Gaza flotilla raid which killed eight Turkish and one Turco-American. Erdoğan's visit to Egypt was met with much enthusiasm by Egyptians. CNN reported some Egyptians saying "We consider him as the Islamic leader in the Middle East", while others were appreciative of his role in supporting Gaza. Erdoğan was later honored in Tahrir Square by members of the Egyptian Revolution Youth Union, and members of the Turkish embassy were presented with a coat of arms in acknowledgment of the Prime Minister's support of the Egyptian Revolution. Erdoğan stated in a 2011 interview that he supported secularism for Egypt, which generated an angry reaction among Islamic movements, especially the Freedom and Justice Party, which was the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, commentators suggest that by forming an alliance with the military junta during Egypt's transition to democracy, Erdoğan may have tipped the balance in favor of an authoritarian government. Erdoğan condemned the sit-in dispersals conducted by Egyptian police on 14 August 2013 at the Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda squares, where violent clashes between police officers and pro-Morsi Islamist protesters led to hundreds of deaths, mostly protesters. In July 2014, one year after the removal of Mohamed Morsi from office, Erdoğan described Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as an "illegitimate tyrant". Somalia Erdoğan's administration maintains strong ties with the Somali government. During the drought of 2011, Erdoğan's government contributed over $201 million to humanitarian relief efforts in the impacted parts of Somalia. Following a greatly improved security situation in Mogadishu in mid-2011, the Turkish government also re-opened its foreign embassy with the intention of more effectively assisting in the post-conflict development process. It was among the first foreign governments to resume formal diplomatic relations with Somalia after the civil war. In May 2010, the Turkish and Somali governments signed a military training agreement, in keeping with the provisions outlined in the Djibouti Peace Process. Turkish Airlines became the first long-distance international commercial airline in two decades to resume flights to and from Mogadishu's Aden Adde International Airport. Turkey also launched various development and infrastructure projects in Somalia including building several hospitals and helping renovate the National Assembly building. Protests 2013 Gezi Park protests against the perceived authoritarianism of Erdoğan and his policies, starting from a small sit-in in Istanbul in defense of a city park. After the police's intense reaction with tear gas, the protests grew each day. Faced by the largest mass protest in a decade, Erdoğan made this controversial remark in a televised speech: "The police were there yesterday, they are there today, and they will be there tomorrow". After weeks of clashes in the streets of Istanbul, his government at first apologized to the protestors and called for a plebiscite, but then ordered a crackdown on the protesters. Presidency (2014–present) Erdoğan took the oath of office on 28 August 2014 and became the 12th president of Turkey. He administered the new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu's oath on 29 August. When asked about his lower-than-expected 51.79% share of the vote, he allegedly responded, "there were even those who did not like the Prophet. I, however, won 52%". Assuming the role of President, Erdoğan was criticized for openly stating that he would not maintain the tradition of presidential neutrality. Erdoğan has also stated his intention to pursue a more active role as president, such as utilising the President's rarely used cabinet-calling powers. The political opposition has argued that Erdoğan will continue to pursue his own political agenda, controlling the government, while his new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu would be docile and submissive. Furthermore, the domination of loyal Erdoğan supporters in Davutoğlu's cabinet fuelled speculation that Erdoğan intended to exercise substantial control over the government. Presidential elections On 1 July 2014, Erdoğan was named the AKP's presidential candidate in the Turkish presidential election. His candidacy was announced by the Deputy President of the AKP, Mehmet Ali Şahin. Erdoğan made a speech after the announcement and used the 'Erdoğan logo' for the first time. The logo was criticised because it was very similar to the logo that U.S. President Barack Obama used in the 2008 presidential election. Erdoğan was elected as the President of Turkey in the first round of the election with 51.79% of the vote, obviating the need for a run-off by winning over 50%. The joint candidate of the CHP, MHP and 13 other opposition parties, former Organisation of Islamic Co-operation general secretary Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu won 38.44% of the vote. The pro-Kurdish HDP candidate Selahattin Demirtaş won 9.76%. The 2018 Turkish presidential election took place as part of the 2018 general election, alongside parliamentary elections on the same day. Following the approval of constitutional changes in a referendum held in 2017, the elected President will be both the head of state and head of government of Turkey, taking over the latter role from the to-be-abolished office of the Prime Minister. Incumbent president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declared his candidacy for the People's Alliance (Turkish: Cumhur İttifakı) on 27 April 2018. Erdoğan's main opposition, the Republican People's Party, nominated Muharrem İnce, a member of the parliament known for his combative opposition and spirited speeches against Erdoğan. Besides these candidates, Meral Akşener, the founder and leader of İyi Party, Temel Karamollaoğlu, the leader of the Felicity Party and Doğu Perinçek, the leader of the Patriotic Party, have announced their candidacies and collected the 100,000 signatures required for nomination. The alliance which Erdoğan was candidate for won 52.59% of the popular vote. Referendum In April 2017, a constitutional referendum was held, where the voters in Turkey (and Turkish citizens abroad) approved a set of 18 proposed amendments to the Constitution of Turkey. The amendments included the replacement of the existing parliamentary system with a presidential system. The post of Prime Minister would be abolished, and the presidency would become an executive post vested with broad executive powers. The parliament seats would be increased from 550 to 600 and the age of candidacy to the parliament was lowered from 25 to 18. The referendum also called for changes to the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors. Local elections In the 2019 local elections, the ruling party AKP lost control of Istanbul and Ankara for the first time in 25 years, as well as 5 of Turkey's 6 largest cities. The loss has been widely attributed to Erdoğan's mismanagement of the Turkish economic crisis, rising authoritarianism as well as the alleged government inaction on the Syrian refugee crisis. Soon after the elections, Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey ordered a re-election in Istanbul, cancelling Ekrem İmamoğlu's mayoral certificate. The decision led to a significant decrease of Erdoğan's and AKP's popularity and his party lost the elections again in June with a greater margin. The result was seen as a huge blow to Erdoğan, who had once said that if his party 'lost Istanbul, we would lose Turkey. The opposition's victory was characterised as 'the beginning of the end' for Erdoğan', with international commentators calling the re-run a huge government miscalculation that led to a potential İmamoğlu candidacy in the next scheduled presidential election. It is suspected that the scale of the government's defeat could provoke a cabinet reshuffle and early general elections, currently scheduled for June 2023. The New Zealand and Australian governments and opposition CHP party have criticized Erdoğan after he repeatedly showed video taken by the Christchurch mosque shooter to his supporters at campaign rallies for 31 March local elections and said Australians and New Zealanders who came to Turkey with anti-Muslim sentiments "would be sent back in coffins like their grandfathers" at Gallipoli. Domestic policy Presidential palace Erdoğan has also received criticism for the construction of a new palace called Ak Saray (pure white palace), which occupies approximately 50 acres of Atatürk Forest Farm (AOÇ) in Ankara. Since the AOÇ is protected land, several court orders were issued to halt the construction of the new palace, though building work went on nonetheless. The opposition described the move as a clear disregard for the rule of law. The project was subject to heavy criticism and allegations were made; of corruption during the construction process, wildlife destruction and the complete obliteration of the zoo in the AOÇ in order to make way for the new compound. The fact that the palace is technically illegal has led to it being branded as the 'Kaç-Ak Saray', the word kaçak in Turkish meaning 'illegal'. Ak Saray was originally designed as a new office for the Prime Minister. However, upon assuming the presidency, Erdoğan announced that the palace would become the new Presidential Palace, while the Çankaya Mansion will be used by the Prime Minister instead. The move was seen as a historic change since the Çankaya Mansion had been used as the iconic office of the presidency ever since its inception. The Ak Saray has almost 1,000 rooms and cost $350 million (€270 million), leading to huge criticism at a time when mining accidents and workers' rights had been dominating the agenda. On 29 October 2014, Erdoğan was due to hold a Republic Day reception in the new palace to commemorate the 91st anniversary of the Republic of Turkey and to officially inaugurate the Presidential Palace. However, after most invited participants announced that they would boycott the event and a mining accident occurred in the district of Ermenek in Karaman, the reception was cancelled. The media President Erdoğan and his government continue to press for court action against the remaining free press in Turkey. The latest newspaper that has been seized is Zaman, in March 2016. After the seizure Morton Abramowitz and Eric Edelman, former U.S. ambassadors to Turkey, condemned President Erdoğan's actions in an opinion piece published by The Washington Post: "Clearly, democracy cannot flourish under Erdoğan now". "The overall pace of reforms in Turkey has not only slowed down but in some key areas, such as freedom of expression and the independence of the judiciary, there has been a regression, which is particularly worrying", rapporteur Kati Piri said in April 2016 after the European Parliament passed its annual progress report on Turkey. On 22 June 2016, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that he considered himself successful in "destroying" Turkish civil groups "working against the state", a conclusion that had been confirmed some days earlier by Sedat Laçiner, Professor of International Relations and rector of the Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University: "Outlawing unarmed and peaceful opposition, sentencing people to unfair punishment under erroneous terror accusations, will feed genuine terrorism in Erdoğan’s Turkey. Guns and violence will become the sole alternative for legally expressing free thought". After the coup attempt, over 200 journalists were arrested and over 120 media outlets were closed. Cumhuriyet journalists were detained in November 2016 after a long-standing crackdown on the newspaper. Subsequently, Reporters Without Borders called Erdoğan an "enemy of press freedom" and said that he "hides his aggressive dictatorship under a veneer of democracy". In April 2017, Turkey blocked all access to Wikipedia over a content dispute. The Turkish government lifted a two-and-a-half-year ban on Wikipedia on 15 January 2020, restoring access to the online encyclopedia a month after Turkey's top court ruled that blocking Wikipedia was unconstitutional. On 1 July 2020, in a statement made to his party members, Erdoğan announced that the government would introduce new measures and regulations to control or shut down social media platforms such as YouTube, Twitter and Netflix. Through these new measures, each company would be required to appoint an official representative in the country to respond to legal concerns. The decision comes after a number of Twitter users insulted his daughter Esra after she welcomed her fourth child. State of emergency and purges On 20 July 2016, President Erdoğan declared the state of emergency, citing the coup d'état attempt as justification. It was first scheduled to last three months. The Turkish parliament approved this measure. The state of emergency was later extended for another three months, amidst the ongoing 2016 Turkish purges including comprehensive purges of independent media and detention of tens of thousands of Turkish citizens politically opposed to Erdoğan. More than 50,000 people have been arrested and over 160,000 fired from their jobs by March 2018. In August 2016, Erdoğan began rounding up journalists who had been publishing, or who were about to publish articles questioning corruption within the Erdoğan administration, and incarcerating them. The number of Turkish journalists jailed by Turkey is higher than any other country, including all of those journalists currently jailed in North Korea, Cuba, Russia, and China combined. In the wake of the coup attempt of July 2016 the Erdoğan administration began rounding up tens of thousands of individuals, both from within the government, and from the public sector, and incarcerating them on charges of alleged "terrorism". As a result of these arrests, many in the international community complained about the lack of proper judicial process in the incarceration of Erdoğan's opposition. In April 2017 Erdoğan successfully sponsored legislation effectively making it illegal for the Turkish legislative branch to investigate his executive branch of government. Without the checks and balances of freedom of speech, and the freedom of the Turkish legislature to hold him accountable for his actions, many have likened Turkey's current form of government to a dictatorship with only nominal forms of democracy in practice. At the time of Erdoğan's successful passing of the most recent legislation silencing his opposition, United States President Donald Trump called Erdoğan to congratulate him for his "recent referendum victory". On 29 April 2017 Erdoğan's administration began an internal Internet block of all of the Wikipedia online encyclopedia site via Turkey's domestic Internet filtering system. This blocking action took place after the government had first made a request for Wikipedia to remove what it referred to as "offensive content". In response, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales replied via a post on Twitter stating, "Access to information is a fundamental human right. Turkish people, I will always stand with you and fight for this right." In January 2016, more than a thousand academics signed a petition criticizing Turkey's military crackdown on ethnic Kurdish towns and neighborhoods in the east of the country, such as Sur (a district of Diyarbakır), Silvan, Nusaybin, Cizre and Silopi, and asking an end to violence. Erdoğan accused those who signed the petition of "terrorist propaganda", calling them "the darkest of people". He called for action by institutions and universities, stating, "Everyone who benefits from this state but is now an enemy of the state must be punished without further delay". Within days, over 30 of the signatories were arrested, many in dawn-time raids on their homes. Although all were quickly released, nearly half were fired from their jobs, eliciting a denunciation from Turkey's Science Academy for such "wrong and disturbing" treatment. Erdoğan vowed that the academics would pay the price for "falling into a pit of treachery". On 8 July 2018, Erdoğan sacked 18,000 officials for alleged ties to US based cleric Fethullah Gülen, shortly before renewing his term as an executive president. Of those removed, 9000 were police officers with 5000 from the armed forces with the addition of hundreds of academics. Foreign policy Europe In February 2016, Erdoğan threatened to send the millions of refugees in Turkey to EU member states, saying: "We can open the doors to Greece and Bulgaria anytime and we can put the refugees on buses ... So how will you deal with refugees if you don't get a deal?" In an interview to the news magazine Der Spiegel, German minister of defence Ursula von der Leyen said on 11 March 2016 that the refugee crisis had made good cooperation between EU and Turkey an "existentially important" issue. "Therefore it is right to advance now negotiations on Turkey's EU accession". In its resolution "The functioning of democratic institutions in Turkey" from 22 June 2016, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe warned that "recent developments in Turkey pertaining to freedom of the media and of expression, erosion of the rule of law and the human rights violations in relation to anti-terrorism security operations in south-east Turkey have ... raised serious questions about the functioning of its democratic institutions". On 20 August 2016, Erdoğan told his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko that Turkey would not recognize the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea; calling it "Crimea's occupation". In January 2017, Erdoğan said that the withdrawal of Turkish troops from Northern Cyprus is "out of the question" and Turkey will be in Cyprus "forever". There is a long-standing dispute between Turkey and Greece in the Aegean Sea. Erdoğan warned that Greece will pay a "heavy price" if Turkey's gas exploration vessel – in what Turkey said are disputed waters – is attacked. In September 2020, Erdoğan declared his government's support for Azerbaijan following clashes between Armenian and Azeri forces over a disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. He dismissed demands for a ceasefire. Diaspora In March 2017, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated to the Turks in Europe, "Make not three, but five children. Because you are the future of Europe. That will be the best response to the injustices against you." This has been interpreted as an imperialist call for demographic warfare. According to The Economist, Erdoğan is the first Turkish leader to take the Turkish diaspora seriously, which has created friction within these diaspora communities and between the Turkish government and several of its European counterparts. The Balkans In February 2018, President Erdoğan expressed Turkish support of the Republic of Macedonia's position during negotiations over the Macedonia naming dispute saying that Greece's position is wrong. In March 2018, President Erdoğan criticized the Kosovan Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj for dismissing his Interior Minister and Intelligence Chief for failing to inform him of an unauthorized and illegal secret operation conducted by the National Intelligence Organization of Turkey on Kosovo's territory that led to the arrest of six people allegedly associated with the Gülen movement. On 26 November 2019, an earthquake struck the Durrës region of Albania. President Erdoğan expressed his condolences. and citing close Albanian-Turkish relations, he committed Turkey to reconstructing 500 earthquake destroyed homes and other civic structures in Laç, Albania. In Istanbul, Erdoğan organised and attended a donors conference (8 December) to assist Albania that included Turkish businessmen, investors and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama. United Kingdom In May 2018, British Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed Erdoğan to the United Kingdom for a three-day state visit. Erdoğan declared that the United Kingdom is "an ally and a strategic partner, but also a real friend. The cooperation we have is well beyond any mechanism that we have established with other partners." Israel Relations between Turkey and Israel began to normalize after Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu officially apologized for the death of the nine Turkish activists during the Gaza flotilla raid. However, in response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of being "more barbaric than Hitler", and conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. In December 2017, President Erdoğan issued a warning to Donald Trump, after the U.S. President acknowledged Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Erdoğan stated, "Jerusalem is a red line for Muslims", indicating that naming Jerusalem as Israel's capital would alienate Palestinians and other Muslims from the city, undermining hopes at a future capital of a Palestinian State. Erdoğan called Israel a "terrorist state". Naftali Bennett dismissed the threats, claiming "Erdoğan does not miss an opportunity to attack Israel". In April 2019, Erdoğan said the West Bank belongs to Palestinians, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would annex Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories if he is re-elected. Erdoğan condemned the Israel–UAE peace agreement, stating that Turkey was considering suspending or cutting off diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates in retaliation. Syrian Civil War Amid allegations of Turkish collaboration with the Islamic State, the 2014 Kobanî protests broke out near the Syrian border city of Kobanî, in protest against the government's perceived facilitation of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant during the Siege of Kobanî. 42 protestors were killed during a brutal police crackdown. Asserting that aid to the Kurdish-majority People's Protection Units (YPG) fighters in Syria would assist the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) (then on ceasefire) in Turkey, Erdoğan held bilateral talks with Barack Obama regarding IS during the 5–6 September 2014 NATO summit in Newport, Wales. In early October, United States Vice President Joe Biden criticised the Turkish government for supplying jihadists in Syria and said Erdoğan had expressed regret to him about letting foreign jihadists transit through Turkey en route to Syria. Erdoğan angrily responded, "Biden has to apologize for his statements" adding that if no apology is made, Biden would become "history to me." Biden subsequently apologised. In response to the U.S. request to use İncirlik Air Base to conduct air strikes against IS, Erdoğan demanded that Bashar al-Assad be removed from power first. Turkey lost its bid for a Security Council seat in the United Nations during the 2014 election; the unexpected result is believed to have been a reaction to Erdoğan's hostile treatment of the Kurds fighting ISIS on the Syrian border and a rebuke of his willingness to support IS-aligned insurgents opposed to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. In 2015, there were consistent allegations that Erdoğan maintained financial links with the Islamic State, including allegation of his son-in-law Berat Albayrak's involvement with oil production and smuggling in ISIL. Revelations that the state was supplying arms to militant groups in Syria in the 2014 National Intelligence Organisation lorry scandal led to accusations of high treason. In July 2015, Turkey became involved in the international military intervention against ISIL, simultaneously launching airstrikes against PKK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan. As of 2015, Turkey began openly supporting the Army of Conquest, a coalition of Syrian rebel groups that included al-Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham. In late November 2016, Erdoğan said that the Turkish military launched its operations in Syria to end Assad's rule, but retracted this statement shortly afterwards. In January 2018, the Turkish military and its Syrian National Army and Sham Legion allies began the Turkish military operation in Afrin in the Kurdish-majority Afrin Canton in Northern Syria, against the YPG. On 10 April, Erdoğan rejected a Russian demand to return Afrin to Syrian government control. In October 2019, after Erdoğan spoke to him, U.S. President Donald Trump gave the go-ahead to the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria, despite recently agreeing to a Northern Syria Buffer Zone. U.S. troops in northern Syria were withdrawn from the border to avoid interference with the Turkish operation. After the U.S. pullout, Turkey proceeded to attack the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria. Rejecting criticism of the invasion, Erdoğan claimed that NATO and European Union countries "sided with terrorists, and all of them attacked us". China Bilateral trade between Turkey and China increased from $1 billion a year in 2002 to $27 billion annually in 2017. Erdoğan has stated that Turkey might consider joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation instead of the European Union. Qatar blockade In June 2017 during a speech, Erdoğan called the isolation of Qatar as "inhumane and against Islamic values" and that "victimising Qatar through smear campaigns serves no purpose". Myanmar In September 2017, Erdoğan condemned the persecution of Muslims in Myanmar and accused Myanmar of "genocide" against the Muslim minority. United States Over time, Turkey began to look for ways to buy its own missile defense system and also to use that procurement to build up its own capacity to manufacture and sell an air and missile defense system. Turkey got serious about acquiring a missile defense system early in the first Obama administration when it opened a competition between the Raytheon Patriot PAC 2 system and systems from Europe, Russia, and even China. Taking advantage of the new low in U.S.-Turkish relations, Putin saw his chance to use an S-400 sale to Turkey, so in July 2017, he offered the air defense system to Turkey. In the months that followed, the United States warned Turkey that a S-400 purchase jeopardized Turkey's F-35 purchase. Integration of the Russian system into the NATO air defense net was also out of the question. Administration officials, including Mark Esper, warned that Turkey had to choose between the S-400 and the F-35. That they couldn't have both. The S-400 deliveries to Turkey began on 12 July. On 16 July, Trump mentioned to reporters that withholding the F-35 from Turkey was unfair. Said the president, "So what happens is we have a situation where Turkey is very good with us, very good, and we are now telling Turkey that because you have really been forced to buy another missile system, we’re not going to sell you the F-35 fighter jets". The U.S. Congress has made clear on a bipartisan basis that it expects the president to sanction Turkey for buying Russian equipment. Out of the F-35, Turkey now considers buying Russian fifth-generation jet fighter Su-57. On 1 August 2018, the U.S. Department of Treasury sanctioned two senior Turkish government ministers who were involved in the detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson. Erdoğan said that the U.S. behavior will force Turkey to look for new friends and allies. The U.S.–Turkey tensions appear to be the most serious diplomatic crisis between the NATO allies in years. Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton claimed that President Donald Trump told Erdoğan he would 'take care' of investigation against Turkey's state-owned bank Halkbank accused of bank fraud charges and laundering up to $20 billion on behalf of Iranian entities. Turkey criticized Bolton's book, saying it included misleading accounts of conversations between Trump and Erdoğan. In August 2020, the former vice president and presidential candidate Joe Biden called for a new U.S. approach to the "autocrat" President Erdoğan and support for Turkish opposition parties. In September 2020, Biden demanded that Erdoğan "stay out" of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, in which Turkey has supported the Azeris. Venezuela Relations with Venezuela were strengthened with recent developments and high level mutual visits. The first official visit between the two countries at presidential level was in October 2017 when Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro visited Turkey. In December 2018, Erdoğan visited Venezuela for the first time and expressed his will to build strong relations with Venezuela and expressed hope that high-level visits "will increasingly continue." Reuters reported that in 2018 23 tons of mined gold were taken from Venezuela to Istanbul. In the first nine months of 2018, Venezuela's gold exports to Turkey rose from zero in the previous year to US$900 million. During the Venezuelan presidential crisis, Erdoğan voiced solidarity with Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro and criticized U.S. sanctions against Venezuela, saying that "political problems cannot be resolved by punishing an entire nation." Following the 2019 Venezuelan uprising attempt, Erdoğan condemned the actions of lawmaker Juan Guaidó, tweeting "Those who are in an effort to appoint a postmodern colonial governor to Venezuela, where the President was appointed by elections and where the people rule, should know that only democratic elections can determine how a country is governed". Events Coup d'état attempt On 15 July 2016, a coup d'état was attempted by the military, with aims to remove Erdoğan from government. By the next day, Erdoğan's government managed to reassert effective control in the country. Reportedly, no government official was arrested or harmed, which, among other factors, raised the suspicion of a false flag event staged by the government itself. Erdoğan, as well as other government officials, has blamed an exiled cleric, and a former ally of Erdoğan, Fethullah Gülen, for staging the coup attempt. Süleyman Soylu, Minister of Labor in Erdoğan's government, accused the US of planning a coup to oust Erdoğan. Erdoğan, as well as other high-ranking Turkish government officials, has issued repeated demands to the US to extradite Gülen. Following the coup attempt, there has been a significant deterioration in Turkey-US relations. European and other world leaders have expressed their concerns over the situation in Turkey, with many of them warning Erdoğan not to use the coup attempt as an excuse to crack down on his opponents. The rise of ISIS and the collapse of the Kurdish peace process had led to a sharp rise in terror incidents in Turkey until 2016. Erdoğan was accused by his critics of having a 'soft corner' for ISIS. However, after the attempted coup, Erdoğan ordered the Turkish military into Syria to combat ISIS and Kurdish militant groups. Erdoğan's critics have decried purges in the education system and judiciary as undermining the rule of law however Erdoğan supporters argue this is a necessary measure as Gulen-linked schools cheated on entrance exams, requiring a purge in the education system and of the Gulen followers who then entered the judiciary. Erdoğan's plan is "to reconstitute Turkey as a presidential system. The plan would create a centralized system that would enable him to better tackle Turkey's internal and external threats. One of the main hurdles allegedly standing in his way is Fethullah Gulen's movement ..." In the aftermath of the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt, a groundswell of national unity and consensus emerged for cracking down on the coup plotters with a National Unity rally held in Turkey that included Islamists, secularists, liberals and nationalists. Erdoğan has used this consensus to remove Gulen's followers from the bureaucracy, curtail their role in NGOs, Turkey's Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Turkish military, with 149 Generals discharged. In a foreign policy shift Erdoğan ordered the Turkish Armed Forces into battle in Syria and has liberated towns from IS control. As relations with Europe soured over in the aftermath of the attempted coup, Erdoğan developed alternative relationships with Russia, Saudi Arabia and a "strategic partnership" with Pakistan, with plans to cultivate relations through free trade agreements and deepening military relations for mutual co-operation with Turkey's regional allies. 2018 currency and debt crisis The Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018 was caused by the Turkish economy's excessive current account deficit and foreign-currency debt, in combination with Erdoğan's increasing authoritarianism and his unorthodox ideas about interest rate policy. Economist Paul Krugman described the unfolding crisis as "a classic currency-and-debt crisis, of a kind we’ve seen many times", adding: "At such a time, the quality of leadership suddenly matters a great deal. You need officials who understand what's happening, can devise a response and have enough credibility that markets give them the benefit of the doubt. Some emerging markets have those things, and they are riding out the turmoil fairly well. The Erdoğan regime has none of that". Ideology and public image Early during his premiership, Erdoğan was praised as a role model for emerging Middle Eastern nations due to several reform packages initiated by his government which expanded religious freedoms and minority rights as part of accession negotiations with the European Union. However, his government underwent several crises including the Sledgehammer coup and the Ergenekon trials, corruption scandals, accusations of media intimidation, as well as the pursuit of an increasingly polarizing political agenda; the opposition accused the government of inciting political hatred throughout the country. Critics say that Erdoğan's government legitimizes homophobia, as Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". Neo-Ottomanism As President, Erdoğan has overseen a revival of Ottoman tradition, greeting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas with an Ottoman-style ceremony in the new presidential palace, with guards dressed in costumes representing founders of 16 Great Turkish Empires in history. While serving as the Prime Minister of Turkey, Erdoğan's AKP made references to the Ottoman era during election campaigns, such as calling their supporters 'grandsons of Ottomans' (Osmanlı torunu). This proved controversial, since it was perceived to be an open attack against the republican nature of modern Turkey founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. In 2015, Erdoğan made a statement in which he endorsed the old Ottoman term külliye to refer to university campuses rather than the standard Turkish word kampüs. Many critics have thus accused Erdoğan of wanting to become an Ottoman sultan and abandon the secular and democratic credentials of the Republic. One of the most cited scholars alive, Noam Chomsky, said that "Erdogan in Turkey is basically trying to create something like the Ottoman Caliphate, with him as caliph, supreme leader, throwing his weight around all over the place, and destroying the remnants of democracy in Turkey at the same time". When pressed on this issue in January 2015, Erdoğan denied these claims and said that he would aim to be more like Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom rather than like an Ottoman sultan. In July 2020, after the Council of State annulled the Cabinet's 1934 decision to establish the Hagia Sophia as museum and revoking the monument's status, Erdoğan ordered its reclassification as a mosque. The 1934 decree was ruled to be unlawful under both Ottoman and Turkish law as Hagia Sophia's waqf, endowed by Sultan Mehmed II, had designated the site a mosque; proponents of the decision argued the Hagia Sophia was the personal property of the sultan. This redesignation is controversial, invoking condemnation from the Turkish opposition, UNESCO, the World Council of Churches, the Holy See, and many other international leaders. In August 2020, he also signed the order that transferred the administration of the Chora Church to the Directorate of Religious Affairs to open it for worship as a mosque. Initially converted to a mosque by the Ottomans, the building had then been designated as a museum by the government since 1934. Authoritarianism Erdoğan has served as the de facto leader of Turkey since 2002. In response to criticism, Erdoğan made a speech in May 2014 denouncing allegations of dictatorship, saying that the leader of the opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who was there at the speech, would not be able to "roam the streets" freely if he were a dictator. Kılıçdaroğlu responded that political tensions would cease to exist if Erdoğan stopped making his polarising speeches for three days. One observer said it was a measure of the state of Turkish democracy that Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu could openly threaten, on 20 December 2015, that, if his party did not win the election, Turkish Kurds would endure a repeat of the era of the "white Toros", the Turkish name for the Renault 12, "a car associated with the gendarmarie’s fearsome intelligence agents, who carried out thousands of extrajudicial executions of Kurdish nationalists during the 1990s". In February 2015, a 13-year-old was charged by a prosecutor after allegedly insulting Erdoğan on Facebook. In 2016, a waiter was arrested for insulting Erdoğan by allegedly saying "If Erdoğan comes here, I will not even serve tea to him.". In April 2014, the President of the Constitutional Court, Haşim Kılıç, accused Erdoğan of damaging the credibility of the judiciary, labelling Erdoğan's attempts to increase political control over the courts as 'desperate'. During the chaotic 2007 presidential election, the military issued an E-memorandum warning the government to keep within the boundaries of secularism when choosing a candidate. Regardless, Erdoğan's close relations with Fethullah Gülen and his Cemaat Movement allowed his government to maintain a degree of influence within the judiciary through Gülen's supporters in high judicial and bureaucratic offices. Shortly after, an alleged coup plot codenamed Sledgehammer became public and resulted in the imprisonment of 300 military officers including İbrahim Fırtına, Çetin Doğan and Engin Alan. Several opposition politicians, journalists and military officers also went on trial for allegedly being part of an ultra-nationalist organisation called Ergenekon. Both cases were marred by irregularities and were condemned as a joint attempt by Erdoğan and Gülen to curb opposition to the AKP. The original Sledgehammer document containing the coup plans, allegedly written in 2003, was found to have been written using Microsoft Word 2007. Despite both domestic and international calls for these irregularities to be addressed in order to guarantee a fair trial, Erdoğan instead praised his government for bringing the coup plots to light. When Gülen publicly withdrew support and openly attacked Erdoğan in late 2013, several imprisoned military officers and journalists were released, with the government admitting that the judicial proceedings were unfair. When Gülen withdrew support from the AKP government in late 2013, a government corruption scandal broke out, leading to the arrest of several family members of cabinet ministers. Erdoğan accused Gülen of co-ordinating a "parallel state" within the judiciary in an attempt to topple him from power. He then removed or reassigned several judicial officials in an attempt to remove Gülen's supporters from office. Erdoğan's 'purge' was widely questioned and criticised by the European Union. In early 2014, a new law was passed by parliament giving the government greater control over the judiciary, which sparked public protest throughout the country. International organisations perceived the law to be a danger to the separation of powers. Several judicial officials removed from their posts said that they had been removed due to their secularist credentials. The political opposition accused Erdoğan of not only attempting to remove Gülen supporters, but supporters of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's principles as well, in order to pave the way for increased politicisation of the judiciary. Several family members of Erdoğan's ministers who had been arrested as a result of the 2013 corruption scandal were released, and a judicial order to question Erdoğan's son Bilal Erdoğan was annulled. Controversy erupted when it emerged that many of the newly appointed judicial officials were actually AKP supporters. İslam Çiçek, a judge who ejected the cases of five ministers' relatives accused of corruption, was accused of being an AKP supporter and an official investigation was launched into his political affiliations. On 1 September 2014, the courts dissolved the cases of 96 suspects, which included Bilal Erdoğan. During a televised press conference he was asked if he believed a presidential system was possible in a unitary state. Erdoğan affirmed this and cited Nazi Germany (among other examples) as a case where such a combination existed. However, the Turkish president's office said that Erdoğan was not advocating a Hitler-style government when he called for a state system with a strong executive, and added that the Turkish president had declared the "Holocaust, anti-semitism and Islamophobia" as crimes against humanity and that it was out of the question for him to cite Hitler's Germany as a good example. Suppression of dissent Erdoğan has been criticised for his politicisation of the media, especially after the 2013 protests. The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) alleged that over 1,863 journalists lost their jobs due to their anti-government views in 12 years of AKP rule. Opposition politicians have also alleged that intimidation in the media is due to the government's attempt to restructure the ownership of private media corporations. Journalists from the Cihan News Agency and the Gülenist Zaman newspaper were repeatedly barred from attending government press conferences or asking questions. Several opposition journalists such as Soner Yalçın were controversially arrested as part of the Ergenekon trials and Sledgehammer coup investigation. Veli Ağbaba, a CHP politician, has called the AKP the 'biggest media boss in Turkey.' In 2015, 74 US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to state their concern over what they saw as deviations from the basic principles of democracy in Turkey and oppressions of Erdoğan over media. Notable cases of media censorship occurred during the 2013 anti-government protests, when the mainstream media did not broadcast any news regarding the demonstrations for three days after they began. The lack of media coverage was symbolised by CNN International covering the protests while CNN Türk broadcast a documentary about penguins at the same time. The Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK) controversially issued a fine to pro-opposition news channels including Halk TV and Ulusal Kanal for their coverage of the protests, accusing them of broadcasting footage that could be morally, physically and mentally destabilising to children. Erdoğan was criticised for not responding to the accusations of media intimidation, and caused international outrage after telling a female journalist (Amberin Zaman of The Economist) to know her place and calling her a 'shameless militant' during his 2014 presidential election campaign. While the 2014 presidential election was not subject to substantial electoral fraud, Erdoğan was again criticised for receiving disproportionate media attention in comparison to his rivals. The British newspaper The Times commented that between 2 and 4 July, the state-owned media channel TRT gave 204 minutes of coverage to Erdoğan's campaign and less than a total of 3 minutes to both his rivals. Erdoğan also tightened controls over the Internet, signing into law a bill which allows the government to block websites without prior court order on 12 September 2014. His government blocked Twitter and YouTube in late March 2014 following the release of a recording of a conversation between him and his son Bilal, where Erdoğan allegedly warned his family to 'nullify' all cash reserves at their home amid the 2013 corruption scandal. Erdoğan has undertaken a media campaign that attempts to portray the presidential family as frugal and simple-living; their palace electricity-bill is estimated at $500,000 per month. In May 2016, former Miss Turkey model Merve Büyüksaraç was sentenced to more than a year in prison for allegedly insulting the president. In a 2016 news story, Bloomberg reported, "more than 2,000 cases have been opened against journalists, cartoonists, teachers, a former Miss Turkey, and even schoolchildren in the past two years". In November 2016, the Turkish government blocked access to social media in all of Turkey as well as sought to completely block Internet access for the citizens in the southeast of the country. Mehmet Aksoy lawsuit In 2009, Turkish sculptor Mehmet Aksoy created the Statue of Humanity in Kars to promote reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia. When visiting the city in 2011, Erdoğan deemed the statue a "freak", and months later it was demolished. Aksoy sued Erdoğan for "moral indemnities", although his lawyer said that his statement was a critique rather than an insult. In March 2015, a judge ordered Erdoğan to pay 10,000 liras. Erdoğanism Erdoğan has produced many aphorisms and catch-phrases known as Erdoğanisms. The term Erdoğanism first emerged shortly after Erdoğan's 2011 general election victory, where it was predominantly described as the AKP's liberal economic and conservative democratic ideals fused with Erdoğan demagoguery and cult of personality. Views on minorities LGBT In 2002, Erdoğan said that "homosexuals must be legally protected within the framework of their rights and freedoms. From time to time, we do not find the treatment they get on some television screens humane", he said. However, in 2017 Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Turkey's top Muslim scholar and President of Religious Affairs, Ali Erbaş, said in a Friday Ramadan announcement that country condemns homosexuality because it "brings illness," insinuating that same sex relations are responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan backed Erbaş, saying that what Erbaş "said was totally right." Jews While Erdoğan has declared several times being against antisemitism, he has been accused of invoking antisemitic stereotypes in public statements. According to Erdoğan, he had been inspired by novelist and Islamist ideologue Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, a publisher (among others) of antisemitic literature. Others During a live interview in 2014, he said: "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian. Excuse me, but they have said even uglier things. They have called me Armenian, but I am Turkish." Honours and accolades Foreign honours Russia: Medal "In Commemoration of the 1000th Anniversary of Kazan" (1 June 2006) Pakistan: Nishan-e-Pakistan, the highest civilian award in Pakistan (26 October 2009) Georgia: Order of Golden Fleece, awarded for his contribution to development of bilateral relations (17 May 2010) Kyrgyzstan: Danaker Order in Bishkek (2 February 2011) Azerbaijan: Heydar Aliyev Order (3 September 2014) Belgium: Grand Cordon in the Order of Leopold (5 October 2015) Madagascar: Knight Grand Cross in the national Order (25 January 2017) Gagauzia: Order of Gagauz-Yeri in Comrat (18 October 2018) Venezuela: Order of the Liberator, Grand Cordon (3 December 2018) Ukraine: Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise (16 October 2020) Other awards 29 January 2004: Profile of Courage Award from the American Jewish Congress, for promoting peace between cultures. Returned at the request of the A.J.C. in July 2014. 13 June 2004: Golden Plate award from the Academy of Achievement during the conference in Chicago. 3 October 2004: German Quadriga prize for improving relationships between different cultures. 2 September 2005: Mediterranean Award for Institutions (). This was awarded by the Fondazione Mediterraneo. 8 August 2006: Caspian Energy Integration Award from the Caspian Integration Business Club. 1 November 2006: Outstanding Service award from the Turkish humanitarian organization Red Crescent. 2 February 2007: Dialogue Between Cultures Award from the President of Tatarstan Mintimer Shaimiev. 15 April 2007: Crystal Hermes Award from the German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the opening of the Hannover Industrial Fair. 11 July 2007: highest award of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the Agricola Medal, in recognition of his contribution to agricultural and social development in Turkey. 11 May 2009: Avicenna award from the Avicenna Foundation in Frankfurt, Germany. 9 June 2009: guest of honor at the 20th Crans Montana Forum in Brussels and received the Prix de la Fondation, for democracy and freedom. 25 June 2009: Key to the City of Tirana on the occasion of his state visit to Albania. 29 December 2009: Award for Contribution to World Peace from the Turgut Özal Thought and Move Association. 12 January 2010: King Faisal International Prize for "service to Islam" from the King Faisal Foundation. 23 February 2010: Nodo Culture Award from the mayor of Seville for his efforts to launch the Alliance of Civilizations initiative. 1 March 2010: United Nations–HABITAT award in memorial of Rafik Hariri. A seven-member international jury unanimously found Erdoğan deserving of the award because of his "excellent achievement and commendable conduct in the area of leadership, statesmanship and good governance. Erdoğan also initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors." 27 May 2010: medal of honor from the Brazilian Federation of Industry for the State of São Paulo (FIESP) for his contributions to industry 31 May 2010: World Health Organization 2010 World No Tobacco Award for "his dedicated leadership on tobacco control in Turkey." 29 June 2010: 2010 World Family Award from the World Family Organization which operates under the umbrella of the United Nations. 4 November 2010: Golden Medal of Independence, an award conferred upon Kosovo citizens and foreigners that have contributed to the independence of Kosovo. 25 November 2010: "Leader of the Year" award presented by the Union of Arab Banks in Lebanon. 11 January 2011: "Outstanding Personality in the Islamic World Award" of the Sheikh Fahad al-Ahmad International Award for Charity in Kuwait. 25 October 2011: Palestinian International Award for Excellence and Creativity (PIA) 2011 for his support to the Palestinian people and cause. 21 January 2012: 'Gold Statue 2012 Special Award' by the Polish Business Center Club (BCC). Erdoğan was awarded for his systematic effort to clear barriers on the way to economic growth, striving to build democracy and free market relations. 2020: Ig Nobel Prize "for using the COVID-19 viral pandemic to teach the world that politicians can have a more immediate effect on life and death than scientists and doctors can." See also List of international presidential trips made by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Leadership approval polling for the 2023 Turkish general election The 500 Most Influential Muslims Notes References Further reading Cagaptay, Soner. The new sultan: Erdogan and the crisis of modern Turkey (2nd ed. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020). online review Cagaptay, Soner. "Making Turkey Great Again." Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 43 (2019): 169–78. online Kirişci, Kemal, and Amanda Sloat. "The rise and fall of liberal democracy in Turkey: Implications for the West" Foreign Policy at Brookings (2019) online Tziarras, Zenonas. "Erdoganist authoritarianism and the 'new' Turkey." Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 18.4 (2018): 593–598. online Yavuz, M. Hakan. "A framework for understanding the Intra-Islamist conflict between the AK party and the Gülen movement." Politics, Religion & Ideology 19.1 (2018): 11–32. online Yesil, Bilge. Media in New Turkey: The Origins of an Authoritarian Neoliberal State (University of Illinois Press, 2016) online review External links Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Instagram. Archived from the original. Welcome to demokrasi: how Erdoğan got more popular than ever by The Guardian 1954 births Living people 21st-century presidents of Turkey 21st-century prime ministers of Turkey Deniers of the Armenian genocide Deputies of Istanbul Deputies of Siirt Recep Tayyip Imam Hatip school alumni Justice and Development Party (Turkey) politicians Leaders of political parties in Turkey Marmara University alumni Mayors of Istanbul Members of the 22nd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 23rd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 24th Parliament of Turkey Naqshbandi order People from Istanbul Politicians arrested in Turkey Presidents of Turkey Prime Ministers of Turkey Recipients of the Heydar Aliyev Order Recipients of the Order of the Golden Fleece (Georgia) Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 1st class Turkish Islamists Turkish Sunni Muslims Chairmen of the Organization of Turkic States Recipients of the Gagauz-Yeri Order Foreign recipients of the Nishan-e-Pakistan	false	[ "Přírodní park Třebíčsko (before Oblast klidu Třebíčsko) is a natural park near Třebíč in the Czech Republic. There are many interesting plants. The park was founded in 1983.\n\nKobylinec and Ptáčovský kopeček\n\nKobylinec is a natural monument situated ca 0,5 km from the village of Trnava.\nThe area of this monument is 0,44 ha. Pulsatilla grandis can be found here and in the Ptáčovský kopeček park near Ptáčov near Třebíč. Both monuments are very popular for tourists.\n\nPonds\n\nIn the natural park there are some interesting ponds such as Velký Bor, Malý Bor, Buršík near Přeckov and a brook Březinka. Dams on the brook are examples of European beaver activity.\n\nSyenitové skály near Pocoucov\n\nSyenitové skály (rocks of syenit) near Pocoucov is one of famed locations. There are interesting granite boulders. The area of the reservation is 0,77 ha.\n\nExternal links\nParts of this article or all article was translated from Czech. The original article is :cs:Přírodní park Třebíčsko.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nNature near the village Trnava which is there\n\nTřebíč\nParks in the Czech Republic\nTourist attractions in the Vysočina Region", "Damn Interesting is an independent website founded by Alan Bellows in 2005. The website presents true stories from science, history, and psychology, primarily as long-form articles, often illustrated with original artwork. Works are written by various authors, and published at irregular intervals. The website openly rejects advertising, relying on reader and listener donations to cover operating costs.\n\nAs of October 2012, each article is also published as a podcast under the same name. In November 2019, a second podcast was launched under the title Damn Interesting Week, featuring unscripted commentary on an assortment of news articles featured on the website's \"Curated Links\" section that week. In mid-2020, a third podcast called Damn Interesting Curio Cabinet began highlighting the website's periodic short-form articles in the same radioplay format as the original podcast.\n\nIn July 2009, Damn Interesting published the print book Alien Hand Syndrome through Workman Publishing. It contains some favorites from the site and some exclusive content.\n\nAwards and recognition \nIn August 2007, PC Magazine named Damn Interesting one of the \"Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites\".\nThe article \"The Zero-Armed Bandit\" by Alan Bellows won a 2015 Sidney Award from David Brooks in The New York Times.\nThe article \"Ghoulish Acts and Dastardly Deeds\" by Alan Bellows was cited as \"nonfiction journalism from 2017 that will stand the test of time\" by Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic.\nThe article \"Dupes and Duplicity\" by Jennifer Lee Noonan won a 2020 Sidney Award from David Brooks in the New York Times.\n\nAccusing The Dollop of plagiarism \n\nOn July 9, 2015, Bellows posted an open letter accusing The Dollop, a comedy podcast about history, of plagiarism due to their repeated use of verbatim text from Damn Interesting articles without permission or attribution. Dave Anthony, the writer of The Dollop, responded on reddit, admitting to using Damn Interesting content, but claiming that the use was protected by fair use, and that \"historical facts are not copyrightable.\" In an article about the controversy on Plagiarism Today, Jonathan Bailey concluded, \"Any way one looks at it, The Dollop failed its ethical obligations to all of the people, not just those writing for Damn Interesting, who put in the time, energy and expertise into writing the original content upon which their show is based.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Official website\n\n2005 podcast debuts" ]
[ "Recep Tayyip Erdoğan", "Armenian Genocide", "What happened in the genocide?", "mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I", "Who was responsible for this?", "Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings", "When did this happen?", "I don't know.", "Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?", "Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul," ]	C_4d6e38301a82483cab0ff9378b6a238e_1	Was he part of the genocide?	5	Was Recep Tayyip Erdoğan part of the Armenian genocide?	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan	Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province. His parents are Ahmet Erdogan and Tenzile Erdogan. Erdogan reportedly said in 2003, "I'm a Georgian, my family is a Georgian family which migrated from Batumi to Rize." But in a 2014 televised interview on the NTV news network, he said, "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian... forgive me for saying this... even much uglier things, they have even called me an Armenian, but I am Turkish." In an account based on registry records, his genealogy was tracked to an ethnic Turkish family. Erdogan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father Ahmet Erdogan (1905 - 1988) was a Captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. Erdogan had a brother Mustafa (b. 1958) and sister Vesile (b. 1965). His summer holidays were mostly spent in Guneysu, Rize, where his family originates from. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdogan was 13 years old. As a teenager, he sold lemonade and sesame buns (simit) on the streets of the city's rougher districts to earn extra money. Brought up in an observant Muslim family, Erdogan graduated from Kasimpasa Piyale primary school in 1965, and Imam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. He received his high school diploma from Eyup High School. He subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences, now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences--although several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated. In his youth, Erdogan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahce wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasimpasa S.K. is named after him. Erdogan married Emine Gulbaran (born 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons; Ahmet Burak and Necmettin Bilal, and two daughters, Esra and Sumeyye. His father, Ahmet Erdogan, died in 1988 and his 88-year-old mother, Tenzile Erdogan, died in 2011. He is a member of the Community of Iskenderpasa, a Turkish sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. In 2001, Erdogan established the Justice and Development Party (AKP). The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdogan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yilmaz and Ciller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdogan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gul became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdogan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdogan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gul handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdogan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as President, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdogan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gul as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Canakkale, and one million in Izmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdogan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdogan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdogan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdogan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdogan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious." He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem." In December 2008, Erdogan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken." In November 2009, he said, "it's not possible for a Muslim to commit genocide." In 2011, Erdogan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish-Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdogan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdogan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences - such as relocation - during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". CANNOTANSWER	"I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician serving as the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as prime minister of Turkey from 2003 to 2014 and as mayor of Istanbul from 1994 to 1998. He founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2001, leading it to election victories in 2002, 2007, and 2011 general elections before being required to stand down upon his election as President in 2014. He later returned to the AKP leadership in 2017 following the constitutional referendum that year. Coming from an Islamist political background and self-describing as a conservative democrat, he has promoted socially conservative and populist policies during his administration. Following the 1994 local elections, Erdoğan was elected mayor of Istanbul as the candidate of the Islamist Welfare Party. He was later stripped of his position, banned from political office, and imprisoned for four months for inciting religious hatred, due to his recitation of a poem by Ziya Gökalp. Erdoğan subsequently abandoned openly Islamist politics, establishing the moderate conservative AKP in 2001, which he went on to lead to a landslide victory in 2002. With Erdoğan still technically prohibited from holding office, the AKP's co-founder, Abdullah Gül, instead became prime minister, and later annulled Erdoğan's political ban. After winning a by-election in Siirt in 2003, Erdoğan replaced Gül as prime minister, with Gül instead becoming the AKP's candidate for the presidency. Erdoğan led the AKP to two more election victories in 2007 and 2011. The early years of Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister saw advances in negotiations for Turkey's membership of the European Union, an economic recovery following a economic crisis in 2001 and investments in infrastructure including roads, airports, and a high-speed train network. He also won two successful constitutional referendums in 2007 and 2010. However, his government remained controversial for its close links with Fethullah Gülen and his Gülen Movement (since designated as a terrorist organisation by the Turkish state) with whom the AKP was accused of orchestrating purges against secular bureaucrats and military officers through the Balyoz and Ergenekon trials. In late 2012, his government began peace negotiations with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to end the Kurdish–Turkish conflict (1978–present). The ceasefire broke down in 2015, leading to a renewed escalation in conflict. Erdoğan's foreign policy has been described as Neo-Ottoman and has led to the Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, with its focus on preventing the Syrian Democratic Forces from gaining ground on the Syria–Turkey border during the Syrian Civil War. In the more recent years of Erdoğan's rule, Turkey has experienced democratic backsliding and corruption. Starting with the anti-government protests in 2013, his government imposed growing censorship on the press and social media, temporarily restricting access to sites such as YouTube, Twitter and Wikipedia. This stalled negotiations related to Turkey's EU membership. A US$100 billion corruption scandal in 2013 led to the arrests of Erdoğan's close allies, and incriminated Erdoğan. After 11 years as head of government (Prime Minister), Erdoğan decided to run for President in 2014. At the time, the presidency was a somewhat ceremonial function. Following the 2014 elections, Erdoğan became the first popularly elected president of Turkey. The souring in relations with Gülen continued, as the government proceeded to purge his supporters from judicial, bureaucratic and military positions. A failed military coup d'état attempt in July 2016 resulted in further purges and a temporary state of emergency. The government claimed that the coup leaders were linked to Gülen, but he has denied any role in it. Erdoğan's rule has been marked with increasing authoritarianism, expansionism, censorship and banning of parties or dissent. Erdoğan supported the 2017 referendum which changed Turkey's parliamentary system into a presidential system, thus setting for the first time in Turkish history a term limit for the head of government (two full five-year terms). This new system of government formally came into place after the 2018 general election, where Erdoğan became an executive president. His party however lost the majority in the parliament and is currently in a coalition (People's Alliance) with the Turkish nationalist MHP. Erdoğan has since been tackling, but also accused of contributing to, the Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018, which has caused a significant decline in his popularity and is widely believed to have contributed to the results of the 2019 local elections, in which his party lost power in big cities like Ankara and Istanbul to opposition parties for the first time in 15 years. Family and personal life Early life Erdoğan was born in Kasımpaşa, a poor neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province in the 1930s. Erdoğan's tribe is originally from Adjara, a region in Georgia. His parents were Ahmet Erdoğan (1905–88) and Tenzile Erdoğan (née Mutlu; 1924–2011). Erdoğan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father was a captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. His summer holidays were mostly spent in Güneysu, Rize, where his family originates. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdoğan was 13 years old. As a teenager, Erdoğan's father provided him with a weekly allowance of 2.5 Turkish lira, less than a dollar. With it, Erdoğan bought postcards and resold them on the street. He sold bottles of water to drivers stuck in traffic. Erdoğan also worked as a street vendor selling simit (sesame bread rings), wearing a white gown and selling the simit from a red three-wheel cart with the rolls stacked behind glass. In his youth, Erdoğan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahçe wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasımpaşa S.K. is named after him. Erdoğan is a member of the Community of İskenderpaşa, a Turkish Sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. Education Erdoğan graduated from Kasımpaşa Piyale primary school in 1965, and İmam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. The same educational path was followed by other co-founders of the AKP party. One quarter of the curriculum of İmam Hatip schools involves study of the Qurʼān, the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and the Arabic language. Erdoğan studied the Qurʼān at an İmam Hatip, where his classmates began calling him "hoca" ("Muslim teacher"). Erdoğan attended a meeting of the nationalist student group National Turkish Student Union (Milli Türk Talebe Birliği), who sought to raise a conservative cohort of young people to counter the rising movement of leftists in Turkey. Within the group, Erdoğan was distinguished by his oratorical skills, developing a penchant for public speaking and excelling in front of an audience. He won first place in a poetry-reading competition organized by the Community of Turkish Technical Painters, and began preparing for speeches through reading and research. Erdoğan would later comment on these competitions as "enhancing our courage to speak in front of the masses". Erdoğan wanted to pursue advanced studies at Mekteb-i Mülkiye, but Mülkiye accepted only students with regular high school diplomas, and not İmam Hatip graduates. Mülkiye was known for its political science department, which trained many statesmen and politicians in Turkey. Erdoğan was then admitted to Eyüp High School, a regular state school, and eventually received his high school diploma from Eyüp. According to his official biography, he subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences (), now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. Several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated, or even attended at all. Family Erdoğan married Emine Gülbaran (b. 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons, Ahmet Burak (b. 1979) and Necmettin Bilal (b. 1981), and two daughters, Esra (b. 1983) and Sümeyye (b. 1985). His father, Ahmet Erdoğan, died in 1988 and his mother, Tenzile Erdoğan, died in 2011 at the age of 88. Erdoğan has a brother, Mustafa (b. 1958), and a sister, Vesile (b. 1965). From his father's first marriage to Havuli Erdoğan (d. 1980), he had two half-brothers: Mehmet (1926–1988) and Hasan (1929–2006). Early political career In 1976, Erdoğan engaged in politics by joining the National Turkish Student Union, an anti-communist action group. In the same year, he became the head of the Beyoğlu youth branch of the Islamist National Salvation Party (MSP), and was later promoted to chair of the Istanbul youth branch of the party. Holding this position until 1980, he served as consultant and senior executive in the private sector during the era following the 1980 military coup when political parties were closed down. In 1983, Erdoğan followed most of Necmettin Erbakan's followers into the Islamist Welfare Party. He became the party's Beyoğlu district chair in 1984, and in 1985 he became the chair of the Istanbul city branch. He was elected to parliament in 1991, but was barred from taking his seat. Mayor of Istanbul (1994–1998) In the local elections of 27 March 1994, Erdoğan was elected Mayor of Istanbul with 25.19% of the popular vote. Erdoğan was a 40-year-old dark horse candidate who had been mocked by the mainstream media and treated as a country bumpkin by his opponents. He was pragmatic in office, tackling many chronic problems in Istanbul including water shortage, pollution and traffic chaos. The water shortage problem was solved with the laying of hundreds of kilometers of new pipelines. The garbage problem was solved with the establishment of state-of-the-art recycling facilities. While Erdoğan was in office, air pollution was reduced through a plan developed to switch to natural gas. He changed the public buses to environmentally friendly ones. The city's traffic and transportation jams were reduced with more than fifty bridges, viaducts, and highways built. He took precautions to prevent corruption, using measures to ensure that municipal funds were used prudently. He paid back a major portion of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality's two-billion-dollar debt and invested four billion dollars in the city. Erdoğan initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors. A seven-member international jury from the United Nations unanimously awarded Erdoğan the UN-Habitat award. Imprisonment In 1998, the fundamentalist Welfare Party was declared unconstitutional on the grounds of threatening the secularism of Turkey and was shut down by the Turkish constitutional court. Erdoğan became a prominent speaker at demonstrations held by his party colleagues. In December 1997 in Siirt, Erdoğan recited a poem from a work written by Ziya Gökalp, a pan-Turkish activist of the early 20th century. His recitation included verses translated as "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers...." which are not in the original version of the poem. Erdoğan said the poem had been approved by the education ministry to be published in textbooks. Under article 312/2 of the Turkish penal code his recitation was regarded as an incitement to violence and religious or racial hatred. He was given a ten-month prison sentence of which he served four months, from 24 March 1999 to 27 July 1999. Due to his conviction, Erdoğan was forced to give up his mayoral position. The conviction also stipulated a political ban, which prevented him from participating in parliamentary elections. He had appealed for the sentence to be converted to a monetary fine, but it was reduced to 120 days instead. In 2017, this period of Erdoğan's life was made into a film titled Reis. Justice and Development Party Erdoğan was member of political parties that kept getting banned by the army or judges. Within his Virtue Party, there was a dispute about the appropriate discourse of the party between traditional politicians and pro-reform politicians. The latter envisioned a party that could operate within the limits of the system, and thus not getting banned as its predecessors like National Order Party, National Salvation Party and Welfare Party. They wanted to give the group the character of an ordinary conservative party following the example of the European Christian democratic parties. When the Virtue Party was also banned in 2001, a definitive split took place: the followers of Necmettin Erbakan founded the Felicity Party (SP) and the reformers founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) under the leadership of Abdullah Gül and Erdoğan. The pro-reform politicians realized that a strictly Islamic party would never be accepted as a governing party by the state apparatus and they believed that an Islamic party did not appeal to more than about 20 percent of the Turkish electorate. The AK party emphatically placed itself as a broad democratic conservative party with new politicians from the political center (like Ali Babacan and Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu), while respecting Islamic norms and values, but without an explicit religious program. This turned out to be successful as the new party won 34% of the vote in the general elections of 2002. Erdoğan became prime minister in March 2003 after the Gül government ended his political ban. Premiership (2003–2014) General elections The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdoğan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yılmaz and Çiller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdoğan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gül became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdoğan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdoğan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gül handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdoğan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as president, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdoğan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gül as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Çanakkale, and one million in İzmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdoğan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdoğan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdoğan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdoğan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Referendums After the opposition parties deadlocked the 2007 presidential election by boycotting the parliament, the ruling AKP proposed a constitutional reform package. The reform package was first vetoed by president Sezer. Then he applied to the Turkish constitutional court about the reform package, because the president is unable to veto amendments for the second time. The Turkish constitutional court did not find any problems in the packet and 68.95% of the voters supported the constitutional changes. The reforms consisted of electing the president by popular vote instead of by parliament; reducing the presidential term from seven years to five; allowing the president to stand for re-election for a second term; holding general elections every four years instead of five; and reducing from 367 to 184 the quorum of lawmakers needed for parliamentary decisions. Reforming the Constitution was one of the main pledges of the AKP during the 2007 election campaign. The main opposition party CHP was not interested in altering the Constitution on a big scale, making it impossible to form a Constitutional Commission (Anayasa Uzlaşma Komisyonu). The amendments lacked the two-thirds majority needed to become law instantly, but secured 336 votes in the 550-seat parliament – enough to put the proposals to a referendum. The reform package included a number of issues such as the right of individuals to appeal to the highest court, the creation of the ombudsman's office; the possibility to negotiate a nationwide labour contract; gender equality; the ability of civilian courts to convict members of the military; the right of civil servants to go on strike; a privacy law; and the structure of the Constitutional Court. The referendum was agreed by a majority of 58%. Domestic Policy Kurdish issue In 2009, Prime Minister Erdoğan's government announced a plan to help end the quarter-century-long Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict that had cost more than 40,000 lives. The government's plan, supported by the European Union, intended to allow the Kurdish language to be used in all broadcast media and political campaigns, and restored Kurdish names to cities and towns that had been given Turkish ones. Erdoğan said, "We took a courageous step to resolve chronic issues that constitute an obstacle along Turkey's development, progression and empowerment". Erdoğan passed a partial amnesty to reduce penalties faced by many members of the Kurdish guerrilla movement PKK who had surrendered to the government. On 23 November 2011, during a televised meeting of his party in Ankara, he apologised on behalf of the state for the Dersim massacre, where many Alevis and Zazas were killed. In 2013 the government of Erdoğan began a peace process between the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Turkish Government, mediated by parliamentarians of the Peoples' Democratic party (HDP). In 2015 he decided that the peace process was over and supported the lift of the parliamentary immunity of the HDP parliamentarians. During his presidency a law was introduced which banned the use of the word Kurdistan in parliament and in a speech he held for the local election of 2019 he told the HDP politicians that if there is no Kurdistan in Turkey and if they looked for one they should go to Northern Iraq. Armenian genocide Prime Minister Erdoğan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdoğan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious". He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem". In December 2008, Erdoğan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken". In November 2009, he said, "it is not possible for those who belong to the Muslim faith to carry out genocide". In 2011, Erdoğan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish–Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdoğan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdoğan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences – such as relocation – during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". The Ottoman Parliament of 1915 had previously used the term "relocation" to describe the purpose of the Tehcir Law, which resulted in the deaths of anywhere between 800,000 and over 1,800,000 Armenian civilians in what is commonly referred to as the Armenian Genocide. Pope Francis in April 2015, at a special mass in St. Peter's Basilica marking the centenary of the events, described atrocities against Armenian civilians in 1915–1922 as "the first genocide of the 20th century". In protest, Erdoğan recalled the Turkish ambassador from the Vatican, and summoned the Vatican's ambassador, to express "disappointment" at what he called a discriminatory message. He later stated "we don’t carry a stain or a shadow like genocide". US President Barack Obama called for a "full, frank and just acknowledgement of the facts", but again stopped short of labelling it "genocide", despite his campaign promise to do so. Human rights During Erdoğan's time as Prime Minister, the far-reaching powers of the 1991 Anti-Terror Law were reduced and the Democratic initiative process was initiated, with the goal to improve democratic standards in general and the rights of ethnic and religious minorities in particular. However, after Turkey's bid to join the European Union stalled, European officials noted a return to more authoritarian ways, notably on freedom of speech, freedom of the press and Kurdish minority rights. Demands by activists for the recognition of LGBT rights were publicly rejected by government members, and members of the Turkish LGBT community were insulted by cabinet members. Reporters Without Borders observed a continuous decrease in Freedom of the Press during Erdoğan's later terms, with a rank of around 100 on the Press Freedom Index during his first term and a rank of 153 out of a total of 179 countries in 2021. Freedom House saw a slight recovery in later years and awarded Turkey a Press Freedom Score of 55/100 in 2012 after a low point of 48/100 in 2006. In 2011, Erdoğan's government made legal reforms to return properties of Christian and Jewish minorities which were seized by the Turkish government in the 1930s. The total value of the properties returned reached $2 billion (USD). Under Erdoğan, the Turkish government tightened the laws on the sale and consumption of alcohol, banning all advertising and increasing the tax on alcoholic beverages. Economy In 2002, Erdoğan inherited a Turkish economy that was beginning to recover from a recession as a result of reforms implemented by Kemal Derviş. Erdoğan supported Finance Minister Ali Babacan in enforcing macro-economic policies. Erdoğan tried to attract more foreign investors to Turkey and lifted many government regulations. The cash-flow into the Turkish economy between 2002 and 2012 caused a growth of 64% in real GDP and a 43% increase in GDP per capita; considerably higher numbers were commonly advertised but these did not account for the inflation of the US dollar between 2002 and 2012. The average annual growth in GDP per capita was 3.6%. The growth in real GDP between 2002 and 2012 was higher than the values from developed countries, but was close to average when developing countries are also taken into account. The ranking of the Turkish economy in terms of GDP moved slightly from 17 to 16 during this decade. A major consequence of the policies between 2002 and 2012 was the widening of the current account deficit from US$600 million to US$58 billion (2013 est.) Since 1961, Turkey has signed 19 IMF loan accords. Erdoğan's government satisfied the budgetary and market requirements of the two during his administration and received every loan installment, the only time any Turkish government has done so. Erdoğan inherited a debt of $23.5 billion to the IMF, which was reduced to $0.9 billion in 2012. He decided not to sign a new deal. Turkey's debt to the IMF was thus declared to be completely paid and he announced that the IMF could borrow from Turkey. In 2010, five-year credit default swaps for Turkey's sovereign debt were trading at a record low of 1.17%, below those of nine EU member countries and Russia. In 2002, the Turkish Central Bank had $26.5 billion in reserves. This amount reached $92.2 billion in 2011. During Erdoğan's leadership, inflation fell from 32% to 9.0% in 2004. Since then, Turkish inflation has continued to fluctuate around 9% and is still one of the highest inflation rates in the world. The Turkish public debt as a percentage of annual GDP declined from 74% in 2002 to 39% in 2009. In 2012, Turkey had a lower ratio of public debt to GDP than 21 of 27 members of the European Union and a lower budget deficit to GDP ratio than 23 of them. In 2003, Erdoğan's government pushed through the Labor Act, a comprehensive reform of Turkey's labor laws. The law greatly expanded the rights of employees, establishing a 45-hour workweek and limiting overtime work to 270 hours a year, provided legal protection against discrimination due to sex, religion, or political affiliation, prohibited discrimination between permanent and temporary workers, entitled employees terminated without "valid cause" to compensation, and mandated written contracts for employment arrangements lasting a year or more. Education Erdoğan increased the budget of the Ministry of Education from 7.5 billion lira in 2002 to 34 billion lira in 2011, the highest share of the national budget given to one ministry. Before his prime ministership the military received the highest share of the national budget. Compulsory education was increased from eight years to twelve. In 2003, the Turkish government, together with UNICEF, initiated a campaign called "Come on girls, [let's go] to school!" (). The goal of this campaign was to close the gender gap in primary school enrollment through the provision of a quality basic education for all girls, especially in southeast Turkey. In 2005, the parliament granted amnesty to students expelled from universities before 2003. The amnesty applied to students dismissed on academic or disciplinary grounds. In 2004, textbooks became free of charge and since 2008 every province in Turkey has its own university. During Erdoğan's Premiership, the number of universities in Turkey nearly doubled, from 98 in 2002 to 186 in October 2012. The Prime Minister kept his campaign promises by starting the Fatih project in which all state schools, from preschool to high school level, received a total of 620,000 smart boards, while tablet computers were distributed to 17 million students and approximately one million teachers and administrators. In June 2017 a draft proposal by the ministry of education was approved by Erdoğan, in which the curriculum for schools excluded the teaching of the theory of evolution of Charles Darwin by 2019. From then on the teaching will be postponed and start at undergraduate level. Infrastructure Under Erdoğan's government, the number of airports in Turkey increased from 26 to 50 in the period of 10 years. Between the founding of the Republic of Turkey in 1923 and 2002, there had been 6,000 km of dual carriageway roads created. Between 2002 and 2011, another 13,500 km of expressway were built. Due to these measures, the number of motor accidents fell by 50 percent. For the first time in Turkish history, high speed railway lines were constructed, and the country's high-speed train service began in 2009. In 8 years, 1,076 km of railway were built and 5,449 km of railway renewed. The construction of Marmaray, an undersea rail tunnel under the Bosphorus strait, started in 2004. It was inaugurated on the 90th anniversary of the Turkish Republic 29 October 2013. The inauguration of the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge, the third bridge over the Bosphorus, was on 26 August 2016. Justice In March 2006, the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) held a press conference to publicly protest the obstruction of the appointment of judges to the high courts for over 10 months. The HSYK said Erdoğan wanted to fill the vacant posts with his own appointees. Erdoğan was accused of creating a rift with Turkey's highest court of appeal, the Yargıtay, and high administrative court, the Danıştay. Erdoğan stated that the constitution gave the power to assign these posts to his elected party. In May 2007, the head of Turkey's High Court asked prosecutors to consider whether Erdoğan should be charged over critical comments regarding the election of Abdullah Gül as president. Erdoğan said the ruling was "a disgrace to the justice system", and criticized the Constitutional Court which had invalidated a presidential vote because a boycott by other parties meant there was no quorum. Prosecutors investigated his earlier comments, including saying it had fired a "bullet at democracy". Tülay Tuğcu, head of the Constitutional Court, condemned Erdoğan for "threats, insults and hostility" towards the justice system. Civil–military relations The Turkish military has had a record of intervening in politics, having removed elected governments four times in the past. During the Erdoğan government, civil–military relationship moved towards normalization in which the influence of the military in politics was significantly reduced. The ruling Justice and Development Party has often faced off against the military, gaining political power by challenging a pillar of the country's laicistic establishment. The most significant issue that caused deep fissures between the army and the government was the midnight e-memorandum posted on the military's website objecting to the selection of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül as the ruling party's candidate for the Presidency in 2007. The military argued that the election of Gül, whose wife wears an Islamic headscarf, could undermine the laicistic order of the country. Contrary to expectations, the government responded harshly to former Chief of General Staff Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt's e-memorandum, stating the military had nothing to do with the selection of the presidential candidate. Health care After assuming power in 2003, Erdoğan's government embarked on a sweeping reform program of the Turkish healthcare system, called the Health Transformation Program (HTP), to greatly increase the quality of healthcare and protect all citizens from financial risks. Its introduction coincided with the period of sustained economic growth, allowing the Turkish government to put greater investments into the healthcare system. As part of the reforms, the "Green Card" program, which provides health benefits to the poor, was expanded in 2004. The reform program aimed at increasing the ratio of private to state-run healthcare, which, along with long queues in state-run hospitals, resulted in the rise of private medical care in Turkey, forcing state-run hospitals to compete by increasing quality. In April 2006, Erdoğan unveiled a social security reform package demanded by the International Monetary Fund under a loan deal. The move, which Erdoğan called one of the most radical reforms ever, was passed with fierce opposition. Turkey's three social security bodies were united under one roof, bringing equal health services and retirement benefits for members of all three bodies. The previous system had been criticized for reserving the best healthcare for civil servants and relegating others to wait in long queues. Under the second bill, everyone under the age of 18 years was entitled to free health services, irrespective of whether they pay premiums to any social security organization. The bill also envisages a gradual increase in the retirement age: starting from 2036, the retirement age will increase to 65 by 2048 for both women and men. In January 2008, the Turkish Parliament adopted a law to prohibit smoking in most public places. Erdoğan is outspokenly anti-smoking. Foreign policy Turkish foreign policy during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister has been associated with the name of Ahmet Davutoğlu. Davutoğlu was the chief foreign policy advisor of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan before he was appointed foreign minister in 2009. The basis of Erdoğan's foreign policy is based on the principle of "don't make enemies, make friends" and the pursuit of "zero problems" with neighboring countries. Erdoğan is co-founder of United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (AOC). The initiative seeks to galvanize international action against extremism through the forging of international, intercultural and inter-religious dialogue and cooperation. European Union When Erdoğan came to power, he continued Turkey's long ambition of joining the European Union. On 3 October 2005 negotiations began for Turkey's accession to the European Union. Erdoğan was named "The European of the Year 2004" by the newspaper European Voice for the reforms in his country in order to accomplish the accession of Turkey to the European Union. He said in a comment that "Turkey's accession shows that Europe is a continent where civilisations reconcile and not clash." On 3 October 2005, the negotiations for Turkey's accession to the EU formally started during Erdoğan's tenure as Prime Minister. The European Commission generally supports Erdoğan's reforms, but remains critical of his policies. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize EU member state Cyprus. Greece and Cyprus dispute Relations between Greece and Turkey were normalized during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister. In May 2004, Erdoğan became the first Turkish Prime Minister to visit Greece since 1988, and the first to visit the Turkish minority of Thrace since 1952. In 2007, Erdoğan and Greek Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis inaugurated the Greek-Turkish natural gas pipeline giving Caspian gas its first direct Western outlet. Turkey and Greece signed an agreement to create a Combined Joint Operational Unit within the framework of NATO to participate in Peace Support Operations. Erdoğan and his party strongly supported the EU-backed referendum to reunify Cyprus in 2004. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships as a consequence of the economic isolation of the internationally unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the failure of the EU to end the isolation, as it had promised in 2004. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize the Republic of Cyprus. Armenia Armenia is Turkey's only neighbor which Erdoğan has not visited during his premiership. The Turkish-Armenian border has been closed since 1993 because of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with Turkey's close ally Azerbaijan. Diplomatic efforts resulted in the signing of protocols between Turkish and Armenian Foreign Ministers in Switzerland to improve relations between the two countries. One of the points of the agreement was the creation of a joint commission on the issue. The Armenian Constitutional Court decided that the commission contradicts the Armenian constitution. Turkey responded saying that Armenian court's ruling on the protocols is not acceptable, resulting in a suspension of the rectification process by the Turkish side. Erdoğan has said that Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan should apologize for calling on school children to re-occupy eastern Turkey. When asked by a student at a literature contest ceremony if Armenians will be able to get back their "western territories" along with Mt. Ararat, Sarksyan said, "This is the task of your generation". Russia In December 2004, President Putin visited Turkey, making it the first presidential visit in the history of Turkish-Russian relations besides that of the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Nikolai Podgorny in 1972. In November 2005, Putin attended the inauguration of a jointly constructed Blue Stream natural gas pipeline in Turkey. This sequence of top-level visits has brought several important bilateral issues to the forefront. The two countries consider it their strategic goal to achieve "multidimensional co-operation", especially in the fields of energy, transport and the military. Specifically, Russia aims to invest in Turkey's fuel and energy industries, and it also expects to participate in tenders for the modernisation of Turkey's military. The relations during this time are described by President Medvedev as "Turkey is one of our most important partners with respect to regional and international issues. We can confidently say that Russian-Turkish relations have advanced to the level of a multidimensional strategic partnership". In May 2010, Turkey and Russia signed 17 agreements to enhance cooperation in energy and other fields, including pacts to build Turkey's first nuclear power plant and further plans for an oil pipeline from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. The leaders of both countries also signed an agreement on visa-free travel, enabling tourists to get into the other country for free and stay there for up to 30 days. United States When Barack Obama became President of United States, he made his first overseas bilateral meeting to Turkey in April 2009. At a joint news conference in Turkey, Obama said: "I'm trying to make a statement about the importance of Turkey, not just to the United States but to the world. I think that where there's the most promise of building stronger U.S.-Turkish relations is in the recognition that Turkey and the United States can build a model partnership in which a predominantly Christian nation, a predominantly Muslim nation – a Western nation and a nation that straddles two continents," he continued, "that we can create a modern international community that is respectful, that is secure, that is prosperous, that there are not tensions – inevitable tensions between cultures – which I think is extraordinarily important." Iraq Turkey under Erdoğan was named by the Bush Administration as a part of the "coalition of the willing" that was central to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. On 1 March 2003, a motion allowing Turkish military to participate in the U.S-led coalition's invasion of Iraq, along with the permission for foreign troops to be stationed in Turkey for this purpose, was overruled by the Turkish Parliament. After the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iraq and Turkey signed 48 trade agreements on issues including security, energy, and water. The Turkish government attempted to mend relations with Iraqi Kurdistan by opening a Turkish university in Erbil, and a Turkish consulate in Mosul. Erdoğan's government fostered economic and political relations with Irbil, and Turkey began to consider the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq as an ally against Maliki's government. Israel Erdoğan visited Israel on 1 May 2005, a gesture unusual for a leader of a Muslim majority country. During his trip, Erdoğan visited the Yad Vashem, Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. The President of Israel Shimon Peres addressed the Turkish parliament during a visit in 2007, the first time an Israeli leader had addressed the legislature of a predominantly Muslim nation. Their relationship worsened at the 2009 World Economic Forum conference over Israel's actions during the Gaza War. Erdoğan was interrupted by the moderator while he was responding to Peres. Erdoğan stated: "Mister Peres, you are older than I am. Maybe you are feeling guilty and that is why you are raising your voice. When it comes to killing you know it too well. I remember how you killed the children on beaches..." Upon the moderator's reminder that they needed to adjourn for dinner, Erdoğan left the panel, accusing the moderator of giving Peres more time than all the other panelists combined. Tensions increased further following the Gaza flotilla raid in May 2010. Erdoğan strongly condemned the raid, describing it as "state terrorism", and demanded an Israeli apology. In February 2013, Erdoğan called Zionism a "crime against humanity", comparing it to Islamophobia, antisemitism, and fascism. He later retracted the statement, saying he had been misinterpreted. He said "everyone should know" that his comments were directed at "Israeli policies", especially as regards to "Gaza and the settlements." Erdoğan's statements were criticized by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, among others. In August 2013, the Hürriyet reported that Erdoğan had claimed to have evidence of Israel's responsibility for the removal of Morsi from office in Egypt. The Israeli and Egyptian governments dismissed the suggestion. In response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. He also stated that "If Israel continues with this attitude, it will definitely be tried at international courts." Syria During Erdoğan's term of office, diplomatic relations between Turkey and Syria significantly deteriorated. In 2004, President Bashar al-Assad arrived in Turkey for the first official visit by a Syrian President in 57 years. In late 2004, Erdoğan signed a free trade agreement with Syria. Visa restrictions between the two countries were lifted in 2009, which caused an economic boom in the regions near the Syrian border. However, in 2011 the relationship between the two countries was strained following the outbreak of conflict in Syria. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he was trying to "cultivate a favorable relationship with whatever government would take the place of Assad". However, he began to support the opposition in Syria, after demonstrations turned violent, creating a serious Syrian refugee problem in Turkey. Erdoğan's policy of providing military training for anti-Damascus fighters has also created conflict with Syria's ally and a neighbour of Turkey, Iran. Saudi Arabia In August 2006, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz as-Saud made a visit to Turkey. This was the first visit by a Saudi monarch to Turkey in the last four decades. The monarch made a second visit, on 9 November 2007. Turk-Saudi trade volume has exceeded 3.2 billion in 2006, almost double the figure achieved in 2003. In 2009, this amount reached 5.5 billion and the goal for the year 2010 was 10 billion. Erdoğan condemned the Saudi-led intervention in Bahrain and characterized the Saudi movement as "a new Karbala." He demanded withdrawal of Saudi forces from Bahrain. Egypt Erdoğan had made his first official visit to Egypt on 12 September 2011, accompanied by six ministers and 200 businessmen. This visit was made very soon after Turkey had ejected Israeli ambassadors, cutting off all diplomatic relations with Israel because Israel refused to apologize for the Gaza flotilla raid which killed eight Turkish and one Turco-American. Erdoğan's visit to Egypt was met with much enthusiasm by Egyptians. CNN reported some Egyptians saying "We consider him as the Islamic leader in the Middle East", while others were appreciative of his role in supporting Gaza. Erdoğan was later honored in Tahrir Square by members of the Egyptian Revolution Youth Union, and members of the Turkish embassy were presented with a coat of arms in acknowledgment of the Prime Minister's support of the Egyptian Revolution. Erdoğan stated in a 2011 interview that he supported secularism for Egypt, which generated an angry reaction among Islamic movements, especially the Freedom and Justice Party, which was the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, commentators suggest that by forming an alliance with the military junta during Egypt's transition to democracy, Erdoğan may have tipped the balance in favor of an authoritarian government. Erdoğan condemned the sit-in dispersals conducted by Egyptian police on 14 August 2013 at the Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda squares, where violent clashes between police officers and pro-Morsi Islamist protesters led to hundreds of deaths, mostly protesters. In July 2014, one year after the removal of Mohamed Morsi from office, Erdoğan described Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as an "illegitimate tyrant". Somalia Erdoğan's administration maintains strong ties with the Somali government. During the drought of 2011, Erdoğan's government contributed over $201 million to humanitarian relief efforts in the impacted parts of Somalia. Following a greatly improved security situation in Mogadishu in mid-2011, the Turkish government also re-opened its foreign embassy with the intention of more effectively assisting in the post-conflict development process. It was among the first foreign governments to resume formal diplomatic relations with Somalia after the civil war. In May 2010, the Turkish and Somali governments signed a military training agreement, in keeping with the provisions outlined in the Djibouti Peace Process. Turkish Airlines became the first long-distance international commercial airline in two decades to resume flights to and from Mogadishu's Aden Adde International Airport. Turkey also launched various development and infrastructure projects in Somalia including building several hospitals and helping renovate the National Assembly building. Protests 2013 Gezi Park protests against the perceived authoritarianism of Erdoğan and his policies, starting from a small sit-in in Istanbul in defense of a city park. After the police's intense reaction with tear gas, the protests grew each day. Faced by the largest mass protest in a decade, Erdoğan made this controversial remark in a televised speech: "The police were there yesterday, they are there today, and they will be there tomorrow". After weeks of clashes in the streets of Istanbul, his government at first apologized to the protestors and called for a plebiscite, but then ordered a crackdown on the protesters. Presidency (2014–present) Erdoğan took the oath of office on 28 August 2014 and became the 12th president of Turkey. He administered the new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu's oath on 29 August. When asked about his lower-than-expected 51.79% share of the vote, he allegedly responded, "there were even those who did not like the Prophet. I, however, won 52%". Assuming the role of President, Erdoğan was criticized for openly stating that he would not maintain the tradition of presidential neutrality. Erdoğan has also stated his intention to pursue a more active role as president, such as utilising the President's rarely used cabinet-calling powers. The political opposition has argued that Erdoğan will continue to pursue his own political agenda, controlling the government, while his new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu would be docile and submissive. Furthermore, the domination of loyal Erdoğan supporters in Davutoğlu's cabinet fuelled speculation that Erdoğan intended to exercise substantial control over the government. Presidential elections On 1 July 2014, Erdoğan was named the AKP's presidential candidate in the Turkish presidential election. His candidacy was announced by the Deputy President of the AKP, Mehmet Ali Şahin. Erdoğan made a speech after the announcement and used the 'Erdoğan logo' for the first time. The logo was criticised because it was very similar to the logo that U.S. President Barack Obama used in the 2008 presidential election. Erdoğan was elected as the President of Turkey in the first round of the election with 51.79% of the vote, obviating the need for a run-off by winning over 50%. The joint candidate of the CHP, MHP and 13 other opposition parties, former Organisation of Islamic Co-operation general secretary Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu won 38.44% of the vote. The pro-Kurdish HDP candidate Selahattin Demirtaş won 9.76%. The 2018 Turkish presidential election took place as part of the 2018 general election, alongside parliamentary elections on the same day. Following the approval of constitutional changes in a referendum held in 2017, the elected President will be both the head of state and head of government of Turkey, taking over the latter role from the to-be-abolished office of the Prime Minister. Incumbent president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declared his candidacy for the People's Alliance (Turkish: Cumhur İttifakı) on 27 April 2018. Erdoğan's main opposition, the Republican People's Party, nominated Muharrem İnce, a member of the parliament known for his combative opposition and spirited speeches against Erdoğan. Besides these candidates, Meral Akşener, the founder and leader of İyi Party, Temel Karamollaoğlu, the leader of the Felicity Party and Doğu Perinçek, the leader of the Patriotic Party, have announced their candidacies and collected the 100,000 signatures required for nomination. The alliance which Erdoğan was candidate for won 52.59% of the popular vote. Referendum In April 2017, a constitutional referendum was held, where the voters in Turkey (and Turkish citizens abroad) approved a set of 18 proposed amendments to the Constitution of Turkey. The amendments included the replacement of the existing parliamentary system with a presidential system. The post of Prime Minister would be abolished, and the presidency would become an executive post vested with broad executive powers. The parliament seats would be increased from 550 to 600 and the age of candidacy to the parliament was lowered from 25 to 18. The referendum also called for changes to the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors. Local elections In the 2019 local elections, the ruling party AKP lost control of Istanbul and Ankara for the first time in 25 years, as well as 5 of Turkey's 6 largest cities. The loss has been widely attributed to Erdoğan's mismanagement of the Turkish economic crisis, rising authoritarianism as well as the alleged government inaction on the Syrian refugee crisis. Soon after the elections, Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey ordered a re-election in Istanbul, cancelling Ekrem İmamoğlu's mayoral certificate. The decision led to a significant decrease of Erdoğan's and AKP's popularity and his party lost the elections again in June with a greater margin. The result was seen as a huge blow to Erdoğan, who had once said that if his party 'lost Istanbul, we would lose Turkey. The opposition's victory was characterised as 'the beginning of the end' for Erdoğan', with international commentators calling the re-run a huge government miscalculation that led to a potential İmamoğlu candidacy in the next scheduled presidential election. It is suspected that the scale of the government's defeat could provoke a cabinet reshuffle and early general elections, currently scheduled for June 2023. The New Zealand and Australian governments and opposition CHP party have criticized Erdoğan after he repeatedly showed video taken by the Christchurch mosque shooter to his supporters at campaign rallies for 31 March local elections and said Australians and New Zealanders who came to Turkey with anti-Muslim sentiments "would be sent back in coffins like their grandfathers" at Gallipoli. Domestic policy Presidential palace Erdoğan has also received criticism for the construction of a new palace called Ak Saray (pure white palace), which occupies approximately 50 acres of Atatürk Forest Farm (AOÇ) in Ankara. Since the AOÇ is protected land, several court orders were issued to halt the construction of the new palace, though building work went on nonetheless. The opposition described the move as a clear disregard for the rule of law. The project was subject to heavy criticism and allegations were made; of corruption during the construction process, wildlife destruction and the complete obliteration of the zoo in the AOÇ in order to make way for the new compound. The fact that the palace is technically illegal has led to it being branded as the 'Kaç-Ak Saray', the word kaçak in Turkish meaning 'illegal'. Ak Saray was originally designed as a new office for the Prime Minister. However, upon assuming the presidency, Erdoğan announced that the palace would become the new Presidential Palace, while the Çankaya Mansion will be used by the Prime Minister instead. The move was seen as a historic change since the Çankaya Mansion had been used as the iconic office of the presidency ever since its inception. The Ak Saray has almost 1,000 rooms and cost $350 million (€270 million), leading to huge criticism at a time when mining accidents and workers' rights had been dominating the agenda. On 29 October 2014, Erdoğan was due to hold a Republic Day reception in the new palace to commemorate the 91st anniversary of the Republic of Turkey and to officially inaugurate the Presidential Palace. However, after most invited participants announced that they would boycott the event and a mining accident occurred in the district of Ermenek in Karaman, the reception was cancelled. The media President Erdoğan and his government continue to press for court action against the remaining free press in Turkey. The latest newspaper that has been seized is Zaman, in March 2016. After the seizure Morton Abramowitz and Eric Edelman, former U.S. ambassadors to Turkey, condemned President Erdoğan's actions in an opinion piece published by The Washington Post: "Clearly, democracy cannot flourish under Erdoğan now". "The overall pace of reforms in Turkey has not only slowed down but in some key areas, such as freedom of expression and the independence of the judiciary, there has been a regression, which is particularly worrying", rapporteur Kati Piri said in April 2016 after the European Parliament passed its annual progress report on Turkey. On 22 June 2016, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that he considered himself successful in "destroying" Turkish civil groups "working against the state", a conclusion that had been confirmed some days earlier by Sedat Laçiner, Professor of International Relations and rector of the Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University: "Outlawing unarmed and peaceful opposition, sentencing people to unfair punishment under erroneous terror accusations, will feed genuine terrorism in Erdoğan’s Turkey. Guns and violence will become the sole alternative for legally expressing free thought". After the coup attempt, over 200 journalists were arrested and over 120 media outlets were closed. Cumhuriyet journalists were detained in November 2016 after a long-standing crackdown on the newspaper. Subsequently, Reporters Without Borders called Erdoğan an "enemy of press freedom" and said that he "hides his aggressive dictatorship under a veneer of democracy". In April 2017, Turkey blocked all access to Wikipedia over a content dispute. The Turkish government lifted a two-and-a-half-year ban on Wikipedia on 15 January 2020, restoring access to the online encyclopedia a month after Turkey's top court ruled that blocking Wikipedia was unconstitutional. On 1 July 2020, in a statement made to his party members, Erdoğan announced that the government would introduce new measures and regulations to control or shut down social media platforms such as YouTube, Twitter and Netflix. Through these new measures, each company would be required to appoint an official representative in the country to respond to legal concerns. The decision comes after a number of Twitter users insulted his daughter Esra after she welcomed her fourth child. State of emergency and purges On 20 July 2016, President Erdoğan declared the state of emergency, citing the coup d'état attempt as justification. It was first scheduled to last three months. The Turkish parliament approved this measure. The state of emergency was later extended for another three months, amidst the ongoing 2016 Turkish purges including comprehensive purges of independent media and detention of tens of thousands of Turkish citizens politically opposed to Erdoğan. More than 50,000 people have been arrested and over 160,000 fired from their jobs by March 2018. In August 2016, Erdoğan began rounding up journalists who had been publishing, or who were about to publish articles questioning corruption within the Erdoğan administration, and incarcerating them. The number of Turkish journalists jailed by Turkey is higher than any other country, including all of those journalists currently jailed in North Korea, Cuba, Russia, and China combined. In the wake of the coup attempt of July 2016 the Erdoğan administration began rounding up tens of thousands of individuals, both from within the government, and from the public sector, and incarcerating them on charges of alleged "terrorism". As a result of these arrests, many in the international community complained about the lack of proper judicial process in the incarceration of Erdoğan's opposition. In April 2017 Erdoğan successfully sponsored legislation effectively making it illegal for the Turkish legislative branch to investigate his executive branch of government. Without the checks and balances of freedom of speech, and the freedom of the Turkish legislature to hold him accountable for his actions, many have likened Turkey's current form of government to a dictatorship with only nominal forms of democracy in practice. At the time of Erdoğan's successful passing of the most recent legislation silencing his opposition, United States President Donald Trump called Erdoğan to congratulate him for his "recent referendum victory". On 29 April 2017 Erdoğan's administration began an internal Internet block of all of the Wikipedia online encyclopedia site via Turkey's domestic Internet filtering system. This blocking action took place after the government had first made a request for Wikipedia to remove what it referred to as "offensive content". In response, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales replied via a post on Twitter stating, "Access to information is a fundamental human right. Turkish people, I will always stand with you and fight for this right." In January 2016, more than a thousand academics signed a petition criticizing Turkey's military crackdown on ethnic Kurdish towns and neighborhoods in the east of the country, such as Sur (a district of Diyarbakır), Silvan, Nusaybin, Cizre and Silopi, and asking an end to violence. Erdoğan accused those who signed the petition of "terrorist propaganda", calling them "the darkest of people". He called for action by institutions and universities, stating, "Everyone who benefits from this state but is now an enemy of the state must be punished without further delay". Within days, over 30 of the signatories were arrested, many in dawn-time raids on their homes. Although all were quickly released, nearly half were fired from their jobs, eliciting a denunciation from Turkey's Science Academy for such "wrong and disturbing" treatment. Erdoğan vowed that the academics would pay the price for "falling into a pit of treachery". On 8 July 2018, Erdoğan sacked 18,000 officials for alleged ties to US based cleric Fethullah Gülen, shortly before renewing his term as an executive president. Of those removed, 9000 were police officers with 5000 from the armed forces with the addition of hundreds of academics. Foreign policy Europe In February 2016, Erdoğan threatened to send the millions of refugees in Turkey to EU member states, saying: "We can open the doors to Greece and Bulgaria anytime and we can put the refugees on buses ... So how will you deal with refugees if you don't get a deal?" In an interview to the news magazine Der Spiegel, German minister of defence Ursula von der Leyen said on 11 March 2016 that the refugee crisis had made good cooperation between EU and Turkey an "existentially important" issue. "Therefore it is right to advance now negotiations on Turkey's EU accession". In its resolution "The functioning of democratic institutions in Turkey" from 22 June 2016, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe warned that "recent developments in Turkey pertaining to freedom of the media and of expression, erosion of the rule of law and the human rights violations in relation to anti-terrorism security operations in south-east Turkey have ... raised serious questions about the functioning of its democratic institutions". On 20 August 2016, Erdoğan told his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko that Turkey would not recognize the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea; calling it "Crimea's occupation". In January 2017, Erdoğan said that the withdrawal of Turkish troops from Northern Cyprus is "out of the question" and Turkey will be in Cyprus "forever". There is a long-standing dispute between Turkey and Greece in the Aegean Sea. Erdoğan warned that Greece will pay a "heavy price" if Turkey's gas exploration vessel – in what Turkey said are disputed waters – is attacked. In September 2020, Erdoğan declared his government's support for Azerbaijan following clashes between Armenian and Azeri forces over a disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. He dismissed demands for a ceasefire. Diaspora In March 2017, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated to the Turks in Europe, "Make not three, but five children. Because you are the future of Europe. That will be the best response to the injustices against you." This has been interpreted as an imperialist call for demographic warfare. According to The Economist, Erdoğan is the first Turkish leader to take the Turkish diaspora seriously, which has created friction within these diaspora communities and between the Turkish government and several of its European counterparts. The Balkans In February 2018, President Erdoğan expressed Turkish support of the Republic of Macedonia's position during negotiations over the Macedonia naming dispute saying that Greece's position is wrong. In March 2018, President Erdoğan criticized the Kosovan Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj for dismissing his Interior Minister and Intelligence Chief for failing to inform him of an unauthorized and illegal secret operation conducted by the National Intelligence Organization of Turkey on Kosovo's territory that led to the arrest of six people allegedly associated with the Gülen movement. On 26 November 2019, an earthquake struck the Durrës region of Albania. President Erdoğan expressed his condolences. and citing close Albanian-Turkish relations, he committed Turkey to reconstructing 500 earthquake destroyed homes and other civic structures in Laç, Albania. In Istanbul, Erdoğan organised and attended a donors conference (8 December) to assist Albania that included Turkish businessmen, investors and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama. United Kingdom In May 2018, British Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed Erdoğan to the United Kingdom for a three-day state visit. Erdoğan declared that the United Kingdom is "an ally and a strategic partner, but also a real friend. The cooperation we have is well beyond any mechanism that we have established with other partners." Israel Relations between Turkey and Israel began to normalize after Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu officially apologized for the death of the nine Turkish activists during the Gaza flotilla raid. However, in response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of being "more barbaric than Hitler", and conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. In December 2017, President Erdoğan issued a warning to Donald Trump, after the U.S. President acknowledged Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Erdoğan stated, "Jerusalem is a red line for Muslims", indicating that naming Jerusalem as Israel's capital would alienate Palestinians and other Muslims from the city, undermining hopes at a future capital of a Palestinian State. Erdoğan called Israel a "terrorist state". Naftali Bennett dismissed the threats, claiming "Erdoğan does not miss an opportunity to attack Israel". In April 2019, Erdoğan said the West Bank belongs to Palestinians, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would annex Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories if he is re-elected. Erdoğan condemned the Israel–UAE peace agreement, stating that Turkey was considering suspending or cutting off diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates in retaliation. Syrian Civil War Amid allegations of Turkish collaboration with the Islamic State, the 2014 Kobanî protests broke out near the Syrian border city of Kobanî, in protest against the government's perceived facilitation of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant during the Siege of Kobanî. 42 protestors were killed during a brutal police crackdown. Asserting that aid to the Kurdish-majority People's Protection Units (YPG) fighters in Syria would assist the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) (then on ceasefire) in Turkey, Erdoğan held bilateral talks with Barack Obama regarding IS during the 5–6 September 2014 NATO summit in Newport, Wales. In early October, United States Vice President Joe Biden criticised the Turkish government for supplying jihadists in Syria and said Erdoğan had expressed regret to him about letting foreign jihadists transit through Turkey en route to Syria. Erdoğan angrily responded, "Biden has to apologize for his statements" adding that if no apology is made, Biden would become "history to me." Biden subsequently apologised. In response to the U.S. request to use İncirlik Air Base to conduct air strikes against IS, Erdoğan demanded that Bashar al-Assad be removed from power first. Turkey lost its bid for a Security Council seat in the United Nations during the 2014 election; the unexpected result is believed to have been a reaction to Erdoğan's hostile treatment of the Kurds fighting ISIS on the Syrian border and a rebuke of his willingness to support IS-aligned insurgents opposed to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. In 2015, there were consistent allegations that Erdoğan maintained financial links with the Islamic State, including allegation of his son-in-law Berat Albayrak's involvement with oil production and smuggling in ISIL. Revelations that the state was supplying arms to militant groups in Syria in the 2014 National Intelligence Organisation lorry scandal led to accusations of high treason. In July 2015, Turkey became involved in the international military intervention against ISIL, simultaneously launching airstrikes against PKK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan. As of 2015, Turkey began openly supporting the Army of Conquest, a coalition of Syrian rebel groups that included al-Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham. In late November 2016, Erdoğan said that the Turkish military launched its operations in Syria to end Assad's rule, but retracted this statement shortly afterwards. In January 2018, the Turkish military and its Syrian National Army and Sham Legion allies began the Turkish military operation in Afrin in the Kurdish-majority Afrin Canton in Northern Syria, against the YPG. On 10 April, Erdoğan rejected a Russian demand to return Afrin to Syrian government control. In October 2019, after Erdoğan spoke to him, U.S. President Donald Trump gave the go-ahead to the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria, despite recently agreeing to a Northern Syria Buffer Zone. U.S. troops in northern Syria were withdrawn from the border to avoid interference with the Turkish operation. After the U.S. pullout, Turkey proceeded to attack the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria. Rejecting criticism of the invasion, Erdoğan claimed that NATO and European Union countries "sided with terrorists, and all of them attacked us". China Bilateral trade between Turkey and China increased from $1 billion a year in 2002 to $27 billion annually in 2017. Erdoğan has stated that Turkey might consider joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation instead of the European Union. Qatar blockade In June 2017 during a speech, Erdoğan called the isolation of Qatar as "inhumane and against Islamic values" and that "victimising Qatar through smear campaigns serves no purpose". Myanmar In September 2017, Erdoğan condemned the persecution of Muslims in Myanmar and accused Myanmar of "genocide" against the Muslim minority. United States Over time, Turkey began to look for ways to buy its own missile defense system and also to use that procurement to build up its own capacity to manufacture and sell an air and missile defense system. Turkey got serious about acquiring a missile defense system early in the first Obama administration when it opened a competition between the Raytheon Patriot PAC 2 system and systems from Europe, Russia, and even China. Taking advantage of the new low in U.S.-Turkish relations, Putin saw his chance to use an S-400 sale to Turkey, so in July 2017, he offered the air defense system to Turkey. In the months that followed, the United States warned Turkey that a S-400 purchase jeopardized Turkey's F-35 purchase. Integration of the Russian system into the NATO air defense net was also out of the question. Administration officials, including Mark Esper, warned that Turkey had to choose between the S-400 and the F-35. That they couldn't have both. The S-400 deliveries to Turkey began on 12 July. On 16 July, Trump mentioned to reporters that withholding the F-35 from Turkey was unfair. Said the president, "So what happens is we have a situation where Turkey is very good with us, very good, and we are now telling Turkey that because you have really been forced to buy another missile system, we’re not going to sell you the F-35 fighter jets". The U.S. Congress has made clear on a bipartisan basis that it expects the president to sanction Turkey for buying Russian equipment. Out of the F-35, Turkey now considers buying Russian fifth-generation jet fighter Su-57. On 1 August 2018, the U.S. Department of Treasury sanctioned two senior Turkish government ministers who were involved in the detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson. Erdoğan said that the U.S. behavior will force Turkey to look for new friends and allies. The U.S.–Turkey tensions appear to be the most serious diplomatic crisis between the NATO allies in years. Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton claimed that President Donald Trump told Erdoğan he would 'take care' of investigation against Turkey's state-owned bank Halkbank accused of bank fraud charges and laundering up to $20 billion on behalf of Iranian entities. Turkey criticized Bolton's book, saying it included misleading accounts of conversations between Trump and Erdoğan. In August 2020, the former vice president and presidential candidate Joe Biden called for a new U.S. approach to the "autocrat" President Erdoğan and support for Turkish opposition parties. In September 2020, Biden demanded that Erdoğan "stay out" of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, in which Turkey has supported the Azeris. Venezuela Relations with Venezuela were strengthened with recent developments and high level mutual visits. The first official visit between the two countries at presidential level was in October 2017 when Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro visited Turkey. In December 2018, Erdoğan visited Venezuela for the first time and expressed his will to build strong relations with Venezuela and expressed hope that high-level visits "will increasingly continue." Reuters reported that in 2018 23 tons of mined gold were taken from Venezuela to Istanbul. In the first nine months of 2018, Venezuela's gold exports to Turkey rose from zero in the previous year to US$900 million. During the Venezuelan presidential crisis, Erdoğan voiced solidarity with Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro and criticized U.S. sanctions against Venezuela, saying that "political problems cannot be resolved by punishing an entire nation." Following the 2019 Venezuelan uprising attempt, Erdoğan condemned the actions of lawmaker Juan Guaidó, tweeting "Those who are in an effort to appoint a postmodern colonial governor to Venezuela, where the President was appointed by elections and where the people rule, should know that only democratic elections can determine how a country is governed". Events Coup d'état attempt On 15 July 2016, a coup d'état was attempted by the military, with aims to remove Erdoğan from government. By the next day, Erdoğan's government managed to reassert effective control in the country. Reportedly, no government official was arrested or harmed, which, among other factors, raised the suspicion of a false flag event staged by the government itself. Erdoğan, as well as other government officials, has blamed an exiled cleric, and a former ally of Erdoğan, Fethullah Gülen, for staging the coup attempt. Süleyman Soylu, Minister of Labor in Erdoğan's government, accused the US of planning a coup to oust Erdoğan. Erdoğan, as well as other high-ranking Turkish government officials, has issued repeated demands to the US to extradite Gülen. Following the coup attempt, there has been a significant deterioration in Turkey-US relations. European and other world leaders have expressed their concerns over the situation in Turkey, with many of them warning Erdoğan not to use the coup attempt as an excuse to crack down on his opponents. The rise of ISIS and the collapse of the Kurdish peace process had led to a sharp rise in terror incidents in Turkey until 2016. Erdoğan was accused by his critics of having a 'soft corner' for ISIS. However, after the attempted coup, Erdoğan ordered the Turkish military into Syria to combat ISIS and Kurdish militant groups. Erdoğan's critics have decried purges in the education system and judiciary as undermining the rule of law however Erdoğan supporters argue this is a necessary measure as Gulen-linked schools cheated on entrance exams, requiring a purge in the education system and of the Gulen followers who then entered the judiciary. Erdoğan's plan is "to reconstitute Turkey as a presidential system. The plan would create a centralized system that would enable him to better tackle Turkey's internal and external threats. One of the main hurdles allegedly standing in his way is Fethullah Gulen's movement ..." In the aftermath of the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt, a groundswell of national unity and consensus emerged for cracking down on the coup plotters with a National Unity rally held in Turkey that included Islamists, secularists, liberals and nationalists. Erdoğan has used this consensus to remove Gulen's followers from the bureaucracy, curtail their role in NGOs, Turkey's Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Turkish military, with 149 Generals discharged. In a foreign policy shift Erdoğan ordered the Turkish Armed Forces into battle in Syria and has liberated towns from IS control. As relations with Europe soured over in the aftermath of the attempted coup, Erdoğan developed alternative relationships with Russia, Saudi Arabia and a "strategic partnership" with Pakistan, with plans to cultivate relations through free trade agreements and deepening military relations for mutual co-operation with Turkey's regional allies. 2018 currency and debt crisis The Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018 was caused by the Turkish economy's excessive current account deficit and foreign-currency debt, in combination with Erdoğan's increasing authoritarianism and his unorthodox ideas about interest rate policy. Economist Paul Krugman described the unfolding crisis as "a classic currency-and-debt crisis, of a kind we’ve seen many times", adding: "At such a time, the quality of leadership suddenly matters a great deal. You need officials who understand what's happening, can devise a response and have enough credibility that markets give them the benefit of the doubt. Some emerging markets have those things, and they are riding out the turmoil fairly well. The Erdoğan regime has none of that". Ideology and public image Early during his premiership, Erdoğan was praised as a role model for emerging Middle Eastern nations due to several reform packages initiated by his government which expanded religious freedoms and minority rights as part of accession negotiations with the European Union. However, his government underwent several crises including the Sledgehammer coup and the Ergenekon trials, corruption scandals, accusations of media intimidation, as well as the pursuit of an increasingly polarizing political agenda; the opposition accused the government of inciting political hatred throughout the country. Critics say that Erdoğan's government legitimizes homophobia, as Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". Neo-Ottomanism As President, Erdoğan has overseen a revival of Ottoman tradition, greeting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas with an Ottoman-style ceremony in the new presidential palace, with guards dressed in costumes representing founders of 16 Great Turkish Empires in history. While serving as the Prime Minister of Turkey, Erdoğan's AKP made references to the Ottoman era during election campaigns, such as calling their supporters 'grandsons of Ottomans' (Osmanlı torunu). This proved controversial, since it was perceived to be an open attack against the republican nature of modern Turkey founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. In 2015, Erdoğan made a statement in which he endorsed the old Ottoman term külliye to refer to university campuses rather than the standard Turkish word kampüs. Many critics have thus accused Erdoğan of wanting to become an Ottoman sultan and abandon the secular and democratic credentials of the Republic. One of the most cited scholars alive, Noam Chomsky, said that "Erdogan in Turkey is basically trying to create something like the Ottoman Caliphate, with him as caliph, supreme leader, throwing his weight around all over the place, and destroying the remnants of democracy in Turkey at the same time". When pressed on this issue in January 2015, Erdoğan denied these claims and said that he would aim to be more like Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom rather than like an Ottoman sultan. In July 2020, after the Council of State annulled the Cabinet's 1934 decision to establish the Hagia Sophia as museum and revoking the monument's status, Erdoğan ordered its reclassification as a mosque. The 1934 decree was ruled to be unlawful under both Ottoman and Turkish law as Hagia Sophia's waqf, endowed by Sultan Mehmed II, had designated the site a mosque; proponents of the decision argued the Hagia Sophia was the personal property of the sultan. This redesignation is controversial, invoking condemnation from the Turkish opposition, UNESCO, the World Council of Churches, the Holy See, and many other international leaders. In August 2020, he also signed the order that transferred the administration of the Chora Church to the Directorate of Religious Affairs to open it for worship as a mosque. Initially converted to a mosque by the Ottomans, the building had then been designated as a museum by the government since 1934. Authoritarianism Erdoğan has served as the de facto leader of Turkey since 2002. In response to criticism, Erdoğan made a speech in May 2014 denouncing allegations of dictatorship, saying that the leader of the opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who was there at the speech, would not be able to "roam the streets" freely if he were a dictator. Kılıçdaroğlu responded that political tensions would cease to exist if Erdoğan stopped making his polarising speeches for three days. One observer said it was a measure of the state of Turkish democracy that Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu could openly threaten, on 20 December 2015, that, if his party did not win the election, Turkish Kurds would endure a repeat of the era of the "white Toros", the Turkish name for the Renault 12, "a car associated with the gendarmarie’s fearsome intelligence agents, who carried out thousands of extrajudicial executions of Kurdish nationalists during the 1990s". In February 2015, a 13-year-old was charged by a prosecutor after allegedly insulting Erdoğan on Facebook. In 2016, a waiter was arrested for insulting Erdoğan by allegedly saying "If Erdoğan comes here, I will not even serve tea to him.". In April 2014, the President of the Constitutional Court, Haşim Kılıç, accused Erdoğan of damaging the credibility of the judiciary, labelling Erdoğan's attempts to increase political control over the courts as 'desperate'. During the chaotic 2007 presidential election, the military issued an E-memorandum warning the government to keep within the boundaries of secularism when choosing a candidate. Regardless, Erdoğan's close relations with Fethullah Gülen and his Cemaat Movement allowed his government to maintain a degree of influence within the judiciary through Gülen's supporters in high judicial and bureaucratic offices. Shortly after, an alleged coup plot codenamed Sledgehammer became public and resulted in the imprisonment of 300 military officers including İbrahim Fırtına, Çetin Doğan and Engin Alan. Several opposition politicians, journalists and military officers also went on trial for allegedly being part of an ultra-nationalist organisation called Ergenekon. Both cases were marred by irregularities and were condemned as a joint attempt by Erdoğan and Gülen to curb opposition to the AKP. The original Sledgehammer document containing the coup plans, allegedly written in 2003, was found to have been written using Microsoft Word 2007. Despite both domestic and international calls for these irregularities to be addressed in order to guarantee a fair trial, Erdoğan instead praised his government for bringing the coup plots to light. When Gülen publicly withdrew support and openly attacked Erdoğan in late 2013, several imprisoned military officers and journalists were released, with the government admitting that the judicial proceedings were unfair. When Gülen withdrew support from the AKP government in late 2013, a government corruption scandal broke out, leading to the arrest of several family members of cabinet ministers. Erdoğan accused Gülen of co-ordinating a "parallel state" within the judiciary in an attempt to topple him from power. He then removed or reassigned several judicial officials in an attempt to remove Gülen's supporters from office. Erdoğan's 'purge' was widely questioned and criticised by the European Union. In early 2014, a new law was passed by parliament giving the government greater control over the judiciary, which sparked public protest throughout the country. International organisations perceived the law to be a danger to the separation of powers. Several judicial officials removed from their posts said that they had been removed due to their secularist credentials. The political opposition accused Erdoğan of not only attempting to remove Gülen supporters, but supporters of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's principles as well, in order to pave the way for increased politicisation of the judiciary. Several family members of Erdoğan's ministers who had been arrested as a result of the 2013 corruption scandal were released, and a judicial order to question Erdoğan's son Bilal Erdoğan was annulled. Controversy erupted when it emerged that many of the newly appointed judicial officials were actually AKP supporters. İslam Çiçek, a judge who ejected the cases of five ministers' relatives accused of corruption, was accused of being an AKP supporter and an official investigation was launched into his political affiliations. On 1 September 2014, the courts dissolved the cases of 96 suspects, which included Bilal Erdoğan. During a televised press conference he was asked if he believed a presidential system was possible in a unitary state. Erdoğan affirmed this and cited Nazi Germany (among other examples) as a case where such a combination existed. However, the Turkish president's office said that Erdoğan was not advocating a Hitler-style government when he called for a state system with a strong executive, and added that the Turkish president had declared the "Holocaust, anti-semitism and Islamophobia" as crimes against humanity and that it was out of the question for him to cite Hitler's Germany as a good example. Suppression of dissent Erdoğan has been criticised for his politicisation of the media, especially after the 2013 protests. The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) alleged that over 1,863 journalists lost their jobs due to their anti-government views in 12 years of AKP rule. Opposition politicians have also alleged that intimidation in the media is due to the government's attempt to restructure the ownership of private media corporations. Journalists from the Cihan News Agency and the Gülenist Zaman newspaper were repeatedly barred from attending government press conferences or asking questions. Several opposition journalists such as Soner Yalçın were controversially arrested as part of the Ergenekon trials and Sledgehammer coup investigation. Veli Ağbaba, a CHP politician, has called the AKP the 'biggest media boss in Turkey.' In 2015, 74 US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to state their concern over what they saw as deviations from the basic principles of democracy in Turkey and oppressions of Erdoğan over media. Notable cases of media censorship occurred during the 2013 anti-government protests, when the mainstream media did not broadcast any news regarding the demonstrations for three days after they began. The lack of media coverage was symbolised by CNN International covering the protests while CNN Türk broadcast a documentary about penguins at the same time. The Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK) controversially issued a fine to pro-opposition news channels including Halk TV and Ulusal Kanal for their coverage of the protests, accusing them of broadcasting footage that could be morally, physically and mentally destabilising to children. Erdoğan was criticised for not responding to the accusations of media intimidation, and caused international outrage after telling a female journalist (Amberin Zaman of The Economist) to know her place and calling her a 'shameless militant' during his 2014 presidential election campaign. While the 2014 presidential election was not subject to substantial electoral fraud, Erdoğan was again criticised for receiving disproportionate media attention in comparison to his rivals. The British newspaper The Times commented that between 2 and 4 July, the state-owned media channel TRT gave 204 minutes of coverage to Erdoğan's campaign and less than a total of 3 minutes to both his rivals. Erdoğan also tightened controls over the Internet, signing into law a bill which allows the government to block websites without prior court order on 12 September 2014. His government blocked Twitter and YouTube in late March 2014 following the release of a recording of a conversation between him and his son Bilal, where Erdoğan allegedly warned his family to 'nullify' all cash reserves at their home amid the 2013 corruption scandal. Erdoğan has undertaken a media campaign that attempts to portray the presidential family as frugal and simple-living; their palace electricity-bill is estimated at $500,000 per month. In May 2016, former Miss Turkey model Merve Büyüksaraç was sentenced to more than a year in prison for allegedly insulting the president. In a 2016 news story, Bloomberg reported, "more than 2,000 cases have been opened against journalists, cartoonists, teachers, a former Miss Turkey, and even schoolchildren in the past two years". In November 2016, the Turkish government blocked access to social media in all of Turkey as well as sought to completely block Internet access for the citizens in the southeast of the country. Mehmet Aksoy lawsuit In 2009, Turkish sculptor Mehmet Aksoy created the Statue of Humanity in Kars to promote reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia. When visiting the city in 2011, Erdoğan deemed the statue a "freak", and months later it was demolished. Aksoy sued Erdoğan for "moral indemnities", although his lawyer said that his statement was a critique rather than an insult. In March 2015, a judge ordered Erdoğan to pay 10,000 liras. Erdoğanism Erdoğan has produced many aphorisms and catch-phrases known as Erdoğanisms. The term Erdoğanism first emerged shortly after Erdoğan's 2011 general election victory, where it was predominantly described as the AKP's liberal economic and conservative democratic ideals fused with Erdoğan demagoguery and cult of personality. Views on minorities LGBT In 2002, Erdoğan said that "homosexuals must be legally protected within the framework of their rights and freedoms. From time to time, we do not find the treatment they get on some television screens humane", he said. However, in 2017 Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Turkey's top Muslim scholar and President of Religious Affairs, Ali Erbaş, said in a Friday Ramadan announcement that country condemns homosexuality because it "brings illness," insinuating that same sex relations are responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan backed Erbaş, saying that what Erbaş "said was totally right." Jews While Erdoğan has declared several times being against antisemitism, he has been accused of invoking antisemitic stereotypes in public statements. According to Erdoğan, he had been inspired by novelist and Islamist ideologue Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, a publisher (among others) of antisemitic literature. Others During a live interview in 2014, he said: "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian. Excuse me, but they have said even uglier things. They have called me Armenian, but I am Turkish." Honours and accolades Foreign honours Russia: Medal "In Commemoration of the 1000th Anniversary of Kazan" (1 June 2006) Pakistan: Nishan-e-Pakistan, the highest civilian award in Pakistan (26 October 2009) Georgia: Order of Golden Fleece, awarded for his contribution to development of bilateral relations (17 May 2010) Kyrgyzstan: Danaker Order in Bishkek (2 February 2011) Azerbaijan: Heydar Aliyev Order (3 September 2014) Belgium: Grand Cordon in the Order of Leopold (5 October 2015) Madagascar: Knight Grand Cross in the national Order (25 January 2017) Gagauzia: Order of Gagauz-Yeri in Comrat (18 October 2018) Venezuela: Order of the Liberator, Grand Cordon (3 December 2018) Ukraine: Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise (16 October 2020) Other awards 29 January 2004: Profile of Courage Award from the American Jewish Congress, for promoting peace between cultures. Returned at the request of the A.J.C. in July 2014. 13 June 2004: Golden Plate award from the Academy of Achievement during the conference in Chicago. 3 October 2004: German Quadriga prize for improving relationships between different cultures. 2 September 2005: Mediterranean Award for Institutions (). This was awarded by the Fondazione Mediterraneo. 8 August 2006: Caspian Energy Integration Award from the Caspian Integration Business Club. 1 November 2006: Outstanding Service award from the Turkish humanitarian organization Red Crescent. 2 February 2007: Dialogue Between Cultures Award from the President of Tatarstan Mintimer Shaimiev. 15 April 2007: Crystal Hermes Award from the German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the opening of the Hannover Industrial Fair. 11 July 2007: highest award of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the Agricola Medal, in recognition of his contribution to agricultural and social development in Turkey. 11 May 2009: Avicenna award from the Avicenna Foundation in Frankfurt, Germany. 9 June 2009: guest of honor at the 20th Crans Montana Forum in Brussels and received the Prix de la Fondation, for democracy and freedom. 25 June 2009: Key to the City of Tirana on the occasion of his state visit to Albania. 29 December 2009: Award for Contribution to World Peace from the Turgut Özal Thought and Move Association. 12 January 2010: King Faisal International Prize for "service to Islam" from the King Faisal Foundation. 23 February 2010: Nodo Culture Award from the mayor of Seville for his efforts to launch the Alliance of Civilizations initiative. 1 March 2010: United Nations–HABITAT award in memorial of Rafik Hariri. A seven-member international jury unanimously found Erdoğan deserving of the award because of his "excellent achievement and commendable conduct in the area of leadership, statesmanship and good governance. Erdoğan also initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors." 27 May 2010: medal of honor from the Brazilian Federation of Industry for the State of São Paulo (FIESP) for his contributions to industry 31 May 2010: World Health Organization 2010 World No Tobacco Award for "his dedicated leadership on tobacco control in Turkey." 29 June 2010: 2010 World Family Award from the World Family Organization which operates under the umbrella of the United Nations. 4 November 2010: Golden Medal of Independence, an award conferred upon Kosovo citizens and foreigners that have contributed to the independence of Kosovo. 25 November 2010: "Leader of the Year" award presented by the Union of Arab Banks in Lebanon. 11 January 2011: "Outstanding Personality in the Islamic World Award" of the Sheikh Fahad al-Ahmad International Award for Charity in Kuwait. 25 October 2011: Palestinian International Award for Excellence and Creativity (PIA) 2011 for his support to the Palestinian people and cause. 21 January 2012: 'Gold Statue 2012 Special Award' by the Polish Business Center Club (BCC). Erdoğan was awarded for his systematic effort to clear barriers on the way to economic growth, striving to build democracy and free market relations. 2020: Ig Nobel Prize "for using the COVID-19 viral pandemic to teach the world that politicians can have a more immediate effect on life and death than scientists and doctors can." See also List of international presidential trips made by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Leadership approval polling for the 2023 Turkish general election The 500 Most Influential Muslims Notes References Further reading Cagaptay, Soner. The new sultan: Erdogan and the crisis of modern Turkey (2nd ed. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020). online review Cagaptay, Soner. "Making Turkey Great Again." Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 43 (2019): 169–78. online Kirişci, Kemal, and Amanda Sloat. "The rise and fall of liberal democracy in Turkey: Implications for the West" Foreign Policy at Brookings (2019) online Tziarras, Zenonas. "Erdoganist authoritarianism and the 'new' Turkey." Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 18.4 (2018): 593–598. online Yavuz, M. Hakan. "A framework for understanding the Intra-Islamist conflict between the AK party and the Gülen movement." Politics, Religion & Ideology 19.1 (2018): 11–32. online Yesil, Bilge. Media in New Turkey: The Origins of an Authoritarian Neoliberal State (University of Illinois Press, 2016) online review External links Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Instagram. Archived from the original. Welcome to demokrasi: how Erdoğan got more popular than ever by The Guardian 1954 births Living people 21st-century presidents of Turkey 21st-century prime ministers of Turkey Deniers of the Armenian genocide Deputies of Istanbul Deputies of Siirt Recep Tayyip Imam Hatip school alumni Justice and Development Party (Turkey) politicians Leaders of political parties in Turkey Marmara University alumni Mayors of Istanbul Members of the 22nd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 23rd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 24th Parliament of Turkey Naqshbandi order People from Istanbul Politicians arrested in Turkey Presidents of Turkey Prime Ministers of Turkey Recipients of the Heydar Aliyev Order Recipients of the Order of the Golden Fleece (Georgia) Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 1st class Turkish Islamists Turkish Sunni Muslims Chairmen of the Organization of Turkic States Recipients of the Gagauz-Yeri Order Foreign recipients of the Nishan-e-Pakistan	true	[ "Jean-Paul Akayesu (born 1953 in Taba) is a former teacher, school inspector, and Republican Democratic Movement (MDR) politician from Rwanda, convicted of genocide for his role in inciting the Rwandan genocide. He was the mayor of Taba commune in Gitarama prefecture from April 1993 until June 1994.\n\nAs mayor, Akayesu was responsible for performing executive functions and maintaining order in Taba, meaning he had command of the communal police and any gendarmes assigned to the commune. He was subject only to the prefect. He was considered well-liked and intelligent.\n\nDuring the Rwandan genocide of mid-1994, many Tutsis were killed in Akayesu's commune, and many others were subject to violence and other forms of hatred. Akayesu not only refrained from stopping the killings, but personally supervised the murder of various Tutsis. He also gave a death list to other Hutus, and ordered house-to-house searches to locate Tutsis.\n\nTrial \n\nAkayesu was arrested in Zambia in October 1995, making Zambia the first African nation to extradite criminals to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).\n\nIn 1996, Godeliève Mukasarasi was contacted by the United Nations to assist in putting together a case against him. Mukasarasi was intimidated and her husband and daughter were killed but she found four people who were willing to testify. She was given an International Women of Courage Award in 2018 for this and other work.\n\nHe stood trial for 15 counts of genocide, crimes against humanity, including rape during the Rwandan genocide and violations of the Geneva Convention. Pierre-Richard Prosper was the lead prosecutor. Akayesu's defence team argued that Akayesu had no part in the killings, and that he had been powerless to stop them. In short, the defence argued, Akayesu was being made a scapegoat for the crimes of the people of Taba.\n\nDespite this defence, the ICTR found him guilty of 9 counts for genocide, numerous crimes against humanity and direct and public incitement to commit genocide; however, he was found not guilty for the counts of complicity in genocide, Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions (war crime), and Article 4(2)(e) of Additional Protocol II to the Geneva Conventions. This was notable in that it was the first time that the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was enforced and in doing so clearly differentiated the mental element of the crime Genocide from the mental element in the breaches of the Geneva Conventions. The court clarified that Genocide is a crime of specific intent that takes the accused outside of the scope of armed conflict. On October 2, 1998, Akayesu was sentenced to life imprisonment.\n\nHe was represented by Montreal lawyer John Philpot, brother of Parti Québécois politician and author Robin Philpot; this connection later surfaced in the 2007 Quebec general election after statements from Robin Philpot's book Rwanda 1994: Colonialism Dies Hard appearing to deny the extent of the genocide were widely publicized.\n\nHere is the relevant section of the September 1999 United Nations report: Fourth Annual Report of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda to the General Assembly (September 1999)\n\n\"Report of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Prosecution of Persons Responsible for Genocide and Other Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law Committed in the Territory of Rwanda and Rwandan Citizens Responsible for Genocide and Other Such Violations Committed in the Territory of Neighbouring States between 1 January and 31 December 1994\":\n\nThe Prosecutor v. Jean Paul Akayesu (ICTR-96-4-T)\n\n14. On 2 September 1998, Trial Chamber I of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, composed of Judges Laïty Kama, Presiding, Lennart Aspegren and Navanethem Pillay, found Jean Paul Akayesu guilty of 9 of the 15 counts proffered against him, including genocide, direct and public incitement to commit genocide and crimes against humanity (extermination, murder, torture, rape and other inhumane acts). Jean Paul Akayesu was found not guilty of the six remaining counts, including the count of complicity in genocide and the counts relating to violations of article 3 common to the Geneva Conventions and of Additional Protocol II thereto.\n\n15. The Akayesu judgement includes the first interpretation and application by an international court of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.\n\n16. The Trial Chamber held that rape, which it defined as \"a physical invasion of a sexual nature committed on a person under circumstances which are coercive\", and sexual assault constitute acts of genocide insofar as they were committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a targeted group, as such. It found that sexual assault formed an integral part of the process of destroying the Tutsi ethnic group and that the rape was systematic and had been perpetrated against Tutsi women only, manifesting the specific intent required for those acts to constitute genocide.\n\n17. On 2 September 1998, Jean Paul Akayesu was sentenced to life imprisonment for each of the nine counts, the sentences to run concurrently.\n\n18. Both Jean Paul Akayesu and the Prosecutor have appealed against the judgement rendered by the Trial Chamber.\n\nAkayesu was first transferred to Mali on 9 December 2001 to serve out his sentence, before later being transferred to Benin on 19 December 2020.\n\nThe trial is the subject of the 2015 documentary film, The Uncondemned.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nICTR case documents for Jean Paul Akayesu\n\n1953 births\nLiving people\nHutu people\nRepublican Democratic Movement politicians\nPeople convicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda\nRwandan people convicted of genocide\nRwandan people convicted of crimes against humanity\nRwandan people imprisoned abroad\nPrisoners and detainees of Mali\nRwandan prisoners sentenced to life imprisonment\nPrisoners sentenced to life imprisonment by international courts and tribunals\nPeople extradited from Zambia\nMayors of places in Rwanda\nRwandan educators\nPeople convicted of incitement to genocide", "Israel W. Charny (born 1931 in Brooklyn, New York) is an Israeli psychologist and genocide scholar. He is the editor of two-volume Encyclopedia of Genocide, and executive director of the Institute on the Holocaust and Genocide in Jerusalem.\n\nBackground \nIsrael Charny received his A.B. in Psychology with Distinction from Temple University in 1952, and his. Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Rochester in 1957. He established and directed the first group psychological practice in the Philadelphia area (1958–1973), where he was also the first Professor of Psychology at the newly founded Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in Philadelphia.\n\nAn affiliate of the Institute for the Study of Genocide, the International Association of Genocide Scholars was founded in 1994 by Israel Charny, Helen Fein, Robert Melson and Roger Smith. From 2005-2007, he was Vice President and then President of the organization.\n\nHe has been devoted to the study of the Holocaust and genocide since the mid-1960s. His first publication on the subject which appeared in Jewish Education in 1968 was \"Teaching the Violence of the Holocaust: A Challenge to Educating Potential Future Oppressors and Victims for Nonviolence.\" He once wrote, \"...Genocide in the generic sense means the mass killing of substantial numbers of human beings, when not in the course of military action against the military forces of an avowed enemy, under conditions of the essential defencelessness of the victim...\"\n\nCharny, a clinical psychologist and practicing psychotherapist, was Professor of Psychology and Family Therapy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where he was the Founder and first Director of the Program for Advanced Studies in Integrative Psychotherapy (Family, Couples, Individual and Group Therapy) of the Martin Buber Center and Department of Psychology. He was the founding and first president of the Israel Association of Family Therapy and later a president of the International Family Therapy Association.\n\nHe is best known for his active stance against denial of the Armenian genocide, and has written articles and given lectures on the subjects of genocide and genocide denial.\nHe is most noted for his comparison of Armenian genocide denial to Holocaust denial, citing that they both have similar techniques and psychological motivation.\n\nSelected publications\nMarital Love and Hate\nExistential/Dialectical Marital Therapy\nEncyclopedia of Genocide\nGenocide: A Critical Bibliographic Review\nThe Widening Circle of Genocide\nCentury of Genocide Critical Essays and Eyewitness Accounts\nFascism and Democracy in the Human Mind\nThe Genocide Contagion\n\"A Classification of Denials of the Holocaust and Other Genocides\", Journal of Genocide Research 2003, 5(1), pp. 11–34.\n\nEach of these three books was awarded \"Outstanding Academic Book of the Year\" by Choice'' of the American Library Association.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \nBiography of Israel Charny\nList of books by Israel Charny\nGenocide Prevention Now, founded and directed by Israel Charny\n \n\nJewish scholars\nIsraeli historians\nLiving people\n1931 births\nTemple University alumni\nUniversity of Rochester alumni\nHebrew University of Jerusalem faculty" ]
[ "Recep Tayyip Erdoğan", "Armenian Genocide", "What happened in the genocide?", "mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I", "Who was responsible for this?", "Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings", "When did this happen?", "I don't know.", "Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?", "Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul,", "Was he part of the genocide?", "\"I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise" ]	C_4d6e38301a82483cab0ff9378b6a238e_1	Did he receive and criticism for this?	6	Did Recep Tayyip Erdoğan receive any criticism for not apologizing for the Armenian genocide?	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan	Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province. His parents are Ahmet Erdogan and Tenzile Erdogan. Erdogan reportedly said in 2003, "I'm a Georgian, my family is a Georgian family which migrated from Batumi to Rize." But in a 2014 televised interview on the NTV news network, he said, "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian... forgive me for saying this... even much uglier things, they have even called me an Armenian, but I am Turkish." In an account based on registry records, his genealogy was tracked to an ethnic Turkish family. Erdogan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father Ahmet Erdogan (1905 - 1988) was a Captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. Erdogan had a brother Mustafa (b. 1958) and sister Vesile (b. 1965). His summer holidays were mostly spent in Guneysu, Rize, where his family originates from. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdogan was 13 years old. As a teenager, he sold lemonade and sesame buns (simit) on the streets of the city's rougher districts to earn extra money. Brought up in an observant Muslim family, Erdogan graduated from Kasimpasa Piyale primary school in 1965, and Imam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. He received his high school diploma from Eyup High School. He subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences, now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences--although several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated. In his youth, Erdogan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahce wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasimpasa S.K. is named after him. Erdogan married Emine Gulbaran (born 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons; Ahmet Burak and Necmettin Bilal, and two daughters, Esra and Sumeyye. His father, Ahmet Erdogan, died in 1988 and his 88-year-old mother, Tenzile Erdogan, died in 2011. He is a member of the Community of Iskenderpasa, a Turkish sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. In 2001, Erdogan established the Justice and Development Party (AKP). The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdogan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yilmaz and Ciller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdogan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gul became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdogan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdogan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gul handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdogan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as President, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdogan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gul as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Canakkale, and one million in Izmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdogan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdogan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdogan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdogan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdogan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious." He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem." In December 2008, Erdogan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken." In November 2009, he said, "it's not possible for a Muslim to commit genocide." In 2011, Erdogan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish-Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdogan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdogan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences - such as relocation - during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician serving as the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as prime minister of Turkey from 2003 to 2014 and as mayor of Istanbul from 1994 to 1998. He founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2001, leading it to election victories in 2002, 2007, and 2011 general elections before being required to stand down upon his election as President in 2014. He later returned to the AKP leadership in 2017 following the constitutional referendum that year. Coming from an Islamist political background and self-describing as a conservative democrat, he has promoted socially conservative and populist policies during his administration. Following the 1994 local elections, Erdoğan was elected mayor of Istanbul as the candidate of the Islamist Welfare Party. He was later stripped of his position, banned from political office, and imprisoned for four months for inciting religious hatred, due to his recitation of a poem by Ziya Gökalp. Erdoğan subsequently abandoned openly Islamist politics, establishing the moderate conservative AKP in 2001, which he went on to lead to a landslide victory in 2002. With Erdoğan still technically prohibited from holding office, the AKP's co-founder, Abdullah Gül, instead became prime minister, and later annulled Erdoğan's political ban. After winning a by-election in Siirt in 2003, Erdoğan replaced Gül as prime minister, with Gül instead becoming the AKP's candidate for the presidency. Erdoğan led the AKP to two more election victories in 2007 and 2011. The early years of Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister saw advances in negotiations for Turkey's membership of the European Union, an economic recovery following a economic crisis in 2001 and investments in infrastructure including roads, airports, and a high-speed train network. He also won two successful constitutional referendums in 2007 and 2010. However, his government remained controversial for its close links with Fethullah Gülen and his Gülen Movement (since designated as a terrorist organisation by the Turkish state) with whom the AKP was accused of orchestrating purges against secular bureaucrats and military officers through the Balyoz and Ergenekon trials. In late 2012, his government began peace negotiations with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to end the Kurdish–Turkish conflict (1978–present). The ceasefire broke down in 2015, leading to a renewed escalation in conflict. Erdoğan's foreign policy has been described as Neo-Ottoman and has led to the Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, with its focus on preventing the Syrian Democratic Forces from gaining ground on the Syria–Turkey border during the Syrian Civil War. In the more recent years of Erdoğan's rule, Turkey has experienced democratic backsliding and corruption. Starting with the anti-government protests in 2013, his government imposed growing censorship on the press and social media, temporarily restricting access to sites such as YouTube, Twitter and Wikipedia. This stalled negotiations related to Turkey's EU membership. A US$100 billion corruption scandal in 2013 led to the arrests of Erdoğan's close allies, and incriminated Erdoğan. After 11 years as head of government (Prime Minister), Erdoğan decided to run for President in 2014. At the time, the presidency was a somewhat ceremonial function. Following the 2014 elections, Erdoğan became the first popularly elected president of Turkey. The souring in relations with Gülen continued, as the government proceeded to purge his supporters from judicial, bureaucratic and military positions. A failed military coup d'état attempt in July 2016 resulted in further purges and a temporary state of emergency. The government claimed that the coup leaders were linked to Gülen, but he has denied any role in it. Erdoğan's rule has been marked with increasing authoritarianism, expansionism, censorship and banning of parties or dissent. Erdoğan supported the 2017 referendum which changed Turkey's parliamentary system into a presidential system, thus setting for the first time in Turkish history a term limit for the head of government (two full five-year terms). This new system of government formally came into place after the 2018 general election, where Erdoğan became an executive president. His party however lost the majority in the parliament and is currently in a coalition (People's Alliance) with the Turkish nationalist MHP. Erdoğan has since been tackling, but also accused of contributing to, the Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018, which has caused a significant decline in his popularity and is widely believed to have contributed to the results of the 2019 local elections, in which his party lost power in big cities like Ankara and Istanbul to opposition parties for the first time in 15 years. Family and personal life Early life Erdoğan was born in Kasımpaşa, a poor neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province in the 1930s. Erdoğan's tribe is originally from Adjara, a region in Georgia. His parents were Ahmet Erdoğan (1905–88) and Tenzile Erdoğan (née Mutlu; 1924–2011). Erdoğan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father was a captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. His summer holidays were mostly spent in Güneysu, Rize, where his family originates. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdoğan was 13 years old. As a teenager, Erdoğan's father provided him with a weekly allowance of 2.5 Turkish lira, less than a dollar. With it, Erdoğan bought postcards and resold them on the street. He sold bottles of water to drivers stuck in traffic. Erdoğan also worked as a street vendor selling simit (sesame bread rings), wearing a white gown and selling the simit from a red three-wheel cart with the rolls stacked behind glass. In his youth, Erdoğan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahçe wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasımpaşa S.K. is named after him. Erdoğan is a member of the Community of İskenderpaşa, a Turkish Sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. Education Erdoğan graduated from Kasımpaşa Piyale primary school in 1965, and İmam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. The same educational path was followed by other co-founders of the AKP party. One quarter of the curriculum of İmam Hatip schools involves study of the Qurʼān, the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and the Arabic language. Erdoğan studied the Qurʼān at an İmam Hatip, where his classmates began calling him "hoca" ("Muslim teacher"). Erdoğan attended a meeting of the nationalist student group National Turkish Student Union (Milli Türk Talebe Birliği), who sought to raise a conservative cohort of young people to counter the rising movement of leftists in Turkey. Within the group, Erdoğan was distinguished by his oratorical skills, developing a penchant for public speaking and excelling in front of an audience. He won first place in a poetry-reading competition organized by the Community of Turkish Technical Painters, and began preparing for speeches through reading and research. Erdoğan would later comment on these competitions as "enhancing our courage to speak in front of the masses". Erdoğan wanted to pursue advanced studies at Mekteb-i Mülkiye, but Mülkiye accepted only students with regular high school diplomas, and not İmam Hatip graduates. Mülkiye was known for its political science department, which trained many statesmen and politicians in Turkey. Erdoğan was then admitted to Eyüp High School, a regular state school, and eventually received his high school diploma from Eyüp. According to his official biography, he subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences (), now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. Several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated, or even attended at all. Family Erdoğan married Emine Gülbaran (b. 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons, Ahmet Burak (b. 1979) and Necmettin Bilal (b. 1981), and two daughters, Esra (b. 1983) and Sümeyye (b. 1985). His father, Ahmet Erdoğan, died in 1988 and his mother, Tenzile Erdoğan, died in 2011 at the age of 88. Erdoğan has a brother, Mustafa (b. 1958), and a sister, Vesile (b. 1965). From his father's first marriage to Havuli Erdoğan (d. 1980), he had two half-brothers: Mehmet (1926–1988) and Hasan (1929–2006). Early political career In 1976, Erdoğan engaged in politics by joining the National Turkish Student Union, an anti-communist action group. In the same year, he became the head of the Beyoğlu youth branch of the Islamist National Salvation Party (MSP), and was later promoted to chair of the Istanbul youth branch of the party. Holding this position until 1980, he served as consultant and senior executive in the private sector during the era following the 1980 military coup when political parties were closed down. In 1983, Erdoğan followed most of Necmettin Erbakan's followers into the Islamist Welfare Party. He became the party's Beyoğlu district chair in 1984, and in 1985 he became the chair of the Istanbul city branch. He was elected to parliament in 1991, but was barred from taking his seat. Mayor of Istanbul (1994–1998) In the local elections of 27 March 1994, Erdoğan was elected Mayor of Istanbul with 25.19% of the popular vote. Erdoğan was a 40-year-old dark horse candidate who had been mocked by the mainstream media and treated as a country bumpkin by his opponents. He was pragmatic in office, tackling many chronic problems in Istanbul including water shortage, pollution and traffic chaos. The water shortage problem was solved with the laying of hundreds of kilometers of new pipelines. The garbage problem was solved with the establishment of state-of-the-art recycling facilities. While Erdoğan was in office, air pollution was reduced through a plan developed to switch to natural gas. He changed the public buses to environmentally friendly ones. The city's traffic and transportation jams were reduced with more than fifty bridges, viaducts, and highways built. He took precautions to prevent corruption, using measures to ensure that municipal funds were used prudently. He paid back a major portion of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality's two-billion-dollar debt and invested four billion dollars in the city. Erdoğan initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors. A seven-member international jury from the United Nations unanimously awarded Erdoğan the UN-Habitat award. Imprisonment In 1998, the fundamentalist Welfare Party was declared unconstitutional on the grounds of threatening the secularism of Turkey and was shut down by the Turkish constitutional court. Erdoğan became a prominent speaker at demonstrations held by his party colleagues. In December 1997 in Siirt, Erdoğan recited a poem from a work written by Ziya Gökalp, a pan-Turkish activist of the early 20th century. His recitation included verses translated as "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers...." which are not in the original version of the poem. Erdoğan said the poem had been approved by the education ministry to be published in textbooks. Under article 312/2 of the Turkish penal code his recitation was regarded as an incitement to violence and religious or racial hatred. He was given a ten-month prison sentence of which he served four months, from 24 March 1999 to 27 July 1999. Due to his conviction, Erdoğan was forced to give up his mayoral position. The conviction also stipulated a political ban, which prevented him from participating in parliamentary elections. He had appealed for the sentence to be converted to a monetary fine, but it was reduced to 120 days instead. In 2017, this period of Erdoğan's life was made into a film titled Reis. Justice and Development Party Erdoğan was member of political parties that kept getting banned by the army or judges. Within his Virtue Party, there was a dispute about the appropriate discourse of the party between traditional politicians and pro-reform politicians. The latter envisioned a party that could operate within the limits of the system, and thus not getting banned as its predecessors like National Order Party, National Salvation Party and Welfare Party. They wanted to give the group the character of an ordinary conservative party following the example of the European Christian democratic parties. When the Virtue Party was also banned in 2001, a definitive split took place: the followers of Necmettin Erbakan founded the Felicity Party (SP) and the reformers founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) under the leadership of Abdullah Gül and Erdoğan. The pro-reform politicians realized that a strictly Islamic party would never be accepted as a governing party by the state apparatus and they believed that an Islamic party did not appeal to more than about 20 percent of the Turkish electorate. The AK party emphatically placed itself as a broad democratic conservative party with new politicians from the political center (like Ali Babacan and Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu), while respecting Islamic norms and values, but without an explicit religious program. This turned out to be successful as the new party won 34% of the vote in the general elections of 2002. Erdoğan became prime minister in March 2003 after the Gül government ended his political ban. Premiership (2003–2014) General elections The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdoğan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yılmaz and Çiller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdoğan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gül became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdoğan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdoğan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gül handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdoğan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as president, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdoğan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gül as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Çanakkale, and one million in İzmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdoğan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdoğan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdoğan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdoğan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Referendums After the opposition parties deadlocked the 2007 presidential election by boycotting the parliament, the ruling AKP proposed a constitutional reform package. The reform package was first vetoed by president Sezer. Then he applied to the Turkish constitutional court about the reform package, because the president is unable to veto amendments for the second time. The Turkish constitutional court did not find any problems in the packet and 68.95% of the voters supported the constitutional changes. The reforms consisted of electing the president by popular vote instead of by parliament; reducing the presidential term from seven years to five; allowing the president to stand for re-election for a second term; holding general elections every four years instead of five; and reducing from 367 to 184 the quorum of lawmakers needed for parliamentary decisions. Reforming the Constitution was one of the main pledges of the AKP during the 2007 election campaign. The main opposition party CHP was not interested in altering the Constitution on a big scale, making it impossible to form a Constitutional Commission (Anayasa Uzlaşma Komisyonu). The amendments lacked the two-thirds majority needed to become law instantly, but secured 336 votes in the 550-seat parliament – enough to put the proposals to a referendum. The reform package included a number of issues such as the right of individuals to appeal to the highest court, the creation of the ombudsman's office; the possibility to negotiate a nationwide labour contract; gender equality; the ability of civilian courts to convict members of the military; the right of civil servants to go on strike; a privacy law; and the structure of the Constitutional Court. The referendum was agreed by a majority of 58%. Domestic Policy Kurdish issue In 2009, Prime Minister Erdoğan's government announced a plan to help end the quarter-century-long Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict that had cost more than 40,000 lives. The government's plan, supported by the European Union, intended to allow the Kurdish language to be used in all broadcast media and political campaigns, and restored Kurdish names to cities and towns that had been given Turkish ones. Erdoğan said, "We took a courageous step to resolve chronic issues that constitute an obstacle along Turkey's development, progression and empowerment". Erdoğan passed a partial amnesty to reduce penalties faced by many members of the Kurdish guerrilla movement PKK who had surrendered to the government. On 23 November 2011, during a televised meeting of his party in Ankara, he apologised on behalf of the state for the Dersim massacre, where many Alevis and Zazas were killed. In 2013 the government of Erdoğan began a peace process between the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Turkish Government, mediated by parliamentarians of the Peoples' Democratic party (HDP). In 2015 he decided that the peace process was over and supported the lift of the parliamentary immunity of the HDP parliamentarians. During his presidency a law was introduced which banned the use of the word Kurdistan in parliament and in a speech he held for the local election of 2019 he told the HDP politicians that if there is no Kurdistan in Turkey and if they looked for one they should go to Northern Iraq. Armenian genocide Prime Minister Erdoğan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdoğan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious". He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem". In December 2008, Erdoğan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken". In November 2009, he said, "it is not possible for those who belong to the Muslim faith to carry out genocide". In 2011, Erdoğan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish–Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdoğan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdoğan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences – such as relocation – during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". The Ottoman Parliament of 1915 had previously used the term "relocation" to describe the purpose of the Tehcir Law, which resulted in the deaths of anywhere between 800,000 and over 1,800,000 Armenian civilians in what is commonly referred to as the Armenian Genocide. Pope Francis in April 2015, at a special mass in St. Peter's Basilica marking the centenary of the events, described atrocities against Armenian civilians in 1915–1922 as "the first genocide of the 20th century". In protest, Erdoğan recalled the Turkish ambassador from the Vatican, and summoned the Vatican's ambassador, to express "disappointment" at what he called a discriminatory message. He later stated "we don’t carry a stain or a shadow like genocide". US President Barack Obama called for a "full, frank and just acknowledgement of the facts", but again stopped short of labelling it "genocide", despite his campaign promise to do so. Human rights During Erdoğan's time as Prime Minister, the far-reaching powers of the 1991 Anti-Terror Law were reduced and the Democratic initiative process was initiated, with the goal to improve democratic standards in general and the rights of ethnic and religious minorities in particular. However, after Turkey's bid to join the European Union stalled, European officials noted a return to more authoritarian ways, notably on freedom of speech, freedom of the press and Kurdish minority rights. Demands by activists for the recognition of LGBT rights were publicly rejected by government members, and members of the Turkish LGBT community were insulted by cabinet members. Reporters Without Borders observed a continuous decrease in Freedom of the Press during Erdoğan's later terms, with a rank of around 100 on the Press Freedom Index during his first term and a rank of 153 out of a total of 179 countries in 2021. Freedom House saw a slight recovery in later years and awarded Turkey a Press Freedom Score of 55/100 in 2012 after a low point of 48/100 in 2006. In 2011, Erdoğan's government made legal reforms to return properties of Christian and Jewish minorities which were seized by the Turkish government in the 1930s. The total value of the properties returned reached $2 billion (USD). Under Erdoğan, the Turkish government tightened the laws on the sale and consumption of alcohol, banning all advertising and increasing the tax on alcoholic beverages. Economy In 2002, Erdoğan inherited a Turkish economy that was beginning to recover from a recession as a result of reforms implemented by Kemal Derviş. Erdoğan supported Finance Minister Ali Babacan in enforcing macro-economic policies. Erdoğan tried to attract more foreign investors to Turkey and lifted many government regulations. The cash-flow into the Turkish economy between 2002 and 2012 caused a growth of 64% in real GDP and a 43% increase in GDP per capita; considerably higher numbers were commonly advertised but these did not account for the inflation of the US dollar between 2002 and 2012. The average annual growth in GDP per capita was 3.6%. The growth in real GDP between 2002 and 2012 was higher than the values from developed countries, but was close to average when developing countries are also taken into account. The ranking of the Turkish economy in terms of GDP moved slightly from 17 to 16 during this decade. A major consequence of the policies between 2002 and 2012 was the widening of the current account deficit from US$600 million to US$58 billion (2013 est.) Since 1961, Turkey has signed 19 IMF loan accords. Erdoğan's government satisfied the budgetary and market requirements of the two during his administration and received every loan installment, the only time any Turkish government has done so. Erdoğan inherited a debt of $23.5 billion to the IMF, which was reduced to $0.9 billion in 2012. He decided not to sign a new deal. Turkey's debt to the IMF was thus declared to be completely paid and he announced that the IMF could borrow from Turkey. In 2010, five-year credit default swaps for Turkey's sovereign debt were trading at a record low of 1.17%, below those of nine EU member countries and Russia. In 2002, the Turkish Central Bank had $26.5 billion in reserves. This amount reached $92.2 billion in 2011. During Erdoğan's leadership, inflation fell from 32% to 9.0% in 2004. Since then, Turkish inflation has continued to fluctuate around 9% and is still one of the highest inflation rates in the world. The Turkish public debt as a percentage of annual GDP declined from 74% in 2002 to 39% in 2009. In 2012, Turkey had a lower ratio of public debt to GDP than 21 of 27 members of the European Union and a lower budget deficit to GDP ratio than 23 of them. In 2003, Erdoğan's government pushed through the Labor Act, a comprehensive reform of Turkey's labor laws. The law greatly expanded the rights of employees, establishing a 45-hour workweek and limiting overtime work to 270 hours a year, provided legal protection against discrimination due to sex, religion, or political affiliation, prohibited discrimination between permanent and temporary workers, entitled employees terminated without "valid cause" to compensation, and mandated written contracts for employment arrangements lasting a year or more. Education Erdoğan increased the budget of the Ministry of Education from 7.5 billion lira in 2002 to 34 billion lira in 2011, the highest share of the national budget given to one ministry. Before his prime ministership the military received the highest share of the national budget. Compulsory education was increased from eight years to twelve. In 2003, the Turkish government, together with UNICEF, initiated a campaign called "Come on girls, [let's go] to school!" (). The goal of this campaign was to close the gender gap in primary school enrollment through the provision of a quality basic education for all girls, especially in southeast Turkey. In 2005, the parliament granted amnesty to students expelled from universities before 2003. The amnesty applied to students dismissed on academic or disciplinary grounds. In 2004, textbooks became free of charge and since 2008 every province in Turkey has its own university. During Erdoğan's Premiership, the number of universities in Turkey nearly doubled, from 98 in 2002 to 186 in October 2012. The Prime Minister kept his campaign promises by starting the Fatih project in which all state schools, from preschool to high school level, received a total of 620,000 smart boards, while tablet computers were distributed to 17 million students and approximately one million teachers and administrators. In June 2017 a draft proposal by the ministry of education was approved by Erdoğan, in which the curriculum for schools excluded the teaching of the theory of evolution of Charles Darwin by 2019. From then on the teaching will be postponed and start at undergraduate level. Infrastructure Under Erdoğan's government, the number of airports in Turkey increased from 26 to 50 in the period of 10 years. Between the founding of the Republic of Turkey in 1923 and 2002, there had been 6,000 km of dual carriageway roads created. Between 2002 and 2011, another 13,500 km of expressway were built. Due to these measures, the number of motor accidents fell by 50 percent. For the first time in Turkish history, high speed railway lines were constructed, and the country's high-speed train service began in 2009. In 8 years, 1,076 km of railway were built and 5,449 km of railway renewed. The construction of Marmaray, an undersea rail tunnel under the Bosphorus strait, started in 2004. It was inaugurated on the 90th anniversary of the Turkish Republic 29 October 2013. The inauguration of the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge, the third bridge over the Bosphorus, was on 26 August 2016. Justice In March 2006, the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) held a press conference to publicly protest the obstruction of the appointment of judges to the high courts for over 10 months. The HSYK said Erdoğan wanted to fill the vacant posts with his own appointees. Erdoğan was accused of creating a rift with Turkey's highest court of appeal, the Yargıtay, and high administrative court, the Danıştay. Erdoğan stated that the constitution gave the power to assign these posts to his elected party. In May 2007, the head of Turkey's High Court asked prosecutors to consider whether Erdoğan should be charged over critical comments regarding the election of Abdullah Gül as president. Erdoğan said the ruling was "a disgrace to the justice system", and criticized the Constitutional Court which had invalidated a presidential vote because a boycott by other parties meant there was no quorum. Prosecutors investigated his earlier comments, including saying it had fired a "bullet at democracy". Tülay Tuğcu, head of the Constitutional Court, condemned Erdoğan for "threats, insults and hostility" towards the justice system. Civil–military relations The Turkish military has had a record of intervening in politics, having removed elected governments four times in the past. During the Erdoğan government, civil–military relationship moved towards normalization in which the influence of the military in politics was significantly reduced. The ruling Justice and Development Party has often faced off against the military, gaining political power by challenging a pillar of the country's laicistic establishment. The most significant issue that caused deep fissures between the army and the government was the midnight e-memorandum posted on the military's website objecting to the selection of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül as the ruling party's candidate for the Presidency in 2007. The military argued that the election of Gül, whose wife wears an Islamic headscarf, could undermine the laicistic order of the country. Contrary to expectations, the government responded harshly to former Chief of General Staff Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt's e-memorandum, stating the military had nothing to do with the selection of the presidential candidate. Health care After assuming power in 2003, Erdoğan's government embarked on a sweeping reform program of the Turkish healthcare system, called the Health Transformation Program (HTP), to greatly increase the quality of healthcare and protect all citizens from financial risks. Its introduction coincided with the period of sustained economic growth, allowing the Turkish government to put greater investments into the healthcare system. As part of the reforms, the "Green Card" program, which provides health benefits to the poor, was expanded in 2004. The reform program aimed at increasing the ratio of private to state-run healthcare, which, along with long queues in state-run hospitals, resulted in the rise of private medical care in Turkey, forcing state-run hospitals to compete by increasing quality. In April 2006, Erdoğan unveiled a social security reform package demanded by the International Monetary Fund under a loan deal. The move, which Erdoğan called one of the most radical reforms ever, was passed with fierce opposition. Turkey's three social security bodies were united under one roof, bringing equal health services and retirement benefits for members of all three bodies. The previous system had been criticized for reserving the best healthcare for civil servants and relegating others to wait in long queues. Under the second bill, everyone under the age of 18 years was entitled to free health services, irrespective of whether they pay premiums to any social security organization. The bill also envisages a gradual increase in the retirement age: starting from 2036, the retirement age will increase to 65 by 2048 for both women and men. In January 2008, the Turkish Parliament adopted a law to prohibit smoking in most public places. Erdoğan is outspokenly anti-smoking. Foreign policy Turkish foreign policy during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister has been associated with the name of Ahmet Davutoğlu. Davutoğlu was the chief foreign policy advisor of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan before he was appointed foreign minister in 2009. The basis of Erdoğan's foreign policy is based on the principle of "don't make enemies, make friends" and the pursuit of "zero problems" with neighboring countries. Erdoğan is co-founder of United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (AOC). The initiative seeks to galvanize international action against extremism through the forging of international, intercultural and inter-religious dialogue and cooperation. European Union When Erdoğan came to power, he continued Turkey's long ambition of joining the European Union. On 3 October 2005 negotiations began for Turkey's accession to the European Union. Erdoğan was named "The European of the Year 2004" by the newspaper European Voice for the reforms in his country in order to accomplish the accession of Turkey to the European Union. He said in a comment that "Turkey's accession shows that Europe is a continent where civilisations reconcile and not clash." On 3 October 2005, the negotiations for Turkey's accession to the EU formally started during Erdoğan's tenure as Prime Minister. The European Commission generally supports Erdoğan's reforms, but remains critical of his policies. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize EU member state Cyprus. Greece and Cyprus dispute Relations between Greece and Turkey were normalized during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister. In May 2004, Erdoğan became the first Turkish Prime Minister to visit Greece since 1988, and the first to visit the Turkish minority of Thrace since 1952. In 2007, Erdoğan and Greek Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis inaugurated the Greek-Turkish natural gas pipeline giving Caspian gas its first direct Western outlet. Turkey and Greece signed an agreement to create a Combined Joint Operational Unit within the framework of NATO to participate in Peace Support Operations. Erdoğan and his party strongly supported the EU-backed referendum to reunify Cyprus in 2004. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships as a consequence of the economic isolation of the internationally unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the failure of the EU to end the isolation, as it had promised in 2004. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize the Republic of Cyprus. Armenia Armenia is Turkey's only neighbor which Erdoğan has not visited during his premiership. The Turkish-Armenian border has been closed since 1993 because of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with Turkey's close ally Azerbaijan. Diplomatic efforts resulted in the signing of protocols between Turkish and Armenian Foreign Ministers in Switzerland to improve relations between the two countries. One of the points of the agreement was the creation of a joint commission on the issue. The Armenian Constitutional Court decided that the commission contradicts the Armenian constitution. Turkey responded saying that Armenian court's ruling on the protocols is not acceptable, resulting in a suspension of the rectification process by the Turkish side. Erdoğan has said that Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan should apologize for calling on school children to re-occupy eastern Turkey. When asked by a student at a literature contest ceremony if Armenians will be able to get back their "western territories" along with Mt. Ararat, Sarksyan said, "This is the task of your generation". Russia In December 2004, President Putin visited Turkey, making it the first presidential visit in the history of Turkish-Russian relations besides that of the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Nikolai Podgorny in 1972. In November 2005, Putin attended the inauguration of a jointly constructed Blue Stream natural gas pipeline in Turkey. This sequence of top-level visits has brought several important bilateral issues to the forefront. The two countries consider it their strategic goal to achieve "multidimensional co-operation", especially in the fields of energy, transport and the military. Specifically, Russia aims to invest in Turkey's fuel and energy industries, and it also expects to participate in tenders for the modernisation of Turkey's military. The relations during this time are described by President Medvedev as "Turkey is one of our most important partners with respect to regional and international issues. We can confidently say that Russian-Turkish relations have advanced to the level of a multidimensional strategic partnership". In May 2010, Turkey and Russia signed 17 agreements to enhance cooperation in energy and other fields, including pacts to build Turkey's first nuclear power plant and further plans for an oil pipeline from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. The leaders of both countries also signed an agreement on visa-free travel, enabling tourists to get into the other country for free and stay there for up to 30 days. United States When Barack Obama became President of United States, he made his first overseas bilateral meeting to Turkey in April 2009. At a joint news conference in Turkey, Obama said: "I'm trying to make a statement about the importance of Turkey, not just to the United States but to the world. I think that where there's the most promise of building stronger U.S.-Turkish relations is in the recognition that Turkey and the United States can build a model partnership in which a predominantly Christian nation, a predominantly Muslim nation – a Western nation and a nation that straddles two continents," he continued, "that we can create a modern international community that is respectful, that is secure, that is prosperous, that there are not tensions – inevitable tensions between cultures – which I think is extraordinarily important." Iraq Turkey under Erdoğan was named by the Bush Administration as a part of the "coalition of the willing" that was central to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. On 1 March 2003, a motion allowing Turkish military to participate in the U.S-led coalition's invasion of Iraq, along with the permission for foreign troops to be stationed in Turkey for this purpose, was overruled by the Turkish Parliament. After the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iraq and Turkey signed 48 trade agreements on issues including security, energy, and water. The Turkish government attempted to mend relations with Iraqi Kurdistan by opening a Turkish university in Erbil, and a Turkish consulate in Mosul. Erdoğan's government fostered economic and political relations with Irbil, and Turkey began to consider the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq as an ally against Maliki's government. Israel Erdoğan visited Israel on 1 May 2005, a gesture unusual for a leader of a Muslim majority country. During his trip, Erdoğan visited the Yad Vashem, Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. The President of Israel Shimon Peres addressed the Turkish parliament during a visit in 2007, the first time an Israeli leader had addressed the legislature of a predominantly Muslim nation. Their relationship worsened at the 2009 World Economic Forum conference over Israel's actions during the Gaza War. Erdoğan was interrupted by the moderator while he was responding to Peres. Erdoğan stated: "Mister Peres, you are older than I am. Maybe you are feeling guilty and that is why you are raising your voice. When it comes to killing you know it too well. I remember how you killed the children on beaches..." Upon the moderator's reminder that they needed to adjourn for dinner, Erdoğan left the panel, accusing the moderator of giving Peres more time than all the other panelists combined. Tensions increased further following the Gaza flotilla raid in May 2010. Erdoğan strongly condemned the raid, describing it as "state terrorism", and demanded an Israeli apology. In February 2013, Erdoğan called Zionism a "crime against humanity", comparing it to Islamophobia, antisemitism, and fascism. He later retracted the statement, saying he had been misinterpreted. He said "everyone should know" that his comments were directed at "Israeli policies", especially as regards to "Gaza and the settlements." Erdoğan's statements were criticized by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, among others. In August 2013, the Hürriyet reported that Erdoğan had claimed to have evidence of Israel's responsibility for the removal of Morsi from office in Egypt. The Israeli and Egyptian governments dismissed the suggestion. In response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. He also stated that "If Israel continues with this attitude, it will definitely be tried at international courts." Syria During Erdoğan's term of office, diplomatic relations between Turkey and Syria significantly deteriorated. In 2004, President Bashar al-Assad arrived in Turkey for the first official visit by a Syrian President in 57 years. In late 2004, Erdoğan signed a free trade agreement with Syria. Visa restrictions between the two countries were lifted in 2009, which caused an economic boom in the regions near the Syrian border. However, in 2011 the relationship between the two countries was strained following the outbreak of conflict in Syria. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he was trying to "cultivate a favorable relationship with whatever government would take the place of Assad". However, he began to support the opposition in Syria, after demonstrations turned violent, creating a serious Syrian refugee problem in Turkey. Erdoğan's policy of providing military training for anti-Damascus fighters has also created conflict with Syria's ally and a neighbour of Turkey, Iran. Saudi Arabia In August 2006, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz as-Saud made a visit to Turkey. This was the first visit by a Saudi monarch to Turkey in the last four decades. The monarch made a second visit, on 9 November 2007. Turk-Saudi trade volume has exceeded 3.2 billion in 2006, almost double the figure achieved in 2003. In 2009, this amount reached 5.5 billion and the goal for the year 2010 was 10 billion. Erdoğan condemned the Saudi-led intervention in Bahrain and characterized the Saudi movement as "a new Karbala." He demanded withdrawal of Saudi forces from Bahrain. Egypt Erdoğan had made his first official visit to Egypt on 12 September 2011, accompanied by six ministers and 200 businessmen. This visit was made very soon after Turkey had ejected Israeli ambassadors, cutting off all diplomatic relations with Israel because Israel refused to apologize for the Gaza flotilla raid which killed eight Turkish and one Turco-American. Erdoğan's visit to Egypt was met with much enthusiasm by Egyptians. CNN reported some Egyptians saying "We consider him as the Islamic leader in the Middle East", while others were appreciative of his role in supporting Gaza. Erdoğan was later honored in Tahrir Square by members of the Egyptian Revolution Youth Union, and members of the Turkish embassy were presented with a coat of arms in acknowledgment of the Prime Minister's support of the Egyptian Revolution. Erdoğan stated in a 2011 interview that he supported secularism for Egypt, which generated an angry reaction among Islamic movements, especially the Freedom and Justice Party, which was the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, commentators suggest that by forming an alliance with the military junta during Egypt's transition to democracy, Erdoğan may have tipped the balance in favor of an authoritarian government. Erdoğan condemned the sit-in dispersals conducted by Egyptian police on 14 August 2013 at the Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda squares, where violent clashes between police officers and pro-Morsi Islamist protesters led to hundreds of deaths, mostly protesters. In July 2014, one year after the removal of Mohamed Morsi from office, Erdoğan described Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as an "illegitimate tyrant". Somalia Erdoğan's administration maintains strong ties with the Somali government. During the drought of 2011, Erdoğan's government contributed over $201 million to humanitarian relief efforts in the impacted parts of Somalia. Following a greatly improved security situation in Mogadishu in mid-2011, the Turkish government also re-opened its foreign embassy with the intention of more effectively assisting in the post-conflict development process. It was among the first foreign governments to resume formal diplomatic relations with Somalia after the civil war. In May 2010, the Turkish and Somali governments signed a military training agreement, in keeping with the provisions outlined in the Djibouti Peace Process. Turkish Airlines became the first long-distance international commercial airline in two decades to resume flights to and from Mogadishu's Aden Adde International Airport. Turkey also launched various development and infrastructure projects in Somalia including building several hospitals and helping renovate the National Assembly building. Protests 2013 Gezi Park protests against the perceived authoritarianism of Erdoğan and his policies, starting from a small sit-in in Istanbul in defense of a city park. After the police's intense reaction with tear gas, the protests grew each day. Faced by the largest mass protest in a decade, Erdoğan made this controversial remark in a televised speech: "The police were there yesterday, they are there today, and they will be there tomorrow". After weeks of clashes in the streets of Istanbul, his government at first apologized to the protestors and called for a plebiscite, but then ordered a crackdown on the protesters. Presidency (2014–present) Erdoğan took the oath of office on 28 August 2014 and became the 12th president of Turkey. He administered the new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu's oath on 29 August. When asked about his lower-than-expected 51.79% share of the vote, he allegedly responded, "there were even those who did not like the Prophet. I, however, won 52%". Assuming the role of President, Erdoğan was criticized for openly stating that he would not maintain the tradition of presidential neutrality. Erdoğan has also stated his intention to pursue a more active role as president, such as utilising the President's rarely used cabinet-calling powers. The political opposition has argued that Erdoğan will continue to pursue his own political agenda, controlling the government, while his new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu would be docile and submissive. Furthermore, the domination of loyal Erdoğan supporters in Davutoğlu's cabinet fuelled speculation that Erdoğan intended to exercise substantial control over the government. Presidential elections On 1 July 2014, Erdoğan was named the AKP's presidential candidate in the Turkish presidential election. His candidacy was announced by the Deputy President of the AKP, Mehmet Ali Şahin. Erdoğan made a speech after the announcement and used the 'Erdoğan logo' for the first time. The logo was criticised because it was very similar to the logo that U.S. President Barack Obama used in the 2008 presidential election. Erdoğan was elected as the President of Turkey in the first round of the election with 51.79% of the vote, obviating the need for a run-off by winning over 50%. The joint candidate of the CHP, MHP and 13 other opposition parties, former Organisation of Islamic Co-operation general secretary Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu won 38.44% of the vote. The pro-Kurdish HDP candidate Selahattin Demirtaş won 9.76%. The 2018 Turkish presidential election took place as part of the 2018 general election, alongside parliamentary elections on the same day. Following the approval of constitutional changes in a referendum held in 2017, the elected President will be both the head of state and head of government of Turkey, taking over the latter role from the to-be-abolished office of the Prime Minister. Incumbent president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declared his candidacy for the People's Alliance (Turkish: Cumhur İttifakı) on 27 April 2018. Erdoğan's main opposition, the Republican People's Party, nominated Muharrem İnce, a member of the parliament known for his combative opposition and spirited speeches against Erdoğan. Besides these candidates, Meral Akşener, the founder and leader of İyi Party, Temel Karamollaoğlu, the leader of the Felicity Party and Doğu Perinçek, the leader of the Patriotic Party, have announced their candidacies and collected the 100,000 signatures required for nomination. The alliance which Erdoğan was candidate for won 52.59% of the popular vote. Referendum In April 2017, a constitutional referendum was held, where the voters in Turkey (and Turkish citizens abroad) approved a set of 18 proposed amendments to the Constitution of Turkey. The amendments included the replacement of the existing parliamentary system with a presidential system. The post of Prime Minister would be abolished, and the presidency would become an executive post vested with broad executive powers. The parliament seats would be increased from 550 to 600 and the age of candidacy to the parliament was lowered from 25 to 18. The referendum also called for changes to the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors. Local elections In the 2019 local elections, the ruling party AKP lost control of Istanbul and Ankara for the first time in 25 years, as well as 5 of Turkey's 6 largest cities. The loss has been widely attributed to Erdoğan's mismanagement of the Turkish economic crisis, rising authoritarianism as well as the alleged government inaction on the Syrian refugee crisis. Soon after the elections, Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey ordered a re-election in Istanbul, cancelling Ekrem İmamoğlu's mayoral certificate. The decision led to a significant decrease of Erdoğan's and AKP's popularity and his party lost the elections again in June with a greater margin. The result was seen as a huge blow to Erdoğan, who had once said that if his party 'lost Istanbul, we would lose Turkey. The opposition's victory was characterised as 'the beginning of the end' for Erdoğan', with international commentators calling the re-run a huge government miscalculation that led to a potential İmamoğlu candidacy in the next scheduled presidential election. It is suspected that the scale of the government's defeat could provoke a cabinet reshuffle and early general elections, currently scheduled for June 2023. The New Zealand and Australian governments and opposition CHP party have criticized Erdoğan after he repeatedly showed video taken by the Christchurch mosque shooter to his supporters at campaign rallies for 31 March local elections and said Australians and New Zealanders who came to Turkey with anti-Muslim sentiments "would be sent back in coffins like their grandfathers" at Gallipoli. Domestic policy Presidential palace Erdoğan has also received criticism for the construction of a new palace called Ak Saray (pure white palace), which occupies approximately 50 acres of Atatürk Forest Farm (AOÇ) in Ankara. Since the AOÇ is protected land, several court orders were issued to halt the construction of the new palace, though building work went on nonetheless. The opposition described the move as a clear disregard for the rule of law. The project was subject to heavy criticism and allegations were made; of corruption during the construction process, wildlife destruction and the complete obliteration of the zoo in the AOÇ in order to make way for the new compound. The fact that the palace is technically illegal has led to it being branded as the 'Kaç-Ak Saray', the word kaçak in Turkish meaning 'illegal'. Ak Saray was originally designed as a new office for the Prime Minister. However, upon assuming the presidency, Erdoğan announced that the palace would become the new Presidential Palace, while the Çankaya Mansion will be used by the Prime Minister instead. The move was seen as a historic change since the Çankaya Mansion had been used as the iconic office of the presidency ever since its inception. The Ak Saray has almost 1,000 rooms and cost $350 million (€270 million), leading to huge criticism at a time when mining accidents and workers' rights had been dominating the agenda. On 29 October 2014, Erdoğan was due to hold a Republic Day reception in the new palace to commemorate the 91st anniversary of the Republic of Turkey and to officially inaugurate the Presidential Palace. However, after most invited participants announced that they would boycott the event and a mining accident occurred in the district of Ermenek in Karaman, the reception was cancelled. The media President Erdoğan and his government continue to press for court action against the remaining free press in Turkey. The latest newspaper that has been seized is Zaman, in March 2016. After the seizure Morton Abramowitz and Eric Edelman, former U.S. ambassadors to Turkey, condemned President Erdoğan's actions in an opinion piece published by The Washington Post: "Clearly, democracy cannot flourish under Erdoğan now". "The overall pace of reforms in Turkey has not only slowed down but in some key areas, such as freedom of expression and the independence of the judiciary, there has been a regression, which is particularly worrying", rapporteur Kati Piri said in April 2016 after the European Parliament passed its annual progress report on Turkey. On 22 June 2016, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that he considered himself successful in "destroying" Turkish civil groups "working against the state", a conclusion that had been confirmed some days earlier by Sedat Laçiner, Professor of International Relations and rector of the Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University: "Outlawing unarmed and peaceful opposition, sentencing people to unfair punishment under erroneous terror accusations, will feed genuine terrorism in Erdoğan’s Turkey. Guns and violence will become the sole alternative for legally expressing free thought". After the coup attempt, over 200 journalists were arrested and over 120 media outlets were closed. Cumhuriyet journalists were detained in November 2016 after a long-standing crackdown on the newspaper. Subsequently, Reporters Without Borders called Erdoğan an "enemy of press freedom" and said that he "hides his aggressive dictatorship under a veneer of democracy". In April 2017, Turkey blocked all access to Wikipedia over a content dispute. The Turkish government lifted a two-and-a-half-year ban on Wikipedia on 15 January 2020, restoring access to the online encyclopedia a month after Turkey's top court ruled that blocking Wikipedia was unconstitutional. On 1 July 2020, in a statement made to his party members, Erdoğan announced that the government would introduce new measures and regulations to control or shut down social media platforms such as YouTube, Twitter and Netflix. Through these new measures, each company would be required to appoint an official representative in the country to respond to legal concerns. The decision comes after a number of Twitter users insulted his daughter Esra after she welcomed her fourth child. State of emergency and purges On 20 July 2016, President Erdoğan declared the state of emergency, citing the coup d'état attempt as justification. It was first scheduled to last three months. The Turkish parliament approved this measure. The state of emergency was later extended for another three months, amidst the ongoing 2016 Turkish purges including comprehensive purges of independent media and detention of tens of thousands of Turkish citizens politically opposed to Erdoğan. More than 50,000 people have been arrested and over 160,000 fired from their jobs by March 2018. In August 2016, Erdoğan began rounding up journalists who had been publishing, or who were about to publish articles questioning corruption within the Erdoğan administration, and incarcerating them. The number of Turkish journalists jailed by Turkey is higher than any other country, including all of those journalists currently jailed in North Korea, Cuba, Russia, and China combined. In the wake of the coup attempt of July 2016 the Erdoğan administration began rounding up tens of thousands of individuals, both from within the government, and from the public sector, and incarcerating them on charges of alleged "terrorism". As a result of these arrests, many in the international community complained about the lack of proper judicial process in the incarceration of Erdoğan's opposition. In April 2017 Erdoğan successfully sponsored legislation effectively making it illegal for the Turkish legislative branch to investigate his executive branch of government. Without the checks and balances of freedom of speech, and the freedom of the Turkish legislature to hold him accountable for his actions, many have likened Turkey's current form of government to a dictatorship with only nominal forms of democracy in practice. At the time of Erdoğan's successful passing of the most recent legislation silencing his opposition, United States President Donald Trump called Erdoğan to congratulate him for his "recent referendum victory". On 29 April 2017 Erdoğan's administration began an internal Internet block of all of the Wikipedia online encyclopedia site via Turkey's domestic Internet filtering system. This blocking action took place after the government had first made a request for Wikipedia to remove what it referred to as "offensive content". In response, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales replied via a post on Twitter stating, "Access to information is a fundamental human right. Turkish people, I will always stand with you and fight for this right." In January 2016, more than a thousand academics signed a petition criticizing Turkey's military crackdown on ethnic Kurdish towns and neighborhoods in the east of the country, such as Sur (a district of Diyarbakır), Silvan, Nusaybin, Cizre and Silopi, and asking an end to violence. Erdoğan accused those who signed the petition of "terrorist propaganda", calling them "the darkest of people". He called for action by institutions and universities, stating, "Everyone who benefits from this state but is now an enemy of the state must be punished without further delay". Within days, over 30 of the signatories were arrested, many in dawn-time raids on their homes. Although all were quickly released, nearly half were fired from their jobs, eliciting a denunciation from Turkey's Science Academy for such "wrong and disturbing" treatment. Erdoğan vowed that the academics would pay the price for "falling into a pit of treachery". On 8 July 2018, Erdoğan sacked 18,000 officials for alleged ties to US based cleric Fethullah Gülen, shortly before renewing his term as an executive president. Of those removed, 9000 were police officers with 5000 from the armed forces with the addition of hundreds of academics. Foreign policy Europe In February 2016, Erdoğan threatened to send the millions of refugees in Turkey to EU member states, saying: "We can open the doors to Greece and Bulgaria anytime and we can put the refugees on buses ... So how will you deal with refugees if you don't get a deal?" In an interview to the news magazine Der Spiegel, German minister of defence Ursula von der Leyen said on 11 March 2016 that the refugee crisis had made good cooperation between EU and Turkey an "existentially important" issue. "Therefore it is right to advance now negotiations on Turkey's EU accession". In its resolution "The functioning of democratic institutions in Turkey" from 22 June 2016, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe warned that "recent developments in Turkey pertaining to freedom of the media and of expression, erosion of the rule of law and the human rights violations in relation to anti-terrorism security operations in south-east Turkey have ... raised serious questions about the functioning of its democratic institutions". On 20 August 2016, Erdoğan told his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko that Turkey would not recognize the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea; calling it "Crimea's occupation". In January 2017, Erdoğan said that the withdrawal of Turkish troops from Northern Cyprus is "out of the question" and Turkey will be in Cyprus "forever". There is a long-standing dispute between Turkey and Greece in the Aegean Sea. Erdoğan warned that Greece will pay a "heavy price" if Turkey's gas exploration vessel – in what Turkey said are disputed waters – is attacked. In September 2020, Erdoğan declared his government's support for Azerbaijan following clashes between Armenian and Azeri forces over a disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. He dismissed demands for a ceasefire. Diaspora In March 2017, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated to the Turks in Europe, "Make not three, but five children. Because you are the future of Europe. That will be the best response to the injustices against you." This has been interpreted as an imperialist call for demographic warfare. According to The Economist, Erdoğan is the first Turkish leader to take the Turkish diaspora seriously, which has created friction within these diaspora communities and between the Turkish government and several of its European counterparts. The Balkans In February 2018, President Erdoğan expressed Turkish support of the Republic of Macedonia's position during negotiations over the Macedonia naming dispute saying that Greece's position is wrong. In March 2018, President Erdoğan criticized the Kosovan Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj for dismissing his Interior Minister and Intelligence Chief for failing to inform him of an unauthorized and illegal secret operation conducted by the National Intelligence Organization of Turkey on Kosovo's territory that led to the arrest of six people allegedly associated with the Gülen movement. On 26 November 2019, an earthquake struck the Durrës region of Albania. President Erdoğan expressed his condolences. and citing close Albanian-Turkish relations, he committed Turkey to reconstructing 500 earthquake destroyed homes and other civic structures in Laç, Albania. In Istanbul, Erdoğan organised and attended a donors conference (8 December) to assist Albania that included Turkish businessmen, investors and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama. United Kingdom In May 2018, British Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed Erdoğan to the United Kingdom for a three-day state visit. Erdoğan declared that the United Kingdom is "an ally and a strategic partner, but also a real friend. The cooperation we have is well beyond any mechanism that we have established with other partners." Israel Relations between Turkey and Israel began to normalize after Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu officially apologized for the death of the nine Turkish activists during the Gaza flotilla raid. However, in response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of being "more barbaric than Hitler", and conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. In December 2017, President Erdoğan issued a warning to Donald Trump, after the U.S. President acknowledged Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Erdoğan stated, "Jerusalem is a red line for Muslims", indicating that naming Jerusalem as Israel's capital would alienate Palestinians and other Muslims from the city, undermining hopes at a future capital of a Palestinian State. Erdoğan called Israel a "terrorist state". Naftali Bennett dismissed the threats, claiming "Erdoğan does not miss an opportunity to attack Israel". In April 2019, Erdoğan said the West Bank belongs to Palestinians, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would annex Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories if he is re-elected. Erdoğan condemned the Israel–UAE peace agreement, stating that Turkey was considering suspending or cutting off diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates in retaliation. Syrian Civil War Amid allegations of Turkish collaboration with the Islamic State, the 2014 Kobanî protests broke out near the Syrian border city of Kobanî, in protest against the government's perceived facilitation of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant during the Siege of Kobanî. 42 protestors were killed during a brutal police crackdown. Asserting that aid to the Kurdish-majority People's Protection Units (YPG) fighters in Syria would assist the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) (then on ceasefire) in Turkey, Erdoğan held bilateral talks with Barack Obama regarding IS during the 5–6 September 2014 NATO summit in Newport, Wales. In early October, United States Vice President Joe Biden criticised the Turkish government for supplying jihadists in Syria and said Erdoğan had expressed regret to him about letting foreign jihadists transit through Turkey en route to Syria. Erdoğan angrily responded, "Biden has to apologize for his statements" adding that if no apology is made, Biden would become "history to me." Biden subsequently apologised. In response to the U.S. request to use İncirlik Air Base to conduct air strikes against IS, Erdoğan demanded that Bashar al-Assad be removed from power first. Turkey lost its bid for a Security Council seat in the United Nations during the 2014 election; the unexpected result is believed to have been a reaction to Erdoğan's hostile treatment of the Kurds fighting ISIS on the Syrian border and a rebuke of his willingness to support IS-aligned insurgents opposed to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. In 2015, there were consistent allegations that Erdoğan maintained financial links with the Islamic State, including allegation of his son-in-law Berat Albayrak's involvement with oil production and smuggling in ISIL. Revelations that the state was supplying arms to militant groups in Syria in the 2014 National Intelligence Organisation lorry scandal led to accusations of high treason. In July 2015, Turkey became involved in the international military intervention against ISIL, simultaneously launching airstrikes against PKK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan. As of 2015, Turkey began openly supporting the Army of Conquest, a coalition of Syrian rebel groups that included al-Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham. In late November 2016, Erdoğan said that the Turkish military launched its operations in Syria to end Assad's rule, but retracted this statement shortly afterwards. In January 2018, the Turkish military and its Syrian National Army and Sham Legion allies began the Turkish military operation in Afrin in the Kurdish-majority Afrin Canton in Northern Syria, against the YPG. On 10 April, Erdoğan rejected a Russian demand to return Afrin to Syrian government control. In October 2019, after Erdoğan spoke to him, U.S. President Donald Trump gave the go-ahead to the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria, despite recently agreeing to a Northern Syria Buffer Zone. U.S. troops in northern Syria were withdrawn from the border to avoid interference with the Turkish operation. After the U.S. pullout, Turkey proceeded to attack the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria. Rejecting criticism of the invasion, Erdoğan claimed that NATO and European Union countries "sided with terrorists, and all of them attacked us". China Bilateral trade between Turkey and China increased from $1 billion a year in 2002 to $27 billion annually in 2017. Erdoğan has stated that Turkey might consider joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation instead of the European Union. Qatar blockade In June 2017 during a speech, Erdoğan called the isolation of Qatar as "inhumane and against Islamic values" and that "victimising Qatar through smear campaigns serves no purpose". Myanmar In September 2017, Erdoğan condemned the persecution of Muslims in Myanmar and accused Myanmar of "genocide" against the Muslim minority. United States Over time, Turkey began to look for ways to buy its own missile defense system and also to use that procurement to build up its own capacity to manufacture and sell an air and missile defense system. Turkey got serious about acquiring a missile defense system early in the first Obama administration when it opened a competition between the Raytheon Patriot PAC 2 system and systems from Europe, Russia, and even China. Taking advantage of the new low in U.S.-Turkish relations, Putin saw his chance to use an S-400 sale to Turkey, so in July 2017, he offered the air defense system to Turkey. In the months that followed, the United States warned Turkey that a S-400 purchase jeopardized Turkey's F-35 purchase. Integration of the Russian system into the NATO air defense net was also out of the question. Administration officials, including Mark Esper, warned that Turkey had to choose between the S-400 and the F-35. That they couldn't have both. The S-400 deliveries to Turkey began on 12 July. On 16 July, Trump mentioned to reporters that withholding the F-35 from Turkey was unfair. Said the president, "So what happens is we have a situation where Turkey is very good with us, very good, and we are now telling Turkey that because you have really been forced to buy another missile system, we’re not going to sell you the F-35 fighter jets". The U.S. Congress has made clear on a bipartisan basis that it expects the president to sanction Turkey for buying Russian equipment. Out of the F-35, Turkey now considers buying Russian fifth-generation jet fighter Su-57. On 1 August 2018, the U.S. Department of Treasury sanctioned two senior Turkish government ministers who were involved in the detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson. Erdoğan said that the U.S. behavior will force Turkey to look for new friends and allies. The U.S.–Turkey tensions appear to be the most serious diplomatic crisis between the NATO allies in years. Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton claimed that President Donald Trump told Erdoğan he would 'take care' of investigation against Turkey's state-owned bank Halkbank accused of bank fraud charges and laundering up to $20 billion on behalf of Iranian entities. Turkey criticized Bolton's book, saying it included misleading accounts of conversations between Trump and Erdoğan. In August 2020, the former vice president and presidential candidate Joe Biden called for a new U.S. approach to the "autocrat" President Erdoğan and support for Turkish opposition parties. In September 2020, Biden demanded that Erdoğan "stay out" of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, in which Turkey has supported the Azeris. Venezuela Relations with Venezuela were strengthened with recent developments and high level mutual visits. The first official visit between the two countries at presidential level was in October 2017 when Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro visited Turkey. In December 2018, Erdoğan visited Venezuela for the first time and expressed his will to build strong relations with Venezuela and expressed hope that high-level visits "will increasingly continue." Reuters reported that in 2018 23 tons of mined gold were taken from Venezuela to Istanbul. In the first nine months of 2018, Venezuela's gold exports to Turkey rose from zero in the previous year to US$900 million. During the Venezuelan presidential crisis, Erdoğan voiced solidarity with Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro and criticized U.S. sanctions against Venezuela, saying that "political problems cannot be resolved by punishing an entire nation." Following the 2019 Venezuelan uprising attempt, Erdoğan condemned the actions of lawmaker Juan Guaidó, tweeting "Those who are in an effort to appoint a postmodern colonial governor to Venezuela, where the President was appointed by elections and where the people rule, should know that only democratic elections can determine how a country is governed". Events Coup d'état attempt On 15 July 2016, a coup d'état was attempted by the military, with aims to remove Erdoğan from government. By the next day, Erdoğan's government managed to reassert effective control in the country. Reportedly, no government official was arrested or harmed, which, among other factors, raised the suspicion of a false flag event staged by the government itself. Erdoğan, as well as other government officials, has blamed an exiled cleric, and a former ally of Erdoğan, Fethullah Gülen, for staging the coup attempt. Süleyman Soylu, Minister of Labor in Erdoğan's government, accused the US of planning a coup to oust Erdoğan. Erdoğan, as well as other high-ranking Turkish government officials, has issued repeated demands to the US to extradite Gülen. Following the coup attempt, there has been a significant deterioration in Turkey-US relations. European and other world leaders have expressed their concerns over the situation in Turkey, with many of them warning Erdoğan not to use the coup attempt as an excuse to crack down on his opponents. The rise of ISIS and the collapse of the Kurdish peace process had led to a sharp rise in terror incidents in Turkey until 2016. Erdoğan was accused by his critics of having a 'soft corner' for ISIS. However, after the attempted coup, Erdoğan ordered the Turkish military into Syria to combat ISIS and Kurdish militant groups. Erdoğan's critics have decried purges in the education system and judiciary as undermining the rule of law however Erdoğan supporters argue this is a necessary measure as Gulen-linked schools cheated on entrance exams, requiring a purge in the education system and of the Gulen followers who then entered the judiciary. Erdoğan's plan is "to reconstitute Turkey as a presidential system. The plan would create a centralized system that would enable him to better tackle Turkey's internal and external threats. One of the main hurdles allegedly standing in his way is Fethullah Gulen's movement ..." In the aftermath of the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt, a groundswell of national unity and consensus emerged for cracking down on the coup plotters with a National Unity rally held in Turkey that included Islamists, secularists, liberals and nationalists. Erdoğan has used this consensus to remove Gulen's followers from the bureaucracy, curtail their role in NGOs, Turkey's Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Turkish military, with 149 Generals discharged. In a foreign policy shift Erdoğan ordered the Turkish Armed Forces into battle in Syria and has liberated towns from IS control. As relations with Europe soured over in the aftermath of the attempted coup, Erdoğan developed alternative relationships with Russia, Saudi Arabia and a "strategic partnership" with Pakistan, with plans to cultivate relations through free trade agreements and deepening military relations for mutual co-operation with Turkey's regional allies. 2018 currency and debt crisis The Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018 was caused by the Turkish economy's excessive current account deficit and foreign-currency debt, in combination with Erdoğan's increasing authoritarianism and his unorthodox ideas about interest rate policy. Economist Paul Krugman described the unfolding crisis as "a classic currency-and-debt crisis, of a kind we’ve seen many times", adding: "At such a time, the quality of leadership suddenly matters a great deal. You need officials who understand what's happening, can devise a response and have enough credibility that markets give them the benefit of the doubt. Some emerging markets have those things, and they are riding out the turmoil fairly well. The Erdoğan regime has none of that". Ideology and public image Early during his premiership, Erdoğan was praised as a role model for emerging Middle Eastern nations due to several reform packages initiated by his government which expanded religious freedoms and minority rights as part of accession negotiations with the European Union. However, his government underwent several crises including the Sledgehammer coup and the Ergenekon trials, corruption scandals, accusations of media intimidation, as well as the pursuit of an increasingly polarizing political agenda; the opposition accused the government of inciting political hatred throughout the country. Critics say that Erdoğan's government legitimizes homophobia, as Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". Neo-Ottomanism As President, Erdoğan has overseen a revival of Ottoman tradition, greeting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas with an Ottoman-style ceremony in the new presidential palace, with guards dressed in costumes representing founders of 16 Great Turkish Empires in history. While serving as the Prime Minister of Turkey, Erdoğan's AKP made references to the Ottoman era during election campaigns, such as calling their supporters 'grandsons of Ottomans' (Osmanlı torunu). This proved controversial, since it was perceived to be an open attack against the republican nature of modern Turkey founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. In 2015, Erdoğan made a statement in which he endorsed the old Ottoman term külliye to refer to university campuses rather than the standard Turkish word kampüs. Many critics have thus accused Erdoğan of wanting to become an Ottoman sultan and abandon the secular and democratic credentials of the Republic. One of the most cited scholars alive, Noam Chomsky, said that "Erdogan in Turkey is basically trying to create something like the Ottoman Caliphate, with him as caliph, supreme leader, throwing his weight around all over the place, and destroying the remnants of democracy in Turkey at the same time". When pressed on this issue in January 2015, Erdoğan denied these claims and said that he would aim to be more like Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom rather than like an Ottoman sultan. In July 2020, after the Council of State annulled the Cabinet's 1934 decision to establish the Hagia Sophia as museum and revoking the monument's status, Erdoğan ordered its reclassification as a mosque. The 1934 decree was ruled to be unlawful under both Ottoman and Turkish law as Hagia Sophia's waqf, endowed by Sultan Mehmed II, had designated the site a mosque; proponents of the decision argued the Hagia Sophia was the personal property of the sultan. This redesignation is controversial, invoking condemnation from the Turkish opposition, UNESCO, the World Council of Churches, the Holy See, and many other international leaders. In August 2020, he also signed the order that transferred the administration of the Chora Church to the Directorate of Religious Affairs to open it for worship as a mosque. Initially converted to a mosque by the Ottomans, the building had then been designated as a museum by the government since 1934. Authoritarianism Erdoğan has served as the de facto leader of Turkey since 2002. In response to criticism, Erdoğan made a speech in May 2014 denouncing allegations of dictatorship, saying that the leader of the opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who was there at the speech, would not be able to "roam the streets" freely if he were a dictator. Kılıçdaroğlu responded that political tensions would cease to exist if Erdoğan stopped making his polarising speeches for three days. One observer said it was a measure of the state of Turkish democracy that Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu could openly threaten, on 20 December 2015, that, if his party did not win the election, Turkish Kurds would endure a repeat of the era of the "white Toros", the Turkish name for the Renault 12, "a car associated with the gendarmarie’s fearsome intelligence agents, who carried out thousands of extrajudicial executions of Kurdish nationalists during the 1990s". In February 2015, a 13-year-old was charged by a prosecutor after allegedly insulting Erdoğan on Facebook. In 2016, a waiter was arrested for insulting Erdoğan by allegedly saying "If Erdoğan comes here, I will not even serve tea to him.". In April 2014, the President of the Constitutional Court, Haşim Kılıç, accused Erdoğan of damaging the credibility of the judiciary, labelling Erdoğan's attempts to increase political control over the courts as 'desperate'. During the chaotic 2007 presidential election, the military issued an E-memorandum warning the government to keep within the boundaries of secularism when choosing a candidate. Regardless, Erdoğan's close relations with Fethullah Gülen and his Cemaat Movement allowed his government to maintain a degree of influence within the judiciary through Gülen's supporters in high judicial and bureaucratic offices. Shortly after, an alleged coup plot codenamed Sledgehammer became public and resulted in the imprisonment of 300 military officers including İbrahim Fırtına, Çetin Doğan and Engin Alan. Several opposition politicians, journalists and military officers also went on trial for allegedly being part of an ultra-nationalist organisation called Ergenekon. Both cases were marred by irregularities and were condemned as a joint attempt by Erdoğan and Gülen to curb opposition to the AKP. The original Sledgehammer document containing the coup plans, allegedly written in 2003, was found to have been written using Microsoft Word 2007. Despite both domestic and international calls for these irregularities to be addressed in order to guarantee a fair trial, Erdoğan instead praised his government for bringing the coup plots to light. When Gülen publicly withdrew support and openly attacked Erdoğan in late 2013, several imprisoned military officers and journalists were released, with the government admitting that the judicial proceedings were unfair. When Gülen withdrew support from the AKP government in late 2013, a government corruption scandal broke out, leading to the arrest of several family members of cabinet ministers. Erdoğan accused Gülen of co-ordinating a "parallel state" within the judiciary in an attempt to topple him from power. He then removed or reassigned several judicial officials in an attempt to remove Gülen's supporters from office. Erdoğan's 'purge' was widely questioned and criticised by the European Union. In early 2014, a new law was passed by parliament giving the government greater control over the judiciary, which sparked public protest throughout the country. International organisations perceived the law to be a danger to the separation of powers. Several judicial officials removed from their posts said that they had been removed due to their secularist credentials. The political opposition accused Erdoğan of not only attempting to remove Gülen supporters, but supporters of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's principles as well, in order to pave the way for increased politicisation of the judiciary. Several family members of Erdoğan's ministers who had been arrested as a result of the 2013 corruption scandal were released, and a judicial order to question Erdoğan's son Bilal Erdoğan was annulled. Controversy erupted when it emerged that many of the newly appointed judicial officials were actually AKP supporters. İslam Çiçek, a judge who ejected the cases of five ministers' relatives accused of corruption, was accused of being an AKP supporter and an official investigation was launched into his political affiliations. On 1 September 2014, the courts dissolved the cases of 96 suspects, which included Bilal Erdoğan. During a televised press conference he was asked if he believed a presidential system was possible in a unitary state. Erdoğan affirmed this and cited Nazi Germany (among other examples) as a case where such a combination existed. However, the Turkish president's office said that Erdoğan was not advocating a Hitler-style government when he called for a state system with a strong executive, and added that the Turkish president had declared the "Holocaust, anti-semitism and Islamophobia" as crimes against humanity and that it was out of the question for him to cite Hitler's Germany as a good example. Suppression of dissent Erdoğan has been criticised for his politicisation of the media, especially after the 2013 protests. The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) alleged that over 1,863 journalists lost their jobs due to their anti-government views in 12 years of AKP rule. Opposition politicians have also alleged that intimidation in the media is due to the government's attempt to restructure the ownership of private media corporations. Journalists from the Cihan News Agency and the Gülenist Zaman newspaper were repeatedly barred from attending government press conferences or asking questions. Several opposition journalists such as Soner Yalçın were controversially arrested as part of the Ergenekon trials and Sledgehammer coup investigation. Veli Ağbaba, a CHP politician, has called the AKP the 'biggest media boss in Turkey.' In 2015, 74 US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to state their concern over what they saw as deviations from the basic principles of democracy in Turkey and oppressions of Erdoğan over media. Notable cases of media censorship occurred during the 2013 anti-government protests, when the mainstream media did not broadcast any news regarding the demonstrations for three days after they began. The lack of media coverage was symbolised by CNN International covering the protests while CNN Türk broadcast a documentary about penguins at the same time. The Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK) controversially issued a fine to pro-opposition news channels including Halk TV and Ulusal Kanal for their coverage of the protests, accusing them of broadcasting footage that could be morally, physically and mentally destabilising to children. Erdoğan was criticised for not responding to the accusations of media intimidation, and caused international outrage after telling a female journalist (Amberin Zaman of The Economist) to know her place and calling her a 'shameless militant' during his 2014 presidential election campaign. While the 2014 presidential election was not subject to substantial electoral fraud, Erdoğan was again criticised for receiving disproportionate media attention in comparison to his rivals. The British newspaper The Times commented that between 2 and 4 July, the state-owned media channel TRT gave 204 minutes of coverage to Erdoğan's campaign and less than a total of 3 minutes to both his rivals. Erdoğan also tightened controls over the Internet, signing into law a bill which allows the government to block websites without prior court order on 12 September 2014. His government blocked Twitter and YouTube in late March 2014 following the release of a recording of a conversation between him and his son Bilal, where Erdoğan allegedly warned his family to 'nullify' all cash reserves at their home amid the 2013 corruption scandal. Erdoğan has undertaken a media campaign that attempts to portray the presidential family as frugal and simple-living; their palace electricity-bill is estimated at $500,000 per month. In May 2016, former Miss Turkey model Merve Büyüksaraç was sentenced to more than a year in prison for allegedly insulting the president. In a 2016 news story, Bloomberg reported, "more than 2,000 cases have been opened against journalists, cartoonists, teachers, a former Miss Turkey, and even schoolchildren in the past two years". In November 2016, the Turkish government blocked access to social media in all of Turkey as well as sought to completely block Internet access for the citizens in the southeast of the country. Mehmet Aksoy lawsuit In 2009, Turkish sculptor Mehmet Aksoy created the Statue of Humanity in Kars to promote reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia. When visiting the city in 2011, Erdoğan deemed the statue a "freak", and months later it was demolished. Aksoy sued Erdoğan for "moral indemnities", although his lawyer said that his statement was a critique rather than an insult. In March 2015, a judge ordered Erdoğan to pay 10,000 liras. Erdoğanism Erdoğan has produced many aphorisms and catch-phrases known as Erdoğanisms. The term Erdoğanism first emerged shortly after Erdoğan's 2011 general election victory, where it was predominantly described as the AKP's liberal economic and conservative democratic ideals fused with Erdoğan demagoguery and cult of personality. Views on minorities LGBT In 2002, Erdoğan said that "homosexuals must be legally protected within the framework of their rights and freedoms. From time to time, we do not find the treatment they get on some television screens humane", he said. However, in 2017 Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Turkey's top Muslim scholar and President of Religious Affairs, Ali Erbaş, said in a Friday Ramadan announcement that country condemns homosexuality because it "brings illness," insinuating that same sex relations are responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan backed Erbaş, saying that what Erbaş "said was totally right." Jews While Erdoğan has declared several times being against antisemitism, he has been accused of invoking antisemitic stereotypes in public statements. According to Erdoğan, he had been inspired by novelist and Islamist ideologue Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, a publisher (among others) of antisemitic literature. Others During a live interview in 2014, he said: "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian. Excuse me, but they have said even uglier things. They have called me Armenian, but I am Turkish." Honours and accolades Foreign honours Russia: Medal "In Commemoration of the 1000th Anniversary of Kazan" (1 June 2006) Pakistan: Nishan-e-Pakistan, the highest civilian award in Pakistan (26 October 2009) Georgia: Order of Golden Fleece, awarded for his contribution to development of bilateral relations (17 May 2010) Kyrgyzstan: Danaker Order in Bishkek (2 February 2011) Azerbaijan: Heydar Aliyev Order (3 September 2014) Belgium: Grand Cordon in the Order of Leopold (5 October 2015) Madagascar: Knight Grand Cross in the national Order (25 January 2017) Gagauzia: Order of Gagauz-Yeri in Comrat (18 October 2018) Venezuela: Order of the Liberator, Grand Cordon (3 December 2018) Ukraine: Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise (16 October 2020) Other awards 29 January 2004: Profile of Courage Award from the American Jewish Congress, for promoting peace between cultures. Returned at the request of the A.J.C. in July 2014. 13 June 2004: Golden Plate award from the Academy of Achievement during the conference in Chicago. 3 October 2004: German Quadriga prize for improving relationships between different cultures. 2 September 2005: Mediterranean Award for Institutions (). This was awarded by the Fondazione Mediterraneo. 8 August 2006: Caspian Energy Integration Award from the Caspian Integration Business Club. 1 November 2006: Outstanding Service award from the Turkish humanitarian organization Red Crescent. 2 February 2007: Dialogue Between Cultures Award from the President of Tatarstan Mintimer Shaimiev. 15 April 2007: Crystal Hermes Award from the German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the opening of the Hannover Industrial Fair. 11 July 2007: highest award of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the Agricola Medal, in recognition of his contribution to agricultural and social development in Turkey. 11 May 2009: Avicenna award from the Avicenna Foundation in Frankfurt, Germany. 9 June 2009: guest of honor at the 20th Crans Montana Forum in Brussels and received the Prix de la Fondation, for democracy and freedom. 25 June 2009: Key to the City of Tirana on the occasion of his state visit to Albania. 29 December 2009: Award for Contribution to World Peace from the Turgut Özal Thought and Move Association. 12 January 2010: King Faisal International Prize for "service to Islam" from the King Faisal Foundation. 23 February 2010: Nodo Culture Award from the mayor of Seville for his efforts to launch the Alliance of Civilizations initiative. 1 March 2010: United Nations–HABITAT award in memorial of Rafik Hariri. A seven-member international jury unanimously found Erdoğan deserving of the award because of his "excellent achievement and commendable conduct in the area of leadership, statesmanship and good governance. Erdoğan also initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors." 27 May 2010: medal of honor from the Brazilian Federation of Industry for the State of São Paulo (FIESP) for his contributions to industry 31 May 2010: World Health Organization 2010 World No Tobacco Award for "his dedicated leadership on tobacco control in Turkey." 29 June 2010: 2010 World Family Award from the World Family Organization which operates under the umbrella of the United Nations. 4 November 2010: Golden Medal of Independence, an award conferred upon Kosovo citizens and foreigners that have contributed to the independence of Kosovo. 25 November 2010: "Leader of the Year" award presented by the Union of Arab Banks in Lebanon. 11 January 2011: "Outstanding Personality in the Islamic World Award" of the Sheikh Fahad al-Ahmad International Award for Charity in Kuwait. 25 October 2011: Palestinian International Award for Excellence and Creativity (PIA) 2011 for his support to the Palestinian people and cause. 21 January 2012: 'Gold Statue 2012 Special Award' by the Polish Business Center Club (BCC). Erdoğan was awarded for his systematic effort to clear barriers on the way to economic growth, striving to build democracy and free market relations. 2020: Ig Nobel Prize "for using the COVID-19 viral pandemic to teach the world that politicians can have a more immediate effect on life and death than scientists and doctors can." See also List of international presidential trips made by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Leadership approval polling for the 2023 Turkish general election The 500 Most Influential Muslims Notes References Further reading Cagaptay, Soner. The new sultan: Erdogan and the crisis of modern Turkey (2nd ed. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020). online review Cagaptay, Soner. "Making Turkey Great Again." Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 43 (2019): 169–78. online Kirişci, Kemal, and Amanda Sloat. "The rise and fall of liberal democracy in Turkey: Implications for the West" Foreign Policy at Brookings (2019) online Tziarras, Zenonas. "Erdoganist authoritarianism and the 'new' Turkey." Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 18.4 (2018): 593–598. online Yavuz, M. Hakan. "A framework for understanding the Intra-Islamist conflict between the AK party and the Gülen movement." Politics, Religion & Ideology 19.1 (2018): 11–32. online Yesil, Bilge. Media in New Turkey: The Origins of an Authoritarian Neoliberal State (University of Illinois Press, 2016) online review External links Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Instagram. Archived from the original. Welcome to demokrasi: how Erdoğan got more popular than ever by The Guardian 1954 births Living people 21st-century presidents of Turkey 21st-century prime ministers of Turkey Deniers of the Armenian genocide Deputies of Istanbul Deputies of Siirt Recep Tayyip Imam Hatip school alumni Justice and Development Party (Turkey) politicians Leaders of political parties in Turkey Marmara University alumni Mayors of Istanbul Members of the 22nd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 23rd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 24th Parliament of Turkey Naqshbandi order People from Istanbul Politicians arrested in Turkey Presidents of Turkey Prime Ministers of Turkey Recipients of the Heydar Aliyev Order Recipients of the Order of the Golden Fleece (Georgia) Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 1st class Turkish Islamists Turkish Sunni Muslims Chairmen of the Organization of Turkic States Recipients of the Gagauz-Yeri Order Foreign recipients of the Nishan-e-Pakistan	false	[ "Alan M. Kriegsman (February 28, 1928 – August 31, 2012) was an American dance critic. He won the 1976 Pulitzer Prize for his work at The Washington Post, the first to win the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism for reporting as a dance critic.\n\nKriegsman was born in Brooklyn, New York, and grew up in Far Rockaway, Queens, graduating from Far Rockaway High School in 1945. He attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and earned a B.S. and M.A. in musicology at Columbia University, where he also completed doctoral coursework. He served in the United States Army from 1946 to 1947. He attended the University of Vienna in 1956 and 1957 as a Fulbright scholar. He married the former Sali Ann Ribakove in 1957.\n\nHe taught at Columbia University, Barnard College, George Washington University, Hunter College, the Juilliard School and Temple University. From 1960 to 1965, he was a music, drama, and dance critic for the San Diego Union. He returned to New York City, where he was assistant to the president of the Juilliard School in 1965 and 1966. He became a music and performing arts critic and columnist for The Washington Post starting in 1966 and was its dance critic from 1974 to his retirement in 1996.\n\nWhile with The Washington Post, Kriegsman won the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism in 1976, the first to receive the award for work in the dance field. After he retired in 1996, he was succeeded by Sarah Kaufman as dance critic, who would go on to win the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for her dance criticism. Kaufman, in a question and answer session in The Washington Post, credited Kriegsman as her \"hero, friend and mentor\"\n\nKriegsman died on August 31, 2012, at his home in Chevy Chase, Maryland, at age 84.\n\nReferences\n\n1928 births\n2012 deaths\nAmerican dance critics\nAmerican male journalists\nColumbia University alumni\nFar Rockaway High School alumni\nHunter College faculty\nGeorge Washington University faculty\nJuilliard School faculty\nTemple University faculty\nColumbia University faculty\nUniversity of California, San Diego faculty\nMassachusetts Institute of Technology alumni\nPeople from Brooklyn\nPeople from Far Rockaway, Queens\nPulitzer Prize for Criticism winners\nUniversity of Vienna alumni\nThe Washington Post journalists\nPeople from Chevy Chase, Maryland\nJournalists from New York City\nBarnard College faculty", "The Samsung Galaxy Avant was a mid-range smartphone released by Samsung in July 2014. It was only available on the T-Mobile network, although it could be purchased both on and off contract. This phone retailed for $230, making it one of the cheaper offerings by T-Mobile. While this phone was praised for its low price and decent performance, it was also criticized for its poor screen and camera. This screen was often cited as having washed out colors and a lack of sharpness, likely as a result of the TFT panel used. This phone did receive a few official software updates, but was never upgraded past Android KitKat.\n\nRooting & Custom ROMs \nSoon after the release of this phone, a method to gain root access on the Galaxy Avant was discovered. In order to root the phone, a root package must be flashed through Odin on a PC, which can then be used to flash a custom recovery, allowing for further ROMs to be flashed. Despite being rooted and having TWRP available, this device did not receive any support past Android 4.4.4, however, it did receive a modified ROM that provided some of the design and functionality of Android Marshmallow.\n\nReferences \n\nSamsung Galaxy" ]
[ "Recep Tayyip Erdoğan", "Armenian Genocide", "What happened in the genocide?", "mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I", "Who was responsible for this?", "Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings", "When did this happen?", "I don't know.", "Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?", "Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul,", "Was he part of the genocide?", "\"I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise", "Did he receive and criticism for this?", "I don't know." ]	C_4d6e38301a82483cab0ff9378b6a238e_1	What else is significant about this article?	7	Other than Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's refusal to apologize for the Armenian genocide, what else is significant about this article?	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan	Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province. His parents are Ahmet Erdogan and Tenzile Erdogan. Erdogan reportedly said in 2003, "I'm a Georgian, my family is a Georgian family which migrated from Batumi to Rize." But in a 2014 televised interview on the NTV news network, he said, "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian... forgive me for saying this... even much uglier things, they have even called me an Armenian, but I am Turkish." In an account based on registry records, his genealogy was tracked to an ethnic Turkish family. Erdogan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father Ahmet Erdogan (1905 - 1988) was a Captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. Erdogan had a brother Mustafa (b. 1958) and sister Vesile (b. 1965). His summer holidays were mostly spent in Guneysu, Rize, where his family originates from. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdogan was 13 years old. As a teenager, he sold lemonade and sesame buns (simit) on the streets of the city's rougher districts to earn extra money. Brought up in an observant Muslim family, Erdogan graduated from Kasimpasa Piyale primary school in 1965, and Imam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. He received his high school diploma from Eyup High School. He subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences, now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences--although several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated. In his youth, Erdogan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahce wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasimpasa S.K. is named after him. Erdogan married Emine Gulbaran (born 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons; Ahmet Burak and Necmettin Bilal, and two daughters, Esra and Sumeyye. His father, Ahmet Erdogan, died in 1988 and his 88-year-old mother, Tenzile Erdogan, died in 2011. He is a member of the Community of Iskenderpasa, a Turkish sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. In 2001, Erdogan established the Justice and Development Party (AKP). The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdogan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yilmaz and Ciller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdogan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gul became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdogan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdogan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gul handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdogan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as President, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdogan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gul as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Canakkale, and one million in Izmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdogan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdogan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdogan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdogan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdogan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious." He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem." In December 2008, Erdogan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken." In November 2009, he said, "it's not possible for a Muslim to commit genocide." In 2011, Erdogan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish-Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdogan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdogan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences - such as relocation - during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". CANNOTANSWER	On 23 April 2014, Erdogan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician serving as the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as prime minister of Turkey from 2003 to 2014 and as mayor of Istanbul from 1994 to 1998. He founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2001, leading it to election victories in 2002, 2007, and 2011 general elections before being required to stand down upon his election as President in 2014. He later returned to the AKP leadership in 2017 following the constitutional referendum that year. Coming from an Islamist political background and self-describing as a conservative democrat, he has promoted socially conservative and populist policies during his administration. Following the 1994 local elections, Erdoğan was elected mayor of Istanbul as the candidate of the Islamist Welfare Party. He was later stripped of his position, banned from political office, and imprisoned for four months for inciting religious hatred, due to his recitation of a poem by Ziya Gökalp. Erdoğan subsequently abandoned openly Islamist politics, establishing the moderate conservative AKP in 2001, which he went on to lead to a landslide victory in 2002. With Erdoğan still technically prohibited from holding office, the AKP's co-founder, Abdullah Gül, instead became prime minister, and later annulled Erdoğan's political ban. After winning a by-election in Siirt in 2003, Erdoğan replaced Gül as prime minister, with Gül instead becoming the AKP's candidate for the presidency. Erdoğan led the AKP to two more election victories in 2007 and 2011. The early years of Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister saw advances in negotiations for Turkey's membership of the European Union, an economic recovery following a economic crisis in 2001 and investments in infrastructure including roads, airports, and a high-speed train network. He also won two successful constitutional referendums in 2007 and 2010. However, his government remained controversial for its close links with Fethullah Gülen and his Gülen Movement (since designated as a terrorist organisation by the Turkish state) with whom the AKP was accused of orchestrating purges against secular bureaucrats and military officers through the Balyoz and Ergenekon trials. In late 2012, his government began peace negotiations with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to end the Kurdish–Turkish conflict (1978–present). The ceasefire broke down in 2015, leading to a renewed escalation in conflict. Erdoğan's foreign policy has been described as Neo-Ottoman and has led to the Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, with its focus on preventing the Syrian Democratic Forces from gaining ground on the Syria–Turkey border during the Syrian Civil War. In the more recent years of Erdoğan's rule, Turkey has experienced democratic backsliding and corruption. Starting with the anti-government protests in 2013, his government imposed growing censorship on the press and social media, temporarily restricting access to sites such as YouTube, Twitter and Wikipedia. This stalled negotiations related to Turkey's EU membership. A US$100 billion corruption scandal in 2013 led to the arrests of Erdoğan's close allies, and incriminated Erdoğan. After 11 years as head of government (Prime Minister), Erdoğan decided to run for President in 2014. At the time, the presidency was a somewhat ceremonial function. Following the 2014 elections, Erdoğan became the first popularly elected president of Turkey. The souring in relations with Gülen continued, as the government proceeded to purge his supporters from judicial, bureaucratic and military positions. A failed military coup d'état attempt in July 2016 resulted in further purges and a temporary state of emergency. The government claimed that the coup leaders were linked to Gülen, but he has denied any role in it. Erdoğan's rule has been marked with increasing authoritarianism, expansionism, censorship and banning of parties or dissent. Erdoğan supported the 2017 referendum which changed Turkey's parliamentary system into a presidential system, thus setting for the first time in Turkish history a term limit for the head of government (two full five-year terms). This new system of government formally came into place after the 2018 general election, where Erdoğan became an executive president. His party however lost the majority in the parliament and is currently in a coalition (People's Alliance) with the Turkish nationalist MHP. Erdoğan has since been tackling, but also accused of contributing to, the Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018, which has caused a significant decline in his popularity and is widely believed to have contributed to the results of the 2019 local elections, in which his party lost power in big cities like Ankara and Istanbul to opposition parties for the first time in 15 years. Family and personal life Early life Erdoğan was born in Kasımpaşa, a poor neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province in the 1930s. Erdoğan's tribe is originally from Adjara, a region in Georgia. His parents were Ahmet Erdoğan (1905–88) and Tenzile Erdoğan (née Mutlu; 1924–2011). Erdoğan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father was a captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. His summer holidays were mostly spent in Güneysu, Rize, where his family originates. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdoğan was 13 years old. As a teenager, Erdoğan's father provided him with a weekly allowance of 2.5 Turkish lira, less than a dollar. With it, Erdoğan bought postcards and resold them on the street. He sold bottles of water to drivers stuck in traffic. Erdoğan also worked as a street vendor selling simit (sesame bread rings), wearing a white gown and selling the simit from a red three-wheel cart with the rolls stacked behind glass. In his youth, Erdoğan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahçe wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasımpaşa S.K. is named after him. Erdoğan is a member of the Community of İskenderpaşa, a Turkish Sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. Education Erdoğan graduated from Kasımpaşa Piyale primary school in 1965, and İmam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. The same educational path was followed by other co-founders of the AKP party. One quarter of the curriculum of İmam Hatip schools involves study of the Qurʼān, the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and the Arabic language. Erdoğan studied the Qurʼān at an İmam Hatip, where his classmates began calling him "hoca" ("Muslim teacher"). Erdoğan attended a meeting of the nationalist student group National Turkish Student Union (Milli Türk Talebe Birliği), who sought to raise a conservative cohort of young people to counter the rising movement of leftists in Turkey. Within the group, Erdoğan was distinguished by his oratorical skills, developing a penchant for public speaking and excelling in front of an audience. He won first place in a poetry-reading competition organized by the Community of Turkish Technical Painters, and began preparing for speeches through reading and research. Erdoğan would later comment on these competitions as "enhancing our courage to speak in front of the masses". Erdoğan wanted to pursue advanced studies at Mekteb-i Mülkiye, but Mülkiye accepted only students with regular high school diplomas, and not İmam Hatip graduates. Mülkiye was known for its political science department, which trained many statesmen and politicians in Turkey. Erdoğan was then admitted to Eyüp High School, a regular state school, and eventually received his high school diploma from Eyüp. According to his official biography, he subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences (), now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. Several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated, or even attended at all. Family Erdoğan married Emine Gülbaran (b. 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons, Ahmet Burak (b. 1979) and Necmettin Bilal (b. 1981), and two daughters, Esra (b. 1983) and Sümeyye (b. 1985). His father, Ahmet Erdoğan, died in 1988 and his mother, Tenzile Erdoğan, died in 2011 at the age of 88. Erdoğan has a brother, Mustafa (b. 1958), and a sister, Vesile (b. 1965). From his father's first marriage to Havuli Erdoğan (d. 1980), he had two half-brothers: Mehmet (1926–1988) and Hasan (1929–2006). Early political career In 1976, Erdoğan engaged in politics by joining the National Turkish Student Union, an anti-communist action group. In the same year, he became the head of the Beyoğlu youth branch of the Islamist National Salvation Party (MSP), and was later promoted to chair of the Istanbul youth branch of the party. Holding this position until 1980, he served as consultant and senior executive in the private sector during the era following the 1980 military coup when political parties were closed down. In 1983, Erdoğan followed most of Necmettin Erbakan's followers into the Islamist Welfare Party. He became the party's Beyoğlu district chair in 1984, and in 1985 he became the chair of the Istanbul city branch. He was elected to parliament in 1991, but was barred from taking his seat. Mayor of Istanbul (1994–1998) In the local elections of 27 March 1994, Erdoğan was elected Mayor of Istanbul with 25.19% of the popular vote. Erdoğan was a 40-year-old dark horse candidate who had been mocked by the mainstream media and treated as a country bumpkin by his opponents. He was pragmatic in office, tackling many chronic problems in Istanbul including water shortage, pollution and traffic chaos. The water shortage problem was solved with the laying of hundreds of kilometers of new pipelines. The garbage problem was solved with the establishment of state-of-the-art recycling facilities. While Erdoğan was in office, air pollution was reduced through a plan developed to switch to natural gas. He changed the public buses to environmentally friendly ones. The city's traffic and transportation jams were reduced with more than fifty bridges, viaducts, and highways built. He took precautions to prevent corruption, using measures to ensure that municipal funds were used prudently. He paid back a major portion of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality's two-billion-dollar debt and invested four billion dollars in the city. Erdoğan initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors. A seven-member international jury from the United Nations unanimously awarded Erdoğan the UN-Habitat award. Imprisonment In 1998, the fundamentalist Welfare Party was declared unconstitutional on the grounds of threatening the secularism of Turkey and was shut down by the Turkish constitutional court. Erdoğan became a prominent speaker at demonstrations held by his party colleagues. In December 1997 in Siirt, Erdoğan recited a poem from a work written by Ziya Gökalp, a pan-Turkish activist of the early 20th century. His recitation included verses translated as "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers...." which are not in the original version of the poem. Erdoğan said the poem had been approved by the education ministry to be published in textbooks. Under article 312/2 of the Turkish penal code his recitation was regarded as an incitement to violence and religious or racial hatred. He was given a ten-month prison sentence of which he served four months, from 24 March 1999 to 27 July 1999. Due to his conviction, Erdoğan was forced to give up his mayoral position. The conviction also stipulated a political ban, which prevented him from participating in parliamentary elections. He had appealed for the sentence to be converted to a monetary fine, but it was reduced to 120 days instead. In 2017, this period of Erdoğan's life was made into a film titled Reis. Justice and Development Party Erdoğan was member of political parties that kept getting banned by the army or judges. Within his Virtue Party, there was a dispute about the appropriate discourse of the party between traditional politicians and pro-reform politicians. The latter envisioned a party that could operate within the limits of the system, and thus not getting banned as its predecessors like National Order Party, National Salvation Party and Welfare Party. They wanted to give the group the character of an ordinary conservative party following the example of the European Christian democratic parties. When the Virtue Party was also banned in 2001, a definitive split took place: the followers of Necmettin Erbakan founded the Felicity Party (SP) and the reformers founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) under the leadership of Abdullah Gül and Erdoğan. The pro-reform politicians realized that a strictly Islamic party would never be accepted as a governing party by the state apparatus and they believed that an Islamic party did not appeal to more than about 20 percent of the Turkish electorate. The AK party emphatically placed itself as a broad democratic conservative party with new politicians from the political center (like Ali Babacan and Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu), while respecting Islamic norms and values, but without an explicit religious program. This turned out to be successful as the new party won 34% of the vote in the general elections of 2002. Erdoğan became prime minister in March 2003 after the Gül government ended his political ban. Premiership (2003–2014) General elections The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdoğan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yılmaz and Çiller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdoğan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gül became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdoğan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdoğan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gül handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdoğan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as president, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdoğan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gül as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Çanakkale, and one million in İzmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdoğan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdoğan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdoğan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdoğan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Referendums After the opposition parties deadlocked the 2007 presidential election by boycotting the parliament, the ruling AKP proposed a constitutional reform package. The reform package was first vetoed by president Sezer. Then he applied to the Turkish constitutional court about the reform package, because the president is unable to veto amendments for the second time. The Turkish constitutional court did not find any problems in the packet and 68.95% of the voters supported the constitutional changes. The reforms consisted of electing the president by popular vote instead of by parliament; reducing the presidential term from seven years to five; allowing the president to stand for re-election for a second term; holding general elections every four years instead of five; and reducing from 367 to 184 the quorum of lawmakers needed for parliamentary decisions. Reforming the Constitution was one of the main pledges of the AKP during the 2007 election campaign. The main opposition party CHP was not interested in altering the Constitution on a big scale, making it impossible to form a Constitutional Commission (Anayasa Uzlaşma Komisyonu). The amendments lacked the two-thirds majority needed to become law instantly, but secured 336 votes in the 550-seat parliament – enough to put the proposals to a referendum. The reform package included a number of issues such as the right of individuals to appeal to the highest court, the creation of the ombudsman's office; the possibility to negotiate a nationwide labour contract; gender equality; the ability of civilian courts to convict members of the military; the right of civil servants to go on strike; a privacy law; and the structure of the Constitutional Court. The referendum was agreed by a majority of 58%. Domestic Policy Kurdish issue In 2009, Prime Minister Erdoğan's government announced a plan to help end the quarter-century-long Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict that had cost more than 40,000 lives. The government's plan, supported by the European Union, intended to allow the Kurdish language to be used in all broadcast media and political campaigns, and restored Kurdish names to cities and towns that had been given Turkish ones. Erdoğan said, "We took a courageous step to resolve chronic issues that constitute an obstacle along Turkey's development, progression and empowerment". Erdoğan passed a partial amnesty to reduce penalties faced by many members of the Kurdish guerrilla movement PKK who had surrendered to the government. On 23 November 2011, during a televised meeting of his party in Ankara, he apologised on behalf of the state for the Dersim massacre, where many Alevis and Zazas were killed. In 2013 the government of Erdoğan began a peace process between the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Turkish Government, mediated by parliamentarians of the Peoples' Democratic party (HDP). In 2015 he decided that the peace process was over and supported the lift of the parliamentary immunity of the HDP parliamentarians. During his presidency a law was introduced which banned the use of the word Kurdistan in parliament and in a speech he held for the local election of 2019 he told the HDP politicians that if there is no Kurdistan in Turkey and if they looked for one they should go to Northern Iraq. Armenian genocide Prime Minister Erdoğan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdoğan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious". He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem". In December 2008, Erdoğan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken". In November 2009, he said, "it is not possible for those who belong to the Muslim faith to carry out genocide". In 2011, Erdoğan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish–Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdoğan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdoğan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences – such as relocation – during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". The Ottoman Parliament of 1915 had previously used the term "relocation" to describe the purpose of the Tehcir Law, which resulted in the deaths of anywhere between 800,000 and over 1,800,000 Armenian civilians in what is commonly referred to as the Armenian Genocide. Pope Francis in April 2015, at a special mass in St. Peter's Basilica marking the centenary of the events, described atrocities against Armenian civilians in 1915–1922 as "the first genocide of the 20th century". In protest, Erdoğan recalled the Turkish ambassador from the Vatican, and summoned the Vatican's ambassador, to express "disappointment" at what he called a discriminatory message. He later stated "we don’t carry a stain or a shadow like genocide". US President Barack Obama called for a "full, frank and just acknowledgement of the facts", but again stopped short of labelling it "genocide", despite his campaign promise to do so. Human rights During Erdoğan's time as Prime Minister, the far-reaching powers of the 1991 Anti-Terror Law were reduced and the Democratic initiative process was initiated, with the goal to improve democratic standards in general and the rights of ethnic and religious minorities in particular. However, after Turkey's bid to join the European Union stalled, European officials noted a return to more authoritarian ways, notably on freedom of speech, freedom of the press and Kurdish minority rights. Demands by activists for the recognition of LGBT rights were publicly rejected by government members, and members of the Turkish LGBT community were insulted by cabinet members. Reporters Without Borders observed a continuous decrease in Freedom of the Press during Erdoğan's later terms, with a rank of around 100 on the Press Freedom Index during his first term and a rank of 153 out of a total of 179 countries in 2021. Freedom House saw a slight recovery in later years and awarded Turkey a Press Freedom Score of 55/100 in 2012 after a low point of 48/100 in 2006. In 2011, Erdoğan's government made legal reforms to return properties of Christian and Jewish minorities which were seized by the Turkish government in the 1930s. The total value of the properties returned reached $2 billion (USD). Under Erdoğan, the Turkish government tightened the laws on the sale and consumption of alcohol, banning all advertising and increasing the tax on alcoholic beverages. Economy In 2002, Erdoğan inherited a Turkish economy that was beginning to recover from a recession as a result of reforms implemented by Kemal Derviş. Erdoğan supported Finance Minister Ali Babacan in enforcing macro-economic policies. Erdoğan tried to attract more foreign investors to Turkey and lifted many government regulations. The cash-flow into the Turkish economy between 2002 and 2012 caused a growth of 64% in real GDP and a 43% increase in GDP per capita; considerably higher numbers were commonly advertised but these did not account for the inflation of the US dollar between 2002 and 2012. The average annual growth in GDP per capita was 3.6%. The growth in real GDP between 2002 and 2012 was higher than the values from developed countries, but was close to average when developing countries are also taken into account. The ranking of the Turkish economy in terms of GDP moved slightly from 17 to 16 during this decade. A major consequence of the policies between 2002 and 2012 was the widening of the current account deficit from US$600 million to US$58 billion (2013 est.) Since 1961, Turkey has signed 19 IMF loan accords. Erdoğan's government satisfied the budgetary and market requirements of the two during his administration and received every loan installment, the only time any Turkish government has done so. Erdoğan inherited a debt of $23.5 billion to the IMF, which was reduced to $0.9 billion in 2012. He decided not to sign a new deal. Turkey's debt to the IMF was thus declared to be completely paid and he announced that the IMF could borrow from Turkey. In 2010, five-year credit default swaps for Turkey's sovereign debt were trading at a record low of 1.17%, below those of nine EU member countries and Russia. In 2002, the Turkish Central Bank had $26.5 billion in reserves. This amount reached $92.2 billion in 2011. During Erdoğan's leadership, inflation fell from 32% to 9.0% in 2004. Since then, Turkish inflation has continued to fluctuate around 9% and is still one of the highest inflation rates in the world. The Turkish public debt as a percentage of annual GDP declined from 74% in 2002 to 39% in 2009. In 2012, Turkey had a lower ratio of public debt to GDP than 21 of 27 members of the European Union and a lower budget deficit to GDP ratio than 23 of them. In 2003, Erdoğan's government pushed through the Labor Act, a comprehensive reform of Turkey's labor laws. The law greatly expanded the rights of employees, establishing a 45-hour workweek and limiting overtime work to 270 hours a year, provided legal protection against discrimination due to sex, religion, or political affiliation, prohibited discrimination between permanent and temporary workers, entitled employees terminated without "valid cause" to compensation, and mandated written contracts for employment arrangements lasting a year or more. Education Erdoğan increased the budget of the Ministry of Education from 7.5 billion lira in 2002 to 34 billion lira in 2011, the highest share of the national budget given to one ministry. Before his prime ministership the military received the highest share of the national budget. Compulsory education was increased from eight years to twelve. In 2003, the Turkish government, together with UNICEF, initiated a campaign called "Come on girls, [let's go] to school!" (). The goal of this campaign was to close the gender gap in primary school enrollment through the provision of a quality basic education for all girls, especially in southeast Turkey. In 2005, the parliament granted amnesty to students expelled from universities before 2003. The amnesty applied to students dismissed on academic or disciplinary grounds. In 2004, textbooks became free of charge and since 2008 every province in Turkey has its own university. During Erdoğan's Premiership, the number of universities in Turkey nearly doubled, from 98 in 2002 to 186 in October 2012. The Prime Minister kept his campaign promises by starting the Fatih project in which all state schools, from preschool to high school level, received a total of 620,000 smart boards, while tablet computers were distributed to 17 million students and approximately one million teachers and administrators. In June 2017 a draft proposal by the ministry of education was approved by Erdoğan, in which the curriculum for schools excluded the teaching of the theory of evolution of Charles Darwin by 2019. From then on the teaching will be postponed and start at undergraduate level. Infrastructure Under Erdoğan's government, the number of airports in Turkey increased from 26 to 50 in the period of 10 years. Between the founding of the Republic of Turkey in 1923 and 2002, there had been 6,000 km of dual carriageway roads created. Between 2002 and 2011, another 13,500 km of expressway were built. Due to these measures, the number of motor accidents fell by 50 percent. For the first time in Turkish history, high speed railway lines were constructed, and the country's high-speed train service began in 2009. In 8 years, 1,076 km of railway were built and 5,449 km of railway renewed. The construction of Marmaray, an undersea rail tunnel under the Bosphorus strait, started in 2004. It was inaugurated on the 90th anniversary of the Turkish Republic 29 October 2013. The inauguration of the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge, the third bridge over the Bosphorus, was on 26 August 2016. Justice In March 2006, the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) held a press conference to publicly protest the obstruction of the appointment of judges to the high courts for over 10 months. The HSYK said Erdoğan wanted to fill the vacant posts with his own appointees. Erdoğan was accused of creating a rift with Turkey's highest court of appeal, the Yargıtay, and high administrative court, the Danıştay. Erdoğan stated that the constitution gave the power to assign these posts to his elected party. In May 2007, the head of Turkey's High Court asked prosecutors to consider whether Erdoğan should be charged over critical comments regarding the election of Abdullah Gül as president. Erdoğan said the ruling was "a disgrace to the justice system", and criticized the Constitutional Court which had invalidated a presidential vote because a boycott by other parties meant there was no quorum. Prosecutors investigated his earlier comments, including saying it had fired a "bullet at democracy". Tülay Tuğcu, head of the Constitutional Court, condemned Erdoğan for "threats, insults and hostility" towards the justice system. Civil–military relations The Turkish military has had a record of intervening in politics, having removed elected governments four times in the past. During the Erdoğan government, civil–military relationship moved towards normalization in which the influence of the military in politics was significantly reduced. The ruling Justice and Development Party has often faced off against the military, gaining political power by challenging a pillar of the country's laicistic establishment. The most significant issue that caused deep fissures between the army and the government was the midnight e-memorandum posted on the military's website objecting to the selection of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül as the ruling party's candidate for the Presidency in 2007. The military argued that the election of Gül, whose wife wears an Islamic headscarf, could undermine the laicistic order of the country. Contrary to expectations, the government responded harshly to former Chief of General Staff Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt's e-memorandum, stating the military had nothing to do with the selection of the presidential candidate. Health care After assuming power in 2003, Erdoğan's government embarked on a sweeping reform program of the Turkish healthcare system, called the Health Transformation Program (HTP), to greatly increase the quality of healthcare and protect all citizens from financial risks. Its introduction coincided with the period of sustained economic growth, allowing the Turkish government to put greater investments into the healthcare system. As part of the reforms, the "Green Card" program, which provides health benefits to the poor, was expanded in 2004. The reform program aimed at increasing the ratio of private to state-run healthcare, which, along with long queues in state-run hospitals, resulted in the rise of private medical care in Turkey, forcing state-run hospitals to compete by increasing quality. In April 2006, Erdoğan unveiled a social security reform package demanded by the International Monetary Fund under a loan deal. The move, which Erdoğan called one of the most radical reforms ever, was passed with fierce opposition. Turkey's three social security bodies were united under one roof, bringing equal health services and retirement benefits for members of all three bodies. The previous system had been criticized for reserving the best healthcare for civil servants and relegating others to wait in long queues. Under the second bill, everyone under the age of 18 years was entitled to free health services, irrespective of whether they pay premiums to any social security organization. The bill also envisages a gradual increase in the retirement age: starting from 2036, the retirement age will increase to 65 by 2048 for both women and men. In January 2008, the Turkish Parliament adopted a law to prohibit smoking in most public places. Erdoğan is outspokenly anti-smoking. Foreign policy Turkish foreign policy during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister has been associated with the name of Ahmet Davutoğlu. Davutoğlu was the chief foreign policy advisor of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan before he was appointed foreign minister in 2009. The basis of Erdoğan's foreign policy is based on the principle of "don't make enemies, make friends" and the pursuit of "zero problems" with neighboring countries. Erdoğan is co-founder of United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (AOC). The initiative seeks to galvanize international action against extremism through the forging of international, intercultural and inter-religious dialogue and cooperation. European Union When Erdoğan came to power, he continued Turkey's long ambition of joining the European Union. On 3 October 2005 negotiations began for Turkey's accession to the European Union. Erdoğan was named "The European of the Year 2004" by the newspaper European Voice for the reforms in his country in order to accomplish the accession of Turkey to the European Union. He said in a comment that "Turkey's accession shows that Europe is a continent where civilisations reconcile and not clash." On 3 October 2005, the negotiations for Turkey's accession to the EU formally started during Erdoğan's tenure as Prime Minister. The European Commission generally supports Erdoğan's reforms, but remains critical of his policies. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize EU member state Cyprus. Greece and Cyprus dispute Relations between Greece and Turkey were normalized during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister. In May 2004, Erdoğan became the first Turkish Prime Minister to visit Greece since 1988, and the first to visit the Turkish minority of Thrace since 1952. In 2007, Erdoğan and Greek Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis inaugurated the Greek-Turkish natural gas pipeline giving Caspian gas its first direct Western outlet. Turkey and Greece signed an agreement to create a Combined Joint Operational Unit within the framework of NATO to participate in Peace Support Operations. Erdoğan and his party strongly supported the EU-backed referendum to reunify Cyprus in 2004. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships as a consequence of the economic isolation of the internationally unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the failure of the EU to end the isolation, as it had promised in 2004. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize the Republic of Cyprus. Armenia Armenia is Turkey's only neighbor which Erdoğan has not visited during his premiership. The Turkish-Armenian border has been closed since 1993 because of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with Turkey's close ally Azerbaijan. Diplomatic efforts resulted in the signing of protocols between Turkish and Armenian Foreign Ministers in Switzerland to improve relations between the two countries. One of the points of the agreement was the creation of a joint commission on the issue. The Armenian Constitutional Court decided that the commission contradicts the Armenian constitution. Turkey responded saying that Armenian court's ruling on the protocols is not acceptable, resulting in a suspension of the rectification process by the Turkish side. Erdoğan has said that Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan should apologize for calling on school children to re-occupy eastern Turkey. When asked by a student at a literature contest ceremony if Armenians will be able to get back their "western territories" along with Mt. Ararat, Sarksyan said, "This is the task of your generation". Russia In December 2004, President Putin visited Turkey, making it the first presidential visit in the history of Turkish-Russian relations besides that of the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Nikolai Podgorny in 1972. In November 2005, Putin attended the inauguration of a jointly constructed Blue Stream natural gas pipeline in Turkey. This sequence of top-level visits has brought several important bilateral issues to the forefront. The two countries consider it their strategic goal to achieve "multidimensional co-operation", especially in the fields of energy, transport and the military. Specifically, Russia aims to invest in Turkey's fuel and energy industries, and it also expects to participate in tenders for the modernisation of Turkey's military. The relations during this time are described by President Medvedev as "Turkey is one of our most important partners with respect to regional and international issues. We can confidently say that Russian-Turkish relations have advanced to the level of a multidimensional strategic partnership". In May 2010, Turkey and Russia signed 17 agreements to enhance cooperation in energy and other fields, including pacts to build Turkey's first nuclear power plant and further plans for an oil pipeline from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. The leaders of both countries also signed an agreement on visa-free travel, enabling tourists to get into the other country for free and stay there for up to 30 days. United States When Barack Obama became President of United States, he made his first overseas bilateral meeting to Turkey in April 2009. At a joint news conference in Turkey, Obama said: "I'm trying to make a statement about the importance of Turkey, not just to the United States but to the world. I think that where there's the most promise of building stronger U.S.-Turkish relations is in the recognition that Turkey and the United States can build a model partnership in which a predominantly Christian nation, a predominantly Muslim nation – a Western nation and a nation that straddles two continents," he continued, "that we can create a modern international community that is respectful, that is secure, that is prosperous, that there are not tensions – inevitable tensions between cultures – which I think is extraordinarily important." Iraq Turkey under Erdoğan was named by the Bush Administration as a part of the "coalition of the willing" that was central to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. On 1 March 2003, a motion allowing Turkish military to participate in the U.S-led coalition's invasion of Iraq, along with the permission for foreign troops to be stationed in Turkey for this purpose, was overruled by the Turkish Parliament. After the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iraq and Turkey signed 48 trade agreements on issues including security, energy, and water. The Turkish government attempted to mend relations with Iraqi Kurdistan by opening a Turkish university in Erbil, and a Turkish consulate in Mosul. Erdoğan's government fostered economic and political relations with Irbil, and Turkey began to consider the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq as an ally against Maliki's government. Israel Erdoğan visited Israel on 1 May 2005, a gesture unusual for a leader of a Muslim majority country. During his trip, Erdoğan visited the Yad Vashem, Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. The President of Israel Shimon Peres addressed the Turkish parliament during a visit in 2007, the first time an Israeli leader had addressed the legislature of a predominantly Muslim nation. Their relationship worsened at the 2009 World Economic Forum conference over Israel's actions during the Gaza War. Erdoğan was interrupted by the moderator while he was responding to Peres. Erdoğan stated: "Mister Peres, you are older than I am. Maybe you are feeling guilty and that is why you are raising your voice. When it comes to killing you know it too well. I remember how you killed the children on beaches..." Upon the moderator's reminder that they needed to adjourn for dinner, Erdoğan left the panel, accusing the moderator of giving Peres more time than all the other panelists combined. Tensions increased further following the Gaza flotilla raid in May 2010. Erdoğan strongly condemned the raid, describing it as "state terrorism", and demanded an Israeli apology. In February 2013, Erdoğan called Zionism a "crime against humanity", comparing it to Islamophobia, antisemitism, and fascism. He later retracted the statement, saying he had been misinterpreted. He said "everyone should know" that his comments were directed at "Israeli policies", especially as regards to "Gaza and the settlements." Erdoğan's statements were criticized by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, among others. In August 2013, the Hürriyet reported that Erdoğan had claimed to have evidence of Israel's responsibility for the removal of Morsi from office in Egypt. The Israeli and Egyptian governments dismissed the suggestion. In response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. He also stated that "If Israel continues with this attitude, it will definitely be tried at international courts." Syria During Erdoğan's term of office, diplomatic relations between Turkey and Syria significantly deteriorated. In 2004, President Bashar al-Assad arrived in Turkey for the first official visit by a Syrian President in 57 years. In late 2004, Erdoğan signed a free trade agreement with Syria. Visa restrictions between the two countries were lifted in 2009, which caused an economic boom in the regions near the Syrian border. However, in 2011 the relationship between the two countries was strained following the outbreak of conflict in Syria. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he was trying to "cultivate a favorable relationship with whatever government would take the place of Assad". However, he began to support the opposition in Syria, after demonstrations turned violent, creating a serious Syrian refugee problem in Turkey. Erdoğan's policy of providing military training for anti-Damascus fighters has also created conflict with Syria's ally and a neighbour of Turkey, Iran. Saudi Arabia In August 2006, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz as-Saud made a visit to Turkey. This was the first visit by a Saudi monarch to Turkey in the last four decades. The monarch made a second visit, on 9 November 2007. Turk-Saudi trade volume has exceeded 3.2 billion in 2006, almost double the figure achieved in 2003. In 2009, this amount reached 5.5 billion and the goal for the year 2010 was 10 billion. Erdoğan condemned the Saudi-led intervention in Bahrain and characterized the Saudi movement as "a new Karbala." He demanded withdrawal of Saudi forces from Bahrain. Egypt Erdoğan had made his first official visit to Egypt on 12 September 2011, accompanied by six ministers and 200 businessmen. This visit was made very soon after Turkey had ejected Israeli ambassadors, cutting off all diplomatic relations with Israel because Israel refused to apologize for the Gaza flotilla raid which killed eight Turkish and one Turco-American. Erdoğan's visit to Egypt was met with much enthusiasm by Egyptians. CNN reported some Egyptians saying "We consider him as the Islamic leader in the Middle East", while others were appreciative of his role in supporting Gaza. Erdoğan was later honored in Tahrir Square by members of the Egyptian Revolution Youth Union, and members of the Turkish embassy were presented with a coat of arms in acknowledgment of the Prime Minister's support of the Egyptian Revolution. Erdoğan stated in a 2011 interview that he supported secularism for Egypt, which generated an angry reaction among Islamic movements, especially the Freedom and Justice Party, which was the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, commentators suggest that by forming an alliance with the military junta during Egypt's transition to democracy, Erdoğan may have tipped the balance in favor of an authoritarian government. Erdoğan condemned the sit-in dispersals conducted by Egyptian police on 14 August 2013 at the Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda squares, where violent clashes between police officers and pro-Morsi Islamist protesters led to hundreds of deaths, mostly protesters. In July 2014, one year after the removal of Mohamed Morsi from office, Erdoğan described Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as an "illegitimate tyrant". Somalia Erdoğan's administration maintains strong ties with the Somali government. During the drought of 2011, Erdoğan's government contributed over $201 million to humanitarian relief efforts in the impacted parts of Somalia. Following a greatly improved security situation in Mogadishu in mid-2011, the Turkish government also re-opened its foreign embassy with the intention of more effectively assisting in the post-conflict development process. It was among the first foreign governments to resume formal diplomatic relations with Somalia after the civil war. In May 2010, the Turkish and Somali governments signed a military training agreement, in keeping with the provisions outlined in the Djibouti Peace Process. Turkish Airlines became the first long-distance international commercial airline in two decades to resume flights to and from Mogadishu's Aden Adde International Airport. Turkey also launched various development and infrastructure projects in Somalia including building several hospitals and helping renovate the National Assembly building. Protests 2013 Gezi Park protests against the perceived authoritarianism of Erdoğan and his policies, starting from a small sit-in in Istanbul in defense of a city park. After the police's intense reaction with tear gas, the protests grew each day. Faced by the largest mass protest in a decade, Erdoğan made this controversial remark in a televised speech: "The police were there yesterday, they are there today, and they will be there tomorrow". After weeks of clashes in the streets of Istanbul, his government at first apologized to the protestors and called for a plebiscite, but then ordered a crackdown on the protesters. Presidency (2014–present) Erdoğan took the oath of office on 28 August 2014 and became the 12th president of Turkey. He administered the new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu's oath on 29 August. When asked about his lower-than-expected 51.79% share of the vote, he allegedly responded, "there were even those who did not like the Prophet. I, however, won 52%". Assuming the role of President, Erdoğan was criticized for openly stating that he would not maintain the tradition of presidential neutrality. Erdoğan has also stated his intention to pursue a more active role as president, such as utilising the President's rarely used cabinet-calling powers. The political opposition has argued that Erdoğan will continue to pursue his own political agenda, controlling the government, while his new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu would be docile and submissive. Furthermore, the domination of loyal Erdoğan supporters in Davutoğlu's cabinet fuelled speculation that Erdoğan intended to exercise substantial control over the government. Presidential elections On 1 July 2014, Erdoğan was named the AKP's presidential candidate in the Turkish presidential election. His candidacy was announced by the Deputy President of the AKP, Mehmet Ali Şahin. Erdoğan made a speech after the announcement and used the 'Erdoğan logo' for the first time. The logo was criticised because it was very similar to the logo that U.S. President Barack Obama used in the 2008 presidential election. Erdoğan was elected as the President of Turkey in the first round of the election with 51.79% of the vote, obviating the need for a run-off by winning over 50%. The joint candidate of the CHP, MHP and 13 other opposition parties, former Organisation of Islamic Co-operation general secretary Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu won 38.44% of the vote. The pro-Kurdish HDP candidate Selahattin Demirtaş won 9.76%. The 2018 Turkish presidential election took place as part of the 2018 general election, alongside parliamentary elections on the same day. Following the approval of constitutional changes in a referendum held in 2017, the elected President will be both the head of state and head of government of Turkey, taking over the latter role from the to-be-abolished office of the Prime Minister. Incumbent president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declared his candidacy for the People's Alliance (Turkish: Cumhur İttifakı) on 27 April 2018. Erdoğan's main opposition, the Republican People's Party, nominated Muharrem İnce, a member of the parliament known for his combative opposition and spirited speeches against Erdoğan. Besides these candidates, Meral Akşener, the founder and leader of İyi Party, Temel Karamollaoğlu, the leader of the Felicity Party and Doğu Perinçek, the leader of the Patriotic Party, have announced their candidacies and collected the 100,000 signatures required for nomination. The alliance which Erdoğan was candidate for won 52.59% of the popular vote. Referendum In April 2017, a constitutional referendum was held, where the voters in Turkey (and Turkish citizens abroad) approved a set of 18 proposed amendments to the Constitution of Turkey. The amendments included the replacement of the existing parliamentary system with a presidential system. The post of Prime Minister would be abolished, and the presidency would become an executive post vested with broad executive powers. The parliament seats would be increased from 550 to 600 and the age of candidacy to the parliament was lowered from 25 to 18. The referendum also called for changes to the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors. Local elections In the 2019 local elections, the ruling party AKP lost control of Istanbul and Ankara for the first time in 25 years, as well as 5 of Turkey's 6 largest cities. The loss has been widely attributed to Erdoğan's mismanagement of the Turkish economic crisis, rising authoritarianism as well as the alleged government inaction on the Syrian refugee crisis. Soon after the elections, Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey ordered a re-election in Istanbul, cancelling Ekrem İmamoğlu's mayoral certificate. The decision led to a significant decrease of Erdoğan's and AKP's popularity and his party lost the elections again in June with a greater margin. The result was seen as a huge blow to Erdoğan, who had once said that if his party 'lost Istanbul, we would lose Turkey. The opposition's victory was characterised as 'the beginning of the end' for Erdoğan', with international commentators calling the re-run a huge government miscalculation that led to a potential İmamoğlu candidacy in the next scheduled presidential election. It is suspected that the scale of the government's defeat could provoke a cabinet reshuffle and early general elections, currently scheduled for June 2023. The New Zealand and Australian governments and opposition CHP party have criticized Erdoğan after he repeatedly showed video taken by the Christchurch mosque shooter to his supporters at campaign rallies for 31 March local elections and said Australians and New Zealanders who came to Turkey with anti-Muslim sentiments "would be sent back in coffins like their grandfathers" at Gallipoli. Domestic policy Presidential palace Erdoğan has also received criticism for the construction of a new palace called Ak Saray (pure white palace), which occupies approximately 50 acres of Atatürk Forest Farm (AOÇ) in Ankara. Since the AOÇ is protected land, several court orders were issued to halt the construction of the new palace, though building work went on nonetheless. The opposition described the move as a clear disregard for the rule of law. The project was subject to heavy criticism and allegations were made; of corruption during the construction process, wildlife destruction and the complete obliteration of the zoo in the AOÇ in order to make way for the new compound. The fact that the palace is technically illegal has led to it being branded as the 'Kaç-Ak Saray', the word kaçak in Turkish meaning 'illegal'. Ak Saray was originally designed as a new office for the Prime Minister. However, upon assuming the presidency, Erdoğan announced that the palace would become the new Presidential Palace, while the Çankaya Mansion will be used by the Prime Minister instead. The move was seen as a historic change since the Çankaya Mansion had been used as the iconic office of the presidency ever since its inception. The Ak Saray has almost 1,000 rooms and cost $350 million (€270 million), leading to huge criticism at a time when mining accidents and workers' rights had been dominating the agenda. On 29 October 2014, Erdoğan was due to hold a Republic Day reception in the new palace to commemorate the 91st anniversary of the Republic of Turkey and to officially inaugurate the Presidential Palace. However, after most invited participants announced that they would boycott the event and a mining accident occurred in the district of Ermenek in Karaman, the reception was cancelled. The media President Erdoğan and his government continue to press for court action against the remaining free press in Turkey. The latest newspaper that has been seized is Zaman, in March 2016. After the seizure Morton Abramowitz and Eric Edelman, former U.S. ambassadors to Turkey, condemned President Erdoğan's actions in an opinion piece published by The Washington Post: "Clearly, democracy cannot flourish under Erdoğan now". "The overall pace of reforms in Turkey has not only slowed down but in some key areas, such as freedom of expression and the independence of the judiciary, there has been a regression, which is particularly worrying", rapporteur Kati Piri said in April 2016 after the European Parliament passed its annual progress report on Turkey. On 22 June 2016, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that he considered himself successful in "destroying" Turkish civil groups "working against the state", a conclusion that had been confirmed some days earlier by Sedat Laçiner, Professor of International Relations and rector of the Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University: "Outlawing unarmed and peaceful opposition, sentencing people to unfair punishment under erroneous terror accusations, will feed genuine terrorism in Erdoğan’s Turkey. Guns and violence will become the sole alternative for legally expressing free thought". After the coup attempt, over 200 journalists were arrested and over 120 media outlets were closed. Cumhuriyet journalists were detained in November 2016 after a long-standing crackdown on the newspaper. Subsequently, Reporters Without Borders called Erdoğan an "enemy of press freedom" and said that he "hides his aggressive dictatorship under a veneer of democracy". In April 2017, Turkey blocked all access to Wikipedia over a content dispute. The Turkish government lifted a two-and-a-half-year ban on Wikipedia on 15 January 2020, restoring access to the online encyclopedia a month after Turkey's top court ruled that blocking Wikipedia was unconstitutional. On 1 July 2020, in a statement made to his party members, Erdoğan announced that the government would introduce new measures and regulations to control or shut down social media platforms such as YouTube, Twitter and Netflix. Through these new measures, each company would be required to appoint an official representative in the country to respond to legal concerns. The decision comes after a number of Twitter users insulted his daughter Esra after she welcomed her fourth child. State of emergency and purges On 20 July 2016, President Erdoğan declared the state of emergency, citing the coup d'état attempt as justification. It was first scheduled to last three months. The Turkish parliament approved this measure. The state of emergency was later extended for another three months, amidst the ongoing 2016 Turkish purges including comprehensive purges of independent media and detention of tens of thousands of Turkish citizens politically opposed to Erdoğan. More than 50,000 people have been arrested and over 160,000 fired from their jobs by March 2018. In August 2016, Erdoğan began rounding up journalists who had been publishing, or who were about to publish articles questioning corruption within the Erdoğan administration, and incarcerating them. The number of Turkish journalists jailed by Turkey is higher than any other country, including all of those journalists currently jailed in North Korea, Cuba, Russia, and China combined. In the wake of the coup attempt of July 2016 the Erdoğan administration began rounding up tens of thousands of individuals, both from within the government, and from the public sector, and incarcerating them on charges of alleged "terrorism". As a result of these arrests, many in the international community complained about the lack of proper judicial process in the incarceration of Erdoğan's opposition. In April 2017 Erdoğan successfully sponsored legislation effectively making it illegal for the Turkish legislative branch to investigate his executive branch of government. Without the checks and balances of freedom of speech, and the freedom of the Turkish legislature to hold him accountable for his actions, many have likened Turkey's current form of government to a dictatorship with only nominal forms of democracy in practice. At the time of Erdoğan's successful passing of the most recent legislation silencing his opposition, United States President Donald Trump called Erdoğan to congratulate him for his "recent referendum victory". On 29 April 2017 Erdoğan's administration began an internal Internet block of all of the Wikipedia online encyclopedia site via Turkey's domestic Internet filtering system. This blocking action took place after the government had first made a request for Wikipedia to remove what it referred to as "offensive content". In response, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales replied via a post on Twitter stating, "Access to information is a fundamental human right. Turkish people, I will always stand with you and fight for this right." In January 2016, more than a thousand academics signed a petition criticizing Turkey's military crackdown on ethnic Kurdish towns and neighborhoods in the east of the country, such as Sur (a district of Diyarbakır), Silvan, Nusaybin, Cizre and Silopi, and asking an end to violence. Erdoğan accused those who signed the petition of "terrorist propaganda", calling them "the darkest of people". He called for action by institutions and universities, stating, "Everyone who benefits from this state but is now an enemy of the state must be punished without further delay". Within days, over 30 of the signatories were arrested, many in dawn-time raids on their homes. Although all were quickly released, nearly half were fired from their jobs, eliciting a denunciation from Turkey's Science Academy for such "wrong and disturbing" treatment. Erdoğan vowed that the academics would pay the price for "falling into a pit of treachery". On 8 July 2018, Erdoğan sacked 18,000 officials for alleged ties to US based cleric Fethullah Gülen, shortly before renewing his term as an executive president. Of those removed, 9000 were police officers with 5000 from the armed forces with the addition of hundreds of academics. Foreign policy Europe In February 2016, Erdoğan threatened to send the millions of refugees in Turkey to EU member states, saying: "We can open the doors to Greece and Bulgaria anytime and we can put the refugees on buses ... So how will you deal with refugees if you don't get a deal?" In an interview to the news magazine Der Spiegel, German minister of defence Ursula von der Leyen said on 11 March 2016 that the refugee crisis had made good cooperation between EU and Turkey an "existentially important" issue. "Therefore it is right to advance now negotiations on Turkey's EU accession". In its resolution "The functioning of democratic institutions in Turkey" from 22 June 2016, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe warned that "recent developments in Turkey pertaining to freedom of the media and of expression, erosion of the rule of law and the human rights violations in relation to anti-terrorism security operations in south-east Turkey have ... raised serious questions about the functioning of its democratic institutions". On 20 August 2016, Erdoğan told his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko that Turkey would not recognize the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea; calling it "Crimea's occupation". In January 2017, Erdoğan said that the withdrawal of Turkish troops from Northern Cyprus is "out of the question" and Turkey will be in Cyprus "forever". There is a long-standing dispute between Turkey and Greece in the Aegean Sea. Erdoğan warned that Greece will pay a "heavy price" if Turkey's gas exploration vessel – in what Turkey said are disputed waters – is attacked. In September 2020, Erdoğan declared his government's support for Azerbaijan following clashes between Armenian and Azeri forces over a disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. He dismissed demands for a ceasefire. Diaspora In March 2017, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated to the Turks in Europe, "Make not three, but five children. Because you are the future of Europe. That will be the best response to the injustices against you." This has been interpreted as an imperialist call for demographic warfare. According to The Economist, Erdoğan is the first Turkish leader to take the Turkish diaspora seriously, which has created friction within these diaspora communities and between the Turkish government and several of its European counterparts. The Balkans In February 2018, President Erdoğan expressed Turkish support of the Republic of Macedonia's position during negotiations over the Macedonia naming dispute saying that Greece's position is wrong. In March 2018, President Erdoğan criticized the Kosovan Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj for dismissing his Interior Minister and Intelligence Chief for failing to inform him of an unauthorized and illegal secret operation conducted by the National Intelligence Organization of Turkey on Kosovo's territory that led to the arrest of six people allegedly associated with the Gülen movement. On 26 November 2019, an earthquake struck the Durrës region of Albania. President Erdoğan expressed his condolences. and citing close Albanian-Turkish relations, he committed Turkey to reconstructing 500 earthquake destroyed homes and other civic structures in Laç, Albania. In Istanbul, Erdoğan organised and attended a donors conference (8 December) to assist Albania that included Turkish businessmen, investors and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama. United Kingdom In May 2018, British Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed Erdoğan to the United Kingdom for a three-day state visit. Erdoğan declared that the United Kingdom is "an ally and a strategic partner, but also a real friend. The cooperation we have is well beyond any mechanism that we have established with other partners." Israel Relations between Turkey and Israel began to normalize after Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu officially apologized for the death of the nine Turkish activists during the Gaza flotilla raid. However, in response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of being "more barbaric than Hitler", and conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. In December 2017, President Erdoğan issued a warning to Donald Trump, after the U.S. President acknowledged Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Erdoğan stated, "Jerusalem is a red line for Muslims", indicating that naming Jerusalem as Israel's capital would alienate Palestinians and other Muslims from the city, undermining hopes at a future capital of a Palestinian State. Erdoğan called Israel a "terrorist state". Naftali Bennett dismissed the threats, claiming "Erdoğan does not miss an opportunity to attack Israel". In April 2019, Erdoğan said the West Bank belongs to Palestinians, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would annex Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories if he is re-elected. Erdoğan condemned the Israel–UAE peace agreement, stating that Turkey was considering suspending or cutting off diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates in retaliation. Syrian Civil War Amid allegations of Turkish collaboration with the Islamic State, the 2014 Kobanî protests broke out near the Syrian border city of Kobanî, in protest against the government's perceived facilitation of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant during the Siege of Kobanî. 42 protestors were killed during a brutal police crackdown. Asserting that aid to the Kurdish-majority People's Protection Units (YPG) fighters in Syria would assist the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) (then on ceasefire) in Turkey, Erdoğan held bilateral talks with Barack Obama regarding IS during the 5–6 September 2014 NATO summit in Newport, Wales. In early October, United States Vice President Joe Biden criticised the Turkish government for supplying jihadists in Syria and said Erdoğan had expressed regret to him about letting foreign jihadists transit through Turkey en route to Syria. Erdoğan angrily responded, "Biden has to apologize for his statements" adding that if no apology is made, Biden would become "history to me." Biden subsequently apologised. In response to the U.S. request to use İncirlik Air Base to conduct air strikes against IS, Erdoğan demanded that Bashar al-Assad be removed from power first. Turkey lost its bid for a Security Council seat in the United Nations during the 2014 election; the unexpected result is believed to have been a reaction to Erdoğan's hostile treatment of the Kurds fighting ISIS on the Syrian border and a rebuke of his willingness to support IS-aligned insurgents opposed to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. In 2015, there were consistent allegations that Erdoğan maintained financial links with the Islamic State, including allegation of his son-in-law Berat Albayrak's involvement with oil production and smuggling in ISIL. Revelations that the state was supplying arms to militant groups in Syria in the 2014 National Intelligence Organisation lorry scandal led to accusations of high treason. In July 2015, Turkey became involved in the international military intervention against ISIL, simultaneously launching airstrikes against PKK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan. As of 2015, Turkey began openly supporting the Army of Conquest, a coalition of Syrian rebel groups that included al-Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham. In late November 2016, Erdoğan said that the Turkish military launched its operations in Syria to end Assad's rule, but retracted this statement shortly afterwards. In January 2018, the Turkish military and its Syrian National Army and Sham Legion allies began the Turkish military operation in Afrin in the Kurdish-majority Afrin Canton in Northern Syria, against the YPG. On 10 April, Erdoğan rejected a Russian demand to return Afrin to Syrian government control. In October 2019, after Erdoğan spoke to him, U.S. President Donald Trump gave the go-ahead to the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria, despite recently agreeing to a Northern Syria Buffer Zone. U.S. troops in northern Syria were withdrawn from the border to avoid interference with the Turkish operation. After the U.S. pullout, Turkey proceeded to attack the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria. Rejecting criticism of the invasion, Erdoğan claimed that NATO and European Union countries "sided with terrorists, and all of them attacked us". China Bilateral trade between Turkey and China increased from $1 billion a year in 2002 to $27 billion annually in 2017. Erdoğan has stated that Turkey might consider joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation instead of the European Union. Qatar blockade In June 2017 during a speech, Erdoğan called the isolation of Qatar as "inhumane and against Islamic values" and that "victimising Qatar through smear campaigns serves no purpose". Myanmar In September 2017, Erdoğan condemned the persecution of Muslims in Myanmar and accused Myanmar of "genocide" against the Muslim minority. United States Over time, Turkey began to look for ways to buy its own missile defense system and also to use that procurement to build up its own capacity to manufacture and sell an air and missile defense system. Turkey got serious about acquiring a missile defense system early in the first Obama administration when it opened a competition between the Raytheon Patriot PAC 2 system and systems from Europe, Russia, and even China. Taking advantage of the new low in U.S.-Turkish relations, Putin saw his chance to use an S-400 sale to Turkey, so in July 2017, he offered the air defense system to Turkey. In the months that followed, the United States warned Turkey that a S-400 purchase jeopardized Turkey's F-35 purchase. Integration of the Russian system into the NATO air defense net was also out of the question. Administration officials, including Mark Esper, warned that Turkey had to choose between the S-400 and the F-35. That they couldn't have both. The S-400 deliveries to Turkey began on 12 July. On 16 July, Trump mentioned to reporters that withholding the F-35 from Turkey was unfair. Said the president, "So what happens is we have a situation where Turkey is very good with us, very good, and we are now telling Turkey that because you have really been forced to buy another missile system, we’re not going to sell you the F-35 fighter jets". The U.S. Congress has made clear on a bipartisan basis that it expects the president to sanction Turkey for buying Russian equipment. Out of the F-35, Turkey now considers buying Russian fifth-generation jet fighter Su-57. On 1 August 2018, the U.S. Department of Treasury sanctioned two senior Turkish government ministers who were involved in the detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson. Erdoğan said that the U.S. behavior will force Turkey to look for new friends and allies. The U.S.–Turkey tensions appear to be the most serious diplomatic crisis between the NATO allies in years. Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton claimed that President Donald Trump told Erdoğan he would 'take care' of investigation against Turkey's state-owned bank Halkbank accused of bank fraud charges and laundering up to $20 billion on behalf of Iranian entities. Turkey criticized Bolton's book, saying it included misleading accounts of conversations between Trump and Erdoğan. In August 2020, the former vice president and presidential candidate Joe Biden called for a new U.S. approach to the "autocrat" President Erdoğan and support for Turkish opposition parties. In September 2020, Biden demanded that Erdoğan "stay out" of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, in which Turkey has supported the Azeris. Venezuela Relations with Venezuela were strengthened with recent developments and high level mutual visits. The first official visit between the two countries at presidential level was in October 2017 when Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro visited Turkey. In December 2018, Erdoğan visited Venezuela for the first time and expressed his will to build strong relations with Venezuela and expressed hope that high-level visits "will increasingly continue." Reuters reported that in 2018 23 tons of mined gold were taken from Venezuela to Istanbul. In the first nine months of 2018, Venezuela's gold exports to Turkey rose from zero in the previous year to US$900 million. During the Venezuelan presidential crisis, Erdoğan voiced solidarity with Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro and criticized U.S. sanctions against Venezuela, saying that "political problems cannot be resolved by punishing an entire nation." Following the 2019 Venezuelan uprising attempt, Erdoğan condemned the actions of lawmaker Juan Guaidó, tweeting "Those who are in an effort to appoint a postmodern colonial governor to Venezuela, where the President was appointed by elections and where the people rule, should know that only democratic elections can determine how a country is governed". Events Coup d'état attempt On 15 July 2016, a coup d'état was attempted by the military, with aims to remove Erdoğan from government. By the next day, Erdoğan's government managed to reassert effective control in the country. Reportedly, no government official was arrested or harmed, which, among other factors, raised the suspicion of a false flag event staged by the government itself. Erdoğan, as well as other government officials, has blamed an exiled cleric, and a former ally of Erdoğan, Fethullah Gülen, for staging the coup attempt. Süleyman Soylu, Minister of Labor in Erdoğan's government, accused the US of planning a coup to oust Erdoğan. Erdoğan, as well as other high-ranking Turkish government officials, has issued repeated demands to the US to extradite Gülen. Following the coup attempt, there has been a significant deterioration in Turkey-US relations. European and other world leaders have expressed their concerns over the situation in Turkey, with many of them warning Erdoğan not to use the coup attempt as an excuse to crack down on his opponents. The rise of ISIS and the collapse of the Kurdish peace process had led to a sharp rise in terror incidents in Turkey until 2016. Erdoğan was accused by his critics of having a 'soft corner' for ISIS. However, after the attempted coup, Erdoğan ordered the Turkish military into Syria to combat ISIS and Kurdish militant groups. Erdoğan's critics have decried purges in the education system and judiciary as undermining the rule of law however Erdoğan supporters argue this is a necessary measure as Gulen-linked schools cheated on entrance exams, requiring a purge in the education system and of the Gulen followers who then entered the judiciary. Erdoğan's plan is "to reconstitute Turkey as a presidential system. The plan would create a centralized system that would enable him to better tackle Turkey's internal and external threats. One of the main hurdles allegedly standing in his way is Fethullah Gulen's movement ..." In the aftermath of the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt, a groundswell of national unity and consensus emerged for cracking down on the coup plotters with a National Unity rally held in Turkey that included Islamists, secularists, liberals and nationalists. Erdoğan has used this consensus to remove Gulen's followers from the bureaucracy, curtail their role in NGOs, Turkey's Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Turkish military, with 149 Generals discharged. In a foreign policy shift Erdoğan ordered the Turkish Armed Forces into battle in Syria and has liberated towns from IS control. As relations with Europe soured over in the aftermath of the attempted coup, Erdoğan developed alternative relationships with Russia, Saudi Arabia and a "strategic partnership" with Pakistan, with plans to cultivate relations through free trade agreements and deepening military relations for mutual co-operation with Turkey's regional allies. 2018 currency and debt crisis The Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018 was caused by the Turkish economy's excessive current account deficit and foreign-currency debt, in combination with Erdoğan's increasing authoritarianism and his unorthodox ideas about interest rate policy. Economist Paul Krugman described the unfolding crisis as "a classic currency-and-debt crisis, of a kind we’ve seen many times", adding: "At such a time, the quality of leadership suddenly matters a great deal. You need officials who understand what's happening, can devise a response and have enough credibility that markets give them the benefit of the doubt. Some emerging markets have those things, and they are riding out the turmoil fairly well. The Erdoğan regime has none of that". Ideology and public image Early during his premiership, Erdoğan was praised as a role model for emerging Middle Eastern nations due to several reform packages initiated by his government which expanded religious freedoms and minority rights as part of accession negotiations with the European Union. However, his government underwent several crises including the Sledgehammer coup and the Ergenekon trials, corruption scandals, accusations of media intimidation, as well as the pursuit of an increasingly polarizing political agenda; the opposition accused the government of inciting political hatred throughout the country. Critics say that Erdoğan's government legitimizes homophobia, as Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". Neo-Ottomanism As President, Erdoğan has overseen a revival of Ottoman tradition, greeting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas with an Ottoman-style ceremony in the new presidential palace, with guards dressed in costumes representing founders of 16 Great Turkish Empires in history. While serving as the Prime Minister of Turkey, Erdoğan's AKP made references to the Ottoman era during election campaigns, such as calling their supporters 'grandsons of Ottomans' (Osmanlı torunu). This proved controversial, since it was perceived to be an open attack against the republican nature of modern Turkey founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. In 2015, Erdoğan made a statement in which he endorsed the old Ottoman term külliye to refer to university campuses rather than the standard Turkish word kampüs. Many critics have thus accused Erdoğan of wanting to become an Ottoman sultan and abandon the secular and democratic credentials of the Republic. One of the most cited scholars alive, Noam Chomsky, said that "Erdogan in Turkey is basically trying to create something like the Ottoman Caliphate, with him as caliph, supreme leader, throwing his weight around all over the place, and destroying the remnants of democracy in Turkey at the same time". When pressed on this issue in January 2015, Erdoğan denied these claims and said that he would aim to be more like Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom rather than like an Ottoman sultan. In July 2020, after the Council of State annulled the Cabinet's 1934 decision to establish the Hagia Sophia as museum and revoking the monument's status, Erdoğan ordered its reclassification as a mosque. The 1934 decree was ruled to be unlawful under both Ottoman and Turkish law as Hagia Sophia's waqf, endowed by Sultan Mehmed II, had designated the site a mosque; proponents of the decision argued the Hagia Sophia was the personal property of the sultan. This redesignation is controversial, invoking condemnation from the Turkish opposition, UNESCO, the World Council of Churches, the Holy See, and many other international leaders. In August 2020, he also signed the order that transferred the administration of the Chora Church to the Directorate of Religious Affairs to open it for worship as a mosque. Initially converted to a mosque by the Ottomans, the building had then been designated as a museum by the government since 1934. Authoritarianism Erdoğan has served as the de facto leader of Turkey since 2002. In response to criticism, Erdoğan made a speech in May 2014 denouncing allegations of dictatorship, saying that the leader of the opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who was there at the speech, would not be able to "roam the streets" freely if he were a dictator. Kılıçdaroğlu responded that political tensions would cease to exist if Erdoğan stopped making his polarising speeches for three days. One observer said it was a measure of the state of Turkish democracy that Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu could openly threaten, on 20 December 2015, that, if his party did not win the election, Turkish Kurds would endure a repeat of the era of the "white Toros", the Turkish name for the Renault 12, "a car associated with the gendarmarie’s fearsome intelligence agents, who carried out thousands of extrajudicial executions of Kurdish nationalists during the 1990s". In February 2015, a 13-year-old was charged by a prosecutor after allegedly insulting Erdoğan on Facebook. In 2016, a waiter was arrested for insulting Erdoğan by allegedly saying "If Erdoğan comes here, I will not even serve tea to him.". In April 2014, the President of the Constitutional Court, Haşim Kılıç, accused Erdoğan of damaging the credibility of the judiciary, labelling Erdoğan's attempts to increase political control over the courts as 'desperate'. During the chaotic 2007 presidential election, the military issued an E-memorandum warning the government to keep within the boundaries of secularism when choosing a candidate. Regardless, Erdoğan's close relations with Fethullah Gülen and his Cemaat Movement allowed his government to maintain a degree of influence within the judiciary through Gülen's supporters in high judicial and bureaucratic offices. Shortly after, an alleged coup plot codenamed Sledgehammer became public and resulted in the imprisonment of 300 military officers including İbrahim Fırtına, Çetin Doğan and Engin Alan. Several opposition politicians, journalists and military officers also went on trial for allegedly being part of an ultra-nationalist organisation called Ergenekon. Both cases were marred by irregularities and were condemned as a joint attempt by Erdoğan and Gülen to curb opposition to the AKP. The original Sledgehammer document containing the coup plans, allegedly written in 2003, was found to have been written using Microsoft Word 2007. Despite both domestic and international calls for these irregularities to be addressed in order to guarantee a fair trial, Erdoğan instead praised his government for bringing the coup plots to light. When Gülen publicly withdrew support and openly attacked Erdoğan in late 2013, several imprisoned military officers and journalists were released, with the government admitting that the judicial proceedings were unfair. When Gülen withdrew support from the AKP government in late 2013, a government corruption scandal broke out, leading to the arrest of several family members of cabinet ministers. Erdoğan accused Gülen of co-ordinating a "parallel state" within the judiciary in an attempt to topple him from power. He then removed or reassigned several judicial officials in an attempt to remove Gülen's supporters from office. Erdoğan's 'purge' was widely questioned and criticised by the European Union. In early 2014, a new law was passed by parliament giving the government greater control over the judiciary, which sparked public protest throughout the country. International organisations perceived the law to be a danger to the separation of powers. Several judicial officials removed from their posts said that they had been removed due to their secularist credentials. The political opposition accused Erdoğan of not only attempting to remove Gülen supporters, but supporters of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's principles as well, in order to pave the way for increased politicisation of the judiciary. Several family members of Erdoğan's ministers who had been arrested as a result of the 2013 corruption scandal were released, and a judicial order to question Erdoğan's son Bilal Erdoğan was annulled. Controversy erupted when it emerged that many of the newly appointed judicial officials were actually AKP supporters. İslam Çiçek, a judge who ejected the cases of five ministers' relatives accused of corruption, was accused of being an AKP supporter and an official investigation was launched into his political affiliations. On 1 September 2014, the courts dissolved the cases of 96 suspects, which included Bilal Erdoğan. During a televised press conference he was asked if he believed a presidential system was possible in a unitary state. Erdoğan affirmed this and cited Nazi Germany (among other examples) as a case where such a combination existed. However, the Turkish president's office said that Erdoğan was not advocating a Hitler-style government when he called for a state system with a strong executive, and added that the Turkish president had declared the "Holocaust, anti-semitism and Islamophobia" as crimes against humanity and that it was out of the question for him to cite Hitler's Germany as a good example. Suppression of dissent Erdoğan has been criticised for his politicisation of the media, especially after the 2013 protests. The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) alleged that over 1,863 journalists lost their jobs due to their anti-government views in 12 years of AKP rule. Opposition politicians have also alleged that intimidation in the media is due to the government's attempt to restructure the ownership of private media corporations. Journalists from the Cihan News Agency and the Gülenist Zaman newspaper were repeatedly barred from attending government press conferences or asking questions. Several opposition journalists such as Soner Yalçın were controversially arrested as part of the Ergenekon trials and Sledgehammer coup investigation. Veli Ağbaba, a CHP politician, has called the AKP the 'biggest media boss in Turkey.' In 2015, 74 US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to state their concern over what they saw as deviations from the basic principles of democracy in Turkey and oppressions of Erdoğan over media. Notable cases of media censorship occurred during the 2013 anti-government protests, when the mainstream media did not broadcast any news regarding the demonstrations for three days after they began. The lack of media coverage was symbolised by CNN International covering the protests while CNN Türk broadcast a documentary about penguins at the same time. The Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK) controversially issued a fine to pro-opposition news channels including Halk TV and Ulusal Kanal for their coverage of the protests, accusing them of broadcasting footage that could be morally, physically and mentally destabilising to children. Erdoğan was criticised for not responding to the accusations of media intimidation, and caused international outrage after telling a female journalist (Amberin Zaman of The Economist) to know her place and calling her a 'shameless militant' during his 2014 presidential election campaign. While the 2014 presidential election was not subject to substantial electoral fraud, Erdoğan was again criticised for receiving disproportionate media attention in comparison to his rivals. The British newspaper The Times commented that between 2 and 4 July, the state-owned media channel TRT gave 204 minutes of coverage to Erdoğan's campaign and less than a total of 3 minutes to both his rivals. Erdoğan also tightened controls over the Internet, signing into law a bill which allows the government to block websites without prior court order on 12 September 2014. His government blocked Twitter and YouTube in late March 2014 following the release of a recording of a conversation between him and his son Bilal, where Erdoğan allegedly warned his family to 'nullify' all cash reserves at their home amid the 2013 corruption scandal. Erdoğan has undertaken a media campaign that attempts to portray the presidential family as frugal and simple-living; their palace electricity-bill is estimated at $500,000 per month. In May 2016, former Miss Turkey model Merve Büyüksaraç was sentenced to more than a year in prison for allegedly insulting the president. In a 2016 news story, Bloomberg reported, "more than 2,000 cases have been opened against journalists, cartoonists, teachers, a former Miss Turkey, and even schoolchildren in the past two years". In November 2016, the Turkish government blocked access to social media in all of Turkey as well as sought to completely block Internet access for the citizens in the southeast of the country. Mehmet Aksoy lawsuit In 2009, Turkish sculptor Mehmet Aksoy created the Statue of Humanity in Kars to promote reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia. When visiting the city in 2011, Erdoğan deemed the statue a "freak", and months later it was demolished. Aksoy sued Erdoğan for "moral indemnities", although his lawyer said that his statement was a critique rather than an insult. In March 2015, a judge ordered Erdoğan to pay 10,000 liras. Erdoğanism Erdoğan has produced many aphorisms and catch-phrases known as Erdoğanisms. The term Erdoğanism first emerged shortly after Erdoğan's 2011 general election victory, where it was predominantly described as the AKP's liberal economic and conservative democratic ideals fused with Erdoğan demagoguery and cult of personality. Views on minorities LGBT In 2002, Erdoğan said that "homosexuals must be legally protected within the framework of their rights and freedoms. From time to time, we do not find the treatment they get on some television screens humane", he said. However, in 2017 Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Turkey's top Muslim scholar and President of Religious Affairs, Ali Erbaş, said in a Friday Ramadan announcement that country condemns homosexuality because it "brings illness," insinuating that same sex relations are responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan backed Erbaş, saying that what Erbaş "said was totally right." Jews While Erdoğan has declared several times being against antisemitism, he has been accused of invoking antisemitic stereotypes in public statements. According to Erdoğan, he had been inspired by novelist and Islamist ideologue Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, a publisher (among others) of antisemitic literature. Others During a live interview in 2014, he said: "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian. Excuse me, but they have said even uglier things. They have called me Armenian, but I am Turkish." Honours and accolades Foreign honours Russia: Medal "In Commemoration of the 1000th Anniversary of Kazan" (1 June 2006) Pakistan: Nishan-e-Pakistan, the highest civilian award in Pakistan (26 October 2009) Georgia: Order of Golden Fleece, awarded for his contribution to development of bilateral relations (17 May 2010) Kyrgyzstan: Danaker Order in Bishkek (2 February 2011) Azerbaijan: Heydar Aliyev Order (3 September 2014) Belgium: Grand Cordon in the Order of Leopold (5 October 2015) Madagascar: Knight Grand Cross in the national Order (25 January 2017) Gagauzia: Order of Gagauz-Yeri in Comrat (18 October 2018) Venezuela: Order of the Liberator, Grand Cordon (3 December 2018) Ukraine: Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise (16 October 2020) Other awards 29 January 2004: Profile of Courage Award from the American Jewish Congress, for promoting peace between cultures. Returned at the request of the A.J.C. in July 2014. 13 June 2004: Golden Plate award from the Academy of Achievement during the conference in Chicago. 3 October 2004: German Quadriga prize for improving relationships between different cultures. 2 September 2005: Mediterranean Award for Institutions (). This was awarded by the Fondazione Mediterraneo. 8 August 2006: Caspian Energy Integration Award from the Caspian Integration Business Club. 1 November 2006: Outstanding Service award from the Turkish humanitarian organization Red Crescent. 2 February 2007: Dialogue Between Cultures Award from the President of Tatarstan Mintimer Shaimiev. 15 April 2007: Crystal Hermes Award from the German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the opening of the Hannover Industrial Fair. 11 July 2007: highest award of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the Agricola Medal, in recognition of his contribution to agricultural and social development in Turkey. 11 May 2009: Avicenna award from the Avicenna Foundation in Frankfurt, Germany. 9 June 2009: guest of honor at the 20th Crans Montana Forum in Brussels and received the Prix de la Fondation, for democracy and freedom. 25 June 2009: Key to the City of Tirana on the occasion of his state visit to Albania. 29 December 2009: Award for Contribution to World Peace from the Turgut Özal Thought and Move Association. 12 January 2010: King Faisal International Prize for "service to Islam" from the King Faisal Foundation. 23 February 2010: Nodo Culture Award from the mayor of Seville for his efforts to launch the Alliance of Civilizations initiative. 1 March 2010: United Nations–HABITAT award in memorial of Rafik Hariri. A seven-member international jury unanimously found Erdoğan deserving of the award because of his "excellent achievement and commendable conduct in the area of leadership, statesmanship and good governance. Erdoğan also initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors." 27 May 2010: medal of honor from the Brazilian Federation of Industry for the State of São Paulo (FIESP) for his contributions to industry 31 May 2010: World Health Organization 2010 World No Tobacco Award for "his dedicated leadership on tobacco control in Turkey." 29 June 2010: 2010 World Family Award from the World Family Organization which operates under the umbrella of the United Nations. 4 November 2010: Golden Medal of Independence, an award conferred upon Kosovo citizens and foreigners that have contributed to the independence of Kosovo. 25 November 2010: "Leader of the Year" award presented by the Union of Arab Banks in Lebanon. 11 January 2011: "Outstanding Personality in the Islamic World Award" of the Sheikh Fahad al-Ahmad International Award for Charity in Kuwait. 25 October 2011: Palestinian International Award for Excellence and Creativity (PIA) 2011 for his support to the Palestinian people and cause. 21 January 2012: 'Gold Statue 2012 Special Award' by the Polish Business Center Club (BCC). Erdoğan was awarded for his systematic effort to clear barriers on the way to economic growth, striving to build democracy and free market relations. 2020: Ig Nobel Prize "for using the COVID-19 viral pandemic to teach the world that politicians can have a more immediate effect on life and death than scientists and doctors can." See also List of international presidential trips made by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Leadership approval polling for the 2023 Turkish general election The 500 Most Influential Muslims Notes References Further reading Cagaptay, Soner. The new sultan: Erdogan and the crisis of modern Turkey (2nd ed. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020). online review Cagaptay, Soner. "Making Turkey Great Again." Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 43 (2019): 169–78. online Kirişci, Kemal, and Amanda Sloat. "The rise and fall of liberal democracy in Turkey: Implications for the West" Foreign Policy at Brookings (2019) online Tziarras, Zenonas. "Erdoganist authoritarianism and the 'new' Turkey." Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 18.4 (2018): 593–598. online Yavuz, M. Hakan. "A framework for understanding the Intra-Islamist conflict between the AK party and the Gülen movement." Politics, Religion & Ideology 19.1 (2018): 11–32. online Yesil, Bilge. Media in New Turkey: The Origins of an Authoritarian Neoliberal State (University of Illinois Press, 2016) online review External links Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Instagram. Archived from the original. Welcome to demokrasi: how Erdoğan got more popular than ever by The Guardian 1954 births Living people 21st-century presidents of Turkey 21st-century prime ministers of Turkey Deniers of the Armenian genocide Deputies of Istanbul Deputies of Siirt Recep Tayyip Imam Hatip school alumni Justice and Development Party (Turkey) politicians Leaders of political parties in Turkey Marmara University alumni Mayors of Istanbul Members of the 22nd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 23rd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 24th Parliament of Turkey Naqshbandi order People from Istanbul Politicians arrested in Turkey Presidents of Turkey Prime Ministers of Turkey Recipients of the Heydar Aliyev Order Recipients of the Order of the Golden Fleece (Georgia) Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 1st class Turkish Islamists Turkish Sunni Muslims Chairmen of the Organization of Turkic States Recipients of the Gagauz-Yeri Order Foreign recipients of the Nishan-e-Pakistan	false	[ "\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer", "the Encyclopedia of American Biography, a biographical encyclopedia, by John A. Garraty (ed.) and Jerome L. Sternstein (assoc. ed.) This encyclopedia, published by Harper & Row in 1974, \"is more than a storehouse of information. It is also a compendium of informed opinion intended to aid readers who want to know the whys, not merely the whats, about the significant figures of our history.\"\n\nAfter the summary of each life which sticks to the facts, follows an article \"...attempting to explain why the individual is notable and to provide some sense of what he or she was like as a human being.\"\n\nNew series contents\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Hathitrust catalog\n NNDB\n \n\nUnited States biographical dictionaries\nHarper & Row books\n1974 non-fiction books" ]
[ "Recep Tayyip Erdoğan", "Armenian Genocide", "What happened in the genocide?", "mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I", "Who was responsible for this?", "Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings", "When did this happen?", "I don't know.", "Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?", "Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul,", "Was he part of the genocide?", "\"I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise", "Did he receive and criticism for this?", "I don't know.", "What else is significant about this article?", "On 23 April 2014, Erdogan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians" ]	C_4d6e38301a82483cab0ff9378b6a238e_1	Does it explain how they were killed?	8	How were the Armenians killed during the the WWI genocide?	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan	Erdogan was born in 1954 in the Kasimpasa neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province. His parents are Ahmet Erdogan and Tenzile Erdogan. Erdogan reportedly said in 2003, "I'm a Georgian, my family is a Georgian family which migrated from Batumi to Rize." But in a 2014 televised interview on the NTV news network, he said, "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian... forgive me for saying this... even much uglier things, they have even called me an Armenian, but I am Turkish." In an account based on registry records, his genealogy was tracked to an ethnic Turkish family. Erdogan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father Ahmet Erdogan (1905 - 1988) was a Captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. Erdogan had a brother Mustafa (b. 1958) and sister Vesile (b. 1965). His summer holidays were mostly spent in Guneysu, Rize, where his family originates from. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdogan was 13 years old. As a teenager, he sold lemonade and sesame buns (simit) on the streets of the city's rougher districts to earn extra money. Brought up in an observant Muslim family, Erdogan graduated from Kasimpasa Piyale primary school in 1965, and Imam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. He received his high school diploma from Eyup High School. He subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences, now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences--although several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated. In his youth, Erdogan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahce wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasimpasa S.K. is named after him. Erdogan married Emine Gulbaran (born 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons; Ahmet Burak and Necmettin Bilal, and two daughters, Esra and Sumeyye. His father, Ahmet Erdogan, died in 1988 and his 88-year-old mother, Tenzile Erdogan, died in 2011. He is a member of the Community of Iskenderpasa, a Turkish sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. In 2001, Erdogan established the Justice and Development Party (AKP). The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdogan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yilmaz and Ciller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdogan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gul became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdogan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdogan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gul handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdogan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as President, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdogan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gul as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Canakkale, and one million in Izmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdogan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdogan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdogan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdogan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Prime Minister Erdogan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdogan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious." He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem." In December 2008, Erdogan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken." In November 2009, he said, "it's not possible for a Muslim to commit genocide." In 2011, Erdogan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish-Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdogan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdogan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences - such as relocation - during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician serving as the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as prime minister of Turkey from 2003 to 2014 and as mayor of Istanbul from 1994 to 1998. He founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2001, leading it to election victories in 2002, 2007, and 2011 general elections before being required to stand down upon his election as President in 2014. He later returned to the AKP leadership in 2017 following the constitutional referendum that year. Coming from an Islamist political background and self-describing as a conservative democrat, he has promoted socially conservative and populist policies during his administration. Following the 1994 local elections, Erdoğan was elected mayor of Istanbul as the candidate of the Islamist Welfare Party. He was later stripped of his position, banned from political office, and imprisoned for four months for inciting religious hatred, due to his recitation of a poem by Ziya Gökalp. Erdoğan subsequently abandoned openly Islamist politics, establishing the moderate conservative AKP in 2001, which he went on to lead to a landslide victory in 2002. With Erdoğan still technically prohibited from holding office, the AKP's co-founder, Abdullah Gül, instead became prime minister, and later annulled Erdoğan's political ban. After winning a by-election in Siirt in 2003, Erdoğan replaced Gül as prime minister, with Gül instead becoming the AKP's candidate for the presidency. Erdoğan led the AKP to two more election victories in 2007 and 2011. The early years of Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister saw advances in negotiations for Turkey's membership of the European Union, an economic recovery following a economic crisis in 2001 and investments in infrastructure including roads, airports, and a high-speed train network. He also won two successful constitutional referendums in 2007 and 2010. However, his government remained controversial for its close links with Fethullah Gülen and his Gülen Movement (since designated as a terrorist organisation by the Turkish state) with whom the AKP was accused of orchestrating purges against secular bureaucrats and military officers through the Balyoz and Ergenekon trials. In late 2012, his government began peace negotiations with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to end the Kurdish–Turkish conflict (1978–present). The ceasefire broke down in 2015, leading to a renewed escalation in conflict. Erdoğan's foreign policy has been described as Neo-Ottoman and has led to the Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, with its focus on preventing the Syrian Democratic Forces from gaining ground on the Syria–Turkey border during the Syrian Civil War. In the more recent years of Erdoğan's rule, Turkey has experienced democratic backsliding and corruption. Starting with the anti-government protests in 2013, his government imposed growing censorship on the press and social media, temporarily restricting access to sites such as YouTube, Twitter and Wikipedia. This stalled negotiations related to Turkey's EU membership. A US$100 billion corruption scandal in 2013 led to the arrests of Erdoğan's close allies, and incriminated Erdoğan. After 11 years as head of government (Prime Minister), Erdoğan decided to run for President in 2014. At the time, the presidency was a somewhat ceremonial function. Following the 2014 elections, Erdoğan became the first popularly elected president of Turkey. The souring in relations with Gülen continued, as the government proceeded to purge his supporters from judicial, bureaucratic and military positions. A failed military coup d'état attempt in July 2016 resulted in further purges and a temporary state of emergency. The government claimed that the coup leaders were linked to Gülen, but he has denied any role in it. Erdoğan's rule has been marked with increasing authoritarianism, expansionism, censorship and banning of parties or dissent. Erdoğan supported the 2017 referendum which changed Turkey's parliamentary system into a presidential system, thus setting for the first time in Turkish history a term limit for the head of government (two full five-year terms). This new system of government formally came into place after the 2018 general election, where Erdoğan became an executive president. His party however lost the majority in the parliament and is currently in a coalition (People's Alliance) with the Turkish nationalist MHP. Erdoğan has since been tackling, but also accused of contributing to, the Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018, which has caused a significant decline in his popularity and is widely believed to have contributed to the results of the 2019 local elections, in which his party lost power in big cities like Ankara and Istanbul to opposition parties for the first time in 15 years. Family and personal life Early life Erdoğan was born in Kasımpaşa, a poor neighborhood of Istanbul, to which his family had moved from Rize Province in the 1930s. Erdoğan's tribe is originally from Adjara, a region in Georgia. His parents were Ahmet Erdoğan (1905–88) and Tenzile Erdoğan (née Mutlu; 1924–2011). Erdoğan spent his early childhood in Rize, where his father was a captain in the Turkish Coast Guard. His summer holidays were mostly spent in Güneysu, Rize, where his family originates. Throughout his life he often returned to this spiritual home, and in 2015 he opened a vast mosque on a mountaintop near this village. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdoğan was 13 years old. As a teenager, Erdoğan's father provided him with a weekly allowance of 2.5 Turkish lira, less than a dollar. With it, Erdoğan bought postcards and resold them on the street. He sold bottles of water to drivers stuck in traffic. Erdoğan also worked as a street vendor selling simit (sesame bread rings), wearing a white gown and selling the simit from a red three-wheel cart with the rolls stacked behind glass. In his youth, Erdoğan played semi-professional football at a local club. Fenerbahçe wanted him to transfer to the club but his father prevented it. The stadium of the local football club in the district where he grew up, Kasımpaşa S.K. is named after him. Erdoğan is a member of the Community of İskenderpaşa, a Turkish Sufistic community of Naqshbandi tariqah. Education Erdoğan graduated from Kasımpaşa Piyale primary school in 1965, and İmam Hatip school, a religious vocational high school, in 1973. The same educational path was followed by other co-founders of the AKP party. One quarter of the curriculum of İmam Hatip schools involves study of the Qurʼān, the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and the Arabic language. Erdoğan studied the Qurʼān at an İmam Hatip, where his classmates began calling him "hoca" ("Muslim teacher"). Erdoğan attended a meeting of the nationalist student group National Turkish Student Union (Milli Türk Talebe Birliği), who sought to raise a conservative cohort of young people to counter the rising movement of leftists in Turkey. Within the group, Erdoğan was distinguished by his oratorical skills, developing a penchant for public speaking and excelling in front of an audience. He won first place in a poetry-reading competition organized by the Community of Turkish Technical Painters, and began preparing for speeches through reading and research. Erdoğan would later comment on these competitions as "enhancing our courage to speak in front of the masses". Erdoğan wanted to pursue advanced studies at Mekteb-i Mülkiye, but Mülkiye accepted only students with regular high school diplomas, and not İmam Hatip graduates. Mülkiye was known for its political science department, which trained many statesmen and politicians in Turkey. Erdoğan was then admitted to Eyüp High School, a regular state school, and eventually received his high school diploma from Eyüp. According to his official biography, he subsequently studied Business Administration at the Aksaray School of Economics and Commercial Sciences (), now known as Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. Several Turkish sources dispute that he graduated, or even attended at all. Family Erdoğan married Emine Gülbaran (b. 1955, Siirt) on 4 July 1978. They have two sons, Ahmet Burak (b. 1979) and Necmettin Bilal (b. 1981), and two daughters, Esra (b. 1983) and Sümeyye (b. 1985). His father, Ahmet Erdoğan, died in 1988 and his mother, Tenzile Erdoğan, died in 2011 at the age of 88. Erdoğan has a brother, Mustafa (b. 1958), and a sister, Vesile (b. 1965). From his father's first marriage to Havuli Erdoğan (d. 1980), he had two half-brothers: Mehmet (1926–1988) and Hasan (1929–2006). Early political career In 1976, Erdoğan engaged in politics by joining the National Turkish Student Union, an anti-communist action group. In the same year, he became the head of the Beyoğlu youth branch of the Islamist National Salvation Party (MSP), and was later promoted to chair of the Istanbul youth branch of the party. Holding this position until 1980, he served as consultant and senior executive in the private sector during the era following the 1980 military coup when political parties were closed down. In 1983, Erdoğan followed most of Necmettin Erbakan's followers into the Islamist Welfare Party. He became the party's Beyoğlu district chair in 1984, and in 1985 he became the chair of the Istanbul city branch. He was elected to parliament in 1991, but was barred from taking his seat. Mayor of Istanbul (1994–1998) In the local elections of 27 March 1994, Erdoğan was elected Mayor of Istanbul with 25.19% of the popular vote. Erdoğan was a 40-year-old dark horse candidate who had been mocked by the mainstream media and treated as a country bumpkin by his opponents. He was pragmatic in office, tackling many chronic problems in Istanbul including water shortage, pollution and traffic chaos. The water shortage problem was solved with the laying of hundreds of kilometers of new pipelines. The garbage problem was solved with the establishment of state-of-the-art recycling facilities. While Erdoğan was in office, air pollution was reduced through a plan developed to switch to natural gas. He changed the public buses to environmentally friendly ones. The city's traffic and transportation jams were reduced with more than fifty bridges, viaducts, and highways built. He took precautions to prevent corruption, using measures to ensure that municipal funds were used prudently. He paid back a major portion of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality's two-billion-dollar debt and invested four billion dollars in the city. Erdoğan initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors. A seven-member international jury from the United Nations unanimously awarded Erdoğan the UN-Habitat award. Imprisonment In 1998, the fundamentalist Welfare Party was declared unconstitutional on the grounds of threatening the secularism of Turkey and was shut down by the Turkish constitutional court. Erdoğan became a prominent speaker at demonstrations held by his party colleagues. In December 1997 in Siirt, Erdoğan recited a poem from a work written by Ziya Gökalp, a pan-Turkish activist of the early 20th century. His recitation included verses translated as "The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers...." which are not in the original version of the poem. Erdoğan said the poem had been approved by the education ministry to be published in textbooks. Under article 312/2 of the Turkish penal code his recitation was regarded as an incitement to violence and religious or racial hatred. He was given a ten-month prison sentence of which he served four months, from 24 March 1999 to 27 July 1999. Due to his conviction, Erdoğan was forced to give up his mayoral position. The conviction also stipulated a political ban, which prevented him from participating in parliamentary elections. He had appealed for the sentence to be converted to a monetary fine, but it was reduced to 120 days instead. In 2017, this period of Erdoğan's life was made into a film titled Reis. Justice and Development Party Erdoğan was member of political parties that kept getting banned by the army or judges. Within his Virtue Party, there was a dispute about the appropriate discourse of the party between traditional politicians and pro-reform politicians. The latter envisioned a party that could operate within the limits of the system, and thus not getting banned as its predecessors like National Order Party, National Salvation Party and Welfare Party. They wanted to give the group the character of an ordinary conservative party following the example of the European Christian democratic parties. When the Virtue Party was also banned in 2001, a definitive split took place: the followers of Necmettin Erbakan founded the Felicity Party (SP) and the reformers founded the Justice and Development Party (AKP) under the leadership of Abdullah Gül and Erdoğan. The pro-reform politicians realized that a strictly Islamic party would never be accepted as a governing party by the state apparatus and they believed that an Islamic party did not appeal to more than about 20 percent of the Turkish electorate. The AK party emphatically placed itself as a broad democratic conservative party with new politicians from the political center (like Ali Babacan and Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu), while respecting Islamic norms and values, but without an explicit religious program. This turned out to be successful as the new party won 34% of the vote in the general elections of 2002. Erdoğan became prime minister in March 2003 after the Gül government ended his political ban. Premiership (2003–2014) General elections The elections of 2002 were the first elections in which Erdoğan participated as a party leader. All parties previously elected to parliament failed to win enough votes to re-enter the parliament. The AKP won 34.3% of the national vote and formed the new government. Turkish stocks rose more than 7% on Monday morning. Politicians of the previous generation, such as Ecevit, Bahceli, Yılmaz and Çiller, resigned. The second largest party, the CHP, received 19.4% of the votes. The AKP won a landslide victory in the parliament, taking nearly two-thirds of the seats. Erdoğan could not become Prime Minister as he was still banned from politics by the judiciary for his speech in Siirt. Gül became the Prime Minister instead. In December 2002, the Supreme Election Board canceled the general election results from Siirt due to voting irregularities and scheduled a new election for 9 February 2003. By this time, party leader Erdoğan was able to run for parliament due to a legal change made possible by the opposition Republican People's Party. The AKP duly listed Erdoğan as a candidate for the rescheduled election, which he won, becoming Prime Minister after Gül handed over the post. On 14 April 2007, an estimated 300,000 people marched in Ankara to protest against the possible candidacy of Erdoğan in the 2007 presidential election, afraid that if elected as president, he would alter the secular nature of the Turkish state. Erdoğan announced on 24 April 2007 that the party had nominated Abdullah Gül as the AKP candidate in the presidential election. The protests continued over the next several weeks, with over one million people reported to have turned out at a 29 April rally in Istanbul, tens of thousands at separate protests on 4 May in Manisa and Çanakkale, and one million in İzmir on 13 May. The stage of the elections of 2007 was set for a fight for legitimacy in the eyes of voters between his government and the CHP. Erdoğan used the event that took place during the ill-fated Presidential elections a few months earlier as a part of the general election campaign of his party. On 22 July 2007, the AKP won an important victory over the opposition, garnering 46.7% of the popular vote. 22 July elections marked only the second time in the Republic of Turkey's history whereby an incumbent governing party won an election by increasing its share of popular support. On 14 March 2008, Turkey's Chief Prosecutor asked the country's Constitutional Court to ban Erdoğan's governing party. The party escaped a ban on 30 July 2008, a year after winning 46.7% of the vote in national elections, although judges did cut the party's public funding by 50%. In the June 2011 elections, Erdoğan's governing party won 327 seats (49.83% of the popular vote) making Erdoğan the only prime minister in Turkey's history to win three consecutive general elections, each time receiving more votes than the previous election. The second party, the Republican People's Party (CHP), received 135 seats (25.94%), the nationalist MHP received 53 seats (13.01%), and the Independents received 35 seats (6.58%). Referendums After the opposition parties deadlocked the 2007 presidential election by boycotting the parliament, the ruling AKP proposed a constitutional reform package. The reform package was first vetoed by president Sezer. Then he applied to the Turkish constitutional court about the reform package, because the president is unable to veto amendments for the second time. The Turkish constitutional court did not find any problems in the packet and 68.95% of the voters supported the constitutional changes. The reforms consisted of electing the president by popular vote instead of by parliament; reducing the presidential term from seven years to five; allowing the president to stand for re-election for a second term; holding general elections every four years instead of five; and reducing from 367 to 184 the quorum of lawmakers needed for parliamentary decisions. Reforming the Constitution was one of the main pledges of the AKP during the 2007 election campaign. The main opposition party CHP was not interested in altering the Constitution on a big scale, making it impossible to form a Constitutional Commission (Anayasa Uzlaşma Komisyonu). The amendments lacked the two-thirds majority needed to become law instantly, but secured 336 votes in the 550-seat parliament – enough to put the proposals to a referendum. The reform package included a number of issues such as the right of individuals to appeal to the highest court, the creation of the ombudsman's office; the possibility to negotiate a nationwide labour contract; gender equality; the ability of civilian courts to convict members of the military; the right of civil servants to go on strike; a privacy law; and the structure of the Constitutional Court. The referendum was agreed by a majority of 58%. Domestic Policy Kurdish issue In 2009, Prime Minister Erdoğan's government announced a plan to help end the quarter-century-long Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict that had cost more than 40,000 lives. The government's plan, supported by the European Union, intended to allow the Kurdish language to be used in all broadcast media and political campaigns, and restored Kurdish names to cities and towns that had been given Turkish ones. Erdoğan said, "We took a courageous step to resolve chronic issues that constitute an obstacle along Turkey's development, progression and empowerment". Erdoğan passed a partial amnesty to reduce penalties faced by many members of the Kurdish guerrilla movement PKK who had surrendered to the government. On 23 November 2011, during a televised meeting of his party in Ankara, he apologised on behalf of the state for the Dersim massacre, where many Alevis and Zazas were killed. In 2013 the government of Erdoğan began a peace process between the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Turkish Government, mediated by parliamentarians of the Peoples' Democratic party (HDP). In 2015 he decided that the peace process was over and supported the lift of the parliamentary immunity of the HDP parliamentarians. During his presidency a law was introduced which banned the use of the word Kurdistan in parliament and in a speech he held for the local election of 2019 he told the HDP politicians that if there is no Kurdistan in Turkey and if they looked for one they should go to Northern Iraq. Armenian genocide Prime Minister Erdoğan expressed multiple times that Turkey would acknowledge the mass killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as genocide only after a thorough investigation by a joint Turkish-Armenian commission consisting of historians, archaeologists, political scientists and other experts. In 2005, Erdoğan and the main opposition party leader Deniz Baykal wrote a letter to Armenian President Robert Kocharian, proposing the creation of a joint Turkish-Armenian commission. Armenian Foreign Minister Vartan Oskanian rejected the offer because he asserted that the proposal itself was "insincere and not serious". He added: "This issue cannot be considered at historical level with Turks, who themselves politicized the problem". In December 2008, Erdoğan criticised the I Apologize campaign by Turkish intellectuals to recognize the Armenian Genocide, saying, "I neither accept nor support this campaign. We did not commit a crime, therefore we do not need to apologise ... It will not have any benefit other than stirring up trouble, disturbing our peace and undoing the steps which have been taken". In November 2009, he said, "it is not possible for those who belong to the Muslim faith to carry out genocide". In 2011, Erdoğan ordered the tearing-down of the Statue of Humanity, a Turkish–Armenian friendship monument in Kars, which was commissioned in 2006 and represented a metaphor of the rapprochement of the two countries after many years of dispute over the events of 1915. Erdoğan justified the removal by stating that the monument was offensively close to the tomb of an 11th-century Islamic scholar, and that its shadow ruined the view of that site, while Kars municipality officials said it was illegally erected in a protected area. However, the former mayor of Kars who approved the original construction of the monument said the municipality was destroying not just a "monument to humanity" but "humanity itself". The demolition was not unopposed; among its detractors were several Turkish artists. Two of them, the painter Bedri Baykam and his associate, Pyramid Art Gallery general coordinator Tugba Kurtulmus, were stabbed after a meeting with other artists at the Istanbul Akatlar cultural center. On 23 April 2014, Erdoğan's office issued a statement in nine languages (including two dialects of Armenian), offering condolences for the mass killings of Armenians and stating that the events of 1915 had inhumane consequences. The statement described the mass killings as the two nations' shared pain and said: "Having experienced events which had inhumane consequences – such as relocation – during the First World War, (it) should not prevent Turks and Armenians from establishing compassion and mutually humane attitudes among one another". The Ottoman Parliament of 1915 had previously used the term "relocation" to describe the purpose of the Tehcir Law, which resulted in the deaths of anywhere between 800,000 and over 1,800,000 Armenian civilians in what is commonly referred to as the Armenian Genocide. Pope Francis in April 2015, at a special mass in St. Peter's Basilica marking the centenary of the events, described atrocities against Armenian civilians in 1915–1922 as "the first genocide of the 20th century". In protest, Erdoğan recalled the Turkish ambassador from the Vatican, and summoned the Vatican's ambassador, to express "disappointment" at what he called a discriminatory message. He later stated "we don’t carry a stain or a shadow like genocide". US President Barack Obama called for a "full, frank and just acknowledgement of the facts", but again stopped short of labelling it "genocide", despite his campaign promise to do so. Human rights During Erdoğan's time as Prime Minister, the far-reaching powers of the 1991 Anti-Terror Law were reduced and the Democratic initiative process was initiated, with the goal to improve democratic standards in general and the rights of ethnic and religious minorities in particular. However, after Turkey's bid to join the European Union stalled, European officials noted a return to more authoritarian ways, notably on freedom of speech, freedom of the press and Kurdish minority rights. Demands by activists for the recognition of LGBT rights were publicly rejected by government members, and members of the Turkish LGBT community were insulted by cabinet members. Reporters Without Borders observed a continuous decrease in Freedom of the Press during Erdoğan's later terms, with a rank of around 100 on the Press Freedom Index during his first term and a rank of 153 out of a total of 179 countries in 2021. Freedom House saw a slight recovery in later years and awarded Turkey a Press Freedom Score of 55/100 in 2012 after a low point of 48/100 in 2006. In 2011, Erdoğan's government made legal reforms to return properties of Christian and Jewish minorities which were seized by the Turkish government in the 1930s. The total value of the properties returned reached $2 billion (USD). Under Erdoğan, the Turkish government tightened the laws on the sale and consumption of alcohol, banning all advertising and increasing the tax on alcoholic beverages. Economy In 2002, Erdoğan inherited a Turkish economy that was beginning to recover from a recession as a result of reforms implemented by Kemal Derviş. Erdoğan supported Finance Minister Ali Babacan in enforcing macro-economic policies. Erdoğan tried to attract more foreign investors to Turkey and lifted many government regulations. The cash-flow into the Turkish economy between 2002 and 2012 caused a growth of 64% in real GDP and a 43% increase in GDP per capita; considerably higher numbers were commonly advertised but these did not account for the inflation of the US dollar between 2002 and 2012. The average annual growth in GDP per capita was 3.6%. The growth in real GDP between 2002 and 2012 was higher than the values from developed countries, but was close to average when developing countries are also taken into account. The ranking of the Turkish economy in terms of GDP moved slightly from 17 to 16 during this decade. A major consequence of the policies between 2002 and 2012 was the widening of the current account deficit from US$600 million to US$58 billion (2013 est.) Since 1961, Turkey has signed 19 IMF loan accords. Erdoğan's government satisfied the budgetary and market requirements of the two during his administration and received every loan installment, the only time any Turkish government has done so. Erdoğan inherited a debt of $23.5 billion to the IMF, which was reduced to $0.9 billion in 2012. He decided not to sign a new deal. Turkey's debt to the IMF was thus declared to be completely paid and he announced that the IMF could borrow from Turkey. In 2010, five-year credit default swaps for Turkey's sovereign debt were trading at a record low of 1.17%, below those of nine EU member countries and Russia. In 2002, the Turkish Central Bank had $26.5 billion in reserves. This amount reached $92.2 billion in 2011. During Erdoğan's leadership, inflation fell from 32% to 9.0% in 2004. Since then, Turkish inflation has continued to fluctuate around 9% and is still one of the highest inflation rates in the world. The Turkish public debt as a percentage of annual GDP declined from 74% in 2002 to 39% in 2009. In 2012, Turkey had a lower ratio of public debt to GDP than 21 of 27 members of the European Union and a lower budget deficit to GDP ratio than 23 of them. In 2003, Erdoğan's government pushed through the Labor Act, a comprehensive reform of Turkey's labor laws. The law greatly expanded the rights of employees, establishing a 45-hour workweek and limiting overtime work to 270 hours a year, provided legal protection against discrimination due to sex, religion, or political affiliation, prohibited discrimination between permanent and temporary workers, entitled employees terminated without "valid cause" to compensation, and mandated written contracts for employment arrangements lasting a year or more. Education Erdoğan increased the budget of the Ministry of Education from 7.5 billion lira in 2002 to 34 billion lira in 2011, the highest share of the national budget given to one ministry. Before his prime ministership the military received the highest share of the national budget. Compulsory education was increased from eight years to twelve. In 2003, the Turkish government, together with UNICEF, initiated a campaign called "Come on girls, [let's go] to school!" (). The goal of this campaign was to close the gender gap in primary school enrollment through the provision of a quality basic education for all girls, especially in southeast Turkey. In 2005, the parliament granted amnesty to students expelled from universities before 2003. The amnesty applied to students dismissed on academic or disciplinary grounds. In 2004, textbooks became free of charge and since 2008 every province in Turkey has its own university. During Erdoğan's Premiership, the number of universities in Turkey nearly doubled, from 98 in 2002 to 186 in October 2012. The Prime Minister kept his campaign promises by starting the Fatih project in which all state schools, from preschool to high school level, received a total of 620,000 smart boards, while tablet computers were distributed to 17 million students and approximately one million teachers and administrators. In June 2017 a draft proposal by the ministry of education was approved by Erdoğan, in which the curriculum for schools excluded the teaching of the theory of evolution of Charles Darwin by 2019. From then on the teaching will be postponed and start at undergraduate level. Infrastructure Under Erdoğan's government, the number of airports in Turkey increased from 26 to 50 in the period of 10 years. Between the founding of the Republic of Turkey in 1923 and 2002, there had been 6,000 km of dual carriageway roads created. Between 2002 and 2011, another 13,500 km of expressway were built. Due to these measures, the number of motor accidents fell by 50 percent. For the first time in Turkish history, high speed railway lines were constructed, and the country's high-speed train service began in 2009. In 8 years, 1,076 km of railway were built and 5,449 km of railway renewed. The construction of Marmaray, an undersea rail tunnel under the Bosphorus strait, started in 2004. It was inaugurated on the 90th anniversary of the Turkish Republic 29 October 2013. The inauguration of the Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge, the third bridge over the Bosphorus, was on 26 August 2016. Justice In March 2006, the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) held a press conference to publicly protest the obstruction of the appointment of judges to the high courts for over 10 months. The HSYK said Erdoğan wanted to fill the vacant posts with his own appointees. Erdoğan was accused of creating a rift with Turkey's highest court of appeal, the Yargıtay, and high administrative court, the Danıştay. Erdoğan stated that the constitution gave the power to assign these posts to his elected party. In May 2007, the head of Turkey's High Court asked prosecutors to consider whether Erdoğan should be charged over critical comments regarding the election of Abdullah Gül as president. Erdoğan said the ruling was "a disgrace to the justice system", and criticized the Constitutional Court which had invalidated a presidential vote because a boycott by other parties meant there was no quorum. Prosecutors investigated his earlier comments, including saying it had fired a "bullet at democracy". Tülay Tuğcu, head of the Constitutional Court, condemned Erdoğan for "threats, insults and hostility" towards the justice system. Civil–military relations The Turkish military has had a record of intervening in politics, having removed elected governments four times in the past. During the Erdoğan government, civil–military relationship moved towards normalization in which the influence of the military in politics was significantly reduced. The ruling Justice and Development Party has often faced off against the military, gaining political power by challenging a pillar of the country's laicistic establishment. The most significant issue that caused deep fissures between the army and the government was the midnight e-memorandum posted on the military's website objecting to the selection of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül as the ruling party's candidate for the Presidency in 2007. The military argued that the election of Gül, whose wife wears an Islamic headscarf, could undermine the laicistic order of the country. Contrary to expectations, the government responded harshly to former Chief of General Staff Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt's e-memorandum, stating the military had nothing to do with the selection of the presidential candidate. Health care After assuming power in 2003, Erdoğan's government embarked on a sweeping reform program of the Turkish healthcare system, called the Health Transformation Program (HTP), to greatly increase the quality of healthcare and protect all citizens from financial risks. Its introduction coincided with the period of sustained economic growth, allowing the Turkish government to put greater investments into the healthcare system. As part of the reforms, the "Green Card" program, which provides health benefits to the poor, was expanded in 2004. The reform program aimed at increasing the ratio of private to state-run healthcare, which, along with long queues in state-run hospitals, resulted in the rise of private medical care in Turkey, forcing state-run hospitals to compete by increasing quality. In April 2006, Erdoğan unveiled a social security reform package demanded by the International Monetary Fund under a loan deal. The move, which Erdoğan called one of the most radical reforms ever, was passed with fierce opposition. Turkey's three social security bodies were united under one roof, bringing equal health services and retirement benefits for members of all three bodies. The previous system had been criticized for reserving the best healthcare for civil servants and relegating others to wait in long queues. Under the second bill, everyone under the age of 18 years was entitled to free health services, irrespective of whether they pay premiums to any social security organization. The bill also envisages a gradual increase in the retirement age: starting from 2036, the retirement age will increase to 65 by 2048 for both women and men. In January 2008, the Turkish Parliament adopted a law to prohibit smoking in most public places. Erdoğan is outspokenly anti-smoking. Foreign policy Turkish foreign policy during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister has been associated with the name of Ahmet Davutoğlu. Davutoğlu was the chief foreign policy advisor of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan before he was appointed foreign minister in 2009. The basis of Erdoğan's foreign policy is based on the principle of "don't make enemies, make friends" and the pursuit of "zero problems" with neighboring countries. Erdoğan is co-founder of United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (AOC). The initiative seeks to galvanize international action against extremism through the forging of international, intercultural and inter-religious dialogue and cooperation. European Union When Erdoğan came to power, he continued Turkey's long ambition of joining the European Union. On 3 October 2005 negotiations began for Turkey's accession to the European Union. Erdoğan was named "The European of the Year 2004" by the newspaper European Voice for the reforms in his country in order to accomplish the accession of Turkey to the European Union. He said in a comment that "Turkey's accession shows that Europe is a continent where civilisations reconcile and not clash." On 3 October 2005, the negotiations for Turkey's accession to the EU formally started during Erdoğan's tenure as Prime Minister. The European Commission generally supports Erdoğan's reforms, but remains critical of his policies. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize EU member state Cyprus. Greece and Cyprus dispute Relations between Greece and Turkey were normalized during Erdoğan's tenure as prime minister. In May 2004, Erdoğan became the first Turkish Prime Minister to visit Greece since 1988, and the first to visit the Turkish minority of Thrace since 1952. In 2007, Erdoğan and Greek Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis inaugurated the Greek-Turkish natural gas pipeline giving Caspian gas its first direct Western outlet. Turkey and Greece signed an agreement to create a Combined Joint Operational Unit within the framework of NATO to participate in Peace Support Operations. Erdoğan and his party strongly supported the EU-backed referendum to reunify Cyprus in 2004. Negotiations about a possible EU membership came to a standstill in 2009 and 2010, when Turkish ports were closed to Cypriot ships as a consequence of the economic isolation of the internationally unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the failure of the EU to end the isolation, as it had promised in 2004. The Turkish government continues its refusal to recognize the Republic of Cyprus. Armenia Armenia is Turkey's only neighbor which Erdoğan has not visited during his premiership. The Turkish-Armenian border has been closed since 1993 because of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with Turkey's close ally Azerbaijan. Diplomatic efforts resulted in the signing of protocols between Turkish and Armenian Foreign Ministers in Switzerland to improve relations between the two countries. One of the points of the agreement was the creation of a joint commission on the issue. The Armenian Constitutional Court decided that the commission contradicts the Armenian constitution. Turkey responded saying that Armenian court's ruling on the protocols is not acceptable, resulting in a suspension of the rectification process by the Turkish side. Erdoğan has said that Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan should apologize for calling on school children to re-occupy eastern Turkey. When asked by a student at a literature contest ceremony if Armenians will be able to get back their "western territories" along with Mt. Ararat, Sarksyan said, "This is the task of your generation". Russia In December 2004, President Putin visited Turkey, making it the first presidential visit in the history of Turkish-Russian relations besides that of the Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Nikolai Podgorny in 1972. In November 2005, Putin attended the inauguration of a jointly constructed Blue Stream natural gas pipeline in Turkey. This sequence of top-level visits has brought several important bilateral issues to the forefront. The two countries consider it their strategic goal to achieve "multidimensional co-operation", especially in the fields of energy, transport and the military. Specifically, Russia aims to invest in Turkey's fuel and energy industries, and it also expects to participate in tenders for the modernisation of Turkey's military. The relations during this time are described by President Medvedev as "Turkey is one of our most important partners with respect to regional and international issues. We can confidently say that Russian-Turkish relations have advanced to the level of a multidimensional strategic partnership". In May 2010, Turkey and Russia signed 17 agreements to enhance cooperation in energy and other fields, including pacts to build Turkey's first nuclear power plant and further plans for an oil pipeline from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. The leaders of both countries also signed an agreement on visa-free travel, enabling tourists to get into the other country for free and stay there for up to 30 days. United States When Barack Obama became President of United States, he made his first overseas bilateral meeting to Turkey in April 2009. At a joint news conference in Turkey, Obama said: "I'm trying to make a statement about the importance of Turkey, not just to the United States but to the world. I think that where there's the most promise of building stronger U.S.-Turkish relations is in the recognition that Turkey and the United States can build a model partnership in which a predominantly Christian nation, a predominantly Muslim nation – a Western nation and a nation that straddles two continents," he continued, "that we can create a modern international community that is respectful, that is secure, that is prosperous, that there are not tensions – inevitable tensions between cultures – which I think is extraordinarily important." Iraq Turkey under Erdoğan was named by the Bush Administration as a part of the "coalition of the willing" that was central to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. On 1 March 2003, a motion allowing Turkish military to participate in the U.S-led coalition's invasion of Iraq, along with the permission for foreign troops to be stationed in Turkey for this purpose, was overruled by the Turkish Parliament. After the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iraq and Turkey signed 48 trade agreements on issues including security, energy, and water. The Turkish government attempted to mend relations with Iraqi Kurdistan by opening a Turkish university in Erbil, and a Turkish consulate in Mosul. Erdoğan's government fostered economic and political relations with Irbil, and Turkey began to consider the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq as an ally against Maliki's government. Israel Erdoğan visited Israel on 1 May 2005, a gesture unusual for a leader of a Muslim majority country. During his trip, Erdoğan visited the Yad Vashem, Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. The President of Israel Shimon Peres addressed the Turkish parliament during a visit in 2007, the first time an Israeli leader had addressed the legislature of a predominantly Muslim nation. Their relationship worsened at the 2009 World Economic Forum conference over Israel's actions during the Gaza War. Erdoğan was interrupted by the moderator while he was responding to Peres. Erdoğan stated: "Mister Peres, you are older than I am. Maybe you are feeling guilty and that is why you are raising your voice. When it comes to killing you know it too well. I remember how you killed the children on beaches..." Upon the moderator's reminder that they needed to adjourn for dinner, Erdoğan left the panel, accusing the moderator of giving Peres more time than all the other panelists combined. Tensions increased further following the Gaza flotilla raid in May 2010. Erdoğan strongly condemned the raid, describing it as "state terrorism", and demanded an Israeli apology. In February 2013, Erdoğan called Zionism a "crime against humanity", comparing it to Islamophobia, antisemitism, and fascism. He later retracted the statement, saying he had been misinterpreted. He said "everyone should know" that his comments were directed at "Israeli policies", especially as regards to "Gaza and the settlements." Erdoğan's statements were criticized by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, among others. In August 2013, the Hürriyet reported that Erdoğan had claimed to have evidence of Israel's responsibility for the removal of Morsi from office in Egypt. The Israeli and Egyptian governments dismissed the suggestion. In response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. He also stated that "If Israel continues with this attitude, it will definitely be tried at international courts." Syria During Erdoğan's term of office, diplomatic relations between Turkey and Syria significantly deteriorated. In 2004, President Bashar al-Assad arrived in Turkey for the first official visit by a Syrian President in 57 years. In late 2004, Erdoğan signed a free trade agreement with Syria. Visa restrictions between the two countries were lifted in 2009, which caused an economic boom in the regions near the Syrian border. However, in 2011 the relationship between the two countries was strained following the outbreak of conflict in Syria. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he was trying to "cultivate a favorable relationship with whatever government would take the place of Assad". However, he began to support the opposition in Syria, after demonstrations turned violent, creating a serious Syrian refugee problem in Turkey. Erdoğan's policy of providing military training for anti-Damascus fighters has also created conflict with Syria's ally and a neighbour of Turkey, Iran. Saudi Arabia In August 2006, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz as-Saud made a visit to Turkey. This was the first visit by a Saudi monarch to Turkey in the last four decades. The monarch made a second visit, on 9 November 2007. Turk-Saudi trade volume has exceeded 3.2 billion in 2006, almost double the figure achieved in 2003. In 2009, this amount reached 5.5 billion and the goal for the year 2010 was 10 billion. Erdoğan condemned the Saudi-led intervention in Bahrain and characterized the Saudi movement as "a new Karbala." He demanded withdrawal of Saudi forces from Bahrain. Egypt Erdoğan had made his first official visit to Egypt on 12 September 2011, accompanied by six ministers and 200 businessmen. This visit was made very soon after Turkey had ejected Israeli ambassadors, cutting off all diplomatic relations with Israel because Israel refused to apologize for the Gaza flotilla raid which killed eight Turkish and one Turco-American. Erdoğan's visit to Egypt was met with much enthusiasm by Egyptians. CNN reported some Egyptians saying "We consider him as the Islamic leader in the Middle East", while others were appreciative of his role in supporting Gaza. Erdoğan was later honored in Tahrir Square by members of the Egyptian Revolution Youth Union, and members of the Turkish embassy were presented with a coat of arms in acknowledgment of the Prime Minister's support of the Egyptian Revolution. Erdoğan stated in a 2011 interview that he supported secularism for Egypt, which generated an angry reaction among Islamic movements, especially the Freedom and Justice Party, which was the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood. However, commentators suggest that by forming an alliance with the military junta during Egypt's transition to democracy, Erdoğan may have tipped the balance in favor of an authoritarian government. Erdoğan condemned the sit-in dispersals conducted by Egyptian police on 14 August 2013 at the Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda squares, where violent clashes between police officers and pro-Morsi Islamist protesters led to hundreds of deaths, mostly protesters. In July 2014, one year after the removal of Mohamed Morsi from office, Erdoğan described Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as an "illegitimate tyrant". Somalia Erdoğan's administration maintains strong ties with the Somali government. During the drought of 2011, Erdoğan's government contributed over $201 million to humanitarian relief efforts in the impacted parts of Somalia. Following a greatly improved security situation in Mogadishu in mid-2011, the Turkish government also re-opened its foreign embassy with the intention of more effectively assisting in the post-conflict development process. It was among the first foreign governments to resume formal diplomatic relations with Somalia after the civil war. In May 2010, the Turkish and Somali governments signed a military training agreement, in keeping with the provisions outlined in the Djibouti Peace Process. Turkish Airlines became the first long-distance international commercial airline in two decades to resume flights to and from Mogadishu's Aden Adde International Airport. Turkey also launched various development and infrastructure projects in Somalia including building several hospitals and helping renovate the National Assembly building. Protests 2013 Gezi Park protests against the perceived authoritarianism of Erdoğan and his policies, starting from a small sit-in in Istanbul in defense of a city park. After the police's intense reaction with tear gas, the protests grew each day. Faced by the largest mass protest in a decade, Erdoğan made this controversial remark in a televised speech: "The police were there yesterday, they are there today, and they will be there tomorrow". After weeks of clashes in the streets of Istanbul, his government at first apologized to the protestors and called for a plebiscite, but then ordered a crackdown on the protesters. Presidency (2014–present) Erdoğan took the oath of office on 28 August 2014 and became the 12th president of Turkey. He administered the new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu's oath on 29 August. When asked about his lower-than-expected 51.79% share of the vote, he allegedly responded, "there were even those who did not like the Prophet. I, however, won 52%". Assuming the role of President, Erdoğan was criticized for openly stating that he would not maintain the tradition of presidential neutrality. Erdoğan has also stated his intention to pursue a more active role as president, such as utilising the President's rarely used cabinet-calling powers. The political opposition has argued that Erdoğan will continue to pursue his own political agenda, controlling the government, while his new Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu would be docile and submissive. Furthermore, the domination of loyal Erdoğan supporters in Davutoğlu's cabinet fuelled speculation that Erdoğan intended to exercise substantial control over the government. Presidential elections On 1 July 2014, Erdoğan was named the AKP's presidential candidate in the Turkish presidential election. His candidacy was announced by the Deputy President of the AKP, Mehmet Ali Şahin. Erdoğan made a speech after the announcement and used the 'Erdoğan logo' for the first time. The logo was criticised because it was very similar to the logo that U.S. President Barack Obama used in the 2008 presidential election. Erdoğan was elected as the President of Turkey in the first round of the election with 51.79% of the vote, obviating the need for a run-off by winning over 50%. The joint candidate of the CHP, MHP and 13 other opposition parties, former Organisation of Islamic Co-operation general secretary Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu won 38.44% of the vote. The pro-Kurdish HDP candidate Selahattin Demirtaş won 9.76%. The 2018 Turkish presidential election took place as part of the 2018 general election, alongside parliamentary elections on the same day. Following the approval of constitutional changes in a referendum held in 2017, the elected President will be both the head of state and head of government of Turkey, taking over the latter role from the to-be-abolished office of the Prime Minister. Incumbent president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declared his candidacy for the People's Alliance (Turkish: Cumhur İttifakı) on 27 April 2018. Erdoğan's main opposition, the Republican People's Party, nominated Muharrem İnce, a member of the parliament known for his combative opposition and spirited speeches against Erdoğan. Besides these candidates, Meral Akşener, the founder and leader of İyi Party, Temel Karamollaoğlu, the leader of the Felicity Party and Doğu Perinçek, the leader of the Patriotic Party, have announced their candidacies and collected the 100,000 signatures required for nomination. The alliance which Erdoğan was candidate for won 52.59% of the popular vote. Referendum In April 2017, a constitutional referendum was held, where the voters in Turkey (and Turkish citizens abroad) approved a set of 18 proposed amendments to the Constitution of Turkey. The amendments included the replacement of the existing parliamentary system with a presidential system. The post of Prime Minister would be abolished, and the presidency would become an executive post vested with broad executive powers. The parliament seats would be increased from 550 to 600 and the age of candidacy to the parliament was lowered from 25 to 18. The referendum also called for changes to the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors. Local elections In the 2019 local elections, the ruling party AKP lost control of Istanbul and Ankara for the first time in 25 years, as well as 5 of Turkey's 6 largest cities. The loss has been widely attributed to Erdoğan's mismanagement of the Turkish economic crisis, rising authoritarianism as well as the alleged government inaction on the Syrian refugee crisis. Soon after the elections, Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey ordered a re-election in Istanbul, cancelling Ekrem İmamoğlu's mayoral certificate. The decision led to a significant decrease of Erdoğan's and AKP's popularity and his party lost the elections again in June with a greater margin. The result was seen as a huge blow to Erdoğan, who had once said that if his party 'lost Istanbul, we would lose Turkey. The opposition's victory was characterised as 'the beginning of the end' for Erdoğan', with international commentators calling the re-run a huge government miscalculation that led to a potential İmamoğlu candidacy in the next scheduled presidential election. It is suspected that the scale of the government's defeat could provoke a cabinet reshuffle and early general elections, currently scheduled for June 2023. The New Zealand and Australian governments and opposition CHP party have criticized Erdoğan after he repeatedly showed video taken by the Christchurch mosque shooter to his supporters at campaign rallies for 31 March local elections and said Australians and New Zealanders who came to Turkey with anti-Muslim sentiments "would be sent back in coffins like their grandfathers" at Gallipoli. Domestic policy Presidential palace Erdoğan has also received criticism for the construction of a new palace called Ak Saray (pure white palace), which occupies approximately 50 acres of Atatürk Forest Farm (AOÇ) in Ankara. Since the AOÇ is protected land, several court orders were issued to halt the construction of the new palace, though building work went on nonetheless. The opposition described the move as a clear disregard for the rule of law. The project was subject to heavy criticism and allegations were made; of corruption during the construction process, wildlife destruction and the complete obliteration of the zoo in the AOÇ in order to make way for the new compound. The fact that the palace is technically illegal has led to it being branded as the 'Kaç-Ak Saray', the word kaçak in Turkish meaning 'illegal'. Ak Saray was originally designed as a new office for the Prime Minister. However, upon assuming the presidency, Erdoğan announced that the palace would become the new Presidential Palace, while the Çankaya Mansion will be used by the Prime Minister instead. The move was seen as a historic change since the Çankaya Mansion had been used as the iconic office of the presidency ever since its inception. The Ak Saray has almost 1,000 rooms and cost $350 million (€270 million), leading to huge criticism at a time when mining accidents and workers' rights had been dominating the agenda. On 29 October 2014, Erdoğan was due to hold a Republic Day reception in the new palace to commemorate the 91st anniversary of the Republic of Turkey and to officially inaugurate the Presidential Palace. However, after most invited participants announced that they would boycott the event and a mining accident occurred in the district of Ermenek in Karaman, the reception was cancelled. The media President Erdoğan and his government continue to press for court action against the remaining free press in Turkey. The latest newspaper that has been seized is Zaman, in March 2016. After the seizure Morton Abramowitz and Eric Edelman, former U.S. ambassadors to Turkey, condemned President Erdoğan's actions in an opinion piece published by The Washington Post: "Clearly, democracy cannot flourish under Erdoğan now". "The overall pace of reforms in Turkey has not only slowed down but in some key areas, such as freedom of expression and the independence of the judiciary, there has been a regression, which is particularly worrying", rapporteur Kati Piri said in April 2016 after the European Parliament passed its annual progress report on Turkey. On 22 June 2016, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that he considered himself successful in "destroying" Turkish civil groups "working against the state", a conclusion that had been confirmed some days earlier by Sedat Laçiner, Professor of International Relations and rector of the Çanakkale Onsekiz Mart University: "Outlawing unarmed and peaceful opposition, sentencing people to unfair punishment under erroneous terror accusations, will feed genuine terrorism in Erdoğan’s Turkey. Guns and violence will become the sole alternative for legally expressing free thought". After the coup attempt, over 200 journalists were arrested and over 120 media outlets were closed. Cumhuriyet journalists were detained in November 2016 after a long-standing crackdown on the newspaper. Subsequently, Reporters Without Borders called Erdoğan an "enemy of press freedom" and said that he "hides his aggressive dictatorship under a veneer of democracy". In April 2017, Turkey blocked all access to Wikipedia over a content dispute. The Turkish government lifted a two-and-a-half-year ban on Wikipedia on 15 January 2020, restoring access to the online encyclopedia a month after Turkey's top court ruled that blocking Wikipedia was unconstitutional. On 1 July 2020, in a statement made to his party members, Erdoğan announced that the government would introduce new measures and regulations to control or shut down social media platforms such as YouTube, Twitter and Netflix. Through these new measures, each company would be required to appoint an official representative in the country to respond to legal concerns. The decision comes after a number of Twitter users insulted his daughter Esra after she welcomed her fourth child. State of emergency and purges On 20 July 2016, President Erdoğan declared the state of emergency, citing the coup d'état attempt as justification. It was first scheduled to last three months. The Turkish parliament approved this measure. The state of emergency was later extended for another three months, amidst the ongoing 2016 Turkish purges including comprehensive purges of independent media and detention of tens of thousands of Turkish citizens politically opposed to Erdoğan. More than 50,000 people have been arrested and over 160,000 fired from their jobs by March 2018. In August 2016, Erdoğan began rounding up journalists who had been publishing, or who were about to publish articles questioning corruption within the Erdoğan administration, and incarcerating them. The number of Turkish journalists jailed by Turkey is higher than any other country, including all of those journalists currently jailed in North Korea, Cuba, Russia, and China combined. In the wake of the coup attempt of July 2016 the Erdoğan administration began rounding up tens of thousands of individuals, both from within the government, and from the public sector, and incarcerating them on charges of alleged "terrorism". As a result of these arrests, many in the international community complained about the lack of proper judicial process in the incarceration of Erdoğan's opposition. In April 2017 Erdoğan successfully sponsored legislation effectively making it illegal for the Turkish legislative branch to investigate his executive branch of government. Without the checks and balances of freedom of speech, and the freedom of the Turkish legislature to hold him accountable for his actions, many have likened Turkey's current form of government to a dictatorship with only nominal forms of democracy in practice. At the time of Erdoğan's successful passing of the most recent legislation silencing his opposition, United States President Donald Trump called Erdoğan to congratulate him for his "recent referendum victory". On 29 April 2017 Erdoğan's administration began an internal Internet block of all of the Wikipedia online encyclopedia site via Turkey's domestic Internet filtering system. This blocking action took place after the government had first made a request for Wikipedia to remove what it referred to as "offensive content". In response, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales replied via a post on Twitter stating, "Access to information is a fundamental human right. Turkish people, I will always stand with you and fight for this right." In January 2016, more than a thousand academics signed a petition criticizing Turkey's military crackdown on ethnic Kurdish towns and neighborhoods in the east of the country, such as Sur (a district of Diyarbakır), Silvan, Nusaybin, Cizre and Silopi, and asking an end to violence. Erdoğan accused those who signed the petition of "terrorist propaganda", calling them "the darkest of people". He called for action by institutions and universities, stating, "Everyone who benefits from this state but is now an enemy of the state must be punished without further delay". Within days, over 30 of the signatories were arrested, many in dawn-time raids on their homes. Although all were quickly released, nearly half were fired from their jobs, eliciting a denunciation from Turkey's Science Academy for such "wrong and disturbing" treatment. Erdoğan vowed that the academics would pay the price for "falling into a pit of treachery". On 8 July 2018, Erdoğan sacked 18,000 officials for alleged ties to US based cleric Fethullah Gülen, shortly before renewing his term as an executive president. Of those removed, 9000 were police officers with 5000 from the armed forces with the addition of hundreds of academics. Foreign policy Europe In February 2016, Erdoğan threatened to send the millions of refugees in Turkey to EU member states, saying: "We can open the doors to Greece and Bulgaria anytime and we can put the refugees on buses ... So how will you deal with refugees if you don't get a deal?" In an interview to the news magazine Der Spiegel, German minister of defence Ursula von der Leyen said on 11 March 2016 that the refugee crisis had made good cooperation between EU and Turkey an "existentially important" issue. "Therefore it is right to advance now negotiations on Turkey's EU accession". In its resolution "The functioning of democratic institutions in Turkey" from 22 June 2016, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe warned that "recent developments in Turkey pertaining to freedom of the media and of expression, erosion of the rule of law and the human rights violations in relation to anti-terrorism security operations in south-east Turkey have ... raised serious questions about the functioning of its democratic institutions". On 20 August 2016, Erdoğan told his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko that Turkey would not recognize the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea; calling it "Crimea's occupation". In January 2017, Erdoğan said that the withdrawal of Turkish troops from Northern Cyprus is "out of the question" and Turkey will be in Cyprus "forever". There is a long-standing dispute between Turkey and Greece in the Aegean Sea. Erdoğan warned that Greece will pay a "heavy price" if Turkey's gas exploration vessel – in what Turkey said are disputed waters – is attacked. In September 2020, Erdoğan declared his government's support for Azerbaijan following clashes between Armenian and Azeri forces over a disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. He dismissed demands for a ceasefire. Diaspora In March 2017, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated to the Turks in Europe, "Make not three, but five children. Because you are the future of Europe. That will be the best response to the injustices against you." This has been interpreted as an imperialist call for demographic warfare. According to The Economist, Erdoğan is the first Turkish leader to take the Turkish diaspora seriously, which has created friction within these diaspora communities and between the Turkish government and several of its European counterparts. The Balkans In February 2018, President Erdoğan expressed Turkish support of the Republic of Macedonia's position during negotiations over the Macedonia naming dispute saying that Greece's position is wrong. In March 2018, President Erdoğan criticized the Kosovan Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj for dismissing his Interior Minister and Intelligence Chief for failing to inform him of an unauthorized and illegal secret operation conducted by the National Intelligence Organization of Turkey on Kosovo's territory that led to the arrest of six people allegedly associated with the Gülen movement. On 26 November 2019, an earthquake struck the Durrës region of Albania. President Erdoğan expressed his condolences. and citing close Albanian-Turkish relations, he committed Turkey to reconstructing 500 earthquake destroyed homes and other civic structures in Laç, Albania. In Istanbul, Erdoğan organised and attended a donors conference (8 December) to assist Albania that included Turkish businessmen, investors and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama. United Kingdom In May 2018, British Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed Erdoğan to the United Kingdom for a three-day state visit. Erdoğan declared that the United Kingdom is "an ally and a strategic partner, but also a real friend. The cooperation we have is well beyond any mechanism that we have established with other partners." Israel Relations between Turkey and Israel began to normalize after Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu officially apologized for the death of the nine Turkish activists during the Gaza flotilla raid. However, in response to the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, Erdoğan accused Israel of being "more barbaric than Hitler", and conducting "state terrorism" and a "genocide attempt" against the Palestinians. In December 2017, President Erdoğan issued a warning to Donald Trump, after the U.S. President acknowledged Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Erdoğan stated, "Jerusalem is a red line for Muslims", indicating that naming Jerusalem as Israel's capital would alienate Palestinians and other Muslims from the city, undermining hopes at a future capital of a Palestinian State. Erdoğan called Israel a "terrorist state". Naftali Bennett dismissed the threats, claiming "Erdoğan does not miss an opportunity to attack Israel". In April 2019, Erdoğan said the West Bank belongs to Palestinians, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would annex Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories if he is re-elected. Erdoğan condemned the Israel–UAE peace agreement, stating that Turkey was considering suspending or cutting off diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates in retaliation. Syrian Civil War Amid allegations of Turkish collaboration with the Islamic State, the 2014 Kobanî protests broke out near the Syrian border city of Kobanî, in protest against the government's perceived facilitation of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant during the Siege of Kobanî. 42 protestors were killed during a brutal police crackdown. Asserting that aid to the Kurdish-majority People's Protection Units (YPG) fighters in Syria would assist the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) (then on ceasefire) in Turkey, Erdoğan held bilateral talks with Barack Obama regarding IS during the 5–6 September 2014 NATO summit in Newport, Wales. In early October, United States Vice President Joe Biden criticised the Turkish government for supplying jihadists in Syria and said Erdoğan had expressed regret to him about letting foreign jihadists transit through Turkey en route to Syria. Erdoğan angrily responded, "Biden has to apologize for his statements" adding that if no apology is made, Biden would become "history to me." Biden subsequently apologised. In response to the U.S. request to use İncirlik Air Base to conduct air strikes against IS, Erdoğan demanded that Bashar al-Assad be removed from power first. Turkey lost its bid for a Security Council seat in the United Nations during the 2014 election; the unexpected result is believed to have been a reaction to Erdoğan's hostile treatment of the Kurds fighting ISIS on the Syrian border and a rebuke of his willingness to support IS-aligned insurgents opposed to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. In 2015, there were consistent allegations that Erdoğan maintained financial links with the Islamic State, including allegation of his son-in-law Berat Albayrak's involvement with oil production and smuggling in ISIL. Revelations that the state was supplying arms to militant groups in Syria in the 2014 National Intelligence Organisation lorry scandal led to accusations of high treason. In July 2015, Turkey became involved in the international military intervention against ISIL, simultaneously launching airstrikes against PKK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan. As of 2015, Turkey began openly supporting the Army of Conquest, a coalition of Syrian rebel groups that included al-Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham. In late November 2016, Erdoğan said that the Turkish military launched its operations in Syria to end Assad's rule, but retracted this statement shortly afterwards. In January 2018, the Turkish military and its Syrian National Army and Sham Legion allies began the Turkish military operation in Afrin in the Kurdish-majority Afrin Canton in Northern Syria, against the YPG. On 10 April, Erdoğan rejected a Russian demand to return Afrin to Syrian government control. In October 2019, after Erdoğan spoke to him, U.S. President Donald Trump gave the go-ahead to the 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria, despite recently agreeing to a Northern Syria Buffer Zone. U.S. troops in northern Syria were withdrawn from the border to avoid interference with the Turkish operation. After the U.S. pullout, Turkey proceeded to attack the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria. Rejecting criticism of the invasion, Erdoğan claimed that NATO and European Union countries "sided with terrorists, and all of them attacked us". China Bilateral trade between Turkey and China increased from $1 billion a year in 2002 to $27 billion annually in 2017. Erdoğan has stated that Turkey might consider joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation instead of the European Union. Qatar blockade In June 2017 during a speech, Erdoğan called the isolation of Qatar as "inhumane and against Islamic values" and that "victimising Qatar through smear campaigns serves no purpose". Myanmar In September 2017, Erdoğan condemned the persecution of Muslims in Myanmar and accused Myanmar of "genocide" against the Muslim minority. United States Over time, Turkey began to look for ways to buy its own missile defense system and also to use that procurement to build up its own capacity to manufacture and sell an air and missile defense system. Turkey got serious about acquiring a missile defense system early in the first Obama administration when it opened a competition between the Raytheon Patriot PAC 2 system and systems from Europe, Russia, and even China. Taking advantage of the new low in U.S.-Turkish relations, Putin saw his chance to use an S-400 sale to Turkey, so in July 2017, he offered the air defense system to Turkey. In the months that followed, the United States warned Turkey that a S-400 purchase jeopardized Turkey's F-35 purchase. Integration of the Russian system into the NATO air defense net was also out of the question. Administration officials, including Mark Esper, warned that Turkey had to choose between the S-400 and the F-35. That they couldn't have both. The S-400 deliveries to Turkey began on 12 July. On 16 July, Trump mentioned to reporters that withholding the F-35 from Turkey was unfair. Said the president, "So what happens is we have a situation where Turkey is very good with us, very good, and we are now telling Turkey that because you have really been forced to buy another missile system, we’re not going to sell you the F-35 fighter jets". The U.S. Congress has made clear on a bipartisan basis that it expects the president to sanction Turkey for buying Russian equipment. Out of the F-35, Turkey now considers buying Russian fifth-generation jet fighter Su-57. On 1 August 2018, the U.S. Department of Treasury sanctioned two senior Turkish government ministers who were involved in the detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson. Erdoğan said that the U.S. behavior will force Turkey to look for new friends and allies. The U.S.–Turkey tensions appear to be the most serious diplomatic crisis between the NATO allies in years. Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton claimed that President Donald Trump told Erdoğan he would 'take care' of investigation against Turkey's state-owned bank Halkbank accused of bank fraud charges and laundering up to $20 billion on behalf of Iranian entities. Turkey criticized Bolton's book, saying it included misleading accounts of conversations between Trump and Erdoğan. In August 2020, the former vice president and presidential candidate Joe Biden called for a new U.S. approach to the "autocrat" President Erdoğan and support for Turkish opposition parties. In September 2020, Biden demanded that Erdoğan "stay out" of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, in which Turkey has supported the Azeris. Venezuela Relations with Venezuela were strengthened with recent developments and high level mutual visits. The first official visit between the two countries at presidential level was in October 2017 when Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro visited Turkey. In December 2018, Erdoğan visited Venezuela for the first time and expressed his will to build strong relations with Venezuela and expressed hope that high-level visits "will increasingly continue." Reuters reported that in 2018 23 tons of mined gold were taken from Venezuela to Istanbul. In the first nine months of 2018, Venezuela's gold exports to Turkey rose from zero in the previous year to US$900 million. During the Venezuelan presidential crisis, Erdoğan voiced solidarity with Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro and criticized U.S. sanctions against Venezuela, saying that "political problems cannot be resolved by punishing an entire nation." Following the 2019 Venezuelan uprising attempt, Erdoğan condemned the actions of lawmaker Juan Guaidó, tweeting "Those who are in an effort to appoint a postmodern colonial governor to Venezuela, where the President was appointed by elections and where the people rule, should know that only democratic elections can determine how a country is governed". Events Coup d'état attempt On 15 July 2016, a coup d'état was attempted by the military, with aims to remove Erdoğan from government. By the next day, Erdoğan's government managed to reassert effective control in the country. Reportedly, no government official was arrested or harmed, which, among other factors, raised the suspicion of a false flag event staged by the government itself. Erdoğan, as well as other government officials, has blamed an exiled cleric, and a former ally of Erdoğan, Fethullah Gülen, for staging the coup attempt. Süleyman Soylu, Minister of Labor in Erdoğan's government, accused the US of planning a coup to oust Erdoğan. Erdoğan, as well as other high-ranking Turkish government officials, has issued repeated demands to the US to extradite Gülen. Following the coup attempt, there has been a significant deterioration in Turkey-US relations. European and other world leaders have expressed their concerns over the situation in Turkey, with many of them warning Erdoğan not to use the coup attempt as an excuse to crack down on his opponents. The rise of ISIS and the collapse of the Kurdish peace process had led to a sharp rise in terror incidents in Turkey until 2016. Erdoğan was accused by his critics of having a 'soft corner' for ISIS. However, after the attempted coup, Erdoğan ordered the Turkish military into Syria to combat ISIS and Kurdish militant groups. Erdoğan's critics have decried purges in the education system and judiciary as undermining the rule of law however Erdoğan supporters argue this is a necessary measure as Gulen-linked schools cheated on entrance exams, requiring a purge in the education system and of the Gulen followers who then entered the judiciary. Erdoğan's plan is "to reconstitute Turkey as a presidential system. The plan would create a centralized system that would enable him to better tackle Turkey's internal and external threats. One of the main hurdles allegedly standing in his way is Fethullah Gulen's movement ..." In the aftermath of the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt, a groundswell of national unity and consensus emerged for cracking down on the coup plotters with a National Unity rally held in Turkey that included Islamists, secularists, liberals and nationalists. Erdoğan has used this consensus to remove Gulen's followers from the bureaucracy, curtail their role in NGOs, Turkey's Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Turkish military, with 149 Generals discharged. In a foreign policy shift Erdoğan ordered the Turkish Armed Forces into battle in Syria and has liberated towns from IS control. As relations with Europe soured over in the aftermath of the attempted coup, Erdoğan developed alternative relationships with Russia, Saudi Arabia and a "strategic partnership" with Pakistan, with plans to cultivate relations through free trade agreements and deepening military relations for mutual co-operation with Turkey's regional allies. 2018 currency and debt crisis The Turkish currency and debt crisis of 2018 was caused by the Turkish economy's excessive current account deficit and foreign-currency debt, in combination with Erdoğan's increasing authoritarianism and his unorthodox ideas about interest rate policy. Economist Paul Krugman described the unfolding crisis as "a classic currency-and-debt crisis, of a kind we’ve seen many times", adding: "At such a time, the quality of leadership suddenly matters a great deal. You need officials who understand what's happening, can devise a response and have enough credibility that markets give them the benefit of the doubt. Some emerging markets have those things, and they are riding out the turmoil fairly well. The Erdoğan regime has none of that". Ideology and public image Early during his premiership, Erdoğan was praised as a role model for emerging Middle Eastern nations due to several reform packages initiated by his government which expanded religious freedoms and minority rights as part of accession negotiations with the European Union. However, his government underwent several crises including the Sledgehammer coup and the Ergenekon trials, corruption scandals, accusations of media intimidation, as well as the pursuit of an increasingly polarizing political agenda; the opposition accused the government of inciting political hatred throughout the country. Critics say that Erdoğan's government legitimizes homophobia, as Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". Neo-Ottomanism As President, Erdoğan has overseen a revival of Ottoman tradition, greeting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas with an Ottoman-style ceremony in the new presidential palace, with guards dressed in costumes representing founders of 16 Great Turkish Empires in history. While serving as the Prime Minister of Turkey, Erdoğan's AKP made references to the Ottoman era during election campaigns, such as calling their supporters 'grandsons of Ottomans' (Osmanlı torunu). This proved controversial, since it was perceived to be an open attack against the republican nature of modern Turkey founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. In 2015, Erdoğan made a statement in which he endorsed the old Ottoman term külliye to refer to university campuses rather than the standard Turkish word kampüs. Many critics have thus accused Erdoğan of wanting to become an Ottoman sultan and abandon the secular and democratic credentials of the Republic. One of the most cited scholars alive, Noam Chomsky, said that "Erdogan in Turkey is basically trying to create something like the Ottoman Caliphate, with him as caliph, supreme leader, throwing his weight around all over the place, and destroying the remnants of democracy in Turkey at the same time". When pressed on this issue in January 2015, Erdoğan denied these claims and said that he would aim to be more like Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom rather than like an Ottoman sultan. In July 2020, after the Council of State annulled the Cabinet's 1934 decision to establish the Hagia Sophia as museum and revoking the monument's status, Erdoğan ordered its reclassification as a mosque. The 1934 decree was ruled to be unlawful under both Ottoman and Turkish law as Hagia Sophia's waqf, endowed by Sultan Mehmed II, had designated the site a mosque; proponents of the decision argued the Hagia Sophia was the personal property of the sultan. This redesignation is controversial, invoking condemnation from the Turkish opposition, UNESCO, the World Council of Churches, the Holy See, and many other international leaders. In August 2020, he also signed the order that transferred the administration of the Chora Church to the Directorate of Religious Affairs to open it for worship as a mosque. Initially converted to a mosque by the Ottomans, the building had then been designated as a museum by the government since 1934. Authoritarianism Erdoğan has served as the de facto leader of Turkey since 2002. In response to criticism, Erdoğan made a speech in May 2014 denouncing allegations of dictatorship, saying that the leader of the opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who was there at the speech, would not be able to "roam the streets" freely if he were a dictator. Kılıçdaroğlu responded that political tensions would cease to exist if Erdoğan stopped making his polarising speeches for three days. One observer said it was a measure of the state of Turkish democracy that Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu could openly threaten, on 20 December 2015, that, if his party did not win the election, Turkish Kurds would endure a repeat of the era of the "white Toros", the Turkish name for the Renault 12, "a car associated with the gendarmarie’s fearsome intelligence agents, who carried out thousands of extrajudicial executions of Kurdish nationalists during the 1990s". In February 2015, a 13-year-old was charged by a prosecutor after allegedly insulting Erdoğan on Facebook. In 2016, a waiter was arrested for insulting Erdoğan by allegedly saying "If Erdoğan comes here, I will not even serve tea to him.". In April 2014, the President of the Constitutional Court, Haşim Kılıç, accused Erdoğan of damaging the credibility of the judiciary, labelling Erdoğan's attempts to increase political control over the courts as 'desperate'. During the chaotic 2007 presidential election, the military issued an E-memorandum warning the government to keep within the boundaries of secularism when choosing a candidate. Regardless, Erdoğan's close relations with Fethullah Gülen and his Cemaat Movement allowed his government to maintain a degree of influence within the judiciary through Gülen's supporters in high judicial and bureaucratic offices. Shortly after, an alleged coup plot codenamed Sledgehammer became public and resulted in the imprisonment of 300 military officers including İbrahim Fırtına, Çetin Doğan and Engin Alan. Several opposition politicians, journalists and military officers also went on trial for allegedly being part of an ultra-nationalist organisation called Ergenekon. Both cases were marred by irregularities and were condemned as a joint attempt by Erdoğan and Gülen to curb opposition to the AKP. The original Sledgehammer document containing the coup plans, allegedly written in 2003, was found to have been written using Microsoft Word 2007. Despite both domestic and international calls for these irregularities to be addressed in order to guarantee a fair trial, Erdoğan instead praised his government for bringing the coup plots to light. When Gülen publicly withdrew support and openly attacked Erdoğan in late 2013, several imprisoned military officers and journalists were released, with the government admitting that the judicial proceedings were unfair. When Gülen withdrew support from the AKP government in late 2013, a government corruption scandal broke out, leading to the arrest of several family members of cabinet ministers. Erdoğan accused Gülen of co-ordinating a "parallel state" within the judiciary in an attempt to topple him from power. He then removed or reassigned several judicial officials in an attempt to remove Gülen's supporters from office. Erdoğan's 'purge' was widely questioned and criticised by the European Union. In early 2014, a new law was passed by parliament giving the government greater control over the judiciary, which sparked public protest throughout the country. International organisations perceived the law to be a danger to the separation of powers. Several judicial officials removed from their posts said that they had been removed due to their secularist credentials. The political opposition accused Erdoğan of not only attempting to remove Gülen supporters, but supporters of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's principles as well, in order to pave the way for increased politicisation of the judiciary. Several family members of Erdoğan's ministers who had been arrested as a result of the 2013 corruption scandal were released, and a judicial order to question Erdoğan's son Bilal Erdoğan was annulled. Controversy erupted when it emerged that many of the newly appointed judicial officials were actually AKP supporters. İslam Çiçek, a judge who ejected the cases of five ministers' relatives accused of corruption, was accused of being an AKP supporter and an official investigation was launched into his political affiliations. On 1 September 2014, the courts dissolved the cases of 96 suspects, which included Bilal Erdoğan. During a televised press conference he was asked if he believed a presidential system was possible in a unitary state. Erdoğan affirmed this and cited Nazi Germany (among other examples) as a case where such a combination existed. However, the Turkish president's office said that Erdoğan was not advocating a Hitler-style government when he called for a state system with a strong executive, and added that the Turkish president had declared the "Holocaust, anti-semitism and Islamophobia" as crimes against humanity and that it was out of the question for him to cite Hitler's Germany as a good example. Suppression of dissent Erdoğan has been criticised for his politicisation of the media, especially after the 2013 protests. The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) alleged that over 1,863 journalists lost their jobs due to their anti-government views in 12 years of AKP rule. Opposition politicians have also alleged that intimidation in the media is due to the government's attempt to restructure the ownership of private media corporations. Journalists from the Cihan News Agency and the Gülenist Zaman newspaper were repeatedly barred from attending government press conferences or asking questions. Several opposition journalists such as Soner Yalçın were controversially arrested as part of the Ergenekon trials and Sledgehammer coup investigation. Veli Ağbaba, a CHP politician, has called the AKP the 'biggest media boss in Turkey.' In 2015, 74 US senators sent a letter to US Secretary of State, John Kerry, to state their concern over what they saw as deviations from the basic principles of democracy in Turkey and oppressions of Erdoğan over media. Notable cases of media censorship occurred during the 2013 anti-government protests, when the mainstream media did not broadcast any news regarding the demonstrations for three days after they began. The lack of media coverage was symbolised by CNN International covering the protests while CNN Türk broadcast a documentary about penguins at the same time. The Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK) controversially issued a fine to pro-opposition news channels including Halk TV and Ulusal Kanal for their coverage of the protests, accusing them of broadcasting footage that could be morally, physically and mentally destabilising to children. Erdoğan was criticised for not responding to the accusations of media intimidation, and caused international outrage after telling a female journalist (Amberin Zaman of The Economist) to know her place and calling her a 'shameless militant' during his 2014 presidential election campaign. While the 2014 presidential election was not subject to substantial electoral fraud, Erdoğan was again criticised for receiving disproportionate media attention in comparison to his rivals. The British newspaper The Times commented that between 2 and 4 July, the state-owned media channel TRT gave 204 minutes of coverage to Erdoğan's campaign and less than a total of 3 minutes to both his rivals. Erdoğan also tightened controls over the Internet, signing into law a bill which allows the government to block websites without prior court order on 12 September 2014. His government blocked Twitter and YouTube in late March 2014 following the release of a recording of a conversation between him and his son Bilal, where Erdoğan allegedly warned his family to 'nullify' all cash reserves at their home amid the 2013 corruption scandal. Erdoğan has undertaken a media campaign that attempts to portray the presidential family as frugal and simple-living; their palace electricity-bill is estimated at $500,000 per month. In May 2016, former Miss Turkey model Merve Büyüksaraç was sentenced to more than a year in prison for allegedly insulting the president. In a 2016 news story, Bloomberg reported, "more than 2,000 cases have been opened against journalists, cartoonists, teachers, a former Miss Turkey, and even schoolchildren in the past two years". In November 2016, the Turkish government blocked access to social media in all of Turkey as well as sought to completely block Internet access for the citizens in the southeast of the country. Mehmet Aksoy lawsuit In 2009, Turkish sculptor Mehmet Aksoy created the Statue of Humanity in Kars to promote reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia. When visiting the city in 2011, Erdoğan deemed the statue a "freak", and months later it was demolished. Aksoy sued Erdoğan for "moral indemnities", although his lawyer said that his statement was a critique rather than an insult. In March 2015, a judge ordered Erdoğan to pay 10,000 liras. Erdoğanism Erdoğan has produced many aphorisms and catch-phrases known as Erdoğanisms. The term Erdoğanism first emerged shortly after Erdoğan's 2011 general election victory, where it was predominantly described as the AKP's liberal economic and conservative democratic ideals fused with Erdoğan demagoguery and cult of personality. Views on minorities LGBT In 2002, Erdoğan said that "homosexuals must be legally protected within the framework of their rights and freedoms. From time to time, we do not find the treatment they get on some television screens humane", he said. However, in 2017 Erdoğan has said that empowering LGBT people in Turkey was "against the values of our nation". In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Turkey's top Muslim scholar and President of Religious Affairs, Ali Erbaş, said in a Friday Ramadan announcement that country condemns homosexuality because it "brings illness," insinuating that same sex relations are responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan backed Erbaş, saying that what Erbaş "said was totally right." Jews While Erdoğan has declared several times being against antisemitism, he has been accused of invoking antisemitic stereotypes in public statements. According to Erdoğan, he had been inspired by novelist and Islamist ideologue Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, a publisher (among others) of antisemitic literature. Others During a live interview in 2014, he said: "You wouldn't believe the things they have said about me. They have said I am Georgian. Excuse me, but they have said even uglier things. They have called me Armenian, but I am Turkish." Honours and accolades Foreign honours Russia: Medal "In Commemoration of the 1000th Anniversary of Kazan" (1 June 2006) Pakistan: Nishan-e-Pakistan, the highest civilian award in Pakistan (26 October 2009) Georgia: Order of Golden Fleece, awarded for his contribution to development of bilateral relations (17 May 2010) Kyrgyzstan: Danaker Order in Bishkek (2 February 2011) Azerbaijan: Heydar Aliyev Order (3 September 2014) Belgium: Grand Cordon in the Order of Leopold (5 October 2015) Madagascar: Knight Grand Cross in the national Order (25 January 2017) Gagauzia: Order of Gagauz-Yeri in Comrat (18 October 2018) Venezuela: Order of the Liberator, Grand Cordon (3 December 2018) Ukraine: Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise (16 October 2020) Other awards 29 January 2004: Profile of Courage Award from the American Jewish Congress, for promoting peace between cultures. Returned at the request of the A.J.C. in July 2014. 13 June 2004: Golden Plate award from the Academy of Achievement during the conference in Chicago. 3 October 2004: German Quadriga prize for improving relationships between different cultures. 2 September 2005: Mediterranean Award for Institutions (). This was awarded by the Fondazione Mediterraneo. 8 August 2006: Caspian Energy Integration Award from the Caspian Integration Business Club. 1 November 2006: Outstanding Service award from the Turkish humanitarian organization Red Crescent. 2 February 2007: Dialogue Between Cultures Award from the President of Tatarstan Mintimer Shaimiev. 15 April 2007: Crystal Hermes Award from the German Chancellor Angela Merkel at the opening of the Hannover Industrial Fair. 11 July 2007: highest award of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the Agricola Medal, in recognition of his contribution to agricultural and social development in Turkey. 11 May 2009: Avicenna award from the Avicenna Foundation in Frankfurt, Germany. 9 June 2009: guest of honor at the 20th Crans Montana Forum in Brussels and received the Prix de la Fondation, for democracy and freedom. 25 June 2009: Key to the City of Tirana on the occasion of his state visit to Albania. 29 December 2009: Award for Contribution to World Peace from the Turgut Özal Thought and Move Association. 12 January 2010: King Faisal International Prize for "service to Islam" from the King Faisal Foundation. 23 February 2010: Nodo Culture Award from the mayor of Seville for his efforts to launch the Alliance of Civilizations initiative. 1 March 2010: United Nations–HABITAT award in memorial of Rafik Hariri. A seven-member international jury unanimously found Erdoğan deserving of the award because of his "excellent achievement and commendable conduct in the area of leadership, statesmanship and good governance. Erdoğan also initiated the first roundtable of mayors during the Istanbul conference, which led to a global, organized movement of mayors." 27 May 2010: medal of honor from the Brazilian Federation of Industry for the State of São Paulo (FIESP) for his contributions to industry 31 May 2010: World Health Organization 2010 World No Tobacco Award for "his dedicated leadership on tobacco control in Turkey." 29 June 2010: 2010 World Family Award from the World Family Organization which operates under the umbrella of the United Nations. 4 November 2010: Golden Medal of Independence, an award conferred upon Kosovo citizens and foreigners that have contributed to the independence of Kosovo. 25 November 2010: "Leader of the Year" award presented by the Union of Arab Banks in Lebanon. 11 January 2011: "Outstanding Personality in the Islamic World Award" of the Sheikh Fahad al-Ahmad International Award for Charity in Kuwait. 25 October 2011: Palestinian International Award for Excellence and Creativity (PIA) 2011 for his support to the Palestinian people and cause. 21 January 2012: 'Gold Statue 2012 Special Award' by the Polish Business Center Club (BCC). Erdoğan was awarded for his systematic effort to clear barriers on the way to economic growth, striving to build democracy and free market relations. 2020: Ig Nobel Prize "for using the COVID-19 viral pandemic to teach the world that politicians can have a more immediate effect on life and death than scientists and doctors can." See also List of international presidential trips made by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Leadership approval polling for the 2023 Turkish general election The 500 Most Influential Muslims Notes References Further reading Cagaptay, Soner. The new sultan: Erdogan and the crisis of modern Turkey (2nd ed. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020). online review Cagaptay, Soner. "Making Turkey Great Again." Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 43 (2019): 169–78. online Kirişci, Kemal, and Amanda Sloat. "The rise and fall of liberal democracy in Turkey: Implications for the West" Foreign Policy at Brookings (2019) online Tziarras, Zenonas. "Erdoganist authoritarianism and the 'new' Turkey." Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 18.4 (2018): 593–598. online Yavuz, M. Hakan. "A framework for understanding the Intra-Islamist conflict between the AK party and the Gülen movement." Politics, Religion & Ideology 19.1 (2018): 11–32. online Yesil, Bilge. Media in New Turkey: The Origins of an Authoritarian Neoliberal State (University of Illinois Press, 2016) online review External links Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Instagram. Archived from the original. Welcome to demokrasi: how Erdoğan got more popular than ever by The Guardian 1954 births Living people 21st-century presidents of Turkey 21st-century prime ministers of Turkey Deniers of the Armenian genocide Deputies of Istanbul Deputies of Siirt Recep Tayyip Imam Hatip school alumni Justice and Development Party (Turkey) politicians Leaders of political parties in Turkey Marmara University alumni Mayors of Istanbul Members of the 22nd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 23rd Parliament of Turkey Members of the 24th Parliament of Turkey Naqshbandi order People from Istanbul Politicians arrested in Turkey Presidents of Turkey Prime Ministers of Turkey Recipients of the Heydar Aliyev Order Recipients of the Order of the Golden Fleece (Georgia) Recipients of the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 1st class Turkish Islamists Turkish Sunni Muslims Chairmen of the Organization of Turkic States Recipients of the Gagauz-Yeri Order Foreign recipients of the Nishan-e-Pakistan	false	[ "Hot Dog was a Saturday morning documentary series for children, seen on NBC from September 12, 1970 to September 4, 1971. Created by Frank Buxton and co-produced by Buxton and Lee Mendelson, the program was notable for its hosts – comedienne Jo Anne Worley, comedian Jonathan Winters and writer and actor Woody Allen. The pilot, televised on March 28, 1970, starred Worley, Allen and Tom Smothers, who was replaced with Winters when the show became a series.\n\nBased on Buxton's travels as a comedian (and later, as host of the ABC series Discovery), which took him on tours to various factories, Hot Dog explained, in a humorous manner, how we do things (such as snore) and how things were made (such as the eponymous hot dogs and their buns, plus condiments like mustard).\n\nSeventy topics were covered during the course of this series, which lasted 13 episodes and was rerun the rest of the season. NBC won a Peabody award for the series in 1970.\n\nSome of the music in this series was performed by The Youngbloods.\n\nSyndication and alternate versions\nReruns of Hot Dog were syndicated during the 1977–1978 television season, at a time when Allen had firmly established himself as a motion picture star, director, and writer. Portions of Hot Dog were also seen on a local KNBC children's program in Los Angeles, That's Cat, which debuted in 1976.\n\nIn 1971, the Individual topic segments were sold to schools on 16mm film.\n\nTopics \n(listed alphabetically)\n \"How does a frog jump?\"\n \"How does a letter get through the mail?\"\n \"How do they get toothpaste in the tube?\"\n \"How do they make a baseball glove?\" \n \"How do they make a hot dog roll?\"\n \"How do they make a surfboard?\"\n \"How do they make baseballs?\"\n “How do they make bicycles?”\n \"How do they make bowling balls?\"\n \"How do they make bubblegum?\"\n \"How do they make cartoons?\"\n \"How do they make chocolate?\"\n \"How do they make playing cards?\" \n \"How do they make pennies?\" \n \"How do they make plywood\"\n \"How do they make spaghetti?\"\n \"How do they make tennis shoes?\"\n \"How do they make toothbrushes?\"\n \"How do they make T-shirts?\"\n \"How money is made\"\n \"Is that really lead in a lead pencil?\"\n \"What makes popcorn pop?\"\n \"What's a compass?\"\n \"Where does honey come from?\"\n \"Where does lumber come from?\"\n \"Where do felt tip pens come from?\"\n \"Who invented the hot dog?\"\n\nReferences\n\n The Encyclopedia of Daytime Television by Wesley Hyatt (Billboard Books 1997)\n\nExternal links\n \n List of productions, including Hot Dog episodes. produced by Lee Mendelson – Frank Buxton Joint Film Productions\n Frank Buxton's web page on the series Hot Dog\n\nScience education television series\n1970s American documentary television series\n1970s American children's television series\n1970s American science fiction television series\n1970 American television series debuts\n1971 American television series endings\nAmerican children's education television series\nNBC original programming\nPeabody Award-winning television programs", "Schrödinger's Kittens and the Search for Reality is a 1995 book by John Gribbin, in which the author attempts to explain the mysteries of modern quantum mechanics in a popular-scientific way. It is a sequel to his earlier book, In Search of Schrödinger's Cat (1984).\n\nIn his epilogue, Gribbin touches on what were then the most recent developments of string theory, and introduces the transactional interpretation of quantum mechanics as the new \"mythology\" of our time. His argument does not refute the theory, but demonstrates how all theories can be true and mythological (depending on one's perspective).\n\n1995 non-fiction books\nBooks by John Gribbin\nEnglish-language books\nPopular physics books\nKittens and the Search for Reality" ]
[ "Martina McBride", "1995-99: Wild Angels and Evolution" ]	C_34620ae9b8484c5cb6189f64bf825803_1	What style of music does Martina McBride normally create?	1	What style of music does Martina McBride normally create?	Martina McBride	Released in 1995, Wild Angels accounted for another top five hit in its lead single "Safe in the Arms of Love", which had previously been recorded by both Wild Choir and Baillie & the Boys, and was concurrently released in Canada by Michelle Wright at the time of McBride's version. The album's title track went on to become McBride's first No. 1 single on the country charts in early 1996. However, the three follow-ups,"Phones Are Ringin' All Over Town", "Swingin' Doors" and "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" were less successful, reaching the lower regions of the top 40. In early 1997, after "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" peaked, McBride released two duets. "Still Holding On", a duet with Clint Black which was the lead-off single to her album Evolution and his album Nothin' but the Taillights, and "Valentine", a collaboration with pop pianist Jim Brickman which appeared on his album Picture This. She also sang duet vocals on "Chances Are" with Bob Seger, featured on the soundtrack of the 1998 motion picture Hope Floats. She had her second number one on the country charts with "A Broken Wing", the second single from her album Evolution, in late 1997 This album went on to produce four more top ten hits at country radio: a re-release of "Valentine", "Happy Girl", "Wrong Again" (which also went to number one), and "Whatever You Say". Towards the end of 1998, the album was certified double platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America for selling two million units. In addition, she also won the Country Music Association Awards' "Female Vocalist of the Year" award in 1999 and also performed for President Bill Clinton during the same time. Also in 1998, McBride released a Christmas album titled White Christmas, which featured a rendition of "O Holy Night" that first charted in 1997 and continued to re-enter the charts until 2001. She also sang a guest vocal on Jason Sellers' mid-1998 single "This Small Divide". CANNOTANSWER	country	Martina Mariea McBride (née Schiff, born July 29, 1966) is an American country music singer-songwriter and record producer. She is known for her soprano singing range and her country pop material. McBride signed to RCA Records in 1991, and made her debut the following year as a neo-traditionalist country singer with the single, "The Time Has Come". Over time, she developed a pop-styled crossover sound, similar to Shania Twain and Faith Hill, and had a string of major hit singles on the Billboard country chart and occasionally on the adult contemporary chart. Five of these singles went to No. 1 on the country chart between 1995 and 2001, and one peaked at No. 1 on the adult contemporary chart in 2003. McBride has fourteen studio albums, two greatest hits compilations, one "live" album, as well as two additional compilation albums. Eight of her studio albums and two of her compilations have an RIAA Gold certification, or higher. In the U.S., she has sold over 14 million albums. In addition, McBride has won the Country Music Association's "Female Vocalist of the Year" award four times (tied with Reba McEntire for the third-most wins) and the Academy of Country Music's "Top Female Vocalist" award three times. She is also a 14-time Grammy Award nominee. Early life McBride was born in Sharon, Kansas, on July 29, 1966. She has two brothers, Martin and Steve, who play in her concert band as of 2017, and a sister, Gina. McBride's parents, Daryl and Jeanne Schiff, owned a dairy farm. Daryl, who was also a cabinetry shop owner, exposed her to country music at a young age. Listening to country music helped her acquire a love for singing. After school, she sang for hours along to the records of such popular artists as Reba McEntire, Linda Ronstadt, Juice Newton, Jeanne Pruett, Connie Smith, and Patsy Cline. Around the age of eight or nine, Martina began singing with a band her father fronted, "The Schiffters." As she grew older her role in the band progressively increased, from simply singing, to also playing keyboard with them. She enjoyed performing in her early years. McBride began performing with a local rock band, The Penetrators, in Wichita instead. Then, in 1987, Schiff gathered a group of musicians called Lotus and started looking for rehearsal space; she began renting space from studio engineer John McBride. In 1988, the two married. After marrying, the couple moved to Nashville, Tennessee, in 1989 with the hope of beginning a career in country music. John McBride joined Garth Brooks's sound crew and later became his concert production manager. She occasionally joined her husband on the road and helped sell Garth Brooks souvenirs. In 1990, impressed by her enthusiastic spirit, Brooks offered her the position of his opening act provided she could obtain a recording contract. During this time, while her husband was working with country artists Charlie Daniels and Ricky Van Shelton, he also helped produce her demo tape, which helped her gain a recording contract with RCA Nashville Records in 1991. Music career 1992–1995: The Time Has Come and The Way That I Am McBride released her debut studio album by RCA Records in 1992, titled The Time Has Come. It was produced by Paul Worley and Ed Seay. This album's title track made it to number 23 on the country music charts, wile the next two singles both failed to make the Top 40. Unlike her later country pop-influenced albums, The Time Has Come featured honky tonk and country folk influences. The Way That I Am was McBride's second album. Its first two singles both brought her into the country top ten: "My Baby Loves Me," the album's de facto title song, peaked at number two, and "Life No. 9" at peaked at number six. The former was previously a Top 10 hit in Canada for Patricia Conroy. The third single, "Independence Day", was prevented from reaching the Top 10 through the oppositions of many radio programmers, who objected to the song's subject of a mother fighting back against abuse by burning the family home to the ground. "Independence Day" won Video of the Year and Song of the Year at the Country Music Association Awards. It also earned the song's composer, Gretchen Peters, a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Country Song. The song also gave McBride a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance. McBride performed the song at the 1995 Grammys ceremony. The fourth and fifth singles from The Way That I Am were less successful: "Heart Trouble" peaked at number 21, and "Where I Used to Have a Heart" fell short of the Top 40. McBride later criticized these single choices, saying that she felt "Strangers" would have been a better followup, as that song was more popular with fans and later appeared on her first greatest-hits album. The Way That I Am was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). "My Baby Loves Me (Just The Way That I Am)," as produced and released, proved to have a sing-along quality that led McBride to sing it that way in her subsequent concerts. 1995–1999: Wild Angels and Evolution McBride's third album, Wild Angels, was released in 1995. It accounted for another Top 5 hit in its lead single "Safe in the Arms of Love", which had previously been recorded by both Wild Choir and Baillie & the Boys, and was concurrently released in Canada by Michelle Wright at the time of McBride's version. The album's title track went on to become McBride's first No. 1 single on the country charts in early 1996. The album's third, fourth, and fifth singles, "Phones Are Ringin' All Over Town", "Swingin' Doors", and "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" were less successful, having reached the lower regions of the Top 40. In early 1997, after "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" peaked, McBride released two duets. "Still Holding On", a duet with Clint Black which was the lead-off single to her fourth album Evolution and Black's album Nothin' but the Taillights, and "Valentine", a collaboration with pop pianist Jim Brickman which appeared on his album Picture This. She also sang duet vocals on "Chances Are" with Bob Seger, featured on the soundtrack of the 1998 motion picture Hope Floats. She had her second number one on the country charts with "A Broken Wing", the second single from her Evolution album, in late 1997. Evolution went on to produce four more Top 10 hits at country radio: a re-release of "Valentine", "Happy Girl", "Wrong Again" (which also went to number one), and "Whatever You Say". Towards the end of 1998, the album was certified double platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America for selling two million units. In addition, she also won the Country Music Association Awards' "Female Vocalist of the Year" award in 1999 and also performed for President Bill Clinton during the same time. Also in 1998, McBride released her first Christmas album titled White Christmas, which featured a rendition of "O Holy Night" that first charted in 1997 and continued to re-enter the charts until 2001. She also sang a guest vocal on Jason Sellers' mid-1998 single "This Small Divide". 1999–2002: Emotion and Greatest Hits McBride's sixth studio album, Emotion, was released in 1999. Its lead single, "I Love You," reached number one on the Billboard country charts in 1999, and also crossed over to the Adult Contemporary chart. The song's follow-ups, "Love's the Only House" and "There You Are", both made the Top 5 at country radio, and "It's My Time" peaked at number 11. In 2001, she released her first compilation, Greatest Hits. This album has been certified 3× Platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America, and is her highest-selling album. It included most of her major hits to that point, and the album track "Strangers" from the album The Way That I Am, which she put on the album because she felt that it should have been a single. The album also included four new songs, all of which were Top 10 hit on the country music charts between 2001 and 2003: "When God-Fearin' Women Get the Blues" (at number 8), "Blessed" (at number 1), "Where Would You Be" (at number 3), and "Concrete Angel" (at number 5). Carolyn Dawn Johnson sang backing vocals on "Blessed"; conversely, McBride sang backing vocals on Johnson's late-2000 debut single, titled "Georgia". Late in 2002, McBride also sang backing vocals on Andy Griggs's single "Practice Life". 2003–04: Martina In 2003, McBride released her seventh studio album, Martina, which celebrated womanhood. The first single, "This One's for the Girls," went to number 3 on the country charts and became her only number-one hit on the Adult Contemporary charts. It also included backing vocals from Faith Hill, Carolyn Dawn Johnson, and McBride's daughters, Delaney and Emma. Follow-up single "In My Daughter's Eyes" was also a Top 5 hit at both country and adult contemporary. "How Far" and "God's Will" both made the Top 20 at country radio, as did her guest appearance on Jimmy Buffett's single "Trip Around the Sun", whose chart run overlapped that of "God's Will". In 2004, McBride won the CMA's Female Vocalist award for the fourth time, following the wins in 2003, 2002 and 1999, which tied her for the most wins in that category with Reba McEntire. 2005–2008: Timeless and Waking Up Laughing After finding success in country pop-styled music, McBride released her next studio album, Timeless, in 2005, which consisted of country covers. The album included cover versions of country music standards, such as Hank Williams' "You Win Again," Loretta Lynn's "You Ain't Woman Enough," and Kris Kristofferson's "Help Me Make It Through the Night." To make the album fit its older style, McBride and her husband hired older Nashville session players and outdated analog equipment. The album sold over 250,000 copies within its first week, the highest sales start for a McBride album. The lead single, a cover of Lynn Anderson's "(I Never Promised You a) Rose Garden", went to number 18 on the country charts, but the other two singles both failed to make top 40. In 2006, McBride served as a guest coach on Canadian Idol. The remaining five finalists traveled to Nashville, where McBride worked with the competitors on the songs they had chosen by country artists such as Gordon Lightfoot and Patsy Cline. Among the other guest judges that year were Nelly Furtado and Cyndi Lauper. McBride later joined Canadian Idol on a tour in the Spring. In 2007, McBride also served as a guest coach on Fox Networks television series, American Idol. In 2007, McBride released her ninth studio album, Waking Up Laughing. It was the first album in which McBride co-wrote some of the tracks. She set up her Waking Up Laughing Tour in 2007, which included country artists Rodney Atkins, Little Big Town, and Jason Michael Carroll. The album's lead single, "Anyway", went to No. 5 on the Billboard Country Chart, becoming her first Top 10 hit since 2003. She also lent her voice singing "Anyway" in a Lifetime movie called, "A Life Interrupted" which premiered on April 23, 2007. Its follow-up, "How I Feel", reached the Top 15. In Spring 2008, McBride released Martina McBride: Live In Concert, a CD/DVD set. It was taped in Moline, Illinois in September 2007. In July 2007, The ABC Television Network announced a special program called Six Degrees of Martina McBride where individuals from around the country were challenged to find their way to McBride on their own connections and research using a maximum of six methods. The "winner" of this challenge eventually located a direct connection to McBride through her husband, John, who knew someone, who knew someone else. McBride recorded an electronically produced duet with Elvis Presley, performing his song "Blue Christmas" as a duet with him on his latest compilation, The Elvis Presley Christmas Duets. A compilation collection, titled Playlist: The Very Best of Martina McBride, was released on December 16, 2008, as part of Sony BMG Playlist series. The album features 11 previously released tracks and three unreleased tracks. 2008–2010: Shine McBride wrapped up production of her tenth studio album in late 2008. The first single, "Ride", was released to radio in October 2008 and debuted at No. No. 43 on the Hot Country Songs chart. It barely missed the Top 10 on the chart, peaking at number eleven in March 2009. A music video produced by Kristin Barlowe was also released at the end of the year. The album, Shine, was released by RCA Records on March 24, 2009, and debuted at the top of the U.S. Country album chart and number 10 on the Billboard 200. McBride co-produced the album with Dann Huff, and it featured "Sunny Side Up", a song that she co-wrote. The second single, "I Just Call You Mine", was released in May 2009 and reached the Top 20. The third single from Shine was "Wrong Baby Wrong Baby Wrong", which the Warren Brothers co-wrote with Robert Ellis Orrall and Love and Theft member Stephen Barker Liles. McBride also initiated the Shine All Night Tour, a co-headlining venture with fellow country star and friend Trace Adkins and opening act Sarah Buxton. The tour began in November 2009 and ended in May 2010. On June 10, 2010, Billboard announced that McBride had collaborated on a song with Kid Rock. In late June 2010, McBride was nominated for a Teen Choice Award, "Favorite Country Female Artist", alongside country stars Carrie Underwood, Miranda Lambert, Taylor Swift and Gretchen Wilson. In late 2010, McBride was nominated for two American Country Awards (Best Female Single & Touring Artist of the year w/ Trace Adkins.) Along with the ACA nominations, she received her 14th Female Vocalist nomination for Country Music Association in October. 2010–2016: Eleven and Everlasting McBride exited RCA in November 2010 and signed with Republic Nashville. She began working on a new studio album with producer Byron Gallimore. Her first single for Republic Nashville is "Teenage Daughters", which she also co-wrote with the Warren Brothers. McBride told Country Weekly that she co-wrote eight of the eleven songs on the album; she decided to write more frequently because she felt more confident in her songwriting ability after "Anyway" had become a hit. An album track, "One Night" was released as a promotion for NASCAR with a music video in June 2011. "I'm Gonna Love You Through It" was released as the album's second single on July 25, 2011. The song became a critical and commercial hit, peaking at number 4 and becoming her first top five hit since 2006's "Anyway." The album, titled Eleven, was released on October 11, 2011. Its third single was a cover of Train's "Marry Me", recorded as a duet with Train lead singer Pat Monahan. In September 2011, McBride was nominated for the CMA's Female Vocalist award for the 15th time, and 14th time consecutively. RCA Records released two compilation albums in 2012, Hits and More in January and The Essential Martina McBride in October. McBride released Everlasting, a collection of R&B and Soul covers, on April 8, 2014 via Kobalt Label Services. The album includes duets with Kelly Clarkson and Gavin DeGraw, and was produced by Don Was. In September 2014, McBride received her 17th Female Vocalist nomination from the Country Music Association. This feat ties her with Reba McEntire for most nominations in any vocalist category. 2016–present: Reckless and Vocal Point podcast In 2016, McBride released a new single called "Reckless", the title track for a new album. Reckless was released on April 29 through Nash Icon Records. It was recorded at Blackbird Studios and produced by Nathan Chapman and Dann Huff. The album includes 10 songs, one of which is the previously released single "Reckless". According to McBride, making this album felt like "coming home". Reckless debuted at number 2 on the Billboard Top Country Albums Chart. On June 8, 2016, McBride debuted the video for her second single, "Just Around The Corner", during the CMT Music Awards. This song is the official Band Against Cancer anthem. Band Against Cancer is a community-based movement led by Sarah Cannon (the cancer institute of HCA) in partnership with Big Machine Label Group and McBride, which aims to raise awareness, support and resources to those battling cancer. The initiative includes a series of concerts across United States, with McBride as a headliner. In August 2016, the singer announced a new tour called "Love Unleashed". According to McBride, the purpose of the tour was to unite people and spread love through the power of music as a response to the "tragedy and uncertainty in the world". She was also selected as one of 30 artists to perform on "Forever Country", a mash-up track of Take Me Home, Country Roads; On the Road Again; and I Will Always Love You which celebrates 50 years of the CMA Awards. In July 2017, McBride revealed she is planning on releasing a Christmas album, of which she said " It won't have as many hymns on it. It will be more things like 'Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town' and 'It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas.'" She has now said it will be out in 2018, "One is a new Christmas album, which will come out in 2018." The Christmas album It's the Holiday Season was released on October 19, 2018. This will accompany a Christmas tour, called "Joy of Christmas" as well as a cookbook called "Martina's Kitchen Mix: My Recipe Playlist for Real Life" which will be out October 30, 2018. This would be McBride's second cookbook, following her 2014 release called "Around the Table: Recipes and Inspiration for Gatherings Throughout the Year". Martina has launched a new show on Food Network, airing on Sundays at 11am eastern. In 2019, McBride began the podcast Vocal Point, a "free-wheeling, wide-ranging" topical conversation series. On May 4, 2020, McBride appeared in the second season episode of NBC's Songland and released the song "Girls Like Me". Personal life In 1988, Martina Schiff, as she was known up to that time, married sound engineer John McBride, taking his family name as her stage name. The couple has three daughters: Delaney Katharine (born December 22, 1994), Emma Justine (born March 29, 1998) and Ava Rose Kathleen (born June 20, 2005). After becoming a mother, the singer reduced her touring schedule so that her daughters could have a normal upbringing. Joe Galante said this was "an enormous choice in terms of money," but McBride had made it very clear that she wanted to be present in her daughters' lives. Charity work McBride works with a variety of charities. She has served as a spokeswoman for the National Domestic Violence Hotline as well as for the National Network to End Domestic Violence and national spokeswoman for the Tulsa Domestic Violence and Intervention Services. Every year since 1995, she has hosted Middle Tennessee's YWCA, "Celebrity Auction", and it has raised nearly $400,000 so far. In 2004, she worked with "Kids Wish Network" to fulfill the wish of a young girl dying from muscular dystrophy. McBride was awarded the "Minnie Pearl Humanitarian Award" in 2003. McBride explained that educating girls and women on domestic violence is something she works on at home with her own daughters, stating: McBride has also teamed up with Loveisrespect, National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline, working with them on a new program called, "My Time to Shine." McBride appeared on the Stand Up 2 Cancer Telethon in September 2010, where she performed "Unchained Melody" with Leona Lewis, Aaron Neville, and Stevie Wonder. Also in 2010, she hosted the YWCA for the 16th consecutive year, raising over 50,000 dollars. It totals over 500,000 dollars raised so far. McBride also has a charity initiative called "Team Music is Love". Speaking about Team Music Is Love, McBride stated "It started a few years ago as a group of fans that asked me if they could wear a T-shirt with my name to walk in a breast cancer walk, and I said 'of course' and it has grown from there. Last year, we decided we wanted to give it a better name, a name that sounded as important as it is, so we changed it to 'Team Music is Love,' since it's about spreading love through music. We have done some amazing things over the past few years and we continue to grow and keep giving back." Discography 1992: The Time Has Come 1993: The Way That I Am 1995: Wild Angels 1997: Evolution 1998: White Christmas 1999: Emotion 2003: Martina 2005: Timeless 2007: Waking Up Laughing 2009: Shine 2011: Eleven 2014: Everlasting 2016: Reckless 2018: It's the Holiday Season Tours Headlining Evolution Tour Emotions Tour Greatest Hits Tour Timeless Tour Waking Up Laughing Tour One Night Tour Everlasting Tour Love Unleashed Tour Co-headlining Virginia Slims on the Legends Lilith Fair Girls Night Out Alan Jackson and Martina McBride in Concert Shine All Night Tour Holiday concert Joy of Christmas Tour Opening act World Tour '93-'94 Walkin on Sundown Tour Easy Come Easy Go Tour Everywhere Tour The Cowboy Rides Away Tour Awards and nominations McBride has received a number of awards, including the Country Music Association Award (CMA) for Female Vocalist of the Year, with her fourth win in 2004. In 2011 she received and honorary CMA award. She has been nominated for 14 Grammy Awards, but has never won. Grammy Awards Note: In 1995, McBride was one of the various artists featured on the album Amazing Grace – A Country Salute to Gospel (singing "How Great Thou Art"), which won the Grammy Award for Best Southern, Country or Bluegrass Gospel Album. This award went to the compilation album's producer Bill Hearn, and not to the artists. Other awards References External links 1966 births Living people American country singer-songwriters American women country singers American sopranos Country musicians from Kansas Country musicians from Tennessee Grand Ole Opry members Members of the Country Music Association Musicians from Nashville, Tennessee People from Barber County, Kansas RCA Records Nashville artists Republic Records artists Singer-songwriters from Tennessee 20th-century American singers 20th-century American women singers 21st-century American singers 21st-century American women singers Singer-songwriters from Kansas	true	[ "Playlist: The Very Best of Martina McBride is a compilation album from Martina McBride released as part of the Legacy Records Playlist series. The album features 14 tracks, 11 previously released and three not previously included on any of McBride's albums.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences\n\nMartina McBride albums\nMcBride, Martina\n2008 compilation albums\nRCA Records compilation albums", "Martina may refer to:\n\nPeople \n Martina (given name), a female form of Martin, including a list of people with the given name Martina\n Martina (surname), a surname found in Italy and Curaçao\n Martina (empress), the second Empress consort of the Byzantine Empire\n\nSport \n A.S.D. Martina Calcio 1947, football club based in Martina Franca, Italy\n LCF Martina, a futsal club based in Martina Franca, Italy\n\nPlaces \n Martina Franca, a municipality in the province of Taranto, Italy\n Martina, Switzerland, a village in the Grisons\n\nOther \n Martina (album), a 2003 album by Martina McBride\n Martina (film), a 1949 West German drama film\n Martina (tunnel boring machine), a hard rock tunnel boring machine\n 981 Martina, an asteroid\n La Martina, Argentine sportswear company and sponsor of international polo" ]
[ "Martina McBride", "1995-99: Wild Angels and Evolution", "What style of music does Martina McBride normally create?", "country" ]	C_34620ae9b8484c5cb6189f64bf825803_1	What was the first album that McBride co-wrote some of songs??	2	What was the first album that Martina McBride co-wrote some of songs??	Martina McBride	Released in 1995, Wild Angels accounted for another top five hit in its lead single "Safe in the Arms of Love", which had previously been recorded by both Wild Choir and Baillie & the Boys, and was concurrently released in Canada by Michelle Wright at the time of McBride's version. The album's title track went on to become McBride's first No. 1 single on the country charts in early 1996. However, the three follow-ups,"Phones Are Ringin' All Over Town", "Swingin' Doors" and "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" were less successful, reaching the lower regions of the top 40. In early 1997, after "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" peaked, McBride released two duets. "Still Holding On", a duet with Clint Black which was the lead-off single to her album Evolution and his album Nothin' but the Taillights, and "Valentine", a collaboration with pop pianist Jim Brickman which appeared on his album Picture This. She also sang duet vocals on "Chances Are" with Bob Seger, featured on the soundtrack of the 1998 motion picture Hope Floats. She had her second number one on the country charts with "A Broken Wing", the second single from her album Evolution, in late 1997 This album went on to produce four more top ten hits at country radio: a re-release of "Valentine", "Happy Girl", "Wrong Again" (which also went to number one), and "Whatever You Say". Towards the end of 1998, the album was certified double platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America for selling two million units. In addition, she also won the Country Music Association Awards' "Female Vocalist of the Year" award in 1999 and also performed for President Bill Clinton during the same time. Also in 1998, McBride released a Christmas album titled White Christmas, which featured a rendition of "O Holy Night" that first charted in 1997 and continued to re-enter the charts until 2001. She also sang a guest vocal on Jason Sellers' mid-1998 single "This Small Divide". CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Martina Mariea McBride (née Schiff, born July 29, 1966) is an American country music singer-songwriter and record producer. She is known for her soprano singing range and her country pop material. McBride signed to RCA Records in 1991, and made her debut the following year as a neo-traditionalist country singer with the single, "The Time Has Come". Over time, she developed a pop-styled crossover sound, similar to Shania Twain and Faith Hill, and had a string of major hit singles on the Billboard country chart and occasionally on the adult contemporary chart. Five of these singles went to No. 1 on the country chart between 1995 and 2001, and one peaked at No. 1 on the adult contemporary chart in 2003. McBride has fourteen studio albums, two greatest hits compilations, one "live" album, as well as two additional compilation albums. Eight of her studio albums and two of her compilations have an RIAA Gold certification, or higher. In the U.S., she has sold over 14 million albums. In addition, McBride has won the Country Music Association's "Female Vocalist of the Year" award four times (tied with Reba McEntire for the third-most wins) and the Academy of Country Music's "Top Female Vocalist" award three times. She is also a 14-time Grammy Award nominee. Early life McBride was born in Sharon, Kansas, on July 29, 1966. She has two brothers, Martin and Steve, who play in her concert band as of 2017, and a sister, Gina. McBride's parents, Daryl and Jeanne Schiff, owned a dairy farm. Daryl, who was also a cabinetry shop owner, exposed her to country music at a young age. Listening to country music helped her acquire a love for singing. After school, she sang for hours along to the records of such popular artists as Reba McEntire, Linda Ronstadt, Juice Newton, Jeanne Pruett, Connie Smith, and Patsy Cline. Around the age of eight or nine, Martina began singing with a band her father fronted, "The Schiffters." As she grew older her role in the band progressively increased, from simply singing, to also playing keyboard with them. She enjoyed performing in her early years. McBride began performing with a local rock band, The Penetrators, in Wichita instead. Then, in 1987, Schiff gathered a group of musicians called Lotus and started looking for rehearsal space; she began renting space from studio engineer John McBride. In 1988, the two married. After marrying, the couple moved to Nashville, Tennessee, in 1989 with the hope of beginning a career in country music. John McBride joined Garth Brooks's sound crew and later became his concert production manager. She occasionally joined her husband on the road and helped sell Garth Brooks souvenirs. In 1990, impressed by her enthusiastic spirit, Brooks offered her the position of his opening act provided she could obtain a recording contract. During this time, while her husband was working with country artists Charlie Daniels and Ricky Van Shelton, he also helped produce her demo tape, which helped her gain a recording contract with RCA Nashville Records in 1991. Music career 1992–1995: The Time Has Come and The Way That I Am McBride released her debut studio album by RCA Records in 1992, titled The Time Has Come. It was produced by Paul Worley and Ed Seay. This album's title track made it to number 23 on the country music charts, wile the next two singles both failed to make the Top 40. Unlike her later country pop-influenced albums, The Time Has Come featured honky tonk and country folk influences. The Way That I Am was McBride's second album. Its first two singles both brought her into the country top ten: "My Baby Loves Me," the album's de facto title song, peaked at number two, and "Life No. 9" at peaked at number six. The former was previously a Top 10 hit in Canada for Patricia Conroy. The third single, "Independence Day", was prevented from reaching the Top 10 through the oppositions of many radio programmers, who objected to the song's subject of a mother fighting back against abuse by burning the family home to the ground. "Independence Day" won Video of the Year and Song of the Year at the Country Music Association Awards. It also earned the song's composer, Gretchen Peters, a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Country Song. The song also gave McBride a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance. McBride performed the song at the 1995 Grammys ceremony. The fourth and fifth singles from The Way That I Am were less successful: "Heart Trouble" peaked at number 21, and "Where I Used to Have a Heart" fell short of the Top 40. McBride later criticized these single choices, saying that she felt "Strangers" would have been a better followup, as that song was more popular with fans and later appeared on her first greatest-hits album. The Way That I Am was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). "My Baby Loves Me (Just The Way That I Am)," as produced and released, proved to have a sing-along quality that led McBride to sing it that way in her subsequent concerts. 1995–1999: Wild Angels and Evolution McBride's third album, Wild Angels, was released in 1995. It accounted for another Top 5 hit in its lead single "Safe in the Arms of Love", which had previously been recorded by both Wild Choir and Baillie & the Boys, and was concurrently released in Canada by Michelle Wright at the time of McBride's version. The album's title track went on to become McBride's first No. 1 single on the country charts in early 1996. The album's third, fourth, and fifth singles, "Phones Are Ringin' All Over Town", "Swingin' Doors", and "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" were less successful, having reached the lower regions of the Top 40. In early 1997, after "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" peaked, McBride released two duets. "Still Holding On", a duet with Clint Black which was the lead-off single to her fourth album Evolution and Black's album Nothin' but the Taillights, and "Valentine", a collaboration with pop pianist Jim Brickman which appeared on his album Picture This. She also sang duet vocals on "Chances Are" with Bob Seger, featured on the soundtrack of the 1998 motion picture Hope Floats. She had her second number one on the country charts with "A Broken Wing", the second single from her Evolution album, in late 1997. Evolution went on to produce four more Top 10 hits at country radio: a re-release of "Valentine", "Happy Girl", "Wrong Again" (which also went to number one), and "Whatever You Say". Towards the end of 1998, the album was certified double platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America for selling two million units. In addition, she also won the Country Music Association Awards' "Female Vocalist of the Year" award in 1999 and also performed for President Bill Clinton during the same time. Also in 1998, McBride released her first Christmas album titled White Christmas, which featured a rendition of "O Holy Night" that first charted in 1997 and continued to re-enter the charts until 2001. She also sang a guest vocal on Jason Sellers' mid-1998 single "This Small Divide". 1999–2002: Emotion and Greatest Hits McBride's sixth studio album, Emotion, was released in 1999. Its lead single, "I Love You," reached number one on the Billboard country charts in 1999, and also crossed over to the Adult Contemporary chart. The song's follow-ups, "Love's the Only House" and "There You Are", both made the Top 5 at country radio, and "It's My Time" peaked at number 11. In 2001, she released her first compilation, Greatest Hits. This album has been certified 3× Platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America, and is her highest-selling album. It included most of her major hits to that point, and the album track "Strangers" from the album The Way That I Am, which she put on the album because she felt that it should have been a single. The album also included four new songs, all of which were Top 10 hit on the country music charts between 2001 and 2003: "When God-Fearin' Women Get the Blues" (at number 8), "Blessed" (at number 1), "Where Would You Be" (at number 3), and "Concrete Angel" (at number 5). Carolyn Dawn Johnson sang backing vocals on "Blessed"; conversely, McBride sang backing vocals on Johnson's late-2000 debut single, titled "Georgia". Late in 2002, McBride also sang backing vocals on Andy Griggs's single "Practice Life". 2003–04: Martina In 2003, McBride released her seventh studio album, Martina, which celebrated womanhood. The first single, "This One's for the Girls," went to number 3 on the country charts and became her only number-one hit on the Adult Contemporary charts. It also included backing vocals from Faith Hill, Carolyn Dawn Johnson, and McBride's daughters, Delaney and Emma. Follow-up single "In My Daughter's Eyes" was also a Top 5 hit at both country and adult contemporary. "How Far" and "God's Will" both made the Top 20 at country radio, as did her guest appearance on Jimmy Buffett's single "Trip Around the Sun", whose chart run overlapped that of "God's Will". In 2004, McBride won the CMA's Female Vocalist award for the fourth time, following the wins in 2003, 2002 and 1999, which tied her for the most wins in that category with Reba McEntire. 2005–2008: Timeless and Waking Up Laughing After finding success in country pop-styled music, McBride released her next studio album, Timeless, in 2005, which consisted of country covers. The album included cover versions of country music standards, such as Hank Williams' "You Win Again," Loretta Lynn's "You Ain't Woman Enough," and Kris Kristofferson's "Help Me Make It Through the Night." To make the album fit its older style, McBride and her husband hired older Nashville session players and outdated analog equipment. The album sold over 250,000 copies within its first week, the highest sales start for a McBride album. The lead single, a cover of Lynn Anderson's "(I Never Promised You a) Rose Garden", went to number 18 on the country charts, but the other two singles both failed to make top 40. In 2006, McBride served as a guest coach on Canadian Idol. The remaining five finalists traveled to Nashville, where McBride worked with the competitors on the songs they had chosen by country artists such as Gordon Lightfoot and Patsy Cline. Among the other guest judges that year were Nelly Furtado and Cyndi Lauper. McBride later joined Canadian Idol on a tour in the Spring. In 2007, McBride also served as a guest coach on Fox Networks television series, American Idol. In 2007, McBride released her ninth studio album, Waking Up Laughing. It was the first album in which McBride co-wrote some of the tracks. She set up her Waking Up Laughing Tour in 2007, which included country artists Rodney Atkins, Little Big Town, and Jason Michael Carroll. The album's lead single, "Anyway", went to No. 5 on the Billboard Country Chart, becoming her first Top 10 hit since 2003. She also lent her voice singing "Anyway" in a Lifetime movie called, "A Life Interrupted" which premiered on April 23, 2007. Its follow-up, "How I Feel", reached the Top 15. In Spring 2008, McBride released Martina McBride: Live In Concert, a CD/DVD set. It was taped in Moline, Illinois in September 2007. In July 2007, The ABC Television Network announced a special program called Six Degrees of Martina McBride where individuals from around the country were challenged to find their way to McBride on their own connections and research using a maximum of six methods. The "winner" of this challenge eventually located a direct connection to McBride through her husband, John, who knew someone, who knew someone else. McBride recorded an electronically produced duet with Elvis Presley, performing his song "Blue Christmas" as a duet with him on his latest compilation, The Elvis Presley Christmas Duets. A compilation collection, titled Playlist: The Very Best of Martina McBride, was released on December 16, 2008, as part of Sony BMG Playlist series. The album features 11 previously released tracks and three unreleased tracks. 2008–2010: Shine McBride wrapped up production of her tenth studio album in late 2008. The first single, "Ride", was released to radio in October 2008 and debuted at No. No. 43 on the Hot Country Songs chart. It barely missed the Top 10 on the chart, peaking at number eleven in March 2009. A music video produced by Kristin Barlowe was also released at the end of the year. The album, Shine, was released by RCA Records on March 24, 2009, and debuted at the top of the U.S. Country album chart and number 10 on the Billboard 200. McBride co-produced the album with Dann Huff, and it featured "Sunny Side Up", a song that she co-wrote. The second single, "I Just Call You Mine", was released in May 2009 and reached the Top 20. The third single from Shine was "Wrong Baby Wrong Baby Wrong", which the Warren Brothers co-wrote with Robert Ellis Orrall and Love and Theft member Stephen Barker Liles. McBride also initiated the Shine All Night Tour, a co-headlining venture with fellow country star and friend Trace Adkins and opening act Sarah Buxton. The tour began in November 2009 and ended in May 2010. On June 10, 2010, Billboard announced that McBride had collaborated on a song with Kid Rock. In late June 2010, McBride was nominated for a Teen Choice Award, "Favorite Country Female Artist", alongside country stars Carrie Underwood, Miranda Lambert, Taylor Swift and Gretchen Wilson. In late 2010, McBride was nominated for two American Country Awards (Best Female Single & Touring Artist of the year w/ Trace Adkins.) Along with the ACA nominations, she received her 14th Female Vocalist nomination for Country Music Association in October. 2010–2016: Eleven and Everlasting McBride exited RCA in November 2010 and signed with Republic Nashville. She began working on a new studio album with producer Byron Gallimore. Her first single for Republic Nashville is "Teenage Daughters", which she also co-wrote with the Warren Brothers. McBride told Country Weekly that she co-wrote eight of the eleven songs on the album; she decided to write more frequently because she felt more confident in her songwriting ability after "Anyway" had become a hit. An album track, "One Night" was released as a promotion for NASCAR with a music video in June 2011. "I'm Gonna Love You Through It" was released as the album's second single on July 25, 2011. The song became a critical and commercial hit, peaking at number 4 and becoming her first top five hit since 2006's "Anyway." The album, titled Eleven, was released on October 11, 2011. Its third single was a cover of Train's "Marry Me", recorded as a duet with Train lead singer Pat Monahan. In September 2011, McBride was nominated for the CMA's Female Vocalist award for the 15th time, and 14th time consecutively. RCA Records released two compilation albums in 2012, Hits and More in January and The Essential Martina McBride in October. McBride released Everlasting, a collection of R&B and Soul covers, on April 8, 2014 via Kobalt Label Services. The album includes duets with Kelly Clarkson and Gavin DeGraw, and was produced by Don Was. In September 2014, McBride received her 17th Female Vocalist nomination from the Country Music Association. This feat ties her with Reba McEntire for most nominations in any vocalist category. 2016–present: Reckless and Vocal Point podcast In 2016, McBride released a new single called "Reckless", the title track for a new album. Reckless was released on April 29 through Nash Icon Records. It was recorded at Blackbird Studios and produced by Nathan Chapman and Dann Huff. The album includes 10 songs, one of which is the previously released single "Reckless". According to McBride, making this album felt like "coming home". Reckless debuted at number 2 on the Billboard Top Country Albums Chart. On June 8, 2016, McBride debuted the video for her second single, "Just Around The Corner", during the CMT Music Awards. This song is the official Band Against Cancer anthem. Band Against Cancer is a community-based movement led by Sarah Cannon (the cancer institute of HCA) in partnership with Big Machine Label Group and McBride, which aims to raise awareness, support and resources to those battling cancer. The initiative includes a series of concerts across United States, with McBride as a headliner. In August 2016, the singer announced a new tour called "Love Unleashed". According to McBride, the purpose of the tour was to unite people and spread love through the power of music as a response to the "tragedy and uncertainty in the world". She was also selected as one of 30 artists to perform on "Forever Country", a mash-up track of Take Me Home, Country Roads; On the Road Again; and I Will Always Love You which celebrates 50 years of the CMA Awards. In July 2017, McBride revealed she is planning on releasing a Christmas album, of which she said " It won't have as many hymns on it. It will be more things like 'Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town' and 'It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas.'" She has now said it will be out in 2018, "One is a new Christmas album, which will come out in 2018." The Christmas album It's the Holiday Season was released on October 19, 2018. This will accompany a Christmas tour, called "Joy of Christmas" as well as a cookbook called "Martina's Kitchen Mix: My Recipe Playlist for Real Life" which will be out October 30, 2018. This would be McBride's second cookbook, following her 2014 release called "Around the Table: Recipes and Inspiration for Gatherings Throughout the Year". Martina has launched a new show on Food Network, airing on Sundays at 11am eastern. In 2019, McBride began the podcast Vocal Point, a "free-wheeling, wide-ranging" topical conversation series. On May 4, 2020, McBride appeared in the second season episode of NBC's Songland and released the song "Girls Like Me". Personal life In 1988, Martina Schiff, as she was known up to that time, married sound engineer John McBride, taking his family name as her stage name. The couple has three daughters: Delaney Katharine (born December 22, 1994), Emma Justine (born March 29, 1998) and Ava Rose Kathleen (born June 20, 2005). After becoming a mother, the singer reduced her touring schedule so that her daughters could have a normal upbringing. Joe Galante said this was "an enormous choice in terms of money," but McBride had made it very clear that she wanted to be present in her daughters' lives. Charity work McBride works with a variety of charities. She has served as a spokeswoman for the National Domestic Violence Hotline as well as for the National Network to End Domestic Violence and national spokeswoman for the Tulsa Domestic Violence and Intervention Services. Every year since 1995, she has hosted Middle Tennessee's YWCA, "Celebrity Auction", and it has raised nearly $400,000 so far. In 2004, she worked with "Kids Wish Network" to fulfill the wish of a young girl dying from muscular dystrophy. McBride was awarded the "Minnie Pearl Humanitarian Award" in 2003. McBride explained that educating girls and women on domestic violence is something she works on at home with her own daughters, stating: McBride has also teamed up with Loveisrespect, National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline, working with them on a new program called, "My Time to Shine." McBride appeared on the Stand Up 2 Cancer Telethon in September 2010, where she performed "Unchained Melody" with Leona Lewis, Aaron Neville, and Stevie Wonder. Also in 2010, she hosted the YWCA for the 16th consecutive year, raising over 50,000 dollars. It totals over 500,000 dollars raised so far. McBride also has a charity initiative called "Team Music is Love". Speaking about Team Music Is Love, McBride stated "It started a few years ago as a group of fans that asked me if they could wear a T-shirt with my name to walk in a breast cancer walk, and I said 'of course' and it has grown from there. Last year, we decided we wanted to give it a better name, a name that sounded as important as it is, so we changed it to 'Team Music is Love,' since it's about spreading love through music. We have done some amazing things over the past few years and we continue to grow and keep giving back." Discography 1992: The Time Has Come 1993: The Way That I Am 1995: Wild Angels 1997: Evolution 1998: White Christmas 1999: Emotion 2003: Martina 2005: Timeless 2007: Waking Up Laughing 2009: Shine 2011: Eleven 2014: Everlasting 2016: Reckless 2018: It's the Holiday Season Tours Headlining Evolution Tour Emotions Tour Greatest Hits Tour Timeless Tour Waking Up Laughing Tour One Night Tour Everlasting Tour Love Unleashed Tour Co-headlining Virginia Slims on the Legends Lilith Fair Girls Night Out Alan Jackson and Martina McBride in Concert Shine All Night Tour Holiday concert Joy of Christmas Tour Opening act World Tour '93-'94 Walkin on Sundown Tour Easy Come Easy Go Tour Everywhere Tour The Cowboy Rides Away Tour Awards and nominations McBride has received a number of awards, including the Country Music Association Award (CMA) for Female Vocalist of the Year, with her fourth win in 2004. In 2011 she received and honorary CMA award. She has been nominated for 14 Grammy Awards, but has never won. Grammy Awards Note: In 1995, McBride was one of the various artists featured on the album Amazing Grace – A Country Salute to Gospel (singing "How Great Thou Art"), which won the Grammy Award for Best Southern, Country or Bluegrass Gospel Album. This award went to the compilation album's producer Bill Hearn, and not to the artists. Other awards References External links 1966 births Living people American country singer-songwriters American women country singers American sopranos Country musicians from Kansas Country musicians from Tennessee Grand Ole Opry members Members of the Country Music Association Musicians from Nashville, Tennessee People from Barber County, Kansas RCA Records Nashville artists Republic Records artists Singer-songwriters from Tennessee 20th-century American singers 20th-century American women singers 21st-century American singers 21st-century American women singers Singer-songwriters from Kansas	false	[ "\"Teenage Daughters\" is a song co-written and recorded by American country music artist Martina McBride. It is her first single for Republic Nashville. It was released in March 2011 as the lead-off single from her album Eleven, which was released on October 11, 2011.\n\nHistory\nMcBride wrote the song with The Warren Brothers (Brad and Brett Warren). She told Country Weekly magazine that they decided to write the song after talking with the Warrens about her older daughter, Delaney. She said, \"I was just saying how one minute you are everything to them[…]and the next minute it's just a whole different thing.\" After saying that, she decided that they should write about having a teenage daughter. The song was released to the iTunes Store on March 29, 2011, the day that McBride's middle daughter, Emma turned 13.\n\nMcBride co-wrote \"Teenage Daughters\" and seven other songs on the album. She said that after having a top five hit with \"Anyway\", the first single release that she ever co-wrote, she decided to co-write more frequently.\n\nCritical reception\nThe song was met with mixed reviews by critics. Matt Bjorke of Roughstock rated it four stars out of five, calling it \"a song that any parent[…]can relate to\" and saying that it \"doesn’t fall into the dramatic melisma-filled type of song that was so often sent out to radio over the years.\" Blake Boldt of Engine 145 gave the song a \"thumbs down.\" His review praises the song's lyrics for being \"a witty and accurate portrayal of what it means to be a parent,\" but criticized the \"misplaced\" production and McBride's \"whiny, exaggerated\" singing.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video shows McBride as the mother of a teenage daughter in the 1950s, the 1970s, and the 1980s. McBride's husband and daughters appear in the video. It was directed by Roman White.\n\nChart performance\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences\n\n2011 singles\n2011 songs\nMartina McBride songs\nSongs written by Martina McBride\nSongs written by The Warren Brothers\nSong recordings produced by Byron Gallimore\nMusic videos directed by Roman White\nRepublic Records singles\nRepublic Nashville singles\nSongs about teenagers", "Jim McBride (born April 28, 1947) is an American country music songwriter. He is well known as writer of several songs that have peaked within the top ten on the US Billboard Hot Country Songs Chart.\n\nHis first song A Bridge That Just Won’t Burn released in October 1980 on MCA Records and it peaked at #3 on the Chart. His other top songs include Bet Your Heart on Me, Rose in Paradise, Someday, and Chattahoochee.\n\nIn 2017 he was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame.\n\nFor a list of songs written by Jim McBride, go to Songs written by Jim McBride.\n\nBiography \nMcBride was born as Jimmy Ray McBride on April 28, 1947, in Huntsville, Alabama to James Alvin and Helen Hillis McBride. McBride has two sons, Brent and Wes from his first marriage, which was to Linda Pierce. McBride is currently married to Jeanne Ivey McBride; they were married in 2012 in Florida. \n\nJim McBride wrote his first song when he was twelve and began writing at the age of eighteen. He spent his younger years reading about songs anywhere he could, especially in Country Song Roundup. In the 70's McBride took his songs to a friend in Nashville at Tree Publishing, Curly Putman, another songwriter from Alabama. His first song to chart was \"We Let Love Fade Away\" by Leon Everette, and co-written with Roger Murrah. It peaked on Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart the week of February 3, 1979, at #89. \n\nMcBride had other songs recorded by The Hagers, performers on Hee Haw. The Hagers would from time-to-time sing McBride's songs on Hee Haw. \n\nMcBride worked as a postman at the United States Post Office before moving to Nashville, TN in January 1981. According to American Songwriter, Jim told Roger Murrah and Bill Rice that if “A Bridge That Just Won’t Burn” got cut as a single, he would quit his job and move to Nashville. Then, \"Roger called me one night and said ‘I guess you need to pack your bags, we’ve got Conway’s next single.’ I quit the post office the day after Christmas, 1980 and then started work the first of January with Bill Rice and Jerry Foster.\" “A Bridge That Just Won’t Burn” hit the Hot Country Songs chart the week of October 18, 1980, at #62. It stayed on the chart for seventeen consecutive weeks,and peaked at #3 the week of January 10, 1981. \n\nHis first #1 on Billboard's Hot Country Songs Chart was \"Bet Your Heart on Me\" recorded by Johnny Lee and released in September 1981. \"Bet Your Heart on Me\" hit Billboard's Hot Country Songs Chart at #55 the week of October 3, 1981, the Billboard Hot 100 Chart at #84 the following week, and the week of October 24th it hit the Top Country Albums chart at #55 and the Billboard 200 at #174. \"Bet Your Heart on Me\" peaked at #147 on the Billboard 200 the week of November 21, 1981, at #54 on the Hot 100 the week of November 14, 1981, at #9 on the Top Country Albums chart the week of December 12, 1981, and at #1 on the Hot Country Songs chart the week of December 5, 1981. \"Bet Your Heart on Me\" was on the Top Country Albums chart for 48 consecutive weeks (from Dec. 12, 1981 to Sept. 18, 1982), the Hot Country Songs chart for fifteen consecutive weeks (from Dec. 5, 1981 to Jan. 9, 1982), the Billboard 200 for eight weeks (from Oct. 24, 1981 to Dec. 12, 1981), and the Hot 100 for nine weeks (from Oct. 10, 1981 to Dec. 5, 1981). \n\nIn March 1983, Alabama released McBride's song \"Dixie Boy\" on their album The Closer You Get (1993 CMA's Album of the Year). The album hit the Billboard Top Country Albums chart at #25 and the Billboard 200 chart at #29 the week of March 26, 1983. It hit the Top Current Albums chart the week of November 5, 1983 at #44, which was also its peak position. It also stayed on the Top Current Albums chart for thirty-eight weeks, the Billboard 200 chart for seventy weeks, and the Top Country Albums chart for 206 weeks (from March 26, 1983 to May 13, 1989), 181 of them consecutively (from March 26, 1983 to Sept. 6, 1986). The album peaked on the Billboard 200 chart at #10 the week of April 30, 1983. It also peaked on the Top Country Albums chart the week of April 16, 1983 at #1 and remained there for eleven consecutive weeks, hitting #1 again the week of July 16, 1983, again August 6, 1983 (remaining there for another four weeks), again the week of September 24, 1983, and once more the week of October 8, 1983 (remaining there for three weeks).\n\nThen in 1987, Waylon Jennings released a song McBride co-wrote with Stewart Harris, \"Rose in Paradise\". \"Rose in Paradise\" would go on to hit #1 on Billboard's Hot Country Songs Chart in April 1987; and #2 on the R&R Charts under the Country Music category for the year in 1987. \"Rose in Paradise\" hit the Hot Country Songs chart the week of January 31, 1987 at #51 and stayed on the chart for nineteen consecutive weeks (from Jan. 31, 1987 to June 6, 1987). In that same year George Jones recorded a song McBride co-wrote with Keith Stegall, \"I'm a Survivor\" on the album titled Too Wild Too Long.\n\nAlso in 1987, Jim met Alan Jackson, who is the co-writer that McBride wrote with the most during the 90's and the 2000's.\n\nJackson and McBride wrote \"Chasin' That Neon Rainbow\" together, Jackson recorded it and it was released as a single in 1989, with another song written by the pair on the B-Side, \"Short Sweet Ride\". \"Chasin' That Neon Rainbow\" was also on Jackson's album, Here in the Real World, released in February 1990, along with two other songs written by McBride and Jackson. \"Chasin' That Neon Rainbow\" peaked at #2 on the Billboard Chats: Hot Country Songs, Country Airplay both in December of 1990. While the album \"Here in the Real World\" peaked at #57 on the Billboard Charts: Top Country Albums and Top Current Albums on May 25, 1991.\n\nWhile writing with Jackson, McBride also had songs recorded by Jackson, Aaron Tippin, Travis Tritt, Conway Twitty, and Randy Travis. Then Jackson recorded a song he and McBride wrote together, \"Someday\", released as a single in 1991. In August 1991, \"Someday\", along with two more of McBride's songs were released on Jackson's album, Don't Rock the Jukebox. \"Someday\" hit the Country Airplay and Hot Country Songs charts at #50 the week of August 31, 1991. It peaked on both charts the week of November 9, 1991 at #1. \"Someday\" was on the charts for twenty consecutive weeks (from Aug. 31 to Jan. 11, 1992). \n\nThen in 1992, McBride and Jackson co-wrote \"Chattahoochee\", which was released on Jackson's album, A Lot About Livin' (And a Little 'bout Love) along with three more songs written by the songwriting duo, \"(Who Says) You Can't Have It All\", \"Tropical Depression\" and \"If It Ain't One Thing (It's You)\". \"Tropical Depression\" peaked at #75 in August 1993 on Billboard's Hot Country Songs Chart. \"(Who Says) You Can't Have It All\" peaked at #4 in April on Billboard's Country Airplay Chart, and Hot Country Songs Chart. \"Chattahoochee\" hit the charts at #72 (Country Airplay & Hot Country Songs) the week of May 15, 1993. It was on Billboard's Hot 100 chart for twenty consecutive weeks (from July 10, 1993 through Nov. 20, 1993). \"Chattahoochee\" peaked at #1 on both the Country Airplay & Hot Country Songs the week of July 17, 1993 and stayed there for four consecutive weeks. The album, A Lot About Livin' (And a Little 'bout Love) hit the charts on October 24, 1992 ranking #84 on Billboard 200, Top Album Sales, and Top Current Albums; in addition to #24 on Top Country Albums. The next week it jumped into #26 on the Billboard 200, Top Album Sales, and Top Current Albums and #10 on the Top Country Albums charts. It stayed on the Top Country Albums chart for 159 consecutive weeks (from Oct. 24, 1992 through Nov. 4, 1995), peaking at #1 the week of August 14, 1993 and staying in the #1 position for five consecutive weeks. It peaked on the Billboard 200, Top Album Sales, and Top Current Albums charts at #13 on the week of October 23, 1993.\n\nIn 2017, McBride was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame.\n\nInfluences \nJim McBride grew up listening to the radio with his parents, especially his mother who always had it on. Jim's biggest influence was Hank Williams and singer/songwriter Don Gibson.\n\nAwards, Inductions and Nominations \nMcBride has been awarded 14 American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers and BMI Awards.\n\nAcademy of Country Music Awards\n\n1993 \nAcademy of Country Music Awards. “Chattahoochee” by Alan Jackson, co-written with Jackson and released on May 17, 1993 on Arista Records won Single Record of the Year and was nominated for Song of the Year and Video of the Year.\n\nAcademy of Country Music Awards. Alan Jackson's album \"A Lot About Livin' (And a Little 'bout Love)\" won Album of the Year. The album was released on October 6, 1992, and produced by Keith Stegall with Scott Hendricks producing \"Tonight I Climbed the Wall\" on Arista Records. There were ten tracts on the album, of which McBride was the co-writer on four of them.\n\n \"Chattahoochee\" co-written with Jackson\n \"(Who Says) You Can't Have It All\" co-written with Jackson\n \"Tropical Depression\" co-written with Jackson and Charlie Craig\n \"If It Ain't One Thing (It's You)\" co-written with Jackson\n\n2001 \nACM Awards. \"Angels in Waiting\" by Tammy Cochran, co-written by Cochran & Stewart Harris, and produced by Blake Chancy on Epic Records was nominated for both Song of the Year and Video of the Year.\n\nAlabama Music Hall of Fame\n\n1995 \nAlabama Music Hall of Fame, Creator's Award.\n\nAmerican Music Awards\n\n1993 \nAmerican Music Awards won Favorite Country Single for “Chattahoochee” and won Favorite Country Album for A Lot About Livin' (And a Little 'bout Love).\n\nASCAP Awards \nAmerican Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (1914 - present).\n\n1994 \nASCAP Country Award, Song of the Year Award for \"Chattahoochee\".\n\nBroadcast Music Country Awards \nBroadcast Music, Inc. (1939 - present).\n\n1981 \nBMI Country Award for \"Bridge That Just Won't Burn\", by Conway Twitty, co-written with Roger Murrah, and released in 1980 on Mercury Records.\n\n1988 \nBMI Country Award for \"Rose in Paradise\", by Waylon Jennings, co-written with Stewart Harris, released on MCA records in 1987.\n\n1996 \nBMI Country Award for \"What I Meant to Say\" by Wade Hayes, co-written with Don Cook and Sam Hogin, released on October 31, 1995 on Columbia records.\n\n2002 \nBMI Country Award for \"Angels in Waiting\" by Tammy Cochran, co-written with Tammy Cochran and Stewart Harris, released on March 19, 2001, on Epic records.\n\nCanadian Country Music Awards\n\n2004 \nCCMA Awards, won Top Selling Album - Alan Jackson's Greatest Hits Volume II; a two disc set with 18 songs on the 1st disc and 8 songs on the 2nd. The second disc included \"Tropical Depression\", \"Hole in the Wall\", and \"Buicks to the Moon\".\n\nCountry Music Association Awards \n1983\n\nCMA Awards, Alabama's album The Closer You Get won Album of the Year. The other nominees were Highways & Heartaches by Ricky Skaggs, It Ain't Easy by Janie Fricke, Pancho & Lefty by Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard, and Wild and Blue by John Anderson. There were twelve tracks on the album including Jim McBride's song \"Dixie Boy\".\n\n1990 \nCMA Awards, Alan Jackson's album \"Here in the Real World\" was nominated for Album of the Year. The album was released on February 27, 1990, and produced by Scott Hendricks and Keith Stegall on Arista Records. There were ten tracts on the album, of which McBride was the co-writer on three of them.\n\n \"Chasin' That Neon Rainbow\" co-written with Jackson\n \"She Don't Get the Blues\" co-written with Jackson\n \"Short Sweet Ride\" co-written with Jackson\n\n1991 \nCMA Awards, Alan Jackson's album \"Don't Rock the Jukebox\" was nominated for Album of the Year. The album was released on May 14, 1991, and produced by Scott Hendricks and Keith Stegall on Arista Records. There were ten tracts on the album, of which McBride was the co-writer on three of them.\n\n \"That's All I Need to Know\" co-written with Jackson\n \"Someday\" co-written with Jackson\n \"Just Playin' Possum\" co-written with Jackson and Gary Overton\n\n1993 \nCMA Awards, won Single of the Year for “Chattahoochee” by Alan Jackson, co-written with Jackson and released on May 17, 1993 on Arista Records.\n\nCMA Awards, nominated for Song of the Year for “Chattahoochee” by Alan Jackson, co-written with Jackson and released on May 17, 1993 on Arista Records.\n\nCMA Awards, Alan Jackson's album \"A Lot About Livin' (And a Little 'bout Love)\" was nominated for Album of the Year. The album was released on October 6, 1992, and produced by Keith Stegall with Scott Hendricks producing \"Tonight I Climbed the Wall\" on Arista Records. There were ten tracts on the album, of which McBride was the co-writer on four of them.\n\n \"Chattahoochee\" co-written with Jackson\n \"(Who Says) You Can't Have It All\" co-written with Jackson\n \"Tropical Depression\" co-written with Jackson and Charlie Craig\n \"If It Ain't One Thing (It's You)\" co-written with Jackson\n\n1994 \nCMA Awards, won Song of the Year for “Chattahoochee” by Alan Jackson, co-written with Jackson and released on May 17, 1993 on Arista Records. The other nominees were \"Don't Take the Girl\" by Tim McGraw, co-written by Larry W. Johnson & Craig Martin, \"He Thinks He'll Keep Her\" by Mary-Chapin Carpenter, co-written by Mary-Chapin Carpenter & Don Schlitz, \"I Swear\" by John Michael Montgomery, co-written by Gary Baker & Frank J. Myers, and \"Little Rock\" by Collin Raye, and written by Tom Douglas. \n\nCMA Awards, Alan Jackson's album \"Who I Am\" was nominated for Album of the Year. The album was released on June 28, 1994, and produced by Keith Stegall on Arista Records. There were thirteen tracts on the album, of which McBride was the co-writer on two of them.\n\n \"Hole in the Wall\" co-written with Jackson\n \"If I Had You\" co-written with Jackson\n\n1995 \nCMA Awards, Alan Jackson's album \"Who I Am\" was nominated for Album of the Year.\n\n1997 \nCMA Awards, Alan Jackson's album \"Everything I Love\" was nominated for Album of the Year. The album was released on October 29, 1996, and produced by Keith Stegall on Arista Records. There were ten tracts on the album, of which McBride was the co-writer on two of them.\n\n \"Buicks to the Moon\" co-written with Jackson\n \"A House with No Curtains\" co-written with Jackson\n\nCountry Music Television Music Awards \n1967 - 1989 - Music City News Awards\n\n1990 - 1999 - TNT Music City News Country Awards\n\n2000 - Country Weekly Presents the TNN Music Awards\n\n2001 - TNN & CMT Country Weekly Music Awards\n\n2002 - 2004 - CMT Flameworthy Video Music Awards\n\n2005 - present - CMT Music Awards\n\n1991 \nTNN Music City News Awards, Here in the Real World, Album of the Year winner.\n\n1992 \nTNN Music City News Awards, Don't Rock the Jukebox, Album of the Year winner.\n\n1994 \nTNN Music City News Awards, \"Chattahoochee\" won Single of the Year and Video of the Year; and A Lot About Livin' (And a Little 'Bout Love) won Album of the Year.\n\n1995 \nTNN Music City News Country Awards, Who I Am, Album of the Year winner.\n\nGrammy's\n\n1994 \nNominated for Best Country Song for \"Chattahoochee\".\n\nNashville Songwriters Hall of Fame\n\n2017 \nJim McBride was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame on Oct. 23, 2017.\n\nRIAA Certification\n\nReferences \n\nCharts\n\n\n\n1947 births\nLiving people" ]
[ "Martina McBride", "1995-99: Wild Angels and Evolution", "What style of music does Martina McBride normally create?", "country", "What was the first album that McBride co-wrote some of songs??", "I don't know." ]	C_34620ae9b8484c5cb6189f64bf825803_1	What television program was McBride on in 2006?	3	What television program was Martina McBride on in 2006?	Martina McBride	Released in 1995, Wild Angels accounted for another top five hit in its lead single "Safe in the Arms of Love", which had previously been recorded by both Wild Choir and Baillie & the Boys, and was concurrently released in Canada by Michelle Wright at the time of McBride's version. The album's title track went on to become McBride's first No. 1 single on the country charts in early 1996. However, the three follow-ups,"Phones Are Ringin' All Over Town", "Swingin' Doors" and "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" were less successful, reaching the lower regions of the top 40. In early 1997, after "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" peaked, McBride released two duets. "Still Holding On", a duet with Clint Black which was the lead-off single to her album Evolution and his album Nothin' but the Taillights, and "Valentine", a collaboration with pop pianist Jim Brickman which appeared on his album Picture This. She also sang duet vocals on "Chances Are" with Bob Seger, featured on the soundtrack of the 1998 motion picture Hope Floats. She had her second number one on the country charts with "A Broken Wing", the second single from her album Evolution, in late 1997 This album went on to produce four more top ten hits at country radio: a re-release of "Valentine", "Happy Girl", "Wrong Again" (which also went to number one), and "Whatever You Say". Towards the end of 1998, the album was certified double platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America for selling two million units. In addition, she also won the Country Music Association Awards' "Female Vocalist of the Year" award in 1999 and also performed for President Bill Clinton during the same time. Also in 1998, McBride released a Christmas album titled White Christmas, which featured a rendition of "O Holy Night" that first charted in 1997 and continued to re-enter the charts until 2001. She also sang a guest vocal on Jason Sellers' mid-1998 single "This Small Divide". CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Martina Mariea McBride (née Schiff, born July 29, 1966) is an American country music singer-songwriter and record producer. She is known for her soprano singing range and her country pop material. McBride signed to RCA Records in 1991, and made her debut the following year as a neo-traditionalist country singer with the single, "The Time Has Come". Over time, she developed a pop-styled crossover sound, similar to Shania Twain and Faith Hill, and had a string of major hit singles on the Billboard country chart and occasionally on the adult contemporary chart. Five of these singles went to No. 1 on the country chart between 1995 and 2001, and one peaked at No. 1 on the adult contemporary chart in 2003. McBride has fourteen studio albums, two greatest hits compilations, one "live" album, as well as two additional compilation albums. Eight of her studio albums and two of her compilations have an RIAA Gold certification, or higher. In the U.S., she has sold over 14 million albums. In addition, McBride has won the Country Music Association's "Female Vocalist of the Year" award four times (tied with Reba McEntire for the third-most wins) and the Academy of Country Music's "Top Female Vocalist" award three times. She is also a 14-time Grammy Award nominee. Early life McBride was born in Sharon, Kansas, on July 29, 1966. She has two brothers, Martin and Steve, who play in her concert band as of 2017, and a sister, Gina. McBride's parents, Daryl and Jeanne Schiff, owned a dairy farm. Daryl, who was also a cabinetry shop owner, exposed her to country music at a young age. Listening to country music helped her acquire a love for singing. After school, she sang for hours along to the records of such popular artists as Reba McEntire, Linda Ronstadt, Juice Newton, Jeanne Pruett, Connie Smith, and Patsy Cline. Around the age of eight or nine, Martina began singing with a band her father fronted, "The Schiffters." As she grew older her role in the band progressively increased, from simply singing, to also playing keyboard with them. She enjoyed performing in her early years. McBride began performing with a local rock band, The Penetrators, in Wichita instead. Then, in 1987, Schiff gathered a group of musicians called Lotus and started looking for rehearsal space; she began renting space from studio engineer John McBride. In 1988, the two married. After marrying, the couple moved to Nashville, Tennessee, in 1989 with the hope of beginning a career in country music. John McBride joined Garth Brooks's sound crew and later became his concert production manager. She occasionally joined her husband on the road and helped sell Garth Brooks souvenirs. In 1990, impressed by her enthusiastic spirit, Brooks offered her the position of his opening act provided she could obtain a recording contract. During this time, while her husband was working with country artists Charlie Daniels and Ricky Van Shelton, he also helped produce her demo tape, which helped her gain a recording contract with RCA Nashville Records in 1991. Music career 1992–1995: The Time Has Come and The Way That I Am McBride released her debut studio album by RCA Records in 1992, titled The Time Has Come. It was produced by Paul Worley and Ed Seay. This album's title track made it to number 23 on the country music charts, wile the next two singles both failed to make the Top 40. Unlike her later country pop-influenced albums, The Time Has Come featured honky tonk and country folk influences. The Way That I Am was McBride's second album. Its first two singles both brought her into the country top ten: "My Baby Loves Me," the album's de facto title song, peaked at number two, and "Life No. 9" at peaked at number six. The former was previously a Top 10 hit in Canada for Patricia Conroy. The third single, "Independence Day", was prevented from reaching the Top 10 through the oppositions of many radio programmers, who objected to the song's subject of a mother fighting back against abuse by burning the family home to the ground. "Independence Day" won Video of the Year and Song of the Year at the Country Music Association Awards. It also earned the song's composer, Gretchen Peters, a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Country Song. The song also gave McBride a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance. McBride performed the song at the 1995 Grammys ceremony. The fourth and fifth singles from The Way That I Am were less successful: "Heart Trouble" peaked at number 21, and "Where I Used to Have a Heart" fell short of the Top 40. McBride later criticized these single choices, saying that she felt "Strangers" would have been a better followup, as that song was more popular with fans and later appeared on her first greatest-hits album. The Way That I Am was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). "My Baby Loves Me (Just The Way That I Am)," as produced and released, proved to have a sing-along quality that led McBride to sing it that way in her subsequent concerts. 1995–1999: Wild Angels and Evolution McBride's third album, Wild Angels, was released in 1995. It accounted for another Top 5 hit in its lead single "Safe in the Arms of Love", which had previously been recorded by both Wild Choir and Baillie & the Boys, and was concurrently released in Canada by Michelle Wright at the time of McBride's version. The album's title track went on to become McBride's first No. 1 single on the country charts in early 1996. The album's third, fourth, and fifth singles, "Phones Are Ringin' All Over Town", "Swingin' Doors", and "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" were less successful, having reached the lower regions of the Top 40. In early 1997, after "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" peaked, McBride released two duets. "Still Holding On", a duet with Clint Black which was the lead-off single to her fourth album Evolution and Black's album Nothin' but the Taillights, and "Valentine", a collaboration with pop pianist Jim Brickman which appeared on his album Picture This. She also sang duet vocals on "Chances Are" with Bob Seger, featured on the soundtrack of the 1998 motion picture Hope Floats. She had her second number one on the country charts with "A Broken Wing", the second single from her Evolution album, in late 1997. Evolution went on to produce four more Top 10 hits at country radio: a re-release of "Valentine", "Happy Girl", "Wrong Again" (which also went to number one), and "Whatever You Say". Towards the end of 1998, the album was certified double platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America for selling two million units. In addition, she also won the Country Music Association Awards' "Female Vocalist of the Year" award in 1999 and also performed for President Bill Clinton during the same time. Also in 1998, McBride released her first Christmas album titled White Christmas, which featured a rendition of "O Holy Night" that first charted in 1997 and continued to re-enter the charts until 2001. She also sang a guest vocal on Jason Sellers' mid-1998 single "This Small Divide". 1999–2002: Emotion and Greatest Hits McBride's sixth studio album, Emotion, was released in 1999. Its lead single, "I Love You," reached number one on the Billboard country charts in 1999, and also crossed over to the Adult Contemporary chart. The song's follow-ups, "Love's the Only House" and "There You Are", both made the Top 5 at country radio, and "It's My Time" peaked at number 11. In 2001, she released her first compilation, Greatest Hits. This album has been certified 3× Platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America, and is her highest-selling album. It included most of her major hits to that point, and the album track "Strangers" from the album The Way That I Am, which she put on the album because she felt that it should have been a single. The album also included four new songs, all of which were Top 10 hit on the country music charts between 2001 and 2003: "When God-Fearin' Women Get the Blues" (at number 8), "Blessed" (at number 1), "Where Would You Be" (at number 3), and "Concrete Angel" (at number 5). Carolyn Dawn Johnson sang backing vocals on "Blessed"; conversely, McBride sang backing vocals on Johnson's late-2000 debut single, titled "Georgia". Late in 2002, McBride also sang backing vocals on Andy Griggs's single "Practice Life". 2003–04: Martina In 2003, McBride released her seventh studio album, Martina, which celebrated womanhood. The first single, "This One's for the Girls," went to number 3 on the country charts and became her only number-one hit on the Adult Contemporary charts. It also included backing vocals from Faith Hill, Carolyn Dawn Johnson, and McBride's daughters, Delaney and Emma. Follow-up single "In My Daughter's Eyes" was also a Top 5 hit at both country and adult contemporary. "How Far" and "God's Will" both made the Top 20 at country radio, as did her guest appearance on Jimmy Buffett's single "Trip Around the Sun", whose chart run overlapped that of "God's Will". In 2004, McBride won the CMA's Female Vocalist award for the fourth time, following the wins in 2003, 2002 and 1999, which tied her for the most wins in that category with Reba McEntire. 2005–2008: Timeless and Waking Up Laughing After finding success in country pop-styled music, McBride released her next studio album, Timeless, in 2005, which consisted of country covers. The album included cover versions of country music standards, such as Hank Williams' "You Win Again," Loretta Lynn's "You Ain't Woman Enough," and Kris Kristofferson's "Help Me Make It Through the Night." To make the album fit its older style, McBride and her husband hired older Nashville session players and outdated analog equipment. The album sold over 250,000 copies within its first week, the highest sales start for a McBride album. The lead single, a cover of Lynn Anderson's "(I Never Promised You a) Rose Garden", went to number 18 on the country charts, but the other two singles both failed to make top 40. In 2006, McBride served as a guest coach on Canadian Idol. The remaining five finalists traveled to Nashville, where McBride worked with the competitors on the songs they had chosen by country artists such as Gordon Lightfoot and Patsy Cline. Among the other guest judges that year were Nelly Furtado and Cyndi Lauper. McBride later joined Canadian Idol on a tour in the Spring. In 2007, McBride also served as a guest coach on Fox Networks television series, American Idol. In 2007, McBride released her ninth studio album, Waking Up Laughing. It was the first album in which McBride co-wrote some of the tracks. She set up her Waking Up Laughing Tour in 2007, which included country artists Rodney Atkins, Little Big Town, and Jason Michael Carroll. The album's lead single, "Anyway", went to No. 5 on the Billboard Country Chart, becoming her first Top 10 hit since 2003. She also lent her voice singing "Anyway" in a Lifetime movie called, "A Life Interrupted" which premiered on April 23, 2007. Its follow-up, "How I Feel", reached the Top 15. In Spring 2008, McBride released Martina McBride: Live In Concert, a CD/DVD set. It was taped in Moline, Illinois in September 2007. In July 2007, The ABC Television Network announced a special program called Six Degrees of Martina McBride where individuals from around the country were challenged to find their way to McBride on their own connections and research using a maximum of six methods. The "winner" of this challenge eventually located a direct connection to McBride through her husband, John, who knew someone, who knew someone else. McBride recorded an electronically produced duet with Elvis Presley, performing his song "Blue Christmas" as a duet with him on his latest compilation, The Elvis Presley Christmas Duets. A compilation collection, titled Playlist: The Very Best of Martina McBride, was released on December 16, 2008, as part of Sony BMG Playlist series. The album features 11 previously released tracks and three unreleased tracks. 2008–2010: Shine McBride wrapped up production of her tenth studio album in late 2008. The first single, "Ride", was released to radio in October 2008 and debuted at No. No. 43 on the Hot Country Songs chart. It barely missed the Top 10 on the chart, peaking at number eleven in March 2009. A music video produced by Kristin Barlowe was also released at the end of the year. The album, Shine, was released by RCA Records on March 24, 2009, and debuted at the top of the U.S. Country album chart and number 10 on the Billboard 200. McBride co-produced the album with Dann Huff, and it featured "Sunny Side Up", a song that she co-wrote. The second single, "I Just Call You Mine", was released in May 2009 and reached the Top 20. The third single from Shine was "Wrong Baby Wrong Baby Wrong", which the Warren Brothers co-wrote with Robert Ellis Orrall and Love and Theft member Stephen Barker Liles. McBride also initiated the Shine All Night Tour, a co-headlining venture with fellow country star and friend Trace Adkins and opening act Sarah Buxton. The tour began in November 2009 and ended in May 2010. On June 10, 2010, Billboard announced that McBride had collaborated on a song with Kid Rock. In late June 2010, McBride was nominated for a Teen Choice Award, "Favorite Country Female Artist", alongside country stars Carrie Underwood, Miranda Lambert, Taylor Swift and Gretchen Wilson. In late 2010, McBride was nominated for two American Country Awards (Best Female Single & Touring Artist of the year w/ Trace Adkins.) Along with the ACA nominations, she received her 14th Female Vocalist nomination for Country Music Association in October. 2010–2016: Eleven and Everlasting McBride exited RCA in November 2010 and signed with Republic Nashville. She began working on a new studio album with producer Byron Gallimore. Her first single for Republic Nashville is "Teenage Daughters", which she also co-wrote with the Warren Brothers. McBride told Country Weekly that she co-wrote eight of the eleven songs on the album; she decided to write more frequently because she felt more confident in her songwriting ability after "Anyway" had become a hit. An album track, "One Night" was released as a promotion for NASCAR with a music video in June 2011. "I'm Gonna Love You Through It" was released as the album's second single on July 25, 2011. The song became a critical and commercial hit, peaking at number 4 and becoming her first top five hit since 2006's "Anyway." The album, titled Eleven, was released on October 11, 2011. Its third single was a cover of Train's "Marry Me", recorded as a duet with Train lead singer Pat Monahan. In September 2011, McBride was nominated for the CMA's Female Vocalist award for the 15th time, and 14th time consecutively. RCA Records released two compilation albums in 2012, Hits and More in January and The Essential Martina McBride in October. McBride released Everlasting, a collection of R&B and Soul covers, on April 8, 2014 via Kobalt Label Services. The album includes duets with Kelly Clarkson and Gavin DeGraw, and was produced by Don Was. In September 2014, McBride received her 17th Female Vocalist nomination from the Country Music Association. This feat ties her with Reba McEntire for most nominations in any vocalist category. 2016–present: Reckless and Vocal Point podcast In 2016, McBride released a new single called "Reckless", the title track for a new album. Reckless was released on April 29 through Nash Icon Records. It was recorded at Blackbird Studios and produced by Nathan Chapman and Dann Huff. The album includes 10 songs, one of which is the previously released single "Reckless". According to McBride, making this album felt like "coming home". Reckless debuted at number 2 on the Billboard Top Country Albums Chart. On June 8, 2016, McBride debuted the video for her second single, "Just Around The Corner", during the CMT Music Awards. This song is the official Band Against Cancer anthem. Band Against Cancer is a community-based movement led by Sarah Cannon (the cancer institute of HCA) in partnership with Big Machine Label Group and McBride, which aims to raise awareness, support and resources to those battling cancer. The initiative includes a series of concerts across United States, with McBride as a headliner. In August 2016, the singer announced a new tour called "Love Unleashed". According to McBride, the purpose of the tour was to unite people and spread love through the power of music as a response to the "tragedy and uncertainty in the world". She was also selected as one of 30 artists to perform on "Forever Country", a mash-up track of Take Me Home, Country Roads; On the Road Again; and I Will Always Love You which celebrates 50 years of the CMA Awards. In July 2017, McBride revealed she is planning on releasing a Christmas album, of which she said " It won't have as many hymns on it. It will be more things like 'Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town' and 'It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas.'" She has now said it will be out in 2018, "One is a new Christmas album, which will come out in 2018." The Christmas album It's the Holiday Season was released on October 19, 2018. This will accompany a Christmas tour, called "Joy of Christmas" as well as a cookbook called "Martina's Kitchen Mix: My Recipe Playlist for Real Life" which will be out October 30, 2018. This would be McBride's second cookbook, following her 2014 release called "Around the Table: Recipes and Inspiration for Gatherings Throughout the Year". Martina has launched a new show on Food Network, airing on Sundays at 11am eastern. In 2019, McBride began the podcast Vocal Point, a "free-wheeling, wide-ranging" topical conversation series. On May 4, 2020, McBride appeared in the second season episode of NBC's Songland and released the song "Girls Like Me". Personal life In 1988, Martina Schiff, as she was known up to that time, married sound engineer John McBride, taking his family name as her stage name. The couple has three daughters: Delaney Katharine (born December 22, 1994), Emma Justine (born March 29, 1998) and Ava Rose Kathleen (born June 20, 2005). After becoming a mother, the singer reduced her touring schedule so that her daughters could have a normal upbringing. Joe Galante said this was "an enormous choice in terms of money," but McBride had made it very clear that she wanted to be present in her daughters' lives. Charity work McBride works with a variety of charities. She has served as a spokeswoman for the National Domestic Violence Hotline as well as for the National Network to End Domestic Violence and national spokeswoman for the Tulsa Domestic Violence and Intervention Services. Every year since 1995, she has hosted Middle Tennessee's YWCA, "Celebrity Auction", and it has raised nearly $400,000 so far. In 2004, she worked with "Kids Wish Network" to fulfill the wish of a young girl dying from muscular dystrophy. McBride was awarded the "Minnie Pearl Humanitarian Award" in 2003. McBride explained that educating girls and women on domestic violence is something she works on at home with her own daughters, stating: McBride has also teamed up with Loveisrespect, National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline, working with them on a new program called, "My Time to Shine." McBride appeared on the Stand Up 2 Cancer Telethon in September 2010, where she performed "Unchained Melody" with Leona Lewis, Aaron Neville, and Stevie Wonder. Also in 2010, she hosted the YWCA for the 16th consecutive year, raising over 50,000 dollars. It totals over 500,000 dollars raised so far. McBride also has a charity initiative called "Team Music is Love". Speaking about Team Music Is Love, McBride stated "It started a few years ago as a group of fans that asked me if they could wear a T-shirt with my name to walk in a breast cancer walk, and I said 'of course' and it has grown from there. Last year, we decided we wanted to give it a better name, a name that sounded as important as it is, so we changed it to 'Team Music is Love,' since it's about spreading love through music. We have done some amazing things over the past few years and we continue to grow and keep giving back." Discography 1992: The Time Has Come 1993: The Way That I Am 1995: Wild Angels 1997: Evolution 1998: White Christmas 1999: Emotion 2003: Martina 2005: Timeless 2007: Waking Up Laughing 2009: Shine 2011: Eleven 2014: Everlasting 2016: Reckless 2018: It's the Holiday Season Tours Headlining Evolution Tour Emotions Tour Greatest Hits Tour Timeless Tour Waking Up Laughing Tour One Night Tour Everlasting Tour Love Unleashed Tour Co-headlining Virginia Slims on the Legends Lilith Fair Girls Night Out Alan Jackson and Martina McBride in Concert Shine All Night Tour Holiday concert Joy of Christmas Tour Opening act World Tour '93-'94 Walkin on Sundown Tour Easy Come Easy Go Tour Everywhere Tour The Cowboy Rides Away Tour Awards and nominations McBride has received a number of awards, including the Country Music Association Award (CMA) for Female Vocalist of the Year, with her fourth win in 2004. In 2011 she received and honorary CMA award. She has been nominated for 14 Grammy Awards, but has never won. Grammy Awards Note: In 1995, McBride was one of the various artists featured on the album Amazing Grace – A Country Salute to Gospel (singing "How Great Thou Art"), which won the Grammy Award for Best Southern, Country or Bluegrass Gospel Album. This award went to the compilation album's producer Bill Hearn, and not to the artists. Other awards References External links 1966 births Living people American country singer-songwriters American women country singers American sopranos Country musicians from Kansas Country musicians from Tennessee Grand Ole Opry members Members of the Country Music Association Musicians from Nashville, Tennessee People from Barber County, Kansas RCA Records Nashville artists Republic Records artists Singer-songwriters from Tennessee 20th-century American singers 20th-century American women singers 21st-century American singers 21st-century American women singers Singer-songwriters from Kansas	false	[ "Six Degrees of Martina McBride was a two-hour TV special/pilot that aired on July 30, 2007 on ABC in which six aspiring country singers from America's smallest towns tried to connect themselves to Martina McBride in six or fewer points of human connection. The program tested the \"six degrees of separation\" phenomenon. Those who made it from \"Nowhere to Nashville to New York\" got both a studio session with McBride and a shot at a record deal with Sony BMG. ABC did not pick up the pilot as a series.\n\nProduction\nThe show also told McBride's own unique story of six degrees, which helped advance her from selling T-shirts for Garth Brooks, to opening for him on stage, to becoming one of country-and-western music's biggest superstars. Rodney Atkins, Ray Benson, Little Big Town, and Miranda Lambert appeared in the show.\n\nThe pilot program was produced for the ABC Television Network by the production team of ABC News Primetime, and was the first of its kind. On July 27, 2007, executive producer David Sloan described the show as a \"hybrid\" to the Chicago Tribune: \"ABC News is looking for new ways of interacting and engaging with the viewer. This represents that effort.\"\n\nThe show aired on July 30, 2007 as an entire season compressed into one two-hour broadcast. \n\nDeAnne Roberts won the final competition. Thomas Stratton and Kristina Craig were the other two finalists. ABC-TV did not pick up the program's series option.\n\nOn August 1, 2007, Sony BMG released all three finalists' singles digitally on iTunes.\n\nCast and crew\nThe show was hosted by Jay Schadler.\n\nContestants\nThe six contestants were:\nMark Jaspers\nThomas Stratton\nDani Riker\nKristina Marie Craig\nDeAnne Roberts\nKen Swick\n\nJudges\nThe contestants faced three judges:\nMiranda Lambert\nRay Benson \nBeverly Keel\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nMedia Bistro article\nMartina McBride's official website\n\nAmerican television pilots\nAmerican music television series\n2000s American reality television series\nABC News", "Mary Margaret McBride (November 16, 1899 – April 7, 1976) was an American radio interview host and writer. Her popular radio shows spanned more than 40 years. In the 1940s the daily audience for her housewife-oriented program numbered from six to eight million listeners. She was called \"The First Lady of Radio.\"\n\nEarly life \nMcBride was born on November 16, 1899, in Paris, Missouri, to a farming family. Their frequent relocations disorganized her early schooling, but at the age of six she became a student at a preparatory school called William Woods College, and at 16 the University of Missouri, receiving a degree in journalism there in 1919. She was a member of Kappa Alpha Theta at the University of Missouri.\n\nShe worked a year as a reporter at the Cleveland Press, and then until 1924 at the New York Evening Mail. Following this, she wrote freelance for periodicals including The Saturday Evening Post, Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping, and starting in 1926 collaborated in writing travel-oriented books.\n\nRadio and sidelines\n\nAs Martha Deane \nMcBride first worked steadily in radio for WOR in New York City, starting in 1934. This daily women's-advice show, with her persona as \"Martha Deane\", a kind and witty grandmother figure with a Missouri-drawl, aired daily until 1940.\n\nOriginally, McBride's character \"Martha Deane\" was to be a grandmother with six children and many grandchildren-all imaginary. They were all named and described; she was to memorize the details. Her job was to talk colloquially and dispense philosophy. She kept getting all her \"grandchildren's\" names mixed up and within three weeks she jettisoned the whole tribe on air. She remained Martha Deane, but was no longer a grandmother.\n\nConcurrently with working as \"Deane\", in 1934 and 1935, she was the women's page editor for the Newspaper Enterprise Association syndicate.\n\nAs herself \nIn 1937, she launched on the CBS radio network the first of a series of similar and successful shows, now as Mary Margaret McBride. She had to abandon the Deane persona because WOR owned the name.\n\nShe interviewed figures well known in the world of arts and entertainment, and politics, with a style recognized as original to herself. She accepted advertising only for products she was prepared to endorse from her own experience, and turned down all tobacco or alcohol products.\n\nShe followed this format in regular broadcasts on\n CBS until 1941\n NBC (where her audience numbered in the millions) from then until 1950\n ABC from then until 1954\n NBC again until 1960, and\n The New York Herald Tribune'''s radio broadcasts with a wider audience via syndication.\n\nHer NBC show in the 1940s had broad range of guests, from politicians to generals to movie stars; she never announced her guests in advance, so the audience tuned in with no idea what they would get. Beginning during World War II, she began \"breaking the color line\", mixing in African American guests. McBride was a popular media figure; the tea rose, 'Mary Margaret McBride' was named for her.\n\nIn September 1948, NBC brought McBride to television for a 30-minute prime time show on Tuesdays at 9pm EST. However, NBC abandoned the show in its partial third month, with Variety describing the attempt sarcastically, and The New York Times calling her the first major \"fatality\" of this kind.\n\nBelow is a review of one of her first television performances, reviewed by The New York Times:\nPerhaps the ladies in the daytime can survive Miss McBride's effusive and interminable commercials, but for the men at home in the evening they are hard to take after a day at the office. To watch Miss McBride shift-without pause or loss of breath-from a eulogy of Kemtone paint to an analysis of Russia is an ordeal not quickly forgotten. If nighttime television is to be daytime radio, away video, away!\n\nFrom 1953 to 1956 she also conducted a syndicated newspaper column for the Associated Press.\n\nAbout 20 years apart, she wrote two books for girls, each with \"Elizabeth\" in the title.\n\nAs time went on, she appeared in smaller radio media markets, in upstate New York, and toward the end of her life hosted \"Your Hudson Valley Neighbor\" three times a week on WGHQ Kingston, NY from the living room of her home. Her longtime companion and business partner, Stella Karn, died in 1957.\n\nShe died at the age of 76 on April 7, 1976, at her home in West Shokan, New York. McBride's ashes were placed in her former rose garden. She has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her work in radio.\n\n Cultural impact \nAn account of her career, It's One O'clock and Here is Mary Margaret McBride: A Radio Biography by Susan Ware was published in early 2005. She is also discussed in depth in Radio Voices by Michele Hilmes.\n\nThe character of \"Mary McGoon\", featured in the comedy routines of Bob and Ray, is a parody of Mary Margaret McBride.\n\nThe TV host \"Molly Margaret McSnide\" in Fantastic Four issue 16 is an obvious reference.\n\nHer name was spoofed on the classic CBS-TV sitcom I Love Lucy in Episode # 79, \"The Million Dollar Idea\", which aired on January 11, 1954. In that installment, Lucy (Lucille Ball) comes up with an ambitious idea to make money. She decides to appear on television selling her Aunt Martha's salad dressing. Assisting her on the program is her best friend Ethel Mertz (Vivian Vance) as \"Mary Margaret McMertz.\"\n\nMcBride's celebrity was hardly a secret confined to daytime radio listeners, either: her 15th anniversary celebration in 1949 was held in Yankee stadium, the only facility large enough to hold the 75,000 people who filled every seat and formed huge crowds outside. Her magazine show was on the air continuously for 25 years.\n\nMcBride pioneered a style of ad-libbing her radio shows, meaning that the content in her show was not rehearsed prior to going on the air. She was acknowledged by Current Biography as \"the first woman to bring newspaper technique to radio interviewing and to make daytime broadcasts profitable.\" The method of sustaining her show was also distinct. McBride and manager Stella Karn would produce their show and then market it directly to sponsors in the New York area or broader national arena. This format allowed McBride and Karn to have complete agency over the content and format of the show. The two were consistently able to maintain a level of support from sponsors, meaning that they were able to produce content that was exactly how they envisioned it, free of outside changes. This model was also one of McBride's notable contributions to broadcasting, as it paved the way for independent producing.\n\n Personal relationship \nMary Margaret McBride and Stella Karn met in the early 1920s in an instance of complete happenstance. As McBride describes it as, “One day a bouncy woman, with eager brown eyes and auburn hair rolled into a bun, burst into our office and announced that she would be handling publicity for us.” McBride and Karn worked together for years, with Karn managing McBride and her show. McBride described the two of them in a Reader's Digest edition in 1962 as, \"No two people were more unlike. My reaction to a crisis was to dissolve into tears; Stella's was to charge into battle.\" The two moved in together in a small apartment in the Chelsea neighborhood of New York City. McBride and Karn relied on each other for the entirety of their professional and personal lives.\n\nMcBride describes their first endeavor as a complete gamble motivated solely by Karn's optimism. During the Great Depression, the opportunity came for McBride to audition for a radio show, one of the only sources of entertainment at the time. When McBride got the job, she immediately recommended Karn as the person to handle the business side of the show's affairs. Karn and McBride became business partners, and Karn's first act on the job was to give her partner a raise.\n\nMcBride and Karn made a name for themselves as pioneers in the field of broadcasting, and also as trailblazers for the future of lesbian and bisexual journalists. McBride and Karn established their show as a connection point for lesbian and bisexual female creatives, forging friendships with influential names in broadcasting such as Ann Batchelder and Lisa Sergio.\n\n Bibliography \n Jazz (with Paul Whiteman), 1926\n Charm (with Alexander Williams), 1927\n Paris Is a Woman's Town (with Helen Josephy), 1929\n London Is a Man's Town [But Women Go There] (with Josephy), 1930\n New York Is Everybody's Town (with Josephy), 1931\n Beer and Skittles: A Friendly Guide to Modern Germany (with Josephy), 1932\n Tune in for Elizabeth, 1945\n Mary Margaret McBride's Harvest of American Cooking, 1957\n The Growing Up of Mary Elizabeth, 1966\n Two autobiographical works\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n Susan Ware. It's One O'Clock and Here Is Mary Margaret McBride: A Radio Biography (New York University Press, 2005). xii + 304 pp. online review\n\nExternal links\n \n \n Mary Margaret McBride interviewed by Mike Wallace on The Mike Wallace Interview'' June 16, 1957\n\n1899 births\n1976 deaths\nAmerican talk radio hosts\nWomen radio presenters\n20th-century American women writers\nUniversity of Missouri alumni\nWomen's page journalists" ]
[ "Martina McBride", "1995-99: Wild Angels and Evolution", "What style of music does Martina McBride normally create?", "country", "What was the first album that McBride co-wrote some of songs??", "I don't know.", "What television program was McBride on in 2006?", "I don't know." ]	C_34620ae9b8484c5cb6189f64bf825803_1	What year was McBride's tour called "Waking Up Laughing" held?	4	What year was Martina McBride's tour called "Waking Up Laughing"?	Martina McBride	Released in 1995, Wild Angels accounted for another top five hit in its lead single "Safe in the Arms of Love", which had previously been recorded by both Wild Choir and Baillie & the Boys, and was concurrently released in Canada by Michelle Wright at the time of McBride's version. The album's title track went on to become McBride's first No. 1 single on the country charts in early 1996. However, the three follow-ups,"Phones Are Ringin' All Over Town", "Swingin' Doors" and "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" were less successful, reaching the lower regions of the top 40. In early 1997, after "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" peaked, McBride released two duets. "Still Holding On", a duet with Clint Black which was the lead-off single to her album Evolution and his album Nothin' but the Taillights, and "Valentine", a collaboration with pop pianist Jim Brickman which appeared on his album Picture This. She also sang duet vocals on "Chances Are" with Bob Seger, featured on the soundtrack of the 1998 motion picture Hope Floats. She had her second number one on the country charts with "A Broken Wing", the second single from her album Evolution, in late 1997 This album went on to produce four more top ten hits at country radio: a re-release of "Valentine", "Happy Girl", "Wrong Again" (which also went to number one), and "Whatever You Say". Towards the end of 1998, the album was certified double platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America for selling two million units. In addition, she also won the Country Music Association Awards' "Female Vocalist of the Year" award in 1999 and also performed for President Bill Clinton during the same time. Also in 1998, McBride released a Christmas album titled White Christmas, which featured a rendition of "O Holy Night" that first charted in 1997 and continued to re-enter the charts until 2001. She also sang a guest vocal on Jason Sellers' mid-1998 single "This Small Divide". CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Martina Mariea McBride (née Schiff, born July 29, 1966) is an American country music singer-songwriter and record producer. She is known for her soprano singing range and her country pop material. McBride signed to RCA Records in 1991, and made her debut the following year as a neo-traditionalist country singer with the single, "The Time Has Come". Over time, she developed a pop-styled crossover sound, similar to Shania Twain and Faith Hill, and had a string of major hit singles on the Billboard country chart and occasionally on the adult contemporary chart. Five of these singles went to No. 1 on the country chart between 1995 and 2001, and one peaked at No. 1 on the adult contemporary chart in 2003. McBride has fourteen studio albums, two greatest hits compilations, one "live" album, as well as two additional compilation albums. Eight of her studio albums and two of her compilations have an RIAA Gold certification, or higher. In the U.S., she has sold over 14 million albums. In addition, McBride has won the Country Music Association's "Female Vocalist of the Year" award four times (tied with Reba McEntire for the third-most wins) and the Academy of Country Music's "Top Female Vocalist" award three times. She is also a 14-time Grammy Award nominee. Early life McBride was born in Sharon, Kansas, on July 29, 1966. She has two brothers, Martin and Steve, who play in her concert band as of 2017, and a sister, Gina. McBride's parents, Daryl and Jeanne Schiff, owned a dairy farm. Daryl, who was also a cabinetry shop owner, exposed her to country music at a young age. Listening to country music helped her acquire a love for singing. After school, she sang for hours along to the records of such popular artists as Reba McEntire, Linda Ronstadt, Juice Newton, Jeanne Pruett, Connie Smith, and Patsy Cline. Around the age of eight or nine, Martina began singing with a band her father fronted, "The Schiffters." As she grew older her role in the band progressively increased, from simply singing, to also playing keyboard with them. She enjoyed performing in her early years. McBride began performing with a local rock band, The Penetrators, in Wichita instead. Then, in 1987, Schiff gathered a group of musicians called Lotus and started looking for rehearsal space; she began renting space from studio engineer John McBride. In 1988, the two married. After marrying, the couple moved to Nashville, Tennessee, in 1989 with the hope of beginning a career in country music. John McBride joined Garth Brooks's sound crew and later became his concert production manager. She occasionally joined her husband on the road and helped sell Garth Brooks souvenirs. In 1990, impressed by her enthusiastic spirit, Brooks offered her the position of his opening act provided she could obtain a recording contract. During this time, while her husband was working with country artists Charlie Daniels and Ricky Van Shelton, he also helped produce her demo tape, which helped her gain a recording contract with RCA Nashville Records in 1991. Music career 1992–1995: The Time Has Come and The Way That I Am McBride released her debut studio album by RCA Records in 1992, titled The Time Has Come. It was produced by Paul Worley and Ed Seay. This album's title track made it to number 23 on the country music charts, wile the next two singles both failed to make the Top 40. Unlike her later country pop-influenced albums, The Time Has Come featured honky tonk and country folk influences. The Way That I Am was McBride's second album. Its first two singles both brought her into the country top ten: "My Baby Loves Me," the album's de facto title song, peaked at number two, and "Life No. 9" at peaked at number six. The former was previously a Top 10 hit in Canada for Patricia Conroy. The third single, "Independence Day", was prevented from reaching the Top 10 through the oppositions of many radio programmers, who objected to the song's subject of a mother fighting back against abuse by burning the family home to the ground. "Independence Day" won Video of the Year and Song of the Year at the Country Music Association Awards. It also earned the song's composer, Gretchen Peters, a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Country Song. The song also gave McBride a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Female Country Vocal Performance. McBride performed the song at the 1995 Grammys ceremony. The fourth and fifth singles from The Way That I Am were less successful: "Heart Trouble" peaked at number 21, and "Where I Used to Have a Heart" fell short of the Top 40. McBride later criticized these single choices, saying that she felt "Strangers" would have been a better followup, as that song was more popular with fans and later appeared on her first greatest-hits album. The Way That I Am was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). "My Baby Loves Me (Just The Way That I Am)," as produced and released, proved to have a sing-along quality that led McBride to sing it that way in her subsequent concerts. 1995–1999: Wild Angels and Evolution McBride's third album, Wild Angels, was released in 1995. It accounted for another Top 5 hit in its lead single "Safe in the Arms of Love", which had previously been recorded by both Wild Choir and Baillie & the Boys, and was concurrently released in Canada by Michelle Wright at the time of McBride's version. The album's title track went on to become McBride's first No. 1 single on the country charts in early 1996. The album's third, fourth, and fifth singles, "Phones Are Ringin' All Over Town", "Swingin' Doors", and "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" were less successful, having reached the lower regions of the Top 40. In early 1997, after "Cry on the Shoulder of the Road" peaked, McBride released two duets. "Still Holding On", a duet with Clint Black which was the lead-off single to her fourth album Evolution and Black's album Nothin' but the Taillights, and "Valentine", a collaboration with pop pianist Jim Brickman which appeared on his album Picture This. She also sang duet vocals on "Chances Are" with Bob Seger, featured on the soundtrack of the 1998 motion picture Hope Floats. She had her second number one on the country charts with "A Broken Wing", the second single from her Evolution album, in late 1997. Evolution went on to produce four more Top 10 hits at country radio: a re-release of "Valentine", "Happy Girl", "Wrong Again" (which also went to number one), and "Whatever You Say". Towards the end of 1998, the album was certified double platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America for selling two million units. In addition, she also won the Country Music Association Awards' "Female Vocalist of the Year" award in 1999 and also performed for President Bill Clinton during the same time. Also in 1998, McBride released her first Christmas album titled White Christmas, which featured a rendition of "O Holy Night" that first charted in 1997 and continued to re-enter the charts until 2001. She also sang a guest vocal on Jason Sellers' mid-1998 single "This Small Divide". 1999–2002: Emotion and Greatest Hits McBride's sixth studio album, Emotion, was released in 1999. Its lead single, "I Love You," reached number one on the Billboard country charts in 1999, and also crossed over to the Adult Contemporary chart. The song's follow-ups, "Love's the Only House" and "There You Are", both made the Top 5 at country radio, and "It's My Time" peaked at number 11. In 2001, she released her first compilation, Greatest Hits. This album has been certified 3× Platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America, and is her highest-selling album. It included most of her major hits to that point, and the album track "Strangers" from the album The Way That I Am, which she put on the album because she felt that it should have been a single. The album also included four new songs, all of which were Top 10 hit on the country music charts between 2001 and 2003: "When God-Fearin' Women Get the Blues" (at number 8), "Blessed" (at number 1), "Where Would You Be" (at number 3), and "Concrete Angel" (at number 5). Carolyn Dawn Johnson sang backing vocals on "Blessed"; conversely, McBride sang backing vocals on Johnson's late-2000 debut single, titled "Georgia". Late in 2002, McBride also sang backing vocals on Andy Griggs's single "Practice Life". 2003–04: Martina In 2003, McBride released her seventh studio album, Martina, which celebrated womanhood. The first single, "This One's for the Girls," went to number 3 on the country charts and became her only number-one hit on the Adult Contemporary charts. It also included backing vocals from Faith Hill, Carolyn Dawn Johnson, and McBride's daughters, Delaney and Emma. Follow-up single "In My Daughter's Eyes" was also a Top 5 hit at both country and adult contemporary. "How Far" and "God's Will" both made the Top 20 at country radio, as did her guest appearance on Jimmy Buffett's single "Trip Around the Sun", whose chart run overlapped that of "God's Will". In 2004, McBride won the CMA's Female Vocalist award for the fourth time, following the wins in 2003, 2002 and 1999, which tied her for the most wins in that category with Reba McEntire. 2005–2008: Timeless and Waking Up Laughing After finding success in country pop-styled music, McBride released her next studio album, Timeless, in 2005, which consisted of country covers. The album included cover versions of country music standards, such as Hank Williams' "You Win Again," Loretta Lynn's "You Ain't Woman Enough," and Kris Kristofferson's "Help Me Make It Through the Night." To make the album fit its older style, McBride and her husband hired older Nashville session players and outdated analog equipment. The album sold over 250,000 copies within its first week, the highest sales start for a McBride album. The lead single, a cover of Lynn Anderson's "(I Never Promised You a) Rose Garden", went to number 18 on the country charts, but the other two singles both failed to make top 40. In 2006, McBride served as a guest coach on Canadian Idol. The remaining five finalists traveled to Nashville, where McBride worked with the competitors on the songs they had chosen by country artists such as Gordon Lightfoot and Patsy Cline. Among the other guest judges that year were Nelly Furtado and Cyndi Lauper. McBride later joined Canadian Idol on a tour in the Spring. In 2007, McBride also served as a guest coach on Fox Networks television series, American Idol. In 2007, McBride released her ninth studio album, Waking Up Laughing. It was the first album in which McBride co-wrote some of the tracks. She set up her Waking Up Laughing Tour in 2007, which included country artists Rodney Atkins, Little Big Town, and Jason Michael Carroll. The album's lead single, "Anyway", went to No. 5 on the Billboard Country Chart, becoming her first Top 10 hit since 2003. She also lent her voice singing "Anyway" in a Lifetime movie called, "A Life Interrupted" which premiered on April 23, 2007. Its follow-up, "How I Feel", reached the Top 15. In Spring 2008, McBride released Martina McBride: Live In Concert, a CD/DVD set. It was taped in Moline, Illinois in September 2007. In July 2007, The ABC Television Network announced a special program called Six Degrees of Martina McBride where individuals from around the country were challenged to find their way to McBride on their own connections and research using a maximum of six methods. The "winner" of this challenge eventually located a direct connection to McBride through her husband, John, who knew someone, who knew someone else. McBride recorded an electronically produced duet with Elvis Presley, performing his song "Blue Christmas" as a duet with him on his latest compilation, The Elvis Presley Christmas Duets. A compilation collection, titled Playlist: The Very Best of Martina McBride, was released on December 16, 2008, as part of Sony BMG Playlist series. The album features 11 previously released tracks and three unreleased tracks. 2008–2010: Shine McBride wrapped up production of her tenth studio album in late 2008. The first single, "Ride", was released to radio in October 2008 and debuted at No. No. 43 on the Hot Country Songs chart. It barely missed the Top 10 on the chart, peaking at number eleven in March 2009. A music video produced by Kristin Barlowe was also released at the end of the year. The album, Shine, was released by RCA Records on March 24, 2009, and debuted at the top of the U.S. Country album chart and number 10 on the Billboard 200. McBride co-produced the album with Dann Huff, and it featured "Sunny Side Up", a song that she co-wrote. The second single, "I Just Call You Mine", was released in May 2009 and reached the Top 20. The third single from Shine was "Wrong Baby Wrong Baby Wrong", which the Warren Brothers co-wrote with Robert Ellis Orrall and Love and Theft member Stephen Barker Liles. McBride also initiated the Shine All Night Tour, a co-headlining venture with fellow country star and friend Trace Adkins and opening act Sarah Buxton. The tour began in November 2009 and ended in May 2010. On June 10, 2010, Billboard announced that McBride had collaborated on a song with Kid Rock. In late June 2010, McBride was nominated for a Teen Choice Award, "Favorite Country Female Artist", alongside country stars Carrie Underwood, Miranda Lambert, Taylor Swift and Gretchen Wilson. In late 2010, McBride was nominated for two American Country Awards (Best Female Single & Touring Artist of the year w/ Trace Adkins.) Along with the ACA nominations, she received her 14th Female Vocalist nomination for Country Music Association in October. 2010–2016: Eleven and Everlasting McBride exited RCA in November 2010 and signed with Republic Nashville. She began working on a new studio album with producer Byron Gallimore. Her first single for Republic Nashville is "Teenage Daughters", which she also co-wrote with the Warren Brothers. McBride told Country Weekly that she co-wrote eight of the eleven songs on the album; she decided to write more frequently because she felt more confident in her songwriting ability after "Anyway" had become a hit. An album track, "One Night" was released as a promotion for NASCAR with a music video in June 2011. "I'm Gonna Love You Through It" was released as the album's second single on July 25, 2011. The song became a critical and commercial hit, peaking at number 4 and becoming her first top five hit since 2006's "Anyway." The album, titled Eleven, was released on October 11, 2011. Its third single was a cover of Train's "Marry Me", recorded as a duet with Train lead singer Pat Monahan. In September 2011, McBride was nominated for the CMA's Female Vocalist award for the 15th time, and 14th time consecutively. RCA Records released two compilation albums in 2012, Hits and More in January and The Essential Martina McBride in October. McBride released Everlasting, a collection of R&B and Soul covers, on April 8, 2014 via Kobalt Label Services. The album includes duets with Kelly Clarkson and Gavin DeGraw, and was produced by Don Was. In September 2014, McBride received her 17th Female Vocalist nomination from the Country Music Association. This feat ties her with Reba McEntire for most nominations in any vocalist category. 2016–present: Reckless and Vocal Point podcast In 2016, McBride released a new single called "Reckless", the title track for a new album. Reckless was released on April 29 through Nash Icon Records. It was recorded at Blackbird Studios and produced by Nathan Chapman and Dann Huff. The album includes 10 songs, one of which is the previously released single "Reckless". According to McBride, making this album felt like "coming home". Reckless debuted at number 2 on the Billboard Top Country Albums Chart. On June 8, 2016, McBride debuted the video for her second single, "Just Around The Corner", during the CMT Music Awards. This song is the official Band Against Cancer anthem. Band Against Cancer is a community-based movement led by Sarah Cannon (the cancer institute of HCA) in partnership with Big Machine Label Group and McBride, which aims to raise awareness, support and resources to those battling cancer. The initiative includes a series of concerts across United States, with McBride as a headliner. In August 2016, the singer announced a new tour called "Love Unleashed". According to McBride, the purpose of the tour was to unite people and spread love through the power of music as a response to the "tragedy and uncertainty in the world". She was also selected as one of 30 artists to perform on "Forever Country", a mash-up track of Take Me Home, Country Roads; On the Road Again; and I Will Always Love You which celebrates 50 years of the CMA Awards. In July 2017, McBride revealed she is planning on releasing a Christmas album, of which she said " It won't have as many hymns on it. It will be more things like 'Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town' and 'It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas.'" She has now said it will be out in 2018, "One is a new Christmas album, which will come out in 2018." The Christmas album It's the Holiday Season was released on October 19, 2018. This will accompany a Christmas tour, called "Joy of Christmas" as well as a cookbook called "Martina's Kitchen Mix: My Recipe Playlist for Real Life" which will be out October 30, 2018. This would be McBride's second cookbook, following her 2014 release called "Around the Table: Recipes and Inspiration for Gatherings Throughout the Year". Martina has launched a new show on Food Network, airing on Sundays at 11am eastern. In 2019, McBride began the podcast Vocal Point, a "free-wheeling, wide-ranging" topical conversation series. On May 4, 2020, McBride appeared in the second season episode of NBC's Songland and released the song "Girls Like Me". Personal life In 1988, Martina Schiff, as she was known up to that time, married sound engineer John McBride, taking his family name as her stage name. The couple has three daughters: Delaney Katharine (born December 22, 1994), Emma Justine (born March 29, 1998) and Ava Rose Kathleen (born June 20, 2005). After becoming a mother, the singer reduced her touring schedule so that her daughters could have a normal upbringing. Joe Galante said this was "an enormous choice in terms of money," but McBride had made it very clear that she wanted to be present in her daughters' lives. Charity work McBride works with a variety of charities. She has served as a spokeswoman for the National Domestic Violence Hotline as well as for the National Network to End Domestic Violence and national spokeswoman for the Tulsa Domestic Violence and Intervention Services. Every year since 1995, she has hosted Middle Tennessee's YWCA, "Celebrity Auction", and it has raised nearly $400,000 so far. In 2004, she worked with "Kids Wish Network" to fulfill the wish of a young girl dying from muscular dystrophy. McBride was awarded the "Minnie Pearl Humanitarian Award" in 2003. McBride explained that educating girls and women on domestic violence is something she works on at home with her own daughters, stating: McBride has also teamed up with Loveisrespect, National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline, working with them on a new program called, "My Time to Shine." McBride appeared on the Stand Up 2 Cancer Telethon in September 2010, where she performed "Unchained Melody" with Leona Lewis, Aaron Neville, and Stevie Wonder. Also in 2010, she hosted the YWCA for the 16th consecutive year, raising over 50,000 dollars. It totals over 500,000 dollars raised so far. McBride also has a charity initiative called "Team Music is Love". Speaking about Team Music Is Love, McBride stated "It started a few years ago as a group of fans that asked me if they could wear a T-shirt with my name to walk in a breast cancer walk, and I said 'of course' and it has grown from there. Last year, we decided we wanted to give it a better name, a name that sounded as important as it is, so we changed it to 'Team Music is Love,' since it's about spreading love through music. We have done some amazing things over the past few years and we continue to grow and keep giving back." Discography 1992: The Time Has Come 1993: The Way That I Am 1995: Wild Angels 1997: Evolution 1998: White Christmas 1999: Emotion 2003: Martina 2005: Timeless 2007: Waking Up Laughing 2009: Shine 2011: Eleven 2014: Everlasting 2016: Reckless 2018: It's the Holiday Season Tours Headlining Evolution Tour Emotions Tour Greatest Hits Tour Timeless Tour Waking Up Laughing Tour One Night Tour Everlasting Tour Love Unleashed Tour Co-headlining Virginia Slims on the Legends Lilith Fair Girls Night Out Alan Jackson and Martina McBride in Concert Shine All Night Tour Holiday concert Joy of Christmas Tour Opening act World Tour '93-'94 Walkin on Sundown Tour Easy Come Easy Go Tour Everywhere Tour The Cowboy Rides Away Tour Awards and nominations McBride has received a number of awards, including the Country Music Association Award (CMA) for Female Vocalist of the Year, with her fourth win in 2004. In 2011 she received and honorary CMA award. She has been nominated for 14 Grammy Awards, but has never won. Grammy Awards Note: In 1995, McBride was one of the various artists featured on the album Amazing Grace – A Country Salute to Gospel (singing "How Great Thou Art"), which won the Grammy Award for Best Southern, Country or Bluegrass Gospel Album. This award went to the compilation album's producer Bill Hearn, and not to the artists. Other awards References External links 1966 births Living people American country singer-songwriters American women country singers American sopranos Country musicians from Kansas Country musicians from Tennessee Grand Ole Opry members Members of the Country Music Association Musicians from Nashville, Tennessee People from Barber County, Kansas RCA Records Nashville artists Republic Records artists Singer-songwriters from Tennessee 20th-century American singers 20th-century American women singers 21st-century American singers 21st-century American women singers Singer-songwriters from Kansas	false	[ "Live in Concert is the first live concert CD and DVD from country music superstar Martina McBride. The show was recorded September 29, 2007 at the iWireless Center in Moline, Illinois during McBride's Waking Up Laughing Tour. The concert was originally taped for a PBS Great Performances special that aired during the month of March 2008.\n\nTrack listing\nDisc 1 – Live CD\n\nDisc 2 – Live DVD\n\nCharts\n\nAlbum\n\nReferences\n[ Martina McBride: Live in Concert] at AllMusic\n\nMartina McBride albums\nLive video albums\n2008 live albums\n2008 video albums\nRCA Records live albums\nRCA Records video albums", "\"How I Feel\" is a song co-written and recorded by American country music singer Martina McBride. It was released in May 2007 as the second single from the album Waking Up Laughing. McBride wrote the song with Aimee Mayo, Chris Lindsey and The Warren Brothers.\n\nMusic video\nA live video of McBride performing the song at the 2007 CMA Music Fest was released to GAC and CMT in August 2007.\n\nChart performance\n\nReferences\n\n2007 singles\n2007 songs\nMartina McBride songs\nSongs written by Martina McBride\nSongs written by Chris Lindsey\nSongs written by Aimee Mayo\nSongs written by The Warren Brothers\nRCA Records Nashville singles" ]
[ "Orchestra", "Expanded instrumentation" ]	C_9123ff7b8c8245fe9021aa28e773b340_0	What instruments were added?	1	What instruments were added?	Orchestra	Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Bolero, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No.6 and 9 and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th-century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Bela Bartok, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). CANNOTANSWER	These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores.	An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass woodwinds such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon brass instruments such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, and tuba percussion instruments such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek phil-, "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. A (sometimes concert orchestra) is a smaller ensemble of not more than about fifty musicians. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire, such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler. Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor's baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed. The leader of the first violin section – commonly called the concertmaster – also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster, or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ὀρχήστρα (orchestra), the name for the area in front of a stage in ancient Greek theatre reserved for the Greek chorus. History Baroque and classical eras In the Baroque era, the size and composition of an orchestra was not standardised. There were large differences in size, instrumentation and playing styles—and therefore in orchestral soundscapes and palettes — between the various European regions. The Baroque orchestra ranged from smaller orchestras (or ensembles) with one player per part, to larger scale orchestras with many players per part. Examples of the smaller variety were Bach's orchestras, for example in Koethen, where he had access to an ensemble of up to 18 players. Examples of large scale Baroque orchestras would include Corelli's orchestra in Rome which ranged between 35 and 80 players for day-to-day performances, being enlarged to 150 players for special occasions. In the classical era, the orchestra became more standardized with a small to medium sized string section and a core wind section consisting of pairs of oboes, flutes, bassoons and horns, sometimes supplemented by percussion and pairs of clarinets and trumpets. Beethoven's influence The so-called "standard complement" of doubled winds and brass in the orchestra pioneered in the late 18th century and consolidated during the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Beethoven after Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven's instrumentation almost always included paired flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets. The exceptions to this are his Symphony No. 4, Violin Concerto, and Piano Concerto No. 4, which each specify a single flute. Beethoven carefully calculated the expansion of this particular timbral "palette" in Symphonies 3, 5, 6, and 9 for an innovative effect. The third horn in the "Eroica" Symphony arrives to provide not only some harmonic flexibility, but also the effect of "choral" brass in the Trio movement. Piccolo, contrabassoon, and trombones add to the triumphal finale of his Symphony No. 5. A piccolo and a pair of trombones help deliver the effect of storm and sunshine in the Sixth, also known as the Pastoral Symphony. The Ninth asks for a second pair of horns, for reasons similar to the "Eroica" (four horns has since become standard); Beethoven's use of piccolo, contrabassoon, trombones, and untuned percussion — plus chorus and vocal soloists — in his finale, are his earliest suggestion that the timbral boundaries of symphony might be expanded. For several decades after his death, symphonic instrumentation was faithful to Beethoven's well-established model, with few exceptions. Instrumental technology The invention of the piston and rotary valve by Heinrich Stölzel and Friedrich Blühmel, both Silesians, in 1815, was the first in a series of innovations which impacted the orchestra, including the development of modern keywork for the flute by Theobald Boehm and the innovations of Adolphe Sax in the woodwinds, notably the invention of the saxophone. These advances would lead Hector Berlioz to write a landmark book on instrumentation, which was the first systematic treatise on the use of instrumental sound as an expressive element of music. Wagner's influence The next major expansion of symphonic practice came from Richard Wagner's Bayreuth orchestra, founded to accompany his musical dramas. Wagner's works for the stage were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. Thus, Wagner envisioned an ever-more-demanding role for the conductor of the theatre orchestra, as he elaborated in his influential work On Conducting. This brought about a revolution in orchestral composition, and set the style for orchestral performance for the next eighty years. Wagner's theories re-examined the importance of tempo, dynamics, bowing of string instruments and the role of principals in the orchestra. 20th-century orchestra At the beginning of the 20th century, symphony orchestras were larger, better funded, and better trained than previously; consequently, composers could compose larger and more ambitious works. The works of Gustav Mahler were particularly innovative; in his later symphonies, such as the mammoth Symphony No. 8, Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces. By the late Romantic era, orchestras could support the most enormous forms of symphonic expression, with huge string sections, massive brass sections and an expanded range of percussion instruments. With the recording era beginning, the standards of performance were pushed to a new level, because a recorded symphony could be listened to closely and even minor errors in intonation or ensemble, which might not be noticeable in a live performance, could be heard by critics. As recording technologies improved over the 20th and 21st centuries, eventually small errors in a recording could be "fixed" by audio editing or overdubbing. Some older conductors and composers could remember a time when simply "getting through" the music as best as possible was the standard. Combined with the wider audience made possible by recording, this led to a renewed focus on particular star conductors and on a high standard of orchestral execution. Instrumentation The typical symphony orchestra consists of four groups of related musical instruments called the woodwinds, brass, percussion, and strings. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes be grouped into a fifth section such as a keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and electric and electronic instruments. The orchestra, depending on the size, contains almost all of the standard instruments in each group. In the history of the orchestra, its instrumentation has been expanded over time, often agreed to have been standardized by the classical period and Ludwig van Beethoven's influence on the classical model. In the 20th and 21st century, new repertory demands expanded the instrumentation of the orchestra, resulting in a flexible use of the classical-model instruments and newly developed electric and electronic instruments in various combinations. The terms symphony orchestra and philharmonic orchestra may be used to distinguish different ensembles from the same locality, such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. A symphony or philharmonic orchestra will usually have over eighty musicians on its roster, in some cases over a hundred, but the actual number of musicians employed in a particular performance may vary according to the work being played and the size of the venue. A chamber orchestra is usually a smaller ensemble; a major chamber orchestra might employ as many as fifty musicians, but some are much smaller. Concert orchestra is an alternative term, as in the BBC Concert Orchestra and the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Expanded instrumentation Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No. 6 and No. 9, and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Béla Bartók, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analysed in five eras: the Baroque era, the Classical era, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic era and combined Modern/Postmodern eras. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann, Brahms); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th-century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). Late Baroque orchestra Woodwinds 2 flutes 2–3 oboes (oboe d'amore and oboe da caccia) bassoon (several players in large orchestras) recorder Brass 2 natural horns(sometimes will have a corno da tirarsi) and/or 2–3 natural trumpets(sometimes will have a tromba da tirarsi) Percussion 2 timpani (one player, used as the bass of the natural trumpet section) Keyboards and other chord-playing instruments selected by the ensemble leader harpsichord pipe organ theorbo Strings (oftentimes several players per part) violin I violin II viola cello or violoncello da spalla double bass (or rather violone/basso a viola da braccio) viola da gamba Classical orchestra Woodwinds 1–2 flutes of which 1 might play 1 piccolo 2 oboes 2 clarinets (B, C, or A) both of which might also play 2 basset horns (occasionally with Mozart) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon (occasionally with Mozart, and Haydn, but not yet a standard instrument) Brass 2 natural horns (valveless) 2 natural trumpets (valveless) 1 alto trombone 1 tenor trombone 1 bass trombone (on occasion Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart, but trombones not yet a standard instrument) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) Keyboards harpsichord or pipe organ (until the late 18th century, by which time it was gradually phased out of the orchestra) Strings (always multiple players per part) violins I violins II violas cellos and double basses Early Romantic orchestra Woodwinds piccolo 2 flutes 2 oboes 2 soprano clarinets of which both might also play 2 Basset horns (occasionally with Beethoven) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4 natural (valveless) or valved horns 2 natural or valved trumpets 3 tenor trombones of which some might play 1 alto trombone 1 bass trombone 1–2 serpents or ophicleides (gradually replaced by tubas) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals triangle tambourine glockenspiel Strings 14 violins 1 12 violins 2 10 violas 8 cellos 6 double basses 1 concert harp Late Romantic orchestra Woodwinds 3–4 flutes, some of which may double on 1–2 piccolos 3–4 oboes, of which some may double on 1 oboe d'amore 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 3–4 clarinets in B or A, of which some might play 1 E clarinet or D clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 3–4 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4–8 French horns, German horns, or Vienna horns (more rarely natural horns) of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas – 2 tenors, 2 bass 3–6 trumpets in F, and other keys including C, B of which some might play 1 bass trumpet 3–4 cornets 3–4 tenor trombones (alto trombone parts from the classical era usually played on tenor trombone) 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 euphonium (usually played by a trombonist when needed) Keyboards piano celesta Percussion 4 or more timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals tam-tam triangle tambourine glockenspiel xylophone tubular bells Strings 16 violins 1 (sometimes more) 14 violins 2 12 violas 12 cellos 10 double basses 2 or more concert harps Modern/Postmodern orchestra Woodwinds 2–4 flutes of which some might play 1–2 piccolos 1 alto flute 2–4 oboes of which 1–2 might play 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 2–4 B clarinets of which some might play 1 E clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 2–4 bassoons of which 1 might play 1 contrabassoon (occasionally 1 or more saxophones of various types) Brass 4–8 horns (double horns) in F/B of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas 3–6 trumpets in B of which some might play 2–3 cornets 1 piccolo trumpet (often for playing very high parts originally for natural trumpets) 1 bass trumpet 1 flugelhorn 1 alto trombone (restored to the postmodern orchestra for playing music of the classical era) 3–6 tenor trombones 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 baritone horn/euphonium Percussion 4–5 timpani (one player) snare drum tenor drum bass drum cymbals triangle tam-tam tambourine wood block glockenspiel xylophone vibraphone marimba crotales tubular bells mark tree sleigh bells bell tree drum kit (in some works) Other percussion instruments, including ethnic or world music instruments specified by composers Keyboards piano pipe organ harpsichord accordion celesta Strings 16 1st violins 14 2nd violins 12 violas 10 cellos 8 double basses 1–2 harps (1 or more classical guitars of various types) Other harmonica Electrophone As required by the compositions in the program, various electric instruments or electronic instruments may be used in the orchestra. These performers are not typically permanent orchestra members. They are typically freelancers hired on contract for one or more concerts. Instruments may include: theremin ondes Martenot electric guitar electric bass guitar electric double bass electric violin, viola & cello Hammond organ Lowrey organ electric piano keytar digital accordion ring modulators synthesizer synclavier novachord clavinet digital drum kit Other electronic musical instruments Non-musical instruments such as a typewriter or reel-to-reel tape player Organization Among the instrument groups and within each group of instruments, there is a generally accepted hierarchy. Every instrumental group (or section) has a principal who is generally responsible for leading the group and playing orchestral solos. The violins are divided into two groups, first violin and second violin, with the second violins playing in lower registers than the first violins, playing an accompaniment part, or harmonizing the melody played by the first violins. The principal first violin is called the concertmaster (or orchestra "leader" in the U.K.) and is not only considered the leader of the string section, but the second-in-command of the entire orchestra, behind only the conductor. The concertmaster leads the pre-concert tuning and handles musical aspects of orchestra management, such as determining the bowings for the violins or for all of the string section. The concertmaster usually sits to the conductor's left, closest to the audience. There is also a principal second violin, a principal viola, a principal cello, and a principal bass. The principal trombone is considered the leader of the low brass section, while the principal trumpet is generally considered the leader of the entire brass section. While the oboe often provides the tuning note for the orchestra (due to a 300 year-old convention), there is generally no designated principal of the woodwind section (though in woodwind ensembles, the flute is often the presumptive leader.) Instead, each principal confers with the others as equals in the case of musical differences of opinion. Most sections also have an assistant principal (or co-principal or associate principal), or in the case of the first violins, an assistant concertmaster, who often plays a tutti part in addition to replacing the principal in his or her absence. A section string player plays in unison with the rest of the section, except in the case of divided (divisi) parts, where upper and lower parts in the music are often assigned to "outside" (nearer the audience) and "inside" seated players. Where a solo part is called for in a string section, the section leader invariably plays that part. The section leader (or principal) of a string section is also responsible for determining the bowings, often based on the bowings set out by the concertmaster. In some cases, the principal of a string section may use a slightly different bowing than the concertmaster, to accommodate the requirements of playing their instrument (e.g., the double-bass section). Principals of a string section will also lead entrances for their section, typically by lifting the bow before the entrance, to ensure the section plays together. Tutti wind and brass players generally play a unique but non-solo part. Section percussionists play parts assigned to them by the principal percussionist. In modern times, the musicians are usually directed by a conductor, although early orchestras did not have one, giving this role instead to the concertmaster or the harpsichordist playing the continuo. Some modern orchestras also do without conductors, particularly smaller orchestras and those specializing in historically accurate (so-called "period") performances of baroque and earlier music. The most frequently performed repertoire for a symphony orchestra is Western classical music or opera. However, orchestras are used sometimes in popular music (e.g., to accompany a rock or pop band in a concert), extensively in film music, and increasingly often in video game music. Orchestras are also used in the symphonic metal genre. The term "orchestra" can also be applied to a jazz ensemble, for example in the performance of big-band music. Selection and appointment of members In the 2000s, all tenured members of a professional orchestra normally audition for positions in the ensemble. Performers typically play one or more solo pieces of the auditionee's choice, such as a movement of a concerto, a solo Bach movement, and a variety of excerpts from the orchestral literature that are advertised in the audition poster (so the auditionees can prepare). The excerpts are typically the most technically challenging parts and solos from the orchestral literature. Orchestral auditions are typically held in front of a panel that includes the conductor, the concertmaster, the principal player of the section for which the auditionee is applying, and possibly other principal players. The most promising candidates from the first round of auditions are invited to return for a second or third round of auditions, which allows the conductor and the panel to compare the best candidates. Performers may be asked to sight read orchestral music. The final stage of the audition process in some orchestras is a test week, in which the performer plays with the orchestra for a week or two, which allows the conductor and principal players to see if the individual can function well in an actual rehearsal and performance setting. There are a range of different employment arrangements. The most sought-after positions are permanent, tenured positions in the orchestra. Orchestras also hire musicians on contracts, ranging in length from a single concert to a full season or more. Contract performers may be hired for individual concerts when the orchestra is doing an exceptionally large late-Romantic era orchestral work, or to substitute for a permanent member who is sick. A professional musician who is hired to perform for a single concert is sometimes called a "sub". Some contract musicians may be hired to replace permanent members for the period that the permanent member is on parental leave or disability leave. History of gender in ensembles Historically, major professional orchestras have been mostly or entirely composed of men. The first women members hired in professional orchestras have been harpists. The Vienna Philharmonic, for example, did not accept women to permanent membership until 1997, far later than comparable orchestras (the other orchestras ranked among the world's top five by Gramophone in 2008). The last major orchestra to appoint a woman to a permanent position was the Berlin Philharmonic. In February 1996, the Vienna Philharmonic's principal flute, Dieter Flury, told Westdeutscher Rundfunk that accepting women would be "gambling with the emotional unity () that this organism currently has". In April 1996, the orchestra's press secretary wrote that "compensating for the expected leaves of absence" of maternity leave would be a problem. In 1997, the Vienna Philharmonic was "facing protests during a [US] tour" by the National Organization for Women and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Finally, "after being held up to increasing ridicule even in socially conservative Austria, members of the orchestra gathered [on 28 February 1997] in an extraordinary meeting on the eve of their departure and agreed to admit a woman, Anna Lelkes, as harpist." As of 2013, the orchestra has six female members; one of them, violinist Albena Danailova, became one of the orchestra's concertmasters in 2008, the first woman to hold that position in that orchestra. In 2012, women made up 6% of the orchestra's membership. VPO president Clemens Hellsberg said the VPO now uses completely screened blind auditions. In 2013, an article in Mother Jones stated that while "[m]any prestigious orchestras have significant female membership — women outnumber men in the New York Philharmonic's violin section — and several renowned ensembles, including the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, and the Minnesota Symphony, are led by women violinists", the double bass, brass, and percussion sections of major orchestras "... are still predominantly male." A 2014 BBC article stated that the "... introduction of 'blind' auditions, where a prospective instrumentalist performs behind a screen so that the judging panel can exercise no gender or racial prejudice, has seen the gender balance of traditionally male-dominated symphony orchestras gradually shift." Amateur ensembles There are also a variety of amateur orchestras: School orchestras These orchestras consist of students from elementary or secondary school. They may be students from a music class or program or they may be drawn from the entire school body. School orchestras are typically led by a music teacher. In some cases, school orchestras are string orchestras, consisting only of students playing string instruments, with students playing woodwinds, brass and percussion grouped together as a concert band. University or conservatory orchestras These orchestras consist of students from a university or music conservatory. In some cases, university orchestras are open to all students from a university, from all programs. Larger universities may have two or more university orchestras: one or more orchestras made up of music majors (or, for major music programs, several tiers of music major orchestras, ranked by skill level) and a second orchestra open to university students from all academic programs (e.g., science, business, etc.) who have previous classical music experience on an orchestral instrument. University and conservatory orchestras are led by a conductor who is typically a professor or instructor at the university or conservatory. Youth orchestras These orchestras consist of teens and young adults drawn from an entire city or region. The age range in youth orchestras varies between different ensembles. In some cases, youth orchestras may consist of teens or young adults from an entire country (e.g., Canada's National Youth Orchestra). Community orchestras These orchestras consist of amateur performers drawn from an entire city or region. Community orchestras typically consist mainly of adult amateur musicians. Community orchestras range in level from beginner-level orchestras which rehearse music without doing formal performances in front of an audience to intermediate-level ensembles to advanced amateur groups which play standard professional orchestra repertoire. In some cases, university or conservatory music students may also be members of community orchestras. While community orchestra members are mostly unpaid amateurs, in some orchestras, a small number of professionals may be hired to act as principal players and section leaders. Repertoire and performances Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire ranging from 17th-century dance suites, 18th century divertimentos to 20th-century film scores and 21st-century symphonies. Orchestras have become synonymous with the symphony, an extended musical composition in Western classical music that typically contains multiple movements which provide contrasting keys and tempos. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. The conductor uses the score to study the symphony before rehearsals and decide on their interpretation (e.g., tempos, articulation, phrasing, etc.), and to follow the music during rehearsals and concerts, while leading the ensemble. Orchestral musicians play from parts containing just the notated music for their instrument. A small number of symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Orchestras also perform overtures, a term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn began to use the term to refer to independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that presaged genres such as the symphonic poem, a form devised by Franz Liszt in several works that began as dramatic overtures. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". In the 1850s the concert overture began to be supplanted by the symphonic poem. Orchestras also play with instrumental soloists in concertos. During concertos, the orchestra plays an accompaniment role to the soloist (e.g., a solo violinist or pianist) and, at times, introduces musical themes or interludes while the soloist is not playing. Orchestras also play during operas, ballets, some musical theatre works and some choral works (both sacred works such as Masses and secular works). In operas and ballets, the orchestra accompanies the singers and dancers, respectively, and plays overtures and interludes where the melodies played by the orchestra take centre stage. Performances In the Baroque era, orchestras performed in a range of venues, including at the fine houses of aristocrats, in opera halls and in churches. Some wealthy aristocrats had an orchestra in residence at their estate, to entertain them and their guests with performances. During the Classical era, as composers increasingly sought out financial support from the general public, orchestra concerts were increasingly held in public concert halls, where music lovers could buy tickets to hear the orchestra. Aristocratic patronage of orchestras continued during the Classical era, but this went on alongside public concerts. In the 20th and 21st century, orchestras found a new patron: governments. Many orchestras in North America and Europe receive part of their funding from national, regional level governments (e.g., state governments in the U.S.) or city governments. These government subsidies make up part of orchestra revenue, along with ticket sales, charitable donations (if the orchestra is registered as a charity) and other fundraising activities. With the invention of successive technologies, including sound recording, radio broadcasting, television broadcasting and Internet-based streaming and downloading of concert videos, orchestras have been able to find new revenue sources. Issues in performance Faking One of the "great unmentionable [topics] of orchestral playing" is "faking", the process by which an orchestral musician gives the false "... impression of playing every note as written", typically for a very challenging passage that is very high or very fast, while not actually playing the notes that are in the printed music part. An article in The Strad states that all orchestral musicians, even those in the top orchestras, occasionally fake certain passages. One reason that musicians fake is because there are not enough rehearsals. Another factor is the extreme challenges in 20th century and 21st century contemporary pieces; some professionals said "faking" was "necessary in anything from ten to almost ninety per cent of some modern works". Professional players who were interviewed were of a consensus that faking may be acceptable when a part is not written well for the instrument, but faking "just because you haven't practised" the music is not acceptable. Counter-revolution With the advent of the early music movement, smaller orchestras where players worked on execution of works in styles derived from the study of older treatises on playing became common. These include the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Classical Players under the direction of Sir Roger Norrington and the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, among others. Recent trends in the United States In the United States, the late 20th century saw a crisis of funding and support for orchestras. The size and cost of a symphony orchestra, compared to the size of the base of supporters, became an issue that struck at the core of the institution. Few orchestras could fill auditoriums, and the time-honored season-subscription system became increasingly anachronistic, as more and more listeners would buy tickets on an ad-hoc basis for individual events. Orchestral endowments and — more centrally to the daily operation of American orchestras — orchestral donors have seen investment portfolios shrink, or produce lower yields, reducing the ability of donors to contribute; further, there has been a trend toward donors finding other social causes more compelling. While government funding is less central to American than European orchestras, cuts in such funding are still significant for American ensembles. Finally, the drastic falling-off of revenues from recording, tied to no small extent to changes in the recording industry itself, began a period of change that has yet to reach its conclusion. U.S. orchestras that have gone into Chapter 11 bankruptcy include the Philadelphia Orchestra (April 2011), and the Louisville Orchestra (December 2010); orchestras that have gone into Chapter 7 bankruptcy and have ceased operations include the Northwest Chamber Orchestra in 2006, the Honolulu Orchestra in March 2011, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra in April 2011, and the Syracuse Symphony in June 2011. The Festival of Orchestras in Orlando, Florida, ceased operations at the end of March 2011. One source of financial difficulties that received notice and criticism was high salaries for music directors of US orchestras, which led several high-profile conductors to take pay cuts in recent years. Music administrators such as Michael Tilson Thomas and Esa-Pekka Salonen argued that new music, new means of presenting it, and a renewed relationship with the community could revitalize the symphony orchestra. The American critic Greg Sandow has argued in detail that orchestras must revise their approach to music, performance, the concert experience, marketing, public relations, community involvement, and presentation to bring them in line with the expectations of 21st century audiences immersed in popular culture. It is not uncommon for contemporary composers to use unconventional instruments, including various synthesizers, to achieve desired effects. Many, however, find more conventional orchestral configuration to provide better possibilities for color and depth. Composers like John Adams often employ Romantic-size orchestras, as in Adams' opera Nixon in China; Philip Glass and others may be more free, yet still identify size-boundaries. Glass in particular has recently turned to conventional orchestras in works like the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra and the Violin Concerto No. 2. Along with a decrease in funding, some U.S. orchestras have reduced their overall personnel, as well as the number of players appearing in performances. The reduced numbers in performance are usually confined to the string section, since the numbers here have traditionally been flexible (as multiple players typically play from the same part). Role of conductor Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. The primary duties of the conductor are to set the tempo, ensure correct entries by various members of the ensemble, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. To convey their ideas and interpretation, a conductor communicates with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, typically (though not invariably) with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals, such as eye contact with relevant performers. A conductor's directions will almost invariably be supplemented or reinforced by verbal instructions or suggestions to their musicians in rehearsal prior to a performance. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments and voices. Since the mid-18th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, although in earlier periods of classical music history, leading an ensemble while playing an instrument was common. In Baroque music from the 1600s to the 1750s, the group would typically be led by the harpsichordist or first violinist (see concertmaster), an approach that in modern times has been revived by several music directors for music from this period. Conducting while playing a piano or synthesizer may also be done with musical theatre pit orchestras. Communication is typically non-verbal during a performance (this is strictly the case in art music, but in jazz big bands or large pop ensembles, there may be occasional spoken instructions, such as a "count in"). However, in rehearsals, frequent interruptions allow the conductor to give verbal directions as to how the music should be played or sung. Conductors act as guides to the orchestras or choirs they conduct. They choose the works to be performed and study their scores, to which they may make certain adjustments (e.g., regarding tempo, articulation, phrasing, repetitions of sections, and so on), work out their interpretation, and relay their vision to the performers. They may also attend to organizational matters, such as scheduling rehearsals, planning a concert season, hearing auditions and selecting members, and promoting their ensemble in the media. Orchestras, choirs, concert bands and other sizable musical ensembles such as big bands are usually led by conductors. Conductorless orchestras In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), most orchestras were led by one of the musicians, typically the principal first violin, called the concertmaster. The concertmaster would lead the tempo of pieces by lifting his or her bow in a rhythmic manner. Leadership might also be provided by one of the chord-playing instrumentalists playing the basso continuo part which was the core of most Baroque instrumental ensemble pieces. Typically, this would be a harpsichord player, a pipe organist, or a lutist or theorbo player. A keyboard player could lead the ensemble with his or her head, or by taking one of the hands off the keyboard to lead a more difficult tempo change. A lutenist or theorbo player could lead by lifting the instrument neck up and down to indicate the tempo of a piece, or to lead a ritard during a cadence or ending. In some works which combined choirs and instrumental ensembles, two leaders were sometimes used: A concertmaster to lead the instrumentalists and a chord-playing performer to lead the singers. During the Classical music period (), the practice of using chordal instruments to play basso continuo was gradually phased out, and it disappeared completely by 1800. Instead, ensembles began to use conductors to lead the orchestra's tempos and playing style, while the concertmaster played an additional leadership role for the musicians, especially the string players, who imitate the bowstroke and playing style of the concertmaster, to the degree that is feasible for the different stringed instruments. In 1922, the idea of a conductor-less orchestra was revived in post-revolutionary Soviet Union. The symphony orchestra Persimfans was formed without a conductor, because the founders believed that the ensemble should be modeled on the ideal Marxist state, in which all people are equal. As such, its members felt that there was no need to be led by the dictatorial baton of a conductor; instead they were led by a committee, which determined tempos and playing styles. Although it was a partial success within the Soviet Union, the principal difficulty with the concept was in changing tempo during performances, because even if the committee had issued a decree about where a tempo change should take place, there was no leader in the ensemble to guide this tempo change. The orchestra survived for ten years before Stalin's cultural politics disbanded it by taking away its funding. In Western nations, some ensembles, such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, based in New York City, have had more success with conductorless orchestras, although decisions are likely to be deferred to some sense of leadership within the ensemble (for example, the principal wind and string players, notably the concertmaster). Others have returned to the tradition of a principal player, usually a violinist, being the artistic director and running rehearsal and leading concerts. Examples include the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam Sinfonietta & Candida Thompson and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. As well, as part of the early music movement, some 20th and 21st century orchestras have revived the Baroque practice of having no conductor on the podium for Baroque pieces, using the concertmaster or a chord-playing basso continuo performer (e.g., harpsichord or organ) to lead the group. Multiple conductors Offstage instruments Some orchestral works specify that an offstage trumpet should be used or that other instruments from the orchestra should be positioned off-stage or behind the stage, to create a haunted, mystical effect. To ensure that the offstage instrumentalist(s) play in time, sometimes a sub-conductor will be stationed offstage with a clear view of the principal conductor. Examples include the ending of "Neptune" from Gustav Holst's The Planets. The principal conductor leads the large orchestra, and the sub-conductor relays the principal conductor's tempo and gestures to the offstage musician (or musicians). One of the challenges with using two conductors is that the second conductor may get out of synchronization with the main conductor, or may mis-convey (or misunderstand) the principal conductor's gestures, which can lead to the offstage instruments being out of time. In the late 20th century and early 21st century, some orchestras use a video camera pointed at the principal conductor and a closed-circuit TV set in front of the offstage performer(s), instead of using two conductors. Contemporary music The techniques of polystylism and polytempo music have led a few 20th and 21st century composers to write music where multiple orchestras or ensembles perform simultaneously. These trends have brought about the phenomenon of polyconductor music, wherein separate sub-conductors conduct each group of musicians. Usually, one principal conductor conducts the sub-conductors, thereby shaping the overall performance. In Percy Grainger's The Warriors which includes three conductors: the primary conductor of the orchestra, a secondary conductor directing an off-stage brass ensemble, and a tertiary conductor directing percussion and harp. One example in the late-century orchestral music is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gruppen, for three orchestras, which are placed around the audience. This way, the "sound masses" could be spatialized, as in an electroacoustic work. Gruppen was premiered in Cologne, in 1958, conducted by Stockhausen, Bruno Maderna and Pierre Boulez. It has been performed in 1996 by Simon Rattle, John Carewe and Daniel Harding. See also Chinese orchestra Gamelan Orchestra List of symphony orchestras List of symphony orchestras in Europe List of symphony orchestras in the United States List of youth orchestras in the United States Orchestral enhancement Orchestration Radio orchestra Rhythm section Shorthand for orchestra instrumentation String orchestra Notes References Further reading External links Articles containing video clips Types of musical groups	true	[ "Naumati Baja (literally – Nine musical instruments) is a group of nine traditional musical instruments played in Nepal and Himalayan region of Sikkim, Darjeeling and Assam during certain auspicious occasions like weddings. \n\nNaumati is more comprehensive form of the Panchai Baaja. Panchai Baaja (or a band of five instruments) has been played since olden times as a good luck to any auspicious performances. There is a reference in the scriptures that Panchai Baaja was played in the Dvapara Yuga on the auspicious occasion of the Christening Ceremony of the Lord Krishna. The Panchai Baaja represents the five metals and while designing these instruments, the images of five deities viz; Ganesh, Bishnu, Shiva, Goddess and the Sun were kept as the background. Later, four more instruments were added to this set of five instruments and called Naumati Baaja (nine musical instruments).\n\nNepalese musical instruments\nIndian musical instruments\nNepalese music\n\nReferences", "Fujian is a Chinese province. Traditional music includes a variety of folk and classical styles. Nanyin is a style of music that dates back to the period between the Sui and Tang eras, in the 7th century. The city of Quanzhou was a major city at the time, and was situated upon an important maritime trade route, bringing elements of distant cultures to the city. The result was what is now known as nanyin or nanguan music, regarded as a \"living fossil\" of ancient Chinese music. The cities of Xiamen and Quanzhou have applied to UNESCO for recognition as masterpieces of the oral and intangible heritage of humanity.\n\nHakka music is literary and laid-back in tone, and consists entirely of five notes; many folk songs only use three notes.\n\nShifan is a kind of music that dates to the Qing Dynasty, when it was a kind of percussive music that accompanied the Dragon Lantern Dance. Over time, string and wind instruments were added.\n\nChanhe arose at the Chanhe School of Buddhism, from the chanting accompanied by percussion instruments like chimes and drums. In the early 1920s, wind and string instruments were added.\n\nModern musical institutions in Fujian include the Quanzhou Nanyin Music Ensemble, founded in the early 1960s, and the Fuzhou Folk Music Ensemble founded in 1990. There is also a Music and Dance Festival of Fujian Province and a Baihua Arts and Cultural Festival of Fuzhou Municipality.\n\nSee also\nBeiguan music\n\nFujian" ]
[ "Orchestra", "Expanded instrumentation", "What instruments were added?", "These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores." ]	C_9123ff7b8c8245fe9021aa28e773b340_0	What was the point of adding these?	2	What was the point of adding the orchestra?	Orchestra	Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Bolero, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No.6 and 9 and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th-century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Bela Bartok, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). CANNOTANSWER	The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors.	An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass woodwinds such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon brass instruments such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, and tuba percussion instruments such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek phil-, "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. A (sometimes concert orchestra) is a smaller ensemble of not more than about fifty musicians. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire, such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler. Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor's baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed. The leader of the first violin section – commonly called the concertmaster – also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster, or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ὀρχήστρα (orchestra), the name for the area in front of a stage in ancient Greek theatre reserved for the Greek chorus. History Baroque and classical eras In the Baroque era, the size and composition of an orchestra was not standardised. There were large differences in size, instrumentation and playing styles—and therefore in orchestral soundscapes and palettes — between the various European regions. The Baroque orchestra ranged from smaller orchestras (or ensembles) with one player per part, to larger scale orchestras with many players per part. Examples of the smaller variety were Bach's orchestras, for example in Koethen, where he had access to an ensemble of up to 18 players. Examples of large scale Baroque orchestras would include Corelli's orchestra in Rome which ranged between 35 and 80 players for day-to-day performances, being enlarged to 150 players for special occasions. In the classical era, the orchestra became more standardized with a small to medium sized string section and a core wind section consisting of pairs of oboes, flutes, bassoons and horns, sometimes supplemented by percussion and pairs of clarinets and trumpets. Beethoven's influence The so-called "standard complement" of doubled winds and brass in the orchestra pioneered in the late 18th century and consolidated during the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Beethoven after Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven's instrumentation almost always included paired flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets. The exceptions to this are his Symphony No. 4, Violin Concerto, and Piano Concerto No. 4, which each specify a single flute. Beethoven carefully calculated the expansion of this particular timbral "palette" in Symphonies 3, 5, 6, and 9 for an innovative effect. The third horn in the "Eroica" Symphony arrives to provide not only some harmonic flexibility, but also the effect of "choral" brass in the Trio movement. Piccolo, contrabassoon, and trombones add to the triumphal finale of his Symphony No. 5. A piccolo and a pair of trombones help deliver the effect of storm and sunshine in the Sixth, also known as the Pastoral Symphony. The Ninth asks for a second pair of horns, for reasons similar to the "Eroica" (four horns has since become standard); Beethoven's use of piccolo, contrabassoon, trombones, and untuned percussion — plus chorus and vocal soloists — in his finale, are his earliest suggestion that the timbral boundaries of symphony might be expanded. For several decades after his death, symphonic instrumentation was faithful to Beethoven's well-established model, with few exceptions. Instrumental technology The invention of the piston and rotary valve by Heinrich Stölzel and Friedrich Blühmel, both Silesians, in 1815, was the first in a series of innovations which impacted the orchestra, including the development of modern keywork for the flute by Theobald Boehm and the innovations of Adolphe Sax in the woodwinds, notably the invention of the saxophone. These advances would lead Hector Berlioz to write a landmark book on instrumentation, which was the first systematic treatise on the use of instrumental sound as an expressive element of music. Wagner's influence The next major expansion of symphonic practice came from Richard Wagner's Bayreuth orchestra, founded to accompany his musical dramas. Wagner's works for the stage were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. Thus, Wagner envisioned an ever-more-demanding role for the conductor of the theatre orchestra, as he elaborated in his influential work On Conducting. This brought about a revolution in orchestral composition, and set the style for orchestral performance for the next eighty years. Wagner's theories re-examined the importance of tempo, dynamics, bowing of string instruments and the role of principals in the orchestra. 20th-century orchestra At the beginning of the 20th century, symphony orchestras were larger, better funded, and better trained than previously; consequently, composers could compose larger and more ambitious works. The works of Gustav Mahler were particularly innovative; in his later symphonies, such as the mammoth Symphony No. 8, Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces. By the late Romantic era, orchestras could support the most enormous forms of symphonic expression, with huge string sections, massive brass sections and an expanded range of percussion instruments. With the recording era beginning, the standards of performance were pushed to a new level, because a recorded symphony could be listened to closely and even minor errors in intonation or ensemble, which might not be noticeable in a live performance, could be heard by critics. As recording technologies improved over the 20th and 21st centuries, eventually small errors in a recording could be "fixed" by audio editing or overdubbing. Some older conductors and composers could remember a time when simply "getting through" the music as best as possible was the standard. Combined with the wider audience made possible by recording, this led to a renewed focus on particular star conductors and on a high standard of orchestral execution. Instrumentation The typical symphony orchestra consists of four groups of related musical instruments called the woodwinds, brass, percussion, and strings. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes be grouped into a fifth section such as a keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and electric and electronic instruments. The orchestra, depending on the size, contains almost all of the standard instruments in each group. In the history of the orchestra, its instrumentation has been expanded over time, often agreed to have been standardized by the classical period and Ludwig van Beethoven's influence on the classical model. In the 20th and 21st century, new repertory demands expanded the instrumentation of the orchestra, resulting in a flexible use of the classical-model instruments and newly developed electric and electronic instruments in various combinations. The terms symphony orchestra and philharmonic orchestra may be used to distinguish different ensembles from the same locality, such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. A symphony or philharmonic orchestra will usually have over eighty musicians on its roster, in some cases over a hundred, but the actual number of musicians employed in a particular performance may vary according to the work being played and the size of the venue. A chamber orchestra is usually a smaller ensemble; a major chamber orchestra might employ as many as fifty musicians, but some are much smaller. Concert orchestra is an alternative term, as in the BBC Concert Orchestra and the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Expanded instrumentation Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No. 6 and No. 9, and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Béla Bartók, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analysed in five eras: the Baroque era, the Classical era, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic era and combined Modern/Postmodern eras. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann, Brahms); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th-century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). Late Baroque orchestra Woodwinds 2 flutes 2–3 oboes (oboe d'amore and oboe da caccia) bassoon (several players in large orchestras) recorder Brass 2 natural horns(sometimes will have a corno da tirarsi) and/or 2–3 natural trumpets(sometimes will have a tromba da tirarsi) Percussion 2 timpani (one player, used as the bass of the natural trumpet section) Keyboards and other chord-playing instruments selected by the ensemble leader harpsichord pipe organ theorbo Strings (oftentimes several players per part) violin I violin II viola cello or violoncello da spalla double bass (or rather violone/basso a viola da braccio) viola da gamba Classical orchestra Woodwinds 1–2 flutes of which 1 might play 1 piccolo 2 oboes 2 clarinets (B, C, or A) both of which might also play 2 basset horns (occasionally with Mozart) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon (occasionally with Mozart, and Haydn, but not yet a standard instrument) Brass 2 natural horns (valveless) 2 natural trumpets (valveless) 1 alto trombone 1 tenor trombone 1 bass trombone (on occasion Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart, but trombones not yet a standard instrument) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) Keyboards harpsichord or pipe organ (until the late 18th century, by which time it was gradually phased out of the orchestra) Strings (always multiple players per part) violins I violins II violas cellos and double basses Early Romantic orchestra Woodwinds piccolo 2 flutes 2 oboes 2 soprano clarinets of which both might also play 2 Basset horns (occasionally with Beethoven) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4 natural (valveless) or valved horns 2 natural or valved trumpets 3 tenor trombones of which some might play 1 alto trombone 1 bass trombone 1–2 serpents or ophicleides (gradually replaced by tubas) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals triangle tambourine glockenspiel Strings 14 violins 1 12 violins 2 10 violas 8 cellos 6 double basses 1 concert harp Late Romantic orchestra Woodwinds 3–4 flutes, some of which may double on 1–2 piccolos 3–4 oboes, of which some may double on 1 oboe d'amore 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 3–4 clarinets in B or A, of which some might play 1 E clarinet or D clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 3–4 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4–8 French horns, German horns, or Vienna horns (more rarely natural horns) of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas – 2 tenors, 2 bass 3–6 trumpets in F, and other keys including C, B of which some might play 1 bass trumpet 3–4 cornets 3–4 tenor trombones (alto trombone parts from the classical era usually played on tenor trombone) 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 euphonium (usually played by a trombonist when needed) Keyboards piano celesta Percussion 4 or more timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals tam-tam triangle tambourine glockenspiel xylophone tubular bells Strings 16 violins 1 (sometimes more) 14 violins 2 12 violas 12 cellos 10 double basses 2 or more concert harps Modern/Postmodern orchestra Woodwinds 2–4 flutes of which some might play 1–2 piccolos 1 alto flute 2–4 oboes of which 1–2 might play 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 2–4 B clarinets of which some might play 1 E clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 2–4 bassoons of which 1 might play 1 contrabassoon (occasionally 1 or more saxophones of various types) Brass 4–8 horns (double horns) in F/B of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas 3–6 trumpets in B of which some might play 2–3 cornets 1 piccolo trumpet (often for playing very high parts originally for natural trumpets) 1 bass trumpet 1 flugelhorn 1 alto trombone (restored to the postmodern orchestra for playing music of the classical era) 3–6 tenor trombones 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 baritone horn/euphonium Percussion 4–5 timpani (one player) snare drum tenor drum bass drum cymbals triangle tam-tam tambourine wood block glockenspiel xylophone vibraphone marimba crotales tubular bells mark tree sleigh bells bell tree drum kit (in some works) Other percussion instruments, including ethnic or world music instruments specified by composers Keyboards piano pipe organ harpsichord accordion celesta Strings 16 1st violins 14 2nd violins 12 violas 10 cellos 8 double basses 1–2 harps (1 or more classical guitars of various types) Other harmonica Electrophone As required by the compositions in the program, various electric instruments or electronic instruments may be used in the orchestra. These performers are not typically permanent orchestra members. They are typically freelancers hired on contract for one or more concerts. Instruments may include: theremin ondes Martenot electric guitar electric bass guitar electric double bass electric violin, viola & cello Hammond organ Lowrey organ electric piano keytar digital accordion ring modulators synthesizer synclavier novachord clavinet digital drum kit Other electronic musical instruments Non-musical instruments such as a typewriter or reel-to-reel tape player Organization Among the instrument groups and within each group of instruments, there is a generally accepted hierarchy. Every instrumental group (or section) has a principal who is generally responsible for leading the group and playing orchestral solos. The violins are divided into two groups, first violin and second violin, with the second violins playing in lower registers than the first violins, playing an accompaniment part, or harmonizing the melody played by the first violins. The principal first violin is called the concertmaster (or orchestra "leader" in the U.K.) and is not only considered the leader of the string section, but the second-in-command of the entire orchestra, behind only the conductor. The concertmaster leads the pre-concert tuning and handles musical aspects of orchestra management, such as determining the bowings for the violins or for all of the string section. The concertmaster usually sits to the conductor's left, closest to the audience. There is also a principal second violin, a principal viola, a principal cello, and a principal bass. The principal trombone is considered the leader of the low brass section, while the principal trumpet is generally considered the leader of the entire brass section. While the oboe often provides the tuning note for the orchestra (due to a 300 year-old convention), there is generally no designated principal of the woodwind section (though in woodwind ensembles, the flute is often the presumptive leader.) Instead, each principal confers with the others as equals in the case of musical differences of opinion. Most sections also have an assistant principal (or co-principal or associate principal), or in the case of the first violins, an assistant concertmaster, who often plays a tutti part in addition to replacing the principal in his or her absence. A section string player plays in unison with the rest of the section, except in the case of divided (divisi) parts, where upper and lower parts in the music are often assigned to "outside" (nearer the audience) and "inside" seated players. Where a solo part is called for in a string section, the section leader invariably plays that part. The section leader (or principal) of a string section is also responsible for determining the bowings, often based on the bowings set out by the concertmaster. In some cases, the principal of a string section may use a slightly different bowing than the concertmaster, to accommodate the requirements of playing their instrument (e.g., the double-bass section). Principals of a string section will also lead entrances for their section, typically by lifting the bow before the entrance, to ensure the section plays together. Tutti wind and brass players generally play a unique but non-solo part. Section percussionists play parts assigned to them by the principal percussionist. In modern times, the musicians are usually directed by a conductor, although early orchestras did not have one, giving this role instead to the concertmaster or the harpsichordist playing the continuo. Some modern orchestras also do without conductors, particularly smaller orchestras and those specializing in historically accurate (so-called "period") performances of baroque and earlier music. The most frequently performed repertoire for a symphony orchestra is Western classical music or opera. However, orchestras are used sometimes in popular music (e.g., to accompany a rock or pop band in a concert), extensively in film music, and increasingly often in video game music. Orchestras are also used in the symphonic metal genre. The term "orchestra" can also be applied to a jazz ensemble, for example in the performance of big-band music. Selection and appointment of members In the 2000s, all tenured members of a professional orchestra normally audition for positions in the ensemble. Performers typically play one or more solo pieces of the auditionee's choice, such as a movement of a concerto, a solo Bach movement, and a variety of excerpts from the orchestral literature that are advertised in the audition poster (so the auditionees can prepare). The excerpts are typically the most technically challenging parts and solos from the orchestral literature. Orchestral auditions are typically held in front of a panel that includes the conductor, the concertmaster, the principal player of the section for which the auditionee is applying, and possibly other principal players. The most promising candidates from the first round of auditions are invited to return for a second or third round of auditions, which allows the conductor and the panel to compare the best candidates. Performers may be asked to sight read orchestral music. The final stage of the audition process in some orchestras is a test week, in which the performer plays with the orchestra for a week or two, which allows the conductor and principal players to see if the individual can function well in an actual rehearsal and performance setting. There are a range of different employment arrangements. The most sought-after positions are permanent, tenured positions in the orchestra. Orchestras also hire musicians on contracts, ranging in length from a single concert to a full season or more. Contract performers may be hired for individual concerts when the orchestra is doing an exceptionally large late-Romantic era orchestral work, or to substitute for a permanent member who is sick. A professional musician who is hired to perform for a single concert is sometimes called a "sub". Some contract musicians may be hired to replace permanent members for the period that the permanent member is on parental leave or disability leave. History of gender in ensembles Historically, major professional orchestras have been mostly or entirely composed of men. The first women members hired in professional orchestras have been harpists. The Vienna Philharmonic, for example, did not accept women to permanent membership until 1997, far later than comparable orchestras (the other orchestras ranked among the world's top five by Gramophone in 2008). The last major orchestra to appoint a woman to a permanent position was the Berlin Philharmonic. In February 1996, the Vienna Philharmonic's principal flute, Dieter Flury, told Westdeutscher Rundfunk that accepting women would be "gambling with the emotional unity () that this organism currently has". In April 1996, the orchestra's press secretary wrote that "compensating for the expected leaves of absence" of maternity leave would be a problem. In 1997, the Vienna Philharmonic was "facing protests during a [US] tour" by the National Organization for Women and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Finally, "after being held up to increasing ridicule even in socially conservative Austria, members of the orchestra gathered [on 28 February 1997] in an extraordinary meeting on the eve of their departure and agreed to admit a woman, Anna Lelkes, as harpist." As of 2013, the orchestra has six female members; one of them, violinist Albena Danailova, became one of the orchestra's concertmasters in 2008, the first woman to hold that position in that orchestra. In 2012, women made up 6% of the orchestra's membership. VPO president Clemens Hellsberg said the VPO now uses completely screened blind auditions. In 2013, an article in Mother Jones stated that while "[m]any prestigious orchestras have significant female membership — women outnumber men in the New York Philharmonic's violin section — and several renowned ensembles, including the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, and the Minnesota Symphony, are led by women violinists", the double bass, brass, and percussion sections of major orchestras "... are still predominantly male." A 2014 BBC article stated that the "... introduction of 'blind' auditions, where a prospective instrumentalist performs behind a screen so that the judging panel can exercise no gender or racial prejudice, has seen the gender balance of traditionally male-dominated symphony orchestras gradually shift." Amateur ensembles There are also a variety of amateur orchestras: School orchestras These orchestras consist of students from elementary or secondary school. They may be students from a music class or program or they may be drawn from the entire school body. School orchestras are typically led by a music teacher. In some cases, school orchestras are string orchestras, consisting only of students playing string instruments, with students playing woodwinds, brass and percussion grouped together as a concert band. University or conservatory orchestras These orchestras consist of students from a university or music conservatory. In some cases, university orchestras are open to all students from a university, from all programs. Larger universities may have two or more university orchestras: one or more orchestras made up of music majors (or, for major music programs, several tiers of music major orchestras, ranked by skill level) and a second orchestra open to university students from all academic programs (e.g., science, business, etc.) who have previous classical music experience on an orchestral instrument. University and conservatory orchestras are led by a conductor who is typically a professor or instructor at the university or conservatory. Youth orchestras These orchestras consist of teens and young adults drawn from an entire city or region. The age range in youth orchestras varies between different ensembles. In some cases, youth orchestras may consist of teens or young adults from an entire country (e.g., Canada's National Youth Orchestra). Community orchestras These orchestras consist of amateur performers drawn from an entire city or region. Community orchestras typically consist mainly of adult amateur musicians. Community orchestras range in level from beginner-level orchestras which rehearse music without doing formal performances in front of an audience to intermediate-level ensembles to advanced amateur groups which play standard professional orchestra repertoire. In some cases, university or conservatory music students may also be members of community orchestras. While community orchestra members are mostly unpaid amateurs, in some orchestras, a small number of professionals may be hired to act as principal players and section leaders. Repertoire and performances Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire ranging from 17th-century dance suites, 18th century divertimentos to 20th-century film scores and 21st-century symphonies. Orchestras have become synonymous with the symphony, an extended musical composition in Western classical music that typically contains multiple movements which provide contrasting keys and tempos. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. The conductor uses the score to study the symphony before rehearsals and decide on their interpretation (e.g., tempos, articulation, phrasing, etc.), and to follow the music during rehearsals and concerts, while leading the ensemble. Orchestral musicians play from parts containing just the notated music for their instrument. A small number of symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Orchestras also perform overtures, a term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn began to use the term to refer to independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that presaged genres such as the symphonic poem, a form devised by Franz Liszt in several works that began as dramatic overtures. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". In the 1850s the concert overture began to be supplanted by the symphonic poem. Orchestras also play with instrumental soloists in concertos. During concertos, the orchestra plays an accompaniment role to the soloist (e.g., a solo violinist or pianist) and, at times, introduces musical themes or interludes while the soloist is not playing. Orchestras also play during operas, ballets, some musical theatre works and some choral works (both sacred works such as Masses and secular works). In operas and ballets, the orchestra accompanies the singers and dancers, respectively, and plays overtures and interludes where the melodies played by the orchestra take centre stage. Performances In the Baroque era, orchestras performed in a range of venues, including at the fine houses of aristocrats, in opera halls and in churches. Some wealthy aristocrats had an orchestra in residence at their estate, to entertain them and their guests with performances. During the Classical era, as composers increasingly sought out financial support from the general public, orchestra concerts were increasingly held in public concert halls, where music lovers could buy tickets to hear the orchestra. Aristocratic patronage of orchestras continued during the Classical era, but this went on alongside public concerts. In the 20th and 21st century, orchestras found a new patron: governments. Many orchestras in North America and Europe receive part of their funding from national, regional level governments (e.g., state governments in the U.S.) or city governments. These government subsidies make up part of orchestra revenue, along with ticket sales, charitable donations (if the orchestra is registered as a charity) and other fundraising activities. With the invention of successive technologies, including sound recording, radio broadcasting, television broadcasting and Internet-based streaming and downloading of concert videos, orchestras have been able to find new revenue sources. Issues in performance Faking One of the "great unmentionable [topics] of orchestral playing" is "faking", the process by which an orchestral musician gives the false "... impression of playing every note as written", typically for a very challenging passage that is very high or very fast, while not actually playing the notes that are in the printed music part. An article in The Strad states that all orchestral musicians, even those in the top orchestras, occasionally fake certain passages. One reason that musicians fake is because there are not enough rehearsals. Another factor is the extreme challenges in 20th century and 21st century contemporary pieces; some professionals said "faking" was "necessary in anything from ten to almost ninety per cent of some modern works". Professional players who were interviewed were of a consensus that faking may be acceptable when a part is not written well for the instrument, but faking "just because you haven't practised" the music is not acceptable. Counter-revolution With the advent of the early music movement, smaller orchestras where players worked on execution of works in styles derived from the study of older treatises on playing became common. These include the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Classical Players under the direction of Sir Roger Norrington and the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, among others. Recent trends in the United States In the United States, the late 20th century saw a crisis of funding and support for orchestras. The size and cost of a symphony orchestra, compared to the size of the base of supporters, became an issue that struck at the core of the institution. Few orchestras could fill auditoriums, and the time-honored season-subscription system became increasingly anachronistic, as more and more listeners would buy tickets on an ad-hoc basis for individual events. Orchestral endowments and — more centrally to the daily operation of American orchestras — orchestral donors have seen investment portfolios shrink, or produce lower yields, reducing the ability of donors to contribute; further, there has been a trend toward donors finding other social causes more compelling. While government funding is less central to American than European orchestras, cuts in such funding are still significant for American ensembles. Finally, the drastic falling-off of revenues from recording, tied to no small extent to changes in the recording industry itself, began a period of change that has yet to reach its conclusion. U.S. orchestras that have gone into Chapter 11 bankruptcy include the Philadelphia Orchestra (April 2011), and the Louisville Orchestra (December 2010); orchestras that have gone into Chapter 7 bankruptcy and have ceased operations include the Northwest Chamber Orchestra in 2006, the Honolulu Orchestra in March 2011, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra in April 2011, and the Syracuse Symphony in June 2011. The Festival of Orchestras in Orlando, Florida, ceased operations at the end of March 2011. One source of financial difficulties that received notice and criticism was high salaries for music directors of US orchestras, which led several high-profile conductors to take pay cuts in recent years. Music administrators such as Michael Tilson Thomas and Esa-Pekka Salonen argued that new music, new means of presenting it, and a renewed relationship with the community could revitalize the symphony orchestra. The American critic Greg Sandow has argued in detail that orchestras must revise their approach to music, performance, the concert experience, marketing, public relations, community involvement, and presentation to bring them in line with the expectations of 21st century audiences immersed in popular culture. It is not uncommon for contemporary composers to use unconventional instruments, including various synthesizers, to achieve desired effects. Many, however, find more conventional orchestral configuration to provide better possibilities for color and depth. Composers like John Adams often employ Romantic-size orchestras, as in Adams' opera Nixon in China; Philip Glass and others may be more free, yet still identify size-boundaries. Glass in particular has recently turned to conventional orchestras in works like the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra and the Violin Concerto No. 2. Along with a decrease in funding, some U.S. orchestras have reduced their overall personnel, as well as the number of players appearing in performances. The reduced numbers in performance are usually confined to the string section, since the numbers here have traditionally been flexible (as multiple players typically play from the same part). Role of conductor Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. The primary duties of the conductor are to set the tempo, ensure correct entries by various members of the ensemble, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. To convey their ideas and interpretation, a conductor communicates with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, typically (though not invariably) with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals, such as eye contact with relevant performers. A conductor's directions will almost invariably be supplemented or reinforced by verbal instructions or suggestions to their musicians in rehearsal prior to a performance. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments and voices. Since the mid-18th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, although in earlier periods of classical music history, leading an ensemble while playing an instrument was common. In Baroque music from the 1600s to the 1750s, the group would typically be led by the harpsichordist or first violinist (see concertmaster), an approach that in modern times has been revived by several music directors for music from this period. Conducting while playing a piano or synthesizer may also be done with musical theatre pit orchestras. Communication is typically non-verbal during a performance (this is strictly the case in art music, but in jazz big bands or large pop ensembles, there may be occasional spoken instructions, such as a "count in"). However, in rehearsals, frequent interruptions allow the conductor to give verbal directions as to how the music should be played or sung. Conductors act as guides to the orchestras or choirs they conduct. They choose the works to be performed and study their scores, to which they may make certain adjustments (e.g., regarding tempo, articulation, phrasing, repetitions of sections, and so on), work out their interpretation, and relay their vision to the performers. They may also attend to organizational matters, such as scheduling rehearsals, planning a concert season, hearing auditions and selecting members, and promoting their ensemble in the media. Orchestras, choirs, concert bands and other sizable musical ensembles such as big bands are usually led by conductors. Conductorless orchestras In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), most orchestras were led by one of the musicians, typically the principal first violin, called the concertmaster. The concertmaster would lead the tempo of pieces by lifting his or her bow in a rhythmic manner. Leadership might also be provided by one of the chord-playing instrumentalists playing the basso continuo part which was the core of most Baroque instrumental ensemble pieces. Typically, this would be a harpsichord player, a pipe organist, or a lutist or theorbo player. A keyboard player could lead the ensemble with his or her head, or by taking one of the hands off the keyboard to lead a more difficult tempo change. A lutenist or theorbo player could lead by lifting the instrument neck up and down to indicate the tempo of a piece, or to lead a ritard during a cadence or ending. In some works which combined choirs and instrumental ensembles, two leaders were sometimes used: A concertmaster to lead the instrumentalists and a chord-playing performer to lead the singers. During the Classical music period (), the practice of using chordal instruments to play basso continuo was gradually phased out, and it disappeared completely by 1800. Instead, ensembles began to use conductors to lead the orchestra's tempos and playing style, while the concertmaster played an additional leadership role for the musicians, especially the string players, who imitate the bowstroke and playing style of the concertmaster, to the degree that is feasible for the different stringed instruments. In 1922, the idea of a conductor-less orchestra was revived in post-revolutionary Soviet Union. The symphony orchestra Persimfans was formed without a conductor, because the founders believed that the ensemble should be modeled on the ideal Marxist state, in which all people are equal. As such, its members felt that there was no need to be led by the dictatorial baton of a conductor; instead they were led by a committee, which determined tempos and playing styles. Although it was a partial success within the Soviet Union, the principal difficulty with the concept was in changing tempo during performances, because even if the committee had issued a decree about where a tempo change should take place, there was no leader in the ensemble to guide this tempo change. The orchestra survived for ten years before Stalin's cultural politics disbanded it by taking away its funding. In Western nations, some ensembles, such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, based in New York City, have had more success with conductorless orchestras, although decisions are likely to be deferred to some sense of leadership within the ensemble (for example, the principal wind and string players, notably the concertmaster). Others have returned to the tradition of a principal player, usually a violinist, being the artistic director and running rehearsal and leading concerts. Examples include the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam Sinfonietta & Candida Thompson and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. As well, as part of the early music movement, some 20th and 21st century orchestras have revived the Baroque practice of having no conductor on the podium for Baroque pieces, using the concertmaster or a chord-playing basso continuo performer (e.g., harpsichord or organ) to lead the group. Multiple conductors Offstage instruments Some orchestral works specify that an offstage trumpet should be used or that other instruments from the orchestra should be positioned off-stage or behind the stage, to create a haunted, mystical effect. To ensure that the offstage instrumentalist(s) play in time, sometimes a sub-conductor will be stationed offstage with a clear view of the principal conductor. Examples include the ending of "Neptune" from Gustav Holst's The Planets. The principal conductor leads the large orchestra, and the sub-conductor relays the principal conductor's tempo and gestures to the offstage musician (or musicians). One of the challenges with using two conductors is that the second conductor may get out of synchronization with the main conductor, or may mis-convey (or misunderstand) the principal conductor's gestures, which can lead to the offstage instruments being out of time. In the late 20th century and early 21st century, some orchestras use a video camera pointed at the principal conductor and a closed-circuit TV set in front of the offstage performer(s), instead of using two conductors. Contemporary music The techniques of polystylism and polytempo music have led a few 20th and 21st century composers to write music where multiple orchestras or ensembles perform simultaneously. These trends have brought about the phenomenon of polyconductor music, wherein separate sub-conductors conduct each group of musicians. Usually, one principal conductor conducts the sub-conductors, thereby shaping the overall performance. In Percy Grainger's The Warriors which includes three conductors: the primary conductor of the orchestra, a secondary conductor directing an off-stage brass ensemble, and a tertiary conductor directing percussion and harp. One example in the late-century orchestral music is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gruppen, for three orchestras, which are placed around the audience. This way, the "sound masses" could be spatialized, as in an electroacoustic work. Gruppen was premiered in Cologne, in 1958, conducted by Stockhausen, Bruno Maderna and Pierre Boulez. It has been performed in 1996 by Simon Rattle, John Carewe and Daniel Harding. See also Chinese orchestra Gamelan Orchestra List of symphony orchestras List of symphony orchestras in Europe List of symphony orchestras in the United States List of youth orchestras in the United States Orchestral enhancement Orchestration Radio orchestra Rhythm section Shorthand for orchestra instrumentation String orchestra Notes References Further reading External links Articles containing video clips Types of musical groups	false	[ "The Europa Batteries are a group of artillery batteries in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. Facing the North African coast, they are the most southerly batteries in Gibraltar and were built to cover ships approaching from the Mediterranean Sea. They run along the fortified clifftops of Europa Point from Camp Bay on the west side of the Rock of Gibraltar to the Europa Advance Batteries on the east side.\n\nThe batteries were constructed in the 18th century on top of an old coastal wall built by King Charles V of Spain. There were originally only two batteries at the Point – in 1762 these were the Five Gun Battery, which mounted five 18-pdrs, and Europa Point Battery, which had a single 18-pdr. A third position, Deadman's Hole Battery, was later constructed and by 1859 the three batteries had 25 guns between them.\n\nThey were subsequently reorganised into a series of seven batteries. 1st Europa Battery was a three-gun battery situated on the coastal defence wall south of Woodford's Battery. 2nd Europa was also referred to as Point or Deadman's Hole Battery and was situated a little way to the east, behind a demi-bastion at the southern end of the wall. 3rd Europa or Lighthouse Battery was situated next to the Europa Point Lighthouse and mounted three guns. The refurbished Harding's Battery was originally built on top of what was the 7th Europa Battery in 1859 and it was positioned between what became the 1st and 2nd Europa Batteries. A Bofors 40 mm anti-aircraft gun was situated at Harding's during the Second World War.\n\nReferences\n\nBatteries in Gibraltar", "An adding machine is a class of mechanical calculator, usually specialized for bookkeeping calculations.\nIn the United States, the earliest adding machines were usually built to read in dollars and cents. Adding machines were ubiquitous office equipment until they were phased out in favor of calculators in the 1970s and by personal computers beginning in about 1985. The older adding machines were rarely seen in American office settings by the year 2000.\n\nBlaise Pascal and Wilhelm Schickard were the two original inventors of the mechanical calculator in 1642. For Pascal, this was an adding machine that could perform additions and subtractions directly and multiplication and divisions by repetitions, whilst Schickard's machine, invented several decades earlier, was less functionally efficient but was supported by a mechanised form of multiplication tables. These two were followed by a series of inventors and inventions leading to those of Thomas de Colmar, who launched the mechanical calculator industry in 1851 when he released his simplified arithmometer (it took him thirty years to refine his machine, patented in 1820, into a simpler and more reliable form). However, they did not gain widespread use until Dorr E. Felt started manufacturing his comptometer (1887) and Burroughs started the commercialization of differently conceived adding machines (1892).\n\nOperation\nTo add a new list of numbers and arrive at a total, the user was first required to \"ZERO\" the machine. Then, to add sets of numbers, the user was required to press numbered keys on a keyboard, which would remain depressed (rather than immediately rebound like the keys of a computer keyboard or typewriter or the buttons of a typical modern machine). The user would then pull the crank, which caused the numbers to be shown on the rotary wheels, and the keys to be released (i.e. to pop back up) in preparation for the next input. To add, for example, the amounts of 30.72 and 4.49 (which, in adding machine terms, on a decimal adding machine is 3,072 plus 449 \"decimal units\"), the following process took place: Press the key in the column fourth from the right (multiples of one thousand), the key in the column 2nd from right (multiples of ten) and the key in the rightmost column (multiples of 1). Pull the crank. The rotary wheels now showed 3072. Press the key in the 3rd column from the right, the key in the 2nd column from right, and the key in the rightmost column. Pull the crank. The rotary wheels now show a running 'total' of 3521 which, when interpreted using the decimal currency colour-coding of the key columns, equates to 35.21. Keyboards typically did not have or need (zero) keys; one simply did not press any key in the column containing a zero. Trailing zeros (those to the right of a number), were there by default because when a machine was zeroed, all numbers visible on the rotary wheels were reset to zero. \n\nSubtraction was impossible, except by adding the complement of a number (for instance, subtract 2.50 by adding 9,997.50).\n\nMultiplication was a simple process of keying in the numbers one or more columns to the left and repeating the \"addition\" process. For example, to multiply 34.72 by 102, key in 3472, pull crank, repeat once more. Wheels show 6944. Key in 3472(00), pull crank. Wheels now show 354144, or 3,541.44. \n\nA later adding machine, called the comptometer, did not require that a crank be pulled to add. Numbers were input simply by pressing keys. The machine was thus driven by finger power. Multiplication was similar to that on the adding machine, but users would \"form\" up their fingers over the keys to be pressed and press them down the multiple of times required. Using the above example, four fingers would be used to press down twice on the (fourth column), (third column), (second column) and (first column) keys. That finger shape would then move left two columns and press once. Usually a small crank near the wheels would be used to zero them. Subtraction was possible by adding complementary numbers; keys would also carry a smaller, complementary digit to help the user form complementary numbers. Division was also possible by putting the dividend to the left end and performing repeated subtractions by using the complementary method.\n\nSome adding machines were electromechanical — an old-style mechanism, but driven by electric power.\n\nSome \"ten-key\" machines had input of numbers as on a modern calculator – 30.72 was input as , , , . These machines could subtract as well as add. Some could multiply and divide, although including these operations made the machine more complex. Those that could multiply, used a form of the old adding machine multiplication method. Using the previous example of multiplying 34.72 by 102, the amount was keyed in, then the 2 key in the \"multiplication\" key column was pressed. The machine cycled twice, then tabulated the adding mechanism below the keyboard one column to the right. The number keys remained locked down on the keyboard. The user now pressed the multiplication key which caused tabulation of the adding mechanism one more column to the right, but did not cycle the machine. Now the user pressed the multiplication key. The machine cycled once. To see the total the user was required to press a key and the machine would print the result on a paper tape, release the locked down keys, reset the adding mechanism to zero and tabulate it back to its home position. \n\nModern adding machines are like simple calculators. They often have a different input system, though.\n\n \nNote: Sometimes the adding machine will have a key labeled instead of . In this case, substitute for in the examples above. Alternatively, the plus key may continuously total instead of either a or key. Sometimes, the plus key is even labeled thus:\n\nBurroughs's calculating machine\n\nWilliam Seward Burroughs received a patent for his adding machine on August 25, 1888. He was a founder of American Arithmometer Company, which became Burroughs Corporation and evolved to produce electronic billing machines and mainframes, and eventually merged with Sperry to form Unisys. The grandson of the inventor of the adding machine is Beat author William S. Burroughs; a collection of his essays is called The Adding Machine.\n\nSee also\n Adder (electronics)\n Cash register\n Standard Adding Machine Company\n\nNotes\n\nSources\n\nExternal links\n\nMechanical calculators\nOffice equipment\n1642 introductions" ]
[ "Orchestra", "Expanded instrumentation", "What instruments were added?", "These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores.", "What was the point of adding these?", "The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors." ]	C_9123ff7b8c8245fe9021aa28e773b340_0	Did this become common practice?	3	Did orchestra become common practice?	Orchestra	Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Bolero, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No.6 and 9 and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th-century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Bela Bartok, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). CANNOTANSWER	During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below.	An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass woodwinds such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon brass instruments such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, and tuba percussion instruments such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek phil-, "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. A (sometimes concert orchestra) is a smaller ensemble of not more than about fifty musicians. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire, such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler. Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor's baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed. The leader of the first violin section – commonly called the concertmaster – also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster, or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ὀρχήστρα (orchestra), the name for the area in front of a stage in ancient Greek theatre reserved for the Greek chorus. History Baroque and classical eras In the Baroque era, the size and composition of an orchestra was not standardised. There were large differences in size, instrumentation and playing styles—and therefore in orchestral soundscapes and palettes — between the various European regions. The Baroque orchestra ranged from smaller orchestras (or ensembles) with one player per part, to larger scale orchestras with many players per part. Examples of the smaller variety were Bach's orchestras, for example in Koethen, where he had access to an ensemble of up to 18 players. Examples of large scale Baroque orchestras would include Corelli's orchestra in Rome which ranged between 35 and 80 players for day-to-day performances, being enlarged to 150 players for special occasions. In the classical era, the orchestra became more standardized with a small to medium sized string section and a core wind section consisting of pairs of oboes, flutes, bassoons and horns, sometimes supplemented by percussion and pairs of clarinets and trumpets. Beethoven's influence The so-called "standard complement" of doubled winds and brass in the orchestra pioneered in the late 18th century and consolidated during the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Beethoven after Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven's instrumentation almost always included paired flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets. The exceptions to this are his Symphony No. 4, Violin Concerto, and Piano Concerto No. 4, which each specify a single flute. Beethoven carefully calculated the expansion of this particular timbral "palette" in Symphonies 3, 5, 6, and 9 for an innovative effect. The third horn in the "Eroica" Symphony arrives to provide not only some harmonic flexibility, but also the effect of "choral" brass in the Trio movement. Piccolo, contrabassoon, and trombones add to the triumphal finale of his Symphony No. 5. A piccolo and a pair of trombones help deliver the effect of storm and sunshine in the Sixth, also known as the Pastoral Symphony. The Ninth asks for a second pair of horns, for reasons similar to the "Eroica" (four horns has since become standard); Beethoven's use of piccolo, contrabassoon, trombones, and untuned percussion — plus chorus and vocal soloists — in his finale, are his earliest suggestion that the timbral boundaries of symphony might be expanded. For several decades after his death, symphonic instrumentation was faithful to Beethoven's well-established model, with few exceptions. Instrumental technology The invention of the piston and rotary valve by Heinrich Stölzel and Friedrich Blühmel, both Silesians, in 1815, was the first in a series of innovations which impacted the orchestra, including the development of modern keywork for the flute by Theobald Boehm and the innovations of Adolphe Sax in the woodwinds, notably the invention of the saxophone. These advances would lead Hector Berlioz to write a landmark book on instrumentation, which was the first systematic treatise on the use of instrumental sound as an expressive element of music. Wagner's influence The next major expansion of symphonic practice came from Richard Wagner's Bayreuth orchestra, founded to accompany his musical dramas. Wagner's works for the stage were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. Thus, Wagner envisioned an ever-more-demanding role for the conductor of the theatre orchestra, as he elaborated in his influential work On Conducting. This brought about a revolution in orchestral composition, and set the style for orchestral performance for the next eighty years. Wagner's theories re-examined the importance of tempo, dynamics, bowing of string instruments and the role of principals in the orchestra. 20th-century orchestra At the beginning of the 20th century, symphony orchestras were larger, better funded, and better trained than previously; consequently, composers could compose larger and more ambitious works. The works of Gustav Mahler were particularly innovative; in his later symphonies, such as the mammoth Symphony No. 8, Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces. By the late Romantic era, orchestras could support the most enormous forms of symphonic expression, with huge string sections, massive brass sections and an expanded range of percussion instruments. With the recording era beginning, the standards of performance were pushed to a new level, because a recorded symphony could be listened to closely and even minor errors in intonation or ensemble, which might not be noticeable in a live performance, could be heard by critics. As recording technologies improved over the 20th and 21st centuries, eventually small errors in a recording could be "fixed" by audio editing or overdubbing. Some older conductors and composers could remember a time when simply "getting through" the music as best as possible was the standard. Combined with the wider audience made possible by recording, this led to a renewed focus on particular star conductors and on a high standard of orchestral execution. Instrumentation The typical symphony orchestra consists of four groups of related musical instruments called the woodwinds, brass, percussion, and strings. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes be grouped into a fifth section such as a keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and electric and electronic instruments. The orchestra, depending on the size, contains almost all of the standard instruments in each group. In the history of the orchestra, its instrumentation has been expanded over time, often agreed to have been standardized by the classical period and Ludwig van Beethoven's influence on the classical model. In the 20th and 21st century, new repertory demands expanded the instrumentation of the orchestra, resulting in a flexible use of the classical-model instruments and newly developed electric and electronic instruments in various combinations. The terms symphony orchestra and philharmonic orchestra may be used to distinguish different ensembles from the same locality, such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. A symphony or philharmonic orchestra will usually have over eighty musicians on its roster, in some cases over a hundred, but the actual number of musicians employed in a particular performance may vary according to the work being played and the size of the venue. A chamber orchestra is usually a smaller ensemble; a major chamber orchestra might employ as many as fifty musicians, but some are much smaller. Concert orchestra is an alternative term, as in the BBC Concert Orchestra and the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Expanded instrumentation Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No. 6 and No. 9, and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Béla Bartók, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analysed in five eras: the Baroque era, the Classical era, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic era and combined Modern/Postmodern eras. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann, Brahms); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th-century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). Late Baroque orchestra Woodwinds 2 flutes 2–3 oboes (oboe d'amore and oboe da caccia) bassoon (several players in large orchestras) recorder Brass 2 natural horns(sometimes will have a corno da tirarsi) and/or 2–3 natural trumpets(sometimes will have a tromba da tirarsi) Percussion 2 timpani (one player, used as the bass of the natural trumpet section) Keyboards and other chord-playing instruments selected by the ensemble leader harpsichord pipe organ theorbo Strings (oftentimes several players per part) violin I violin II viola cello or violoncello da spalla double bass (or rather violone/basso a viola da braccio) viola da gamba Classical orchestra Woodwinds 1–2 flutes of which 1 might play 1 piccolo 2 oboes 2 clarinets (B, C, or A) both of which might also play 2 basset horns (occasionally with Mozart) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon (occasionally with Mozart, and Haydn, but not yet a standard instrument) Brass 2 natural horns (valveless) 2 natural trumpets (valveless) 1 alto trombone 1 tenor trombone 1 bass trombone (on occasion Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart, but trombones not yet a standard instrument) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) Keyboards harpsichord or pipe organ (until the late 18th century, by which time it was gradually phased out of the orchestra) Strings (always multiple players per part) violins I violins II violas cellos and double basses Early Romantic orchestra Woodwinds piccolo 2 flutes 2 oboes 2 soprano clarinets of which both might also play 2 Basset horns (occasionally with Beethoven) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4 natural (valveless) or valved horns 2 natural or valved trumpets 3 tenor trombones of which some might play 1 alto trombone 1 bass trombone 1–2 serpents or ophicleides (gradually replaced by tubas) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals triangle tambourine glockenspiel Strings 14 violins 1 12 violins 2 10 violas 8 cellos 6 double basses 1 concert harp Late Romantic orchestra Woodwinds 3–4 flutes, some of which may double on 1–2 piccolos 3–4 oboes, of which some may double on 1 oboe d'amore 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 3–4 clarinets in B or A, of which some might play 1 E clarinet or D clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 3–4 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4–8 French horns, German horns, or Vienna horns (more rarely natural horns) of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas – 2 tenors, 2 bass 3–6 trumpets in F, and other keys including C, B of which some might play 1 bass trumpet 3–4 cornets 3–4 tenor trombones (alto trombone parts from the classical era usually played on tenor trombone) 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 euphonium (usually played by a trombonist when needed) Keyboards piano celesta Percussion 4 or more timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals tam-tam triangle tambourine glockenspiel xylophone tubular bells Strings 16 violins 1 (sometimes more) 14 violins 2 12 violas 12 cellos 10 double basses 2 or more concert harps Modern/Postmodern orchestra Woodwinds 2–4 flutes of which some might play 1–2 piccolos 1 alto flute 2–4 oboes of which 1–2 might play 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 2–4 B clarinets of which some might play 1 E clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 2–4 bassoons of which 1 might play 1 contrabassoon (occasionally 1 or more saxophones of various types) Brass 4–8 horns (double horns) in F/B of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas 3–6 trumpets in B of which some might play 2–3 cornets 1 piccolo trumpet (often for playing very high parts originally for natural trumpets) 1 bass trumpet 1 flugelhorn 1 alto trombone (restored to the postmodern orchestra for playing music of the classical era) 3–6 tenor trombones 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 baritone horn/euphonium Percussion 4–5 timpani (one player) snare drum tenor drum bass drum cymbals triangle tam-tam tambourine wood block glockenspiel xylophone vibraphone marimba crotales tubular bells mark tree sleigh bells bell tree drum kit (in some works) Other percussion instruments, including ethnic or world music instruments specified by composers Keyboards piano pipe organ harpsichord accordion celesta Strings 16 1st violins 14 2nd violins 12 violas 10 cellos 8 double basses 1–2 harps (1 or more classical guitars of various types) Other harmonica Electrophone As required by the compositions in the program, various electric instruments or electronic instruments may be used in the orchestra. These performers are not typically permanent orchestra members. They are typically freelancers hired on contract for one or more concerts. Instruments may include: theremin ondes Martenot electric guitar electric bass guitar electric double bass electric violin, viola & cello Hammond organ Lowrey organ electric piano keytar digital accordion ring modulators synthesizer synclavier novachord clavinet digital drum kit Other electronic musical instruments Non-musical instruments such as a typewriter or reel-to-reel tape player Organization Among the instrument groups and within each group of instruments, there is a generally accepted hierarchy. Every instrumental group (or section) has a principal who is generally responsible for leading the group and playing orchestral solos. The violins are divided into two groups, first violin and second violin, with the second violins playing in lower registers than the first violins, playing an accompaniment part, or harmonizing the melody played by the first violins. The principal first violin is called the concertmaster (or orchestra "leader" in the U.K.) and is not only considered the leader of the string section, but the second-in-command of the entire orchestra, behind only the conductor. The concertmaster leads the pre-concert tuning and handles musical aspects of orchestra management, such as determining the bowings for the violins or for all of the string section. The concertmaster usually sits to the conductor's left, closest to the audience. There is also a principal second violin, a principal viola, a principal cello, and a principal bass. The principal trombone is considered the leader of the low brass section, while the principal trumpet is generally considered the leader of the entire brass section. While the oboe often provides the tuning note for the orchestra (due to a 300 year-old convention), there is generally no designated principal of the woodwind section (though in woodwind ensembles, the flute is often the presumptive leader.) Instead, each principal confers with the others as equals in the case of musical differences of opinion. Most sections also have an assistant principal (or co-principal or associate principal), or in the case of the first violins, an assistant concertmaster, who often plays a tutti part in addition to replacing the principal in his or her absence. A section string player plays in unison with the rest of the section, except in the case of divided (divisi) parts, where upper and lower parts in the music are often assigned to "outside" (nearer the audience) and "inside" seated players. Where a solo part is called for in a string section, the section leader invariably plays that part. The section leader (or principal) of a string section is also responsible for determining the bowings, often based on the bowings set out by the concertmaster. In some cases, the principal of a string section may use a slightly different bowing than the concertmaster, to accommodate the requirements of playing their instrument (e.g., the double-bass section). Principals of a string section will also lead entrances for their section, typically by lifting the bow before the entrance, to ensure the section plays together. Tutti wind and brass players generally play a unique but non-solo part. Section percussionists play parts assigned to them by the principal percussionist. In modern times, the musicians are usually directed by a conductor, although early orchestras did not have one, giving this role instead to the concertmaster or the harpsichordist playing the continuo. Some modern orchestras also do without conductors, particularly smaller orchestras and those specializing in historically accurate (so-called "period") performances of baroque and earlier music. The most frequently performed repertoire for a symphony orchestra is Western classical music or opera. However, orchestras are used sometimes in popular music (e.g., to accompany a rock or pop band in a concert), extensively in film music, and increasingly often in video game music. Orchestras are also used in the symphonic metal genre. The term "orchestra" can also be applied to a jazz ensemble, for example in the performance of big-band music. Selection and appointment of members In the 2000s, all tenured members of a professional orchestra normally audition for positions in the ensemble. Performers typically play one or more solo pieces of the auditionee's choice, such as a movement of a concerto, a solo Bach movement, and a variety of excerpts from the orchestral literature that are advertised in the audition poster (so the auditionees can prepare). The excerpts are typically the most technically challenging parts and solos from the orchestral literature. Orchestral auditions are typically held in front of a panel that includes the conductor, the concertmaster, the principal player of the section for which the auditionee is applying, and possibly other principal players. The most promising candidates from the first round of auditions are invited to return for a second or third round of auditions, which allows the conductor and the panel to compare the best candidates. Performers may be asked to sight read orchestral music. The final stage of the audition process in some orchestras is a test week, in which the performer plays with the orchestra for a week or two, which allows the conductor and principal players to see if the individual can function well in an actual rehearsal and performance setting. There are a range of different employment arrangements. The most sought-after positions are permanent, tenured positions in the orchestra. Orchestras also hire musicians on contracts, ranging in length from a single concert to a full season or more. Contract performers may be hired for individual concerts when the orchestra is doing an exceptionally large late-Romantic era orchestral work, or to substitute for a permanent member who is sick. A professional musician who is hired to perform for a single concert is sometimes called a "sub". Some contract musicians may be hired to replace permanent members for the period that the permanent member is on parental leave or disability leave. History of gender in ensembles Historically, major professional orchestras have been mostly or entirely composed of men. The first women members hired in professional orchestras have been harpists. The Vienna Philharmonic, for example, did not accept women to permanent membership until 1997, far later than comparable orchestras (the other orchestras ranked among the world's top five by Gramophone in 2008). The last major orchestra to appoint a woman to a permanent position was the Berlin Philharmonic. In February 1996, the Vienna Philharmonic's principal flute, Dieter Flury, told Westdeutscher Rundfunk that accepting women would be "gambling with the emotional unity () that this organism currently has". In April 1996, the orchestra's press secretary wrote that "compensating for the expected leaves of absence" of maternity leave would be a problem. In 1997, the Vienna Philharmonic was "facing protests during a [US] tour" by the National Organization for Women and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Finally, "after being held up to increasing ridicule even in socially conservative Austria, members of the orchestra gathered [on 28 February 1997] in an extraordinary meeting on the eve of their departure and agreed to admit a woman, Anna Lelkes, as harpist." As of 2013, the orchestra has six female members; one of them, violinist Albena Danailova, became one of the orchestra's concertmasters in 2008, the first woman to hold that position in that orchestra. In 2012, women made up 6% of the orchestra's membership. VPO president Clemens Hellsberg said the VPO now uses completely screened blind auditions. In 2013, an article in Mother Jones stated that while "[m]any prestigious orchestras have significant female membership — women outnumber men in the New York Philharmonic's violin section — and several renowned ensembles, including the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, and the Minnesota Symphony, are led by women violinists", the double bass, brass, and percussion sections of major orchestras "... are still predominantly male." A 2014 BBC article stated that the "... introduction of 'blind' auditions, where a prospective instrumentalist performs behind a screen so that the judging panel can exercise no gender or racial prejudice, has seen the gender balance of traditionally male-dominated symphony orchestras gradually shift." Amateur ensembles There are also a variety of amateur orchestras: School orchestras These orchestras consist of students from elementary or secondary school. They may be students from a music class or program or they may be drawn from the entire school body. School orchestras are typically led by a music teacher. In some cases, school orchestras are string orchestras, consisting only of students playing string instruments, with students playing woodwinds, brass and percussion grouped together as a concert band. University or conservatory orchestras These orchestras consist of students from a university or music conservatory. In some cases, university orchestras are open to all students from a university, from all programs. Larger universities may have two or more university orchestras: one or more orchestras made up of music majors (or, for major music programs, several tiers of music major orchestras, ranked by skill level) and a second orchestra open to university students from all academic programs (e.g., science, business, etc.) who have previous classical music experience on an orchestral instrument. University and conservatory orchestras are led by a conductor who is typically a professor or instructor at the university or conservatory. Youth orchestras These orchestras consist of teens and young adults drawn from an entire city or region. The age range in youth orchestras varies between different ensembles. In some cases, youth orchestras may consist of teens or young adults from an entire country (e.g., Canada's National Youth Orchestra). Community orchestras These orchestras consist of amateur performers drawn from an entire city or region. Community orchestras typically consist mainly of adult amateur musicians. Community orchestras range in level from beginner-level orchestras which rehearse music without doing formal performances in front of an audience to intermediate-level ensembles to advanced amateur groups which play standard professional orchestra repertoire. In some cases, university or conservatory music students may also be members of community orchestras. While community orchestra members are mostly unpaid amateurs, in some orchestras, a small number of professionals may be hired to act as principal players and section leaders. Repertoire and performances Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire ranging from 17th-century dance suites, 18th century divertimentos to 20th-century film scores and 21st-century symphonies. Orchestras have become synonymous with the symphony, an extended musical composition in Western classical music that typically contains multiple movements which provide contrasting keys and tempos. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. The conductor uses the score to study the symphony before rehearsals and decide on their interpretation (e.g., tempos, articulation, phrasing, etc.), and to follow the music during rehearsals and concerts, while leading the ensemble. Orchestral musicians play from parts containing just the notated music for their instrument. A small number of symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Orchestras also perform overtures, a term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn began to use the term to refer to independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that presaged genres such as the symphonic poem, a form devised by Franz Liszt in several works that began as dramatic overtures. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". In the 1850s the concert overture began to be supplanted by the symphonic poem. Orchestras also play with instrumental soloists in concertos. During concertos, the orchestra plays an accompaniment role to the soloist (e.g., a solo violinist or pianist) and, at times, introduces musical themes or interludes while the soloist is not playing. Orchestras also play during operas, ballets, some musical theatre works and some choral works (both sacred works such as Masses and secular works). In operas and ballets, the orchestra accompanies the singers and dancers, respectively, and plays overtures and interludes where the melodies played by the orchestra take centre stage. Performances In the Baroque era, orchestras performed in a range of venues, including at the fine houses of aristocrats, in opera halls and in churches. Some wealthy aristocrats had an orchestra in residence at their estate, to entertain them and their guests with performances. During the Classical era, as composers increasingly sought out financial support from the general public, orchestra concerts were increasingly held in public concert halls, where music lovers could buy tickets to hear the orchestra. Aristocratic patronage of orchestras continued during the Classical era, but this went on alongside public concerts. In the 20th and 21st century, orchestras found a new patron: governments. Many orchestras in North America and Europe receive part of their funding from national, regional level governments (e.g., state governments in the U.S.) or city governments. These government subsidies make up part of orchestra revenue, along with ticket sales, charitable donations (if the orchestra is registered as a charity) and other fundraising activities. With the invention of successive technologies, including sound recording, radio broadcasting, television broadcasting and Internet-based streaming and downloading of concert videos, orchestras have been able to find new revenue sources. Issues in performance Faking One of the "great unmentionable [topics] of orchestral playing" is "faking", the process by which an orchestral musician gives the false "... impression of playing every note as written", typically for a very challenging passage that is very high or very fast, while not actually playing the notes that are in the printed music part. An article in The Strad states that all orchestral musicians, even those in the top orchestras, occasionally fake certain passages. One reason that musicians fake is because there are not enough rehearsals. Another factor is the extreme challenges in 20th century and 21st century contemporary pieces; some professionals said "faking" was "necessary in anything from ten to almost ninety per cent of some modern works". Professional players who were interviewed were of a consensus that faking may be acceptable when a part is not written well for the instrument, but faking "just because you haven't practised" the music is not acceptable. Counter-revolution With the advent of the early music movement, smaller orchestras where players worked on execution of works in styles derived from the study of older treatises on playing became common. These include the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Classical Players under the direction of Sir Roger Norrington and the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, among others. Recent trends in the United States In the United States, the late 20th century saw a crisis of funding and support for orchestras. The size and cost of a symphony orchestra, compared to the size of the base of supporters, became an issue that struck at the core of the institution. Few orchestras could fill auditoriums, and the time-honored season-subscription system became increasingly anachronistic, as more and more listeners would buy tickets on an ad-hoc basis for individual events. Orchestral endowments and — more centrally to the daily operation of American orchestras — orchestral donors have seen investment portfolios shrink, or produce lower yields, reducing the ability of donors to contribute; further, there has been a trend toward donors finding other social causes more compelling. While government funding is less central to American than European orchestras, cuts in such funding are still significant for American ensembles. Finally, the drastic falling-off of revenues from recording, tied to no small extent to changes in the recording industry itself, began a period of change that has yet to reach its conclusion. U.S. orchestras that have gone into Chapter 11 bankruptcy include the Philadelphia Orchestra (April 2011), and the Louisville Orchestra (December 2010); orchestras that have gone into Chapter 7 bankruptcy and have ceased operations include the Northwest Chamber Orchestra in 2006, the Honolulu Orchestra in March 2011, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra in April 2011, and the Syracuse Symphony in June 2011. The Festival of Orchestras in Orlando, Florida, ceased operations at the end of March 2011. One source of financial difficulties that received notice and criticism was high salaries for music directors of US orchestras, which led several high-profile conductors to take pay cuts in recent years. Music administrators such as Michael Tilson Thomas and Esa-Pekka Salonen argued that new music, new means of presenting it, and a renewed relationship with the community could revitalize the symphony orchestra. The American critic Greg Sandow has argued in detail that orchestras must revise their approach to music, performance, the concert experience, marketing, public relations, community involvement, and presentation to bring them in line with the expectations of 21st century audiences immersed in popular culture. It is not uncommon for contemporary composers to use unconventional instruments, including various synthesizers, to achieve desired effects. Many, however, find more conventional orchestral configuration to provide better possibilities for color and depth. Composers like John Adams often employ Romantic-size orchestras, as in Adams' opera Nixon in China; Philip Glass and others may be more free, yet still identify size-boundaries. Glass in particular has recently turned to conventional orchestras in works like the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra and the Violin Concerto No. 2. Along with a decrease in funding, some U.S. orchestras have reduced their overall personnel, as well as the number of players appearing in performances. The reduced numbers in performance are usually confined to the string section, since the numbers here have traditionally been flexible (as multiple players typically play from the same part). Role of conductor Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. The primary duties of the conductor are to set the tempo, ensure correct entries by various members of the ensemble, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. To convey their ideas and interpretation, a conductor communicates with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, typically (though not invariably) with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals, such as eye contact with relevant performers. A conductor's directions will almost invariably be supplemented or reinforced by verbal instructions or suggestions to their musicians in rehearsal prior to a performance. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments and voices. Since the mid-18th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, although in earlier periods of classical music history, leading an ensemble while playing an instrument was common. In Baroque music from the 1600s to the 1750s, the group would typically be led by the harpsichordist or first violinist (see concertmaster), an approach that in modern times has been revived by several music directors for music from this period. Conducting while playing a piano or synthesizer may also be done with musical theatre pit orchestras. Communication is typically non-verbal during a performance (this is strictly the case in art music, but in jazz big bands or large pop ensembles, there may be occasional spoken instructions, such as a "count in"). However, in rehearsals, frequent interruptions allow the conductor to give verbal directions as to how the music should be played or sung. Conductors act as guides to the orchestras or choirs they conduct. They choose the works to be performed and study their scores, to which they may make certain adjustments (e.g., regarding tempo, articulation, phrasing, repetitions of sections, and so on), work out their interpretation, and relay their vision to the performers. They may also attend to organizational matters, such as scheduling rehearsals, planning a concert season, hearing auditions and selecting members, and promoting their ensemble in the media. Orchestras, choirs, concert bands and other sizable musical ensembles such as big bands are usually led by conductors. Conductorless orchestras In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), most orchestras were led by one of the musicians, typically the principal first violin, called the concertmaster. The concertmaster would lead the tempo of pieces by lifting his or her bow in a rhythmic manner. Leadership might also be provided by one of the chord-playing instrumentalists playing the basso continuo part which was the core of most Baroque instrumental ensemble pieces. Typically, this would be a harpsichord player, a pipe organist, or a lutist or theorbo player. A keyboard player could lead the ensemble with his or her head, or by taking one of the hands off the keyboard to lead a more difficult tempo change. A lutenist or theorbo player could lead by lifting the instrument neck up and down to indicate the tempo of a piece, or to lead a ritard during a cadence or ending. In some works which combined choirs and instrumental ensembles, two leaders were sometimes used: A concertmaster to lead the instrumentalists and a chord-playing performer to lead the singers. During the Classical music period (), the practice of using chordal instruments to play basso continuo was gradually phased out, and it disappeared completely by 1800. Instead, ensembles began to use conductors to lead the orchestra's tempos and playing style, while the concertmaster played an additional leadership role for the musicians, especially the string players, who imitate the bowstroke and playing style of the concertmaster, to the degree that is feasible for the different stringed instruments. In 1922, the idea of a conductor-less orchestra was revived in post-revolutionary Soviet Union. The symphony orchestra Persimfans was formed without a conductor, because the founders believed that the ensemble should be modeled on the ideal Marxist state, in which all people are equal. As such, its members felt that there was no need to be led by the dictatorial baton of a conductor; instead they were led by a committee, which determined tempos and playing styles. Although it was a partial success within the Soviet Union, the principal difficulty with the concept was in changing tempo during performances, because even if the committee had issued a decree about where a tempo change should take place, there was no leader in the ensemble to guide this tempo change. The orchestra survived for ten years before Stalin's cultural politics disbanded it by taking away its funding. In Western nations, some ensembles, such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, based in New York City, have had more success with conductorless orchestras, although decisions are likely to be deferred to some sense of leadership within the ensemble (for example, the principal wind and string players, notably the concertmaster). Others have returned to the tradition of a principal player, usually a violinist, being the artistic director and running rehearsal and leading concerts. Examples include the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam Sinfonietta & Candida Thompson and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. As well, as part of the early music movement, some 20th and 21st century orchestras have revived the Baroque practice of having no conductor on the podium for Baroque pieces, using the concertmaster or a chord-playing basso continuo performer (e.g., harpsichord or organ) to lead the group. Multiple conductors Offstage instruments Some orchestral works specify that an offstage trumpet should be used or that other instruments from the orchestra should be positioned off-stage or behind the stage, to create a haunted, mystical effect. To ensure that the offstage instrumentalist(s) play in time, sometimes a sub-conductor will be stationed offstage with a clear view of the principal conductor. Examples include the ending of "Neptune" from Gustav Holst's The Planets. The principal conductor leads the large orchestra, and the sub-conductor relays the principal conductor's tempo and gestures to the offstage musician (or musicians). One of the challenges with using two conductors is that the second conductor may get out of synchronization with the main conductor, or may mis-convey (or misunderstand) the principal conductor's gestures, which can lead to the offstage instruments being out of time. In the late 20th century and early 21st century, some orchestras use a video camera pointed at the principal conductor and a closed-circuit TV set in front of the offstage performer(s), instead of using two conductors. Contemporary music The techniques of polystylism and polytempo music have led a few 20th and 21st century composers to write music where multiple orchestras or ensembles perform simultaneously. These trends have brought about the phenomenon of polyconductor music, wherein separate sub-conductors conduct each group of musicians. Usually, one principal conductor conducts the sub-conductors, thereby shaping the overall performance. In Percy Grainger's The Warriors which includes three conductors: the primary conductor of the orchestra, a secondary conductor directing an off-stage brass ensemble, and a tertiary conductor directing percussion and harp. One example in the late-century orchestral music is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gruppen, for three orchestras, which are placed around the audience. This way, the "sound masses" could be spatialized, as in an electroacoustic work. Gruppen was premiered in Cologne, in 1958, conducted by Stockhausen, Bruno Maderna and Pierre Boulez. It has been performed in 1996 by Simon Rattle, John Carewe and Daniel Harding. See also Chinese orchestra Gamelan Orchestra List of symphony orchestras List of symphony orchestras in Europe List of symphony orchestras in the United States List of youth orchestras in the United States Orchestral enhancement Orchestration Radio orchestra Rhythm section Shorthand for orchestra instrumentation String orchestra Notes References Further reading External links Articles containing video clips Types of musical groups	false	[ "In the history of European art music, the common practice period is the era of the tonal system. Though it has no exact dates, most features of the common-practice period persisted from the mid- to late baroque period, through the Classical, Romantic and Impressionist periods, from around 1650 to 1900. The period saw considerable stylistic evolution, with some patterns and conventions flourishing and then declining, for example the sonata form. Thus, the dates 1650–1900 are necessarily nebulous and arbitrary borders that depend on context. The most important unifying feature throughout the period is a harmonic language to which modern music theorists can apply Roman numeral chord analysis.\n\nTechnical features\n\nHarmony\n\nThe harmonic language of this period is known as \"common-practice tonality\", or sometimes the \"tonal system\" (though whether tonality implies common-practice idioms is a question of debate). Common-practice tonality represents a union between harmonic function and counterpoint. In other words, individual melodic lines, when taken together, express harmonic unity and goal-oriented progression. In tonal music, each tone in the diatonic scale functions according to its relationship to the tonic (the fundamental pitch of the scale). While diatonicism forms the basis for the tonal system, the system can withstand considerable chromatic alteration without losing its tonal identity.\n\nThroughout the common-practice period, certain harmonic patterns span styles, composers, regions, and epochs. Johann Sebastian Bach and Richard Strauss, for instance, may both write passages that can be analysed according to the progression I-ii-V-I, despite vast differences in style and context. Such harmonic conventions can be distilled into the familiar chord progressions with which musicians analyse and compose tonal music.\n\nVarious popular idioms of the twentieth century break down the standardized chord progressions of the common-practice period. While these later styles incorporate many elements of the tonal vocabulary (such as major and minor chords), the function of these elements is not necessarily rooted in classical models of counterpoint and harmonic function. For example, in common-practice harmony, a major triad built on the fifth degree of the scale (V) is unlikely to progress directly to a root position triad built on the fourth degree of the scale (IV), but the reverse of this progression (IV–V) is quite common. By contrast, the V–IV progression is readily acceptable by many other standards; for example, this transition is essential to the \"shuffle\" blues progression's last line (V–IV–I–I), which has become the orthodox ending for blues progressions at the expense of the original last line (V–V–I–I) .\n\nRhythm\nCoordination of the various parts of a piece of music through an externalized metre is a deeply rooted aspect of common-practice music. Rhythmically, common practice metric structures generally include :\n\n Clearly enunciated or implied pulse at all levels, with the fastest levels rarely being extreme\n Metres, or pulse groups, in two-pulse or three-pulse groups, most often two\n Metre and pulse groups that, once established, rarely change throughout a section or composition\n Synchronous pulse groups on all levels: all pulses on slower levels coincide with strong pulses on faster levels\n Consistent tempo throughout a composition or section\n Tempo, beat length, and measure length chosen to allow one time signature throughout the piece or section\n\nDuration\nDurational patterns typically include :\n\n Small or moderate duration complement and range, with one duration (or pulse) predominating in the duration hierarchy, are heard as the basic unit throughout a composition. Exceptions are most frequently extremely long, such as pedal tones; or, if they are short, they generally occur as the rapidly alternating or transient components of trills, tremolos, or other ornaments.\n Rhythmic units are based on metric or intrametric patterns, though specific contrametric or extrametric patterns are signatures of certain styles or composers. Triplets and other extrametric patterns are usually heard on levels higher than the basic durational unit or pulse.\n Rhythmic gestures of a limited number of rhythmic units, sometimes based on a single or alternating pair.\n Thetic (i.e., stressed), anacrustic (i.e., unstressed), and initial rest rhythmic gestures are used, with anacrustic beginnings and strong endings possibly most frequent and upbeat endings most rare.\n Rhythmic gestures are repeated exactly or in variation after contrasting gestures. There may be one rhythmic gesture almost exclusively throughout an entire composition, but complete avoidance of repetition is rare.\n Composite rhythms confirm the metre, often in metric or even note patterns identical to the pulse on specific metric level.\n\nPatterns of pitch and duration are of primary importance in common practice melody, while tone quality is of secondary importance. Durations recur and are often periodic; pitches are generally diatonic .\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Benjamin Piekut, \"No Common Practice: The New Common Practice and its Historical Antecedents\" (February 1, 2004).", "Albert Salomon (1883–1976) was a Jewish-German surgeon at the Royal Surgical University Clinic in Berlin. He is best known for his study of early mastectomies that is considered the beginning of mammography. He was the father of the artist Charlotte Salomon, who was murdered in Auschwitz concentration camp during the Holocaust.\n\nBreast pathology\nIn 1913, Salomon performed a study on 3,000 mastectomies. In the study, Salomon compared X-rays of the breasts to the actual removed tissue, observing specifically microcalcifications. By doing so, he was able to establish the difference as seen on an X-ray image between cancerous and non-cancerous tumors in the breast. Salomon's mammographs provided substantial information about the spread of tumors and their borders. In the midst of the study, Salomon also discovered that there are multiple types of breast cancer. Salomon was unable to use this technique in practice because he did not work with breast cancer patients, and although he published his findings in 1913, mammography did not become a common practice until years later.\n\nLater life\nSalomon was dismissed from the University of Berlin in 1933 after Adolf Hitler came to power. He was later imprisoned in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. He was released in 1939 and left for the Netherlands. From there he was deported to the Westerbork transit camp in (Drente) Holland, from where he escaped in 1943 and went into hiding in the Netherlands until 1945. After World War II ended, he moved to Amsterdam, where he worked as a professor.\n\nReferences\n\nGerman surgeons\nJewish emigrants from Nazi Germany to the Netherlands\n1883 births\n1976 deaths\n20th-century surgeons" ]
[ "Orchestra", "Expanded instrumentation", "What instruments were added?", "These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores.", "What was the point of adding these?", "The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors.", "Did this become common practice?", "During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below." ]	C_9123ff7b8c8245fe9021aa28e773b340_0	What part of the world did this originate?	4	What part of the world did orchestra originate?	Orchestra	Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Bolero, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No.6 and 9 and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th-century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Bela Bartok, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass woodwinds such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon brass instruments such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, and tuba percussion instruments such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek phil-, "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. A (sometimes concert orchestra) is a smaller ensemble of not more than about fifty musicians. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire, such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler. Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor's baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed. The leader of the first violin section – commonly called the concertmaster – also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster, or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ὀρχήστρα (orchestra), the name for the area in front of a stage in ancient Greek theatre reserved for the Greek chorus. History Baroque and classical eras In the Baroque era, the size and composition of an orchestra was not standardised. There were large differences in size, instrumentation and playing styles—and therefore in orchestral soundscapes and palettes — between the various European regions. The Baroque orchestra ranged from smaller orchestras (or ensembles) with one player per part, to larger scale orchestras with many players per part. Examples of the smaller variety were Bach's orchestras, for example in Koethen, where he had access to an ensemble of up to 18 players. Examples of large scale Baroque orchestras would include Corelli's orchestra in Rome which ranged between 35 and 80 players for day-to-day performances, being enlarged to 150 players for special occasions. In the classical era, the orchestra became more standardized with a small to medium sized string section and a core wind section consisting of pairs of oboes, flutes, bassoons and horns, sometimes supplemented by percussion and pairs of clarinets and trumpets. Beethoven's influence The so-called "standard complement" of doubled winds and brass in the orchestra pioneered in the late 18th century and consolidated during the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Beethoven after Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven's instrumentation almost always included paired flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets. The exceptions to this are his Symphony No. 4, Violin Concerto, and Piano Concerto No. 4, which each specify a single flute. Beethoven carefully calculated the expansion of this particular timbral "palette" in Symphonies 3, 5, 6, and 9 for an innovative effect. The third horn in the "Eroica" Symphony arrives to provide not only some harmonic flexibility, but also the effect of "choral" brass in the Trio movement. Piccolo, contrabassoon, and trombones add to the triumphal finale of his Symphony No. 5. A piccolo and a pair of trombones help deliver the effect of storm and sunshine in the Sixth, also known as the Pastoral Symphony. The Ninth asks for a second pair of horns, for reasons similar to the "Eroica" (four horns has since become standard); Beethoven's use of piccolo, contrabassoon, trombones, and untuned percussion — plus chorus and vocal soloists — in his finale, are his earliest suggestion that the timbral boundaries of symphony might be expanded. For several decades after his death, symphonic instrumentation was faithful to Beethoven's well-established model, with few exceptions. Instrumental technology The invention of the piston and rotary valve by Heinrich Stölzel and Friedrich Blühmel, both Silesians, in 1815, was the first in a series of innovations which impacted the orchestra, including the development of modern keywork for the flute by Theobald Boehm and the innovations of Adolphe Sax in the woodwinds, notably the invention of the saxophone. These advances would lead Hector Berlioz to write a landmark book on instrumentation, which was the first systematic treatise on the use of instrumental sound as an expressive element of music. Wagner's influence The next major expansion of symphonic practice came from Richard Wagner's Bayreuth orchestra, founded to accompany his musical dramas. Wagner's works for the stage were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. Thus, Wagner envisioned an ever-more-demanding role for the conductor of the theatre orchestra, as he elaborated in his influential work On Conducting. This brought about a revolution in orchestral composition, and set the style for orchestral performance for the next eighty years. Wagner's theories re-examined the importance of tempo, dynamics, bowing of string instruments and the role of principals in the orchestra. 20th-century orchestra At the beginning of the 20th century, symphony orchestras were larger, better funded, and better trained than previously; consequently, composers could compose larger and more ambitious works. The works of Gustav Mahler were particularly innovative; in his later symphonies, such as the mammoth Symphony No. 8, Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces. By the late Romantic era, orchestras could support the most enormous forms of symphonic expression, with huge string sections, massive brass sections and an expanded range of percussion instruments. With the recording era beginning, the standards of performance were pushed to a new level, because a recorded symphony could be listened to closely and even minor errors in intonation or ensemble, which might not be noticeable in a live performance, could be heard by critics. As recording technologies improved over the 20th and 21st centuries, eventually small errors in a recording could be "fixed" by audio editing or overdubbing. Some older conductors and composers could remember a time when simply "getting through" the music as best as possible was the standard. Combined with the wider audience made possible by recording, this led to a renewed focus on particular star conductors and on a high standard of orchestral execution. Instrumentation The typical symphony orchestra consists of four groups of related musical instruments called the woodwinds, brass, percussion, and strings. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes be grouped into a fifth section such as a keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and electric and electronic instruments. The orchestra, depending on the size, contains almost all of the standard instruments in each group. In the history of the orchestra, its instrumentation has been expanded over time, often agreed to have been standardized by the classical period and Ludwig van Beethoven's influence on the classical model. In the 20th and 21st century, new repertory demands expanded the instrumentation of the orchestra, resulting in a flexible use of the classical-model instruments and newly developed electric and electronic instruments in various combinations. The terms symphony orchestra and philharmonic orchestra may be used to distinguish different ensembles from the same locality, such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. A symphony or philharmonic orchestra will usually have over eighty musicians on its roster, in some cases over a hundred, but the actual number of musicians employed in a particular performance may vary according to the work being played and the size of the venue. A chamber orchestra is usually a smaller ensemble; a major chamber orchestra might employ as many as fifty musicians, but some are much smaller. Concert orchestra is an alternative term, as in the BBC Concert Orchestra and the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Expanded instrumentation Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No. 6 and No. 9, and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Béla Bartók, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analysed in five eras: the Baroque era, the Classical era, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic era and combined Modern/Postmodern eras. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann, Brahms); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th-century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). Late Baroque orchestra Woodwinds 2 flutes 2–3 oboes (oboe d'amore and oboe da caccia) bassoon (several players in large orchestras) recorder Brass 2 natural horns(sometimes will have a corno da tirarsi) and/or 2–3 natural trumpets(sometimes will have a tromba da tirarsi) Percussion 2 timpani (one player, used as the bass of the natural trumpet section) Keyboards and other chord-playing instruments selected by the ensemble leader harpsichord pipe organ theorbo Strings (oftentimes several players per part) violin I violin II viola cello or violoncello da spalla double bass (or rather violone/basso a viola da braccio) viola da gamba Classical orchestra Woodwinds 1–2 flutes of which 1 might play 1 piccolo 2 oboes 2 clarinets (B, C, or A) both of which might also play 2 basset horns (occasionally with Mozart) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon (occasionally with Mozart, and Haydn, but not yet a standard instrument) Brass 2 natural horns (valveless) 2 natural trumpets (valveless) 1 alto trombone 1 tenor trombone 1 bass trombone (on occasion Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart, but trombones not yet a standard instrument) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) Keyboards harpsichord or pipe organ (until the late 18th century, by which time it was gradually phased out of the orchestra) Strings (always multiple players per part) violins I violins II violas cellos and double basses Early Romantic orchestra Woodwinds piccolo 2 flutes 2 oboes 2 soprano clarinets of which both might also play 2 Basset horns (occasionally with Beethoven) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4 natural (valveless) or valved horns 2 natural or valved trumpets 3 tenor trombones of which some might play 1 alto trombone 1 bass trombone 1–2 serpents or ophicleides (gradually replaced by tubas) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals triangle tambourine glockenspiel Strings 14 violins 1 12 violins 2 10 violas 8 cellos 6 double basses 1 concert harp Late Romantic orchestra Woodwinds 3–4 flutes, some of which may double on 1–2 piccolos 3–4 oboes, of which some may double on 1 oboe d'amore 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 3–4 clarinets in B or A, of which some might play 1 E clarinet or D clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 3–4 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4–8 French horns, German horns, or Vienna horns (more rarely natural horns) of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas – 2 tenors, 2 bass 3–6 trumpets in F, and other keys including C, B of which some might play 1 bass trumpet 3–4 cornets 3–4 tenor trombones (alto trombone parts from the classical era usually played on tenor trombone) 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 euphonium (usually played by a trombonist when needed) Keyboards piano celesta Percussion 4 or more timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals tam-tam triangle tambourine glockenspiel xylophone tubular bells Strings 16 violins 1 (sometimes more) 14 violins 2 12 violas 12 cellos 10 double basses 2 or more concert harps Modern/Postmodern orchestra Woodwinds 2–4 flutes of which some might play 1–2 piccolos 1 alto flute 2–4 oboes of which 1–2 might play 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 2–4 B clarinets of which some might play 1 E clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 2–4 bassoons of which 1 might play 1 contrabassoon (occasionally 1 or more saxophones of various types) Brass 4–8 horns (double horns) in F/B of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas 3–6 trumpets in B of which some might play 2–3 cornets 1 piccolo trumpet (often for playing very high parts originally for natural trumpets) 1 bass trumpet 1 flugelhorn 1 alto trombone (restored to the postmodern orchestra for playing music of the classical era) 3–6 tenor trombones 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 baritone horn/euphonium Percussion 4–5 timpani (one player) snare drum tenor drum bass drum cymbals triangle tam-tam tambourine wood block glockenspiel xylophone vibraphone marimba crotales tubular bells mark tree sleigh bells bell tree drum kit (in some works) Other percussion instruments, including ethnic or world music instruments specified by composers Keyboards piano pipe organ harpsichord accordion celesta Strings 16 1st violins 14 2nd violins 12 violas 10 cellos 8 double basses 1–2 harps (1 or more classical guitars of various types) Other harmonica Electrophone As required by the compositions in the program, various electric instruments or electronic instruments may be used in the orchestra. These performers are not typically permanent orchestra members. They are typically freelancers hired on contract for one or more concerts. Instruments may include: theremin ondes Martenot electric guitar electric bass guitar electric double bass electric violin, viola & cello Hammond organ Lowrey organ electric piano keytar digital accordion ring modulators synthesizer synclavier novachord clavinet digital drum kit Other electronic musical instruments Non-musical instruments such as a typewriter or reel-to-reel tape player Organization Among the instrument groups and within each group of instruments, there is a generally accepted hierarchy. Every instrumental group (or section) has a principal who is generally responsible for leading the group and playing orchestral solos. The violins are divided into two groups, first violin and second violin, with the second violins playing in lower registers than the first violins, playing an accompaniment part, or harmonizing the melody played by the first violins. The principal first violin is called the concertmaster (or orchestra "leader" in the U.K.) and is not only considered the leader of the string section, but the second-in-command of the entire orchestra, behind only the conductor. The concertmaster leads the pre-concert tuning and handles musical aspects of orchestra management, such as determining the bowings for the violins or for all of the string section. The concertmaster usually sits to the conductor's left, closest to the audience. There is also a principal second violin, a principal viola, a principal cello, and a principal bass. The principal trombone is considered the leader of the low brass section, while the principal trumpet is generally considered the leader of the entire brass section. While the oboe often provides the tuning note for the orchestra (due to a 300 year-old convention), there is generally no designated principal of the woodwind section (though in woodwind ensembles, the flute is often the presumptive leader.) Instead, each principal confers with the others as equals in the case of musical differences of opinion. Most sections also have an assistant principal (or co-principal or associate principal), or in the case of the first violins, an assistant concertmaster, who often plays a tutti part in addition to replacing the principal in his or her absence. A section string player plays in unison with the rest of the section, except in the case of divided (divisi) parts, where upper and lower parts in the music are often assigned to "outside" (nearer the audience) and "inside" seated players. Where a solo part is called for in a string section, the section leader invariably plays that part. The section leader (or principal) of a string section is also responsible for determining the bowings, often based on the bowings set out by the concertmaster. In some cases, the principal of a string section may use a slightly different bowing than the concertmaster, to accommodate the requirements of playing their instrument (e.g., the double-bass section). Principals of a string section will also lead entrances for their section, typically by lifting the bow before the entrance, to ensure the section plays together. Tutti wind and brass players generally play a unique but non-solo part. Section percussionists play parts assigned to them by the principal percussionist. In modern times, the musicians are usually directed by a conductor, although early orchestras did not have one, giving this role instead to the concertmaster or the harpsichordist playing the continuo. Some modern orchestras also do without conductors, particularly smaller orchestras and those specializing in historically accurate (so-called "period") performances of baroque and earlier music. The most frequently performed repertoire for a symphony orchestra is Western classical music or opera. However, orchestras are used sometimes in popular music (e.g., to accompany a rock or pop band in a concert), extensively in film music, and increasingly often in video game music. Orchestras are also used in the symphonic metal genre. The term "orchestra" can also be applied to a jazz ensemble, for example in the performance of big-band music. Selection and appointment of members In the 2000s, all tenured members of a professional orchestra normally audition for positions in the ensemble. Performers typically play one or more solo pieces of the auditionee's choice, such as a movement of a concerto, a solo Bach movement, and a variety of excerpts from the orchestral literature that are advertised in the audition poster (so the auditionees can prepare). The excerpts are typically the most technically challenging parts and solos from the orchestral literature. Orchestral auditions are typically held in front of a panel that includes the conductor, the concertmaster, the principal player of the section for which the auditionee is applying, and possibly other principal players. The most promising candidates from the first round of auditions are invited to return for a second or third round of auditions, which allows the conductor and the panel to compare the best candidates. Performers may be asked to sight read orchestral music. The final stage of the audition process in some orchestras is a test week, in which the performer plays with the orchestra for a week or two, which allows the conductor and principal players to see if the individual can function well in an actual rehearsal and performance setting. There are a range of different employment arrangements. The most sought-after positions are permanent, tenured positions in the orchestra. Orchestras also hire musicians on contracts, ranging in length from a single concert to a full season or more. Contract performers may be hired for individual concerts when the orchestra is doing an exceptionally large late-Romantic era orchestral work, or to substitute for a permanent member who is sick. A professional musician who is hired to perform for a single concert is sometimes called a "sub". Some contract musicians may be hired to replace permanent members for the period that the permanent member is on parental leave or disability leave. History of gender in ensembles Historically, major professional orchestras have been mostly or entirely composed of men. The first women members hired in professional orchestras have been harpists. The Vienna Philharmonic, for example, did not accept women to permanent membership until 1997, far later than comparable orchestras (the other orchestras ranked among the world's top five by Gramophone in 2008). The last major orchestra to appoint a woman to a permanent position was the Berlin Philharmonic. In February 1996, the Vienna Philharmonic's principal flute, Dieter Flury, told Westdeutscher Rundfunk that accepting women would be "gambling with the emotional unity () that this organism currently has". In April 1996, the orchestra's press secretary wrote that "compensating for the expected leaves of absence" of maternity leave would be a problem. In 1997, the Vienna Philharmonic was "facing protests during a [US] tour" by the National Organization for Women and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Finally, "after being held up to increasing ridicule even in socially conservative Austria, members of the orchestra gathered [on 28 February 1997] in an extraordinary meeting on the eve of their departure and agreed to admit a woman, Anna Lelkes, as harpist." As of 2013, the orchestra has six female members; one of them, violinist Albena Danailova, became one of the orchestra's concertmasters in 2008, the first woman to hold that position in that orchestra. In 2012, women made up 6% of the orchestra's membership. VPO president Clemens Hellsberg said the VPO now uses completely screened blind auditions. In 2013, an article in Mother Jones stated that while "[m]any prestigious orchestras have significant female membership — women outnumber men in the New York Philharmonic's violin section — and several renowned ensembles, including the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, and the Minnesota Symphony, are led by women violinists", the double bass, brass, and percussion sections of major orchestras "... are still predominantly male." A 2014 BBC article stated that the "... introduction of 'blind' auditions, where a prospective instrumentalist performs behind a screen so that the judging panel can exercise no gender or racial prejudice, has seen the gender balance of traditionally male-dominated symphony orchestras gradually shift." Amateur ensembles There are also a variety of amateur orchestras: School orchestras These orchestras consist of students from elementary or secondary school. They may be students from a music class or program or they may be drawn from the entire school body. School orchestras are typically led by a music teacher. In some cases, school orchestras are string orchestras, consisting only of students playing string instruments, with students playing woodwinds, brass and percussion grouped together as a concert band. University or conservatory orchestras These orchestras consist of students from a university or music conservatory. In some cases, university orchestras are open to all students from a university, from all programs. Larger universities may have two or more university orchestras: one or more orchestras made up of music majors (or, for major music programs, several tiers of music major orchestras, ranked by skill level) and a second orchestra open to university students from all academic programs (e.g., science, business, etc.) who have previous classical music experience on an orchestral instrument. University and conservatory orchestras are led by a conductor who is typically a professor or instructor at the university or conservatory. Youth orchestras These orchestras consist of teens and young adults drawn from an entire city or region. The age range in youth orchestras varies between different ensembles. In some cases, youth orchestras may consist of teens or young adults from an entire country (e.g., Canada's National Youth Orchestra). Community orchestras These orchestras consist of amateur performers drawn from an entire city or region. Community orchestras typically consist mainly of adult amateur musicians. Community orchestras range in level from beginner-level orchestras which rehearse music without doing formal performances in front of an audience to intermediate-level ensembles to advanced amateur groups which play standard professional orchestra repertoire. In some cases, university or conservatory music students may also be members of community orchestras. While community orchestra members are mostly unpaid amateurs, in some orchestras, a small number of professionals may be hired to act as principal players and section leaders. Repertoire and performances Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire ranging from 17th-century dance suites, 18th century divertimentos to 20th-century film scores and 21st-century symphonies. Orchestras have become synonymous with the symphony, an extended musical composition in Western classical music that typically contains multiple movements which provide contrasting keys and tempos. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. The conductor uses the score to study the symphony before rehearsals and decide on their interpretation (e.g., tempos, articulation, phrasing, etc.), and to follow the music during rehearsals and concerts, while leading the ensemble. Orchestral musicians play from parts containing just the notated music for their instrument. A small number of symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Orchestras also perform overtures, a term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn began to use the term to refer to independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that presaged genres such as the symphonic poem, a form devised by Franz Liszt in several works that began as dramatic overtures. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". In the 1850s the concert overture began to be supplanted by the symphonic poem. Orchestras also play with instrumental soloists in concertos. During concertos, the orchestra plays an accompaniment role to the soloist (e.g., a solo violinist or pianist) and, at times, introduces musical themes or interludes while the soloist is not playing. Orchestras also play during operas, ballets, some musical theatre works and some choral works (both sacred works such as Masses and secular works). In operas and ballets, the orchestra accompanies the singers and dancers, respectively, and plays overtures and interludes where the melodies played by the orchestra take centre stage. Performances In the Baroque era, orchestras performed in a range of venues, including at the fine houses of aristocrats, in opera halls and in churches. Some wealthy aristocrats had an orchestra in residence at their estate, to entertain them and their guests with performances. During the Classical era, as composers increasingly sought out financial support from the general public, orchestra concerts were increasingly held in public concert halls, where music lovers could buy tickets to hear the orchestra. Aristocratic patronage of orchestras continued during the Classical era, but this went on alongside public concerts. In the 20th and 21st century, orchestras found a new patron: governments. Many orchestras in North America and Europe receive part of their funding from national, regional level governments (e.g., state governments in the U.S.) or city governments. These government subsidies make up part of orchestra revenue, along with ticket sales, charitable donations (if the orchestra is registered as a charity) and other fundraising activities. With the invention of successive technologies, including sound recording, radio broadcasting, television broadcasting and Internet-based streaming and downloading of concert videos, orchestras have been able to find new revenue sources. Issues in performance Faking One of the "great unmentionable [topics] of orchestral playing" is "faking", the process by which an orchestral musician gives the false "... impression of playing every note as written", typically for a very challenging passage that is very high or very fast, while not actually playing the notes that are in the printed music part. An article in The Strad states that all orchestral musicians, even those in the top orchestras, occasionally fake certain passages. One reason that musicians fake is because there are not enough rehearsals. Another factor is the extreme challenges in 20th century and 21st century contemporary pieces; some professionals said "faking" was "necessary in anything from ten to almost ninety per cent of some modern works". Professional players who were interviewed were of a consensus that faking may be acceptable when a part is not written well for the instrument, but faking "just because you haven't practised" the music is not acceptable. Counter-revolution With the advent of the early music movement, smaller orchestras where players worked on execution of works in styles derived from the study of older treatises on playing became common. These include the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Classical Players under the direction of Sir Roger Norrington and the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, among others. Recent trends in the United States In the United States, the late 20th century saw a crisis of funding and support for orchestras. The size and cost of a symphony orchestra, compared to the size of the base of supporters, became an issue that struck at the core of the institution. Few orchestras could fill auditoriums, and the time-honored season-subscription system became increasingly anachronistic, as more and more listeners would buy tickets on an ad-hoc basis for individual events. Orchestral endowments and — more centrally to the daily operation of American orchestras — orchestral donors have seen investment portfolios shrink, or produce lower yields, reducing the ability of donors to contribute; further, there has been a trend toward donors finding other social causes more compelling. While government funding is less central to American than European orchestras, cuts in such funding are still significant for American ensembles. Finally, the drastic falling-off of revenues from recording, tied to no small extent to changes in the recording industry itself, began a period of change that has yet to reach its conclusion. U.S. orchestras that have gone into Chapter 11 bankruptcy include the Philadelphia Orchestra (April 2011), and the Louisville Orchestra (December 2010); orchestras that have gone into Chapter 7 bankruptcy and have ceased operations include the Northwest Chamber Orchestra in 2006, the Honolulu Orchestra in March 2011, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra in April 2011, and the Syracuse Symphony in June 2011. The Festival of Orchestras in Orlando, Florida, ceased operations at the end of March 2011. One source of financial difficulties that received notice and criticism was high salaries for music directors of US orchestras, which led several high-profile conductors to take pay cuts in recent years. Music administrators such as Michael Tilson Thomas and Esa-Pekka Salonen argued that new music, new means of presenting it, and a renewed relationship with the community could revitalize the symphony orchestra. The American critic Greg Sandow has argued in detail that orchestras must revise their approach to music, performance, the concert experience, marketing, public relations, community involvement, and presentation to bring them in line with the expectations of 21st century audiences immersed in popular culture. It is not uncommon for contemporary composers to use unconventional instruments, including various synthesizers, to achieve desired effects. Many, however, find more conventional orchestral configuration to provide better possibilities for color and depth. Composers like John Adams often employ Romantic-size orchestras, as in Adams' opera Nixon in China; Philip Glass and others may be more free, yet still identify size-boundaries. Glass in particular has recently turned to conventional orchestras in works like the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra and the Violin Concerto No. 2. Along with a decrease in funding, some U.S. orchestras have reduced their overall personnel, as well as the number of players appearing in performances. The reduced numbers in performance are usually confined to the string section, since the numbers here have traditionally been flexible (as multiple players typically play from the same part). Role of conductor Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. The primary duties of the conductor are to set the tempo, ensure correct entries by various members of the ensemble, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. To convey their ideas and interpretation, a conductor communicates with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, typically (though not invariably) with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals, such as eye contact with relevant performers. A conductor's directions will almost invariably be supplemented or reinforced by verbal instructions or suggestions to their musicians in rehearsal prior to a performance. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments and voices. Since the mid-18th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, although in earlier periods of classical music history, leading an ensemble while playing an instrument was common. In Baroque music from the 1600s to the 1750s, the group would typically be led by the harpsichordist or first violinist (see concertmaster), an approach that in modern times has been revived by several music directors for music from this period. Conducting while playing a piano or synthesizer may also be done with musical theatre pit orchestras. Communication is typically non-verbal during a performance (this is strictly the case in art music, but in jazz big bands or large pop ensembles, there may be occasional spoken instructions, such as a "count in"). However, in rehearsals, frequent interruptions allow the conductor to give verbal directions as to how the music should be played or sung. Conductors act as guides to the orchestras or choirs they conduct. They choose the works to be performed and study their scores, to which they may make certain adjustments (e.g., regarding tempo, articulation, phrasing, repetitions of sections, and so on), work out their interpretation, and relay their vision to the performers. They may also attend to organizational matters, such as scheduling rehearsals, planning a concert season, hearing auditions and selecting members, and promoting their ensemble in the media. Orchestras, choirs, concert bands and other sizable musical ensembles such as big bands are usually led by conductors. Conductorless orchestras In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), most orchestras were led by one of the musicians, typically the principal first violin, called the concertmaster. The concertmaster would lead the tempo of pieces by lifting his or her bow in a rhythmic manner. Leadership might also be provided by one of the chord-playing instrumentalists playing the basso continuo part which was the core of most Baroque instrumental ensemble pieces. Typically, this would be a harpsichord player, a pipe organist, or a lutist or theorbo player. A keyboard player could lead the ensemble with his or her head, or by taking one of the hands off the keyboard to lead a more difficult tempo change. A lutenist or theorbo player could lead by lifting the instrument neck up and down to indicate the tempo of a piece, or to lead a ritard during a cadence or ending. In some works which combined choirs and instrumental ensembles, two leaders were sometimes used: A concertmaster to lead the instrumentalists and a chord-playing performer to lead the singers. During the Classical music period (), the practice of using chordal instruments to play basso continuo was gradually phased out, and it disappeared completely by 1800. Instead, ensembles began to use conductors to lead the orchestra's tempos and playing style, while the concertmaster played an additional leadership role for the musicians, especially the string players, who imitate the bowstroke and playing style of the concertmaster, to the degree that is feasible for the different stringed instruments. In 1922, the idea of a conductor-less orchestra was revived in post-revolutionary Soviet Union. The symphony orchestra Persimfans was formed without a conductor, because the founders believed that the ensemble should be modeled on the ideal Marxist state, in which all people are equal. As such, its members felt that there was no need to be led by the dictatorial baton of a conductor; instead they were led by a committee, which determined tempos and playing styles. Although it was a partial success within the Soviet Union, the principal difficulty with the concept was in changing tempo during performances, because even if the committee had issued a decree about where a tempo change should take place, there was no leader in the ensemble to guide this tempo change. The orchestra survived for ten years before Stalin's cultural politics disbanded it by taking away its funding. In Western nations, some ensembles, such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, based in New York City, have had more success with conductorless orchestras, although decisions are likely to be deferred to some sense of leadership within the ensemble (for example, the principal wind and string players, notably the concertmaster). Others have returned to the tradition of a principal player, usually a violinist, being the artistic director and running rehearsal and leading concerts. Examples include the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam Sinfonietta & Candida Thompson and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. As well, as part of the early music movement, some 20th and 21st century orchestras have revived the Baroque practice of having no conductor on the podium for Baroque pieces, using the concertmaster or a chord-playing basso continuo performer (e.g., harpsichord or organ) to lead the group. Multiple conductors Offstage instruments Some orchestral works specify that an offstage trumpet should be used or that other instruments from the orchestra should be positioned off-stage or behind the stage, to create a haunted, mystical effect. To ensure that the offstage instrumentalist(s) play in time, sometimes a sub-conductor will be stationed offstage with a clear view of the principal conductor. Examples include the ending of "Neptune" from Gustav Holst's The Planets. The principal conductor leads the large orchestra, and the sub-conductor relays the principal conductor's tempo and gestures to the offstage musician (or musicians). One of the challenges with using two conductors is that the second conductor may get out of synchronization with the main conductor, or may mis-convey (or misunderstand) the principal conductor's gestures, which can lead to the offstage instruments being out of time. In the late 20th century and early 21st century, some orchestras use a video camera pointed at the principal conductor and a closed-circuit TV set in front of the offstage performer(s), instead of using two conductors. Contemporary music The techniques of polystylism and polytempo music have led a few 20th and 21st century composers to write music where multiple orchestras or ensembles perform simultaneously. These trends have brought about the phenomenon of polyconductor music, wherein separate sub-conductors conduct each group of musicians. Usually, one principal conductor conducts the sub-conductors, thereby shaping the overall performance. In Percy Grainger's The Warriors which includes three conductors: the primary conductor of the orchestra, a secondary conductor directing an off-stage brass ensemble, and a tertiary conductor directing percussion and harp. One example in the late-century orchestral music is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gruppen, for three orchestras, which are placed around the audience. This way, the "sound masses" could be spatialized, as in an electroacoustic work. Gruppen was premiered in Cologne, in 1958, conducted by Stockhausen, Bruno Maderna and Pierre Boulez. It has been performed in 1996 by Simon Rattle, John Carewe and Daniel Harding. See also Chinese orchestra Gamelan Orchestra List of symphony orchestras List of symphony orchestras in Europe List of symphony orchestras in the United States List of youth orchestras in the United States Orchestral enhancement Orchestration Radio orchestra Rhythm section Shorthand for orchestra instrumentation String orchestra Notes References Further reading External links Articles containing video clips Types of musical groups	false	[ "Newspapers have been widely distributed in the United Kingdom for hundreds of years. Sales rose during the 1800s and continued to do so until the middle of the 20th century, when they reached their peak circulation, however since then their readership has significantly declined. Today, the UK's most highly circulating paper is the free sheet Metro whilst other popular titles include tabloids such as The Sun and Daily Mirror, middle market papers such as the Daily Mail and Daily Express and Broadsheet newspapers such as The Guardian and The Times.\n\nHistory \n\nAt the start of the 19th century, the highest-circulation newspaper in the United Kingdom was the Morning Post, which sold around 4,000 copies per day, twice the sales of its nearest rival. As production methods improved, print runs increased and newspapers were sold at lower prices. By 1828, the Morning Herald was selling the most copies, but it was soon overtaken by The Times.\n\nPubs would typically take in one or two papers for their customers to read, and through this method, by the 1850s the newspaper of the licensed trade, the Morning Advertiser, had the second highest circulation. Sales of The Times were around 40,000, and it had around 80% of the entire daily newspaper market, but Sunday papers were more popular, some boasting sales of more than 100,000. Later in the century, the Daily News came to prominence, selling 150,000 copies a day in the 1870s, while by 1890, The Daily Telegraph had a circulation of 300,000. Sunday newspaper sales also grew rapidly, with Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper being the first to sell one million copies an issue.\n\nThe press was changed by the introduction of halfpenny papers. The first national halfpenny paper was the Daily Mail (followed by the Daily Express and the Daily Mirror), which became the first weekday paper to sell one million copies around 1911. Circulation continued to increase, reaching a peak in the mid-1950s; sales of the News of the World reached a peak of more than eight million in 1950. Since the 1950s, there has been a gradual decline in newspaper sales. The availability of multimedia news platforms has accelerated this decline in the 21st century, and by the close of 2014, no UK daily or Sunday newspaper had a circulation exceeding two million. The overall circulation of newspapers declined by 6.6% in 2014–15.\n\nIn February 2018 The Sun'''s 40-year dominance at the top of the circulation charts was eclipsed by the free Metro newspaper for the first time. In May 2020 the Audit Bureau of Circulations, which records and audits sales, stated that monthly publication of circulation figures would no longer be automatic, as publishers were concerned that they had become a \"negative narrative of decline\". The first newspapers to decline to publish circulation figures were The Telegraph, The Sun and The Times.\n\nDaily newspapers\n\n 2020 to present \nFigures shown are average circulations for January of each year. Regardless of immediate source, all figures originate from the Audit Bureau of Circulations. In the 2020s, several newspapers stopped reporting circulation figures.\n\n2010–2019\nFigures shown are average circulations for January of each year. Regardless of immediate source, all figures originate from the Audit Bureau of Circulations.\n\n2000–2009\nFigures shown are average circulations for January of each year. Only newspapers with circulations of more than 100,000 copies per day in January 2009 are listed. Regardless of immediate source, all figures originate from the Audit Bureau of Circulations.\n\n1950–1999\nFigures shown are average circulations for each year. Figures originate from the Audit Bureau of Circulations.\n\nBefore 1950\nFigures shown are average circulations for each year. Figures from after 1931 originate from the Audit Bureau of Circulations;those from 1852 and 1838 originate from stamp duty returns. Those from 1910, 1921 and 1930 are the most uncertain and rely on information originating from T. B. Browne's Advertiser's ABC''.\n\nSunday newspapers\n\n2020 to present \nFigures shown are average circulations for January of each year. Only newspapers with circulations of more than 50,000 copies in January 2020 are listed. Regardless of immediate source, all figures originate from the Audit Bureau of Circulations. In the 2020s, several newspapers stopped reporting circulation figures.\n\n2010–2019 \nFigures shown are average circulations for January of each year. Only newspapers with circulations of more than 100,000 copies in January 2010 are listed. Regardless of immediate source, all figures originate from the Audit Bureau of Circulations.\n\n2000–2009\nFigures shown are average circulations for January of each year. Only newspapers with circulations of more than 100,000 copies in January 2009 are listed. Regardless of immediate source, all figures originate from the Audit Bureau of Circulations.\n\n20th century\nFigures shown are average circulations for each year. Figures originate from the Audit Bureau of Circulations.\n\n19th century\nFigures shown are average circulations for each year. Figures originate from stamp duty returns.\n\nRegional newspapers\nFigures shown are average circulations for each year. Figures originate from the Audit Bureau of Circulations.\n\nSee also \nList of newspapers in the United Kingdom\nList of newspapers in the world by circulation\n\nReferences\n\nUnited Kingdom\nCirculation", "This incomplete list is not intended to be exhaustive.\nThis is a list of common contemporary false etymologies for English words.\n\nProfanity\nCrap: The word \"crap\" did not originate as a back-formation of British plumber Thomas Crapper's surname, nor does his name originate from the word \"crap\", although the surname may have helped popularize the word. The surname \"Crapper\" is a variant of \"Cropper\", which originally referred to someone who harvested crops. The word \"crap\" ultimately comes from Medieval Latin crappa, meaning \"chaff\".\nFuck: The word \"fuck\" did not originate as an acronym of \"For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge\", either as a sign posted above adulterers in the stocks, or as a criminal charge against members of the British Armed Forces; nor did it originate during the 15th-century Battle of Agincourt as a corruption of \"pluck yew\" (an idiom falsely attributed to the English for drawing a longbow). The word did not originate in Christianized Anglo-Saxon England as an acronym of \"Fornication Under Consent of King\"; Modern English was not spoken until the 16th century, and words such as \"fornication\" and \"consent\" did not exist in any form in English until the influence of Anglo-Norman in the late 12th century. The earliest recorded use of \"fuck\" in English comes from 1475, in the poem Flen flyys, where it is spelled fuccant (conjugated as if a Latin verb meaning \"they fuck\"). The word derived from Proto-Germanic roots, and has cognates in many other Germanic languages.\nShit: The word \"shit\" did not originate as an acronym for \"Ship High in Transit\", a label falsely said to have been used on shipments of manure to prevent them from becoming waterlogged and releasing explosive methane gas. The word comes from Old English scitte, and is of Proto-Germanic origin.\n\nEthnic slurs\nCracker: The use of \"cracker\" as a pejorative term for a white person does not come from the use of bullwhips by whites against slaves in the Atlantic slave trade. The term comes from an old sense of \"boaster\" or \"braggart\"; alternatively, it may come from \"corn-cracker\".\nGringo: The word \"gringo\" (a pejorative term for a white American) did not originate during the Mexican–American War (1846–1848), the Venezuelan War of Independence (1811–1823), the Mexican Revolution (1910–1920), or in the American Old West ( 1865–1899) as a corruption of the lyrics \"green grow\" in either \"Green Grow the Lilacs\" or \"Green Grow the Rushes, O\" sung by American soldiers or cowboys; nor did it originate during any of these times as a corruption of \"Green go home!\", falsely said to have been shouted at green-clad American troops, or of \"green coats\" as a description of their uniforms. The word originally simply meant \"foreigner\" and is probably a corruption of Spanish griego, \"Greek\".\nNiggardly: The word \"niggardly\", meaning stingy or miserly, is not actually related to the racial slur \"nigger\", despite the similar sound. Like \"niggle\", it may derive from Old Norse nigla, meaning \"to fuss about small matters\"; alternatively, it may derive from another Germanic root meaning \"exact\" or \"careful\". Meanwhile, \"nigger\", like \"Negro\", traces back to Latin niger, meaning \"black\".\nRedneck: A \"sometimes disparaging\" term for a \"white member of the Southern rural laboring class.\" Several sources have reported an incorrect origin story for the term as used in this sense: that it was first used to describe striking miners who tied red bandanas around their necks during the Battle of Blair Mountain in 1921. However, The Oxford English Dictionary attests to uses in the relevant sense at least as early as 1830.\nSpic: The word \"spic\" (a pejorative term for a Latino) did not originate as an abbreviation of \"Hispanic\"; nor as an acronym for \"Spanish, Indian, and Colored\" (in reference to minority races in the United States); nor as an acronym for \"Spanish, Polish, Italian, and Chinese\", falsely said to have been used by U.S. immigration officials in the 1940s, 1950s, or 1960s to categorize citizenship applications. The American Heritage Dictionary claims that the word is derived from \"spiggoty\", possibly from the Spanglish phrase \"No speak the English\".\nWog: The cacophemism \"wog\", for a foreigner or person of colour, is sometimes believed to be an acronym for \"wily Oriental gentleman\". It is more likely to be a shortening of \"golliwog\".\nWop: The word \"wop\" (a pejorative term for an Italian) was not originally an acronym for \"without passport\" or \"working off passage\". It is a corruption of dialectal Italian guappo, \"thug\".\n\nAcronyms\nThe use of acronyms to create new words was nearly non-existent in English until the middle of the 20th century. Nearly all older words were formed in other ways.\n\"Chav\": see under \"Other\"\nComa: Some falsely believe that the word coma originates from \"cessation of motor activity\". Although this describes the condition of coma, this is not the true derivation. The word is actually derived from the Greek kōma, meaning deep sleep.\n Fuck: see under \"Profanity\"\nGolf: did not originate as an acronym of \"gentlemen only, ladies forbidden\". The word's true origin is unknown, but it existed in the Middle Scots period.\nNews: The word news has been claimed to be an acronym of the four cardinal directions (north, east, west, and south). However, old spellings of the word varied widely (e.g., newesse, newis, nevis, neus, newys, niewes, newis, nues, etc.). Additionally, an identical term exists in French, \"les nouvelles\", which translates as the plural of \"the new\". \"News\" also does not stand for \"notable events, weather, and sports\". The word \"news\" is simply a plural form of new.\n Pom or pommy is an Australian English, New Zealand English, and South African English term for a person of British descent or origin. The exact origins of the term remain obscure (see here for further information). A legend persists that the term arises from the acronym P.O.M.E., for \"prisoner of Mother England\" (or P.O.H.M, \"prisoners of His/Her Majesty\"), although there is no evidence to support this assertion.\n Posh was not an acronym for wealthy British passengers getting \"port out, starboard home\" cabins on ocean liners to India, in order to get ocean breeze. The actual origins of the word are unknown.\nShit: see under \"Profanity\"\n Swag is not an acronym for \"stuff we all get\", \"secretly we are gay\" or anything else. It comes from early-19th-century slang for a thief's booty or loot.\n Tip did not gain their name from the phrase \"to insure promptness\" (prompt service). The word originated in the 17th century and is of uncertain origin.\n Wog and wop: see under \"Ethnic slurs\"\n\nIdioms \n Rule of thumb is not derived from a medieval constraint on the thickness of an object with which one might beat one's wife. More likely it means that the thumb can be used to measure an approximate inch.\n Whole nine yards: The actual origin of the phrase \"the whole nine yards\" is a mystery, and nearly all claimed explanations are easily proven false. Incorrect explanations include the length of machine gun belts, the capacity of concrete mixers (in cubic yards), various types of fabric, and many other explanations. All are probably false, since most rely on nine yards when evidence suggests that the phrase began as \"the whole six yards\". In addition, the phrase has appeared in print as early as 1907, while many explanations require a much later origin date.\n\nOther\n420 did not originate as the Los Angeles police or penal code for marijuana use. Police Code 420 is \"juvenile disturbance\", and Penal Code 420 defines the prevention, hindrance, or obstruction of legal \"entry, settlement, or residence\" on \"any tract of public land\" as a misdemeanor. Some LA police codes that do relate to illegal drugs include 10-50 (\"under influence of drugs\"), 966 (\"drug deal\"), 11300 (\"narcotics\"), and 23105 (\"driver under narcotics\"). The number's association with marijuana originated with a group of students who would meet on the campus of San Rafael High School at 4:20 pm to smoke.\n Adamant: often believed to come from Latin adamare, meaning to love to excess. In fact derived from Greek ἀδάμας, meaning indomitable. There was a further confusion about whether the substance referred to is diamond or lodestone.\n Buck: The use of \"buck\" to mean \"dollar\" did not originate from a practice of referring to African slaves as \"bucks\" (male deer) when trading. \"Buck\" was originally short for \"buckskin\", as buckskins were used in trade.\nButterfly: The word \"butterfly\" did not originate from \"flutterby\". It comes from the Middle English word butterflye, which in turn comes from the Old English word butorflēoge.\nChav: This disparaging UK term for a person of low social class or graces does not originate from \"Chatham-\" or \"Cheltenham Average\", nor is it an acronym for \"Council Housed And Violent\". It comes from a word meaning \"boy\" in the Romani language.\nCrowbar: A \"crowbar\" is not so named for its use by Black menial workers. The name comes from the forked end of a crowbar, which resembles a crow's foot.\nEaster: The high Christian holiday does not take its name from Ishtar, the Mesopotamian fertility goddess. It instead is based on Ēostre, a West Germanic goddess representing the dawn, whose name derives from the sun rising in the east.\nEmoji: These pictographic characters are often mistakenly believed to be a simplified form of the word emoticon, itself a portmanteau of \"emotion icon\". However, emoji is a Japanese term composed from \"e\" (image) and \"moji\" (character).\nFaggot: The slur usage of the word \"faggot\" (originally referring to a bundle of firewood) is sometimes falsely claimed to come from a practice of throwing homosexuals into a fire to be burned to death. One possible origin is in the use of \"faggot\" as a pejorative term for women in a similar way to \"baggage\", i.e. something heavy to be dealt with. The usage may also have been influenced by the British term \"fag\", meaning a younger schoolboy who acts as an older schoolboy's servant.\nFemale and male: the terms are not etymologically related. Male originates from Old French masle, a shortened form of Latin masculus. Female originates from Medieval Latin femella, a diminutive of femina.\nThe Fluorescent lamp did not derive its name from the fictional Filipino inventor Agapito Flores.\nHandicap: The word \"handicap\" did not originate as a metathetic corruption of \"cap in hand\" in reference to disabled beggars. The word originally referred to the game hand-i'-cap, in which forfeits were placed in a cap to equalize the game.\n Hiccough, an alternate spelling still encountered for hiccup, originates in an assumption that the second syllable was originally cough. The word is in fact onomatopoeic in origin.\n History does not derive from \"His story\" (that is, a version of the past from which the acts of women and girls are systemically excluded) but from the Greek word ἱστορία, historia, meaning \"inquiry.\"\n Innocent: often wrongly believed to have the original meaning of \"not knowing\", as if it came from Latin noscere (to know); in fact it comes from nocere (to harm), so the primary sense is \"harmless\".\n Isle and island: The word \"isle\" is not short for \"island\", nor is the word \"island\" an extension of \"isle\"; the words are unrelated. \"Isle\" comes ultimately from Latin īnsula, meaning \"island\"; \"island\" comes ultimately from Old English īegland, also meaning \"island\", or technically \"island land\" (cf. Icelandic ey \"island\"). The spelling island with an S, however, is indeed due to the influence of isle.\n Marmalade: there is an apocryphal story that Mary, Queen of Scots, ate it when she had a headache, and that the name is derived from her maids' whisper of \"Marie est malade\" (Mary is ill). In fact it is derived from Portuguese marmelada, meaning quince jam, and then expanded from quince jam to other fruit preserves. It is found in English-language sources written before Mary was even born.\n Nasty: The term nasty was not derived from the surname of Thomas Nast as a reference to his biting, vitriolic cartoons. The word may be related to the Dutch word nestig, or \"dirty\". It predates Nast by several centuries, appearing in the most famous sentence of Thomas Hobbes's Leviathan, that in the state of nature, the life of man is \"solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short\". That work was published in 1651, whereas Nast was born in 1840.\nPicnic: The word \"picnic\" did not originate as an abbreviation of \"pick a nigger\", a phrase falsely claimed to have been used by white families at community lynchings in the 19th century. \"Picnic\" comes from 17th-century French piquenique, which is of uncertain origin.\n Pumpernickel is said to have been given the name by a French man (sometimes Napoleon) referring to his horse, Nicole—\"Il étoit bon pour Nicole\" (\"It was good enough for Nicole\"), or \"C'est une pomme pour Nicole\" (\"It's an apple for Nicole\") or \"C'est du pain pour Nicole\" (\"It's bread for Nicole\"). Some dictionaries claim a derivation from the German vernacular Pumpern (fart) and \"Nick\" (demon or devil), though others disagree.\n Sincere does not originate from Latin sine cera (\"without wax\"), but from sincerus (\"true, genuine\"), which combines roots meaning \"single\" and \"grow\".\n Snob does not originate from Latin sine nobilitate (\"without nobility\").\n Till is not an abbreviation of \"until\", though the increasingly common spelling 'til is a result of this misconception. In fact, \"till\" is the older word; \"until\" is a compound of \"till\" and the Old Norse prefix \"und-\" (\"up to\", \"as far as\"), just as \"unto\" is a compound of that prefix and \"to\".\n Welsh rarebit has been claimed to be the original spelling of the savoury dish \"Welsh rabbit\". Both forms now have currency, though the form with \"rabbit\" is in fact the original. Furthermore, the word \"Welsh\" in this context was used in a pejorative sense, meaning \"foreign\" or \"substandard\", and does not indicate that the dish originated in Wales.\n Woman does not originate from \"woven from man\", nor from \"womb\". It came from the Old English wifmann (\"woman person\"), a compound of wif (\"woman\" – cf. \"wife\") + man (\"human being\"). Adult human males were called wer (as in weregeld, and world, and possibly also be the first element in \"werwolf\", man-wolf). Mann, the word for \"person\", eventually came to be used for adult human males specifically. Both \"wer\" and \"wyf\" may be used to qualify \"man\", for example:\n\nSee also\n List of common English usage misconceptions\n List of common misconceptions#Language\n\nReferences\n\nEtymology\nFalse friends\nLinguistics lists\nEnglish etymology\nEnglish words\nPseudolinguistics" ]
[ "Orchestra", "Expanded instrumentation", "What instruments were added?", "These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores.", "What was the point of adding these?", "The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors.", "Did this become common practice?", "During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below.", "What part of the world did this originate?", "I don't know." ]	C_9123ff7b8c8245fe9021aa28e773b340_0	What else did you find interesting about this section?	5	Besides orchestra what else did you find interesting about?	Orchestra	Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Bolero, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No.6 and 9 and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th-century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Bela Bartok, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). CANNOTANSWER	the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era.	An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass woodwinds such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon brass instruments such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, and tuba percussion instruments such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek phil-, "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. A (sometimes concert orchestra) is a smaller ensemble of not more than about fifty musicians. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire, such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler. Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor's baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed. The leader of the first violin section – commonly called the concertmaster – also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster, or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ὀρχήστρα (orchestra), the name for the area in front of a stage in ancient Greek theatre reserved for the Greek chorus. History Baroque and classical eras In the Baroque era, the size and composition of an orchestra was not standardised. There were large differences in size, instrumentation and playing styles—and therefore in orchestral soundscapes and palettes — between the various European regions. The Baroque orchestra ranged from smaller orchestras (or ensembles) with one player per part, to larger scale orchestras with many players per part. Examples of the smaller variety were Bach's orchestras, for example in Koethen, where he had access to an ensemble of up to 18 players. Examples of large scale Baroque orchestras would include Corelli's orchestra in Rome which ranged between 35 and 80 players for day-to-day performances, being enlarged to 150 players for special occasions. In the classical era, the orchestra became more standardized with a small to medium sized string section and a core wind section consisting of pairs of oboes, flutes, bassoons and horns, sometimes supplemented by percussion and pairs of clarinets and trumpets. Beethoven's influence The so-called "standard complement" of doubled winds and brass in the orchestra pioneered in the late 18th century and consolidated during the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Beethoven after Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven's instrumentation almost always included paired flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets. The exceptions to this are his Symphony No. 4, Violin Concerto, and Piano Concerto No. 4, which each specify a single flute. Beethoven carefully calculated the expansion of this particular timbral "palette" in Symphonies 3, 5, 6, and 9 for an innovative effect. The third horn in the "Eroica" Symphony arrives to provide not only some harmonic flexibility, but also the effect of "choral" brass in the Trio movement. Piccolo, contrabassoon, and trombones add to the triumphal finale of his Symphony No. 5. A piccolo and a pair of trombones help deliver the effect of storm and sunshine in the Sixth, also known as the Pastoral Symphony. The Ninth asks for a second pair of horns, for reasons similar to the "Eroica" (four horns has since become standard); Beethoven's use of piccolo, contrabassoon, trombones, and untuned percussion — plus chorus and vocal soloists — in his finale, are his earliest suggestion that the timbral boundaries of symphony might be expanded. For several decades after his death, symphonic instrumentation was faithful to Beethoven's well-established model, with few exceptions. Instrumental technology The invention of the piston and rotary valve by Heinrich Stölzel and Friedrich Blühmel, both Silesians, in 1815, was the first in a series of innovations which impacted the orchestra, including the development of modern keywork for the flute by Theobald Boehm and the innovations of Adolphe Sax in the woodwinds, notably the invention of the saxophone. These advances would lead Hector Berlioz to write a landmark book on instrumentation, which was the first systematic treatise on the use of instrumental sound as an expressive element of music. Wagner's influence The next major expansion of symphonic practice came from Richard Wagner's Bayreuth orchestra, founded to accompany his musical dramas. Wagner's works for the stage were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. Thus, Wagner envisioned an ever-more-demanding role for the conductor of the theatre orchestra, as he elaborated in his influential work On Conducting. This brought about a revolution in orchestral composition, and set the style for orchestral performance for the next eighty years. Wagner's theories re-examined the importance of tempo, dynamics, bowing of string instruments and the role of principals in the orchestra. 20th-century orchestra At the beginning of the 20th century, symphony orchestras were larger, better funded, and better trained than previously; consequently, composers could compose larger and more ambitious works. The works of Gustav Mahler were particularly innovative; in his later symphonies, such as the mammoth Symphony No. 8, Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces. By the late Romantic era, orchestras could support the most enormous forms of symphonic expression, with huge string sections, massive brass sections and an expanded range of percussion instruments. With the recording era beginning, the standards of performance were pushed to a new level, because a recorded symphony could be listened to closely and even minor errors in intonation or ensemble, which might not be noticeable in a live performance, could be heard by critics. As recording technologies improved over the 20th and 21st centuries, eventually small errors in a recording could be "fixed" by audio editing or overdubbing. Some older conductors and composers could remember a time when simply "getting through" the music as best as possible was the standard. Combined with the wider audience made possible by recording, this led to a renewed focus on particular star conductors and on a high standard of orchestral execution. Instrumentation The typical symphony orchestra consists of four groups of related musical instruments called the woodwinds, brass, percussion, and strings. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes be grouped into a fifth section such as a keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and electric and electronic instruments. The orchestra, depending on the size, contains almost all of the standard instruments in each group. In the history of the orchestra, its instrumentation has been expanded over time, often agreed to have been standardized by the classical period and Ludwig van Beethoven's influence on the classical model. In the 20th and 21st century, new repertory demands expanded the instrumentation of the orchestra, resulting in a flexible use of the classical-model instruments and newly developed electric and electronic instruments in various combinations. The terms symphony orchestra and philharmonic orchestra may be used to distinguish different ensembles from the same locality, such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. A symphony or philharmonic orchestra will usually have over eighty musicians on its roster, in some cases over a hundred, but the actual number of musicians employed in a particular performance may vary according to the work being played and the size of the venue. A chamber orchestra is usually a smaller ensemble; a major chamber orchestra might employ as many as fifty musicians, but some are much smaller. Concert orchestra is an alternative term, as in the BBC Concert Orchestra and the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Expanded instrumentation Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No. 6 and No. 9, and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Béla Bartók, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analysed in five eras: the Baroque era, the Classical era, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic era and combined Modern/Postmodern eras. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann, Brahms); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th-century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). Late Baroque orchestra Woodwinds 2 flutes 2–3 oboes (oboe d'amore and oboe da caccia) bassoon (several players in large orchestras) recorder Brass 2 natural horns(sometimes will have a corno da tirarsi) and/or 2–3 natural trumpets(sometimes will have a tromba da tirarsi) Percussion 2 timpani (one player, used as the bass of the natural trumpet section) Keyboards and other chord-playing instruments selected by the ensemble leader harpsichord pipe organ theorbo Strings (oftentimes several players per part) violin I violin II viola cello or violoncello da spalla double bass (or rather violone/basso a viola da braccio) viola da gamba Classical orchestra Woodwinds 1–2 flutes of which 1 might play 1 piccolo 2 oboes 2 clarinets (B, C, or A) both of which might also play 2 basset horns (occasionally with Mozart) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon (occasionally with Mozart, and Haydn, but not yet a standard instrument) Brass 2 natural horns (valveless) 2 natural trumpets (valveless) 1 alto trombone 1 tenor trombone 1 bass trombone (on occasion Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart, but trombones not yet a standard instrument) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) Keyboards harpsichord or pipe organ (until the late 18th century, by which time it was gradually phased out of the orchestra) Strings (always multiple players per part) violins I violins II violas cellos and double basses Early Romantic orchestra Woodwinds piccolo 2 flutes 2 oboes 2 soprano clarinets of which both might also play 2 Basset horns (occasionally with Beethoven) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4 natural (valveless) or valved horns 2 natural or valved trumpets 3 tenor trombones of which some might play 1 alto trombone 1 bass trombone 1–2 serpents or ophicleides (gradually replaced by tubas) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals triangle tambourine glockenspiel Strings 14 violins 1 12 violins 2 10 violas 8 cellos 6 double basses 1 concert harp Late Romantic orchestra Woodwinds 3–4 flutes, some of which may double on 1–2 piccolos 3–4 oboes, of which some may double on 1 oboe d'amore 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 3–4 clarinets in B or A, of which some might play 1 E clarinet or D clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 3–4 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4–8 French horns, German horns, or Vienna horns (more rarely natural horns) of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas – 2 tenors, 2 bass 3–6 trumpets in F, and other keys including C, B of which some might play 1 bass trumpet 3–4 cornets 3–4 tenor trombones (alto trombone parts from the classical era usually played on tenor trombone) 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 euphonium (usually played by a trombonist when needed) Keyboards piano celesta Percussion 4 or more timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals tam-tam triangle tambourine glockenspiel xylophone tubular bells Strings 16 violins 1 (sometimes more) 14 violins 2 12 violas 12 cellos 10 double basses 2 or more concert harps Modern/Postmodern orchestra Woodwinds 2–4 flutes of which some might play 1–2 piccolos 1 alto flute 2–4 oboes of which 1–2 might play 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 2–4 B clarinets of which some might play 1 E clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 2–4 bassoons of which 1 might play 1 contrabassoon (occasionally 1 or more saxophones of various types) Brass 4–8 horns (double horns) in F/B of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas 3–6 trumpets in B of which some might play 2–3 cornets 1 piccolo trumpet (often for playing very high parts originally for natural trumpets) 1 bass trumpet 1 flugelhorn 1 alto trombone (restored to the postmodern orchestra for playing music of the classical era) 3–6 tenor trombones 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 baritone horn/euphonium Percussion 4–5 timpani (one player) snare drum tenor drum bass drum cymbals triangle tam-tam tambourine wood block glockenspiel xylophone vibraphone marimba crotales tubular bells mark tree sleigh bells bell tree drum kit (in some works) Other percussion instruments, including ethnic or world music instruments specified by composers Keyboards piano pipe organ harpsichord accordion celesta Strings 16 1st violins 14 2nd violins 12 violas 10 cellos 8 double basses 1–2 harps (1 or more classical guitars of various types) Other harmonica Electrophone As required by the compositions in the program, various electric instruments or electronic instruments may be used in the orchestra. These performers are not typically permanent orchestra members. They are typically freelancers hired on contract for one or more concerts. Instruments may include: theremin ondes Martenot electric guitar electric bass guitar electric double bass electric violin, viola & cello Hammond organ Lowrey organ electric piano keytar digital accordion ring modulators synthesizer synclavier novachord clavinet digital drum kit Other electronic musical instruments Non-musical instruments such as a typewriter or reel-to-reel tape player Organization Among the instrument groups and within each group of instruments, there is a generally accepted hierarchy. Every instrumental group (or section) has a principal who is generally responsible for leading the group and playing orchestral solos. The violins are divided into two groups, first violin and second violin, with the second violins playing in lower registers than the first violins, playing an accompaniment part, or harmonizing the melody played by the first violins. The principal first violin is called the concertmaster (or orchestra "leader" in the U.K.) and is not only considered the leader of the string section, but the second-in-command of the entire orchestra, behind only the conductor. The concertmaster leads the pre-concert tuning and handles musical aspects of orchestra management, such as determining the bowings for the violins or for all of the string section. The concertmaster usually sits to the conductor's left, closest to the audience. There is also a principal second violin, a principal viola, a principal cello, and a principal bass. The principal trombone is considered the leader of the low brass section, while the principal trumpet is generally considered the leader of the entire brass section. While the oboe often provides the tuning note for the orchestra (due to a 300 year-old convention), there is generally no designated principal of the woodwind section (though in woodwind ensembles, the flute is often the presumptive leader.) Instead, each principal confers with the others as equals in the case of musical differences of opinion. Most sections also have an assistant principal (or co-principal or associate principal), or in the case of the first violins, an assistant concertmaster, who often plays a tutti part in addition to replacing the principal in his or her absence. A section string player plays in unison with the rest of the section, except in the case of divided (divisi) parts, where upper and lower parts in the music are often assigned to "outside" (nearer the audience) and "inside" seated players. Where a solo part is called for in a string section, the section leader invariably plays that part. The section leader (or principal) of a string section is also responsible for determining the bowings, often based on the bowings set out by the concertmaster. In some cases, the principal of a string section may use a slightly different bowing than the concertmaster, to accommodate the requirements of playing their instrument (e.g., the double-bass section). Principals of a string section will also lead entrances for their section, typically by lifting the bow before the entrance, to ensure the section plays together. Tutti wind and brass players generally play a unique but non-solo part. Section percussionists play parts assigned to them by the principal percussionist. In modern times, the musicians are usually directed by a conductor, although early orchestras did not have one, giving this role instead to the concertmaster or the harpsichordist playing the continuo. Some modern orchestras also do without conductors, particularly smaller orchestras and those specializing in historically accurate (so-called "period") performances of baroque and earlier music. The most frequently performed repertoire for a symphony orchestra is Western classical music or opera. However, orchestras are used sometimes in popular music (e.g., to accompany a rock or pop band in a concert), extensively in film music, and increasingly often in video game music. Orchestras are also used in the symphonic metal genre. The term "orchestra" can also be applied to a jazz ensemble, for example in the performance of big-band music. Selection and appointment of members In the 2000s, all tenured members of a professional orchestra normally audition for positions in the ensemble. Performers typically play one or more solo pieces of the auditionee's choice, such as a movement of a concerto, a solo Bach movement, and a variety of excerpts from the orchestral literature that are advertised in the audition poster (so the auditionees can prepare). The excerpts are typically the most technically challenging parts and solos from the orchestral literature. Orchestral auditions are typically held in front of a panel that includes the conductor, the concertmaster, the principal player of the section for which the auditionee is applying, and possibly other principal players. The most promising candidates from the first round of auditions are invited to return for a second or third round of auditions, which allows the conductor and the panel to compare the best candidates. Performers may be asked to sight read orchestral music. The final stage of the audition process in some orchestras is a test week, in which the performer plays with the orchestra for a week or two, which allows the conductor and principal players to see if the individual can function well in an actual rehearsal and performance setting. There are a range of different employment arrangements. The most sought-after positions are permanent, tenured positions in the orchestra. Orchestras also hire musicians on contracts, ranging in length from a single concert to a full season or more. Contract performers may be hired for individual concerts when the orchestra is doing an exceptionally large late-Romantic era orchestral work, or to substitute for a permanent member who is sick. A professional musician who is hired to perform for a single concert is sometimes called a "sub". Some contract musicians may be hired to replace permanent members for the period that the permanent member is on parental leave or disability leave. History of gender in ensembles Historically, major professional orchestras have been mostly or entirely composed of men. The first women members hired in professional orchestras have been harpists. The Vienna Philharmonic, for example, did not accept women to permanent membership until 1997, far later than comparable orchestras (the other orchestras ranked among the world's top five by Gramophone in 2008). The last major orchestra to appoint a woman to a permanent position was the Berlin Philharmonic. In February 1996, the Vienna Philharmonic's principal flute, Dieter Flury, told Westdeutscher Rundfunk that accepting women would be "gambling with the emotional unity () that this organism currently has". In April 1996, the orchestra's press secretary wrote that "compensating for the expected leaves of absence" of maternity leave would be a problem. In 1997, the Vienna Philharmonic was "facing protests during a [US] tour" by the National Organization for Women and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Finally, "after being held up to increasing ridicule even in socially conservative Austria, members of the orchestra gathered [on 28 February 1997] in an extraordinary meeting on the eve of their departure and agreed to admit a woman, Anna Lelkes, as harpist." As of 2013, the orchestra has six female members; one of them, violinist Albena Danailova, became one of the orchestra's concertmasters in 2008, the first woman to hold that position in that orchestra. In 2012, women made up 6% of the orchestra's membership. VPO president Clemens Hellsberg said the VPO now uses completely screened blind auditions. In 2013, an article in Mother Jones stated that while "[m]any prestigious orchestras have significant female membership — women outnumber men in the New York Philharmonic's violin section — and several renowned ensembles, including the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, and the Minnesota Symphony, are led by women violinists", the double bass, brass, and percussion sections of major orchestras "... are still predominantly male." A 2014 BBC article stated that the "... introduction of 'blind' auditions, where a prospective instrumentalist performs behind a screen so that the judging panel can exercise no gender or racial prejudice, has seen the gender balance of traditionally male-dominated symphony orchestras gradually shift." Amateur ensembles There are also a variety of amateur orchestras: School orchestras These orchestras consist of students from elementary or secondary school. They may be students from a music class or program or they may be drawn from the entire school body. School orchestras are typically led by a music teacher. In some cases, school orchestras are string orchestras, consisting only of students playing string instruments, with students playing woodwinds, brass and percussion grouped together as a concert band. University or conservatory orchestras These orchestras consist of students from a university or music conservatory. In some cases, university orchestras are open to all students from a university, from all programs. Larger universities may have two or more university orchestras: one or more orchestras made up of music majors (or, for major music programs, several tiers of music major orchestras, ranked by skill level) and a second orchestra open to university students from all academic programs (e.g., science, business, etc.) who have previous classical music experience on an orchestral instrument. University and conservatory orchestras are led by a conductor who is typically a professor or instructor at the university or conservatory. Youth orchestras These orchestras consist of teens and young adults drawn from an entire city or region. The age range in youth orchestras varies between different ensembles. In some cases, youth orchestras may consist of teens or young adults from an entire country (e.g., Canada's National Youth Orchestra). Community orchestras These orchestras consist of amateur performers drawn from an entire city or region. Community orchestras typically consist mainly of adult amateur musicians. Community orchestras range in level from beginner-level orchestras which rehearse music without doing formal performances in front of an audience to intermediate-level ensembles to advanced amateur groups which play standard professional orchestra repertoire. In some cases, university or conservatory music students may also be members of community orchestras. While community orchestra members are mostly unpaid amateurs, in some orchestras, a small number of professionals may be hired to act as principal players and section leaders. Repertoire and performances Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire ranging from 17th-century dance suites, 18th century divertimentos to 20th-century film scores and 21st-century symphonies. Orchestras have become synonymous with the symphony, an extended musical composition in Western classical music that typically contains multiple movements which provide contrasting keys and tempos. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. The conductor uses the score to study the symphony before rehearsals and decide on their interpretation (e.g., tempos, articulation, phrasing, etc.), and to follow the music during rehearsals and concerts, while leading the ensemble. Orchestral musicians play from parts containing just the notated music for their instrument. A small number of symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Orchestras also perform overtures, a term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn began to use the term to refer to independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that presaged genres such as the symphonic poem, a form devised by Franz Liszt in several works that began as dramatic overtures. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". In the 1850s the concert overture began to be supplanted by the symphonic poem. Orchestras also play with instrumental soloists in concertos. During concertos, the orchestra plays an accompaniment role to the soloist (e.g., a solo violinist or pianist) and, at times, introduces musical themes or interludes while the soloist is not playing. Orchestras also play during operas, ballets, some musical theatre works and some choral works (both sacred works such as Masses and secular works). In operas and ballets, the orchestra accompanies the singers and dancers, respectively, and plays overtures and interludes where the melodies played by the orchestra take centre stage. Performances In the Baroque era, orchestras performed in a range of venues, including at the fine houses of aristocrats, in opera halls and in churches. Some wealthy aristocrats had an orchestra in residence at their estate, to entertain them and their guests with performances. During the Classical era, as composers increasingly sought out financial support from the general public, orchestra concerts were increasingly held in public concert halls, where music lovers could buy tickets to hear the orchestra. Aristocratic patronage of orchestras continued during the Classical era, but this went on alongside public concerts. In the 20th and 21st century, orchestras found a new patron: governments. Many orchestras in North America and Europe receive part of their funding from national, regional level governments (e.g., state governments in the U.S.) or city governments. These government subsidies make up part of orchestra revenue, along with ticket sales, charitable donations (if the orchestra is registered as a charity) and other fundraising activities. With the invention of successive technologies, including sound recording, radio broadcasting, television broadcasting and Internet-based streaming and downloading of concert videos, orchestras have been able to find new revenue sources. Issues in performance Faking One of the "great unmentionable [topics] of orchestral playing" is "faking", the process by which an orchestral musician gives the false "... impression of playing every note as written", typically for a very challenging passage that is very high or very fast, while not actually playing the notes that are in the printed music part. An article in The Strad states that all orchestral musicians, even those in the top orchestras, occasionally fake certain passages. One reason that musicians fake is because there are not enough rehearsals. Another factor is the extreme challenges in 20th century and 21st century contemporary pieces; some professionals said "faking" was "necessary in anything from ten to almost ninety per cent of some modern works". Professional players who were interviewed were of a consensus that faking may be acceptable when a part is not written well for the instrument, but faking "just because you haven't practised" the music is not acceptable. Counter-revolution With the advent of the early music movement, smaller orchestras where players worked on execution of works in styles derived from the study of older treatises on playing became common. These include the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Classical Players under the direction of Sir Roger Norrington and the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, among others. Recent trends in the United States In the United States, the late 20th century saw a crisis of funding and support for orchestras. The size and cost of a symphony orchestra, compared to the size of the base of supporters, became an issue that struck at the core of the institution. Few orchestras could fill auditoriums, and the time-honored season-subscription system became increasingly anachronistic, as more and more listeners would buy tickets on an ad-hoc basis for individual events. Orchestral endowments and — more centrally to the daily operation of American orchestras — orchestral donors have seen investment portfolios shrink, or produce lower yields, reducing the ability of donors to contribute; further, there has been a trend toward donors finding other social causes more compelling. While government funding is less central to American than European orchestras, cuts in such funding are still significant for American ensembles. Finally, the drastic falling-off of revenues from recording, tied to no small extent to changes in the recording industry itself, began a period of change that has yet to reach its conclusion. U.S. orchestras that have gone into Chapter 11 bankruptcy include the Philadelphia Orchestra (April 2011), and the Louisville Orchestra (December 2010); orchestras that have gone into Chapter 7 bankruptcy and have ceased operations include the Northwest Chamber Orchestra in 2006, the Honolulu Orchestra in March 2011, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra in April 2011, and the Syracuse Symphony in June 2011. The Festival of Orchestras in Orlando, Florida, ceased operations at the end of March 2011. One source of financial difficulties that received notice and criticism was high salaries for music directors of US orchestras, which led several high-profile conductors to take pay cuts in recent years. Music administrators such as Michael Tilson Thomas and Esa-Pekka Salonen argued that new music, new means of presenting it, and a renewed relationship with the community could revitalize the symphony orchestra. The American critic Greg Sandow has argued in detail that orchestras must revise their approach to music, performance, the concert experience, marketing, public relations, community involvement, and presentation to bring them in line with the expectations of 21st century audiences immersed in popular culture. It is not uncommon for contemporary composers to use unconventional instruments, including various synthesizers, to achieve desired effects. Many, however, find more conventional orchestral configuration to provide better possibilities for color and depth. Composers like John Adams often employ Romantic-size orchestras, as in Adams' opera Nixon in China; Philip Glass and others may be more free, yet still identify size-boundaries. Glass in particular has recently turned to conventional orchestras in works like the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra and the Violin Concerto No. 2. Along with a decrease in funding, some U.S. orchestras have reduced their overall personnel, as well as the number of players appearing in performances. The reduced numbers in performance are usually confined to the string section, since the numbers here have traditionally been flexible (as multiple players typically play from the same part). Role of conductor Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. The primary duties of the conductor are to set the tempo, ensure correct entries by various members of the ensemble, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. To convey their ideas and interpretation, a conductor communicates with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, typically (though not invariably) with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals, such as eye contact with relevant performers. A conductor's directions will almost invariably be supplemented or reinforced by verbal instructions or suggestions to their musicians in rehearsal prior to a performance. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments and voices. Since the mid-18th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, although in earlier periods of classical music history, leading an ensemble while playing an instrument was common. In Baroque music from the 1600s to the 1750s, the group would typically be led by the harpsichordist or first violinist (see concertmaster), an approach that in modern times has been revived by several music directors for music from this period. Conducting while playing a piano or synthesizer may also be done with musical theatre pit orchestras. Communication is typically non-verbal during a performance (this is strictly the case in art music, but in jazz big bands or large pop ensembles, there may be occasional spoken instructions, such as a "count in"). However, in rehearsals, frequent interruptions allow the conductor to give verbal directions as to how the music should be played or sung. Conductors act as guides to the orchestras or choirs they conduct. They choose the works to be performed and study their scores, to which they may make certain adjustments (e.g., regarding tempo, articulation, phrasing, repetitions of sections, and so on), work out their interpretation, and relay their vision to the performers. They may also attend to organizational matters, such as scheduling rehearsals, planning a concert season, hearing auditions and selecting members, and promoting their ensemble in the media. Orchestras, choirs, concert bands and other sizable musical ensembles such as big bands are usually led by conductors. Conductorless orchestras In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), most orchestras were led by one of the musicians, typically the principal first violin, called the concertmaster. The concertmaster would lead the tempo of pieces by lifting his or her bow in a rhythmic manner. Leadership might also be provided by one of the chord-playing instrumentalists playing the basso continuo part which was the core of most Baroque instrumental ensemble pieces. Typically, this would be a harpsichord player, a pipe organist, or a lutist or theorbo player. A keyboard player could lead the ensemble with his or her head, or by taking one of the hands off the keyboard to lead a more difficult tempo change. A lutenist or theorbo player could lead by lifting the instrument neck up and down to indicate the tempo of a piece, or to lead a ritard during a cadence or ending. In some works which combined choirs and instrumental ensembles, two leaders were sometimes used: A concertmaster to lead the instrumentalists and a chord-playing performer to lead the singers. During the Classical music period (), the practice of using chordal instruments to play basso continuo was gradually phased out, and it disappeared completely by 1800. Instead, ensembles began to use conductors to lead the orchestra's tempos and playing style, while the concertmaster played an additional leadership role for the musicians, especially the string players, who imitate the bowstroke and playing style of the concertmaster, to the degree that is feasible for the different stringed instruments. In 1922, the idea of a conductor-less orchestra was revived in post-revolutionary Soviet Union. The symphony orchestra Persimfans was formed without a conductor, because the founders believed that the ensemble should be modeled on the ideal Marxist state, in which all people are equal. As such, its members felt that there was no need to be led by the dictatorial baton of a conductor; instead they were led by a committee, which determined tempos and playing styles. Although it was a partial success within the Soviet Union, the principal difficulty with the concept was in changing tempo during performances, because even if the committee had issued a decree about where a tempo change should take place, there was no leader in the ensemble to guide this tempo change. The orchestra survived for ten years before Stalin's cultural politics disbanded it by taking away its funding. In Western nations, some ensembles, such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, based in New York City, have had more success with conductorless orchestras, although decisions are likely to be deferred to some sense of leadership within the ensemble (for example, the principal wind and string players, notably the concertmaster). Others have returned to the tradition of a principal player, usually a violinist, being the artistic director and running rehearsal and leading concerts. Examples include the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam Sinfonietta & Candida Thompson and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. As well, as part of the early music movement, some 20th and 21st century orchestras have revived the Baroque practice of having no conductor on the podium for Baroque pieces, using the concertmaster or a chord-playing basso continuo performer (e.g., harpsichord or organ) to lead the group. Multiple conductors Offstage instruments Some orchestral works specify that an offstage trumpet should be used or that other instruments from the orchestra should be positioned off-stage or behind the stage, to create a haunted, mystical effect. To ensure that the offstage instrumentalist(s) play in time, sometimes a sub-conductor will be stationed offstage with a clear view of the principal conductor. Examples include the ending of "Neptune" from Gustav Holst's The Planets. The principal conductor leads the large orchestra, and the sub-conductor relays the principal conductor's tempo and gestures to the offstage musician (or musicians). One of the challenges with using two conductors is that the second conductor may get out of synchronization with the main conductor, or may mis-convey (or misunderstand) the principal conductor's gestures, which can lead to the offstage instruments being out of time. In the late 20th century and early 21st century, some orchestras use a video camera pointed at the principal conductor and a closed-circuit TV set in front of the offstage performer(s), instead of using two conductors. Contemporary music The techniques of polystylism and polytempo music have led a few 20th and 21st century composers to write music where multiple orchestras or ensembles perform simultaneously. These trends have brought about the phenomenon of polyconductor music, wherein separate sub-conductors conduct each group of musicians. Usually, one principal conductor conducts the sub-conductors, thereby shaping the overall performance. In Percy Grainger's The Warriors which includes three conductors: the primary conductor of the orchestra, a secondary conductor directing an off-stage brass ensemble, and a tertiary conductor directing percussion and harp. One example in the late-century orchestral music is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gruppen, for three orchestras, which are placed around the audience. This way, the "sound masses" could be spatialized, as in an electroacoustic work. Gruppen was premiered in Cologne, in 1958, conducted by Stockhausen, Bruno Maderna and Pierre Boulez. It has been performed in 1996 by Simon Rattle, John Carewe and Daniel Harding. See also Chinese orchestra Gamelan Orchestra List of symphony orchestras List of symphony orchestras in Europe List of symphony orchestras in the United States List of youth orchestras in the United States Orchestral enhancement Orchestration Radio orchestra Rhythm section Shorthand for orchestra instrumentation String orchestra Notes References Further reading External links Articles containing video clips Types of musical groups	false	[ "Finally Awake is the fifth studio album released by Christian rock band Seventh Day Slumber. It was released on March 20, 2007 under Tooth & Nail Records. Finally Awake reached its peak on the Top Christian Albums chart at No. 16 in 2007.\n\nMeaning \nWhen Joseph Rojas was asked about the meaning behind Finally Awake, he responded: \"The message of this album is clear. We want to empower kids to stop looking to the media, to what the world tells them they have to be, to find identity. You don’t have to be what everyone else tells you to. Be what you were created to be.\"\n\nTrack listing \n \"Awake\" - 3:42\n \"Last Regret\" - 3:08\n \"Missing Pages\" - 3:53\n \"My Only Hope\" - 3:45\n \"Always\" - 4:40\n \"Breaking Away\" - 3:35\n \"Burning Bridges\" - 3:54\n \"Undone\" - 3:26\n \"On My Way Home\" - 3:43\n \"Broken Buildings\" - 4:21\n \"Every Saturday\" - 4:20\n\nReferences \n\n2007 albums\nTooth & Nail Records albums\nSeventh Day Slumber albums", "This is the discography of R&B/Hip hop soul trio, Total.\n\nAlbums\n\nStudio albums\n\nSingles\n\n Notes\n Did not chart on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart (Billboard rules at the time prevented album cuts from charting). Chart peak listed represents the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart.\n\nFeatured singles\n\nGuest appearances\n\nSoundtracks\n\nVideography\n From Total (1996)\n No One Else\n No One Else (Puff Daddy Remix)\n Kissin' You\n Kissin' You / Oh Honey\n Can't You See\n Can't You See (Bad Boy Remix)\n Do You Think About Us\n From Kima, Keisha, and Pam (1998)\n Trippin'\n Sitting Home\n From Soul Food (soundtrack) (1997)\n What About Us? (1997)\n As Guest Artists\n LL Cool J - Loungin' (Who Do U Love?) (1995)\nNotorious B.I.G. \"Hypnotize\" (Pam)\nNotorious B.I.G \"Juicy\" (Keisha & Kima)\n Mase - What You Want (1997)\n Foxy Brown - I Can't (1998)\n Tony Touch - I Wonder Why (He's The Greatest DJ) (2000)\n Cameos\n Craig Mack - Flava In Ya Ear (Remix) (Keisha from Total) (1994)\n The Notorious B.I.G. - One More Chance/Stay With Me (1994)\nSoul For Real - Every Little Thing I Do (1995)\n 112 - Only You - Bad Boy Remix (Keisha from Total) (1996)\n Missy Elliott - The Rain (Supa Supa Fly) (1997)\n Jerome - Too Old For Me (Keisha from Total) (1997)\nLil' Kim - Not Tonight (Remix) (1997)\nThe Lox - We'll Always Love Big Poppa (1998)\nThe Bad Boy Family - You (2001) [Featuring Pam & Keisha]\n\nReferences\n\nTotal discography\nHip hop discographies\nRhythm and blues discographies" ]
[ "Orchestra", "Expanded instrumentation", "What instruments were added?", "These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores.", "What was the point of adding these?", "The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors.", "Did this become common practice?", "During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below.", "What part of the world did this originate?", "I don't know.", "What else did you find interesting about this section?", "the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era." ]	C_9123ff7b8c8245fe9021aa28e773b340_0	What details make the orchestras different?	6	What details make the orchestras different?	Orchestra	Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Bolero, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No.6 and 9 and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th-century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Bela Bartok, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). CANNOTANSWER	The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers,	An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass woodwinds such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon brass instruments such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, and tuba percussion instruments such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek phil-, "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. A (sometimes concert orchestra) is a smaller ensemble of not more than about fifty musicians. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire, such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler. Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor's baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed. The leader of the first violin section – commonly called the concertmaster – also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster, or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ὀρχήστρα (orchestra), the name for the area in front of a stage in ancient Greek theatre reserved for the Greek chorus. History Baroque and classical eras In the Baroque era, the size and composition of an orchestra was not standardised. There were large differences in size, instrumentation and playing styles—and therefore in orchestral soundscapes and palettes — between the various European regions. The Baroque orchestra ranged from smaller orchestras (or ensembles) with one player per part, to larger scale orchestras with many players per part. Examples of the smaller variety were Bach's orchestras, for example in Koethen, where he had access to an ensemble of up to 18 players. Examples of large scale Baroque orchestras would include Corelli's orchestra in Rome which ranged between 35 and 80 players for day-to-day performances, being enlarged to 150 players for special occasions. In the classical era, the orchestra became more standardized with a small to medium sized string section and a core wind section consisting of pairs of oboes, flutes, bassoons and horns, sometimes supplemented by percussion and pairs of clarinets and trumpets. Beethoven's influence The so-called "standard complement" of doubled winds and brass in the orchestra pioneered in the late 18th century and consolidated during the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Beethoven after Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven's instrumentation almost always included paired flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets. The exceptions to this are his Symphony No. 4, Violin Concerto, and Piano Concerto No. 4, which each specify a single flute. Beethoven carefully calculated the expansion of this particular timbral "palette" in Symphonies 3, 5, 6, and 9 for an innovative effect. The third horn in the "Eroica" Symphony arrives to provide not only some harmonic flexibility, but also the effect of "choral" brass in the Trio movement. Piccolo, contrabassoon, and trombones add to the triumphal finale of his Symphony No. 5. A piccolo and a pair of trombones help deliver the effect of storm and sunshine in the Sixth, also known as the Pastoral Symphony. The Ninth asks for a second pair of horns, for reasons similar to the "Eroica" (four horns has since become standard); Beethoven's use of piccolo, contrabassoon, trombones, and untuned percussion — plus chorus and vocal soloists — in his finale, are his earliest suggestion that the timbral boundaries of symphony might be expanded. For several decades after his death, symphonic instrumentation was faithful to Beethoven's well-established model, with few exceptions. Instrumental technology The invention of the piston and rotary valve by Heinrich Stölzel and Friedrich Blühmel, both Silesians, in 1815, was the first in a series of innovations which impacted the orchestra, including the development of modern keywork for the flute by Theobald Boehm and the innovations of Adolphe Sax in the woodwinds, notably the invention of the saxophone. These advances would lead Hector Berlioz to write a landmark book on instrumentation, which was the first systematic treatise on the use of instrumental sound as an expressive element of music. Wagner's influence The next major expansion of symphonic practice came from Richard Wagner's Bayreuth orchestra, founded to accompany his musical dramas. Wagner's works for the stage were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. Thus, Wagner envisioned an ever-more-demanding role for the conductor of the theatre orchestra, as he elaborated in his influential work On Conducting. This brought about a revolution in orchestral composition, and set the style for orchestral performance for the next eighty years. Wagner's theories re-examined the importance of tempo, dynamics, bowing of string instruments and the role of principals in the orchestra. 20th-century orchestra At the beginning of the 20th century, symphony orchestras were larger, better funded, and better trained than previously; consequently, composers could compose larger and more ambitious works. The works of Gustav Mahler were particularly innovative; in his later symphonies, such as the mammoth Symphony No. 8, Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces. By the late Romantic era, orchestras could support the most enormous forms of symphonic expression, with huge string sections, massive brass sections and an expanded range of percussion instruments. With the recording era beginning, the standards of performance were pushed to a new level, because a recorded symphony could be listened to closely and even minor errors in intonation or ensemble, which might not be noticeable in a live performance, could be heard by critics. As recording technologies improved over the 20th and 21st centuries, eventually small errors in a recording could be "fixed" by audio editing or overdubbing. Some older conductors and composers could remember a time when simply "getting through" the music as best as possible was the standard. Combined with the wider audience made possible by recording, this led to a renewed focus on particular star conductors and on a high standard of orchestral execution. Instrumentation The typical symphony orchestra consists of four groups of related musical instruments called the woodwinds, brass, percussion, and strings. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes be grouped into a fifth section such as a keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and electric and electronic instruments. The orchestra, depending on the size, contains almost all of the standard instruments in each group. In the history of the orchestra, its instrumentation has been expanded over time, often agreed to have been standardized by the classical period and Ludwig van Beethoven's influence on the classical model. In the 20th and 21st century, new repertory demands expanded the instrumentation of the orchestra, resulting in a flexible use of the classical-model instruments and newly developed electric and electronic instruments in various combinations. The terms symphony orchestra and philharmonic orchestra may be used to distinguish different ensembles from the same locality, such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. A symphony or philharmonic orchestra will usually have over eighty musicians on its roster, in some cases over a hundred, but the actual number of musicians employed in a particular performance may vary according to the work being played and the size of the venue. A chamber orchestra is usually a smaller ensemble; a major chamber orchestra might employ as many as fifty musicians, but some are much smaller. Concert orchestra is an alternative term, as in the BBC Concert Orchestra and the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Expanded instrumentation Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No. 6 and No. 9, and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Béla Bartók, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analysed in five eras: the Baroque era, the Classical era, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic era and combined Modern/Postmodern eras. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann, Brahms); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th-century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). Late Baroque orchestra Woodwinds 2 flutes 2–3 oboes (oboe d'amore and oboe da caccia) bassoon (several players in large orchestras) recorder Brass 2 natural horns(sometimes will have a corno da tirarsi) and/or 2–3 natural trumpets(sometimes will have a tromba da tirarsi) Percussion 2 timpani (one player, used as the bass of the natural trumpet section) Keyboards and other chord-playing instruments selected by the ensemble leader harpsichord pipe organ theorbo Strings (oftentimes several players per part) violin I violin II viola cello or violoncello da spalla double bass (or rather violone/basso a viola da braccio) viola da gamba Classical orchestra Woodwinds 1–2 flutes of which 1 might play 1 piccolo 2 oboes 2 clarinets (B, C, or A) both of which might also play 2 basset horns (occasionally with Mozart) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon (occasionally with Mozart, and Haydn, but not yet a standard instrument) Brass 2 natural horns (valveless) 2 natural trumpets (valveless) 1 alto trombone 1 tenor trombone 1 bass trombone (on occasion Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart, but trombones not yet a standard instrument) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) Keyboards harpsichord or pipe organ (until the late 18th century, by which time it was gradually phased out of the orchestra) Strings (always multiple players per part) violins I violins II violas cellos and double basses Early Romantic orchestra Woodwinds piccolo 2 flutes 2 oboes 2 soprano clarinets of which both might also play 2 Basset horns (occasionally with Beethoven) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4 natural (valveless) or valved horns 2 natural or valved trumpets 3 tenor trombones of which some might play 1 alto trombone 1 bass trombone 1–2 serpents or ophicleides (gradually replaced by tubas) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals triangle tambourine glockenspiel Strings 14 violins 1 12 violins 2 10 violas 8 cellos 6 double basses 1 concert harp Late Romantic orchestra Woodwinds 3–4 flutes, some of which may double on 1–2 piccolos 3–4 oboes, of which some may double on 1 oboe d'amore 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 3–4 clarinets in B or A, of which some might play 1 E clarinet or D clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 3–4 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4–8 French horns, German horns, or Vienna horns (more rarely natural horns) of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas – 2 tenors, 2 bass 3–6 trumpets in F, and other keys including C, B of which some might play 1 bass trumpet 3–4 cornets 3–4 tenor trombones (alto trombone parts from the classical era usually played on tenor trombone) 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 euphonium (usually played by a trombonist when needed) Keyboards piano celesta Percussion 4 or more timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals tam-tam triangle tambourine glockenspiel xylophone tubular bells Strings 16 violins 1 (sometimes more) 14 violins 2 12 violas 12 cellos 10 double basses 2 or more concert harps Modern/Postmodern orchestra Woodwinds 2–4 flutes of which some might play 1–2 piccolos 1 alto flute 2–4 oboes of which 1–2 might play 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 2–4 B clarinets of which some might play 1 E clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 2–4 bassoons of which 1 might play 1 contrabassoon (occasionally 1 or more saxophones of various types) Brass 4–8 horns (double horns) in F/B of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas 3–6 trumpets in B of which some might play 2–3 cornets 1 piccolo trumpet (often for playing very high parts originally for natural trumpets) 1 bass trumpet 1 flugelhorn 1 alto trombone (restored to the postmodern orchestra for playing music of the classical era) 3–6 tenor trombones 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 baritone horn/euphonium Percussion 4–5 timpani (one player) snare drum tenor drum bass drum cymbals triangle tam-tam tambourine wood block glockenspiel xylophone vibraphone marimba crotales tubular bells mark tree sleigh bells bell tree drum kit (in some works) Other percussion instruments, including ethnic or world music instruments specified by composers Keyboards piano pipe organ harpsichord accordion celesta Strings 16 1st violins 14 2nd violins 12 violas 10 cellos 8 double basses 1–2 harps (1 or more classical guitars of various types) Other harmonica Electrophone As required by the compositions in the program, various electric instruments or electronic instruments may be used in the orchestra. These performers are not typically permanent orchestra members. They are typically freelancers hired on contract for one or more concerts. Instruments may include: theremin ondes Martenot electric guitar electric bass guitar electric double bass electric violin, viola & cello Hammond organ Lowrey organ electric piano keytar digital accordion ring modulators synthesizer synclavier novachord clavinet digital drum kit Other electronic musical instruments Non-musical instruments such as a typewriter or reel-to-reel tape player Organization Among the instrument groups and within each group of instruments, there is a generally accepted hierarchy. Every instrumental group (or section) has a principal who is generally responsible for leading the group and playing orchestral solos. The violins are divided into two groups, first violin and second violin, with the second violins playing in lower registers than the first violins, playing an accompaniment part, or harmonizing the melody played by the first violins. The principal first violin is called the concertmaster (or orchestra "leader" in the U.K.) and is not only considered the leader of the string section, but the second-in-command of the entire orchestra, behind only the conductor. The concertmaster leads the pre-concert tuning and handles musical aspects of orchestra management, such as determining the bowings for the violins or for all of the string section. The concertmaster usually sits to the conductor's left, closest to the audience. There is also a principal second violin, a principal viola, a principal cello, and a principal bass. The principal trombone is considered the leader of the low brass section, while the principal trumpet is generally considered the leader of the entire brass section. While the oboe often provides the tuning note for the orchestra (due to a 300 year-old convention), there is generally no designated principal of the woodwind section (though in woodwind ensembles, the flute is often the presumptive leader.) Instead, each principal confers with the others as equals in the case of musical differences of opinion. Most sections also have an assistant principal (or co-principal or associate principal), or in the case of the first violins, an assistant concertmaster, who often plays a tutti part in addition to replacing the principal in his or her absence. A section string player plays in unison with the rest of the section, except in the case of divided (divisi) parts, where upper and lower parts in the music are often assigned to "outside" (nearer the audience) and "inside" seated players. Where a solo part is called for in a string section, the section leader invariably plays that part. The section leader (or principal) of a string section is also responsible for determining the bowings, often based on the bowings set out by the concertmaster. In some cases, the principal of a string section may use a slightly different bowing than the concertmaster, to accommodate the requirements of playing their instrument (e.g., the double-bass section). Principals of a string section will also lead entrances for their section, typically by lifting the bow before the entrance, to ensure the section plays together. Tutti wind and brass players generally play a unique but non-solo part. Section percussionists play parts assigned to them by the principal percussionist. In modern times, the musicians are usually directed by a conductor, although early orchestras did not have one, giving this role instead to the concertmaster or the harpsichordist playing the continuo. Some modern orchestras also do without conductors, particularly smaller orchestras and those specializing in historically accurate (so-called "period") performances of baroque and earlier music. The most frequently performed repertoire for a symphony orchestra is Western classical music or opera. However, orchestras are used sometimes in popular music (e.g., to accompany a rock or pop band in a concert), extensively in film music, and increasingly often in video game music. Orchestras are also used in the symphonic metal genre. The term "orchestra" can also be applied to a jazz ensemble, for example in the performance of big-band music. Selection and appointment of members In the 2000s, all tenured members of a professional orchestra normally audition for positions in the ensemble. Performers typically play one or more solo pieces of the auditionee's choice, such as a movement of a concerto, a solo Bach movement, and a variety of excerpts from the orchestral literature that are advertised in the audition poster (so the auditionees can prepare). The excerpts are typically the most technically challenging parts and solos from the orchestral literature. Orchestral auditions are typically held in front of a panel that includes the conductor, the concertmaster, the principal player of the section for which the auditionee is applying, and possibly other principal players. The most promising candidates from the first round of auditions are invited to return for a second or third round of auditions, which allows the conductor and the panel to compare the best candidates. Performers may be asked to sight read orchestral music. The final stage of the audition process in some orchestras is a test week, in which the performer plays with the orchestra for a week or two, which allows the conductor and principal players to see if the individual can function well in an actual rehearsal and performance setting. There are a range of different employment arrangements. The most sought-after positions are permanent, tenured positions in the orchestra. Orchestras also hire musicians on contracts, ranging in length from a single concert to a full season or more. Contract performers may be hired for individual concerts when the orchestra is doing an exceptionally large late-Romantic era orchestral work, or to substitute for a permanent member who is sick. A professional musician who is hired to perform for a single concert is sometimes called a "sub". Some contract musicians may be hired to replace permanent members for the period that the permanent member is on parental leave or disability leave. History of gender in ensembles Historically, major professional orchestras have been mostly or entirely composed of men. The first women members hired in professional orchestras have been harpists. The Vienna Philharmonic, for example, did not accept women to permanent membership until 1997, far later than comparable orchestras (the other orchestras ranked among the world's top five by Gramophone in 2008). The last major orchestra to appoint a woman to a permanent position was the Berlin Philharmonic. In February 1996, the Vienna Philharmonic's principal flute, Dieter Flury, told Westdeutscher Rundfunk that accepting women would be "gambling with the emotional unity () that this organism currently has". In April 1996, the orchestra's press secretary wrote that "compensating for the expected leaves of absence" of maternity leave would be a problem. In 1997, the Vienna Philharmonic was "facing protests during a [US] tour" by the National Organization for Women and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Finally, "after being held up to increasing ridicule even in socially conservative Austria, members of the orchestra gathered [on 28 February 1997] in an extraordinary meeting on the eve of their departure and agreed to admit a woman, Anna Lelkes, as harpist." As of 2013, the orchestra has six female members; one of them, violinist Albena Danailova, became one of the orchestra's concertmasters in 2008, the first woman to hold that position in that orchestra. In 2012, women made up 6% of the orchestra's membership. VPO president Clemens Hellsberg said the VPO now uses completely screened blind auditions. In 2013, an article in Mother Jones stated that while "[m]any prestigious orchestras have significant female membership — women outnumber men in the New York Philharmonic's violin section — and several renowned ensembles, including the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, and the Minnesota Symphony, are led by women violinists", the double bass, brass, and percussion sections of major orchestras "... are still predominantly male." A 2014 BBC article stated that the "... introduction of 'blind' auditions, where a prospective instrumentalist performs behind a screen so that the judging panel can exercise no gender or racial prejudice, has seen the gender balance of traditionally male-dominated symphony orchestras gradually shift." Amateur ensembles There are also a variety of amateur orchestras: School orchestras These orchestras consist of students from elementary or secondary school. They may be students from a music class or program or they may be drawn from the entire school body. School orchestras are typically led by a music teacher. In some cases, school orchestras are string orchestras, consisting only of students playing string instruments, with students playing woodwinds, brass and percussion grouped together as a concert band. University or conservatory orchestras These orchestras consist of students from a university or music conservatory. In some cases, university orchestras are open to all students from a university, from all programs. Larger universities may have two or more university orchestras: one or more orchestras made up of music majors (or, for major music programs, several tiers of music major orchestras, ranked by skill level) and a second orchestra open to university students from all academic programs (e.g., science, business, etc.) who have previous classical music experience on an orchestral instrument. University and conservatory orchestras are led by a conductor who is typically a professor or instructor at the university or conservatory. Youth orchestras These orchestras consist of teens and young adults drawn from an entire city or region. The age range in youth orchestras varies between different ensembles. In some cases, youth orchestras may consist of teens or young adults from an entire country (e.g., Canada's National Youth Orchestra). Community orchestras These orchestras consist of amateur performers drawn from an entire city or region. Community orchestras typically consist mainly of adult amateur musicians. Community orchestras range in level from beginner-level orchestras which rehearse music without doing formal performances in front of an audience to intermediate-level ensembles to advanced amateur groups which play standard professional orchestra repertoire. In some cases, university or conservatory music students may also be members of community orchestras. While community orchestra members are mostly unpaid amateurs, in some orchestras, a small number of professionals may be hired to act as principal players and section leaders. Repertoire and performances Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire ranging from 17th-century dance suites, 18th century divertimentos to 20th-century film scores and 21st-century symphonies. Orchestras have become synonymous with the symphony, an extended musical composition in Western classical music that typically contains multiple movements which provide contrasting keys and tempos. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. The conductor uses the score to study the symphony before rehearsals and decide on their interpretation (e.g., tempos, articulation, phrasing, etc.), and to follow the music during rehearsals and concerts, while leading the ensemble. Orchestral musicians play from parts containing just the notated music for their instrument. A small number of symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Orchestras also perform overtures, a term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn began to use the term to refer to independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that presaged genres such as the symphonic poem, a form devised by Franz Liszt in several works that began as dramatic overtures. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". In the 1850s the concert overture began to be supplanted by the symphonic poem. Orchestras also play with instrumental soloists in concertos. During concertos, the orchestra plays an accompaniment role to the soloist (e.g., a solo violinist or pianist) and, at times, introduces musical themes or interludes while the soloist is not playing. Orchestras also play during operas, ballets, some musical theatre works and some choral works (both sacred works such as Masses and secular works). In operas and ballets, the orchestra accompanies the singers and dancers, respectively, and plays overtures and interludes where the melodies played by the orchestra take centre stage. Performances In the Baroque era, orchestras performed in a range of venues, including at the fine houses of aristocrats, in opera halls and in churches. Some wealthy aristocrats had an orchestra in residence at their estate, to entertain them and their guests with performances. During the Classical era, as composers increasingly sought out financial support from the general public, orchestra concerts were increasingly held in public concert halls, where music lovers could buy tickets to hear the orchestra. Aristocratic patronage of orchestras continued during the Classical era, but this went on alongside public concerts. In the 20th and 21st century, orchestras found a new patron: governments. Many orchestras in North America and Europe receive part of their funding from national, regional level governments (e.g., state governments in the U.S.) or city governments. These government subsidies make up part of orchestra revenue, along with ticket sales, charitable donations (if the orchestra is registered as a charity) and other fundraising activities. With the invention of successive technologies, including sound recording, radio broadcasting, television broadcasting and Internet-based streaming and downloading of concert videos, orchestras have been able to find new revenue sources. Issues in performance Faking One of the "great unmentionable [topics] of orchestral playing" is "faking", the process by which an orchestral musician gives the false "... impression of playing every note as written", typically for a very challenging passage that is very high or very fast, while not actually playing the notes that are in the printed music part. An article in The Strad states that all orchestral musicians, even those in the top orchestras, occasionally fake certain passages. One reason that musicians fake is because there are not enough rehearsals. Another factor is the extreme challenges in 20th century and 21st century contemporary pieces; some professionals said "faking" was "necessary in anything from ten to almost ninety per cent of some modern works". Professional players who were interviewed were of a consensus that faking may be acceptable when a part is not written well for the instrument, but faking "just because you haven't practised" the music is not acceptable. Counter-revolution With the advent of the early music movement, smaller orchestras where players worked on execution of works in styles derived from the study of older treatises on playing became common. These include the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Classical Players under the direction of Sir Roger Norrington and the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, among others. Recent trends in the United States In the United States, the late 20th century saw a crisis of funding and support for orchestras. The size and cost of a symphony orchestra, compared to the size of the base of supporters, became an issue that struck at the core of the institution. Few orchestras could fill auditoriums, and the time-honored season-subscription system became increasingly anachronistic, as more and more listeners would buy tickets on an ad-hoc basis for individual events. Orchestral endowments and — more centrally to the daily operation of American orchestras — orchestral donors have seen investment portfolios shrink, or produce lower yields, reducing the ability of donors to contribute; further, there has been a trend toward donors finding other social causes more compelling. While government funding is less central to American than European orchestras, cuts in such funding are still significant for American ensembles. Finally, the drastic falling-off of revenues from recording, tied to no small extent to changes in the recording industry itself, began a period of change that has yet to reach its conclusion. U.S. orchestras that have gone into Chapter 11 bankruptcy include the Philadelphia Orchestra (April 2011), and the Louisville Orchestra (December 2010); orchestras that have gone into Chapter 7 bankruptcy and have ceased operations include the Northwest Chamber Orchestra in 2006, the Honolulu Orchestra in March 2011, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra in April 2011, and the Syracuse Symphony in June 2011. The Festival of Orchestras in Orlando, Florida, ceased operations at the end of March 2011. One source of financial difficulties that received notice and criticism was high salaries for music directors of US orchestras, which led several high-profile conductors to take pay cuts in recent years. Music administrators such as Michael Tilson Thomas and Esa-Pekka Salonen argued that new music, new means of presenting it, and a renewed relationship with the community could revitalize the symphony orchestra. The American critic Greg Sandow has argued in detail that orchestras must revise their approach to music, performance, the concert experience, marketing, public relations, community involvement, and presentation to bring them in line with the expectations of 21st century audiences immersed in popular culture. It is not uncommon for contemporary composers to use unconventional instruments, including various synthesizers, to achieve desired effects. Many, however, find more conventional orchestral configuration to provide better possibilities for color and depth. Composers like John Adams often employ Romantic-size orchestras, as in Adams' opera Nixon in China; Philip Glass and others may be more free, yet still identify size-boundaries. Glass in particular has recently turned to conventional orchestras in works like the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra and the Violin Concerto No. 2. Along with a decrease in funding, some U.S. orchestras have reduced their overall personnel, as well as the number of players appearing in performances. The reduced numbers in performance are usually confined to the string section, since the numbers here have traditionally been flexible (as multiple players typically play from the same part). Role of conductor Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. The primary duties of the conductor are to set the tempo, ensure correct entries by various members of the ensemble, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. To convey their ideas and interpretation, a conductor communicates with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, typically (though not invariably) with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals, such as eye contact with relevant performers. A conductor's directions will almost invariably be supplemented or reinforced by verbal instructions or suggestions to their musicians in rehearsal prior to a performance. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments and voices. Since the mid-18th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, although in earlier periods of classical music history, leading an ensemble while playing an instrument was common. In Baroque music from the 1600s to the 1750s, the group would typically be led by the harpsichordist or first violinist (see concertmaster), an approach that in modern times has been revived by several music directors for music from this period. Conducting while playing a piano or synthesizer may also be done with musical theatre pit orchestras. Communication is typically non-verbal during a performance (this is strictly the case in art music, but in jazz big bands or large pop ensembles, there may be occasional spoken instructions, such as a "count in"). However, in rehearsals, frequent interruptions allow the conductor to give verbal directions as to how the music should be played or sung. Conductors act as guides to the orchestras or choirs they conduct. They choose the works to be performed and study their scores, to which they may make certain adjustments (e.g., regarding tempo, articulation, phrasing, repetitions of sections, and so on), work out their interpretation, and relay their vision to the performers. They may also attend to organizational matters, such as scheduling rehearsals, planning a concert season, hearing auditions and selecting members, and promoting their ensemble in the media. Orchestras, choirs, concert bands and other sizable musical ensembles such as big bands are usually led by conductors. Conductorless orchestras In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), most orchestras were led by one of the musicians, typically the principal first violin, called the concertmaster. The concertmaster would lead the tempo of pieces by lifting his or her bow in a rhythmic manner. Leadership might also be provided by one of the chord-playing instrumentalists playing the basso continuo part which was the core of most Baroque instrumental ensemble pieces. Typically, this would be a harpsichord player, a pipe organist, or a lutist or theorbo player. A keyboard player could lead the ensemble with his or her head, or by taking one of the hands off the keyboard to lead a more difficult tempo change. A lutenist or theorbo player could lead by lifting the instrument neck up and down to indicate the tempo of a piece, or to lead a ritard during a cadence or ending. In some works which combined choirs and instrumental ensembles, two leaders were sometimes used: A concertmaster to lead the instrumentalists and a chord-playing performer to lead the singers. During the Classical music period (), the practice of using chordal instruments to play basso continuo was gradually phased out, and it disappeared completely by 1800. Instead, ensembles began to use conductors to lead the orchestra's tempos and playing style, while the concertmaster played an additional leadership role for the musicians, especially the string players, who imitate the bowstroke and playing style of the concertmaster, to the degree that is feasible for the different stringed instruments. In 1922, the idea of a conductor-less orchestra was revived in post-revolutionary Soviet Union. The symphony orchestra Persimfans was formed without a conductor, because the founders believed that the ensemble should be modeled on the ideal Marxist state, in which all people are equal. As such, its members felt that there was no need to be led by the dictatorial baton of a conductor; instead they were led by a committee, which determined tempos and playing styles. Although it was a partial success within the Soviet Union, the principal difficulty with the concept was in changing tempo during performances, because even if the committee had issued a decree about where a tempo change should take place, there was no leader in the ensemble to guide this tempo change. The orchestra survived for ten years before Stalin's cultural politics disbanded it by taking away its funding. In Western nations, some ensembles, such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, based in New York City, have had more success with conductorless orchestras, although decisions are likely to be deferred to some sense of leadership within the ensemble (for example, the principal wind and string players, notably the concertmaster). Others have returned to the tradition of a principal player, usually a violinist, being the artistic director and running rehearsal and leading concerts. Examples include the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam Sinfonietta & Candida Thompson and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. As well, as part of the early music movement, some 20th and 21st century orchestras have revived the Baroque practice of having no conductor on the podium for Baroque pieces, using the concertmaster or a chord-playing basso continuo performer (e.g., harpsichord or organ) to lead the group. Multiple conductors Offstage instruments Some orchestral works specify that an offstage trumpet should be used or that other instruments from the orchestra should be positioned off-stage or behind the stage, to create a haunted, mystical effect. To ensure that the offstage instrumentalist(s) play in time, sometimes a sub-conductor will be stationed offstage with a clear view of the principal conductor. Examples include the ending of "Neptune" from Gustav Holst's The Planets. The principal conductor leads the large orchestra, and the sub-conductor relays the principal conductor's tempo and gestures to the offstage musician (or musicians). One of the challenges with using two conductors is that the second conductor may get out of synchronization with the main conductor, or may mis-convey (or misunderstand) the principal conductor's gestures, which can lead to the offstage instruments being out of time. In the late 20th century and early 21st century, some orchestras use a video camera pointed at the principal conductor and a closed-circuit TV set in front of the offstage performer(s), instead of using two conductors. Contemporary music The techniques of polystylism and polytempo music have led a few 20th and 21st century composers to write music where multiple orchestras or ensembles perform simultaneously. These trends have brought about the phenomenon of polyconductor music, wherein separate sub-conductors conduct each group of musicians. Usually, one principal conductor conducts the sub-conductors, thereby shaping the overall performance. In Percy Grainger's The Warriors which includes three conductors: the primary conductor of the orchestra, a secondary conductor directing an off-stage brass ensemble, and a tertiary conductor directing percussion and harp. One example in the late-century orchestral music is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gruppen, for three orchestras, which are placed around the audience. This way, the "sound masses" could be spatialized, as in an electroacoustic work. Gruppen was premiered in Cologne, in 1958, conducted by Stockhausen, Bruno Maderna and Pierre Boulez. It has been performed in 1996 by Simon Rattle, John Carewe and Daniel Harding. See also Chinese orchestra Gamelan Orchestra List of symphony orchestras List of symphony orchestras in Europe List of symphony orchestras in the United States List of youth orchestras in the United States Orchestral enhancement Orchestration Radio orchestra Rhythm section Shorthand for orchestra instrumentation String orchestra Notes References Further reading External links Articles containing video clips Types of musical groups	true	[ "The Hafnia Chamber Orchestra is a string orchestra from Copenhagen, Denmark.\n\nThe ensemble was formed by young musicians from different international professional orchestras as well as talented students from the Soloist Class at the Royal Danish Academy of Music in Copenhagen.\n\nThe ensemble focuses on a varied repertoire for string orchestra, ranging from baroque to contemporary.\n\nThe orchestra toured Vietnam in November 2007 and Israel and the Palestinian Territories in February 2008.\n\nReferences\n\nDanish orchestras", "A youth orchestra is an orchestra made of young musicians, typically ranging from pre-teens or teenagers to those of conservatory age. Depending on the age range and selectiveness, they may serve different purposes. Orchestras for young students have the primary purpose of music education, often led by a conductor who is also a music teacher. Some youth orchestras have been set up by professional symphony orchestras, both as a training ground for future players, and as part of their community outreach program. This is particularly common in the United States, examples including the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra and the New York Youth Symphony.\n\nWhile a professional orchestra will receive the parts and have a few days of rehearsal, and then play several performances, youth orchestras will typically rehearse the concert program over several months. This additional time gives the conductor to coach the orchestra and teach them how to learn the many skills required of an orchestral player, including instrumental techniques and ensemble playing.\n\nA significant festival for youth orchestras is Young Euro Classic, taking place every summer at the Konzerthaus Berlin in Germany.\n\nNational youth orchestras \nIn contrast to local youth orchestras, which include players from a city or region and thus can meet regularly, national youth orchestras are composed of musicians from all over a country. Therefore, national youth orchestras are usually organized in short-term residencies, followed by a national or international tour. For example, the National Youth Orchestra of the United States organizes a two-week residency in New York each year, before embarking on an international tour.\n\nDepending on the cultural tradition of classical music in a country, national youth orchestras can carry significant prestige, often being led by renowned career conductors. Therefore, they are usually quite selective, requiring applications to audition and recruiting only a fraction of them. For example, the European Union Youth Orchestra (EUYO) selects only around 120 members from 2,000 to 3,000 auditionees each year.\n\nNational youth orchestras often serve as a stepping stone in the career of young musicians. As the required artistic prowess in national youth orchestras is quite high, many former members go on to become professional musicians.\n\nNotable orchestras \n\nNotable youth orchestras include:\n European Union Youth Orchestra\n National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America\n National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain\n National Youth Orchestra of China\n National Youth Orchestra of Canada\n Bundesjugendorchester\n Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra\n\nSee also \n El Sistema\n\nReferences" ]
[ "Orchestra", "Expanded instrumentation", "What instruments were added?", "These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores.", "What was the point of adding these?", "The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors.", "Did this become common practice?", "During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below.", "What part of the world did this originate?", "I don't know.", "What else did you find interesting about this section?", "the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era.", "What details make the orchestras different?", "The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers," ]	C_9123ff7b8c8245fe9021aa28e773b340_0	What changed in the Classical period?	7	What changed in the Classical period?	Orchestra	Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Bolero, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No.6 and 9 and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th-century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Bela Bartok, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). CANNOTANSWER	which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation;	An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass woodwinds such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon brass instruments such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, and tuba percussion instruments such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek phil-, "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. A (sometimes concert orchestra) is a smaller ensemble of not more than about fifty musicians. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire, such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler. Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor's baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed. The leader of the first violin section – commonly called the concertmaster – also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster, or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ὀρχήστρα (orchestra), the name for the area in front of a stage in ancient Greek theatre reserved for the Greek chorus. History Baroque and classical eras In the Baroque era, the size and composition of an orchestra was not standardised. There were large differences in size, instrumentation and playing styles—and therefore in orchestral soundscapes and palettes — between the various European regions. The Baroque orchestra ranged from smaller orchestras (or ensembles) with one player per part, to larger scale orchestras with many players per part. Examples of the smaller variety were Bach's orchestras, for example in Koethen, where he had access to an ensemble of up to 18 players. Examples of large scale Baroque orchestras would include Corelli's orchestra in Rome which ranged between 35 and 80 players for day-to-day performances, being enlarged to 150 players for special occasions. In the classical era, the orchestra became more standardized with a small to medium sized string section and a core wind section consisting of pairs of oboes, flutes, bassoons and horns, sometimes supplemented by percussion and pairs of clarinets and trumpets. Beethoven's influence The so-called "standard complement" of doubled winds and brass in the orchestra pioneered in the late 18th century and consolidated during the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Beethoven after Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven's instrumentation almost always included paired flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets. The exceptions to this are his Symphony No. 4, Violin Concerto, and Piano Concerto No. 4, which each specify a single flute. Beethoven carefully calculated the expansion of this particular timbral "palette" in Symphonies 3, 5, 6, and 9 for an innovative effect. The third horn in the "Eroica" Symphony arrives to provide not only some harmonic flexibility, but also the effect of "choral" brass in the Trio movement. Piccolo, contrabassoon, and trombones add to the triumphal finale of his Symphony No. 5. A piccolo and a pair of trombones help deliver the effect of storm and sunshine in the Sixth, also known as the Pastoral Symphony. The Ninth asks for a second pair of horns, for reasons similar to the "Eroica" (four horns has since become standard); Beethoven's use of piccolo, contrabassoon, trombones, and untuned percussion — plus chorus and vocal soloists — in his finale, are his earliest suggestion that the timbral boundaries of symphony might be expanded. For several decades after his death, symphonic instrumentation was faithful to Beethoven's well-established model, with few exceptions. Instrumental technology The invention of the piston and rotary valve by Heinrich Stölzel and Friedrich Blühmel, both Silesians, in 1815, was the first in a series of innovations which impacted the orchestra, including the development of modern keywork for the flute by Theobald Boehm and the innovations of Adolphe Sax in the woodwinds, notably the invention of the saxophone. These advances would lead Hector Berlioz to write a landmark book on instrumentation, which was the first systematic treatise on the use of instrumental sound as an expressive element of music. Wagner's influence The next major expansion of symphonic practice came from Richard Wagner's Bayreuth orchestra, founded to accompany his musical dramas. Wagner's works for the stage were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. Thus, Wagner envisioned an ever-more-demanding role for the conductor of the theatre orchestra, as he elaborated in his influential work On Conducting. This brought about a revolution in orchestral composition, and set the style for orchestral performance for the next eighty years. Wagner's theories re-examined the importance of tempo, dynamics, bowing of string instruments and the role of principals in the orchestra. 20th-century orchestra At the beginning of the 20th century, symphony orchestras were larger, better funded, and better trained than previously; consequently, composers could compose larger and more ambitious works. The works of Gustav Mahler were particularly innovative; in his later symphonies, such as the mammoth Symphony No. 8, Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces. By the late Romantic era, orchestras could support the most enormous forms of symphonic expression, with huge string sections, massive brass sections and an expanded range of percussion instruments. With the recording era beginning, the standards of performance were pushed to a new level, because a recorded symphony could be listened to closely and even minor errors in intonation or ensemble, which might not be noticeable in a live performance, could be heard by critics. As recording technologies improved over the 20th and 21st centuries, eventually small errors in a recording could be "fixed" by audio editing or overdubbing. Some older conductors and composers could remember a time when simply "getting through" the music as best as possible was the standard. Combined with the wider audience made possible by recording, this led to a renewed focus on particular star conductors and on a high standard of orchestral execution. Instrumentation The typical symphony orchestra consists of four groups of related musical instruments called the woodwinds, brass, percussion, and strings. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes be grouped into a fifth section such as a keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and electric and electronic instruments. The orchestra, depending on the size, contains almost all of the standard instruments in each group. In the history of the orchestra, its instrumentation has been expanded over time, often agreed to have been standardized by the classical period and Ludwig van Beethoven's influence on the classical model. In the 20th and 21st century, new repertory demands expanded the instrumentation of the orchestra, resulting in a flexible use of the classical-model instruments and newly developed electric and electronic instruments in various combinations. The terms symphony orchestra and philharmonic orchestra may be used to distinguish different ensembles from the same locality, such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. A symphony or philharmonic orchestra will usually have over eighty musicians on its roster, in some cases over a hundred, but the actual number of musicians employed in a particular performance may vary according to the work being played and the size of the venue. A chamber orchestra is usually a smaller ensemble; a major chamber orchestra might employ as many as fifty musicians, but some are much smaller. Concert orchestra is an alternative term, as in the BBC Concert Orchestra and the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Expanded instrumentation Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No. 6 and No. 9, and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Béla Bartók, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analysed in five eras: the Baroque era, the Classical era, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic era and combined Modern/Postmodern eras. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann, Brahms); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th-century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). Late Baroque orchestra Woodwinds 2 flutes 2–3 oboes (oboe d'amore and oboe da caccia) bassoon (several players in large orchestras) recorder Brass 2 natural horns(sometimes will have a corno da tirarsi) and/or 2–3 natural trumpets(sometimes will have a tromba da tirarsi) Percussion 2 timpani (one player, used as the bass of the natural trumpet section) Keyboards and other chord-playing instruments selected by the ensemble leader harpsichord pipe organ theorbo Strings (oftentimes several players per part) violin I violin II viola cello or violoncello da spalla double bass (or rather violone/basso a viola da braccio) viola da gamba Classical orchestra Woodwinds 1–2 flutes of which 1 might play 1 piccolo 2 oboes 2 clarinets (B, C, or A) both of which might also play 2 basset horns (occasionally with Mozart) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon (occasionally with Mozart, and Haydn, but not yet a standard instrument) Brass 2 natural horns (valveless) 2 natural trumpets (valveless) 1 alto trombone 1 tenor trombone 1 bass trombone (on occasion Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart, but trombones not yet a standard instrument) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) Keyboards harpsichord or pipe organ (until the late 18th century, by which time it was gradually phased out of the orchestra) Strings (always multiple players per part) violins I violins II violas cellos and double basses Early Romantic orchestra Woodwinds piccolo 2 flutes 2 oboes 2 soprano clarinets of which both might also play 2 Basset horns (occasionally with Beethoven) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4 natural (valveless) or valved horns 2 natural or valved trumpets 3 tenor trombones of which some might play 1 alto trombone 1 bass trombone 1–2 serpents or ophicleides (gradually replaced by tubas) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals triangle tambourine glockenspiel Strings 14 violins 1 12 violins 2 10 violas 8 cellos 6 double basses 1 concert harp Late Romantic orchestra Woodwinds 3–4 flutes, some of which may double on 1–2 piccolos 3–4 oboes, of which some may double on 1 oboe d'amore 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 3–4 clarinets in B or A, of which some might play 1 E clarinet or D clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 3–4 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4–8 French horns, German horns, or Vienna horns (more rarely natural horns) of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas – 2 tenors, 2 bass 3–6 trumpets in F, and other keys including C, B of which some might play 1 bass trumpet 3–4 cornets 3–4 tenor trombones (alto trombone parts from the classical era usually played on tenor trombone) 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 euphonium (usually played by a trombonist when needed) Keyboards piano celesta Percussion 4 or more timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals tam-tam triangle tambourine glockenspiel xylophone tubular bells Strings 16 violins 1 (sometimes more) 14 violins 2 12 violas 12 cellos 10 double basses 2 or more concert harps Modern/Postmodern orchestra Woodwinds 2–4 flutes of which some might play 1–2 piccolos 1 alto flute 2–4 oboes of which 1–2 might play 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 2–4 B clarinets of which some might play 1 E clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 2–4 bassoons of which 1 might play 1 contrabassoon (occasionally 1 or more saxophones of various types) Brass 4–8 horns (double horns) in F/B of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas 3–6 trumpets in B of which some might play 2–3 cornets 1 piccolo trumpet (often for playing very high parts originally for natural trumpets) 1 bass trumpet 1 flugelhorn 1 alto trombone (restored to the postmodern orchestra for playing music of the classical era) 3–6 tenor trombones 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 baritone horn/euphonium Percussion 4–5 timpani (one player) snare drum tenor drum bass drum cymbals triangle tam-tam tambourine wood block glockenspiel xylophone vibraphone marimba crotales tubular bells mark tree sleigh bells bell tree drum kit (in some works) Other percussion instruments, including ethnic or world music instruments specified by composers Keyboards piano pipe organ harpsichord accordion celesta Strings 16 1st violins 14 2nd violins 12 violas 10 cellos 8 double basses 1–2 harps (1 or more classical guitars of various types) Other harmonica Electrophone As required by the compositions in the program, various electric instruments or electronic instruments may be used in the orchestra. These performers are not typically permanent orchestra members. They are typically freelancers hired on contract for one or more concerts. Instruments may include: theremin ondes Martenot electric guitar electric bass guitar electric double bass electric violin, viola & cello Hammond organ Lowrey organ electric piano keytar digital accordion ring modulators synthesizer synclavier novachord clavinet digital drum kit Other electronic musical instruments Non-musical instruments such as a typewriter or reel-to-reel tape player Organization Among the instrument groups and within each group of instruments, there is a generally accepted hierarchy. Every instrumental group (or section) has a principal who is generally responsible for leading the group and playing orchestral solos. The violins are divided into two groups, first violin and second violin, with the second violins playing in lower registers than the first violins, playing an accompaniment part, or harmonizing the melody played by the first violins. The principal first violin is called the concertmaster (or orchestra "leader" in the U.K.) and is not only considered the leader of the string section, but the second-in-command of the entire orchestra, behind only the conductor. The concertmaster leads the pre-concert tuning and handles musical aspects of orchestra management, such as determining the bowings for the violins or for all of the string section. The concertmaster usually sits to the conductor's left, closest to the audience. There is also a principal second violin, a principal viola, a principal cello, and a principal bass. The principal trombone is considered the leader of the low brass section, while the principal trumpet is generally considered the leader of the entire brass section. While the oboe often provides the tuning note for the orchestra (due to a 300 year-old convention), there is generally no designated principal of the woodwind section (though in woodwind ensembles, the flute is often the presumptive leader.) Instead, each principal confers with the others as equals in the case of musical differences of opinion. Most sections also have an assistant principal (or co-principal or associate principal), or in the case of the first violins, an assistant concertmaster, who often plays a tutti part in addition to replacing the principal in his or her absence. A section string player plays in unison with the rest of the section, except in the case of divided (divisi) parts, where upper and lower parts in the music are often assigned to "outside" (nearer the audience) and "inside" seated players. Where a solo part is called for in a string section, the section leader invariably plays that part. The section leader (or principal) of a string section is also responsible for determining the bowings, often based on the bowings set out by the concertmaster. In some cases, the principal of a string section may use a slightly different bowing than the concertmaster, to accommodate the requirements of playing their instrument (e.g., the double-bass section). Principals of a string section will also lead entrances for their section, typically by lifting the bow before the entrance, to ensure the section plays together. Tutti wind and brass players generally play a unique but non-solo part. Section percussionists play parts assigned to them by the principal percussionist. In modern times, the musicians are usually directed by a conductor, although early orchestras did not have one, giving this role instead to the concertmaster or the harpsichordist playing the continuo. Some modern orchestras also do without conductors, particularly smaller orchestras and those specializing in historically accurate (so-called "period") performances of baroque and earlier music. The most frequently performed repertoire for a symphony orchestra is Western classical music or opera. However, orchestras are used sometimes in popular music (e.g., to accompany a rock or pop band in a concert), extensively in film music, and increasingly often in video game music. Orchestras are also used in the symphonic metal genre. The term "orchestra" can also be applied to a jazz ensemble, for example in the performance of big-band music. Selection and appointment of members In the 2000s, all tenured members of a professional orchestra normally audition for positions in the ensemble. Performers typically play one or more solo pieces of the auditionee's choice, such as a movement of a concerto, a solo Bach movement, and a variety of excerpts from the orchestral literature that are advertised in the audition poster (so the auditionees can prepare). The excerpts are typically the most technically challenging parts and solos from the orchestral literature. Orchestral auditions are typically held in front of a panel that includes the conductor, the concertmaster, the principal player of the section for which the auditionee is applying, and possibly other principal players. The most promising candidates from the first round of auditions are invited to return for a second or third round of auditions, which allows the conductor and the panel to compare the best candidates. Performers may be asked to sight read orchestral music. The final stage of the audition process in some orchestras is a test week, in which the performer plays with the orchestra for a week or two, which allows the conductor and principal players to see if the individual can function well in an actual rehearsal and performance setting. There are a range of different employment arrangements. The most sought-after positions are permanent, tenured positions in the orchestra. Orchestras also hire musicians on contracts, ranging in length from a single concert to a full season or more. Contract performers may be hired for individual concerts when the orchestra is doing an exceptionally large late-Romantic era orchestral work, or to substitute for a permanent member who is sick. A professional musician who is hired to perform for a single concert is sometimes called a "sub". Some contract musicians may be hired to replace permanent members for the period that the permanent member is on parental leave or disability leave. History of gender in ensembles Historically, major professional orchestras have been mostly or entirely composed of men. The first women members hired in professional orchestras have been harpists. The Vienna Philharmonic, for example, did not accept women to permanent membership until 1997, far later than comparable orchestras (the other orchestras ranked among the world's top five by Gramophone in 2008). The last major orchestra to appoint a woman to a permanent position was the Berlin Philharmonic. In February 1996, the Vienna Philharmonic's principal flute, Dieter Flury, told Westdeutscher Rundfunk that accepting women would be "gambling with the emotional unity () that this organism currently has". In April 1996, the orchestra's press secretary wrote that "compensating for the expected leaves of absence" of maternity leave would be a problem. In 1997, the Vienna Philharmonic was "facing protests during a [US] tour" by the National Organization for Women and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Finally, "after being held up to increasing ridicule even in socially conservative Austria, members of the orchestra gathered [on 28 February 1997] in an extraordinary meeting on the eve of their departure and agreed to admit a woman, Anna Lelkes, as harpist." As of 2013, the orchestra has six female members; one of them, violinist Albena Danailova, became one of the orchestra's concertmasters in 2008, the first woman to hold that position in that orchestra. In 2012, women made up 6% of the orchestra's membership. VPO president Clemens Hellsberg said the VPO now uses completely screened blind auditions. In 2013, an article in Mother Jones stated that while "[m]any prestigious orchestras have significant female membership — women outnumber men in the New York Philharmonic's violin section — and several renowned ensembles, including the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, and the Minnesota Symphony, are led by women violinists", the double bass, brass, and percussion sections of major orchestras "... are still predominantly male." A 2014 BBC article stated that the "... introduction of 'blind' auditions, where a prospective instrumentalist performs behind a screen so that the judging panel can exercise no gender or racial prejudice, has seen the gender balance of traditionally male-dominated symphony orchestras gradually shift." Amateur ensembles There are also a variety of amateur orchestras: School orchestras These orchestras consist of students from elementary or secondary school. They may be students from a music class or program or they may be drawn from the entire school body. School orchestras are typically led by a music teacher. In some cases, school orchestras are string orchestras, consisting only of students playing string instruments, with students playing woodwinds, brass and percussion grouped together as a concert band. University or conservatory orchestras These orchestras consist of students from a university or music conservatory. In some cases, university orchestras are open to all students from a university, from all programs. Larger universities may have two or more university orchestras: one or more orchestras made up of music majors (or, for major music programs, several tiers of music major orchestras, ranked by skill level) and a second orchestra open to university students from all academic programs (e.g., science, business, etc.) who have previous classical music experience on an orchestral instrument. University and conservatory orchestras are led by a conductor who is typically a professor or instructor at the university or conservatory. Youth orchestras These orchestras consist of teens and young adults drawn from an entire city or region. The age range in youth orchestras varies between different ensembles. In some cases, youth orchestras may consist of teens or young adults from an entire country (e.g., Canada's National Youth Orchestra). Community orchestras These orchestras consist of amateur performers drawn from an entire city or region. Community orchestras typically consist mainly of adult amateur musicians. Community orchestras range in level from beginner-level orchestras which rehearse music without doing formal performances in front of an audience to intermediate-level ensembles to advanced amateur groups which play standard professional orchestra repertoire. In some cases, university or conservatory music students may also be members of community orchestras. While community orchestra members are mostly unpaid amateurs, in some orchestras, a small number of professionals may be hired to act as principal players and section leaders. Repertoire and performances Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire ranging from 17th-century dance suites, 18th century divertimentos to 20th-century film scores and 21st-century symphonies. Orchestras have become synonymous with the symphony, an extended musical composition in Western classical music that typically contains multiple movements which provide contrasting keys and tempos. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. The conductor uses the score to study the symphony before rehearsals and decide on their interpretation (e.g., tempos, articulation, phrasing, etc.), and to follow the music during rehearsals and concerts, while leading the ensemble. Orchestral musicians play from parts containing just the notated music for their instrument. A small number of symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Orchestras also perform overtures, a term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn began to use the term to refer to independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that presaged genres such as the symphonic poem, a form devised by Franz Liszt in several works that began as dramatic overtures. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". In the 1850s the concert overture began to be supplanted by the symphonic poem. Orchestras also play with instrumental soloists in concertos. During concertos, the orchestra plays an accompaniment role to the soloist (e.g., a solo violinist or pianist) and, at times, introduces musical themes or interludes while the soloist is not playing. Orchestras also play during operas, ballets, some musical theatre works and some choral works (both sacred works such as Masses and secular works). In operas and ballets, the orchestra accompanies the singers and dancers, respectively, and plays overtures and interludes where the melodies played by the orchestra take centre stage. Performances In the Baroque era, orchestras performed in a range of venues, including at the fine houses of aristocrats, in opera halls and in churches. Some wealthy aristocrats had an orchestra in residence at their estate, to entertain them and their guests with performances. During the Classical era, as composers increasingly sought out financial support from the general public, orchestra concerts were increasingly held in public concert halls, where music lovers could buy tickets to hear the orchestra. Aristocratic patronage of orchestras continued during the Classical era, but this went on alongside public concerts. In the 20th and 21st century, orchestras found a new patron: governments. Many orchestras in North America and Europe receive part of their funding from national, regional level governments (e.g., state governments in the U.S.) or city governments. These government subsidies make up part of orchestra revenue, along with ticket sales, charitable donations (if the orchestra is registered as a charity) and other fundraising activities. With the invention of successive technologies, including sound recording, radio broadcasting, television broadcasting and Internet-based streaming and downloading of concert videos, orchestras have been able to find new revenue sources. Issues in performance Faking One of the "great unmentionable [topics] of orchestral playing" is "faking", the process by which an orchestral musician gives the false "... impression of playing every note as written", typically for a very challenging passage that is very high or very fast, while not actually playing the notes that are in the printed music part. An article in The Strad states that all orchestral musicians, even those in the top orchestras, occasionally fake certain passages. One reason that musicians fake is because there are not enough rehearsals. Another factor is the extreme challenges in 20th century and 21st century contemporary pieces; some professionals said "faking" was "necessary in anything from ten to almost ninety per cent of some modern works". Professional players who were interviewed were of a consensus that faking may be acceptable when a part is not written well for the instrument, but faking "just because you haven't practised" the music is not acceptable. Counter-revolution With the advent of the early music movement, smaller orchestras where players worked on execution of works in styles derived from the study of older treatises on playing became common. These include the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Classical Players under the direction of Sir Roger Norrington and the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, among others. Recent trends in the United States In the United States, the late 20th century saw a crisis of funding and support for orchestras. The size and cost of a symphony orchestra, compared to the size of the base of supporters, became an issue that struck at the core of the institution. Few orchestras could fill auditoriums, and the time-honored season-subscription system became increasingly anachronistic, as more and more listeners would buy tickets on an ad-hoc basis for individual events. Orchestral endowments and — more centrally to the daily operation of American orchestras — orchestral donors have seen investment portfolios shrink, or produce lower yields, reducing the ability of donors to contribute; further, there has been a trend toward donors finding other social causes more compelling. While government funding is less central to American than European orchestras, cuts in such funding are still significant for American ensembles. Finally, the drastic falling-off of revenues from recording, tied to no small extent to changes in the recording industry itself, began a period of change that has yet to reach its conclusion. U.S. orchestras that have gone into Chapter 11 bankruptcy include the Philadelphia Orchestra (April 2011), and the Louisville Orchestra (December 2010); orchestras that have gone into Chapter 7 bankruptcy and have ceased operations include the Northwest Chamber Orchestra in 2006, the Honolulu Orchestra in March 2011, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra in April 2011, and the Syracuse Symphony in June 2011. The Festival of Orchestras in Orlando, Florida, ceased operations at the end of March 2011. One source of financial difficulties that received notice and criticism was high salaries for music directors of US orchestras, which led several high-profile conductors to take pay cuts in recent years. Music administrators such as Michael Tilson Thomas and Esa-Pekka Salonen argued that new music, new means of presenting it, and a renewed relationship with the community could revitalize the symphony orchestra. The American critic Greg Sandow has argued in detail that orchestras must revise their approach to music, performance, the concert experience, marketing, public relations, community involvement, and presentation to bring them in line with the expectations of 21st century audiences immersed in popular culture. It is not uncommon for contemporary composers to use unconventional instruments, including various synthesizers, to achieve desired effects. Many, however, find more conventional orchestral configuration to provide better possibilities for color and depth. Composers like John Adams often employ Romantic-size orchestras, as in Adams' opera Nixon in China; Philip Glass and others may be more free, yet still identify size-boundaries. Glass in particular has recently turned to conventional orchestras in works like the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra and the Violin Concerto No. 2. Along with a decrease in funding, some U.S. orchestras have reduced their overall personnel, as well as the number of players appearing in performances. The reduced numbers in performance are usually confined to the string section, since the numbers here have traditionally been flexible (as multiple players typically play from the same part). Role of conductor Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. The primary duties of the conductor are to set the tempo, ensure correct entries by various members of the ensemble, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. To convey their ideas and interpretation, a conductor communicates with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, typically (though not invariably) with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals, such as eye contact with relevant performers. A conductor's directions will almost invariably be supplemented or reinforced by verbal instructions or suggestions to their musicians in rehearsal prior to a performance. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments and voices. Since the mid-18th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, although in earlier periods of classical music history, leading an ensemble while playing an instrument was common. In Baroque music from the 1600s to the 1750s, the group would typically be led by the harpsichordist or first violinist (see concertmaster), an approach that in modern times has been revived by several music directors for music from this period. Conducting while playing a piano or synthesizer may also be done with musical theatre pit orchestras. Communication is typically non-verbal during a performance (this is strictly the case in art music, but in jazz big bands or large pop ensembles, there may be occasional spoken instructions, such as a "count in"). However, in rehearsals, frequent interruptions allow the conductor to give verbal directions as to how the music should be played or sung. Conductors act as guides to the orchestras or choirs they conduct. They choose the works to be performed and study their scores, to which they may make certain adjustments (e.g., regarding tempo, articulation, phrasing, repetitions of sections, and so on), work out their interpretation, and relay their vision to the performers. They may also attend to organizational matters, such as scheduling rehearsals, planning a concert season, hearing auditions and selecting members, and promoting their ensemble in the media. Orchestras, choirs, concert bands and other sizable musical ensembles such as big bands are usually led by conductors. Conductorless orchestras In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), most orchestras were led by one of the musicians, typically the principal first violin, called the concertmaster. The concertmaster would lead the tempo of pieces by lifting his or her bow in a rhythmic manner. Leadership might also be provided by one of the chord-playing instrumentalists playing the basso continuo part which was the core of most Baroque instrumental ensemble pieces. Typically, this would be a harpsichord player, a pipe organist, or a lutist or theorbo player. A keyboard player could lead the ensemble with his or her head, or by taking one of the hands off the keyboard to lead a more difficult tempo change. A lutenist or theorbo player could lead by lifting the instrument neck up and down to indicate the tempo of a piece, or to lead a ritard during a cadence or ending. In some works which combined choirs and instrumental ensembles, two leaders were sometimes used: A concertmaster to lead the instrumentalists and a chord-playing performer to lead the singers. During the Classical music period (), the practice of using chordal instruments to play basso continuo was gradually phased out, and it disappeared completely by 1800. Instead, ensembles began to use conductors to lead the orchestra's tempos and playing style, while the concertmaster played an additional leadership role for the musicians, especially the string players, who imitate the bowstroke and playing style of the concertmaster, to the degree that is feasible for the different stringed instruments. In 1922, the idea of a conductor-less orchestra was revived in post-revolutionary Soviet Union. The symphony orchestra Persimfans was formed without a conductor, because the founders believed that the ensemble should be modeled on the ideal Marxist state, in which all people are equal. As such, its members felt that there was no need to be led by the dictatorial baton of a conductor; instead they were led by a committee, which determined tempos and playing styles. Although it was a partial success within the Soviet Union, the principal difficulty with the concept was in changing tempo during performances, because even if the committee had issued a decree about where a tempo change should take place, there was no leader in the ensemble to guide this tempo change. The orchestra survived for ten years before Stalin's cultural politics disbanded it by taking away its funding. In Western nations, some ensembles, such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, based in New York City, have had more success with conductorless orchestras, although decisions are likely to be deferred to some sense of leadership within the ensemble (for example, the principal wind and string players, notably the concertmaster). Others have returned to the tradition of a principal player, usually a violinist, being the artistic director and running rehearsal and leading concerts. Examples include the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam Sinfonietta & Candida Thompson and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. As well, as part of the early music movement, some 20th and 21st century orchestras have revived the Baroque practice of having no conductor on the podium for Baroque pieces, using the concertmaster or a chord-playing basso continuo performer (e.g., harpsichord or organ) to lead the group. Multiple conductors Offstage instruments Some orchestral works specify that an offstage trumpet should be used or that other instruments from the orchestra should be positioned off-stage or behind the stage, to create a haunted, mystical effect. To ensure that the offstage instrumentalist(s) play in time, sometimes a sub-conductor will be stationed offstage with a clear view of the principal conductor. Examples include the ending of "Neptune" from Gustav Holst's The Planets. The principal conductor leads the large orchestra, and the sub-conductor relays the principal conductor's tempo and gestures to the offstage musician (or musicians). One of the challenges with using two conductors is that the second conductor may get out of synchronization with the main conductor, or may mis-convey (or misunderstand) the principal conductor's gestures, which can lead to the offstage instruments being out of time. In the late 20th century and early 21st century, some orchestras use a video camera pointed at the principal conductor and a closed-circuit TV set in front of the offstage performer(s), instead of using two conductors. Contemporary music The techniques of polystylism and polytempo music have led a few 20th and 21st century composers to write music where multiple orchestras or ensembles perform simultaneously. These trends have brought about the phenomenon of polyconductor music, wherein separate sub-conductors conduct each group of musicians. Usually, one principal conductor conducts the sub-conductors, thereby shaping the overall performance. In Percy Grainger's The Warriors which includes three conductors: the primary conductor of the orchestra, a secondary conductor directing an off-stage brass ensemble, and a tertiary conductor directing percussion and harp. One example in the late-century orchestral music is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gruppen, for three orchestras, which are placed around the audience. This way, the "sound masses" could be spatialized, as in an electroacoustic work. Gruppen was premiered in Cologne, in 1958, conducted by Stockhausen, Bruno Maderna and Pierre Boulez. It has been performed in 1996 by Simon Rattle, John Carewe and Daniel Harding. See also Chinese orchestra Gamelan Orchestra List of symphony orchestras List of symphony orchestras in Europe List of symphony orchestras in the United States List of youth orchestras in the United States Orchestral enhancement Orchestration Radio orchestra Rhythm section Shorthand for orchestra instrumentation String orchestra Notes References Further reading External links Articles containing video clips Types of musical groups	true	[ "WCVT (101.7 FM) is a radio station broadcasting a full-service classic hits format, branded as \"101-7 WCVT Classic Hits Vermont\" Licensed to Stowe, Vermont, United States, the station serves Northern Vermont including the Burlington-Plattsburgh market, along with the Montpelier-Saint Johnsbury market. It is owned by the Radio Vermont Group, controlled by NASCAR broadcaster Ken Squier.\n\nHistory\n\nThe station went on the air as WVMX on October 28, 1990. On July 2, 1997, the station changed its call sign to the current WCVT. When the station's call sign changed, its format did as well, and it began airing classical music. In June 2014, Radio Vermont announced that WCVT would drop the classical format in July, citing the growth of the noncommercial VPR Classical network. The station launched a full service classic hits music format branded as \"101 The One\" on July 1; the new format features what Ken Squier described as \"a new adult service local to Vermont.\"\n\nOn September 28, 2020 the station re-branded as 101.7 WCVT Classic Hits Vermont, while retaining a deep library classic hits format.\n\nTranslator\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nCVT\nRadio stations established in 1990\n1990 establishments in Vermont\nClassic hits radio stations in the United States", "Christian Ernst Friedrich Graf (Rudolstadt, 30 June 1723 – The Hague, 17 July 1804) was a Dutch Kapellmeister and composer of German descent. He was Kapellmeister to William V, Prince of Orange and resident in the Netherlands from 1762, where he changed the spelling of his name to Graaf.\n\nHe was the son of Kapellmeister :de:Johann Graf (1684–1750) and brother of the flautist Friedrich Hartmann Graf.\n\nHe composed multiple symphonies as well as concertos and songs.\n\nWorks Include:\n\nOp. 1 Sinfonia voor Orkest in C (Symphony for Orchestra in C)\nSymphony No. 1 in F major\nSymphony in D\nCello Concerto No. 1 in D major (1777) for cello and orchestra\nLaat ons juichen, Batavieren! (1766) for tenor and harpsichord\nDe pruimeboom (Jantje zag eens pruimen hangen) for baritone and harpsichord, poem by Hieronymus van Alphen\n\nReferences\n\nClassical-period composers\n1723 births\n1804 deaths\nGerman male classical composers\nGerman classical composers\n19th-century German male musicians" ]
[ "Orchestra", "Expanded instrumentation", "What instruments were added?", "These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores.", "What was the point of adding these?", "The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors.", "Did this become common practice?", "During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below.", "What part of the world did this originate?", "I don't know.", "What else did you find interesting about this section?", "the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era.", "What details make the orchestras different?", "The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers,", "What changed in the Classical period?", "which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation;" ]	C_9123ff7b8c8245fe9021aa28e773b340_0	Did the early-mid Romantic period have many changes?	8	Did the early-mid Romantic period have many changes?	Orchestra	Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Bolero, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No.6 and 9 and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th-century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Bela Bartok, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). CANNOTANSWER	the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann);	An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass woodwinds such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon brass instruments such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, and tuba percussion instruments such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek phil-, "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. A (sometimes concert orchestra) is a smaller ensemble of not more than about fifty musicians. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire, such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler. Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor's baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed. The leader of the first violin section – commonly called the concertmaster – also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster, or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ὀρχήστρα (orchestra), the name for the area in front of a stage in ancient Greek theatre reserved for the Greek chorus. History Baroque and classical eras In the Baroque era, the size and composition of an orchestra was not standardised. There were large differences in size, instrumentation and playing styles—and therefore in orchestral soundscapes and palettes — between the various European regions. The Baroque orchestra ranged from smaller orchestras (or ensembles) with one player per part, to larger scale orchestras with many players per part. Examples of the smaller variety were Bach's orchestras, for example in Koethen, where he had access to an ensemble of up to 18 players. Examples of large scale Baroque orchestras would include Corelli's orchestra in Rome which ranged between 35 and 80 players for day-to-day performances, being enlarged to 150 players for special occasions. In the classical era, the orchestra became more standardized with a small to medium sized string section and a core wind section consisting of pairs of oboes, flutes, bassoons and horns, sometimes supplemented by percussion and pairs of clarinets and trumpets. Beethoven's influence The so-called "standard complement" of doubled winds and brass in the orchestra pioneered in the late 18th century and consolidated during the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Beethoven after Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven's instrumentation almost always included paired flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets. The exceptions to this are his Symphony No. 4, Violin Concerto, and Piano Concerto No. 4, which each specify a single flute. Beethoven carefully calculated the expansion of this particular timbral "palette" in Symphonies 3, 5, 6, and 9 for an innovative effect. The third horn in the "Eroica" Symphony arrives to provide not only some harmonic flexibility, but also the effect of "choral" brass in the Trio movement. Piccolo, contrabassoon, and trombones add to the triumphal finale of his Symphony No. 5. A piccolo and a pair of trombones help deliver the effect of storm and sunshine in the Sixth, also known as the Pastoral Symphony. The Ninth asks for a second pair of horns, for reasons similar to the "Eroica" (four horns has since become standard); Beethoven's use of piccolo, contrabassoon, trombones, and untuned percussion — plus chorus and vocal soloists — in his finale, are his earliest suggestion that the timbral boundaries of symphony might be expanded. For several decades after his death, symphonic instrumentation was faithful to Beethoven's well-established model, with few exceptions. Instrumental technology The invention of the piston and rotary valve by Heinrich Stölzel and Friedrich Blühmel, both Silesians, in 1815, was the first in a series of innovations which impacted the orchestra, including the development of modern keywork for the flute by Theobald Boehm and the innovations of Adolphe Sax in the woodwinds, notably the invention of the saxophone. These advances would lead Hector Berlioz to write a landmark book on instrumentation, which was the first systematic treatise on the use of instrumental sound as an expressive element of music. Wagner's influence The next major expansion of symphonic practice came from Richard Wagner's Bayreuth orchestra, founded to accompany his musical dramas. Wagner's works for the stage were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. Thus, Wagner envisioned an ever-more-demanding role for the conductor of the theatre orchestra, as he elaborated in his influential work On Conducting. This brought about a revolution in orchestral composition, and set the style for orchestral performance for the next eighty years. Wagner's theories re-examined the importance of tempo, dynamics, bowing of string instruments and the role of principals in the orchestra. 20th-century orchestra At the beginning of the 20th century, symphony orchestras were larger, better funded, and better trained than previously; consequently, composers could compose larger and more ambitious works. The works of Gustav Mahler were particularly innovative; in his later symphonies, such as the mammoth Symphony No. 8, Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces. By the late Romantic era, orchestras could support the most enormous forms of symphonic expression, with huge string sections, massive brass sections and an expanded range of percussion instruments. With the recording era beginning, the standards of performance were pushed to a new level, because a recorded symphony could be listened to closely and even minor errors in intonation or ensemble, which might not be noticeable in a live performance, could be heard by critics. As recording technologies improved over the 20th and 21st centuries, eventually small errors in a recording could be "fixed" by audio editing or overdubbing. Some older conductors and composers could remember a time when simply "getting through" the music as best as possible was the standard. Combined with the wider audience made possible by recording, this led to a renewed focus on particular star conductors and on a high standard of orchestral execution. Instrumentation The typical symphony orchestra consists of four groups of related musical instruments called the woodwinds, brass, percussion, and strings. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes be grouped into a fifth section such as a keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and electric and electronic instruments. The orchestra, depending on the size, contains almost all of the standard instruments in each group. In the history of the orchestra, its instrumentation has been expanded over time, often agreed to have been standardized by the classical period and Ludwig van Beethoven's influence on the classical model. In the 20th and 21st century, new repertory demands expanded the instrumentation of the orchestra, resulting in a flexible use of the classical-model instruments and newly developed electric and electronic instruments in various combinations. The terms symphony orchestra and philharmonic orchestra may be used to distinguish different ensembles from the same locality, such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. A symphony or philharmonic orchestra will usually have over eighty musicians on its roster, in some cases over a hundred, but the actual number of musicians employed in a particular performance may vary according to the work being played and the size of the venue. A chamber orchestra is usually a smaller ensemble; a major chamber orchestra might employ as many as fifty musicians, but some are much smaller. Concert orchestra is an alternative term, as in the BBC Concert Orchestra and the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Expanded instrumentation Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No. 6 and No. 9, and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Béla Bartók, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analysed in five eras: the Baroque era, the Classical era, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic era and combined Modern/Postmodern eras. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann, Brahms); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th-century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). Late Baroque orchestra Woodwinds 2 flutes 2–3 oboes (oboe d'amore and oboe da caccia) bassoon (several players in large orchestras) recorder Brass 2 natural horns(sometimes will have a corno da tirarsi) and/or 2–3 natural trumpets(sometimes will have a tromba da tirarsi) Percussion 2 timpani (one player, used as the bass of the natural trumpet section) Keyboards and other chord-playing instruments selected by the ensemble leader harpsichord pipe organ theorbo Strings (oftentimes several players per part) violin I violin II viola cello or violoncello da spalla double bass (or rather violone/basso a viola da braccio) viola da gamba Classical orchestra Woodwinds 1–2 flutes of which 1 might play 1 piccolo 2 oboes 2 clarinets (B, C, or A) both of which might also play 2 basset horns (occasionally with Mozart) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon (occasionally with Mozart, and Haydn, but not yet a standard instrument) Brass 2 natural horns (valveless) 2 natural trumpets (valveless) 1 alto trombone 1 tenor trombone 1 bass trombone (on occasion Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart, but trombones not yet a standard instrument) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) Keyboards harpsichord or pipe organ (until the late 18th century, by which time it was gradually phased out of the orchestra) Strings (always multiple players per part) violins I violins II violas cellos and double basses Early Romantic orchestra Woodwinds piccolo 2 flutes 2 oboes 2 soprano clarinets of which both might also play 2 Basset horns (occasionally with Beethoven) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4 natural (valveless) or valved horns 2 natural or valved trumpets 3 tenor trombones of which some might play 1 alto trombone 1 bass trombone 1–2 serpents or ophicleides (gradually replaced by tubas) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals triangle tambourine glockenspiel Strings 14 violins 1 12 violins 2 10 violas 8 cellos 6 double basses 1 concert harp Late Romantic orchestra Woodwinds 3–4 flutes, some of which may double on 1–2 piccolos 3–4 oboes, of which some may double on 1 oboe d'amore 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 3–4 clarinets in B or A, of which some might play 1 E clarinet or D clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 3–4 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4–8 French horns, German horns, or Vienna horns (more rarely natural horns) of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas – 2 tenors, 2 bass 3–6 trumpets in F, and other keys including C, B of which some might play 1 bass trumpet 3–4 cornets 3–4 tenor trombones (alto trombone parts from the classical era usually played on tenor trombone) 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 euphonium (usually played by a trombonist when needed) Keyboards piano celesta Percussion 4 or more timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals tam-tam triangle tambourine glockenspiel xylophone tubular bells Strings 16 violins 1 (sometimes more) 14 violins 2 12 violas 12 cellos 10 double basses 2 or more concert harps Modern/Postmodern orchestra Woodwinds 2–4 flutes of which some might play 1–2 piccolos 1 alto flute 2–4 oboes of which 1–2 might play 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 2–4 B clarinets of which some might play 1 E clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 2–4 bassoons of which 1 might play 1 contrabassoon (occasionally 1 or more saxophones of various types) Brass 4–8 horns (double horns) in F/B of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas 3–6 trumpets in B of which some might play 2–3 cornets 1 piccolo trumpet (often for playing very high parts originally for natural trumpets) 1 bass trumpet 1 flugelhorn 1 alto trombone (restored to the postmodern orchestra for playing music of the classical era) 3–6 tenor trombones 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 baritone horn/euphonium Percussion 4–5 timpani (one player) snare drum tenor drum bass drum cymbals triangle tam-tam tambourine wood block glockenspiel xylophone vibraphone marimba crotales tubular bells mark tree sleigh bells bell tree drum kit (in some works) Other percussion instruments, including ethnic or world music instruments specified by composers Keyboards piano pipe organ harpsichord accordion celesta Strings 16 1st violins 14 2nd violins 12 violas 10 cellos 8 double basses 1–2 harps (1 or more classical guitars of various types) Other harmonica Electrophone As required by the compositions in the program, various electric instruments or electronic instruments may be used in the orchestra. These performers are not typically permanent orchestra members. They are typically freelancers hired on contract for one or more concerts. Instruments may include: theremin ondes Martenot electric guitar electric bass guitar electric double bass electric violin, viola & cello Hammond organ Lowrey organ electric piano keytar digital accordion ring modulators synthesizer synclavier novachord clavinet digital drum kit Other electronic musical instruments Non-musical instruments such as a typewriter or reel-to-reel tape player Organization Among the instrument groups and within each group of instruments, there is a generally accepted hierarchy. Every instrumental group (or section) has a principal who is generally responsible for leading the group and playing orchestral solos. The violins are divided into two groups, first violin and second violin, with the second violins playing in lower registers than the first violins, playing an accompaniment part, or harmonizing the melody played by the first violins. The principal first violin is called the concertmaster (or orchestra "leader" in the U.K.) and is not only considered the leader of the string section, but the second-in-command of the entire orchestra, behind only the conductor. The concertmaster leads the pre-concert tuning and handles musical aspects of orchestra management, such as determining the bowings for the violins or for all of the string section. The concertmaster usually sits to the conductor's left, closest to the audience. There is also a principal second violin, a principal viola, a principal cello, and a principal bass. The principal trombone is considered the leader of the low brass section, while the principal trumpet is generally considered the leader of the entire brass section. While the oboe often provides the tuning note for the orchestra (due to a 300 year-old convention), there is generally no designated principal of the woodwind section (though in woodwind ensembles, the flute is often the presumptive leader.) Instead, each principal confers with the others as equals in the case of musical differences of opinion. Most sections also have an assistant principal (or co-principal or associate principal), or in the case of the first violins, an assistant concertmaster, who often plays a tutti part in addition to replacing the principal in his or her absence. A section string player plays in unison with the rest of the section, except in the case of divided (divisi) parts, where upper and lower parts in the music are often assigned to "outside" (nearer the audience) and "inside" seated players. Where a solo part is called for in a string section, the section leader invariably plays that part. The section leader (or principal) of a string section is also responsible for determining the bowings, often based on the bowings set out by the concertmaster. In some cases, the principal of a string section may use a slightly different bowing than the concertmaster, to accommodate the requirements of playing their instrument (e.g., the double-bass section). Principals of a string section will also lead entrances for their section, typically by lifting the bow before the entrance, to ensure the section plays together. Tutti wind and brass players generally play a unique but non-solo part. Section percussionists play parts assigned to them by the principal percussionist. In modern times, the musicians are usually directed by a conductor, although early orchestras did not have one, giving this role instead to the concertmaster or the harpsichordist playing the continuo. Some modern orchestras also do without conductors, particularly smaller orchestras and those specializing in historically accurate (so-called "period") performances of baroque and earlier music. The most frequently performed repertoire for a symphony orchestra is Western classical music or opera. However, orchestras are used sometimes in popular music (e.g., to accompany a rock or pop band in a concert), extensively in film music, and increasingly often in video game music. Orchestras are also used in the symphonic metal genre. The term "orchestra" can also be applied to a jazz ensemble, for example in the performance of big-band music. Selection and appointment of members In the 2000s, all tenured members of a professional orchestra normally audition for positions in the ensemble. Performers typically play one or more solo pieces of the auditionee's choice, such as a movement of a concerto, a solo Bach movement, and a variety of excerpts from the orchestral literature that are advertised in the audition poster (so the auditionees can prepare). The excerpts are typically the most technically challenging parts and solos from the orchestral literature. Orchestral auditions are typically held in front of a panel that includes the conductor, the concertmaster, the principal player of the section for which the auditionee is applying, and possibly other principal players. The most promising candidates from the first round of auditions are invited to return for a second or third round of auditions, which allows the conductor and the panel to compare the best candidates. Performers may be asked to sight read orchestral music. The final stage of the audition process in some orchestras is a test week, in which the performer plays with the orchestra for a week or two, which allows the conductor and principal players to see if the individual can function well in an actual rehearsal and performance setting. There are a range of different employment arrangements. The most sought-after positions are permanent, tenured positions in the orchestra. Orchestras also hire musicians on contracts, ranging in length from a single concert to a full season or more. Contract performers may be hired for individual concerts when the orchestra is doing an exceptionally large late-Romantic era orchestral work, or to substitute for a permanent member who is sick. A professional musician who is hired to perform for a single concert is sometimes called a "sub". Some contract musicians may be hired to replace permanent members for the period that the permanent member is on parental leave or disability leave. History of gender in ensembles Historically, major professional orchestras have been mostly or entirely composed of men. The first women members hired in professional orchestras have been harpists. The Vienna Philharmonic, for example, did not accept women to permanent membership until 1997, far later than comparable orchestras (the other orchestras ranked among the world's top five by Gramophone in 2008). The last major orchestra to appoint a woman to a permanent position was the Berlin Philharmonic. In February 1996, the Vienna Philharmonic's principal flute, Dieter Flury, told Westdeutscher Rundfunk that accepting women would be "gambling with the emotional unity () that this organism currently has". In April 1996, the orchestra's press secretary wrote that "compensating for the expected leaves of absence" of maternity leave would be a problem. In 1997, the Vienna Philharmonic was "facing protests during a [US] tour" by the National Organization for Women and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Finally, "after being held up to increasing ridicule even in socially conservative Austria, members of the orchestra gathered [on 28 February 1997] in an extraordinary meeting on the eve of their departure and agreed to admit a woman, Anna Lelkes, as harpist." As of 2013, the orchestra has six female members; one of them, violinist Albena Danailova, became one of the orchestra's concertmasters in 2008, the first woman to hold that position in that orchestra. In 2012, women made up 6% of the orchestra's membership. VPO president Clemens Hellsberg said the VPO now uses completely screened blind auditions. In 2013, an article in Mother Jones stated that while "[m]any prestigious orchestras have significant female membership — women outnumber men in the New York Philharmonic's violin section — and several renowned ensembles, including the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, and the Minnesota Symphony, are led by women violinists", the double bass, brass, and percussion sections of major orchestras "... are still predominantly male." A 2014 BBC article stated that the "... introduction of 'blind' auditions, where a prospective instrumentalist performs behind a screen so that the judging panel can exercise no gender or racial prejudice, has seen the gender balance of traditionally male-dominated symphony orchestras gradually shift." Amateur ensembles There are also a variety of amateur orchestras: School orchestras These orchestras consist of students from elementary or secondary school. They may be students from a music class or program or they may be drawn from the entire school body. School orchestras are typically led by a music teacher. In some cases, school orchestras are string orchestras, consisting only of students playing string instruments, with students playing woodwinds, brass and percussion grouped together as a concert band. University or conservatory orchestras These orchestras consist of students from a university or music conservatory. In some cases, university orchestras are open to all students from a university, from all programs. Larger universities may have two or more university orchestras: one or more orchestras made up of music majors (or, for major music programs, several tiers of music major orchestras, ranked by skill level) and a second orchestra open to university students from all academic programs (e.g., science, business, etc.) who have previous classical music experience on an orchestral instrument. University and conservatory orchestras are led by a conductor who is typically a professor or instructor at the university or conservatory. Youth orchestras These orchestras consist of teens and young adults drawn from an entire city or region. The age range in youth orchestras varies between different ensembles. In some cases, youth orchestras may consist of teens or young adults from an entire country (e.g., Canada's National Youth Orchestra). Community orchestras These orchestras consist of amateur performers drawn from an entire city or region. Community orchestras typically consist mainly of adult amateur musicians. Community orchestras range in level from beginner-level orchestras which rehearse music without doing formal performances in front of an audience to intermediate-level ensembles to advanced amateur groups which play standard professional orchestra repertoire. In some cases, university or conservatory music students may also be members of community orchestras. While community orchestra members are mostly unpaid amateurs, in some orchestras, a small number of professionals may be hired to act as principal players and section leaders. Repertoire and performances Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire ranging from 17th-century dance suites, 18th century divertimentos to 20th-century film scores and 21st-century symphonies. Orchestras have become synonymous with the symphony, an extended musical composition in Western classical music that typically contains multiple movements which provide contrasting keys and tempos. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. The conductor uses the score to study the symphony before rehearsals and decide on their interpretation (e.g., tempos, articulation, phrasing, etc.), and to follow the music during rehearsals and concerts, while leading the ensemble. Orchestral musicians play from parts containing just the notated music for their instrument. A small number of symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Orchestras also perform overtures, a term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn began to use the term to refer to independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that presaged genres such as the symphonic poem, a form devised by Franz Liszt in several works that began as dramatic overtures. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". In the 1850s the concert overture began to be supplanted by the symphonic poem. Orchestras also play with instrumental soloists in concertos. During concertos, the orchestra plays an accompaniment role to the soloist (e.g., a solo violinist or pianist) and, at times, introduces musical themes or interludes while the soloist is not playing. Orchestras also play during operas, ballets, some musical theatre works and some choral works (both sacred works such as Masses and secular works). In operas and ballets, the orchestra accompanies the singers and dancers, respectively, and plays overtures and interludes where the melodies played by the orchestra take centre stage. Performances In the Baroque era, orchestras performed in a range of venues, including at the fine houses of aristocrats, in opera halls and in churches. Some wealthy aristocrats had an orchestra in residence at their estate, to entertain them and their guests with performances. During the Classical era, as composers increasingly sought out financial support from the general public, orchestra concerts were increasingly held in public concert halls, where music lovers could buy tickets to hear the orchestra. Aristocratic patronage of orchestras continued during the Classical era, but this went on alongside public concerts. In the 20th and 21st century, orchestras found a new patron: governments. Many orchestras in North America and Europe receive part of their funding from national, regional level governments (e.g., state governments in the U.S.) or city governments. These government subsidies make up part of orchestra revenue, along with ticket sales, charitable donations (if the orchestra is registered as a charity) and other fundraising activities. With the invention of successive technologies, including sound recording, radio broadcasting, television broadcasting and Internet-based streaming and downloading of concert videos, orchestras have been able to find new revenue sources. Issues in performance Faking One of the "great unmentionable [topics] of orchestral playing" is "faking", the process by which an orchestral musician gives the false "... impression of playing every note as written", typically for a very challenging passage that is very high or very fast, while not actually playing the notes that are in the printed music part. An article in The Strad states that all orchestral musicians, even those in the top orchestras, occasionally fake certain passages. One reason that musicians fake is because there are not enough rehearsals. Another factor is the extreme challenges in 20th century and 21st century contemporary pieces; some professionals said "faking" was "necessary in anything from ten to almost ninety per cent of some modern works". Professional players who were interviewed were of a consensus that faking may be acceptable when a part is not written well for the instrument, but faking "just because you haven't practised" the music is not acceptable. Counter-revolution With the advent of the early music movement, smaller orchestras where players worked on execution of works in styles derived from the study of older treatises on playing became common. These include the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Classical Players under the direction of Sir Roger Norrington and the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, among others. Recent trends in the United States In the United States, the late 20th century saw a crisis of funding and support for orchestras. The size and cost of a symphony orchestra, compared to the size of the base of supporters, became an issue that struck at the core of the institution. Few orchestras could fill auditoriums, and the time-honored season-subscription system became increasingly anachronistic, as more and more listeners would buy tickets on an ad-hoc basis for individual events. Orchestral endowments and — more centrally to the daily operation of American orchestras — orchestral donors have seen investment portfolios shrink, or produce lower yields, reducing the ability of donors to contribute; further, there has been a trend toward donors finding other social causes more compelling. While government funding is less central to American than European orchestras, cuts in such funding are still significant for American ensembles. Finally, the drastic falling-off of revenues from recording, tied to no small extent to changes in the recording industry itself, began a period of change that has yet to reach its conclusion. U.S. orchestras that have gone into Chapter 11 bankruptcy include the Philadelphia Orchestra (April 2011), and the Louisville Orchestra (December 2010); orchestras that have gone into Chapter 7 bankruptcy and have ceased operations include the Northwest Chamber Orchestra in 2006, the Honolulu Orchestra in March 2011, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra in April 2011, and the Syracuse Symphony in June 2011. The Festival of Orchestras in Orlando, Florida, ceased operations at the end of March 2011. One source of financial difficulties that received notice and criticism was high salaries for music directors of US orchestras, which led several high-profile conductors to take pay cuts in recent years. Music administrators such as Michael Tilson Thomas and Esa-Pekka Salonen argued that new music, new means of presenting it, and a renewed relationship with the community could revitalize the symphony orchestra. The American critic Greg Sandow has argued in detail that orchestras must revise their approach to music, performance, the concert experience, marketing, public relations, community involvement, and presentation to bring them in line with the expectations of 21st century audiences immersed in popular culture. It is not uncommon for contemporary composers to use unconventional instruments, including various synthesizers, to achieve desired effects. Many, however, find more conventional orchestral configuration to provide better possibilities for color and depth. Composers like John Adams often employ Romantic-size orchestras, as in Adams' opera Nixon in China; Philip Glass and others may be more free, yet still identify size-boundaries. Glass in particular has recently turned to conventional orchestras in works like the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra and the Violin Concerto No. 2. Along with a decrease in funding, some U.S. orchestras have reduced their overall personnel, as well as the number of players appearing in performances. The reduced numbers in performance are usually confined to the string section, since the numbers here have traditionally been flexible (as multiple players typically play from the same part). Role of conductor Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. The primary duties of the conductor are to set the tempo, ensure correct entries by various members of the ensemble, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. To convey their ideas and interpretation, a conductor communicates with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, typically (though not invariably) with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals, such as eye contact with relevant performers. A conductor's directions will almost invariably be supplemented or reinforced by verbal instructions or suggestions to their musicians in rehearsal prior to a performance. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments and voices. Since the mid-18th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, although in earlier periods of classical music history, leading an ensemble while playing an instrument was common. In Baroque music from the 1600s to the 1750s, the group would typically be led by the harpsichordist or first violinist (see concertmaster), an approach that in modern times has been revived by several music directors for music from this period. Conducting while playing a piano or synthesizer may also be done with musical theatre pit orchestras. Communication is typically non-verbal during a performance (this is strictly the case in art music, but in jazz big bands or large pop ensembles, there may be occasional spoken instructions, such as a "count in"). However, in rehearsals, frequent interruptions allow the conductor to give verbal directions as to how the music should be played or sung. Conductors act as guides to the orchestras or choirs they conduct. They choose the works to be performed and study their scores, to which they may make certain adjustments (e.g., regarding tempo, articulation, phrasing, repetitions of sections, and so on), work out their interpretation, and relay their vision to the performers. They may also attend to organizational matters, such as scheduling rehearsals, planning a concert season, hearing auditions and selecting members, and promoting their ensemble in the media. Orchestras, choirs, concert bands and other sizable musical ensembles such as big bands are usually led by conductors. Conductorless orchestras In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), most orchestras were led by one of the musicians, typically the principal first violin, called the concertmaster. The concertmaster would lead the tempo of pieces by lifting his or her bow in a rhythmic manner. Leadership might also be provided by one of the chord-playing instrumentalists playing the basso continuo part which was the core of most Baroque instrumental ensemble pieces. Typically, this would be a harpsichord player, a pipe organist, or a lutist or theorbo player. A keyboard player could lead the ensemble with his or her head, or by taking one of the hands off the keyboard to lead a more difficult tempo change. A lutenist or theorbo player could lead by lifting the instrument neck up and down to indicate the tempo of a piece, or to lead a ritard during a cadence or ending. In some works which combined choirs and instrumental ensembles, two leaders were sometimes used: A concertmaster to lead the instrumentalists and a chord-playing performer to lead the singers. During the Classical music period (), the practice of using chordal instruments to play basso continuo was gradually phased out, and it disappeared completely by 1800. Instead, ensembles began to use conductors to lead the orchestra's tempos and playing style, while the concertmaster played an additional leadership role for the musicians, especially the string players, who imitate the bowstroke and playing style of the concertmaster, to the degree that is feasible for the different stringed instruments. In 1922, the idea of a conductor-less orchestra was revived in post-revolutionary Soviet Union. The symphony orchestra Persimfans was formed without a conductor, because the founders believed that the ensemble should be modeled on the ideal Marxist state, in which all people are equal. As such, its members felt that there was no need to be led by the dictatorial baton of a conductor; instead they were led by a committee, which determined tempos and playing styles. Although it was a partial success within the Soviet Union, the principal difficulty with the concept was in changing tempo during performances, because even if the committee had issued a decree about where a tempo change should take place, there was no leader in the ensemble to guide this tempo change. The orchestra survived for ten years before Stalin's cultural politics disbanded it by taking away its funding. In Western nations, some ensembles, such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, based in New York City, have had more success with conductorless orchestras, although decisions are likely to be deferred to some sense of leadership within the ensemble (for example, the principal wind and string players, notably the concertmaster). Others have returned to the tradition of a principal player, usually a violinist, being the artistic director and running rehearsal and leading concerts. Examples include the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam Sinfonietta & Candida Thompson and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. As well, as part of the early music movement, some 20th and 21st century orchestras have revived the Baroque practice of having no conductor on the podium for Baroque pieces, using the concertmaster or a chord-playing basso continuo performer (e.g., harpsichord or organ) to lead the group. Multiple conductors Offstage instruments Some orchestral works specify that an offstage trumpet should be used or that other instruments from the orchestra should be positioned off-stage or behind the stage, to create a haunted, mystical effect. To ensure that the offstage instrumentalist(s) play in time, sometimes a sub-conductor will be stationed offstage with a clear view of the principal conductor. Examples include the ending of "Neptune" from Gustav Holst's The Planets. The principal conductor leads the large orchestra, and the sub-conductor relays the principal conductor's tempo and gestures to the offstage musician (or musicians). One of the challenges with using two conductors is that the second conductor may get out of synchronization with the main conductor, or may mis-convey (or misunderstand) the principal conductor's gestures, which can lead to the offstage instruments being out of time. In the late 20th century and early 21st century, some orchestras use a video camera pointed at the principal conductor and a closed-circuit TV set in front of the offstage performer(s), instead of using two conductors. Contemporary music The techniques of polystylism and polytempo music have led a few 20th and 21st century composers to write music where multiple orchestras or ensembles perform simultaneously. These trends have brought about the phenomenon of polyconductor music, wherein separate sub-conductors conduct each group of musicians. Usually, one principal conductor conducts the sub-conductors, thereby shaping the overall performance. In Percy Grainger's The Warriors which includes three conductors: the primary conductor of the orchestra, a secondary conductor directing an off-stage brass ensemble, and a tertiary conductor directing percussion and harp. One example in the late-century orchestral music is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gruppen, for three orchestras, which are placed around the audience. This way, the "sound masses" could be spatialized, as in an electroacoustic work. Gruppen was premiered in Cologne, in 1958, conducted by Stockhausen, Bruno Maderna and Pierre Boulez. It has been performed in 1996 by Simon Rattle, John Carewe and Daniel Harding. See also Chinese orchestra Gamelan Orchestra List of symphony orchestras List of symphony orchestras in Europe List of symphony orchestras in the United States List of youth orchestras in the United States Orchestral enhancement Orchestration Radio orchestra Rhythm section Shorthand for orchestra instrumentation String orchestra Notes References Further reading External links Articles containing video clips Types of musical groups	false	[ "The following is an incomplete list of classical music festivals – music festivals focused on classical music. Classical music is art music produced or rooted in the traditions of Western music (both liturgical and secular), and has long been played at festival-like settings. It encompasses a broad span of time from roughly the 11th century to the present day. The major time divisions of classical music are as follows: the early music period, which includes the Medieval (500–1400) and the Renaissance (1400–1600) era, played at early music festivals; the common practice period, which includes the Baroque (1600–1750), Classical (1750–1830), and Romantic eras (1804–1910), which included opera festivals and choral festivals; and the 20th century (1901–2000) which includes the modern (1890–1930) that overlaps from the late 19th-century, the high modern (mid 20th-century), and contemporary classical music festivals or postmodern (1975–2000) eras, the last of which overlaps into the 21st-century. The term \"classical music\" did not appear until the early 19th century, in an attempt to distinctly canonize the period from Johann Sebastian Bach to Beethoven as a golden age.\n\nRelated lists, categories, and media\n\nFestivals\n\nAfrica\n\nAsia\n\nEurope\n\nNorth America\n\nOceania\n\nSouth America\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links", "The Romantic ballet is defined primarily by an era in ballet in which the ideas of Romanticism in art and literature influenced the creation of ballets. The era occurred during the early to mid 19th century primarily at the Théâtre de l'Académie Royale de Musique of the Paris Opera Ballet and Her Majesty's Theatre in London. It is typically considered to have begun with the 1827 début in Paris of the ballerina Marie Taglioni in the ballet La Sylphide, and to have reached its zenith with the premiere of the divertissement Pas de Quatre staged by the Ballet Master Jules Perrot in London in 1845. The Romantic ballet had no immediate end, but rather a slow decline. Arthur Saint-Léon's 1870 ballet Coppélia is considered to be the last work of the Romantic Ballet.\n\nDuring this era, the development of pointework, although still at a fairly basic stage, profoundly affected people's perception of the ballerina. Many lithographs of the period show her virtually floating, poised only on the tip of a toe. This idea of weightlessness was capitalised on in ballets such as La Sylphide and Giselle, and the famous leap apparently attempted by Carlotta Grisi in La Péri.\n\nOther features which distinguished Romantic ballet were the separate identity of the scenarist or author from the choreographer, and the use of specially written music as opposed to a pastiche typical of the ballet of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The invention of gas lighting enabled gradual changes and enhanced the mysteriousness of many ballets with its softer gleam. Illusion became more diverse with wires and trap doors being widely used.\n\nCult of the ballerina \n\nThe Romantic era marked the rise of the ballerina as a central part of ballet, where previously men had dominated performances. There had always been admiration for superior dancers, but elevating ballerinas to the level of celebrity came into its own in the nineteenth century, especially as female performers became idealized and objectified. Marie Taglioni became the prototypical Romantic ballerina, praised highly for her lyricism. The movement style for Romantic ballerinas was characterized by soft, rounded arms and a forward tilt in the upper body. This gave the woman a flowery, willowy look. Leg movements became more elaborate due to the new tutu length and rising standards of technical proficiency. Important Romantic ballerinas included Marie Taglioni, Carlotta Grisi, Lucille Grahn, Fanny Cerrito, Pauline Leroux and Fanny Elssler. The plots of many ballets were dominated by spirit women—sylphs, wilis, and ghosts, who enslaved the hearts and senses of mortal men and made it impossible for them to live happily in the real world.\n\nWhile ballerinas became increasingly virtuosic, male dancers became scarce, particularly in Paris (although they were still common in other European areas, such as Denmark). This led to the rise of the female travesty dancer - a female dancer who played male roles. While travesty dancing had existed prior to the romantic period it was generally used in tableau and walk-on (marcheuse) parts. Now it became a high-status occupation, and a number of prima ballerinas made their names by dancing en travestie. Fanny Elssler and her sister both played travesty parts. The most well known travesty dancer was Eugénie Fiocre, who was the first dancer to play Frantz in Coppélia, as well as a number of ballerina roles.\n\nDesign and scenography\n\nRomantic tutu\n\nThe costume for the Romantic ballerina was the romantic tutu. This was a full, white, multi-layered skirt made of [[tulle]]. The ballerina wore a white bodice with the tutu. In the second acts of Romantic ballets, representing the spiritual realm, the corps de ballet appeared on stage in Romantic tutus, giving rise to the term \"white act\" or ballet-blanc. The dancers wore pointe shoes to give the effect of floating.\n\nSpecial effects\n\nRomantic ballet owed much to the new developments in theatre effects, particularly gas lighting. Candles had been previously used to light theatres, but gas lighting allowed for dimming effects and other subtleties. Combined with the effects of the Romantic tutu, ballerinas posing en pointe, and the use of wires to make dancers \"fly,\" directors used gas lighting to create supernatural spectacles on stage.\n\nFamous ballets\n\n La Somnambule (1827)\n La Sylphide (1832)\n (1836)\n La Fille du Danube (1836)\n La Gipsy (1839)\n Le Diable amoureux (1840)\n Giselle (1841)\n La Jolie Fille de Gand (1842)\n La Péri (1843)\n Ondine (1843)\n La Vivandière or Markitenka (1844)\n La Esmeralda (1844)\n Éoline, ou La Dryade (1845)\n Le Diable à Quatre (1845)\n Pas de Quatre (1845)\n Catarina, or La Fille du Bandit (1846)\n Le Jugement de Paris (1846)\n Paquita (1846)\n La Fille de marbre (1847)\n Electra, ou La Pléiade perdue (1849)\n Le Violon du diable (1849)\n La Filleule des fées (1849)\n Les Métamorphoses (1850)\n Vert-Vert (1851)\n Le Corsaire (1856)\n Le Papillon (1861)\n Coppélia (1870)\n\nNotable choreographers \n\n Albert\n Jean Coralli\n Joseph Mazilier\n Jules Perrot\n Marius Petipa\n Arthur Saint-Léon\n Filippo Taglioni\n Paul Taglioni\n\nNotable composers \n\n Adolphe Adam\n Cesare Pugni\n\nNotable theatres \n\n Her Majesty's Theatre, London\n Théâtre de l'Académie Royale de Musique of the Paris Opera Ballet\n\nReferences\n\nRomanticism\nBallet terminology" ]
[ "Orchestra", "Expanded instrumentation", "What instruments were added?", "These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores.", "What was the point of adding these?", "The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors.", "Did this become common practice?", "During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below.", "What part of the world did this originate?", "I don't know.", "What else did you find interesting about this section?", "the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era.", "What details make the orchestras different?", "The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers,", "What changed in the Classical period?", "which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation;", "Did the early-mid Romantic period have many changes?", "the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann);" ]	C_9123ff7b8c8245fe9021aa28e773b340_0	What was the greatest change in the 21st century era?	9	What was the greatest change in the 21st century era?	Orchestra	Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Bolero, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No.6 and 9 and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th-century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Bela Bartok, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). CANNOTANSWER	the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland,	An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass woodwinds such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon brass instruments such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, and tuba percussion instruments such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek phil-, "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. A (sometimes concert orchestra) is a smaller ensemble of not more than about fifty musicians. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire, such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler. Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor's baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed. The leader of the first violin section – commonly called the concertmaster – also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster, or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ὀρχήστρα (orchestra), the name for the area in front of a stage in ancient Greek theatre reserved for the Greek chorus. History Baroque and classical eras In the Baroque era, the size and composition of an orchestra was not standardised. There were large differences in size, instrumentation and playing styles—and therefore in orchestral soundscapes and palettes — between the various European regions. The Baroque orchestra ranged from smaller orchestras (or ensembles) with one player per part, to larger scale orchestras with many players per part. Examples of the smaller variety were Bach's orchestras, for example in Koethen, where he had access to an ensemble of up to 18 players. Examples of large scale Baroque orchestras would include Corelli's orchestra in Rome which ranged between 35 and 80 players for day-to-day performances, being enlarged to 150 players for special occasions. In the classical era, the orchestra became more standardized with a small to medium sized string section and a core wind section consisting of pairs of oboes, flutes, bassoons and horns, sometimes supplemented by percussion and pairs of clarinets and trumpets. Beethoven's influence The so-called "standard complement" of doubled winds and brass in the orchestra pioneered in the late 18th century and consolidated during the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Beethoven after Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven's instrumentation almost always included paired flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets. The exceptions to this are his Symphony No. 4, Violin Concerto, and Piano Concerto No. 4, which each specify a single flute. Beethoven carefully calculated the expansion of this particular timbral "palette" in Symphonies 3, 5, 6, and 9 for an innovative effect. The third horn in the "Eroica" Symphony arrives to provide not only some harmonic flexibility, but also the effect of "choral" brass in the Trio movement. Piccolo, contrabassoon, and trombones add to the triumphal finale of his Symphony No. 5. A piccolo and a pair of trombones help deliver the effect of storm and sunshine in the Sixth, also known as the Pastoral Symphony. The Ninth asks for a second pair of horns, for reasons similar to the "Eroica" (four horns has since become standard); Beethoven's use of piccolo, contrabassoon, trombones, and untuned percussion — plus chorus and vocal soloists — in his finale, are his earliest suggestion that the timbral boundaries of symphony might be expanded. For several decades after his death, symphonic instrumentation was faithful to Beethoven's well-established model, with few exceptions. Instrumental technology The invention of the piston and rotary valve by Heinrich Stölzel and Friedrich Blühmel, both Silesians, in 1815, was the first in a series of innovations which impacted the orchestra, including the development of modern keywork for the flute by Theobald Boehm and the innovations of Adolphe Sax in the woodwinds, notably the invention of the saxophone. These advances would lead Hector Berlioz to write a landmark book on instrumentation, which was the first systematic treatise on the use of instrumental sound as an expressive element of music. Wagner's influence The next major expansion of symphonic practice came from Richard Wagner's Bayreuth orchestra, founded to accompany his musical dramas. Wagner's works for the stage were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. Thus, Wagner envisioned an ever-more-demanding role for the conductor of the theatre orchestra, as he elaborated in his influential work On Conducting. This brought about a revolution in orchestral composition, and set the style for orchestral performance for the next eighty years. Wagner's theories re-examined the importance of tempo, dynamics, bowing of string instruments and the role of principals in the orchestra. 20th-century orchestra At the beginning of the 20th century, symphony orchestras were larger, better funded, and better trained than previously; consequently, composers could compose larger and more ambitious works. The works of Gustav Mahler were particularly innovative; in his later symphonies, such as the mammoth Symphony No. 8, Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces. By the late Romantic era, orchestras could support the most enormous forms of symphonic expression, with huge string sections, massive brass sections and an expanded range of percussion instruments. With the recording era beginning, the standards of performance were pushed to a new level, because a recorded symphony could be listened to closely and even minor errors in intonation or ensemble, which might not be noticeable in a live performance, could be heard by critics. As recording technologies improved over the 20th and 21st centuries, eventually small errors in a recording could be "fixed" by audio editing or overdubbing. Some older conductors and composers could remember a time when simply "getting through" the music as best as possible was the standard. Combined with the wider audience made possible by recording, this led to a renewed focus on particular star conductors and on a high standard of orchestral execution. Instrumentation The typical symphony orchestra consists of four groups of related musical instruments called the woodwinds, brass, percussion, and strings. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes be grouped into a fifth section such as a keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and electric and electronic instruments. The orchestra, depending on the size, contains almost all of the standard instruments in each group. In the history of the orchestra, its instrumentation has been expanded over time, often agreed to have been standardized by the classical period and Ludwig van Beethoven's influence on the classical model. In the 20th and 21st century, new repertory demands expanded the instrumentation of the orchestra, resulting in a flexible use of the classical-model instruments and newly developed electric and electronic instruments in various combinations. The terms symphony orchestra and philharmonic orchestra may be used to distinguish different ensembles from the same locality, such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. A symphony or philharmonic orchestra will usually have over eighty musicians on its roster, in some cases over a hundred, but the actual number of musicians employed in a particular performance may vary according to the work being played and the size of the venue. A chamber orchestra is usually a smaller ensemble; a major chamber orchestra might employ as many as fifty musicians, but some are much smaller. Concert orchestra is an alternative term, as in the BBC Concert Orchestra and the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Expanded instrumentation Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No. 6 and No. 9, and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Béla Bartók, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analysed in five eras: the Baroque era, the Classical era, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic era and combined Modern/Postmodern eras. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann, Brahms); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th-century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). Late Baroque orchestra Woodwinds 2 flutes 2–3 oboes (oboe d'amore and oboe da caccia) bassoon (several players in large orchestras) recorder Brass 2 natural horns(sometimes will have a corno da tirarsi) and/or 2–3 natural trumpets(sometimes will have a tromba da tirarsi) Percussion 2 timpani (one player, used as the bass of the natural trumpet section) Keyboards and other chord-playing instruments selected by the ensemble leader harpsichord pipe organ theorbo Strings (oftentimes several players per part) violin I violin II viola cello or violoncello da spalla double bass (or rather violone/basso a viola da braccio) viola da gamba Classical orchestra Woodwinds 1–2 flutes of which 1 might play 1 piccolo 2 oboes 2 clarinets (B, C, or A) both of which might also play 2 basset horns (occasionally with Mozart) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon (occasionally with Mozart, and Haydn, but not yet a standard instrument) Brass 2 natural horns (valveless) 2 natural trumpets (valveless) 1 alto trombone 1 tenor trombone 1 bass trombone (on occasion Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart, but trombones not yet a standard instrument) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) Keyboards harpsichord or pipe organ (until the late 18th century, by which time it was gradually phased out of the orchestra) Strings (always multiple players per part) violins I violins II violas cellos and double basses Early Romantic orchestra Woodwinds piccolo 2 flutes 2 oboes 2 soprano clarinets of which both might also play 2 Basset horns (occasionally with Beethoven) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4 natural (valveless) or valved horns 2 natural or valved trumpets 3 tenor trombones of which some might play 1 alto trombone 1 bass trombone 1–2 serpents or ophicleides (gradually replaced by tubas) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals triangle tambourine glockenspiel Strings 14 violins 1 12 violins 2 10 violas 8 cellos 6 double basses 1 concert harp Late Romantic orchestra Woodwinds 3–4 flutes, some of which may double on 1–2 piccolos 3–4 oboes, of which some may double on 1 oboe d'amore 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 3–4 clarinets in B or A, of which some might play 1 E clarinet or D clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 3–4 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4–8 French horns, German horns, or Vienna horns (more rarely natural horns) of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas – 2 tenors, 2 bass 3–6 trumpets in F, and other keys including C, B of which some might play 1 bass trumpet 3–4 cornets 3–4 tenor trombones (alto trombone parts from the classical era usually played on tenor trombone) 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 euphonium (usually played by a trombonist when needed) Keyboards piano celesta Percussion 4 or more timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals tam-tam triangle tambourine glockenspiel xylophone tubular bells Strings 16 violins 1 (sometimes more) 14 violins 2 12 violas 12 cellos 10 double basses 2 or more concert harps Modern/Postmodern orchestra Woodwinds 2–4 flutes of which some might play 1–2 piccolos 1 alto flute 2–4 oboes of which 1–2 might play 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 2–4 B clarinets of which some might play 1 E clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 2–4 bassoons of which 1 might play 1 contrabassoon (occasionally 1 or more saxophones of various types) Brass 4–8 horns (double horns) in F/B of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas 3–6 trumpets in B of which some might play 2–3 cornets 1 piccolo trumpet (often for playing very high parts originally for natural trumpets) 1 bass trumpet 1 flugelhorn 1 alto trombone (restored to the postmodern orchestra for playing music of the classical era) 3–6 tenor trombones 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 baritone horn/euphonium Percussion 4–5 timpani (one player) snare drum tenor drum bass drum cymbals triangle tam-tam tambourine wood block glockenspiel xylophone vibraphone marimba crotales tubular bells mark tree sleigh bells bell tree drum kit (in some works) Other percussion instruments, including ethnic or world music instruments specified by composers Keyboards piano pipe organ harpsichord accordion celesta Strings 16 1st violins 14 2nd violins 12 violas 10 cellos 8 double basses 1–2 harps (1 or more classical guitars of various types) Other harmonica Electrophone As required by the compositions in the program, various electric instruments or electronic instruments may be used in the orchestra. These performers are not typically permanent orchestra members. They are typically freelancers hired on contract for one or more concerts. Instruments may include: theremin ondes Martenot electric guitar electric bass guitar electric double bass electric violin, viola & cello Hammond organ Lowrey organ electric piano keytar digital accordion ring modulators synthesizer synclavier novachord clavinet digital drum kit Other electronic musical instruments Non-musical instruments such as a typewriter or reel-to-reel tape player Organization Among the instrument groups and within each group of instruments, there is a generally accepted hierarchy. Every instrumental group (or section) has a principal who is generally responsible for leading the group and playing orchestral solos. The violins are divided into two groups, first violin and second violin, with the second violins playing in lower registers than the first violins, playing an accompaniment part, or harmonizing the melody played by the first violins. The principal first violin is called the concertmaster (or orchestra "leader" in the U.K.) and is not only considered the leader of the string section, but the second-in-command of the entire orchestra, behind only the conductor. The concertmaster leads the pre-concert tuning and handles musical aspects of orchestra management, such as determining the bowings for the violins or for all of the string section. The concertmaster usually sits to the conductor's left, closest to the audience. There is also a principal second violin, a principal viola, a principal cello, and a principal bass. The principal trombone is considered the leader of the low brass section, while the principal trumpet is generally considered the leader of the entire brass section. While the oboe often provides the tuning note for the orchestra (due to a 300 year-old convention), there is generally no designated principal of the woodwind section (though in woodwind ensembles, the flute is often the presumptive leader.) Instead, each principal confers with the others as equals in the case of musical differences of opinion. Most sections also have an assistant principal (or co-principal or associate principal), or in the case of the first violins, an assistant concertmaster, who often plays a tutti part in addition to replacing the principal in his or her absence. A section string player plays in unison with the rest of the section, except in the case of divided (divisi) parts, where upper and lower parts in the music are often assigned to "outside" (nearer the audience) and "inside" seated players. Where a solo part is called for in a string section, the section leader invariably plays that part. The section leader (or principal) of a string section is also responsible for determining the bowings, often based on the bowings set out by the concertmaster. In some cases, the principal of a string section may use a slightly different bowing than the concertmaster, to accommodate the requirements of playing their instrument (e.g., the double-bass section). Principals of a string section will also lead entrances for their section, typically by lifting the bow before the entrance, to ensure the section plays together. Tutti wind and brass players generally play a unique but non-solo part. Section percussionists play parts assigned to them by the principal percussionist. In modern times, the musicians are usually directed by a conductor, although early orchestras did not have one, giving this role instead to the concertmaster or the harpsichordist playing the continuo. Some modern orchestras also do without conductors, particularly smaller orchestras and those specializing in historically accurate (so-called "period") performances of baroque and earlier music. The most frequently performed repertoire for a symphony orchestra is Western classical music or opera. However, orchestras are used sometimes in popular music (e.g., to accompany a rock or pop band in a concert), extensively in film music, and increasingly often in video game music. Orchestras are also used in the symphonic metal genre. The term "orchestra" can also be applied to a jazz ensemble, for example in the performance of big-band music. Selection and appointment of members In the 2000s, all tenured members of a professional orchestra normally audition for positions in the ensemble. Performers typically play one or more solo pieces of the auditionee's choice, such as a movement of a concerto, a solo Bach movement, and a variety of excerpts from the orchestral literature that are advertised in the audition poster (so the auditionees can prepare). The excerpts are typically the most technically challenging parts and solos from the orchestral literature. Orchestral auditions are typically held in front of a panel that includes the conductor, the concertmaster, the principal player of the section for which the auditionee is applying, and possibly other principal players. The most promising candidates from the first round of auditions are invited to return for a second or third round of auditions, which allows the conductor and the panel to compare the best candidates. Performers may be asked to sight read orchestral music. The final stage of the audition process in some orchestras is a test week, in which the performer plays with the orchestra for a week or two, which allows the conductor and principal players to see if the individual can function well in an actual rehearsal and performance setting. There are a range of different employment arrangements. The most sought-after positions are permanent, tenured positions in the orchestra. Orchestras also hire musicians on contracts, ranging in length from a single concert to a full season or more. Contract performers may be hired for individual concerts when the orchestra is doing an exceptionally large late-Romantic era orchestral work, or to substitute for a permanent member who is sick. A professional musician who is hired to perform for a single concert is sometimes called a "sub". Some contract musicians may be hired to replace permanent members for the period that the permanent member is on parental leave or disability leave. History of gender in ensembles Historically, major professional orchestras have been mostly or entirely composed of men. The first women members hired in professional orchestras have been harpists. The Vienna Philharmonic, for example, did not accept women to permanent membership until 1997, far later than comparable orchestras (the other orchestras ranked among the world's top five by Gramophone in 2008). The last major orchestra to appoint a woman to a permanent position was the Berlin Philharmonic. In February 1996, the Vienna Philharmonic's principal flute, Dieter Flury, told Westdeutscher Rundfunk that accepting women would be "gambling with the emotional unity () that this organism currently has". In April 1996, the orchestra's press secretary wrote that "compensating for the expected leaves of absence" of maternity leave would be a problem. In 1997, the Vienna Philharmonic was "facing protests during a [US] tour" by the National Organization for Women and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Finally, "after being held up to increasing ridicule even in socially conservative Austria, members of the orchestra gathered [on 28 February 1997] in an extraordinary meeting on the eve of their departure and agreed to admit a woman, Anna Lelkes, as harpist." As of 2013, the orchestra has six female members; one of them, violinist Albena Danailova, became one of the orchestra's concertmasters in 2008, the first woman to hold that position in that orchestra. In 2012, women made up 6% of the orchestra's membership. VPO president Clemens Hellsberg said the VPO now uses completely screened blind auditions. In 2013, an article in Mother Jones stated that while "[m]any prestigious orchestras have significant female membership — women outnumber men in the New York Philharmonic's violin section — and several renowned ensembles, including the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, and the Minnesota Symphony, are led by women violinists", the double bass, brass, and percussion sections of major orchestras "... are still predominantly male." A 2014 BBC article stated that the "... introduction of 'blind' auditions, where a prospective instrumentalist performs behind a screen so that the judging panel can exercise no gender or racial prejudice, has seen the gender balance of traditionally male-dominated symphony orchestras gradually shift." Amateur ensembles There are also a variety of amateur orchestras: School orchestras These orchestras consist of students from elementary or secondary school. They may be students from a music class or program or they may be drawn from the entire school body. School orchestras are typically led by a music teacher. In some cases, school orchestras are string orchestras, consisting only of students playing string instruments, with students playing woodwinds, brass and percussion grouped together as a concert band. University or conservatory orchestras These orchestras consist of students from a university or music conservatory. In some cases, university orchestras are open to all students from a university, from all programs. Larger universities may have two or more university orchestras: one or more orchestras made up of music majors (or, for major music programs, several tiers of music major orchestras, ranked by skill level) and a second orchestra open to university students from all academic programs (e.g., science, business, etc.) who have previous classical music experience on an orchestral instrument. University and conservatory orchestras are led by a conductor who is typically a professor or instructor at the university or conservatory. Youth orchestras These orchestras consist of teens and young adults drawn from an entire city or region. The age range in youth orchestras varies between different ensembles. In some cases, youth orchestras may consist of teens or young adults from an entire country (e.g., Canada's National Youth Orchestra). Community orchestras These orchestras consist of amateur performers drawn from an entire city or region. Community orchestras typically consist mainly of adult amateur musicians. Community orchestras range in level from beginner-level orchestras which rehearse music without doing formal performances in front of an audience to intermediate-level ensembles to advanced amateur groups which play standard professional orchestra repertoire. In some cases, university or conservatory music students may also be members of community orchestras. While community orchestra members are mostly unpaid amateurs, in some orchestras, a small number of professionals may be hired to act as principal players and section leaders. Repertoire and performances Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire ranging from 17th-century dance suites, 18th century divertimentos to 20th-century film scores and 21st-century symphonies. Orchestras have become synonymous with the symphony, an extended musical composition in Western classical music that typically contains multiple movements which provide contrasting keys and tempos. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. The conductor uses the score to study the symphony before rehearsals and decide on their interpretation (e.g., tempos, articulation, phrasing, etc.), and to follow the music during rehearsals and concerts, while leading the ensemble. Orchestral musicians play from parts containing just the notated music for their instrument. A small number of symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Orchestras also perform overtures, a term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn began to use the term to refer to independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that presaged genres such as the symphonic poem, a form devised by Franz Liszt in several works that began as dramatic overtures. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". In the 1850s the concert overture began to be supplanted by the symphonic poem. Orchestras also play with instrumental soloists in concertos. During concertos, the orchestra plays an accompaniment role to the soloist (e.g., a solo violinist or pianist) and, at times, introduces musical themes or interludes while the soloist is not playing. Orchestras also play during operas, ballets, some musical theatre works and some choral works (both sacred works such as Masses and secular works). In operas and ballets, the orchestra accompanies the singers and dancers, respectively, and plays overtures and interludes where the melodies played by the orchestra take centre stage. Performances In the Baroque era, orchestras performed in a range of venues, including at the fine houses of aristocrats, in opera halls and in churches. Some wealthy aristocrats had an orchestra in residence at their estate, to entertain them and their guests with performances. During the Classical era, as composers increasingly sought out financial support from the general public, orchestra concerts were increasingly held in public concert halls, where music lovers could buy tickets to hear the orchestra. Aristocratic patronage of orchestras continued during the Classical era, but this went on alongside public concerts. In the 20th and 21st century, orchestras found a new patron: governments. Many orchestras in North America and Europe receive part of their funding from national, regional level governments (e.g., state governments in the U.S.) or city governments. These government subsidies make up part of orchestra revenue, along with ticket sales, charitable donations (if the orchestra is registered as a charity) and other fundraising activities. With the invention of successive technologies, including sound recording, radio broadcasting, television broadcasting and Internet-based streaming and downloading of concert videos, orchestras have been able to find new revenue sources. Issues in performance Faking One of the "great unmentionable [topics] of orchestral playing" is "faking", the process by which an orchestral musician gives the false "... impression of playing every note as written", typically for a very challenging passage that is very high or very fast, while not actually playing the notes that are in the printed music part. An article in The Strad states that all orchestral musicians, even those in the top orchestras, occasionally fake certain passages. One reason that musicians fake is because there are not enough rehearsals. Another factor is the extreme challenges in 20th century and 21st century contemporary pieces; some professionals said "faking" was "necessary in anything from ten to almost ninety per cent of some modern works". Professional players who were interviewed were of a consensus that faking may be acceptable when a part is not written well for the instrument, but faking "just because you haven't practised" the music is not acceptable. Counter-revolution With the advent of the early music movement, smaller orchestras where players worked on execution of works in styles derived from the study of older treatises on playing became common. These include the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Classical Players under the direction of Sir Roger Norrington and the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, among others. Recent trends in the United States In the United States, the late 20th century saw a crisis of funding and support for orchestras. The size and cost of a symphony orchestra, compared to the size of the base of supporters, became an issue that struck at the core of the institution. Few orchestras could fill auditoriums, and the time-honored season-subscription system became increasingly anachronistic, as more and more listeners would buy tickets on an ad-hoc basis for individual events. Orchestral endowments and — more centrally to the daily operation of American orchestras — orchestral donors have seen investment portfolios shrink, or produce lower yields, reducing the ability of donors to contribute; further, there has been a trend toward donors finding other social causes more compelling. While government funding is less central to American than European orchestras, cuts in such funding are still significant for American ensembles. Finally, the drastic falling-off of revenues from recording, tied to no small extent to changes in the recording industry itself, began a period of change that has yet to reach its conclusion. U.S. orchestras that have gone into Chapter 11 bankruptcy include the Philadelphia Orchestra (April 2011), and the Louisville Orchestra (December 2010); orchestras that have gone into Chapter 7 bankruptcy and have ceased operations include the Northwest Chamber Orchestra in 2006, the Honolulu Orchestra in March 2011, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra in April 2011, and the Syracuse Symphony in June 2011. The Festival of Orchestras in Orlando, Florida, ceased operations at the end of March 2011. One source of financial difficulties that received notice and criticism was high salaries for music directors of US orchestras, which led several high-profile conductors to take pay cuts in recent years. Music administrators such as Michael Tilson Thomas and Esa-Pekka Salonen argued that new music, new means of presenting it, and a renewed relationship with the community could revitalize the symphony orchestra. The American critic Greg Sandow has argued in detail that orchestras must revise their approach to music, performance, the concert experience, marketing, public relations, community involvement, and presentation to bring them in line with the expectations of 21st century audiences immersed in popular culture. It is not uncommon for contemporary composers to use unconventional instruments, including various synthesizers, to achieve desired effects. Many, however, find more conventional orchestral configuration to provide better possibilities for color and depth. Composers like John Adams often employ Romantic-size orchestras, as in Adams' opera Nixon in China; Philip Glass and others may be more free, yet still identify size-boundaries. Glass in particular has recently turned to conventional orchestras in works like the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra and the Violin Concerto No. 2. Along with a decrease in funding, some U.S. orchestras have reduced their overall personnel, as well as the number of players appearing in performances. The reduced numbers in performance are usually confined to the string section, since the numbers here have traditionally been flexible (as multiple players typically play from the same part). Role of conductor Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. The primary duties of the conductor are to set the tempo, ensure correct entries by various members of the ensemble, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. To convey their ideas and interpretation, a conductor communicates with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, typically (though not invariably) with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals, such as eye contact with relevant performers. A conductor's directions will almost invariably be supplemented or reinforced by verbal instructions or suggestions to their musicians in rehearsal prior to a performance. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments and voices. Since the mid-18th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, although in earlier periods of classical music history, leading an ensemble while playing an instrument was common. In Baroque music from the 1600s to the 1750s, the group would typically be led by the harpsichordist or first violinist (see concertmaster), an approach that in modern times has been revived by several music directors for music from this period. Conducting while playing a piano or synthesizer may also be done with musical theatre pit orchestras. Communication is typically non-verbal during a performance (this is strictly the case in art music, but in jazz big bands or large pop ensembles, there may be occasional spoken instructions, such as a "count in"). However, in rehearsals, frequent interruptions allow the conductor to give verbal directions as to how the music should be played or sung. Conductors act as guides to the orchestras or choirs they conduct. They choose the works to be performed and study their scores, to which they may make certain adjustments (e.g., regarding tempo, articulation, phrasing, repetitions of sections, and so on), work out their interpretation, and relay their vision to the performers. They may also attend to organizational matters, such as scheduling rehearsals, planning a concert season, hearing auditions and selecting members, and promoting their ensemble in the media. Orchestras, choirs, concert bands and other sizable musical ensembles such as big bands are usually led by conductors. Conductorless orchestras In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), most orchestras were led by one of the musicians, typically the principal first violin, called the concertmaster. The concertmaster would lead the tempo of pieces by lifting his or her bow in a rhythmic manner. Leadership might also be provided by one of the chord-playing instrumentalists playing the basso continuo part which was the core of most Baroque instrumental ensemble pieces. Typically, this would be a harpsichord player, a pipe organist, or a lutist or theorbo player. A keyboard player could lead the ensemble with his or her head, or by taking one of the hands off the keyboard to lead a more difficult tempo change. A lutenist or theorbo player could lead by lifting the instrument neck up and down to indicate the tempo of a piece, or to lead a ritard during a cadence or ending. In some works which combined choirs and instrumental ensembles, two leaders were sometimes used: A concertmaster to lead the instrumentalists and a chord-playing performer to lead the singers. During the Classical music period (), the practice of using chordal instruments to play basso continuo was gradually phased out, and it disappeared completely by 1800. Instead, ensembles began to use conductors to lead the orchestra's tempos and playing style, while the concertmaster played an additional leadership role for the musicians, especially the string players, who imitate the bowstroke and playing style of the concertmaster, to the degree that is feasible for the different stringed instruments. In 1922, the idea of a conductor-less orchestra was revived in post-revolutionary Soviet Union. The symphony orchestra Persimfans was formed without a conductor, because the founders believed that the ensemble should be modeled on the ideal Marxist state, in which all people are equal. As such, its members felt that there was no need to be led by the dictatorial baton of a conductor; instead they were led by a committee, which determined tempos and playing styles. Although it was a partial success within the Soviet Union, the principal difficulty with the concept was in changing tempo during performances, because even if the committee had issued a decree about where a tempo change should take place, there was no leader in the ensemble to guide this tempo change. The orchestra survived for ten years before Stalin's cultural politics disbanded it by taking away its funding. In Western nations, some ensembles, such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, based in New York City, have had more success with conductorless orchestras, although decisions are likely to be deferred to some sense of leadership within the ensemble (for example, the principal wind and string players, notably the concertmaster). Others have returned to the tradition of a principal player, usually a violinist, being the artistic director and running rehearsal and leading concerts. Examples include the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam Sinfonietta & Candida Thompson and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. As well, as part of the early music movement, some 20th and 21st century orchestras have revived the Baroque practice of having no conductor on the podium for Baroque pieces, using the concertmaster or a chord-playing basso continuo performer (e.g., harpsichord or organ) to lead the group. Multiple conductors Offstage instruments Some orchestral works specify that an offstage trumpet should be used or that other instruments from the orchestra should be positioned off-stage or behind the stage, to create a haunted, mystical effect. To ensure that the offstage instrumentalist(s) play in time, sometimes a sub-conductor will be stationed offstage with a clear view of the principal conductor. Examples include the ending of "Neptune" from Gustav Holst's The Planets. The principal conductor leads the large orchestra, and the sub-conductor relays the principal conductor's tempo and gestures to the offstage musician (or musicians). One of the challenges with using two conductors is that the second conductor may get out of synchronization with the main conductor, or may mis-convey (or misunderstand) the principal conductor's gestures, which can lead to the offstage instruments being out of time. In the late 20th century and early 21st century, some orchestras use a video camera pointed at the principal conductor and a closed-circuit TV set in front of the offstage performer(s), instead of using two conductors. Contemporary music The techniques of polystylism and polytempo music have led a few 20th and 21st century composers to write music where multiple orchestras or ensembles perform simultaneously. These trends have brought about the phenomenon of polyconductor music, wherein separate sub-conductors conduct each group of musicians. Usually, one principal conductor conducts the sub-conductors, thereby shaping the overall performance. In Percy Grainger's The Warriors which includes three conductors: the primary conductor of the orchestra, a secondary conductor directing an off-stage brass ensemble, and a tertiary conductor directing percussion and harp. One example in the late-century orchestral music is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gruppen, for three orchestras, which are placed around the audience. This way, the "sound masses" could be spatialized, as in an electroacoustic work. Gruppen was premiered in Cologne, in 1958, conducted by Stockhausen, Bruno Maderna and Pierre Boulez. It has been performed in 1996 by Simon Rattle, John Carewe and Daniel Harding. See also Chinese orchestra Gamelan Orchestra List of symphony orchestras List of symphony orchestras in Europe List of symphony orchestras in the United States List of youth orchestras in the United States Orchestral enhancement Orchestration Radio orchestra Rhythm section Shorthand for orchestra instrumentation String orchestra Notes References Further reading External links Articles containing video clips Types of musical groups	false	[ "Lothar Koch (1 July 1935 – 16 March 2003) was an oboist. He was one of the two principal oboists in the Berlin Philharmonic during the Herbert von Karajan era. He was also an active soloist and was regarded as one of the greatest oboe players of his era. One critic described him as the greatest musician of the last 150 years.\n\nHe was born in Velbert and studied at the Folkwangschule in Essen. In the nineties, Koch retired from the Berlin Philharmonic and became a lecturer at the Mozarteum University Salzburg.\n\nReferences\n\n1935 births\n2003 deaths\nFolkwang University of the Arts alumni\nMozarteum University Salzburg faculty\nGerman classical oboists\nMale oboists\n20th-century classical musicians\n20th-century German male musicians\n20th-century German musicians", "Dio of Alexandria (; ) was an Academic Skeptic philosopher and a friend of Antiochus of Ascalon who lived in the first century BC. Along with being an Academic Skeptic, Dio was an avid believer in the Greek gods and Titans, specifically worshipping the personification of time, Chronos. He was sent by his fellow citizens as ambassador to Rome, to complain about the conduct of their king, Ptolemy XII Auletes. In Rome he was poisoned by the king's secret agents, and the strongest suspicion of the murder fell upon Marcus Caelius. The defence of Caelius in April 56 BC, the Pro Caelio, is considered one of Cicero's and indeed Rome's greatest orations.\n\nHis brother was the wrestler Topsius ().\n\nReferences\n\nAcademic philosophers\nHellenistic-era philosophers from Africa\n1st-century BC Greek people\n1st-century BC philosophers\nAmbassadors to ancient Rome\nAcademic skepticism" ]
[ "Orchestra", "Expanded instrumentation", "What instruments were added?", "These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores.", "What was the point of adding these?", "The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors.", "Did this become common practice?", "During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below.", "What part of the world did this originate?", "I don't know.", "What else did you find interesting about this section?", "the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era.", "What details make the orchestras different?", "The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers,", "What changed in the Classical period?", "which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation;", "Did the early-mid Romantic period have many changes?", "the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann);", "What was the greatest change in the 21st century era?", "the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland," ]	C_9123ff7b8c8245fe9021aa28e773b340_0	Is most of the 21st century practice still in use?	10	Is most of the 21st century practice still in use?	Orchestra	Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Bolero, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No.6 and 9 and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th-century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Bela Bartok, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th-century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analyzed in five periods: the Baroque era, the Classical music period, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic/early 20th century music and 21st century era. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Brahms, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). CANNOTANSWER	by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (	An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass woodwinds such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon brass instruments such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, and tuba percussion instruments such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek phil-, "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. A (sometimes concert orchestra) is a smaller ensemble of not more than about fifty musicians. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire, such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler. Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor's baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed. The leader of the first violin section – commonly called the concertmaster – also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster, or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ὀρχήστρα (orchestra), the name for the area in front of a stage in ancient Greek theatre reserved for the Greek chorus. History Baroque and classical eras In the Baroque era, the size and composition of an orchestra was not standardised. There were large differences in size, instrumentation and playing styles—and therefore in orchestral soundscapes and palettes — between the various European regions. The Baroque orchestra ranged from smaller orchestras (or ensembles) with one player per part, to larger scale orchestras with many players per part. Examples of the smaller variety were Bach's orchestras, for example in Koethen, where he had access to an ensemble of up to 18 players. Examples of large scale Baroque orchestras would include Corelli's orchestra in Rome which ranged between 35 and 80 players for day-to-day performances, being enlarged to 150 players for special occasions. In the classical era, the orchestra became more standardized with a small to medium sized string section and a core wind section consisting of pairs of oboes, flutes, bassoons and horns, sometimes supplemented by percussion and pairs of clarinets and trumpets. Beethoven's influence The so-called "standard complement" of doubled winds and brass in the orchestra pioneered in the late 18th century and consolidated during the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Beethoven after Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven's instrumentation almost always included paired flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets. The exceptions to this are his Symphony No. 4, Violin Concerto, and Piano Concerto No. 4, which each specify a single flute. Beethoven carefully calculated the expansion of this particular timbral "palette" in Symphonies 3, 5, 6, and 9 for an innovative effect. The third horn in the "Eroica" Symphony arrives to provide not only some harmonic flexibility, but also the effect of "choral" brass in the Trio movement. Piccolo, contrabassoon, and trombones add to the triumphal finale of his Symphony No. 5. A piccolo and a pair of trombones help deliver the effect of storm and sunshine in the Sixth, also known as the Pastoral Symphony. The Ninth asks for a second pair of horns, for reasons similar to the "Eroica" (four horns has since become standard); Beethoven's use of piccolo, contrabassoon, trombones, and untuned percussion — plus chorus and vocal soloists — in his finale, are his earliest suggestion that the timbral boundaries of symphony might be expanded. For several decades after his death, symphonic instrumentation was faithful to Beethoven's well-established model, with few exceptions. Instrumental technology The invention of the piston and rotary valve by Heinrich Stölzel and Friedrich Blühmel, both Silesians, in 1815, was the first in a series of innovations which impacted the orchestra, including the development of modern keywork for the flute by Theobald Boehm and the innovations of Adolphe Sax in the woodwinds, notably the invention of the saxophone. These advances would lead Hector Berlioz to write a landmark book on instrumentation, which was the first systematic treatise on the use of instrumental sound as an expressive element of music. Wagner's influence The next major expansion of symphonic practice came from Richard Wagner's Bayreuth orchestra, founded to accompany his musical dramas. Wagner's works for the stage were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. Thus, Wagner envisioned an ever-more-demanding role for the conductor of the theatre orchestra, as he elaborated in his influential work On Conducting. This brought about a revolution in orchestral composition, and set the style for orchestral performance for the next eighty years. Wagner's theories re-examined the importance of tempo, dynamics, bowing of string instruments and the role of principals in the orchestra. 20th-century orchestra At the beginning of the 20th century, symphony orchestras were larger, better funded, and better trained than previously; consequently, composers could compose larger and more ambitious works. The works of Gustav Mahler were particularly innovative; in his later symphonies, such as the mammoth Symphony No. 8, Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces. By the late Romantic era, orchestras could support the most enormous forms of symphonic expression, with huge string sections, massive brass sections and an expanded range of percussion instruments. With the recording era beginning, the standards of performance were pushed to a new level, because a recorded symphony could be listened to closely and even minor errors in intonation or ensemble, which might not be noticeable in a live performance, could be heard by critics. As recording technologies improved over the 20th and 21st centuries, eventually small errors in a recording could be "fixed" by audio editing or overdubbing. Some older conductors and composers could remember a time when simply "getting through" the music as best as possible was the standard. Combined with the wider audience made possible by recording, this led to a renewed focus on particular star conductors and on a high standard of orchestral execution. Instrumentation The typical symphony orchestra consists of four groups of related musical instruments called the woodwinds, brass, percussion, and strings. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes be grouped into a fifth section such as a keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and electric and electronic instruments. The orchestra, depending on the size, contains almost all of the standard instruments in each group. In the history of the orchestra, its instrumentation has been expanded over time, often agreed to have been standardized by the classical period and Ludwig van Beethoven's influence on the classical model. In the 20th and 21st century, new repertory demands expanded the instrumentation of the orchestra, resulting in a flexible use of the classical-model instruments and newly developed electric and electronic instruments in various combinations. The terms symphony orchestra and philharmonic orchestra may be used to distinguish different ensembles from the same locality, such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. A symphony or philharmonic orchestra will usually have over eighty musicians on its roster, in some cases over a hundred, but the actual number of musicians employed in a particular performance may vary according to the work being played and the size of the venue. A chamber orchestra is usually a smaller ensemble; a major chamber orchestra might employ as many as fifty musicians, but some are much smaller. Concert orchestra is an alternative term, as in the BBC Concert Orchestra and the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Expanded instrumentation Apart from the core orchestral complement, various other instruments are called for occasionally. These include the flugelhorn and cornet. Saxophones and classical guitars, for example, appear in some 19th- through 21st-century scores. While appearing only as featured solo instruments in some works, for example Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, the saxophone is included in other works, such as Ravel's Boléro, Sergei Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet Suites 1 and 2, Vaughan Williams' Symphonies No. 6 and No. 9, and William Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and many other works as a member of the orchestral ensemble. The euphonium is featured in a few late Romantic and 20th century works, usually playing parts marked "tenor tuba", including Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. The Wagner tuba, a modified member of the horn family, appears in Richard Wagner's cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and several other works by Strauss, Béla Bartók, and others; it has a prominent role in Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 in E Major. Cornets appear in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Claude Debussy's La Mer, and several orchestral works by Hector Berlioz. Unless these instruments are played by members "doubling" on another instrument (for example, a trombone player changing to euphonium or a bassoon player switching to contrabassoon for a certain passage), orchestras typically hire freelance musicians to augment their regular ensemble. The 20th century orchestra was far more flexible than its predecessors. In Beethoven's and Felix Mendelssohn's time, the orchestra was composed of a fairly standard core of instruments, which was very rarely modified by composers. As time progressed, and as the Romantic period saw changes in accepted modification with composers such as Berlioz and Mahler; some composers used multiple harps and sound effect such as the wind machine. During the 20th century, the modern orchestra was generally standardized with the modern instrumentation listed below. Nevertheless, by the mid- to late 20th century, with the development of contemporary classical music, instrumentation could practically be hand-picked by the composer (e.g., to add electric instruments such as electric guitar, electronic instruments such as synthesizers, non-Western instruments, or other instruments not traditionally used in orchestra). With this history in mind, the orchestra can be analysed in five eras: the Baroque era, the Classical era, early/mid-Romantic music era, late-Romantic era and combined Modern/Postmodern eras. The first is a Baroque orchestra (i.e., J.S. Bach, Handel, Vivaldi), which generally had a smaller number of performers, and in which one or more chord-playing instruments, the basso continuo group (e.g., harpsichord or pipe organ and assorted bass instruments to perform the bassline), played an important role; the second is a typical classical period orchestra (e.g., early Beethoven along with Mozart and Haydn), which used a smaller group of performers than a Romantic music orchestra and a fairly standardized instrumentation; the third is typical of an early/mid-Romantic era (e.g., Schubert, Berlioz, Schumann, Brahms); the fourth is a late-Romantic/early 20th-century orchestra (e.g., Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky), to the common complement of a 2010-era modern orchestra (e.g., Adams, Barber, Aaron Copland, Glass, Penderecki). Late Baroque orchestra Woodwinds 2 flutes 2–3 oboes (oboe d'amore and oboe da caccia) bassoon (several players in large orchestras) recorder Brass 2 natural horns(sometimes will have a corno da tirarsi) and/or 2–3 natural trumpets(sometimes will have a tromba da tirarsi) Percussion 2 timpani (one player, used as the bass of the natural trumpet section) Keyboards and other chord-playing instruments selected by the ensemble leader harpsichord pipe organ theorbo Strings (oftentimes several players per part) violin I violin II viola cello or violoncello da spalla double bass (or rather violone/basso a viola da braccio) viola da gamba Classical orchestra Woodwinds 1–2 flutes of which 1 might play 1 piccolo 2 oboes 2 clarinets (B, C, or A) both of which might also play 2 basset horns (occasionally with Mozart) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon (occasionally with Mozart, and Haydn, but not yet a standard instrument) Brass 2 natural horns (valveless) 2 natural trumpets (valveless) 1 alto trombone 1 tenor trombone 1 bass trombone (on occasion Gluck, Haydn, and Mozart, but trombones not yet a standard instrument) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) Keyboards harpsichord or pipe organ (until the late 18th century, by which time it was gradually phased out of the orchestra) Strings (always multiple players per part) violins I violins II violas cellos and double basses Early Romantic orchestra Woodwinds piccolo 2 flutes 2 oboes 2 soprano clarinets of which both might also play 2 Basset horns (occasionally with Beethoven) 2 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4 natural (valveless) or valved horns 2 natural or valved trumpets 3 tenor trombones of which some might play 1 alto trombone 1 bass trombone 1–2 serpents or ophicleides (gradually replaced by tubas) Percussion 2 timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals triangle tambourine glockenspiel Strings 14 violins 1 12 violins 2 10 violas 8 cellos 6 double basses 1 concert harp Late Romantic orchestra Woodwinds 3–4 flutes, some of which may double on 1–2 piccolos 3–4 oboes, of which some may double on 1 oboe d'amore 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 3–4 clarinets in B or A, of which some might play 1 E clarinet or D clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 3–4 bassoons 1 contrabassoon Brass 4–8 French horns, German horns, or Vienna horns (more rarely natural horns) of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas – 2 tenors, 2 bass 3–6 trumpets in F, and other keys including C, B of which some might play 1 bass trumpet 3–4 cornets 3–4 tenor trombones (alto trombone parts from the classical era usually played on tenor trombone) 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 euphonium (usually played by a trombonist when needed) Keyboards piano celesta Percussion 4 or more timpani (one player) snare drum bass drum cymbals tam-tam triangle tambourine glockenspiel xylophone tubular bells Strings 16 violins 1 (sometimes more) 14 violins 2 12 violas 12 cellos 10 double basses 2 or more concert harps Modern/Postmodern orchestra Woodwinds 2–4 flutes of which some might play 1–2 piccolos 1 alto flute 2–4 oboes of which 1–2 might play 1 cor anglais 1 bass oboe 2–4 B clarinets of which some might play 1 E clarinet 1 basset horn 1 bass clarinet 1 contrabass clarinet 2–4 bassoons of which 1 might play 1 contrabassoon (occasionally 1 or more saxophones of various types) Brass 4–8 horns (double horns) in F/B of which some might play 2–4 Wagner tubas 3–6 trumpets in B of which some might play 2–3 cornets 1 piccolo trumpet (often for playing very high parts originally for natural trumpets) 1 bass trumpet 1 flugelhorn 1 alto trombone (restored to the postmodern orchestra for playing music of the classical era) 3–6 tenor trombones 1–2 bass trombones of which 1 might play 1 contrabass trombone 1–2 tubas 1 baritone horn/euphonium Percussion 4–5 timpani (one player) snare drum tenor drum bass drum cymbals triangle tam-tam tambourine wood block glockenspiel xylophone vibraphone marimba crotales tubular bells mark tree sleigh bells bell tree drum kit (in some works) Other percussion instruments, including ethnic or world music instruments specified by composers Keyboards piano pipe organ harpsichord accordion celesta Strings 16 1st violins 14 2nd violins 12 violas 10 cellos 8 double basses 1–2 harps (1 or more classical guitars of various types) Other harmonica Electrophone As required by the compositions in the program, various electric instruments or electronic instruments may be used in the orchestra. These performers are not typically permanent orchestra members. They are typically freelancers hired on contract for one or more concerts. Instruments may include: theremin ondes Martenot electric guitar electric bass guitar electric double bass electric violin, viola & cello Hammond organ Lowrey organ electric piano keytar digital accordion ring modulators synthesizer synclavier novachord clavinet digital drum kit Other electronic musical instruments Non-musical instruments such as a typewriter or reel-to-reel tape player Organization Among the instrument groups and within each group of instruments, there is a generally accepted hierarchy. Every instrumental group (or section) has a principal who is generally responsible for leading the group and playing orchestral solos. The violins are divided into two groups, first violin and second violin, with the second violins playing in lower registers than the first violins, playing an accompaniment part, or harmonizing the melody played by the first violins. The principal first violin is called the concertmaster (or orchestra "leader" in the U.K.) and is not only considered the leader of the string section, but the second-in-command of the entire orchestra, behind only the conductor. The concertmaster leads the pre-concert tuning and handles musical aspects of orchestra management, such as determining the bowings for the violins or for all of the string section. The concertmaster usually sits to the conductor's left, closest to the audience. There is also a principal second violin, a principal viola, a principal cello, and a principal bass. The principal trombone is considered the leader of the low brass section, while the principal trumpet is generally considered the leader of the entire brass section. While the oboe often provides the tuning note for the orchestra (due to a 300 year-old convention), there is generally no designated principal of the woodwind section (though in woodwind ensembles, the flute is often the presumptive leader.) Instead, each principal confers with the others as equals in the case of musical differences of opinion. Most sections also have an assistant principal (or co-principal or associate principal), or in the case of the first violins, an assistant concertmaster, who often plays a tutti part in addition to replacing the principal in his or her absence. A section string player plays in unison with the rest of the section, except in the case of divided (divisi) parts, where upper and lower parts in the music are often assigned to "outside" (nearer the audience) and "inside" seated players. Where a solo part is called for in a string section, the section leader invariably plays that part. The section leader (or principal) of a string section is also responsible for determining the bowings, often based on the bowings set out by the concertmaster. In some cases, the principal of a string section may use a slightly different bowing than the concertmaster, to accommodate the requirements of playing their instrument (e.g., the double-bass section). Principals of a string section will also lead entrances for their section, typically by lifting the bow before the entrance, to ensure the section plays together. Tutti wind and brass players generally play a unique but non-solo part. Section percussionists play parts assigned to them by the principal percussionist. In modern times, the musicians are usually directed by a conductor, although early orchestras did not have one, giving this role instead to the concertmaster or the harpsichordist playing the continuo. Some modern orchestras also do without conductors, particularly smaller orchestras and those specializing in historically accurate (so-called "period") performances of baroque and earlier music. The most frequently performed repertoire for a symphony orchestra is Western classical music or opera. However, orchestras are used sometimes in popular music (e.g., to accompany a rock or pop band in a concert), extensively in film music, and increasingly often in video game music. Orchestras are also used in the symphonic metal genre. The term "orchestra" can also be applied to a jazz ensemble, for example in the performance of big-band music. Selection and appointment of members In the 2000s, all tenured members of a professional orchestra normally audition for positions in the ensemble. Performers typically play one or more solo pieces of the auditionee's choice, such as a movement of a concerto, a solo Bach movement, and a variety of excerpts from the orchestral literature that are advertised in the audition poster (so the auditionees can prepare). The excerpts are typically the most technically challenging parts and solos from the orchestral literature. Orchestral auditions are typically held in front of a panel that includes the conductor, the concertmaster, the principal player of the section for which the auditionee is applying, and possibly other principal players. The most promising candidates from the first round of auditions are invited to return for a second or third round of auditions, which allows the conductor and the panel to compare the best candidates. Performers may be asked to sight read orchestral music. The final stage of the audition process in some orchestras is a test week, in which the performer plays with the orchestra for a week or two, which allows the conductor and principal players to see if the individual can function well in an actual rehearsal and performance setting. There are a range of different employment arrangements. The most sought-after positions are permanent, tenured positions in the orchestra. Orchestras also hire musicians on contracts, ranging in length from a single concert to a full season or more. Contract performers may be hired for individual concerts when the orchestra is doing an exceptionally large late-Romantic era orchestral work, or to substitute for a permanent member who is sick. A professional musician who is hired to perform for a single concert is sometimes called a "sub". Some contract musicians may be hired to replace permanent members for the period that the permanent member is on parental leave or disability leave. History of gender in ensembles Historically, major professional orchestras have been mostly or entirely composed of men. The first women members hired in professional orchestras have been harpists. The Vienna Philharmonic, for example, did not accept women to permanent membership until 1997, far later than comparable orchestras (the other orchestras ranked among the world's top five by Gramophone in 2008). The last major orchestra to appoint a woman to a permanent position was the Berlin Philharmonic. In February 1996, the Vienna Philharmonic's principal flute, Dieter Flury, told Westdeutscher Rundfunk that accepting women would be "gambling with the emotional unity () that this organism currently has". In April 1996, the orchestra's press secretary wrote that "compensating for the expected leaves of absence" of maternity leave would be a problem. In 1997, the Vienna Philharmonic was "facing protests during a [US] tour" by the National Organization for Women and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Finally, "after being held up to increasing ridicule even in socially conservative Austria, members of the orchestra gathered [on 28 February 1997] in an extraordinary meeting on the eve of their departure and agreed to admit a woman, Anna Lelkes, as harpist." As of 2013, the orchestra has six female members; one of them, violinist Albena Danailova, became one of the orchestra's concertmasters in 2008, the first woman to hold that position in that orchestra. In 2012, women made up 6% of the orchestra's membership. VPO president Clemens Hellsberg said the VPO now uses completely screened blind auditions. In 2013, an article in Mother Jones stated that while "[m]any prestigious orchestras have significant female membership — women outnumber men in the New York Philharmonic's violin section — and several renowned ensembles, including the National Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, and the Minnesota Symphony, are led by women violinists", the double bass, brass, and percussion sections of major orchestras "... are still predominantly male." A 2014 BBC article stated that the "... introduction of 'blind' auditions, where a prospective instrumentalist performs behind a screen so that the judging panel can exercise no gender or racial prejudice, has seen the gender balance of traditionally male-dominated symphony orchestras gradually shift." Amateur ensembles There are also a variety of amateur orchestras: School orchestras These orchestras consist of students from elementary or secondary school. They may be students from a music class or program or they may be drawn from the entire school body. School orchestras are typically led by a music teacher. In some cases, school orchestras are string orchestras, consisting only of students playing string instruments, with students playing woodwinds, brass and percussion grouped together as a concert band. University or conservatory orchestras These orchestras consist of students from a university or music conservatory. In some cases, university orchestras are open to all students from a university, from all programs. Larger universities may have two or more university orchestras: one or more orchestras made up of music majors (or, for major music programs, several tiers of music major orchestras, ranked by skill level) and a second orchestra open to university students from all academic programs (e.g., science, business, etc.) who have previous classical music experience on an orchestral instrument. University and conservatory orchestras are led by a conductor who is typically a professor or instructor at the university or conservatory. Youth orchestras These orchestras consist of teens and young adults drawn from an entire city or region. The age range in youth orchestras varies between different ensembles. In some cases, youth orchestras may consist of teens or young adults from an entire country (e.g., Canada's National Youth Orchestra). Community orchestras These orchestras consist of amateur performers drawn from an entire city or region. Community orchestras typically consist mainly of adult amateur musicians. Community orchestras range in level from beginner-level orchestras which rehearse music without doing formal performances in front of an audience to intermediate-level ensembles to advanced amateur groups which play standard professional orchestra repertoire. In some cases, university or conservatory music students may also be members of community orchestras. While community orchestra members are mostly unpaid amateurs, in some orchestras, a small number of professionals may be hired to act as principal players and section leaders. Repertoire and performances Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire ranging from 17th-century dance suites, 18th century divertimentos to 20th-century film scores and 21st-century symphonies. Orchestras have become synonymous with the symphony, an extended musical composition in Western classical music that typically contains multiple movements which provide contrasting keys and tempos. Symphonies are notated in a musical score, which contains all the instrument parts. The conductor uses the score to study the symphony before rehearsals and decide on their interpretation (e.g., tempos, articulation, phrasing, etc.), and to follow the music during rehearsals and concerts, while leading the ensemble. Orchestral musicians play from parts containing just the notated music for their instrument. A small number of symphonies also contain vocal parts (e.g., Beethoven's Ninth Symphony). Orchestras also perform overtures, a term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera. During the early Romantic era, composers such as Beethoven and Mendelssohn began to use the term to refer to independent, self-existing instrumental, programmatic works that presaged genres such as the symphonic poem, a form devised by Franz Liszt in several works that began as dramatic overtures. These were "at first undoubtedly intended to be played at the head of a programme". In the 1850s the concert overture began to be supplanted by the symphonic poem. Orchestras also play with instrumental soloists in concertos. During concertos, the orchestra plays an accompaniment role to the soloist (e.g., a solo violinist or pianist) and, at times, introduces musical themes or interludes while the soloist is not playing. Orchestras also play during operas, ballets, some musical theatre works and some choral works (both sacred works such as Masses and secular works). In operas and ballets, the orchestra accompanies the singers and dancers, respectively, and plays overtures and interludes where the melodies played by the orchestra take centre stage. Performances In the Baroque era, orchestras performed in a range of venues, including at the fine houses of aristocrats, in opera halls and in churches. Some wealthy aristocrats had an orchestra in residence at their estate, to entertain them and their guests with performances. During the Classical era, as composers increasingly sought out financial support from the general public, orchestra concerts were increasingly held in public concert halls, where music lovers could buy tickets to hear the orchestra. Aristocratic patronage of orchestras continued during the Classical era, but this went on alongside public concerts. In the 20th and 21st century, orchestras found a new patron: governments. Many orchestras in North America and Europe receive part of their funding from national, regional level governments (e.g., state governments in the U.S.) or city governments. These government subsidies make up part of orchestra revenue, along with ticket sales, charitable donations (if the orchestra is registered as a charity) and other fundraising activities. With the invention of successive technologies, including sound recording, radio broadcasting, television broadcasting and Internet-based streaming and downloading of concert videos, orchestras have been able to find new revenue sources. Issues in performance Faking One of the "great unmentionable [topics] of orchestral playing" is "faking", the process by which an orchestral musician gives the false "... impression of playing every note as written", typically for a very challenging passage that is very high or very fast, while not actually playing the notes that are in the printed music part. An article in The Strad states that all orchestral musicians, even those in the top orchestras, occasionally fake certain passages. One reason that musicians fake is because there are not enough rehearsals. Another factor is the extreme challenges in 20th century and 21st century contemporary pieces; some professionals said "faking" was "necessary in anything from ten to almost ninety per cent of some modern works". Professional players who were interviewed were of a consensus that faking may be acceptable when a part is not written well for the instrument, but faking "just because you haven't practised" the music is not acceptable. Counter-revolution With the advent of the early music movement, smaller orchestras where players worked on execution of works in styles derived from the study of older treatises on playing became common. These include the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Classical Players under the direction of Sir Roger Norrington and the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, among others. Recent trends in the United States In the United States, the late 20th century saw a crisis of funding and support for orchestras. The size and cost of a symphony orchestra, compared to the size of the base of supporters, became an issue that struck at the core of the institution. Few orchestras could fill auditoriums, and the time-honored season-subscription system became increasingly anachronistic, as more and more listeners would buy tickets on an ad-hoc basis for individual events. Orchestral endowments and — more centrally to the daily operation of American orchestras — orchestral donors have seen investment portfolios shrink, or produce lower yields, reducing the ability of donors to contribute; further, there has been a trend toward donors finding other social causes more compelling. While government funding is less central to American than European orchestras, cuts in such funding are still significant for American ensembles. Finally, the drastic falling-off of revenues from recording, tied to no small extent to changes in the recording industry itself, began a period of change that has yet to reach its conclusion. U.S. orchestras that have gone into Chapter 11 bankruptcy include the Philadelphia Orchestra (April 2011), and the Louisville Orchestra (December 2010); orchestras that have gone into Chapter 7 bankruptcy and have ceased operations include the Northwest Chamber Orchestra in 2006, the Honolulu Orchestra in March 2011, the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra in April 2011, and the Syracuse Symphony in June 2011. The Festival of Orchestras in Orlando, Florida, ceased operations at the end of March 2011. One source of financial difficulties that received notice and criticism was high salaries for music directors of US orchestras, which led several high-profile conductors to take pay cuts in recent years. Music administrators such as Michael Tilson Thomas and Esa-Pekka Salonen argued that new music, new means of presenting it, and a renewed relationship with the community could revitalize the symphony orchestra. The American critic Greg Sandow has argued in detail that orchestras must revise their approach to music, performance, the concert experience, marketing, public relations, community involvement, and presentation to bring them in line with the expectations of 21st century audiences immersed in popular culture. It is not uncommon for contemporary composers to use unconventional instruments, including various synthesizers, to achieve desired effects. Many, however, find more conventional orchestral configuration to provide better possibilities for color and depth. Composers like John Adams often employ Romantic-size orchestras, as in Adams' opera Nixon in China; Philip Glass and others may be more free, yet still identify size-boundaries. Glass in particular has recently turned to conventional orchestras in works like the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra and the Violin Concerto No. 2. Along with a decrease in funding, some U.S. orchestras have reduced their overall personnel, as well as the number of players appearing in performances. The reduced numbers in performance are usually confined to the string section, since the numbers here have traditionally been flexible (as multiple players typically play from the same part). Role of conductor Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. The primary duties of the conductor are to set the tempo, ensure correct entries by various members of the ensemble, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. To convey their ideas and interpretation, a conductor communicates with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, typically (though not invariably) with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals, such as eye contact with relevant performers. A conductor's directions will almost invariably be supplemented or reinforced by verbal instructions or suggestions to their musicians in rehearsal prior to a performance. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments and voices. Since the mid-18th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, although in earlier periods of classical music history, leading an ensemble while playing an instrument was common. In Baroque music from the 1600s to the 1750s, the group would typically be led by the harpsichordist or first violinist (see concertmaster), an approach that in modern times has been revived by several music directors for music from this period. Conducting while playing a piano or synthesizer may also be done with musical theatre pit orchestras. Communication is typically non-verbal during a performance (this is strictly the case in art music, but in jazz big bands or large pop ensembles, there may be occasional spoken instructions, such as a "count in"). However, in rehearsals, frequent interruptions allow the conductor to give verbal directions as to how the music should be played or sung. Conductors act as guides to the orchestras or choirs they conduct. They choose the works to be performed and study their scores, to which they may make certain adjustments (e.g., regarding tempo, articulation, phrasing, repetitions of sections, and so on), work out their interpretation, and relay their vision to the performers. They may also attend to organizational matters, such as scheduling rehearsals, planning a concert season, hearing auditions and selecting members, and promoting their ensemble in the media. Orchestras, choirs, concert bands and other sizable musical ensembles such as big bands are usually led by conductors. Conductorless orchestras In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), most orchestras were led by one of the musicians, typically the principal first violin, called the concertmaster. The concertmaster would lead the tempo of pieces by lifting his or her bow in a rhythmic manner. Leadership might also be provided by one of the chord-playing instrumentalists playing the basso continuo part which was the core of most Baroque instrumental ensemble pieces. Typically, this would be a harpsichord player, a pipe organist, or a lutist or theorbo player. A keyboard player could lead the ensemble with his or her head, or by taking one of the hands off the keyboard to lead a more difficult tempo change. A lutenist or theorbo player could lead by lifting the instrument neck up and down to indicate the tempo of a piece, or to lead a ritard during a cadence or ending. In some works which combined choirs and instrumental ensembles, two leaders were sometimes used: A concertmaster to lead the instrumentalists and a chord-playing performer to lead the singers. During the Classical music period (), the practice of using chordal instruments to play basso continuo was gradually phased out, and it disappeared completely by 1800. Instead, ensembles began to use conductors to lead the orchestra's tempos and playing style, while the concertmaster played an additional leadership role for the musicians, especially the string players, who imitate the bowstroke and playing style of the concertmaster, to the degree that is feasible for the different stringed instruments. In 1922, the idea of a conductor-less orchestra was revived in post-revolutionary Soviet Union. The symphony orchestra Persimfans was formed without a conductor, because the founders believed that the ensemble should be modeled on the ideal Marxist state, in which all people are equal. As such, its members felt that there was no need to be led by the dictatorial baton of a conductor; instead they were led by a committee, which determined tempos and playing styles. Although it was a partial success within the Soviet Union, the principal difficulty with the concept was in changing tempo during performances, because even if the committee had issued a decree about where a tempo change should take place, there was no leader in the ensemble to guide this tempo change. The orchestra survived for ten years before Stalin's cultural politics disbanded it by taking away its funding. In Western nations, some ensembles, such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, based in New York City, have had more success with conductorless orchestras, although decisions are likely to be deferred to some sense of leadership within the ensemble (for example, the principal wind and string players, notably the concertmaster). Others have returned to the tradition of a principal player, usually a violinist, being the artistic director and running rehearsal and leading concerts. Examples include the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam Sinfonietta & Candida Thompson and the New Century Chamber Orchestra. As well, as part of the early music movement, some 20th and 21st century orchestras have revived the Baroque practice of having no conductor on the podium for Baroque pieces, using the concertmaster or a chord-playing basso continuo performer (e.g., harpsichord or organ) to lead the group. Multiple conductors Offstage instruments Some orchestral works specify that an offstage trumpet should be used or that other instruments from the orchestra should be positioned off-stage or behind the stage, to create a haunted, mystical effect. To ensure that the offstage instrumentalist(s) play in time, sometimes a sub-conductor will be stationed offstage with a clear view of the principal conductor. Examples include the ending of "Neptune" from Gustav Holst's The Planets. The principal conductor leads the large orchestra, and the sub-conductor relays the principal conductor's tempo and gestures to the offstage musician (or musicians). One of the challenges with using two conductors is that the second conductor may get out of synchronization with the main conductor, or may mis-convey (or misunderstand) the principal conductor's gestures, which can lead to the offstage instruments being out of time. In the late 20th century and early 21st century, some orchestras use a video camera pointed at the principal conductor and a closed-circuit TV set in front of the offstage performer(s), instead of using two conductors. Contemporary music The techniques of polystylism and polytempo music have led a few 20th and 21st century composers to write music where multiple orchestras or ensembles perform simultaneously. These trends have brought about the phenomenon of polyconductor music, wherein separate sub-conductors conduct each group of musicians. Usually, one principal conductor conducts the sub-conductors, thereby shaping the overall performance. In Percy Grainger's The Warriors which includes three conductors: the primary conductor of the orchestra, a secondary conductor directing an off-stage brass ensemble, and a tertiary conductor directing percussion and harp. One example in the late-century orchestral music is Karlheinz Stockhausen's Gruppen, for three orchestras, which are placed around the audience. This way, the "sound masses" could be spatialized, as in an electroacoustic work. Gruppen was premiered in Cologne, in 1958, conducted by Stockhausen, Bruno Maderna and Pierre Boulez. It has been performed in 1996 by Simon Rattle, John Carewe and Daniel Harding. See also Chinese orchestra Gamelan Orchestra List of symphony orchestras List of symphony orchestras in Europe List of symphony orchestras in the United States List of youth orchestras in the United States Orchestral enhancement Orchestration Radio orchestra Rhythm section Shorthand for orchestra instrumentation String orchestra Notes References Further reading External links Articles containing video clips Types of musical groups	false	[ "The Torre Troyana (Troyan Tower, after the family Troya that built it) is a tower in Asti, Italy, and one of the main symbols of the city.\n\nIt is a campanile, or freestanding bell tower, and in the 19th century it was used to signal hours during daylight.\n\nBuilding \nIt is 44 metres high and is square in plan with 5.90-metre sides. It ends with Ghibelline merlons surmounted by a metal pinnacle which covers a clock.\n\nHistory \nThe basement was built in late 12th century. The original client is unknown, but the construction remained incomplete. In the first half of the 13th century, the powerful family of bankers Troja (later Troya) bought the unfinished tower and resumed the building; the tower was then finished somewhere between 1260 and 1280. In the medieval period it was a common practice for powerful and rich families to build a tall tower to show off their wealth: during the history there have been about 120 towers in Asti, of which several still remain.\n\nFollowing the decline of Troja family, in the second half of 14th century the tower was annexed to the nearby building, which was the seat of the government of the city, headed by the Dukes of Orléans. Later in 1422 Filippo Maria Visconti moved the seat of government to another building and the former one was assigned to the use of the town council. A clock was then placed in the tower and in 1470 the roof and the steeple were added. The seat of the city council was later moved again, but the tower kept its public function. In 1560, Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy finally donated the tower to the city council.\n\nThe tower was restored in 1905.\n\nBell \nA bell was first placed in the tower in early 15th century, but the current one dates back to the 16th century and is the second most ancient bell in Piedmont and the most ancient that still marks the hours, being the older one preserved in a museum.\n\nAccording to some old annals, the bell was created in 1531. It has a diameter and a height of , weighs and its intonation is in the note of E.\n\nAn inscription in Latin is present, which gives information about the origin of the bell:\n\nIn the Middle Ages it was a common practice to use bells as a source of iron to forge cannons in wartime, when it was necessary to quicken their production. The inscription states that the iron of a cannon was used to forge the bell instead, probably after the war ended.\n\nSee also \n Casane Astigiane\n\nBell towers in Italy\nTowers in Asti", "Ison is a drone note, or a slow-moving lower vocal part, used in Byzantine chant and some related musical traditions to accompany the melody, thus enriching the singing. It was not considered to transform it into a harmonized or polyphonic piece.\n\nHistory \nIt is widely believed that ison was first introduced in Byzantine practice in the 16th century. It stresses or supports the melody. Before that Greek church chanting was purely monophonic (as it still remains in some more archaic traditions, such as Russian Znamenny chant). The drone practice may have been borrowed from the West, namely from Italy. Traditionally the ison was not notated (see below). The first example of notated ison was not documented until 1847, and the practice of notating the ison did not become widespread for 100 years, or only in the second half of the 20th century.\n\nThere is some evidence for a use of a 2nd \"auxiliary\" ison in Patriarchal chanting practice, that would be pitched on a different tone (usually in a 4th of a 5th from the main ison, in a different tetrachord, but in some cases maybe even in a 2nd), and sang more discreetly, at the same time still effectively introducing the 3rd independent tone in the chant. Simon Karas is known to be interested in a double-ison technique, and he tried to reconstruct how it could sound like in the older 15th- 16th-century practices, when there appeared indeed some first attempts to create a \"Native Byzantine alternative to Western polyphony\".\n\nThe mobility of ison seems to gradually increase with time, with modern ison lines being much more mobile than those known from the end of the 19th century. The main reason for this gradual change obviously lies in the influence of Western music over Byzantine chanting practices. Some chanters however tend to emphasize the influence of Simon Karas, who was a supporter of much more mobile ison.\n\nChanters holding the ison were (and are) called isokratima (ισοκράτημα) in Greek.\n\nModern use in Byzantine chant \n\nThe use of ison in Byzantine chant is relatively flexible, so the same piece can be performed with isons of various mobility—starting from a stable drone on one note for a whole piece, and up to a more mobile lower tone, changing at least once within each musical phrase. Still ison is never as mobile as the melody, and does not introduce counterpoint in the performance, but rather stresses the melody by introducing a base to pitch stressed or consonant (just) intervals against it.\n\nThe main logic of ison is the following:\n for each Byzantine tone it has a main stable note (such as D for the 1st tone, G for the 2nd, F for the 3d etc.)\n whenever a melody transposes to a different tetrachord, the ison is likely to jump to the base note of this tetrachord, either up or down\n whenever a melody goes below the ison for a short time, the ison is likely to follow it down and then back up to the stable note, in order not to be above the melody (which is usually, but not always, undesirable) \n in some modes the ison performs phrasing of cadences, following the internal logic of the tone (such as the D-C-D cadence in the Plagal 1st tone, or the G-E interchanging phrasing of the 2nd tone)\n\nHowever, as it was noted above, for the majority of compositions a stable ison staying on the main stable note of the tone would usually work as well. With this in mind, in most traditional Byzantine scores prior to the mid-20th century the ison was not even notated, as it was assumed that to perform it is just too simple to bother to fix it in writing.\n\nFor really quick, as well as for extremely slow and ornamental pieces the ison is usually sung without words, just as a kind of \"humming\", while for the majority of pieces performed in normal tempo the words are supposed to be produced in synchrony with the melody. There is also an \"intermediate\" approach, when the ison follows the vowels of the text, but not the consonants. The ison is also supposed to be held across the gaps between the phrases, when the leading chanters, singing the melody, catch their breath.\n\nModern use in other traditions \nApart from Byzantine chant, ison is also used in some Russian traditions, such as Valaam chant. Recently, under the influence of Byzantine chant, Znamenny chant also tends to be performed with the ison. This innovation is rather controversial however, as Znamenny chant follows different musical logic than the Byzantine chant, is less ornamental and mobile on its own, and also does not use different scales for different tones. With ison introduced, Znamenny chant tends sometimes to sound rather dull, and the chants of different tones become more similar, which is not always a desirable effect. Ison is also used in Bulgarian and Serbian chant.\n\nReferences \n\nByzantine music theory\nPolyphonic singing" ]
[ "Giuseppe Verdi", "Politics" ]	C_5c162a8d57704ac39a956fcf85083bc5_0	What were Giuseppe's political beliefs?	1	What were Giuseppe Verdi's political beliefs?	Giuseppe Verdi	Having achieved some fame and prosperity, Verdi began in 1859 to take an active interest in Italian politics. His early commitment to the Risorgimento movement is difficult to estimate accurately; in the words of the music historian Philip Gossett "myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating" during the nineteenth century. An example is the claim that when the "Va, pensiero" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan, the audience, responding with nationalistic fervour, demanded an encore. As encores were expressly forbidden by the government at the time, such a gesture would have been extremely significant. But in fact the piece encored was not "Va, pensiero" but the hymn "Immenso Jehova". The growth of the "identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics" perhaps began in the 1840s. In 1848, the nationalist leader Giuseppe Mazzini, (whom Verdi had met in London the previous year) requested Verdi (who complied) to write a patriotic hymn. The opera historian Charles Osborne describes the 1849 La battaglia di Legnano as "an opera with a purpose" and maintains that "while parts of Verdi's earlier operas had frequently been taken up by the fighters of the Risorgimento...this time the composer had given the movement its own opera" It was not until 1859 in Naples, and only then spreading throughout Italy, that the slogan "Viva Verdi" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Viva Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), (who was then king of Piedmont). After Italy was unified in 1861, many of Verdi's early operas were increasingly re-interpreted as Risorgimento works with hidden Revolutionary messages that perhaps had not been originally intended by either the composer or his librettists. In 1859, Verdi was elected as a member of the new provincial council, and was appointed to head a group of five who would meet with King Vittorio Emanuele II in Turin. They were enthusiastically greeted along the way and in Turin Verdi himself received much of the publicity. On 17 October Verdi met with Cavour, the architect of the initial stages of Italian unification. Later that year the government of Emilia was subsumed under the United Provinces of Central Italy, and Verdi's political life temporarily came to an end. Whilst still maintaining nationalist feelings, he declined in 1860 the office of provincial council member to which he had been elected in absentia. Cavour however was anxious to convince a man of Verdi's stature that running for political office was essential to strengthening and securing Italy's future. The composer confided to Piave some years later that "I accepted on the condition that after a few months I would resign." Verdi was elected on 3 February 1861 for the town of Borgo San Donnino (Fidenza) to the Parliament of Piedmont-Sardinia in Turin (which from March 1861 became the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy), but following the death of Cavour in 1861, which deeply distressed him, he scarcely attended. Later, in 1874, Verdi was appointed a member of the Italian Senate, but did not participate in its activities. CANNOTANSWER	"myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating" during the nineteenth century.	Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi (; 9 or 10 October 1813 – 27 January 1901) was an Italian composer best known for his operas. He was born near Busseto to a provincial family of moderate means, receiving a musical education with the help of a local patron. Verdi came to dominate the Italian opera scene after the era of Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti, and Vincenzo Bellini, whose works significantly influenced him. In his early operas, Verdi demonstrated a sympathy with the Risorgimento movement which sought the unification of Italy. He also participated briefly as an elected politician. The chorus "Va, pensiero" from his early opera Nabucco (1842), and similar choruses in later operas, were much in the spirit of the unification movement, and the composer himself became esteemed as a representative of these ideals. An intensely private person, Verdi did not seek to ingratiate himself with popular movements. As he became professionally successful he was able to reduce his operatic workload and sought to establish himself as a landowner in his native region. He surprised the musical world by returning, after his success with the opera Aida (1871), with three late masterpieces: his Requiem (1874), and the operas Otello (1887) and Falstaff (1893). His operas remain extremely popular, especially the three peaks of his 'middle period': Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata. The bicentenary of his birth in 2013 was widely celebrated in broadcasts and performances. Life Childhood and education Verdi, the first child of Carlo Giuseppe Verdi (1785–1867) and Luigia Uttini (1787–1851), was born at their home in Le Roncole, a village near Busseto, then in the Département Taro and within the borders of the First French Empire following the annexation of the Duchy of Parma and Piacenza in 1808. The baptismal register, prepared on 11 October 1813, lists his parents Carlo and Luigia as "innkeeper" and "spinner" respectively. Additionally, it lists Verdi as being "born yesterday", but since days were often considered to begin at sunset, this could have meant either 9 or 10 October. Following his mother, Verdi always celebrated his birthday on 9 October, the day he himself believed he was born. Verdi had a younger sister, Giuseppa, who died aged 17 in 1833. She is said to have been his closest friend during childhood. From the age of four, Verdi was given private lessons in Latin and Italian by the village schoolmaster, Baistrocchi, and at six he attended the local school. After learning to play the organ, he showed so much interest in music that his parents finally provided him with a spinet. Verdi's gift for music was already apparent by 1820–21 when he began his association with the local church, serving in the choir, acting as an altar boy for a while, and taking organ lessons. After Baistrocchi's death, Verdi, at the age of eight, became the official paid organist. The music historian Roger Parker points out that both of Verdi's parents "belonged to families of small landowners and traders, certainly not the illiterate peasants from which Verdi later liked to present himself as having emerged... Carlo Verdi was energetic in furthering his son's education...something which Verdi tended to hide in later life... [T]he picture emerges of youthful precocity eagerly nurtured by an ambitious father and of a sustained, sophisticated and elaborate formal education." In 1823, when he was 10, Verdi's parents arranged for the boy to attend school in Busseto, enrolling him in a Ginnasio—an upper school for boys—run by Don Pietro Seletti, while they continued to run their inn at Le Roncole. Verdi returned to Busseto regularly to play the organ on Sundays, covering the distance of several kilometres on foot. At age 11, Verdi received schooling in Italian, Latin, the humanities, and rhetoric. By the time he was 12, he began lessons with Ferdinando Provesi, maestro di cappella at San Bartolomeo, director of the municipal music school and co-director of the local Società Filarmonica (Philharmonic Society). Verdi later stated: "From the ages of 13 to 18 I wrote a motley assortment of pieces: marches for band by the hundred, perhaps as many little sinfonie that were used in church, in the theatre and at concerts, five or six concertos and sets of variations for pianoforte, which I played myself at concerts, many serenades, cantatas (arias, duets, very many trios) and various pieces of church music, of which I remember only a Stabat Mater." This information comes from the Autobiographical Sketch which Verdi dictated to the publisher Giulio Ricordi late in life, in 1879, and remains the leading source for his early life and career. Written, understandably, with the benefit of hindsight, it is not always reliable when dealing with issues more contentious than those of his childhood. The other director of the Philharmonic Society was , a wholesale grocer and distiller, who was described by a contemporary as a "manic dilettante" of music. The young Verdi did not immediately become involved with the Philharmonic. By June 1827, he had graduated with honours from the Ginnasio and was able to focus solely on music under Provesi. By chance, when he was 13, Verdi was asked to step in as a replacement to play in what became his first public event in his home town; he was an immediate success mostly playing his own music to the surprise of many and receiving strong local recognition. By 1829–30, Verdi had established himself as a leader of the Philharmonic: "none of us could rival him" reported the secretary of the organisation, Giuseppe Demaldè. An eight-movement cantata, I deliri di Saul, based on a drama by Vittorio Alfieri, was written by Verdi when he was 15 and performed in Bergamo. It was acclaimed by both Demaldè and Barezzi, who commented: "He shows a vivid imagination, a philosophical outlook, and sound judgment in the arrangement of instrumental parts." In late 1829, Verdi had completed his studies with Provesi, who declared that he had no more to teach him. At the time, Verdi had been giving singing and piano lessons to Barezzi's daughter Margherita; by 1831, they were unofficially engaged. Verdi set his sights on Milan, then the cultural capital of northern Italy, where he applied unsuccessfully to study at the Conservatory. Barezzi made arrangements for him to become a private pupil of , who had been maestro concertatore at La Scala, and who described Verdi's compositions as "very promising". Lavigna encouraged Verdi to take out a subscription to La Scala, where he heard Maria Malibran in operas by Gioachino Rossini and Vincenzo Bellini. Verdi began making connections in the Milanese world of music that were to stand him in good stead. These included an introduction by Lavigna to an amateur choral group, the Società Filarmonica, led by Pietro Massini. Attending the Società frequently in 1834, Verdi soon found himself functioning as rehearsal director (for Rossini's La cenerentola) and continuo player. It was Massini who encouraged him to write his first opera, originally titled Rocester, to a libretto by the journalist Antonio Piazza. 1834–1842: First operas List of compositions by Giuseppe Verdi In mid-1834, Verdi sought to acquire Provesi's former post in Busseto but without success. But with Barezzi's help he did obtain the secular post of maestro di musica. He taught, gave lessons, and conducted the Philharmonic for several months before returning to Milan in early 1835. By the following July, he obtained his certification from Lavigna. Eventually in 1835 Verdi became director of the Busseto school with a three-year contract. He married Margherita in May 1836, and by March 1837, she had given birth to their first child, Virginia Maria Luigia on 26 March 1837. Icilio Romano followed on 11 July 1838. Both the children died young, Virginia on 12 August 1838, Icilio on 22 October 1839. In 1837, the young composer asked for Massini's assistance to stage his opera in Milan. The La Scala impresario, Bartolomeo Merelli, agreed to put on Oberto (as the reworked opera was now called, with a libretto rewritten by Temistocle Solera) in November 1839. It achieved a respectable 13 additional performances, following which Merelli offered Verdi a contract for three more works. While Verdi was working on his second opera Un giorno di regno, Margherita died of encephalitis at the age of 26. Verdi adored his wife and children and was devastated by their early deaths. Un giorno, a comedy, was premiered only a few months later. It was a flop and only given the one performance. Following its failure, it is claimed Verdi vowed never to compose again, but in his Sketch he recounts how Merelli persuaded him to write a new opera. Verdi was to claim that he gradually began to work on the music for Nabucco, the libretto of which had originally been rejected by the composer Otto Nicolai: "This verse today, tomorrow that, here a note, there a whole phrase, and little by little the opera was written", he later recalled. By the autumn of 1841 it was complete, originally under the title Nabucodonosor. Well received at its first performance on 9 March 1842, Nabucco underpinned Verdi's success until his retirement from the theatre, twenty-nine operas (including some revised and updated versions) later. At its revival in La Scala for the 1842 autumn season it was given an unprecedented (and later unequalled) total of 57 performances; within three years it had reached (among other venues) Vienna, Lisbon, Barcelona, Berlin, Paris and Hamburg; in 1848 it was heard in New York, in 1850 in Buenos Aires. Porter comments that "similar accounts...could be provided to show how widely and rapidly all [Verdi's] other successful operas were disseminated." 1842–1849 A period of hard work for Verdi—with the creation of twenty operas (excluding revisions and translations)—followed over the next sixteen years, culminating in Un ballo in maschera. This period was not without its frustrations and setbacks for the young composer, and he was frequently demoralised. In April 1845, in connection with I due Foscari, he wrote: "I am happy, no matter what reception it gets, and I am utterly indifferent to everything. I cannot wait for these next three years to pass. I have to write six operas, then addio to everything." In 1858 Verdi complained: "Since Nabucco, you may say, I have never had one hour of peace. Sixteen years in the galleys." After the initial success of Nabucco, Verdi settled in Milan, making a number of influential acquaintances. He attended the Salotto Maffei, Countess Clara Maffei's salons in Milan, becoming her lifelong friend and correspondent. A revival of Nabucco followed in 1842 at La Scala where it received a run of fifty-seven performances, and this led to a commission from Merelli for a new opera for the 1843 season. I Lombardi alla prima crociata was based on a libretto by Solera and premiered in February 1843. Inevitably, comparisons were made with Nabucco; but one contemporary writer noted: "If [Nabucco] created this young man's reputation, I Lombardi served to confirm it." Verdi paid close attention to his financial contracts, making sure he was appropriately remunerated as his popularity increased. For I Lombardi and Ernani (1844) in Venice he was paid 12,000 lire (including supervision of the productions); Attila and Macbeth (1847), each brought him 18,000 lire. His contracts with the publishers Ricordi in 1847 were very specific about the amounts he was to receive for new works, first productions, musical arrangements, and so on. He began to use his growing prosperity to invest in land near his birthplace. In 1844 he purchased Il Pulgaro, 62 acres (23 hectares) of farmland with a farmhouse and outbuildings, providing a home for his parents from May 1844. Later that year, he also bought the Palazzo Cavalli (now known as the Palazzo Orlandi) on the via Roma, Busseto's main street. In May 1848, Verdi signed a contract for land and houses at Sant'Agata in Busseto, which had once belonged to his family. It was here he built his own house, completed in 1880, now known as the Villa Verdi, where he lived from 1851 until his death. In March 1843, Verdi visited Vienna (where Gaetano Donizetti was musical director) to oversee a production of Nabucco. The older composer, recognising Verdi's talent, noted in a letter of January 1844: "I am very, very happy to give way to people of talent like Verdi... Nothing will prevent the good Verdi from soon reaching one of the most honourable positions in the cohort of composers." Verdi travelled on to Parma, where the Teatro Regio di Parma was producing Nabucco with Strepponi in the cast. For Verdi the performances were a personal triumph in his native region, especially as his father, Carlo, attended the first performance. Verdi remained in Parma for some weeks beyond his intended departure date. This fuelled speculation that the delay was due to Verdi's interest in Giuseppina Strepponi (who stated that their relationship began in 1843). Strepponi was in fact known for her amorous relationships (and many illegitimate children) and her history was an awkward factor in their relationship until they eventually agreed on marriage. After successful stagings of Nabucco in Venice (with twenty-five performances in the 1842/43 season), Verdi began negotiations with the impresario of La Fenice to stage I Lombardi, and to write a new opera. Eventually, Victor Hugo's Hernani was chosen, with Francesco Maria Piave as librettist. Ernani was successfully premiered in 1844 and within six months had been performed at twenty other theatres in Italy, and also in Vienna. The writer Andrew Porter notes that for the next ten years, Verdi's life "reads like a travel diary—a timetable of visits...to bring new operas to the stage or to supervise local premieres". La Scala premiered none of these new works, except for Giovanna d'Arco. Verdi "never forgave the Milanese for their reception of Un giorno di regno". During this period, Verdi began to work more consistently with his librettists. He relied on Piave again for I due Foscari, performed in Rome in November 1844, then on Solera once more for Giovanna d'Arco, at La Scala in February 1845, while in August that year he was able to work with Salvadore Cammarano on Alzira for the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples. Solera and Piave worked together on Attila for La Fenice (March 1846). In April 1844, Verdi took on Emanuele Muzio, eight years his junior, as a pupil and amanuensis. He had known him since about 1828 as another of Barezzi's protégés. Muzio, who in fact was Verdi's only pupil, became indispensable to the composer. He reported to Barezzi that Verdi "has a breadth of spirit, of generosity, a wisdom". In November 1846, Muzio wrote of Verdi: "If you could see us, I seem more like a friend, rather than his pupil. We are always together at dinner, in the cafes, when we play cards...; all in all, he doesn't go anywhere without me at his side; in the house we have a big table and we both write there together, and so I always have his advice." Muzio was to remain associated with Verdi, assisting in the preparation of scores and transcriptions, and later conducting many of his works in their premiere performances in the US and elsewhere outside Italy. He was chosen by Verdi as one of the executors of his will, but predeceased the composer in 1890. After a period of illness Verdi began work on Macbeth in September 1846. He dedicated the opera to Barezzi: "I have long intended to dedicate an opera to you, as you have been a father, a benefactor and a friend for me. It was a duty I should have fulfilled sooner if imperious circumstances had not prevented me. Now, I send you Macbeth, which I prize above all my other operas, and therefore deem worthier to present to you." In 1997 Martin Chusid wrote that Macbeth was the only one of Verdi's operas of his "early period" to remain regularly in the international repertoire, although in the 21st century Nabucco has also entered the lists. Strepponi's voice declined and her engagements dried up in the 1845 to 1846 period, and she returned to live in Milan whilst retaining contact with Verdi as his "supporter, promoter, unofficial adviser, and occasional secretary" until she decided to move to Paris in October 1846. Before she left Verdi gave her a letter that pledged his love. On the envelope, Strepponi wrote: "5 or 6 October 1846. They shall lay this letter on my heart when they bury me." Verdi had completed I masnadieri for London by May 1847 except for the orchestration. This he left until the opera was in rehearsal, since he wanted to hear "la [Jenny] Lind and modify her role to suit her more exactly". Verdi agreed to conduct the premiere on 22 July 1847 at Her Majesty's Theatre, as well as the second performance. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert attended the first performance, and for the most part, the press was generous in its praise. For the next two years, except for two visits to Italy during periods of political unrest, Verdi was based in Paris. Within a week of returning to Paris in July 1847, he received his first commission from the Paris Opéra. Verdi agreed to adapt I Lombardi to a new French libretto; the result was Jérusalem, which contained significant changes to the music and structure of the work (including an extensive ballet scene) to meet Parisian expectations. Verdi was awarded the Order of Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. To satisfy his contracts with the publisher , Verdi dashed off Il Corsaro. Budden comments "In no other opera of his does Verdi appear to have taken so little interest before it was staged." On hearing the news of the "Cinque Giornate", the "Five Days" of street fighting that took place between 18 and 22 March 1848 and temporarily drove the Austrians out of Milan, Verdi travelled there, arriving on 5 April. He discovered that Piave was now "Citizen Piave" of the newly proclaimed Republic of San Marco. Writing a patriotic letter to him in Venice, Verdi concluded "Banish every petty municipal idea! We must all extend a fraternal hand, and Italy will yet become the first nation of the world...I am drunk with joy! Imagine that there are no more Germans here!!" Verdi had been admonished by the poet Giuseppe Giusti for turning away from patriotic subjects, the poet pleading with him to "do what you can to nourish the [sorrow of the Italian people], to strengthen it, and direct it to its goal." Cammarano suggested adapting Joseph Méry's 1828 play La Bataille de Toulouse, which he described as a story "that should stir every man with an Italian soul in his breast". The premiere was set for late January 1849. Verdi travelled to Rome before the end of 1848. He found that city on the verge of becoming a (short-lived) republic, which commenced within days of La battaglia di Legnanos enthusiastically received premiere. In the spirit of the time were the tenor hero's final words, "Whoever dies for the fatherland cannot be evil-minded". Verdi had intended to return to Italy in early 1848, but was prevented by work and illness, as well as, most probably, by his increasing attachment to Strepponi. Verdi and Strepponi left Paris in July 1849, the immediate cause being an outbreak of cholera, and Verdi went directly to Busseto to continue work on completing his latest opera, Luisa Miller, for a production in Naples later in the year. 1849–1853: Fame Verdi was committed to the publisher Giovanni Ricordi for an opera—which became Stiffelio—for Trieste in the Spring of 1850; and, subsequently, following negotiations with La Fenice, developed a libretto with Piave and wrote the music for Rigoletto (based on Victor Hugo's Le roi s'amuse) for Venice in March 1851. This was the first of a sequence of three operas (followed by Il trovatore and La traviata) which were to cement his fame as a master of opera. The failure of Stiffelio (attributable not least to the censors of the time taking offence at the taboo subject of the supposed adultery of a clergyman's wife and interfering with the text and roles) incited Verdi to take pains to rework it, although even in the completely recycled version of Aroldo (1857) it still failed to please. Rigoletto, with its intended murder of royalty, and its sordid attributes, also upset the censors. Verdi would not compromise: What does the sack matter to the police? Are they worried about the effect it will produce?...Do they think they know better than I?...I see the hero has been made no longer ugly and hunchbacked!! Why? A singing hunchback...why not?...I think it splendid to show this character as outwardly deformed and ridiculous, and inwardly passionate and full of love. I chose the subject for these very qualities...if they are removed I can no longer set it to music. Verdi substituted a Duke for the King, and the public response and subsequent success of the opera all over Italy and Europe fully vindicated the composer. Aware that the melody of the Duke's song "La donna è mobile" ("Woman is fickle") would become a popular hit, Verdi excluded it from orchestral rehearsals for the opera, and rehearsed the tenor separately. For several months Verdi was preoccupied with family matters. These stemmed from the way in which the citizens of Busseto were treating Giuseppina Strepponi, with whom he was living openly in an unmarried relationship. She was shunned in the town and at church, and while Verdi appeared indifferent, she was certainly not. Furthermore, Verdi was concerned about the administration of his newly acquired property at Sant'Agata. A growing estrangement between Verdi and his parents was perhaps also attributable to Strepponi (the suggestion that this situation was sparked by the birth of a child to Verdi and Strepponi which was given away as a foundling lacks any firm evidence). In January 1851, Verdi broke off relations with his parents, and in April they were ordered to leave Sant'Agata; Verdi found new premises for them and helped them financially to settle into their new home. It may not be coincidental that all six Verdi operas written in the period 1849–53 (La battaglia, Luisa Miller, Stiffelio, Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata), have, uniquely in his oeuvre, heroines who are, in the opera critic Joseph Kerman's words, "women who come to grief because of sexual transgression, actual or perceived". Kerman, like the psychologist Gerald Mendelssohn, sees this choice of subjects as being influenced by Verdi's uneasy passion for Strepponi. Verdi and Strepponi moved into Sant'Agata on 1 May 1851. May also brought an offer for a new opera from La Fenice, which Verdi eventually realised as La traviata. That was followed by an agreement with the Rome Opera company to present Il trovatore for January 1853. Verdi now had sufficient earnings to retire, had he wished to. He had reached a stage where he could develop his operas as he wished, rather than be dependent on commissions from third parties. Il trovatore was in fact the first opera he wrote without a specific commission (apart from Oberto). At around the same time he began to consider creating an opera from Shakespeare's King Lear. After first (1850) seeking a libretto from Cammarano (which never appeared), Verdi later (1857) commissioned one from Antonio Somma, but this proved intractable, and no music was ever written. Verdi began work on Il trovatore after the death of his mother in June 1851. The fact that this is "the one opera of Verdi's which focuses on a mother rather than a father" is perhaps related to her death. In the winter of 1851–52 Verdi decided to go to Paris with Strepponi, where he concluded an agreement with the Opéra to write what became Les vêpres siciliennes, his first original work in the style of grand opera. In February 1852, the couple attended a performance of Alexander Dumas filss play The Lady of the Camellias; Verdi immediately began to compose music for what would later become La traviata. After his visit to Rome for Il trovatore in January 1853, Verdi worked on completing La traviata, but with little hope of its success, due to his lack of confidence in any of the singers engaged for the season. Furthermore, the management insisted that the opera be given a historical, not a contemporary setting. The premiere in March 1853 was indeed a failure: Verdi wrote: "Was the fault mine or the singers'? Time will tell." Subsequent productions (following some rewriting) throughout Europe over the following two years fully vindicated the composer; Roger Parker has written "Il trovatore consistently remains one of the three or four most popular operas in the Verdian repertoire: but it has never pleased the critics". 1853–1860: Consolidation In the eleven years up to and including Traviata, Verdi had written sixteen operas. Over the next eighteen years (up to Aida), he wrote only six new works for the stage. Verdi was happy to return to Sant'Agata and, in February 1856, was reporting a "total abandonment of music; a little reading; some light occupation with agriculture and horses; that's all". A couple of months later, writing in the same vein to Countess Maffei he stated: "I'm not doing anything. I don't read. I don't write. I walk in the fields from morning to evening, trying to recover, so far without success, from the stomach trouble caused me by I vespri siciliani. Cursed operas!" An 1858 letter by Strepponi to the publisher Léon Escudier describes the kind of lifestyle that increasingly appealed to the composer: "His love for the country has become a mania, madness, rage, and fury—anything you like that is exaggerated. He gets up almost with the dawn, to go and examine the wheat, the maize, the vines, etc....Fortunately our tastes for this sort of life coincide, except in the matter of sunrise, which he likes to see up and dressed, and I from my bed." Nonetheless on 15 May, Verdi signed a contract with La Fenice for an opera for the following spring. This was to be Simon Boccanegra. The couple stayed in Paris until January 1857 to deal with these proposals, and also the offer to stage the translated version of Il trovatore as a grand opera. Verdi and Strepponi travelled to Venice in March for the premiere of Simon Boccanegra, which turned out to be "a fiasco" (as Verdi reported, although on the second and third nights, the reception improved considerably). With Strepponi, Verdi went to Naples early in January 1858 to work with Somma on the libretto of the opera Gustave III, which over a year later would become Un ballo in maschera. By this time, Verdi had begun to write about Strepponi as "my wife" and she was signing her letters as "Giuseppina Verdi". Verdi raged against the stringent requirements of the Neapolitan censor stating: "I'm drowning in a sea of troubles. It's almost certain that the censors will forbid our libretto." With no hope of seeing his Gustavo III staged as written, he broke his contract. This resulted in litigation and counter-litigation; with the legal issues resolved, Verdi was free to present the libretto and musical outline of Gustave III to the Rome Opera. There, the censors demanded further changes; at this point, the opera took the title Un ballo in maschera. Arriving in Sant'Agata in March 1859 Verdi and Strepponi found the nearby city of Piacenza occupied by about 6,000 Austrian troops who had made it their base, to combat the rise of Italian interest in unification in the Piedmont region. In the ensuing Second Italian War of Independence the Austrians abandoned the region and began to leave Lombardy, although they remained in control of the Venice region under the terms of the armistice signed at Villafranca. Verdi was disgusted at this outcome: "[W]here then is the independence of Italy, so long hoped for and promised?...Venice is not Italian? After so many victories, what an outcome... It is enough to drive one mad" he wrote to Clara Maffei. Verdi and Strepponi now decided on marriage; they travelled to Collonges-sous-Salève, a village then part of Piedmont. On 29 August 1859 the couple were married there, with only the coachman who had driven them there and the church bell-ringer as witnesses. At the end of 1859, Verdi wrote to his friend Cesare De Sanctis "[Since completing Ballo] I have not made any more music, I have not seen any more music, I have not thought anymore about music. I don't even know what colour my last opera is, and I almost don't remember it." He began to remodel Sant'Agata, which took most of 1860 to complete and on which he continued to work for the next twenty years. This included major work on a square room that became his workroom, his bedroom, and his office. Politics Having achieved some fame and prosperity, Verdi began in 1859 to take an active interest in Italian politics. His early commitment to the Risorgimento movement is difficult to estimate accurately; in the words of the music historian Philip Gossett "myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating" during the nineteenth century. An example is the claim that when the "Va, pensiero" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan, the audience, responding with nationalistic fervour, demanded an encore. As encores were expressly forbidden by the government at the time, such a gesture would have been extremely significant. But in fact the piece encored was not "Va, pensiero" but the hymn "Immenso Jehova". The growth of the "identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics" perhaps began in the 1840s. In 1848, the nationalist leader Giuseppe Mazzini (whom Verdi had met in London the previous year) requested Verdi (who complied) to write a patriotic hymn. The opera historian Charles Osborne describes the 1849 La battaglia di Legnano as "an opera with a purpose" and maintains that "while parts of Verdi's earlier operas had frequently been taken up by the fighters of the Risorgimento...this time the composer had given the movement its own opera" It was not until 1859 in Naples, and only then spreading throughout Italy, that the slogan "Viva Verdi" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Viva Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), (who was then king of Piedmont). After Italy was unified in 1861, many of Verdi's early operas were increasingly re-interpreted as Risorgimento works with hidden Revolutionary messages that perhaps had not been originally intended by either the composer or his librettists. In 1859, Verdi was elected as a member of the new provincial council, and was appointed to head a group of five who would meet with King Vittorio Emanuele II in Turin. They were enthusiastically greeted along the way and in Turin Verdi himself received much of the publicity. On 17 October Verdi met with Cavour, the architect of the initial stages of Italian unification. Later that year the government of Emilia was subsumed under the United Provinces of Central Italy, and Verdi's political life temporarily came to an end. Whilst still maintaining nationalist feelings, he declined in 1860 the office of provincial council member to which he had been elected in absentia. Cavour however was anxious to convince a man of Verdi's stature that running for political office was essential to strengthening and securing Italy's future. The composer confided to Piave some years later that "I accepted on the condition that after a few months I would resign." Verdi was elected on 3 February 1861 for the town of Borgo San Donnino (Fidenza) to the Parliament of Piedmont-Sardinia in Turin (which from March 1861 became the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy), but following the death of Cavour in 1861, which deeply distressed him, he scarcely attended. Later, in 1874, Verdi was appointed a member of the Italian Senate, but did not participate in its activities. 1860–1887: from La forza to Otello In the months following the staging of Ballo, Verdi was approached by several opera companies seeking a new work or making offers to stage one of his existing ones, but refused them all. But when, in December 1860, an approach was made from Saint Petersburg's Imperial Theatre, the offer of 60,000 francs plus all expenses was doubtless a strong incentive. Verdi came up with the idea of adapting the 1835 Spanish play Don Alvaro o la fuerza del sino by Angel Saavedra, which became La forza del destino, with Piave writing the libretto. The Verdis arrived in St. Petersburg in December 1861 for the premiere, but casting problems meant that it had to be postponed. Returning via Paris from Russia on 24 February 1862, Verdi met two young Italian writers, the twenty-year-old Arrigo Boito and Franco Faccio. Verdi had been invited to write a piece of music for the 1862 International Exhibition in London, and charged Boito with writing a text, which became the Inno delle nazioni. Boito, as a supporter of the grand opera of Giacomo Meyerbeer and an opera composer in his own right, was later in the 1860s critical of Verdi's "reliance on formula rather than form", incurring the composer's wrath. Nevertheless, he was to become Verdi's close collaborator in his final operas. The St. Petersburg premiere of La forza finally took place in September 1862, and Verdi received the Order of St. Stanislaus. A revival of Macbeth in Paris in 1865 was not a success, but he obtained a commission for a new work, Don Carlos, based on the play Don Carlos by Friedrich Schiller. He and Giuseppina spent late 1866 and much of 1867 in Paris, where they heard, and did not warm to, Giacomo Meyerbeer's last opera, L'Africaine, and Richard Wagner's overture to Tannhäuser. The opera's premiere in 1867 drew mixed comments. While the critic Théophile Gautier praised the work, the composer Georges Bizet was disappointed at Verdi's changing style: "Verdi is no longer Italian. He is following Wagner." During the 1860s and 1870s, Verdi paid great attention to his estate around Busseto, purchasing additional land, dealing with unsatisfactory (in one case, embezzling) stewards, installing irrigation, and coping with variable harvests and economic slumps. In 1867, both Verdi's father Carlo, with whom he had restored good relations, and his early patron and father-in-law Antonio Barezzi, died. Verdi and Giuseppina decided to adopt Carlo's great-niece Filomena Maria Verdi, then seven years old, as their own child. She was to marry in 1878 the son of Verdi's friend and lawyer Angelo Carrara and her family became eventually the heirs of Verdi's estate. Aida was commissioned by the Egyptian government for the opera house built by the Khedive Isma'il Pasha to celebrate the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. The opera house actually opened with a production of Rigoletto. The prose libretto in French by Camille du Locle, based on a scenario by the Egyptologist Auguste Mariette, was transformed to Italian verse by Antonio Ghislanzoni. Verdi was offered the enormous sum of 150,000 francs for the opera (even though he confessed that Ancient Egypt was "a civilization I have never been able to admire"), and it was first performed in Cairo in 1871. Verdi spent much of 1872 and 1873 supervising the Italian productions of Aida at Milan, Parma and Naples, effectively acting as producer and demanding high standards and adequate rehearsal time. During the rehearsals for the Naples production he wrote his string quartet, the only chamber music by him to survive, and the only major work in the form by an Italian of the 19th century. In 1869, Verdi had been asked to compose a section for a requiem mass in memory of Rossini. He compiled and completed the requiem, but its performance was abandoned (and its premiere did not take place until 1988). Five years later, Verdi reworked his "Libera Me" section of the Rossini Requiem and made it a part of his Requiem honouring Alessandro Manzoni, who had died in 1873. The complete Requiem was first performed at the cathedral in Milan on the anniversary of Manzoni's death on 22 May 1874. The spinto soprano Teresa Stolz (1834–1902), who had sung in La Scala productions from 1865 onwards, was the soloist in the first and many later performances of the Requiem; in February 1872, she had created Aida in its European premiere in Milan. She became closely associated personally with Verdi (exactly how closely remains conjectural), to Giuseppina Verdi's initial disquiet; but the women were reconciled and Stolz remained a companion of Verdi after Giuseppina's death in 1897 until his own death. Verdi conducted his Requiem in Paris, London and Vienna in 1875 and in Cologne in 1876. It seemed that it would be his last work. In the words of his biographer John Rosselli, it "confirmed him as the unique presiding genius of Italian music. No fellow composer...came near him in popularity or reputation". Verdi, now in his sixties, initially seemed to withdraw into retirement. He deliberately shied away from opportunities to publicise himself or to become involved with new productions of his works, but secretly he began work on Otello, which Boito (to whom the composer had been reconciled by Ricordi) had proposed to him privately in 1879. The composition was delayed by a revision of Simon Boccanegra which Verdi undertook with Boito, produced in 1881, and a revision of Don Carlos. Even when Otello was virtually completed, Verdi teased "Shall I finish it? Shall I have it performed? Hard to tell, even for me." As news leaked out, Verdi was pressed by opera houses across Europe with enquiries; eventually the opera was triumphantly premiered at La Scala in February 1887. 1887–1901: Falstaff and last years Following the success of Otello Verdi commented, "After having relentlessly massacred so many heroes and heroines, I have at last the right to laugh a little." He had considered a variety of comic subjects but had found none of them wholly suitable and confided his ambition to Boito. The librettist said nothing at the time but secretly began work on a libretto based on The Merry Wives of Windsor with additional material taken from Henry IV, Part 1 and Part 2. Verdi received the draft libretto probably in early July 1889 after he had just read Shakespeare's play: "Benissimo! Benissimo!... No one could have done better than you", he wrote back to Boito. But he still had doubts: his age, his health (which he admits to being good) and his ability to complete the project: "If I were not to finish the music?". If the project failed, it would have been a waste of Boito's time, and have distracted him from completing his own new opera. Finally on 10 July 1889 he wrote again: "So be it! So let's do Falstaff! For now, let's not think of obstacles, of age, of illnesses!" Verdi emphasised the need for secrecy, but continued "If you are in the mood, then start to write." Later he wrote to Boito (capitals and exclamation marks are Verdi's own): "What joy to be able to say to the public: HERE WE ARE AGAIN!!! COME AND SEE US!" The first performance of Falstaff took place at La Scala on 9 February 1893. For the first night, official ticket prices were thirty times higher than usual. Royalty, aristocracy, critics and leading figures from the arts all over Europe were present. The performance was a huge success; numbers were encored, and at the end the applause for Verdi and the cast lasted an hour. That was followed by a tumultuous welcome when the composer, his wife and Boito arrived at the Grand Hotel de Milan. Even more hectic scenes ensued when he went to Rome in May for the opera's premiere at the Teatro Costanzi, when crowds of well-wishers at the railway station initially forced Verdi to take refuge in a tool-shed. He witnessed the performance from the Royal Box at the side of King Umberto and the Queen. In his last years Verdi undertook a number of philanthropic ventures, publishing in 1894 a song for the benefit of earthquake victims in Sicily, and from 1895 onwards planning, building and endowing a rest-home for retired musicians in Milan, the Casa di Riposo per Musicisti, and building a hospital at Villanova sull'Arda, close to Busseto. His last major composition, the choral set of Four sacred pieces, was published in 1898. In 1900 he was deeply upset at the assassination of King Umberto and sketched a setting of a poem in his memory but was unable to complete it. While staying at the Grand Hotel, Verdi suffered a stroke on 21 January 1901. He gradually grew more feeble over the next week, during which Stolz cared for him, and died on 27 January at the age of 87. Verdi was initially buried in a private ceremony at Milan's Cimitero Monumentale. A month later, his body was moved to the crypt of the Casa di Riposo. On this occasion, "Va, pensiero" from Nabucco was conducted by Arturo Toscanini with a chorus of 820 singers. A huge crowd was in attendance, estimated at 300,000. Boito wrote to a friend, in words which recall the mysterious final scene of Don Carlos, "[Verdi] sleeps like a King of Spain in his Escurial, under a bronze slab that completely covers him." Personality Not all of Verdi's personal qualities were amiable. John Rosselli concluded after writing his biography that "I do not very much like the man Verdi, in particular the autocratic rentier-cum-estate owner, part-time composer, and seemingly full-time grumbler and reactionary critic of the later years", yet admits that like other writers, he must "admire him, warts and all...a deep integrity runs beneath his life, and can be felt even when he is being unreasonable or wrong." Budden suggests that "With Verdi...the man and the artist on many ways developed side by side." Ungainly and awkward in society in his early years, "as he became a man of property and underwent the civilizing influence of Giuseppina,...[he] acquired assurance and authority." He also learnt to keep himself to himself, never discussing his private life and maintaining, when it suited him, legends about his supposed 'peasant' origins, his materialism and his indifference to criticism. Gerald Mendelsohn describes the composer as "an intensely private man who deeply resented efforts to inquire into his personal affairs. He regarded journalists and would-be biographers, as well as his neighbors in Busseto and the operatic public at large, as an intrusive lot, against whose prying attentions he needed constantly to defend himself." Verdi was never explicit about his religious beliefs. Anti-clerical by nature in his early years, he nonetheless built a chapel at Sant'Agata, but is little recorded as attending church. Strepponi wrote in 1871 "I won't say [Verdi] is an atheist, but he is not much of a believer." Rosselli comments that in the Requiem "The prospect of Hell appears to rule...[the Requiem] is troubled to the end," and offers little consolation. Music and form Spirit The writer Friedrich Schiller (four of whose plays were adapted as operas by Verdi) distinguished two types of artist in his 1795 essay On Naïve and Sentimental Poetry. The philosopher Isaiah Berlin ranked Verdi in the 'naïve' category—"They are not...self-conscious. They do not...stand aside to contemplate their creations and express their own feelings....They are able...if they have genius, to embody their vision fully." (The 'sentimentals' seek to recreate nature and natural feelings on their own terms—Berlin instances Richard Wagner—"offering not peace, but a sword".) Verdi's operas are not written according to an aesthetic theory, or with a purpose to change the tastes of their audiences. In conversation with a German visitor in 1887 he is recorded as saying that, whilst "there was much to be admired in [Wagner's operas] Tannhäuser and Lohengrin...in his recent operas [Wagner] seemed to be overstepping the bounds of what can be expressed in music. For him "philosophical" music was incomprehensible." Although Verdi's works belong, as Rosselli admits "to the most artificial of genres...[they] ring emotionally true: truth and directness make them exciting, often hugely so." Periods The earliest study of Verdi's music, published in 1859 by the Italian critic Abraham Basevi, already distinguished four periods in Verdi's music. The early, 'grandiose' period, ended according to Basevi with La battaglia di Legnano (1849), and a 'personal' style began with the next opera Luisa Miller. These two operas are generally agreed today by critics to mark the division between Verdi's 'early' and 'middle' periods. The 'middle' period is felt to end with La traviata (1853) and Les vêpres siciliennes (1855), with a 'late' period commencing with Simon Boccanegra (1857) running through to Aida (1871). The last two operas, Otello and Falstaff, together with the Requiem and the Four Sacred Pieces, then represent a 'final' period. Early period Verdi was to claim in his Sketch that during his early training with Lavigna "I did nothing but canons and fugues...No-one taught me orchestration or how to handle dramatic music." He is known to have written a variety of music for the Busseto Philharmonic society, including vocal music, band music and chamber works, (and including an alternative overture to Rossini's Barber of Seville) but few of these works survive. (He may have given instructions before his death to destroy his early works). Verdi uses in his early operas (and, in his own stylized versions, throughout his later work) the standard elements of Italian opera content of the period, referred to by the opera writer Julian Budden as the 'Code Rossini', after the composer who established through his work and popularity the accepted templates of these forms; they were also used by the composers dominant during Verdi's early career, Bellini, Donizetti and Saverio Mercadante. Amongst the essential elements are the aria, the duet, the ensemble, and the finale sequence of an act. The aria format, centred on a soloist, typically involved three sections; a slow introduction, marked typically cantabile or adagio, a tempo di mezzo which might involve chorus or other characters, and a cabaletta, an opportunity for bravura singing for the soloist. The duet was similarly formatted. Finales, covering climactic sequences of action, used the various forces of soloists, ensemble and chorus, usually culminating with an exciting stretto section. Verdi was to develop these and the other formulae of the generation preceding him with increasing sophistication during his career. The operas of the early period show Verdi learning by doing and gradually establishing mastery over the different elements of opera. Oberto is poorly structured, and the orchestration of the first operas is generally simple, sometimes even basic. The musicologist Richard Taruskin suggests "the most striking effect in the early Verdi operas, and the one most obviously allied to the mood of the Risorgimento, was the big choral number sung—crudely or sublimely, according to the ear of the beholder—in unison. The success of "Va, pensiero" in Nabucco (which Rossini approvingly denoted as "a grand aria sung by sopranos, contraltos, tenors and basses"), was replicated in the similar "O Signor, dal tetto natio" in I lombardi and in 1844 in the chorus "Si ridesti il Leon di Castiglia" in Ernani, the battle hymn of the conspirators seeking freedom In I due Foscari Verdi first uses recurring themes identified with main characters; here and in future operas the accent moves away from the 'oratorio' characteristics of the first operas towards individual action and intrigue. From this period onwards Verdi also develops his instinct for "tinta" (literally 'colour'), a term which he used for characterising elements of an individual opera score—Parker gives as an example "the rising 6th that begins so many lyric pieces in Ernani". Macbeth, even in its original 1847 version, shows many original touches; characterization by key (the Macbeths themselves generally singing in sharp keys, the witches in flat keys), a preponderance of minor key music, and highly original orchestration. In the 'dagger scene' and the duet following the murder of Duncan, the forms transcend the 'Code Rossini' and propel the drama in a compelling fashion. Verdi was to comment in 1868 that Rossini and his followers missed "the golden thread that binds all the parts together and, rather than a set of numbers without coherence, makes an opera". Tinta was for Verdi this "golden thread", an essential unifying factor in his works. Middle period The writer David Kimbell states that in Luisa Miller and Stiffelio (the earliest operas of this period) there appears to be a "growing freedom in the large scale structure...and an acute attention to fine detail". Others echo those feelings. Julian Budden expresses the impact of Rigoletto and its place in Verdi's output as follows: "Just after 1850 at the age of 38, Verdi closed the door on a period of Italian opera with Rigoletto. The so-called ottocento in music is finished. Verdi will continue to draw on certain of its forms for the next few operas, but in a totally new spirit." One example of Verdi's wish to move away from "standard forms" appears in his feelings about the structure of Il trovatore. To his librettist, Cammarano, Verdi plainly states in a letter of April 1851 that if there were no standard forms—"cavatinas, duets, trios, choruses, finales, etc. ... and if you could avoid beginning with an opening chorus....", he would be quite happy. Two external factors had their impacts on Verdi's compositions of this period. One is that with increasing reputation and financial security he no longer needed to commit himself to the productive treadmill, had more freedom to choose his own subjects, and had more time to develop them according to his own ideas. In the years 1849 to 1859 he wrote eight new operas, compared with fourteen in the previous ten years. Another factor was the changed political situation; the failure of the 1848 revolutions led both to some diminution of the Risorgimento ethos (at least initially) and a significant increase in theatre censorship. This is reflected both in Verdi's choices of plots dealing more with personal relationships than political conflict, and in a (partly consequent) dramatic reduction in the operas of this period in the number of choruses (of the type which had first made him famous)—not only are there on average 40% fewer choruses in the 'middle' period operas compared to the 'early' period', but whereas virtually all the 'early' operas commence with a chorus, only one (Luisa Miller) of the 'middle' period operas begin this way. Instead, Verdi experiments with a variety of means, e.g. a stage band (Rigoletto), an aria for bass (Stiffelio), a party scene (La traviata). Chusid also notes Verdi's increasing tendency to replace full-scale overtures with shorter orchestral introductions. Parker comments that La traviata, the last opera of the 'middle' period, is "again a new adventure. It gestures towards a level of 'realism'...the contemporary world of waltzes pervades the score, and the heroine's death from disease is graphically depicted in the music." Verdi's increasing command of musical highlighting of changing moods and relationships is exemplified in Act III of Rigoletto, where Duke's flippant song "La donna è mobile" is followed immediately by the quartet "Bella figlia dell'amore", contrasting the rapacious Duke and his inamorata with the (concealed) indignant Rigoletto and his grieving daughter. Taruskin asserts this is "the most famous ensemble Verdi ever composed". Late period Chusid notes Strepponi's description of the operas of the 1860s and 1870s as being "modern" whereas Verdi described the pre-1849 works as "the cavatina operas", as further indication that "Verdi became increasingly dissatisfied with the older, familiar conventions of his predecessors that he had adopted at the outset of his career," Parker sees a physical differentiation of the operas from Les vêpres siciliennes (1855) to Aida (1871) is that they are significantly longer, and with larger cast-lists, than previous works. They also reflect a shift towards the French genre of grand opera, notable in more colorful orchestration, counterpointing of serious and comic scenes, and greater spectacle. The opportunities of transforming Italian opera by utilising such resources appealed to him. For a commission from the Paris Opéra he expressly demanded a libretto from Eugène Scribe, the favorite librettist of Meyerbeer, telling him: "I want—in fact, I must have—a grandiose, impassioned and original subject." The result was Les vêpres siciliennes, and the scenarios of Simon Boccanegra (1857), Un ballo in maschera (1859), La forza del destino (1862), Don Carlos (1865) and Aida (1872) all meet the same criteria. Porter notes that Un ballo marks an almost complete synthesis of Verdi's style with the grand opera hallmarks, such that "huge spectacle is not mere decoration but essential to the drama...musical and theatrical lines remain taut [and] the characters still sing as warmly, passionately and personally as in Il trovatore." When the composer Ferdinand Hiller asked Verdi whether he preferred Aida or Don Carlos, Verdi replied that Aida had "more bite and (if you'll forgive the word), more theatricality". During the rehearsals for the Naples production of Aida Verdi amused himself by writing his only string quartet, a sprightly work which shows in its last movement that he had not lost the skill for fugue-writing that he had learned with Lavigna. Final works Verdi's three last major works continued to show new development in conveying drama and emotion. The first to appear, in 1874 was his Requiem, scored for operatic forces but by no means an "opera in ecclesiastical dress" (the words in which Hans von Bülow condemned it before even hearing it). Although in the Requiem Verdi puts to use many of the techniques he learned in opera, its musical forms and emotions are not those of the stage. Verdi's tone painting at the opening of the Requiem is vividly described by the Italian composer Ildebrando Pizzetti, writing in 1941: "in [the words] murmured by an invisible crowd over the slow swaying of a few simple chords, you straightaway sense the fear and sadness of a vast multitude before the mystery of death. In the [following] Et lux perpetuum the melody spreads it wings...before falling back on itself...you hear a sigh for consolation and eternal peace." By the time Otello premièred in 1887, more than 15 years after Aida, the operas of Verdi's (predeceased) contemporary Richard Wagner had begun their ascendancy in popular taste, and many sought or identified Wagnerian aspects in Verdi's latest composition. Budden points out that there is little in the music of Otello that relates either to the verismo opera of the younger Italian composers, and little if anything which can be construed as a homage to the New German School. Nonetheless there is still much originality, building on the strengths which Verdi had already demonstrated; the powerful storm which opens the opera in medias res, the recollection of the love duet of Act I in Otello's dying words (more an aspect of tinta than leitmotif), imaginative touches of harmony in Iago's "Era la notte" (Act II). Finally, six years later, appeared Falstaff, Verdi's only comedy apart from the early, ill-fated Un giorno di regno. In this work Roger Parker writes that: "the listener is bombarded by a stunning diversity of rhythms, orchestral textures, melodic motifs and harmonic devices. Passages that in earlier times would have furnished material for an entire number here crowd in on each other, shouldering themselves unceremoniously to the fore in bewildering succession". Rosselli comments: "In Otello Verdi had miniaturized the forms of romantic Italian opera; in Falstaff he miniaturized himself...[M]oments...crystallize a feeling...as though an aria or duet had been precipitated into a phrase." Legacy Reception Although Verdi's operas brought him a popular following, not all contemporary critics approved of his work. The English critic Henry Chorley allowed in 1846 that "he is the only modern man...having a style—for better or worse", but found all his output unacceptable. "[His] faults [are] grave ones, calculated to destroy and degrade taste beyond those of any Italian composer in the long list" wrote Chorley, whilst conceding that "howsoever incomplete may have been his training, howsoever mistaken his aspirations may have proved...he has aspired." But by the time of Verdi's death, 55 years later, his reputation was assured, and the 1910 edition of Grove's Dictionary pronounced him "one of the greatest and most popular opera composers of the nineteenth century". Verdi had no pupils apart from Muzio and no school of composers sought to follow his style which, however much it reflected his own musical direction, was rooted in the period of his own youth. By the time of his death, verismo was the accepted style of young Italian composers. The New York Metropolitan Opera frequently staged Rigoletto, Trovatore and Traviata during this period and featured Aida in every season from 1898 to 1945. Interest in the operas reawakened in mid-1920s Germany and this sparked a revival in England and elsewhere. From the 1930s onward there began to appear scholarly biographies and publications of documentation and correspondence. In 1959 the Instituto di Studi Verdiani (from 1989 the Istituto Nazionale di Studi Verdiani) was founded in Parma and became a leading centre for research and publication of Verdi studies, and in the 1970s the American Institute for Verdi Studies was founded at New York University. Nationalism in the operas Historians have debated how political Verdi's operas were. In particular, the Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves (known as Va, pensiero) from the third act of the opera Nabucco was used an anthem for Italian patriots, who were seeking to unify their country and free it from foreign control in the years up to 1861 (the chorus's theme of exiles singing about their homeland, and its lines such as O mia patria, si bella e perduta / "O my country, so lovely and so lost" were thought to have resonated with many Italians). Beginning in Naples in 1859 and spreading throughout Italy, the slogan "Viva VERDI" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Long live Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), referring to Victor Emmanuel II. Marco Pizzo argues that after 1815, music became a political tool, and many songwriters expressed ideals of freedom and equality. Pizzo claims that Verdi was part of this movement, for his operas were inspired by the love of country, the struggle for Italian independence, and speak to the sacrifice of patriots and exiles. George Martin claims Verdi was "the greatest artist" of the Risorgimento. "Throughout his work its values, its issues recur constantly, and he expressed them with great power". But Mary Ann Smart argues that music critics at the time seldom mentioned any political themes. Likewise, Roger Parker argues that the political dimension of Verdi's operas was exaggerated by nationalistic historians looking for a hero in the late 19th century. From the 1850s onwards, Verdi's operas displayed few patriotic themes because of the heavy censorship by the absolutist regime in power. Verdi later became disillusioned by politics, but he was personally active part in the political world of events of the Risorgimento and was elected to the first Italian parliament in 1861. Memorials and cultural portrayals Three Italian conservatories, the Milan Conservatory and those in Turin and Como, are named after Verdi, as are many Italian theatres. Verdi's hometown of Busseto displays Luigi Secchi's statue of a seated Verdi in 1913, next to the Teatro Verdi built in his honour in the 1850s. It is one of many statues to the composer in Italy. The Giuseppe Verdi Monument, a 1906 marble memorial, sculpted by Pasquale Civiletti, is located in Verdi Square in Manhattan, New York City. The monument includes a statue of Verdi himself and life-sized statues of four characters from his operas, (Aida, Otello, and Falstaff from the operas of the same names, and Leonora from La forza del destino). Verdi has been the subject of a number of film and stage works. These include the 1938 film directed by Carmine Gallone, Giuseppe Verdi, starring Fosco Giachetti; the 1982 miniseries, The Life of Verdi, directed by Renato Castellani, where Verdi was played by Ronald Pickup, with narration by Burt Lancaster in the English version; and the 1985 play After Aida, by Julian Mitchell (1985). He is a character in the 2011 opera Risorgimento! by Italian composer Lorenzo Ferrero, written to commemorate the 150th anniversary of Italian unification of 1861. Verdi today Verdi's operas are frequently staged around the world. All of his operas are available in recordings in a number of versions, and on DVD – Naxos Records offers a complete boxed set. Modern productions may differ substantially from those originally envisaged by the composer. Jonathan Miller's 1982 version of Rigoletto for English National Opera, set in the world of modern American mafiosi, received critical plaudits. But the same company's staging in 2002 of Un ballo in maschera as A Masked Ball, directed by Calixto Bieito, including "satanic sex rituals, homosexual rape, [and] a demonic dwarf", got a general critical thumbs down. Meanwhile, the music of Verdi can still evoke a range of cultural and political resonances. Excerpts from the Requiem were featured at the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997. On 12 March 2011 during a performance of Nabucco at the Opera di Roma celebrating 150 years of Italian unification, the conductor Riccardo Muti paused after "Va pensiero" and turned to address the audience (which included the then Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi) to complain about cuts in state funding of culture; the audience then joined in a repeat of the chorus. In 2014, the pop singer Katy Perry appeared at the Grammy Award wearing a dress designed by Valentino, embroidered with the music of "Dell'invito trascorsa è già l'ora" from the start of La traviata. The bicentenary of Verdi's birth in 2013 was celebrated in numerous events around the world, both in performances and broadcasts. Notes References Citations Sources External links Bicentennial of Giuseppe Verdi "Album Verdi" from the Digital Library of the National Library of Naples (Italy) Giuseppe Verdi recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings. 1813 births 1901 deaths 19th-century classical composers 19th-century Italian male musicians Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur Deaths from cerebrovascular disease Deputies of Legislature VIII of the Kingdom of Italy Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur Grand Officiers of the Légion d'honneur Italian classical composers Italian male classical composers Italian opera composers Italian philanthropists Italian Romantic composers Italian unification Male opera composers Members of the Senate of the Kingdom of Italy People from Busseto Recipients of the Order of Saint Stanislaus (Russian), 1st class Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class)	true	[ "Hold come what may is a phrase popularized by logician Willard Van Orman Quine. Beliefs that are \"held come what may\" are beliefs one is unwilling to give up, regardless of any evidence with which one might be presented.\n\nQuine held (on a perhaps simplistic construal) that there are no beliefs that one ought to hold come what may—in other words, that all beliefs are rationally revisable (\"no statement is immune to revision\"), and compared this to the simplification of quantum mechanics. Many philosophers argue to the contrary, believing that, for example, the laws of thought cannot be revised and may be \"held come what may\". Quine believed that all beliefs are linked by a web of beliefs, in which a belief is linked to another belief by supporting relations, but if one belief is found untrue, there is ground to find the linked beliefs also untrue. The latter statement is usually referred to as either confirmation holism or Duhem–Quine thesis.\n\nA closely related concept is hold more stubbornly at least, also popularized by Quine. Some beliefs may be more useful than others, or may be implied by a large number of beliefs. Examples might be laws of logic, or the belief in an external world of physical objects. Altering such central portions of the web of beliefs would have immense, ramifying consequences, and affect many other beliefs. It is better to alter auxiliary beliefs around the edges of the web of beliefs (considered to be sense beliefs, rather than main beliefs) in the face of new evidence unfriendly to one's central principles. Thus, while one might agree that there is no belief one can hold come what may, there are some for which there is ample practical ground to \"hold more stubbornly at least\".\n\nSee also\n Coherentism\n\nReferences\n\nEnglish phrases\nBelief\nConcepts in logic\nWillard Van Orman Quine", "Faccia di spia (also known as C.I.A. Secret Story) is a 1975 Italian political drama film written and directed by Giuseppe Ferrara.\n\nCast \nAdalberto Maria Merli as captain Felix Ramos\nMariangela Melato as Tania\nFrancisco Rabal as Mehdi Ben Barka\nRiccardo Cucciolla as Giuseppe Pinelli \nClaudio Camaso as Che Guevara\nGeorge Ardisson as Patrick\nUgo Bologna as Salvador Allende\nDominique Boschero as Licia Pinelli\nLou Castel as the torturer\nGérard Landry as Mr. Rutherford\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1975 films\nItalian drama films\nFilms directed by Giuseppe Ferrara\n1970s political drama films\nItalian films\nCentral Intelligence Agency in fiction\nFilms scored by Manos Hatzidakis\n1975 drama films" ]
[ "Giuseppe Verdi", "Politics", "What were Giuseppe's political beliefs?", "\"myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating\" during the nineteenth century." ]	C_5c162a8d57704ac39a956fcf85083bc5_0	What were the myths about?	2	What were the myths of the nineteenth century about?	Giuseppe Verdi	Having achieved some fame and prosperity, Verdi began in 1859 to take an active interest in Italian politics. His early commitment to the Risorgimento movement is difficult to estimate accurately; in the words of the music historian Philip Gossett "myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating" during the nineteenth century. An example is the claim that when the "Va, pensiero" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan, the audience, responding with nationalistic fervour, demanded an encore. As encores were expressly forbidden by the government at the time, such a gesture would have been extremely significant. But in fact the piece encored was not "Va, pensiero" but the hymn "Immenso Jehova". The growth of the "identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics" perhaps began in the 1840s. In 1848, the nationalist leader Giuseppe Mazzini, (whom Verdi had met in London the previous year) requested Verdi (who complied) to write a patriotic hymn. The opera historian Charles Osborne describes the 1849 La battaglia di Legnano as "an opera with a purpose" and maintains that "while parts of Verdi's earlier operas had frequently been taken up by the fighters of the Risorgimento...this time the composer had given the movement its own opera" It was not until 1859 in Naples, and only then spreading throughout Italy, that the slogan "Viva Verdi" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Viva Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), (who was then king of Piedmont). After Italy was unified in 1861, many of Verdi's early operas were increasingly re-interpreted as Risorgimento works with hidden Revolutionary messages that perhaps had not been originally intended by either the composer or his librettists. In 1859, Verdi was elected as a member of the new provincial council, and was appointed to head a group of five who would meet with King Vittorio Emanuele II in Turin. They were enthusiastically greeted along the way and in Turin Verdi himself received much of the publicity. On 17 October Verdi met with Cavour, the architect of the initial stages of Italian unification. Later that year the government of Emilia was subsumed under the United Provinces of Central Italy, and Verdi's political life temporarily came to an end. Whilst still maintaining nationalist feelings, he declined in 1860 the office of provincial council member to which he had been elected in absentia. Cavour however was anxious to convince a man of Verdi's stature that running for political office was essential to strengthening and securing Italy's future. The composer confided to Piave some years later that "I accepted on the condition that after a few months I would resign." Verdi was elected on 3 February 1861 for the town of Borgo San Donnino (Fidenza) to the Parliament of Piedmont-Sardinia in Turin (which from March 1861 became the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy), but following the death of Cavour in 1861, which deeply distressed him, he scarcely attended. Later, in 1874, Verdi was appointed a member of the Italian Senate, but did not participate in its activities. CANNOTANSWER	An example is the claim that when the "Va, pensiero" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan,	Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi (; 9 or 10 October 1813 – 27 January 1901) was an Italian composer best known for his operas. He was born near Busseto to a provincial family of moderate means, receiving a musical education with the help of a local patron. Verdi came to dominate the Italian opera scene after the era of Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti, and Vincenzo Bellini, whose works significantly influenced him. In his early operas, Verdi demonstrated a sympathy with the Risorgimento movement which sought the unification of Italy. He also participated briefly as an elected politician. The chorus "Va, pensiero" from his early opera Nabucco (1842), and similar choruses in later operas, were much in the spirit of the unification movement, and the composer himself became esteemed as a representative of these ideals. An intensely private person, Verdi did not seek to ingratiate himself with popular movements. As he became professionally successful he was able to reduce his operatic workload and sought to establish himself as a landowner in his native region. He surprised the musical world by returning, after his success with the opera Aida (1871), with three late masterpieces: his Requiem (1874), and the operas Otello (1887) and Falstaff (1893). His operas remain extremely popular, especially the three peaks of his 'middle period': Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata. The bicentenary of his birth in 2013 was widely celebrated in broadcasts and performances. Life Childhood and education Verdi, the first child of Carlo Giuseppe Verdi (1785–1867) and Luigia Uttini (1787–1851), was born at their home in Le Roncole, a village near Busseto, then in the Département Taro and within the borders of the First French Empire following the annexation of the Duchy of Parma and Piacenza in 1808. The baptismal register, prepared on 11 October 1813, lists his parents Carlo and Luigia as "innkeeper" and "spinner" respectively. Additionally, it lists Verdi as being "born yesterday", but since days were often considered to begin at sunset, this could have meant either 9 or 10 October. Following his mother, Verdi always celebrated his birthday on 9 October, the day he himself believed he was born. Verdi had a younger sister, Giuseppa, who died aged 17 in 1833. She is said to have been his closest friend during childhood. From the age of four, Verdi was given private lessons in Latin and Italian by the village schoolmaster, Baistrocchi, and at six he attended the local school. After learning to play the organ, he showed so much interest in music that his parents finally provided him with a spinet. Verdi's gift for music was already apparent by 1820–21 when he began his association with the local church, serving in the choir, acting as an altar boy for a while, and taking organ lessons. After Baistrocchi's death, Verdi, at the age of eight, became the official paid organist. The music historian Roger Parker points out that both of Verdi's parents "belonged to families of small landowners and traders, certainly not the illiterate peasants from which Verdi later liked to present himself as having emerged... Carlo Verdi was energetic in furthering his son's education...something which Verdi tended to hide in later life... [T]he picture emerges of youthful precocity eagerly nurtured by an ambitious father and of a sustained, sophisticated and elaborate formal education." In 1823, when he was 10, Verdi's parents arranged for the boy to attend school in Busseto, enrolling him in a Ginnasio—an upper school for boys—run by Don Pietro Seletti, while they continued to run their inn at Le Roncole. Verdi returned to Busseto regularly to play the organ on Sundays, covering the distance of several kilometres on foot. At age 11, Verdi received schooling in Italian, Latin, the humanities, and rhetoric. By the time he was 12, he began lessons with Ferdinando Provesi, maestro di cappella at San Bartolomeo, director of the municipal music school and co-director of the local Società Filarmonica (Philharmonic Society). Verdi later stated: "From the ages of 13 to 18 I wrote a motley assortment of pieces: marches for band by the hundred, perhaps as many little sinfonie that were used in church, in the theatre and at concerts, five or six concertos and sets of variations for pianoforte, which I played myself at concerts, many serenades, cantatas (arias, duets, very many trios) and various pieces of church music, of which I remember only a Stabat Mater." This information comes from the Autobiographical Sketch which Verdi dictated to the publisher Giulio Ricordi late in life, in 1879, and remains the leading source for his early life and career. Written, understandably, with the benefit of hindsight, it is not always reliable when dealing with issues more contentious than those of his childhood. The other director of the Philharmonic Society was , a wholesale grocer and distiller, who was described by a contemporary as a "manic dilettante" of music. The young Verdi did not immediately become involved with the Philharmonic. By June 1827, he had graduated with honours from the Ginnasio and was able to focus solely on music under Provesi. By chance, when he was 13, Verdi was asked to step in as a replacement to play in what became his first public event in his home town; he was an immediate success mostly playing his own music to the surprise of many and receiving strong local recognition. By 1829–30, Verdi had established himself as a leader of the Philharmonic: "none of us could rival him" reported the secretary of the organisation, Giuseppe Demaldè. An eight-movement cantata, I deliri di Saul, based on a drama by Vittorio Alfieri, was written by Verdi when he was 15 and performed in Bergamo. It was acclaimed by both Demaldè and Barezzi, who commented: "He shows a vivid imagination, a philosophical outlook, and sound judgment in the arrangement of instrumental parts." In late 1829, Verdi had completed his studies with Provesi, who declared that he had no more to teach him. At the time, Verdi had been giving singing and piano lessons to Barezzi's daughter Margherita; by 1831, they were unofficially engaged. Verdi set his sights on Milan, then the cultural capital of northern Italy, where he applied unsuccessfully to study at the Conservatory. Barezzi made arrangements for him to become a private pupil of , who had been maestro concertatore at La Scala, and who described Verdi's compositions as "very promising". Lavigna encouraged Verdi to take out a subscription to La Scala, where he heard Maria Malibran in operas by Gioachino Rossini and Vincenzo Bellini. Verdi began making connections in the Milanese world of music that were to stand him in good stead. These included an introduction by Lavigna to an amateur choral group, the Società Filarmonica, led by Pietro Massini. Attending the Società frequently in 1834, Verdi soon found himself functioning as rehearsal director (for Rossini's La cenerentola) and continuo player. It was Massini who encouraged him to write his first opera, originally titled Rocester, to a libretto by the journalist Antonio Piazza. 1834–1842: First operas List of compositions by Giuseppe Verdi In mid-1834, Verdi sought to acquire Provesi's former post in Busseto but without success. But with Barezzi's help he did obtain the secular post of maestro di musica. He taught, gave lessons, and conducted the Philharmonic for several months before returning to Milan in early 1835. By the following July, he obtained his certification from Lavigna. Eventually in 1835 Verdi became director of the Busseto school with a three-year contract. He married Margherita in May 1836, and by March 1837, she had given birth to their first child, Virginia Maria Luigia on 26 March 1837. Icilio Romano followed on 11 July 1838. Both the children died young, Virginia on 12 August 1838, Icilio on 22 October 1839. In 1837, the young composer asked for Massini's assistance to stage his opera in Milan. The La Scala impresario, Bartolomeo Merelli, agreed to put on Oberto (as the reworked opera was now called, with a libretto rewritten by Temistocle Solera) in November 1839. It achieved a respectable 13 additional performances, following which Merelli offered Verdi a contract for three more works. While Verdi was working on his second opera Un giorno di regno, Margherita died of encephalitis at the age of 26. Verdi adored his wife and children and was devastated by their early deaths. Un giorno, a comedy, was premiered only a few months later. It was a flop and only given the one performance. Following its failure, it is claimed Verdi vowed never to compose again, but in his Sketch he recounts how Merelli persuaded him to write a new opera. Verdi was to claim that he gradually began to work on the music for Nabucco, the libretto of which had originally been rejected by the composer Otto Nicolai: "This verse today, tomorrow that, here a note, there a whole phrase, and little by little the opera was written", he later recalled. By the autumn of 1841 it was complete, originally under the title Nabucodonosor. Well received at its first performance on 9 March 1842, Nabucco underpinned Verdi's success until his retirement from the theatre, twenty-nine operas (including some revised and updated versions) later. At its revival in La Scala for the 1842 autumn season it was given an unprecedented (and later unequalled) total of 57 performances; within three years it had reached (among other venues) Vienna, Lisbon, Barcelona, Berlin, Paris and Hamburg; in 1848 it was heard in New York, in 1850 in Buenos Aires. Porter comments that "similar accounts...could be provided to show how widely and rapidly all [Verdi's] other successful operas were disseminated." 1842–1849 A period of hard work for Verdi—with the creation of twenty operas (excluding revisions and translations)—followed over the next sixteen years, culminating in Un ballo in maschera. This period was not without its frustrations and setbacks for the young composer, and he was frequently demoralised. In April 1845, in connection with I due Foscari, he wrote: "I am happy, no matter what reception it gets, and I am utterly indifferent to everything. I cannot wait for these next three years to pass. I have to write six operas, then addio to everything." In 1858 Verdi complained: "Since Nabucco, you may say, I have never had one hour of peace. Sixteen years in the galleys." After the initial success of Nabucco, Verdi settled in Milan, making a number of influential acquaintances. He attended the Salotto Maffei, Countess Clara Maffei's salons in Milan, becoming her lifelong friend and correspondent. A revival of Nabucco followed in 1842 at La Scala where it received a run of fifty-seven performances, and this led to a commission from Merelli for a new opera for the 1843 season. I Lombardi alla prima crociata was based on a libretto by Solera and premiered in February 1843. Inevitably, comparisons were made with Nabucco; but one contemporary writer noted: "If [Nabucco] created this young man's reputation, I Lombardi served to confirm it." Verdi paid close attention to his financial contracts, making sure he was appropriately remunerated as his popularity increased. For I Lombardi and Ernani (1844) in Venice he was paid 12,000 lire (including supervision of the productions); Attila and Macbeth (1847), each brought him 18,000 lire. His contracts with the publishers Ricordi in 1847 were very specific about the amounts he was to receive for new works, first productions, musical arrangements, and so on. He began to use his growing prosperity to invest in land near his birthplace. In 1844 he purchased Il Pulgaro, 62 acres (23 hectares) of farmland with a farmhouse and outbuildings, providing a home for his parents from May 1844. Later that year, he also bought the Palazzo Cavalli (now known as the Palazzo Orlandi) on the via Roma, Busseto's main street. In May 1848, Verdi signed a contract for land and houses at Sant'Agata in Busseto, which had once belonged to his family. It was here he built his own house, completed in 1880, now known as the Villa Verdi, where he lived from 1851 until his death. In March 1843, Verdi visited Vienna (where Gaetano Donizetti was musical director) to oversee a production of Nabucco. The older composer, recognising Verdi's talent, noted in a letter of January 1844: "I am very, very happy to give way to people of talent like Verdi... Nothing will prevent the good Verdi from soon reaching one of the most honourable positions in the cohort of composers." Verdi travelled on to Parma, where the Teatro Regio di Parma was producing Nabucco with Strepponi in the cast. For Verdi the performances were a personal triumph in his native region, especially as his father, Carlo, attended the first performance. Verdi remained in Parma for some weeks beyond his intended departure date. This fuelled speculation that the delay was due to Verdi's interest in Giuseppina Strepponi (who stated that their relationship began in 1843). Strepponi was in fact known for her amorous relationships (and many illegitimate children) and her history was an awkward factor in their relationship until they eventually agreed on marriage. After successful stagings of Nabucco in Venice (with twenty-five performances in the 1842/43 season), Verdi began negotiations with the impresario of La Fenice to stage I Lombardi, and to write a new opera. Eventually, Victor Hugo's Hernani was chosen, with Francesco Maria Piave as librettist. Ernani was successfully premiered in 1844 and within six months had been performed at twenty other theatres in Italy, and also in Vienna. The writer Andrew Porter notes that for the next ten years, Verdi's life "reads like a travel diary—a timetable of visits...to bring new operas to the stage or to supervise local premieres". La Scala premiered none of these new works, except for Giovanna d'Arco. Verdi "never forgave the Milanese for their reception of Un giorno di regno". During this period, Verdi began to work more consistently with his librettists. He relied on Piave again for I due Foscari, performed in Rome in November 1844, then on Solera once more for Giovanna d'Arco, at La Scala in February 1845, while in August that year he was able to work with Salvadore Cammarano on Alzira for the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples. Solera and Piave worked together on Attila for La Fenice (March 1846). In April 1844, Verdi took on Emanuele Muzio, eight years his junior, as a pupil and amanuensis. He had known him since about 1828 as another of Barezzi's protégés. Muzio, who in fact was Verdi's only pupil, became indispensable to the composer. He reported to Barezzi that Verdi "has a breadth of spirit, of generosity, a wisdom". In November 1846, Muzio wrote of Verdi: "If you could see us, I seem more like a friend, rather than his pupil. We are always together at dinner, in the cafes, when we play cards...; all in all, he doesn't go anywhere without me at his side; in the house we have a big table and we both write there together, and so I always have his advice." Muzio was to remain associated with Verdi, assisting in the preparation of scores and transcriptions, and later conducting many of his works in their premiere performances in the US and elsewhere outside Italy. He was chosen by Verdi as one of the executors of his will, but predeceased the composer in 1890. After a period of illness Verdi began work on Macbeth in September 1846. He dedicated the opera to Barezzi: "I have long intended to dedicate an opera to you, as you have been a father, a benefactor and a friend for me. It was a duty I should have fulfilled sooner if imperious circumstances had not prevented me. Now, I send you Macbeth, which I prize above all my other operas, and therefore deem worthier to present to you." In 1997 Martin Chusid wrote that Macbeth was the only one of Verdi's operas of his "early period" to remain regularly in the international repertoire, although in the 21st century Nabucco has also entered the lists. Strepponi's voice declined and her engagements dried up in the 1845 to 1846 period, and she returned to live in Milan whilst retaining contact with Verdi as his "supporter, promoter, unofficial adviser, and occasional secretary" until she decided to move to Paris in October 1846. Before she left Verdi gave her a letter that pledged his love. On the envelope, Strepponi wrote: "5 or 6 October 1846. They shall lay this letter on my heart when they bury me." Verdi had completed I masnadieri for London by May 1847 except for the orchestration. This he left until the opera was in rehearsal, since he wanted to hear "la [Jenny] Lind and modify her role to suit her more exactly". Verdi agreed to conduct the premiere on 22 July 1847 at Her Majesty's Theatre, as well as the second performance. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert attended the first performance, and for the most part, the press was generous in its praise. For the next two years, except for two visits to Italy during periods of political unrest, Verdi was based in Paris. Within a week of returning to Paris in July 1847, he received his first commission from the Paris Opéra. Verdi agreed to adapt I Lombardi to a new French libretto; the result was Jérusalem, which contained significant changes to the music and structure of the work (including an extensive ballet scene) to meet Parisian expectations. Verdi was awarded the Order of Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. To satisfy his contracts with the publisher , Verdi dashed off Il Corsaro. Budden comments "In no other opera of his does Verdi appear to have taken so little interest before it was staged." On hearing the news of the "Cinque Giornate", the "Five Days" of street fighting that took place between 18 and 22 March 1848 and temporarily drove the Austrians out of Milan, Verdi travelled there, arriving on 5 April. He discovered that Piave was now "Citizen Piave" of the newly proclaimed Republic of San Marco. Writing a patriotic letter to him in Venice, Verdi concluded "Banish every petty municipal idea! We must all extend a fraternal hand, and Italy will yet become the first nation of the world...I am drunk with joy! Imagine that there are no more Germans here!!" Verdi had been admonished by the poet Giuseppe Giusti for turning away from patriotic subjects, the poet pleading with him to "do what you can to nourish the [sorrow of the Italian people], to strengthen it, and direct it to its goal." Cammarano suggested adapting Joseph Méry's 1828 play La Bataille de Toulouse, which he described as a story "that should stir every man with an Italian soul in his breast". The premiere was set for late January 1849. Verdi travelled to Rome before the end of 1848. He found that city on the verge of becoming a (short-lived) republic, which commenced within days of La battaglia di Legnanos enthusiastically received premiere. In the spirit of the time were the tenor hero's final words, "Whoever dies for the fatherland cannot be evil-minded". Verdi had intended to return to Italy in early 1848, but was prevented by work and illness, as well as, most probably, by his increasing attachment to Strepponi. Verdi and Strepponi left Paris in July 1849, the immediate cause being an outbreak of cholera, and Verdi went directly to Busseto to continue work on completing his latest opera, Luisa Miller, for a production in Naples later in the year. 1849–1853: Fame Verdi was committed to the publisher Giovanni Ricordi for an opera—which became Stiffelio—for Trieste in the Spring of 1850; and, subsequently, following negotiations with La Fenice, developed a libretto with Piave and wrote the music for Rigoletto (based on Victor Hugo's Le roi s'amuse) for Venice in March 1851. This was the first of a sequence of three operas (followed by Il trovatore and La traviata) which were to cement his fame as a master of opera. The failure of Stiffelio (attributable not least to the censors of the time taking offence at the taboo subject of the supposed adultery of a clergyman's wife and interfering with the text and roles) incited Verdi to take pains to rework it, although even in the completely recycled version of Aroldo (1857) it still failed to please. Rigoletto, with its intended murder of royalty, and its sordid attributes, also upset the censors. Verdi would not compromise: What does the sack matter to the police? Are they worried about the effect it will produce?...Do they think they know better than I?...I see the hero has been made no longer ugly and hunchbacked!! Why? A singing hunchback...why not?...I think it splendid to show this character as outwardly deformed and ridiculous, and inwardly passionate and full of love. I chose the subject for these very qualities...if they are removed I can no longer set it to music. Verdi substituted a Duke for the King, and the public response and subsequent success of the opera all over Italy and Europe fully vindicated the composer. Aware that the melody of the Duke's song "La donna è mobile" ("Woman is fickle") would become a popular hit, Verdi excluded it from orchestral rehearsals for the opera, and rehearsed the tenor separately. For several months Verdi was preoccupied with family matters. These stemmed from the way in which the citizens of Busseto were treating Giuseppina Strepponi, with whom he was living openly in an unmarried relationship. She was shunned in the town and at church, and while Verdi appeared indifferent, she was certainly not. Furthermore, Verdi was concerned about the administration of his newly acquired property at Sant'Agata. A growing estrangement between Verdi and his parents was perhaps also attributable to Strepponi (the suggestion that this situation was sparked by the birth of a child to Verdi and Strepponi which was given away as a foundling lacks any firm evidence). In January 1851, Verdi broke off relations with his parents, and in April they were ordered to leave Sant'Agata; Verdi found new premises for them and helped them financially to settle into their new home. It may not be coincidental that all six Verdi operas written in the period 1849–53 (La battaglia, Luisa Miller, Stiffelio, Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata), have, uniquely in his oeuvre, heroines who are, in the opera critic Joseph Kerman's words, "women who come to grief because of sexual transgression, actual or perceived". Kerman, like the psychologist Gerald Mendelssohn, sees this choice of subjects as being influenced by Verdi's uneasy passion for Strepponi. Verdi and Strepponi moved into Sant'Agata on 1 May 1851. May also brought an offer for a new opera from La Fenice, which Verdi eventually realised as La traviata. That was followed by an agreement with the Rome Opera company to present Il trovatore for January 1853. Verdi now had sufficient earnings to retire, had he wished to. He had reached a stage where he could develop his operas as he wished, rather than be dependent on commissions from third parties. Il trovatore was in fact the first opera he wrote without a specific commission (apart from Oberto). At around the same time he began to consider creating an opera from Shakespeare's King Lear. After first (1850) seeking a libretto from Cammarano (which never appeared), Verdi later (1857) commissioned one from Antonio Somma, but this proved intractable, and no music was ever written. Verdi began work on Il trovatore after the death of his mother in June 1851. The fact that this is "the one opera of Verdi's which focuses on a mother rather than a father" is perhaps related to her death. In the winter of 1851–52 Verdi decided to go to Paris with Strepponi, where he concluded an agreement with the Opéra to write what became Les vêpres siciliennes, his first original work in the style of grand opera. In February 1852, the couple attended a performance of Alexander Dumas filss play The Lady of the Camellias; Verdi immediately began to compose music for what would later become La traviata. After his visit to Rome for Il trovatore in January 1853, Verdi worked on completing La traviata, but with little hope of its success, due to his lack of confidence in any of the singers engaged for the season. Furthermore, the management insisted that the opera be given a historical, not a contemporary setting. The premiere in March 1853 was indeed a failure: Verdi wrote: "Was the fault mine or the singers'? Time will tell." Subsequent productions (following some rewriting) throughout Europe over the following two years fully vindicated the composer; Roger Parker has written "Il trovatore consistently remains one of the three or four most popular operas in the Verdian repertoire: but it has never pleased the critics". 1853–1860: Consolidation In the eleven years up to and including Traviata, Verdi had written sixteen operas. Over the next eighteen years (up to Aida), he wrote only six new works for the stage. Verdi was happy to return to Sant'Agata and, in February 1856, was reporting a "total abandonment of music; a little reading; some light occupation with agriculture and horses; that's all". A couple of months later, writing in the same vein to Countess Maffei he stated: "I'm not doing anything. I don't read. I don't write. I walk in the fields from morning to evening, trying to recover, so far without success, from the stomach trouble caused me by I vespri siciliani. Cursed operas!" An 1858 letter by Strepponi to the publisher Léon Escudier describes the kind of lifestyle that increasingly appealed to the composer: "His love for the country has become a mania, madness, rage, and fury—anything you like that is exaggerated. He gets up almost with the dawn, to go and examine the wheat, the maize, the vines, etc....Fortunately our tastes for this sort of life coincide, except in the matter of sunrise, which he likes to see up and dressed, and I from my bed." Nonetheless on 15 May, Verdi signed a contract with La Fenice for an opera for the following spring. This was to be Simon Boccanegra. The couple stayed in Paris until January 1857 to deal with these proposals, and also the offer to stage the translated version of Il trovatore as a grand opera. Verdi and Strepponi travelled to Venice in March for the premiere of Simon Boccanegra, which turned out to be "a fiasco" (as Verdi reported, although on the second and third nights, the reception improved considerably). With Strepponi, Verdi went to Naples early in January 1858 to work with Somma on the libretto of the opera Gustave III, which over a year later would become Un ballo in maschera. By this time, Verdi had begun to write about Strepponi as "my wife" and she was signing her letters as "Giuseppina Verdi". Verdi raged against the stringent requirements of the Neapolitan censor stating: "I'm drowning in a sea of troubles. It's almost certain that the censors will forbid our libretto." With no hope of seeing his Gustavo III staged as written, he broke his contract. This resulted in litigation and counter-litigation; with the legal issues resolved, Verdi was free to present the libretto and musical outline of Gustave III to the Rome Opera. There, the censors demanded further changes; at this point, the opera took the title Un ballo in maschera. Arriving in Sant'Agata in March 1859 Verdi and Strepponi found the nearby city of Piacenza occupied by about 6,000 Austrian troops who had made it their base, to combat the rise of Italian interest in unification in the Piedmont region. In the ensuing Second Italian War of Independence the Austrians abandoned the region and began to leave Lombardy, although they remained in control of the Venice region under the terms of the armistice signed at Villafranca. Verdi was disgusted at this outcome: "[W]here then is the independence of Italy, so long hoped for and promised?...Venice is not Italian? After so many victories, what an outcome... It is enough to drive one mad" he wrote to Clara Maffei. Verdi and Strepponi now decided on marriage; they travelled to Collonges-sous-Salève, a village then part of Piedmont. On 29 August 1859 the couple were married there, with only the coachman who had driven them there and the church bell-ringer as witnesses. At the end of 1859, Verdi wrote to his friend Cesare De Sanctis "[Since completing Ballo] I have not made any more music, I have not seen any more music, I have not thought anymore about music. I don't even know what colour my last opera is, and I almost don't remember it." He began to remodel Sant'Agata, which took most of 1860 to complete and on which he continued to work for the next twenty years. This included major work on a square room that became his workroom, his bedroom, and his office. Politics Having achieved some fame and prosperity, Verdi began in 1859 to take an active interest in Italian politics. His early commitment to the Risorgimento movement is difficult to estimate accurately; in the words of the music historian Philip Gossett "myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating" during the nineteenth century. An example is the claim that when the "Va, pensiero" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan, the audience, responding with nationalistic fervour, demanded an encore. As encores were expressly forbidden by the government at the time, such a gesture would have been extremely significant. But in fact the piece encored was not "Va, pensiero" but the hymn "Immenso Jehova". The growth of the "identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics" perhaps began in the 1840s. In 1848, the nationalist leader Giuseppe Mazzini (whom Verdi had met in London the previous year) requested Verdi (who complied) to write a patriotic hymn. The opera historian Charles Osborne describes the 1849 La battaglia di Legnano as "an opera with a purpose" and maintains that "while parts of Verdi's earlier operas had frequently been taken up by the fighters of the Risorgimento...this time the composer had given the movement its own opera" It was not until 1859 in Naples, and only then spreading throughout Italy, that the slogan "Viva Verdi" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Viva Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), (who was then king of Piedmont). After Italy was unified in 1861, many of Verdi's early operas were increasingly re-interpreted as Risorgimento works with hidden Revolutionary messages that perhaps had not been originally intended by either the composer or his librettists. In 1859, Verdi was elected as a member of the new provincial council, and was appointed to head a group of five who would meet with King Vittorio Emanuele II in Turin. They were enthusiastically greeted along the way and in Turin Verdi himself received much of the publicity. On 17 October Verdi met with Cavour, the architect of the initial stages of Italian unification. Later that year the government of Emilia was subsumed under the United Provinces of Central Italy, and Verdi's political life temporarily came to an end. Whilst still maintaining nationalist feelings, he declined in 1860 the office of provincial council member to which he had been elected in absentia. Cavour however was anxious to convince a man of Verdi's stature that running for political office was essential to strengthening and securing Italy's future. The composer confided to Piave some years later that "I accepted on the condition that after a few months I would resign." Verdi was elected on 3 February 1861 for the town of Borgo San Donnino (Fidenza) to the Parliament of Piedmont-Sardinia in Turin (which from March 1861 became the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy), but following the death of Cavour in 1861, which deeply distressed him, he scarcely attended. Later, in 1874, Verdi was appointed a member of the Italian Senate, but did not participate in its activities. 1860–1887: from La forza to Otello In the months following the staging of Ballo, Verdi was approached by several opera companies seeking a new work or making offers to stage one of his existing ones, but refused them all. But when, in December 1860, an approach was made from Saint Petersburg's Imperial Theatre, the offer of 60,000 francs plus all expenses was doubtless a strong incentive. Verdi came up with the idea of adapting the 1835 Spanish play Don Alvaro o la fuerza del sino by Angel Saavedra, which became La forza del destino, with Piave writing the libretto. The Verdis arrived in St. Petersburg in December 1861 for the premiere, but casting problems meant that it had to be postponed. Returning via Paris from Russia on 24 February 1862, Verdi met two young Italian writers, the twenty-year-old Arrigo Boito and Franco Faccio. Verdi had been invited to write a piece of music for the 1862 International Exhibition in London, and charged Boito with writing a text, which became the Inno delle nazioni. Boito, as a supporter of the grand opera of Giacomo Meyerbeer and an opera composer in his own right, was later in the 1860s critical of Verdi's "reliance on formula rather than form", incurring the composer's wrath. Nevertheless, he was to become Verdi's close collaborator in his final operas. The St. Petersburg premiere of La forza finally took place in September 1862, and Verdi received the Order of St. Stanislaus. A revival of Macbeth in Paris in 1865 was not a success, but he obtained a commission for a new work, Don Carlos, based on the play Don Carlos by Friedrich Schiller. He and Giuseppina spent late 1866 and much of 1867 in Paris, where they heard, and did not warm to, Giacomo Meyerbeer's last opera, L'Africaine, and Richard Wagner's overture to Tannhäuser. The opera's premiere in 1867 drew mixed comments. While the critic Théophile Gautier praised the work, the composer Georges Bizet was disappointed at Verdi's changing style: "Verdi is no longer Italian. He is following Wagner." During the 1860s and 1870s, Verdi paid great attention to his estate around Busseto, purchasing additional land, dealing with unsatisfactory (in one case, embezzling) stewards, installing irrigation, and coping with variable harvests and economic slumps. In 1867, both Verdi's father Carlo, with whom he had restored good relations, and his early patron and father-in-law Antonio Barezzi, died. Verdi and Giuseppina decided to adopt Carlo's great-niece Filomena Maria Verdi, then seven years old, as their own child. She was to marry in 1878 the son of Verdi's friend and lawyer Angelo Carrara and her family became eventually the heirs of Verdi's estate. Aida was commissioned by the Egyptian government for the opera house built by the Khedive Isma'il Pasha to celebrate the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. The opera house actually opened with a production of Rigoletto. The prose libretto in French by Camille du Locle, based on a scenario by the Egyptologist Auguste Mariette, was transformed to Italian verse by Antonio Ghislanzoni. Verdi was offered the enormous sum of 150,000 francs for the opera (even though he confessed that Ancient Egypt was "a civilization I have never been able to admire"), and it was first performed in Cairo in 1871. Verdi spent much of 1872 and 1873 supervising the Italian productions of Aida at Milan, Parma and Naples, effectively acting as producer and demanding high standards and adequate rehearsal time. During the rehearsals for the Naples production he wrote his string quartet, the only chamber music by him to survive, and the only major work in the form by an Italian of the 19th century. In 1869, Verdi had been asked to compose a section for a requiem mass in memory of Rossini. He compiled and completed the requiem, but its performance was abandoned (and its premiere did not take place until 1988). Five years later, Verdi reworked his "Libera Me" section of the Rossini Requiem and made it a part of his Requiem honouring Alessandro Manzoni, who had died in 1873. The complete Requiem was first performed at the cathedral in Milan on the anniversary of Manzoni's death on 22 May 1874. The spinto soprano Teresa Stolz (1834–1902), who had sung in La Scala productions from 1865 onwards, was the soloist in the first and many later performances of the Requiem; in February 1872, she had created Aida in its European premiere in Milan. She became closely associated personally with Verdi (exactly how closely remains conjectural), to Giuseppina Verdi's initial disquiet; but the women were reconciled and Stolz remained a companion of Verdi after Giuseppina's death in 1897 until his own death. Verdi conducted his Requiem in Paris, London and Vienna in 1875 and in Cologne in 1876. It seemed that it would be his last work. In the words of his biographer John Rosselli, it "confirmed him as the unique presiding genius of Italian music. No fellow composer...came near him in popularity or reputation". Verdi, now in his sixties, initially seemed to withdraw into retirement. He deliberately shied away from opportunities to publicise himself or to become involved with new productions of his works, but secretly he began work on Otello, which Boito (to whom the composer had been reconciled by Ricordi) had proposed to him privately in 1879. The composition was delayed by a revision of Simon Boccanegra which Verdi undertook with Boito, produced in 1881, and a revision of Don Carlos. Even when Otello was virtually completed, Verdi teased "Shall I finish it? Shall I have it performed? Hard to tell, even for me." As news leaked out, Verdi was pressed by opera houses across Europe with enquiries; eventually the opera was triumphantly premiered at La Scala in February 1887. 1887–1901: Falstaff and last years Following the success of Otello Verdi commented, "After having relentlessly massacred so many heroes and heroines, I have at last the right to laugh a little." He had considered a variety of comic subjects but had found none of them wholly suitable and confided his ambition to Boito. The librettist said nothing at the time but secretly began work on a libretto based on The Merry Wives of Windsor with additional material taken from Henry IV, Part 1 and Part 2. Verdi received the draft libretto probably in early July 1889 after he had just read Shakespeare's play: "Benissimo! Benissimo!... No one could have done better than you", he wrote back to Boito. But he still had doubts: his age, his health (which he admits to being good) and his ability to complete the project: "If I were not to finish the music?". If the project failed, it would have been a waste of Boito's time, and have distracted him from completing his own new opera. Finally on 10 July 1889 he wrote again: "So be it! So let's do Falstaff! For now, let's not think of obstacles, of age, of illnesses!" Verdi emphasised the need for secrecy, but continued "If you are in the mood, then start to write." Later he wrote to Boito (capitals and exclamation marks are Verdi's own): "What joy to be able to say to the public: HERE WE ARE AGAIN!!! COME AND SEE US!" The first performance of Falstaff took place at La Scala on 9 February 1893. For the first night, official ticket prices were thirty times higher than usual. Royalty, aristocracy, critics and leading figures from the arts all over Europe were present. The performance was a huge success; numbers were encored, and at the end the applause for Verdi and the cast lasted an hour. That was followed by a tumultuous welcome when the composer, his wife and Boito arrived at the Grand Hotel de Milan. Even more hectic scenes ensued when he went to Rome in May for the opera's premiere at the Teatro Costanzi, when crowds of well-wishers at the railway station initially forced Verdi to take refuge in a tool-shed. He witnessed the performance from the Royal Box at the side of King Umberto and the Queen. In his last years Verdi undertook a number of philanthropic ventures, publishing in 1894 a song for the benefit of earthquake victims in Sicily, and from 1895 onwards planning, building and endowing a rest-home for retired musicians in Milan, the Casa di Riposo per Musicisti, and building a hospital at Villanova sull'Arda, close to Busseto. His last major composition, the choral set of Four sacred pieces, was published in 1898. In 1900 he was deeply upset at the assassination of King Umberto and sketched a setting of a poem in his memory but was unable to complete it. While staying at the Grand Hotel, Verdi suffered a stroke on 21 January 1901. He gradually grew more feeble over the next week, during which Stolz cared for him, and died on 27 January at the age of 87. Verdi was initially buried in a private ceremony at Milan's Cimitero Monumentale. A month later, his body was moved to the crypt of the Casa di Riposo. On this occasion, "Va, pensiero" from Nabucco was conducted by Arturo Toscanini with a chorus of 820 singers. A huge crowd was in attendance, estimated at 300,000. Boito wrote to a friend, in words which recall the mysterious final scene of Don Carlos, "[Verdi] sleeps like a King of Spain in his Escurial, under a bronze slab that completely covers him." Personality Not all of Verdi's personal qualities were amiable. John Rosselli concluded after writing his biography that "I do not very much like the man Verdi, in particular the autocratic rentier-cum-estate owner, part-time composer, and seemingly full-time grumbler and reactionary critic of the later years", yet admits that like other writers, he must "admire him, warts and all...a deep integrity runs beneath his life, and can be felt even when he is being unreasonable or wrong." Budden suggests that "With Verdi...the man and the artist on many ways developed side by side." Ungainly and awkward in society in his early years, "as he became a man of property and underwent the civilizing influence of Giuseppina,...[he] acquired assurance and authority." He also learnt to keep himself to himself, never discussing his private life and maintaining, when it suited him, legends about his supposed 'peasant' origins, his materialism and his indifference to criticism. Gerald Mendelsohn describes the composer as "an intensely private man who deeply resented efforts to inquire into his personal affairs. He regarded journalists and would-be biographers, as well as his neighbors in Busseto and the operatic public at large, as an intrusive lot, against whose prying attentions he needed constantly to defend himself." Verdi was never explicit about his religious beliefs. Anti-clerical by nature in his early years, he nonetheless built a chapel at Sant'Agata, but is little recorded as attending church. Strepponi wrote in 1871 "I won't say [Verdi] is an atheist, but he is not much of a believer." Rosselli comments that in the Requiem "The prospect of Hell appears to rule...[the Requiem] is troubled to the end," and offers little consolation. Music and form Spirit The writer Friedrich Schiller (four of whose plays were adapted as operas by Verdi) distinguished two types of artist in his 1795 essay On Naïve and Sentimental Poetry. The philosopher Isaiah Berlin ranked Verdi in the 'naïve' category—"They are not...self-conscious. They do not...stand aside to contemplate their creations and express their own feelings....They are able...if they have genius, to embody their vision fully." (The 'sentimentals' seek to recreate nature and natural feelings on their own terms—Berlin instances Richard Wagner—"offering not peace, but a sword".) Verdi's operas are not written according to an aesthetic theory, or with a purpose to change the tastes of their audiences. In conversation with a German visitor in 1887 he is recorded as saying that, whilst "there was much to be admired in [Wagner's operas] Tannhäuser and Lohengrin...in his recent operas [Wagner] seemed to be overstepping the bounds of what can be expressed in music. For him "philosophical" music was incomprehensible." Although Verdi's works belong, as Rosselli admits "to the most artificial of genres...[they] ring emotionally true: truth and directness make them exciting, often hugely so." Periods The earliest study of Verdi's music, published in 1859 by the Italian critic Abraham Basevi, already distinguished four periods in Verdi's music. The early, 'grandiose' period, ended according to Basevi with La battaglia di Legnano (1849), and a 'personal' style began with the next opera Luisa Miller. These two operas are generally agreed today by critics to mark the division between Verdi's 'early' and 'middle' periods. The 'middle' period is felt to end with La traviata (1853) and Les vêpres siciliennes (1855), with a 'late' period commencing with Simon Boccanegra (1857) running through to Aida (1871). The last two operas, Otello and Falstaff, together with the Requiem and the Four Sacred Pieces, then represent a 'final' period. Early period Verdi was to claim in his Sketch that during his early training with Lavigna "I did nothing but canons and fugues...No-one taught me orchestration or how to handle dramatic music." He is known to have written a variety of music for the Busseto Philharmonic society, including vocal music, band music and chamber works, (and including an alternative overture to Rossini's Barber of Seville) but few of these works survive. (He may have given instructions before his death to destroy his early works). Verdi uses in his early operas (and, in his own stylized versions, throughout his later work) the standard elements of Italian opera content of the period, referred to by the opera writer Julian Budden as the 'Code Rossini', after the composer who established through his work and popularity the accepted templates of these forms; they were also used by the composers dominant during Verdi's early career, Bellini, Donizetti and Saverio Mercadante. Amongst the essential elements are the aria, the duet, the ensemble, and the finale sequence of an act. The aria format, centred on a soloist, typically involved three sections; a slow introduction, marked typically cantabile or adagio, a tempo di mezzo which might involve chorus or other characters, and a cabaletta, an opportunity for bravura singing for the soloist. The duet was similarly formatted. Finales, covering climactic sequences of action, used the various forces of soloists, ensemble and chorus, usually culminating with an exciting stretto section. Verdi was to develop these and the other formulae of the generation preceding him with increasing sophistication during his career. The operas of the early period show Verdi learning by doing and gradually establishing mastery over the different elements of opera. Oberto is poorly structured, and the orchestration of the first operas is generally simple, sometimes even basic. The musicologist Richard Taruskin suggests "the most striking effect in the early Verdi operas, and the one most obviously allied to the mood of the Risorgimento, was the big choral number sung—crudely or sublimely, according to the ear of the beholder—in unison. The success of "Va, pensiero" in Nabucco (which Rossini approvingly denoted as "a grand aria sung by sopranos, contraltos, tenors and basses"), was replicated in the similar "O Signor, dal tetto natio" in I lombardi and in 1844 in the chorus "Si ridesti il Leon di Castiglia" in Ernani, the battle hymn of the conspirators seeking freedom In I due Foscari Verdi first uses recurring themes identified with main characters; here and in future operas the accent moves away from the 'oratorio' characteristics of the first operas towards individual action and intrigue. From this period onwards Verdi also develops his instinct for "tinta" (literally 'colour'), a term which he used for characterising elements of an individual opera score—Parker gives as an example "the rising 6th that begins so many lyric pieces in Ernani". Macbeth, even in its original 1847 version, shows many original touches; characterization by key (the Macbeths themselves generally singing in sharp keys, the witches in flat keys), a preponderance of minor key music, and highly original orchestration. In the 'dagger scene' and the duet following the murder of Duncan, the forms transcend the 'Code Rossini' and propel the drama in a compelling fashion. Verdi was to comment in 1868 that Rossini and his followers missed "the golden thread that binds all the parts together and, rather than a set of numbers without coherence, makes an opera". Tinta was for Verdi this "golden thread", an essential unifying factor in his works. Middle period The writer David Kimbell states that in Luisa Miller and Stiffelio (the earliest operas of this period) there appears to be a "growing freedom in the large scale structure...and an acute attention to fine detail". Others echo those feelings. Julian Budden expresses the impact of Rigoletto and its place in Verdi's output as follows: "Just after 1850 at the age of 38, Verdi closed the door on a period of Italian opera with Rigoletto. The so-called ottocento in music is finished. Verdi will continue to draw on certain of its forms for the next few operas, but in a totally new spirit." One example of Verdi's wish to move away from "standard forms" appears in his feelings about the structure of Il trovatore. To his librettist, Cammarano, Verdi plainly states in a letter of April 1851 that if there were no standard forms—"cavatinas, duets, trios, choruses, finales, etc. ... and if you could avoid beginning with an opening chorus....", he would be quite happy. Two external factors had their impacts on Verdi's compositions of this period. One is that with increasing reputation and financial security he no longer needed to commit himself to the productive treadmill, had more freedom to choose his own subjects, and had more time to develop them according to his own ideas. In the years 1849 to 1859 he wrote eight new operas, compared with fourteen in the previous ten years. Another factor was the changed political situation; the failure of the 1848 revolutions led both to some diminution of the Risorgimento ethos (at least initially) and a significant increase in theatre censorship. This is reflected both in Verdi's choices of plots dealing more with personal relationships than political conflict, and in a (partly consequent) dramatic reduction in the operas of this period in the number of choruses (of the type which had first made him famous)—not only are there on average 40% fewer choruses in the 'middle' period operas compared to the 'early' period', but whereas virtually all the 'early' operas commence with a chorus, only one (Luisa Miller) of the 'middle' period operas begin this way. Instead, Verdi experiments with a variety of means, e.g. a stage band (Rigoletto), an aria for bass (Stiffelio), a party scene (La traviata). Chusid also notes Verdi's increasing tendency to replace full-scale overtures with shorter orchestral introductions. Parker comments that La traviata, the last opera of the 'middle' period, is "again a new adventure. It gestures towards a level of 'realism'...the contemporary world of waltzes pervades the score, and the heroine's death from disease is graphically depicted in the music." Verdi's increasing command of musical highlighting of changing moods and relationships is exemplified in Act III of Rigoletto, where Duke's flippant song "La donna è mobile" is followed immediately by the quartet "Bella figlia dell'amore", contrasting the rapacious Duke and his inamorata with the (concealed) indignant Rigoletto and his grieving daughter. Taruskin asserts this is "the most famous ensemble Verdi ever composed". Late period Chusid notes Strepponi's description of the operas of the 1860s and 1870s as being "modern" whereas Verdi described the pre-1849 works as "the cavatina operas", as further indication that "Verdi became increasingly dissatisfied with the older, familiar conventions of his predecessors that he had adopted at the outset of his career," Parker sees a physical differentiation of the operas from Les vêpres siciliennes (1855) to Aida (1871) is that they are significantly longer, and with larger cast-lists, than previous works. They also reflect a shift towards the French genre of grand opera, notable in more colorful orchestration, counterpointing of serious and comic scenes, and greater spectacle. The opportunities of transforming Italian opera by utilising such resources appealed to him. For a commission from the Paris Opéra he expressly demanded a libretto from Eugène Scribe, the favorite librettist of Meyerbeer, telling him: "I want—in fact, I must have—a grandiose, impassioned and original subject." The result was Les vêpres siciliennes, and the scenarios of Simon Boccanegra (1857), Un ballo in maschera (1859), La forza del destino (1862), Don Carlos (1865) and Aida (1872) all meet the same criteria. Porter notes that Un ballo marks an almost complete synthesis of Verdi's style with the grand opera hallmarks, such that "huge spectacle is not mere decoration but essential to the drama...musical and theatrical lines remain taut [and] the characters still sing as warmly, passionately and personally as in Il trovatore." When the composer Ferdinand Hiller asked Verdi whether he preferred Aida or Don Carlos, Verdi replied that Aida had "more bite and (if you'll forgive the word), more theatricality". During the rehearsals for the Naples production of Aida Verdi amused himself by writing his only string quartet, a sprightly work which shows in its last movement that he had not lost the skill for fugue-writing that he had learned with Lavigna. Final works Verdi's three last major works continued to show new development in conveying drama and emotion. The first to appear, in 1874 was his Requiem, scored for operatic forces but by no means an "opera in ecclesiastical dress" (the words in which Hans von Bülow condemned it before even hearing it). Although in the Requiem Verdi puts to use many of the techniques he learned in opera, its musical forms and emotions are not those of the stage. Verdi's tone painting at the opening of the Requiem is vividly described by the Italian composer Ildebrando Pizzetti, writing in 1941: "in [the words] murmured by an invisible crowd over the slow swaying of a few simple chords, you straightaway sense the fear and sadness of a vast multitude before the mystery of death. In the [following] Et lux perpetuum the melody spreads it wings...before falling back on itself...you hear a sigh for consolation and eternal peace." By the time Otello premièred in 1887, more than 15 years after Aida, the operas of Verdi's (predeceased) contemporary Richard Wagner had begun their ascendancy in popular taste, and many sought or identified Wagnerian aspects in Verdi's latest composition. Budden points out that there is little in the music of Otello that relates either to the verismo opera of the younger Italian composers, and little if anything which can be construed as a homage to the New German School. Nonetheless there is still much originality, building on the strengths which Verdi had already demonstrated; the powerful storm which opens the opera in medias res, the recollection of the love duet of Act I in Otello's dying words (more an aspect of tinta than leitmotif), imaginative touches of harmony in Iago's "Era la notte" (Act II). Finally, six years later, appeared Falstaff, Verdi's only comedy apart from the early, ill-fated Un giorno di regno. In this work Roger Parker writes that: "the listener is bombarded by a stunning diversity of rhythms, orchestral textures, melodic motifs and harmonic devices. Passages that in earlier times would have furnished material for an entire number here crowd in on each other, shouldering themselves unceremoniously to the fore in bewildering succession". Rosselli comments: "In Otello Verdi had miniaturized the forms of romantic Italian opera; in Falstaff he miniaturized himself...[M]oments...crystallize a feeling...as though an aria or duet had been precipitated into a phrase." Legacy Reception Although Verdi's operas brought him a popular following, not all contemporary critics approved of his work. The English critic Henry Chorley allowed in 1846 that "he is the only modern man...having a style—for better or worse", but found all his output unacceptable. "[His] faults [are] grave ones, calculated to destroy and degrade taste beyond those of any Italian composer in the long list" wrote Chorley, whilst conceding that "howsoever incomplete may have been his training, howsoever mistaken his aspirations may have proved...he has aspired." But by the time of Verdi's death, 55 years later, his reputation was assured, and the 1910 edition of Grove's Dictionary pronounced him "one of the greatest and most popular opera composers of the nineteenth century". Verdi had no pupils apart from Muzio and no school of composers sought to follow his style which, however much it reflected his own musical direction, was rooted in the period of his own youth. By the time of his death, verismo was the accepted style of young Italian composers. The New York Metropolitan Opera frequently staged Rigoletto, Trovatore and Traviata during this period and featured Aida in every season from 1898 to 1945. Interest in the operas reawakened in mid-1920s Germany and this sparked a revival in England and elsewhere. From the 1930s onward there began to appear scholarly biographies and publications of documentation and correspondence. In 1959 the Instituto di Studi Verdiani (from 1989 the Istituto Nazionale di Studi Verdiani) was founded in Parma and became a leading centre for research and publication of Verdi studies, and in the 1970s the American Institute for Verdi Studies was founded at New York University. Nationalism in the operas Historians have debated how political Verdi's operas were. In particular, the Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves (known as Va, pensiero) from the third act of the opera Nabucco was used an anthem for Italian patriots, who were seeking to unify their country and free it from foreign control in the years up to 1861 (the chorus's theme of exiles singing about their homeland, and its lines such as O mia patria, si bella e perduta / "O my country, so lovely and so lost" were thought to have resonated with many Italians). Beginning in Naples in 1859 and spreading throughout Italy, the slogan "Viva VERDI" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Long live Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), referring to Victor Emmanuel II. Marco Pizzo argues that after 1815, music became a political tool, and many songwriters expressed ideals of freedom and equality. Pizzo claims that Verdi was part of this movement, for his operas were inspired by the love of country, the struggle for Italian independence, and speak to the sacrifice of patriots and exiles. George Martin claims Verdi was "the greatest artist" of the Risorgimento. "Throughout his work its values, its issues recur constantly, and he expressed them with great power". But Mary Ann Smart argues that music critics at the time seldom mentioned any political themes. Likewise, Roger Parker argues that the political dimension of Verdi's operas was exaggerated by nationalistic historians looking for a hero in the late 19th century. From the 1850s onwards, Verdi's operas displayed few patriotic themes because of the heavy censorship by the absolutist regime in power. Verdi later became disillusioned by politics, but he was personally active part in the political world of events of the Risorgimento and was elected to the first Italian parliament in 1861. Memorials and cultural portrayals Three Italian conservatories, the Milan Conservatory and those in Turin and Como, are named after Verdi, as are many Italian theatres. Verdi's hometown of Busseto displays Luigi Secchi's statue of a seated Verdi in 1913, next to the Teatro Verdi built in his honour in the 1850s. It is one of many statues to the composer in Italy. The Giuseppe Verdi Monument, a 1906 marble memorial, sculpted by Pasquale Civiletti, is located in Verdi Square in Manhattan, New York City. The monument includes a statue of Verdi himself and life-sized statues of four characters from his operas, (Aida, Otello, and Falstaff from the operas of the same names, and Leonora from La forza del destino). Verdi has been the subject of a number of film and stage works. These include the 1938 film directed by Carmine Gallone, Giuseppe Verdi, starring Fosco Giachetti; the 1982 miniseries, The Life of Verdi, directed by Renato Castellani, where Verdi was played by Ronald Pickup, with narration by Burt Lancaster in the English version; and the 1985 play After Aida, by Julian Mitchell (1985). He is a character in the 2011 opera Risorgimento! by Italian composer Lorenzo Ferrero, written to commemorate the 150th anniversary of Italian unification of 1861. Verdi today Verdi's operas are frequently staged around the world. All of his operas are available in recordings in a number of versions, and on DVD – Naxos Records offers a complete boxed set. Modern productions may differ substantially from those originally envisaged by the composer. Jonathan Miller's 1982 version of Rigoletto for English National Opera, set in the world of modern American mafiosi, received critical plaudits. But the same company's staging in 2002 of Un ballo in maschera as A Masked Ball, directed by Calixto Bieito, including "satanic sex rituals, homosexual rape, [and] a demonic dwarf", got a general critical thumbs down. Meanwhile, the music of Verdi can still evoke a range of cultural and political resonances. Excerpts from the Requiem were featured at the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997. On 12 March 2011 during a performance of Nabucco at the Opera di Roma celebrating 150 years of Italian unification, the conductor Riccardo Muti paused after "Va pensiero" and turned to address the audience (which included the then Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi) to complain about cuts in state funding of culture; the audience then joined in a repeat of the chorus. In 2014, the pop singer Katy Perry appeared at the Grammy Award wearing a dress designed by Valentino, embroidered with the music of "Dell'invito trascorsa è già l'ora" from the start of La traviata. The bicentenary of Verdi's birth in 2013 was celebrated in numerous events around the world, both in performances and broadcasts. Notes References Citations Sources External links Bicentennial of Giuseppe Verdi "Album Verdi" from the Digital Library of the National Library of Naples (Italy) Giuseppe Verdi recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings. 1813 births 1901 deaths 19th-century classical composers 19th-century Italian male musicians Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur Deaths from cerebrovascular disease Deputies of Legislature VIII of the Kingdom of Italy Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur Grand Officiers of the Légion d'honneur Italian classical composers Italian male classical composers Italian opera composers Italian philanthropists Italian Romantic composers Italian unification Male opera composers Members of the Senate of the Kingdom of Italy People from Busseto Recipients of the Order of Saint Stanislaus (Russian), 1st class Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class)	true	[ "Six Myths about the Good Life: Thinking about what has Value is a popular philosophical book by Joel J. Kupperman of the University of Connecticut. Its primary focus is on what has value, and which values are most worth espousing in life — a question central to what is known as the philosophy of life.\n\nWhile some philosophers have come to see the pursuit of happiness as central to the making of a good life, others point to the value of achievement. Kupperman sees grounds for both conceptions, but finds them wanting in simple and general terms. Drawing on classical Chinese, Indian, Greek and Roman sources, Six Myths explores this and in the process gives its readership a general impression of what Kupperman believes a good life ought to be. The \"broader theme\", according to reviewer and Rhodes University philosopher Samantha Vice, \"is an exploration of particular values and their role in making a life desirable.\" Kupperman seeks also to debunk the apparently widely held notion that a simple account suffices.\n\nThe myths \n \"Pursuing Comfort and Pleasure Will Lead to the Best Possible Life\".\n \"The Desirable Life Equals the One That Is Most Happy\".\n \"The Good Life Requires Reaching a Good Equilibrium, a Point at Which the Important Difficulties Are Resolved\".\n \"Reason Rather Than Emotions Would Be the Best Indicator of What Would Be a Good Life\".\n \"There Is No Real Connection, At Least in This Life, Between True Virtue and a Desirable Kind of Life\".\n \"True Virtue is Impeccable\".\n\nThere is also a seventh chapter, entitled \"How Can We Know What Has Value?\", and an appendix addressing ensuant concerns.\n\nCritical reception \n\"This,\" declared Boston University's Philip J. Ivanhoe, \"is the best introduction to philosophical accounts of the good life available. An excellent choice for any student of philosophy, this original and revealing study will inform, stimulate, and challenge even the most sophisticated reader. Kupperman combines the distinctive care, precision, and analytic power of philosophy with the best insights of contemporary psychology and a sophisticated, sensitive, and wise appreciation of the Indian, Chinese, and Western philosophical traditions. The result is a modern classic.\"\n\nCharles Guignon of the University of South Florida was similarly impressed:\n\nSix Myths is a consistently clear and engaging book, in the same league as Bertrand Russell's classic work, The Conquest of Happiness [...]. The author's grasp of Eastern thought and the \"positive psychology\" movement makes the book useful to a very wide audience.\n\nBibliography \n Kupperman, Joel J. Six Myths about the Good Life: Thinking about what has Value. Indianapolis: Hackett, 2006.\n Vice, Samantha. \"Joel K. Kupperman - Six Myths about the Good Life: Thinking About What Has Value - Reviewed by Samantha Vice, Rhodes University.\" Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews. 16 August 2006. (accessed June 10, 2009).\n\nNotes \n\nEthics books\nContemporary philosophical literature", "Spoiled (stylized as spOILed) is a 2011 documentary film about energy myths, environmental issues with energy, the problems with alternative energy, and the global warming controversy associated with energy. Spoiled also discusses wind energy, solar energy, fossil fuels, green energy, alternative energy, and sustainable energy as a part of its renewable energy documentary scope.\n\nSynopsis\nSpoiled begins investigating energy myths by asking if people today believe we are \"addicted\" to oil and if oil is destroying our lives the way other addictions do. The energy movie documentary explores humankind's relationship to oil addiction, and reveals a pattern of misinformation, disinformation, and deception about energy myths.\nThe renewable energy documentary investigates what is likely to be the greatest challenge ever faced by humanity; that of trying to run the modern world on less oil addiction.\n\nCast\nMark Mathis\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nEnergy economics\nFilms shot in New Mexico\nAmerican films\nAmerican documentary films\n2011 documentary films\n2011 films\n2011 in the environment\nDocumentary films about alternative energy\nDocumentary films about global warming\nDocumentary films about fossil fuels" ]
[ "Giuseppe Verdi", "Politics", "What were Giuseppe's political beliefs?", "\"myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating\" during the nineteenth century.", "What were the myths about?", "An example is the claim that when the \"Va, pensiero\" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan," ]	C_5c162a8d57704ac39a956fcf85083bc5_0	What effect did he have on politics?	3	What effect did Giuseppe Verdi have on politics?	Giuseppe Verdi	Having achieved some fame and prosperity, Verdi began in 1859 to take an active interest in Italian politics. His early commitment to the Risorgimento movement is difficult to estimate accurately; in the words of the music historian Philip Gossett "myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating" during the nineteenth century. An example is the claim that when the "Va, pensiero" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan, the audience, responding with nationalistic fervour, demanded an encore. As encores were expressly forbidden by the government at the time, such a gesture would have been extremely significant. But in fact the piece encored was not "Va, pensiero" but the hymn "Immenso Jehova". The growth of the "identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics" perhaps began in the 1840s. In 1848, the nationalist leader Giuseppe Mazzini, (whom Verdi had met in London the previous year) requested Verdi (who complied) to write a patriotic hymn. The opera historian Charles Osborne describes the 1849 La battaglia di Legnano as "an opera with a purpose" and maintains that "while parts of Verdi's earlier operas had frequently been taken up by the fighters of the Risorgimento...this time the composer had given the movement its own opera" It was not until 1859 in Naples, and only then spreading throughout Italy, that the slogan "Viva Verdi" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Viva Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), (who was then king of Piedmont). After Italy was unified in 1861, many of Verdi's early operas were increasingly re-interpreted as Risorgimento works with hidden Revolutionary messages that perhaps had not been originally intended by either the composer or his librettists. In 1859, Verdi was elected as a member of the new provincial council, and was appointed to head a group of five who would meet with King Vittorio Emanuele II in Turin. They were enthusiastically greeted along the way and in Turin Verdi himself received much of the publicity. On 17 October Verdi met with Cavour, the architect of the initial stages of Italian unification. Later that year the government of Emilia was subsumed under the United Provinces of Central Italy, and Verdi's political life temporarily came to an end. Whilst still maintaining nationalist feelings, he declined in 1860 the office of provincial council member to which he had been elected in absentia. Cavour however was anxious to convince a man of Verdi's stature that running for political office was essential to strengthening and securing Italy's future. The composer confided to Piave some years later that "I accepted on the condition that after a few months I would resign." Verdi was elected on 3 February 1861 for the town of Borgo San Donnino (Fidenza) to the Parliament of Piedmont-Sardinia in Turin (which from March 1861 became the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy), but following the death of Cavour in 1861, which deeply distressed him, he scarcely attended. Later, in 1874, Verdi was appointed a member of the Italian Senate, but did not participate in its activities. CANNOTANSWER	The growth of the "identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics" perhaps began in the 1840s.	Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi (; 9 or 10 October 1813 – 27 January 1901) was an Italian composer best known for his operas. He was born near Busseto to a provincial family of moderate means, receiving a musical education with the help of a local patron. Verdi came to dominate the Italian opera scene after the era of Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti, and Vincenzo Bellini, whose works significantly influenced him. In his early operas, Verdi demonstrated a sympathy with the Risorgimento movement which sought the unification of Italy. He also participated briefly as an elected politician. The chorus "Va, pensiero" from his early opera Nabucco (1842), and similar choruses in later operas, were much in the spirit of the unification movement, and the composer himself became esteemed as a representative of these ideals. An intensely private person, Verdi did not seek to ingratiate himself with popular movements. As he became professionally successful he was able to reduce his operatic workload and sought to establish himself as a landowner in his native region. He surprised the musical world by returning, after his success with the opera Aida (1871), with three late masterpieces: his Requiem (1874), and the operas Otello (1887) and Falstaff (1893). His operas remain extremely popular, especially the three peaks of his 'middle period': Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata. The bicentenary of his birth in 2013 was widely celebrated in broadcasts and performances. Life Childhood and education Verdi, the first child of Carlo Giuseppe Verdi (1785–1867) and Luigia Uttini (1787–1851), was born at their home in Le Roncole, a village near Busseto, then in the Département Taro and within the borders of the First French Empire following the annexation of the Duchy of Parma and Piacenza in 1808. The baptismal register, prepared on 11 October 1813, lists his parents Carlo and Luigia as "innkeeper" and "spinner" respectively. Additionally, it lists Verdi as being "born yesterday", but since days were often considered to begin at sunset, this could have meant either 9 or 10 October. Following his mother, Verdi always celebrated his birthday on 9 October, the day he himself believed he was born. Verdi had a younger sister, Giuseppa, who died aged 17 in 1833. She is said to have been his closest friend during childhood. From the age of four, Verdi was given private lessons in Latin and Italian by the village schoolmaster, Baistrocchi, and at six he attended the local school. After learning to play the organ, he showed so much interest in music that his parents finally provided him with a spinet. Verdi's gift for music was already apparent by 1820–21 when he began his association with the local church, serving in the choir, acting as an altar boy for a while, and taking organ lessons. After Baistrocchi's death, Verdi, at the age of eight, became the official paid organist. The music historian Roger Parker points out that both of Verdi's parents "belonged to families of small landowners and traders, certainly not the illiterate peasants from which Verdi later liked to present himself as having emerged... Carlo Verdi was energetic in furthering his son's education...something which Verdi tended to hide in later life... [T]he picture emerges of youthful precocity eagerly nurtured by an ambitious father and of a sustained, sophisticated and elaborate formal education." In 1823, when he was 10, Verdi's parents arranged for the boy to attend school in Busseto, enrolling him in a Ginnasio—an upper school for boys—run by Don Pietro Seletti, while they continued to run their inn at Le Roncole. Verdi returned to Busseto regularly to play the organ on Sundays, covering the distance of several kilometres on foot. At age 11, Verdi received schooling in Italian, Latin, the humanities, and rhetoric. By the time he was 12, he began lessons with Ferdinando Provesi, maestro di cappella at San Bartolomeo, director of the municipal music school and co-director of the local Società Filarmonica (Philharmonic Society). Verdi later stated: "From the ages of 13 to 18 I wrote a motley assortment of pieces: marches for band by the hundred, perhaps as many little sinfonie that were used in church, in the theatre and at concerts, five or six concertos and sets of variations for pianoforte, which I played myself at concerts, many serenades, cantatas (arias, duets, very many trios) and various pieces of church music, of which I remember only a Stabat Mater." This information comes from the Autobiographical Sketch which Verdi dictated to the publisher Giulio Ricordi late in life, in 1879, and remains the leading source for his early life and career. Written, understandably, with the benefit of hindsight, it is not always reliable when dealing with issues more contentious than those of his childhood. The other director of the Philharmonic Society was , a wholesale grocer and distiller, who was described by a contemporary as a "manic dilettante" of music. The young Verdi did not immediately become involved with the Philharmonic. By June 1827, he had graduated with honours from the Ginnasio and was able to focus solely on music under Provesi. By chance, when he was 13, Verdi was asked to step in as a replacement to play in what became his first public event in his home town; he was an immediate success mostly playing his own music to the surprise of many and receiving strong local recognition. By 1829–30, Verdi had established himself as a leader of the Philharmonic: "none of us could rival him" reported the secretary of the organisation, Giuseppe Demaldè. An eight-movement cantata, I deliri di Saul, based on a drama by Vittorio Alfieri, was written by Verdi when he was 15 and performed in Bergamo. It was acclaimed by both Demaldè and Barezzi, who commented: "He shows a vivid imagination, a philosophical outlook, and sound judgment in the arrangement of instrumental parts." In late 1829, Verdi had completed his studies with Provesi, who declared that he had no more to teach him. At the time, Verdi had been giving singing and piano lessons to Barezzi's daughter Margherita; by 1831, they were unofficially engaged. Verdi set his sights on Milan, then the cultural capital of northern Italy, where he applied unsuccessfully to study at the Conservatory. Barezzi made arrangements for him to become a private pupil of , who had been maestro concertatore at La Scala, and who described Verdi's compositions as "very promising". Lavigna encouraged Verdi to take out a subscription to La Scala, where he heard Maria Malibran in operas by Gioachino Rossini and Vincenzo Bellini. Verdi began making connections in the Milanese world of music that were to stand him in good stead. These included an introduction by Lavigna to an amateur choral group, the Società Filarmonica, led by Pietro Massini. Attending the Società frequently in 1834, Verdi soon found himself functioning as rehearsal director (for Rossini's La cenerentola) and continuo player. It was Massini who encouraged him to write his first opera, originally titled Rocester, to a libretto by the journalist Antonio Piazza. 1834–1842: First operas List of compositions by Giuseppe Verdi In mid-1834, Verdi sought to acquire Provesi's former post in Busseto but without success. But with Barezzi's help he did obtain the secular post of maestro di musica. He taught, gave lessons, and conducted the Philharmonic for several months before returning to Milan in early 1835. By the following July, he obtained his certification from Lavigna. Eventually in 1835 Verdi became director of the Busseto school with a three-year contract. He married Margherita in May 1836, and by March 1837, she had given birth to their first child, Virginia Maria Luigia on 26 March 1837. Icilio Romano followed on 11 July 1838. Both the children died young, Virginia on 12 August 1838, Icilio on 22 October 1839. In 1837, the young composer asked for Massini's assistance to stage his opera in Milan. The La Scala impresario, Bartolomeo Merelli, agreed to put on Oberto (as the reworked opera was now called, with a libretto rewritten by Temistocle Solera) in November 1839. It achieved a respectable 13 additional performances, following which Merelli offered Verdi a contract for three more works. While Verdi was working on his second opera Un giorno di regno, Margherita died of encephalitis at the age of 26. Verdi adored his wife and children and was devastated by their early deaths. Un giorno, a comedy, was premiered only a few months later. It was a flop and only given the one performance. Following its failure, it is claimed Verdi vowed never to compose again, but in his Sketch he recounts how Merelli persuaded him to write a new opera. Verdi was to claim that he gradually began to work on the music for Nabucco, the libretto of which had originally been rejected by the composer Otto Nicolai: "This verse today, tomorrow that, here a note, there a whole phrase, and little by little the opera was written", he later recalled. By the autumn of 1841 it was complete, originally under the title Nabucodonosor. Well received at its first performance on 9 March 1842, Nabucco underpinned Verdi's success until his retirement from the theatre, twenty-nine operas (including some revised and updated versions) later. At its revival in La Scala for the 1842 autumn season it was given an unprecedented (and later unequalled) total of 57 performances; within three years it had reached (among other venues) Vienna, Lisbon, Barcelona, Berlin, Paris and Hamburg; in 1848 it was heard in New York, in 1850 in Buenos Aires. Porter comments that "similar accounts...could be provided to show how widely and rapidly all [Verdi's] other successful operas were disseminated." 1842–1849 A period of hard work for Verdi—with the creation of twenty operas (excluding revisions and translations)—followed over the next sixteen years, culminating in Un ballo in maschera. This period was not without its frustrations and setbacks for the young composer, and he was frequently demoralised. In April 1845, in connection with I due Foscari, he wrote: "I am happy, no matter what reception it gets, and I am utterly indifferent to everything. I cannot wait for these next three years to pass. I have to write six operas, then addio to everything." In 1858 Verdi complained: "Since Nabucco, you may say, I have never had one hour of peace. Sixteen years in the galleys." After the initial success of Nabucco, Verdi settled in Milan, making a number of influential acquaintances. He attended the Salotto Maffei, Countess Clara Maffei's salons in Milan, becoming her lifelong friend and correspondent. A revival of Nabucco followed in 1842 at La Scala where it received a run of fifty-seven performances, and this led to a commission from Merelli for a new opera for the 1843 season. I Lombardi alla prima crociata was based on a libretto by Solera and premiered in February 1843. Inevitably, comparisons were made with Nabucco; but one contemporary writer noted: "If [Nabucco] created this young man's reputation, I Lombardi served to confirm it." Verdi paid close attention to his financial contracts, making sure he was appropriately remunerated as his popularity increased. For I Lombardi and Ernani (1844) in Venice he was paid 12,000 lire (including supervision of the productions); Attila and Macbeth (1847), each brought him 18,000 lire. His contracts with the publishers Ricordi in 1847 were very specific about the amounts he was to receive for new works, first productions, musical arrangements, and so on. He began to use his growing prosperity to invest in land near his birthplace. In 1844 he purchased Il Pulgaro, 62 acres (23 hectares) of farmland with a farmhouse and outbuildings, providing a home for his parents from May 1844. Later that year, he also bought the Palazzo Cavalli (now known as the Palazzo Orlandi) on the via Roma, Busseto's main street. In May 1848, Verdi signed a contract for land and houses at Sant'Agata in Busseto, which had once belonged to his family. It was here he built his own house, completed in 1880, now known as the Villa Verdi, where he lived from 1851 until his death. In March 1843, Verdi visited Vienna (where Gaetano Donizetti was musical director) to oversee a production of Nabucco. The older composer, recognising Verdi's talent, noted in a letter of January 1844: "I am very, very happy to give way to people of talent like Verdi... Nothing will prevent the good Verdi from soon reaching one of the most honourable positions in the cohort of composers." Verdi travelled on to Parma, where the Teatro Regio di Parma was producing Nabucco with Strepponi in the cast. For Verdi the performances were a personal triumph in his native region, especially as his father, Carlo, attended the first performance. Verdi remained in Parma for some weeks beyond his intended departure date. This fuelled speculation that the delay was due to Verdi's interest in Giuseppina Strepponi (who stated that their relationship began in 1843). Strepponi was in fact known for her amorous relationships (and many illegitimate children) and her history was an awkward factor in their relationship until they eventually agreed on marriage. After successful stagings of Nabucco in Venice (with twenty-five performances in the 1842/43 season), Verdi began negotiations with the impresario of La Fenice to stage I Lombardi, and to write a new opera. Eventually, Victor Hugo's Hernani was chosen, with Francesco Maria Piave as librettist. Ernani was successfully premiered in 1844 and within six months had been performed at twenty other theatres in Italy, and also in Vienna. The writer Andrew Porter notes that for the next ten years, Verdi's life "reads like a travel diary—a timetable of visits...to bring new operas to the stage or to supervise local premieres". La Scala premiered none of these new works, except for Giovanna d'Arco. Verdi "never forgave the Milanese for their reception of Un giorno di regno". During this period, Verdi began to work more consistently with his librettists. He relied on Piave again for I due Foscari, performed in Rome in November 1844, then on Solera once more for Giovanna d'Arco, at La Scala in February 1845, while in August that year he was able to work with Salvadore Cammarano on Alzira for the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples. Solera and Piave worked together on Attila for La Fenice (March 1846). In April 1844, Verdi took on Emanuele Muzio, eight years his junior, as a pupil and amanuensis. He had known him since about 1828 as another of Barezzi's protégés. Muzio, who in fact was Verdi's only pupil, became indispensable to the composer. He reported to Barezzi that Verdi "has a breadth of spirit, of generosity, a wisdom". In November 1846, Muzio wrote of Verdi: "If you could see us, I seem more like a friend, rather than his pupil. We are always together at dinner, in the cafes, when we play cards...; all in all, he doesn't go anywhere without me at his side; in the house we have a big table and we both write there together, and so I always have his advice." Muzio was to remain associated with Verdi, assisting in the preparation of scores and transcriptions, and later conducting many of his works in their premiere performances in the US and elsewhere outside Italy. He was chosen by Verdi as one of the executors of his will, but predeceased the composer in 1890. After a period of illness Verdi began work on Macbeth in September 1846. He dedicated the opera to Barezzi: "I have long intended to dedicate an opera to you, as you have been a father, a benefactor and a friend for me. It was a duty I should have fulfilled sooner if imperious circumstances had not prevented me. Now, I send you Macbeth, which I prize above all my other operas, and therefore deem worthier to present to you." In 1997 Martin Chusid wrote that Macbeth was the only one of Verdi's operas of his "early period" to remain regularly in the international repertoire, although in the 21st century Nabucco has also entered the lists. Strepponi's voice declined and her engagements dried up in the 1845 to 1846 period, and she returned to live in Milan whilst retaining contact with Verdi as his "supporter, promoter, unofficial adviser, and occasional secretary" until she decided to move to Paris in October 1846. Before she left Verdi gave her a letter that pledged his love. On the envelope, Strepponi wrote: "5 or 6 October 1846. They shall lay this letter on my heart when they bury me." Verdi had completed I masnadieri for London by May 1847 except for the orchestration. This he left until the opera was in rehearsal, since he wanted to hear "la [Jenny] Lind and modify her role to suit her more exactly". Verdi agreed to conduct the premiere on 22 July 1847 at Her Majesty's Theatre, as well as the second performance. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert attended the first performance, and for the most part, the press was generous in its praise. For the next two years, except for two visits to Italy during periods of political unrest, Verdi was based in Paris. Within a week of returning to Paris in July 1847, he received his first commission from the Paris Opéra. Verdi agreed to adapt I Lombardi to a new French libretto; the result was Jérusalem, which contained significant changes to the music and structure of the work (including an extensive ballet scene) to meet Parisian expectations. Verdi was awarded the Order of Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. To satisfy his contracts with the publisher , Verdi dashed off Il Corsaro. Budden comments "In no other opera of his does Verdi appear to have taken so little interest before it was staged." On hearing the news of the "Cinque Giornate", the "Five Days" of street fighting that took place between 18 and 22 March 1848 and temporarily drove the Austrians out of Milan, Verdi travelled there, arriving on 5 April. He discovered that Piave was now "Citizen Piave" of the newly proclaimed Republic of San Marco. Writing a patriotic letter to him in Venice, Verdi concluded "Banish every petty municipal idea! We must all extend a fraternal hand, and Italy will yet become the first nation of the world...I am drunk with joy! Imagine that there are no more Germans here!!" Verdi had been admonished by the poet Giuseppe Giusti for turning away from patriotic subjects, the poet pleading with him to "do what you can to nourish the [sorrow of the Italian people], to strengthen it, and direct it to its goal." Cammarano suggested adapting Joseph Méry's 1828 play La Bataille de Toulouse, which he described as a story "that should stir every man with an Italian soul in his breast". The premiere was set for late January 1849. Verdi travelled to Rome before the end of 1848. He found that city on the verge of becoming a (short-lived) republic, which commenced within days of La battaglia di Legnanos enthusiastically received premiere. In the spirit of the time were the tenor hero's final words, "Whoever dies for the fatherland cannot be evil-minded". Verdi had intended to return to Italy in early 1848, but was prevented by work and illness, as well as, most probably, by his increasing attachment to Strepponi. Verdi and Strepponi left Paris in July 1849, the immediate cause being an outbreak of cholera, and Verdi went directly to Busseto to continue work on completing his latest opera, Luisa Miller, for a production in Naples later in the year. 1849–1853: Fame Verdi was committed to the publisher Giovanni Ricordi for an opera—which became Stiffelio—for Trieste in the Spring of 1850; and, subsequently, following negotiations with La Fenice, developed a libretto with Piave and wrote the music for Rigoletto (based on Victor Hugo's Le roi s'amuse) for Venice in March 1851. This was the first of a sequence of three operas (followed by Il trovatore and La traviata) which were to cement his fame as a master of opera. The failure of Stiffelio (attributable not least to the censors of the time taking offence at the taboo subject of the supposed adultery of a clergyman's wife and interfering with the text and roles) incited Verdi to take pains to rework it, although even in the completely recycled version of Aroldo (1857) it still failed to please. Rigoletto, with its intended murder of royalty, and its sordid attributes, also upset the censors. Verdi would not compromise: What does the sack matter to the police? Are they worried about the effect it will produce?...Do they think they know better than I?...I see the hero has been made no longer ugly and hunchbacked!! Why? A singing hunchback...why not?...I think it splendid to show this character as outwardly deformed and ridiculous, and inwardly passionate and full of love. I chose the subject for these very qualities...if they are removed I can no longer set it to music. Verdi substituted a Duke for the King, and the public response and subsequent success of the opera all over Italy and Europe fully vindicated the composer. Aware that the melody of the Duke's song "La donna è mobile" ("Woman is fickle") would become a popular hit, Verdi excluded it from orchestral rehearsals for the opera, and rehearsed the tenor separately. For several months Verdi was preoccupied with family matters. These stemmed from the way in which the citizens of Busseto were treating Giuseppina Strepponi, with whom he was living openly in an unmarried relationship. She was shunned in the town and at church, and while Verdi appeared indifferent, she was certainly not. Furthermore, Verdi was concerned about the administration of his newly acquired property at Sant'Agata. A growing estrangement between Verdi and his parents was perhaps also attributable to Strepponi (the suggestion that this situation was sparked by the birth of a child to Verdi and Strepponi which was given away as a foundling lacks any firm evidence). In January 1851, Verdi broke off relations with his parents, and in April they were ordered to leave Sant'Agata; Verdi found new premises for them and helped them financially to settle into their new home. It may not be coincidental that all six Verdi operas written in the period 1849–53 (La battaglia, Luisa Miller, Stiffelio, Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata), have, uniquely in his oeuvre, heroines who are, in the opera critic Joseph Kerman's words, "women who come to grief because of sexual transgression, actual or perceived". Kerman, like the psychologist Gerald Mendelssohn, sees this choice of subjects as being influenced by Verdi's uneasy passion for Strepponi. Verdi and Strepponi moved into Sant'Agata on 1 May 1851. May also brought an offer for a new opera from La Fenice, which Verdi eventually realised as La traviata. That was followed by an agreement with the Rome Opera company to present Il trovatore for January 1853. Verdi now had sufficient earnings to retire, had he wished to. He had reached a stage where he could develop his operas as he wished, rather than be dependent on commissions from third parties. Il trovatore was in fact the first opera he wrote without a specific commission (apart from Oberto). At around the same time he began to consider creating an opera from Shakespeare's King Lear. After first (1850) seeking a libretto from Cammarano (which never appeared), Verdi later (1857) commissioned one from Antonio Somma, but this proved intractable, and no music was ever written. Verdi began work on Il trovatore after the death of his mother in June 1851. The fact that this is "the one opera of Verdi's which focuses on a mother rather than a father" is perhaps related to her death. In the winter of 1851–52 Verdi decided to go to Paris with Strepponi, where he concluded an agreement with the Opéra to write what became Les vêpres siciliennes, his first original work in the style of grand opera. In February 1852, the couple attended a performance of Alexander Dumas filss play The Lady of the Camellias; Verdi immediately began to compose music for what would later become La traviata. After his visit to Rome for Il trovatore in January 1853, Verdi worked on completing La traviata, but with little hope of its success, due to his lack of confidence in any of the singers engaged for the season. Furthermore, the management insisted that the opera be given a historical, not a contemporary setting. The premiere in March 1853 was indeed a failure: Verdi wrote: "Was the fault mine or the singers'? Time will tell." Subsequent productions (following some rewriting) throughout Europe over the following two years fully vindicated the composer; Roger Parker has written "Il trovatore consistently remains one of the three or four most popular operas in the Verdian repertoire: but it has never pleased the critics". 1853–1860: Consolidation In the eleven years up to and including Traviata, Verdi had written sixteen operas. Over the next eighteen years (up to Aida), he wrote only six new works for the stage. Verdi was happy to return to Sant'Agata and, in February 1856, was reporting a "total abandonment of music; a little reading; some light occupation with agriculture and horses; that's all". A couple of months later, writing in the same vein to Countess Maffei he stated: "I'm not doing anything. I don't read. I don't write. I walk in the fields from morning to evening, trying to recover, so far without success, from the stomach trouble caused me by I vespri siciliani. Cursed operas!" An 1858 letter by Strepponi to the publisher Léon Escudier describes the kind of lifestyle that increasingly appealed to the composer: "His love for the country has become a mania, madness, rage, and fury—anything you like that is exaggerated. He gets up almost with the dawn, to go and examine the wheat, the maize, the vines, etc....Fortunately our tastes for this sort of life coincide, except in the matter of sunrise, which he likes to see up and dressed, and I from my bed." Nonetheless on 15 May, Verdi signed a contract with La Fenice for an opera for the following spring. This was to be Simon Boccanegra. The couple stayed in Paris until January 1857 to deal with these proposals, and also the offer to stage the translated version of Il trovatore as a grand opera. Verdi and Strepponi travelled to Venice in March for the premiere of Simon Boccanegra, which turned out to be "a fiasco" (as Verdi reported, although on the second and third nights, the reception improved considerably). With Strepponi, Verdi went to Naples early in January 1858 to work with Somma on the libretto of the opera Gustave III, which over a year later would become Un ballo in maschera. By this time, Verdi had begun to write about Strepponi as "my wife" and she was signing her letters as "Giuseppina Verdi". Verdi raged against the stringent requirements of the Neapolitan censor stating: "I'm drowning in a sea of troubles. It's almost certain that the censors will forbid our libretto." With no hope of seeing his Gustavo III staged as written, he broke his contract. This resulted in litigation and counter-litigation; with the legal issues resolved, Verdi was free to present the libretto and musical outline of Gustave III to the Rome Opera. There, the censors demanded further changes; at this point, the opera took the title Un ballo in maschera. Arriving in Sant'Agata in March 1859 Verdi and Strepponi found the nearby city of Piacenza occupied by about 6,000 Austrian troops who had made it their base, to combat the rise of Italian interest in unification in the Piedmont region. In the ensuing Second Italian War of Independence the Austrians abandoned the region and began to leave Lombardy, although they remained in control of the Venice region under the terms of the armistice signed at Villafranca. Verdi was disgusted at this outcome: "[W]here then is the independence of Italy, so long hoped for and promised?...Venice is not Italian? After so many victories, what an outcome... It is enough to drive one mad" he wrote to Clara Maffei. Verdi and Strepponi now decided on marriage; they travelled to Collonges-sous-Salève, a village then part of Piedmont. On 29 August 1859 the couple were married there, with only the coachman who had driven them there and the church bell-ringer as witnesses. At the end of 1859, Verdi wrote to his friend Cesare De Sanctis "[Since completing Ballo] I have not made any more music, I have not seen any more music, I have not thought anymore about music. I don't even know what colour my last opera is, and I almost don't remember it." He began to remodel Sant'Agata, which took most of 1860 to complete and on which he continued to work for the next twenty years. This included major work on a square room that became his workroom, his bedroom, and his office. Politics Having achieved some fame and prosperity, Verdi began in 1859 to take an active interest in Italian politics. His early commitment to the Risorgimento movement is difficult to estimate accurately; in the words of the music historian Philip Gossett "myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating" during the nineteenth century. An example is the claim that when the "Va, pensiero" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan, the audience, responding with nationalistic fervour, demanded an encore. As encores were expressly forbidden by the government at the time, such a gesture would have been extremely significant. But in fact the piece encored was not "Va, pensiero" but the hymn "Immenso Jehova". The growth of the "identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics" perhaps began in the 1840s. In 1848, the nationalist leader Giuseppe Mazzini (whom Verdi had met in London the previous year) requested Verdi (who complied) to write a patriotic hymn. The opera historian Charles Osborne describes the 1849 La battaglia di Legnano as "an opera with a purpose" and maintains that "while parts of Verdi's earlier operas had frequently been taken up by the fighters of the Risorgimento...this time the composer had given the movement its own opera" It was not until 1859 in Naples, and only then spreading throughout Italy, that the slogan "Viva Verdi" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Viva Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), (who was then king of Piedmont). After Italy was unified in 1861, many of Verdi's early operas were increasingly re-interpreted as Risorgimento works with hidden Revolutionary messages that perhaps had not been originally intended by either the composer or his librettists. In 1859, Verdi was elected as a member of the new provincial council, and was appointed to head a group of five who would meet with King Vittorio Emanuele II in Turin. They were enthusiastically greeted along the way and in Turin Verdi himself received much of the publicity. On 17 October Verdi met with Cavour, the architect of the initial stages of Italian unification. Later that year the government of Emilia was subsumed under the United Provinces of Central Italy, and Verdi's political life temporarily came to an end. Whilst still maintaining nationalist feelings, he declined in 1860 the office of provincial council member to which he had been elected in absentia. Cavour however was anxious to convince a man of Verdi's stature that running for political office was essential to strengthening and securing Italy's future. The composer confided to Piave some years later that "I accepted on the condition that after a few months I would resign." Verdi was elected on 3 February 1861 for the town of Borgo San Donnino (Fidenza) to the Parliament of Piedmont-Sardinia in Turin (which from March 1861 became the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy), but following the death of Cavour in 1861, which deeply distressed him, he scarcely attended. Later, in 1874, Verdi was appointed a member of the Italian Senate, but did not participate in its activities. 1860–1887: from La forza to Otello In the months following the staging of Ballo, Verdi was approached by several opera companies seeking a new work or making offers to stage one of his existing ones, but refused them all. But when, in December 1860, an approach was made from Saint Petersburg's Imperial Theatre, the offer of 60,000 francs plus all expenses was doubtless a strong incentive. Verdi came up with the idea of adapting the 1835 Spanish play Don Alvaro o la fuerza del sino by Angel Saavedra, which became La forza del destino, with Piave writing the libretto. The Verdis arrived in St. Petersburg in December 1861 for the premiere, but casting problems meant that it had to be postponed. Returning via Paris from Russia on 24 February 1862, Verdi met two young Italian writers, the twenty-year-old Arrigo Boito and Franco Faccio. Verdi had been invited to write a piece of music for the 1862 International Exhibition in London, and charged Boito with writing a text, which became the Inno delle nazioni. Boito, as a supporter of the grand opera of Giacomo Meyerbeer and an opera composer in his own right, was later in the 1860s critical of Verdi's "reliance on formula rather than form", incurring the composer's wrath. Nevertheless, he was to become Verdi's close collaborator in his final operas. The St. Petersburg premiere of La forza finally took place in September 1862, and Verdi received the Order of St. Stanislaus. A revival of Macbeth in Paris in 1865 was not a success, but he obtained a commission for a new work, Don Carlos, based on the play Don Carlos by Friedrich Schiller. He and Giuseppina spent late 1866 and much of 1867 in Paris, where they heard, and did not warm to, Giacomo Meyerbeer's last opera, L'Africaine, and Richard Wagner's overture to Tannhäuser. The opera's premiere in 1867 drew mixed comments. While the critic Théophile Gautier praised the work, the composer Georges Bizet was disappointed at Verdi's changing style: "Verdi is no longer Italian. He is following Wagner." During the 1860s and 1870s, Verdi paid great attention to his estate around Busseto, purchasing additional land, dealing with unsatisfactory (in one case, embezzling) stewards, installing irrigation, and coping with variable harvests and economic slumps. In 1867, both Verdi's father Carlo, with whom he had restored good relations, and his early patron and father-in-law Antonio Barezzi, died. Verdi and Giuseppina decided to adopt Carlo's great-niece Filomena Maria Verdi, then seven years old, as their own child. She was to marry in 1878 the son of Verdi's friend and lawyer Angelo Carrara and her family became eventually the heirs of Verdi's estate. Aida was commissioned by the Egyptian government for the opera house built by the Khedive Isma'il Pasha to celebrate the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. The opera house actually opened with a production of Rigoletto. The prose libretto in French by Camille du Locle, based on a scenario by the Egyptologist Auguste Mariette, was transformed to Italian verse by Antonio Ghislanzoni. Verdi was offered the enormous sum of 150,000 francs for the opera (even though he confessed that Ancient Egypt was "a civilization I have never been able to admire"), and it was first performed in Cairo in 1871. Verdi spent much of 1872 and 1873 supervising the Italian productions of Aida at Milan, Parma and Naples, effectively acting as producer and demanding high standards and adequate rehearsal time. During the rehearsals for the Naples production he wrote his string quartet, the only chamber music by him to survive, and the only major work in the form by an Italian of the 19th century. In 1869, Verdi had been asked to compose a section for a requiem mass in memory of Rossini. He compiled and completed the requiem, but its performance was abandoned (and its premiere did not take place until 1988). Five years later, Verdi reworked his "Libera Me" section of the Rossini Requiem and made it a part of his Requiem honouring Alessandro Manzoni, who had died in 1873. The complete Requiem was first performed at the cathedral in Milan on the anniversary of Manzoni's death on 22 May 1874. The spinto soprano Teresa Stolz (1834–1902), who had sung in La Scala productions from 1865 onwards, was the soloist in the first and many later performances of the Requiem; in February 1872, she had created Aida in its European premiere in Milan. She became closely associated personally with Verdi (exactly how closely remains conjectural), to Giuseppina Verdi's initial disquiet; but the women were reconciled and Stolz remained a companion of Verdi after Giuseppina's death in 1897 until his own death. Verdi conducted his Requiem in Paris, London and Vienna in 1875 and in Cologne in 1876. It seemed that it would be his last work. In the words of his biographer John Rosselli, it "confirmed him as the unique presiding genius of Italian music. No fellow composer...came near him in popularity or reputation". Verdi, now in his sixties, initially seemed to withdraw into retirement. He deliberately shied away from opportunities to publicise himself or to become involved with new productions of his works, but secretly he began work on Otello, which Boito (to whom the composer had been reconciled by Ricordi) had proposed to him privately in 1879. The composition was delayed by a revision of Simon Boccanegra which Verdi undertook with Boito, produced in 1881, and a revision of Don Carlos. Even when Otello was virtually completed, Verdi teased "Shall I finish it? Shall I have it performed? Hard to tell, even for me." As news leaked out, Verdi was pressed by opera houses across Europe with enquiries; eventually the opera was triumphantly premiered at La Scala in February 1887. 1887–1901: Falstaff and last years Following the success of Otello Verdi commented, "After having relentlessly massacred so many heroes and heroines, I have at last the right to laugh a little." He had considered a variety of comic subjects but had found none of them wholly suitable and confided his ambition to Boito. The librettist said nothing at the time but secretly began work on a libretto based on The Merry Wives of Windsor with additional material taken from Henry IV, Part 1 and Part 2. Verdi received the draft libretto probably in early July 1889 after he had just read Shakespeare's play: "Benissimo! Benissimo!... No one could have done better than you", he wrote back to Boito. But he still had doubts: his age, his health (which he admits to being good) and his ability to complete the project: "If I were not to finish the music?". If the project failed, it would have been a waste of Boito's time, and have distracted him from completing his own new opera. Finally on 10 July 1889 he wrote again: "So be it! So let's do Falstaff! For now, let's not think of obstacles, of age, of illnesses!" Verdi emphasised the need for secrecy, but continued "If you are in the mood, then start to write." Later he wrote to Boito (capitals and exclamation marks are Verdi's own): "What joy to be able to say to the public: HERE WE ARE AGAIN!!! COME AND SEE US!" The first performance of Falstaff took place at La Scala on 9 February 1893. For the first night, official ticket prices were thirty times higher than usual. Royalty, aristocracy, critics and leading figures from the arts all over Europe were present. The performance was a huge success; numbers were encored, and at the end the applause for Verdi and the cast lasted an hour. That was followed by a tumultuous welcome when the composer, his wife and Boito arrived at the Grand Hotel de Milan. Even more hectic scenes ensued when he went to Rome in May for the opera's premiere at the Teatro Costanzi, when crowds of well-wishers at the railway station initially forced Verdi to take refuge in a tool-shed. He witnessed the performance from the Royal Box at the side of King Umberto and the Queen. In his last years Verdi undertook a number of philanthropic ventures, publishing in 1894 a song for the benefit of earthquake victims in Sicily, and from 1895 onwards planning, building and endowing a rest-home for retired musicians in Milan, the Casa di Riposo per Musicisti, and building a hospital at Villanova sull'Arda, close to Busseto. His last major composition, the choral set of Four sacred pieces, was published in 1898. In 1900 he was deeply upset at the assassination of King Umberto and sketched a setting of a poem in his memory but was unable to complete it. While staying at the Grand Hotel, Verdi suffered a stroke on 21 January 1901. He gradually grew more feeble over the next week, during which Stolz cared for him, and died on 27 January at the age of 87. Verdi was initially buried in a private ceremony at Milan's Cimitero Monumentale. A month later, his body was moved to the crypt of the Casa di Riposo. On this occasion, "Va, pensiero" from Nabucco was conducted by Arturo Toscanini with a chorus of 820 singers. A huge crowd was in attendance, estimated at 300,000. Boito wrote to a friend, in words which recall the mysterious final scene of Don Carlos, "[Verdi] sleeps like a King of Spain in his Escurial, under a bronze slab that completely covers him." Personality Not all of Verdi's personal qualities were amiable. John Rosselli concluded after writing his biography that "I do not very much like the man Verdi, in particular the autocratic rentier-cum-estate owner, part-time composer, and seemingly full-time grumbler and reactionary critic of the later years", yet admits that like other writers, he must "admire him, warts and all...a deep integrity runs beneath his life, and can be felt even when he is being unreasonable or wrong." Budden suggests that "With Verdi...the man and the artist on many ways developed side by side." Ungainly and awkward in society in his early years, "as he became a man of property and underwent the civilizing influence of Giuseppina,...[he] acquired assurance and authority." He also learnt to keep himself to himself, never discussing his private life and maintaining, when it suited him, legends about his supposed 'peasant' origins, his materialism and his indifference to criticism. Gerald Mendelsohn describes the composer as "an intensely private man who deeply resented efforts to inquire into his personal affairs. He regarded journalists and would-be biographers, as well as his neighbors in Busseto and the operatic public at large, as an intrusive lot, against whose prying attentions he needed constantly to defend himself." Verdi was never explicit about his religious beliefs. Anti-clerical by nature in his early years, he nonetheless built a chapel at Sant'Agata, but is little recorded as attending church. Strepponi wrote in 1871 "I won't say [Verdi] is an atheist, but he is not much of a believer." Rosselli comments that in the Requiem "The prospect of Hell appears to rule...[the Requiem] is troubled to the end," and offers little consolation. Music and form Spirit The writer Friedrich Schiller (four of whose plays were adapted as operas by Verdi) distinguished two types of artist in his 1795 essay On Naïve and Sentimental Poetry. The philosopher Isaiah Berlin ranked Verdi in the 'naïve' category—"They are not...self-conscious. They do not...stand aside to contemplate their creations and express their own feelings....They are able...if they have genius, to embody their vision fully." (The 'sentimentals' seek to recreate nature and natural feelings on their own terms—Berlin instances Richard Wagner—"offering not peace, but a sword".) Verdi's operas are not written according to an aesthetic theory, or with a purpose to change the tastes of their audiences. In conversation with a German visitor in 1887 he is recorded as saying that, whilst "there was much to be admired in [Wagner's operas] Tannhäuser and Lohengrin...in his recent operas [Wagner] seemed to be overstepping the bounds of what can be expressed in music. For him "philosophical" music was incomprehensible." Although Verdi's works belong, as Rosselli admits "to the most artificial of genres...[they] ring emotionally true: truth and directness make them exciting, often hugely so." Periods The earliest study of Verdi's music, published in 1859 by the Italian critic Abraham Basevi, already distinguished four periods in Verdi's music. The early, 'grandiose' period, ended according to Basevi with La battaglia di Legnano (1849), and a 'personal' style began with the next opera Luisa Miller. These two operas are generally agreed today by critics to mark the division between Verdi's 'early' and 'middle' periods. The 'middle' period is felt to end with La traviata (1853) and Les vêpres siciliennes (1855), with a 'late' period commencing with Simon Boccanegra (1857) running through to Aida (1871). The last two operas, Otello and Falstaff, together with the Requiem and the Four Sacred Pieces, then represent a 'final' period. Early period Verdi was to claim in his Sketch that during his early training with Lavigna "I did nothing but canons and fugues...No-one taught me orchestration or how to handle dramatic music." He is known to have written a variety of music for the Busseto Philharmonic society, including vocal music, band music and chamber works, (and including an alternative overture to Rossini's Barber of Seville) but few of these works survive. (He may have given instructions before his death to destroy his early works). Verdi uses in his early operas (and, in his own stylized versions, throughout his later work) the standard elements of Italian opera content of the period, referred to by the opera writer Julian Budden as the 'Code Rossini', after the composer who established through his work and popularity the accepted templates of these forms; they were also used by the composers dominant during Verdi's early career, Bellini, Donizetti and Saverio Mercadante. Amongst the essential elements are the aria, the duet, the ensemble, and the finale sequence of an act. The aria format, centred on a soloist, typically involved three sections; a slow introduction, marked typically cantabile or adagio, a tempo di mezzo which might involve chorus or other characters, and a cabaletta, an opportunity for bravura singing for the soloist. The duet was similarly formatted. Finales, covering climactic sequences of action, used the various forces of soloists, ensemble and chorus, usually culminating with an exciting stretto section. Verdi was to develop these and the other formulae of the generation preceding him with increasing sophistication during his career. The operas of the early period show Verdi learning by doing and gradually establishing mastery over the different elements of opera. Oberto is poorly structured, and the orchestration of the first operas is generally simple, sometimes even basic. The musicologist Richard Taruskin suggests "the most striking effect in the early Verdi operas, and the one most obviously allied to the mood of the Risorgimento, was the big choral number sung—crudely or sublimely, according to the ear of the beholder—in unison. The success of "Va, pensiero" in Nabucco (which Rossini approvingly denoted as "a grand aria sung by sopranos, contraltos, tenors and basses"), was replicated in the similar "O Signor, dal tetto natio" in I lombardi and in 1844 in the chorus "Si ridesti il Leon di Castiglia" in Ernani, the battle hymn of the conspirators seeking freedom In I due Foscari Verdi first uses recurring themes identified with main characters; here and in future operas the accent moves away from the 'oratorio' characteristics of the first operas towards individual action and intrigue. From this period onwards Verdi also develops his instinct for "tinta" (literally 'colour'), a term which he used for characterising elements of an individual opera score—Parker gives as an example "the rising 6th that begins so many lyric pieces in Ernani". Macbeth, even in its original 1847 version, shows many original touches; characterization by key (the Macbeths themselves generally singing in sharp keys, the witches in flat keys), a preponderance of minor key music, and highly original orchestration. In the 'dagger scene' and the duet following the murder of Duncan, the forms transcend the 'Code Rossini' and propel the drama in a compelling fashion. Verdi was to comment in 1868 that Rossini and his followers missed "the golden thread that binds all the parts together and, rather than a set of numbers without coherence, makes an opera". Tinta was for Verdi this "golden thread", an essential unifying factor in his works. Middle period The writer David Kimbell states that in Luisa Miller and Stiffelio (the earliest operas of this period) there appears to be a "growing freedom in the large scale structure...and an acute attention to fine detail". Others echo those feelings. Julian Budden expresses the impact of Rigoletto and its place in Verdi's output as follows: "Just after 1850 at the age of 38, Verdi closed the door on a period of Italian opera with Rigoletto. The so-called ottocento in music is finished. Verdi will continue to draw on certain of its forms for the next few operas, but in a totally new spirit." One example of Verdi's wish to move away from "standard forms" appears in his feelings about the structure of Il trovatore. To his librettist, Cammarano, Verdi plainly states in a letter of April 1851 that if there were no standard forms—"cavatinas, duets, trios, choruses, finales, etc. ... and if you could avoid beginning with an opening chorus....", he would be quite happy. Two external factors had their impacts on Verdi's compositions of this period. One is that with increasing reputation and financial security he no longer needed to commit himself to the productive treadmill, had more freedom to choose his own subjects, and had more time to develop them according to his own ideas. In the years 1849 to 1859 he wrote eight new operas, compared with fourteen in the previous ten years. Another factor was the changed political situation; the failure of the 1848 revolutions led both to some diminution of the Risorgimento ethos (at least initially) and a significant increase in theatre censorship. This is reflected both in Verdi's choices of plots dealing more with personal relationships than political conflict, and in a (partly consequent) dramatic reduction in the operas of this period in the number of choruses (of the type which had first made him famous)—not only are there on average 40% fewer choruses in the 'middle' period operas compared to the 'early' period', but whereas virtually all the 'early' operas commence with a chorus, only one (Luisa Miller) of the 'middle' period operas begin this way. Instead, Verdi experiments with a variety of means, e.g. a stage band (Rigoletto), an aria for bass (Stiffelio), a party scene (La traviata). Chusid also notes Verdi's increasing tendency to replace full-scale overtures with shorter orchestral introductions. Parker comments that La traviata, the last opera of the 'middle' period, is "again a new adventure. It gestures towards a level of 'realism'...the contemporary world of waltzes pervades the score, and the heroine's death from disease is graphically depicted in the music." Verdi's increasing command of musical highlighting of changing moods and relationships is exemplified in Act III of Rigoletto, where Duke's flippant song "La donna è mobile" is followed immediately by the quartet "Bella figlia dell'amore", contrasting the rapacious Duke and his inamorata with the (concealed) indignant Rigoletto and his grieving daughter. Taruskin asserts this is "the most famous ensemble Verdi ever composed". Late period Chusid notes Strepponi's description of the operas of the 1860s and 1870s as being "modern" whereas Verdi described the pre-1849 works as "the cavatina operas", as further indication that "Verdi became increasingly dissatisfied with the older, familiar conventions of his predecessors that he had adopted at the outset of his career," Parker sees a physical differentiation of the operas from Les vêpres siciliennes (1855) to Aida (1871) is that they are significantly longer, and with larger cast-lists, than previous works. They also reflect a shift towards the French genre of grand opera, notable in more colorful orchestration, counterpointing of serious and comic scenes, and greater spectacle. The opportunities of transforming Italian opera by utilising such resources appealed to him. For a commission from the Paris Opéra he expressly demanded a libretto from Eugène Scribe, the favorite librettist of Meyerbeer, telling him: "I want—in fact, I must have—a grandiose, impassioned and original subject." The result was Les vêpres siciliennes, and the scenarios of Simon Boccanegra (1857), Un ballo in maschera (1859), La forza del destino (1862), Don Carlos (1865) and Aida (1872) all meet the same criteria. Porter notes that Un ballo marks an almost complete synthesis of Verdi's style with the grand opera hallmarks, such that "huge spectacle is not mere decoration but essential to the drama...musical and theatrical lines remain taut [and] the characters still sing as warmly, passionately and personally as in Il trovatore." When the composer Ferdinand Hiller asked Verdi whether he preferred Aida or Don Carlos, Verdi replied that Aida had "more bite and (if you'll forgive the word), more theatricality". During the rehearsals for the Naples production of Aida Verdi amused himself by writing his only string quartet, a sprightly work which shows in its last movement that he had not lost the skill for fugue-writing that he had learned with Lavigna. Final works Verdi's three last major works continued to show new development in conveying drama and emotion. The first to appear, in 1874 was his Requiem, scored for operatic forces but by no means an "opera in ecclesiastical dress" (the words in which Hans von Bülow condemned it before even hearing it). Although in the Requiem Verdi puts to use many of the techniques he learned in opera, its musical forms and emotions are not those of the stage. Verdi's tone painting at the opening of the Requiem is vividly described by the Italian composer Ildebrando Pizzetti, writing in 1941: "in [the words] murmured by an invisible crowd over the slow swaying of a few simple chords, you straightaway sense the fear and sadness of a vast multitude before the mystery of death. In the [following] Et lux perpetuum the melody spreads it wings...before falling back on itself...you hear a sigh for consolation and eternal peace." By the time Otello premièred in 1887, more than 15 years after Aida, the operas of Verdi's (predeceased) contemporary Richard Wagner had begun their ascendancy in popular taste, and many sought or identified Wagnerian aspects in Verdi's latest composition. Budden points out that there is little in the music of Otello that relates either to the verismo opera of the younger Italian composers, and little if anything which can be construed as a homage to the New German School. Nonetheless there is still much originality, building on the strengths which Verdi had already demonstrated; the powerful storm which opens the opera in medias res, the recollection of the love duet of Act I in Otello's dying words (more an aspect of tinta than leitmotif), imaginative touches of harmony in Iago's "Era la notte" (Act II). Finally, six years later, appeared Falstaff, Verdi's only comedy apart from the early, ill-fated Un giorno di regno. In this work Roger Parker writes that: "the listener is bombarded by a stunning diversity of rhythms, orchestral textures, melodic motifs and harmonic devices. Passages that in earlier times would have furnished material for an entire number here crowd in on each other, shouldering themselves unceremoniously to the fore in bewildering succession". Rosselli comments: "In Otello Verdi had miniaturized the forms of romantic Italian opera; in Falstaff he miniaturized himself...[M]oments...crystallize a feeling...as though an aria or duet had been precipitated into a phrase." Legacy Reception Although Verdi's operas brought him a popular following, not all contemporary critics approved of his work. The English critic Henry Chorley allowed in 1846 that "he is the only modern man...having a style—for better or worse", but found all his output unacceptable. "[His] faults [are] grave ones, calculated to destroy and degrade taste beyond those of any Italian composer in the long list" wrote Chorley, whilst conceding that "howsoever incomplete may have been his training, howsoever mistaken his aspirations may have proved...he has aspired." But by the time of Verdi's death, 55 years later, his reputation was assured, and the 1910 edition of Grove's Dictionary pronounced him "one of the greatest and most popular opera composers of the nineteenth century". Verdi had no pupils apart from Muzio and no school of composers sought to follow his style which, however much it reflected his own musical direction, was rooted in the period of his own youth. By the time of his death, verismo was the accepted style of young Italian composers. The New York Metropolitan Opera frequently staged Rigoletto, Trovatore and Traviata during this period and featured Aida in every season from 1898 to 1945. Interest in the operas reawakened in mid-1920s Germany and this sparked a revival in England and elsewhere. From the 1930s onward there began to appear scholarly biographies and publications of documentation and correspondence. In 1959 the Instituto di Studi Verdiani (from 1989 the Istituto Nazionale di Studi Verdiani) was founded in Parma and became a leading centre for research and publication of Verdi studies, and in the 1970s the American Institute for Verdi Studies was founded at New York University. Nationalism in the operas Historians have debated how political Verdi's operas were. In particular, the Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves (known as Va, pensiero) from the third act of the opera Nabucco was used an anthem for Italian patriots, who were seeking to unify their country and free it from foreign control in the years up to 1861 (the chorus's theme of exiles singing about their homeland, and its lines such as O mia patria, si bella e perduta / "O my country, so lovely and so lost" were thought to have resonated with many Italians). Beginning in Naples in 1859 and spreading throughout Italy, the slogan "Viva VERDI" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Long live Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), referring to Victor Emmanuel II. Marco Pizzo argues that after 1815, music became a political tool, and many songwriters expressed ideals of freedom and equality. Pizzo claims that Verdi was part of this movement, for his operas were inspired by the love of country, the struggle for Italian independence, and speak to the sacrifice of patriots and exiles. George Martin claims Verdi was "the greatest artist" of the Risorgimento. "Throughout his work its values, its issues recur constantly, and he expressed them with great power". But Mary Ann Smart argues that music critics at the time seldom mentioned any political themes. Likewise, Roger Parker argues that the political dimension of Verdi's operas was exaggerated by nationalistic historians looking for a hero in the late 19th century. From the 1850s onwards, Verdi's operas displayed few patriotic themes because of the heavy censorship by the absolutist regime in power. Verdi later became disillusioned by politics, but he was personally active part in the political world of events of the Risorgimento and was elected to the first Italian parliament in 1861. Memorials and cultural portrayals Three Italian conservatories, the Milan Conservatory and those in Turin and Como, are named after Verdi, as are many Italian theatres. Verdi's hometown of Busseto displays Luigi Secchi's statue of a seated Verdi in 1913, next to the Teatro Verdi built in his honour in the 1850s. It is one of many statues to the composer in Italy. The Giuseppe Verdi Monument, a 1906 marble memorial, sculpted by Pasquale Civiletti, is located in Verdi Square in Manhattan, New York City. The monument includes a statue of Verdi himself and life-sized statues of four characters from his operas, (Aida, Otello, and Falstaff from the operas of the same names, and Leonora from La forza del destino). Verdi has been the subject of a number of film and stage works. These include the 1938 film directed by Carmine Gallone, Giuseppe Verdi, starring Fosco Giachetti; the 1982 miniseries, The Life of Verdi, directed by Renato Castellani, where Verdi was played by Ronald Pickup, with narration by Burt Lancaster in the English version; and the 1985 play After Aida, by Julian Mitchell (1985). He is a character in the 2011 opera Risorgimento! by Italian composer Lorenzo Ferrero, written to commemorate the 150th anniversary of Italian unification of 1861. Verdi today Verdi's operas are frequently staged around the world. All of his operas are available in recordings in a number of versions, and on DVD – Naxos Records offers a complete boxed set. Modern productions may differ substantially from those originally envisaged by the composer. Jonathan Miller's 1982 version of Rigoletto for English National Opera, set in the world of modern American mafiosi, received critical plaudits. But the same company's staging in 2002 of Un ballo in maschera as A Masked Ball, directed by Calixto Bieito, including "satanic sex rituals, homosexual rape, [and] a demonic dwarf", got a general critical thumbs down. Meanwhile, the music of Verdi can still evoke a range of cultural and political resonances. Excerpts from the Requiem were featured at the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997. On 12 March 2011 during a performance of Nabucco at the Opera di Roma celebrating 150 years of Italian unification, the conductor Riccardo Muti paused after "Va pensiero" and turned to address the audience (which included the then Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi) to complain about cuts in state funding of culture; the audience then joined in a repeat of the chorus. In 2014, the pop singer Katy Perry appeared at the Grammy Award wearing a dress designed by Valentino, embroidered with the music of "Dell'invito trascorsa è già l'ora" from the start of La traviata. The bicentenary of Verdi's birth in 2013 was celebrated in numerous events around the world, both in performances and broadcasts. Notes References Citations Sources External links Bicentennial of Giuseppe Verdi "Album Verdi" from the Digital Library of the National Library of Naples (Italy) Giuseppe Verdi recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings. 1813 births 1901 deaths 19th-century classical composers 19th-century Italian male musicians Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur Deaths from cerebrovascular disease Deputies of Legislature VIII of the Kingdom of Italy Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur Grand Officiers of the Légion d'honneur Italian classical composers Italian male classical composers Italian opera composers Italian philanthropists Italian Romantic composers Italian unification Male opera composers Members of the Senate of the Kingdom of Italy People from Busseto Recipients of the Order of Saint Stanislaus (Russian), 1st class Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class)	true	[ "In political science (and within the subfield of international relations in particular), the concept high politics covers all matters that are vital to the very survival of the state: namely national and international security concerns. It is often used in opposition to low politics, which often designates economic, cultural or social affairs.\n\nHistory\nAlthough the idea of high politics has been present in all cultures and epochs, Hobbes was the first to enunciate that survival (of trade, the laws, societal order) hinges upon a finite number of ingredients; these ingredients were embodied and provided by the state. However, interpreting Hobbes, these ingredients are what one can call \"high politics\".\n\nThe term \"high politics\" in itself was probably coined during the Cold War, given the stakes of an atomic war. The advent of the atomic bomb made it clear what was ultimately worth fighting for and what was not, hence, made clear what \"high politics\" meant. In that sense, the United States and the former Soviet Union would have gone to war for a direct atomic threat (Cuban Missile Crisis), but would have never gone to war over \"low politics\", a boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics. Trade, for all its importance, is considered by most political scientists as \"low politics\", as it depends on specific security conditions to come into effect.\n\nLow politics is a concept that covers all matters that are not absolutely vital to the survival of the state as the economics and the social affairs. The low politics are the domain of the state's welfare. It concerns all things about social or human security. Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye describe that previously, the international relations were based on a simple interdependence scheme based on national security (high politics); nowadays the international relations are ruled by a complex interdependence based on domestic issues: low politics.\n\nThe classical realism theory of international relations only considers the high politics as relevant and completely rejects the low politics. The complex interdependence of the liberal theory considers the low politics as fundamental without rejecting the high politics.\n\nReferences\n\nBibliography \n\n Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Power and. Interdependence: World Politics in Transition (Boston: Little, Brown, 1977)\n\nPolitical science terminology", "Sack is a five-piece Irish band, based in Dublin. To date the band has released three albums: You Are What You Eat, Butterfly Effect and Adventura Majestica. The band formed after the demise of Lord John White.\n\nTheir first single \"What Did The Christians Ever Do For Us?\" was single of the week in both the NME and Melody Maker. They have supported Morrissey on several world tours taking in mainland Europe, North America, and the UK. Sack have also supported the likes of The Fall, Boo Radleys among others. They have gigged sporadically in recent years and are planning to record new material.\n\nThe band appeared on the Morrissey-endorsed NME CD Songs to Save Your Life, while \"Laughter Lines\" appeared on the soundtrack to the movie Carrie 2: The Rage.\n\nCurrent members\nMartin McCann: lead vocals\nJohn Brereton: guitars\nTony Brereton: drums, backing vocals\nKen Haughton: guitars\nDerek Lee: bass\n\nDiscography\nAlbums \n\n You Are What You Eat (1994) Lemon Records\n Butterfly Effect (1997) Dirt Records\n Adventura Majestica (2001) Jetset Junta Records\n\nSingles \n\n Dilettanti (1993)\n Indian Rope Trick. (1993)\n What Did The Christians Ever Do For Us (1994)\n Latitude (1997)\n Laughter Lines (1998)\n What a Way to Live (2021)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nOfficial site\n\nIrish rock music groups\nMusical groups from Dublin (city)\nMusical groups established in 1994" ]
[ "Giuseppe Verdi", "Politics", "What were Giuseppe's political beliefs?", "\"myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating\" during the nineteenth century.", "What were the myths about?", "An example is the claim that when the \"Va, pensiero\" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan,", "What effect did he have on politics?", "The growth of the \"identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics\" perhaps began in the 1840s." ]	C_5c162a8d57704ac39a956fcf85083bc5_0	What did that lead to?	4	What did the growth of the identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics in the 1840s lead to?	Giuseppe Verdi	Having achieved some fame and prosperity, Verdi began in 1859 to take an active interest in Italian politics. His early commitment to the Risorgimento movement is difficult to estimate accurately; in the words of the music historian Philip Gossett "myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating" during the nineteenth century. An example is the claim that when the "Va, pensiero" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan, the audience, responding with nationalistic fervour, demanded an encore. As encores were expressly forbidden by the government at the time, such a gesture would have been extremely significant. But in fact the piece encored was not "Va, pensiero" but the hymn "Immenso Jehova". The growth of the "identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics" perhaps began in the 1840s. In 1848, the nationalist leader Giuseppe Mazzini, (whom Verdi had met in London the previous year) requested Verdi (who complied) to write a patriotic hymn. The opera historian Charles Osborne describes the 1849 La battaglia di Legnano as "an opera with a purpose" and maintains that "while parts of Verdi's earlier operas had frequently been taken up by the fighters of the Risorgimento...this time the composer had given the movement its own opera" It was not until 1859 in Naples, and only then spreading throughout Italy, that the slogan "Viva Verdi" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Viva Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), (who was then king of Piedmont). After Italy was unified in 1861, many of Verdi's early operas were increasingly re-interpreted as Risorgimento works with hidden Revolutionary messages that perhaps had not been originally intended by either the composer or his librettists. In 1859, Verdi was elected as a member of the new provincial council, and was appointed to head a group of five who would meet with King Vittorio Emanuele II in Turin. They were enthusiastically greeted along the way and in Turin Verdi himself received much of the publicity. On 17 October Verdi met with Cavour, the architect of the initial stages of Italian unification. Later that year the government of Emilia was subsumed under the United Provinces of Central Italy, and Verdi's political life temporarily came to an end. Whilst still maintaining nationalist feelings, he declined in 1860 the office of provincial council member to which he had been elected in absentia. Cavour however was anxious to convince a man of Verdi's stature that running for political office was essential to strengthening and securing Italy's future. The composer confided to Piave some years later that "I accepted on the condition that after a few months I would resign." Verdi was elected on 3 February 1861 for the town of Borgo San Donnino (Fidenza) to the Parliament of Piedmont-Sardinia in Turin (which from March 1861 became the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy), but following the death of Cavour in 1861, which deeply distressed him, he scarcely attended. Later, in 1874, Verdi was appointed a member of the Italian Senate, but did not participate in its activities. CANNOTANSWER	1840s. In 1848, the nationalist leader Giuseppe Mazzini, (whom Verdi had met in London the previous year) requested Verdi	Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi (; 9 or 10 October 1813 – 27 January 1901) was an Italian composer best known for his operas. He was born near Busseto to a provincial family of moderate means, receiving a musical education with the help of a local patron. Verdi came to dominate the Italian opera scene after the era of Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti, and Vincenzo Bellini, whose works significantly influenced him. In his early operas, Verdi demonstrated a sympathy with the Risorgimento movement which sought the unification of Italy. He also participated briefly as an elected politician. The chorus "Va, pensiero" from his early opera Nabucco (1842), and similar choruses in later operas, were much in the spirit of the unification movement, and the composer himself became esteemed as a representative of these ideals. An intensely private person, Verdi did not seek to ingratiate himself with popular movements. As he became professionally successful he was able to reduce his operatic workload and sought to establish himself as a landowner in his native region. He surprised the musical world by returning, after his success with the opera Aida (1871), with three late masterpieces: his Requiem (1874), and the operas Otello (1887) and Falstaff (1893). His operas remain extremely popular, especially the three peaks of his 'middle period': Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata. The bicentenary of his birth in 2013 was widely celebrated in broadcasts and performances. Life Childhood and education Verdi, the first child of Carlo Giuseppe Verdi (1785–1867) and Luigia Uttini (1787–1851), was born at their home in Le Roncole, a village near Busseto, then in the Département Taro and within the borders of the First French Empire following the annexation of the Duchy of Parma and Piacenza in 1808. The baptismal register, prepared on 11 October 1813, lists his parents Carlo and Luigia as "innkeeper" and "spinner" respectively. Additionally, it lists Verdi as being "born yesterday", but since days were often considered to begin at sunset, this could have meant either 9 or 10 October. Following his mother, Verdi always celebrated his birthday on 9 October, the day he himself believed he was born. Verdi had a younger sister, Giuseppa, who died aged 17 in 1833. She is said to have been his closest friend during childhood. From the age of four, Verdi was given private lessons in Latin and Italian by the village schoolmaster, Baistrocchi, and at six he attended the local school. After learning to play the organ, he showed so much interest in music that his parents finally provided him with a spinet. Verdi's gift for music was already apparent by 1820–21 when he began his association with the local church, serving in the choir, acting as an altar boy for a while, and taking organ lessons. After Baistrocchi's death, Verdi, at the age of eight, became the official paid organist. The music historian Roger Parker points out that both of Verdi's parents "belonged to families of small landowners and traders, certainly not the illiterate peasants from which Verdi later liked to present himself as having emerged... Carlo Verdi was energetic in furthering his son's education...something which Verdi tended to hide in later life... [T]he picture emerges of youthful precocity eagerly nurtured by an ambitious father and of a sustained, sophisticated and elaborate formal education." In 1823, when he was 10, Verdi's parents arranged for the boy to attend school in Busseto, enrolling him in a Ginnasio—an upper school for boys—run by Don Pietro Seletti, while they continued to run their inn at Le Roncole. Verdi returned to Busseto regularly to play the organ on Sundays, covering the distance of several kilometres on foot. At age 11, Verdi received schooling in Italian, Latin, the humanities, and rhetoric. By the time he was 12, he began lessons with Ferdinando Provesi, maestro di cappella at San Bartolomeo, director of the municipal music school and co-director of the local Società Filarmonica (Philharmonic Society). Verdi later stated: "From the ages of 13 to 18 I wrote a motley assortment of pieces: marches for band by the hundred, perhaps as many little sinfonie that were used in church, in the theatre and at concerts, five or six concertos and sets of variations for pianoforte, which I played myself at concerts, many serenades, cantatas (arias, duets, very many trios) and various pieces of church music, of which I remember only a Stabat Mater." This information comes from the Autobiographical Sketch which Verdi dictated to the publisher Giulio Ricordi late in life, in 1879, and remains the leading source for his early life and career. Written, understandably, with the benefit of hindsight, it is not always reliable when dealing with issues more contentious than those of his childhood. The other director of the Philharmonic Society was , a wholesale grocer and distiller, who was described by a contemporary as a "manic dilettante" of music. The young Verdi did not immediately become involved with the Philharmonic. By June 1827, he had graduated with honours from the Ginnasio and was able to focus solely on music under Provesi. By chance, when he was 13, Verdi was asked to step in as a replacement to play in what became his first public event in his home town; he was an immediate success mostly playing his own music to the surprise of many and receiving strong local recognition. By 1829–30, Verdi had established himself as a leader of the Philharmonic: "none of us could rival him" reported the secretary of the organisation, Giuseppe Demaldè. An eight-movement cantata, I deliri di Saul, based on a drama by Vittorio Alfieri, was written by Verdi when he was 15 and performed in Bergamo. It was acclaimed by both Demaldè and Barezzi, who commented: "He shows a vivid imagination, a philosophical outlook, and sound judgment in the arrangement of instrumental parts." In late 1829, Verdi had completed his studies with Provesi, who declared that he had no more to teach him. At the time, Verdi had been giving singing and piano lessons to Barezzi's daughter Margherita; by 1831, they were unofficially engaged. Verdi set his sights on Milan, then the cultural capital of northern Italy, where he applied unsuccessfully to study at the Conservatory. Barezzi made arrangements for him to become a private pupil of , who had been maestro concertatore at La Scala, and who described Verdi's compositions as "very promising". Lavigna encouraged Verdi to take out a subscription to La Scala, where he heard Maria Malibran in operas by Gioachino Rossini and Vincenzo Bellini. Verdi began making connections in the Milanese world of music that were to stand him in good stead. These included an introduction by Lavigna to an amateur choral group, the Società Filarmonica, led by Pietro Massini. Attending the Società frequently in 1834, Verdi soon found himself functioning as rehearsal director (for Rossini's La cenerentola) and continuo player. It was Massini who encouraged him to write his first opera, originally titled Rocester, to a libretto by the journalist Antonio Piazza. 1834–1842: First operas List of compositions by Giuseppe Verdi In mid-1834, Verdi sought to acquire Provesi's former post in Busseto but without success. But with Barezzi's help he did obtain the secular post of maestro di musica. He taught, gave lessons, and conducted the Philharmonic for several months before returning to Milan in early 1835. By the following July, he obtained his certification from Lavigna. Eventually in 1835 Verdi became director of the Busseto school with a three-year contract. He married Margherita in May 1836, and by March 1837, she had given birth to their first child, Virginia Maria Luigia on 26 March 1837. Icilio Romano followed on 11 July 1838. Both the children died young, Virginia on 12 August 1838, Icilio on 22 October 1839. In 1837, the young composer asked for Massini's assistance to stage his opera in Milan. The La Scala impresario, Bartolomeo Merelli, agreed to put on Oberto (as the reworked opera was now called, with a libretto rewritten by Temistocle Solera) in November 1839. It achieved a respectable 13 additional performances, following which Merelli offered Verdi a contract for three more works. While Verdi was working on his second opera Un giorno di regno, Margherita died of encephalitis at the age of 26. Verdi adored his wife and children and was devastated by their early deaths. Un giorno, a comedy, was premiered only a few months later. It was a flop and only given the one performance. Following its failure, it is claimed Verdi vowed never to compose again, but in his Sketch he recounts how Merelli persuaded him to write a new opera. Verdi was to claim that he gradually began to work on the music for Nabucco, the libretto of which had originally been rejected by the composer Otto Nicolai: "This verse today, tomorrow that, here a note, there a whole phrase, and little by little the opera was written", he later recalled. By the autumn of 1841 it was complete, originally under the title Nabucodonosor. Well received at its first performance on 9 March 1842, Nabucco underpinned Verdi's success until his retirement from the theatre, twenty-nine operas (including some revised and updated versions) later. At its revival in La Scala for the 1842 autumn season it was given an unprecedented (and later unequalled) total of 57 performances; within three years it had reached (among other venues) Vienna, Lisbon, Barcelona, Berlin, Paris and Hamburg; in 1848 it was heard in New York, in 1850 in Buenos Aires. Porter comments that "similar accounts...could be provided to show how widely and rapidly all [Verdi's] other successful operas were disseminated." 1842–1849 A period of hard work for Verdi—with the creation of twenty operas (excluding revisions and translations)—followed over the next sixteen years, culminating in Un ballo in maschera. This period was not without its frustrations and setbacks for the young composer, and he was frequently demoralised. In April 1845, in connection with I due Foscari, he wrote: "I am happy, no matter what reception it gets, and I am utterly indifferent to everything. I cannot wait for these next three years to pass. I have to write six operas, then addio to everything." In 1858 Verdi complained: "Since Nabucco, you may say, I have never had one hour of peace. Sixteen years in the galleys." After the initial success of Nabucco, Verdi settled in Milan, making a number of influential acquaintances. He attended the Salotto Maffei, Countess Clara Maffei's salons in Milan, becoming her lifelong friend and correspondent. A revival of Nabucco followed in 1842 at La Scala where it received a run of fifty-seven performances, and this led to a commission from Merelli for a new opera for the 1843 season. I Lombardi alla prima crociata was based on a libretto by Solera and premiered in February 1843. Inevitably, comparisons were made with Nabucco; but one contemporary writer noted: "If [Nabucco] created this young man's reputation, I Lombardi served to confirm it." Verdi paid close attention to his financial contracts, making sure he was appropriately remunerated as his popularity increased. For I Lombardi and Ernani (1844) in Venice he was paid 12,000 lire (including supervision of the productions); Attila and Macbeth (1847), each brought him 18,000 lire. His contracts with the publishers Ricordi in 1847 were very specific about the amounts he was to receive for new works, first productions, musical arrangements, and so on. He began to use his growing prosperity to invest in land near his birthplace. In 1844 he purchased Il Pulgaro, 62 acres (23 hectares) of farmland with a farmhouse and outbuildings, providing a home for his parents from May 1844. Later that year, he also bought the Palazzo Cavalli (now known as the Palazzo Orlandi) on the via Roma, Busseto's main street. In May 1848, Verdi signed a contract for land and houses at Sant'Agata in Busseto, which had once belonged to his family. It was here he built his own house, completed in 1880, now known as the Villa Verdi, where he lived from 1851 until his death. In March 1843, Verdi visited Vienna (where Gaetano Donizetti was musical director) to oversee a production of Nabucco. The older composer, recognising Verdi's talent, noted in a letter of January 1844: "I am very, very happy to give way to people of talent like Verdi... Nothing will prevent the good Verdi from soon reaching one of the most honourable positions in the cohort of composers." Verdi travelled on to Parma, where the Teatro Regio di Parma was producing Nabucco with Strepponi in the cast. For Verdi the performances were a personal triumph in his native region, especially as his father, Carlo, attended the first performance. Verdi remained in Parma for some weeks beyond his intended departure date. This fuelled speculation that the delay was due to Verdi's interest in Giuseppina Strepponi (who stated that their relationship began in 1843). Strepponi was in fact known for her amorous relationships (and many illegitimate children) and her history was an awkward factor in their relationship until they eventually agreed on marriage. After successful stagings of Nabucco in Venice (with twenty-five performances in the 1842/43 season), Verdi began negotiations with the impresario of La Fenice to stage I Lombardi, and to write a new opera. Eventually, Victor Hugo's Hernani was chosen, with Francesco Maria Piave as librettist. Ernani was successfully premiered in 1844 and within six months had been performed at twenty other theatres in Italy, and also in Vienna. The writer Andrew Porter notes that for the next ten years, Verdi's life "reads like a travel diary—a timetable of visits...to bring new operas to the stage or to supervise local premieres". La Scala premiered none of these new works, except for Giovanna d'Arco. Verdi "never forgave the Milanese for their reception of Un giorno di regno". During this period, Verdi began to work more consistently with his librettists. He relied on Piave again for I due Foscari, performed in Rome in November 1844, then on Solera once more for Giovanna d'Arco, at La Scala in February 1845, while in August that year he was able to work with Salvadore Cammarano on Alzira for the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples. Solera and Piave worked together on Attila for La Fenice (March 1846). In April 1844, Verdi took on Emanuele Muzio, eight years his junior, as a pupil and amanuensis. He had known him since about 1828 as another of Barezzi's protégés. Muzio, who in fact was Verdi's only pupil, became indispensable to the composer. He reported to Barezzi that Verdi "has a breadth of spirit, of generosity, a wisdom". In November 1846, Muzio wrote of Verdi: "If you could see us, I seem more like a friend, rather than his pupil. We are always together at dinner, in the cafes, when we play cards...; all in all, he doesn't go anywhere without me at his side; in the house we have a big table and we both write there together, and so I always have his advice." Muzio was to remain associated with Verdi, assisting in the preparation of scores and transcriptions, and later conducting many of his works in their premiere performances in the US and elsewhere outside Italy. He was chosen by Verdi as one of the executors of his will, but predeceased the composer in 1890. After a period of illness Verdi began work on Macbeth in September 1846. He dedicated the opera to Barezzi: "I have long intended to dedicate an opera to you, as you have been a father, a benefactor and a friend for me. It was a duty I should have fulfilled sooner if imperious circumstances had not prevented me. Now, I send you Macbeth, which I prize above all my other operas, and therefore deem worthier to present to you." In 1997 Martin Chusid wrote that Macbeth was the only one of Verdi's operas of his "early period" to remain regularly in the international repertoire, although in the 21st century Nabucco has also entered the lists. Strepponi's voice declined and her engagements dried up in the 1845 to 1846 period, and she returned to live in Milan whilst retaining contact with Verdi as his "supporter, promoter, unofficial adviser, and occasional secretary" until she decided to move to Paris in October 1846. Before she left Verdi gave her a letter that pledged his love. On the envelope, Strepponi wrote: "5 or 6 October 1846. They shall lay this letter on my heart when they bury me." Verdi had completed I masnadieri for London by May 1847 except for the orchestration. This he left until the opera was in rehearsal, since he wanted to hear "la [Jenny] Lind and modify her role to suit her more exactly". Verdi agreed to conduct the premiere on 22 July 1847 at Her Majesty's Theatre, as well as the second performance. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert attended the first performance, and for the most part, the press was generous in its praise. For the next two years, except for two visits to Italy during periods of political unrest, Verdi was based in Paris. Within a week of returning to Paris in July 1847, he received his first commission from the Paris Opéra. Verdi agreed to adapt I Lombardi to a new French libretto; the result was Jérusalem, which contained significant changes to the music and structure of the work (including an extensive ballet scene) to meet Parisian expectations. Verdi was awarded the Order of Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. To satisfy his contracts with the publisher , Verdi dashed off Il Corsaro. Budden comments "In no other opera of his does Verdi appear to have taken so little interest before it was staged." On hearing the news of the "Cinque Giornate", the "Five Days" of street fighting that took place between 18 and 22 March 1848 and temporarily drove the Austrians out of Milan, Verdi travelled there, arriving on 5 April. He discovered that Piave was now "Citizen Piave" of the newly proclaimed Republic of San Marco. Writing a patriotic letter to him in Venice, Verdi concluded "Banish every petty municipal idea! We must all extend a fraternal hand, and Italy will yet become the first nation of the world...I am drunk with joy! Imagine that there are no more Germans here!!" Verdi had been admonished by the poet Giuseppe Giusti for turning away from patriotic subjects, the poet pleading with him to "do what you can to nourish the [sorrow of the Italian people], to strengthen it, and direct it to its goal." Cammarano suggested adapting Joseph Méry's 1828 play La Bataille de Toulouse, which he described as a story "that should stir every man with an Italian soul in his breast". The premiere was set for late January 1849. Verdi travelled to Rome before the end of 1848. He found that city on the verge of becoming a (short-lived) republic, which commenced within days of La battaglia di Legnanos enthusiastically received premiere. In the spirit of the time were the tenor hero's final words, "Whoever dies for the fatherland cannot be evil-minded". Verdi had intended to return to Italy in early 1848, but was prevented by work and illness, as well as, most probably, by his increasing attachment to Strepponi. Verdi and Strepponi left Paris in July 1849, the immediate cause being an outbreak of cholera, and Verdi went directly to Busseto to continue work on completing his latest opera, Luisa Miller, for a production in Naples later in the year. 1849–1853: Fame Verdi was committed to the publisher Giovanni Ricordi for an opera—which became Stiffelio—for Trieste in the Spring of 1850; and, subsequently, following negotiations with La Fenice, developed a libretto with Piave and wrote the music for Rigoletto (based on Victor Hugo's Le roi s'amuse) for Venice in March 1851. This was the first of a sequence of three operas (followed by Il trovatore and La traviata) which were to cement his fame as a master of opera. The failure of Stiffelio (attributable not least to the censors of the time taking offence at the taboo subject of the supposed adultery of a clergyman's wife and interfering with the text and roles) incited Verdi to take pains to rework it, although even in the completely recycled version of Aroldo (1857) it still failed to please. Rigoletto, with its intended murder of royalty, and its sordid attributes, also upset the censors. Verdi would not compromise: What does the sack matter to the police? Are they worried about the effect it will produce?...Do they think they know better than I?...I see the hero has been made no longer ugly and hunchbacked!! Why? A singing hunchback...why not?...I think it splendid to show this character as outwardly deformed and ridiculous, and inwardly passionate and full of love. I chose the subject for these very qualities...if they are removed I can no longer set it to music. Verdi substituted a Duke for the King, and the public response and subsequent success of the opera all over Italy and Europe fully vindicated the composer. Aware that the melody of the Duke's song "La donna è mobile" ("Woman is fickle") would become a popular hit, Verdi excluded it from orchestral rehearsals for the opera, and rehearsed the tenor separately. For several months Verdi was preoccupied with family matters. These stemmed from the way in which the citizens of Busseto were treating Giuseppina Strepponi, with whom he was living openly in an unmarried relationship. She was shunned in the town and at church, and while Verdi appeared indifferent, she was certainly not. Furthermore, Verdi was concerned about the administration of his newly acquired property at Sant'Agata. A growing estrangement between Verdi and his parents was perhaps also attributable to Strepponi (the suggestion that this situation was sparked by the birth of a child to Verdi and Strepponi which was given away as a foundling lacks any firm evidence). In January 1851, Verdi broke off relations with his parents, and in April they were ordered to leave Sant'Agata; Verdi found new premises for them and helped them financially to settle into their new home. It may not be coincidental that all six Verdi operas written in the period 1849–53 (La battaglia, Luisa Miller, Stiffelio, Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata), have, uniquely in his oeuvre, heroines who are, in the opera critic Joseph Kerman's words, "women who come to grief because of sexual transgression, actual or perceived". Kerman, like the psychologist Gerald Mendelssohn, sees this choice of subjects as being influenced by Verdi's uneasy passion for Strepponi. Verdi and Strepponi moved into Sant'Agata on 1 May 1851. May also brought an offer for a new opera from La Fenice, which Verdi eventually realised as La traviata. That was followed by an agreement with the Rome Opera company to present Il trovatore for January 1853. Verdi now had sufficient earnings to retire, had he wished to. He had reached a stage where he could develop his operas as he wished, rather than be dependent on commissions from third parties. Il trovatore was in fact the first opera he wrote without a specific commission (apart from Oberto). At around the same time he began to consider creating an opera from Shakespeare's King Lear. After first (1850) seeking a libretto from Cammarano (which never appeared), Verdi later (1857) commissioned one from Antonio Somma, but this proved intractable, and no music was ever written. Verdi began work on Il trovatore after the death of his mother in June 1851. The fact that this is "the one opera of Verdi's which focuses on a mother rather than a father" is perhaps related to her death. In the winter of 1851–52 Verdi decided to go to Paris with Strepponi, where he concluded an agreement with the Opéra to write what became Les vêpres siciliennes, his first original work in the style of grand opera. In February 1852, the couple attended a performance of Alexander Dumas filss play The Lady of the Camellias; Verdi immediately began to compose music for what would later become La traviata. After his visit to Rome for Il trovatore in January 1853, Verdi worked on completing La traviata, but with little hope of its success, due to his lack of confidence in any of the singers engaged for the season. Furthermore, the management insisted that the opera be given a historical, not a contemporary setting. The premiere in March 1853 was indeed a failure: Verdi wrote: "Was the fault mine or the singers'? Time will tell." Subsequent productions (following some rewriting) throughout Europe over the following two years fully vindicated the composer; Roger Parker has written "Il trovatore consistently remains one of the three or four most popular operas in the Verdian repertoire: but it has never pleased the critics". 1853–1860: Consolidation In the eleven years up to and including Traviata, Verdi had written sixteen operas. Over the next eighteen years (up to Aida), he wrote only six new works for the stage. Verdi was happy to return to Sant'Agata and, in February 1856, was reporting a "total abandonment of music; a little reading; some light occupation with agriculture and horses; that's all". A couple of months later, writing in the same vein to Countess Maffei he stated: "I'm not doing anything. I don't read. I don't write. I walk in the fields from morning to evening, trying to recover, so far without success, from the stomach trouble caused me by I vespri siciliani. Cursed operas!" An 1858 letter by Strepponi to the publisher Léon Escudier describes the kind of lifestyle that increasingly appealed to the composer: "His love for the country has become a mania, madness, rage, and fury—anything you like that is exaggerated. He gets up almost with the dawn, to go and examine the wheat, the maize, the vines, etc....Fortunately our tastes for this sort of life coincide, except in the matter of sunrise, which he likes to see up and dressed, and I from my bed." Nonetheless on 15 May, Verdi signed a contract with La Fenice for an opera for the following spring. This was to be Simon Boccanegra. The couple stayed in Paris until January 1857 to deal with these proposals, and also the offer to stage the translated version of Il trovatore as a grand opera. Verdi and Strepponi travelled to Venice in March for the premiere of Simon Boccanegra, which turned out to be "a fiasco" (as Verdi reported, although on the second and third nights, the reception improved considerably). With Strepponi, Verdi went to Naples early in January 1858 to work with Somma on the libretto of the opera Gustave III, which over a year later would become Un ballo in maschera. By this time, Verdi had begun to write about Strepponi as "my wife" and she was signing her letters as "Giuseppina Verdi". Verdi raged against the stringent requirements of the Neapolitan censor stating: "I'm drowning in a sea of troubles. It's almost certain that the censors will forbid our libretto." With no hope of seeing his Gustavo III staged as written, he broke his contract. This resulted in litigation and counter-litigation; with the legal issues resolved, Verdi was free to present the libretto and musical outline of Gustave III to the Rome Opera. There, the censors demanded further changes; at this point, the opera took the title Un ballo in maschera. Arriving in Sant'Agata in March 1859 Verdi and Strepponi found the nearby city of Piacenza occupied by about 6,000 Austrian troops who had made it their base, to combat the rise of Italian interest in unification in the Piedmont region. In the ensuing Second Italian War of Independence the Austrians abandoned the region and began to leave Lombardy, although they remained in control of the Venice region under the terms of the armistice signed at Villafranca. Verdi was disgusted at this outcome: "[W]here then is the independence of Italy, so long hoped for and promised?...Venice is not Italian? After so many victories, what an outcome... It is enough to drive one mad" he wrote to Clara Maffei. Verdi and Strepponi now decided on marriage; they travelled to Collonges-sous-Salève, a village then part of Piedmont. On 29 August 1859 the couple were married there, with only the coachman who had driven them there and the church bell-ringer as witnesses. At the end of 1859, Verdi wrote to his friend Cesare De Sanctis "[Since completing Ballo] I have not made any more music, I have not seen any more music, I have not thought anymore about music. I don't even know what colour my last opera is, and I almost don't remember it." He began to remodel Sant'Agata, which took most of 1860 to complete and on which he continued to work for the next twenty years. This included major work on a square room that became his workroom, his bedroom, and his office. Politics Having achieved some fame and prosperity, Verdi began in 1859 to take an active interest in Italian politics. His early commitment to the Risorgimento movement is difficult to estimate accurately; in the words of the music historian Philip Gossett "myths intensifying and exaggerating [such] sentiment began circulating" during the nineteenth century. An example is the claim that when the "Va, pensiero" chorus in Nabucco was first sung in Milan, the audience, responding with nationalistic fervour, demanded an encore. As encores were expressly forbidden by the government at the time, such a gesture would have been extremely significant. But in fact the piece encored was not "Va, pensiero" but the hymn "Immenso Jehova". The growth of the "identification of Verdi's music with Italian nationalist politics" perhaps began in the 1840s. In 1848, the nationalist leader Giuseppe Mazzini (whom Verdi had met in London the previous year) requested Verdi (who complied) to write a patriotic hymn. The opera historian Charles Osborne describes the 1849 La battaglia di Legnano as "an opera with a purpose" and maintains that "while parts of Verdi's earlier operas had frequently been taken up by the fighters of the Risorgimento...this time the composer had given the movement its own opera" It was not until 1859 in Naples, and only then spreading throughout Italy, that the slogan "Viva Verdi" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Viva Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), (who was then king of Piedmont). After Italy was unified in 1861, many of Verdi's early operas were increasingly re-interpreted as Risorgimento works with hidden Revolutionary messages that perhaps had not been originally intended by either the composer or his librettists. In 1859, Verdi was elected as a member of the new provincial council, and was appointed to head a group of five who would meet with King Vittorio Emanuele II in Turin. They were enthusiastically greeted along the way and in Turin Verdi himself received much of the publicity. On 17 October Verdi met with Cavour, the architect of the initial stages of Italian unification. Later that year the government of Emilia was subsumed under the United Provinces of Central Italy, and Verdi's political life temporarily came to an end. Whilst still maintaining nationalist feelings, he declined in 1860 the office of provincial council member to which he had been elected in absentia. Cavour however was anxious to convince a man of Verdi's stature that running for political office was essential to strengthening and securing Italy's future. The composer confided to Piave some years later that "I accepted on the condition that after a few months I would resign." Verdi was elected on 3 February 1861 for the town of Borgo San Donnino (Fidenza) to the Parliament of Piedmont-Sardinia in Turin (which from March 1861 became the Parliament of the Kingdom of Italy), but following the death of Cavour in 1861, which deeply distressed him, he scarcely attended. Later, in 1874, Verdi was appointed a member of the Italian Senate, but did not participate in its activities. 1860–1887: from La forza to Otello In the months following the staging of Ballo, Verdi was approached by several opera companies seeking a new work or making offers to stage one of his existing ones, but refused them all. But when, in December 1860, an approach was made from Saint Petersburg's Imperial Theatre, the offer of 60,000 francs plus all expenses was doubtless a strong incentive. Verdi came up with the idea of adapting the 1835 Spanish play Don Alvaro o la fuerza del sino by Angel Saavedra, which became La forza del destino, with Piave writing the libretto. The Verdis arrived in St. Petersburg in December 1861 for the premiere, but casting problems meant that it had to be postponed. Returning via Paris from Russia on 24 February 1862, Verdi met two young Italian writers, the twenty-year-old Arrigo Boito and Franco Faccio. Verdi had been invited to write a piece of music for the 1862 International Exhibition in London, and charged Boito with writing a text, which became the Inno delle nazioni. Boito, as a supporter of the grand opera of Giacomo Meyerbeer and an opera composer in his own right, was later in the 1860s critical of Verdi's "reliance on formula rather than form", incurring the composer's wrath. Nevertheless, he was to become Verdi's close collaborator in his final operas. The St. Petersburg premiere of La forza finally took place in September 1862, and Verdi received the Order of St. Stanislaus. A revival of Macbeth in Paris in 1865 was not a success, but he obtained a commission for a new work, Don Carlos, based on the play Don Carlos by Friedrich Schiller. He and Giuseppina spent late 1866 and much of 1867 in Paris, where they heard, and did not warm to, Giacomo Meyerbeer's last opera, L'Africaine, and Richard Wagner's overture to Tannhäuser. The opera's premiere in 1867 drew mixed comments. While the critic Théophile Gautier praised the work, the composer Georges Bizet was disappointed at Verdi's changing style: "Verdi is no longer Italian. He is following Wagner." During the 1860s and 1870s, Verdi paid great attention to his estate around Busseto, purchasing additional land, dealing with unsatisfactory (in one case, embezzling) stewards, installing irrigation, and coping with variable harvests and economic slumps. In 1867, both Verdi's father Carlo, with whom he had restored good relations, and his early patron and father-in-law Antonio Barezzi, died. Verdi and Giuseppina decided to adopt Carlo's great-niece Filomena Maria Verdi, then seven years old, as their own child. She was to marry in 1878 the son of Verdi's friend and lawyer Angelo Carrara and her family became eventually the heirs of Verdi's estate. Aida was commissioned by the Egyptian government for the opera house built by the Khedive Isma'il Pasha to celebrate the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. The opera house actually opened with a production of Rigoletto. The prose libretto in French by Camille du Locle, based on a scenario by the Egyptologist Auguste Mariette, was transformed to Italian verse by Antonio Ghislanzoni. Verdi was offered the enormous sum of 150,000 francs for the opera (even though he confessed that Ancient Egypt was "a civilization I have never been able to admire"), and it was first performed in Cairo in 1871. Verdi spent much of 1872 and 1873 supervising the Italian productions of Aida at Milan, Parma and Naples, effectively acting as producer and demanding high standards and adequate rehearsal time. During the rehearsals for the Naples production he wrote his string quartet, the only chamber music by him to survive, and the only major work in the form by an Italian of the 19th century. In 1869, Verdi had been asked to compose a section for a requiem mass in memory of Rossini. He compiled and completed the requiem, but its performance was abandoned (and its premiere did not take place until 1988). Five years later, Verdi reworked his "Libera Me" section of the Rossini Requiem and made it a part of his Requiem honouring Alessandro Manzoni, who had died in 1873. The complete Requiem was first performed at the cathedral in Milan on the anniversary of Manzoni's death on 22 May 1874. The spinto soprano Teresa Stolz (1834–1902), who had sung in La Scala productions from 1865 onwards, was the soloist in the first and many later performances of the Requiem; in February 1872, she had created Aida in its European premiere in Milan. She became closely associated personally with Verdi (exactly how closely remains conjectural), to Giuseppina Verdi's initial disquiet; but the women were reconciled and Stolz remained a companion of Verdi after Giuseppina's death in 1897 until his own death. Verdi conducted his Requiem in Paris, London and Vienna in 1875 and in Cologne in 1876. It seemed that it would be his last work. In the words of his biographer John Rosselli, it "confirmed him as the unique presiding genius of Italian music. No fellow composer...came near him in popularity or reputation". Verdi, now in his sixties, initially seemed to withdraw into retirement. He deliberately shied away from opportunities to publicise himself or to become involved with new productions of his works, but secretly he began work on Otello, which Boito (to whom the composer had been reconciled by Ricordi) had proposed to him privately in 1879. The composition was delayed by a revision of Simon Boccanegra which Verdi undertook with Boito, produced in 1881, and a revision of Don Carlos. Even when Otello was virtually completed, Verdi teased "Shall I finish it? Shall I have it performed? Hard to tell, even for me." As news leaked out, Verdi was pressed by opera houses across Europe with enquiries; eventually the opera was triumphantly premiered at La Scala in February 1887. 1887–1901: Falstaff and last years Following the success of Otello Verdi commented, "After having relentlessly massacred so many heroes and heroines, I have at last the right to laugh a little." He had considered a variety of comic subjects but had found none of them wholly suitable and confided his ambition to Boito. The librettist said nothing at the time but secretly began work on a libretto based on The Merry Wives of Windsor with additional material taken from Henry IV, Part 1 and Part 2. Verdi received the draft libretto probably in early July 1889 after he had just read Shakespeare's play: "Benissimo! Benissimo!... No one could have done better than you", he wrote back to Boito. But he still had doubts: his age, his health (which he admits to being good) and his ability to complete the project: "If I were not to finish the music?". If the project failed, it would have been a waste of Boito's time, and have distracted him from completing his own new opera. Finally on 10 July 1889 he wrote again: "So be it! So let's do Falstaff! For now, let's not think of obstacles, of age, of illnesses!" Verdi emphasised the need for secrecy, but continued "If you are in the mood, then start to write." Later he wrote to Boito (capitals and exclamation marks are Verdi's own): "What joy to be able to say to the public: HERE WE ARE AGAIN!!! COME AND SEE US!" The first performance of Falstaff took place at La Scala on 9 February 1893. For the first night, official ticket prices were thirty times higher than usual. Royalty, aristocracy, critics and leading figures from the arts all over Europe were present. The performance was a huge success; numbers were encored, and at the end the applause for Verdi and the cast lasted an hour. That was followed by a tumultuous welcome when the composer, his wife and Boito arrived at the Grand Hotel de Milan. Even more hectic scenes ensued when he went to Rome in May for the opera's premiere at the Teatro Costanzi, when crowds of well-wishers at the railway station initially forced Verdi to take refuge in a tool-shed. He witnessed the performance from the Royal Box at the side of King Umberto and the Queen. In his last years Verdi undertook a number of philanthropic ventures, publishing in 1894 a song for the benefit of earthquake victims in Sicily, and from 1895 onwards planning, building and endowing a rest-home for retired musicians in Milan, the Casa di Riposo per Musicisti, and building a hospital at Villanova sull'Arda, close to Busseto. His last major composition, the choral set of Four sacred pieces, was published in 1898. In 1900 he was deeply upset at the assassination of King Umberto and sketched a setting of a poem in his memory but was unable to complete it. While staying at the Grand Hotel, Verdi suffered a stroke on 21 January 1901. He gradually grew more feeble over the next week, during which Stolz cared for him, and died on 27 January at the age of 87. Verdi was initially buried in a private ceremony at Milan's Cimitero Monumentale. A month later, his body was moved to the crypt of the Casa di Riposo. On this occasion, "Va, pensiero" from Nabucco was conducted by Arturo Toscanini with a chorus of 820 singers. A huge crowd was in attendance, estimated at 300,000. Boito wrote to a friend, in words which recall the mysterious final scene of Don Carlos, "[Verdi] sleeps like a King of Spain in his Escurial, under a bronze slab that completely covers him." Personality Not all of Verdi's personal qualities were amiable. John Rosselli concluded after writing his biography that "I do not very much like the man Verdi, in particular the autocratic rentier-cum-estate owner, part-time composer, and seemingly full-time grumbler and reactionary critic of the later years", yet admits that like other writers, he must "admire him, warts and all...a deep integrity runs beneath his life, and can be felt even when he is being unreasonable or wrong." Budden suggests that "With Verdi...the man and the artist on many ways developed side by side." Ungainly and awkward in society in his early years, "as he became a man of property and underwent the civilizing influence of Giuseppina,...[he] acquired assurance and authority." He also learnt to keep himself to himself, never discussing his private life and maintaining, when it suited him, legends about his supposed 'peasant' origins, his materialism and his indifference to criticism. Gerald Mendelsohn describes the composer as "an intensely private man who deeply resented efforts to inquire into his personal affairs. He regarded journalists and would-be biographers, as well as his neighbors in Busseto and the operatic public at large, as an intrusive lot, against whose prying attentions he needed constantly to defend himself." Verdi was never explicit about his religious beliefs. Anti-clerical by nature in his early years, he nonetheless built a chapel at Sant'Agata, but is little recorded as attending church. Strepponi wrote in 1871 "I won't say [Verdi] is an atheist, but he is not much of a believer." Rosselli comments that in the Requiem "The prospect of Hell appears to rule...[the Requiem] is troubled to the end," and offers little consolation. Music and form Spirit The writer Friedrich Schiller (four of whose plays were adapted as operas by Verdi) distinguished two types of artist in his 1795 essay On Naïve and Sentimental Poetry. The philosopher Isaiah Berlin ranked Verdi in the 'naïve' category—"They are not...self-conscious. They do not...stand aside to contemplate their creations and express their own feelings....They are able...if they have genius, to embody their vision fully." (The 'sentimentals' seek to recreate nature and natural feelings on their own terms—Berlin instances Richard Wagner—"offering not peace, but a sword".) Verdi's operas are not written according to an aesthetic theory, or with a purpose to change the tastes of their audiences. In conversation with a German visitor in 1887 he is recorded as saying that, whilst "there was much to be admired in [Wagner's operas] Tannhäuser and Lohengrin...in his recent operas [Wagner] seemed to be overstepping the bounds of what can be expressed in music. For him "philosophical" music was incomprehensible." Although Verdi's works belong, as Rosselli admits "to the most artificial of genres...[they] ring emotionally true: truth and directness make them exciting, often hugely so." Periods The earliest study of Verdi's music, published in 1859 by the Italian critic Abraham Basevi, already distinguished four periods in Verdi's music. The early, 'grandiose' period, ended according to Basevi with La battaglia di Legnano (1849), and a 'personal' style began with the next opera Luisa Miller. These two operas are generally agreed today by critics to mark the division between Verdi's 'early' and 'middle' periods. The 'middle' period is felt to end with La traviata (1853) and Les vêpres siciliennes (1855), with a 'late' period commencing with Simon Boccanegra (1857) running through to Aida (1871). The last two operas, Otello and Falstaff, together with the Requiem and the Four Sacred Pieces, then represent a 'final' period. Early period Verdi was to claim in his Sketch that during his early training with Lavigna "I did nothing but canons and fugues...No-one taught me orchestration or how to handle dramatic music." He is known to have written a variety of music for the Busseto Philharmonic society, including vocal music, band music and chamber works, (and including an alternative overture to Rossini's Barber of Seville) but few of these works survive. (He may have given instructions before his death to destroy his early works). Verdi uses in his early operas (and, in his own stylized versions, throughout his later work) the standard elements of Italian opera content of the period, referred to by the opera writer Julian Budden as the 'Code Rossini', after the composer who established through his work and popularity the accepted templates of these forms; they were also used by the composers dominant during Verdi's early career, Bellini, Donizetti and Saverio Mercadante. Amongst the essential elements are the aria, the duet, the ensemble, and the finale sequence of an act. The aria format, centred on a soloist, typically involved three sections; a slow introduction, marked typically cantabile or adagio, a tempo di mezzo which might involve chorus or other characters, and a cabaletta, an opportunity for bravura singing for the soloist. The duet was similarly formatted. Finales, covering climactic sequences of action, used the various forces of soloists, ensemble and chorus, usually culminating with an exciting stretto section. Verdi was to develop these and the other formulae of the generation preceding him with increasing sophistication during his career. The operas of the early period show Verdi learning by doing and gradually establishing mastery over the different elements of opera. Oberto is poorly structured, and the orchestration of the first operas is generally simple, sometimes even basic. The musicologist Richard Taruskin suggests "the most striking effect in the early Verdi operas, and the one most obviously allied to the mood of the Risorgimento, was the big choral number sung—crudely or sublimely, according to the ear of the beholder—in unison. The success of "Va, pensiero" in Nabucco (which Rossini approvingly denoted as "a grand aria sung by sopranos, contraltos, tenors and basses"), was replicated in the similar "O Signor, dal tetto natio" in I lombardi and in 1844 in the chorus "Si ridesti il Leon di Castiglia" in Ernani, the battle hymn of the conspirators seeking freedom In I due Foscari Verdi first uses recurring themes identified with main characters; here and in future operas the accent moves away from the 'oratorio' characteristics of the first operas towards individual action and intrigue. From this period onwards Verdi also develops his instinct for "tinta" (literally 'colour'), a term which he used for characterising elements of an individual opera score—Parker gives as an example "the rising 6th that begins so many lyric pieces in Ernani". Macbeth, even in its original 1847 version, shows many original touches; characterization by key (the Macbeths themselves generally singing in sharp keys, the witches in flat keys), a preponderance of minor key music, and highly original orchestration. In the 'dagger scene' and the duet following the murder of Duncan, the forms transcend the 'Code Rossini' and propel the drama in a compelling fashion. Verdi was to comment in 1868 that Rossini and his followers missed "the golden thread that binds all the parts together and, rather than a set of numbers without coherence, makes an opera". Tinta was for Verdi this "golden thread", an essential unifying factor in his works. Middle period The writer David Kimbell states that in Luisa Miller and Stiffelio (the earliest operas of this period) there appears to be a "growing freedom in the large scale structure...and an acute attention to fine detail". Others echo those feelings. Julian Budden expresses the impact of Rigoletto and its place in Verdi's output as follows: "Just after 1850 at the age of 38, Verdi closed the door on a period of Italian opera with Rigoletto. The so-called ottocento in music is finished. Verdi will continue to draw on certain of its forms for the next few operas, but in a totally new spirit." One example of Verdi's wish to move away from "standard forms" appears in his feelings about the structure of Il trovatore. To his librettist, Cammarano, Verdi plainly states in a letter of April 1851 that if there were no standard forms—"cavatinas, duets, trios, choruses, finales, etc. ... and if you could avoid beginning with an opening chorus....", he would be quite happy. Two external factors had their impacts on Verdi's compositions of this period. One is that with increasing reputation and financial security he no longer needed to commit himself to the productive treadmill, had more freedom to choose his own subjects, and had more time to develop them according to his own ideas. In the years 1849 to 1859 he wrote eight new operas, compared with fourteen in the previous ten years. Another factor was the changed political situation; the failure of the 1848 revolutions led both to some diminution of the Risorgimento ethos (at least initially) and a significant increase in theatre censorship. This is reflected both in Verdi's choices of plots dealing more with personal relationships than political conflict, and in a (partly consequent) dramatic reduction in the operas of this period in the number of choruses (of the type which had first made him famous)—not only are there on average 40% fewer choruses in the 'middle' period operas compared to the 'early' period', but whereas virtually all the 'early' operas commence with a chorus, only one (Luisa Miller) of the 'middle' period operas begin this way. Instead, Verdi experiments with a variety of means, e.g. a stage band (Rigoletto), an aria for bass (Stiffelio), a party scene (La traviata). Chusid also notes Verdi's increasing tendency to replace full-scale overtures with shorter orchestral introductions. Parker comments that La traviata, the last opera of the 'middle' period, is "again a new adventure. It gestures towards a level of 'realism'...the contemporary world of waltzes pervades the score, and the heroine's death from disease is graphically depicted in the music." Verdi's increasing command of musical highlighting of changing moods and relationships is exemplified in Act III of Rigoletto, where Duke's flippant song "La donna è mobile" is followed immediately by the quartet "Bella figlia dell'amore", contrasting the rapacious Duke and his inamorata with the (concealed) indignant Rigoletto and his grieving daughter. Taruskin asserts this is "the most famous ensemble Verdi ever composed". Late period Chusid notes Strepponi's description of the operas of the 1860s and 1870s as being "modern" whereas Verdi described the pre-1849 works as "the cavatina operas", as further indication that "Verdi became increasingly dissatisfied with the older, familiar conventions of his predecessors that he had adopted at the outset of his career," Parker sees a physical differentiation of the operas from Les vêpres siciliennes (1855) to Aida (1871) is that they are significantly longer, and with larger cast-lists, than previous works. They also reflect a shift towards the French genre of grand opera, notable in more colorful orchestration, counterpointing of serious and comic scenes, and greater spectacle. The opportunities of transforming Italian opera by utilising such resources appealed to him. For a commission from the Paris Opéra he expressly demanded a libretto from Eugène Scribe, the favorite librettist of Meyerbeer, telling him: "I want—in fact, I must have—a grandiose, impassioned and original subject." The result was Les vêpres siciliennes, and the scenarios of Simon Boccanegra (1857), Un ballo in maschera (1859), La forza del destino (1862), Don Carlos (1865) and Aida (1872) all meet the same criteria. Porter notes that Un ballo marks an almost complete synthesis of Verdi's style with the grand opera hallmarks, such that "huge spectacle is not mere decoration but essential to the drama...musical and theatrical lines remain taut [and] the characters still sing as warmly, passionately and personally as in Il trovatore." When the composer Ferdinand Hiller asked Verdi whether he preferred Aida or Don Carlos, Verdi replied that Aida had "more bite and (if you'll forgive the word), more theatricality". During the rehearsals for the Naples production of Aida Verdi amused himself by writing his only string quartet, a sprightly work which shows in its last movement that he had not lost the skill for fugue-writing that he had learned with Lavigna. Final works Verdi's three last major works continued to show new development in conveying drama and emotion. The first to appear, in 1874 was his Requiem, scored for operatic forces but by no means an "opera in ecclesiastical dress" (the words in which Hans von Bülow condemned it before even hearing it). Although in the Requiem Verdi puts to use many of the techniques he learned in opera, its musical forms and emotions are not those of the stage. Verdi's tone painting at the opening of the Requiem is vividly described by the Italian composer Ildebrando Pizzetti, writing in 1941: "in [the words] murmured by an invisible crowd over the slow swaying of a few simple chords, you straightaway sense the fear and sadness of a vast multitude before the mystery of death. In the [following] Et lux perpetuum the melody spreads it wings...before falling back on itself...you hear a sigh for consolation and eternal peace." By the time Otello premièred in 1887, more than 15 years after Aida, the operas of Verdi's (predeceased) contemporary Richard Wagner had begun their ascendancy in popular taste, and many sought or identified Wagnerian aspects in Verdi's latest composition. Budden points out that there is little in the music of Otello that relates either to the verismo opera of the younger Italian composers, and little if anything which can be construed as a homage to the New German School. Nonetheless there is still much originality, building on the strengths which Verdi had already demonstrated; the powerful storm which opens the opera in medias res, the recollection of the love duet of Act I in Otello's dying words (more an aspect of tinta than leitmotif), imaginative touches of harmony in Iago's "Era la notte" (Act II). Finally, six years later, appeared Falstaff, Verdi's only comedy apart from the early, ill-fated Un giorno di regno. In this work Roger Parker writes that: "the listener is bombarded by a stunning diversity of rhythms, orchestral textures, melodic motifs and harmonic devices. Passages that in earlier times would have furnished material for an entire number here crowd in on each other, shouldering themselves unceremoniously to the fore in bewildering succession". Rosselli comments: "In Otello Verdi had miniaturized the forms of romantic Italian opera; in Falstaff he miniaturized himself...[M]oments...crystallize a feeling...as though an aria or duet had been precipitated into a phrase." Legacy Reception Although Verdi's operas brought him a popular following, not all contemporary critics approved of his work. The English critic Henry Chorley allowed in 1846 that "he is the only modern man...having a style—for better or worse", but found all his output unacceptable. "[His] faults [are] grave ones, calculated to destroy and degrade taste beyond those of any Italian composer in the long list" wrote Chorley, whilst conceding that "howsoever incomplete may have been his training, howsoever mistaken his aspirations may have proved...he has aspired." But by the time of Verdi's death, 55 years later, his reputation was assured, and the 1910 edition of Grove's Dictionary pronounced him "one of the greatest and most popular opera composers of the nineteenth century". Verdi had no pupils apart from Muzio and no school of composers sought to follow his style which, however much it reflected his own musical direction, was rooted in the period of his own youth. By the time of his death, verismo was the accepted style of young Italian composers. The New York Metropolitan Opera frequently staged Rigoletto, Trovatore and Traviata during this period and featured Aida in every season from 1898 to 1945. Interest in the operas reawakened in mid-1920s Germany and this sparked a revival in England and elsewhere. From the 1930s onward there began to appear scholarly biographies and publications of documentation and correspondence. In 1959 the Instituto di Studi Verdiani (from 1989 the Istituto Nazionale di Studi Verdiani) was founded in Parma and became a leading centre for research and publication of Verdi studies, and in the 1970s the American Institute for Verdi Studies was founded at New York University. Nationalism in the operas Historians have debated how political Verdi's operas were. In particular, the Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves (known as Va, pensiero) from the third act of the opera Nabucco was used an anthem for Italian patriots, who were seeking to unify their country and free it from foreign control in the years up to 1861 (the chorus's theme of exiles singing about their homeland, and its lines such as O mia patria, si bella e perduta / "O my country, so lovely and so lost" were thought to have resonated with many Italians). Beginning in Naples in 1859 and spreading throughout Italy, the slogan "Viva VERDI" was used as an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia (Long live Victor Emmanuel King of Italy), referring to Victor Emmanuel II. Marco Pizzo argues that after 1815, music became a political tool, and many songwriters expressed ideals of freedom and equality. Pizzo claims that Verdi was part of this movement, for his operas were inspired by the love of country, the struggle for Italian independence, and speak to the sacrifice of patriots and exiles. George Martin claims Verdi was "the greatest artist" of the Risorgimento. "Throughout his work its values, its issues recur constantly, and he expressed them with great power". But Mary Ann Smart argues that music critics at the time seldom mentioned any political themes. Likewise, Roger Parker argues that the political dimension of Verdi's operas was exaggerated by nationalistic historians looking for a hero in the late 19th century. From the 1850s onwards, Verdi's operas displayed few patriotic themes because of the heavy censorship by the absolutist regime in power. Verdi later became disillusioned by politics, but he was personally active part in the political world of events of the Risorgimento and was elected to the first Italian parliament in 1861. Memorials and cultural portrayals Three Italian conservatories, the Milan Conservatory and those in Turin and Como, are named after Verdi, as are many Italian theatres. Verdi's hometown of Busseto displays Luigi Secchi's statue of a seated Verdi in 1913, next to the Teatro Verdi built in his honour in the 1850s. It is one of many statues to the composer in Italy. The Giuseppe Verdi Monument, a 1906 marble memorial, sculpted by Pasquale Civiletti, is located in Verdi Square in Manhattan, New York City. The monument includes a statue of Verdi himself and life-sized statues of four characters from his operas, (Aida, Otello, and Falstaff from the operas of the same names, and Leonora from La forza del destino). Verdi has been the subject of a number of film and stage works. These include the 1938 film directed by Carmine Gallone, Giuseppe Verdi, starring Fosco Giachetti; the 1982 miniseries, The Life of Verdi, directed by Renato Castellani, where Verdi was played by Ronald Pickup, with narration by Burt Lancaster in the English version; and the 1985 play After Aida, by Julian Mitchell (1985). He is a character in the 2011 opera Risorgimento! by Italian composer Lorenzo Ferrero, written to commemorate the 150th anniversary of Italian unification of 1861. Verdi today Verdi's operas are frequently staged around the world. All of his operas are available in recordings in a number of versions, and on DVD – Naxos Records offers a complete boxed set. Modern productions may differ substantially from those originally envisaged by the composer. Jonathan Miller's 1982 version of Rigoletto for English National Opera, set in the world of modern American mafiosi, received critical plaudits. But the same company's staging in 2002 of Un ballo in maschera as A Masked Ball, directed by Calixto Bieito, including "satanic sex rituals, homosexual rape, [and] a demonic dwarf", got a general critical thumbs down. Meanwhile, the music of Verdi can still evoke a range of cultural and political resonances. Excerpts from the Requiem were featured at the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997. On 12 March 2011 during a performance of Nabucco at the Opera di Roma celebrating 150 years of Italian unification, the conductor Riccardo Muti paused after "Va pensiero" and turned to address the audience (which included the then Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi) to complain about cuts in state funding of culture; the audience then joined in a repeat of the chorus. In 2014, the pop singer Katy Perry appeared at the Grammy Award wearing a dress designed by Valentino, embroidered with the music of "Dell'invito trascorsa è già l'ora" from the start of La traviata. The bicentenary of Verdi's birth in 2013 was celebrated in numerous events around the world, both in performances and broadcasts. Notes References Citations Sources External links Bicentennial of Giuseppe Verdi "Album Verdi" from the Digital Library of the National Library of Naples (Italy) Giuseppe Verdi recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings. 1813 births 1901 deaths 19th-century classical composers 19th-century Italian male musicians Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur Deaths from cerebrovascular disease Deputies of Legislature VIII of the Kingdom of Italy Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur Grand Officiers of the Légion d'honneur Italian classical composers Italian male classical composers Italian opera composers Italian philanthropists Italian Romantic composers Italian unification Male opera composers Members of the Senate of the Kingdom of Italy People from Busseto Recipients of the Order of Saint Stanislaus (Russian), 1st class Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class)	false	[ "The situation, task, action, result (STAR) format is a technique used by interviewers to gather all the relevant information about a specific capability that the job requires. \n\n Situation: The interviewer wants you to present a recent challenging situation in which you found yourself.\n Task: What were you required to achieve? The interviewer will be looking to see what you were trying to achieve from the situation. Some performance development methods use “Target” rather than “Task”. Job interview candidates who describe a “Target” they set themselves instead of an externally imposed “Task” emphasize their own intrinsic motivation to perform and to develop their performance.\n Action: What did you do? The interviewer will be looking for information on what you did, why you did it and what the alternatives were.\n Results: What was the outcome of your actions? What did you achieve through your actions? Did you meet your objectives? What did you learn from this experience? Have you used this learning since?\n\nThe STAR technique is similar to the SOARA technique.\n\nThe STAR technique is also often complemented with an additional R on the end STARR or STAR(R) with the last R resembling reflection. This R aims to gather insight and interviewee's ability to learn and iterate. Whereas the STAR reveals how and what kind of result on an objective was achieved, the STARR with the additional R helps the interviewer to understand what the interviewee learned from the experience and how they would assimilate experiences. The interviewee can define what they would do (differently, the same, or better) next time being posed with a situation.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nThe ‘STAR’ technique to answer behavioral interview questions\nThe STAR method explained\n\nJob interview", "The Predator is the third EP by American metalcore band Ice Nine Kills and was self-released by the band on January 15, 2013. The EP debuted at No. 9 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart.\n\nIt is the only album to feature Steve Koch as bassist and backup singer after his departure in 2013, and the last album to feature Justin Morrow as rhythm guitarist; he would switch to bass guitar and backing vocals (on live performance only) while still playing rhythm guitar in studio in 2013.\n\nThe tracks \"The Coffin Is Moving\" and \"What I Never Learned in Study Hall\" later would be featured on the band's 2014 album The Predator Becomes the Prey.\n\nThe track \"What I Never Learned in Study Hall\" was later re-recorded acoustically for Take Action. Vol. 11 making it similar to the song's predecessors \"What I Really Learned in Study Hall\" and \"What I Should Have Learned in Study Hall\". Unlike the original version, the acoustic version did not feature Tyler Carter as guest vocalist, but instead featured former Kid's Jackson Summer vocalist Kate Ellen Dean.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel \n Spencer Charnas - lead vocals, piano on \"A Reptile's Dysfunction\"\n Justin \"JD\" DeBlieck - lead guitar, lead vocals\n Justin Morrow - rhythm guitar\n Steve Koch - bass guitar, backing vocals\n Connor Sullivan - drums\n Steve Sopchak - producer, engineer, mixing\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2013 EPs\nIce Nine Kills EPs\nSelf-released EPs" ]
[ "Robbie Robertson", "1967-1968 (Music From Big Pink)" ]	C_ea62ce7604624d0ba7e25bc05367e754_0	What happened in 1967?	1	What happened in 1967 to Robbie Robertson?	Robbie Robertson	In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967). After recording the basic tracks, Dylan asked Robertson and Garth Hudson about playing on the album to fill out the sound. However, when Robertson heard the tracks, he liked the starkness of the sound and recommended that Dylan leave the songs as they were. Dylan worked with the members of the Hawks once again when they appeared as his backup band at two Woody Guthrie memorial concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York City in January 1968. Three of these performances were later released by Columbia Records on the LP A Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Vol. 1 (1972). Over the course of the "Basement Tapes" period, the group had developed a sound of their own, and Grossman went to Los Angeles to shop the group to a major label, securing a contract with Capitol Records. The group went to New York to begin recording songs with music producer John Simon. Capitol brought the group to Los Angeles to finish the album. The resulting album, Music From Big Pink, was released in August 1968. Robertson wrote four of the songs on Music From Big Pink, including "The Weight", "Chest Fever", "Caledonia Mission," and "To Kingdom Come". Robertson is listed in the songwriting credits as "J.R. Robertson". Robertson sang lead vocal on the track "To Kingdom Come"; he would not sing on another Band song released to the public until "Knockin' Lost John" on 1977's Islands. Two of Robertson's compositions for the album, "The Weight" and "Chest Fever", would become important touchstones in the group's career. "The Weight" was influenced by the films of director Luis Bunuel, in particular Nazarin (1959) and Viridiana (1961), and reflects the recurring theme in Bunuel's films about the impossibility of sainthood. The song portrays an individual who attempts to take a saintly pilgrimage, and becomes mired down with requests from other people to do favors for them along the way. The mention of "Nazareth" at the beginning of the song refers to Nazareth, Pennsylvania, where the C. F. Martin & Company guitar manufacturer is located; it was inspired by Robertson seeing the word "Nazareth" in the hole of his Martin guitar. Although "The Weight" reached #21 on the British radio charts, it did not fare as well on the American charts, initially stalling at #63. However, the song gained traction due to more successful covers by Jackie DeShannon (US #55, 1968), Aretha Franklin (US #19, 1969), and The Supremes with The Temptations (US #46, 1969), as well as to the song's inclusion in the movie Easy Rider (1969), which became a runaway success. "The Weight" has since become The Band's best known song. It has been covered by many artists, appeared in dozens of films and documentaries, and has become a staple in American rock music. When Music from Big Pink was released in 1968, The Band initially avoided media attention, and discouraged Capitol Records from promotional efforts. They also did not immediately pursue touring to support the album, and declined to be interviewed for a year. The resulting mystery surrounding the group led to speculation in the underground press. Music from Big Pink received excellent reviews, and the album influenced many well-known musicians of the period. CANNOTANSWER	In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967).	Jaime Royal "Robbie" Robertson, OC (born July 5, 1943), is a Canadian musician, songwriter, film composer, producer, actor, and author. Robertson is best known for his work as lead guitarist and songwriter for The Band, and for his career as a solo recording artist. Robertson's work with The Band was instrumental in creating the Americana music genre. Robertson has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Canadian Music Hall of Fame as a member of The Band, and has been inducted to Canada's Walk of Fame, both with The Band and on his own. He is ranked 59th in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 100 greatest guitarists. As a songwriter, Robertson is credited for writing "The Weight", "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down", "Up on Cripple Creek" with The Band, and had solo hits with "Broken Arrow" and "Somewhere Down the Crazy River", and many others. He has been inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, and received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Songwriters. As a film soundtrack producer and composer, Robertson is known for his collaborations with director Martin Scorsese, which began with the rockumentary film The Last Waltz (1978), and continued through a number of dramatic films, including Raging Bull (1980), The King of Comedy (1983), Casino (1995), The Departed (2006), The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) and The Irishman (2019). He has worked on many other soundtracks for film and television. Early life Robertson was born Jaime Royal Robertson on July 5, 1943. He was an only child. His mother was Rosemarie Dolly Chrysler, born February 6, 1922. She was Cayuga and Mohawk, raised on the Six Nations Reserve southwest of Toronto, Ontario. Chrysler lived with an aunt in the Cabbagetown neighbourhood and worked at the Coro jewellery plating factory. She met James Patrick Robertson at the factory and they married in 1942. Rosemarie and James Robertson continued to work at the factory where they met. The family lived in several homes in different Toronto neighbourhoods when Robbie was a child. He often travelled with his mother to the Six Nations Reserve to visit her family. It was here that Robertson was mentored in playing guitar by family members, in particular his older cousin Herb Myke. He became a fan of rock 'n' roll and R&B through the radio, listening to disc jockey George "Hound Dog" Lorenz play rock 'n' roll on WKBW in Buffalo, New York, and staying up at night to listen to disc jockey John R.'s all-night blues show on WLAC, a clear-channel station in Nashville, Tennessee. When Robertson was in his early teens, his parents separated. His mother revealed to Robertson that his biological father was not James, but Alexander David Klegerman, a Jewish man whom she had met working at the Coro factory. He became a professional gambler and was killed in a hit-and-run accident on the Queen Elizabeth Way. She had been with him while James Robertson was stationed in Newfoundland with the Canadian Army, before she married James. After telling Robertson, his mother arranged for the youth to meet his paternal uncles Morris (Morrie) and Nathan (Natie) Klegerman. Career When Robertson was 14, he worked two brief summer jobs in the travelling carnival circuit, first for a few days in a suburb of Toronto, and later as an assistant at a freak show for three weeks during the Canadian National Exhibition. He drew from this for his song "Life is a Carnival" (with the Band) and the movie Carny (1980), which he produced and starred in. The first band Robertson joined was Little Caesar and the Consuls, formed in 1956 by pianist/vocalist Bruce Morshead and guitarist Gene MacLellan. He stayed with the group for almost a year, playing popular songs of the day at local teen dances. In 1957 he formed Robbie and the Rhythm Chords with his friend Pete "Thumper" Traynor (who would later found Traynor Amplifiers). They changed the name to Robbie and the Robots after they watched the film Forbidden Planet and took a liking to the film's character Robby the Robot. Traynor customized Robertson's guitar for the Robots, fitting it with antennae and wires to give it a space age look. Traynor and Robertson joined with pianist Scott Cushnie and became The Suedes. At a Suedes show on October 5, 1959, when they played CHUM Radio's Hif Fi Club on Toronto's Merton Street, Ronnie Hawkins first became aware of them and was impressed enough to join them for a few numbers. With Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks Robertson began shadowing Hawkins. After the Suedes opened for the Arkansas-based rockabilly group Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks at Dixie Arena, Hawkins hired Robertson for the Hawks' road crew. Hawkins recorded two songs co-credited to Robertson, "Hey Baba Lou" and "Someone Like You", for his album Mr. Dynamo (1959), and brought Robertson to the Brill Building in New York City to help him choose songs for the rest of the album. Hawkins hired pianist Scott Cushnie away from the Suedes, and took him on tour with Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks in Arkansas. When the Hawks' bass player left the group, Cushnie recommended that Hawkins hire Robertson to replace him on bass. Hawkins invited Robertson to Arkansas, and flew to the UK to perform on television there. Left in Arkansas, Robertson spent his living allowance on records and practised intensively each day. Upon returning, Hawkins hired him to play bass. Cushnie left the band a few months later. Robertson soon switched over from bass to playing lead guitar for the Hawks. Robertson developed into a guitar virtuoso. Roy Buchanan, a few years older than Robertson, was briefly a member of the Hawks and became an important influence on Robertson's guitar style: "Standing next to Buchanan on stage for several months, Robertson was able to absorb Buchanan’s deft manipulations with his volume speed dial, his tendency to bend multiple strings for steel guitar-like effect, his rapid sweep picking and his passion for bending past the root and fifth notes during solo flights." Drummer/singer Levon Helm was already a member of the Hawks and soon became close friends with Robertson. The Hawks continued to tour the United States and Canada, adding Rick Danko, Richard Manuel, and Garth Hudson to the Hawks lineup in 1961. This lineup, which later became The Band, toured with Hawkins throughout 1962 and into 1963. They also hired the saxophone player Jerry Penfound and later Bruce Bruno, who were both with the group in their intermediary period as Levon and the Hawks. Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks cut sessions for Roulette Records throughout 1961–1963, all of which Robertson appeared on. The sessions included three singles: "Come Love" b/w "I Feel Good" (Roulette 4400 1961); "Who Do You Love" b/w "Bo Diddley" (Roulette 4483 1963); and "There's A Screw Loose" b/w "High Blood Pressure" (Roulette 4502 1963). With Levon and the Hawks The Hawks left Ronnie Hawkins at the beginning of 1964 to go on their own. The members of the Hawks were losing interest in playing in the rockabilly style and favoured blues and soul music. In early 1964, the group approached agent Harold Kudlets about representing them, which he agreed to do, booking them a year's worth of shows in the same circuits as they had been in before with Ronnie Hawkins. Originally dubbed The Levon Helm Sextet, the group included all of the future members of The Band, plus Jerry Penfound on saxophone and Bob Bruno on vocals. After Bruno left in May 1964, the group changed their name to Levon and the Hawks. Penfound stayed with the group until 1965. Kudlets kept the group busy performing throughout 1964 and into 1965, finally booking them into two lengthy summer engagements at the popular nightclub Tony Mart's in Somers Point, New Jersey, at the Shore. They played six nights a week alongside Conway Twitty and other acts. The members of Levon and the Hawks befriended blues artist John P. Hammond while he was performing in Toronto in 1964. Later in the year, the group agreed to work on Hammond's album So Many Roads (released in 1965) at the same time that they were playing the Peppermint Lounge in New York City. Robertson played guitar throughout the album, and was billed "Jaime R. Robertson" in the album's credits. Levon and the Hawks cut a single "Uh Uh Uh" b/w "Leave Me Alone" under the name the Canadian Squires in March 1965. Both songs were written by Robertson. The single was recorded in New York and released on Apex Records in the United States and on Ware Records in Canada. As Levon and the Hawks, the group cut an afternoon session for Atco Records later in 1965, which yielded two singles, "The Stones I Throw" b/w "He Don't Love You" (Atco 6383) and "Go, Go, Liza Jane" b/w "He Don't Love You" (Atco 6625). Robertson also wrote all three of the tracks on Levon and the Hawks' Atco singles. With Bob Dylan and the Hawks 1965–1966 World Tour Toward the end of Levon and the Hawks' second engagement at Tony Mart's in New Jersey, in August 1965, Robertson received a call from Albert Grossman Management requesting a meeting with singer Bob Dylan. The group had been recommended to both Grossman and to Dylan by Mary Martin, one of Grossman's employees; she was originally from Toronto and was a friend of the band. Dylan was also aware of the group through his friend John Hammond, whose album So Many Roads members of the Hawks had performed on. Robertson agreed to meet with Dylan. Initially, Dylan intended simply to hire Robertson as the guitarist for his backing group. Robertson refused the offer, but did agree to play two shows with Dylan, one at the Forest Hills Tennis Stadium in Forest Hills, New York on August 28, and one at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles on September 3. Robertson suggested they use Levon Helm on drums for the shows. Robertson and Helm performed in Dylan's backing band, along with Harvey Brooks and Al Kooper for both shows. The first at Forest Hills received a predominantly hostile response, but the second in Los Angeles was received slightly more favourably. Dylan flew up to Toronto and rehearsed with Levon and the Hawks September 15–17, as Levon and the Hawks finished an engagement there, and hired the full band for his upcoming tour. Bob Dylan and the Hawks toured the United States throughout October–December 1965, with each show consisting of two sets: an acoustic show featuring only Dylan on guitar and harmonica, and an electric set featuring Dylan backed by the Hawks. The tours were largely met with a hostile reaction from fans who knew Dylan as a prominent figure in the American folk music revival, and thought his move into rock music a betrayal. Helm left the group after their November 28 performance in Washington, D.C. Session drummer Bobby Gregg replaced Helm for the December dates, and Sandy Konikoff was brought in to replace Gregg in January 1966. Dylan and the Hawks played more dates in the continental United States in February–March 1966 of the 1966 world tour. From April 9-May 27, they played Hawaii, Australia, Europe, and the UK and Ireland. Drummer Sandy Konikoff left after the Pacific Northwest dates in March, and Mickey Jones replaced him, staying with the group for the remainder of the tour. The Australian and European legs of the tour received a particularly harsh response from disgruntled folk fans. The May 17 Manchester Free Trade Hall show is best known for an angry audience member audibly yelling "Judas!" at Dylan; it became a frequently-bootlegged live show from the tour, was eventually released officially as The Bootleg Series Vol. 4: Bob Dylan Live 1966, The "Royal Albert Hall" Concert. The European leg of the tour was filmed by documentary filmmaker D. A. Pennebaker, but completion of a planned film was delayed. After recovering from an accident, Dylan decided to edit it himself. ABC television rejected it, and it was never commercially released. It was screened as Eat the Document in 1972 at the Whitney Museum in New York. On November 30, 1965, Dylan cut a studio session with members of the Hawks, which yielded the non-LP single "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?" Dylan completed the Blonde on Blonde album in Nashville in mid-February 1966, employing Robertson for one of these sessions, which took place on February 14. The "Basement Tapes" period On July 29, 1966, Dylan sustained an injured neck from a motorcycle accident, and retreated to a quiet domestic life with his new wife and child in upstate New York. Some of the members of the Hawks were living at the Chelsea Hotel in New York City at the time, and were kept on a weekly retainer by Dylan's management. In February 1967, Dylan invited the members of the Hawks to come up to Woodstock, New York to work on music. Robertson had met a French-Canadian woman on the Paris stop of Dylan's 1966 world tour, and the two moved into a house in the Woodstock area. The remaining three members of the Hawks rented a house near West Saugerties, New York; it was later dubbed "Big Pink" because of its pink exterior. Dylan and the members of the Hawks worked together at the "Big Pink" house every day to rehearse and generate ideas for new songs, many of which they recorded in "Big Pink"'s makeshift basement studio. The recordings were made between the late spring and autumn of 1967. Previous Hawks member Levon Helm returned to the group in August 1967. By this time, Robertson's guitar style had evolved to be more supportive of the song and less devoted to displaying speed and virtuosity. In time, word about these sessions began to circulate, and in 1968, Rolling Stone magazine co-founder Jann Wenner brought attention to these tracks in an article entitled "Dylan's Basement Tape Should Be Released". In 1969, a bootleg album with a plain white cover compiled by two incognito music industry insiders featured a collection of seven tracks from these sessions. The album, which became known as The Great White Wonder, began to appear in independent record stores and receive radio airplay. This album became a runaway success and helped to launch the bootleg recording industry. In 1975, Robertson would produce an official compilation, The Basement Tapes, which included a selection of tracks from the sessions. An exhaustive collection of all 138 extant recordings was released in 2014 as The Bootleg Series Vol. 11: The Basement Tapes Complete. With the Band 1967–1968 (Music From Big Pink) In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967). After recording the basic tracks, Dylan asked Robertson and Garth Hudson about playing on the album to fill out the sound. However, when Robertson heard the tracks, he liked the starkness of the sound and recommended that Dylan leave the songs as they were. Dylan worked with the members of the Hawks again when they appeared as his backup band at two Woody Guthrie memorial concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York City in January 1968. Three of these performances were later released by Columbia Records on the LP A Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Vol. 1 (1972). Over the course of the "Basement Tapes" period, the group had developed a sound of their own, and Grossman went to Los Angeles to shop the group to a major label, securing a contract with Capitol Records. The group went to New York to begin recording songs with music producer John Simon. Capitol brought the group to Los Angeles to finish the album. The resulting album, Music From Big Pink, was released in August 1968. Robertson wrote four of the songs on Music From Big Pink, including "The Weight", "Chest Fever", "Caledonia Mission," and "To Kingdom Come". Robertson is listed in the songwriting credits as "J.R. Robertson". Robertson sang lead vocal on the track "To Kingdom Come"; he would not sing on another Band song released to the public until "Knockin' Lost John" on 1977's Islands. Two of Robertson's compositions for the album, "The Weight" and "Chest Fever", would become important touchstones in the group's career. "The Weight" was influenced by the films of director Luis Buñuel, in particular Nazarín (1959) and Viridiana (1961), and reflects the recurring theme in Buñuel's films about the impossibility of sainthood. The song portrays an individual who attempts to take a saintly pilgrimage, and becomes mired down with requests from other people to do favors for them along the way. The mention of "Nazareth" at the beginning of the song refers to Nazareth, Pennsylvania, where the C. F. Martin & Company guitar manufacturer is located; it was inspired by Robertson seeing the word "Nazareth" in the hole of his Martin guitar. Although "The Weight" reached #21 on the British radio charts, it did not fare as well on the American charts, initially stalling at #63. But the song gained traction following more successful covers by Jackie DeShannon (US #55, 1968), Aretha Franklin (US #19, 1969), and the Supremes with the Temptations (US #46, 1969), and the song's inclusion in the movie Easy Rider (1969), which became a runaway success. "The Weight" has since become the Band's best known song. It has been covered by many artists, appeared in dozens of films and documentaries, and has become a staple in American rock music. When Music from Big Pink was released in 1968, the Band initially avoided media attention, and discouraged Capitol Records from promotional efforts. They also did not immediately pursue touring to support the album, and declined to be interviewed for a year. The resulting mystery surrounding the group prompted speculation in the underground press. Music from Big Pink received excellent reviews, and the album influenced many well-known musicians of the period. 1969 The Band In early 1969, the Band rented a home from Sammy Davis Jr. in Hollywood Hills, and converted the pool house behind it into a studio to recreate the "clubhouse" atmosphere that they had previously enjoyed at "Big Pink". The band began recording every day in the pool house studio, working on a tight schedule to complete the album. An additional three tracks were recorded at The Hit Factory in New York in April 1969. Robertson did most of the audio engineering on the album. The Band began performing regularly in spring 1969, with their first live dates as the Band taking place at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. Their most notable performances that year were at the 1969 Woodstock Festival and the UK Isle of Wight Festival with Bob Dylan in August. The Band's album The Band was released in September 1969, and became a critical and commercial success. The album received almost universal critical praise, peaked at #9 on the US pop charts, and stayed in the Top 40 for 24 weeks. The Band works as a loose concept album of Americana themes, and was instrumental in the creation of the Americana music genre. It was included in the Library of Congress' National Recording Registry in 2009. The song from this album that had the strongest cultural influence was "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down". The song explores a Confederate man's life after defeat of the South following the American Civil War. It incorporates historical events to create a larger American mythos. Although the Band's original version was not released as a single, a cover version by Joan Baez went to #3 on the charts in 1971 and helped to popularize the song. Several other tracks from The Band received significant radio airplay, and would become staples in the group's concert appearances. "Up on Cripple Creek" peaked at #25 in late 1969 in the United States, and would be their only Top 30 hit there. "Rag Mama Rag" reached #16 in the UK in April 1970, the highest chart position of any single by the group in that country. "Whispering Pines", co-written by Richard Manuel, was released as a single in France in 1970, and would become the title of a 2009 book about Canadian contributions to the Americana music genre by Jason Schneider. On November 2, 1969, the Band appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, one of only two television appearances they would make. 1970–1973 (Stage Fright through Moondog Matinee) On January 12, 1970, the Band was featured on the cover of Time magazine. This was the first time a North American rock band featured on the cover of the magazine. The Band rented The Woodstock Playhouse in Woodstock, New York with the intent of recording a new live album there, but the city council voted against it, so they recorded on location, but without an audience. Robertson handled most of the songwriting duties as before. Robertson brought in Todd Rundgren to engineer the album which was recorded in two weeks' time. These sessions became their third album, Stage Fright, which would become the Band's highest charting album, peaking at #5 on September 5 and staying in the Billboard Top 40 for 14 weeks. The Band's next album, Cahoots, was recorded at Albert Grossman's newly built Bearsville Studios and was released in October 1971. The album received mixed reviews, and peaked at #24 on the Billboard charts, only remaining in the Billboard Top 40 for five weeks. Cahoots is notable for its cover of Bob Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece", as well as for featuring the concert favourite "Life Is a Carnival". The inclusion of "When I Paint My Masterpiece" came about when Dylan stopped by Robertson's home during the recording of Cahoots and Robertson asked if he might have any songs to contribute. That led to Dylan playing an unfinished version of "When I Paint My Masterpiece" for him. Dylan completed the song soon afterwards, and the Band recorded it for the album. "Life Is a Carnival" features horn parts written by producer and arranger Allen Toussaint. It would be the only track from Cahoots the group would keep in their set list through to The Last Waltz concert and film. The Band continued to tour throughout 1970-71. A live album recorded at a series of shows at the Academy of Music in New York City between December 28–31, 1971, was released in 1972 as the double album Rock Of Ages. Rock of Ages peaked at #6, and remained in the Top 40 for 14 weeks. After the Academy of Music shows, the Band again retreated from performing live. They returned to the stage on July 28, 1973, to play the Summer Jam at Watkins Glen alongside the Allman Brothers Band and the Grateful Dead. A recording of the Band's performance was released by Capitol Records as the album Live at Watkins Glen in 1995. With over 600,000 people in attendance, the festival set a record for "Pop Festival Attendance" in the Guinness Book of World Records. The record was first published in the 1976 edition of the book. In October 1973, the Band released an album of cover songs entitled Moondog Matinee, which peaked at #28 on the Billboard charts. Around the time of the recording of Moondog Matinee, Robertson began working on an ambitious project entitled Works that was never finished or released. One lyric from the Works project, "Lay a flower in the snow," was used in Robertson's song "Fallen Angel", which appeared on his 1987 self-titled solo album. 1974 Reunion with Bob Dylan (Planet Waves and Before the Flood) In February 1973, Bob Dylan relocated from Woodstock, New York to Malibu, California. Coincidentally, Robertson moved to Malibu in the summer of 1973, and by October of the year the rest of the members of the Band had followed suit, moving into properties near Zuma Beach. David Geffen had signed Dylan to Asylum Records, and worked with promoter Bill Graham on the concept that would become the Bob Dylan and the Band 1974 Tour. It would be Dylan's first tour in more than seven years. Meanwhile, Bill Graham took out a full page advertisement for the Bob Dylan and the Band tour in the New York Times. The response was one of the largest in entertainment history up to that point, with between 5 and 6 million requests for tickets mailed in for 650,000 seats. Graham's office ended up selling tickets off on a lottery basis, and Dylan and the Band netted $2 million from the deal. Amongst the rehearsals and preparations, the Band went into the studio with Bob Dylan to record a new album for Asylum Records that would become the Bob Dylan album Planet Waves (1974). Sessions took place at Village Recorder in West Los Angeles, California, from November 2–14, 1973. Planet Waves was released on February 9, 1974. The album was #1 on the Billboard album charts for four weeks, and spent 12 weeks total in the Billboard Top 40. Planet Waves was Bob Dylan's first #1 album, and the first and only time Bob Dylan and the Band recorded a studio album together. The 1974 tour began at the Chicago Stadium on January 3, 1974, and ended at The Forum in Inglewood, California on February 14. The shows began with more songs from the new Planet Waves album and with covers that Dylan and the Band liked, but as the tour went on, they moved toward playing older and more familiar material, only keeping "Forever Young" from the Planet Waves album in the set list. Dylan and the Band played a number of tracks from the controversial 1965–1966 World Tour, this time to wildly enthusiastic response from the audience where there had been mixed reaction and boos a mere nine years previously. The final three shows of the tour at The Forum in Inglewood, California were recorded and assembled into the double album Before the Flood. Credited to "Bob Dylan/The Band", Before the Flood was released by Asylum Records on July 20, 1974. The album debuted at #3 on the Billboard charts, and spent ten weeks in the Top Forty. 1974–1975 (Shangri-La Studios, The Basement Tapes, and Northern Lights – Southern Cross) Following the 1974 reunion tour with Bob Dylan, rock manager Elliot Roberts booked the Band with the recently reunited Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. On September 4, both artists played Wembley Stadium in London, appearing with Jesse Colin Young and Joni Mitchell. After moving to Malibu in 1973, Robertson and the Band had discovered a ranch in Malibu near Zuma Beach called "Shangri-La", and decided to lease the property. The main house on the property had originally been built by Lost Horizon (1937) actress Margo Albert, and the ranch had been the filming and stabling site for the Mister Ed television show in the 1960s. In the interim, the house had served as a high-class bordello. The album release of The Basement Tapes, credited to Bob Dylan and the Band, was the first album production that took place in the new studio. The album, produced by Robertson, featured a selection of tapes from the original 1967 Basement Tapes sessions with Dylan, as well as demos for tracks eventually recorded for Music From Big Pink album. Robertson cleaned up the tracks, and the album was released in July 1975. Shangri-La Studios proved to be a return to a clubhouse atmosphere that the Band had enjoyed previously at Big Pink, and in the spring of 1975, the group began work on Northern Lights – Southern Cross, their first release of original material in four years. One of the best known tracks on the album is "Acadian Driftwood", the first song with specifically Canadian subject material. Robertson was inspired to write "Acadian Driftwood" after seeing the documentary L'Acadie, l'Acadie (1971) on Canadian television while in Montreal. Two other notable tracks from that album are "It Makes No Difference" and "Ophelia". Northern Lights – Southern Cross was released on November 1, 1975. The album received generally positive reviews, and reached #26 on the Billboard charts, remaining in the Top 40 for five weeks. 1976 (Islands and The Last Waltz concert) The Band began touring again in June 1976, performing throughout the summer. The members of the Band were splintering off to work on other projects, with Levon Helm building a studio in Woodstock and Rick Danko having been contracted to Arista Records as a solo artist. While on the summer tour, member Richard Manuel was involved in a boating accident that severely injured his neck, and ten dates of the 25-date tour were cancelled. It was during this time period that Robertson introduced the concept that the Band would cease to operate as a touring act. According to Robertson, the group's mutual agreement was that they would stage one final "grand finale" show, part ways to work on their various projects, and then regroup. Helm later made the case in his autobiography, This Wheel's on Fire, that Robertson had forced the Band's breakup on the rest of the group. Concert promoter Bill Graham booked the Band at the Winterland Ballroom on Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976. The show was intended as a gala event, with ticket prices of $25 per person. The event would include a Thanksgiving dinner served to the audience, and would feature the Band performing with various musical guests. The onstage guest list included Ronnie Hawkins, Muddy Waters, Paul Butterfield, Dr. John, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, Neil Diamond, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, and others. Robertson wanted to document the event on film, and approached director Martin Scorsese to see if he would be interested in shooting the concert. The Winterland concert was called The Last Waltz. Robertson and Scorsese developed a 200-page script for the show, listing out in columns the lyrics of the songs, who was singing what part, and what instruments were being featured. It included columns for the camera and lighting work. Scorsese brought in all-star cameramen such as Michael Chapman, László Kovács and Vilmos Zsigmond to film the show in 35mm. John Simon, producer on the Band's first two albums, was brought in to coordinate rehearsals and work as musical director. Boris Leven was brought in as art director. Jonathan Taplin assumed the role of executive producer, and Robertson worked as producer of the film. Rehearsals for The Last Waltz concert began in early November. Warner Bros. Records president Mo Ostin offered to finance the production of The Last Waltz film in exchange for the rights to release music from The Last Waltz as an album. However, the group were contractually obligated to supply Capitol Records with one more album before they could be released to work with Warner Bros. So in between rehearsing, the Band worked on the studio album Islands for Capitol. Robertson wrote or co-wrote eight of the ten tracks. One of the songs, "Knockin' Lost John", features Robertson on vocals, and was the first Band song Robertson had sung on since "To Kingdom Come" from Music From Big Pink. "Christmas Must Be Tonight" was inspired by the birth of Robertson's son, Sebastian, in July 1974. The Last Waltz concert event took place on Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976. Approximately five thousand people were in attendance. The event began at 5 pm, beginning with the audience members being served a full traditional Thanksgiving meal at candlelit tables, with a vegetarian table serving an alternate menu as an option. The Berkeley Promenade Orchestra played waltz music for dancing afterwards. The tables were cleared and moved at 8 pm. At 9 pm, the Band played songs for an hour, beginning with "Up On Cripple Creek". Just after 10 pm, Robertson introduced Ronnie Hawkins, the first onstage guest, with a succession of guest stars appearing with the group until just after midnight. The group took a 30-minute break, during which several Bay Area poets performed readings of their poems. After the break, the Band returned to the stage, performing, among other songs, a new composition entitled "The Last Waltz Theme" that Robertson had just completed less than 48 hours prior. Bob Dylan was brought in at the end of this second set, performing several songs, and finally being joined with the other guest stars for a finale performance of "I Shall Be Released". This was then followed with two all-star jam sessions, after which the Band returned to the stage to close the show with one more song, their rendition of "Baby Don't You Do It". 1977–1978 (The Last Waltz film and album) After The Last Waltz concert event was finished, director Martin Scorsese had 400 reels of raw footage to work with, and began editing the footage. The film was then sold to United Artists. In the meantime, Robertson and Scorsese continued to brainstorm more ideas for the film. In April 1977, country singer Emmylou Harris and gospel vocal group the Staple Singers were filmed on a sound stage at MGM performing with the Band. Emmylou Harris performed on "Evangeline", a new song written by Robertson, and the Staples Singers performed on a new recording of "The Weight," which they themselves had recorded a version of in 1968. Scorsese's next idea was to intersperse the concert footage with interviews of the Band that told their story. Scorsese conducted the interviews. The Last Waltz album was released by Warner Brothers Records on April 7, 1978, as a 3-LP set. The first five sides feature live performances from the concert, and the last side contains studio recordings from the MGM sound stage sessions. The album peaked at #16 on the Billboard charts, and remained in the Top 40 for 8 weeks. The Last Waltz film was released to theatres on April 26, 1978. The film fared well with both rock and film critics. Robertson and Scorsese made appearances throughout America and Europe to promote the film. Over time, The Last Waltz has become lauded by many as an important and pioneering rockumentary. Its influence has been felt on subsequent rock music films such as Talking Heads' Stop Making Sense (1984), and U2's Rattle and Hum (1988). Production and session work outside of the Band 1970–1977 Robertson produced Jesse Winchester's debut self-titled album, which was released in 1970 on Ampex Records. The album features Robertson playing guitar throughout the album, and co-credits the track "Snow" to Robertson as well. Robertson played guitar on ex-Beatle Ringo Starr's third solo album, Ringo (1973), performing with four-fifths of the Band on the track "Sunshine Life For Me (Sail Away Raymond)". Robertson contributed a guitar solo on the track "Snookeroo" on Starr's fourth album, Goodnight Vienna (1974). Robertson played guitar for Joni Mitchell on the track "Raised on Robbery", which was released on her album Court and Spark. In 1974, Robertson also played guitar on Carly Simon's version of "Mockingbird", which featured Simon singing with her then-husband James Taylor. In 1975, Robertson produced and played guitar on singer/guitarist Hirth Martinez's debut album Hirth From Earth. Bob Dylan had heard Martinez, and recommended him to Robertson. Robertson identified strongly with Martinez' music, helped him to secure a recording contract with Warner Bros. Records, and agreed to produce Martinez' debut album. He also played guitar on Martinez' follow-up album, Big Bright Street (1977). In 1975, Eric Clapton recorded the album No Reason to Cry at the Band's Shangri-La Studios with help from members of the Band. Robertson played lead guitar on the track "Sign Language". In the mid-1970s, Robertson connected with singer Neil Diamond, and the two began collaborating on a concept album about the life and struggles of a Tin Pan Alley songwriter. The resulting album, entitled Beautiful Noise, was recorded at Shangri-La Studios in early 1976. It reached #6 on the Billboard charts and remained in the Top 40 for sixteen weeks. Robertson produced the album, co-wrote the track "Dry Your Eyes" with Diamond, and played guitar on "Dry Your Eyes", "Lady-Oh", and "Jungletime". He produced Diamond's live double album Love at the Greek (1977), which was recorded in 1976 at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles. Love at the Greek reached #8 on the Billboard charts and remained in the Top 40 for nine weeks. In 1977, Robertson contributed to two album projects from the Band alumni. Robertson played guitar on "Java Blues" on Rick Danko's self-titled debut album, and also played guitar on the Earl King-penned "Sing, Sing, Sing" on the album Levon Helm & the RCO All-Stars. Also in 1977, Robertson contributed to the second self-titled album by singer-songwriter Libby Titus, who was the former girlfriend of Levon Helm. Robertson produced the track "The Night You Took Me To Barbados In My Dreams" (co-written by Titus and Hirth Martinez), and produced and played guitar on the Cole Porter standard "Miss Otis Regrets". Film career 1980–1986 Carny (1980) film and soundtrack After the release of The Last Waltz, MGM/UA, who released the film, viewed Robertson as a potential film actor, and provided Robertson with an office on the MGM lot. During this time, Martin Scorsese's agent, Harry Ulfand, contacted Robertson about the idea of producing a dramatic film about traveling carnivals, which Robertson was drawn to because of his childhood experiences working in carnivals. The screenplay for the film Carny was directed by documentary filmmaker Robert Kaylor. Although Robertson was initially only intended to be the producer of Carny, he ended up becoming the third lead actor in the film, playing the role of Patch, the patch man. Gary Busey played "Frankie", the carnival bozo and Patch's best friend. Jodie Foster was selected to play the role of Donna, a small town girl who runs away to join the carnival and threatens to come between the two friends. The film cast real life carnies alongside professional film actors, which created a difficult atmosphere on set. Carny opened to theaters on June 13, 1980. Also in 1980, Warner Bros released a soundtrack album for Carny, which is co-credited to Robertson and composer Alex North, who wrote the orchestral score for the film. The soundtrack was re-released on compact disc by Real Gone Music in 2015. Early collaborations with Martin Scorsese 1980–1986 (Raging Bull, The King of Comedy, The Color of Money) After the production of Carny was completed, Robertson flew to New York to assist Martin Scorsese on the music for the film Raging Bull (1980). Robertson and Scorsese would have a long-running working relationship. The former would find and/or create music to underscore the latter's films. Raging Bull was the first of these collaborations. Robertson credits his work on Raging Bull for sparking his interest in the work of sourcing and underscoring music for movies. Robertson supplied three newly recorded instrumental jazz tracks for sourced music, which he also produced. These three tracks feature Robertson playing guitar, along with performances from the Band alumni Garth Hudson and Richard Manuel. One of the tracks, "Webster Hall", is co-written by Robertson and Garth Hudson. Robertson also worked with Scorsese on selecting the film's opening theme music, choosing the intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana by Italian opera composer Pietro Mascagni. The soundtrack was finally released by Capitol Records in 2005 as a 37 track, 2-CD set. Robertson worked with Scorsese again on his next film, The King of Comedy (1983), and is credited in the film's opening credits for "Music Production". Robertson contributed one original song, "Between Trains," to the film's soundtrack. The song was written in tribute to "Cowboy" Dan Johnson, an assistant of Scorsese's who had recently died. Robertson produced the track, sings lead vocals, and plays guitar and keyboards; the Band alumni Garth Hudson and Richard Manuel appear on the track was well. A soundtrack album for the film was released by Warner Bros. in 1983. In June 1986, Robertson began working with Scorsese on his next film The Color of Money. In addition to sourcing music for the film, Robertson also composed the film's score; it was the first time Robertson had ever written a dramatic underscore for a film. Robertson brought in Canadian jazz composer Gil Evans to orchestrate the arrangements. The best known song on The Color of Money soundtrack is Eric Clapton's "It's in the Way That You Use It", which was co-written by Robertson. "It's in the Way That You Use It" reached #1 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Songs chart in January 1987. Robertson produced a song for the film with blues player Willie Dixon entitled "Don't Tell Me Nothin'"; Dixon's track was co-written with Robertson. The Color of Moneys soundtrack album was released by MCA Records. Solo career Geffen Records period Robbie Robertson (1987) Robertson began work on his first solo album, Robbie Robertson, in July 1986 after signing to Geffen Records. Robertson chose fellow Canadian Daniel Lanois to produce the album. Much of the album was recorded at The Village Recorder in West Los Angeles, California. He recorded at Bearsville Studios near Woodstock, New York, and also in Dublin, Ireland, with U2, and in Bath, England, with Peter Gabriel. He employed a number of guest artists on the album, including U2, Gabriel, the Bodeans, and Maria McKee. Garth Hudson and Rick Danko also made appearances on the album. Robertson wrote one track, "Fallen Angel", in honor of Richard Manuel, after his passing in March 1986. Released on October 26, 1987, Robbie Robertson peaked at #35 on the Billboard 200, remaining in the top 40 for three weeks. The album charted even higher in the UK, peaking at #23 on the UK Albums Chart and remaining on the chart for 14 weeks. Robbie Robertson received overwhelming critical acclaim at the time of its release, being listed in the Top-Ten Albums of the Year by several critics in Billboard magazine's 1987 "The Critics' Choice" end of the year feature. The album was listed as #77 in Rolling Stones 1989 list "100 Best Albums of the Eighties." Robertson had his single largest hit in the UK with "Somewhere Down The Crazy River", which features his spoken word verses contrasted with singing in the choruses. The song reached #15 in the UK Hit Singles chart, and remained in the chart for 11 weeks. The video for "Somewhere Down The Crazy River" was directed by Martin Scorsese, and features Maria McKee in an acting role. In the US, Robbie Robertson produced several hits on the Billboard Mainstream Rock charts, with "Showdown At Big Sky" coming in the highest (#2) and "Sweet Fire Of Love" the second highest (#7). The album was nominated for a Grammy Award for "Best Rock / Vocal Album", and was certified gold in the United States in 1991. In Canada, Robertson won Album Of The Year, Best Male Vocalist Of The Year and Producer Of The Year at the Juno Award ceremony in 1989. In 1991, Rod Stewart recorded a version of "Broken Arrow" for his album Vagabond Heart. Stewart's version of the song reached #20 on the Billboard 100 chart in the US and #2 on the Billboard Top Canadian Hit Singles chart in Canada. "Broken Arrow" was performed live by the Grateful Dead with Phil Lesh on vocals. Storyville (1991) Storyville was released on September 30, 1991. Robertson headed to New Orleans to collaborate with some of the city's natives like Aaron and Ivan Neville and the Rebirth Brass Band. Once again, Robertson brought in Band alumni Garth Hudson and Rick Danko as contributors. The album reached #69 on the Billboard 200 chart. Storyville received numerous positive reviews, with Rolling Stone giving it 4 1/2 stars out of 5, and the Los Angeles Times awarding it 3 stars out of 4. Two tracks from the album, "What About Now" and "Go Back To Your Woods", charted on the Billboard Mainstream Rock charts at #15 and #32 respectively. The album was nominated for Grammy awards in the categories "Best Rock Vocal Performance (solo)" and "Best Engineer". Production and session work 1984–1992 In 1984, Robertson co-produced the track "The Best of Everything" with Tom Petty for the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers album Southern Accents. Robertson also worked on the horn arrangements for the track, and brought in Band alumni Richard Manuel and Garth Hudson as guests. In 1986, Robertson appeared as a guest on the album Reconciled by the Call, playing guitar on the track "The Morning". Also in 1986, Robertson was brought on as creative consultant for Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll (1987), a feature film saluting Chuck Berry. Robertson appears in film, interviewing Chuck Berry, and then playing guitar while Berry recites poetry. In 1988, Robertson collaborated as a songwriter with Lone Justice lead singer Maria McKee. One of the songs they co-wrote, "Nobody's Child", was released on McKee's self-titled debut album in 1989. In 1989, Robertson recorded and produced a new version of the Band's "Christmas Must Be Tonight" for the Scrooged soundtrack. In 1990, Robertson appeared as a guest on the Ryuichi Sakamoto album Beauty, playing guitar on the song "Romance". He also contributed to the world music video and album production One World One Voice. In 1992, Robertson produced the song "Love in Time" for Roy Orbison's posthumous album King of Hearts. "Love In Time" was a basic demo Orbison had recorded that was believed to be lost, but had just recently been rediscovered. Robertson set about augmenting Orbison's basic vocal track with new arrangements and instrumentation, with the intent of making it sound like the arrangements were there from the beginning instead of later additions. Later solo albumsMusic for the Native Americans (1994): In 1994, Robertson returned to his roots, forming a Native American group called the Red Road Ensemble for Music for the Native Americans, a collection of songs that accompanied a television documentary series produced by TBS. Like his songs, "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down," and "Acadian Driftwood," Robertson touches on history that connects to his life and family. The Battle Of Wounded Knee and the near extinction of the buffalo in the United States are outlined in the song, "Ghost Dance." Robertson was recognized with a Juno Award for Producer of the Year. The international success of "Mahk Jchi (Heartbeat Drum Song)" inspired a concert in Agrigento, Italy, celebrating Native American music. Robertson headlined the festival along with other Native American musicians, and portions of the live performance appeared in a PBS documentary. Contact from the Underworld of Redboy (1998): On Contact from the Underworld of Redboy, Robertson departed from his typical production style and delved deep into a mix of rock, native, and electronic music. He employed the services of Howie B, DJ Premier, and producer Marius de Vries (Björk, Massive Attack). Through the songs on the album, he takes a close look at native traditions like Peyote Healing. The album's opening track, "The Sound Is Fading", samples a recording of a young Native American singer from the 1940s that Robertson got from the Library Of Congress, and the song "Sacrifice" includes parts of an interview from prison with Leonard Peltier set to a soundscape produced by Robertson and de Vries. The racial epithet in the album's title comes from an experience Robertson had where some bullies referred to him as "Red Boy" while he was playing with his cousins. Rolling Stone gave the album 4 out of 5 stars, and Robertson received a Juno Award for Best Music of Aboriginal Canada Recording. How to Become Clairvoyant (2011): Released on April 5, 2011, How To Become Clairvoyant is the fifth solo release from Robertson. The album arose from some impromptu demo sessions in Los Angeles with long time friend Eric Clapton. It features Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Trent Reznor, Tom Morello, Robert Randolph, Rocco Deluca, Angela McCluskey, and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes. Robbie performed "He Don't Live Here No More" on CBS's Late Show with David Letterman and Later... with Jools Holland in support of the album. He also appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon performing the song "Straight Down The Line," with Robert Randolph and the Roots. The album was released in a deluxe edition containing five bonus tracks (four demos and the exclusive track "Houdini", named after the magician Harry Houdini). "How To Become Clairvoyant" debuted at No. 13 on the Billboard 200, marking the highest debut and highest chart position for Robbie's solo works in his career. He teamed with painter and photographer Richard Prince to produce a special limited-edition collector's release of the album. The resulting LP-sized box included an art book, an individually numbered set of five lithographs (including pieces by Prince and photographer Anton Corbijn), a set of original tarot cards, and the original album plus ten bonus tracks. Only 2,500 were made. Sinematic (2019): Released on September 20, 2019, Sinematic is Robertson's sixth solo album. It features Van Morrison joining Robertson as dueling hitmen on the track “I Hear You Paint Houses," as well as other allusions to the world of Scorsese's films. Citizen Cope, Derek Trucks, and Frédéric Yonnet make guest appearances on the album. Later career Robertson worked on Martin Scorsese's movies Casino, The Departed, and Gangs of New York, and he provided music supervision for Shutter Island, The Wolf of Wall Street, and Silence. In Rome, he headlined the 1995 annual Labour Day concert festival with supporting acts Andrea Bocelli, Elvis Costello, and Radiohead. In 1996, as executive soundtrack producer, Robertson heard a demo of Change the World and sent it to Clapton as a suggestion for the soundtrack of Phenomenon, starring John Travolta. Babyface produced the track. Change the World won 1997 Grammy awards for Song of the Year and Record of the Year. In 1999, Robertson contributed songs to Oliver Stone's film, Any Given Sunday. In 2000, David Geffen and Mo Ostin convinced Robertson to join DreamWorks Records as creative executive. Robertson, who persuaded Nelly Furtado to sign with the company, is actively involved with film projects and developing new artist talent, including signings of A.i., Boomkat, eastmountainsouth, and Dana Glover. On February 9, 2002, Robertson performed "Stomp Dance (Unity)" as part of the opening ceremony of the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City, Utah. In 2004, he contributed the song "Shine Your Light" to the Ladder 49 soundtrack. In 2005, Robertson was executive producer of the definitive box set for the Band, entitled A Musical History. In 2006, he recorded with Jerry Lee Lewis on the track "Twilight", a Robertson composition, for Lewis' album Last Man Standing. On July 28, 2007, at Eric Clapton's Crossroads Guitar Festival in Bridgeview, Illinois, Robertson made a rare live appearance. Also in 2007, Robertson accepted an invitation to participate in Goin' Home: A Tribute to Fats Domino (Vanguard). With the group Galactic, Robertson contributed a version of Domino's "Goin' to the River". For the 2019 Martin Scorsese movie The Irishman, Robertson provided the score and consulted with music supervisor Randall Poster on the entire soundtrack. Honours and awards In 1989, the Band was inducted into the Canadian Juno Hall of Fame. In 1994, The Band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 1997, Robertson received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Songwriters. At the 2003 commencement ceremonies at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Robertson delivered an address to the graduating class and was awarded an honorary degree by the university. In 2003, Robertson received the Indspire Aboriginal Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2003, Robertson was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame. In 2005, Robertson received an honorary doctorate from York University. In 2006, he received the Governor General's Performing Arts Award for Lifetime Artistic Achievement, Canada's highest honour in the performing arts. In 2008, Robertson and the Band received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2011, Robertson was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame. On May 27, 2011, Robertson was made an Officer of the Order of Canada by Governor General David Johnston. In 2014, the Band was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame. October 14, 2017 Robbie Robertson receives the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Native American Music Awards In 2019, Robertson was given a key to the city of Toronto by Mayor John Tory during a TIFF press conference for Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band, a documentary about Robertson. 2019 Robbie Robertson the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award in the Canadian Music Industry Hall of Fame from Canadian Music Week (CMW) As author Robertson co-authored Legends, Icons and Rebels: Music That Changed the World with his son, Sebastian Robertson, and colleagues Jim Guerinot and Jared Levine. He also wrote Hiawatha and the Peacemaker, illustrated by David Shannon. His autobiography, Testimony, written over the course of five years, was published by Crown Archetype in November 2016. Personal life In 1967, Robertson married Dominique Bourgeois, a Canadian journalist. They later divorced. They have three children: daughters Alexandra and Delphine and son Sebastian. Robertson is a member of the Canadian charity Artists Against Racism. Discography Robbie Robertson (1987) Storyville (1991) Music for the Native Americans (soundtrack) (1994) Contact from the Underworld of Redboy (1998) How to Become Clairvoyant (2011) Sinematic (2019) Filmography 1978 – The Last Waltz (performer/producer) 1980 – Carny (actor/writer/producer/composer) 1980 – Raging Bull (music producer) 1982 – The King of Comedy (music producer) 1986 – The Color of Money (composer) 1994 – Jimmy Hollywood (composer) 1995 – Robbie Robertson: Going Home (documentary) 1995 – Casino (music consultant) 1995 – The Crossing Guard (actor – Roger) 1996 – Phenomenon (executive soundtrack producer) 1996 – Dakota Exile (narrator) 1999 – Forces of Nature (creative music consultant) 1999 – Wolves (narrator) 1999 – Any Given Sunday (songs) 2001 – The Life and Times of Robbie Robertson 2002 – Gangs of New York (executive music producer) 2002 – Skins (writer) 2003 – Festival Express (performer) 2004 – Jenifa (executive producer) 2004 – Ladder 49 (original song "Shine Your Light") 2006 – The Departed (music producer) 2007 – Eric Clapton: Crossroads Guitar Festival 2007 (performer) 2010 – Shutter Island (music supervisor) 2012 – Curse of the Axe (narrator) 2013 – Eric Clapton: Crossroads Guitar Festival 2013 (performer) 2013 – The Wolf of Wall Street (executive music producer) 2016 – Silence (executive music producer) 2017 – Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked The World (performer) 2018 – Native America (narrator) 2019 – The Irishman (executive music producer, musical director, musician) 2019 – Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band (himself) TBA – Killers of the Flower Moon See also Notable Aboriginal people of Canada References Further reading External links Robbie Robertson Interview NAMM Oral History Library (2017) 1943 births Canadian country rock musicians Canadian expatriate musicians in the United States Canadian folk rock musicians Canadian male singers Canadian people of Jewish descent Canadian Mohawk people Canadian rock guitarists Canadian male guitarists Canadian rock singers Canadian singer-songwriters Cayuga people First Nations musicians Governor General's Performing Arts Award winners Juno Award for Indigenous Music Album of the Year winners Living people Musicians from Toronto Officers of the Order of Canada The Band members Indspire Awards Native American musicians Jewish Canadian musicians Jewish musicians Jewish rock musicians Jewish singers Juno Award for Album of the Year winners Juno Award for Artist of the Year winners Jack Richardson Producer of the Year Award winners	true	[ "Don Juan Manuel's Tales of Count Lucanor, in Spanish Libro de los ejemplos del conde Lucanor y de Patronio (Book of the Examples of Count Lucanor and of Patronio), also commonly known as El Conde Lucanor, Libro de Patronio, or Libro de los ejemplos (original Old Castilian: Libro de los enxiemplos del Conde Lucanor et de Patronio), is one of the earliest works of prose in Castilian Spanish. It was first written in 1335.\n\nThe book is divided into four parts. The first and most well-known part is a series of 51 short stories (some no more than a page or two) drawn from various sources, such as Aesop and other classical writers, and Arabic folktales.\n\nTales of Count Lucanor was first printed in 1575 when it was published at Seville under the auspices of Argote de Molina. It was again printed at Madrid in 1642, after which it lay forgotten for nearly two centuries.\n\nPurpose and structure\n\nA didactic, moralistic purpose, which would color so much of the Spanish literature to follow (see Novela picaresca), is the mark of this book. Count Lucanor engages in conversation with his advisor Patronio, putting to him a problem (\"Some man has made me a proposition...\" or \"I fear that such and such person intends to...\") and asking for advice. Patronio responds always with the greatest humility, claiming not to wish to offer advice to so illustrious a person as the Count, but offering to tell him a story of which the Count's problem reminds him. (Thus, the stories are \"examples\" [ejemplos] of wise action.) At the end he advises the Count to do as the protagonist of his story did.\n\nEach chapter ends in more or less the same way, with slight variations on: \"And this pleased the Count greatly and he did just so, and found it well. And Don Johán (Juan) saw that this example was very good, and had it written in this book, and composed the following verses.\" A rhymed couplet closes, giving the moral of the story.\n\nOrigin of stories and influence on later literature\nMany of the stories written in the book are the first examples written in a modern European language of various stories, which many other writers would use in the proceeding centuries. Many of the stories he included were themselves derived from other stories, coming from western and Arab sources.\n\nShakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew has the basic elements of Tale 35, \"What Happened to a Young Man Who Married a Strong and Ill-tempered Woman\".\n\nTale 32, \"What Happened to the King and the Tricksters Who Made Cloth\" tells the story that Hans Christian Andersen made popular as The Emperor's New Clothes.\n\nStory 7, \"What Happened to a Woman Named Truhana\", a version of Aesop's The Milkmaid and Her Pail, was claimed by Max Müller to originate in the Hindu cycle Panchatantra.\n\nTale 2, \"What happened to a good Man and his Son, leading a beast to market,\" is the familiar fable The miller, his son and the donkey.\n\nIn 2016, Baroque Decay released a game under the name \"The Count Lucanor\". As well as some protagonists' names, certain events from the books inspired past events in the game.\n\nThe stories\n\nThe book opens with a prologue which introduces the characters of the Count and Patronio. The titles in the following list are those given in Keller and Keating's 1977 translation into English. James York's 1868 translation into English gives a significantly different ordering of the stories and omits the fifty-first.\n\n What Happened to a King and His Favorite \n What Happened to a Good Man and His Son \n How King Richard of England Leapt into the Sea against the Moors\n What a Genoese Said to His Soul When He Was about to Die \n What Happened to a Fox and a Crow Who Had a Piece of Cheese in His Beak\n How the Swallow Warned the Other Birds When She Saw Flax Being Sown \n What Happened to a Woman Named Truhana \n What Happened to a Man Whose Liver Had to Be Washed \n What Happened to Two Horses Which Were Thrown to the Lion \n What Happened to a Man Who on Account of Poverty and Lack of Other Food Was Eating Bitter Lentils \n What Happened to a Dean of Santiago de Compostela and Don Yllán, the Grand Master of Toledo\n What Happened to the Fox and the Rooster \n What Happened to a Man Who Was Hunting Partridges \n The Miracle of Saint Dominick When He Preached against the Usurer \n What Happened to Lorenzo Suárez at the Siege of Seville \n The Reply that count Fernán González Gave to His Relative Núño Laynes \n What Happened to a Very Hungry Man Who Was Half-heartedly Invited to Dinner \n What Happened to Pero Meléndez de Valdés When He Broke His Leg \n What Happened to the Crows and the Owls \n What Happened to a King for Whom a Man Promised to Perform Alchemy \n What Happened to a Young King and a Philosopher to Whom his Father Commended Him \n What Happened to the Lion and the Bull \n How the Ants Provide for Themselves \n What Happened to the King Who Wanted to Test His Three Sons \n What Happened to the Count of Provence and How He Was Freed from Prison by the Advice of Saladin\n What Happened to the Tree of Lies \n What Happened to an Emperor and to Don Alvarfáñez Minaya and Their Wives \n What Happened in Granada to Don Lorenzo Suárez Gallinato When He Beheaded the Renegade Chaplain \n What Happened to a Fox Who Lay down in the Street to Play Dead \n What Happened to King Abenabet of Seville and Ramayquía His Wife \n How a Cardinal Judged between the Canons of Paris and the Friars Minor \n What Happened to the King and the Tricksters Who Made Cloth \n What Happened to Don Juan Manuel's Saker Falcon and an Eagle and a Heron \n What Happened to a Blind Man Who Was Leading Another \n What Happened to a Young Man Who Married a Strong and Ill-tempered Woman\n What Happened to a Merchant When He Found His Son and His Wife Sleeping Together \n What Happened to Count Fernán González with His Men after He Had Won the Battle of Hacinas \n What Happened to a Man Who Was Loaded down with Precious Stones and Drowned in the River \n What Happened to a Man and a Swallow and a Sparrow \n Why the Seneschal of Carcassonne Lost His Soul \n What Happened to a King of Córdova Named Al-Haquem \n What Happened to a Woman of Sham Piety \n What Happened to Good and Evil and the Wise Man and the Madman \n What Happened to Don Pero Núñez the Loyal, to Don Ruy González de Zavallos, and to Don Gutier Roiz de Blaguiello with Don Rodrigo the Generous \n What Happened to a Man Who Became the Devil's Friend and Vassal \n What Happened to a Philosopher who by Accident Went down a Street Where Prostitutes Lived \n What Befell a Moor and His Sister Who Pretended That She Was Timid \n What Happened to a Man Who Tested His Friends \n What Happened to the Man Whom They Cast out Naked on an Island When They Took away from Him the Kingdom He Ruled \n What Happened to Saladin and a Lady, the Wife of a Knight Who Was His Vassal \n What Happened to a Christian King Who Was Very Powerful and Haughty\n\nReferences\n\nNotes\n\nBibliography\n\n Sturm, Harlan\n\n Wacks, David\n\nExternal links\n\nThe Internet Archive provides free access to the 1868 translation by James York.\nJSTOR has the to the 1977 translation by Keller and Keating.\nSelections in English and Spanish (pedagogical edition) with introduction, notes, and bibliography in Open Iberia/América (open access teaching anthology)\n\n14th-century books\nSpanish literature\n1335 books", "\"What Happened to Us\" is a song by Australian recording artist Jessica Mauboy, featuring English recording artist Jay Sean. It was written by Sean, Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim and Israel Cruz. \"What Happened to Us\" was leaked online in October 2010, and was released on 10 March 2011, as the third single from Mauboy's second studio album, Get 'Em Girls (2010). The song received positive reviews from critics.\n\nA remix of \"What Happened to Us\" made by production team OFM, was released on 11 April 2011. A different version of the song which features Stan Walker, was released on 29 May 2011. \"What Happened to Us\" charted on the ARIA Singles Chart at number 14 and was certified platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA). An accompanying music video was directed by Mark Alston, and reminisces on a former relationship between Mauboy and Sean.\n\nProduction and release\n\n\"What Happened to Us\" was written by Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim, Israel Cruz and Jay Sean. It was produced by Skaller, Cruz, Rohaim and Bobby Bass. The song uses C, D, and B minor chords in the chorus. \"What Happened to Us\" was sent to contemporary hit radio in Australia on 14 February 2011. The cover art for the song was revealed on 22 February on Mauboy's official Facebook page. A CD release was available for purchase via her official website on 10 March, for one week only. It was released digitally the following day.\n\nReception\nMajhid Heath from ABC Online Indigenous called the song a \"Jordin Sparks-esque duet\", and wrote that it \"has a nice innocence to it that rings true to the experience of losing a first love.\" Chris Urankar from Nine to Five wrote that it as a \"mid-tempo duet ballad\" which signifies Mauboy's strength as a global player. On 21 March 2011, \"What Happened to Us\" debuted at number 30 on the ARIA Singles Chart, and peaked at number 14 the following week. The song was certified platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA), for selling 70,000 copies. \"What Happened to Us\" spent a total of ten weeks in the ARIA top fifty.\n\nMusic video\n\nBackground\nThe music video for the song was shot in the Elizabeth Bay House in Sydney on 26 November 2010. The video was shot during Sean's visit to Australia for the Summerbeatz tour. During an interview with The Daily Telegraph while on the set of the video, Sean said \"the song is sick! ... Jessica's voice is amazing and we're shooting [the video] in this ridiculously beautiful mansion overlooking the harbour.\" The video was directed by Mark Alston, who had previously directed the video for Mauboy's single \"Let Me Be Me\" (2009). It premiered on YouTube on 10 February 2011.\n\nSynopsis and reception\nThe video begins showing Mauboy who appears to be sitting on a yellow antique couch in a mansion, wearing a purple dress. As the video progresses, scenes of memories are displayed of Mauboy and her love interest, played by Sean, spending time there previously. It then cuts to the scenes where Sean appears in the main entrance room of the mansion. The final scene shows Mauboy outdoors in a gold dress, surrounded by green grass and trees. She is later joined by Sean who appears in a black suit and a white shirt, and together they sing the chorus of the song to each other. David Lim of Feed Limmy wrote that the video is \"easily the best thing our R&B princess has committed to film – ever\" and praised the \"mansion and wondrous interior décor\". He also commended Mauboy for choosing Australian talent to direct the video instead of American directors, which she had used for her previous two music videos. Since its release, the video has received over two million views on Vevo.\n\nLive performances\nMauboy performed \"What Happened to Us\" live for the first time during her YouTube Live Sessions program on 4 December 2010. She also appeared on Adam Hills in Gordon Street Tonight on 23 February 2011 for an interview and later performed the song. On 15 March 2011, Mauboy performed \"What Happened to Us\" on Sunrise. She also performed the song with Stan Walker during the Australian leg of Chris Brown's F.A.M.E. Tour in April 2011. Mauboy and Walker later performed \"What Happened to Us\" on Dancing with the Stars Australia on 29 May 2011. From November 2013 to February 2014, \"What Happened to Us\" was part of the set list of the To the End of the Earth Tour, Mauboy's second headlining tour of Australia, with Nathaniel Willemse singing Sean's part.\n\nTrack listing\n\nDigital download\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean – 3:19\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Sgt Slick Remix) – 6:33\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Just Witness Remix) – 3:45\n\nCD single\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Album Version) – 3:19\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Sgt Slick Remix) – 6:33\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (OFM Remix) – 3:39\n\nDigital download – Remix\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (OFM Remix) – 3:38\n\nDigital download\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Stan Walker – 3:20\n\nPersonnel\nSongwriting – Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim, Israel Cruz, Jay Sean\nProduction – Jeremy Skaller, Bobby Bass\nAdditional production – Israel Cruz, Khaled Rohaim\nLead vocals – Jessica Mauboy, Jay Sean\nMixing – Phil Tan\nAdditional mixing – Damien Lewis\nMastering – Tom Coyne \nSource:\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly chart\n\nYear-end chart\n\nCertification\n\nRadio dates and release history\n\nReferences\n\n2010 songs\n2011 singles\nJessica Mauboy songs\nJay Sean songs\nSongs written by Billy Steinberg\nSongs written by Jay Sean\nSongs written by Josh Alexander\nSongs written by Israel Cruz\nVocal duets\nSony Music Australia singles\nSongs written by Khaled Rohaim" ]
[ "Robbie Robertson", "1967-1968 (Music From Big Pink)", "What happened in 1967?", "In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967)." ]	C_ea62ce7604624d0ba7e25bc05367e754_0	Was his album successful?	2	Was Robbie Robertson's album John Wesley Harding successful?	Robbie Robertson	In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967). After recording the basic tracks, Dylan asked Robertson and Garth Hudson about playing on the album to fill out the sound. However, when Robertson heard the tracks, he liked the starkness of the sound and recommended that Dylan leave the songs as they were. Dylan worked with the members of the Hawks once again when they appeared as his backup band at two Woody Guthrie memorial concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York City in January 1968. Three of these performances were later released by Columbia Records on the LP A Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Vol. 1 (1972). Over the course of the "Basement Tapes" period, the group had developed a sound of their own, and Grossman went to Los Angeles to shop the group to a major label, securing a contract with Capitol Records. The group went to New York to begin recording songs with music producer John Simon. Capitol brought the group to Los Angeles to finish the album. The resulting album, Music From Big Pink, was released in August 1968. Robertson wrote four of the songs on Music From Big Pink, including "The Weight", "Chest Fever", "Caledonia Mission," and "To Kingdom Come". Robertson is listed in the songwriting credits as "J.R. Robertson". Robertson sang lead vocal on the track "To Kingdom Come"; he would not sing on another Band song released to the public until "Knockin' Lost John" on 1977's Islands. Two of Robertson's compositions for the album, "The Weight" and "Chest Fever", would become important touchstones in the group's career. "The Weight" was influenced by the films of director Luis Bunuel, in particular Nazarin (1959) and Viridiana (1961), and reflects the recurring theme in Bunuel's films about the impossibility of sainthood. The song portrays an individual who attempts to take a saintly pilgrimage, and becomes mired down with requests from other people to do favors for them along the way. The mention of "Nazareth" at the beginning of the song refers to Nazareth, Pennsylvania, where the C. F. Martin & Company guitar manufacturer is located; it was inspired by Robertson seeing the word "Nazareth" in the hole of his Martin guitar. Although "The Weight" reached #21 on the British radio charts, it did not fare as well on the American charts, initially stalling at #63. However, the song gained traction due to more successful covers by Jackie DeShannon (US #55, 1968), Aretha Franklin (US #19, 1969), and The Supremes with The Temptations (US #46, 1969), as well as to the song's inclusion in the movie Easy Rider (1969), which became a runaway success. "The Weight" has since become The Band's best known song. It has been covered by many artists, appeared in dozens of films and documentaries, and has become a staple in American rock music. When Music from Big Pink was released in 1968, The Band initially avoided media attention, and discouraged Capitol Records from promotional efforts. They also did not immediately pursue touring to support the album, and declined to be interviewed for a year. The resulting mystery surrounding the group led to speculation in the underground press. Music from Big Pink received excellent reviews, and the album influenced many well-known musicians of the period. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Jaime Royal "Robbie" Robertson, OC (born July 5, 1943), is a Canadian musician, songwriter, film composer, producer, actor, and author. Robertson is best known for his work as lead guitarist and songwriter for The Band, and for his career as a solo recording artist. Robertson's work with The Band was instrumental in creating the Americana music genre. Robertson has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Canadian Music Hall of Fame as a member of The Band, and has been inducted to Canada's Walk of Fame, both with The Band and on his own. He is ranked 59th in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 100 greatest guitarists. As a songwriter, Robertson is credited for writing "The Weight", "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down", "Up on Cripple Creek" with The Band, and had solo hits with "Broken Arrow" and "Somewhere Down the Crazy River", and many others. He has been inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, and received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Songwriters. As a film soundtrack producer and composer, Robertson is known for his collaborations with director Martin Scorsese, which began with the rockumentary film The Last Waltz (1978), and continued through a number of dramatic films, including Raging Bull (1980), The King of Comedy (1983), Casino (1995), The Departed (2006), The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) and The Irishman (2019). He has worked on many other soundtracks for film and television. Early life Robertson was born Jaime Royal Robertson on July 5, 1943. He was an only child. His mother was Rosemarie Dolly Chrysler, born February 6, 1922. She was Cayuga and Mohawk, raised on the Six Nations Reserve southwest of Toronto, Ontario. Chrysler lived with an aunt in the Cabbagetown neighbourhood and worked at the Coro jewellery plating factory. She met James Patrick Robertson at the factory and they married in 1942. Rosemarie and James Robertson continued to work at the factory where they met. The family lived in several homes in different Toronto neighbourhoods when Robbie was a child. He often travelled with his mother to the Six Nations Reserve to visit her family. It was here that Robertson was mentored in playing guitar by family members, in particular his older cousin Herb Myke. He became a fan of rock 'n' roll and R&B through the radio, listening to disc jockey George "Hound Dog" Lorenz play rock 'n' roll on WKBW in Buffalo, New York, and staying up at night to listen to disc jockey John R.'s all-night blues show on WLAC, a clear-channel station in Nashville, Tennessee. When Robertson was in his early teens, his parents separated. His mother revealed to Robertson that his biological father was not James, but Alexander David Klegerman, a Jewish man whom she had met working at the Coro factory. He became a professional gambler and was killed in a hit-and-run accident on the Queen Elizabeth Way. She had been with him while James Robertson was stationed in Newfoundland with the Canadian Army, before she married James. After telling Robertson, his mother arranged for the youth to meet his paternal uncles Morris (Morrie) and Nathan (Natie) Klegerman. Career When Robertson was 14, he worked two brief summer jobs in the travelling carnival circuit, first for a few days in a suburb of Toronto, and later as an assistant at a freak show for three weeks during the Canadian National Exhibition. He drew from this for his song "Life is a Carnival" (with the Band) and the movie Carny (1980), which he produced and starred in. The first band Robertson joined was Little Caesar and the Consuls, formed in 1956 by pianist/vocalist Bruce Morshead and guitarist Gene MacLellan. He stayed with the group for almost a year, playing popular songs of the day at local teen dances. In 1957 he formed Robbie and the Rhythm Chords with his friend Pete "Thumper" Traynor (who would later found Traynor Amplifiers). They changed the name to Robbie and the Robots after they watched the film Forbidden Planet and took a liking to the film's character Robby the Robot. Traynor customized Robertson's guitar for the Robots, fitting it with antennae and wires to give it a space age look. Traynor and Robertson joined with pianist Scott Cushnie and became The Suedes. At a Suedes show on October 5, 1959, when they played CHUM Radio's Hif Fi Club on Toronto's Merton Street, Ronnie Hawkins first became aware of them and was impressed enough to join them for a few numbers. With Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks Robertson began shadowing Hawkins. After the Suedes opened for the Arkansas-based rockabilly group Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks at Dixie Arena, Hawkins hired Robertson for the Hawks' road crew. Hawkins recorded two songs co-credited to Robertson, "Hey Baba Lou" and "Someone Like You", for his album Mr. Dynamo (1959), and brought Robertson to the Brill Building in New York City to help him choose songs for the rest of the album. Hawkins hired pianist Scott Cushnie away from the Suedes, and took him on tour with Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks in Arkansas. When the Hawks' bass player left the group, Cushnie recommended that Hawkins hire Robertson to replace him on bass. Hawkins invited Robertson to Arkansas, and flew to the UK to perform on television there. Left in Arkansas, Robertson spent his living allowance on records and practised intensively each day. Upon returning, Hawkins hired him to play bass. Cushnie left the band a few months later. Robertson soon switched over from bass to playing lead guitar for the Hawks. Robertson developed into a guitar virtuoso. Roy Buchanan, a few years older than Robertson, was briefly a member of the Hawks and became an important influence on Robertson's guitar style: "Standing next to Buchanan on stage for several months, Robertson was able to absorb Buchanan’s deft manipulations with his volume speed dial, his tendency to bend multiple strings for steel guitar-like effect, his rapid sweep picking and his passion for bending past the root and fifth notes during solo flights." Drummer/singer Levon Helm was already a member of the Hawks and soon became close friends with Robertson. The Hawks continued to tour the United States and Canada, adding Rick Danko, Richard Manuel, and Garth Hudson to the Hawks lineup in 1961. This lineup, which later became The Band, toured with Hawkins throughout 1962 and into 1963. They also hired the saxophone player Jerry Penfound and later Bruce Bruno, who were both with the group in their intermediary period as Levon and the Hawks. Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks cut sessions for Roulette Records throughout 1961–1963, all of which Robertson appeared on. The sessions included three singles: "Come Love" b/w "I Feel Good" (Roulette 4400 1961); "Who Do You Love" b/w "Bo Diddley" (Roulette 4483 1963); and "There's A Screw Loose" b/w "High Blood Pressure" (Roulette 4502 1963). With Levon and the Hawks The Hawks left Ronnie Hawkins at the beginning of 1964 to go on their own. The members of the Hawks were losing interest in playing in the rockabilly style and favoured blues and soul music. In early 1964, the group approached agent Harold Kudlets about representing them, which he agreed to do, booking them a year's worth of shows in the same circuits as they had been in before with Ronnie Hawkins. Originally dubbed The Levon Helm Sextet, the group included all of the future members of The Band, plus Jerry Penfound on saxophone and Bob Bruno on vocals. After Bruno left in May 1964, the group changed their name to Levon and the Hawks. Penfound stayed with the group until 1965. Kudlets kept the group busy performing throughout 1964 and into 1965, finally booking them into two lengthy summer engagements at the popular nightclub Tony Mart's in Somers Point, New Jersey, at the Shore. They played six nights a week alongside Conway Twitty and other acts. The members of Levon and the Hawks befriended blues artist John P. Hammond while he was performing in Toronto in 1964. Later in the year, the group agreed to work on Hammond's album So Many Roads (released in 1965) at the same time that they were playing the Peppermint Lounge in New York City. Robertson played guitar throughout the album, and was billed "Jaime R. Robertson" in the album's credits. Levon and the Hawks cut a single "Uh Uh Uh" b/w "Leave Me Alone" under the name the Canadian Squires in March 1965. Both songs were written by Robertson. The single was recorded in New York and released on Apex Records in the United States and on Ware Records in Canada. As Levon and the Hawks, the group cut an afternoon session for Atco Records later in 1965, which yielded two singles, "The Stones I Throw" b/w "He Don't Love You" (Atco 6383) and "Go, Go, Liza Jane" b/w "He Don't Love You" (Atco 6625). Robertson also wrote all three of the tracks on Levon and the Hawks' Atco singles. With Bob Dylan and the Hawks 1965–1966 World Tour Toward the end of Levon and the Hawks' second engagement at Tony Mart's in New Jersey, in August 1965, Robertson received a call from Albert Grossman Management requesting a meeting with singer Bob Dylan. The group had been recommended to both Grossman and to Dylan by Mary Martin, one of Grossman's employees; she was originally from Toronto and was a friend of the band. Dylan was also aware of the group through his friend John Hammond, whose album So Many Roads members of the Hawks had performed on. Robertson agreed to meet with Dylan. Initially, Dylan intended simply to hire Robertson as the guitarist for his backing group. Robertson refused the offer, but did agree to play two shows with Dylan, one at the Forest Hills Tennis Stadium in Forest Hills, New York on August 28, and one at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles on September 3. Robertson suggested they use Levon Helm on drums for the shows. Robertson and Helm performed in Dylan's backing band, along with Harvey Brooks and Al Kooper for both shows. The first at Forest Hills received a predominantly hostile response, but the second in Los Angeles was received slightly more favourably. Dylan flew up to Toronto and rehearsed with Levon and the Hawks September 15–17, as Levon and the Hawks finished an engagement there, and hired the full band for his upcoming tour. Bob Dylan and the Hawks toured the United States throughout October–December 1965, with each show consisting of two sets: an acoustic show featuring only Dylan on guitar and harmonica, and an electric set featuring Dylan backed by the Hawks. The tours were largely met with a hostile reaction from fans who knew Dylan as a prominent figure in the American folk music revival, and thought his move into rock music a betrayal. Helm left the group after their November 28 performance in Washington, D.C. Session drummer Bobby Gregg replaced Helm for the December dates, and Sandy Konikoff was brought in to replace Gregg in January 1966. Dylan and the Hawks played more dates in the continental United States in February–March 1966 of the 1966 world tour. From April 9-May 27, they played Hawaii, Australia, Europe, and the UK and Ireland. Drummer Sandy Konikoff left after the Pacific Northwest dates in March, and Mickey Jones replaced him, staying with the group for the remainder of the tour. The Australian and European legs of the tour received a particularly harsh response from disgruntled folk fans. The May 17 Manchester Free Trade Hall show is best known for an angry audience member audibly yelling "Judas!" at Dylan; it became a frequently-bootlegged live show from the tour, was eventually released officially as The Bootleg Series Vol. 4: Bob Dylan Live 1966, The "Royal Albert Hall" Concert. The European leg of the tour was filmed by documentary filmmaker D. A. Pennebaker, but completion of a planned film was delayed. After recovering from an accident, Dylan decided to edit it himself. ABC television rejected it, and it was never commercially released. It was screened as Eat the Document in 1972 at the Whitney Museum in New York. On November 30, 1965, Dylan cut a studio session with members of the Hawks, which yielded the non-LP single "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?" Dylan completed the Blonde on Blonde album in Nashville in mid-February 1966, employing Robertson for one of these sessions, which took place on February 14. The "Basement Tapes" period On July 29, 1966, Dylan sustained an injured neck from a motorcycle accident, and retreated to a quiet domestic life with his new wife and child in upstate New York. Some of the members of the Hawks were living at the Chelsea Hotel in New York City at the time, and were kept on a weekly retainer by Dylan's management. In February 1967, Dylan invited the members of the Hawks to come up to Woodstock, New York to work on music. Robertson had met a French-Canadian woman on the Paris stop of Dylan's 1966 world tour, and the two moved into a house in the Woodstock area. The remaining three members of the Hawks rented a house near West Saugerties, New York; it was later dubbed "Big Pink" because of its pink exterior. Dylan and the members of the Hawks worked together at the "Big Pink" house every day to rehearse and generate ideas for new songs, many of which they recorded in "Big Pink"'s makeshift basement studio. The recordings were made between the late spring and autumn of 1967. Previous Hawks member Levon Helm returned to the group in August 1967. By this time, Robertson's guitar style had evolved to be more supportive of the song and less devoted to displaying speed and virtuosity. In time, word about these sessions began to circulate, and in 1968, Rolling Stone magazine co-founder Jann Wenner brought attention to these tracks in an article entitled "Dylan's Basement Tape Should Be Released". In 1969, a bootleg album with a plain white cover compiled by two incognito music industry insiders featured a collection of seven tracks from these sessions. The album, which became known as The Great White Wonder, began to appear in independent record stores and receive radio airplay. This album became a runaway success and helped to launch the bootleg recording industry. In 1975, Robertson would produce an official compilation, The Basement Tapes, which included a selection of tracks from the sessions. An exhaustive collection of all 138 extant recordings was released in 2014 as The Bootleg Series Vol. 11: The Basement Tapes Complete. With the Band 1967–1968 (Music From Big Pink) In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967). After recording the basic tracks, Dylan asked Robertson and Garth Hudson about playing on the album to fill out the sound. However, when Robertson heard the tracks, he liked the starkness of the sound and recommended that Dylan leave the songs as they were. Dylan worked with the members of the Hawks again when they appeared as his backup band at two Woody Guthrie memorial concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York City in January 1968. Three of these performances were later released by Columbia Records on the LP A Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Vol. 1 (1972). Over the course of the "Basement Tapes" period, the group had developed a sound of their own, and Grossman went to Los Angeles to shop the group to a major label, securing a contract with Capitol Records. The group went to New York to begin recording songs with music producer John Simon. Capitol brought the group to Los Angeles to finish the album. The resulting album, Music From Big Pink, was released in August 1968. Robertson wrote four of the songs on Music From Big Pink, including "The Weight", "Chest Fever", "Caledonia Mission," and "To Kingdom Come". Robertson is listed in the songwriting credits as "J.R. Robertson". Robertson sang lead vocal on the track "To Kingdom Come"; he would not sing on another Band song released to the public until "Knockin' Lost John" on 1977's Islands. Two of Robertson's compositions for the album, "The Weight" and "Chest Fever", would become important touchstones in the group's career. "The Weight" was influenced by the films of director Luis Buñuel, in particular Nazarín (1959) and Viridiana (1961), and reflects the recurring theme in Buñuel's films about the impossibility of sainthood. The song portrays an individual who attempts to take a saintly pilgrimage, and becomes mired down with requests from other people to do favors for them along the way. The mention of "Nazareth" at the beginning of the song refers to Nazareth, Pennsylvania, where the C. F. Martin & Company guitar manufacturer is located; it was inspired by Robertson seeing the word "Nazareth" in the hole of his Martin guitar. Although "The Weight" reached #21 on the British radio charts, it did not fare as well on the American charts, initially stalling at #63. But the song gained traction following more successful covers by Jackie DeShannon (US #55, 1968), Aretha Franklin (US #19, 1969), and the Supremes with the Temptations (US #46, 1969), and the song's inclusion in the movie Easy Rider (1969), which became a runaway success. "The Weight" has since become the Band's best known song. It has been covered by many artists, appeared in dozens of films and documentaries, and has become a staple in American rock music. When Music from Big Pink was released in 1968, the Band initially avoided media attention, and discouraged Capitol Records from promotional efforts. They also did not immediately pursue touring to support the album, and declined to be interviewed for a year. The resulting mystery surrounding the group prompted speculation in the underground press. Music from Big Pink received excellent reviews, and the album influenced many well-known musicians of the period. 1969 The Band In early 1969, the Band rented a home from Sammy Davis Jr. in Hollywood Hills, and converted the pool house behind it into a studio to recreate the "clubhouse" atmosphere that they had previously enjoyed at "Big Pink". The band began recording every day in the pool house studio, working on a tight schedule to complete the album. An additional three tracks were recorded at The Hit Factory in New York in April 1969. Robertson did most of the audio engineering on the album. The Band began performing regularly in spring 1969, with their first live dates as the Band taking place at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. Their most notable performances that year were at the 1969 Woodstock Festival and the UK Isle of Wight Festival with Bob Dylan in August. The Band's album The Band was released in September 1969, and became a critical and commercial success. The album received almost universal critical praise, peaked at #9 on the US pop charts, and stayed in the Top 40 for 24 weeks. The Band works as a loose concept album of Americana themes, and was instrumental in the creation of the Americana music genre. It was included in the Library of Congress' National Recording Registry in 2009. The song from this album that had the strongest cultural influence was "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down". The song explores a Confederate man's life after defeat of the South following the American Civil War. It incorporates historical events to create a larger American mythos. Although the Band's original version was not released as a single, a cover version by Joan Baez went to #3 on the charts in 1971 and helped to popularize the song. Several other tracks from The Band received significant radio airplay, and would become staples in the group's concert appearances. "Up on Cripple Creek" peaked at #25 in late 1969 in the United States, and would be their only Top 30 hit there. "Rag Mama Rag" reached #16 in the UK in April 1970, the highest chart position of any single by the group in that country. "Whispering Pines", co-written by Richard Manuel, was released as a single in France in 1970, and would become the title of a 2009 book about Canadian contributions to the Americana music genre by Jason Schneider. On November 2, 1969, the Band appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, one of only two television appearances they would make. 1970–1973 (Stage Fright through Moondog Matinee) On January 12, 1970, the Band was featured on the cover of Time magazine. This was the first time a North American rock band featured on the cover of the magazine. The Band rented The Woodstock Playhouse in Woodstock, New York with the intent of recording a new live album there, but the city council voted against it, so they recorded on location, but without an audience. Robertson handled most of the songwriting duties as before. Robertson brought in Todd Rundgren to engineer the album which was recorded in two weeks' time. These sessions became their third album, Stage Fright, which would become the Band's highest charting album, peaking at #5 on September 5 and staying in the Billboard Top 40 for 14 weeks. The Band's next album, Cahoots, was recorded at Albert Grossman's newly built Bearsville Studios and was released in October 1971. The album received mixed reviews, and peaked at #24 on the Billboard charts, only remaining in the Billboard Top 40 for five weeks. Cahoots is notable for its cover of Bob Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece", as well as for featuring the concert favourite "Life Is a Carnival". The inclusion of "When I Paint My Masterpiece" came about when Dylan stopped by Robertson's home during the recording of Cahoots and Robertson asked if he might have any songs to contribute. That led to Dylan playing an unfinished version of "When I Paint My Masterpiece" for him. Dylan completed the song soon afterwards, and the Band recorded it for the album. "Life Is a Carnival" features horn parts written by producer and arranger Allen Toussaint. It would be the only track from Cahoots the group would keep in their set list through to The Last Waltz concert and film. The Band continued to tour throughout 1970-71. A live album recorded at a series of shows at the Academy of Music in New York City between December 28–31, 1971, was released in 1972 as the double album Rock Of Ages. Rock of Ages peaked at #6, and remained in the Top 40 for 14 weeks. After the Academy of Music shows, the Band again retreated from performing live. They returned to the stage on July 28, 1973, to play the Summer Jam at Watkins Glen alongside the Allman Brothers Band and the Grateful Dead. A recording of the Band's performance was released by Capitol Records as the album Live at Watkins Glen in 1995. With over 600,000 people in attendance, the festival set a record for "Pop Festival Attendance" in the Guinness Book of World Records. The record was first published in the 1976 edition of the book. In October 1973, the Band released an album of cover songs entitled Moondog Matinee, which peaked at #28 on the Billboard charts. Around the time of the recording of Moondog Matinee, Robertson began working on an ambitious project entitled Works that was never finished or released. One lyric from the Works project, "Lay a flower in the snow," was used in Robertson's song "Fallen Angel", which appeared on his 1987 self-titled solo album. 1974 Reunion with Bob Dylan (Planet Waves and Before the Flood) In February 1973, Bob Dylan relocated from Woodstock, New York to Malibu, California. Coincidentally, Robertson moved to Malibu in the summer of 1973, and by October of the year the rest of the members of the Band had followed suit, moving into properties near Zuma Beach. David Geffen had signed Dylan to Asylum Records, and worked with promoter Bill Graham on the concept that would become the Bob Dylan and the Band 1974 Tour. It would be Dylan's first tour in more than seven years. Meanwhile, Bill Graham took out a full page advertisement for the Bob Dylan and the Band tour in the New York Times. The response was one of the largest in entertainment history up to that point, with between 5 and 6 million requests for tickets mailed in for 650,000 seats. Graham's office ended up selling tickets off on a lottery basis, and Dylan and the Band netted $2 million from the deal. Amongst the rehearsals and preparations, the Band went into the studio with Bob Dylan to record a new album for Asylum Records that would become the Bob Dylan album Planet Waves (1974). Sessions took place at Village Recorder in West Los Angeles, California, from November 2–14, 1973. Planet Waves was released on February 9, 1974. The album was #1 on the Billboard album charts for four weeks, and spent 12 weeks total in the Billboard Top 40. Planet Waves was Bob Dylan's first #1 album, and the first and only time Bob Dylan and the Band recorded a studio album together. The 1974 tour began at the Chicago Stadium on January 3, 1974, and ended at The Forum in Inglewood, California on February 14. The shows began with more songs from the new Planet Waves album and with covers that Dylan and the Band liked, but as the tour went on, they moved toward playing older and more familiar material, only keeping "Forever Young" from the Planet Waves album in the set list. Dylan and the Band played a number of tracks from the controversial 1965–1966 World Tour, this time to wildly enthusiastic response from the audience where there had been mixed reaction and boos a mere nine years previously. The final three shows of the tour at The Forum in Inglewood, California were recorded and assembled into the double album Before the Flood. Credited to "Bob Dylan/The Band", Before the Flood was released by Asylum Records on July 20, 1974. The album debuted at #3 on the Billboard charts, and spent ten weeks in the Top Forty. 1974–1975 (Shangri-La Studios, The Basement Tapes, and Northern Lights – Southern Cross) Following the 1974 reunion tour with Bob Dylan, rock manager Elliot Roberts booked the Band with the recently reunited Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. On September 4, both artists played Wembley Stadium in London, appearing with Jesse Colin Young and Joni Mitchell. After moving to Malibu in 1973, Robertson and the Band had discovered a ranch in Malibu near Zuma Beach called "Shangri-La", and decided to lease the property. The main house on the property had originally been built by Lost Horizon (1937) actress Margo Albert, and the ranch had been the filming and stabling site for the Mister Ed television show in the 1960s. In the interim, the house had served as a high-class bordello. The album release of The Basement Tapes, credited to Bob Dylan and the Band, was the first album production that took place in the new studio. The album, produced by Robertson, featured a selection of tapes from the original 1967 Basement Tapes sessions with Dylan, as well as demos for tracks eventually recorded for Music From Big Pink album. Robertson cleaned up the tracks, and the album was released in July 1975. Shangri-La Studios proved to be a return to a clubhouse atmosphere that the Band had enjoyed previously at Big Pink, and in the spring of 1975, the group began work on Northern Lights – Southern Cross, their first release of original material in four years. One of the best known tracks on the album is "Acadian Driftwood", the first song with specifically Canadian subject material. Robertson was inspired to write "Acadian Driftwood" after seeing the documentary L'Acadie, l'Acadie (1971) on Canadian television while in Montreal. Two other notable tracks from that album are "It Makes No Difference" and "Ophelia". Northern Lights – Southern Cross was released on November 1, 1975. The album received generally positive reviews, and reached #26 on the Billboard charts, remaining in the Top 40 for five weeks. 1976 (Islands and The Last Waltz concert) The Band began touring again in June 1976, performing throughout the summer. The members of the Band were splintering off to work on other projects, with Levon Helm building a studio in Woodstock and Rick Danko having been contracted to Arista Records as a solo artist. While on the summer tour, member Richard Manuel was involved in a boating accident that severely injured his neck, and ten dates of the 25-date tour were cancelled. It was during this time period that Robertson introduced the concept that the Band would cease to operate as a touring act. According to Robertson, the group's mutual agreement was that they would stage one final "grand finale" show, part ways to work on their various projects, and then regroup. Helm later made the case in his autobiography, This Wheel's on Fire, that Robertson had forced the Band's breakup on the rest of the group. Concert promoter Bill Graham booked the Band at the Winterland Ballroom on Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976. The show was intended as a gala event, with ticket prices of $25 per person. The event would include a Thanksgiving dinner served to the audience, and would feature the Band performing with various musical guests. The onstage guest list included Ronnie Hawkins, Muddy Waters, Paul Butterfield, Dr. John, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, Neil Diamond, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, and others. Robertson wanted to document the event on film, and approached director Martin Scorsese to see if he would be interested in shooting the concert. The Winterland concert was called The Last Waltz. Robertson and Scorsese developed a 200-page script for the show, listing out in columns the lyrics of the songs, who was singing what part, and what instruments were being featured. It included columns for the camera and lighting work. Scorsese brought in all-star cameramen such as Michael Chapman, László Kovács and Vilmos Zsigmond to film the show in 35mm. John Simon, producer on the Band's first two albums, was brought in to coordinate rehearsals and work as musical director. Boris Leven was brought in as art director. Jonathan Taplin assumed the role of executive producer, and Robertson worked as producer of the film. Rehearsals for The Last Waltz concert began in early November. Warner Bros. Records president Mo Ostin offered to finance the production of The Last Waltz film in exchange for the rights to release music from The Last Waltz as an album. However, the group were contractually obligated to supply Capitol Records with one more album before they could be released to work with Warner Bros. So in between rehearsing, the Band worked on the studio album Islands for Capitol. Robertson wrote or co-wrote eight of the ten tracks. One of the songs, "Knockin' Lost John", features Robertson on vocals, and was the first Band song Robertson had sung on since "To Kingdom Come" from Music From Big Pink. "Christmas Must Be Tonight" was inspired by the birth of Robertson's son, Sebastian, in July 1974. The Last Waltz concert event took place on Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976. Approximately five thousand people were in attendance. The event began at 5 pm, beginning with the audience members being served a full traditional Thanksgiving meal at candlelit tables, with a vegetarian table serving an alternate menu as an option. The Berkeley Promenade Orchestra played waltz music for dancing afterwards. The tables were cleared and moved at 8 pm. At 9 pm, the Band played songs for an hour, beginning with "Up On Cripple Creek". Just after 10 pm, Robertson introduced Ronnie Hawkins, the first onstage guest, with a succession of guest stars appearing with the group until just after midnight. The group took a 30-minute break, during which several Bay Area poets performed readings of their poems. After the break, the Band returned to the stage, performing, among other songs, a new composition entitled "The Last Waltz Theme" that Robertson had just completed less than 48 hours prior. Bob Dylan was brought in at the end of this second set, performing several songs, and finally being joined with the other guest stars for a finale performance of "I Shall Be Released". This was then followed with two all-star jam sessions, after which the Band returned to the stage to close the show with one more song, their rendition of "Baby Don't You Do It". 1977–1978 (The Last Waltz film and album) After The Last Waltz concert event was finished, director Martin Scorsese had 400 reels of raw footage to work with, and began editing the footage. The film was then sold to United Artists. In the meantime, Robertson and Scorsese continued to brainstorm more ideas for the film. In April 1977, country singer Emmylou Harris and gospel vocal group the Staple Singers were filmed on a sound stage at MGM performing with the Band. Emmylou Harris performed on "Evangeline", a new song written by Robertson, and the Staples Singers performed on a new recording of "The Weight," which they themselves had recorded a version of in 1968. Scorsese's next idea was to intersperse the concert footage with interviews of the Band that told their story. Scorsese conducted the interviews. The Last Waltz album was released by Warner Brothers Records on April 7, 1978, as a 3-LP set. The first five sides feature live performances from the concert, and the last side contains studio recordings from the MGM sound stage sessions. The album peaked at #16 on the Billboard charts, and remained in the Top 40 for 8 weeks. The Last Waltz film was released to theatres on April 26, 1978. The film fared well with both rock and film critics. Robertson and Scorsese made appearances throughout America and Europe to promote the film. Over time, The Last Waltz has become lauded by many as an important and pioneering rockumentary. Its influence has been felt on subsequent rock music films such as Talking Heads' Stop Making Sense (1984), and U2's Rattle and Hum (1988). Production and session work outside of the Band 1970–1977 Robertson produced Jesse Winchester's debut self-titled album, which was released in 1970 on Ampex Records. The album features Robertson playing guitar throughout the album, and co-credits the track "Snow" to Robertson as well. Robertson played guitar on ex-Beatle Ringo Starr's third solo album, Ringo (1973), performing with four-fifths of the Band on the track "Sunshine Life For Me (Sail Away Raymond)". Robertson contributed a guitar solo on the track "Snookeroo" on Starr's fourth album, Goodnight Vienna (1974). Robertson played guitar for Joni Mitchell on the track "Raised on Robbery", which was released on her album Court and Spark. In 1974, Robertson also played guitar on Carly Simon's version of "Mockingbird", which featured Simon singing with her then-husband James Taylor. In 1975, Robertson produced and played guitar on singer/guitarist Hirth Martinez's debut album Hirth From Earth. Bob Dylan had heard Martinez, and recommended him to Robertson. Robertson identified strongly with Martinez' music, helped him to secure a recording contract with Warner Bros. Records, and agreed to produce Martinez' debut album. He also played guitar on Martinez' follow-up album, Big Bright Street (1977). In 1975, Eric Clapton recorded the album No Reason to Cry at the Band's Shangri-La Studios with help from members of the Band. Robertson played lead guitar on the track "Sign Language". In the mid-1970s, Robertson connected with singer Neil Diamond, and the two began collaborating on a concept album about the life and struggles of a Tin Pan Alley songwriter. The resulting album, entitled Beautiful Noise, was recorded at Shangri-La Studios in early 1976. It reached #6 on the Billboard charts and remained in the Top 40 for sixteen weeks. Robertson produced the album, co-wrote the track "Dry Your Eyes" with Diamond, and played guitar on "Dry Your Eyes", "Lady-Oh", and "Jungletime". He produced Diamond's live double album Love at the Greek (1977), which was recorded in 1976 at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles. Love at the Greek reached #8 on the Billboard charts and remained in the Top 40 for nine weeks. In 1977, Robertson contributed to two album projects from the Band alumni. Robertson played guitar on "Java Blues" on Rick Danko's self-titled debut album, and also played guitar on the Earl King-penned "Sing, Sing, Sing" on the album Levon Helm & the RCO All-Stars. Also in 1977, Robertson contributed to the second self-titled album by singer-songwriter Libby Titus, who was the former girlfriend of Levon Helm. Robertson produced the track "The Night You Took Me To Barbados In My Dreams" (co-written by Titus and Hirth Martinez), and produced and played guitar on the Cole Porter standard "Miss Otis Regrets". Film career 1980–1986 Carny (1980) film and soundtrack After the release of The Last Waltz, MGM/UA, who released the film, viewed Robertson as a potential film actor, and provided Robertson with an office on the MGM lot. During this time, Martin Scorsese's agent, Harry Ulfand, contacted Robertson about the idea of producing a dramatic film about traveling carnivals, which Robertson was drawn to because of his childhood experiences working in carnivals. The screenplay for the film Carny was directed by documentary filmmaker Robert Kaylor. Although Robertson was initially only intended to be the producer of Carny, he ended up becoming the third lead actor in the film, playing the role of Patch, the patch man. Gary Busey played "Frankie", the carnival bozo and Patch's best friend. Jodie Foster was selected to play the role of Donna, a small town girl who runs away to join the carnival and threatens to come between the two friends. The film cast real life carnies alongside professional film actors, which created a difficult atmosphere on set. Carny opened to theaters on June 13, 1980. Also in 1980, Warner Bros released a soundtrack album for Carny, which is co-credited to Robertson and composer Alex North, who wrote the orchestral score for the film. The soundtrack was re-released on compact disc by Real Gone Music in 2015. Early collaborations with Martin Scorsese 1980–1986 (Raging Bull, The King of Comedy, The Color of Money) After the production of Carny was completed, Robertson flew to New York to assist Martin Scorsese on the music for the film Raging Bull (1980). Robertson and Scorsese would have a long-running working relationship. The former would find and/or create music to underscore the latter's films. Raging Bull was the first of these collaborations. Robertson credits his work on Raging Bull for sparking his interest in the work of sourcing and underscoring music for movies. Robertson supplied three newly recorded instrumental jazz tracks for sourced music, which he also produced. These three tracks feature Robertson playing guitar, along with performances from the Band alumni Garth Hudson and Richard Manuel. One of the tracks, "Webster Hall", is co-written by Robertson and Garth Hudson. Robertson also worked with Scorsese on selecting the film's opening theme music, choosing the intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana by Italian opera composer Pietro Mascagni. The soundtrack was finally released by Capitol Records in 2005 as a 37 track, 2-CD set. Robertson worked with Scorsese again on his next film, The King of Comedy (1983), and is credited in the film's opening credits for "Music Production". Robertson contributed one original song, "Between Trains," to the film's soundtrack. The song was written in tribute to "Cowboy" Dan Johnson, an assistant of Scorsese's who had recently died. Robertson produced the track, sings lead vocals, and plays guitar and keyboards; the Band alumni Garth Hudson and Richard Manuel appear on the track was well. A soundtrack album for the film was released by Warner Bros. in 1983. In June 1986, Robertson began working with Scorsese on his next film The Color of Money. In addition to sourcing music for the film, Robertson also composed the film's score; it was the first time Robertson had ever written a dramatic underscore for a film. Robertson brought in Canadian jazz composer Gil Evans to orchestrate the arrangements. The best known song on The Color of Money soundtrack is Eric Clapton's "It's in the Way That You Use It", which was co-written by Robertson. "It's in the Way That You Use It" reached #1 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Songs chart in January 1987. Robertson produced a song for the film with blues player Willie Dixon entitled "Don't Tell Me Nothin'"; Dixon's track was co-written with Robertson. The Color of Moneys soundtrack album was released by MCA Records. Solo career Geffen Records period Robbie Robertson (1987) Robertson began work on his first solo album, Robbie Robertson, in July 1986 after signing to Geffen Records. Robertson chose fellow Canadian Daniel Lanois to produce the album. Much of the album was recorded at The Village Recorder in West Los Angeles, California. He recorded at Bearsville Studios near Woodstock, New York, and also in Dublin, Ireland, with U2, and in Bath, England, with Peter Gabriel. He employed a number of guest artists on the album, including U2, Gabriel, the Bodeans, and Maria McKee. Garth Hudson and Rick Danko also made appearances on the album. Robertson wrote one track, "Fallen Angel", in honor of Richard Manuel, after his passing in March 1986. Released on October 26, 1987, Robbie Robertson peaked at #35 on the Billboard 200, remaining in the top 40 for three weeks. The album charted even higher in the UK, peaking at #23 on the UK Albums Chart and remaining on the chart for 14 weeks. Robbie Robertson received overwhelming critical acclaim at the time of its release, being listed in the Top-Ten Albums of the Year by several critics in Billboard magazine's 1987 "The Critics' Choice" end of the year feature. The album was listed as #77 in Rolling Stones 1989 list "100 Best Albums of the Eighties." Robertson had his single largest hit in the UK with "Somewhere Down The Crazy River", which features his spoken word verses contrasted with singing in the choruses. The song reached #15 in the UK Hit Singles chart, and remained in the chart for 11 weeks. The video for "Somewhere Down The Crazy River" was directed by Martin Scorsese, and features Maria McKee in an acting role. In the US, Robbie Robertson produced several hits on the Billboard Mainstream Rock charts, with "Showdown At Big Sky" coming in the highest (#2) and "Sweet Fire Of Love" the second highest (#7). The album was nominated for a Grammy Award for "Best Rock / Vocal Album", and was certified gold in the United States in 1991. In Canada, Robertson won Album Of The Year, Best Male Vocalist Of The Year and Producer Of The Year at the Juno Award ceremony in 1989. In 1991, Rod Stewart recorded a version of "Broken Arrow" for his album Vagabond Heart. Stewart's version of the song reached #20 on the Billboard 100 chart in the US and #2 on the Billboard Top Canadian Hit Singles chart in Canada. "Broken Arrow" was performed live by the Grateful Dead with Phil Lesh on vocals. Storyville (1991) Storyville was released on September 30, 1991. Robertson headed to New Orleans to collaborate with some of the city's natives like Aaron and Ivan Neville and the Rebirth Brass Band. Once again, Robertson brought in Band alumni Garth Hudson and Rick Danko as contributors. The album reached #69 on the Billboard 200 chart. Storyville received numerous positive reviews, with Rolling Stone giving it 4 1/2 stars out of 5, and the Los Angeles Times awarding it 3 stars out of 4. Two tracks from the album, "What About Now" and "Go Back To Your Woods", charted on the Billboard Mainstream Rock charts at #15 and #32 respectively. The album was nominated for Grammy awards in the categories "Best Rock Vocal Performance (solo)" and "Best Engineer". Production and session work 1984–1992 In 1984, Robertson co-produced the track "The Best of Everything" with Tom Petty for the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers album Southern Accents. Robertson also worked on the horn arrangements for the track, and brought in Band alumni Richard Manuel and Garth Hudson as guests. In 1986, Robertson appeared as a guest on the album Reconciled by the Call, playing guitar on the track "The Morning". Also in 1986, Robertson was brought on as creative consultant for Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll (1987), a feature film saluting Chuck Berry. Robertson appears in film, interviewing Chuck Berry, and then playing guitar while Berry recites poetry. In 1988, Robertson collaborated as a songwriter with Lone Justice lead singer Maria McKee. One of the songs they co-wrote, "Nobody's Child", was released on McKee's self-titled debut album in 1989. In 1989, Robertson recorded and produced a new version of the Band's "Christmas Must Be Tonight" for the Scrooged soundtrack. In 1990, Robertson appeared as a guest on the Ryuichi Sakamoto album Beauty, playing guitar on the song "Romance". He also contributed to the world music video and album production One World One Voice. In 1992, Robertson produced the song "Love in Time" for Roy Orbison's posthumous album King of Hearts. "Love In Time" was a basic demo Orbison had recorded that was believed to be lost, but had just recently been rediscovered. Robertson set about augmenting Orbison's basic vocal track with new arrangements and instrumentation, with the intent of making it sound like the arrangements were there from the beginning instead of later additions. Later solo albumsMusic for the Native Americans (1994): In 1994, Robertson returned to his roots, forming a Native American group called the Red Road Ensemble for Music for the Native Americans, a collection of songs that accompanied a television documentary series produced by TBS. Like his songs, "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down," and "Acadian Driftwood," Robertson touches on history that connects to his life and family. The Battle Of Wounded Knee and the near extinction of the buffalo in the United States are outlined in the song, "Ghost Dance." Robertson was recognized with a Juno Award for Producer of the Year. The international success of "Mahk Jchi (Heartbeat Drum Song)" inspired a concert in Agrigento, Italy, celebrating Native American music. Robertson headlined the festival along with other Native American musicians, and portions of the live performance appeared in a PBS documentary. Contact from the Underworld of Redboy (1998): On Contact from the Underworld of Redboy, Robertson departed from his typical production style and delved deep into a mix of rock, native, and electronic music. He employed the services of Howie B, DJ Premier, and producer Marius de Vries (Björk, Massive Attack). Through the songs on the album, he takes a close look at native traditions like Peyote Healing. The album's opening track, "The Sound Is Fading", samples a recording of a young Native American singer from the 1940s that Robertson got from the Library Of Congress, and the song "Sacrifice" includes parts of an interview from prison with Leonard Peltier set to a soundscape produced by Robertson and de Vries. The racial epithet in the album's title comes from an experience Robertson had where some bullies referred to him as "Red Boy" while he was playing with his cousins. Rolling Stone gave the album 4 out of 5 stars, and Robertson received a Juno Award for Best Music of Aboriginal Canada Recording. How to Become Clairvoyant (2011): Released on April 5, 2011, How To Become Clairvoyant is the fifth solo release from Robertson. The album arose from some impromptu demo sessions in Los Angeles with long time friend Eric Clapton. It features Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Trent Reznor, Tom Morello, Robert Randolph, Rocco Deluca, Angela McCluskey, and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes. Robbie performed "He Don't Live Here No More" on CBS's Late Show with David Letterman and Later... with Jools Holland in support of the album. He also appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon performing the song "Straight Down The Line," with Robert Randolph and the Roots. The album was released in a deluxe edition containing five bonus tracks (four demos and the exclusive track "Houdini", named after the magician Harry Houdini). "How To Become Clairvoyant" debuted at No. 13 on the Billboard 200, marking the highest debut and highest chart position for Robbie's solo works in his career. He teamed with painter and photographer Richard Prince to produce a special limited-edition collector's release of the album. The resulting LP-sized box included an art book, an individually numbered set of five lithographs (including pieces by Prince and photographer Anton Corbijn), a set of original tarot cards, and the original album plus ten bonus tracks. Only 2,500 were made. Sinematic (2019): Released on September 20, 2019, Sinematic is Robertson's sixth solo album. It features Van Morrison joining Robertson as dueling hitmen on the track “I Hear You Paint Houses," as well as other allusions to the world of Scorsese's films. Citizen Cope, Derek Trucks, and Frédéric Yonnet make guest appearances on the album. Later career Robertson worked on Martin Scorsese's movies Casino, The Departed, and Gangs of New York, and he provided music supervision for Shutter Island, The Wolf of Wall Street, and Silence. In Rome, he headlined the 1995 annual Labour Day concert festival with supporting acts Andrea Bocelli, Elvis Costello, and Radiohead. In 1996, as executive soundtrack producer, Robertson heard a demo of Change the World and sent it to Clapton as a suggestion for the soundtrack of Phenomenon, starring John Travolta. Babyface produced the track. Change the World won 1997 Grammy awards for Song of the Year and Record of the Year. In 1999, Robertson contributed songs to Oliver Stone's film, Any Given Sunday. In 2000, David Geffen and Mo Ostin convinced Robertson to join DreamWorks Records as creative executive. Robertson, who persuaded Nelly Furtado to sign with the company, is actively involved with film projects and developing new artist talent, including signings of A.i., Boomkat, eastmountainsouth, and Dana Glover. On February 9, 2002, Robertson performed "Stomp Dance (Unity)" as part of the opening ceremony of the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City, Utah. In 2004, he contributed the song "Shine Your Light" to the Ladder 49 soundtrack. In 2005, Robertson was executive producer of the definitive box set for the Band, entitled A Musical History. In 2006, he recorded with Jerry Lee Lewis on the track "Twilight", a Robertson composition, for Lewis' album Last Man Standing. On July 28, 2007, at Eric Clapton's Crossroads Guitar Festival in Bridgeview, Illinois, Robertson made a rare live appearance. Also in 2007, Robertson accepted an invitation to participate in Goin' Home: A Tribute to Fats Domino (Vanguard). With the group Galactic, Robertson contributed a version of Domino's "Goin' to the River". For the 2019 Martin Scorsese movie The Irishman, Robertson provided the score and consulted with music supervisor Randall Poster on the entire soundtrack. Honours and awards In 1989, the Band was inducted into the Canadian Juno Hall of Fame. In 1994, The Band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 1997, Robertson received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Songwriters. At the 2003 commencement ceremonies at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Robertson delivered an address to the graduating class and was awarded an honorary degree by the university. In 2003, Robertson received the Indspire Aboriginal Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2003, Robertson was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame. In 2005, Robertson received an honorary doctorate from York University. In 2006, he received the Governor General's Performing Arts Award for Lifetime Artistic Achievement, Canada's highest honour in the performing arts. In 2008, Robertson and the Band received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2011, Robertson was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame. On May 27, 2011, Robertson was made an Officer of the Order of Canada by Governor General David Johnston. In 2014, the Band was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame. October 14, 2017 Robbie Robertson receives the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Native American Music Awards In 2019, Robertson was given a key to the city of Toronto by Mayor John Tory during a TIFF press conference for Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band, a documentary about Robertson. 2019 Robbie Robertson the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award in the Canadian Music Industry Hall of Fame from Canadian Music Week (CMW) As author Robertson co-authored Legends, Icons and Rebels: Music That Changed the World with his son, Sebastian Robertson, and colleagues Jim Guerinot and Jared Levine. He also wrote Hiawatha and the Peacemaker, illustrated by David Shannon. His autobiography, Testimony, written over the course of five years, was published by Crown Archetype in November 2016. Personal life In 1967, Robertson married Dominique Bourgeois, a Canadian journalist. They later divorced. They have three children: daughters Alexandra and Delphine and son Sebastian. Robertson is a member of the Canadian charity Artists Against Racism. Discography Robbie Robertson (1987) Storyville (1991) Music for the Native Americans (soundtrack) (1994) Contact from the Underworld of Redboy (1998) How to Become Clairvoyant (2011) Sinematic (2019) Filmography 1978 – The Last Waltz (performer/producer) 1980 – Carny (actor/writer/producer/composer) 1980 – Raging Bull (music producer) 1982 – The King of Comedy (music producer) 1986 – The Color of Money (composer) 1994 – Jimmy Hollywood (composer) 1995 – Robbie Robertson: Going Home (documentary) 1995 – Casino (music consultant) 1995 – The Crossing Guard (actor – Roger) 1996 – Phenomenon (executive soundtrack producer) 1996 – Dakota Exile (narrator) 1999 – Forces of Nature (creative music consultant) 1999 – Wolves (narrator) 1999 – Any Given Sunday (songs) 2001 – The Life and Times of Robbie Robertson 2002 – Gangs of New York (executive music producer) 2002 – Skins (writer) 2003 – Festival Express (performer) 2004 – Jenifa (executive producer) 2004 – Ladder 49 (original song "Shine Your Light") 2006 – The Departed (music producer) 2007 – Eric Clapton: Crossroads Guitar Festival 2007 (performer) 2010 – Shutter Island (music supervisor) 2012 – Curse of the Axe (narrator) 2013 – Eric Clapton: Crossroads Guitar Festival 2013 (performer) 2013 – The Wolf of Wall Street (executive music producer) 2016 – Silence (executive music producer) 2017 – Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked The World (performer) 2018 – Native America (narrator) 2019 – The Irishman (executive music producer, musical director, musician) 2019 – Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band (himself) TBA – Killers of the Flower Moon See also Notable Aboriginal people of Canada References Further reading External links Robbie Robertson Interview NAMM Oral History Library (2017) 1943 births Canadian country rock musicians Canadian expatriate musicians in the United States Canadian folk rock musicians Canadian male singers Canadian people of Jewish descent Canadian Mohawk people Canadian rock guitarists Canadian male guitarists Canadian rock singers Canadian singer-songwriters Cayuga people First Nations musicians Governor General's Performing Arts Award winners Juno Award for Indigenous Music Album of the Year winners Living people Musicians from Toronto Officers of the Order of Canada The Band members Indspire Awards Native American musicians Jewish Canadian musicians Jewish musicians Jewish rock musicians Jewish singers Juno Award for Album of the Year winners Juno Award for Artist of the Year winners Jack Richardson Producer of the Year Award winners	false	[ "Aniksi (Greek: Άνοιξη; English: Springtime) is a successful studio album by Greek artist Glykeria. It was released in mid-2004 by Sony Music Greece. The album was certified Gold by IFPI Greece.\n\nThe album also includes several well-known collaborations including Kitrina Podilata, Antonis Vardis and Dimirtis Zervoudakis.\n\nTrack listing\n\nChart performance\nAniksi was a successful album in Cyprus and Greece, however the album was only certified Gold in Greece over 2 years after its release.\n\n2004 albums\nGlykeria albums\nGreek-language albums\nSony Music Greece albums", "Singh Better Than King is the tenth studio album, and his first religious album, by the Punjabi singer Babbu Maan, released on 16 November 2009. The album was also released in the USA, Canada and the UK.\n\nThe album was preceded by the lead single, \"Ik Baba Nanak Si\". The song was Mann's first religious single. Following the success of the single, \"Marno Mool Na Darde\" was released and was also successful. The album received good reviews.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences\n\n2009 albums\nBabbu Maan albums" ]
[ "Robbie Robertson", "1967-1968 (Music From Big Pink)", "What happened in 1967?", "In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967).", "Was his album successful?", "I don't know." ]	C_ea62ce7604624d0ba7e25bc05367e754_0	Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?	3	Are there any other interesting aspects about this article besides the John Wesley Harding album?	Robbie Robertson	In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967). After recording the basic tracks, Dylan asked Robertson and Garth Hudson about playing on the album to fill out the sound. However, when Robertson heard the tracks, he liked the starkness of the sound and recommended that Dylan leave the songs as they were. Dylan worked with the members of the Hawks once again when they appeared as his backup band at two Woody Guthrie memorial concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York City in January 1968. Three of these performances were later released by Columbia Records on the LP A Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Vol. 1 (1972). Over the course of the "Basement Tapes" period, the group had developed a sound of their own, and Grossman went to Los Angeles to shop the group to a major label, securing a contract with Capitol Records. The group went to New York to begin recording songs with music producer John Simon. Capitol brought the group to Los Angeles to finish the album. The resulting album, Music From Big Pink, was released in August 1968. Robertson wrote four of the songs on Music From Big Pink, including "The Weight", "Chest Fever", "Caledonia Mission," and "To Kingdom Come". Robertson is listed in the songwriting credits as "J.R. Robertson". Robertson sang lead vocal on the track "To Kingdom Come"; he would not sing on another Band song released to the public until "Knockin' Lost John" on 1977's Islands. Two of Robertson's compositions for the album, "The Weight" and "Chest Fever", would become important touchstones in the group's career. "The Weight" was influenced by the films of director Luis Bunuel, in particular Nazarin (1959) and Viridiana (1961), and reflects the recurring theme in Bunuel's films about the impossibility of sainthood. The song portrays an individual who attempts to take a saintly pilgrimage, and becomes mired down with requests from other people to do favors for them along the way. The mention of "Nazareth" at the beginning of the song refers to Nazareth, Pennsylvania, where the C. F. Martin & Company guitar manufacturer is located; it was inspired by Robertson seeing the word "Nazareth" in the hole of his Martin guitar. Although "The Weight" reached #21 on the British radio charts, it did not fare as well on the American charts, initially stalling at #63. However, the song gained traction due to more successful covers by Jackie DeShannon (US #55, 1968), Aretha Franklin (US #19, 1969), and The Supremes with The Temptations (US #46, 1969), as well as to the song's inclusion in the movie Easy Rider (1969), which became a runaway success. "The Weight" has since become The Band's best known song. It has been covered by many artists, appeared in dozens of films and documentaries, and has become a staple in American rock music. When Music from Big Pink was released in 1968, The Band initially avoided media attention, and discouraged Capitol Records from promotional efforts. They also did not immediately pursue touring to support the album, and declined to be interviewed for a year. The resulting mystery surrounding the group led to speculation in the underground press. Music from Big Pink received excellent reviews, and the album influenced many well-known musicians of the period. CANNOTANSWER	Over the course of the "Basement Tapes" period, the group had developed a sound of their own,	Jaime Royal "Robbie" Robertson, OC (born July 5, 1943), is a Canadian musician, songwriter, film composer, producer, actor, and author. Robertson is best known for his work as lead guitarist and songwriter for The Band, and for his career as a solo recording artist. Robertson's work with The Band was instrumental in creating the Americana music genre. Robertson has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Canadian Music Hall of Fame as a member of The Band, and has been inducted to Canada's Walk of Fame, both with The Band and on his own. He is ranked 59th in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 100 greatest guitarists. As a songwriter, Robertson is credited for writing "The Weight", "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down", "Up on Cripple Creek" with The Band, and had solo hits with "Broken Arrow" and "Somewhere Down the Crazy River", and many others. He has been inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, and received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Songwriters. As a film soundtrack producer and composer, Robertson is known for his collaborations with director Martin Scorsese, which began with the rockumentary film The Last Waltz (1978), and continued through a number of dramatic films, including Raging Bull (1980), The King of Comedy (1983), Casino (1995), The Departed (2006), The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) and The Irishman (2019). He has worked on many other soundtracks for film and television. Early life Robertson was born Jaime Royal Robertson on July 5, 1943. He was an only child. His mother was Rosemarie Dolly Chrysler, born February 6, 1922. She was Cayuga and Mohawk, raised on the Six Nations Reserve southwest of Toronto, Ontario. Chrysler lived with an aunt in the Cabbagetown neighbourhood and worked at the Coro jewellery plating factory. She met James Patrick Robertson at the factory and they married in 1942. Rosemarie and James Robertson continued to work at the factory where they met. The family lived in several homes in different Toronto neighbourhoods when Robbie was a child. He often travelled with his mother to the Six Nations Reserve to visit her family. It was here that Robertson was mentored in playing guitar by family members, in particular his older cousin Herb Myke. He became a fan of rock 'n' roll and R&B through the radio, listening to disc jockey George "Hound Dog" Lorenz play rock 'n' roll on WKBW in Buffalo, New York, and staying up at night to listen to disc jockey John R.'s all-night blues show on WLAC, a clear-channel station in Nashville, Tennessee. When Robertson was in his early teens, his parents separated. His mother revealed to Robertson that his biological father was not James, but Alexander David Klegerman, a Jewish man whom she had met working at the Coro factory. He became a professional gambler and was killed in a hit-and-run accident on the Queen Elizabeth Way. She had been with him while James Robertson was stationed in Newfoundland with the Canadian Army, before she married James. After telling Robertson, his mother arranged for the youth to meet his paternal uncles Morris (Morrie) and Nathan (Natie) Klegerman. Career When Robertson was 14, he worked two brief summer jobs in the travelling carnival circuit, first for a few days in a suburb of Toronto, and later as an assistant at a freak show for three weeks during the Canadian National Exhibition. He drew from this for his song "Life is a Carnival" (with the Band) and the movie Carny (1980), which he produced and starred in. The first band Robertson joined was Little Caesar and the Consuls, formed in 1956 by pianist/vocalist Bruce Morshead and guitarist Gene MacLellan. He stayed with the group for almost a year, playing popular songs of the day at local teen dances. In 1957 he formed Robbie and the Rhythm Chords with his friend Pete "Thumper" Traynor (who would later found Traynor Amplifiers). They changed the name to Robbie and the Robots after they watched the film Forbidden Planet and took a liking to the film's character Robby the Robot. Traynor customized Robertson's guitar for the Robots, fitting it with antennae and wires to give it a space age look. Traynor and Robertson joined with pianist Scott Cushnie and became The Suedes. At a Suedes show on October 5, 1959, when they played CHUM Radio's Hif Fi Club on Toronto's Merton Street, Ronnie Hawkins first became aware of them and was impressed enough to join them for a few numbers. With Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks Robertson began shadowing Hawkins. After the Suedes opened for the Arkansas-based rockabilly group Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks at Dixie Arena, Hawkins hired Robertson for the Hawks' road crew. Hawkins recorded two songs co-credited to Robertson, "Hey Baba Lou" and "Someone Like You", for his album Mr. Dynamo (1959), and brought Robertson to the Brill Building in New York City to help him choose songs for the rest of the album. Hawkins hired pianist Scott Cushnie away from the Suedes, and took him on tour with Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks in Arkansas. When the Hawks' bass player left the group, Cushnie recommended that Hawkins hire Robertson to replace him on bass. Hawkins invited Robertson to Arkansas, and flew to the UK to perform on television there. Left in Arkansas, Robertson spent his living allowance on records and practised intensively each day. Upon returning, Hawkins hired him to play bass. Cushnie left the band a few months later. Robertson soon switched over from bass to playing lead guitar for the Hawks. Robertson developed into a guitar virtuoso. Roy Buchanan, a few years older than Robertson, was briefly a member of the Hawks and became an important influence on Robertson's guitar style: "Standing next to Buchanan on stage for several months, Robertson was able to absorb Buchanan’s deft manipulations with his volume speed dial, his tendency to bend multiple strings for steel guitar-like effect, his rapid sweep picking and his passion for bending past the root and fifth notes during solo flights." Drummer/singer Levon Helm was already a member of the Hawks and soon became close friends with Robertson. The Hawks continued to tour the United States and Canada, adding Rick Danko, Richard Manuel, and Garth Hudson to the Hawks lineup in 1961. This lineup, which later became The Band, toured with Hawkins throughout 1962 and into 1963. They also hired the saxophone player Jerry Penfound and later Bruce Bruno, who were both with the group in their intermediary period as Levon and the Hawks. Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks cut sessions for Roulette Records throughout 1961–1963, all of which Robertson appeared on. The sessions included three singles: "Come Love" b/w "I Feel Good" (Roulette 4400 1961); "Who Do You Love" b/w "Bo Diddley" (Roulette 4483 1963); and "There's A Screw Loose" b/w "High Blood Pressure" (Roulette 4502 1963). With Levon and the Hawks The Hawks left Ronnie Hawkins at the beginning of 1964 to go on their own. The members of the Hawks were losing interest in playing in the rockabilly style and favoured blues and soul music. In early 1964, the group approached agent Harold Kudlets about representing them, which he agreed to do, booking them a year's worth of shows in the same circuits as they had been in before with Ronnie Hawkins. Originally dubbed The Levon Helm Sextet, the group included all of the future members of The Band, plus Jerry Penfound on saxophone and Bob Bruno on vocals. After Bruno left in May 1964, the group changed their name to Levon and the Hawks. Penfound stayed with the group until 1965. Kudlets kept the group busy performing throughout 1964 and into 1965, finally booking them into two lengthy summer engagements at the popular nightclub Tony Mart's in Somers Point, New Jersey, at the Shore. They played six nights a week alongside Conway Twitty and other acts. The members of Levon and the Hawks befriended blues artist John P. Hammond while he was performing in Toronto in 1964. Later in the year, the group agreed to work on Hammond's album So Many Roads (released in 1965) at the same time that they were playing the Peppermint Lounge in New York City. Robertson played guitar throughout the album, and was billed "Jaime R. Robertson" in the album's credits. Levon and the Hawks cut a single "Uh Uh Uh" b/w "Leave Me Alone" under the name the Canadian Squires in March 1965. Both songs were written by Robertson. The single was recorded in New York and released on Apex Records in the United States and on Ware Records in Canada. As Levon and the Hawks, the group cut an afternoon session for Atco Records later in 1965, which yielded two singles, "The Stones I Throw" b/w "He Don't Love You" (Atco 6383) and "Go, Go, Liza Jane" b/w "He Don't Love You" (Atco 6625). Robertson also wrote all three of the tracks on Levon and the Hawks' Atco singles. With Bob Dylan and the Hawks 1965–1966 World Tour Toward the end of Levon and the Hawks' second engagement at Tony Mart's in New Jersey, in August 1965, Robertson received a call from Albert Grossman Management requesting a meeting with singer Bob Dylan. The group had been recommended to both Grossman and to Dylan by Mary Martin, one of Grossman's employees; she was originally from Toronto and was a friend of the band. Dylan was also aware of the group through his friend John Hammond, whose album So Many Roads members of the Hawks had performed on. Robertson agreed to meet with Dylan. Initially, Dylan intended simply to hire Robertson as the guitarist for his backing group. Robertson refused the offer, but did agree to play two shows with Dylan, one at the Forest Hills Tennis Stadium in Forest Hills, New York on August 28, and one at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles on September 3. Robertson suggested they use Levon Helm on drums for the shows. Robertson and Helm performed in Dylan's backing band, along with Harvey Brooks and Al Kooper for both shows. The first at Forest Hills received a predominantly hostile response, but the second in Los Angeles was received slightly more favourably. Dylan flew up to Toronto and rehearsed with Levon and the Hawks September 15–17, as Levon and the Hawks finished an engagement there, and hired the full band for his upcoming tour. Bob Dylan and the Hawks toured the United States throughout October–December 1965, with each show consisting of two sets: an acoustic show featuring only Dylan on guitar and harmonica, and an electric set featuring Dylan backed by the Hawks. The tours were largely met with a hostile reaction from fans who knew Dylan as a prominent figure in the American folk music revival, and thought his move into rock music a betrayal. Helm left the group after their November 28 performance in Washington, D.C. Session drummer Bobby Gregg replaced Helm for the December dates, and Sandy Konikoff was brought in to replace Gregg in January 1966. Dylan and the Hawks played more dates in the continental United States in February–March 1966 of the 1966 world tour. From April 9-May 27, they played Hawaii, Australia, Europe, and the UK and Ireland. Drummer Sandy Konikoff left after the Pacific Northwest dates in March, and Mickey Jones replaced him, staying with the group for the remainder of the tour. The Australian and European legs of the tour received a particularly harsh response from disgruntled folk fans. The May 17 Manchester Free Trade Hall show is best known for an angry audience member audibly yelling "Judas!" at Dylan; it became a frequently-bootlegged live show from the tour, was eventually released officially as The Bootleg Series Vol. 4: Bob Dylan Live 1966, The "Royal Albert Hall" Concert. The European leg of the tour was filmed by documentary filmmaker D. A. Pennebaker, but completion of a planned film was delayed. After recovering from an accident, Dylan decided to edit it himself. ABC television rejected it, and it was never commercially released. It was screened as Eat the Document in 1972 at the Whitney Museum in New York. On November 30, 1965, Dylan cut a studio session with members of the Hawks, which yielded the non-LP single "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?" Dylan completed the Blonde on Blonde album in Nashville in mid-February 1966, employing Robertson for one of these sessions, which took place on February 14. The "Basement Tapes" period On July 29, 1966, Dylan sustained an injured neck from a motorcycle accident, and retreated to a quiet domestic life with his new wife and child in upstate New York. Some of the members of the Hawks were living at the Chelsea Hotel in New York City at the time, and were kept on a weekly retainer by Dylan's management. In February 1967, Dylan invited the members of the Hawks to come up to Woodstock, New York to work on music. Robertson had met a French-Canadian woman on the Paris stop of Dylan's 1966 world tour, and the two moved into a house in the Woodstock area. The remaining three members of the Hawks rented a house near West Saugerties, New York; it was later dubbed "Big Pink" because of its pink exterior. Dylan and the members of the Hawks worked together at the "Big Pink" house every day to rehearse and generate ideas for new songs, many of which they recorded in "Big Pink"'s makeshift basement studio. The recordings were made between the late spring and autumn of 1967. Previous Hawks member Levon Helm returned to the group in August 1967. By this time, Robertson's guitar style had evolved to be more supportive of the song and less devoted to displaying speed and virtuosity. In time, word about these sessions began to circulate, and in 1968, Rolling Stone magazine co-founder Jann Wenner brought attention to these tracks in an article entitled "Dylan's Basement Tape Should Be Released". In 1969, a bootleg album with a plain white cover compiled by two incognito music industry insiders featured a collection of seven tracks from these sessions. The album, which became known as The Great White Wonder, began to appear in independent record stores and receive radio airplay. This album became a runaway success and helped to launch the bootleg recording industry. In 1975, Robertson would produce an official compilation, The Basement Tapes, which included a selection of tracks from the sessions. An exhaustive collection of all 138 extant recordings was released in 2014 as The Bootleg Series Vol. 11: The Basement Tapes Complete. With the Band 1967–1968 (Music From Big Pink) In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967). After recording the basic tracks, Dylan asked Robertson and Garth Hudson about playing on the album to fill out the sound. However, when Robertson heard the tracks, he liked the starkness of the sound and recommended that Dylan leave the songs as they were. Dylan worked with the members of the Hawks again when they appeared as his backup band at two Woody Guthrie memorial concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York City in January 1968. Three of these performances were later released by Columbia Records on the LP A Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Vol. 1 (1972). Over the course of the "Basement Tapes" period, the group had developed a sound of their own, and Grossman went to Los Angeles to shop the group to a major label, securing a contract with Capitol Records. The group went to New York to begin recording songs with music producer John Simon. Capitol brought the group to Los Angeles to finish the album. The resulting album, Music From Big Pink, was released in August 1968. Robertson wrote four of the songs on Music From Big Pink, including "The Weight", "Chest Fever", "Caledonia Mission," and "To Kingdom Come". Robertson is listed in the songwriting credits as "J.R. Robertson". Robertson sang lead vocal on the track "To Kingdom Come"; he would not sing on another Band song released to the public until "Knockin' Lost John" on 1977's Islands. Two of Robertson's compositions for the album, "The Weight" and "Chest Fever", would become important touchstones in the group's career. "The Weight" was influenced by the films of director Luis Buñuel, in particular Nazarín (1959) and Viridiana (1961), and reflects the recurring theme in Buñuel's films about the impossibility of sainthood. The song portrays an individual who attempts to take a saintly pilgrimage, and becomes mired down with requests from other people to do favors for them along the way. The mention of "Nazareth" at the beginning of the song refers to Nazareth, Pennsylvania, where the C. F. Martin & Company guitar manufacturer is located; it was inspired by Robertson seeing the word "Nazareth" in the hole of his Martin guitar. Although "The Weight" reached #21 on the British radio charts, it did not fare as well on the American charts, initially stalling at #63. But the song gained traction following more successful covers by Jackie DeShannon (US #55, 1968), Aretha Franklin (US #19, 1969), and the Supremes with the Temptations (US #46, 1969), and the song's inclusion in the movie Easy Rider (1969), which became a runaway success. "The Weight" has since become the Band's best known song. It has been covered by many artists, appeared in dozens of films and documentaries, and has become a staple in American rock music. When Music from Big Pink was released in 1968, the Band initially avoided media attention, and discouraged Capitol Records from promotional efforts. They also did not immediately pursue touring to support the album, and declined to be interviewed for a year. The resulting mystery surrounding the group prompted speculation in the underground press. Music from Big Pink received excellent reviews, and the album influenced many well-known musicians of the period. 1969 The Band In early 1969, the Band rented a home from Sammy Davis Jr. in Hollywood Hills, and converted the pool house behind it into a studio to recreate the "clubhouse" atmosphere that they had previously enjoyed at "Big Pink". The band began recording every day in the pool house studio, working on a tight schedule to complete the album. An additional three tracks were recorded at The Hit Factory in New York in April 1969. Robertson did most of the audio engineering on the album. The Band began performing regularly in spring 1969, with their first live dates as the Band taking place at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. Their most notable performances that year were at the 1969 Woodstock Festival and the UK Isle of Wight Festival with Bob Dylan in August. The Band's album The Band was released in September 1969, and became a critical and commercial success. The album received almost universal critical praise, peaked at #9 on the US pop charts, and stayed in the Top 40 for 24 weeks. The Band works as a loose concept album of Americana themes, and was instrumental in the creation of the Americana music genre. It was included in the Library of Congress' National Recording Registry in 2009. The song from this album that had the strongest cultural influence was "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down". The song explores a Confederate man's life after defeat of the South following the American Civil War. It incorporates historical events to create a larger American mythos. Although the Band's original version was not released as a single, a cover version by Joan Baez went to #3 on the charts in 1971 and helped to popularize the song. Several other tracks from The Band received significant radio airplay, and would become staples in the group's concert appearances. "Up on Cripple Creek" peaked at #25 in late 1969 in the United States, and would be their only Top 30 hit there. "Rag Mama Rag" reached #16 in the UK in April 1970, the highest chart position of any single by the group in that country. "Whispering Pines", co-written by Richard Manuel, was released as a single in France in 1970, and would become the title of a 2009 book about Canadian contributions to the Americana music genre by Jason Schneider. On November 2, 1969, the Band appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, one of only two television appearances they would make. 1970–1973 (Stage Fright through Moondog Matinee) On January 12, 1970, the Band was featured on the cover of Time magazine. This was the first time a North American rock band featured on the cover of the magazine. The Band rented The Woodstock Playhouse in Woodstock, New York with the intent of recording a new live album there, but the city council voted against it, so they recorded on location, but without an audience. Robertson handled most of the songwriting duties as before. Robertson brought in Todd Rundgren to engineer the album which was recorded in two weeks' time. These sessions became their third album, Stage Fright, which would become the Band's highest charting album, peaking at #5 on September 5 and staying in the Billboard Top 40 for 14 weeks. The Band's next album, Cahoots, was recorded at Albert Grossman's newly built Bearsville Studios and was released in October 1971. The album received mixed reviews, and peaked at #24 on the Billboard charts, only remaining in the Billboard Top 40 for five weeks. Cahoots is notable for its cover of Bob Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece", as well as for featuring the concert favourite "Life Is a Carnival". The inclusion of "When I Paint My Masterpiece" came about when Dylan stopped by Robertson's home during the recording of Cahoots and Robertson asked if he might have any songs to contribute. That led to Dylan playing an unfinished version of "When I Paint My Masterpiece" for him. Dylan completed the song soon afterwards, and the Band recorded it for the album. "Life Is a Carnival" features horn parts written by producer and arranger Allen Toussaint. It would be the only track from Cahoots the group would keep in their set list through to The Last Waltz concert and film. The Band continued to tour throughout 1970-71. A live album recorded at a series of shows at the Academy of Music in New York City between December 28–31, 1971, was released in 1972 as the double album Rock Of Ages. Rock of Ages peaked at #6, and remained in the Top 40 for 14 weeks. After the Academy of Music shows, the Band again retreated from performing live. They returned to the stage on July 28, 1973, to play the Summer Jam at Watkins Glen alongside the Allman Brothers Band and the Grateful Dead. A recording of the Band's performance was released by Capitol Records as the album Live at Watkins Glen in 1995. With over 600,000 people in attendance, the festival set a record for "Pop Festival Attendance" in the Guinness Book of World Records. The record was first published in the 1976 edition of the book. In October 1973, the Band released an album of cover songs entitled Moondog Matinee, which peaked at #28 on the Billboard charts. Around the time of the recording of Moondog Matinee, Robertson began working on an ambitious project entitled Works that was never finished or released. One lyric from the Works project, "Lay a flower in the snow," was used in Robertson's song "Fallen Angel", which appeared on his 1987 self-titled solo album. 1974 Reunion with Bob Dylan (Planet Waves and Before the Flood) In February 1973, Bob Dylan relocated from Woodstock, New York to Malibu, California. Coincidentally, Robertson moved to Malibu in the summer of 1973, and by October of the year the rest of the members of the Band had followed suit, moving into properties near Zuma Beach. David Geffen had signed Dylan to Asylum Records, and worked with promoter Bill Graham on the concept that would become the Bob Dylan and the Band 1974 Tour. It would be Dylan's first tour in more than seven years. Meanwhile, Bill Graham took out a full page advertisement for the Bob Dylan and the Band tour in the New York Times. The response was one of the largest in entertainment history up to that point, with between 5 and 6 million requests for tickets mailed in for 650,000 seats. Graham's office ended up selling tickets off on a lottery basis, and Dylan and the Band netted $2 million from the deal. Amongst the rehearsals and preparations, the Band went into the studio with Bob Dylan to record a new album for Asylum Records that would become the Bob Dylan album Planet Waves (1974). Sessions took place at Village Recorder in West Los Angeles, California, from November 2–14, 1973. Planet Waves was released on February 9, 1974. The album was #1 on the Billboard album charts for four weeks, and spent 12 weeks total in the Billboard Top 40. Planet Waves was Bob Dylan's first #1 album, and the first and only time Bob Dylan and the Band recorded a studio album together. The 1974 tour began at the Chicago Stadium on January 3, 1974, and ended at The Forum in Inglewood, California on February 14. The shows began with more songs from the new Planet Waves album and with covers that Dylan and the Band liked, but as the tour went on, they moved toward playing older and more familiar material, only keeping "Forever Young" from the Planet Waves album in the set list. Dylan and the Band played a number of tracks from the controversial 1965–1966 World Tour, this time to wildly enthusiastic response from the audience where there had been mixed reaction and boos a mere nine years previously. The final three shows of the tour at The Forum in Inglewood, California were recorded and assembled into the double album Before the Flood. Credited to "Bob Dylan/The Band", Before the Flood was released by Asylum Records on July 20, 1974. The album debuted at #3 on the Billboard charts, and spent ten weeks in the Top Forty. 1974–1975 (Shangri-La Studios, The Basement Tapes, and Northern Lights – Southern Cross) Following the 1974 reunion tour with Bob Dylan, rock manager Elliot Roberts booked the Band with the recently reunited Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. On September 4, both artists played Wembley Stadium in London, appearing with Jesse Colin Young and Joni Mitchell. After moving to Malibu in 1973, Robertson and the Band had discovered a ranch in Malibu near Zuma Beach called "Shangri-La", and decided to lease the property. The main house on the property had originally been built by Lost Horizon (1937) actress Margo Albert, and the ranch had been the filming and stabling site for the Mister Ed television show in the 1960s. In the interim, the house had served as a high-class bordello. The album release of The Basement Tapes, credited to Bob Dylan and the Band, was the first album production that took place in the new studio. The album, produced by Robertson, featured a selection of tapes from the original 1967 Basement Tapes sessions with Dylan, as well as demos for tracks eventually recorded for Music From Big Pink album. Robertson cleaned up the tracks, and the album was released in July 1975. Shangri-La Studios proved to be a return to a clubhouse atmosphere that the Band had enjoyed previously at Big Pink, and in the spring of 1975, the group began work on Northern Lights – Southern Cross, their first release of original material in four years. One of the best known tracks on the album is "Acadian Driftwood", the first song with specifically Canadian subject material. Robertson was inspired to write "Acadian Driftwood" after seeing the documentary L'Acadie, l'Acadie (1971) on Canadian television while in Montreal. Two other notable tracks from that album are "It Makes No Difference" and "Ophelia". Northern Lights – Southern Cross was released on November 1, 1975. The album received generally positive reviews, and reached #26 on the Billboard charts, remaining in the Top 40 for five weeks. 1976 (Islands and The Last Waltz concert) The Band began touring again in June 1976, performing throughout the summer. The members of the Band were splintering off to work on other projects, with Levon Helm building a studio in Woodstock and Rick Danko having been contracted to Arista Records as a solo artist. While on the summer tour, member Richard Manuel was involved in a boating accident that severely injured his neck, and ten dates of the 25-date tour were cancelled. It was during this time period that Robertson introduced the concept that the Band would cease to operate as a touring act. According to Robertson, the group's mutual agreement was that they would stage one final "grand finale" show, part ways to work on their various projects, and then regroup. Helm later made the case in his autobiography, This Wheel's on Fire, that Robertson had forced the Band's breakup on the rest of the group. Concert promoter Bill Graham booked the Band at the Winterland Ballroom on Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976. The show was intended as a gala event, with ticket prices of $25 per person. The event would include a Thanksgiving dinner served to the audience, and would feature the Band performing with various musical guests. The onstage guest list included Ronnie Hawkins, Muddy Waters, Paul Butterfield, Dr. John, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, Neil Diamond, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, and others. Robertson wanted to document the event on film, and approached director Martin Scorsese to see if he would be interested in shooting the concert. The Winterland concert was called The Last Waltz. Robertson and Scorsese developed a 200-page script for the show, listing out in columns the lyrics of the songs, who was singing what part, and what instruments were being featured. It included columns for the camera and lighting work. Scorsese brought in all-star cameramen such as Michael Chapman, László Kovács and Vilmos Zsigmond to film the show in 35mm. John Simon, producer on the Band's first two albums, was brought in to coordinate rehearsals and work as musical director. Boris Leven was brought in as art director. Jonathan Taplin assumed the role of executive producer, and Robertson worked as producer of the film. Rehearsals for The Last Waltz concert began in early November. Warner Bros. Records president Mo Ostin offered to finance the production of The Last Waltz film in exchange for the rights to release music from The Last Waltz as an album. However, the group were contractually obligated to supply Capitol Records with one more album before they could be released to work with Warner Bros. So in between rehearsing, the Band worked on the studio album Islands for Capitol. Robertson wrote or co-wrote eight of the ten tracks. One of the songs, "Knockin' Lost John", features Robertson on vocals, and was the first Band song Robertson had sung on since "To Kingdom Come" from Music From Big Pink. "Christmas Must Be Tonight" was inspired by the birth of Robertson's son, Sebastian, in July 1974. The Last Waltz concert event took place on Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976. Approximately five thousand people were in attendance. The event began at 5 pm, beginning with the audience members being served a full traditional Thanksgiving meal at candlelit tables, with a vegetarian table serving an alternate menu as an option. The Berkeley Promenade Orchestra played waltz music for dancing afterwards. The tables were cleared and moved at 8 pm. At 9 pm, the Band played songs for an hour, beginning with "Up On Cripple Creek". Just after 10 pm, Robertson introduced Ronnie Hawkins, the first onstage guest, with a succession of guest stars appearing with the group until just after midnight. The group took a 30-minute break, during which several Bay Area poets performed readings of their poems. After the break, the Band returned to the stage, performing, among other songs, a new composition entitled "The Last Waltz Theme" that Robertson had just completed less than 48 hours prior. Bob Dylan was brought in at the end of this second set, performing several songs, and finally being joined with the other guest stars for a finale performance of "I Shall Be Released". This was then followed with two all-star jam sessions, after which the Band returned to the stage to close the show with one more song, their rendition of "Baby Don't You Do It". 1977–1978 (The Last Waltz film and album) After The Last Waltz concert event was finished, director Martin Scorsese had 400 reels of raw footage to work with, and began editing the footage. The film was then sold to United Artists. In the meantime, Robertson and Scorsese continued to brainstorm more ideas for the film. In April 1977, country singer Emmylou Harris and gospel vocal group the Staple Singers were filmed on a sound stage at MGM performing with the Band. Emmylou Harris performed on "Evangeline", a new song written by Robertson, and the Staples Singers performed on a new recording of "The Weight," which they themselves had recorded a version of in 1968. Scorsese's next idea was to intersperse the concert footage with interviews of the Band that told their story. Scorsese conducted the interviews. The Last Waltz album was released by Warner Brothers Records on April 7, 1978, as a 3-LP set. The first five sides feature live performances from the concert, and the last side contains studio recordings from the MGM sound stage sessions. The album peaked at #16 on the Billboard charts, and remained in the Top 40 for 8 weeks. The Last Waltz film was released to theatres on April 26, 1978. The film fared well with both rock and film critics. Robertson and Scorsese made appearances throughout America and Europe to promote the film. Over time, The Last Waltz has become lauded by many as an important and pioneering rockumentary. Its influence has been felt on subsequent rock music films such as Talking Heads' Stop Making Sense (1984), and U2's Rattle and Hum (1988). Production and session work outside of the Band 1970–1977 Robertson produced Jesse Winchester's debut self-titled album, which was released in 1970 on Ampex Records. The album features Robertson playing guitar throughout the album, and co-credits the track "Snow" to Robertson as well. Robertson played guitar on ex-Beatle Ringo Starr's third solo album, Ringo (1973), performing with four-fifths of the Band on the track "Sunshine Life For Me (Sail Away Raymond)". Robertson contributed a guitar solo on the track "Snookeroo" on Starr's fourth album, Goodnight Vienna (1974). Robertson played guitar for Joni Mitchell on the track "Raised on Robbery", which was released on her album Court and Spark. In 1974, Robertson also played guitar on Carly Simon's version of "Mockingbird", which featured Simon singing with her then-husband James Taylor. In 1975, Robertson produced and played guitar on singer/guitarist Hirth Martinez's debut album Hirth From Earth. Bob Dylan had heard Martinez, and recommended him to Robertson. Robertson identified strongly with Martinez' music, helped him to secure a recording contract with Warner Bros. Records, and agreed to produce Martinez' debut album. He also played guitar on Martinez' follow-up album, Big Bright Street (1977). In 1975, Eric Clapton recorded the album No Reason to Cry at the Band's Shangri-La Studios with help from members of the Band. Robertson played lead guitar on the track "Sign Language". In the mid-1970s, Robertson connected with singer Neil Diamond, and the two began collaborating on a concept album about the life and struggles of a Tin Pan Alley songwriter. The resulting album, entitled Beautiful Noise, was recorded at Shangri-La Studios in early 1976. It reached #6 on the Billboard charts and remained in the Top 40 for sixteen weeks. Robertson produced the album, co-wrote the track "Dry Your Eyes" with Diamond, and played guitar on "Dry Your Eyes", "Lady-Oh", and "Jungletime". He produced Diamond's live double album Love at the Greek (1977), which was recorded in 1976 at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles. Love at the Greek reached #8 on the Billboard charts and remained in the Top 40 for nine weeks. In 1977, Robertson contributed to two album projects from the Band alumni. Robertson played guitar on "Java Blues" on Rick Danko's self-titled debut album, and also played guitar on the Earl King-penned "Sing, Sing, Sing" on the album Levon Helm & the RCO All-Stars. Also in 1977, Robertson contributed to the second self-titled album by singer-songwriter Libby Titus, who was the former girlfriend of Levon Helm. Robertson produced the track "The Night You Took Me To Barbados In My Dreams" (co-written by Titus and Hirth Martinez), and produced and played guitar on the Cole Porter standard "Miss Otis Regrets". Film career 1980–1986 Carny (1980) film and soundtrack After the release of The Last Waltz, MGM/UA, who released the film, viewed Robertson as a potential film actor, and provided Robertson with an office on the MGM lot. During this time, Martin Scorsese's agent, Harry Ulfand, contacted Robertson about the idea of producing a dramatic film about traveling carnivals, which Robertson was drawn to because of his childhood experiences working in carnivals. The screenplay for the film Carny was directed by documentary filmmaker Robert Kaylor. Although Robertson was initially only intended to be the producer of Carny, he ended up becoming the third lead actor in the film, playing the role of Patch, the patch man. Gary Busey played "Frankie", the carnival bozo and Patch's best friend. Jodie Foster was selected to play the role of Donna, a small town girl who runs away to join the carnival and threatens to come between the two friends. The film cast real life carnies alongside professional film actors, which created a difficult atmosphere on set. Carny opened to theaters on June 13, 1980. Also in 1980, Warner Bros released a soundtrack album for Carny, which is co-credited to Robertson and composer Alex North, who wrote the orchestral score for the film. The soundtrack was re-released on compact disc by Real Gone Music in 2015. Early collaborations with Martin Scorsese 1980–1986 (Raging Bull, The King of Comedy, The Color of Money) After the production of Carny was completed, Robertson flew to New York to assist Martin Scorsese on the music for the film Raging Bull (1980). Robertson and Scorsese would have a long-running working relationship. The former would find and/or create music to underscore the latter's films. Raging Bull was the first of these collaborations. Robertson credits his work on Raging Bull for sparking his interest in the work of sourcing and underscoring music for movies. Robertson supplied three newly recorded instrumental jazz tracks for sourced music, which he also produced. These three tracks feature Robertson playing guitar, along with performances from the Band alumni Garth Hudson and Richard Manuel. One of the tracks, "Webster Hall", is co-written by Robertson and Garth Hudson. Robertson also worked with Scorsese on selecting the film's opening theme music, choosing the intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana by Italian opera composer Pietro Mascagni. The soundtrack was finally released by Capitol Records in 2005 as a 37 track, 2-CD set. Robertson worked with Scorsese again on his next film, The King of Comedy (1983), and is credited in the film's opening credits for "Music Production". Robertson contributed one original song, "Between Trains," to the film's soundtrack. The song was written in tribute to "Cowboy" Dan Johnson, an assistant of Scorsese's who had recently died. Robertson produced the track, sings lead vocals, and plays guitar and keyboards; the Band alumni Garth Hudson and Richard Manuel appear on the track was well. A soundtrack album for the film was released by Warner Bros. in 1983. In June 1986, Robertson began working with Scorsese on his next film The Color of Money. In addition to sourcing music for the film, Robertson also composed the film's score; it was the first time Robertson had ever written a dramatic underscore for a film. Robertson brought in Canadian jazz composer Gil Evans to orchestrate the arrangements. The best known song on The Color of Money soundtrack is Eric Clapton's "It's in the Way That You Use It", which was co-written by Robertson. "It's in the Way That You Use It" reached #1 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Songs chart in January 1987. Robertson produced a song for the film with blues player Willie Dixon entitled "Don't Tell Me Nothin'"; Dixon's track was co-written with Robertson. The Color of Moneys soundtrack album was released by MCA Records. Solo career Geffen Records period Robbie Robertson (1987) Robertson began work on his first solo album, Robbie Robertson, in July 1986 after signing to Geffen Records. Robertson chose fellow Canadian Daniel Lanois to produce the album. Much of the album was recorded at The Village Recorder in West Los Angeles, California. He recorded at Bearsville Studios near Woodstock, New York, and also in Dublin, Ireland, with U2, and in Bath, England, with Peter Gabriel. He employed a number of guest artists on the album, including U2, Gabriel, the Bodeans, and Maria McKee. Garth Hudson and Rick Danko also made appearances on the album. Robertson wrote one track, "Fallen Angel", in honor of Richard Manuel, after his passing in March 1986. Released on October 26, 1987, Robbie Robertson peaked at #35 on the Billboard 200, remaining in the top 40 for three weeks. The album charted even higher in the UK, peaking at #23 on the UK Albums Chart and remaining on the chart for 14 weeks. Robbie Robertson received overwhelming critical acclaim at the time of its release, being listed in the Top-Ten Albums of the Year by several critics in Billboard magazine's 1987 "The Critics' Choice" end of the year feature. The album was listed as #77 in Rolling Stones 1989 list "100 Best Albums of the Eighties." Robertson had his single largest hit in the UK with "Somewhere Down The Crazy River", which features his spoken word verses contrasted with singing in the choruses. The song reached #15 in the UK Hit Singles chart, and remained in the chart for 11 weeks. The video for "Somewhere Down The Crazy River" was directed by Martin Scorsese, and features Maria McKee in an acting role. In the US, Robbie Robertson produced several hits on the Billboard Mainstream Rock charts, with "Showdown At Big Sky" coming in the highest (#2) and "Sweet Fire Of Love" the second highest (#7). The album was nominated for a Grammy Award for "Best Rock / Vocal Album", and was certified gold in the United States in 1991. In Canada, Robertson won Album Of The Year, Best Male Vocalist Of The Year and Producer Of The Year at the Juno Award ceremony in 1989. In 1991, Rod Stewart recorded a version of "Broken Arrow" for his album Vagabond Heart. Stewart's version of the song reached #20 on the Billboard 100 chart in the US and #2 on the Billboard Top Canadian Hit Singles chart in Canada. "Broken Arrow" was performed live by the Grateful Dead with Phil Lesh on vocals. Storyville (1991) Storyville was released on September 30, 1991. Robertson headed to New Orleans to collaborate with some of the city's natives like Aaron and Ivan Neville and the Rebirth Brass Band. Once again, Robertson brought in Band alumni Garth Hudson and Rick Danko as contributors. The album reached #69 on the Billboard 200 chart. Storyville received numerous positive reviews, with Rolling Stone giving it 4 1/2 stars out of 5, and the Los Angeles Times awarding it 3 stars out of 4. Two tracks from the album, "What About Now" and "Go Back To Your Woods", charted on the Billboard Mainstream Rock charts at #15 and #32 respectively. The album was nominated for Grammy awards in the categories "Best Rock Vocal Performance (solo)" and "Best Engineer". Production and session work 1984–1992 In 1984, Robertson co-produced the track "The Best of Everything" with Tom Petty for the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers album Southern Accents. Robertson also worked on the horn arrangements for the track, and brought in Band alumni Richard Manuel and Garth Hudson as guests. In 1986, Robertson appeared as a guest on the album Reconciled by the Call, playing guitar on the track "The Morning". Also in 1986, Robertson was brought on as creative consultant for Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll (1987), a feature film saluting Chuck Berry. Robertson appears in film, interviewing Chuck Berry, and then playing guitar while Berry recites poetry. In 1988, Robertson collaborated as a songwriter with Lone Justice lead singer Maria McKee. One of the songs they co-wrote, "Nobody's Child", was released on McKee's self-titled debut album in 1989. In 1989, Robertson recorded and produced a new version of the Band's "Christmas Must Be Tonight" for the Scrooged soundtrack. In 1990, Robertson appeared as a guest on the Ryuichi Sakamoto album Beauty, playing guitar on the song "Romance". He also contributed to the world music video and album production One World One Voice. In 1992, Robertson produced the song "Love in Time" for Roy Orbison's posthumous album King of Hearts. "Love In Time" was a basic demo Orbison had recorded that was believed to be lost, but had just recently been rediscovered. Robertson set about augmenting Orbison's basic vocal track with new arrangements and instrumentation, with the intent of making it sound like the arrangements were there from the beginning instead of later additions. Later solo albumsMusic for the Native Americans (1994): In 1994, Robertson returned to his roots, forming a Native American group called the Red Road Ensemble for Music for the Native Americans, a collection of songs that accompanied a television documentary series produced by TBS. Like his songs, "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down," and "Acadian Driftwood," Robertson touches on history that connects to his life and family. The Battle Of Wounded Knee and the near extinction of the buffalo in the United States are outlined in the song, "Ghost Dance." Robertson was recognized with a Juno Award for Producer of the Year. The international success of "Mahk Jchi (Heartbeat Drum Song)" inspired a concert in Agrigento, Italy, celebrating Native American music. Robertson headlined the festival along with other Native American musicians, and portions of the live performance appeared in a PBS documentary. Contact from the Underworld of Redboy (1998): On Contact from the Underworld of Redboy, Robertson departed from his typical production style and delved deep into a mix of rock, native, and electronic music. He employed the services of Howie B, DJ Premier, and producer Marius de Vries (Björk, Massive Attack). Through the songs on the album, he takes a close look at native traditions like Peyote Healing. The album's opening track, "The Sound Is Fading", samples a recording of a young Native American singer from the 1940s that Robertson got from the Library Of Congress, and the song "Sacrifice" includes parts of an interview from prison with Leonard Peltier set to a soundscape produced by Robertson and de Vries. The racial epithet in the album's title comes from an experience Robertson had where some bullies referred to him as "Red Boy" while he was playing with his cousins. Rolling Stone gave the album 4 out of 5 stars, and Robertson received a Juno Award for Best Music of Aboriginal Canada Recording. How to Become Clairvoyant (2011): Released on April 5, 2011, How To Become Clairvoyant is the fifth solo release from Robertson. The album arose from some impromptu demo sessions in Los Angeles with long time friend Eric Clapton. It features Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Trent Reznor, Tom Morello, Robert Randolph, Rocco Deluca, Angela McCluskey, and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes. Robbie performed "He Don't Live Here No More" on CBS's Late Show with David Letterman and Later... with Jools Holland in support of the album. He also appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon performing the song "Straight Down The Line," with Robert Randolph and the Roots. The album was released in a deluxe edition containing five bonus tracks (four demos and the exclusive track "Houdini", named after the magician Harry Houdini). "How To Become Clairvoyant" debuted at No. 13 on the Billboard 200, marking the highest debut and highest chart position for Robbie's solo works in his career. He teamed with painter and photographer Richard Prince to produce a special limited-edition collector's release of the album. The resulting LP-sized box included an art book, an individually numbered set of five lithographs (including pieces by Prince and photographer Anton Corbijn), a set of original tarot cards, and the original album plus ten bonus tracks. Only 2,500 were made. Sinematic (2019): Released on September 20, 2019, Sinematic is Robertson's sixth solo album. It features Van Morrison joining Robertson as dueling hitmen on the track “I Hear You Paint Houses," as well as other allusions to the world of Scorsese's films. Citizen Cope, Derek Trucks, and Frédéric Yonnet make guest appearances on the album. Later career Robertson worked on Martin Scorsese's movies Casino, The Departed, and Gangs of New York, and he provided music supervision for Shutter Island, The Wolf of Wall Street, and Silence. In Rome, he headlined the 1995 annual Labour Day concert festival with supporting acts Andrea Bocelli, Elvis Costello, and Radiohead. In 1996, as executive soundtrack producer, Robertson heard a demo of Change the World and sent it to Clapton as a suggestion for the soundtrack of Phenomenon, starring John Travolta. Babyface produced the track. Change the World won 1997 Grammy awards for Song of the Year and Record of the Year. In 1999, Robertson contributed songs to Oliver Stone's film, Any Given Sunday. In 2000, David Geffen and Mo Ostin convinced Robertson to join DreamWorks Records as creative executive. Robertson, who persuaded Nelly Furtado to sign with the company, is actively involved with film projects and developing new artist talent, including signings of A.i., Boomkat, eastmountainsouth, and Dana Glover. On February 9, 2002, Robertson performed "Stomp Dance (Unity)" as part of the opening ceremony of the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City, Utah. In 2004, he contributed the song "Shine Your Light" to the Ladder 49 soundtrack. In 2005, Robertson was executive producer of the definitive box set for the Band, entitled A Musical History. In 2006, he recorded with Jerry Lee Lewis on the track "Twilight", a Robertson composition, for Lewis' album Last Man Standing. On July 28, 2007, at Eric Clapton's Crossroads Guitar Festival in Bridgeview, Illinois, Robertson made a rare live appearance. Also in 2007, Robertson accepted an invitation to participate in Goin' Home: A Tribute to Fats Domino (Vanguard). With the group Galactic, Robertson contributed a version of Domino's "Goin' to the River". For the 2019 Martin Scorsese movie The Irishman, Robertson provided the score and consulted with music supervisor Randall Poster on the entire soundtrack. Honours and awards In 1989, the Band was inducted into the Canadian Juno Hall of Fame. In 1994, The Band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 1997, Robertson received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Songwriters. At the 2003 commencement ceremonies at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Robertson delivered an address to the graduating class and was awarded an honorary degree by the university. In 2003, Robertson received the Indspire Aboriginal Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2003, Robertson was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame. In 2005, Robertson received an honorary doctorate from York University. In 2006, he received the Governor General's Performing Arts Award for Lifetime Artistic Achievement, Canada's highest honour in the performing arts. In 2008, Robertson and the Band received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2011, Robertson was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame. On May 27, 2011, Robertson was made an Officer of the Order of Canada by Governor General David Johnston. In 2014, the Band was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame. October 14, 2017 Robbie Robertson receives the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Native American Music Awards In 2019, Robertson was given a key to the city of Toronto by Mayor John Tory during a TIFF press conference for Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band, a documentary about Robertson. 2019 Robbie Robertson the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award in the Canadian Music Industry Hall of Fame from Canadian Music Week (CMW) As author Robertson co-authored Legends, Icons and Rebels: Music That Changed the World with his son, Sebastian Robertson, and colleagues Jim Guerinot and Jared Levine. He also wrote Hiawatha and the Peacemaker, illustrated by David Shannon. His autobiography, Testimony, written over the course of five years, was published by Crown Archetype in November 2016. Personal life In 1967, Robertson married Dominique Bourgeois, a Canadian journalist. They later divorced. They have three children: daughters Alexandra and Delphine and son Sebastian. Robertson is a member of the Canadian charity Artists Against Racism. Discography Robbie Robertson (1987) Storyville (1991) Music for the Native Americans (soundtrack) (1994) Contact from the Underworld of Redboy (1998) How to Become Clairvoyant (2011) Sinematic (2019) Filmography 1978 – The Last Waltz (performer/producer) 1980 – Carny (actor/writer/producer/composer) 1980 – Raging Bull (music producer) 1982 – The King of Comedy (music producer) 1986 – The Color of Money (composer) 1994 – Jimmy Hollywood (composer) 1995 – Robbie Robertson: Going Home (documentary) 1995 – Casino (music consultant) 1995 – The Crossing Guard (actor – Roger) 1996 – Phenomenon (executive soundtrack producer) 1996 – Dakota Exile (narrator) 1999 – Forces of Nature (creative music consultant) 1999 – Wolves (narrator) 1999 – Any Given Sunday (songs) 2001 – The Life and Times of Robbie Robertson 2002 – Gangs of New York (executive music producer) 2002 – Skins (writer) 2003 – Festival Express (performer) 2004 – Jenifa (executive producer) 2004 – Ladder 49 (original song "Shine Your Light") 2006 – The Departed (music producer) 2007 – Eric Clapton: Crossroads Guitar Festival 2007 (performer) 2010 – Shutter Island (music supervisor) 2012 – Curse of the Axe (narrator) 2013 – Eric Clapton: Crossroads Guitar Festival 2013 (performer) 2013 – The Wolf of Wall Street (executive music producer) 2016 – Silence (executive music producer) 2017 – Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked The World (performer) 2018 – Native America (narrator) 2019 – The Irishman (executive music producer, musical director, musician) 2019 – Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band (himself) TBA – Killers of the Flower Moon See also Notable Aboriginal people of Canada References Further reading External links Robbie Robertson Interview NAMM Oral History Library (2017) 1943 births Canadian country rock musicians Canadian expatriate musicians in the United States Canadian folk rock musicians Canadian male singers Canadian people of Jewish descent Canadian Mohawk people Canadian rock guitarists Canadian male guitarists Canadian rock singers Canadian singer-songwriters Cayuga people First Nations musicians Governor General's Performing Arts Award winners Juno Award for Indigenous Music Album of the Year winners Living people Musicians from Toronto Officers of the Order of Canada The Band members Indspire Awards Native American musicians Jewish Canadian musicians Jewish musicians Jewish rock musicians Jewish singers Juno Award for Album of the Year winners Juno Award for Artist of the Year winners Jack Richardson Producer of the Year Award winners	true	[ "Přírodní park Třebíčsko (before Oblast klidu Třebíčsko) is a natural park near Třebíč in the Czech Republic. There are many interesting plants. The park was founded in 1983.\n\nKobylinec and Ptáčovský kopeček\n\nKobylinec is a natural monument situated ca 0,5 km from the village of Trnava.\nThe area of this monument is 0,44 ha. Pulsatilla grandis can be found here and in the Ptáčovský kopeček park near Ptáčov near Třebíč. Both monuments are very popular for tourists.\n\nPonds\n\nIn the natural park there are some interesting ponds such as Velký Bor, Malý Bor, Buršík near Přeckov and a brook Březinka. Dams on the brook are examples of European beaver activity.\n\nSyenitové skály near Pocoucov\n\nSyenitové skály (rocks of syenit) near Pocoucov is one of famed locations. There are interesting granite boulders. The area of the reservation is 0,77 ha.\n\nExternal links\nParts of this article or all article was translated from Czech. The original article is :cs:Přírodní park Třebíčsko.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nNature near the village Trnava which is there\n\nTřebíč\nParks in the Czech Republic\nTourist attractions in the Vysočina Region", "Damn Interesting is an independent website founded by Alan Bellows in 2005. The website presents true stories from science, history, and psychology, primarily as long-form articles, often illustrated with original artwork. Works are written by various authors, and published at irregular intervals. The website openly rejects advertising, relying on reader and listener donations to cover operating costs.\n\nAs of October 2012, each article is also published as a podcast under the same name. In November 2019, a second podcast was launched under the title Damn Interesting Week, featuring unscripted commentary on an assortment of news articles featured on the website's \"Curated Links\" section that week. In mid-2020, a third podcast called Damn Interesting Curio Cabinet began highlighting the website's periodic short-form articles in the same radioplay format as the original podcast.\n\nIn July 2009, Damn Interesting published the print book Alien Hand Syndrome through Workman Publishing. It contains some favorites from the site and some exclusive content.\n\nAwards and recognition \nIn August 2007, PC Magazine named Damn Interesting one of the \"Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites\".\nThe article \"The Zero-Armed Bandit\" by Alan Bellows won a 2015 Sidney Award from David Brooks in The New York Times.\nThe article \"Ghoulish Acts and Dastardly Deeds\" by Alan Bellows was cited as \"nonfiction journalism from 2017 that will stand the test of time\" by Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic.\nThe article \"Dupes and Duplicity\" by Jennifer Lee Noonan won a 2020 Sidney Award from David Brooks in the New York Times.\n\nAccusing The Dollop of plagiarism \n\nOn July 9, 2015, Bellows posted an open letter accusing The Dollop, a comedy podcast about history, of plagiarism due to their repeated use of verbatim text from Damn Interesting articles without permission or attribution. Dave Anthony, the writer of The Dollop, responded on reddit, admitting to using Damn Interesting content, but claiming that the use was protected by fair use, and that \"historical facts are not copyrightable.\" In an article about the controversy on Plagiarism Today, Jonathan Bailey concluded, \"Any way one looks at it, The Dollop failed its ethical obligations to all of the people, not just those writing for Damn Interesting, who put in the time, energy and expertise into writing the original content upon which their show is based.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Official website\n\n2005 podcast debuts" ]
[ "Robbie Robertson", "1967-1968 (Music From Big Pink)", "What happened in 1967?", "In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967).", "Was his album successful?", "I don't know.", "Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?", "Over the course of the \"Basement Tapes\" period, the group had developed a sound of their own," ]	C_ea62ce7604624d0ba7e25bc05367e754_0	What was their sound like?	4	What was the sound of Basement Tapes like?	Robbie Robertson	In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967). After recording the basic tracks, Dylan asked Robertson and Garth Hudson about playing on the album to fill out the sound. However, when Robertson heard the tracks, he liked the starkness of the sound and recommended that Dylan leave the songs as they were. Dylan worked with the members of the Hawks once again when they appeared as his backup band at two Woody Guthrie memorial concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York City in January 1968. Three of these performances were later released by Columbia Records on the LP A Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Vol. 1 (1972). Over the course of the "Basement Tapes" period, the group had developed a sound of their own, and Grossman went to Los Angeles to shop the group to a major label, securing a contract with Capitol Records. The group went to New York to begin recording songs with music producer John Simon. Capitol brought the group to Los Angeles to finish the album. The resulting album, Music From Big Pink, was released in August 1968. Robertson wrote four of the songs on Music From Big Pink, including "The Weight", "Chest Fever", "Caledonia Mission," and "To Kingdom Come". Robertson is listed in the songwriting credits as "J.R. Robertson". Robertson sang lead vocal on the track "To Kingdom Come"; he would not sing on another Band song released to the public until "Knockin' Lost John" on 1977's Islands. Two of Robertson's compositions for the album, "The Weight" and "Chest Fever", would become important touchstones in the group's career. "The Weight" was influenced by the films of director Luis Bunuel, in particular Nazarin (1959) and Viridiana (1961), and reflects the recurring theme in Bunuel's films about the impossibility of sainthood. The song portrays an individual who attempts to take a saintly pilgrimage, and becomes mired down with requests from other people to do favors for them along the way. The mention of "Nazareth" at the beginning of the song refers to Nazareth, Pennsylvania, where the C. F. Martin & Company guitar manufacturer is located; it was inspired by Robertson seeing the word "Nazareth" in the hole of his Martin guitar. Although "The Weight" reached #21 on the British radio charts, it did not fare as well on the American charts, initially stalling at #63. However, the song gained traction due to more successful covers by Jackie DeShannon (US #55, 1968), Aretha Franklin (US #19, 1969), and The Supremes with The Temptations (US #46, 1969), as well as to the song's inclusion in the movie Easy Rider (1969), which became a runaway success. "The Weight" has since become The Band's best known song. It has been covered by many artists, appeared in dozens of films and documentaries, and has become a staple in American rock music. When Music from Big Pink was released in 1968, The Band initially avoided media attention, and discouraged Capitol Records from promotional efforts. They also did not immediately pursue touring to support the album, and declined to be interviewed for a year. The resulting mystery surrounding the group led to speculation in the underground press. Music from Big Pink received excellent reviews, and the album influenced many well-known musicians of the period. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Jaime Royal "Robbie" Robertson, OC (born July 5, 1943), is a Canadian musician, songwriter, film composer, producer, actor, and author. Robertson is best known for his work as lead guitarist and songwriter for The Band, and for his career as a solo recording artist. Robertson's work with The Band was instrumental in creating the Americana music genre. Robertson has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Canadian Music Hall of Fame as a member of The Band, and has been inducted to Canada's Walk of Fame, both with The Band and on his own. He is ranked 59th in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 100 greatest guitarists. As a songwriter, Robertson is credited for writing "The Weight", "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down", "Up on Cripple Creek" with The Band, and had solo hits with "Broken Arrow" and "Somewhere Down the Crazy River", and many others. He has been inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, and received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Songwriters. As a film soundtrack producer and composer, Robertson is known for his collaborations with director Martin Scorsese, which began with the rockumentary film The Last Waltz (1978), and continued through a number of dramatic films, including Raging Bull (1980), The King of Comedy (1983), Casino (1995), The Departed (2006), The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) and The Irishman (2019). He has worked on many other soundtracks for film and television. Early life Robertson was born Jaime Royal Robertson on July 5, 1943. He was an only child. His mother was Rosemarie Dolly Chrysler, born February 6, 1922. She was Cayuga and Mohawk, raised on the Six Nations Reserve southwest of Toronto, Ontario. Chrysler lived with an aunt in the Cabbagetown neighbourhood and worked at the Coro jewellery plating factory. She met James Patrick Robertson at the factory and they married in 1942. Rosemarie and James Robertson continued to work at the factory where they met. The family lived in several homes in different Toronto neighbourhoods when Robbie was a child. He often travelled with his mother to the Six Nations Reserve to visit her family. It was here that Robertson was mentored in playing guitar by family members, in particular his older cousin Herb Myke. He became a fan of rock 'n' roll and R&B through the radio, listening to disc jockey George "Hound Dog" Lorenz play rock 'n' roll on WKBW in Buffalo, New York, and staying up at night to listen to disc jockey John R.'s all-night blues show on WLAC, a clear-channel station in Nashville, Tennessee. When Robertson was in his early teens, his parents separated. His mother revealed to Robertson that his biological father was not James, but Alexander David Klegerman, a Jewish man whom she had met working at the Coro factory. He became a professional gambler and was killed in a hit-and-run accident on the Queen Elizabeth Way. She had been with him while James Robertson was stationed in Newfoundland with the Canadian Army, before she married James. After telling Robertson, his mother arranged for the youth to meet his paternal uncles Morris (Morrie) and Nathan (Natie) Klegerman. Career When Robertson was 14, he worked two brief summer jobs in the travelling carnival circuit, first for a few days in a suburb of Toronto, and later as an assistant at a freak show for three weeks during the Canadian National Exhibition. He drew from this for his song "Life is a Carnival" (with the Band) and the movie Carny (1980), which he produced and starred in. The first band Robertson joined was Little Caesar and the Consuls, formed in 1956 by pianist/vocalist Bruce Morshead and guitarist Gene MacLellan. He stayed with the group for almost a year, playing popular songs of the day at local teen dances. In 1957 he formed Robbie and the Rhythm Chords with his friend Pete "Thumper" Traynor (who would later found Traynor Amplifiers). They changed the name to Robbie and the Robots after they watched the film Forbidden Planet and took a liking to the film's character Robby the Robot. Traynor customized Robertson's guitar for the Robots, fitting it with antennae and wires to give it a space age look. Traynor and Robertson joined with pianist Scott Cushnie and became The Suedes. At a Suedes show on October 5, 1959, when they played CHUM Radio's Hif Fi Club on Toronto's Merton Street, Ronnie Hawkins first became aware of them and was impressed enough to join them for a few numbers. With Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks Robertson began shadowing Hawkins. After the Suedes opened for the Arkansas-based rockabilly group Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks at Dixie Arena, Hawkins hired Robertson for the Hawks' road crew. Hawkins recorded two songs co-credited to Robertson, "Hey Baba Lou" and "Someone Like You", for his album Mr. Dynamo (1959), and brought Robertson to the Brill Building in New York City to help him choose songs for the rest of the album. Hawkins hired pianist Scott Cushnie away from the Suedes, and took him on tour with Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks in Arkansas. When the Hawks' bass player left the group, Cushnie recommended that Hawkins hire Robertson to replace him on bass. Hawkins invited Robertson to Arkansas, and flew to the UK to perform on television there. Left in Arkansas, Robertson spent his living allowance on records and practised intensively each day. Upon returning, Hawkins hired him to play bass. Cushnie left the band a few months later. Robertson soon switched over from bass to playing lead guitar for the Hawks. Robertson developed into a guitar virtuoso. Roy Buchanan, a few years older than Robertson, was briefly a member of the Hawks and became an important influence on Robertson's guitar style: "Standing next to Buchanan on stage for several months, Robertson was able to absorb Buchanan’s deft manipulations with his volume speed dial, his tendency to bend multiple strings for steel guitar-like effect, his rapid sweep picking and his passion for bending past the root and fifth notes during solo flights." Drummer/singer Levon Helm was already a member of the Hawks and soon became close friends with Robertson. The Hawks continued to tour the United States and Canada, adding Rick Danko, Richard Manuel, and Garth Hudson to the Hawks lineup in 1961. This lineup, which later became The Band, toured with Hawkins throughout 1962 and into 1963. They also hired the saxophone player Jerry Penfound and later Bruce Bruno, who were both with the group in their intermediary period as Levon and the Hawks. Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks cut sessions for Roulette Records throughout 1961–1963, all of which Robertson appeared on. The sessions included three singles: "Come Love" b/w "I Feel Good" (Roulette 4400 1961); "Who Do You Love" b/w "Bo Diddley" (Roulette 4483 1963); and "There's A Screw Loose" b/w "High Blood Pressure" (Roulette 4502 1963). With Levon and the Hawks The Hawks left Ronnie Hawkins at the beginning of 1964 to go on their own. The members of the Hawks were losing interest in playing in the rockabilly style and favoured blues and soul music. In early 1964, the group approached agent Harold Kudlets about representing them, which he agreed to do, booking them a year's worth of shows in the same circuits as they had been in before with Ronnie Hawkins. Originally dubbed The Levon Helm Sextet, the group included all of the future members of The Band, plus Jerry Penfound on saxophone and Bob Bruno on vocals. After Bruno left in May 1964, the group changed their name to Levon and the Hawks. Penfound stayed with the group until 1965. Kudlets kept the group busy performing throughout 1964 and into 1965, finally booking them into two lengthy summer engagements at the popular nightclub Tony Mart's in Somers Point, New Jersey, at the Shore. They played six nights a week alongside Conway Twitty and other acts. The members of Levon and the Hawks befriended blues artist John P. Hammond while he was performing in Toronto in 1964. Later in the year, the group agreed to work on Hammond's album So Many Roads (released in 1965) at the same time that they were playing the Peppermint Lounge in New York City. Robertson played guitar throughout the album, and was billed "Jaime R. Robertson" in the album's credits. Levon and the Hawks cut a single "Uh Uh Uh" b/w "Leave Me Alone" under the name the Canadian Squires in March 1965. Both songs were written by Robertson. The single was recorded in New York and released on Apex Records in the United States and on Ware Records in Canada. As Levon and the Hawks, the group cut an afternoon session for Atco Records later in 1965, which yielded two singles, "The Stones I Throw" b/w "He Don't Love You" (Atco 6383) and "Go, Go, Liza Jane" b/w "He Don't Love You" (Atco 6625). Robertson also wrote all three of the tracks on Levon and the Hawks' Atco singles. With Bob Dylan and the Hawks 1965–1966 World Tour Toward the end of Levon and the Hawks' second engagement at Tony Mart's in New Jersey, in August 1965, Robertson received a call from Albert Grossman Management requesting a meeting with singer Bob Dylan. The group had been recommended to both Grossman and to Dylan by Mary Martin, one of Grossman's employees; she was originally from Toronto and was a friend of the band. Dylan was also aware of the group through his friend John Hammond, whose album So Many Roads members of the Hawks had performed on. Robertson agreed to meet with Dylan. Initially, Dylan intended simply to hire Robertson as the guitarist for his backing group. Robertson refused the offer, but did agree to play two shows with Dylan, one at the Forest Hills Tennis Stadium in Forest Hills, New York on August 28, and one at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles on September 3. Robertson suggested they use Levon Helm on drums for the shows. Robertson and Helm performed in Dylan's backing band, along with Harvey Brooks and Al Kooper for both shows. The first at Forest Hills received a predominantly hostile response, but the second in Los Angeles was received slightly more favourably. Dylan flew up to Toronto and rehearsed with Levon and the Hawks September 15–17, as Levon and the Hawks finished an engagement there, and hired the full band for his upcoming tour. Bob Dylan and the Hawks toured the United States throughout October–December 1965, with each show consisting of two sets: an acoustic show featuring only Dylan on guitar and harmonica, and an electric set featuring Dylan backed by the Hawks. The tours were largely met with a hostile reaction from fans who knew Dylan as a prominent figure in the American folk music revival, and thought his move into rock music a betrayal. Helm left the group after their November 28 performance in Washington, D.C. Session drummer Bobby Gregg replaced Helm for the December dates, and Sandy Konikoff was brought in to replace Gregg in January 1966. Dylan and the Hawks played more dates in the continental United States in February–March 1966 of the 1966 world tour. From April 9-May 27, they played Hawaii, Australia, Europe, and the UK and Ireland. Drummer Sandy Konikoff left after the Pacific Northwest dates in March, and Mickey Jones replaced him, staying with the group for the remainder of the tour. The Australian and European legs of the tour received a particularly harsh response from disgruntled folk fans. The May 17 Manchester Free Trade Hall show is best known for an angry audience member audibly yelling "Judas!" at Dylan; it became a frequently-bootlegged live show from the tour, was eventually released officially as The Bootleg Series Vol. 4: Bob Dylan Live 1966, The "Royal Albert Hall" Concert. The European leg of the tour was filmed by documentary filmmaker D. A. Pennebaker, but completion of a planned film was delayed. After recovering from an accident, Dylan decided to edit it himself. ABC television rejected it, and it was never commercially released. It was screened as Eat the Document in 1972 at the Whitney Museum in New York. On November 30, 1965, Dylan cut a studio session with members of the Hawks, which yielded the non-LP single "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?" Dylan completed the Blonde on Blonde album in Nashville in mid-February 1966, employing Robertson for one of these sessions, which took place on February 14. The "Basement Tapes" period On July 29, 1966, Dylan sustained an injured neck from a motorcycle accident, and retreated to a quiet domestic life with his new wife and child in upstate New York. Some of the members of the Hawks were living at the Chelsea Hotel in New York City at the time, and were kept on a weekly retainer by Dylan's management. In February 1967, Dylan invited the members of the Hawks to come up to Woodstock, New York to work on music. Robertson had met a French-Canadian woman on the Paris stop of Dylan's 1966 world tour, and the two moved into a house in the Woodstock area. The remaining three members of the Hawks rented a house near West Saugerties, New York; it was later dubbed "Big Pink" because of its pink exterior. Dylan and the members of the Hawks worked together at the "Big Pink" house every day to rehearse and generate ideas for new songs, many of which they recorded in "Big Pink"'s makeshift basement studio. The recordings were made between the late spring and autumn of 1967. Previous Hawks member Levon Helm returned to the group in August 1967. By this time, Robertson's guitar style had evolved to be more supportive of the song and less devoted to displaying speed and virtuosity. In time, word about these sessions began to circulate, and in 1968, Rolling Stone magazine co-founder Jann Wenner brought attention to these tracks in an article entitled "Dylan's Basement Tape Should Be Released". In 1969, a bootleg album with a plain white cover compiled by two incognito music industry insiders featured a collection of seven tracks from these sessions. The album, which became known as The Great White Wonder, began to appear in independent record stores and receive radio airplay. This album became a runaway success and helped to launch the bootleg recording industry. In 1975, Robertson would produce an official compilation, The Basement Tapes, which included a selection of tracks from the sessions. An exhaustive collection of all 138 extant recordings was released in 2014 as The Bootleg Series Vol. 11: The Basement Tapes Complete. With the Band 1967–1968 (Music From Big Pink) In late 1967, Dylan left to record his next album, John Wesley Harding (1967). After recording the basic tracks, Dylan asked Robertson and Garth Hudson about playing on the album to fill out the sound. However, when Robertson heard the tracks, he liked the starkness of the sound and recommended that Dylan leave the songs as they were. Dylan worked with the members of the Hawks again when they appeared as his backup band at two Woody Guthrie memorial concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York City in January 1968. Three of these performances were later released by Columbia Records on the LP A Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Vol. 1 (1972). Over the course of the "Basement Tapes" period, the group had developed a sound of their own, and Grossman went to Los Angeles to shop the group to a major label, securing a contract with Capitol Records. The group went to New York to begin recording songs with music producer John Simon. Capitol brought the group to Los Angeles to finish the album. The resulting album, Music From Big Pink, was released in August 1968. Robertson wrote four of the songs on Music From Big Pink, including "The Weight", "Chest Fever", "Caledonia Mission," and "To Kingdom Come". Robertson is listed in the songwriting credits as "J.R. Robertson". Robertson sang lead vocal on the track "To Kingdom Come"; he would not sing on another Band song released to the public until "Knockin' Lost John" on 1977's Islands. Two of Robertson's compositions for the album, "The Weight" and "Chest Fever", would become important touchstones in the group's career. "The Weight" was influenced by the films of director Luis Buñuel, in particular Nazarín (1959) and Viridiana (1961), and reflects the recurring theme in Buñuel's films about the impossibility of sainthood. The song portrays an individual who attempts to take a saintly pilgrimage, and becomes mired down with requests from other people to do favors for them along the way. The mention of "Nazareth" at the beginning of the song refers to Nazareth, Pennsylvania, where the C. F. Martin & Company guitar manufacturer is located; it was inspired by Robertson seeing the word "Nazareth" in the hole of his Martin guitar. Although "The Weight" reached #21 on the British radio charts, it did not fare as well on the American charts, initially stalling at #63. But the song gained traction following more successful covers by Jackie DeShannon (US #55, 1968), Aretha Franklin (US #19, 1969), and the Supremes with the Temptations (US #46, 1969), and the song's inclusion in the movie Easy Rider (1969), which became a runaway success. "The Weight" has since become the Band's best known song. It has been covered by many artists, appeared in dozens of films and documentaries, and has become a staple in American rock music. When Music from Big Pink was released in 1968, the Band initially avoided media attention, and discouraged Capitol Records from promotional efforts. They also did not immediately pursue touring to support the album, and declined to be interviewed for a year. The resulting mystery surrounding the group prompted speculation in the underground press. Music from Big Pink received excellent reviews, and the album influenced many well-known musicians of the period. 1969 The Band In early 1969, the Band rented a home from Sammy Davis Jr. in Hollywood Hills, and converted the pool house behind it into a studio to recreate the "clubhouse" atmosphere that they had previously enjoyed at "Big Pink". The band began recording every day in the pool house studio, working on a tight schedule to complete the album. An additional three tracks were recorded at The Hit Factory in New York in April 1969. Robertson did most of the audio engineering on the album. The Band began performing regularly in spring 1969, with their first live dates as the Band taking place at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. Their most notable performances that year were at the 1969 Woodstock Festival and the UK Isle of Wight Festival with Bob Dylan in August. The Band's album The Band was released in September 1969, and became a critical and commercial success. The album received almost universal critical praise, peaked at #9 on the US pop charts, and stayed in the Top 40 for 24 weeks. The Band works as a loose concept album of Americana themes, and was instrumental in the creation of the Americana music genre. It was included in the Library of Congress' National Recording Registry in 2009. The song from this album that had the strongest cultural influence was "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down". The song explores a Confederate man's life after defeat of the South following the American Civil War. It incorporates historical events to create a larger American mythos. Although the Band's original version was not released as a single, a cover version by Joan Baez went to #3 on the charts in 1971 and helped to popularize the song. Several other tracks from The Band received significant radio airplay, and would become staples in the group's concert appearances. "Up on Cripple Creek" peaked at #25 in late 1969 in the United States, and would be their only Top 30 hit there. "Rag Mama Rag" reached #16 in the UK in April 1970, the highest chart position of any single by the group in that country. "Whispering Pines", co-written by Richard Manuel, was released as a single in France in 1970, and would become the title of a 2009 book about Canadian contributions to the Americana music genre by Jason Schneider. On November 2, 1969, the Band appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, one of only two television appearances they would make. 1970–1973 (Stage Fright through Moondog Matinee) On January 12, 1970, the Band was featured on the cover of Time magazine. This was the first time a North American rock band featured on the cover of the magazine. The Band rented The Woodstock Playhouse in Woodstock, New York with the intent of recording a new live album there, but the city council voted against it, so they recorded on location, but without an audience. Robertson handled most of the songwriting duties as before. Robertson brought in Todd Rundgren to engineer the album which was recorded in two weeks' time. These sessions became their third album, Stage Fright, which would become the Band's highest charting album, peaking at #5 on September 5 and staying in the Billboard Top 40 for 14 weeks. The Band's next album, Cahoots, was recorded at Albert Grossman's newly built Bearsville Studios and was released in October 1971. The album received mixed reviews, and peaked at #24 on the Billboard charts, only remaining in the Billboard Top 40 for five weeks. Cahoots is notable for its cover of Bob Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece", as well as for featuring the concert favourite "Life Is a Carnival". The inclusion of "When I Paint My Masterpiece" came about when Dylan stopped by Robertson's home during the recording of Cahoots and Robertson asked if he might have any songs to contribute. That led to Dylan playing an unfinished version of "When I Paint My Masterpiece" for him. Dylan completed the song soon afterwards, and the Band recorded it for the album. "Life Is a Carnival" features horn parts written by producer and arranger Allen Toussaint. It would be the only track from Cahoots the group would keep in their set list through to The Last Waltz concert and film. The Band continued to tour throughout 1970-71. A live album recorded at a series of shows at the Academy of Music in New York City between December 28–31, 1971, was released in 1972 as the double album Rock Of Ages. Rock of Ages peaked at #6, and remained in the Top 40 for 14 weeks. After the Academy of Music shows, the Band again retreated from performing live. They returned to the stage on July 28, 1973, to play the Summer Jam at Watkins Glen alongside the Allman Brothers Band and the Grateful Dead. A recording of the Band's performance was released by Capitol Records as the album Live at Watkins Glen in 1995. With over 600,000 people in attendance, the festival set a record for "Pop Festival Attendance" in the Guinness Book of World Records. The record was first published in the 1976 edition of the book. In October 1973, the Band released an album of cover songs entitled Moondog Matinee, which peaked at #28 on the Billboard charts. Around the time of the recording of Moondog Matinee, Robertson began working on an ambitious project entitled Works that was never finished or released. One lyric from the Works project, "Lay a flower in the snow," was used in Robertson's song "Fallen Angel", which appeared on his 1987 self-titled solo album. 1974 Reunion with Bob Dylan (Planet Waves and Before the Flood) In February 1973, Bob Dylan relocated from Woodstock, New York to Malibu, California. Coincidentally, Robertson moved to Malibu in the summer of 1973, and by October of the year the rest of the members of the Band had followed suit, moving into properties near Zuma Beach. David Geffen had signed Dylan to Asylum Records, and worked with promoter Bill Graham on the concept that would become the Bob Dylan and the Band 1974 Tour. It would be Dylan's first tour in more than seven years. Meanwhile, Bill Graham took out a full page advertisement for the Bob Dylan and the Band tour in the New York Times. The response was one of the largest in entertainment history up to that point, with between 5 and 6 million requests for tickets mailed in for 650,000 seats. Graham's office ended up selling tickets off on a lottery basis, and Dylan and the Band netted $2 million from the deal. Amongst the rehearsals and preparations, the Band went into the studio with Bob Dylan to record a new album for Asylum Records that would become the Bob Dylan album Planet Waves (1974). Sessions took place at Village Recorder in West Los Angeles, California, from November 2–14, 1973. Planet Waves was released on February 9, 1974. The album was #1 on the Billboard album charts for four weeks, and spent 12 weeks total in the Billboard Top 40. Planet Waves was Bob Dylan's first #1 album, and the first and only time Bob Dylan and the Band recorded a studio album together. The 1974 tour began at the Chicago Stadium on January 3, 1974, and ended at The Forum in Inglewood, California on February 14. The shows began with more songs from the new Planet Waves album and with covers that Dylan and the Band liked, but as the tour went on, they moved toward playing older and more familiar material, only keeping "Forever Young" from the Planet Waves album in the set list. Dylan and the Band played a number of tracks from the controversial 1965–1966 World Tour, this time to wildly enthusiastic response from the audience where there had been mixed reaction and boos a mere nine years previously. The final three shows of the tour at The Forum in Inglewood, California were recorded and assembled into the double album Before the Flood. Credited to "Bob Dylan/The Band", Before the Flood was released by Asylum Records on July 20, 1974. The album debuted at #3 on the Billboard charts, and spent ten weeks in the Top Forty. 1974–1975 (Shangri-La Studios, The Basement Tapes, and Northern Lights – Southern Cross) Following the 1974 reunion tour with Bob Dylan, rock manager Elliot Roberts booked the Band with the recently reunited Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. On September 4, both artists played Wembley Stadium in London, appearing with Jesse Colin Young and Joni Mitchell. After moving to Malibu in 1973, Robertson and the Band had discovered a ranch in Malibu near Zuma Beach called "Shangri-La", and decided to lease the property. The main house on the property had originally been built by Lost Horizon (1937) actress Margo Albert, and the ranch had been the filming and stabling site for the Mister Ed television show in the 1960s. In the interim, the house had served as a high-class bordello. The album release of The Basement Tapes, credited to Bob Dylan and the Band, was the first album production that took place in the new studio. The album, produced by Robertson, featured a selection of tapes from the original 1967 Basement Tapes sessions with Dylan, as well as demos for tracks eventually recorded for Music From Big Pink album. Robertson cleaned up the tracks, and the album was released in July 1975. Shangri-La Studios proved to be a return to a clubhouse atmosphere that the Band had enjoyed previously at Big Pink, and in the spring of 1975, the group began work on Northern Lights – Southern Cross, their first release of original material in four years. One of the best known tracks on the album is "Acadian Driftwood", the first song with specifically Canadian subject material. Robertson was inspired to write "Acadian Driftwood" after seeing the documentary L'Acadie, l'Acadie (1971) on Canadian television while in Montreal. Two other notable tracks from that album are "It Makes No Difference" and "Ophelia". Northern Lights – Southern Cross was released on November 1, 1975. The album received generally positive reviews, and reached #26 on the Billboard charts, remaining in the Top 40 for five weeks. 1976 (Islands and The Last Waltz concert) The Band began touring again in June 1976, performing throughout the summer. The members of the Band were splintering off to work on other projects, with Levon Helm building a studio in Woodstock and Rick Danko having been contracted to Arista Records as a solo artist. While on the summer tour, member Richard Manuel was involved in a boating accident that severely injured his neck, and ten dates of the 25-date tour were cancelled. It was during this time period that Robertson introduced the concept that the Band would cease to operate as a touring act. According to Robertson, the group's mutual agreement was that they would stage one final "grand finale" show, part ways to work on their various projects, and then regroup. Helm later made the case in his autobiography, This Wheel's on Fire, that Robertson had forced the Band's breakup on the rest of the group. Concert promoter Bill Graham booked the Band at the Winterland Ballroom on Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976. The show was intended as a gala event, with ticket prices of $25 per person. The event would include a Thanksgiving dinner served to the audience, and would feature the Band performing with various musical guests. The onstage guest list included Ronnie Hawkins, Muddy Waters, Paul Butterfield, Dr. John, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, Neil Diamond, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, and others. Robertson wanted to document the event on film, and approached director Martin Scorsese to see if he would be interested in shooting the concert. The Winterland concert was called The Last Waltz. Robertson and Scorsese developed a 200-page script for the show, listing out in columns the lyrics of the songs, who was singing what part, and what instruments were being featured. It included columns for the camera and lighting work. Scorsese brought in all-star cameramen such as Michael Chapman, László Kovács and Vilmos Zsigmond to film the show in 35mm. John Simon, producer on the Band's first two albums, was brought in to coordinate rehearsals and work as musical director. Boris Leven was brought in as art director. Jonathan Taplin assumed the role of executive producer, and Robertson worked as producer of the film. Rehearsals for The Last Waltz concert began in early November. Warner Bros. Records president Mo Ostin offered to finance the production of The Last Waltz film in exchange for the rights to release music from The Last Waltz as an album. However, the group were contractually obligated to supply Capitol Records with one more album before they could be released to work with Warner Bros. So in between rehearsing, the Band worked on the studio album Islands for Capitol. Robertson wrote or co-wrote eight of the ten tracks. One of the songs, "Knockin' Lost John", features Robertson on vocals, and was the first Band song Robertson had sung on since "To Kingdom Come" from Music From Big Pink. "Christmas Must Be Tonight" was inspired by the birth of Robertson's son, Sebastian, in July 1974. The Last Waltz concert event took place on Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976. Approximately five thousand people were in attendance. The event began at 5 pm, beginning with the audience members being served a full traditional Thanksgiving meal at candlelit tables, with a vegetarian table serving an alternate menu as an option. The Berkeley Promenade Orchestra played waltz music for dancing afterwards. The tables were cleared and moved at 8 pm. At 9 pm, the Band played songs for an hour, beginning with "Up On Cripple Creek". Just after 10 pm, Robertson introduced Ronnie Hawkins, the first onstage guest, with a succession of guest stars appearing with the group until just after midnight. The group took a 30-minute break, during which several Bay Area poets performed readings of their poems. After the break, the Band returned to the stage, performing, among other songs, a new composition entitled "The Last Waltz Theme" that Robertson had just completed less than 48 hours prior. Bob Dylan was brought in at the end of this second set, performing several songs, and finally being joined with the other guest stars for a finale performance of "I Shall Be Released". This was then followed with two all-star jam sessions, after which the Band returned to the stage to close the show with one more song, their rendition of "Baby Don't You Do It". 1977–1978 (The Last Waltz film and album) After The Last Waltz concert event was finished, director Martin Scorsese had 400 reels of raw footage to work with, and began editing the footage. The film was then sold to United Artists. In the meantime, Robertson and Scorsese continued to brainstorm more ideas for the film. In April 1977, country singer Emmylou Harris and gospel vocal group the Staple Singers were filmed on a sound stage at MGM performing with the Band. Emmylou Harris performed on "Evangeline", a new song written by Robertson, and the Staples Singers performed on a new recording of "The Weight," which they themselves had recorded a version of in 1968. Scorsese's next idea was to intersperse the concert footage with interviews of the Band that told their story. Scorsese conducted the interviews. The Last Waltz album was released by Warner Brothers Records on April 7, 1978, as a 3-LP set. The first five sides feature live performances from the concert, and the last side contains studio recordings from the MGM sound stage sessions. The album peaked at #16 on the Billboard charts, and remained in the Top 40 for 8 weeks. The Last Waltz film was released to theatres on April 26, 1978. The film fared well with both rock and film critics. Robertson and Scorsese made appearances throughout America and Europe to promote the film. Over time, The Last Waltz has become lauded by many as an important and pioneering rockumentary. Its influence has been felt on subsequent rock music films such as Talking Heads' Stop Making Sense (1984), and U2's Rattle and Hum (1988). Production and session work outside of the Band 1970–1977 Robertson produced Jesse Winchester's debut self-titled album, which was released in 1970 on Ampex Records. The album features Robertson playing guitar throughout the album, and co-credits the track "Snow" to Robertson as well. Robertson played guitar on ex-Beatle Ringo Starr's third solo album, Ringo (1973), performing with four-fifths of the Band on the track "Sunshine Life For Me (Sail Away Raymond)". Robertson contributed a guitar solo on the track "Snookeroo" on Starr's fourth album, Goodnight Vienna (1974). Robertson played guitar for Joni Mitchell on the track "Raised on Robbery", which was released on her album Court and Spark. In 1974, Robertson also played guitar on Carly Simon's version of "Mockingbird", which featured Simon singing with her then-husband James Taylor. In 1975, Robertson produced and played guitar on singer/guitarist Hirth Martinez's debut album Hirth From Earth. Bob Dylan had heard Martinez, and recommended him to Robertson. Robertson identified strongly with Martinez' music, helped him to secure a recording contract with Warner Bros. Records, and agreed to produce Martinez' debut album. He also played guitar on Martinez' follow-up album, Big Bright Street (1977). In 1975, Eric Clapton recorded the album No Reason to Cry at the Band's Shangri-La Studios with help from members of the Band. Robertson played lead guitar on the track "Sign Language". In the mid-1970s, Robertson connected with singer Neil Diamond, and the two began collaborating on a concept album about the life and struggles of a Tin Pan Alley songwriter. The resulting album, entitled Beautiful Noise, was recorded at Shangri-La Studios in early 1976. It reached #6 on the Billboard charts and remained in the Top 40 for sixteen weeks. Robertson produced the album, co-wrote the track "Dry Your Eyes" with Diamond, and played guitar on "Dry Your Eyes", "Lady-Oh", and "Jungletime". He produced Diamond's live double album Love at the Greek (1977), which was recorded in 1976 at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles. Love at the Greek reached #8 on the Billboard charts and remained in the Top 40 for nine weeks. In 1977, Robertson contributed to two album projects from the Band alumni. Robertson played guitar on "Java Blues" on Rick Danko's self-titled debut album, and also played guitar on the Earl King-penned "Sing, Sing, Sing" on the album Levon Helm & the RCO All-Stars. Also in 1977, Robertson contributed to the second self-titled album by singer-songwriter Libby Titus, who was the former girlfriend of Levon Helm. Robertson produced the track "The Night You Took Me To Barbados In My Dreams" (co-written by Titus and Hirth Martinez), and produced and played guitar on the Cole Porter standard "Miss Otis Regrets". Film career 1980–1986 Carny (1980) film and soundtrack After the release of The Last Waltz, MGM/UA, who released the film, viewed Robertson as a potential film actor, and provided Robertson with an office on the MGM lot. During this time, Martin Scorsese's agent, Harry Ulfand, contacted Robertson about the idea of producing a dramatic film about traveling carnivals, which Robertson was drawn to because of his childhood experiences working in carnivals. The screenplay for the film Carny was directed by documentary filmmaker Robert Kaylor. Although Robertson was initially only intended to be the producer of Carny, he ended up becoming the third lead actor in the film, playing the role of Patch, the patch man. Gary Busey played "Frankie", the carnival bozo and Patch's best friend. Jodie Foster was selected to play the role of Donna, a small town girl who runs away to join the carnival and threatens to come between the two friends. The film cast real life carnies alongside professional film actors, which created a difficult atmosphere on set. Carny opened to theaters on June 13, 1980. Also in 1980, Warner Bros released a soundtrack album for Carny, which is co-credited to Robertson and composer Alex North, who wrote the orchestral score for the film. The soundtrack was re-released on compact disc by Real Gone Music in 2015. Early collaborations with Martin Scorsese 1980–1986 (Raging Bull, The King of Comedy, The Color of Money) After the production of Carny was completed, Robertson flew to New York to assist Martin Scorsese on the music for the film Raging Bull (1980). Robertson and Scorsese would have a long-running working relationship. The former would find and/or create music to underscore the latter's films. Raging Bull was the first of these collaborations. Robertson credits his work on Raging Bull for sparking his interest in the work of sourcing and underscoring music for movies. Robertson supplied three newly recorded instrumental jazz tracks for sourced music, which he also produced. These three tracks feature Robertson playing guitar, along with performances from the Band alumni Garth Hudson and Richard Manuel. One of the tracks, "Webster Hall", is co-written by Robertson and Garth Hudson. Robertson also worked with Scorsese on selecting the film's opening theme music, choosing the intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana by Italian opera composer Pietro Mascagni. The soundtrack was finally released by Capitol Records in 2005 as a 37 track, 2-CD set. Robertson worked with Scorsese again on his next film, The King of Comedy (1983), and is credited in the film's opening credits for "Music Production". Robertson contributed one original song, "Between Trains," to the film's soundtrack. The song was written in tribute to "Cowboy" Dan Johnson, an assistant of Scorsese's who had recently died. Robertson produced the track, sings lead vocals, and plays guitar and keyboards; the Band alumni Garth Hudson and Richard Manuel appear on the track was well. A soundtrack album for the film was released by Warner Bros. in 1983. In June 1986, Robertson began working with Scorsese on his next film The Color of Money. In addition to sourcing music for the film, Robertson also composed the film's score; it was the first time Robertson had ever written a dramatic underscore for a film. Robertson brought in Canadian jazz composer Gil Evans to orchestrate the arrangements. The best known song on The Color of Money soundtrack is Eric Clapton's "It's in the Way That You Use It", which was co-written by Robertson. "It's in the Way That You Use It" reached #1 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Songs chart in January 1987. Robertson produced a song for the film with blues player Willie Dixon entitled "Don't Tell Me Nothin'"; Dixon's track was co-written with Robertson. The Color of Moneys soundtrack album was released by MCA Records. Solo career Geffen Records period Robbie Robertson (1987) Robertson began work on his first solo album, Robbie Robertson, in July 1986 after signing to Geffen Records. Robertson chose fellow Canadian Daniel Lanois to produce the album. Much of the album was recorded at The Village Recorder in West Los Angeles, California. He recorded at Bearsville Studios near Woodstock, New York, and also in Dublin, Ireland, with U2, and in Bath, England, with Peter Gabriel. He employed a number of guest artists on the album, including U2, Gabriel, the Bodeans, and Maria McKee. Garth Hudson and Rick Danko also made appearances on the album. Robertson wrote one track, "Fallen Angel", in honor of Richard Manuel, after his passing in March 1986. Released on October 26, 1987, Robbie Robertson peaked at #35 on the Billboard 200, remaining in the top 40 for three weeks. The album charted even higher in the UK, peaking at #23 on the UK Albums Chart and remaining on the chart for 14 weeks. Robbie Robertson received overwhelming critical acclaim at the time of its release, being listed in the Top-Ten Albums of the Year by several critics in Billboard magazine's 1987 "The Critics' Choice" end of the year feature. The album was listed as #77 in Rolling Stones 1989 list "100 Best Albums of the Eighties." Robertson had his single largest hit in the UK with "Somewhere Down The Crazy River", which features his spoken word verses contrasted with singing in the choruses. The song reached #15 in the UK Hit Singles chart, and remained in the chart for 11 weeks. The video for "Somewhere Down The Crazy River" was directed by Martin Scorsese, and features Maria McKee in an acting role. In the US, Robbie Robertson produced several hits on the Billboard Mainstream Rock charts, with "Showdown At Big Sky" coming in the highest (#2) and "Sweet Fire Of Love" the second highest (#7). The album was nominated for a Grammy Award for "Best Rock / Vocal Album", and was certified gold in the United States in 1991. In Canada, Robertson won Album Of The Year, Best Male Vocalist Of The Year and Producer Of The Year at the Juno Award ceremony in 1989. In 1991, Rod Stewart recorded a version of "Broken Arrow" for his album Vagabond Heart. Stewart's version of the song reached #20 on the Billboard 100 chart in the US and #2 on the Billboard Top Canadian Hit Singles chart in Canada. "Broken Arrow" was performed live by the Grateful Dead with Phil Lesh on vocals. Storyville (1991) Storyville was released on September 30, 1991. Robertson headed to New Orleans to collaborate with some of the city's natives like Aaron and Ivan Neville and the Rebirth Brass Band. Once again, Robertson brought in Band alumni Garth Hudson and Rick Danko as contributors. The album reached #69 on the Billboard 200 chart. Storyville received numerous positive reviews, with Rolling Stone giving it 4 1/2 stars out of 5, and the Los Angeles Times awarding it 3 stars out of 4. Two tracks from the album, "What About Now" and "Go Back To Your Woods", charted on the Billboard Mainstream Rock charts at #15 and #32 respectively. The album was nominated for Grammy awards in the categories "Best Rock Vocal Performance (solo)" and "Best Engineer". Production and session work 1984–1992 In 1984, Robertson co-produced the track "The Best of Everything" with Tom Petty for the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers album Southern Accents. Robertson also worked on the horn arrangements for the track, and brought in Band alumni Richard Manuel and Garth Hudson as guests. In 1986, Robertson appeared as a guest on the album Reconciled by the Call, playing guitar on the track "The Morning". Also in 1986, Robertson was brought on as creative consultant for Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll (1987), a feature film saluting Chuck Berry. Robertson appears in film, interviewing Chuck Berry, and then playing guitar while Berry recites poetry. In 1988, Robertson collaborated as a songwriter with Lone Justice lead singer Maria McKee. One of the songs they co-wrote, "Nobody's Child", was released on McKee's self-titled debut album in 1989. In 1989, Robertson recorded and produced a new version of the Band's "Christmas Must Be Tonight" for the Scrooged soundtrack. In 1990, Robertson appeared as a guest on the Ryuichi Sakamoto album Beauty, playing guitar on the song "Romance". He also contributed to the world music video and album production One World One Voice. In 1992, Robertson produced the song "Love in Time" for Roy Orbison's posthumous album King of Hearts. "Love In Time" was a basic demo Orbison had recorded that was believed to be lost, but had just recently been rediscovered. Robertson set about augmenting Orbison's basic vocal track with new arrangements and instrumentation, with the intent of making it sound like the arrangements were there from the beginning instead of later additions. Later solo albumsMusic for the Native Americans (1994): In 1994, Robertson returned to his roots, forming a Native American group called the Red Road Ensemble for Music for the Native Americans, a collection of songs that accompanied a television documentary series produced by TBS. Like his songs, "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down," and "Acadian Driftwood," Robertson touches on history that connects to his life and family. The Battle Of Wounded Knee and the near extinction of the buffalo in the United States are outlined in the song, "Ghost Dance." Robertson was recognized with a Juno Award for Producer of the Year. The international success of "Mahk Jchi (Heartbeat Drum Song)" inspired a concert in Agrigento, Italy, celebrating Native American music. Robertson headlined the festival along with other Native American musicians, and portions of the live performance appeared in a PBS documentary. Contact from the Underworld of Redboy (1998): On Contact from the Underworld of Redboy, Robertson departed from his typical production style and delved deep into a mix of rock, native, and electronic music. He employed the services of Howie B, DJ Premier, and producer Marius de Vries (Björk, Massive Attack). Through the songs on the album, he takes a close look at native traditions like Peyote Healing. The album's opening track, "The Sound Is Fading", samples a recording of a young Native American singer from the 1940s that Robertson got from the Library Of Congress, and the song "Sacrifice" includes parts of an interview from prison with Leonard Peltier set to a soundscape produced by Robertson and de Vries. The racial epithet in the album's title comes from an experience Robertson had where some bullies referred to him as "Red Boy" while he was playing with his cousins. Rolling Stone gave the album 4 out of 5 stars, and Robertson received a Juno Award for Best Music of Aboriginal Canada Recording. How to Become Clairvoyant (2011): Released on April 5, 2011, How To Become Clairvoyant is the fifth solo release from Robertson. The album arose from some impromptu demo sessions in Los Angeles with long time friend Eric Clapton. It features Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Trent Reznor, Tom Morello, Robert Randolph, Rocco Deluca, Angela McCluskey, and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes. Robbie performed "He Don't Live Here No More" on CBS's Late Show with David Letterman and Later... with Jools Holland in support of the album. He also appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon performing the song "Straight Down The Line," with Robert Randolph and the Roots. The album was released in a deluxe edition containing five bonus tracks (four demos and the exclusive track "Houdini", named after the magician Harry Houdini). "How To Become Clairvoyant" debuted at No. 13 on the Billboard 200, marking the highest debut and highest chart position for Robbie's solo works in his career. He teamed with painter and photographer Richard Prince to produce a special limited-edition collector's release of the album. The resulting LP-sized box included an art book, an individually numbered set of five lithographs (including pieces by Prince and photographer Anton Corbijn), a set of original tarot cards, and the original album plus ten bonus tracks. Only 2,500 were made. Sinematic (2019): Released on September 20, 2019, Sinematic is Robertson's sixth solo album. It features Van Morrison joining Robertson as dueling hitmen on the track “I Hear You Paint Houses," as well as other allusions to the world of Scorsese's films. Citizen Cope, Derek Trucks, and Frédéric Yonnet make guest appearances on the album. Later career Robertson worked on Martin Scorsese's movies Casino, The Departed, and Gangs of New York, and he provided music supervision for Shutter Island, The Wolf of Wall Street, and Silence. In Rome, he headlined the 1995 annual Labour Day concert festival with supporting acts Andrea Bocelli, Elvis Costello, and Radiohead. In 1996, as executive soundtrack producer, Robertson heard a demo of Change the World and sent it to Clapton as a suggestion for the soundtrack of Phenomenon, starring John Travolta. Babyface produced the track. Change the World won 1997 Grammy awards for Song of the Year and Record of the Year. In 1999, Robertson contributed songs to Oliver Stone's film, Any Given Sunday. In 2000, David Geffen and Mo Ostin convinced Robertson to join DreamWorks Records as creative executive. Robertson, who persuaded Nelly Furtado to sign with the company, is actively involved with film projects and developing new artist talent, including signings of A.i., Boomkat, eastmountainsouth, and Dana Glover. On February 9, 2002, Robertson performed "Stomp Dance (Unity)" as part of the opening ceremony of the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City, Utah. In 2004, he contributed the song "Shine Your Light" to the Ladder 49 soundtrack. In 2005, Robertson was executive producer of the definitive box set for the Band, entitled A Musical History. In 2006, he recorded with Jerry Lee Lewis on the track "Twilight", a Robertson composition, for Lewis' album Last Man Standing. On July 28, 2007, at Eric Clapton's Crossroads Guitar Festival in Bridgeview, Illinois, Robertson made a rare live appearance. Also in 2007, Robertson accepted an invitation to participate in Goin' Home: A Tribute to Fats Domino (Vanguard). With the group Galactic, Robertson contributed a version of Domino's "Goin' to the River". For the 2019 Martin Scorsese movie The Irishman, Robertson provided the score and consulted with music supervisor Randall Poster on the entire soundtrack. Honours and awards In 1989, the Band was inducted into the Canadian Juno Hall of Fame. In 1994, The Band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 1997, Robertson received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Songwriters. At the 2003 commencement ceremonies at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Robertson delivered an address to the graduating class and was awarded an honorary degree by the university. In 2003, Robertson received the Indspire Aboriginal Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2003, Robertson was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame. In 2005, Robertson received an honorary doctorate from York University. In 2006, he received the Governor General's Performing Arts Award for Lifetime Artistic Achievement, Canada's highest honour in the performing arts. In 2008, Robertson and the Band received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2011, Robertson was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame. On May 27, 2011, Robertson was made an Officer of the Order of Canada by Governor General David Johnston. In 2014, the Band was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame. October 14, 2017 Robbie Robertson receives the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Native American Music Awards In 2019, Robertson was given a key to the city of Toronto by Mayor John Tory during a TIFF press conference for Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band, a documentary about Robertson. 2019 Robbie Robertson the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award in the Canadian Music Industry Hall of Fame from Canadian Music Week (CMW) As author Robertson co-authored Legends, Icons and Rebels: Music That Changed the World with his son, Sebastian Robertson, and colleagues Jim Guerinot and Jared Levine. He also wrote Hiawatha and the Peacemaker, illustrated by David Shannon. His autobiography, Testimony, written over the course of five years, was published by Crown Archetype in November 2016. Personal life In 1967, Robertson married Dominique Bourgeois, a Canadian journalist. They later divorced. They have three children: daughters Alexandra and Delphine and son Sebastian. Robertson is a member of the Canadian charity Artists Against Racism. Discography Robbie Robertson (1987) Storyville (1991) Music for the Native Americans (soundtrack) (1994) Contact from the Underworld of Redboy (1998) How to Become Clairvoyant (2011) Sinematic (2019) Filmography 1978 – The Last Waltz (performer/producer) 1980 – Carny (actor/writer/producer/composer) 1980 – Raging Bull (music producer) 1982 – The King of Comedy (music producer) 1986 – The Color of Money (composer) 1994 – Jimmy Hollywood (composer) 1995 – Robbie Robertson: Going Home (documentary) 1995 – Casino (music consultant) 1995 – The Crossing Guard (actor – Roger) 1996 – Phenomenon (executive soundtrack producer) 1996 – Dakota Exile (narrator) 1999 – Forces of Nature (creative music consultant) 1999 – Wolves (narrator) 1999 – Any Given Sunday (songs) 2001 – The Life and Times of Robbie Robertson 2002 – Gangs of New York (executive music producer) 2002 – Skins (writer) 2003 – Festival Express (performer) 2004 – Jenifa (executive producer) 2004 – Ladder 49 (original song "Shine Your Light") 2006 – The Departed (music producer) 2007 – Eric Clapton: Crossroads Guitar Festival 2007 (performer) 2010 – Shutter Island (music supervisor) 2012 – Curse of the Axe (narrator) 2013 – Eric Clapton: Crossroads Guitar Festival 2013 (performer) 2013 – The Wolf of Wall Street (executive music producer) 2016 – Silence (executive music producer) 2017 – Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked The World (performer) 2018 – Native America (narrator) 2019 – The Irishman (executive music producer, musical director, musician) 2019 – Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band (himself) TBA – Killers of the Flower Moon See also Notable Aboriginal people of Canada References Further reading External links Robbie Robertson Interview NAMM Oral History Library (2017) 1943 births Canadian country rock musicians Canadian expatriate musicians in the United States Canadian folk rock musicians Canadian male singers Canadian people of Jewish descent Canadian Mohawk people Canadian rock guitarists Canadian male guitarists Canadian rock singers Canadian singer-songwriters Cayuga people First Nations musicians Governor General's Performing Arts Award winners Juno Award for Indigenous Music Album of the Year winners Living people Musicians from Toronto Officers of the Order of Canada The Band members Indspire Awards Native American musicians Jewish Canadian musicians Jewish musicians Jewish rock musicians Jewish singers Juno Award for Album of the Year winners Juno Award for Artist of the Year winners Jack Richardson Producer of the Year Award winners	false	[ "Triage is the third studio album by Australian band Methyl Ethel. It was released on 15 February 2019 through Dot Dash/4AD Records.\n\nIn February 2020, Triage was nominated for the Australian Music Prize of 2019.\n\nReception\n\nMarcy Donelson from AllMusic said \"Triage was produced, performed, and recorded by Jake Webb at his home studio, though its lush, lopsided textures hardly sound like what was a solo effort until the mixing stage. Parts melancholy, trippy, and dancy, he combined programmed and traditional instruments, including his own synth timbres, layering them in ways that sound more like atmospheric arena fare than what was essentially a one-man recording project.\"\n\nBrad Dountz from Consequence of Sound said \"Every song from Methyl Ethel's latest album seems like it is trying to outdo all the others and that is never a bad thing. Triage is probably their best album yet because they only seem to be competing with themselves, which makes for the best form of uncompromising music.\"\n\nTrack listing\n\nCharts\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2019 albums\nMethyl Ethel albums\n4AD albums\nDot Dash Recordings albums", "What's It Like Over There? is the third studio album by British indie rock band, Circa Waves. The album was released 5 April 2019 through PIAS Recordings.\n\nReception \n{{Album ratings\n\| aggregate1 = AOTY\n\| aggregate1score = 65/100\n\| MC = 59/100\n\| rev1 = Allmusic\n\| rev1score = <ref name=\"allmusic review\">{{AllMusic \| class= album \| id= mw0003233822 \| title= Review of 'What's It Like Over There \| first= Matt \| last= Collar \| accessdate= 2 June 2019}}</ref>\n\| rev2 = DIY\n\| rev2Score= \n\| rev3 = Dork\n\| rev3Score= \n\| rev4 = The Independent\| rev4Score = \n\| rev5 = NME\| rev5Score = \n\| rev6 = Q\| rev6score = \n\| rev7 = The Skinny\| rev7score = \n}}What's It Like Over There? has received mixed reviews from contemporary music critics. At review aggregator website, Album of the Year, the album holds an average critic score of 65/100 indicating mixed reviews. On Metacritic, What's It Like Over There? holds an average critic score of 59 out of 100 indicating \"mixed or average reviews based on 6 critics\".\n\nDylan Tuck, writing for The Skinny praised Circa Waves' change in trajectory compared to their first two albums: Different Creatures and Young Chasers and compared the album to the Arctic Monkeys' Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino. Describing the piano-influences in the album, Tuck said \"What’s It Like Over There? sees the group ditch the surging guitars in favour of more subtle, delicate touches. In a very Arctic Monkey’s move, throbbing, angst-fuelled rhythms make way for piano melodies (Times Won’t Change Me, Passport), ambitiously pop-infused moments incorporated with an anthemic quality (Sorry I’m Yours, Be Somebody Good), or melancholic yet upbeat ballads (The Way We Say Goodbye).\" Tuck ultimately awarded the album four stars out of five.\n\nDork magazine staff writer, Jamie MacMillan called What's It Like Over There? a \"a gospel-tinged bluesy piano number\". MacMillan further said that \"the band have created something that few would have seen coming, a seismic shift away from their usual big guitar sound into something far poppier and unrestrained by tired old tropes.\" Like Tuck, MacMillan also awarded the album four stars out of five.\n\nHannah Mylrea, writing for New Music Express was more critical of What's It Like Over There?'' Mylrea felt that the album was inconsistent, with only a handful of well composed tracks, with \"lacklustre\" filler tracks. Mylrea summarized the album by saying \"Circa Waves are no longer are the perfect band to accompany you and your pals necking tinnies in the sun, and instead sound more like the soundtrack to a Nicholas Sparks film. ‘What’s It Like Over There?’ is the band’s sugar rush sound moving into a toothache.\" Louisa Dixon, writing for DIY, was similarly critical of the album, describing it as \"both over-produced and underwhelming\".\n\nTrack listing\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n \n \n\n2019 albums\nAlbums produced by Alan Moulder\nCirca Waves albums\nPIAS Recordings albums" ]
[ "Sheila E.", "2009-12: The E Family" ]	C_bbd59fb6f1d84402acda38bc5fa0d0f7_0	Who is the E Family?	1	Who is the E Family?	Sheila E.	On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in San Francisco on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the tenth season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. CANNOTANSWER	On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.	Sheila Cecilia Escovedo (born December 12, 1957) better known under the stage name Sheila E., is an American percussionist and singer. She began her career in the mid-1970s as a percussionist and singer for The George Duke Band. After leaving the group in 1983, Sheila began a successful solo career, starting with her critically acclaimed debut album, which included the career-defining song, "The Glamorous Life". She became a mainstream solo star in 1985 following the success of the singles "The Belle of St. Mark", "Sister Fate", and "A Love Bizarre" with the last becoming one of her signature songs. She is commonly referred to as The Queen of Percussion. Early life and family Born in Oakland, California, Sheila E. is the daughter of Juanita Gardere, a dairy factory worker, and percussionist Pete Escovedo, with whom she frequently performs. Her mother is of Creole-French/African descent, and her father is of Mexican-American origin. She was raised Catholic. Sheila E's uncle is Alejandro Escovedo, and Tito Puente was Escovedo's godfather. She also is niece to Javier Escovedo, founder of seminal San Diego punk act The Zeros. Another uncle, Mario Escovedo, fronted long-running indie rockers The Dragons. She also is the niece of Coke Escovedo, who was in Santana and formed the band Azteca. Nicole Richie is Sheila E.'s biological niece, the daughter of Sheila's musician brother, Peter Michael Escovedo. She has publicly stated that, at the age of five, she was raped by her teen-aged babysitter, and this event had a profound influence on her childhood development. Career 1976–1983: Beginnings Sheila made her recording debut with jazz bassist Alphonso Johnson on "Yesterday's Dream" in 1976. By her early 20s, she had already played with George Duke, Lionel Richie, Marvin Gaye, Herbie Hancock, and Diana Ross. In 1977, she joined The George Duke Band. She appeared on several of Duke's albums, including Don't Let Go (1978), Follow the Rainbow (1979), Master of the Game (1979), and A Brazilian Love Affair (1980). Along with appearing on Duke's Don't Let Go in 1978, Escovedo and her father released "Happy Together" that year on Fantasy Records, sharing billing as Pete and Sheila Escovedo. In 1980, she appeared on the pivotal Herbie Hancock album Monster. In 1983, she joined Marvin Gaye's final tour Midnight Love Tour as one of his percussionists. 1984–1989: The Glamorous Life and A Love Bizarre Prince met Sheila E. at a concert in 1977, when she was performing with her father. After the show he met her and told her that he and his bassist Andre Cymone "were just fighting about which one of us would be the first to be your husband." He also vowed that one day she would join his band. The two would eventually join forces during the Purple Rain recording sessions. She provided vocals on the B-side to "Let's Go Crazy", "Erotic City" in 1984. Though taken under Prince's wing, she proved to be a successful artist in her own right. In June 1984, she released her debut album The Glamorous Life. The album's title-track single "The Glamorous Life" peaked at number 7 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts for two weeks in August 1984. The video for the song would bring three MTV Award nominations for Best Female Video, Best New Artist, and Best Choreography. She also received two Grammy Award nominations for Best New Artist and Best Pop Vocal Performance Female. Her second single "The Belle of St. Mark" charted at number 34 on Billboard Hot 100 and later became NME'''s "Single of the Week". She also toured as the opening act for Prince's Purple Rain Tour and the duo began a brief romantic relationship, while Prince was still seeing Susannah Melvoin, twin sister of The Revolution band member, Wendy Melvoin. They would later become briefly engaged in the late 1980s, during Prince's Lovesexy Tour. In 1985, she released Romance 1600. The lead single "Sister Fate" peaked at number 36 on the R&B charts. The album's second single "A Love Bizarre" became her signature song, peaking at number 11 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts. The non-album track "Holly Rock" made its way to live shows and into the film Krush Groove. Sheila later served as Prince's drummer and musical director in his band during the tours from 1987 to 1989. In July 1987, her self-titled album Sheila E. was released. The ballad single "Hold Me" peaked at number 3 on R&B charts. She appeared in four films, Krush Groove with Run-D.M.C., LL Cool J and Blair Underwood in 1985, Prince's concert film, Sign "O" the Times in 1987, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane and Chasing Papi in 2003. 1989–1994: Sex Cymbal and Mi Tierra After leaving the Prince organization in 1989, Sheila E. collaborated with writers like Demetrius Ross and David Gamson, recorded and released an album, Sex Cymbal in 1991. The album spawned singles: "Sex Cymbal", "Dropping Like Flies", and "Cry Baby". She began her tour in Japan which only lasted for a brief time. Shortly after returning to America, she developed severe health issues after her lung collapsed. She described herself as "semi-paralyzed from playing drums in heels for so long". Unable to promote and tour, her album Sex Cymbal suffered low sales. In 1994, Sheila E. contributed as a guest artist, playing congas and timbales, for the multi-platinum album Mi Tierra by Gloria Estefan, produced by Emilio Estefan. 1996–2005: Music directing In 1996, she played in Japanese pop singer Namie Amuro's live band. The show at Chiba Marine Stadium was later made available on DVD. In 1998, she played percussion on the Phil Collins cover of "True Colors". She was also the leader of the house band on the short-lived late night talk show, The Magic Hour, hosted by Earvin "Magic" Johnson in the late 1990s. Sheila E. has performed three stints as one of the member "All-Starrs" of Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band, in 2001, 2003, and 2006. Her drum "duets" with Starr are a moment of comic relief in the show, where they play the same parts but he quickly falls behind, shrugs and smiles as she takes off on an extended percussion solo. Says Sheila E.: "Ringo truly is one of the greatest rock n' roll drummers in the history of music. He enjoys the joke!" In 2002, Sheila E. appeared on the Beyoncé song "Work It Out". In 2004, Sheila E. toured New Zealand as drummer and percussionist for the Abe Laboriel Band. The same year, she also was featured on Tonex's Out the Box on the song "Todos Juntos". She also played drums on Cyndi Lauper's hit album of standard covers, At Last. She played percussion on the song "Stay". Sheila E. joined Lauper on a live version of that song on VH1 Divas. Sheila also performed at Prince's One Nite Alone... Live! concert, Live at the Aladdin Las Vegas in 2003, 36th NAACP Image Awards in 2005, and on the Good Morning show in June 2006. In 2005, Sheila E. was a surprise guest orchestrating a band, in Amerie's "1 Thing" performances for The Lady Of Soul & World Music Awards. In February 2006, Sheila E. performed with Prince (and Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman) once again at the BRIT Awards. Sheila E. performed at the Sonoma Jazz Festival in 2006 as part of Herbie Hancock's band featuring Larry Carlton, Terrence Blanchard, Marcus Miller, and Terri Lyne Carrington. 2007–2009: C.O.E.D. and reunion with Prince In 2006, Sheila formed a female group C.O.E.D. (Chronicles of Every Diva), consisting of Sheila E., Kat Dyson, Rhonda Smith and Cassandra O'Neal. The group released a single "Waters of Life". In March 2007, the group went on a successful tour in Europe and Japan. The group toured overseas in 2008 and released a CD available in limited distribution or through her website. For several concerts she was joined by Candy Dulfer, who was billed as a special guest. She performed at the 2007 Latin Grammy Awards with Juan Luis Guerra. She also performed at the American Latin Music Awards in June 2007 with Prince and on July 7, 2007, in Minneapolis with Prince. She performed at all three of his concerts: at Prince's 3121 perfume launch at Macy's, followed by the Target Center concert, and finally, at an aftershow at First Avenue. In October 2007, Sheila E. was a judge alongside Australian Idol judge and marketing manager Ian "Dicko" Dickson and Goo Goo Dolls lead singer John Rzeznik on the Fox network's The Next Great American Band. Sheila E. once again teamed up with Prince in March 2008, as she sat in (and played keyboard) on the performance with her family at Harvelle Redondo Beach. On April 9, 2008, Sheila E. appeared on the Emmy winning program, Idol Gives Back. Sheila E. took part in the show opener "Get on Your Feet" with Gloria Estefan. Dance troupe, So You Think You Can Dance finalists joined them on stage. On April 26, 2008, Sheila E., along with Morris Day and Jerome Benton, performed with Prince at the Coachella Music Festival. From May 2 to 6, 2008, Sheila E. played four sold-out shows at Blue Note Tokyo, the most frequented jazz music club in Tokyo, Japan. On June 14, 2008, Sheila E. performed at the Rhythm on the Vine music and wine festival at the South Coast Winery in Temecula, California for Shriners Hospital for Children. She took the stage with the E Family, Pete Escovedo, Juan Escovedo and Peter Michael Escovedo. Other performers at the event were jazz musician Herbie Hancock, contemporary music artist Jim Brickman and Kirk Whalum. 2009–2012: The E Family On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in Oakland, California, on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the 10th-season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. 2013–2015: Icon and Beat of my Own Drum In 2013, Sheila began recording her seventh album. In November 2013, she released her album Icon in the UK. The album was also Sheila's first release of her own recording label Stilettoflats Music. In September 2014, she released her autobiography Beat of my Own Drum. In November 2014, her album Icon was internationally released. 2016–present: Girl Meets Boy In 2016, Sheila provided drums for Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL's orchestral soundtrack to the blockbuster superhero films Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. On June 26, 2016, Sheila and The New Power Generation led a tribute to Prince on the 2016 BET Awards, featuring a medley of his hits. The next day, she released a new song, "Girl Meets Boy," in honor of Prince. In 2017 she was the featured percussionist for the soundtrack to the film The Boss Baby, which was also co-produced by Zimmer. Sheila E. is featured in Fred Armisen's 2018 Netflix comedy special Stand Up for Drummers. Sheila E. plays percussion on a number of tracks on Gary Clark Jr.'s album This Land''. She performed and served as music director for Let's Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince concert at the Staples Center on January 28, 2020. It was broadcast on CBS on April 21, 2020. On April 17, 2020, she released the single "Lemon Cake" which was available as an audio track on YouTube. On May 14, 2020, Sheila E. premiered the official video for "Lemon Cake" on Rated R&B. In July 2020, Sheila E. collaborated with MasterClass to create "Sheila E. Teaches Drumming and Percussion" Honors In February 2009, she was made an honorary member of Tau Beta Sigma National Honorary Band Sorority by the Eta Delta Chapter located at Howard University in recognition of her humanitarian efforts through and in music. Escovedo and her friend Lynn Mabry are also the co-founder of Elevate Oakland, a nonprofit that uses music and art to serve the needs of youth in Oakland public schools. Sheila E., along with her father, were presented with the Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021. Discography Studio albums Singles See also List of number-one dance hits (United States) List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart References External links Sheila E.’s MasterClass American musicians of Mexican descent American dance musicians American women drummers Living people Timbaleros Bongo players Conga players American rock percussionists African-American drummers American funk drummers American rock drummers Rhythm and blues drummers Soul drummers American contemporary R&B singers American soul singers American funk singers Warner Records artists Paisley Park Records artists Participants in American reality television series Musicians from Oakland, California Singing talent show winners Musicians from the San Francisco Bay Area 20th-century American drummers 21st-century African-American women singers 20th-century African-American women singers Hispanic and Latino American musicians The Blackout All-Stars members 1957 births Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band members African-American women singer-songwriters Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners American performers of Latin music Hispanic and Latino American women singers Women in Latin music Singer-songwriters from California	true	[ "The Narasinganavar family is a patriarchal Jain family of about 206 individuals who are residing together in the village of Lokur in the Dharwad district of Karnataka, India. All the individuals in the family share a common ancestry and this family is recognised as one of the largest undivided families in the world. The family spans across five generations and lives in two adjacent houses in the village. Bhimanna Jinapa Narasinganavar is the patriarch of the family and the entire family has lunch and dinner together. This is an extreme example of the joint family system that is in vogue in India.\n\nOrigin\nNarasinganavar, the pater familias of the family originally belonged to the Hatkal Angada village near Miraj in Maharashtra. He was a wrestler and once visited the Durga temple at Lokur. Apparently, it was the Goddess Durga who instructed him to shift base to Lokur. He purchased a small piece of land in Lokur, started farming and married a local girl. The couple had seven children and they formed the initial set of people who later bore other generations of children to become a gigantic family.\n\nFamily structure\nTammanna who is aged around 90 years is the eldest male person in the family. The head of the family is Bhimanna who at 74 years old is the most educated person in his generation. Together there are around 70 men, 50 women and 60 children in the family. The family follows a rule that all family members must eat lunch and dinner together since they feel that people who eat together, stay together. They consume 50 kg of maize, 20 kg wheat flour and 40 litres of milk daily. The family is male-dominated with women having much less freedom. The menfolk in the family prefer less-educated girls with a view that girls with more education can bring disharmony among them. Several marriages are performed collectively after which the couples settle down in and around the ancestral home. The annual budget of the family is about 1.2 million rupees while a further 300 thousand rupees is spent on clothing, medicines and agriculture. The family grows all the vegetables and grains needed for its consumption in the of farming land that it owns. Other prominent members in the family include Padmanna who supervises agricultural activities, Mahaveer who looks after the supply of materials to the kitchen, Dharanendra who looks after the dairy and Devendra who maintains the vehicles the family owns and the borewells. The women in the family mostly work in the kitchen, tend to the children and look after the cleanliness in the house. The girls in the family are married off after they complete their secondary education.\n\nRecognition\nIn 1992, the Hindi film director, Ketan Mehta completed a documentary film titled All in the Family on the Narasinganavars. In 2007, a photo exhibition portraying different facets of the family was organised by the photographer K. Venkatesh at the Chitrakala Parishat in Bangalore.\n\nNotes\n\nKarnataka society\nIndian Jains\nJain families", "Otolo is a town in Nnewi North, Anambra State, Nigeria. Otolo is the premier quarter in Nnewi among the four quarters of Nnewi town. Others are Umudim, Uruagu and Nnewichi.This is true in terms of population, seat of political power and, apparently even, concentration of wealth. Otolo is ruled by a monarchy, the Nwosu family which is a part of a larger nwakanwa family has ruled Otolo for centuries. The current traditional ruler Chief Chukwuemeka Ofili Nwosu is the son of the late chief A.B.C Nwosu, former lawyer and general in the now deposed Biafran army. Chief Ofili Nwosu has three children with his first wife Chief Mrs Ebele Nwosu. Next in line to the throne of Otolo is the first son of Chief Ofili Nwosu and heir apparent to the throne, Prince Nwosu Chukwudumebi obidimma, Princess Adanna Nwosu who is the first daughter of Chief Ofili and also the ADA of Otolo, Prince Chukwukamso Nwosu who is the last child of the three children. The Nwosu family is a very large and dense family which is also part of the even larger Nwakanwa family which is also part of an even larger Obiuno family.\n\nIn addition, Chukwuemeka Ofili Nwosu(The prime minister of Nnewi) passed on the 9th October, 2019 and was buried this year. The heir to the throne he left has not been announced.\n\nReferences\n\nPopulated places in Anambra State\nNnewi" ]
[ "Sheila E.", "2009-12: The E Family", "Who is the E Family?", "On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert." ]	C_bbd59fb6f1d84402acda38bc5fa0d0f7_0	Where did the E Family perform?	2	Where did the E Family perform?	Sheila E.	On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in San Francisco on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the tenth season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. CANNOTANSWER	at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.	Sheila Cecilia Escovedo (born December 12, 1957) better known under the stage name Sheila E., is an American percussionist and singer. She began her career in the mid-1970s as a percussionist and singer for The George Duke Band. After leaving the group in 1983, Sheila began a successful solo career, starting with her critically acclaimed debut album, which included the career-defining song, "The Glamorous Life". She became a mainstream solo star in 1985 following the success of the singles "The Belle of St. Mark", "Sister Fate", and "A Love Bizarre" with the last becoming one of her signature songs. She is commonly referred to as The Queen of Percussion. Early life and family Born in Oakland, California, Sheila E. is the daughter of Juanita Gardere, a dairy factory worker, and percussionist Pete Escovedo, with whom she frequently performs. Her mother is of Creole-French/African descent, and her father is of Mexican-American origin. She was raised Catholic. Sheila E's uncle is Alejandro Escovedo, and Tito Puente was Escovedo's godfather. She also is niece to Javier Escovedo, founder of seminal San Diego punk act The Zeros. Another uncle, Mario Escovedo, fronted long-running indie rockers The Dragons. She also is the niece of Coke Escovedo, who was in Santana and formed the band Azteca. Nicole Richie is Sheila E.'s biological niece, the daughter of Sheila's musician brother, Peter Michael Escovedo. She has publicly stated that, at the age of five, she was raped by her teen-aged babysitter, and this event had a profound influence on her childhood development. Career 1976–1983: Beginnings Sheila made her recording debut with jazz bassist Alphonso Johnson on "Yesterday's Dream" in 1976. By her early 20s, she had already played with George Duke, Lionel Richie, Marvin Gaye, Herbie Hancock, and Diana Ross. In 1977, she joined The George Duke Band. She appeared on several of Duke's albums, including Don't Let Go (1978), Follow the Rainbow (1979), Master of the Game (1979), and A Brazilian Love Affair (1980). Along with appearing on Duke's Don't Let Go in 1978, Escovedo and her father released "Happy Together" that year on Fantasy Records, sharing billing as Pete and Sheila Escovedo. In 1980, she appeared on the pivotal Herbie Hancock album Monster. In 1983, she joined Marvin Gaye's final tour Midnight Love Tour as one of his percussionists. 1984–1989: The Glamorous Life and A Love Bizarre Prince met Sheila E. at a concert in 1977, when she was performing with her father. After the show he met her and told her that he and his bassist Andre Cymone "were just fighting about which one of us would be the first to be your husband." He also vowed that one day she would join his band. The two would eventually join forces during the Purple Rain recording sessions. She provided vocals on the B-side to "Let's Go Crazy", "Erotic City" in 1984. Though taken under Prince's wing, she proved to be a successful artist in her own right. In June 1984, she released her debut album The Glamorous Life. The album's title-track single "The Glamorous Life" peaked at number 7 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts for two weeks in August 1984. The video for the song would bring three MTV Award nominations for Best Female Video, Best New Artist, and Best Choreography. She also received two Grammy Award nominations for Best New Artist and Best Pop Vocal Performance Female. Her second single "The Belle of St. Mark" charted at number 34 on Billboard Hot 100 and later became NME'''s "Single of the Week". She also toured as the opening act for Prince's Purple Rain Tour and the duo began a brief romantic relationship, while Prince was still seeing Susannah Melvoin, twin sister of The Revolution band member, Wendy Melvoin. They would later become briefly engaged in the late 1980s, during Prince's Lovesexy Tour. In 1985, she released Romance 1600. The lead single "Sister Fate" peaked at number 36 on the R&B charts. The album's second single "A Love Bizarre" became her signature song, peaking at number 11 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts. The non-album track "Holly Rock" made its way to live shows and into the film Krush Groove. Sheila later served as Prince's drummer and musical director in his band during the tours from 1987 to 1989. In July 1987, her self-titled album Sheila E. was released. The ballad single "Hold Me" peaked at number 3 on R&B charts. She appeared in four films, Krush Groove with Run-D.M.C., LL Cool J and Blair Underwood in 1985, Prince's concert film, Sign "O" the Times in 1987, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane and Chasing Papi in 2003. 1989–1994: Sex Cymbal and Mi Tierra After leaving the Prince organization in 1989, Sheila E. collaborated with writers like Demetrius Ross and David Gamson, recorded and released an album, Sex Cymbal in 1991. The album spawned singles: "Sex Cymbal", "Dropping Like Flies", and "Cry Baby". She began her tour in Japan which only lasted for a brief time. Shortly after returning to America, she developed severe health issues after her lung collapsed. She described herself as "semi-paralyzed from playing drums in heels for so long". Unable to promote and tour, her album Sex Cymbal suffered low sales. In 1994, Sheila E. contributed as a guest artist, playing congas and timbales, for the multi-platinum album Mi Tierra by Gloria Estefan, produced by Emilio Estefan. 1996–2005: Music directing In 1996, she played in Japanese pop singer Namie Amuro's live band. The show at Chiba Marine Stadium was later made available on DVD. In 1998, she played percussion on the Phil Collins cover of "True Colors". She was also the leader of the house band on the short-lived late night talk show, The Magic Hour, hosted by Earvin "Magic" Johnson in the late 1990s. Sheila E. has performed three stints as one of the member "All-Starrs" of Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band, in 2001, 2003, and 2006. Her drum "duets" with Starr are a moment of comic relief in the show, where they play the same parts but he quickly falls behind, shrugs and smiles as she takes off on an extended percussion solo. Says Sheila E.: "Ringo truly is one of the greatest rock n' roll drummers in the history of music. He enjoys the joke!" In 2002, Sheila E. appeared on the Beyoncé song "Work It Out". In 2004, Sheila E. toured New Zealand as drummer and percussionist for the Abe Laboriel Band. The same year, she also was featured on Tonex's Out the Box on the song "Todos Juntos". She also played drums on Cyndi Lauper's hit album of standard covers, At Last. She played percussion on the song "Stay". Sheila E. joined Lauper on a live version of that song on VH1 Divas. Sheila also performed at Prince's One Nite Alone... Live! concert, Live at the Aladdin Las Vegas in 2003, 36th NAACP Image Awards in 2005, and on the Good Morning show in June 2006. In 2005, Sheila E. was a surprise guest orchestrating a band, in Amerie's "1 Thing" performances for The Lady Of Soul & World Music Awards. In February 2006, Sheila E. performed with Prince (and Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman) once again at the BRIT Awards. Sheila E. performed at the Sonoma Jazz Festival in 2006 as part of Herbie Hancock's band featuring Larry Carlton, Terrence Blanchard, Marcus Miller, and Terri Lyne Carrington. 2007–2009: C.O.E.D. and reunion with Prince In 2006, Sheila formed a female group C.O.E.D. (Chronicles of Every Diva), consisting of Sheila E., Kat Dyson, Rhonda Smith and Cassandra O'Neal. The group released a single "Waters of Life". In March 2007, the group went on a successful tour in Europe and Japan. The group toured overseas in 2008 and released a CD available in limited distribution or through her website. For several concerts she was joined by Candy Dulfer, who was billed as a special guest. She performed at the 2007 Latin Grammy Awards with Juan Luis Guerra. She also performed at the American Latin Music Awards in June 2007 with Prince and on July 7, 2007, in Minneapolis with Prince. She performed at all three of his concerts: at Prince's 3121 perfume launch at Macy's, followed by the Target Center concert, and finally, at an aftershow at First Avenue. In October 2007, Sheila E. was a judge alongside Australian Idol judge and marketing manager Ian "Dicko" Dickson and Goo Goo Dolls lead singer John Rzeznik on the Fox network's The Next Great American Band. Sheila E. once again teamed up with Prince in March 2008, as she sat in (and played keyboard) on the performance with her family at Harvelle Redondo Beach. On April 9, 2008, Sheila E. appeared on the Emmy winning program, Idol Gives Back. Sheila E. took part in the show opener "Get on Your Feet" with Gloria Estefan. Dance troupe, So You Think You Can Dance finalists joined them on stage. On April 26, 2008, Sheila E., along with Morris Day and Jerome Benton, performed with Prince at the Coachella Music Festival. From May 2 to 6, 2008, Sheila E. played four sold-out shows at Blue Note Tokyo, the most frequented jazz music club in Tokyo, Japan. On June 14, 2008, Sheila E. performed at the Rhythm on the Vine music and wine festival at the South Coast Winery in Temecula, California for Shriners Hospital for Children. She took the stage with the E Family, Pete Escovedo, Juan Escovedo and Peter Michael Escovedo. Other performers at the event were jazz musician Herbie Hancock, contemporary music artist Jim Brickman and Kirk Whalum. 2009–2012: The E Family On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in Oakland, California, on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the 10th-season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. 2013–2015: Icon and Beat of my Own Drum In 2013, Sheila began recording her seventh album. In November 2013, she released her album Icon in the UK. The album was also Sheila's first release of her own recording label Stilettoflats Music. In September 2014, she released her autobiography Beat of my Own Drum. In November 2014, her album Icon was internationally released. 2016–present: Girl Meets Boy In 2016, Sheila provided drums for Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL's orchestral soundtrack to the blockbuster superhero films Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. On June 26, 2016, Sheila and The New Power Generation led a tribute to Prince on the 2016 BET Awards, featuring a medley of his hits. The next day, she released a new song, "Girl Meets Boy," in honor of Prince. In 2017 she was the featured percussionist for the soundtrack to the film The Boss Baby, which was also co-produced by Zimmer. Sheila E. is featured in Fred Armisen's 2018 Netflix comedy special Stand Up for Drummers. Sheila E. plays percussion on a number of tracks on Gary Clark Jr.'s album This Land''. She performed and served as music director for Let's Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince concert at the Staples Center on January 28, 2020. It was broadcast on CBS on April 21, 2020. On April 17, 2020, she released the single "Lemon Cake" which was available as an audio track on YouTube. On May 14, 2020, Sheila E. premiered the official video for "Lemon Cake" on Rated R&B. In July 2020, Sheila E. collaborated with MasterClass to create "Sheila E. Teaches Drumming and Percussion" Honors In February 2009, she was made an honorary member of Tau Beta Sigma National Honorary Band Sorority by the Eta Delta Chapter located at Howard University in recognition of her humanitarian efforts through and in music. Escovedo and her friend Lynn Mabry are also the co-founder of Elevate Oakland, a nonprofit that uses music and art to serve the needs of youth in Oakland public schools. Sheila E., along with her father, were presented with the Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021. Discography Studio albums Singles See also List of number-one dance hits (United States) List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart References External links Sheila E.’s MasterClass American musicians of Mexican descent American dance musicians American women drummers Living people Timbaleros Bongo players Conga players American rock percussionists African-American drummers American funk drummers American rock drummers Rhythm and blues drummers Soul drummers American contemporary R&B singers American soul singers American funk singers Warner Records artists Paisley Park Records artists Participants in American reality television series Musicians from Oakland, California Singing talent show winners Musicians from the San Francisco Bay Area 20th-century American drummers 21st-century African-American women singers 20th-century African-American women singers Hispanic and Latino American musicians The Blackout All-Stars members 1957 births Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band members African-American women singer-songwriters Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners American performers of Latin music Hispanic and Latino American women singers Women in Latin music Singer-songwriters from California	true	[ "The No Sound Without Silence Tour is the third arena tour by Irish pop rock band The Script. Launched in support of their fourth studio album No Sound Without Silence (2014), the tour began in Tokyo on 16 January 2015 and visited Europe, North America, Asia, Africa and Oceania. The opening acts were American singer Phillip Phillips for the South African dates, and English singer Tinie Tempah for the European dates. Pharrell Williams served as a co-headliner for the Croke Park concert on 20 June 2015.\n\nOpening acts\nColton Avery (Europe, North America, Australia, Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia)\nMary Lambert (North America)\nPhillip Phillips (South Africa)\nSilent Sanctuary (Philippines)\nTinie Tempah (Europe)\nPharrell Williams (Dublin)\nThe Wailers (Dublin)\nThe Sam Willows (Singapore)\nKensington (Band) (Europe)\n\nSetlist\nThis setlist is based on previous performances of the tour.\n\n \"Paint the Town Green\"\n \"Hail Rain or Sunshine\"\n \"Breakeven\"\n \"Before the Worst\"\n \"Superheroes\"\n \"We Cry\"\n \"If You Could See Me Now\"\n \"Man on a Wire\"\n \"Nothing\"\n \"Good Ol' Days\"\n \"Never Seen Anything (Quite Like You)\"\n \"The Man Who Can't Be Moved\"\n \"You Won't Feel A Thing\"\n \"It's Not Right For You\"\n \"Six Degrees of Separation\"\n \"The Energy Never Dies\"\n \"For the First Time\"\n \"No Good in Goodbye\"\n \"Hall of Fame\"\n\nAdditional information\nDuring the performance in Sheffield, The Script didn't perform \"We Cry\" due to a fan collapsing. Danny called for Paramedic to check on her, she was fine and they carried on.\n\nDuring the performance in Barcelona, The Script didn't perform \"The End Where I Begin\" or \"Nothing\". They also did not perform \"Six Degrees Of Separation\" and \"It's Not Right For You\".\n\nDuring the performance in Oakland, The Script didn't perform \"The End Where I Begin\", \"We Cry\", or \"Six Degrees of Separation\".\n\nDuring the performance in Toronto, The Script did not perform \"The End Where I Begin\" and \"Six Degrees of Separation\".\n\nDuring the performance im Hamburg, The Script did not perform \"Nothing\" and \"Never Seen Anything (Quite Like You)\".\n\nTour dates\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\n2015 concert tours\nThe Script concert tours", "Sonic Temple Art & Music Festival is a rock festival currently held in Columbus, Ohio, United States and is produced by Danny Wimmer Presents.\n\nHistory\n\nIn 2018 it was announced that Rock on the Range would be replaced by Danny Wimmer Presents as the Sonic Temple Art & Music Festival. The inaugural festival was held in May 2019 with sold-out crowds of 120,000.\n\nIn December 2019, the full lineup for Sonic Temple 2020 was revealed. Metallica were to headline both Friday and Saturday night, with Slipknot headlining on Saturday. Other performers were to include Deftones, Bring Me the Horizon, Evanescence, Sublime with Rome, Rancid, Dropkick Murphys, Cypress Hill, Pennywise, Royal Blood, The Pretty Reckless, Alter Bridge, Anthrax, Flatbush Zombies, Pop Evil, Hellyeah, Ghostemane, Suicidal Tendencies, Testament, Dance Gavin Dance, Ice Nine Kills, Sleeping with Sirens, The Darkness, Knocked Loose, Code Orange, Power Trip, Saint Asonia, Dirty Honey, Jinjer, City Morgue, Bones UK, Airbourne, Fire from the Gods, Dinosaur Pile-Up, Des Rocs, Counterfeit, Crobot, Cherry Bomb, DED, Goodbye June, Brutus, 3Teeth, BRKN Love, Killstation, Brass Against, Crown Lands, Ego Kill Talent, Dregg, Bloodywood, and Zero 9:36, with more to have been announced.\n\nIn February 2020, it was announced that Metallica would be replaced as headliners by the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Tool, following frontman James Hetfield's entrance into a rehabilitation program for substance abuse. The following month, the festival was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In February 2021, it was announced it would once again be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with plans to return in 2022.\n\nEvents\n\n2019 \n\nMonster Energy Stadium Stage:\n System of a Down\n Ghost\n Halestorm\n Parkway Drive\n Beartooth\n Avatar\n Badflower\n\nEcho Stage:\n Meshuggah\n Black Label Society\n Bad Wolves\n Zeal & Ardor\n Wage War\n SHVPES\n The Jacks\n\nWave Stage:\n Tom Morello\n Pussy Riot\n Ho99o99\n Cleopatrick\n Hands Like Houses\n Radattack\n\nSiriusXM Comedy & Spoken Word Tent:\n Henry Rollins\n Tom Morello\n Shapel Lacy\n Nadya\n\nMonster Energy Stadium Stage:\n Disturbed\n Papa Roach\n Lamb of God\n In This Moment\n Gojira\n Fever 333\n Black Coffee\n\nEcho Stage:\n The Cult\n Killswitch Engage\n Architects\n The Black Dahlia Murder\n While She Sleeps\n Evan Konrad\n The Plot in You\n\nWave Stage:\n Action Bronson (did not perform due to an \"unforeseen knee injury\")\n Mark Lanegan Band\n Don Broco\n Movements\n Boston Manor\n No1Cares\n\nSiriusXM Comedy & Spoken Word Tent:\n Andrew Dice Clay\n Eleanor Kerrigan\n Mark Normand\n Craig Grass\n\nMonster Energy Stadium Stage:\n Foo Fighters\n Bring Me the Horizon (did not perform due to high winds)\n Chevelle (did not perform due to high winds)\n The Distillers (did not perform due to high winds)\n The Struts\n The Glorious Sons\n Amigo the Devil\n\nEcho Stage:\n Joan Jett and the Blackhearts\n The Hives (performance ended early due to high winds)\n The Interrupters\n Yungblud\n Palaye Royale\n Dirty Honey\n Teenage Wrist\n\nWave Stage:\n Scars on Broadway (did not perform due to high winds)\n Refused (did not perform due to high winds)\n Black Pistol Fire (did not perform due to high winds)\n Basement (did not perform due to high winds)\n Scarlxrd (did not perform due to high winds)\n Demob Happy (did not perform due to high winds)\n\nSiriusXM Comedy & Spoken Word Tent:\n Pauly Shore (did not perform due to high winds)\n Carmen Lynch (did not perform due to high winds)\n Joe Deuce (did not perform due to high winds)\n Bill Squire (did not perform due to high winds)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\nHeavy metal festivals in the United States\nMusic festivals established in 2019\nMusic festivals in Ohio\nRock festivals in the United States" ]
[ "Sheila E.", "2009-12: The E Family", "Who is the E Family?", "On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.", "Where did the E Family perform?", "at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert." ]	C_bbd59fb6f1d84402acda38bc5fa0d0f7_0	Did Sheila E. perform anywhere else?	3	Did Sheila E. perform anywhere else besides at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard and in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.	Sheila E.	On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in San Francisco on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the tenth season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. CANNOTANSWER	On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados.	Sheila Cecilia Escovedo (born December 12, 1957) better known under the stage name Sheila E., is an American percussionist and singer. She began her career in the mid-1970s as a percussionist and singer for The George Duke Band. After leaving the group in 1983, Sheila began a successful solo career, starting with her critically acclaimed debut album, which included the career-defining song, "The Glamorous Life". She became a mainstream solo star in 1985 following the success of the singles "The Belle of St. Mark", "Sister Fate", and "A Love Bizarre" with the last becoming one of her signature songs. She is commonly referred to as The Queen of Percussion. Early life and family Born in Oakland, California, Sheila E. is the daughter of Juanita Gardere, a dairy factory worker, and percussionist Pete Escovedo, with whom she frequently performs. Her mother is of Creole-French/African descent, and her father is of Mexican-American origin. She was raised Catholic. Sheila E's uncle is Alejandro Escovedo, and Tito Puente was Escovedo's godfather. She also is niece to Javier Escovedo, founder of seminal San Diego punk act The Zeros. Another uncle, Mario Escovedo, fronted long-running indie rockers The Dragons. She also is the niece of Coke Escovedo, who was in Santana and formed the band Azteca. Nicole Richie is Sheila E.'s biological niece, the daughter of Sheila's musician brother, Peter Michael Escovedo. She has publicly stated that, at the age of five, she was raped by her teen-aged babysitter, and this event had a profound influence on her childhood development. Career 1976–1983: Beginnings Sheila made her recording debut with jazz bassist Alphonso Johnson on "Yesterday's Dream" in 1976. By her early 20s, she had already played with George Duke, Lionel Richie, Marvin Gaye, Herbie Hancock, and Diana Ross. In 1977, she joined The George Duke Band. She appeared on several of Duke's albums, including Don't Let Go (1978), Follow the Rainbow (1979), Master of the Game (1979), and A Brazilian Love Affair (1980). Along with appearing on Duke's Don't Let Go in 1978, Escovedo and her father released "Happy Together" that year on Fantasy Records, sharing billing as Pete and Sheila Escovedo. In 1980, she appeared on the pivotal Herbie Hancock album Monster. In 1983, she joined Marvin Gaye's final tour Midnight Love Tour as one of his percussionists. 1984–1989: The Glamorous Life and A Love Bizarre Prince met Sheila E. at a concert in 1977, when she was performing with her father. After the show he met her and told her that he and his bassist Andre Cymone "were just fighting about which one of us would be the first to be your husband." He also vowed that one day she would join his band. The two would eventually join forces during the Purple Rain recording sessions. She provided vocals on the B-side to "Let's Go Crazy", "Erotic City" in 1984. Though taken under Prince's wing, she proved to be a successful artist in her own right. In June 1984, she released her debut album The Glamorous Life. The album's title-track single "The Glamorous Life" peaked at number 7 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts for two weeks in August 1984. The video for the song would bring three MTV Award nominations for Best Female Video, Best New Artist, and Best Choreography. She also received two Grammy Award nominations for Best New Artist and Best Pop Vocal Performance Female. Her second single "The Belle of St. Mark" charted at number 34 on Billboard Hot 100 and later became NME'''s "Single of the Week". She also toured as the opening act for Prince's Purple Rain Tour and the duo began a brief romantic relationship, while Prince was still seeing Susannah Melvoin, twin sister of The Revolution band member, Wendy Melvoin. They would later become briefly engaged in the late 1980s, during Prince's Lovesexy Tour. In 1985, she released Romance 1600. The lead single "Sister Fate" peaked at number 36 on the R&B charts. The album's second single "A Love Bizarre" became her signature song, peaking at number 11 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts. The non-album track "Holly Rock" made its way to live shows and into the film Krush Groove. Sheila later served as Prince's drummer and musical director in his band during the tours from 1987 to 1989. In July 1987, her self-titled album Sheila E. was released. The ballad single "Hold Me" peaked at number 3 on R&B charts. She appeared in four films, Krush Groove with Run-D.M.C., LL Cool J and Blair Underwood in 1985, Prince's concert film, Sign "O" the Times in 1987, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane and Chasing Papi in 2003. 1989–1994: Sex Cymbal and Mi Tierra After leaving the Prince organization in 1989, Sheila E. collaborated with writers like Demetrius Ross and David Gamson, recorded and released an album, Sex Cymbal in 1991. The album spawned singles: "Sex Cymbal", "Dropping Like Flies", and "Cry Baby". She began her tour in Japan which only lasted for a brief time. Shortly after returning to America, she developed severe health issues after her lung collapsed. She described herself as "semi-paralyzed from playing drums in heels for so long". Unable to promote and tour, her album Sex Cymbal suffered low sales. In 1994, Sheila E. contributed as a guest artist, playing congas and timbales, for the multi-platinum album Mi Tierra by Gloria Estefan, produced by Emilio Estefan. 1996–2005: Music directing In 1996, she played in Japanese pop singer Namie Amuro's live band. The show at Chiba Marine Stadium was later made available on DVD. In 1998, she played percussion on the Phil Collins cover of "True Colors". She was also the leader of the house band on the short-lived late night talk show, The Magic Hour, hosted by Earvin "Magic" Johnson in the late 1990s. Sheila E. has performed three stints as one of the member "All-Starrs" of Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band, in 2001, 2003, and 2006. Her drum "duets" with Starr are a moment of comic relief in the show, where they play the same parts but he quickly falls behind, shrugs and smiles as she takes off on an extended percussion solo. Says Sheila E.: "Ringo truly is one of the greatest rock n' roll drummers in the history of music. He enjoys the joke!" In 2002, Sheila E. appeared on the Beyoncé song "Work It Out". In 2004, Sheila E. toured New Zealand as drummer and percussionist for the Abe Laboriel Band. The same year, she also was featured on Tonex's Out the Box on the song "Todos Juntos". She also played drums on Cyndi Lauper's hit album of standard covers, At Last. She played percussion on the song "Stay". Sheila E. joined Lauper on a live version of that song on VH1 Divas. Sheila also performed at Prince's One Nite Alone... Live! concert, Live at the Aladdin Las Vegas in 2003, 36th NAACP Image Awards in 2005, and on the Good Morning show in June 2006. In 2005, Sheila E. was a surprise guest orchestrating a band, in Amerie's "1 Thing" performances for The Lady Of Soul & World Music Awards. In February 2006, Sheila E. performed with Prince (and Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman) once again at the BRIT Awards. Sheila E. performed at the Sonoma Jazz Festival in 2006 as part of Herbie Hancock's band featuring Larry Carlton, Terrence Blanchard, Marcus Miller, and Terri Lyne Carrington. 2007–2009: C.O.E.D. and reunion with Prince In 2006, Sheila formed a female group C.O.E.D. (Chronicles of Every Diva), consisting of Sheila E., Kat Dyson, Rhonda Smith and Cassandra O'Neal. The group released a single "Waters of Life". In March 2007, the group went on a successful tour in Europe and Japan. The group toured overseas in 2008 and released a CD available in limited distribution or through her website. For several concerts she was joined by Candy Dulfer, who was billed as a special guest. She performed at the 2007 Latin Grammy Awards with Juan Luis Guerra. She also performed at the American Latin Music Awards in June 2007 with Prince and on July 7, 2007, in Minneapolis with Prince. She performed at all three of his concerts: at Prince's 3121 perfume launch at Macy's, followed by the Target Center concert, and finally, at an aftershow at First Avenue. In October 2007, Sheila E. was a judge alongside Australian Idol judge and marketing manager Ian "Dicko" Dickson and Goo Goo Dolls lead singer John Rzeznik on the Fox network's The Next Great American Band. Sheila E. once again teamed up with Prince in March 2008, as she sat in (and played keyboard) on the performance with her family at Harvelle Redondo Beach. On April 9, 2008, Sheila E. appeared on the Emmy winning program, Idol Gives Back. Sheila E. took part in the show opener "Get on Your Feet" with Gloria Estefan. Dance troupe, So You Think You Can Dance finalists joined them on stage. On April 26, 2008, Sheila E., along with Morris Day and Jerome Benton, performed with Prince at the Coachella Music Festival. From May 2 to 6, 2008, Sheila E. played four sold-out shows at Blue Note Tokyo, the most frequented jazz music club in Tokyo, Japan. On June 14, 2008, Sheila E. performed at the Rhythm on the Vine music and wine festival at the South Coast Winery in Temecula, California for Shriners Hospital for Children. She took the stage with the E Family, Pete Escovedo, Juan Escovedo and Peter Michael Escovedo. Other performers at the event were jazz musician Herbie Hancock, contemporary music artist Jim Brickman and Kirk Whalum. 2009–2012: The E Family On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in Oakland, California, on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the 10th-season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. 2013–2015: Icon and Beat of my Own Drum In 2013, Sheila began recording her seventh album. In November 2013, she released her album Icon in the UK. The album was also Sheila's first release of her own recording label Stilettoflats Music. In September 2014, she released her autobiography Beat of my Own Drum. In November 2014, her album Icon was internationally released. 2016–present: Girl Meets Boy In 2016, Sheila provided drums for Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL's orchestral soundtrack to the blockbuster superhero films Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. On June 26, 2016, Sheila and The New Power Generation led a tribute to Prince on the 2016 BET Awards, featuring a medley of his hits. The next day, she released a new song, "Girl Meets Boy," in honor of Prince. In 2017 she was the featured percussionist for the soundtrack to the film The Boss Baby, which was also co-produced by Zimmer. Sheila E. is featured in Fred Armisen's 2018 Netflix comedy special Stand Up for Drummers. Sheila E. plays percussion on a number of tracks on Gary Clark Jr.'s album This Land''. She performed and served as music director for Let's Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince concert at the Staples Center on January 28, 2020. It was broadcast on CBS on April 21, 2020. On April 17, 2020, she released the single "Lemon Cake" which was available as an audio track on YouTube. On May 14, 2020, Sheila E. premiered the official video for "Lemon Cake" on Rated R&B. In July 2020, Sheila E. collaborated with MasterClass to create "Sheila E. Teaches Drumming and Percussion" Honors In February 2009, she was made an honorary member of Tau Beta Sigma National Honorary Band Sorority by the Eta Delta Chapter located at Howard University in recognition of her humanitarian efforts through and in music. Escovedo and her friend Lynn Mabry are also the co-founder of Elevate Oakland, a nonprofit that uses music and art to serve the needs of youth in Oakland public schools. Sheila E., along with her father, were presented with the Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021. Discography Studio albums Singles See also List of number-one dance hits (United States) List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart References External links Sheila E.’s MasterClass American musicians of Mexican descent American dance musicians American women drummers Living people Timbaleros Bongo players Conga players American rock percussionists African-American drummers American funk drummers American rock drummers Rhythm and blues drummers Soul drummers American contemporary R&B singers American soul singers American funk singers Warner Records artists Paisley Park Records artists Participants in American reality television series Musicians from Oakland, California Singing talent show winners Musicians from the San Francisco Bay Area 20th-century American drummers 21st-century African-American women singers 20th-century African-American women singers Hispanic and Latino American musicians The Blackout All-Stars members 1957 births Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band members African-American women singer-songwriters Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners American performers of Latin music Hispanic and Latino American women singers Women in Latin music Singer-songwriters from California	true	[ "Для Тех, Кто Прогулялся Бы С Богами, which translates as For Those Who Would Walk with the Gods, is a special 2001 The Tear Garden compilation created by Brudenia for the Russian market. It contains songs from The Tear Garden's first three LPs (Tired Eyes Slowly Burning, The Last Man to Fly, and To Be an Angel Blind, the Crippled Soul Divide) and second EP (Sheila Liked the Rodeo).\n\nIt is unique in that every letter of text on the album, from title to words on the disc itself, are written in Cyrillic lettering. Other special things about this release are noted below.\n\nTrack listing\nCircles in the Sand – 3:28\nIn Search of My Rose – 4:28\nSheila Liked the Rodeo – 4:45\nAscension Day – 6:01\nWhite Coats and Haloes – 2:19\nIsis Veiled – 3:25\nYou and Me and Rainbows – 16:49\nA Ship Named \"Despair\" – 3:43\nThe Running Man – 8:25\nMalice Through the Looking Glass – 7:59\nGood Evening Houston – 7:02\nGood Night Little Lights – 4:55\n\nNotes\nLimited to 2000 copies.\n\nTracks 11 and 12 are unique to this release and cannot be found anywhere else.\n\nTracks 1, 5, 6, 8 and 9 are originally from the LP The Last Man to Fly.\n\nTracks 2, 4 and 10 are originally from the LP To Be an Angel Blind, the Crippled Soul Divide.\n\nTrack 3 is originally from the EP Sheila Liked the Rodeo.\n\nTrack 7 is originally from the LP Tired Eyes Slowly Burning.\n\n2001 compilation albums\nThe Tear Garden albums", "\"Be Someone Else\" is a song by Slimmy, released in 2010 as the lead single from his second studio album Be Someone Else. The single wasn't particularly successful, charting anywhere.\nA music video was also made for \"Be Someone Else\", produced by Riot Films. It premiered on 27 June 2010 on YouTube.\n\nBackground\n\"Be Someone Else\" was unveiled as the album's lead single. The song was written by Fernandes and produced by Quico Serrano and Mark J Turner. It was released to MySpace on 1 January 2010.\n\nMusic video\nA music video was also made for \"Be Someone Else\", produced by Riot Films. It premiered on 27 June 2010 on YouTube. The music video features two different scenes which alternate with each other many times during the video. The first scene features Slimmy performing the song with an electric guitar and the second scene features Slimmy performing with the band in the background.\n\nChart performance\nThe single wasn't particularly successful, charting anywhere.\n\nLive performances\n A Very Slimmy Tour\n Be Someone Else Tour\n\nTrack listing\n\nDigital single\n\"Be Someone Else\" (album version) - 3:22\n\nPersonnel\nTaken from the album's booklet.\n\nPaulo Fernandes – main vocals, guitar\nPaulo Garim – bass\nTó-Zé – drums\n\nRelease history\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nOfficial music video at YouTube.\n\n2010 singles\nEnglish-language Portuguese songs\n2009 songs" ]
[ "Sheila E.", "2009-12: The E Family", "Who is the E Family?", "On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.", "Where did the E Family perform?", "at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.", "Did Sheila E. perform anywhere else?", "On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados." ]	C_bbd59fb6f1d84402acda38bc5fa0d0f7_0	Who did Sheila E. perform with at the Christmas Jazz event?	4	Who did Sheila E. perform with at the Christmas Jazz event?	Sheila E.	On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in San Francisco on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the tenth season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Sheila Cecilia Escovedo (born December 12, 1957) better known under the stage name Sheila E., is an American percussionist and singer. She began her career in the mid-1970s as a percussionist and singer for The George Duke Band. After leaving the group in 1983, Sheila began a successful solo career, starting with her critically acclaimed debut album, which included the career-defining song, "The Glamorous Life". She became a mainstream solo star in 1985 following the success of the singles "The Belle of St. Mark", "Sister Fate", and "A Love Bizarre" with the last becoming one of her signature songs. She is commonly referred to as The Queen of Percussion. Early life and family Born in Oakland, California, Sheila E. is the daughter of Juanita Gardere, a dairy factory worker, and percussionist Pete Escovedo, with whom she frequently performs. Her mother is of Creole-French/African descent, and her father is of Mexican-American origin. She was raised Catholic. Sheila E's uncle is Alejandro Escovedo, and Tito Puente was Escovedo's godfather. She also is niece to Javier Escovedo, founder of seminal San Diego punk act The Zeros. Another uncle, Mario Escovedo, fronted long-running indie rockers The Dragons. She also is the niece of Coke Escovedo, who was in Santana and formed the band Azteca. Nicole Richie is Sheila E.'s biological niece, the daughter of Sheila's musician brother, Peter Michael Escovedo. She has publicly stated that, at the age of five, she was raped by her teen-aged babysitter, and this event had a profound influence on her childhood development. Career 1976–1983: Beginnings Sheila made her recording debut with jazz bassist Alphonso Johnson on "Yesterday's Dream" in 1976. By her early 20s, she had already played with George Duke, Lionel Richie, Marvin Gaye, Herbie Hancock, and Diana Ross. In 1977, she joined The George Duke Band. She appeared on several of Duke's albums, including Don't Let Go (1978), Follow the Rainbow (1979), Master of the Game (1979), and A Brazilian Love Affair (1980). Along with appearing on Duke's Don't Let Go in 1978, Escovedo and her father released "Happy Together" that year on Fantasy Records, sharing billing as Pete and Sheila Escovedo. In 1980, she appeared on the pivotal Herbie Hancock album Monster. In 1983, she joined Marvin Gaye's final tour Midnight Love Tour as one of his percussionists. 1984–1989: The Glamorous Life and A Love Bizarre Prince met Sheila E. at a concert in 1977, when she was performing with her father. After the show he met her and told her that he and his bassist Andre Cymone "were just fighting about which one of us would be the first to be your husband." He also vowed that one day she would join his band. The two would eventually join forces during the Purple Rain recording sessions. She provided vocals on the B-side to "Let's Go Crazy", "Erotic City" in 1984. Though taken under Prince's wing, she proved to be a successful artist in her own right. In June 1984, she released her debut album The Glamorous Life. The album's title-track single "The Glamorous Life" peaked at number 7 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts for two weeks in August 1984. The video for the song would bring three MTV Award nominations for Best Female Video, Best New Artist, and Best Choreography. She also received two Grammy Award nominations for Best New Artist and Best Pop Vocal Performance Female. Her second single "The Belle of St. Mark" charted at number 34 on Billboard Hot 100 and later became NME'''s "Single of the Week". She also toured as the opening act for Prince's Purple Rain Tour and the duo began a brief romantic relationship, while Prince was still seeing Susannah Melvoin, twin sister of The Revolution band member, Wendy Melvoin. They would later become briefly engaged in the late 1980s, during Prince's Lovesexy Tour. In 1985, she released Romance 1600. The lead single "Sister Fate" peaked at number 36 on the R&B charts. The album's second single "A Love Bizarre" became her signature song, peaking at number 11 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts. The non-album track "Holly Rock" made its way to live shows and into the film Krush Groove. Sheila later served as Prince's drummer and musical director in his band during the tours from 1987 to 1989. In July 1987, her self-titled album Sheila E. was released. The ballad single "Hold Me" peaked at number 3 on R&B charts. She appeared in four films, Krush Groove with Run-D.M.C., LL Cool J and Blair Underwood in 1985, Prince's concert film, Sign "O" the Times in 1987, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane and Chasing Papi in 2003. 1989–1994: Sex Cymbal and Mi Tierra After leaving the Prince organization in 1989, Sheila E. collaborated with writers like Demetrius Ross and David Gamson, recorded and released an album, Sex Cymbal in 1991. The album spawned singles: "Sex Cymbal", "Dropping Like Flies", and "Cry Baby". She began her tour in Japan which only lasted for a brief time. Shortly after returning to America, she developed severe health issues after her lung collapsed. She described herself as "semi-paralyzed from playing drums in heels for so long". Unable to promote and tour, her album Sex Cymbal suffered low sales. In 1994, Sheila E. contributed as a guest artist, playing congas and timbales, for the multi-platinum album Mi Tierra by Gloria Estefan, produced by Emilio Estefan. 1996–2005: Music directing In 1996, she played in Japanese pop singer Namie Amuro's live band. The show at Chiba Marine Stadium was later made available on DVD. In 1998, she played percussion on the Phil Collins cover of "True Colors". She was also the leader of the house band on the short-lived late night talk show, The Magic Hour, hosted by Earvin "Magic" Johnson in the late 1990s. Sheila E. has performed three stints as one of the member "All-Starrs" of Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band, in 2001, 2003, and 2006. Her drum "duets" with Starr are a moment of comic relief in the show, where they play the same parts but he quickly falls behind, shrugs and smiles as she takes off on an extended percussion solo. Says Sheila E.: "Ringo truly is one of the greatest rock n' roll drummers in the history of music. He enjoys the joke!" In 2002, Sheila E. appeared on the Beyoncé song "Work It Out". In 2004, Sheila E. toured New Zealand as drummer and percussionist for the Abe Laboriel Band. The same year, she also was featured on Tonex's Out the Box on the song "Todos Juntos". She also played drums on Cyndi Lauper's hit album of standard covers, At Last. She played percussion on the song "Stay". Sheila E. joined Lauper on a live version of that song on VH1 Divas. Sheila also performed at Prince's One Nite Alone... Live! concert, Live at the Aladdin Las Vegas in 2003, 36th NAACP Image Awards in 2005, and on the Good Morning show in June 2006. In 2005, Sheila E. was a surprise guest orchestrating a band, in Amerie's "1 Thing" performances for The Lady Of Soul & World Music Awards. In February 2006, Sheila E. performed with Prince (and Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman) once again at the BRIT Awards. Sheila E. performed at the Sonoma Jazz Festival in 2006 as part of Herbie Hancock's band featuring Larry Carlton, Terrence Blanchard, Marcus Miller, and Terri Lyne Carrington. 2007–2009: C.O.E.D. and reunion with Prince In 2006, Sheila formed a female group C.O.E.D. (Chronicles of Every Diva), consisting of Sheila E., Kat Dyson, Rhonda Smith and Cassandra O'Neal. The group released a single "Waters of Life". In March 2007, the group went on a successful tour in Europe and Japan. The group toured overseas in 2008 and released a CD available in limited distribution or through her website. For several concerts she was joined by Candy Dulfer, who was billed as a special guest. She performed at the 2007 Latin Grammy Awards with Juan Luis Guerra. She also performed at the American Latin Music Awards in June 2007 with Prince and on July 7, 2007, in Minneapolis with Prince. She performed at all three of his concerts: at Prince's 3121 perfume launch at Macy's, followed by the Target Center concert, and finally, at an aftershow at First Avenue. In October 2007, Sheila E. was a judge alongside Australian Idol judge and marketing manager Ian "Dicko" Dickson and Goo Goo Dolls lead singer John Rzeznik on the Fox network's The Next Great American Band. Sheila E. once again teamed up with Prince in March 2008, as she sat in (and played keyboard) on the performance with her family at Harvelle Redondo Beach. On April 9, 2008, Sheila E. appeared on the Emmy winning program, Idol Gives Back. Sheila E. took part in the show opener "Get on Your Feet" with Gloria Estefan. Dance troupe, So You Think You Can Dance finalists joined them on stage. On April 26, 2008, Sheila E., along with Morris Day and Jerome Benton, performed with Prince at the Coachella Music Festival. From May 2 to 6, 2008, Sheila E. played four sold-out shows at Blue Note Tokyo, the most frequented jazz music club in Tokyo, Japan. On June 14, 2008, Sheila E. performed at the Rhythm on the Vine music and wine festival at the South Coast Winery in Temecula, California for Shriners Hospital for Children. She took the stage with the E Family, Pete Escovedo, Juan Escovedo and Peter Michael Escovedo. Other performers at the event were jazz musician Herbie Hancock, contemporary music artist Jim Brickman and Kirk Whalum. 2009–2012: The E Family On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in Oakland, California, on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the 10th-season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. 2013–2015: Icon and Beat of my Own Drum In 2013, Sheila began recording her seventh album. In November 2013, she released her album Icon in the UK. The album was also Sheila's first release of her own recording label Stilettoflats Music. In September 2014, she released her autobiography Beat of my Own Drum. In November 2014, her album Icon was internationally released. 2016–present: Girl Meets Boy In 2016, Sheila provided drums for Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL's orchestral soundtrack to the blockbuster superhero films Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. On June 26, 2016, Sheila and The New Power Generation led a tribute to Prince on the 2016 BET Awards, featuring a medley of his hits. The next day, she released a new song, "Girl Meets Boy," in honor of Prince. In 2017 she was the featured percussionist for the soundtrack to the film The Boss Baby, which was also co-produced by Zimmer. Sheila E. is featured in Fred Armisen's 2018 Netflix comedy special Stand Up for Drummers. Sheila E. plays percussion on a number of tracks on Gary Clark Jr.'s album This Land''. She performed and served as music director for Let's Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince concert at the Staples Center on January 28, 2020. It was broadcast on CBS on April 21, 2020. On April 17, 2020, she released the single "Lemon Cake" which was available as an audio track on YouTube. On May 14, 2020, Sheila E. premiered the official video for "Lemon Cake" on Rated R&B. In July 2020, Sheila E. collaborated with MasterClass to create "Sheila E. Teaches Drumming and Percussion" Honors In February 2009, she was made an honorary member of Tau Beta Sigma National Honorary Band Sorority by the Eta Delta Chapter located at Howard University in recognition of her humanitarian efforts through and in music. Escovedo and her friend Lynn Mabry are also the co-founder of Elevate Oakland, a nonprofit that uses music and art to serve the needs of youth in Oakland public schools. Sheila E., along with her father, were presented with the Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021. Discography Studio albums Singles See also List of number-one dance hits (United States) List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart References External links Sheila E.’s MasterClass American musicians of Mexican descent American dance musicians American women drummers Living people Timbaleros Bongo players Conga players American rock percussionists African-American drummers American funk drummers American rock drummers Rhythm and blues drummers Soul drummers American contemporary R&B singers American soul singers American funk singers Warner Records artists Paisley Park Records artists Participants in American reality television series Musicians from Oakland, California Singing talent show winners Musicians from the San Francisco Bay Area 20th-century American drummers 21st-century African-American women singers 20th-century African-American women singers Hispanic and Latino American musicians The Blackout All-Stars members 1957 births Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band members African-American women singer-songwriters Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners American performers of Latin music Hispanic and Latino American women singers Women in Latin music Singer-songwriters from California	false	[ "A Very Rosie Christmas is the fifth album by American singer-songwriter Rosie Thomas, released in 2008. It is her first holiday album and features vocals from her friends and family members. The album mixes original songs with cover versions.\n\nThomas said of the album: \"I've always loved to work on Christmas songs; Growing up, every Christmas Eve we entertained the family that came over 'cause my parents were musicians. I've had a blast doing this.\"\n\nThe album includes a comedy skit featuring Thomas's Sheila Saputo character. Damien Jurado guests on \"Sheila's Christmas Miracle\".\n\nReception\nPopMatters gave the album a 6/10 rating, with Ben Child calling it \"a pleasant batch of jazz-pop Christmas songs\". The Capital Times described the album as \"cute\", with Rob Thomas stating \"She has a quirky but affecting voice, a wry sense of humor and a deep, questioning Christian faith, and brings them all to bear on this winsome collection.\" The Tucson Weekly gave it a positive review, with Stephen Seigel viewing Thomas's original songs as the highlights.\n\nThe album was included at number 35 in Rolling Stones \"40 Essential Christmas Albums\", describing it as \"charming and heartfelt\". The Miami New Times included it in their \"The Best Christmas Albums of 2008\".\n\nTrack listing\nAll songs written by Rosie Thomas unless otherwise stated.\n\n\"Christmastime Is Here\" – 3:08 (Originally by Vince Guaraldi Trio)\n\"Why Can't It Be Christmastime All Year\" – 4:25\n\"River\" – 3:05 (Originally by Joni Mitchell)\n\"Winter Wonderland\" – 3:23 (Music and lyrics by Felix Bernard & Richard B. Smith)\n\"Silent Night\" – 4:14 (Music and lyrics by Joseph Mohr & Franz Gruber)\n\"O Come O Come Emmanuel\" – 3:35 (Lyrics from Latin text by John Mason Neale)\n\"Snow Day\" – 3:54\n\"Alone At Christmastime\" – 2:59\n\"Christmas Don't Be Late\" – 6:40 (Originally by The Chipmunks)\n\"Let It Snow\" – 2:39 (Music and lyrics by Sammy Cahn & Jule Styne)\n\"Sheila's Christmas Miracle\" – 8:54\n\"Rosie's Christmas Wish\" – 2:21\n\nReferences\n\nRosie Thomas (singer-songwriter) albums\n2008 Christmas albums\nChristmas albums by American artists", "Sheila Permatasaka (born in Jakarta on March 4, 1984) is an Indonesian musician. She spent three years learning how to play bass in Farabi Music School, Jakarta, and plays bass in the jazz band \"Starlite\". Her formal education was in Atma Jaya University, Jakarta, with the subject Accounting but she founds her true calling in music.\n\nShe has reached several awards, such as the best bassist at Festival Budaya Jakarta on 2004 and she also won the Jazz Goes to Campus Competition on 2004 with Starlite. Sheila could play the bass guitar and double bass as well. She has recorded one digital album with Starlite called “Our Journey”.\n\nHer experience in performing consisted of playing regularly in some major places in Jakarta. She also played in Jazz Goes To Campus, Jazz For Aceh, Jazz For Jogja, Dutch Embassy events, Mexican Embassy events, A Mild event (with Clorophyl Band), Jak Jazz Festival, Jazz Tiga Generasi, Bimasena Jazz (Jakarta Jazz Society), Jajan Jazz events, Komunitas Jazz Kemayoran events, Jazz Kota Tua, NgayogJazz, Jakarta International Java Jazz Festival (she was once collaborating with Tiwi Shakuhachi, Titi Rajo Bintang, and Tinneke Postma – a Dutch saxophonist), Jazz Traffic Festival, Prambanan Heritage Jazz Festival, Jazz Gunung Bromo, World Youth Jazz Festival in Kuala Lumpur, and many prestigious events in Indonesia.\n\nSheila also plays as home band at several television stations until now. She has performed as the bass player for Gita Gutawa, Dewi Sandra, Vidi Aldiano, Mike Mohede, Bams, Denada, and Olive Latuputty. She currently works as the Managing Director for Bebop Entertainment.\n\nReferences\n\nLiving people\n1984 births\nIndonesian bassists\nWomen jazz musicians\nWomen bass guitarists\nIndonesian bass guitarists\nMusicians from Jakarta\n21st-century women musicians\n21st-century bass guitarists" ]
[ "Sheila E.", "2009-12: The E Family", "Who is the E Family?", "On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.", "Where did the E Family perform?", "at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.", "Did Sheila E. perform anywhere else?", "On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados.", "Who did Sheila E. perform with at the Christmas Jazz event?", "I don't know." ]	C_bbd59fb6f1d84402acda38bc5fa0d0f7_0	What were some of the songs she performed during this time?	5	What were some of the songs Sheila E. performed during the Christmas Jazz event?	Sheila E.	On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in San Francisco on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the tenth season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. CANNOTANSWER	At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (	Sheila Cecilia Escovedo (born December 12, 1957) better known under the stage name Sheila E., is an American percussionist and singer. She began her career in the mid-1970s as a percussionist and singer for The George Duke Band. After leaving the group in 1983, Sheila began a successful solo career, starting with her critically acclaimed debut album, which included the career-defining song, "The Glamorous Life". She became a mainstream solo star in 1985 following the success of the singles "The Belle of St. Mark", "Sister Fate", and "A Love Bizarre" with the last becoming one of her signature songs. She is commonly referred to as The Queen of Percussion. Early life and family Born in Oakland, California, Sheila E. is the daughter of Juanita Gardere, a dairy factory worker, and percussionist Pete Escovedo, with whom she frequently performs. Her mother is of Creole-French/African descent, and her father is of Mexican-American origin. She was raised Catholic. Sheila E's uncle is Alejandro Escovedo, and Tito Puente was Escovedo's godfather. She also is niece to Javier Escovedo, founder of seminal San Diego punk act The Zeros. Another uncle, Mario Escovedo, fronted long-running indie rockers The Dragons. She also is the niece of Coke Escovedo, who was in Santana and formed the band Azteca. Nicole Richie is Sheila E.'s biological niece, the daughter of Sheila's musician brother, Peter Michael Escovedo. She has publicly stated that, at the age of five, she was raped by her teen-aged babysitter, and this event had a profound influence on her childhood development. Career 1976–1983: Beginnings Sheila made her recording debut with jazz bassist Alphonso Johnson on "Yesterday's Dream" in 1976. By her early 20s, she had already played with George Duke, Lionel Richie, Marvin Gaye, Herbie Hancock, and Diana Ross. In 1977, she joined The George Duke Band. She appeared on several of Duke's albums, including Don't Let Go (1978), Follow the Rainbow (1979), Master of the Game (1979), and A Brazilian Love Affair (1980). Along with appearing on Duke's Don't Let Go in 1978, Escovedo and her father released "Happy Together" that year on Fantasy Records, sharing billing as Pete and Sheila Escovedo. In 1980, she appeared on the pivotal Herbie Hancock album Monster. In 1983, she joined Marvin Gaye's final tour Midnight Love Tour as one of his percussionists. 1984–1989: The Glamorous Life and A Love Bizarre Prince met Sheila E. at a concert in 1977, when she was performing with her father. After the show he met her and told her that he and his bassist Andre Cymone "were just fighting about which one of us would be the first to be your husband." He also vowed that one day she would join his band. The two would eventually join forces during the Purple Rain recording sessions. She provided vocals on the B-side to "Let's Go Crazy", "Erotic City" in 1984. Though taken under Prince's wing, she proved to be a successful artist in her own right. In June 1984, she released her debut album The Glamorous Life. The album's title-track single "The Glamorous Life" peaked at number 7 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts for two weeks in August 1984. The video for the song would bring three MTV Award nominations for Best Female Video, Best New Artist, and Best Choreography. She also received two Grammy Award nominations for Best New Artist and Best Pop Vocal Performance Female. Her second single "The Belle of St. Mark" charted at number 34 on Billboard Hot 100 and later became NME'''s "Single of the Week". She also toured as the opening act for Prince's Purple Rain Tour and the duo began a brief romantic relationship, while Prince was still seeing Susannah Melvoin, twin sister of The Revolution band member, Wendy Melvoin. They would later become briefly engaged in the late 1980s, during Prince's Lovesexy Tour. In 1985, she released Romance 1600. The lead single "Sister Fate" peaked at number 36 on the R&B charts. The album's second single "A Love Bizarre" became her signature song, peaking at number 11 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts. The non-album track "Holly Rock" made its way to live shows and into the film Krush Groove. Sheila later served as Prince's drummer and musical director in his band during the tours from 1987 to 1989. In July 1987, her self-titled album Sheila E. was released. The ballad single "Hold Me" peaked at number 3 on R&B charts. She appeared in four films, Krush Groove with Run-D.M.C., LL Cool J and Blair Underwood in 1985, Prince's concert film, Sign "O" the Times in 1987, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane and Chasing Papi in 2003. 1989–1994: Sex Cymbal and Mi Tierra After leaving the Prince organization in 1989, Sheila E. collaborated with writers like Demetrius Ross and David Gamson, recorded and released an album, Sex Cymbal in 1991. The album spawned singles: "Sex Cymbal", "Dropping Like Flies", and "Cry Baby". She began her tour in Japan which only lasted for a brief time. Shortly after returning to America, she developed severe health issues after her lung collapsed. She described herself as "semi-paralyzed from playing drums in heels for so long". Unable to promote and tour, her album Sex Cymbal suffered low sales. In 1994, Sheila E. contributed as a guest artist, playing congas and timbales, for the multi-platinum album Mi Tierra by Gloria Estefan, produced by Emilio Estefan. 1996–2005: Music directing In 1996, she played in Japanese pop singer Namie Amuro's live band. The show at Chiba Marine Stadium was later made available on DVD. In 1998, she played percussion on the Phil Collins cover of "True Colors". She was also the leader of the house band on the short-lived late night talk show, The Magic Hour, hosted by Earvin "Magic" Johnson in the late 1990s. Sheila E. has performed three stints as one of the member "All-Starrs" of Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band, in 2001, 2003, and 2006. Her drum "duets" with Starr are a moment of comic relief in the show, where they play the same parts but he quickly falls behind, shrugs and smiles as she takes off on an extended percussion solo. Says Sheila E.: "Ringo truly is one of the greatest rock n' roll drummers in the history of music. He enjoys the joke!" In 2002, Sheila E. appeared on the Beyoncé song "Work It Out". In 2004, Sheila E. toured New Zealand as drummer and percussionist for the Abe Laboriel Band. The same year, she also was featured on Tonex's Out the Box on the song "Todos Juntos". She also played drums on Cyndi Lauper's hit album of standard covers, At Last. She played percussion on the song "Stay". Sheila E. joined Lauper on a live version of that song on VH1 Divas. Sheila also performed at Prince's One Nite Alone... Live! concert, Live at the Aladdin Las Vegas in 2003, 36th NAACP Image Awards in 2005, and on the Good Morning show in June 2006. In 2005, Sheila E. was a surprise guest orchestrating a band, in Amerie's "1 Thing" performances for The Lady Of Soul & World Music Awards. In February 2006, Sheila E. performed with Prince (and Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman) once again at the BRIT Awards. Sheila E. performed at the Sonoma Jazz Festival in 2006 as part of Herbie Hancock's band featuring Larry Carlton, Terrence Blanchard, Marcus Miller, and Terri Lyne Carrington. 2007–2009: C.O.E.D. and reunion with Prince In 2006, Sheila formed a female group C.O.E.D. (Chronicles of Every Diva), consisting of Sheila E., Kat Dyson, Rhonda Smith and Cassandra O'Neal. The group released a single "Waters of Life". In March 2007, the group went on a successful tour in Europe and Japan. The group toured overseas in 2008 and released a CD available in limited distribution or through her website. For several concerts she was joined by Candy Dulfer, who was billed as a special guest. She performed at the 2007 Latin Grammy Awards with Juan Luis Guerra. She also performed at the American Latin Music Awards in June 2007 with Prince and on July 7, 2007, in Minneapolis with Prince. She performed at all three of his concerts: at Prince's 3121 perfume launch at Macy's, followed by the Target Center concert, and finally, at an aftershow at First Avenue. In October 2007, Sheila E. was a judge alongside Australian Idol judge and marketing manager Ian "Dicko" Dickson and Goo Goo Dolls lead singer John Rzeznik on the Fox network's The Next Great American Band. Sheila E. once again teamed up with Prince in March 2008, as she sat in (and played keyboard) on the performance with her family at Harvelle Redondo Beach. On April 9, 2008, Sheila E. appeared on the Emmy winning program, Idol Gives Back. Sheila E. took part in the show opener "Get on Your Feet" with Gloria Estefan. Dance troupe, So You Think You Can Dance finalists joined them on stage. On April 26, 2008, Sheila E., along with Morris Day and Jerome Benton, performed with Prince at the Coachella Music Festival. From May 2 to 6, 2008, Sheila E. played four sold-out shows at Blue Note Tokyo, the most frequented jazz music club in Tokyo, Japan. On June 14, 2008, Sheila E. performed at the Rhythm on the Vine music and wine festival at the South Coast Winery in Temecula, California for Shriners Hospital for Children. She took the stage with the E Family, Pete Escovedo, Juan Escovedo and Peter Michael Escovedo. Other performers at the event were jazz musician Herbie Hancock, contemporary music artist Jim Brickman and Kirk Whalum. 2009–2012: The E Family On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in Oakland, California, on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the 10th-season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. 2013–2015: Icon and Beat of my Own Drum In 2013, Sheila began recording her seventh album. In November 2013, she released her album Icon in the UK. The album was also Sheila's first release of her own recording label Stilettoflats Music. In September 2014, she released her autobiography Beat of my Own Drum. In November 2014, her album Icon was internationally released. 2016–present: Girl Meets Boy In 2016, Sheila provided drums for Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL's orchestral soundtrack to the blockbuster superhero films Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. On June 26, 2016, Sheila and The New Power Generation led a tribute to Prince on the 2016 BET Awards, featuring a medley of his hits. The next day, she released a new song, "Girl Meets Boy," in honor of Prince. In 2017 she was the featured percussionist for the soundtrack to the film The Boss Baby, which was also co-produced by Zimmer. Sheila E. is featured in Fred Armisen's 2018 Netflix comedy special Stand Up for Drummers. Sheila E. plays percussion on a number of tracks on Gary Clark Jr.'s album This Land''. She performed and served as music director for Let's Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince concert at the Staples Center on January 28, 2020. It was broadcast on CBS on April 21, 2020. On April 17, 2020, she released the single "Lemon Cake" which was available as an audio track on YouTube. On May 14, 2020, Sheila E. premiered the official video for "Lemon Cake" on Rated R&B. In July 2020, Sheila E. collaborated with MasterClass to create "Sheila E. Teaches Drumming and Percussion" Honors In February 2009, she was made an honorary member of Tau Beta Sigma National Honorary Band Sorority by the Eta Delta Chapter located at Howard University in recognition of her humanitarian efforts through and in music. Escovedo and her friend Lynn Mabry are also the co-founder of Elevate Oakland, a nonprofit that uses music and art to serve the needs of youth in Oakland public schools. Sheila E., along with her father, were presented with the Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021. Discography Studio albums Singles See also List of number-one dance hits (United States) List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart References External links Sheila E.’s MasterClass American musicians of Mexican descent American dance musicians American women drummers Living people Timbaleros Bongo players Conga players American rock percussionists African-American drummers American funk drummers American rock drummers Rhythm and blues drummers Soul drummers American contemporary R&B singers American soul singers American funk singers Warner Records artists Paisley Park Records artists Participants in American reality television series Musicians from Oakland, California Singing talent show winners Musicians from the San Francisco Bay Area 20th-century American drummers 21st-century African-American women singers 20th-century African-American women singers Hispanic and Latino American musicians The Blackout All-Stars members 1957 births Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band members African-American women singer-songwriters Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners American performers of Latin music Hispanic and Latino American women singers Women in Latin music Singer-songwriters from California	true	[ "\"Octavo Día\" (English: Eighth Day) is a song written and performed by Colombian singer-songwriter Shakira. The song was released as promotional single from her multi-platinum album Dónde Están los Ladrones? (1998), but received more attention when it created controversy while performed live in her 2002-2003 world tour Tour of the Mongoose. This song expresses Shakira's opinion about God.\n\nBackground\nIn an interview with MTV News, Shakira stated that \"Octavo Dia\" \"talks about God when he created the world, the eighth day he went for a walk to outer space and when he came back he found our world in an infernal mess. And he found that we were being controlled and manipulated by just a few leaders and that we were like pieces of a chess game\".\n\nLive performances \nShakira performed \"Octavo Día\" at a concert held on 12 August 1999 at Grand Ballroom, which later became MTV Unplugged. She also performed it during the 2000 Tour Anfibio.\n\nIn the Tour of the Mongoose, behind the stage was a black and white backdrop video of George W. Bush and Saddam Hussein playing chess, and on the stage some of the musicians were wearing masks of Richard Nixon and Cuba's president Fidel Castro. \n\nDuring the video at the show, Hussein's and Bush's puppets suddenly became restless and violent as they started playing with nuclear bombs instead of chess pieces. Then the Grim Reaper appeared behind the two leaders and moved the strings that control the puppets. Shakira said during the concert that pop singers typically do not talk about politics nor about politicians, but this time, her tour had a political view. \"I know pop stars are not supposed to stick their noses into politics\", said Shakira during her concert in New York. \"Sometimes people don't want to see pop stars giving their opinion about political situations. They think pop stars are made to entertain. Period. I don't see it that way. I know it was a little risky to use my show to deliver a message and many people around me told me not to do it, but, at the end of the day, it was a statement about love and what I feel this world and its leaders are lacking\", she later told The Guardian.\n\nThe symbolism of the video clip was that Bush and Hussein were treating the war as if a game, as if not treating it with much importance. The performance ended with a quote from Jimi Hendrix in the back screen of the stage: \"When the power of love overcomes the love for power, the world will know the peace.\"\n\nHowever, some members of the audience were confused with Shakira's criticism when she performed \"Octavo Día\". David Hiltbrand, a journalist from The Philadelphia Inquirer, said that it was an atypical show number. \"I thought it was a mistake, personally, not as a journalist. What I took from it [is that] our leaders are caught up with themselves,\" Hiltbrand said.\n\nAwards\n\nReferences \n\n1998 songs\nShakira songs\nSongs written by Shakira\nSongs written by Luis Fernando Ochoa", "The Scarlet Tulip EP is a 2011 EP studio release from KT Tunstall, recorded in her home studio in April 2011. The album was recorded and produced by Tunstall, co-produced by Luke Bullen and mastered by Jeremy Cooper.\n\nBackground \nTunstall wrote all of the songs on the EP, notably recording each in a single take in her solar-powered studio in the Berkshire countryside.\n\nThe EP project was borne out of Tunstall's desire to record some songs she had written during the recording of Tiger Suit and which were not included on the final album. \"The Hidden Heart\" was written for the naturalist Bruce Parry's Survival project, \"to try and gain land protection for indigenous people of the Amazon,\" she said. All songs are played on acoustic guitar except for \"Shanty of the Whale\", which Tunstall performed a cappella.\n\nLive performances of The Scarlet Tulip EP tracks \nTunstall started playing some of The Scarlet Tulip EP songs during her gigs, often still performing \"The Punk\", \"Scarlet Tulip\" and \"The Hidden Heart\". The latter was first performed during a concert in Ireland in 2008, subsequently featuring in the compilation Songs for Survival with Piotr Lisiecki singing. The track also features in her 2011 live-to-tape concert recording Live in London March 2011; it was after this time that Tunstall recorded the song for the EP.\n\nAfter its release, Tunstall continued playing \"The Hidden Heart\" as part of her 2011 solo tour. Tunstall also sang it as she launched the countdown to the WWF Earth Hour at the Westfield London.\n\nTunstall played \"Alchemy\" for her following live album Live Islington Assembly Hall. She continues to play songs from The Scarlet Tulip EP live to this day, including \"Shanty Of The Whale\" in 2013 and \"Patience\" in 2021.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences\n\nKT Tunstall albums\n2011 EPs" ]
[ "Sheila E.", "2009-12: The E Family", "Who is the E Family?", "On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.", "Where did the E Family perform?", "at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.", "Did Sheila E. perform anywhere else?", "On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados.", "Who did Sheila E. perform with at the Christmas Jazz event?", "I don't know.", "What were some of the songs she performed during this time?", "At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song \"Leader of the Band\" written by Prince (" ]	C_bbd59fb6f1d84402acda38bc5fa0d0f7_0	Did Sheila E. ever perform with Prince?	6	Did Sheila E. ever perform with Prince?	Sheila E.	On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in San Francisco on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the tenth season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. CANNOTANSWER	and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name.	Sheila Cecilia Escovedo (born December 12, 1957) better known under the stage name Sheila E., is an American percussionist and singer. She began her career in the mid-1970s as a percussionist and singer for The George Duke Band. After leaving the group in 1983, Sheila began a successful solo career, starting with her critically acclaimed debut album, which included the career-defining song, "The Glamorous Life". She became a mainstream solo star in 1985 following the success of the singles "The Belle of St. Mark", "Sister Fate", and "A Love Bizarre" with the last becoming one of her signature songs. She is commonly referred to as The Queen of Percussion. Early life and family Born in Oakland, California, Sheila E. is the daughter of Juanita Gardere, a dairy factory worker, and percussionist Pete Escovedo, with whom she frequently performs. Her mother is of Creole-French/African descent, and her father is of Mexican-American origin. She was raised Catholic. Sheila E's uncle is Alejandro Escovedo, and Tito Puente was Escovedo's godfather. She also is niece to Javier Escovedo, founder of seminal San Diego punk act The Zeros. Another uncle, Mario Escovedo, fronted long-running indie rockers The Dragons. She also is the niece of Coke Escovedo, who was in Santana and formed the band Azteca. Nicole Richie is Sheila E.'s biological niece, the daughter of Sheila's musician brother, Peter Michael Escovedo. She has publicly stated that, at the age of five, she was raped by her teen-aged babysitter, and this event had a profound influence on her childhood development. Career 1976–1983: Beginnings Sheila made her recording debut with jazz bassist Alphonso Johnson on "Yesterday's Dream" in 1976. By her early 20s, she had already played with George Duke, Lionel Richie, Marvin Gaye, Herbie Hancock, and Diana Ross. In 1977, she joined The George Duke Band. She appeared on several of Duke's albums, including Don't Let Go (1978), Follow the Rainbow (1979), Master of the Game (1979), and A Brazilian Love Affair (1980). Along with appearing on Duke's Don't Let Go in 1978, Escovedo and her father released "Happy Together" that year on Fantasy Records, sharing billing as Pete and Sheila Escovedo. In 1980, she appeared on the pivotal Herbie Hancock album Monster. In 1983, she joined Marvin Gaye's final tour Midnight Love Tour as one of his percussionists. 1984–1989: The Glamorous Life and A Love Bizarre Prince met Sheila E. at a concert in 1977, when she was performing with her father. After the show he met her and told her that he and his bassist Andre Cymone "were just fighting about which one of us would be the first to be your husband." He also vowed that one day she would join his band. The two would eventually join forces during the Purple Rain recording sessions. She provided vocals on the B-side to "Let's Go Crazy", "Erotic City" in 1984. Though taken under Prince's wing, she proved to be a successful artist in her own right. In June 1984, she released her debut album The Glamorous Life. The album's title-track single "The Glamorous Life" peaked at number 7 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts for two weeks in August 1984. The video for the song would bring three MTV Award nominations for Best Female Video, Best New Artist, and Best Choreography. She also received two Grammy Award nominations for Best New Artist and Best Pop Vocal Performance Female. Her second single "The Belle of St. Mark" charted at number 34 on Billboard Hot 100 and later became NME'''s "Single of the Week". She also toured as the opening act for Prince's Purple Rain Tour and the duo began a brief romantic relationship, while Prince was still seeing Susannah Melvoin, twin sister of The Revolution band member, Wendy Melvoin. They would later become briefly engaged in the late 1980s, during Prince's Lovesexy Tour. In 1985, she released Romance 1600. The lead single "Sister Fate" peaked at number 36 on the R&B charts. The album's second single "A Love Bizarre" became her signature song, peaking at number 11 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts. The non-album track "Holly Rock" made its way to live shows and into the film Krush Groove. Sheila later served as Prince's drummer and musical director in his band during the tours from 1987 to 1989. In July 1987, her self-titled album Sheila E. was released. The ballad single "Hold Me" peaked at number 3 on R&B charts. She appeared in four films, Krush Groove with Run-D.M.C., LL Cool J and Blair Underwood in 1985, Prince's concert film, Sign "O" the Times in 1987, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane and Chasing Papi in 2003. 1989–1994: Sex Cymbal and Mi Tierra After leaving the Prince organization in 1989, Sheila E. collaborated with writers like Demetrius Ross and David Gamson, recorded and released an album, Sex Cymbal in 1991. The album spawned singles: "Sex Cymbal", "Dropping Like Flies", and "Cry Baby". She began her tour in Japan which only lasted for a brief time. Shortly after returning to America, she developed severe health issues after her lung collapsed. She described herself as "semi-paralyzed from playing drums in heels for so long". Unable to promote and tour, her album Sex Cymbal suffered low sales. In 1994, Sheila E. contributed as a guest artist, playing congas and timbales, for the multi-platinum album Mi Tierra by Gloria Estefan, produced by Emilio Estefan. 1996–2005: Music directing In 1996, she played in Japanese pop singer Namie Amuro's live band. The show at Chiba Marine Stadium was later made available on DVD. In 1998, she played percussion on the Phil Collins cover of "True Colors". She was also the leader of the house band on the short-lived late night talk show, The Magic Hour, hosted by Earvin "Magic" Johnson in the late 1990s. Sheila E. has performed three stints as one of the member "All-Starrs" of Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band, in 2001, 2003, and 2006. Her drum "duets" with Starr are a moment of comic relief in the show, where they play the same parts but he quickly falls behind, shrugs and smiles as she takes off on an extended percussion solo. Says Sheila E.: "Ringo truly is one of the greatest rock n' roll drummers in the history of music. He enjoys the joke!" In 2002, Sheila E. appeared on the Beyoncé song "Work It Out". In 2004, Sheila E. toured New Zealand as drummer and percussionist for the Abe Laboriel Band. The same year, she also was featured on Tonex's Out the Box on the song "Todos Juntos". She also played drums on Cyndi Lauper's hit album of standard covers, At Last. She played percussion on the song "Stay". Sheila E. joined Lauper on a live version of that song on VH1 Divas. Sheila also performed at Prince's One Nite Alone... Live! concert, Live at the Aladdin Las Vegas in 2003, 36th NAACP Image Awards in 2005, and on the Good Morning show in June 2006. In 2005, Sheila E. was a surprise guest orchestrating a band, in Amerie's "1 Thing" performances for The Lady Of Soul & World Music Awards. In February 2006, Sheila E. performed with Prince (and Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman) once again at the BRIT Awards. Sheila E. performed at the Sonoma Jazz Festival in 2006 as part of Herbie Hancock's band featuring Larry Carlton, Terrence Blanchard, Marcus Miller, and Terri Lyne Carrington. 2007–2009: C.O.E.D. and reunion with Prince In 2006, Sheila formed a female group C.O.E.D. (Chronicles of Every Diva), consisting of Sheila E., Kat Dyson, Rhonda Smith and Cassandra O'Neal. The group released a single "Waters of Life". In March 2007, the group went on a successful tour in Europe and Japan. The group toured overseas in 2008 and released a CD available in limited distribution or through her website. For several concerts she was joined by Candy Dulfer, who was billed as a special guest. She performed at the 2007 Latin Grammy Awards with Juan Luis Guerra. She also performed at the American Latin Music Awards in June 2007 with Prince and on July 7, 2007, in Minneapolis with Prince. She performed at all three of his concerts: at Prince's 3121 perfume launch at Macy's, followed by the Target Center concert, and finally, at an aftershow at First Avenue. In October 2007, Sheila E. was a judge alongside Australian Idol judge and marketing manager Ian "Dicko" Dickson and Goo Goo Dolls lead singer John Rzeznik on the Fox network's The Next Great American Band. Sheila E. once again teamed up with Prince in March 2008, as she sat in (and played keyboard) on the performance with her family at Harvelle Redondo Beach. On April 9, 2008, Sheila E. appeared on the Emmy winning program, Idol Gives Back. Sheila E. took part in the show opener "Get on Your Feet" with Gloria Estefan. Dance troupe, So You Think You Can Dance finalists joined them on stage. On April 26, 2008, Sheila E., along with Morris Day and Jerome Benton, performed with Prince at the Coachella Music Festival. From May 2 to 6, 2008, Sheila E. played four sold-out shows at Blue Note Tokyo, the most frequented jazz music club in Tokyo, Japan. On June 14, 2008, Sheila E. performed at the Rhythm on the Vine music and wine festival at the South Coast Winery in Temecula, California for Shriners Hospital for Children. She took the stage with the E Family, Pete Escovedo, Juan Escovedo and Peter Michael Escovedo. Other performers at the event were jazz musician Herbie Hancock, contemporary music artist Jim Brickman and Kirk Whalum. 2009–2012: The E Family On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in Oakland, California, on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the 10th-season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. 2013–2015: Icon and Beat of my Own Drum In 2013, Sheila began recording her seventh album. In November 2013, she released her album Icon in the UK. The album was also Sheila's first release of her own recording label Stilettoflats Music. In September 2014, she released her autobiography Beat of my Own Drum. In November 2014, her album Icon was internationally released. 2016–present: Girl Meets Boy In 2016, Sheila provided drums for Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL's orchestral soundtrack to the blockbuster superhero films Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. On June 26, 2016, Sheila and The New Power Generation led a tribute to Prince on the 2016 BET Awards, featuring a medley of his hits. The next day, she released a new song, "Girl Meets Boy," in honor of Prince. In 2017 she was the featured percussionist for the soundtrack to the film The Boss Baby, which was also co-produced by Zimmer. Sheila E. is featured in Fred Armisen's 2018 Netflix comedy special Stand Up for Drummers. Sheila E. plays percussion on a number of tracks on Gary Clark Jr.'s album This Land''. She performed and served as music director for Let's Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince concert at the Staples Center on January 28, 2020. It was broadcast on CBS on April 21, 2020. On April 17, 2020, she released the single "Lemon Cake" which was available as an audio track on YouTube. On May 14, 2020, Sheila E. premiered the official video for "Lemon Cake" on Rated R&B. In July 2020, Sheila E. collaborated with MasterClass to create "Sheila E. Teaches Drumming and Percussion" Honors In February 2009, she was made an honorary member of Tau Beta Sigma National Honorary Band Sorority by the Eta Delta Chapter located at Howard University in recognition of her humanitarian efforts through and in music. Escovedo and her friend Lynn Mabry are also the co-founder of Elevate Oakland, a nonprofit that uses music and art to serve the needs of youth in Oakland public schools. Sheila E., along with her father, were presented with the Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021. Discography Studio albums Singles See also List of number-one dance hits (United States) List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart References External links Sheila E.’s MasterClass American musicians of Mexican descent American dance musicians American women drummers Living people Timbaleros Bongo players Conga players American rock percussionists African-American drummers American funk drummers American rock drummers Rhythm and blues drummers Soul drummers American contemporary R&B singers American soul singers American funk singers Warner Records artists Paisley Park Records artists Participants in American reality television series Musicians from Oakland, California Singing talent show winners Musicians from the San Francisco Bay Area 20th-century American drummers 21st-century African-American women singers 20th-century African-American women singers Hispanic and Latino American musicians The Blackout All-Stars members 1957 births Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band members African-American women singer-songwriters Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners American performers of Latin music Hispanic and Latino American women singers Women in Latin music Singer-songwriters from California	true	[ "Prince 20Ten was a concert tour performed by American recording artist Prince in 2010 to promote his 20Ten album. The tour was divided in two legs, the first set of shows were from July 4 to July 25. The tour kicked off in Denmark and took Prince to Germany, France, Belgium, Austria, and Portugal. Larry Graham and Mint Condition were supporting acts. He rehearsed them in Paisley Park Studios. The second leg was from October 15 to November 18. He played these dates with a slightly different band and no supporting acts. This leg of the tour took him to Norway, Denmark, Italy, Belgium, and the Netherlands. He also took the tour to the United Arab Emirates where he performed at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.\n\nSet list\nThe set list and duration varied heavily during the tour. During a single concert Prince would perform between 25 and 45 songs from the list below.\n\n \"1999\"\n \"7\"\n \"A Love Bizarre\"\n \"A Sós com a Noite\" (Ana Moura song, performed with Ana Moura at the Portugal concert)\n \"Act of God\"\n \"Alphabet St.\"\n \"Angel\" (performed by the backing vocalists)\n \"Cream\"\n \"Crimson and Clover\"\n \"Controversy\"\n \"Dance (Disco Heat)\"\n \"Everyday People\"\n \"Forever in My Life\"\n \"Guitar\"\n \"How Come U Don't Call Me Anymore?\"\n \"I Know You Got Soul\"\n \"I Want to Take You Higher\"\n \"Jungle Love\"\n \"Kiss\"\n \"Lean on Me\"\n \"Let's Go Crazy\"\n \"Little Red Corvette\"\n \"Mountains\"\n \"Musicology\"\n \"Nothing Compares 2 U\"\n \"Ol' Skool Company\"\n \"Partyman\"\n \"Peach\"\n \"Purple Rain\"\n \"Sexy Dancer\"/\"Le Freak\" (mash-up)\n \"Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)\" (vocals by vocals by Elisa Dease)\n \"Sometimes It Snows In April\"\n \"Shhh\"\n \"Spanish Castle Magic\"\n \"Stratus\"\n \"Take Me with U\"\n \"The Bird\"\n \"The Love We Make\"\n \"The Glamorous Life\"\n \"The Question of U\"/\"The One\" (mash-up)\n \"U Got the Look\"\n \"Venus de Milo\"\n \"Vou Dar de Beber à Dor\" (Ana Moura song, performed with Ana Moura at the Portugal concert)\n \"When Will We B Paid?\"\n \"Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad?\"\n \"When You Were Mine\"\n\nSet list of July 4, 2010, at the Festivalpladsen, Roskilde, Denmark\n\n \"Venus de Milo\" (performed by Cassandra O'Neal on keyboards and vocals, sans Prince)\n \"Let's Go Crazy\"\n \"Delirious\" ft Frederic Yonnet (includes \"Let's Go Crazy\" coda)\n \"1999\"\n \"Little Red Corvette\"\n \"Controversy\" (includes \"(I Like) Funky Music\" chants)\n \"Sexy Dancer\"/\"Le Freak\" (includes \"Controversy\" coda and \"Housequake\" chants) (performed with Shelby J., Liv Warfield and Elisa Dease)\n \"Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad?\"\n \"Take Me with U\" (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Guitar\"\n \"Angel\" (performed with Shelby J., Liv Warfield and Elisa Dease)\n \"Lean on Me\" (performed with Elisa Dease)\n \"Nothing Compares 2 U\" (performed with Shelby J., with fake jazz arrangement)\n \"Purple Rain\"\nEncore\n \"Mountains\" (includes \"Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)\", performed by Elisa Dease)\n \"Everyday People\" \n \"I Want to Take You Higher\" (includes \"Love Rollercoaster\" interpolation)\nEncore 2\n \"Kiss\"\nEncore 3\n \"Dance (Disco Heat)\" (performed with Shelby J., Liv Warfield and Elisa Dease)\n\nSet list of July 13, 2010, at the Wiener Stadhalle, Vienna, Austria\n\n \"Purple Rain\" (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Let's Go Crazy\" (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Delirious\" (includes \"Let's Go Crazy\" coda) (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"1999\" (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Shhh\"\n \"Cream\" (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Dreamer\"\n \"Stratus\" \n \"The Glamorous Life\" (performed with Sheila E., sans Prince)\n \"The Question of U\" (Instrumental)/\"The One\" (includes \"Fallin'\" and \"Electric Man\" interpolations) (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Musicology\" (includes \"Housequake\" percussion interpolation, \"Tighten Up\" vocal interpolation and \"Watermelon Man\" segue-coda) (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Take Me with U\" (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Kiss\" (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Nothing Compares 2 U\" (performed with Shelby J.)\nEncore\n \"The Bird\" (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Jungle Love\" (includes \"Play That Funky Music\" and \"(I Like) Funky Music\" chants) (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"A Love Bizarre\" (includes \"(I Like) Funky Music\" chants and \"I Know You Got Soul\" interpolation) (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Dance (Disco Heat)\" (includes \"Everybody Loves Me\" chants and \"Love Rollercoaster\" guitar interpolation) (performed with Shelby J., Liv Warfield and Elisa Dease)\nEncore 2\n \"How Come U Don't Call Me Anymore?\" (includes \"Please, Please, Please\")\nEncore 3\n \"Mountains\" (includes \"Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)\", performed by Elisa Dease and Sheila E.)\n \"Everyday People\" (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"I Want to Take You Higher\" (performed with Sheila E.)\n \"Ol' Skool Company\" (includes \"Purple Rain\" tease intro and \"Also Sprach Zarathustra\" interpolation) (performed with Sheila E.)\nEncore 4\n \"Peach\" (performed with Sheila E., sans Cora Coleman-Dunham)\n\nTour dates\n\nBox office score data\n\nBand\n Prince: Lead Vocals and Guitar\n Cora Coleman Dunham: Drums [First Leg]\n John Blackwell: Drums [Second Leg]\n Joshua Dunham: Bass [First Leg]\n Ida Nielsen: Bass [Second Leg]\n Cassandra O' Neal: Keyboards\n Morris Hayes: Keyboards\n Renato Neto: Keyboards [Second Leg]\n Shelby Johnson: Vocals\n Elisa Dease: Vocals\n Liv Warfield: Vocals\n Frédéric Yonnet: Harmonica [First Leg]\n Sheila E.: Percussion and Vocals [Second Leg]\n\nDue to unknown reasons, Sheila E. did not appear after the October 22 show.\n\n Madje Malki : FOH Sound\n Tifred Lucas : Monitor Sound\n Andy Doig : Lights\n\nReferences\n\nPrince (musician) concert tours\n2010 concert tours", "Boni Boyer (July 28, 1958 – December 4, 1996) was an American vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and composer. She is best known for her work with Prince in the late 1980s.\n\nBiography\nBoyer was playing keyboards and singing backing vocals with Sheila E.’s group when Prince was forming a new touring band after the break-up of The Revolution, in 1986. When Sheila E. became the drummer in the new band, she also brought Boyer and her bassist Levi Seacer, Jr. with her. Boyer performed as keyboardist and vocalist on the concert tours for Sign o' the Times and on the albums and concert tours for Lovesexy and Graffiti Bridge.\n\nTechnically Boni Boyer left Prince's band for Australia after the Lovesexy tour was over. The same goes for Cat, but Sheila E who protested the changing of the band, suffered back issues/collapsed lung after she parted ways with Prince when she did not agree with the direction of Prince's 4th album for her.\nWhen Prince formed The New Power Generation in 1990, Boyer left the band along with Sheila E. and Cat Glover. She performed and recorded with many artists, including Tony! Toni! Toné!, Con Funk Shun, Digital Underground, Lionel Richie and Al Jarreau. \n \nBoyer died from a brain aneurysm in San Pablo, California, Contra Costa County, California, U.S..\n\nDiscography\nWith Prince\n Lovesexy (1988)\n Graffiti Bridge (1990)\n\nWith Sheila E.\n Sheila E. (1987)\n\nWith Al Jarreau\n Heaven and Earth (1992)\n\nFilmography\n Sign o' the Times (1987)\n The Adventures of Ford Fairlane (1990)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1958 births\n1996 deaths\nAmerican soul keyboardists\nAmerican rhythm and blues keyboardists\nAmerican soul singers\nAmerican funk keyboardists\nAmerican pop keyboardists\nAmerican rhythm and blues singers\nAmerican funk singers\nAmerican women pop singers\nAmerican jazz keyboardists\nDeaths from intracranial aneurysm\n20th-century American women singers\n20th-century American singers" ]
[ "Sheila E.", "2009-12: The E Family", "Who is the E Family?", "On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.", "Where did the E Family perform?", "at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert.", "Did Sheila E. perform anywhere else?", "On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados.", "Who did Sheila E. perform with at the Christmas Jazz event?", "I don't know.", "What were some of the songs she performed during this time?", "At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song \"Leader of the Band\" written by Prince (", "Did Sheila E. ever perform with Prince?", "and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name." ]	C_bbd59fb6f1d84402acda38bc5fa0d0f7_0	Besides concerts, was Sheila E. ever featured on television or radio?	7	Besides concerts, was Sheila E. ever featured on television or radio?	Sheila E.	On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in San Francisco on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the tenth season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. CANNOTANSWER	On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the tenth season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman	Sheila Cecilia Escovedo (born December 12, 1957) better known under the stage name Sheila E., is an American percussionist and singer. She began her career in the mid-1970s as a percussionist and singer for The George Duke Band. After leaving the group in 1983, Sheila began a successful solo career, starting with her critically acclaimed debut album, which included the career-defining song, "The Glamorous Life". She became a mainstream solo star in 1985 following the success of the singles "The Belle of St. Mark", "Sister Fate", and "A Love Bizarre" with the last becoming one of her signature songs. She is commonly referred to as The Queen of Percussion. Early life and family Born in Oakland, California, Sheila E. is the daughter of Juanita Gardere, a dairy factory worker, and percussionist Pete Escovedo, with whom she frequently performs. Her mother is of Creole-French/African descent, and her father is of Mexican-American origin. She was raised Catholic. Sheila E's uncle is Alejandro Escovedo, and Tito Puente was Escovedo's godfather. She also is niece to Javier Escovedo, founder of seminal San Diego punk act The Zeros. Another uncle, Mario Escovedo, fronted long-running indie rockers The Dragons. She also is the niece of Coke Escovedo, who was in Santana and formed the band Azteca. Nicole Richie is Sheila E.'s biological niece, the daughter of Sheila's musician brother, Peter Michael Escovedo. She has publicly stated that, at the age of five, she was raped by her teen-aged babysitter, and this event had a profound influence on her childhood development. Career 1976–1983: Beginnings Sheila made her recording debut with jazz bassist Alphonso Johnson on "Yesterday's Dream" in 1976. By her early 20s, she had already played with George Duke, Lionel Richie, Marvin Gaye, Herbie Hancock, and Diana Ross. In 1977, she joined The George Duke Band. She appeared on several of Duke's albums, including Don't Let Go (1978), Follow the Rainbow (1979), Master of the Game (1979), and A Brazilian Love Affair (1980). Along with appearing on Duke's Don't Let Go in 1978, Escovedo and her father released "Happy Together" that year on Fantasy Records, sharing billing as Pete and Sheila Escovedo. In 1980, she appeared on the pivotal Herbie Hancock album Monster. In 1983, she joined Marvin Gaye's final tour Midnight Love Tour as one of his percussionists. 1984–1989: The Glamorous Life and A Love Bizarre Prince met Sheila E. at a concert in 1977, when she was performing with her father. After the show he met her and told her that he and his bassist Andre Cymone "were just fighting about which one of us would be the first to be your husband." He also vowed that one day she would join his band. The two would eventually join forces during the Purple Rain recording sessions. She provided vocals on the B-side to "Let's Go Crazy", "Erotic City" in 1984. Though taken under Prince's wing, she proved to be a successful artist in her own right. In June 1984, she released her debut album The Glamorous Life. The album's title-track single "The Glamorous Life" peaked at number 7 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts for two weeks in August 1984. The video for the song would bring three MTV Award nominations for Best Female Video, Best New Artist, and Best Choreography. She also received two Grammy Award nominations for Best New Artist and Best Pop Vocal Performance Female. Her second single "The Belle of St. Mark" charted at number 34 on Billboard Hot 100 and later became NME'''s "Single of the Week". She also toured as the opening act for Prince's Purple Rain Tour and the duo began a brief romantic relationship, while Prince was still seeing Susannah Melvoin, twin sister of The Revolution band member, Wendy Melvoin. They would later become briefly engaged in the late 1980s, during Prince's Lovesexy Tour. In 1985, she released Romance 1600. The lead single "Sister Fate" peaked at number 36 on the R&B charts. The album's second single "A Love Bizarre" became her signature song, peaking at number 11 the Hot 100 and also topped the dance charts. The non-album track "Holly Rock" made its way to live shows and into the film Krush Groove. Sheila later served as Prince's drummer and musical director in his band during the tours from 1987 to 1989. In July 1987, her self-titled album Sheila E. was released. The ballad single "Hold Me" peaked at number 3 on R&B charts. She appeared in four films, Krush Groove with Run-D.M.C., LL Cool J and Blair Underwood in 1985, Prince's concert film, Sign "O" the Times in 1987, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane and Chasing Papi in 2003. 1989–1994: Sex Cymbal and Mi Tierra After leaving the Prince organization in 1989, Sheila E. collaborated with writers like Demetrius Ross and David Gamson, recorded and released an album, Sex Cymbal in 1991. The album spawned singles: "Sex Cymbal", "Dropping Like Flies", and "Cry Baby". She began her tour in Japan which only lasted for a brief time. Shortly after returning to America, she developed severe health issues after her lung collapsed. She described herself as "semi-paralyzed from playing drums in heels for so long". Unable to promote and tour, her album Sex Cymbal suffered low sales. In 1994, Sheila E. contributed as a guest artist, playing congas and timbales, for the multi-platinum album Mi Tierra by Gloria Estefan, produced by Emilio Estefan. 1996–2005: Music directing In 1996, she played in Japanese pop singer Namie Amuro's live band. The show at Chiba Marine Stadium was later made available on DVD. In 1998, she played percussion on the Phil Collins cover of "True Colors". She was also the leader of the house band on the short-lived late night talk show, The Magic Hour, hosted by Earvin "Magic" Johnson in the late 1990s. Sheila E. has performed three stints as one of the member "All-Starrs" of Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band, in 2001, 2003, and 2006. Her drum "duets" with Starr are a moment of comic relief in the show, where they play the same parts but he quickly falls behind, shrugs and smiles as she takes off on an extended percussion solo. Says Sheila E.: "Ringo truly is one of the greatest rock n' roll drummers in the history of music. He enjoys the joke!" In 2002, Sheila E. appeared on the Beyoncé song "Work It Out". In 2004, Sheila E. toured New Zealand as drummer and percussionist for the Abe Laboriel Band. The same year, she also was featured on Tonex's Out the Box on the song "Todos Juntos". She also played drums on Cyndi Lauper's hit album of standard covers, At Last. She played percussion on the song "Stay". Sheila E. joined Lauper on a live version of that song on VH1 Divas. Sheila also performed at Prince's One Nite Alone... Live! concert, Live at the Aladdin Las Vegas in 2003, 36th NAACP Image Awards in 2005, and on the Good Morning show in June 2006. In 2005, Sheila E. was a surprise guest orchestrating a band, in Amerie's "1 Thing" performances for The Lady Of Soul & World Music Awards. In February 2006, Sheila E. performed with Prince (and Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman) once again at the BRIT Awards. Sheila E. performed at the Sonoma Jazz Festival in 2006 as part of Herbie Hancock's band featuring Larry Carlton, Terrence Blanchard, Marcus Miller, and Terri Lyne Carrington. 2007–2009: C.O.E.D. and reunion with Prince In 2006, Sheila formed a female group C.O.E.D. (Chronicles of Every Diva), consisting of Sheila E., Kat Dyson, Rhonda Smith and Cassandra O'Neal. The group released a single "Waters of Life". In March 2007, the group went on a successful tour in Europe and Japan. The group toured overseas in 2008 and released a CD available in limited distribution or through her website. For several concerts she was joined by Candy Dulfer, who was billed as a special guest. She performed at the 2007 Latin Grammy Awards with Juan Luis Guerra. She also performed at the American Latin Music Awards in June 2007 with Prince and on July 7, 2007, in Minneapolis with Prince. She performed at all three of his concerts: at Prince's 3121 perfume launch at Macy's, followed by the Target Center concert, and finally, at an aftershow at First Avenue. In October 2007, Sheila E. was a judge alongside Australian Idol judge and marketing manager Ian "Dicko" Dickson and Goo Goo Dolls lead singer John Rzeznik on the Fox network's The Next Great American Band. Sheila E. once again teamed up with Prince in March 2008, as she sat in (and played keyboard) on the performance with her family at Harvelle Redondo Beach. On April 9, 2008, Sheila E. appeared on the Emmy winning program, Idol Gives Back. Sheila E. took part in the show opener "Get on Your Feet" with Gloria Estefan. Dance troupe, So You Think You Can Dance finalists joined them on stage. On April 26, 2008, Sheila E., along with Morris Day and Jerome Benton, performed with Prince at the Coachella Music Festival. From May 2 to 6, 2008, Sheila E. played four sold-out shows at Blue Note Tokyo, the most frequented jazz music club in Tokyo, Japan. On June 14, 2008, Sheila E. performed at the Rhythm on the Vine music and wine festival at the South Coast Winery in Temecula, California for Shriners Hospital for Children. She took the stage with the E Family, Pete Escovedo, Juan Escovedo and Peter Michael Escovedo. Other performers at the event were jazz musician Herbie Hancock, contemporary music artist Jim Brickman and Kirk Whalum. 2009–2012: The E Family On May 30, 2009, Sheila E. and the E Family Band performed at Rhythm on the Vine at Gainey Vineyard in Santa Ynez, California for the Hot Latin Beats concert. Also performing at the concert was Poncho Sanchez. On December 13, 2009, Sheila E. performed at the Deryck Walcott produced Christmas Jazz held at the Plantation Restaurant in Barbados. In 2009, Sheila E. participated and won the CMT reality show, Gone Country. This gave her an opportunity to make country music aided by the country producer, writer, and singer John Rich. Sheila E.'s first song in the country market was "Glorious Train". A video for the song debuted on CMT on March 7, 2009, following the airing of the episode of Gone Country in which Sheila E. was announced the winner. Sheila E. performed two shows at Yoshi's in Oakland, California, on August 15, 2010. At her merchandise stand she sold an EP From E 2 U. It includes a song "Leader of the Band" written by Prince (uncredited, but confirmed by Sheila E.) and it features Prince on piano according to the song's introduction, where he is called by name. She toured on his 20Ten Tour and Welcome 2 America tours. In 2010, Sheila E joined forces with Avon as a celebrity judge for Avon Voices, Avon's first global, online singing talent search for women and songwriting competition for men and women. On May 25, 2011, Sheila performed alongside Marc Anthony on the 10th-season finale of American Idol. On June 7, 2011, she performed on the Late Show with David Letterman as a part of the show's first "Drum Solo Week". In September 2011, The E. Family consisting of Pete Escovedo, Peter Michael Escovedo III, Juan Escovedo, and Sheila released an album Now & Forever. The album spawned the singles "Do What It Do" and "I Like It". On February 26, 2012, Sheila performed at the 2012 Academy Awards alongside Pharrell Williams and Hans Zimmer, playing the into and out of commercial segments. On April 17, 2012, Sheila was featured with "Macy's Stars of Dance" on the Dancing with the Stars results show. On June 16, Sheila headlined the 2012 Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. Sheila toured in 2012 alongside Sy Smith throughout Europe and the United States. Sheila joined Dave Koz on his 2012 Christmas Tour. 2013–2015: Icon and Beat of my Own Drum In 2013, Sheila began recording her seventh album. In November 2013, she released her album Icon in the UK. The album was also Sheila's first release of her own recording label Stilettoflats Music. In September 2014, she released her autobiography Beat of my Own Drum. In November 2014, her album Icon was internationally released. 2016–present: Girl Meets Boy In 2016, Sheila provided drums for Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL's orchestral soundtrack to the blockbuster superhero films Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. On June 26, 2016, Sheila and The New Power Generation led a tribute to Prince on the 2016 BET Awards, featuring a medley of his hits. The next day, she released a new song, "Girl Meets Boy," in honor of Prince. In 2017 she was the featured percussionist for the soundtrack to the film The Boss Baby, which was also co-produced by Zimmer. Sheila E. is featured in Fred Armisen's 2018 Netflix comedy special Stand Up for Drummers. Sheila E. plays percussion on a number of tracks on Gary Clark Jr.'s album This Land''. She performed and served as music director for Let's Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince concert at the Staples Center on January 28, 2020. It was broadcast on CBS on April 21, 2020. On April 17, 2020, she released the single "Lemon Cake" which was available as an audio track on YouTube. On May 14, 2020, Sheila E. premiered the official video for "Lemon Cake" on Rated R&B. In July 2020, Sheila E. collaborated with MasterClass to create "Sheila E. Teaches Drumming and Percussion" Honors In February 2009, she was made an honorary member of Tau Beta Sigma National Honorary Band Sorority by the Eta Delta Chapter located at Howard University in recognition of her humanitarian efforts through and in music. Escovedo and her friend Lynn Mabry are also the co-founder of Elevate Oakland, a nonprofit that uses music and art to serve the needs of youth in Oakland public schools. Sheila E., along with her father, were presented with the Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2021. Discography Studio albums Singles See also List of number-one dance hits (United States) List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart References External links Sheila E.’s MasterClass American musicians of Mexican descent American dance musicians American women drummers Living people Timbaleros Bongo players Conga players American rock percussionists African-American drummers American funk drummers American rock drummers Rhythm and blues drummers Soul drummers American contemporary R&B singers American soul singers American funk singers Warner Records artists Paisley Park Records artists Participants in American reality television series Musicians from Oakland, California Singing talent show winners Musicians from the San Francisco Bay Area 20th-century American drummers 21st-century African-American women singers 20th-century African-American women singers Hispanic and Latino American musicians The Blackout All-Stars members 1957 births Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band members African-American women singer-songwriters Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners American performers of Latin music Hispanic and Latino American women singers Women in Latin music Singer-songwriters from California	false	[ "Sheila Borrett (born Margaret Sheila Graham; 20 June 1905 – 30 April 1986) was a British radio presenter, the first female announcer on the BBC’s National Service. At the time of her work as a BBC announcer she was referred to as Mrs Giles Borrett, but she generally used the stage name Sheila Stewart, or during a later marriage Sheila Wasey.\n\nLife and career\nShe was born in Harrow, Middlesex, England. She was a theatrical actress known as Sheila Stewart when she first appeared in plays broadcast by the BBC, and married Giles Borrett in 1930. She had ambitions of becoming an announcer, and was employed by the BBC in a well-publicised initiative in July 1933, to become the first ever female announcer on the station. She later said that she was hired for her strong, low-pitched voice, adding: \"In those days, radio was so bad technically that a woman's high-pitched voice was very displeasing to the ear.\" After just three months, she was removed from the position in November 1933 after the BBC received thousands of complaints from listeners who were uncomfortable with hearing a woman announcer. \n\nAfter she and her husband opened a cleaning business in 1934, she continued to work occasionally as an actress at the BBC, especially in reading novels aloud for broadcast. She and Borrett divorced; she remarried and continued to broadcast for the BBC, as an announcer, during and after the Second World War. She married an American, Gager Wasey, and moved to the United States in 1952, becoming a naturalized citizen in 1961. In 1967, as Sheila Wasey, she was working as Programme Director at WQXM (FM) in Clearwater, Florida. After Wasey's death in 1970, she moved to Dunedin, and from the 1970s, again using the name Sheila Stewart, she hosted programmes at WUSF (FM) in Tampa.\n \nShe died in 1986 at Morton Plant Hospital in Clearwater, aged 80, after suffering a stroke.\n\nLegacy\nThe University of South Florida created a memorial fund to commemorate her broadcasting career. She was featured in the book Behind the Wireless: An Early History of Women at the BBC by Kate Murphy and The Untold Story of the Talking Book by Matthew Rubery.\n\nReferences\n\n1905 births\n1986 deaths\nBritish radio personalities\nBBC radio presenters", "CBC Summer Symphonies is a Canadian music television miniseries which aired on CBC Television and CBC Stereo in 1978.\n\nPremise\nThis series featured symphony orchestra concerts from Halifax, Hamilton, Montreal, Quebec, Toronto and Winnipeg. Artists featured included the Canadian Brass, Colette Boky (vocalist), Philippe Djokic (violin), Monica Gaylord (piano), Jon Peterson (oboe), Marie-Claire Seguin (vocalist) and Richard Turner (harp). CBC Stereo provided a national FM radio simulcast of the concerts. The debut episode featured the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra with conductor Boris Brott and the Canadian Brass.\n\nScheduling\nThis hour-long series was broadcast on Sundays at 10:00 p.m. (Eastern) from 16 July to 27 August 1978.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\nCBC Television original programming\n1978 Canadian television series debuts\n1978 Canadian television series endings" ]
[ "Richard Stallman", "Terminology" ]	C_48eeef8db60c4df68ba565e3cc185e20_0	Can you provide information on Terminology?	1	Can you provide information on Richard Stallman's Terminology?	Richard Stallman	Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copyright). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agree to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term "intellectual property" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other laws by lumping together areas of law that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues. These laws originated separately, evolved differently, cover different activities, have different rules, and raise different public policy issues. Copyright law was designed to promote authorship and art, and covers the details of a work of authorship or art. Patent law was intended to encourage publication of ideas, at the price of finite monopolies over these ideas - a price that may be worth paying in some fields and not in others. Trademark law was not intended to promote any business activity, but simply to enable buyers to know what they are buying. An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: I think it is ok for authors (please let's not call them creators, they are not gods) to ask for money for copies of their works (please let's not devalue these works by calling them content) in order to gain income (the term compensation falsely implies it is a matter of making up for some kind of damages). CANNOTANSWER	Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world,	Richard Matthew Stallman (; born March 16, 1953), also known by his initials, rms, is an American free software movement activist and programmer. He campaigns for software to be distributed in such a manner, so that its users receive the freedoms to use, study, distribute, and modify that software. Software that ensures these freedoms is termed free software. Stallman launched the GNU Project, founded the Free Software Foundation, developed the GNU Compiler Collection and GNU Emacs, and wrote the GNU General Public License. Stallman launched the GNU Project in September 1983 to write a Unix-like computer operating system composed entirely of free software. With this, he also launched the free software movement. He has been the GNU project's lead architect and organizer, and developed a number of pieces of widely used GNU software including, among others, the GNU Compiler Collection, GNU Debugger, and GNU Emacs text editor. In October 1985 he founded the Free Software Foundation (FSF). Stallman pioneered the concept of copyleft, which uses the principles of copyright law to preserve the right to use, modify, and distribute free software. He is the main author of free software licenses which describe those terms, most notably the GNU General Public License (GPL), the most widely used free software license. In 1989, he co-founded the League for Programming Freedom. Since the mid-1990s, Stallman has spent most of his time advocating for free software, as well as campaigning against software patents, digital rights management (which he refers to as digital restrictions management, calling the more common term misleading), and other legal and technical systems which he sees as taking away users' freedoms. This has included software license agreements, non-disclosure agreements, activation keys, dongles, copy restriction, proprietary formats, and binary executables without source code. In September 2019, Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT after making controversial comments about the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking scandal. Stallman remained head of the GNU Project, and in 2021 returned to the FSF board of directors. Early life Stallman was born March 16, 1953, in New York City, to a family of Jewish heritage. He had a troublesome relationship with his parents and did not feel he had a proper home. He was interested in computers at a young age; when Stallman was a pre-teen at a summer camp, he read manuals for the IBM 7094. From 1967 to 1969, Stallman attended a Columbia University Saturday program for high school students. Stallman was also a volunteer laboratory assistant in the biology department at Rockefeller University. Although he was interested in mathematics and physics, his supervising professor at Rockefeller thought he showed promise as a biologist. His first experience with actual computers was at the IBM New York Scientific Center when he was in high school. He was hired for the summer in 1970, following his senior year of high school, to write a numerical analysis program in Fortran. He completed the task after a couple of weeks ("I swore that I would never use FORTRAN again because I despised it as a language compared with other languages") and spent the rest of the summer writing a text editor in APL and a preprocessor for the PL/I programming language on the IBM System/360. Harvard University and MIT As a first-year student at Harvard University in fall 1970, Stallman was known for his strong performance in Math 55. He was happy: "For the first time in my life, I felt I had found a home at Harvard." In 1971, near the end of his first year at Harvard, he became a programmer at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, and became a regular in the hacker community, where he was usually known by his initials, RMS, which he used in his computer accounts. Stallman received a bachelor's degree in physics (magna cum laude) from Harvard in 1974. Stallman considered staying on at Harvard, but instead decided to enroll as a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He pursued a doctorate in physics for one year, but left that program to focus on his programming at the MIT AI Laboratory. While working (starting in 1975) as a research assistant at MIT under Gerry Sussman, Stallman published a paper (with Sussman) in 1977 on an AI truth maintenance system, called dependency-directed backtracking. This paper was an early work on the problem of intelligent backtracking in constraint satisfaction problems. , the technique Stallman and Sussman introduced is still the most general and powerful form of intelligent backtracking. The technique of constraint recording, wherein partial results of a search are recorded for later reuse, was also introduced in this paper. As a hacker in MIT's AI laboratory, Stallman worked on software projects such as TECO and Emacs for the Incompatible Timesharing System (ITS), as well as the Lisp machine operating system (the CONS of 1974–1976 and the CADR of 1977–1979—this latter unit was commercialized by Symbolics and Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) starting around 1980). He would become an ardent critic of restricted computer access in the lab, which at that time was funded primarily by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). When MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) installed a password control system in 1977, Stallman found a way to decrypt the passwords and sent users messages containing their decoded password, with a suggestion to change it to the empty string (that is, no password) instead, to re-enable anonymous access to the systems. Around 20 percent of the users followed his advice at the time, although passwords ultimately prevailed. Stallman boasted of the success of his campaign for many years afterward. Events leading to GNU In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the hacker culture that Stallman thrived on began to fragment. To prevent software from being used on their competitors' computers, most manufacturers stopped distributing source code and began using copyright and restrictive software licenses to limit or prohibit copying and redistribution. Such proprietary software had existed before, and it became apparent that it would become the norm. This shift in the legal characteristics of software was a consequence triggered by the US Copyright Act of 1976. When Brian Reid in 1979 placed time bombs in the Scribe markup language and word processing system to restrict unlicensed access to the software, Stallman proclaimed it "a crime against humanity". During an interview in 2008, he clarified that it is blocking the user's freedom that he believes is a crime, not the issue of charging for software. Stallman's texinfo is a GPL replacement, loosely based on Scribe; the original version was finished in 1986. In 1980, Stallman and some other hackers at the AI Lab were refused access to the source code for the software of a newly installed laser printer, the Xerox 9700. Stallman had modified the software for the Lab's previous laser printer (the XGP, Xerographic Printer), so it electronically messaged a user when the person's job was printed, and would message all logged-in users waiting for print jobs if the printer was jammed. Not being able to add these features to the new printer was a major inconvenience, as the printer was on a different floor from most of the users. This experience convinced Stallman of people's need to be able to freely modify the software they use. Richard Greenblatt, a fellow AI Lab hacker, founded Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) to market Lisp machines, which he and Tom Knight designed at the lab. Greenblatt rejected outside investment, believing that the proceeds from the construction and sale of a few machines could be profitably reinvested in the growth of the company. In contrast, the other hackers felt that the venture capital-funded approach was better. As no agreement could be reached, hackers from the latter camp founded Symbolics, with the aid of Russ Noftsker, an AI Lab administrator. Symbolics recruited most of the remaining hackers including notable hacker Bill Gosper, who then left the AI Lab. Symbolics also forced Greenblatt to resign by citing MIT policies. While both companies delivered proprietary software, Stallman believed that LMI, unlike Symbolics, had tried to avoid hurting the lab's community. For two years, from 1982 to the end of 1983, Stallman worked by himself to clone the output of the Symbolics programmers, with the aim of preventing them from gaining a monopoly on the lab's computers. Stallman argues that software users should have the freedom to share with their neighbors and be able to study and make changes to the software that they use. He maintains that attempts by proprietary software vendors to prohibit these acts are antisocial and unethical. The phrase "software wants to be free" is often incorrectly attributed to him, and Stallman argues that this is a misstatement of his philosophy. He argues that freedom is vital for the sake of users and society as a moral value, and not merely for pragmatic reasons such as possibly developing technically superior software. Eric S. Raymond, one of the creators of the open-source movement, argues that moral arguments, rather than pragmatic ones, alienate potential allies and hurt the end goal of removing code secrecy. In February 1984, Stallman quit his job at MIT to work full-time on the GNU project, which he had announced in September 1983. Since then, he had remained affiliated with MIT as an unpaid "visiting scientist" in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. Until "around 1998", he maintained an office at the Institute that doubled as his legal residence. GNU project Stallman announced the plan for the GNU operating system in September 1983 on several ARPANET mailing lists and USENET. He started the project on his own and describes: "As an operating system developer, I had the right skills for this job. So even though I could not take success for granted, I realized that I was elected to do the job. I chose to make the system compatible with Unix so that it would be portable, and so that Unix users could easily switch to it." In 1985, Stallman published the GNU Manifesto, which outlined his motivation for creating a free operating system called GNU, which would be compatible with Unix. The name GNU is a recursive acronym for "GNU's Not Unix". Soon after, he started a nonprofit corporation called the Free Software Foundation to employ free software programmers and provide a legal infrastructure for the free software movement. Stallman was the nonsalaried president of the FSF, which is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in Massachusetts. Stallman popularized the concept of copyleft, a legal mechanism to protect the modification and redistribution rights for free software. It was first implemented in the GNU Emacs General Public License, and in 1989 the first program-independent GNU General Public License (GPL) was released. By then, much of the GNU system had been completed. Stallman was responsible for contributing many necessary tools, including a text editor (Emacs), compiler (GCC), debugger (GNU Debugger), and a build automator (GNU make). The notable omission was a kernel. In 1990, members of the GNU project began using Carnegie Mellon's Mach microkernel in a project called GNU Hurd, which has yet to achieve the maturity level required for full POSIX compliance. In 1991, Linus Torvalds, a Finnish student, used the GNU's development tools to produce the free monolithic Linux kernel. The existing programs from the GNU project were readily ported to run on the resultant platform. Most sources use the name Linux to refer to the general-purpose operating system thus formed, while Stallman and the FSF call it GNU/Linux. This has been a longstanding naming controversy in the free software community. Stallman argues that not using GNU in the name of the operating system unfairly disparages the value of the GNU project and harms the sustainability of the free software movement by breaking the link between the software and the free software philosophy of the GNU project. Stallman's influences on hacker culture include the name POSIX and the Emacs editor. On Unix systems, GNU Emacs's popularity rivaled that of another editor vi, spawning an editor war. Stallman's take on this was to canonize himself as St. IGNUcius of the Church of Emacs and acknowledge that "vi vi vi is the editor of the beast", while "using a free version of vi is not a sin; it is a penance". On his homepage Stallman explains what a life in the Church of Emacs means to its members: "Sainthood in the Church of Emacs requires living a life of purity—but in the Church of Emacs, this does not require celibacy (a sigh of relief is heard)". In 1992, developers at Lucid Inc. doing their own work on Emacs clashed with Stallman and ultimately forked the software into what would become XEmacs. The technology journalist Andrew Leonard has characterized what he sees as Stallman's uncompromising stubbornness as common among elite computer programmers: In 2018, Stallman instituted "Kind Communication Guidelines" for the GNU project to help its mailing list discussions remain constructive while avoiding explicitly promoting diversity. In October 2019, a public statement signed by 33 maintainers of the GNU project asserted that Stallman's behaviour had "undermined a core value of the GNU project: the empowerment of all computer users" and called for "GNU maintainers to collectively decide about the organization of the project". The statement was published soon after Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT in September 2019. In spite of that, Stallman remained head of the GNU project. Activism Stallman has written many essays on software freedom, and has been an outspoken political campaigner for the free software movement since the early 1990s. The speeches he has regularly given are titled The GNU Project and the Free Software Movement, The Dangers of Software Patents, and Copyright and Community in the Age of Computer Networks. In 2006 and 2007, during the eighteen month public consultation for the drafting of version 3 of the GNU General Public License, he added a fourth topic explaining the proposed changes. Stallman's staunch advocacy for free software inspired the creation of the Virtual Richard M. Stallman (vrms), software that analyzes the packages currently installed on a Debian GNU/Linux system, and reports those that are from the non-free tree. Stallman disagrees with parts of Debian's definition of free software. In 1999, Stallman called for development of a free online encyclopedia through the means of inviting the public to contribute articles. The resulting GNUPedia was eventually retired in favour of the emerging Wikipedia, which had similar aims and was enjoying greater success. Stallman is a world traveler and has visited at least 65 countries, mostly to speak about free software and the GNU project. According to Stallman, the free software movement has much in common with that of Mahatma Gandhi. Stallman is also highly critical of the effect that drug patents have had on developing countries. In Venezuela, Stallman has delivered public speeches and promoted the adoption of free software in the state's oil company (PDVSA), in municipal government, and in the nation's military. In meetings with Hugo Chávez and in public speeches, Stallman criticised some policies on television broadcasting, free speech rights, and privacy. Stallman was on the Advisory Council of Latin American television station teleSUR from its launch but resigned in February 2011, criticizing pro-Gaddafi propaganda during the Arab Spring. In August 2006, at his meetings with the government of the Indian State of Kerala, he persuaded officials to discard proprietary software, such as Microsoft's, at state-run schools. This has resulted in a landmark decision to switch all school computers in 12,500 high schools from Windows to a free software operating system. After personal meetings, Stallman obtained positive statements about the free software movement from the then-president of India, , French 2007 presidential candidate Ségolène Royal, and the president of Ecuador Rafael Correa. Stallman has participated in protests about software patents, digital rights management, and proprietary software. Protesting against proprietary software in April 2006, Stallman held a "Don't buy from ATI, enemy of your freedom" placard at a speech by an ATI representative in the building where Stallman worked, resulting in the police being called. AMD has since acquired ATI and has taken steps to make their hardware documentation available for use by the free software community. In response to Apple's Macintosh look and feel lawsuits against Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard in 1988, Stallman called for a boycott of Apple products on the grounds that a successful look and feel lawsuit would "put an end to free software that could substitute for commercial software". The boycott was lifted in 1995, which meant the FSF started to accept patches to GNU software for Apple operating systems. Stallman has characterized Steve Jobs as having a "malign influence" on computing because of Jobs' leadership in guiding Apple to produce closed platforms. In 1993, while Jobs was at NeXT, Jobs asked Stallman if he could distribute a modified GCC in two parts, one part under GPL and the other part, an Objective-C preprocessor under a proprietary license. Stallman initially thought this would be legal, but since he also thought it would be "very undesirable for free software", he asked a lawyer for advice. The response he got was that judges would consider such schemes to be "subterfuges" and would be very harsh toward them, and a judge would ask whether it was "really" one program, rather than how the parts were labeled. Therefore, Stallman sent a message back to Jobs which said they believed Jobs' plan was not allowed by the GPL, which resulted in NeXT releasing the Objective-C front end under GPL. For a period of time, Stallman used a notebook from the One Laptop per Child program. Stallman's computer is a refurbished ThinkPad T400s with Libreboot, a free BIOS replacement, and the GNU/Linux distribution Trisquel. Before the ThinkPad T400s, Stallman used a Thinkpad X60 with Libreboot and Trisquel GNU/Linux. And before the X60, Stallman used the Lemote Yeeloong netbook (using the same company's Loongson processor) which he chose because, like the X60 and the T400s, it could run with free software at the BIOS level, stating "freedom is my priority. I've campaigned for freedom since 1983, and I am not going to surrender that freedom for the sake of a more convenient computer." Stallman's Lemote was stolen from him in 2012 while in Argentina. Before Trisquel, Stallman has used the gNewSense operating system. Copyright reduction Stallman has regularly given a talk entitled "Copyright vs. Community" where he reviews the state of digital rights management (DRM) and names many of the products and corporations which he boycotts. His approach to DRM is best summed up by the FSF Defective by Design campaign. In the talks, he makes proposals for a "reduced copyright" and suggests a 10-year limit on copyright. He suggests that, instead of restrictions on sharing, authors be supported using a tax, with revenues distributed among them based on cubic roots of their popularity to ensure that "fairly successful non-stars" receive a greater share than they do now (compare with private copying levy which is associated with proponents of strong copyright), or a convenient anonymous micropayment system for people to support authors directly. He indicates that no form of non-commercial sharing of copies should be considered a copyright violation. He has advocated civil disobedience in a comment on Ley Sinde. Stallman has also helped and supported the International Music Score Library Project in getting back online, after it had been taken down on October 19, 2007, following a cease and desist letter from Universal Edition. Stallman mentions the dangers some e-books bring compared to paper books, with the example of the Amazon Kindle e-reader that prevents the copying of e-books and allows Amazon to order automatic deletion of a book. He says that such e-books present a big step backward with respect to paper books by being less easy to use, copy, lend to others or sell, also mentioning that Amazon e-books cannot be bought anonymously. His short story "The Right to Read" provides a picture of a dystopian future if the right to share books is impeded. He objects to many of the terms within typical end-user license agreements that accompany e-books. Stallman discourages the use of several storage technologies such as DVD or Blu-ray video discs because the content of such media is encrypted. He considers manufacturers' use of encryption on non-secret data (to force the user to view certain promotional material) as a conspiracy. He recognized the Sony BMG copy protection rootkit scandal to be a criminal act by Sony. Stallman supports a general boycott of Sony for its legal actions against George Hotz. Stallman has suggested that the United States government may encourage the use of software as a service because this would allow them to access users' data without needing a search warrant. He denies being an anarchist despite his wariness of some legislation and the fact that he has "advocated strongly for user privacy and his own view of software freedom". Terminologies Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copying not approved by the publisher). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agrees to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term intellectual property is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other areas of law by lumping together things that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues, writing: An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: Open source and Free software His requests that people use certain terms, and his ongoing efforts to convince people of the importance of terminology, are a source of regular misunderstanding and friction with parts of the free software and open-source communities. After initially accepting the concept, Stallman rejects a common alternative term, open-source software, because it does not call to mind what Stallman sees as the value of the software: freedom. He wrote, "Free software is a political movement; open source is a development model." Thus, he believes that the use of the term will not inform people of the freedom issues, and will not lead to people valuing and defending their freedom. Two alternatives which Stallman does accept are software libre and unfettered software, but free software is the term he asks people to use in English. For similar reasons, he argues for the term proprietary software or non-free software rather than closed-source software, when referring to software that is not free software. Linux and GNU Stallman asks that the term GNU/Linux, which he pronounces , be used to refer to the operating system created by combining the GNU system and the kernel Linux. Stallman refers to this operating system as "a variant of GNU, and the GNU Project is its principal developer". He claims that the connection between the GNU project's philosophy and its software is broken when people refer to the combination as merely Linux. Starting around 2003, he began also using the term GNU+Linux, which he pronounces , to prevent others from pronouncing the phrase GNU/Linux as , which would erroneously imply that the kernel Linux is maintained by the GNU project. The creator of Linux, Linus Torvalds, has publicly stated that he objects to modification of the name, and that the rename "is their [the FSF] confusion not ours". Surveillance resistance Stallman professes admiration for Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. He has spoken against government and corporate surveillance on many occasions. He refers to mobile phones as "portable surveillance and tracking devices", refusing to own a cell phone due to the lack of phones running entirely on free software. He also avoids using a key card to enter his office building since key card systems track each location and time that someone enters the building using a card. He usually does not browse the web directly from his personal computer. Instead, he uses GNU Womb's grab-url-from-mail utility, an email-based proxy which downloads the web page content and then emails it to the user. More recently, he stated that he accesses all web sites via Tor, except for Wikipedia (which generally disallows editing from Tor unless users have an IP block exemption). Personal life Stallman resides in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He speaks English, French, Spanish and some Indonesian. He has said that he is "an atheist of Jewish ancestry" and often wears a button that reads "Impeach God". Stallman has written a collection of filk music and parody songs. He is childfree and antinatalist. He denies having Asperger's, but has sometimes speculated whether he could have a "shadow" version of it. Resignation from MIT and FSF In August and September 2019, it was learned that Jeffrey Epstein had made donations to MIT, and in the wake of this, MIT Media Lab director Joi Ito resigned. An internal MIT CSAIL listserv mailing list thread was started to protest the coverup of MIT's connections to Epstein. In the thread, discussion had turned to deceased MIT professor Marvin Minsky, who was named by Virginia Giuffre as one of the people that Epstein had directed her to have sex with. Giuffre, a minor at the time, had been caught in Epstein's underage sex trafficking ring. In response to a comment where one reply stated that Minsky "is accused of assaulting one of Epstein's victims", Stallman questioned whether the word "assault" was applicable in that case, arguing that "the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to conceal that from most of his associates". When challenged by other members of the mailing list, he added "It is morally absurd to define 'rape' in a way that depends on minor details such as which country it was in or whether the victim was 18 years old or 17". Stallman remained critical of Epstein and his role, stating "We know that Giuffre was being coerced into sex – by Epstein. She was being harmed." Stallman's comments along with a compilation of accusations against him were published to the public via Medium by Selam Gano, who outlined MIT alumnae claims of sexual harassment and contributions to a hostile environment by Stallman. Vice published a copy of the email chain on September 13, 2019, drawing attention to Stallman's comments. Stallman's writings from 2013 and earlier related to underage sex and child pornography laws resurfaced, increasing the controversy. Tied to his comments regarding Minsky, this led to several calling for Stallman's resignation. On September 14, Stallman acknowledged that since the time of his past writings, he had learned that there were problems with underage sex, writing on his blog: "Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that." On September 16, Stallman announced his resignation from both MIT and FSF, "due to pressure on MIT and me over a series of misunderstandings and mischaracterizations". In a post on his website, Stallman asserted that his posts to the email lists were not to defend Epstein, stating "Nothing could be further from the truth. I've called him a 'serial rapist,' and said he deserved to be imprisoned. But many people now believe I defended him—and other inaccurate claims—and feel a real hurt because of what they believe I said. I'm sorry for that hurt. I wish I could have prevented the misunderstanding." Return to FSF In March 2021, at LibrePlanet2021, Stallman announced his return to the FSF board of directors. Shortly thereafter, an open letter was published on GitHub asking for Stallman's removal, along with the entire FSF board of directors, with the support of prominent open-source organizations including GNOME and Mozilla. The letter includes a list of accusations against Stallman. In response, an open letter asking for the FSF to retain Stallman was also published, arguing that Stallman's statements were mischaracterized, misunderstood and that they need to be interpreted in context. The FSF board in April 12 made a statement re-affirming its decision to bring back Richard Stallman. Following this, Stallman issued a statement explaining his poor social skills and apologizing. Multiple organizations criticized, defunded and/or cut ties with the FSF, including: Red Hat, the Free Software Foundation Europe, the Software Freedom Conservacy, SUSE, the OSI, the Document Foundation, the EFF, KDE, and the Tor Project. Debian declined to issue a statement after a community voting on the issue. However, this had relatively little impact on the FSF, as it has stated that direct financial support from corporations accounted for less than 3% of its revenue in the most recent fiscal year. Honors and awards 1986: Honorary lifetime membership of the Chalmers University of Technology Computer Society 1990: Exceptional merit award MacArthur Fellowship ("genius grant") 1990: The Association for Computing Machinery's Grace Murray Hopper Award "For pioneering work in the development of the extensible editor EMACS (Editing Macros)" 1996: Honorary doctorate from Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology 1998: Electronic Frontier Foundation's Pioneer Award 1999: Yuri Rubinsky Memorial Award 2001: The Takeda Techno-Entrepreneurship Award for Social/Economic Well-Being () 2001: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Glasgow 2002: US National Academy of Engineering membership "for starting the GNU project, which produced influential, non-proprietary software tools, and for founding the free software movement" 2003: Honorary doctorate, from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel 2004: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Nacional de Salta 2004: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería del Perú 2007: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Inca Garcilaso de la Vega 2007: First Premio Internacional Extremadura al Conocimiento Libre 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad de Los Angeles de Chimbote 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Pavia 2008: Honorary doctorate from the Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, in Peru 2009: Honorary doctorate, from Lakehead University 2011: Honorary doctorate, from National University of Córdoba 2012: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad César Vallejo de Trujillo, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Latinoamericana Cima de Tacna, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad José Faustino Sánchez Carrión, in Peru 2014: Honorary doctorate, from Concordia University, in Montréal 2015: ACM Software System Award "For the development and leadership of GCC" 2016: Honorary doctorate, from Pierre and Marie Curie University 2016: Social Medicine award, from GNU Solidario Selected publications Manuals Selected essays See also 9882 Stallman Free as in Freedom, a biography by Sam Williams Free Software Street History of free and open-source software Lisp Machine Lisp Revolution OS vrms Free Software Foundation References External links In Support of Richard Stallman, a website which advocates for Stallman. Essays on the Philosophy of the GNU Project, almost all written by Stallman 1953 births Activists from New York City Jewish American atheists American bloggers American computer programmers Anti-natalists Articles containing video clips Artificial intelligence researchers Copyright activists Education activists Emacs Filkers Free software people Free software programmers GNU people Grace Murray Hopper Award laureates Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences alumni Internet activists Jewish American scientists Linux people Lisp (programming language) people Living people MacArthur Fellows Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni Members of the Free Software Foundation board of directors Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering Privacy activists Programming language designers	true	[ "MultiTerm is a terminology management tool providing one solution to\nstore and manage multilingual terminology.\n\nHistory\nMultiTerm was launched in 1990 by Trados GmbH as a terminology database for translation professionals. Trados was acquired by SDL plc in 2005, with MultiTerm being renamed SDL MultiTerm. SDL merged with RWS in 2020, and the name reverted to MultiTerm.\n\nAbout MultiTerm\nMultiTerm Desktop is the desktop terminology management tool from RWS. It can be used by translators and terminologists as a standalone desktop tool to manage terminology, or it can be integrated with Trados Studio to increase translation productivity and accuracy.\n\nFeatures\nMultiTerm allows the user to:\n\nCustomize termbases with descriptive fields to provide more information about the term\nInsert digital media files and hyperlink to URLs to terms in the termbase\nStore an unlimited number of terms in unlimited languages\nImport and export terms from different technology environments, such as Microsoft Excel, \nIntegrate with Trados Studio to improve translation consistency\n\nComponents of MultiTerm\n\"MultiTerm Desktop\"\nMultiTerm Desktop is a database application that allows the user to create, manage and present terminology. Terms can be added and searched in a wide variety of languages, allowing for consistent use of brand terms.\n\n\"MultiTerm Extract\"\nMultiTerm Extract is a tool used to create glossaries of terminology using existing translated documents. The software does this by using a statistical algorithm to examine the frequency of terms at a sub-segment level. This allows translators to build project glossaries without having to manually search for the terms.\n\n\"MultiTerm Widget\"\nMultiTerm Widget is a lightweight application that allows you to highlight a word from any application on your desktop and retrieve its meaning and translation immediately from your project glossaries and translation memories.\n\nSystem requirements\nSDL MultiTerm 2017 Desktop is a Unicode application and can therefore be used only on Windows 7, Windows 8 or Windows 10. SDL recommend at least a Pentium® IV-based computer with 2 GB RAM.\n\nCriticism\nEntering terms individually is a time-consuming process. This is somewhat circumvented by the use of SDL's Glossary Converter, which allows terminology from other sources to be converted to a MultiTerm termbase, and by allowing translators to create term entries while translating in SDL Trados Studio.\nContrary to certain claims, the TBX interchange format (ISO 30042:2008) is not supported. Whilst TBX files cannot be imported directly, they can be converted to a MultiTerm termbase by SDL Convert or SDL Glossary Converter. Support for terminology relations is only possible through the use of cross-references, but you cannot designate the type of relation between terms.\n\nExternal links\nwww.rws.com - Official RWS MultiTerm website.\n\nReferences\n\nTranslation software", "Content as a service (CaaS) or managed content as a service (MCaaS) is a service-oriented model, where the service provider delivers the content on demand to the service consumer via web services that are licensed under subscription. The content is hosted by the service provider centrally in the cloud and offered to a number of consumers that need the content delivered into any applications or system, hence content can be demanded by the consumers as and when required.\n\nContent as a Service is a way to provide raw content (in other words, without the need for a specific human compatible representation, such as HTML) in a way that other systems can make use of it. Content as a Service is not meant for direct human consumption, but rather for other platforms to consume and make use of the content according to their particular needs. This happens usually on the cloud, with a centralized platform which can be globally accessible and provides a standard format for your content. With Content as a Service, you centralize your content into a single repository, where you can manage it, categorize it, make it available to others, search for it, or do whatever you wish with it.\n\nOverview\nThe content delivered typically could be one or more of the following\n The technical terminology related to equipments or spares that is required to procure or design the materials\n The industrial terminology of the equipments or spares\n Technical values pertaining to various types, specifications, applications, characteristics of equipments or spares\n Sourcing information which will help in procurement or supply-chain management of equipments or spares\n Descriptive specifications of equipments or spares based on the product reference number or identifier\n UNSPSC codes or industry practiced classifications\n ISO, IEC compliant terminology\n Ontology or Technical Dictionary of products & services\n Predefined content for specific business needs\nThe term \"Content as a service\" (CaaS) is considered to be part of the nomenclature of cloud computing service models & Service-oriented architecture along with Software as a service (SaaS), Infrastructure as a service (IaaS), Platform as a service (PaaS), Master Data as a service (MDaaS), Desktop as a service (DaaS), Managed Software as a service (MSaaS), Digital content as a service (DCaaS), Mobile backend as a service (MBaaS), Process as a service (PraaS), Consulting as a service (CoaaS), and Information Technology management as a service (ITMaaS).\n\nSee also\n\n Cloud computing service models\n\nReferences \n\nAs a service\nBusiness models\nCloud computing\nContent management systems\nService-oriented (business computing)\nService-oriented architecture-related products" ]
[ "Richard Stallman", "Terminology", "Can you provide information on Terminology?", "Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world," ]	C_48eeef8db60c4df68ba565e3cc185e20_0	Was he very popular or very well known for this?	2	Was Richard Stallman very popular or very well known for placing great importance on terminology?	Richard Stallman	Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copyright). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agree to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term "intellectual property" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other laws by lumping together areas of law that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues. These laws originated separately, evolved differently, cover different activities, have different rules, and raise different public policy issues. Copyright law was designed to promote authorship and art, and covers the details of a work of authorship or art. Patent law was intended to encourage publication of ideas, at the price of finite monopolies over these ideas - a price that may be worth paying in some fields and not in others. Trademark law was not intended to promote any business activity, but simply to enable buyers to know what they are buying. An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: I think it is ok for authors (please let's not call them creators, they are not gods) to ask for money for copies of their works (please let's not devalue these works by calling them content) in order to gain income (the term compensation falsely implies it is a matter of making up for some kind of damages). CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Richard Matthew Stallman (; born March 16, 1953), also known by his initials, rms, is an American free software movement activist and programmer. He campaigns for software to be distributed in such a manner, so that its users receive the freedoms to use, study, distribute, and modify that software. Software that ensures these freedoms is termed free software. Stallman launched the GNU Project, founded the Free Software Foundation, developed the GNU Compiler Collection and GNU Emacs, and wrote the GNU General Public License. Stallman launched the GNU Project in September 1983 to write a Unix-like computer operating system composed entirely of free software. With this, he also launched the free software movement. He has been the GNU project's lead architect and organizer, and developed a number of pieces of widely used GNU software including, among others, the GNU Compiler Collection, GNU Debugger, and GNU Emacs text editor. In October 1985 he founded the Free Software Foundation (FSF). Stallman pioneered the concept of copyleft, which uses the principles of copyright law to preserve the right to use, modify, and distribute free software. He is the main author of free software licenses which describe those terms, most notably the GNU General Public License (GPL), the most widely used free software license. In 1989, he co-founded the League for Programming Freedom. Since the mid-1990s, Stallman has spent most of his time advocating for free software, as well as campaigning against software patents, digital rights management (which he refers to as digital restrictions management, calling the more common term misleading), and other legal and technical systems which he sees as taking away users' freedoms. This has included software license agreements, non-disclosure agreements, activation keys, dongles, copy restriction, proprietary formats, and binary executables without source code. In September 2019, Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT after making controversial comments about the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking scandal. Stallman remained head of the GNU Project, and in 2021 returned to the FSF board of directors. Early life Stallman was born March 16, 1953, in New York City, to a family of Jewish heritage. He had a troublesome relationship with his parents and did not feel he had a proper home. He was interested in computers at a young age; when Stallman was a pre-teen at a summer camp, he read manuals for the IBM 7094. From 1967 to 1969, Stallman attended a Columbia University Saturday program for high school students. Stallman was also a volunteer laboratory assistant in the biology department at Rockefeller University. Although he was interested in mathematics and physics, his supervising professor at Rockefeller thought he showed promise as a biologist. His first experience with actual computers was at the IBM New York Scientific Center when he was in high school. He was hired for the summer in 1970, following his senior year of high school, to write a numerical analysis program in Fortran. He completed the task after a couple of weeks ("I swore that I would never use FORTRAN again because I despised it as a language compared with other languages") and spent the rest of the summer writing a text editor in APL and a preprocessor for the PL/I programming language on the IBM System/360. Harvard University and MIT As a first-year student at Harvard University in fall 1970, Stallman was known for his strong performance in Math 55. He was happy: "For the first time in my life, I felt I had found a home at Harvard." In 1971, near the end of his first year at Harvard, he became a programmer at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, and became a regular in the hacker community, where he was usually known by his initials, RMS, which he used in his computer accounts. Stallman received a bachelor's degree in physics (magna cum laude) from Harvard in 1974. Stallman considered staying on at Harvard, but instead decided to enroll as a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He pursued a doctorate in physics for one year, but left that program to focus on his programming at the MIT AI Laboratory. While working (starting in 1975) as a research assistant at MIT under Gerry Sussman, Stallman published a paper (with Sussman) in 1977 on an AI truth maintenance system, called dependency-directed backtracking. This paper was an early work on the problem of intelligent backtracking in constraint satisfaction problems. , the technique Stallman and Sussman introduced is still the most general and powerful form of intelligent backtracking. The technique of constraint recording, wherein partial results of a search are recorded for later reuse, was also introduced in this paper. As a hacker in MIT's AI laboratory, Stallman worked on software projects such as TECO and Emacs for the Incompatible Timesharing System (ITS), as well as the Lisp machine operating system (the CONS of 1974–1976 and the CADR of 1977–1979—this latter unit was commercialized by Symbolics and Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) starting around 1980). He would become an ardent critic of restricted computer access in the lab, which at that time was funded primarily by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). When MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) installed a password control system in 1977, Stallman found a way to decrypt the passwords and sent users messages containing their decoded password, with a suggestion to change it to the empty string (that is, no password) instead, to re-enable anonymous access to the systems. Around 20 percent of the users followed his advice at the time, although passwords ultimately prevailed. Stallman boasted of the success of his campaign for many years afterward. Events leading to GNU In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the hacker culture that Stallman thrived on began to fragment. To prevent software from being used on their competitors' computers, most manufacturers stopped distributing source code and began using copyright and restrictive software licenses to limit or prohibit copying and redistribution. Such proprietary software had existed before, and it became apparent that it would become the norm. This shift in the legal characteristics of software was a consequence triggered by the US Copyright Act of 1976. When Brian Reid in 1979 placed time bombs in the Scribe markup language and word processing system to restrict unlicensed access to the software, Stallman proclaimed it "a crime against humanity". During an interview in 2008, he clarified that it is blocking the user's freedom that he believes is a crime, not the issue of charging for software. Stallman's texinfo is a GPL replacement, loosely based on Scribe; the original version was finished in 1986. In 1980, Stallman and some other hackers at the AI Lab were refused access to the source code for the software of a newly installed laser printer, the Xerox 9700. Stallman had modified the software for the Lab's previous laser printer (the XGP, Xerographic Printer), so it electronically messaged a user when the person's job was printed, and would message all logged-in users waiting for print jobs if the printer was jammed. Not being able to add these features to the new printer was a major inconvenience, as the printer was on a different floor from most of the users. This experience convinced Stallman of people's need to be able to freely modify the software they use. Richard Greenblatt, a fellow AI Lab hacker, founded Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) to market Lisp machines, which he and Tom Knight designed at the lab. Greenblatt rejected outside investment, believing that the proceeds from the construction and sale of a few machines could be profitably reinvested in the growth of the company. In contrast, the other hackers felt that the venture capital-funded approach was better. As no agreement could be reached, hackers from the latter camp founded Symbolics, with the aid of Russ Noftsker, an AI Lab administrator. Symbolics recruited most of the remaining hackers including notable hacker Bill Gosper, who then left the AI Lab. Symbolics also forced Greenblatt to resign by citing MIT policies. While both companies delivered proprietary software, Stallman believed that LMI, unlike Symbolics, had tried to avoid hurting the lab's community. For two years, from 1982 to the end of 1983, Stallman worked by himself to clone the output of the Symbolics programmers, with the aim of preventing them from gaining a monopoly on the lab's computers. Stallman argues that software users should have the freedom to share with their neighbors and be able to study and make changes to the software that they use. He maintains that attempts by proprietary software vendors to prohibit these acts are antisocial and unethical. The phrase "software wants to be free" is often incorrectly attributed to him, and Stallman argues that this is a misstatement of his philosophy. He argues that freedom is vital for the sake of users and society as a moral value, and not merely for pragmatic reasons such as possibly developing technically superior software. Eric S. Raymond, one of the creators of the open-source movement, argues that moral arguments, rather than pragmatic ones, alienate potential allies and hurt the end goal of removing code secrecy. In February 1984, Stallman quit his job at MIT to work full-time on the GNU project, which he had announced in September 1983. Since then, he had remained affiliated with MIT as an unpaid "visiting scientist" in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. Until "around 1998", he maintained an office at the Institute that doubled as his legal residence. GNU project Stallman announced the plan for the GNU operating system in September 1983 on several ARPANET mailing lists and USENET. He started the project on his own and describes: "As an operating system developer, I had the right skills for this job. So even though I could not take success for granted, I realized that I was elected to do the job. I chose to make the system compatible with Unix so that it would be portable, and so that Unix users could easily switch to it." In 1985, Stallman published the GNU Manifesto, which outlined his motivation for creating a free operating system called GNU, which would be compatible with Unix. The name GNU is a recursive acronym for "GNU's Not Unix". Soon after, he started a nonprofit corporation called the Free Software Foundation to employ free software programmers and provide a legal infrastructure for the free software movement. Stallman was the nonsalaried president of the FSF, which is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in Massachusetts. Stallman popularized the concept of copyleft, a legal mechanism to protect the modification and redistribution rights for free software. It was first implemented in the GNU Emacs General Public License, and in 1989 the first program-independent GNU General Public License (GPL) was released. By then, much of the GNU system had been completed. Stallman was responsible for contributing many necessary tools, including a text editor (Emacs), compiler (GCC), debugger (GNU Debugger), and a build automator (GNU make). The notable omission was a kernel. In 1990, members of the GNU project began using Carnegie Mellon's Mach microkernel in a project called GNU Hurd, which has yet to achieve the maturity level required for full POSIX compliance. In 1991, Linus Torvalds, a Finnish student, used the GNU's development tools to produce the free monolithic Linux kernel. The existing programs from the GNU project were readily ported to run on the resultant platform. Most sources use the name Linux to refer to the general-purpose operating system thus formed, while Stallman and the FSF call it GNU/Linux. This has been a longstanding naming controversy in the free software community. Stallman argues that not using GNU in the name of the operating system unfairly disparages the value of the GNU project and harms the sustainability of the free software movement by breaking the link between the software and the free software philosophy of the GNU project. Stallman's influences on hacker culture include the name POSIX and the Emacs editor. On Unix systems, GNU Emacs's popularity rivaled that of another editor vi, spawning an editor war. Stallman's take on this was to canonize himself as St. IGNUcius of the Church of Emacs and acknowledge that "vi vi vi is the editor of the beast", while "using a free version of vi is not a sin; it is a penance". On his homepage Stallman explains what a life in the Church of Emacs means to its members: "Sainthood in the Church of Emacs requires living a life of purity—but in the Church of Emacs, this does not require celibacy (a sigh of relief is heard)". In 1992, developers at Lucid Inc. doing their own work on Emacs clashed with Stallman and ultimately forked the software into what would become XEmacs. The technology journalist Andrew Leonard has characterized what he sees as Stallman's uncompromising stubbornness as common among elite computer programmers: In 2018, Stallman instituted "Kind Communication Guidelines" for the GNU project to help its mailing list discussions remain constructive while avoiding explicitly promoting diversity. In October 2019, a public statement signed by 33 maintainers of the GNU project asserted that Stallman's behaviour had "undermined a core value of the GNU project: the empowerment of all computer users" and called for "GNU maintainers to collectively decide about the organization of the project". The statement was published soon after Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT in September 2019. In spite of that, Stallman remained head of the GNU project. Activism Stallman has written many essays on software freedom, and has been an outspoken political campaigner for the free software movement since the early 1990s. The speeches he has regularly given are titled The GNU Project and the Free Software Movement, The Dangers of Software Patents, and Copyright and Community in the Age of Computer Networks. In 2006 and 2007, during the eighteen month public consultation for the drafting of version 3 of the GNU General Public License, he added a fourth topic explaining the proposed changes. Stallman's staunch advocacy for free software inspired the creation of the Virtual Richard M. Stallman (vrms), software that analyzes the packages currently installed on a Debian GNU/Linux system, and reports those that are from the non-free tree. Stallman disagrees with parts of Debian's definition of free software. In 1999, Stallman called for development of a free online encyclopedia through the means of inviting the public to contribute articles. The resulting GNUPedia was eventually retired in favour of the emerging Wikipedia, which had similar aims and was enjoying greater success. Stallman is a world traveler and has visited at least 65 countries, mostly to speak about free software and the GNU project. According to Stallman, the free software movement has much in common with that of Mahatma Gandhi. Stallman is also highly critical of the effect that drug patents have had on developing countries. In Venezuela, Stallman has delivered public speeches and promoted the adoption of free software in the state's oil company (PDVSA), in municipal government, and in the nation's military. In meetings with Hugo Chávez and in public speeches, Stallman criticised some policies on television broadcasting, free speech rights, and privacy. Stallman was on the Advisory Council of Latin American television station teleSUR from its launch but resigned in February 2011, criticizing pro-Gaddafi propaganda during the Arab Spring. In August 2006, at his meetings with the government of the Indian State of Kerala, he persuaded officials to discard proprietary software, such as Microsoft's, at state-run schools. This has resulted in a landmark decision to switch all school computers in 12,500 high schools from Windows to a free software operating system. After personal meetings, Stallman obtained positive statements about the free software movement from the then-president of India, , French 2007 presidential candidate Ségolène Royal, and the president of Ecuador Rafael Correa. Stallman has participated in protests about software patents, digital rights management, and proprietary software. Protesting against proprietary software in April 2006, Stallman held a "Don't buy from ATI, enemy of your freedom" placard at a speech by an ATI representative in the building where Stallman worked, resulting in the police being called. AMD has since acquired ATI and has taken steps to make their hardware documentation available for use by the free software community. In response to Apple's Macintosh look and feel lawsuits against Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard in 1988, Stallman called for a boycott of Apple products on the grounds that a successful look and feel lawsuit would "put an end to free software that could substitute for commercial software". The boycott was lifted in 1995, which meant the FSF started to accept patches to GNU software for Apple operating systems. Stallman has characterized Steve Jobs as having a "malign influence" on computing because of Jobs' leadership in guiding Apple to produce closed platforms. In 1993, while Jobs was at NeXT, Jobs asked Stallman if he could distribute a modified GCC in two parts, one part under GPL and the other part, an Objective-C preprocessor under a proprietary license. Stallman initially thought this would be legal, but since he also thought it would be "very undesirable for free software", he asked a lawyer for advice. The response he got was that judges would consider such schemes to be "subterfuges" and would be very harsh toward them, and a judge would ask whether it was "really" one program, rather than how the parts were labeled. Therefore, Stallman sent a message back to Jobs which said they believed Jobs' plan was not allowed by the GPL, which resulted in NeXT releasing the Objective-C front end under GPL. For a period of time, Stallman used a notebook from the One Laptop per Child program. Stallman's computer is a refurbished ThinkPad T400s with Libreboot, a free BIOS replacement, and the GNU/Linux distribution Trisquel. Before the ThinkPad T400s, Stallman used a Thinkpad X60 with Libreboot and Trisquel GNU/Linux. And before the X60, Stallman used the Lemote Yeeloong netbook (using the same company's Loongson processor) which he chose because, like the X60 and the T400s, it could run with free software at the BIOS level, stating "freedom is my priority. I've campaigned for freedom since 1983, and I am not going to surrender that freedom for the sake of a more convenient computer." Stallman's Lemote was stolen from him in 2012 while in Argentina. Before Trisquel, Stallman has used the gNewSense operating system. Copyright reduction Stallman has regularly given a talk entitled "Copyright vs. Community" where he reviews the state of digital rights management (DRM) and names many of the products and corporations which he boycotts. His approach to DRM is best summed up by the FSF Defective by Design campaign. In the talks, he makes proposals for a "reduced copyright" and suggests a 10-year limit on copyright. He suggests that, instead of restrictions on sharing, authors be supported using a tax, with revenues distributed among them based on cubic roots of their popularity to ensure that "fairly successful non-stars" receive a greater share than they do now (compare with private copying levy which is associated with proponents of strong copyright), or a convenient anonymous micropayment system for people to support authors directly. He indicates that no form of non-commercial sharing of copies should be considered a copyright violation. He has advocated civil disobedience in a comment on Ley Sinde. Stallman has also helped and supported the International Music Score Library Project in getting back online, after it had been taken down on October 19, 2007, following a cease and desist letter from Universal Edition. Stallman mentions the dangers some e-books bring compared to paper books, with the example of the Amazon Kindle e-reader that prevents the copying of e-books and allows Amazon to order automatic deletion of a book. He says that such e-books present a big step backward with respect to paper books by being less easy to use, copy, lend to others or sell, also mentioning that Amazon e-books cannot be bought anonymously. His short story "The Right to Read" provides a picture of a dystopian future if the right to share books is impeded. He objects to many of the terms within typical end-user license agreements that accompany e-books. Stallman discourages the use of several storage technologies such as DVD or Blu-ray video discs because the content of such media is encrypted. He considers manufacturers' use of encryption on non-secret data (to force the user to view certain promotional material) as a conspiracy. He recognized the Sony BMG copy protection rootkit scandal to be a criminal act by Sony. Stallman supports a general boycott of Sony for its legal actions against George Hotz. Stallman has suggested that the United States government may encourage the use of software as a service because this would allow them to access users' data without needing a search warrant. He denies being an anarchist despite his wariness of some legislation and the fact that he has "advocated strongly for user privacy and his own view of software freedom". Terminologies Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copying not approved by the publisher). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agrees to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term intellectual property is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other areas of law by lumping together things that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues, writing: An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: Open source and Free software His requests that people use certain terms, and his ongoing efforts to convince people of the importance of terminology, are a source of regular misunderstanding and friction with parts of the free software and open-source communities. After initially accepting the concept, Stallman rejects a common alternative term, open-source software, because it does not call to mind what Stallman sees as the value of the software: freedom. He wrote, "Free software is a political movement; open source is a development model." Thus, he believes that the use of the term will not inform people of the freedom issues, and will not lead to people valuing and defending their freedom. Two alternatives which Stallman does accept are software libre and unfettered software, but free software is the term he asks people to use in English. For similar reasons, he argues for the term proprietary software or non-free software rather than closed-source software, when referring to software that is not free software. Linux and GNU Stallman asks that the term GNU/Linux, which he pronounces , be used to refer to the operating system created by combining the GNU system and the kernel Linux. Stallman refers to this operating system as "a variant of GNU, and the GNU Project is its principal developer". He claims that the connection between the GNU project's philosophy and its software is broken when people refer to the combination as merely Linux. Starting around 2003, he began also using the term GNU+Linux, which he pronounces , to prevent others from pronouncing the phrase GNU/Linux as , which would erroneously imply that the kernel Linux is maintained by the GNU project. The creator of Linux, Linus Torvalds, has publicly stated that he objects to modification of the name, and that the rename "is their [the FSF] confusion not ours". Surveillance resistance Stallman professes admiration for Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. He has spoken against government and corporate surveillance on many occasions. He refers to mobile phones as "portable surveillance and tracking devices", refusing to own a cell phone due to the lack of phones running entirely on free software. He also avoids using a key card to enter his office building since key card systems track each location and time that someone enters the building using a card. He usually does not browse the web directly from his personal computer. Instead, he uses GNU Womb's grab-url-from-mail utility, an email-based proxy which downloads the web page content and then emails it to the user. More recently, he stated that he accesses all web sites via Tor, except for Wikipedia (which generally disallows editing from Tor unless users have an IP block exemption). Personal life Stallman resides in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He speaks English, French, Spanish and some Indonesian. He has said that he is "an atheist of Jewish ancestry" and often wears a button that reads "Impeach God". Stallman has written a collection of filk music and parody songs. He is childfree and antinatalist. He denies having Asperger's, but has sometimes speculated whether he could have a "shadow" version of it. Resignation from MIT and FSF In August and September 2019, it was learned that Jeffrey Epstein had made donations to MIT, and in the wake of this, MIT Media Lab director Joi Ito resigned. An internal MIT CSAIL listserv mailing list thread was started to protest the coverup of MIT's connections to Epstein. In the thread, discussion had turned to deceased MIT professor Marvin Minsky, who was named by Virginia Giuffre as one of the people that Epstein had directed her to have sex with. Giuffre, a minor at the time, had been caught in Epstein's underage sex trafficking ring. In response to a comment where one reply stated that Minsky "is accused of assaulting one of Epstein's victims", Stallman questioned whether the word "assault" was applicable in that case, arguing that "the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to conceal that from most of his associates". When challenged by other members of the mailing list, he added "It is morally absurd to define 'rape' in a way that depends on minor details such as which country it was in or whether the victim was 18 years old or 17". Stallman remained critical of Epstein and his role, stating "We know that Giuffre was being coerced into sex – by Epstein. She was being harmed." Stallman's comments along with a compilation of accusations against him were published to the public via Medium by Selam Gano, who outlined MIT alumnae claims of sexual harassment and contributions to a hostile environment by Stallman. Vice published a copy of the email chain on September 13, 2019, drawing attention to Stallman's comments. Stallman's writings from 2013 and earlier related to underage sex and child pornography laws resurfaced, increasing the controversy. Tied to his comments regarding Minsky, this led to several calling for Stallman's resignation. On September 14, Stallman acknowledged that since the time of his past writings, he had learned that there were problems with underage sex, writing on his blog: "Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that." On September 16, Stallman announced his resignation from both MIT and FSF, "due to pressure on MIT and me over a series of misunderstandings and mischaracterizations". In a post on his website, Stallman asserted that his posts to the email lists were not to defend Epstein, stating "Nothing could be further from the truth. I've called him a 'serial rapist,' and said he deserved to be imprisoned. But many people now believe I defended him—and other inaccurate claims—and feel a real hurt because of what they believe I said. I'm sorry for that hurt. I wish I could have prevented the misunderstanding." Return to FSF In March 2021, at LibrePlanet2021, Stallman announced his return to the FSF board of directors. Shortly thereafter, an open letter was published on GitHub asking for Stallman's removal, along with the entire FSF board of directors, with the support of prominent open-source organizations including GNOME and Mozilla. The letter includes a list of accusations against Stallman. In response, an open letter asking for the FSF to retain Stallman was also published, arguing that Stallman's statements were mischaracterized, misunderstood and that they need to be interpreted in context. The FSF board in April 12 made a statement re-affirming its decision to bring back Richard Stallman. Following this, Stallman issued a statement explaining his poor social skills and apologizing. Multiple organizations criticized, defunded and/or cut ties with the FSF, including: Red Hat, the Free Software Foundation Europe, the Software Freedom Conservacy, SUSE, the OSI, the Document Foundation, the EFF, KDE, and the Tor Project. Debian declined to issue a statement after a community voting on the issue. However, this had relatively little impact on the FSF, as it has stated that direct financial support from corporations accounted for less than 3% of its revenue in the most recent fiscal year. Honors and awards 1986: Honorary lifetime membership of the Chalmers University of Technology Computer Society 1990: Exceptional merit award MacArthur Fellowship ("genius grant") 1990: The Association for Computing Machinery's Grace Murray Hopper Award "For pioneering work in the development of the extensible editor EMACS (Editing Macros)" 1996: Honorary doctorate from Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology 1998: Electronic Frontier Foundation's Pioneer Award 1999: Yuri Rubinsky Memorial Award 2001: The Takeda Techno-Entrepreneurship Award for Social/Economic Well-Being () 2001: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Glasgow 2002: US National Academy of Engineering membership "for starting the GNU project, which produced influential, non-proprietary software tools, and for founding the free software movement" 2003: Honorary doctorate, from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel 2004: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Nacional de Salta 2004: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería del Perú 2007: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Inca Garcilaso de la Vega 2007: First Premio Internacional Extremadura al Conocimiento Libre 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad de Los Angeles de Chimbote 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Pavia 2008: Honorary doctorate from the Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, in Peru 2009: Honorary doctorate, from Lakehead University 2011: Honorary doctorate, from National University of Córdoba 2012: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad César Vallejo de Trujillo, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Latinoamericana Cima de Tacna, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad José Faustino Sánchez Carrión, in Peru 2014: Honorary doctorate, from Concordia University, in Montréal 2015: ACM Software System Award "For the development and leadership of GCC" 2016: Honorary doctorate, from Pierre and Marie Curie University 2016: Social Medicine award, from GNU Solidario Selected publications Manuals Selected essays See also 9882 Stallman Free as in Freedom, a biography by Sam Williams Free Software Street History of free and open-source software Lisp Machine Lisp Revolution OS vrms Free Software Foundation References External links In Support of Richard Stallman, a website which advocates for Stallman. Essays on the Philosophy of the GNU Project, almost all written by Stallman 1953 births Activists from New York City Jewish American atheists American bloggers American computer programmers Anti-natalists Articles containing video clips Artificial intelligence researchers Copyright activists Education activists Emacs Filkers Free software people Free software programmers GNU people Grace Murray Hopper Award laureates Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences alumni Internet activists Jewish American scientists Linux people Lisp (programming language) people Living people MacArthur Fellows Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni Members of the Free Software Foundation board of directors Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering Privacy activists Programming language designers	false	[ "Savo Pređa was a Serbian Partisan general in World War II and, later, governor of Bileća prison. He was also a director of OZNA for eastern Bosnia for a short period, after that, he was deputy minister of interior. Savo was well known for being close to Aleksandar Ranković. He was also the establisher of the Yugoslavian automobile-motor association. He was one of the leaders of the team that caught Serbian Chetnik leader Draža Mihajlović. Pređa wrote the script for the movie Valter defends Sarajevo, that used to be very popular in former Yugoslavia and China.\n\nYugoslav military personnel of World War II\nYugoslav Partisans members\nSerbian prison administrators\nYear of birth missing\nYear of death missing", "Maharaja Gangadahra Koviladhikarikal Sri Ravi Varma (1865–1946) was the Maharaja of Cochin, India in 1943–46.\n\nRavi Varma was born on 29 November 1865, in Tripunithura, then part of British India. Maharaja Gangadahra Koviladhikarikal Sri Ravi Varma ruled Cochin from 1943 to 1946. He was the Elaya Raja (crown prince) until his brother Midukkan Thampuran died on 13 October 1943. He ascended the throne at the age of 78 years. Although his reign was short, he was very popular with the people of Cochin. He was known for his spirit of equality, and the way he got along with the common people despite the vast economic inequality prevailing in those times. A very well educated man for his time, he was fluent in English, Hindi, Malayalam, Sanskrit and to some extent Urdu. Maharaja Ravi Varma was admired for his painting skills and was very well versed in oil painting. Maharaja Ravi Varma was possibly also a famous player of Polo during his youth.\n\nRavi Varma V was married to Kamakshi Nethiyar. They had four children: Balagopalan, Chandrasekharan, DevakiNandanan and UmaLakshmi Amma. Their daughter UmaLakShmi Amma married Rama Varma Thampuran and gave birth to Valia Thampuran of the Cochin Royal Family SaradaMani Varma.\n\nMaharaja Ravi Varma died of natural causes in 1946 at the age of 81 years (Makara 18th, 1121 M.E), in Tripunithura. A 17 gun salute was given to him. His Maternal Cousin, Maharaja Sri Kerala Varma, popularly known as Ikyakeralam Thampuran ascended to the throne after his death.\n\nExternal links\nRulers of Cochin\nCochin\n\n1865 births\n1946 deaths\nRulers of Cochin" ]
[ "Richard Stallman", "Terminology", "Can you provide information on Terminology?", "Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world,", "Was he very popular or very well known for this?", "I don't know." ]	C_48eeef8db60c4df68ba565e3cc185e20_0	What else was unique about his terminology?	3	Aside from placing great importance on the words and labels people use, What else was unique about Richard Stallman's terminology?	Richard Stallman	Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copyright). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agree to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term "intellectual property" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other laws by lumping together areas of law that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues. These laws originated separately, evolved differently, cover different activities, have different rules, and raise different public policy issues. Copyright law was designed to promote authorship and art, and covers the details of a work of authorship or art. Patent law was intended to encourage publication of ideas, at the price of finite monopolies over these ideas - a price that may be worth paying in some fields and not in others. Trademark law was not intended to promote any business activity, but simply to enable buyers to know what they are buying. An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: I think it is ok for authors (please let's not call them creators, they are not gods) to ask for money for copies of their works (please let's not devalue these works by calling them content) in order to gain income (the term compensation falsely implies it is a matter of making up for some kind of damages). CANNOTANSWER	He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (	Richard Matthew Stallman (; born March 16, 1953), also known by his initials, rms, is an American free software movement activist and programmer. He campaigns for software to be distributed in such a manner, so that its users receive the freedoms to use, study, distribute, and modify that software. Software that ensures these freedoms is termed free software. Stallman launched the GNU Project, founded the Free Software Foundation, developed the GNU Compiler Collection and GNU Emacs, and wrote the GNU General Public License. Stallman launched the GNU Project in September 1983 to write a Unix-like computer operating system composed entirely of free software. With this, he also launched the free software movement. He has been the GNU project's lead architect and organizer, and developed a number of pieces of widely used GNU software including, among others, the GNU Compiler Collection, GNU Debugger, and GNU Emacs text editor. In October 1985 he founded the Free Software Foundation (FSF). Stallman pioneered the concept of copyleft, which uses the principles of copyright law to preserve the right to use, modify, and distribute free software. He is the main author of free software licenses which describe those terms, most notably the GNU General Public License (GPL), the most widely used free software license. In 1989, he co-founded the League for Programming Freedom. Since the mid-1990s, Stallman has spent most of his time advocating for free software, as well as campaigning against software patents, digital rights management (which he refers to as digital restrictions management, calling the more common term misleading), and other legal and technical systems which he sees as taking away users' freedoms. This has included software license agreements, non-disclosure agreements, activation keys, dongles, copy restriction, proprietary formats, and binary executables without source code. In September 2019, Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT after making controversial comments about the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking scandal. Stallman remained head of the GNU Project, and in 2021 returned to the FSF board of directors. Early life Stallman was born March 16, 1953, in New York City, to a family of Jewish heritage. He had a troublesome relationship with his parents and did not feel he had a proper home. He was interested in computers at a young age; when Stallman was a pre-teen at a summer camp, he read manuals for the IBM 7094. From 1967 to 1969, Stallman attended a Columbia University Saturday program for high school students. Stallman was also a volunteer laboratory assistant in the biology department at Rockefeller University. Although he was interested in mathematics and physics, his supervising professor at Rockefeller thought he showed promise as a biologist. His first experience with actual computers was at the IBM New York Scientific Center when he was in high school. He was hired for the summer in 1970, following his senior year of high school, to write a numerical analysis program in Fortran. He completed the task after a couple of weeks ("I swore that I would never use FORTRAN again because I despised it as a language compared with other languages") and spent the rest of the summer writing a text editor in APL and a preprocessor for the PL/I programming language on the IBM System/360. Harvard University and MIT As a first-year student at Harvard University in fall 1970, Stallman was known for his strong performance in Math 55. He was happy: "For the first time in my life, I felt I had found a home at Harvard." In 1971, near the end of his first year at Harvard, he became a programmer at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, and became a regular in the hacker community, where he was usually known by his initials, RMS, which he used in his computer accounts. Stallman received a bachelor's degree in physics (magna cum laude) from Harvard in 1974. Stallman considered staying on at Harvard, but instead decided to enroll as a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He pursued a doctorate in physics for one year, but left that program to focus on his programming at the MIT AI Laboratory. While working (starting in 1975) as a research assistant at MIT under Gerry Sussman, Stallman published a paper (with Sussman) in 1977 on an AI truth maintenance system, called dependency-directed backtracking. This paper was an early work on the problem of intelligent backtracking in constraint satisfaction problems. , the technique Stallman and Sussman introduced is still the most general and powerful form of intelligent backtracking. The technique of constraint recording, wherein partial results of a search are recorded for later reuse, was also introduced in this paper. As a hacker in MIT's AI laboratory, Stallman worked on software projects such as TECO and Emacs for the Incompatible Timesharing System (ITS), as well as the Lisp machine operating system (the CONS of 1974–1976 and the CADR of 1977–1979—this latter unit was commercialized by Symbolics and Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) starting around 1980). He would become an ardent critic of restricted computer access in the lab, which at that time was funded primarily by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). When MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) installed a password control system in 1977, Stallman found a way to decrypt the passwords and sent users messages containing their decoded password, with a suggestion to change it to the empty string (that is, no password) instead, to re-enable anonymous access to the systems. Around 20 percent of the users followed his advice at the time, although passwords ultimately prevailed. Stallman boasted of the success of his campaign for many years afterward. Events leading to GNU In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the hacker culture that Stallman thrived on began to fragment. To prevent software from being used on their competitors' computers, most manufacturers stopped distributing source code and began using copyright and restrictive software licenses to limit or prohibit copying and redistribution. Such proprietary software had existed before, and it became apparent that it would become the norm. This shift in the legal characteristics of software was a consequence triggered by the US Copyright Act of 1976. When Brian Reid in 1979 placed time bombs in the Scribe markup language and word processing system to restrict unlicensed access to the software, Stallman proclaimed it "a crime against humanity". During an interview in 2008, he clarified that it is blocking the user's freedom that he believes is a crime, not the issue of charging for software. Stallman's texinfo is a GPL replacement, loosely based on Scribe; the original version was finished in 1986. In 1980, Stallman and some other hackers at the AI Lab were refused access to the source code for the software of a newly installed laser printer, the Xerox 9700. Stallman had modified the software for the Lab's previous laser printer (the XGP, Xerographic Printer), so it electronically messaged a user when the person's job was printed, and would message all logged-in users waiting for print jobs if the printer was jammed. Not being able to add these features to the new printer was a major inconvenience, as the printer was on a different floor from most of the users. This experience convinced Stallman of people's need to be able to freely modify the software they use. Richard Greenblatt, a fellow AI Lab hacker, founded Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) to market Lisp machines, which he and Tom Knight designed at the lab. Greenblatt rejected outside investment, believing that the proceeds from the construction and sale of a few machines could be profitably reinvested in the growth of the company. In contrast, the other hackers felt that the venture capital-funded approach was better. As no agreement could be reached, hackers from the latter camp founded Symbolics, with the aid of Russ Noftsker, an AI Lab administrator. Symbolics recruited most of the remaining hackers including notable hacker Bill Gosper, who then left the AI Lab. Symbolics also forced Greenblatt to resign by citing MIT policies. While both companies delivered proprietary software, Stallman believed that LMI, unlike Symbolics, had tried to avoid hurting the lab's community. For two years, from 1982 to the end of 1983, Stallman worked by himself to clone the output of the Symbolics programmers, with the aim of preventing them from gaining a monopoly on the lab's computers. Stallman argues that software users should have the freedom to share with their neighbors and be able to study and make changes to the software that they use. He maintains that attempts by proprietary software vendors to prohibit these acts are antisocial and unethical. The phrase "software wants to be free" is often incorrectly attributed to him, and Stallman argues that this is a misstatement of his philosophy. He argues that freedom is vital for the sake of users and society as a moral value, and not merely for pragmatic reasons such as possibly developing technically superior software. Eric S. Raymond, one of the creators of the open-source movement, argues that moral arguments, rather than pragmatic ones, alienate potential allies and hurt the end goal of removing code secrecy. In February 1984, Stallman quit his job at MIT to work full-time on the GNU project, which he had announced in September 1983. Since then, he had remained affiliated with MIT as an unpaid "visiting scientist" in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. Until "around 1998", he maintained an office at the Institute that doubled as his legal residence. GNU project Stallman announced the plan for the GNU operating system in September 1983 on several ARPANET mailing lists and USENET. He started the project on his own and describes: "As an operating system developer, I had the right skills for this job. So even though I could not take success for granted, I realized that I was elected to do the job. I chose to make the system compatible with Unix so that it would be portable, and so that Unix users could easily switch to it." In 1985, Stallman published the GNU Manifesto, which outlined his motivation for creating a free operating system called GNU, which would be compatible with Unix. The name GNU is a recursive acronym for "GNU's Not Unix". Soon after, he started a nonprofit corporation called the Free Software Foundation to employ free software programmers and provide a legal infrastructure for the free software movement. Stallman was the nonsalaried president of the FSF, which is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in Massachusetts. Stallman popularized the concept of copyleft, a legal mechanism to protect the modification and redistribution rights for free software. It was first implemented in the GNU Emacs General Public License, and in 1989 the first program-independent GNU General Public License (GPL) was released. By then, much of the GNU system had been completed. Stallman was responsible for contributing many necessary tools, including a text editor (Emacs), compiler (GCC), debugger (GNU Debugger), and a build automator (GNU make). The notable omission was a kernel. In 1990, members of the GNU project began using Carnegie Mellon's Mach microkernel in a project called GNU Hurd, which has yet to achieve the maturity level required for full POSIX compliance. In 1991, Linus Torvalds, a Finnish student, used the GNU's development tools to produce the free monolithic Linux kernel. The existing programs from the GNU project were readily ported to run on the resultant platform. Most sources use the name Linux to refer to the general-purpose operating system thus formed, while Stallman and the FSF call it GNU/Linux. This has been a longstanding naming controversy in the free software community. Stallman argues that not using GNU in the name of the operating system unfairly disparages the value of the GNU project and harms the sustainability of the free software movement by breaking the link between the software and the free software philosophy of the GNU project. Stallman's influences on hacker culture include the name POSIX and the Emacs editor. On Unix systems, GNU Emacs's popularity rivaled that of another editor vi, spawning an editor war. Stallman's take on this was to canonize himself as St. IGNUcius of the Church of Emacs and acknowledge that "vi vi vi is the editor of the beast", while "using a free version of vi is not a sin; it is a penance". On his homepage Stallman explains what a life in the Church of Emacs means to its members: "Sainthood in the Church of Emacs requires living a life of purity—but in the Church of Emacs, this does not require celibacy (a sigh of relief is heard)". In 1992, developers at Lucid Inc. doing their own work on Emacs clashed with Stallman and ultimately forked the software into what would become XEmacs. The technology journalist Andrew Leonard has characterized what he sees as Stallman's uncompromising stubbornness as common among elite computer programmers: In 2018, Stallman instituted "Kind Communication Guidelines" for the GNU project to help its mailing list discussions remain constructive while avoiding explicitly promoting diversity. In October 2019, a public statement signed by 33 maintainers of the GNU project asserted that Stallman's behaviour had "undermined a core value of the GNU project: the empowerment of all computer users" and called for "GNU maintainers to collectively decide about the organization of the project". The statement was published soon after Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT in September 2019. In spite of that, Stallman remained head of the GNU project. Activism Stallman has written many essays on software freedom, and has been an outspoken political campaigner for the free software movement since the early 1990s. The speeches he has regularly given are titled The GNU Project and the Free Software Movement, The Dangers of Software Patents, and Copyright and Community in the Age of Computer Networks. In 2006 and 2007, during the eighteen month public consultation for the drafting of version 3 of the GNU General Public License, he added a fourth topic explaining the proposed changes. Stallman's staunch advocacy for free software inspired the creation of the Virtual Richard M. Stallman (vrms), software that analyzes the packages currently installed on a Debian GNU/Linux system, and reports those that are from the non-free tree. Stallman disagrees with parts of Debian's definition of free software. In 1999, Stallman called for development of a free online encyclopedia through the means of inviting the public to contribute articles. The resulting GNUPedia was eventually retired in favour of the emerging Wikipedia, which had similar aims and was enjoying greater success. Stallman is a world traveler and has visited at least 65 countries, mostly to speak about free software and the GNU project. According to Stallman, the free software movement has much in common with that of Mahatma Gandhi. Stallman is also highly critical of the effect that drug patents have had on developing countries. In Venezuela, Stallman has delivered public speeches and promoted the adoption of free software in the state's oil company (PDVSA), in municipal government, and in the nation's military. In meetings with Hugo Chávez and in public speeches, Stallman criticised some policies on television broadcasting, free speech rights, and privacy. Stallman was on the Advisory Council of Latin American television station teleSUR from its launch but resigned in February 2011, criticizing pro-Gaddafi propaganda during the Arab Spring. In August 2006, at his meetings with the government of the Indian State of Kerala, he persuaded officials to discard proprietary software, such as Microsoft's, at state-run schools. This has resulted in a landmark decision to switch all school computers in 12,500 high schools from Windows to a free software operating system. After personal meetings, Stallman obtained positive statements about the free software movement from the then-president of India, , French 2007 presidential candidate Ségolène Royal, and the president of Ecuador Rafael Correa. Stallman has participated in protests about software patents, digital rights management, and proprietary software. Protesting against proprietary software in April 2006, Stallman held a "Don't buy from ATI, enemy of your freedom" placard at a speech by an ATI representative in the building where Stallman worked, resulting in the police being called. AMD has since acquired ATI and has taken steps to make their hardware documentation available for use by the free software community. In response to Apple's Macintosh look and feel lawsuits against Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard in 1988, Stallman called for a boycott of Apple products on the grounds that a successful look and feel lawsuit would "put an end to free software that could substitute for commercial software". The boycott was lifted in 1995, which meant the FSF started to accept patches to GNU software for Apple operating systems. Stallman has characterized Steve Jobs as having a "malign influence" on computing because of Jobs' leadership in guiding Apple to produce closed platforms. In 1993, while Jobs was at NeXT, Jobs asked Stallman if he could distribute a modified GCC in two parts, one part under GPL and the other part, an Objective-C preprocessor under a proprietary license. Stallman initially thought this would be legal, but since he also thought it would be "very undesirable for free software", he asked a lawyer for advice. The response he got was that judges would consider such schemes to be "subterfuges" and would be very harsh toward them, and a judge would ask whether it was "really" one program, rather than how the parts were labeled. Therefore, Stallman sent a message back to Jobs which said they believed Jobs' plan was not allowed by the GPL, which resulted in NeXT releasing the Objective-C front end under GPL. For a period of time, Stallman used a notebook from the One Laptop per Child program. Stallman's computer is a refurbished ThinkPad T400s with Libreboot, a free BIOS replacement, and the GNU/Linux distribution Trisquel. Before the ThinkPad T400s, Stallman used a Thinkpad X60 with Libreboot and Trisquel GNU/Linux. And before the X60, Stallman used the Lemote Yeeloong netbook (using the same company's Loongson processor) which he chose because, like the X60 and the T400s, it could run with free software at the BIOS level, stating "freedom is my priority. I've campaigned for freedom since 1983, and I am not going to surrender that freedom for the sake of a more convenient computer." Stallman's Lemote was stolen from him in 2012 while in Argentina. Before Trisquel, Stallman has used the gNewSense operating system. Copyright reduction Stallman has regularly given a talk entitled "Copyright vs. Community" where he reviews the state of digital rights management (DRM) and names many of the products and corporations which he boycotts. His approach to DRM is best summed up by the FSF Defective by Design campaign. In the talks, he makes proposals for a "reduced copyright" and suggests a 10-year limit on copyright. He suggests that, instead of restrictions on sharing, authors be supported using a tax, with revenues distributed among them based on cubic roots of their popularity to ensure that "fairly successful non-stars" receive a greater share than they do now (compare with private copying levy which is associated with proponents of strong copyright), or a convenient anonymous micropayment system for people to support authors directly. He indicates that no form of non-commercial sharing of copies should be considered a copyright violation. He has advocated civil disobedience in a comment on Ley Sinde. Stallman has also helped and supported the International Music Score Library Project in getting back online, after it had been taken down on October 19, 2007, following a cease and desist letter from Universal Edition. Stallman mentions the dangers some e-books bring compared to paper books, with the example of the Amazon Kindle e-reader that prevents the copying of e-books and allows Amazon to order automatic deletion of a book. He says that such e-books present a big step backward with respect to paper books by being less easy to use, copy, lend to others or sell, also mentioning that Amazon e-books cannot be bought anonymously. His short story "The Right to Read" provides a picture of a dystopian future if the right to share books is impeded. He objects to many of the terms within typical end-user license agreements that accompany e-books. Stallman discourages the use of several storage technologies such as DVD or Blu-ray video discs because the content of such media is encrypted. He considers manufacturers' use of encryption on non-secret data (to force the user to view certain promotional material) as a conspiracy. He recognized the Sony BMG copy protection rootkit scandal to be a criminal act by Sony. Stallman supports a general boycott of Sony for its legal actions against George Hotz. Stallman has suggested that the United States government may encourage the use of software as a service because this would allow them to access users' data without needing a search warrant. He denies being an anarchist despite his wariness of some legislation and the fact that he has "advocated strongly for user privacy and his own view of software freedom". Terminologies Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copying not approved by the publisher). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agrees to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term intellectual property is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other areas of law by lumping together things that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues, writing: An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: Open source and Free software His requests that people use certain terms, and his ongoing efforts to convince people of the importance of terminology, are a source of regular misunderstanding and friction with parts of the free software and open-source communities. After initially accepting the concept, Stallman rejects a common alternative term, open-source software, because it does not call to mind what Stallman sees as the value of the software: freedom. He wrote, "Free software is a political movement; open source is a development model." Thus, he believes that the use of the term will not inform people of the freedom issues, and will not lead to people valuing and defending their freedom. Two alternatives which Stallman does accept are software libre and unfettered software, but free software is the term he asks people to use in English. For similar reasons, he argues for the term proprietary software or non-free software rather than closed-source software, when referring to software that is not free software. Linux and GNU Stallman asks that the term GNU/Linux, which he pronounces , be used to refer to the operating system created by combining the GNU system and the kernel Linux. Stallman refers to this operating system as "a variant of GNU, and the GNU Project is its principal developer". He claims that the connection between the GNU project's philosophy and its software is broken when people refer to the combination as merely Linux. Starting around 2003, he began also using the term GNU+Linux, which he pronounces , to prevent others from pronouncing the phrase GNU/Linux as , which would erroneously imply that the kernel Linux is maintained by the GNU project. The creator of Linux, Linus Torvalds, has publicly stated that he objects to modification of the name, and that the rename "is their [the FSF] confusion not ours". Surveillance resistance Stallman professes admiration for Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. He has spoken against government and corporate surveillance on many occasions. He refers to mobile phones as "portable surveillance and tracking devices", refusing to own a cell phone due to the lack of phones running entirely on free software. He also avoids using a key card to enter his office building since key card systems track each location and time that someone enters the building using a card. He usually does not browse the web directly from his personal computer. Instead, he uses GNU Womb's grab-url-from-mail utility, an email-based proxy which downloads the web page content and then emails it to the user. More recently, he stated that he accesses all web sites via Tor, except for Wikipedia (which generally disallows editing from Tor unless users have an IP block exemption). Personal life Stallman resides in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He speaks English, French, Spanish and some Indonesian. He has said that he is "an atheist of Jewish ancestry" and often wears a button that reads "Impeach God". Stallman has written a collection of filk music and parody songs. He is childfree and antinatalist. He denies having Asperger's, but has sometimes speculated whether he could have a "shadow" version of it. Resignation from MIT and FSF In August and September 2019, it was learned that Jeffrey Epstein had made donations to MIT, and in the wake of this, MIT Media Lab director Joi Ito resigned. An internal MIT CSAIL listserv mailing list thread was started to protest the coverup of MIT's connections to Epstein. In the thread, discussion had turned to deceased MIT professor Marvin Minsky, who was named by Virginia Giuffre as one of the people that Epstein had directed her to have sex with. Giuffre, a minor at the time, had been caught in Epstein's underage sex trafficking ring. In response to a comment where one reply stated that Minsky "is accused of assaulting one of Epstein's victims", Stallman questioned whether the word "assault" was applicable in that case, arguing that "the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to conceal that from most of his associates". When challenged by other members of the mailing list, he added "It is morally absurd to define 'rape' in a way that depends on minor details such as which country it was in or whether the victim was 18 years old or 17". Stallman remained critical of Epstein and his role, stating "We know that Giuffre was being coerced into sex – by Epstein. She was being harmed." Stallman's comments along with a compilation of accusations against him were published to the public via Medium by Selam Gano, who outlined MIT alumnae claims of sexual harassment and contributions to a hostile environment by Stallman. Vice published a copy of the email chain on September 13, 2019, drawing attention to Stallman's comments. Stallman's writings from 2013 and earlier related to underage sex and child pornography laws resurfaced, increasing the controversy. Tied to his comments regarding Minsky, this led to several calling for Stallman's resignation. On September 14, Stallman acknowledged that since the time of his past writings, he had learned that there were problems with underage sex, writing on his blog: "Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that." On September 16, Stallman announced his resignation from both MIT and FSF, "due to pressure on MIT and me over a series of misunderstandings and mischaracterizations". In a post on his website, Stallman asserted that his posts to the email lists were not to defend Epstein, stating "Nothing could be further from the truth. I've called him a 'serial rapist,' and said he deserved to be imprisoned. But many people now believe I defended him—and other inaccurate claims—and feel a real hurt because of what they believe I said. I'm sorry for that hurt. I wish I could have prevented the misunderstanding." Return to FSF In March 2021, at LibrePlanet2021, Stallman announced his return to the FSF board of directors. Shortly thereafter, an open letter was published on GitHub asking for Stallman's removal, along with the entire FSF board of directors, with the support of prominent open-source organizations including GNOME and Mozilla. The letter includes a list of accusations against Stallman. In response, an open letter asking for the FSF to retain Stallman was also published, arguing that Stallman's statements were mischaracterized, misunderstood and that they need to be interpreted in context. The FSF board in April 12 made a statement re-affirming its decision to bring back Richard Stallman. Following this, Stallman issued a statement explaining his poor social skills and apologizing. Multiple organizations criticized, defunded and/or cut ties with the FSF, including: Red Hat, the Free Software Foundation Europe, the Software Freedom Conservacy, SUSE, the OSI, the Document Foundation, the EFF, KDE, and the Tor Project. Debian declined to issue a statement after a community voting on the issue. However, this had relatively little impact on the FSF, as it has stated that direct financial support from corporations accounted for less than 3% of its revenue in the most recent fiscal year. Honors and awards 1986: Honorary lifetime membership of the Chalmers University of Technology Computer Society 1990: Exceptional merit award MacArthur Fellowship ("genius grant") 1990: The Association for Computing Machinery's Grace Murray Hopper Award "For pioneering work in the development of the extensible editor EMACS (Editing Macros)" 1996: Honorary doctorate from Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology 1998: Electronic Frontier Foundation's Pioneer Award 1999: Yuri Rubinsky Memorial Award 2001: The Takeda Techno-Entrepreneurship Award for Social/Economic Well-Being () 2001: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Glasgow 2002: US National Academy of Engineering membership "for starting the GNU project, which produced influential, non-proprietary software tools, and for founding the free software movement" 2003: Honorary doctorate, from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel 2004: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Nacional de Salta 2004: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería del Perú 2007: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Inca Garcilaso de la Vega 2007: First Premio Internacional Extremadura al Conocimiento Libre 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad de Los Angeles de Chimbote 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Pavia 2008: Honorary doctorate from the Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, in Peru 2009: Honorary doctorate, from Lakehead University 2011: Honorary doctorate, from National University of Córdoba 2012: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad César Vallejo de Trujillo, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Latinoamericana Cima de Tacna, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad José Faustino Sánchez Carrión, in Peru 2014: Honorary doctorate, from Concordia University, in Montréal 2015: ACM Software System Award "For the development and leadership of GCC" 2016: Honorary doctorate, from Pierre and Marie Curie University 2016: Social Medicine award, from GNU Solidario Selected publications Manuals Selected essays See also 9882 Stallman Free as in Freedom, a biography by Sam Williams Free Software Street History of free and open-source software Lisp Machine Lisp Revolution OS vrms Free Software Foundation References External links In Support of Richard Stallman, a website which advocates for Stallman. Essays on the Philosophy of the GNU Project, almost all written by Stallman 1953 births Activists from New York City Jewish American atheists American bloggers American computer programmers Anti-natalists Articles containing video clips Artificial intelligence researchers Copyright activists Education activists Emacs Filkers Free software people Free software programmers GNU people Grace Murray Hopper Award laureates Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences alumni Internet activists Jewish American scientists Linux people Lisp (programming language) people Living people MacArthur Fellows Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni Members of the Free Software Foundation board of directors Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering Privacy activists Programming language designers	true	[ "Mongkon ( ) is a type of headgear worn by Muay Thai athletes. The Mongkhon is given to a boxer after their trainer saw that the student had become an experienced fighter and learned a great deal of knowledge about Muay Thai. The Mongkhon was never to be, in any way, close to the ground or else they believed it would lose its worth. The Mongkhon is unique to Thai boxing and is also worn in Cambodia and Burma.\n\nIt must be worn during the Wai khru ram muay and should be only handled by the fighter and teacher, so as not to lose its perceived special powers.\n\nMuay Thai\nKickboxing terminology", "\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer" ]
[ "Richard Stallman", "Terminology", "Can you provide information on Terminology?", "Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world,", "Was he very popular or very well known for this?", "I don't know.", "What else was unique about his terminology?", "He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (" ]	C_48eeef8db60c4df68ba565e3cc185e20_0	Why did he say that?	4	Why did Richard Stallman say to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy?	Richard Stallman	Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copyright). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agree to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term "intellectual property" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other laws by lumping together areas of law that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues. These laws originated separately, evolved differently, cover different activities, have different rules, and raise different public policy issues. Copyright law was designed to promote authorship and art, and covers the details of a work of authorship or art. Patent law was intended to encourage publication of ideas, at the price of finite monopolies over these ideas - a price that may be worth paying in some fields and not in others. Trademark law was not intended to promote any business activity, but simply to enable buyers to know what they are buying. An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: I think it is ok for authors (please let's not call them creators, they are not gods) to ask for money for copies of their works (please let's not devalue these works by calling them content) in order to gain income (the term compensation falsely implies it is a matter of making up for some kind of damages). CANNOTANSWER	argues that the term "intellectual property" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics	Richard Matthew Stallman (; born March 16, 1953), also known by his initials, rms, is an American free software movement activist and programmer. He campaigns for software to be distributed in such a manner, so that its users receive the freedoms to use, study, distribute, and modify that software. Software that ensures these freedoms is termed free software. Stallman launched the GNU Project, founded the Free Software Foundation, developed the GNU Compiler Collection and GNU Emacs, and wrote the GNU General Public License. Stallman launched the GNU Project in September 1983 to write a Unix-like computer operating system composed entirely of free software. With this, he also launched the free software movement. He has been the GNU project's lead architect and organizer, and developed a number of pieces of widely used GNU software including, among others, the GNU Compiler Collection, GNU Debugger, and GNU Emacs text editor. In October 1985 he founded the Free Software Foundation (FSF). Stallman pioneered the concept of copyleft, which uses the principles of copyright law to preserve the right to use, modify, and distribute free software. He is the main author of free software licenses which describe those terms, most notably the GNU General Public License (GPL), the most widely used free software license. In 1989, he co-founded the League for Programming Freedom. Since the mid-1990s, Stallman has spent most of his time advocating for free software, as well as campaigning against software patents, digital rights management (which he refers to as digital restrictions management, calling the more common term misleading), and other legal and technical systems which he sees as taking away users' freedoms. This has included software license agreements, non-disclosure agreements, activation keys, dongles, copy restriction, proprietary formats, and binary executables without source code. In September 2019, Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT after making controversial comments about the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking scandal. Stallman remained head of the GNU Project, and in 2021 returned to the FSF board of directors. Early life Stallman was born March 16, 1953, in New York City, to a family of Jewish heritage. He had a troublesome relationship with his parents and did not feel he had a proper home. He was interested in computers at a young age; when Stallman was a pre-teen at a summer camp, he read manuals for the IBM 7094. From 1967 to 1969, Stallman attended a Columbia University Saturday program for high school students. Stallman was also a volunteer laboratory assistant in the biology department at Rockefeller University. Although he was interested in mathematics and physics, his supervising professor at Rockefeller thought he showed promise as a biologist. His first experience with actual computers was at the IBM New York Scientific Center when he was in high school. He was hired for the summer in 1970, following his senior year of high school, to write a numerical analysis program in Fortran. He completed the task after a couple of weeks ("I swore that I would never use FORTRAN again because I despised it as a language compared with other languages") and spent the rest of the summer writing a text editor in APL and a preprocessor for the PL/I programming language on the IBM System/360. Harvard University and MIT As a first-year student at Harvard University in fall 1970, Stallman was known for his strong performance in Math 55. He was happy: "For the first time in my life, I felt I had found a home at Harvard." In 1971, near the end of his first year at Harvard, he became a programmer at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, and became a regular in the hacker community, where he was usually known by his initials, RMS, which he used in his computer accounts. Stallman received a bachelor's degree in physics (magna cum laude) from Harvard in 1974. Stallman considered staying on at Harvard, but instead decided to enroll as a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He pursued a doctorate in physics for one year, but left that program to focus on his programming at the MIT AI Laboratory. While working (starting in 1975) as a research assistant at MIT under Gerry Sussman, Stallman published a paper (with Sussman) in 1977 on an AI truth maintenance system, called dependency-directed backtracking. This paper was an early work on the problem of intelligent backtracking in constraint satisfaction problems. , the technique Stallman and Sussman introduced is still the most general and powerful form of intelligent backtracking. The technique of constraint recording, wherein partial results of a search are recorded for later reuse, was also introduced in this paper. As a hacker in MIT's AI laboratory, Stallman worked on software projects such as TECO and Emacs for the Incompatible Timesharing System (ITS), as well as the Lisp machine operating system (the CONS of 1974–1976 and the CADR of 1977–1979—this latter unit was commercialized by Symbolics and Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) starting around 1980). He would become an ardent critic of restricted computer access in the lab, which at that time was funded primarily by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). When MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) installed a password control system in 1977, Stallman found a way to decrypt the passwords and sent users messages containing their decoded password, with a suggestion to change it to the empty string (that is, no password) instead, to re-enable anonymous access to the systems. Around 20 percent of the users followed his advice at the time, although passwords ultimately prevailed. Stallman boasted of the success of his campaign for many years afterward. Events leading to GNU In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the hacker culture that Stallman thrived on began to fragment. To prevent software from being used on their competitors' computers, most manufacturers stopped distributing source code and began using copyright and restrictive software licenses to limit or prohibit copying and redistribution. Such proprietary software had existed before, and it became apparent that it would become the norm. This shift in the legal characteristics of software was a consequence triggered by the US Copyright Act of 1976. When Brian Reid in 1979 placed time bombs in the Scribe markup language and word processing system to restrict unlicensed access to the software, Stallman proclaimed it "a crime against humanity". During an interview in 2008, he clarified that it is blocking the user's freedom that he believes is a crime, not the issue of charging for software. Stallman's texinfo is a GPL replacement, loosely based on Scribe; the original version was finished in 1986. In 1980, Stallman and some other hackers at the AI Lab were refused access to the source code for the software of a newly installed laser printer, the Xerox 9700. Stallman had modified the software for the Lab's previous laser printer (the XGP, Xerographic Printer), so it electronically messaged a user when the person's job was printed, and would message all logged-in users waiting for print jobs if the printer was jammed. Not being able to add these features to the new printer was a major inconvenience, as the printer was on a different floor from most of the users. This experience convinced Stallman of people's need to be able to freely modify the software they use. Richard Greenblatt, a fellow AI Lab hacker, founded Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) to market Lisp machines, which he and Tom Knight designed at the lab. Greenblatt rejected outside investment, believing that the proceeds from the construction and sale of a few machines could be profitably reinvested in the growth of the company. In contrast, the other hackers felt that the venture capital-funded approach was better. As no agreement could be reached, hackers from the latter camp founded Symbolics, with the aid of Russ Noftsker, an AI Lab administrator. Symbolics recruited most of the remaining hackers including notable hacker Bill Gosper, who then left the AI Lab. Symbolics also forced Greenblatt to resign by citing MIT policies. While both companies delivered proprietary software, Stallman believed that LMI, unlike Symbolics, had tried to avoid hurting the lab's community. For two years, from 1982 to the end of 1983, Stallman worked by himself to clone the output of the Symbolics programmers, with the aim of preventing them from gaining a monopoly on the lab's computers. Stallman argues that software users should have the freedom to share with their neighbors and be able to study and make changes to the software that they use. He maintains that attempts by proprietary software vendors to prohibit these acts are antisocial and unethical. The phrase "software wants to be free" is often incorrectly attributed to him, and Stallman argues that this is a misstatement of his philosophy. He argues that freedom is vital for the sake of users and society as a moral value, and not merely for pragmatic reasons such as possibly developing technically superior software. Eric S. Raymond, one of the creators of the open-source movement, argues that moral arguments, rather than pragmatic ones, alienate potential allies and hurt the end goal of removing code secrecy. In February 1984, Stallman quit his job at MIT to work full-time on the GNU project, which he had announced in September 1983. Since then, he had remained affiliated with MIT as an unpaid "visiting scientist" in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. Until "around 1998", he maintained an office at the Institute that doubled as his legal residence. GNU project Stallman announced the plan for the GNU operating system in September 1983 on several ARPANET mailing lists and USENET. He started the project on his own and describes: "As an operating system developer, I had the right skills for this job. So even though I could not take success for granted, I realized that I was elected to do the job. I chose to make the system compatible with Unix so that it would be portable, and so that Unix users could easily switch to it." In 1985, Stallman published the GNU Manifesto, which outlined his motivation for creating a free operating system called GNU, which would be compatible with Unix. The name GNU is a recursive acronym for "GNU's Not Unix". Soon after, he started a nonprofit corporation called the Free Software Foundation to employ free software programmers and provide a legal infrastructure for the free software movement. Stallman was the nonsalaried president of the FSF, which is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in Massachusetts. Stallman popularized the concept of copyleft, a legal mechanism to protect the modification and redistribution rights for free software. It was first implemented in the GNU Emacs General Public License, and in 1989 the first program-independent GNU General Public License (GPL) was released. By then, much of the GNU system had been completed. Stallman was responsible for contributing many necessary tools, including a text editor (Emacs), compiler (GCC), debugger (GNU Debugger), and a build automator (GNU make). The notable omission was a kernel. In 1990, members of the GNU project began using Carnegie Mellon's Mach microkernel in a project called GNU Hurd, which has yet to achieve the maturity level required for full POSIX compliance. In 1991, Linus Torvalds, a Finnish student, used the GNU's development tools to produce the free monolithic Linux kernel. The existing programs from the GNU project were readily ported to run on the resultant platform. Most sources use the name Linux to refer to the general-purpose operating system thus formed, while Stallman and the FSF call it GNU/Linux. This has been a longstanding naming controversy in the free software community. Stallman argues that not using GNU in the name of the operating system unfairly disparages the value of the GNU project and harms the sustainability of the free software movement by breaking the link between the software and the free software philosophy of the GNU project. Stallman's influences on hacker culture include the name POSIX and the Emacs editor. On Unix systems, GNU Emacs's popularity rivaled that of another editor vi, spawning an editor war. Stallman's take on this was to canonize himself as St. IGNUcius of the Church of Emacs and acknowledge that "vi vi vi is the editor of the beast", while "using a free version of vi is not a sin; it is a penance". On his homepage Stallman explains what a life in the Church of Emacs means to its members: "Sainthood in the Church of Emacs requires living a life of purity—but in the Church of Emacs, this does not require celibacy (a sigh of relief is heard)". In 1992, developers at Lucid Inc. doing their own work on Emacs clashed with Stallman and ultimately forked the software into what would become XEmacs. The technology journalist Andrew Leonard has characterized what he sees as Stallman's uncompromising stubbornness as common among elite computer programmers: In 2018, Stallman instituted "Kind Communication Guidelines" for the GNU project to help its mailing list discussions remain constructive while avoiding explicitly promoting diversity. In October 2019, a public statement signed by 33 maintainers of the GNU project asserted that Stallman's behaviour had "undermined a core value of the GNU project: the empowerment of all computer users" and called for "GNU maintainers to collectively decide about the organization of the project". The statement was published soon after Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT in September 2019. In spite of that, Stallman remained head of the GNU project. Activism Stallman has written many essays on software freedom, and has been an outspoken political campaigner for the free software movement since the early 1990s. The speeches he has regularly given are titled The GNU Project and the Free Software Movement, The Dangers of Software Patents, and Copyright and Community in the Age of Computer Networks. In 2006 and 2007, during the eighteen month public consultation for the drafting of version 3 of the GNU General Public License, he added a fourth topic explaining the proposed changes. Stallman's staunch advocacy for free software inspired the creation of the Virtual Richard M. Stallman (vrms), software that analyzes the packages currently installed on a Debian GNU/Linux system, and reports those that are from the non-free tree. Stallman disagrees with parts of Debian's definition of free software. In 1999, Stallman called for development of a free online encyclopedia through the means of inviting the public to contribute articles. The resulting GNUPedia was eventually retired in favour of the emerging Wikipedia, which had similar aims and was enjoying greater success. Stallman is a world traveler and has visited at least 65 countries, mostly to speak about free software and the GNU project. According to Stallman, the free software movement has much in common with that of Mahatma Gandhi. Stallman is also highly critical of the effect that drug patents have had on developing countries. In Venezuela, Stallman has delivered public speeches and promoted the adoption of free software in the state's oil company (PDVSA), in municipal government, and in the nation's military. In meetings with Hugo Chávez and in public speeches, Stallman criticised some policies on television broadcasting, free speech rights, and privacy. Stallman was on the Advisory Council of Latin American television station teleSUR from its launch but resigned in February 2011, criticizing pro-Gaddafi propaganda during the Arab Spring. In August 2006, at his meetings with the government of the Indian State of Kerala, he persuaded officials to discard proprietary software, such as Microsoft's, at state-run schools. This has resulted in a landmark decision to switch all school computers in 12,500 high schools from Windows to a free software operating system. After personal meetings, Stallman obtained positive statements about the free software movement from the then-president of India, , French 2007 presidential candidate Ségolène Royal, and the president of Ecuador Rafael Correa. Stallman has participated in protests about software patents, digital rights management, and proprietary software. Protesting against proprietary software in April 2006, Stallman held a "Don't buy from ATI, enemy of your freedom" placard at a speech by an ATI representative in the building where Stallman worked, resulting in the police being called. AMD has since acquired ATI and has taken steps to make their hardware documentation available for use by the free software community. In response to Apple's Macintosh look and feel lawsuits against Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard in 1988, Stallman called for a boycott of Apple products on the grounds that a successful look and feel lawsuit would "put an end to free software that could substitute for commercial software". The boycott was lifted in 1995, which meant the FSF started to accept patches to GNU software for Apple operating systems. Stallman has characterized Steve Jobs as having a "malign influence" on computing because of Jobs' leadership in guiding Apple to produce closed platforms. In 1993, while Jobs was at NeXT, Jobs asked Stallman if he could distribute a modified GCC in two parts, one part under GPL and the other part, an Objective-C preprocessor under a proprietary license. Stallman initially thought this would be legal, but since he also thought it would be "very undesirable for free software", he asked a lawyer for advice. The response he got was that judges would consider such schemes to be "subterfuges" and would be very harsh toward them, and a judge would ask whether it was "really" one program, rather than how the parts were labeled. Therefore, Stallman sent a message back to Jobs which said they believed Jobs' plan was not allowed by the GPL, which resulted in NeXT releasing the Objective-C front end under GPL. For a period of time, Stallman used a notebook from the One Laptop per Child program. Stallman's computer is a refurbished ThinkPad T400s with Libreboot, a free BIOS replacement, and the GNU/Linux distribution Trisquel. Before the ThinkPad T400s, Stallman used a Thinkpad X60 with Libreboot and Trisquel GNU/Linux. And before the X60, Stallman used the Lemote Yeeloong netbook (using the same company's Loongson processor) which he chose because, like the X60 and the T400s, it could run with free software at the BIOS level, stating "freedom is my priority. I've campaigned for freedom since 1983, and I am not going to surrender that freedom for the sake of a more convenient computer." Stallman's Lemote was stolen from him in 2012 while in Argentina. Before Trisquel, Stallman has used the gNewSense operating system. Copyright reduction Stallman has regularly given a talk entitled "Copyright vs. Community" where he reviews the state of digital rights management (DRM) and names many of the products and corporations which he boycotts. His approach to DRM is best summed up by the FSF Defective by Design campaign. In the talks, he makes proposals for a "reduced copyright" and suggests a 10-year limit on copyright. He suggests that, instead of restrictions on sharing, authors be supported using a tax, with revenues distributed among them based on cubic roots of their popularity to ensure that "fairly successful non-stars" receive a greater share than they do now (compare with private copying levy which is associated with proponents of strong copyright), or a convenient anonymous micropayment system for people to support authors directly. He indicates that no form of non-commercial sharing of copies should be considered a copyright violation. He has advocated civil disobedience in a comment on Ley Sinde. Stallman has also helped and supported the International Music Score Library Project in getting back online, after it had been taken down on October 19, 2007, following a cease and desist letter from Universal Edition. Stallman mentions the dangers some e-books bring compared to paper books, with the example of the Amazon Kindle e-reader that prevents the copying of e-books and allows Amazon to order automatic deletion of a book. He says that such e-books present a big step backward with respect to paper books by being less easy to use, copy, lend to others or sell, also mentioning that Amazon e-books cannot be bought anonymously. His short story "The Right to Read" provides a picture of a dystopian future if the right to share books is impeded. He objects to many of the terms within typical end-user license agreements that accompany e-books. Stallman discourages the use of several storage technologies such as DVD or Blu-ray video discs because the content of such media is encrypted. He considers manufacturers' use of encryption on non-secret data (to force the user to view certain promotional material) as a conspiracy. He recognized the Sony BMG copy protection rootkit scandal to be a criminal act by Sony. Stallman supports a general boycott of Sony for its legal actions against George Hotz. Stallman has suggested that the United States government may encourage the use of software as a service because this would allow them to access users' data without needing a search warrant. He denies being an anarchist despite his wariness of some legislation and the fact that he has "advocated strongly for user privacy and his own view of software freedom". Terminologies Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copying not approved by the publisher). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agrees to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term intellectual property is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other areas of law by lumping together things that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues, writing: An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: Open source and Free software His requests that people use certain terms, and his ongoing efforts to convince people of the importance of terminology, are a source of regular misunderstanding and friction with parts of the free software and open-source communities. After initially accepting the concept, Stallman rejects a common alternative term, open-source software, because it does not call to mind what Stallman sees as the value of the software: freedom. He wrote, "Free software is a political movement; open source is a development model." Thus, he believes that the use of the term will not inform people of the freedom issues, and will not lead to people valuing and defending their freedom. Two alternatives which Stallman does accept are software libre and unfettered software, but free software is the term he asks people to use in English. For similar reasons, he argues for the term proprietary software or non-free software rather than closed-source software, when referring to software that is not free software. Linux and GNU Stallman asks that the term GNU/Linux, which he pronounces , be used to refer to the operating system created by combining the GNU system and the kernel Linux. Stallman refers to this operating system as "a variant of GNU, and the GNU Project is its principal developer". He claims that the connection between the GNU project's philosophy and its software is broken when people refer to the combination as merely Linux. Starting around 2003, he began also using the term GNU+Linux, which he pronounces , to prevent others from pronouncing the phrase GNU/Linux as , which would erroneously imply that the kernel Linux is maintained by the GNU project. The creator of Linux, Linus Torvalds, has publicly stated that he objects to modification of the name, and that the rename "is their [the FSF] confusion not ours". Surveillance resistance Stallman professes admiration for Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. He has spoken against government and corporate surveillance on many occasions. He refers to mobile phones as "portable surveillance and tracking devices", refusing to own a cell phone due to the lack of phones running entirely on free software. He also avoids using a key card to enter his office building since key card systems track each location and time that someone enters the building using a card. He usually does not browse the web directly from his personal computer. Instead, he uses GNU Womb's grab-url-from-mail utility, an email-based proxy which downloads the web page content and then emails it to the user. More recently, he stated that he accesses all web sites via Tor, except for Wikipedia (which generally disallows editing from Tor unless users have an IP block exemption). Personal life Stallman resides in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He speaks English, French, Spanish and some Indonesian. He has said that he is "an atheist of Jewish ancestry" and often wears a button that reads "Impeach God". Stallman has written a collection of filk music and parody songs. He is childfree and antinatalist. He denies having Asperger's, but has sometimes speculated whether he could have a "shadow" version of it. Resignation from MIT and FSF In August and September 2019, it was learned that Jeffrey Epstein had made donations to MIT, and in the wake of this, MIT Media Lab director Joi Ito resigned. An internal MIT CSAIL listserv mailing list thread was started to protest the coverup of MIT's connections to Epstein. In the thread, discussion had turned to deceased MIT professor Marvin Minsky, who was named by Virginia Giuffre as one of the people that Epstein had directed her to have sex with. Giuffre, a minor at the time, had been caught in Epstein's underage sex trafficking ring. In response to a comment where one reply stated that Minsky "is accused of assaulting one of Epstein's victims", Stallman questioned whether the word "assault" was applicable in that case, arguing that "the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to conceal that from most of his associates". When challenged by other members of the mailing list, he added "It is morally absurd to define 'rape' in a way that depends on minor details such as which country it was in or whether the victim was 18 years old or 17". Stallman remained critical of Epstein and his role, stating "We know that Giuffre was being coerced into sex – by Epstein. She was being harmed." Stallman's comments along with a compilation of accusations against him were published to the public via Medium by Selam Gano, who outlined MIT alumnae claims of sexual harassment and contributions to a hostile environment by Stallman. Vice published a copy of the email chain on September 13, 2019, drawing attention to Stallman's comments. Stallman's writings from 2013 and earlier related to underage sex and child pornography laws resurfaced, increasing the controversy. Tied to his comments regarding Minsky, this led to several calling for Stallman's resignation. On September 14, Stallman acknowledged that since the time of his past writings, he had learned that there were problems with underage sex, writing on his blog: "Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that." On September 16, Stallman announced his resignation from both MIT and FSF, "due to pressure on MIT and me over a series of misunderstandings and mischaracterizations". In a post on his website, Stallman asserted that his posts to the email lists were not to defend Epstein, stating "Nothing could be further from the truth. I've called him a 'serial rapist,' and said he deserved to be imprisoned. But many people now believe I defended him—and other inaccurate claims—and feel a real hurt because of what they believe I said. I'm sorry for that hurt. I wish I could have prevented the misunderstanding." Return to FSF In March 2021, at LibrePlanet2021, Stallman announced his return to the FSF board of directors. Shortly thereafter, an open letter was published on GitHub asking for Stallman's removal, along with the entire FSF board of directors, with the support of prominent open-source organizations including GNOME and Mozilla. The letter includes a list of accusations against Stallman. In response, an open letter asking for the FSF to retain Stallman was also published, arguing that Stallman's statements were mischaracterized, misunderstood and that they need to be interpreted in context. The FSF board in April 12 made a statement re-affirming its decision to bring back Richard Stallman. Following this, Stallman issued a statement explaining his poor social skills and apologizing. Multiple organizations criticized, defunded and/or cut ties with the FSF, including: Red Hat, the Free Software Foundation Europe, the Software Freedom Conservacy, SUSE, the OSI, the Document Foundation, the EFF, KDE, and the Tor Project. Debian declined to issue a statement after a community voting on the issue. However, this had relatively little impact on the FSF, as it has stated that direct financial support from corporations accounted for less than 3% of its revenue in the most recent fiscal year. Honors and awards 1986: Honorary lifetime membership of the Chalmers University of Technology Computer Society 1990: Exceptional merit award MacArthur Fellowship ("genius grant") 1990: The Association for Computing Machinery's Grace Murray Hopper Award "For pioneering work in the development of the extensible editor EMACS (Editing Macros)" 1996: Honorary doctorate from Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology 1998: Electronic Frontier Foundation's Pioneer Award 1999: Yuri Rubinsky Memorial Award 2001: The Takeda Techno-Entrepreneurship Award for Social/Economic Well-Being () 2001: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Glasgow 2002: US National Academy of Engineering membership "for starting the GNU project, which produced influential, non-proprietary software tools, and for founding the free software movement" 2003: Honorary doctorate, from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel 2004: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Nacional de Salta 2004: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería del Perú 2007: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Inca Garcilaso de la Vega 2007: First Premio Internacional Extremadura al Conocimiento Libre 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad de Los Angeles de Chimbote 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Pavia 2008: Honorary doctorate from the Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, in Peru 2009: Honorary doctorate, from Lakehead University 2011: Honorary doctorate, from National University of Córdoba 2012: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad César Vallejo de Trujillo, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Latinoamericana Cima de Tacna, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad José Faustino Sánchez Carrión, in Peru 2014: Honorary doctorate, from Concordia University, in Montréal 2015: ACM Software System Award "For the development and leadership of GCC" 2016: Honorary doctorate, from Pierre and Marie Curie University 2016: Social Medicine award, from GNU Solidario Selected publications Manuals Selected essays See also 9882 Stallman Free as in Freedom, a biography by Sam Williams Free Software Street History of free and open-source software Lisp Machine Lisp Revolution OS vrms Free Software Foundation References External links In Support of Richard Stallman, a website which advocates for Stallman. Essays on the Philosophy of the GNU Project, almost all written by Stallman 1953 births Activists from New York City Jewish American atheists American bloggers American computer programmers Anti-natalists Articles containing video clips Artificial intelligence researchers Copyright activists Education activists Emacs Filkers Free software people Free software programmers GNU people Grace Murray Hopper Award laureates Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences alumni Internet activists Jewish American scientists Linux people Lisp (programming language) people Living people MacArthur Fellows Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni Members of the Free Software Foundation board of directors Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering Privacy activists Programming language designers	false	[ "Buğra Mert Alkayalar (5 June 1998, Yozgat), is a Turkish director and screenwriter.\n\nHe completed his elementary education in Tekirdağ, Türkiye and started studying Film and Television at University of Anatolia in 2016. Meanwhile, he completed his voice acting training in 2018 with the leadership of Kadir Özübek. He won an Audience Special Award for his experimental short film \"Disintegration\" at 6th International Antakya Film Festival. He also won a Best Thriller award for his short thriller Why Not? (2019) from IMDb's official Top Shorts Film Festival, and a Best Student Film award from Direct Monthly Online Film Festival.\n\nFilmography \n Be Careful What You Say (short film, 2020)\n Why Not? (short film, 2019)\n Fairy (short film, 2019)\n In The Pink (short film, 2019)\n Visitors at The Door (documentary short, 2018)\n Disintegration (short film, 2018)\n Session (short, 2018/II)\n Separated (short, 2018)\n\nNominations \nFestival Nominations\n 2020: Be Careful What You Say (nominee, best short)\n 2019: Fairy (nominee, best short film)\n 2019: Why Not? (nominee, best short film)\n 2019: Why Not? (nominee, best thriller)\n 2019: Why Not? (nominee, best student short)\n 2019: Why Not? (nominee, film of the month)\n 2019: Why Not? (nominee, best screenplay)\n 2018: Disintegration (nominee, best short experimental film)\n\nAwards \nFestival Awards\n 2019: Why Not? (WON Best Student Short Film of the Month)\n 2019: Why Not (WON Best Thriller)\n\nReferences \n\nLiving people\n1998 births\nPeople from Yozgat\nTurkish directors\nTurkish male screenwriters", "Go and Ask Peggy for the Principal Thing is the fourth album by German rock band Fool's Garden, released in 1997. It contains a cover of the Beatles' song \"Martha My Dear\".\n\nTrack listing\n \"The Principal Thing\"\n \"Emily\"\n \"Why Did She Go?\"\n \"Why Am I Sad Today\"\n \"Martha My Dear\" (Lennon–McCartney)\n \"And You Say\"\n \"Probably\"\n \"Nothing\"\n \"When The Moon Kisses Town\"\n \"Rainy Day\"\n \"Northern Town\"\n \"Good Night\"\n \"Probably\" (reprise) - hidden track\n\nMusicians\nPeter Freudenthaler - vocals\nVolker Hinkel - guitars, mandolin, blues harp, keyboards and backing vocals\nRoland Röhl - keyboards, accordion and backing vocals\nThomas Mangold - bass, double bass and backing vocals\nRalf Wochele - drums and backing vocals\nOliver Frager - trumpet and French horn\nBob Perry - trombone and tuba\nGitte Haus - backing vocals\nJette Schniering - cello\nOliver Maguire - weatherforecast on \"Rainy Day\"\n\nSingles\n\"Why Did She Go?\"\n\"Probably\"\n\"Rainy Day\"\n\n1997 albums\nFools Garden albums\nIntercord albums" ]
[ "Richard Stallman", "Terminology", "Can you provide information on Terminology?", "Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world,", "Was he very popular or very well known for this?", "I don't know.", "What else was unique about his terminology?", "He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (", "Why did he say that?", "argues that the term \"intellectual property\" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics" ]	C_48eeef8db60c4df68ba565e3cc185e20_0	Did people listen to what he told them?	5	Did anyone listen to what Richard Stallman said about terminology?	Richard Stallman	Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copyright). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agree to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term "intellectual property" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other laws by lumping together areas of law that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues. These laws originated separately, evolved differently, cover different activities, have different rules, and raise different public policy issues. Copyright law was designed to promote authorship and art, and covers the details of a work of authorship or art. Patent law was intended to encourage publication of ideas, at the price of finite monopolies over these ideas - a price that may be worth paying in some fields and not in others. Trademark law was not intended to promote any business activity, but simply to enable buyers to know what they are buying. An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: I think it is ok for authors (please let's not call them creators, they are not gods) to ask for money for copies of their works (please let's not devalue these works by calling them content) in order to gain income (the term compensation falsely implies it is a matter of making up for some kind of damages). CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Richard Matthew Stallman (; born March 16, 1953), also known by his initials, rms, is an American free software movement activist and programmer. He campaigns for software to be distributed in such a manner, so that its users receive the freedoms to use, study, distribute, and modify that software. Software that ensures these freedoms is termed free software. Stallman launched the GNU Project, founded the Free Software Foundation, developed the GNU Compiler Collection and GNU Emacs, and wrote the GNU General Public License. Stallman launched the GNU Project in September 1983 to write a Unix-like computer operating system composed entirely of free software. With this, he also launched the free software movement. He has been the GNU project's lead architect and organizer, and developed a number of pieces of widely used GNU software including, among others, the GNU Compiler Collection, GNU Debugger, and GNU Emacs text editor. In October 1985 he founded the Free Software Foundation (FSF). Stallman pioneered the concept of copyleft, which uses the principles of copyright law to preserve the right to use, modify, and distribute free software. He is the main author of free software licenses which describe those terms, most notably the GNU General Public License (GPL), the most widely used free software license. In 1989, he co-founded the League for Programming Freedom. Since the mid-1990s, Stallman has spent most of his time advocating for free software, as well as campaigning against software patents, digital rights management (which he refers to as digital restrictions management, calling the more common term misleading), and other legal and technical systems which he sees as taking away users' freedoms. This has included software license agreements, non-disclosure agreements, activation keys, dongles, copy restriction, proprietary formats, and binary executables without source code. In September 2019, Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT after making controversial comments about the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking scandal. Stallman remained head of the GNU Project, and in 2021 returned to the FSF board of directors. Early life Stallman was born March 16, 1953, in New York City, to a family of Jewish heritage. He had a troublesome relationship with his parents and did not feel he had a proper home. He was interested in computers at a young age; when Stallman was a pre-teen at a summer camp, he read manuals for the IBM 7094. From 1967 to 1969, Stallman attended a Columbia University Saturday program for high school students. Stallman was also a volunteer laboratory assistant in the biology department at Rockefeller University. Although he was interested in mathematics and physics, his supervising professor at Rockefeller thought he showed promise as a biologist. His first experience with actual computers was at the IBM New York Scientific Center when he was in high school. He was hired for the summer in 1970, following his senior year of high school, to write a numerical analysis program in Fortran. He completed the task after a couple of weeks ("I swore that I would never use FORTRAN again because I despised it as a language compared with other languages") and spent the rest of the summer writing a text editor in APL and a preprocessor for the PL/I programming language on the IBM System/360. Harvard University and MIT As a first-year student at Harvard University in fall 1970, Stallman was known for his strong performance in Math 55. He was happy: "For the first time in my life, I felt I had found a home at Harvard." In 1971, near the end of his first year at Harvard, he became a programmer at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, and became a regular in the hacker community, where he was usually known by his initials, RMS, which he used in his computer accounts. Stallman received a bachelor's degree in physics (magna cum laude) from Harvard in 1974. Stallman considered staying on at Harvard, but instead decided to enroll as a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He pursued a doctorate in physics for one year, but left that program to focus on his programming at the MIT AI Laboratory. While working (starting in 1975) as a research assistant at MIT under Gerry Sussman, Stallman published a paper (with Sussman) in 1977 on an AI truth maintenance system, called dependency-directed backtracking. This paper was an early work on the problem of intelligent backtracking in constraint satisfaction problems. , the technique Stallman and Sussman introduced is still the most general and powerful form of intelligent backtracking. The technique of constraint recording, wherein partial results of a search are recorded for later reuse, was also introduced in this paper. As a hacker in MIT's AI laboratory, Stallman worked on software projects such as TECO and Emacs for the Incompatible Timesharing System (ITS), as well as the Lisp machine operating system (the CONS of 1974–1976 and the CADR of 1977–1979—this latter unit was commercialized by Symbolics and Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) starting around 1980). He would become an ardent critic of restricted computer access in the lab, which at that time was funded primarily by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). When MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) installed a password control system in 1977, Stallman found a way to decrypt the passwords and sent users messages containing their decoded password, with a suggestion to change it to the empty string (that is, no password) instead, to re-enable anonymous access to the systems. Around 20 percent of the users followed his advice at the time, although passwords ultimately prevailed. Stallman boasted of the success of his campaign for many years afterward. Events leading to GNU In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the hacker culture that Stallman thrived on began to fragment. To prevent software from being used on their competitors' computers, most manufacturers stopped distributing source code and began using copyright and restrictive software licenses to limit or prohibit copying and redistribution. Such proprietary software had existed before, and it became apparent that it would become the norm. This shift in the legal characteristics of software was a consequence triggered by the US Copyright Act of 1976. When Brian Reid in 1979 placed time bombs in the Scribe markup language and word processing system to restrict unlicensed access to the software, Stallman proclaimed it "a crime against humanity". During an interview in 2008, he clarified that it is blocking the user's freedom that he believes is a crime, not the issue of charging for software. Stallman's texinfo is a GPL replacement, loosely based on Scribe; the original version was finished in 1986. In 1980, Stallman and some other hackers at the AI Lab were refused access to the source code for the software of a newly installed laser printer, the Xerox 9700. Stallman had modified the software for the Lab's previous laser printer (the XGP, Xerographic Printer), so it electronically messaged a user when the person's job was printed, and would message all logged-in users waiting for print jobs if the printer was jammed. Not being able to add these features to the new printer was a major inconvenience, as the printer was on a different floor from most of the users. This experience convinced Stallman of people's need to be able to freely modify the software they use. Richard Greenblatt, a fellow AI Lab hacker, founded Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) to market Lisp machines, which he and Tom Knight designed at the lab. Greenblatt rejected outside investment, believing that the proceeds from the construction and sale of a few machines could be profitably reinvested in the growth of the company. In contrast, the other hackers felt that the venture capital-funded approach was better. As no agreement could be reached, hackers from the latter camp founded Symbolics, with the aid of Russ Noftsker, an AI Lab administrator. Symbolics recruited most of the remaining hackers including notable hacker Bill Gosper, who then left the AI Lab. Symbolics also forced Greenblatt to resign by citing MIT policies. While both companies delivered proprietary software, Stallman believed that LMI, unlike Symbolics, had tried to avoid hurting the lab's community. For two years, from 1982 to the end of 1983, Stallman worked by himself to clone the output of the Symbolics programmers, with the aim of preventing them from gaining a monopoly on the lab's computers. Stallman argues that software users should have the freedom to share with their neighbors and be able to study and make changes to the software that they use. He maintains that attempts by proprietary software vendors to prohibit these acts are antisocial and unethical. The phrase "software wants to be free" is often incorrectly attributed to him, and Stallman argues that this is a misstatement of his philosophy. He argues that freedom is vital for the sake of users and society as a moral value, and not merely for pragmatic reasons such as possibly developing technically superior software. Eric S. Raymond, one of the creators of the open-source movement, argues that moral arguments, rather than pragmatic ones, alienate potential allies and hurt the end goal of removing code secrecy. In February 1984, Stallman quit his job at MIT to work full-time on the GNU project, which he had announced in September 1983. Since then, he had remained affiliated with MIT as an unpaid "visiting scientist" in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. Until "around 1998", he maintained an office at the Institute that doubled as his legal residence. GNU project Stallman announced the plan for the GNU operating system in September 1983 on several ARPANET mailing lists and USENET. He started the project on his own and describes: "As an operating system developer, I had the right skills for this job. So even though I could not take success for granted, I realized that I was elected to do the job. I chose to make the system compatible with Unix so that it would be portable, and so that Unix users could easily switch to it." In 1985, Stallman published the GNU Manifesto, which outlined his motivation for creating a free operating system called GNU, which would be compatible with Unix. The name GNU is a recursive acronym for "GNU's Not Unix". Soon after, he started a nonprofit corporation called the Free Software Foundation to employ free software programmers and provide a legal infrastructure for the free software movement. Stallman was the nonsalaried president of the FSF, which is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in Massachusetts. Stallman popularized the concept of copyleft, a legal mechanism to protect the modification and redistribution rights for free software. It was first implemented in the GNU Emacs General Public License, and in 1989 the first program-independent GNU General Public License (GPL) was released. By then, much of the GNU system had been completed. Stallman was responsible for contributing many necessary tools, including a text editor (Emacs), compiler (GCC), debugger (GNU Debugger), and a build automator (GNU make). The notable omission was a kernel. In 1990, members of the GNU project began using Carnegie Mellon's Mach microkernel in a project called GNU Hurd, which has yet to achieve the maturity level required for full POSIX compliance. In 1991, Linus Torvalds, a Finnish student, used the GNU's development tools to produce the free monolithic Linux kernel. The existing programs from the GNU project were readily ported to run on the resultant platform. Most sources use the name Linux to refer to the general-purpose operating system thus formed, while Stallman and the FSF call it GNU/Linux. This has been a longstanding naming controversy in the free software community. Stallman argues that not using GNU in the name of the operating system unfairly disparages the value of the GNU project and harms the sustainability of the free software movement by breaking the link between the software and the free software philosophy of the GNU project. Stallman's influences on hacker culture include the name POSIX and the Emacs editor. On Unix systems, GNU Emacs's popularity rivaled that of another editor vi, spawning an editor war. Stallman's take on this was to canonize himself as St. IGNUcius of the Church of Emacs and acknowledge that "vi vi vi is the editor of the beast", while "using a free version of vi is not a sin; it is a penance". On his homepage Stallman explains what a life in the Church of Emacs means to its members: "Sainthood in the Church of Emacs requires living a life of purity—but in the Church of Emacs, this does not require celibacy (a sigh of relief is heard)". In 1992, developers at Lucid Inc. doing their own work on Emacs clashed with Stallman and ultimately forked the software into what would become XEmacs. The technology journalist Andrew Leonard has characterized what he sees as Stallman's uncompromising stubbornness as common among elite computer programmers: In 2018, Stallman instituted "Kind Communication Guidelines" for the GNU project to help its mailing list discussions remain constructive while avoiding explicitly promoting diversity. In October 2019, a public statement signed by 33 maintainers of the GNU project asserted that Stallman's behaviour had "undermined a core value of the GNU project: the empowerment of all computer users" and called for "GNU maintainers to collectively decide about the organization of the project". The statement was published soon after Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT in September 2019. In spite of that, Stallman remained head of the GNU project. Activism Stallman has written many essays on software freedom, and has been an outspoken political campaigner for the free software movement since the early 1990s. The speeches he has regularly given are titled The GNU Project and the Free Software Movement, The Dangers of Software Patents, and Copyright and Community in the Age of Computer Networks. In 2006 and 2007, during the eighteen month public consultation for the drafting of version 3 of the GNU General Public License, he added a fourth topic explaining the proposed changes. Stallman's staunch advocacy for free software inspired the creation of the Virtual Richard M. Stallman (vrms), software that analyzes the packages currently installed on a Debian GNU/Linux system, and reports those that are from the non-free tree. Stallman disagrees with parts of Debian's definition of free software. In 1999, Stallman called for development of a free online encyclopedia through the means of inviting the public to contribute articles. The resulting GNUPedia was eventually retired in favour of the emerging Wikipedia, which had similar aims and was enjoying greater success. Stallman is a world traveler and has visited at least 65 countries, mostly to speak about free software and the GNU project. According to Stallman, the free software movement has much in common with that of Mahatma Gandhi. Stallman is also highly critical of the effect that drug patents have had on developing countries. In Venezuela, Stallman has delivered public speeches and promoted the adoption of free software in the state's oil company (PDVSA), in municipal government, and in the nation's military. In meetings with Hugo Chávez and in public speeches, Stallman criticised some policies on television broadcasting, free speech rights, and privacy. Stallman was on the Advisory Council of Latin American television station teleSUR from its launch but resigned in February 2011, criticizing pro-Gaddafi propaganda during the Arab Spring. In August 2006, at his meetings with the government of the Indian State of Kerala, he persuaded officials to discard proprietary software, such as Microsoft's, at state-run schools. This has resulted in a landmark decision to switch all school computers in 12,500 high schools from Windows to a free software operating system. After personal meetings, Stallman obtained positive statements about the free software movement from the then-president of India, , French 2007 presidential candidate Ségolène Royal, and the president of Ecuador Rafael Correa. Stallman has participated in protests about software patents, digital rights management, and proprietary software. Protesting against proprietary software in April 2006, Stallman held a "Don't buy from ATI, enemy of your freedom" placard at a speech by an ATI representative in the building where Stallman worked, resulting in the police being called. AMD has since acquired ATI and has taken steps to make their hardware documentation available for use by the free software community. In response to Apple's Macintosh look and feel lawsuits against Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard in 1988, Stallman called for a boycott of Apple products on the grounds that a successful look and feel lawsuit would "put an end to free software that could substitute for commercial software". The boycott was lifted in 1995, which meant the FSF started to accept patches to GNU software for Apple operating systems. Stallman has characterized Steve Jobs as having a "malign influence" on computing because of Jobs' leadership in guiding Apple to produce closed platforms. In 1993, while Jobs was at NeXT, Jobs asked Stallman if he could distribute a modified GCC in two parts, one part under GPL and the other part, an Objective-C preprocessor under a proprietary license. Stallman initially thought this would be legal, but since he also thought it would be "very undesirable for free software", he asked a lawyer for advice. The response he got was that judges would consider such schemes to be "subterfuges" and would be very harsh toward them, and a judge would ask whether it was "really" one program, rather than how the parts were labeled. Therefore, Stallman sent a message back to Jobs which said they believed Jobs' plan was not allowed by the GPL, which resulted in NeXT releasing the Objective-C front end under GPL. For a period of time, Stallman used a notebook from the One Laptop per Child program. Stallman's computer is a refurbished ThinkPad T400s with Libreboot, a free BIOS replacement, and the GNU/Linux distribution Trisquel. Before the ThinkPad T400s, Stallman used a Thinkpad X60 with Libreboot and Trisquel GNU/Linux. And before the X60, Stallman used the Lemote Yeeloong netbook (using the same company's Loongson processor) which he chose because, like the X60 and the T400s, it could run with free software at the BIOS level, stating "freedom is my priority. I've campaigned for freedom since 1983, and I am not going to surrender that freedom for the sake of a more convenient computer." Stallman's Lemote was stolen from him in 2012 while in Argentina. Before Trisquel, Stallman has used the gNewSense operating system. Copyright reduction Stallman has regularly given a talk entitled "Copyright vs. Community" where he reviews the state of digital rights management (DRM) and names many of the products and corporations which he boycotts. His approach to DRM is best summed up by the FSF Defective by Design campaign. In the talks, he makes proposals for a "reduced copyright" and suggests a 10-year limit on copyright. He suggests that, instead of restrictions on sharing, authors be supported using a tax, with revenues distributed among them based on cubic roots of their popularity to ensure that "fairly successful non-stars" receive a greater share than they do now (compare with private copying levy which is associated with proponents of strong copyright), or a convenient anonymous micropayment system for people to support authors directly. He indicates that no form of non-commercial sharing of copies should be considered a copyright violation. He has advocated civil disobedience in a comment on Ley Sinde. Stallman has also helped and supported the International Music Score Library Project in getting back online, after it had been taken down on October 19, 2007, following a cease and desist letter from Universal Edition. Stallman mentions the dangers some e-books bring compared to paper books, with the example of the Amazon Kindle e-reader that prevents the copying of e-books and allows Amazon to order automatic deletion of a book. He says that such e-books present a big step backward with respect to paper books by being less easy to use, copy, lend to others or sell, also mentioning that Amazon e-books cannot be bought anonymously. His short story "The Right to Read" provides a picture of a dystopian future if the right to share books is impeded. He objects to many of the terms within typical end-user license agreements that accompany e-books. Stallman discourages the use of several storage technologies such as DVD or Blu-ray video discs because the content of such media is encrypted. He considers manufacturers' use of encryption on non-secret data (to force the user to view certain promotional material) as a conspiracy. He recognized the Sony BMG copy protection rootkit scandal to be a criminal act by Sony. Stallman supports a general boycott of Sony for its legal actions against George Hotz. Stallman has suggested that the United States government may encourage the use of software as a service because this would allow them to access users' data without needing a search warrant. He denies being an anarchist despite his wariness of some legislation and the fact that he has "advocated strongly for user privacy and his own view of software freedom". Terminologies Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copying not approved by the publisher). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agrees to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term intellectual property is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other areas of law by lumping together things that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues, writing: An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: Open source and Free software His requests that people use certain terms, and his ongoing efforts to convince people of the importance of terminology, are a source of regular misunderstanding and friction with parts of the free software and open-source communities. After initially accepting the concept, Stallman rejects a common alternative term, open-source software, because it does not call to mind what Stallman sees as the value of the software: freedom. He wrote, "Free software is a political movement; open source is a development model." Thus, he believes that the use of the term will not inform people of the freedom issues, and will not lead to people valuing and defending their freedom. Two alternatives which Stallman does accept are software libre and unfettered software, but free software is the term he asks people to use in English. For similar reasons, he argues for the term proprietary software or non-free software rather than closed-source software, when referring to software that is not free software. Linux and GNU Stallman asks that the term GNU/Linux, which he pronounces , be used to refer to the operating system created by combining the GNU system and the kernel Linux. Stallman refers to this operating system as "a variant of GNU, and the GNU Project is its principal developer". He claims that the connection between the GNU project's philosophy and its software is broken when people refer to the combination as merely Linux. Starting around 2003, he began also using the term GNU+Linux, which he pronounces , to prevent others from pronouncing the phrase GNU/Linux as , which would erroneously imply that the kernel Linux is maintained by the GNU project. The creator of Linux, Linus Torvalds, has publicly stated that he objects to modification of the name, and that the rename "is their [the FSF] confusion not ours". Surveillance resistance Stallman professes admiration for Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. He has spoken against government and corporate surveillance on many occasions. He refers to mobile phones as "portable surveillance and tracking devices", refusing to own a cell phone due to the lack of phones running entirely on free software. He also avoids using a key card to enter his office building since key card systems track each location and time that someone enters the building using a card. He usually does not browse the web directly from his personal computer. Instead, he uses GNU Womb's grab-url-from-mail utility, an email-based proxy which downloads the web page content and then emails it to the user. More recently, he stated that he accesses all web sites via Tor, except for Wikipedia (which generally disallows editing from Tor unless users have an IP block exemption). Personal life Stallman resides in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He speaks English, French, Spanish and some Indonesian. He has said that he is "an atheist of Jewish ancestry" and often wears a button that reads "Impeach God". Stallman has written a collection of filk music and parody songs. He is childfree and antinatalist. He denies having Asperger's, but has sometimes speculated whether he could have a "shadow" version of it. Resignation from MIT and FSF In August and September 2019, it was learned that Jeffrey Epstein had made donations to MIT, and in the wake of this, MIT Media Lab director Joi Ito resigned. An internal MIT CSAIL listserv mailing list thread was started to protest the coverup of MIT's connections to Epstein. In the thread, discussion had turned to deceased MIT professor Marvin Minsky, who was named by Virginia Giuffre as one of the people that Epstein had directed her to have sex with. Giuffre, a minor at the time, had been caught in Epstein's underage sex trafficking ring. In response to a comment where one reply stated that Minsky "is accused of assaulting one of Epstein's victims", Stallman questioned whether the word "assault" was applicable in that case, arguing that "the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to conceal that from most of his associates". When challenged by other members of the mailing list, he added "It is morally absurd to define 'rape' in a way that depends on minor details such as which country it was in or whether the victim was 18 years old or 17". Stallman remained critical of Epstein and his role, stating "We know that Giuffre was being coerced into sex – by Epstein. She was being harmed." Stallman's comments along with a compilation of accusations against him were published to the public via Medium by Selam Gano, who outlined MIT alumnae claims of sexual harassment and contributions to a hostile environment by Stallman. Vice published a copy of the email chain on September 13, 2019, drawing attention to Stallman's comments. Stallman's writings from 2013 and earlier related to underage sex and child pornography laws resurfaced, increasing the controversy. Tied to his comments regarding Minsky, this led to several calling for Stallman's resignation. On September 14, Stallman acknowledged that since the time of his past writings, he had learned that there were problems with underage sex, writing on his blog: "Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that." On September 16, Stallman announced his resignation from both MIT and FSF, "due to pressure on MIT and me over a series of misunderstandings and mischaracterizations". In a post on his website, Stallman asserted that his posts to the email lists were not to defend Epstein, stating "Nothing could be further from the truth. I've called him a 'serial rapist,' and said he deserved to be imprisoned. But many people now believe I defended him—and other inaccurate claims—and feel a real hurt because of what they believe I said. I'm sorry for that hurt. I wish I could have prevented the misunderstanding." Return to FSF In March 2021, at LibrePlanet2021, Stallman announced his return to the FSF board of directors. Shortly thereafter, an open letter was published on GitHub asking for Stallman's removal, along with the entire FSF board of directors, with the support of prominent open-source organizations including GNOME and Mozilla. The letter includes a list of accusations against Stallman. In response, an open letter asking for the FSF to retain Stallman was also published, arguing that Stallman's statements were mischaracterized, misunderstood and that they need to be interpreted in context. The FSF board in April 12 made a statement re-affirming its decision to bring back Richard Stallman. Following this, Stallman issued a statement explaining his poor social skills and apologizing. Multiple organizations criticized, defunded and/or cut ties with the FSF, including: Red Hat, the Free Software Foundation Europe, the Software Freedom Conservacy, SUSE, the OSI, the Document Foundation, the EFF, KDE, and the Tor Project. Debian declined to issue a statement after a community voting on the issue. However, this had relatively little impact on the FSF, as it has stated that direct financial support from corporations accounted for less than 3% of its revenue in the most recent fiscal year. Honors and awards 1986: Honorary lifetime membership of the Chalmers University of Technology Computer Society 1990: Exceptional merit award MacArthur Fellowship ("genius grant") 1990: The Association for Computing Machinery's Grace Murray Hopper Award "For pioneering work in the development of the extensible editor EMACS (Editing Macros)" 1996: Honorary doctorate from Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology 1998: Electronic Frontier Foundation's Pioneer Award 1999: Yuri Rubinsky Memorial Award 2001: The Takeda Techno-Entrepreneurship Award for Social/Economic Well-Being () 2001: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Glasgow 2002: US National Academy of Engineering membership "for starting the GNU project, which produced influential, non-proprietary software tools, and for founding the free software movement" 2003: Honorary doctorate, from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel 2004: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Nacional de Salta 2004: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería del Perú 2007: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Inca Garcilaso de la Vega 2007: First Premio Internacional Extremadura al Conocimiento Libre 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad de Los Angeles de Chimbote 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Pavia 2008: Honorary doctorate from the Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, in Peru 2009: Honorary doctorate, from Lakehead University 2011: Honorary doctorate, from National University of Córdoba 2012: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad César Vallejo de Trujillo, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Latinoamericana Cima de Tacna, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad José Faustino Sánchez Carrión, in Peru 2014: Honorary doctorate, from Concordia University, in Montréal 2015: ACM Software System Award "For the development and leadership of GCC" 2016: Honorary doctorate, from Pierre and Marie Curie University 2016: Social Medicine award, from GNU Solidario Selected publications Manuals Selected essays See also 9882 Stallman Free as in Freedom, a biography by Sam Williams Free Software Street History of free and open-source software Lisp Machine Lisp Revolution OS vrms Free Software Foundation References External links In Support of Richard Stallman, a website which advocates for Stallman. Essays on the Philosophy of the GNU Project, almost all written by Stallman 1953 births Activists from New York City Jewish American atheists American bloggers American computer programmers Anti-natalists Articles containing video clips Artificial intelligence researchers Copyright activists Education activists Emacs Filkers Free software people Free software programmers GNU people Grace Murray Hopper Award laureates Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences alumni Internet activists Jewish American scientists Linux people Lisp (programming language) people Living people MacArthur Fellows Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni Members of the Free Software Foundation board of directors Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering Privacy activists Programming language designers	false	[ "Imperial Parliament may refer to: Torres’s Empire \n\nThe Land of 364(you already know). Dictator Torres, reigned from year 1-2022 present time. Helped with Paul revere, Lewis and Clark with the Louisiana Purchase, invented the pull up, told President JFK to ride with the top on(didn’t listen), told President Abraham Lincoln to don’t signed the emancipation of liberation(didn’t listen), told MLK to stay away from the balcony after giving his lil pep rally speech(didn’t listen). In Line Supreme Leader Torres(O-Dawg) has helped many leaders and followers long live 364. \nDuring the British Empire, the Parliament of the United Kingdom\nThe Imperial Council of Austria\nThe General Assembly of the Ottoman Empire", "The Elf Maiden is a Sámi fairy tale, collected by J. C. Poestion in Lapplandische Märchen. Andrew Lang included it in The Brown Fairy Book.\n\nSynopsis\n\nOnce upon a time, two men fell in love with the same maiden. One day, on a fishing expedition to an island, one of them noticed she favored the other, and so he tricked the other into staying behind. \n\nThe man, stranded on the island, survived there until Christmas, when he saw a small boat approach, on which were two young women, who were better dressed than the others. The two young maidens saw the man sitting by a bundle of sticks, and one of them, to find out what he was made of, pinched him. As she did, her fingers caught a pin, and it drew blood. The rest of the company fled, leaving behind the maiden and a ring of keys. The maiden told the man that he had drawn her blood and now must marry her. The man objected, arguing that they could not survive on this island, but the maiden promised to provide for them both. Thus he agreed to married her, and she kept her word, and did provide for them, though he never saw how.\n\nWhen the man's people returned to fish, they landed on the far side of the island at night. The maiden, now the man's wife, told him not to stir no matter what he heard. A great clatter, like carpentry, arose, and the man nearly jumped up before he remembered. In the morning the man found that a fine house had been built for them. His wife then told him to pick a place for a cow-shed though they had no cows, and, the following morning, he found it was built in the same manner.\n\nHis wife then took him to visit her parents. The man and his wife were made welcome, but when it came time to leave, the man's wife warned him to jump quickly over the threshold, and not turn around until he was inside their home, whatever he heard. The man did, though as he did, his wife's father threw a hammer at him that would have broken his legs if he had not moved quickly. Even though he heard cattle following, the man did not look back. When he had his hand on the door, he thought he was safe, and looked, but by then half of the cows had vanished. Still, there were enough for them both to be rich.\n\nThe man's wife vanished from time to time. When the man asked her why, his wife told him that she went against her will, but if he drove a nail into the threshold, she would remain all the time, so he did. And so she did. And they lived happily ever after.\n\nExternal links\nThe Elf Maiden\n\nSámi fairy tales\nElves\nFemale characters in fairy tales" ]
[ "Richard Stallman", "Terminology", "Can you provide information on Terminology?", "Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world,", "Was he very popular or very well known for this?", "I don't know.", "What else was unique about his terminology?", "He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (", "Why did he say that?", "argues that the term \"intellectual property\" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics", "Did people listen to what he told them?", "I don't know." ]	C_48eeef8db60c4df68ba565e3cc185e20_0	What other terminology did he use?	6	What other terminology did Richard Stallman use, aside from arguing against "intellectual property"?	Richard Stallman	Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copyright). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agree to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term "intellectual property" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other laws by lumping together areas of law that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues. These laws originated separately, evolved differently, cover different activities, have different rules, and raise different public policy issues. Copyright law was designed to promote authorship and art, and covers the details of a work of authorship or art. Patent law was intended to encourage publication of ideas, at the price of finite monopolies over these ideas - a price that may be worth paying in some fields and not in others. Trademark law was not intended to promote any business activity, but simply to enable buyers to know what they are buying. An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: I think it is ok for authors (please let's not call them creators, they are not gods) to ask for money for copies of their works (please let's not devalue these works by calling them content) in order to gain income (the term compensation falsely implies it is a matter of making up for some kind of damages). CANNOTANSWER	cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives	Richard Matthew Stallman (; born March 16, 1953), also known by his initials, rms, is an American free software movement activist and programmer. He campaigns for software to be distributed in such a manner, so that its users receive the freedoms to use, study, distribute, and modify that software. Software that ensures these freedoms is termed free software. Stallman launched the GNU Project, founded the Free Software Foundation, developed the GNU Compiler Collection and GNU Emacs, and wrote the GNU General Public License. Stallman launched the GNU Project in September 1983 to write a Unix-like computer operating system composed entirely of free software. With this, he also launched the free software movement. He has been the GNU project's lead architect and organizer, and developed a number of pieces of widely used GNU software including, among others, the GNU Compiler Collection, GNU Debugger, and GNU Emacs text editor. In October 1985 he founded the Free Software Foundation (FSF). Stallman pioneered the concept of copyleft, which uses the principles of copyright law to preserve the right to use, modify, and distribute free software. He is the main author of free software licenses which describe those terms, most notably the GNU General Public License (GPL), the most widely used free software license. In 1989, he co-founded the League for Programming Freedom. Since the mid-1990s, Stallman has spent most of his time advocating for free software, as well as campaigning against software patents, digital rights management (which he refers to as digital restrictions management, calling the more common term misleading), and other legal and technical systems which he sees as taking away users' freedoms. This has included software license agreements, non-disclosure agreements, activation keys, dongles, copy restriction, proprietary formats, and binary executables without source code. In September 2019, Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT after making controversial comments about the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking scandal. Stallman remained head of the GNU Project, and in 2021 returned to the FSF board of directors. Early life Stallman was born March 16, 1953, in New York City, to a family of Jewish heritage. He had a troublesome relationship with his parents and did not feel he had a proper home. He was interested in computers at a young age; when Stallman was a pre-teen at a summer camp, he read manuals for the IBM 7094. From 1967 to 1969, Stallman attended a Columbia University Saturday program for high school students. Stallman was also a volunteer laboratory assistant in the biology department at Rockefeller University. Although he was interested in mathematics and physics, his supervising professor at Rockefeller thought he showed promise as a biologist. His first experience with actual computers was at the IBM New York Scientific Center when he was in high school. He was hired for the summer in 1970, following his senior year of high school, to write a numerical analysis program in Fortran. He completed the task after a couple of weeks ("I swore that I would never use FORTRAN again because I despised it as a language compared with other languages") and spent the rest of the summer writing a text editor in APL and a preprocessor for the PL/I programming language on the IBM System/360. Harvard University and MIT As a first-year student at Harvard University in fall 1970, Stallman was known for his strong performance in Math 55. He was happy: "For the first time in my life, I felt I had found a home at Harvard." In 1971, near the end of his first year at Harvard, he became a programmer at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, and became a regular in the hacker community, where he was usually known by his initials, RMS, which he used in his computer accounts. Stallman received a bachelor's degree in physics (magna cum laude) from Harvard in 1974. Stallman considered staying on at Harvard, but instead decided to enroll as a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He pursued a doctorate in physics for one year, but left that program to focus on his programming at the MIT AI Laboratory. While working (starting in 1975) as a research assistant at MIT under Gerry Sussman, Stallman published a paper (with Sussman) in 1977 on an AI truth maintenance system, called dependency-directed backtracking. This paper was an early work on the problem of intelligent backtracking in constraint satisfaction problems. , the technique Stallman and Sussman introduced is still the most general and powerful form of intelligent backtracking. The technique of constraint recording, wherein partial results of a search are recorded for later reuse, was also introduced in this paper. As a hacker in MIT's AI laboratory, Stallman worked on software projects such as TECO and Emacs for the Incompatible Timesharing System (ITS), as well as the Lisp machine operating system (the CONS of 1974–1976 and the CADR of 1977–1979—this latter unit was commercialized by Symbolics and Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) starting around 1980). He would become an ardent critic of restricted computer access in the lab, which at that time was funded primarily by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). When MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) installed a password control system in 1977, Stallman found a way to decrypt the passwords and sent users messages containing their decoded password, with a suggestion to change it to the empty string (that is, no password) instead, to re-enable anonymous access to the systems. Around 20 percent of the users followed his advice at the time, although passwords ultimately prevailed. Stallman boasted of the success of his campaign for many years afterward. Events leading to GNU In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the hacker culture that Stallman thrived on began to fragment. To prevent software from being used on their competitors' computers, most manufacturers stopped distributing source code and began using copyright and restrictive software licenses to limit or prohibit copying and redistribution. Such proprietary software had existed before, and it became apparent that it would become the norm. This shift in the legal characteristics of software was a consequence triggered by the US Copyright Act of 1976. When Brian Reid in 1979 placed time bombs in the Scribe markup language and word processing system to restrict unlicensed access to the software, Stallman proclaimed it "a crime against humanity". During an interview in 2008, he clarified that it is blocking the user's freedom that he believes is a crime, not the issue of charging for software. Stallman's texinfo is a GPL replacement, loosely based on Scribe; the original version was finished in 1986. In 1980, Stallman and some other hackers at the AI Lab were refused access to the source code for the software of a newly installed laser printer, the Xerox 9700. Stallman had modified the software for the Lab's previous laser printer (the XGP, Xerographic Printer), so it electronically messaged a user when the person's job was printed, and would message all logged-in users waiting for print jobs if the printer was jammed. Not being able to add these features to the new printer was a major inconvenience, as the printer was on a different floor from most of the users. This experience convinced Stallman of people's need to be able to freely modify the software they use. Richard Greenblatt, a fellow AI Lab hacker, founded Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) to market Lisp machines, which he and Tom Knight designed at the lab. Greenblatt rejected outside investment, believing that the proceeds from the construction and sale of a few machines could be profitably reinvested in the growth of the company. In contrast, the other hackers felt that the venture capital-funded approach was better. As no agreement could be reached, hackers from the latter camp founded Symbolics, with the aid of Russ Noftsker, an AI Lab administrator. Symbolics recruited most of the remaining hackers including notable hacker Bill Gosper, who then left the AI Lab. Symbolics also forced Greenblatt to resign by citing MIT policies. While both companies delivered proprietary software, Stallman believed that LMI, unlike Symbolics, had tried to avoid hurting the lab's community. For two years, from 1982 to the end of 1983, Stallman worked by himself to clone the output of the Symbolics programmers, with the aim of preventing them from gaining a monopoly on the lab's computers. Stallman argues that software users should have the freedom to share with their neighbors and be able to study and make changes to the software that they use. He maintains that attempts by proprietary software vendors to prohibit these acts are antisocial and unethical. The phrase "software wants to be free" is often incorrectly attributed to him, and Stallman argues that this is a misstatement of his philosophy. He argues that freedom is vital for the sake of users and society as a moral value, and not merely for pragmatic reasons such as possibly developing technically superior software. Eric S. Raymond, one of the creators of the open-source movement, argues that moral arguments, rather than pragmatic ones, alienate potential allies and hurt the end goal of removing code secrecy. In February 1984, Stallman quit his job at MIT to work full-time on the GNU project, which he had announced in September 1983. Since then, he had remained affiliated with MIT as an unpaid "visiting scientist" in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. Until "around 1998", he maintained an office at the Institute that doubled as his legal residence. GNU project Stallman announced the plan for the GNU operating system in September 1983 on several ARPANET mailing lists and USENET. He started the project on his own and describes: "As an operating system developer, I had the right skills for this job. So even though I could not take success for granted, I realized that I was elected to do the job. I chose to make the system compatible with Unix so that it would be portable, and so that Unix users could easily switch to it." In 1985, Stallman published the GNU Manifesto, which outlined his motivation for creating a free operating system called GNU, which would be compatible with Unix. The name GNU is a recursive acronym for "GNU's Not Unix". Soon after, he started a nonprofit corporation called the Free Software Foundation to employ free software programmers and provide a legal infrastructure for the free software movement. Stallman was the nonsalaried president of the FSF, which is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in Massachusetts. Stallman popularized the concept of copyleft, a legal mechanism to protect the modification and redistribution rights for free software. It was first implemented in the GNU Emacs General Public License, and in 1989 the first program-independent GNU General Public License (GPL) was released. By then, much of the GNU system had been completed. Stallman was responsible for contributing many necessary tools, including a text editor (Emacs), compiler (GCC), debugger (GNU Debugger), and a build automator (GNU make). The notable omission was a kernel. In 1990, members of the GNU project began using Carnegie Mellon's Mach microkernel in a project called GNU Hurd, which has yet to achieve the maturity level required for full POSIX compliance. In 1991, Linus Torvalds, a Finnish student, used the GNU's development tools to produce the free monolithic Linux kernel. The existing programs from the GNU project were readily ported to run on the resultant platform. Most sources use the name Linux to refer to the general-purpose operating system thus formed, while Stallman and the FSF call it GNU/Linux. This has been a longstanding naming controversy in the free software community. Stallman argues that not using GNU in the name of the operating system unfairly disparages the value of the GNU project and harms the sustainability of the free software movement by breaking the link between the software and the free software philosophy of the GNU project. Stallman's influences on hacker culture include the name POSIX and the Emacs editor. On Unix systems, GNU Emacs's popularity rivaled that of another editor vi, spawning an editor war. Stallman's take on this was to canonize himself as St. IGNUcius of the Church of Emacs and acknowledge that "vi vi vi is the editor of the beast", while "using a free version of vi is not a sin; it is a penance". On his homepage Stallman explains what a life in the Church of Emacs means to its members: "Sainthood in the Church of Emacs requires living a life of purity—but in the Church of Emacs, this does not require celibacy (a sigh of relief is heard)". In 1992, developers at Lucid Inc. doing their own work on Emacs clashed with Stallman and ultimately forked the software into what would become XEmacs. The technology journalist Andrew Leonard has characterized what he sees as Stallman's uncompromising stubbornness as common among elite computer programmers: In 2018, Stallman instituted "Kind Communication Guidelines" for the GNU project to help its mailing list discussions remain constructive while avoiding explicitly promoting diversity. In October 2019, a public statement signed by 33 maintainers of the GNU project asserted that Stallman's behaviour had "undermined a core value of the GNU project: the empowerment of all computer users" and called for "GNU maintainers to collectively decide about the organization of the project". The statement was published soon after Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT in September 2019. In spite of that, Stallman remained head of the GNU project. Activism Stallman has written many essays on software freedom, and has been an outspoken political campaigner for the free software movement since the early 1990s. The speeches he has regularly given are titled The GNU Project and the Free Software Movement, The Dangers of Software Patents, and Copyright and Community in the Age of Computer Networks. In 2006 and 2007, during the eighteen month public consultation for the drafting of version 3 of the GNU General Public License, he added a fourth topic explaining the proposed changes. Stallman's staunch advocacy for free software inspired the creation of the Virtual Richard M. Stallman (vrms), software that analyzes the packages currently installed on a Debian GNU/Linux system, and reports those that are from the non-free tree. Stallman disagrees with parts of Debian's definition of free software. In 1999, Stallman called for development of a free online encyclopedia through the means of inviting the public to contribute articles. The resulting GNUPedia was eventually retired in favour of the emerging Wikipedia, which had similar aims and was enjoying greater success. Stallman is a world traveler and has visited at least 65 countries, mostly to speak about free software and the GNU project. According to Stallman, the free software movement has much in common with that of Mahatma Gandhi. Stallman is also highly critical of the effect that drug patents have had on developing countries. In Venezuela, Stallman has delivered public speeches and promoted the adoption of free software in the state's oil company (PDVSA), in municipal government, and in the nation's military. In meetings with Hugo Chávez and in public speeches, Stallman criticised some policies on television broadcasting, free speech rights, and privacy. Stallman was on the Advisory Council of Latin American television station teleSUR from its launch but resigned in February 2011, criticizing pro-Gaddafi propaganda during the Arab Spring. In August 2006, at his meetings with the government of the Indian State of Kerala, he persuaded officials to discard proprietary software, such as Microsoft's, at state-run schools. This has resulted in a landmark decision to switch all school computers in 12,500 high schools from Windows to a free software operating system. After personal meetings, Stallman obtained positive statements about the free software movement from the then-president of India, , French 2007 presidential candidate Ségolène Royal, and the president of Ecuador Rafael Correa. Stallman has participated in protests about software patents, digital rights management, and proprietary software. Protesting against proprietary software in April 2006, Stallman held a "Don't buy from ATI, enemy of your freedom" placard at a speech by an ATI representative in the building where Stallman worked, resulting in the police being called. AMD has since acquired ATI and has taken steps to make their hardware documentation available for use by the free software community. In response to Apple's Macintosh look and feel lawsuits against Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard in 1988, Stallman called for a boycott of Apple products on the grounds that a successful look and feel lawsuit would "put an end to free software that could substitute for commercial software". The boycott was lifted in 1995, which meant the FSF started to accept patches to GNU software for Apple operating systems. Stallman has characterized Steve Jobs as having a "malign influence" on computing because of Jobs' leadership in guiding Apple to produce closed platforms. In 1993, while Jobs was at NeXT, Jobs asked Stallman if he could distribute a modified GCC in two parts, one part under GPL and the other part, an Objective-C preprocessor under a proprietary license. Stallman initially thought this would be legal, but since he also thought it would be "very undesirable for free software", he asked a lawyer for advice. The response he got was that judges would consider such schemes to be "subterfuges" and would be very harsh toward them, and a judge would ask whether it was "really" one program, rather than how the parts were labeled. Therefore, Stallman sent a message back to Jobs which said they believed Jobs' plan was not allowed by the GPL, which resulted in NeXT releasing the Objective-C front end under GPL. For a period of time, Stallman used a notebook from the One Laptop per Child program. Stallman's computer is a refurbished ThinkPad T400s with Libreboot, a free BIOS replacement, and the GNU/Linux distribution Trisquel. Before the ThinkPad T400s, Stallman used a Thinkpad X60 with Libreboot and Trisquel GNU/Linux. And before the X60, Stallman used the Lemote Yeeloong netbook (using the same company's Loongson processor) which he chose because, like the X60 and the T400s, it could run with free software at the BIOS level, stating "freedom is my priority. I've campaigned for freedom since 1983, and I am not going to surrender that freedom for the sake of a more convenient computer." Stallman's Lemote was stolen from him in 2012 while in Argentina. Before Trisquel, Stallman has used the gNewSense operating system. Copyright reduction Stallman has regularly given a talk entitled "Copyright vs. Community" where he reviews the state of digital rights management (DRM) and names many of the products and corporations which he boycotts. His approach to DRM is best summed up by the FSF Defective by Design campaign. In the talks, he makes proposals for a "reduced copyright" and suggests a 10-year limit on copyright. He suggests that, instead of restrictions on sharing, authors be supported using a tax, with revenues distributed among them based on cubic roots of their popularity to ensure that "fairly successful non-stars" receive a greater share than they do now (compare with private copying levy which is associated with proponents of strong copyright), or a convenient anonymous micropayment system for people to support authors directly. He indicates that no form of non-commercial sharing of copies should be considered a copyright violation. He has advocated civil disobedience in a comment on Ley Sinde. Stallman has also helped and supported the International Music Score Library Project in getting back online, after it had been taken down on October 19, 2007, following a cease and desist letter from Universal Edition. Stallman mentions the dangers some e-books bring compared to paper books, with the example of the Amazon Kindle e-reader that prevents the copying of e-books and allows Amazon to order automatic deletion of a book. He says that such e-books present a big step backward with respect to paper books by being less easy to use, copy, lend to others or sell, also mentioning that Amazon e-books cannot be bought anonymously. His short story "The Right to Read" provides a picture of a dystopian future if the right to share books is impeded. He objects to many of the terms within typical end-user license agreements that accompany e-books. Stallman discourages the use of several storage technologies such as DVD or Blu-ray video discs because the content of such media is encrypted. He considers manufacturers' use of encryption on non-secret data (to force the user to view certain promotional material) as a conspiracy. He recognized the Sony BMG copy protection rootkit scandal to be a criminal act by Sony. Stallman supports a general boycott of Sony for its legal actions against George Hotz. Stallman has suggested that the United States government may encourage the use of software as a service because this would allow them to access users' data without needing a search warrant. He denies being an anarchist despite his wariness of some legislation and the fact that he has "advocated strongly for user privacy and his own view of software freedom". Terminologies Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copying not approved by the publisher). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agrees to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term intellectual property is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other areas of law by lumping together things that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues, writing: An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: Open source and Free software His requests that people use certain terms, and his ongoing efforts to convince people of the importance of terminology, are a source of regular misunderstanding and friction with parts of the free software and open-source communities. After initially accepting the concept, Stallman rejects a common alternative term, open-source software, because it does not call to mind what Stallman sees as the value of the software: freedom. He wrote, "Free software is a political movement; open source is a development model." Thus, he believes that the use of the term will not inform people of the freedom issues, and will not lead to people valuing and defending their freedom. Two alternatives which Stallman does accept are software libre and unfettered software, but free software is the term he asks people to use in English. For similar reasons, he argues for the term proprietary software or non-free software rather than closed-source software, when referring to software that is not free software. Linux and GNU Stallman asks that the term GNU/Linux, which he pronounces , be used to refer to the operating system created by combining the GNU system and the kernel Linux. Stallman refers to this operating system as "a variant of GNU, and the GNU Project is its principal developer". He claims that the connection between the GNU project's philosophy and its software is broken when people refer to the combination as merely Linux. Starting around 2003, he began also using the term GNU+Linux, which he pronounces , to prevent others from pronouncing the phrase GNU/Linux as , which would erroneously imply that the kernel Linux is maintained by the GNU project. The creator of Linux, Linus Torvalds, has publicly stated that he objects to modification of the name, and that the rename "is their [the FSF] confusion not ours". Surveillance resistance Stallman professes admiration for Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. He has spoken against government and corporate surveillance on many occasions. He refers to mobile phones as "portable surveillance and tracking devices", refusing to own a cell phone due to the lack of phones running entirely on free software. He also avoids using a key card to enter his office building since key card systems track each location and time that someone enters the building using a card. He usually does not browse the web directly from his personal computer. Instead, he uses GNU Womb's grab-url-from-mail utility, an email-based proxy which downloads the web page content and then emails it to the user. More recently, he stated that he accesses all web sites via Tor, except for Wikipedia (which generally disallows editing from Tor unless users have an IP block exemption). Personal life Stallman resides in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He speaks English, French, Spanish and some Indonesian. He has said that he is "an atheist of Jewish ancestry" and often wears a button that reads "Impeach God". Stallman has written a collection of filk music and parody songs. He is childfree and antinatalist. He denies having Asperger's, but has sometimes speculated whether he could have a "shadow" version of it. Resignation from MIT and FSF In August and September 2019, it was learned that Jeffrey Epstein had made donations to MIT, and in the wake of this, MIT Media Lab director Joi Ito resigned. An internal MIT CSAIL listserv mailing list thread was started to protest the coverup of MIT's connections to Epstein. In the thread, discussion had turned to deceased MIT professor Marvin Minsky, who was named by Virginia Giuffre as one of the people that Epstein had directed her to have sex with. Giuffre, a minor at the time, had been caught in Epstein's underage sex trafficking ring. In response to a comment where one reply stated that Minsky "is accused of assaulting one of Epstein's victims", Stallman questioned whether the word "assault" was applicable in that case, arguing that "the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to conceal that from most of his associates". When challenged by other members of the mailing list, he added "It is morally absurd to define 'rape' in a way that depends on minor details such as which country it was in or whether the victim was 18 years old or 17". Stallman remained critical of Epstein and his role, stating "We know that Giuffre was being coerced into sex – by Epstein. She was being harmed." Stallman's comments along with a compilation of accusations against him were published to the public via Medium by Selam Gano, who outlined MIT alumnae claims of sexual harassment and contributions to a hostile environment by Stallman. Vice published a copy of the email chain on September 13, 2019, drawing attention to Stallman's comments. Stallman's writings from 2013 and earlier related to underage sex and child pornography laws resurfaced, increasing the controversy. Tied to his comments regarding Minsky, this led to several calling for Stallman's resignation. On September 14, Stallman acknowledged that since the time of his past writings, he had learned that there were problems with underage sex, writing on his blog: "Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that." On September 16, Stallman announced his resignation from both MIT and FSF, "due to pressure on MIT and me over a series of misunderstandings and mischaracterizations". In a post on his website, Stallman asserted that his posts to the email lists were not to defend Epstein, stating "Nothing could be further from the truth. I've called him a 'serial rapist,' and said he deserved to be imprisoned. But many people now believe I defended him—and other inaccurate claims—and feel a real hurt because of what they believe I said. I'm sorry for that hurt. I wish I could have prevented the misunderstanding." Return to FSF In March 2021, at LibrePlanet2021, Stallman announced his return to the FSF board of directors. Shortly thereafter, an open letter was published on GitHub asking for Stallman's removal, along with the entire FSF board of directors, with the support of prominent open-source organizations including GNOME and Mozilla. The letter includes a list of accusations against Stallman. In response, an open letter asking for the FSF to retain Stallman was also published, arguing that Stallman's statements were mischaracterized, misunderstood and that they need to be interpreted in context. The FSF board in April 12 made a statement re-affirming its decision to bring back Richard Stallman. Following this, Stallman issued a statement explaining his poor social skills and apologizing. Multiple organizations criticized, defunded and/or cut ties with the FSF, including: Red Hat, the Free Software Foundation Europe, the Software Freedom Conservacy, SUSE, the OSI, the Document Foundation, the EFF, KDE, and the Tor Project. Debian declined to issue a statement after a community voting on the issue. However, this had relatively little impact on the FSF, as it has stated that direct financial support from corporations accounted for less than 3% of its revenue in the most recent fiscal year. Honors and awards 1986: Honorary lifetime membership of the Chalmers University of Technology Computer Society 1990: Exceptional merit award MacArthur Fellowship ("genius grant") 1990: The Association for Computing Machinery's Grace Murray Hopper Award "For pioneering work in the development of the extensible editor EMACS (Editing Macros)" 1996: Honorary doctorate from Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology 1998: Electronic Frontier Foundation's Pioneer Award 1999: Yuri Rubinsky Memorial Award 2001: The Takeda Techno-Entrepreneurship Award for Social/Economic Well-Being () 2001: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Glasgow 2002: US National Academy of Engineering membership "for starting the GNU project, which produced influential, non-proprietary software tools, and for founding the free software movement" 2003: Honorary doctorate, from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel 2004: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Nacional de Salta 2004: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería del Perú 2007: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Inca Garcilaso de la Vega 2007: First Premio Internacional Extremadura al Conocimiento Libre 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad de Los Angeles de Chimbote 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Pavia 2008: Honorary doctorate from the Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, in Peru 2009: Honorary doctorate, from Lakehead University 2011: Honorary doctorate, from National University of Córdoba 2012: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad César Vallejo de Trujillo, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Latinoamericana Cima de Tacna, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad José Faustino Sánchez Carrión, in Peru 2014: Honorary doctorate, from Concordia University, in Montréal 2015: ACM Software System Award "For the development and leadership of GCC" 2016: Honorary doctorate, from Pierre and Marie Curie University 2016: Social Medicine award, from GNU Solidario Selected publications Manuals Selected essays See also 9882 Stallman Free as in Freedom, a biography by Sam Williams Free Software Street History of free and open-source software Lisp Machine Lisp Revolution OS vrms Free Software Foundation References External links In Support of Richard Stallman, a website which advocates for Stallman. Essays on the Philosophy of the GNU Project, almost all written by Stallman 1953 births Activists from New York City Jewish American atheists American bloggers American computer programmers Anti-natalists Articles containing video clips Artificial intelligence researchers Copyright activists Education activists Emacs Filkers Free software people Free software programmers GNU people Grace Murray Hopper Award laureates Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences alumni Internet activists Jewish American scientists Linux people Lisp (programming language) people Living people MacArthur Fellows Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni Members of the Free Software Foundation board of directors Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering Privacy activists Programming language designers	true	[ "A United States data item description (DID) is a completed document defining the data deliverables required of a United States Department of Defense contractor. A DID specifically defines the data content, format, and intended use of the data with a primary objective of achieving standardization objectives by the U.S. Department of Defense. The content and format requirements for DIDs are defined within MIL-STD-963C, Data Item Descriptions (2014).\n\nTerminology \nThe terminology of DIDs and the term contract data requirements list (CDRL) originated with US military procurements, and it is now often encountered in other large procurements that are modeled after the military procurement process. Within a military solicitation or contract, each DID is uniquely numbered to identify the data deliverables in terms of specific information such as: purpose, description, preparation instructions including a table of contents and descriptions of each section, and references to the Contract Statement of work (SOW).\n\nPractices and terms where definition is given by MIL-STD-963:\n\n Tailoring of data requirements. The deletion of the applicability of a portion of the data requirements from an approved DID that are unnecessary to meet the needs of a specific contract.\n Format. The desired organization, structure, or arrangement of the content of the data product described by the DID. This term relates to the shape, size, makeup, style, physical organization, or arrangement of the data product described in the DID.\n Content. The desired subject(s), topic(s), or element(s) which constitutes the data product described in the DID (for example, a string of defined data elements for entry into a Government database; a listing of paragraph titles or topics for inclusion in a data deliverable) under general topics; or subject matter which may be further defined into sub-topics.\n\n DID number: Each DID is assigned a unique three-part identifier by the DID approval authority. An example DID number for repetitive use is DI-SESS-80013B (DI- Data Item; SESS – four character code for the \"Systems Engineering\" Standardization Area (see \"SD-1, Standardization Directory\" for descriptions); 80013 assigned by ASSIST Automated Document Number Module, and B the sequential version). An example DID number for one-time use is OT-13-1000 (OT- One Time; 13 – fiscal year issued; 10000 – (the first number assigned in FY13 by the Army).\n\nSince DID documents are what contract mechanics cause to be produced, the defined content guidelines and their terminologies are commonly referred to in United States Military Standards or other forms of procedural and administrative guidance of the United States Department of Defense.\n\nUsage in government contracts \nWriters of a SOW often include requirements that belong in other parts of a contract. Specifically, quantitative technical requirements are addressed in the military specification and work requirements are specified in the SOW, and data requirements (e.g., delivery, format, and content) should be in the CDRL along with the appropriate DID to minimize the potential for conflict.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n DoD ASSIST Quick search website, public site for access to DIDs\n DoD ASSIST website, public-restricted site for access to DIDs\n Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC) website\n EverySpec access to PDFs of common DIDs\n Abelia example DID, System/Subsystem Specification as used in MIL-STD-498\n\nGovernment procurement in the United States\nMilitary of the United States standards\nSystems engineering\nMilitary terminology of the United States", "Nomina Anatomica (NA) was the international standard on human anatomic terminology from 1895 until it was replaced by Terminologia Anatomica in 1998.\n\nIn the late nineteenth century some 30,000 terms for various body parts were in use. The same structures were described by different names, depending (among other things) on the anatomist's school and national tradition. Vernacular translations of Latin and Greek, as well as various eponymous terms, were barriers to effective international communication. There was disagreement and confusion among anatomists regarding anatomical terminology.\n\nEditions\nThe first and last entries in the following table are not NA editions, but they are included for the sake of continuity. Although these early editions were authorized by different bodies, they are sometimes considered part of the same series.\n\nBefore these codes of terminology, approved at anatomists congresses, the usage of anatomical terms was based on authoritative works of scholars like Galen, Berengario da Carpi, Gaspard Bauhin, Henle, Hyrtl, etc.\n\nThe IANC and the FCAT\n\nTwelfth congress\nAround the time of the Twelfth Congress (London, 1985), a dispute arose over the editorial independence of the IANC. The IANC did not believe that their work should be subject to the approval of IFAA Member Associations.\n\nThe types of discussion underlying this dispute are illustrated in an article by Roger Warwick, then Honorary Secretary of the IANC:\n\n An aura of scholasticism, erudition and, unfortunately, pedantry has therefore often impeded attempts to rationalize and simplify anatomical nomenclature, and such obstruction still persists. The preservation of archaic terms such as Lien, Ventriculus, Epiplooon and Syndesmologia, in a world which uses and continues to use Splen, Gaster, Omentum and Arthrologia (and their numerous derivatives) provides an example of such pedantry.\n\n We have inherited a number of archaic and now somewhat irrational terms which are confusing to the non-Latinistic students and scientists of today ... Knowledge of Latin is extremely limited today, and thus any Latin nomenclature must be simplified to the utmost to achieve maximum clarity, usefulness, and hence acceptance.\n\n Unless anatomical nomenclature is subject to a most rigorous revision, in terms of simplification and rationalization, general use of such an internationally official nomenclature as Nomina Anatomica will decline rather than increase.\n\nWhat declined, however, was the influence of the IANC on anatomical terminology. The IANC published a sixth edition of Nomina Anatomica, but it was never approved by the IFAA.\n\nThirteenth congress\nInstead, at the Thirteenth Congress (Rio de Janeiro, 1989), the IFAA created a new committee – the Federative Committee on Anatomical Terminology (FCAT). The FCAT took over the task of revising international anatomical terminology. The result was the publication, in 1998, of a \"new, updated, simplified and uniform anatomical terminology\", the Terminologia Anatomica (TA)\n. The IANC was acknowledged in this work as follows:\n\n Since the first meeting, the FCAT made several contacts with the IANC aiming at the natural transition from the old approach to the approach established by the General Assembly of the IFAA. Such initiatives, however, did not result in a modus vivendi for harmonious collaboration.\n\nTerminologia Anatomica (TA)\nThe Terminologia Anatomica is the joint creation of the FCAT (now FICAT—the Federative International Committee on Anatomical Terminology) and the Member Associations of the International Federation of Associations of Anatomists (IFAA). The first edition, published in 1998, supersedes all previous lists. It is the international standard for anatomical terminology.\n\nThe 39th edition of Gray's Anatomy (2005) explicitly recognizes Terminologia Anatomica.\n\nModern use\nNA and its derivatives are still used in some contexts (even the controversial sixth edition), and there remain some obstacles to universal adoption of TA:\n\n The TA is only available in Latin, English, and Spanish, while the NA is available in many additional languages, which has had an impact upon international adoption of TA.\n Terminologia Embryologica is under development, but is not yet available. By contrast, multiple editions of Nomina Embryologica were published.\n Nomina Histologica underwent several editions. Until recently, there was no Terminologia Histologica. However, an edition was published in 2008.\n There is no \"Terminologia\" equivalent to the Nomina Anatomica Veterinaria.\n\nSee also\n Federative International Committee on Anatomical Terminology\n International Federation of Associations of Anatomists\n International Morphological Terminology\n\nReferences\n\nHistory of anatomy\nAnatomical terminology\nReference works in medicine" ]
[ "Richard Stallman", "Terminology", "Can you provide information on Terminology?", "Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world,", "Was he very popular or very well known for this?", "I don't know.", "What else was unique about his terminology?", "He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (", "Why did he say that?", "argues that the term \"intellectual property\" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics", "Did people listen to what he told them?", "I don't know.", "What other terminology did he use?", "cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives" ]	C_48eeef8db60c4df68ba565e3cc185e20_0	Did others use his suggestions?	7	Did others use Richard Stallman's suggestions?	Richard Stallman	Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copyright). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agree to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term "intellectual property" is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other laws by lumping together areas of law that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues. These laws originated separately, evolved differently, cover different activities, have different rules, and raise different public policy issues. Copyright law was designed to promote authorship and art, and covers the details of a work of authorship or art. Patent law was intended to encourage publication of ideas, at the price of finite monopolies over these ideas - a price that may be worth paying in some fields and not in others. Trademark law was not intended to promote any business activity, but simply to enable buyers to know what they are buying. An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: I think it is ok for authors (please let's not call them creators, they are not gods) to ask for money for copies of their works (please let's not devalue these works by calling them content) in order to gain income (the term compensation falsely implies it is a matter of making up for some kind of damages). CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Richard Matthew Stallman (; born March 16, 1953), also known by his initials, rms, is an American free software movement activist and programmer. He campaigns for software to be distributed in such a manner, so that its users receive the freedoms to use, study, distribute, and modify that software. Software that ensures these freedoms is termed free software. Stallman launched the GNU Project, founded the Free Software Foundation, developed the GNU Compiler Collection and GNU Emacs, and wrote the GNU General Public License. Stallman launched the GNU Project in September 1983 to write a Unix-like computer operating system composed entirely of free software. With this, he also launched the free software movement. He has been the GNU project's lead architect and organizer, and developed a number of pieces of widely used GNU software including, among others, the GNU Compiler Collection, GNU Debugger, and GNU Emacs text editor. In October 1985 he founded the Free Software Foundation (FSF). Stallman pioneered the concept of copyleft, which uses the principles of copyright law to preserve the right to use, modify, and distribute free software. He is the main author of free software licenses which describe those terms, most notably the GNU General Public License (GPL), the most widely used free software license. In 1989, he co-founded the League for Programming Freedom. Since the mid-1990s, Stallman has spent most of his time advocating for free software, as well as campaigning against software patents, digital rights management (which he refers to as digital restrictions management, calling the more common term misleading), and other legal and technical systems which he sees as taking away users' freedoms. This has included software license agreements, non-disclosure agreements, activation keys, dongles, copy restriction, proprietary formats, and binary executables without source code. In September 2019, Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT after making controversial comments about the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking scandal. Stallman remained head of the GNU Project, and in 2021 returned to the FSF board of directors. Early life Stallman was born March 16, 1953, in New York City, to a family of Jewish heritage. He had a troublesome relationship with his parents and did not feel he had a proper home. He was interested in computers at a young age; when Stallman was a pre-teen at a summer camp, he read manuals for the IBM 7094. From 1967 to 1969, Stallman attended a Columbia University Saturday program for high school students. Stallman was also a volunteer laboratory assistant in the biology department at Rockefeller University. Although he was interested in mathematics and physics, his supervising professor at Rockefeller thought he showed promise as a biologist. His first experience with actual computers was at the IBM New York Scientific Center when he was in high school. He was hired for the summer in 1970, following his senior year of high school, to write a numerical analysis program in Fortran. He completed the task after a couple of weeks ("I swore that I would never use FORTRAN again because I despised it as a language compared with other languages") and spent the rest of the summer writing a text editor in APL and a preprocessor for the PL/I programming language on the IBM System/360. Harvard University and MIT As a first-year student at Harvard University in fall 1970, Stallman was known for his strong performance in Math 55. He was happy: "For the first time in my life, I felt I had found a home at Harvard." In 1971, near the end of his first year at Harvard, he became a programmer at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, and became a regular in the hacker community, where he was usually known by his initials, RMS, which he used in his computer accounts. Stallman received a bachelor's degree in physics (magna cum laude) from Harvard in 1974. Stallman considered staying on at Harvard, but instead decided to enroll as a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He pursued a doctorate in physics for one year, but left that program to focus on his programming at the MIT AI Laboratory. While working (starting in 1975) as a research assistant at MIT under Gerry Sussman, Stallman published a paper (with Sussman) in 1977 on an AI truth maintenance system, called dependency-directed backtracking. This paper was an early work on the problem of intelligent backtracking in constraint satisfaction problems. , the technique Stallman and Sussman introduced is still the most general and powerful form of intelligent backtracking. The technique of constraint recording, wherein partial results of a search are recorded for later reuse, was also introduced in this paper. As a hacker in MIT's AI laboratory, Stallman worked on software projects such as TECO and Emacs for the Incompatible Timesharing System (ITS), as well as the Lisp machine operating system (the CONS of 1974–1976 and the CADR of 1977–1979—this latter unit was commercialized by Symbolics and Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) starting around 1980). He would become an ardent critic of restricted computer access in the lab, which at that time was funded primarily by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). When MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science (LCS) installed a password control system in 1977, Stallman found a way to decrypt the passwords and sent users messages containing their decoded password, with a suggestion to change it to the empty string (that is, no password) instead, to re-enable anonymous access to the systems. Around 20 percent of the users followed his advice at the time, although passwords ultimately prevailed. Stallman boasted of the success of his campaign for many years afterward. Events leading to GNU In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the hacker culture that Stallman thrived on began to fragment. To prevent software from being used on their competitors' computers, most manufacturers stopped distributing source code and began using copyright and restrictive software licenses to limit or prohibit copying and redistribution. Such proprietary software had existed before, and it became apparent that it would become the norm. This shift in the legal characteristics of software was a consequence triggered by the US Copyright Act of 1976. When Brian Reid in 1979 placed time bombs in the Scribe markup language and word processing system to restrict unlicensed access to the software, Stallman proclaimed it "a crime against humanity". During an interview in 2008, he clarified that it is blocking the user's freedom that he believes is a crime, not the issue of charging for software. Stallman's texinfo is a GPL replacement, loosely based on Scribe; the original version was finished in 1986. In 1980, Stallman and some other hackers at the AI Lab were refused access to the source code for the software of a newly installed laser printer, the Xerox 9700. Stallman had modified the software for the Lab's previous laser printer (the XGP, Xerographic Printer), so it electronically messaged a user when the person's job was printed, and would message all logged-in users waiting for print jobs if the printer was jammed. Not being able to add these features to the new printer was a major inconvenience, as the printer was on a different floor from most of the users. This experience convinced Stallman of people's need to be able to freely modify the software they use. Richard Greenblatt, a fellow AI Lab hacker, founded Lisp Machines, Inc. (LMI) to market Lisp machines, which he and Tom Knight designed at the lab. Greenblatt rejected outside investment, believing that the proceeds from the construction and sale of a few machines could be profitably reinvested in the growth of the company. In contrast, the other hackers felt that the venture capital-funded approach was better. As no agreement could be reached, hackers from the latter camp founded Symbolics, with the aid of Russ Noftsker, an AI Lab administrator. Symbolics recruited most of the remaining hackers including notable hacker Bill Gosper, who then left the AI Lab. Symbolics also forced Greenblatt to resign by citing MIT policies. While both companies delivered proprietary software, Stallman believed that LMI, unlike Symbolics, had tried to avoid hurting the lab's community. For two years, from 1982 to the end of 1983, Stallman worked by himself to clone the output of the Symbolics programmers, with the aim of preventing them from gaining a monopoly on the lab's computers. Stallman argues that software users should have the freedom to share with their neighbors and be able to study and make changes to the software that they use. He maintains that attempts by proprietary software vendors to prohibit these acts are antisocial and unethical. The phrase "software wants to be free" is often incorrectly attributed to him, and Stallman argues that this is a misstatement of his philosophy. He argues that freedom is vital for the sake of users and society as a moral value, and not merely for pragmatic reasons such as possibly developing technically superior software. Eric S. Raymond, one of the creators of the open-source movement, argues that moral arguments, rather than pragmatic ones, alienate potential allies and hurt the end goal of removing code secrecy. In February 1984, Stallman quit his job at MIT to work full-time on the GNU project, which he had announced in September 1983. Since then, he had remained affiliated with MIT as an unpaid "visiting scientist" in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. Until "around 1998", he maintained an office at the Institute that doubled as his legal residence. GNU project Stallman announced the plan for the GNU operating system in September 1983 on several ARPANET mailing lists and USENET. He started the project on his own and describes: "As an operating system developer, I had the right skills for this job. So even though I could not take success for granted, I realized that I was elected to do the job. I chose to make the system compatible with Unix so that it would be portable, and so that Unix users could easily switch to it." In 1985, Stallman published the GNU Manifesto, which outlined his motivation for creating a free operating system called GNU, which would be compatible with Unix. The name GNU is a recursive acronym for "GNU's Not Unix". Soon after, he started a nonprofit corporation called the Free Software Foundation to employ free software programmers and provide a legal infrastructure for the free software movement. Stallman was the nonsalaried president of the FSF, which is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in Massachusetts. Stallman popularized the concept of copyleft, a legal mechanism to protect the modification and redistribution rights for free software. It was first implemented in the GNU Emacs General Public License, and in 1989 the first program-independent GNU General Public License (GPL) was released. By then, much of the GNU system had been completed. Stallman was responsible for contributing many necessary tools, including a text editor (Emacs), compiler (GCC), debugger (GNU Debugger), and a build automator (GNU make). The notable omission was a kernel. In 1990, members of the GNU project began using Carnegie Mellon's Mach microkernel in a project called GNU Hurd, which has yet to achieve the maturity level required for full POSIX compliance. In 1991, Linus Torvalds, a Finnish student, used the GNU's development tools to produce the free monolithic Linux kernel. The existing programs from the GNU project were readily ported to run on the resultant platform. Most sources use the name Linux to refer to the general-purpose operating system thus formed, while Stallman and the FSF call it GNU/Linux. This has been a longstanding naming controversy in the free software community. Stallman argues that not using GNU in the name of the operating system unfairly disparages the value of the GNU project and harms the sustainability of the free software movement by breaking the link between the software and the free software philosophy of the GNU project. Stallman's influences on hacker culture include the name POSIX and the Emacs editor. On Unix systems, GNU Emacs's popularity rivaled that of another editor vi, spawning an editor war. Stallman's take on this was to canonize himself as St. IGNUcius of the Church of Emacs and acknowledge that "vi vi vi is the editor of the beast", while "using a free version of vi is not a sin; it is a penance". On his homepage Stallman explains what a life in the Church of Emacs means to its members: "Sainthood in the Church of Emacs requires living a life of purity—but in the Church of Emacs, this does not require celibacy (a sigh of relief is heard)". In 1992, developers at Lucid Inc. doing their own work on Emacs clashed with Stallman and ultimately forked the software into what would become XEmacs. The technology journalist Andrew Leonard has characterized what he sees as Stallman's uncompromising stubbornness as common among elite computer programmers: In 2018, Stallman instituted "Kind Communication Guidelines" for the GNU project to help its mailing list discussions remain constructive while avoiding explicitly promoting diversity. In October 2019, a public statement signed by 33 maintainers of the GNU project asserted that Stallman's behaviour had "undermined a core value of the GNU project: the empowerment of all computer users" and called for "GNU maintainers to collectively decide about the organization of the project". The statement was published soon after Stallman resigned as president of the FSF and left his "visiting scientist" role at MIT in September 2019. In spite of that, Stallman remained head of the GNU project. Activism Stallman has written many essays on software freedom, and has been an outspoken political campaigner for the free software movement since the early 1990s. The speeches he has regularly given are titled The GNU Project and the Free Software Movement, The Dangers of Software Patents, and Copyright and Community in the Age of Computer Networks. In 2006 and 2007, during the eighteen month public consultation for the drafting of version 3 of the GNU General Public License, he added a fourth topic explaining the proposed changes. Stallman's staunch advocacy for free software inspired the creation of the Virtual Richard M. Stallman (vrms), software that analyzes the packages currently installed on a Debian GNU/Linux system, and reports those that are from the non-free tree. Stallman disagrees with parts of Debian's definition of free software. In 1999, Stallman called for development of a free online encyclopedia through the means of inviting the public to contribute articles. The resulting GNUPedia was eventually retired in favour of the emerging Wikipedia, which had similar aims and was enjoying greater success. Stallman is a world traveler and has visited at least 65 countries, mostly to speak about free software and the GNU project. According to Stallman, the free software movement has much in common with that of Mahatma Gandhi. Stallman is also highly critical of the effect that drug patents have had on developing countries. In Venezuela, Stallman has delivered public speeches and promoted the adoption of free software in the state's oil company (PDVSA), in municipal government, and in the nation's military. In meetings with Hugo Chávez and in public speeches, Stallman criticised some policies on television broadcasting, free speech rights, and privacy. Stallman was on the Advisory Council of Latin American television station teleSUR from its launch but resigned in February 2011, criticizing pro-Gaddafi propaganda during the Arab Spring. In August 2006, at his meetings with the government of the Indian State of Kerala, he persuaded officials to discard proprietary software, such as Microsoft's, at state-run schools. This has resulted in a landmark decision to switch all school computers in 12,500 high schools from Windows to a free software operating system. After personal meetings, Stallman obtained positive statements about the free software movement from the then-president of India, , French 2007 presidential candidate Ségolène Royal, and the president of Ecuador Rafael Correa. Stallman has participated in protests about software patents, digital rights management, and proprietary software. Protesting against proprietary software in April 2006, Stallman held a "Don't buy from ATI, enemy of your freedom" placard at a speech by an ATI representative in the building where Stallman worked, resulting in the police being called. AMD has since acquired ATI and has taken steps to make their hardware documentation available for use by the free software community. In response to Apple's Macintosh look and feel lawsuits against Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard in 1988, Stallman called for a boycott of Apple products on the grounds that a successful look and feel lawsuit would "put an end to free software that could substitute for commercial software". The boycott was lifted in 1995, which meant the FSF started to accept patches to GNU software for Apple operating systems. Stallman has characterized Steve Jobs as having a "malign influence" on computing because of Jobs' leadership in guiding Apple to produce closed platforms. In 1993, while Jobs was at NeXT, Jobs asked Stallman if he could distribute a modified GCC in two parts, one part under GPL and the other part, an Objective-C preprocessor under a proprietary license. Stallman initially thought this would be legal, but since he also thought it would be "very undesirable for free software", he asked a lawyer for advice. The response he got was that judges would consider such schemes to be "subterfuges" and would be very harsh toward them, and a judge would ask whether it was "really" one program, rather than how the parts were labeled. Therefore, Stallman sent a message back to Jobs which said they believed Jobs' plan was not allowed by the GPL, which resulted in NeXT releasing the Objective-C front end under GPL. For a period of time, Stallman used a notebook from the One Laptop per Child program. Stallman's computer is a refurbished ThinkPad T400s with Libreboot, a free BIOS replacement, and the GNU/Linux distribution Trisquel. Before the ThinkPad T400s, Stallman used a Thinkpad X60 with Libreboot and Trisquel GNU/Linux. And before the X60, Stallman used the Lemote Yeeloong netbook (using the same company's Loongson processor) which he chose because, like the X60 and the T400s, it could run with free software at the BIOS level, stating "freedom is my priority. I've campaigned for freedom since 1983, and I am not going to surrender that freedom for the sake of a more convenient computer." Stallman's Lemote was stolen from him in 2012 while in Argentina. Before Trisquel, Stallman has used the gNewSense operating system. Copyright reduction Stallman has regularly given a talk entitled "Copyright vs. Community" where he reviews the state of digital rights management (DRM) and names many of the products and corporations which he boycotts. His approach to DRM is best summed up by the FSF Defective by Design campaign. In the talks, he makes proposals for a "reduced copyright" and suggests a 10-year limit on copyright. He suggests that, instead of restrictions on sharing, authors be supported using a tax, with revenues distributed among them based on cubic roots of their popularity to ensure that "fairly successful non-stars" receive a greater share than they do now (compare with private copying levy which is associated with proponents of strong copyright), or a convenient anonymous micropayment system for people to support authors directly. He indicates that no form of non-commercial sharing of copies should be considered a copyright violation. He has advocated civil disobedience in a comment on Ley Sinde. Stallman has also helped and supported the International Music Score Library Project in getting back online, after it had been taken down on October 19, 2007, following a cease and desist letter from Universal Edition. Stallman mentions the dangers some e-books bring compared to paper books, with the example of the Amazon Kindle e-reader that prevents the copying of e-books and allows Amazon to order automatic deletion of a book. He says that such e-books present a big step backward with respect to paper books by being less easy to use, copy, lend to others or sell, also mentioning that Amazon e-books cannot be bought anonymously. His short story "The Right to Read" provides a picture of a dystopian future if the right to share books is impeded. He objects to many of the terms within typical end-user license agreements that accompany e-books. Stallman discourages the use of several storage technologies such as DVD or Blu-ray video discs because the content of such media is encrypted. He considers manufacturers' use of encryption on non-secret data (to force the user to view certain promotional material) as a conspiracy. He recognized the Sony BMG copy protection rootkit scandal to be a criminal act by Sony. Stallman supports a general boycott of Sony for its legal actions against George Hotz. Stallman has suggested that the United States government may encourage the use of software as a service because this would allow them to access users' data without needing a search warrant. He denies being an anarchist despite his wariness of some legislation and the fact that he has "advocated strongly for user privacy and his own view of software freedom". Terminologies Stallman places great importance on the words and labels people use to talk about the world, including the relationship between software and freedom. He asks people to say free software and GNU/Linux, and to avoid the terms intellectual property and piracy (in relation to copying not approved by the publisher). One of his criteria for giving an interview to a journalist is that the journalist agrees to use his terminology throughout the article. He has been known to turn down speaking requests over some terminology issues. Stallman argues that the term intellectual property is designed to confuse people, and is used to prevent intelligent discussion on the specifics of copyright, patent, trademark, and other areas of law by lumping together things that are more dissimilar than similar. He also argues that by referring to these laws as property laws, the term biases the discussion when thinking about how to treat these issues, writing: An example of cautioning others to avoid other terminology while also offering suggestions for possible alternatives is this sentence of an e-mail by Stallman to a public mailing list: Open source and Free software His requests that people use certain terms, and his ongoing efforts to convince people of the importance of terminology, are a source of regular misunderstanding and friction with parts of the free software and open-source communities. After initially accepting the concept, Stallman rejects a common alternative term, open-source software, because it does not call to mind what Stallman sees as the value of the software: freedom. He wrote, "Free software is a political movement; open source is a development model." Thus, he believes that the use of the term will not inform people of the freedom issues, and will not lead to people valuing and defending their freedom. Two alternatives which Stallman does accept are software libre and unfettered software, but free software is the term he asks people to use in English. For similar reasons, he argues for the term proprietary software or non-free software rather than closed-source software, when referring to software that is not free software. Linux and GNU Stallman asks that the term GNU/Linux, which he pronounces , be used to refer to the operating system created by combining the GNU system and the kernel Linux. Stallman refers to this operating system as "a variant of GNU, and the GNU Project is its principal developer". He claims that the connection between the GNU project's philosophy and its software is broken when people refer to the combination as merely Linux. Starting around 2003, he began also using the term GNU+Linux, which he pronounces , to prevent others from pronouncing the phrase GNU/Linux as , which would erroneously imply that the kernel Linux is maintained by the GNU project. The creator of Linux, Linus Torvalds, has publicly stated that he objects to modification of the name, and that the rename "is their [the FSF] confusion not ours". Surveillance resistance Stallman professes admiration for Julian Assange and Edward Snowden. He has spoken against government and corporate surveillance on many occasions. He refers to mobile phones as "portable surveillance and tracking devices", refusing to own a cell phone due to the lack of phones running entirely on free software. He also avoids using a key card to enter his office building since key card systems track each location and time that someone enters the building using a card. He usually does not browse the web directly from his personal computer. Instead, he uses GNU Womb's grab-url-from-mail utility, an email-based proxy which downloads the web page content and then emails it to the user. More recently, he stated that he accesses all web sites via Tor, except for Wikipedia (which generally disallows editing from Tor unless users have an IP block exemption). Personal life Stallman resides in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He speaks English, French, Spanish and some Indonesian. He has said that he is "an atheist of Jewish ancestry" and often wears a button that reads "Impeach God". Stallman has written a collection of filk music and parody songs. He is childfree and antinatalist. He denies having Asperger's, but has sometimes speculated whether he could have a "shadow" version of it. Resignation from MIT and FSF In August and September 2019, it was learned that Jeffrey Epstein had made donations to MIT, and in the wake of this, MIT Media Lab director Joi Ito resigned. An internal MIT CSAIL listserv mailing list thread was started to protest the coverup of MIT's connections to Epstein. In the thread, discussion had turned to deceased MIT professor Marvin Minsky, who was named by Virginia Giuffre as one of the people that Epstein had directed her to have sex with. Giuffre, a minor at the time, had been caught in Epstein's underage sex trafficking ring. In response to a comment where one reply stated that Minsky "is accused of assaulting one of Epstein's victims", Stallman questioned whether the word "assault" was applicable in that case, arguing that "the most plausible scenario is that she presented herself to him as entirely willing. Assuming she was being coerced by Epstein, he would have had every reason to conceal that from most of his associates". When challenged by other members of the mailing list, he added "It is morally absurd to define 'rape' in a way that depends on minor details such as which country it was in or whether the victim was 18 years old or 17". Stallman remained critical of Epstein and his role, stating "We know that Giuffre was being coerced into sex – by Epstein. She was being harmed." Stallman's comments along with a compilation of accusations against him were published to the public via Medium by Selam Gano, who outlined MIT alumnae claims of sexual harassment and contributions to a hostile environment by Stallman. Vice published a copy of the email chain on September 13, 2019, drawing attention to Stallman's comments. Stallman's writings from 2013 and earlier related to underage sex and child pornography laws resurfaced, increasing the controversy. Tied to his comments regarding Minsky, this led to several calling for Stallman's resignation. On September 14, Stallman acknowledged that since the time of his past writings, he had learned that there were problems with underage sex, writing on his blog: "Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that." On September 16, Stallman announced his resignation from both MIT and FSF, "due to pressure on MIT and me over a series of misunderstandings and mischaracterizations". In a post on his website, Stallman asserted that his posts to the email lists were not to defend Epstein, stating "Nothing could be further from the truth. I've called him a 'serial rapist,' and said he deserved to be imprisoned. But many people now believe I defended him—and other inaccurate claims—and feel a real hurt because of what they believe I said. I'm sorry for that hurt. I wish I could have prevented the misunderstanding." Return to FSF In March 2021, at LibrePlanet2021, Stallman announced his return to the FSF board of directors. Shortly thereafter, an open letter was published on GitHub asking for Stallman's removal, along with the entire FSF board of directors, with the support of prominent open-source organizations including GNOME and Mozilla. The letter includes a list of accusations against Stallman. In response, an open letter asking for the FSF to retain Stallman was also published, arguing that Stallman's statements were mischaracterized, misunderstood and that they need to be interpreted in context. The FSF board in April 12 made a statement re-affirming its decision to bring back Richard Stallman. Following this, Stallman issued a statement explaining his poor social skills and apologizing. Multiple organizations criticized, defunded and/or cut ties with the FSF, including: Red Hat, the Free Software Foundation Europe, the Software Freedom Conservacy, SUSE, the OSI, the Document Foundation, the EFF, KDE, and the Tor Project. Debian declined to issue a statement after a community voting on the issue. However, this had relatively little impact on the FSF, as it has stated that direct financial support from corporations accounted for less than 3% of its revenue in the most recent fiscal year. Honors and awards 1986: Honorary lifetime membership of the Chalmers University of Technology Computer Society 1990: Exceptional merit award MacArthur Fellowship ("genius grant") 1990: The Association for Computing Machinery's Grace Murray Hopper Award "For pioneering work in the development of the extensible editor EMACS (Editing Macros)" 1996: Honorary doctorate from Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology 1998: Electronic Frontier Foundation's Pioneer Award 1999: Yuri Rubinsky Memorial Award 2001: The Takeda Techno-Entrepreneurship Award for Social/Economic Well-Being () 2001: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Glasgow 2002: US National Academy of Engineering membership "for starting the GNU project, which produced influential, non-proprietary software tools, and for founding the free software movement" 2003: Honorary doctorate, from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel 2004: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Nacional de Salta 2004: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería del Perú 2007: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad Inca Garcilaso de la Vega 2007: First Premio Internacional Extremadura al Conocimiento Libre 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad de Los Angeles de Chimbote 2007: Honorary doctorate, from the University of Pavia 2008: Honorary doctorate from the Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, in Peru 2009: Honorary doctorate, from Lakehead University 2011: Honorary doctorate, from National University of Córdoba 2012: Honorary professorship, from the Universidad César Vallejo de Trujillo, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad Latinoamericana Cima de Tacna, in Peru 2012: Honorary doctorate, from the Universidad José Faustino Sánchez Carrión, in Peru 2014: Honorary doctorate, from Concordia University, in Montréal 2015: ACM Software System Award "For the development and leadership of GCC" 2016: Honorary doctorate, from Pierre and Marie Curie University 2016: Social Medicine award, from GNU Solidario Selected publications Manuals Selected essays See also 9882 Stallman Free as in Freedom, a biography by Sam Williams Free Software Street History of free and open-source software Lisp Machine Lisp Revolution OS vrms Free Software Foundation References External links In Support of Richard Stallman, a website which advocates for Stallman. Essays on the Philosophy of the GNU Project, almost all written by Stallman 1953 births Activists from New York City Jewish American atheists American bloggers American computer programmers Anti-natalists Articles containing video clips Artificial intelligence researchers Copyright activists Education activists Emacs Filkers Free software people Free software programmers GNU people Grace Murray Hopper Award laureates Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences alumni Internet activists Jewish American scientists Linux people Lisp (programming language) people Living people MacArthur Fellows Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni Members of the Free Software Foundation board of directors Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering Privacy activists Programming language designers	false	[ "Ma Zhou (601–648), courtesy name Binwang, formally the Duke of Gaotang (), was a Chinese official who served as a chancellor during the reign of Emperor Taizong in the Tang dynasty. He was initially a commoner and a guest of the general Chang He (), and after Chang submitted suggestions that Ma drafted, Emperor Taizong was impressed and retained Ma as an imperial official, eventually rising to the post of chancellor.\n\nBackground and discovery by Emperor Taizong \nMa Zhou was born in 601, during the reign of Emperor Wen in the Sui dynasty. He appeared to have been born from a relatively poor household in Qinghe Commandery (清河, roughly modern Xingtai, Hebei) and lost his father early in life. He was studious, particularly concentrating on the Shi Jing and the Spring and Autumn Annals, but was also carefree, not paying attention to details, and because of this, the people of his home region did not view him highly. During the reign of Emperor Gaozu in the Tang dynasty, he served as a teacher in Bo Prefecture (博州, i.e., Qinghe), but was said to spend his days drinking, not concentrating on teaching the students, and was often rebuked by the prefect Daxi Shu (). He thus resigned and went to travel in Cao Prefecture (曹州, roughly modern Heze, Shandong) and Bian Prefecture (汴州, roughly modern Kaifeng, Henan). While there, however, on one occasion he was insulted by Cui Xian (), the county magistrate for Junyi County (浚儀, in modern Kaifeng), and in anger, he travelled to the capital Chang'an. Once there, he became a guest of the general Chang He.\n\nIn 629, Emperor Gaozu's son and successor, Emperor Taizong, ordered his officials to submit suggestions for him. As Chang was unacquainted with historical writings, Ma drafted some 20 suggestions for him. When Emperor Taizong read the suggestions that Chang submitted, he was impressed, but he knew that Chang was not well-studied, he summoned Chang to ask him how he came up with the suggestions. Chang told Emperor Taizong that he did not write the suggestions and that Ma did. He also told Emperor Taizong that whenever he conversed with Ma, Ma was always concerned about faithfulness and filial piety. Emperor Taizong sent messengers to summon Ma into his presence, and once they conversed, he was impressed by Ma and, while initially not giving him an official position, had him serve at the examination bureau of the government (門下省, Menxia Sheng). In 632, he officially made Ma a governmental auditor. He awarded Chang silk for having discovered Ma.\n\nService under Emperor Taizong \nIn 632, Ma Zhou submitted a petition to Emperor Taizong that was later included in its entirety in the Old Book of Tang for its importance, which made several suggestions to Emperor Taizong:\n\n That Emperor Taizong expand Da'an Palace (), the residence of Emperor Gaozu (who was then Taishang Huang (retired emperor)), to show filial piety.\n That Emperor Taizong should not spend much time away from Chang'an in the summer, because he would then be unable to attend to Emperor Gaozu.\n That Emperor Taizong's plans to create a feudal system of governance, where the contributors to his reign would be given inheritable prefectural posts to be passed to their descendants, were inadvisable, because there would be no guarantees in future generations that the descendants of capable men would also be capable.\n That Emperor Taizong should personally offer sacrifices to the imperial ancestors.\n That Emperor Taizong should be careful not to bestow honors on people not due them.\n\nEmperor Taizong was impressed by Ma's suggestions and promoted him.\n\nIn 637, Ma submitted another petition considered important enough to be included in its entirety in the Old Book of Tang. He noted that at the time, even though Emperor Taizong had reigned for over a decade, the empire was still, overall, a fraction of the strength of the Sui dynasty at its prime, in terms of population and wealth. He pointed out that the population was therefore ill-equipped to deal with the construction projects that Emperor Taizong was then carrying out for his own palaces and for mansions for his sons and daughters. He advocated frugality, and further pointed out that Emperor Taizong's favors for his sons were creating competition between them, which was not good for the long term, either for his sons or for their descendants. Emperor Taizong praised Ma for his suggestions. Also based on Ma's suggestions, the institution of Chang'an city criers (who would call out at both dawn and dusk) and replaced with drums, greatly reducing the amount of labor necessary.\n\nIn 638, Ma was made a mid-level official at the legislative bureau (中書省, Zhongshu Sheng). Ma was praised for his alertness and logical thinking, and Emperor Taizong once stated, \"If I did not see Ma Zhou for a while, I would always miss him.\" The chancellor Cen Wenben also stated, \"When Mr. Ma analyzes matters, he took examples from both history and current events. He deletes what is not necessary, and then analyzes thoroughly. Nothing should be added and nothing should be taken away from what he writes. His words are well-written, and one will not get tired of them.\" In 641, Ma was given three different posts—assistant auditor, imperial advisor, and secretary to Emperor Taizong's son, Li Zhi (the Prince of Jin). After Li Zhi replaced his elder brother, Li Chengqian, as crown prince, Ma was made an advisor to the new crown prince as well as deputy head of the legislative bureau.\n\nIn 644, when Emperor Taizong, at an imperial gathering, stated to his key officials their strengths and weaknesses, he spoke, with regard to Ma:\n\nMa Zhou has quick reactions and is faithful and honest. When he evaluated others, he did so truthfully, and whatever task I give him, he usually performed it to my great satisfaction.\n\nLater that year, Ma was made the acting head of the legislative bureau—a position considered one for a chancellor. In 645, when Emperor Taizong attacked Goguryeo, he left Li Zhi in charge of logistics at Ding Prefecture (定州, roughly modern Baoding, Hebei), assisted by Gao Shilian, Liu Ji, and Ma. Once Emperor Taizong returned from the Goguryeo campaign, he gave Ma the additional post as minister of civil service affairs.\n\nMa was said to suffer from chronic diabetes, and when Emperor Taizong built the Cuiwei Palace (翠微宮, in the Qinling Mountains), he looked for a place near the palace to construct a summer mansion for Ma. He also had the imperial physicians attend to Ma and often supplied Ma with imperial meals. As Ma's illness grew worse, Emperor Taizong personally attended to Ma's medicinal needs, while sending Li Zhi to greet him. As Ma grew gravely ill, he asked his family to bring him the copies of the petitions he had submitted to Emperor Taizong, and he personally burned them, stating, \"Guan Zhong and Yan Ying [(晏嬰)] [both great chancellors of the Spring and Autumn period] publicly showed their lords' faults to become famous for posterity. That is something I will not do.\" He died in 648 and was buried near the tomb of Emperor Taizong's wife, Empress Zhangsun, where Emperor Taizong himself would eventually be buried. After Emperor Taizong died in 649 and Li Zhi succeeded him (as Emperor Gaozong), Ma was posthumously enfeoffed as the Duke of Gaotang. Later, after Emperor Gaozong's own death in 683, during the time when Emperor Gaozong's son Emperor Ruizong was emperor under the regency of his mother Empress Dowager Wu, Ma was worshipped at Emperor Gaozong's temple.\n\nNotes and references \n\n Old Book of Tang, vol. 74.\n New Book of Tang, vol. 98.\n Zizhi Tongjian, vols. 193, 194, 195, 197, 198.\n\n601 births\n648 deaths\nSui dynasty people\nChancellors under Emperor Taizong of Tang\nPoliticians from Liaocheng\nTang dynasty politicians from Shandong", "Suggestion is the psychological process by which a person guides their own or another person's desired thoughts, feelings, and behaviors by presenting stimuli that may elicit them as reflexes instead of relying on conscious effort.\n\nNineteenth-century writers on psychology such as William James used the words \"suggest\" and \"suggestion\" in the context of a particular idea which was said to suggest another when it brought that other idea to mind. Early scientific studies of hypnosis by Clark Leonard Hull and others extended the meaning of these words in a special and technical sense (Hull, 1933).\n\nThe original neuropsychological theory of hypnotic suggestion was based upon the ideomotor reflex response that William B. Carpenter declared, in 1852, was the principle through which James Braid's hypnotic phenomena were produced.\n\nÉmile Coué \nÉmile Coué (1857–1926) was a significant pioneer in the development of an understanding of the application of therapeutic suggestion; and, according to Cheek and LeCron, most of our current knowledge of suggestion \"stems from Coué\" (1968, p.60). With the intention of \"saturating the cognitive microenvironment of the mind\", Coué's therapeutic method approach was based on four non-controversial principles:\n(1) suggestion can produce somatic phenomena;\n(2) specific suggestions generate specific somatic outcomes;\n(3) suggestions are just as efficacious in the treatment of physical or organic conditions as they are for functional or emotional conditions; and\n(4) a successful suggestion-based intervention for a physical condition does not indicate that the original complaint was in any way imaginary. \n\nCoué's laws of suggestion. Ideomotor and ideosensory effect. (Suggestion and Autosuggestion, Baudouin, C. 1920: 117).\n1. The Law of Concentrated Attention\n\nIf spontaneous attention is concentrated on an idea, this tends to become realized.\n\n2. The Law of Auxiliary Emotion, also called the Law of dominant effect When a suggestion is supported by emotion it will become stronger than every other suggestion, given at the same moment.\n\n3. The Law of Reversed Effort\n\n If conscious will is in conflict with fantasy, the fantasy will win.\n\n4. The Law of Subconscious Teleology\n\nWhen the goal has been traced out the unconscious will find out how to reach it.\n\n“When the end has been suggested the subconscious finds means for its realisation.”\n\nTo be realized an idea must be unconsciously processed and accepted. The mechanism is the same as in motivation.\n\nHypnosis\n\nTrance and suggestion\nModern scientific study of hypnosis, which follows the pattern of Hull's work, separates two essential factors: \"trance\" and suggestion. The state of mind induced by \"trance\" is said to come about via the process of a hypnotic induction—essentially instructing and suggesting to the subject that they will enter a hypnotic state. Once a subject enters hypnosis, the hypnotist gives suggestions that can produce sought effects. Commonly used suggestions on measures of \"suggestibility\" or \"susceptibility\" (or for those with a different theoretical orientation, \"hypnotic talent\") include suggestions that one's arm is getting lighter and floating up in the air, or that a fly is buzzing around one's head. The \"classic\" response to an accepted suggestion that one's arm is beginning to float in the air is that the subject perceives the intended effect as happening involuntarily.\n\nScientific hypnotism\nConsistent with the views of Pierre Janet—who noted (1920, pp.284–285) that the critical feature is not the making of a 'suggestion', but, instead, is the taking of the 'suggestion'—Weitzenhoffer (2000, passim), argued that scientific hypnotism centres on the delivery of \"suggestions\" to hypnotized subjects; and, according to Yeates (2016b, p.35), these suggestions are delivered with the intention of eliciting:\n(1) the further stimulation of partially active mental states and/or physiological processes;\n(2) the awakening of dormant mental states and/or physiological processes;\n(3) the activation of latent mental states and/or physiological processes;\n(4) alterations in existing perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and/or behaviours; and/or\n(5) entirely new perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and/or behaviours.\n\nTemporal dimensions\nFurthermore, according to Yeates (2016b, pp.35–36), 'suggestions' have four temporal dimensions: \n(1) pre-hypnotic suggestions, delivered prior to the formal induction;\n(2) suggestions for within-hypnotic influence, to elicit specific within-session outcomes;\n(3) suggestions for post-hypnotic influence, to elicit specific post-session outcomes:\n(i) immediate influence (\"and, on leaving here today, you'll…\");\n(ii) shorter-term influence (\"and, each time you're…\");\n(iii) longer-term influence (\"and, as time passes, you'll increasingly…\"); or\n(iv) specific-moment influence (Bernheim's suggestions à longue échéance, 'suggestions to be realised after a long interval'), which are (i) intended \"to produce a particular effect at a designated later hour\", (ii) have \"no influence before the appointed hour\", (iii) nor \"after it had expired\" (Barrows, 1896, pp.22–23), or\n(4) post-hypnotic suggestions, delivered to dehypnotised-but-not-yet-completely-reoriented subjects.\n\nWaking suggestion\nSuggestions, however, can also have an effect in the absence of a hypnosis. These so-called \"waking suggestions\" are given in precisely the same way as \"hypnotic suggestions\" (i.e., suggestions given within hypnosis) and can produce strong changes in perceptual experience. Experiments on suggestion, in the absence of hypnosis, were conducted by early researchers such as Hull (1933). More recently, researchers such as Nicholas Spanos and Irving Kirsch have conducted experiments investigating such non-hypnotic-suggestibility and found a strong correlation between people's responses to suggestion both in- and outside hypnosis.\n\nOther forms\nIn addition to the kinds of suggestion typically delivered by researchers interested in hypnosis there are other forms of suggestibility, though not all are considered interrelated. These include: primary and secondary suggestibility (older terms for non-hypnotic and hypnotic suggestibility respectively), hypnotic suggestibility (i.e., the response to suggestion measured within hypnosis), and interrogative suggestibility (yielding to interrogative questions, and shifting responses when interrogative pressure is applied: see Gudjonsson suggestibility scale. Metaphors and imagery can also be used to deliver suggestion.\n\nSee also \n\nAffirmations\nAttitude\nAutosuggestion\nAutogenic training\nCrowd manipulation\nHypnosis\nHypnotic susceptibility\nNancy School\nNeuro-linguistic programming\nPosthypnotic amnesia\nPsychosomatic medicine\nThe Salpêtrière School of Hypnosis\nSelf-hypnosis\nSubconscious\nSuggestibility\n\nFootnotes\n\nReferences\n Barrows, C.M., \"Suggestion Without Hypnotism: An Account of Experiments in Preventing or Suppressing Pain\", Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, vol.12, No.30, (1896), pp.21–44.\n V. M. Bekhterev \"Suggestion and its Role in Social Life\" with a Preface by José Manuel Jara Italian edition, Psichiatria e Territorio, 2013.\n Cheek, D.B., & LeCron, L.M., Clinical Hypnotherapy, Grune & Stratton (New York), 1968.\n Janet, P., \"Lecture XIII: The Hysterical Stigmata—Suggestibility\", pp.270–292 in P. Janet, The Major Symptoms of Hysteria: Fifteen Lectures Given in the Medical School of Harvard University, Second Edition with New Matter, Macmillan Company, (New York), 1920.\n \n Weitzenhoffer, A.M., The Practice of Hypnotism (Second Edition), John Wiley & Sons (New York), 2000.\n Yeates, L.B., James Braid: Surgeon, Gentleman Scientist, and Hypnotist, Ph.D. Dissertation, School of History and Philosophy of Science, Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences, University of New South Wales, January 2013.\n Yeates, Lindsay B. (2016a), \"Émile Coué and his Method (I): The Chemist of Thought and Human Action\", Australian Journal of Clinical Hypnotherapy & Hypnosis, Volume 38, No.1, (Autumn 2016), pp.3–27.\n Yeates, Lindsay B. (2016b), \"Émile Coué and his Method (II): Hypnotism, Suggestion, Ego-Strengthening, and Autosuggestion\", Australian Journal of Clinical Hypnotherapy & Hypnosis, Volume 38, No.1, (Autumn 2016), pp.28–54.\n Yeates, Lindsay B. (2016c), \"Émile Coué and his Method (III): Every Day in Every Way\", Australian Journal of Clinical Hypnotherapy & Hypnosis, Volume 38, No.1, (Autumn 2016), pp.55–79.\n\nExternal links\n\n , Chautauqua Institution\n The Power of Suggestion: What We Expect Influences Our Behavior, for Better or Worse\n Exploring the science behind hypnosis\n\nHypnosis\nSentences by type" ]
[ "Tinariwen", "Early years" ]	C_b0cf644ab3764721ad182de5751f068f_1	When did Tinariwen form?	1	When did Tinariwen form?	Tinariwen	Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who at age four witnessed the execution of his father (a Tuareg rebel) during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a tin can, a stick and bicycle brake wire. He started to play old Tuareg and modern Arabic pop tunes. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he received a guitar from a local Arab man. Later, he resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. In the late 1970s, Ag Alhabib joined with other musicians in the Tuareg rebel community, exploring the radical chaabi protest music of Moroccan groups like Nass El Ghiwane and Jil Jilala; Algerian pop rai; and western rock and pop artists like Elvis Presley, Led Zeppelin, Carlos Santana, Dire Straits, Jimi Hendrix, Boney M, and Bob Marley. Ag Alhabib formed a group with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil in Tamanrasset, Algeria to play at parties and weddings. Ag Alhabib acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as "The People of the Deserts" or "The Desert Boys." In 1980, Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of the best young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. They answered a similar call in 1985, this time by leaders of the Tuareg rebel movement in Libya, and met fellow musicians Keddou Ag Ossade, Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais"), Sweiloum, Abouhadid, and Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. All sang and played guitar in various permutations. The musicians joined together in a collective (now known as Tinariwen) in order to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people, built a makeshift studio, and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region. In 1989, the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the military and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people. CANNOTANSWER	Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who at age four witnessed the execution of his father (a Tuareg rebel) during a 1963 uprising in Mali.	Tinariwen (Tamasheq: , with vowels , pronounced tinariwen "deserts", plural of ténéré "desert") is a group of Tuareg musicians from the Sahara Desert region of northern Mali. The band was formed in 1979 in Tamanrasset, Algeria, but returned to Mali after a peace accord between 1990 and 1995. Considered a pioneer of desert blues, the group first started to gain a following outside the Sahara region in 2001 with the release of the album The Radio Tisdas Sessions, and with performances at Festival au Désert in Mali and the Roskilde Festival in Denmark. Their popularity rose internationally with the release of the critically acclaimed album Aman Iman in 2007. NPR calls the group "music's true rebels", AllMusic deems the group's music "a grassroots voice of rebellion", and Slate calls the group "rock 'n' roll rebels whose rebellion, for once, wasn't just metaphorical". Biography Early years Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib who, at age four witnessed the execution of his father, a Tuareg rebel, during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a "plastic water can, a stick and some fishing wire", according to future bandmate Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he was given a guitar from a local Arab man. Later, Ag Alhabib resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. He acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. During this period he formed a band with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil to play at parties and weddings. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as "The People of the Deserts" or "The Desert Boys." In 1980 Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. During such exercises, the band met additional Tuareg musicians and formed a loosely-organized collective, now known as Tinariwen, to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people. They built a makeshift studio and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region. In 1989 the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the rebel movement and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people. International recognition (1998–2009) In 1998 Tinariwen came to the attention of the French world music ensemble Lo'Jo and their manager Philippe Brix. That group traveled to a music festival in Bamako and met two members of the Tinariwen collective. In 1999, some members of Tinariwen traveled to France and performed with Lo'Jo under the name Azawad. The two groups organized the January 2001 Festival au Désert in Essakane, Mali with Tinariwen as the headliners, and in cooperation with the Belgian Sfinks Festival. Their debut commercial album, The Radio Tisdas Sessions, was recorded by Justin Adams and Jean-Paul Romann at the radio station of the same name in Kidal, Mali (the only Tamashek-speaking station in the region) and released in 2001. It was Tinariwen's first recording to be released outside of northern Africa. Since 2001 Tinariwen have toured regularly in Europe, North America, Japan, and Australia. Their 2004 album Amassakoul ("The Traveller" in Tamashek) and the 2007 album Aman Iman ("Water Is Life" in Tamashek) were released worldwide and gained the notice of celebrity fans including Carlos Santana, Robert Plant, Bono and the Edge of U2, Thom Yorke of Radiohead, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Henry Rollins, Brian Eno, and members of TV On The Radio. In 2005, Tinariwen received a BBC Award for World Music, and in 2008, they received Germany's prestigious Praetorius Music Prize. The band's 2009 album Imidiwan: Companions was recorded in a mobile studio by Jean-Paul Romann in the village of Tessalit, Mali. The band appeared at Glastonbury in 2009. Also since 2001 the Tinariwen collective has added several younger Tuareg musicians who did not live through the military conflicts experienced by the older members but have contributed to the collective's multi-generational evolution. New members include bassist Eyadou Ag Leche, percussionist Said Ag Ayad, guitarist Elaga Ag Hamid, guitarist Abdallah Ag Lamida, and vocalists Wonou Walet Sidati and the Walet Oumar sisters. Further international success (2010–present) In 2010 Tinariwen represented Algeria in the opening ceremony of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, and completed a lengthy American tour. The band released their fifth album Tassili on August 30, 2011. Tassili included guest appearances by Nels Cline, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio. Ian Brennan produced the album with engineer, Jean Paul Romman. The album later won the Award for Best World Music Album at the 54th Grammy Awards. In July 2011, the collective set out for a new world tour that included performances at the End of the Road Festival in September and All Tomorrow's Parties in December. Tinariwen appeared on The Colbert Report on November 29, 2011 with Adebimpe and Malone to play "Tenere Taqqim Tossam" and "Imidiwan Ma Tenam" from Tassili. Group members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Alhassane Ag Touhami, and Eyadou Ag Leche participated in a translated interview with Colbert. In early 2012 there was another Tuareg rebellion in Tinariwen's home region of northern Mali, with the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) declaring independence and forming the short-lived unrecognized state Azawad. In August 2012, another party in the rebellion, the militant Islamist group Ansar Dine, denounced the presence of popular music in the territory and stated "We do not want Satan's music. In its place will be Quranic verses. Sharia demands this. What God commands must be done." Tinariwen was targeted specifically during this campaign. In a January 2013 confrontation, most band members evaded capture, except Abdallah Ag Lamida who was abducted while trying to save his guitars. A few weeks later, Tinariwen reported that Ag Lamida had been released and was "safe and free." During Ag Lamida's captivity, several other members of Tinariwen fled from the conflict and resettled temporarily in the southwestern United States to record their sixth album, Emmaarproduced by Patrick Vo Tan, with guests including Josh Klinghoffer, Fats Kaplin, Matt Sweeney, and Saul Williams. Recording took place at Joshua Tree National Park in California, which features a desert environment similar to that of Tinariwen's homeland. Emmaar was released worldwide in February 2014. Tinariwen then embarked on a tour of Europe and North America, but without group leader Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who decided to remain in Mali to attend to family issues caused by the latest political crisis. Bassist Eyadou Ag Leche assumed the role of musical director, and a new singer/guitarist named Iyad Abderrahmane was recruited to perform Ag Alhabib's parts during the tour. In 2016, the group returned to Joshua Tree National Park and spent few days at Rancho De La Luna to record part of their seventh album, Elwan, with additional recording in France and a two weeks session in a town called M'hamed El Ghizlane in Southern Morocco, an oasis very near the Algerian border and home to its own Saharan music festival. The album was released in February 2017 and features guest appearances by Matt Sweeney, Kurt Vile, Mark Lanegan, and Alain Johannes. Tinariwen then embarked on an American tour with Dengue Fever as support. The group also toured Europe and Asia in 2017, and toured Australia, New Zealand, and North America in 2018. Upon returning from the international tour in support of Elwan in 2018, Tinariwen were unable to return to their home area in northern Mali due to ongoing sectarian violence and threats from Islamist militants. The group instead decamped in Morocco and embarked on a multi-month journey through Western Sahara and Mauritania, collaborating with local musicians at several stops along the way and writing songs while camped out in the desert. Their eighth full-length album Amadjar was recorded outdoors with mobile equipment near Nouakchott and was released on September 6, 2019. Amadjar features guest appearances by Noura Mint Seymali, Micah Nelson, Cass McCombs, Stephen O'Malley, Warren Ellis, and Rodolphe Burger. Musical style and influence The Tinariwen sound is primarily guitar-driven in the style known as assouf among the Tuareg people. The Tinariwen guitar style has its roots in West African music and other traditional styles practiced by the Tuareg and Berber peoples, and has often been categorized as "desert blues". Tinariwen was also influenced by traditional Malian musicians, most notably Ali Farka Touré, and regional pop singers like Rabah Driassa. While the Tinariwen style is possibly a distant relative of blues music, via West African music, members of Tinariwen claim to have never heard actual American blues music until they began to travel internationally in the early 2000s. Tinariwen was also influenced by American and British rock bands whose bootlegged albums had made it to the Sahara region, such as Dire Straits, Santana, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, and Jimi Hendrix. Tinariwen has been named as a formative influence on a growing Tuareg rock scene, made up of younger musicians who were not rebels like the members of Tinariwen but have experienced their region's recent struggles with poverty and terrorism. The band Imarhan is led by Sadam Iyad Moussa Ben Abderamane, who has collaborated with Tinariwen and is the nephew of longtime Tinariwen bassist Eyadu ag Leche. Kel Assouf and Tamikrest have also gained notice as younger Tuareg rock bands that cite Tinariwen as a fundamental influence. Band members Tinariwen is a collective of singers, songwriters, and musicians who come together in different combinations to play concerts and to record. This is because of the nomadic lifestyle of the Tuareg people and the difficulties of transportation and communication in the Sahara region. The group has never brought exactly the same line-up on its international tours, though several members tour regularly. One of the group's founder members, Inteyeden Ag Ablil (brother of guitarist Liya Ag Ablil) died of a virus in the desert in 1994, and singer Wonou Walet Oumar died of a kidney infection in 2005. Mohamed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais") died on 14 February 2021 from a heart attack. Active touring members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib – guitar, vocals Alhassane Ag Touhami – guitar, vocals Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni – acoustic guitar, guitar, vocals Eyadou Ag Leche – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, calabash, vocals, backing vocals Said Ag Ayad – percussion, backing vocals Elaga Ag Hamid – guitar, backing vocals Non-touring or previous members Abdallah Ag Lamida ("Intidao") – guitar, backing vocals Mohammed Ag Tahada – percussion Iyad Moussa Abderrahmane – guitar, vocals Inteyeden Ag Ablil (died 1994) – guitar, vocals Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais") (died 2021) – guitar, vocals Kedou Ag Ossad – guitar, vocals Liya Ag Ablil – rhythm guitar, vocals Sweiloum – guitar, vocals Foy Foy – guitar, vocals Abouhadid – guitar, vocals Wonou Walet Sidati – vocals Kesa Malet Hamid – vocals Mina Walet Oumar – vocals Wonou Walet Oumar (died 2005) – vocals Awards In 2012 Tinariwen won Best Group at the Songlines Music Awards. In 2012 Tassili won the Grammy Award for Best World Music Album. In 2017 Elwan was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best World Music Album. In 2020 Amadjar was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best Global Music Album. In 2020 Amadjar won the Libera Award for best world music album. Discography Albums Others Contributing artist The Rough Guide to Desert Blues (2010) The Imagine Project – Herbie Hancock (2010) ("Tamatant Tilay/Exodus" with K'naan and Los Lobos) References External links Official Tinariwen site Malian musical groups Tuareg culture Wrasse Records artists Berber music Grammy Award winners Outside Music albums Independiente Records artists Algerian music Desert blues	false	[ "The Radio Tisdas Sessions is a 2001 (see 2001 in music) album by the Malian group Tinariwen. The album was recorded at Kidal's local Tuareg station, Radio Tisdas, by producers Justin Adams and Lo'Jo. While Tinariwen had previously recorded several cassette-only albums for regional markets, The Radio Tisdas Sessions was their first on CD and their first to be distributed worldwide.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences \n\n2001 albums\nTinariwen albums", "Tinariwen (Tamasheq: , with vowels , pronounced tinariwen \"deserts\", plural of ténéré \"desert\") is a group of Tuareg musicians from the Sahara Desert region of northern Mali. The band was formed in 1979 in Tamanrasset, Algeria, but returned to Mali after a peace accord between 1990 and 1995. Considered a pioneer of desert blues, the group first started to gain a following outside the Sahara region in 2001 with the release of the album The Radio Tisdas Sessions, and with performances at Festival au Désert in Mali and the Roskilde Festival in Denmark.\n\nTheir popularity rose internationally with the release of the critically acclaimed album Aman Iman in 2007. NPR calls the group \"music's true rebels\", AllMusic deems the group's music \"a grassroots voice of rebellion\", and Slate calls the group \"rock 'n' roll rebels whose rebellion, for once, wasn't just metaphorical\".\n\nBiography\n\nEarly years\nTinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib who, at age four witnessed the execution of his father, a Tuareg rebel, during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a \"plastic water can, a stick and some fishing wire\", according to future bandmate Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he was given a guitar from a local Arab man.\n\nLater, Ag Alhabib resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. He acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. During this period he formed a band with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil to play at parties and weddings. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as \"The People of the Deserts\" or \"The Desert Boys.\"\n\nIn 1980 Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. During such exercises, the band met additional Tuareg musicians and formed a loosely-organized collective, now known as Tinariwen, to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people. They built a makeshift studio and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region.\n\nIn 1989 the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the rebel movement and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people.\n\nInternational recognition (1998–2009)\n\nIn 1998 Tinariwen came to the attention of the French world music ensemble Lo'Jo and their manager Philippe Brix. That group traveled to a music festival in Bamako and met two members of the Tinariwen collective. In 1999, some members of Tinariwen traveled to France and performed with Lo'Jo under the name Azawad. The two groups organized the January 2001 Festival au Désert in Essakane, Mali with Tinariwen as the headliners, and in cooperation with the Belgian Sfinks Festival. Their debut commercial album, The Radio Tisdas Sessions, was recorded by Justin Adams and Jean-Paul Romann at the radio station of the same name in Kidal, Mali (the only Tamashek-speaking station in the region) and released in 2001. It was Tinariwen's first recording to be released outside of northern Africa.\n\nSince 2001 Tinariwen have toured regularly in Europe, North America, Japan, and Australia. Their 2004 album Amassakoul (\"The Traveller\" in Tamashek) and the 2007 album Aman Iman (\"Water Is Life\" in Tamashek) were released worldwide and gained the notice of celebrity fans including Carlos Santana, Robert Plant, Bono and the Edge of U2, Thom Yorke of Radiohead, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Henry Rollins, Brian Eno, and members of TV On The Radio. In 2005, Tinariwen received a BBC Award for World Music, and in 2008, they received Germany's prestigious Praetorius Music Prize. The band's 2009 album Imidiwan: Companions was recorded in a mobile studio by Jean-Paul Romann in the village of Tessalit, Mali. The band appeared at Glastonbury in 2009.\n\nAlso since 2001 the Tinariwen collective has added several younger Tuareg musicians who did not live through the military conflicts experienced by the older members but have contributed to the collective's multi-generational evolution. New members include bassist Eyadou Ag Leche, percussionist Said Ag Ayad, guitarist Elaga Ag Hamid, guitarist Abdallah Ag Lamida, and vocalists Wonou Walet Sidati and the Walet Oumar sisters.\n\nFurther international success (2010–present)\n\nIn 2010 Tinariwen represented Algeria in the opening ceremony of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, and completed a lengthy American tour. The band released their fifth album Tassili on August 30, 2011. Tassili included guest appearances by Nels Cline, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio. Ian Brennan produced the album with engineer, Jean Paul Romman. The album later won the Award for Best World Music Album at the 54th Grammy Awards. In July 2011, the collective set out for a new world tour that included performances at the End of the Road Festival in September and All Tomorrow's Parties in December. Tinariwen appeared on The Colbert Report on November 29, 2011 with Adebimpe and Malone to play \"Tenere Taqqim Tossam\" and \"Imidiwan Ma Tenam\" from Tassili. Group members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Alhassane Ag Touhami, and Eyadou Ag Leche participated in a translated interview with Colbert.\n\nIn early 2012 there was another Tuareg rebellion in Tinariwen's home region of northern Mali, with the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) declaring independence and forming the short-lived unrecognized state Azawad. In August 2012, another party in the rebellion, the militant Islamist group Ansar Dine, denounced the presence of popular music in the territory and stated \"We do not want Satan's music. In its place will be Quranic verses. Sharia demands this. What God commands must be done.\" Tinariwen was targeted specifically during this campaign. In a January 2013 confrontation, most band members evaded capture, except Abdallah Ag Lamida who was abducted while trying to save his guitars. A few weeks later, Tinariwen reported that Ag Lamida had been released and was \"safe and free.\"\n\nDuring Ag Lamida's captivity, several other members of Tinariwen fled from the conflict and resettled temporarily in the southwestern United States to record their sixth album, Emmaarproduced by Patrick Vo Tan, with guests including Josh Klinghoffer, Fats Kaplin, Matt Sweeney, and Saul Williams. Recording took place at Joshua Tree National Park in California, which features a desert environment similar to that of Tinariwen's homeland. Emmaar was released worldwide in February 2014. Tinariwen then embarked on a tour of Europe and North America, but without group leader Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who decided to remain in Mali to attend to family issues caused by the latest political crisis. Bassist Eyadou Ag Leche assumed the role of musical director, and a new singer/guitarist named Iyad Abderrahmane was recruited to perform Ag Alhabib's parts during the tour. In 2016, the group returned to Joshua Tree National Park and spent few days at Rancho De La Luna to record part of their seventh album, Elwan, with additional recording in France and a two weeks session in a town called M'hamed El Ghizlane in Southern Morocco, an oasis very near the Algerian border and home to its own Saharan music festival. The album was released in February 2017 and features guest appearances by Matt Sweeney, Kurt Vile, Mark Lanegan, and Alain Johannes. Tinariwen then embarked on an American tour with Dengue Fever as support. The group also toured Europe and Asia in 2017, and toured Australia, New Zealand, and North America in 2018.\n\nUpon returning from the international tour in support of Elwan in 2018, Tinariwen were unable to return to their home area in northern Mali due to ongoing sectarian violence and threats from Islamist militants. The group instead decamped in Morocco and embarked on a multi-month journey through Western Sahara and Mauritania, collaborating with local musicians at several stops along the way and writing songs while camped out in the desert. Their eighth full-length album Amadjar was recorded outdoors with mobile equipment near Nouakchott and was released on September 6, 2019. Amadjar features guest appearances by Noura Mint Seymali, Micah Nelson, Cass McCombs, Stephen O'Malley, Warren Ellis, and Rodolphe Burger.\n\nMusical style and influence\nThe Tinariwen sound is primarily guitar-driven in the style known as assouf among the Tuareg people. The Tinariwen guitar style has its roots in West African music and other traditional styles practiced by the Tuareg and Berber peoples, and has often been categorized as \"desert blues\". Tinariwen was also influenced by traditional Malian musicians, most notably Ali Farka Touré, and regional pop singers like Rabah Driassa. While the Tinariwen style is possibly a distant relative of blues music, via West African music, members of Tinariwen claim to have never heard actual American blues music until they began to travel internationally in the early 2000s. Tinariwen was also influenced by American and British rock bands whose bootlegged albums had made it to the Sahara region, such as Dire Straits, Santana, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, and Jimi Hendrix.\n\nTinariwen has been named as a formative influence on a growing Tuareg rock scene, made up of younger musicians who were not rebels like the members of Tinariwen but have experienced their region's recent struggles with poverty and terrorism. The band Imarhan is led by Sadam Iyad Moussa Ben Abderamane, who has collaborated with Tinariwen and is the nephew of longtime Tinariwen bassist Eyadu ag Leche. Kel Assouf and Tamikrest have also gained notice as younger Tuareg rock bands that cite Tinariwen as a fundamental influence.\n\nBand members\n\nTinariwen is a collective of singers, songwriters, and musicians who come together in different combinations to play concerts and to record. This is because of the nomadic lifestyle of the Tuareg people and the difficulties of transportation and communication in the Sahara region. The group has never brought exactly the same line-up on its international tours, though several members tour regularly.\n\nOne of the group's founder members, Inteyeden Ag Ablil (brother of guitarist Liya Ag Ablil) died of a virus in the desert in 1994, and singer Wonou Walet Oumar died of a kidney infection in 2005. Mohamed Ag Itlale (aka \"Japonais\") died on 14 February 2021 from a heart attack.\n\nActive touring members\n Ibrahim Ag Alhabib – guitar, vocals\n Alhassane Ag Touhami – guitar, vocals\n Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni – acoustic guitar, guitar, vocals\n Eyadou Ag Leche – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, calabash, vocals, backing vocals\n Said Ag Ayad – percussion, backing vocals\n Elaga Ag Hamid – guitar, backing vocals\n\nNon-touring or previous members\n\n Abdallah Ag Lamida (\"Intidao\") – guitar, backing vocals\n Mohammed Ag Tahada – percussion\n Iyad Moussa Abderrahmane – guitar, vocals\n Inteyeden Ag Ablil (died 1994) – guitar, vocals\n Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka \"Japonais\") (died 2021) – guitar, vocals\n Kedou Ag Ossad – guitar, vocals\n Liya Ag Ablil – rhythm guitar, vocals\n Sweiloum – guitar, vocals\n Foy Foy – guitar, vocals\n Abouhadid – guitar, vocals\n Wonou Walet Sidati – vocals\n Kesa Malet Hamid – vocals\n Mina Walet Oumar – vocals\n Wonou Walet Oumar (died 2005) – vocals\n\nAwards\n In 2012 Tinariwen won Best Group at the Songlines Music Awards.\n In 2012 Tassili won the Grammy Award for Best World Music Album.\nIn 2017 Elwan was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best World Music Album.\n In 2020 Amadjar was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best Global Music Album.\n In 2020 Amadjar won the Libera Award for best world music album.\n\nDiscography\n\nAlbums\n\nOthers\n\nContributing artist\n The Rough Guide to Desert Blues (2010)\n The Imagine Project – Herbie Hancock (2010) (\"Tamatant Tilay/Exodus\" with K'naan and Los Lobos)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n Official Tinariwen site\n\nMalian musical groups\nTuareg culture\nWrasse Records artists\nBerber music\nGrammy Award winners\nOutside Music albums\nIndependiente Records artists\nAlgerian music\nDesert blues" ]
[ "Tinariwen", "Early years", "When did Tinariwen form?", "Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who at age four witnessed the execution of his father (a Tuareg rebel) during a 1963 uprising in Mali." ]	C_b0cf644ab3764721ad182de5751f068f_1	Who are the other members of Tinariwen?	2	Who are the other members of Tinariwen besides Ibrahim Ag Alhabib ?	Tinariwen	Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who at age four witnessed the execution of his father (a Tuareg rebel) during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a tin can, a stick and bicycle brake wire. He started to play old Tuareg and modern Arabic pop tunes. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he received a guitar from a local Arab man. Later, he resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. In the late 1970s, Ag Alhabib joined with other musicians in the Tuareg rebel community, exploring the radical chaabi protest music of Moroccan groups like Nass El Ghiwane and Jil Jilala; Algerian pop rai; and western rock and pop artists like Elvis Presley, Led Zeppelin, Carlos Santana, Dire Straits, Jimi Hendrix, Boney M, and Bob Marley. Ag Alhabib formed a group with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil in Tamanrasset, Algeria to play at parties and weddings. Ag Alhabib acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as "The People of the Deserts" or "The Desert Boys." In 1980, Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of the best young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. They answered a similar call in 1985, this time by leaders of the Tuareg rebel movement in Libya, and met fellow musicians Keddou Ag Ossade, Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais"), Sweiloum, Abouhadid, and Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. All sang and played guitar in various permutations. The musicians joined together in a collective (now known as Tinariwen) in order to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people, built a makeshift studio, and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region. In 1989, the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the military and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people. CANNOTANSWER	Ag Alhabib joined with other musicians in the Tuareg rebel community, exploring the radical chaabi protest music of Moroccan groups	Tinariwen (Tamasheq: , with vowels , pronounced tinariwen "deserts", plural of ténéré "desert") is a group of Tuareg musicians from the Sahara Desert region of northern Mali. The band was formed in 1979 in Tamanrasset, Algeria, but returned to Mali after a peace accord between 1990 and 1995. Considered a pioneer of desert blues, the group first started to gain a following outside the Sahara region in 2001 with the release of the album The Radio Tisdas Sessions, and with performances at Festival au Désert in Mali and the Roskilde Festival in Denmark. Their popularity rose internationally with the release of the critically acclaimed album Aman Iman in 2007. NPR calls the group "music's true rebels", AllMusic deems the group's music "a grassroots voice of rebellion", and Slate calls the group "rock 'n' roll rebels whose rebellion, for once, wasn't just metaphorical". Biography Early years Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib who, at age four witnessed the execution of his father, a Tuareg rebel, during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a "plastic water can, a stick and some fishing wire", according to future bandmate Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he was given a guitar from a local Arab man. Later, Ag Alhabib resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. He acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. During this period he formed a band with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil to play at parties and weddings. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as "The People of the Deserts" or "The Desert Boys." In 1980 Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. During such exercises, the band met additional Tuareg musicians and formed a loosely-organized collective, now known as Tinariwen, to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people. They built a makeshift studio and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region. In 1989 the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the rebel movement and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people. International recognition (1998–2009) In 1998 Tinariwen came to the attention of the French world music ensemble Lo'Jo and their manager Philippe Brix. That group traveled to a music festival in Bamako and met two members of the Tinariwen collective. In 1999, some members of Tinariwen traveled to France and performed with Lo'Jo under the name Azawad. The two groups organized the January 2001 Festival au Désert in Essakane, Mali with Tinariwen as the headliners, and in cooperation with the Belgian Sfinks Festival. Their debut commercial album, The Radio Tisdas Sessions, was recorded by Justin Adams and Jean-Paul Romann at the radio station of the same name in Kidal, Mali (the only Tamashek-speaking station in the region) and released in 2001. It was Tinariwen's first recording to be released outside of northern Africa. Since 2001 Tinariwen have toured regularly in Europe, North America, Japan, and Australia. Their 2004 album Amassakoul ("The Traveller" in Tamashek) and the 2007 album Aman Iman ("Water Is Life" in Tamashek) were released worldwide and gained the notice of celebrity fans including Carlos Santana, Robert Plant, Bono and the Edge of U2, Thom Yorke of Radiohead, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Henry Rollins, Brian Eno, and members of TV On The Radio. In 2005, Tinariwen received a BBC Award for World Music, and in 2008, they received Germany's prestigious Praetorius Music Prize. The band's 2009 album Imidiwan: Companions was recorded in a mobile studio by Jean-Paul Romann in the village of Tessalit, Mali. The band appeared at Glastonbury in 2009. Also since 2001 the Tinariwen collective has added several younger Tuareg musicians who did not live through the military conflicts experienced by the older members but have contributed to the collective's multi-generational evolution. New members include bassist Eyadou Ag Leche, percussionist Said Ag Ayad, guitarist Elaga Ag Hamid, guitarist Abdallah Ag Lamida, and vocalists Wonou Walet Sidati and the Walet Oumar sisters. Further international success (2010–present) In 2010 Tinariwen represented Algeria in the opening ceremony of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, and completed a lengthy American tour. The band released their fifth album Tassili on August 30, 2011. Tassili included guest appearances by Nels Cline, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio. Ian Brennan produced the album with engineer, Jean Paul Romman. The album later won the Award for Best World Music Album at the 54th Grammy Awards. In July 2011, the collective set out for a new world tour that included performances at the End of the Road Festival in September and All Tomorrow's Parties in December. Tinariwen appeared on The Colbert Report on November 29, 2011 with Adebimpe and Malone to play "Tenere Taqqim Tossam" and "Imidiwan Ma Tenam" from Tassili. Group members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Alhassane Ag Touhami, and Eyadou Ag Leche participated in a translated interview with Colbert. In early 2012 there was another Tuareg rebellion in Tinariwen's home region of northern Mali, with the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) declaring independence and forming the short-lived unrecognized state Azawad. In August 2012, another party in the rebellion, the militant Islamist group Ansar Dine, denounced the presence of popular music in the territory and stated "We do not want Satan's music. In its place will be Quranic verses. Sharia demands this. What God commands must be done." Tinariwen was targeted specifically during this campaign. In a January 2013 confrontation, most band members evaded capture, except Abdallah Ag Lamida who was abducted while trying to save his guitars. A few weeks later, Tinariwen reported that Ag Lamida had been released and was "safe and free." During Ag Lamida's captivity, several other members of Tinariwen fled from the conflict and resettled temporarily in the southwestern United States to record their sixth album, Emmaarproduced by Patrick Vo Tan, with guests including Josh Klinghoffer, Fats Kaplin, Matt Sweeney, and Saul Williams. Recording took place at Joshua Tree National Park in California, which features a desert environment similar to that of Tinariwen's homeland. Emmaar was released worldwide in February 2014. Tinariwen then embarked on a tour of Europe and North America, but without group leader Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who decided to remain in Mali to attend to family issues caused by the latest political crisis. Bassist Eyadou Ag Leche assumed the role of musical director, and a new singer/guitarist named Iyad Abderrahmane was recruited to perform Ag Alhabib's parts during the tour. In 2016, the group returned to Joshua Tree National Park and spent few days at Rancho De La Luna to record part of their seventh album, Elwan, with additional recording in France and a two weeks session in a town called M'hamed El Ghizlane in Southern Morocco, an oasis very near the Algerian border and home to its own Saharan music festival. The album was released in February 2017 and features guest appearances by Matt Sweeney, Kurt Vile, Mark Lanegan, and Alain Johannes. Tinariwen then embarked on an American tour with Dengue Fever as support. The group also toured Europe and Asia in 2017, and toured Australia, New Zealand, and North America in 2018. Upon returning from the international tour in support of Elwan in 2018, Tinariwen were unable to return to their home area in northern Mali due to ongoing sectarian violence and threats from Islamist militants. The group instead decamped in Morocco and embarked on a multi-month journey through Western Sahara and Mauritania, collaborating with local musicians at several stops along the way and writing songs while camped out in the desert. Their eighth full-length album Amadjar was recorded outdoors with mobile equipment near Nouakchott and was released on September 6, 2019. Amadjar features guest appearances by Noura Mint Seymali, Micah Nelson, Cass McCombs, Stephen O'Malley, Warren Ellis, and Rodolphe Burger. Musical style and influence The Tinariwen sound is primarily guitar-driven in the style known as assouf among the Tuareg people. The Tinariwen guitar style has its roots in West African music and other traditional styles practiced by the Tuareg and Berber peoples, and has often been categorized as "desert blues". Tinariwen was also influenced by traditional Malian musicians, most notably Ali Farka Touré, and regional pop singers like Rabah Driassa. While the Tinariwen style is possibly a distant relative of blues music, via West African music, members of Tinariwen claim to have never heard actual American blues music until they began to travel internationally in the early 2000s. Tinariwen was also influenced by American and British rock bands whose bootlegged albums had made it to the Sahara region, such as Dire Straits, Santana, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, and Jimi Hendrix. Tinariwen has been named as a formative influence on a growing Tuareg rock scene, made up of younger musicians who were not rebels like the members of Tinariwen but have experienced their region's recent struggles with poverty and terrorism. The band Imarhan is led by Sadam Iyad Moussa Ben Abderamane, who has collaborated with Tinariwen and is the nephew of longtime Tinariwen bassist Eyadu ag Leche. Kel Assouf and Tamikrest have also gained notice as younger Tuareg rock bands that cite Tinariwen as a fundamental influence. Band members Tinariwen is a collective of singers, songwriters, and musicians who come together in different combinations to play concerts and to record. This is because of the nomadic lifestyle of the Tuareg people and the difficulties of transportation and communication in the Sahara region. The group has never brought exactly the same line-up on its international tours, though several members tour regularly. One of the group's founder members, Inteyeden Ag Ablil (brother of guitarist Liya Ag Ablil) died of a virus in the desert in 1994, and singer Wonou Walet Oumar died of a kidney infection in 2005. Mohamed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais") died on 14 February 2021 from a heart attack. Active touring members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib – guitar, vocals Alhassane Ag Touhami – guitar, vocals Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni – acoustic guitar, guitar, vocals Eyadou Ag Leche – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, calabash, vocals, backing vocals Said Ag Ayad – percussion, backing vocals Elaga Ag Hamid – guitar, backing vocals Non-touring or previous members Abdallah Ag Lamida ("Intidao") – guitar, backing vocals Mohammed Ag Tahada – percussion Iyad Moussa Abderrahmane – guitar, vocals Inteyeden Ag Ablil (died 1994) – guitar, vocals Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais") (died 2021) – guitar, vocals Kedou Ag Ossad – guitar, vocals Liya Ag Ablil – rhythm guitar, vocals Sweiloum – guitar, vocals Foy Foy – guitar, vocals Abouhadid – guitar, vocals Wonou Walet Sidati – vocals Kesa Malet Hamid – vocals Mina Walet Oumar – vocals Wonou Walet Oumar (died 2005) – vocals Awards In 2012 Tinariwen won Best Group at the Songlines Music Awards. In 2012 Tassili won the Grammy Award for Best World Music Album. In 2017 Elwan was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best World Music Album. In 2020 Amadjar was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best Global Music Album. In 2020 Amadjar won the Libera Award for best world music album. Discography Albums Others Contributing artist The Rough Guide to Desert Blues (2010) The Imagine Project – Herbie Hancock (2010) ("Tamatant Tilay/Exodus" with K'naan and Los Lobos) References External links Official Tinariwen site Malian musical groups Tuareg culture Wrasse Records artists Berber music Grammy Award winners Outside Music albums Independiente Records artists Algerian music Desert blues	false	[ "Tinariwen (Tamasheq: , with vowels , pronounced tinariwen \"deserts\", plural of ténéré \"desert\") is a group of Tuareg musicians from the Sahara Desert region of northern Mali. The band was formed in 1979 in Tamanrasset, Algeria, but returned to Mali after a peace accord between 1990 and 1995. Considered a pioneer of desert blues, the group first started to gain a following outside the Sahara region in 2001 with the release of the album The Radio Tisdas Sessions, and with performances at Festival au Désert in Mali and the Roskilde Festival in Denmark.\n\nTheir popularity rose internationally with the release of the critically acclaimed album Aman Iman in 2007. NPR calls the group \"music's true rebels\", AllMusic deems the group's music \"a grassroots voice of rebellion\", and Slate calls the group \"rock 'n' roll rebels whose rebellion, for once, wasn't just metaphorical\".\n\nBiography\n\nEarly years\nTinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib who, at age four witnessed the execution of his father, a Tuareg rebel, during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a \"plastic water can, a stick and some fishing wire\", according to future bandmate Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he was given a guitar from a local Arab man.\n\nLater, Ag Alhabib resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. He acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. During this period he formed a band with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil to play at parties and weddings. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as \"The People of the Deserts\" or \"The Desert Boys.\"\n\nIn 1980 Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. During such exercises, the band met additional Tuareg musicians and formed a loosely-organized collective, now known as Tinariwen, to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people. They built a makeshift studio and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region.\n\nIn 1989 the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the rebel movement and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people.\n\nInternational recognition (1998–2009)\n\nIn 1998 Tinariwen came to the attention of the French world music ensemble Lo'Jo and their manager Philippe Brix. That group traveled to a music festival in Bamako and met two members of the Tinariwen collective. In 1999, some members of Tinariwen traveled to France and performed with Lo'Jo under the name Azawad. The two groups organized the January 2001 Festival au Désert in Essakane, Mali with Tinariwen as the headliners, and in cooperation with the Belgian Sfinks Festival. Their debut commercial album, The Radio Tisdas Sessions, was recorded by Justin Adams and Jean-Paul Romann at the radio station of the same name in Kidal, Mali (the only Tamashek-speaking station in the region) and released in 2001. It was Tinariwen's first recording to be released outside of northern Africa.\n\nSince 2001 Tinariwen have toured regularly in Europe, North America, Japan, and Australia. Their 2004 album Amassakoul (\"The Traveller\" in Tamashek) and the 2007 album Aman Iman (\"Water Is Life\" in Tamashek) were released worldwide and gained the notice of celebrity fans including Carlos Santana, Robert Plant, Bono and the Edge of U2, Thom Yorke of Radiohead, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Henry Rollins, Brian Eno, and members of TV On The Radio. In 2005, Tinariwen received a BBC Award for World Music, and in 2008, they received Germany's prestigious Praetorius Music Prize. The band's 2009 album Imidiwan: Companions was recorded in a mobile studio by Jean-Paul Romann in the village of Tessalit, Mali. The band appeared at Glastonbury in 2009.\n\nAlso since 2001 the Tinariwen collective has added several younger Tuareg musicians who did not live through the military conflicts experienced by the older members but have contributed to the collective's multi-generational evolution. New members include bassist Eyadou Ag Leche, percussionist Said Ag Ayad, guitarist Elaga Ag Hamid, guitarist Abdallah Ag Lamida, and vocalists Wonou Walet Sidati and the Walet Oumar sisters.\n\nFurther international success (2010–present)\n\nIn 2010 Tinariwen represented Algeria in the opening ceremony of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, and completed a lengthy American tour. The band released their fifth album Tassili on August 30, 2011. Tassili included guest appearances by Nels Cline, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio. Ian Brennan produced the album with engineer, Jean Paul Romman. The album later won the Award for Best World Music Album at the 54th Grammy Awards. In July 2011, the collective set out for a new world tour that included performances at the End of the Road Festival in September and All Tomorrow's Parties in December. Tinariwen appeared on The Colbert Report on November 29, 2011 with Adebimpe and Malone to play \"Tenere Taqqim Tossam\" and \"Imidiwan Ma Tenam\" from Tassili. Group members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Alhassane Ag Touhami, and Eyadou Ag Leche participated in a translated interview with Colbert.\n\nIn early 2012 there was another Tuareg rebellion in Tinariwen's home region of northern Mali, with the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) declaring independence and forming the short-lived unrecognized state Azawad. In August 2012, another party in the rebellion, the militant Islamist group Ansar Dine, denounced the presence of popular music in the territory and stated \"We do not want Satan's music. In its place will be Quranic verses. Sharia demands this. What God commands must be done.\" Tinariwen was targeted specifically during this campaign. In a January 2013 confrontation, most band members evaded capture, except Abdallah Ag Lamida who was abducted while trying to save his guitars. A few weeks later, Tinariwen reported that Ag Lamida had been released and was \"safe and free.\"\n\nDuring Ag Lamida's captivity, several other members of Tinariwen fled from the conflict and resettled temporarily in the southwestern United States to record their sixth album, Emmaarproduced by Patrick Vo Tan, with guests including Josh Klinghoffer, Fats Kaplin, Matt Sweeney, and Saul Williams. Recording took place at Joshua Tree National Park in California, which features a desert environment similar to that of Tinariwen's homeland. Emmaar was released worldwide in February 2014. Tinariwen then embarked on a tour of Europe and North America, but without group leader Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who decided to remain in Mali to attend to family issues caused by the latest political crisis. Bassist Eyadou Ag Leche assumed the role of musical director, and a new singer/guitarist named Iyad Abderrahmane was recruited to perform Ag Alhabib's parts during the tour. In 2016, the group returned to Joshua Tree National Park and spent few days at Rancho De La Luna to record part of their seventh album, Elwan, with additional recording in France and a two weeks session in a town called M'hamed El Ghizlane in Southern Morocco, an oasis very near the Algerian border and home to its own Saharan music festival. The album was released in February 2017 and features guest appearances by Matt Sweeney, Kurt Vile, Mark Lanegan, and Alain Johannes. Tinariwen then embarked on an American tour with Dengue Fever as support. The group also toured Europe and Asia in 2017, and toured Australia, New Zealand, and North America in 2018.\n\nUpon returning from the international tour in support of Elwan in 2018, Tinariwen were unable to return to their home area in northern Mali due to ongoing sectarian violence and threats from Islamist militants. The group instead decamped in Morocco and embarked on a multi-month journey through Western Sahara and Mauritania, collaborating with local musicians at several stops along the way and writing songs while camped out in the desert. Their eighth full-length album Amadjar was recorded outdoors with mobile equipment near Nouakchott and was released on September 6, 2019. Amadjar features guest appearances by Noura Mint Seymali, Micah Nelson, Cass McCombs, Stephen O'Malley, Warren Ellis, and Rodolphe Burger.\n\nMusical style and influence\nThe Tinariwen sound is primarily guitar-driven in the style known as assouf among the Tuareg people. The Tinariwen guitar style has its roots in West African music and other traditional styles practiced by the Tuareg and Berber peoples, and has often been categorized as \"desert blues\". Tinariwen was also influenced by traditional Malian musicians, most notably Ali Farka Touré, and regional pop singers like Rabah Driassa. While the Tinariwen style is possibly a distant relative of blues music, via West African music, members of Tinariwen claim to have never heard actual American blues music until they began to travel internationally in the early 2000s. Tinariwen was also influenced by American and British rock bands whose bootlegged albums had made it to the Sahara region, such as Dire Straits, Santana, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, and Jimi Hendrix.\n\nTinariwen has been named as a formative influence on a growing Tuareg rock scene, made up of younger musicians who were not rebels like the members of Tinariwen but have experienced their region's recent struggles with poverty and terrorism. The band Imarhan is led by Sadam Iyad Moussa Ben Abderamane, who has collaborated with Tinariwen and is the nephew of longtime Tinariwen bassist Eyadu ag Leche. Kel Assouf and Tamikrest have also gained notice as younger Tuareg rock bands that cite Tinariwen as a fundamental influence.\n\nBand members\n\nTinariwen is a collective of singers, songwriters, and musicians who come together in different combinations to play concerts and to record. This is because of the nomadic lifestyle of the Tuareg people and the difficulties of transportation and communication in the Sahara region. The group has never brought exactly the same line-up on its international tours, though several members tour regularly.\n\nOne of the group's founder members, Inteyeden Ag Ablil (brother of guitarist Liya Ag Ablil) died of a virus in the desert in 1994, and singer Wonou Walet Oumar died of a kidney infection in 2005. Mohamed Ag Itlale (aka \"Japonais\") died on 14 February 2021 from a heart attack.\n\nActive touring members\n Ibrahim Ag Alhabib – guitar, vocals\n Alhassane Ag Touhami – guitar, vocals\n Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni – acoustic guitar, guitar, vocals\n Eyadou Ag Leche – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, calabash, vocals, backing vocals\n Said Ag Ayad – percussion, backing vocals\n Elaga Ag Hamid – guitar, backing vocals\n\nNon-touring or previous members\n\n Abdallah Ag Lamida (\"Intidao\") – guitar, backing vocals\n Mohammed Ag Tahada – percussion\n Iyad Moussa Abderrahmane – guitar, vocals\n Inteyeden Ag Ablil (died 1994) – guitar, vocals\n Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka \"Japonais\") (died 2021) – guitar, vocals\n Kedou Ag Ossad – guitar, vocals\n Liya Ag Ablil – rhythm guitar, vocals\n Sweiloum – guitar, vocals\n Foy Foy – guitar, vocals\n Abouhadid – guitar, vocals\n Wonou Walet Sidati – vocals\n Kesa Malet Hamid – vocals\n Mina Walet Oumar – vocals\n Wonou Walet Oumar (died 2005) – vocals\n\nAwards\n In 2012 Tinariwen won Best Group at the Songlines Music Awards.\n In 2012 Tassili won the Grammy Award for Best World Music Album.\nIn 2017 Elwan was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best World Music Album.\n In 2020 Amadjar was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best Global Music Album.\n In 2020 Amadjar won the Libera Award for best world music album.\n\nDiscography\n\nAlbums\n\nOthers\n\nContributing artist\n The Rough Guide to Desert Blues (2010)\n The Imagine Project – Herbie Hancock (2010) (\"Tamatant Tilay/Exodus\" with K'naan and Los Lobos)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n Official Tinariwen site\n\nMalian musical groups\nTuareg culture\nWrasse Records artists\nBerber music\nGrammy Award winners\nOutside Music albums\nIndependiente Records artists\nAlgerian music\nDesert blues", "Tassili is the fifth album by the Tuareg-Berber band Tinariwen, recorded in Tassili n'Ajjer, an Algerian national park in 2011. The album marked a major departure from previous recordings. The producer, Ian Brennan, stated that it \"was the least overdubbed, most live, band-centric and song-oriented record they have done.”\n\nThe album won a Grammy Award for Best World Music Album in 2012.\n\nRecording sessions \nThe album was recorded during a three-week session in the rocky desert near Djanet, a town on the southern rim of the Tassili n'Ajjer plateau, in south-eastern Algeria. It was this protected region from which the group derived the album's name. The plateau served as an alternate location to record the album after Tessalit, the band's home town in northern Mali, proved to be too precarious due to renewed conflict.\n\nThe region's close proximity to Libya made it a place of relative safe passage for Kel Tamashek fighters who traveled from the refugee camps in Libya to the battlefront of northern Mali during the 1980s and the Tuareg Rebellion during the early 1990s. It was during this time that the group's founding members first came to play together as political exiles in tents and around campfires of refugee settlements.\n\nThe rehearsals for and recording of the album were conducted in similar way to those original performances.\n\nTinariwen, in addition to largely substituting both acoustic guitars and unamplified percussion for their usual electric guitars (reflecting their return to an older way of life), also had hundreds of pounds of recording equipment and other gear transported to a canyon deep in the desert (running off a generator placed far enough from the microphones in the main tent to prevent noise pollution).\n\nGregory Davis and Roger Lewis of the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, with arrangement by Ian Brennan, contributed to the fourth track \"Ya Messinagh\". Kyp Malone and Tunde Adebimpe from the American art rock band, TV on the Radio, traveled to the isolated recording site in Mali, staying eight days and contributing backing vocal harmonies on five tracks and lead vocals on one track. They had first met Tinariwen two years before at the Coachella festival in California when the two bands were on the same bill. Nels Cline, the guitarist from the American alternative rock band Wilco, played on the first track, \"Imidiwan Ma Tenam\".\n\nThe album was mixed by David Odlum at Studio Soyuz in Paris during February 2011 and at Studio Black Box in Angers during March 2011. It was mastered by John Golden at the Golden Mastering recording studio in Ventura, California during April 2011.\n\nReception \n\nBob Boilen stated in a review of the album for NPR Music that \"Tinariwen is just about the best guitar-based rock band of the 21st century.\"\n\nElysa Gardner of USA Today gave the album 2.5 stars out of 4. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received a score of 80, based on 37 reviews, indicating \"generally favorable reviews\". Uncut placed the album at number 18 on its list of the top 50 albums of 2011.\n\nMojo placed the album at number 35 on its list of \"Top 50 albums of 2011.\"\n\nOn 12 February 2012, the album won a Grammy Award for Best World Music Album.\n\nTrack listing\n\nNote: A two-disc special edition of the album includes a bonus disc with the tracks \"Djegh Ishilan\", \"El Huria Telitwar\", \"Kud Edazamin\", and \"Nak Ezzaragh Tinariwen\".\n\nPersonnel \n\nAll information from album liner notes. \n Ibrahim Ag Alhabib – lead vocals and lead guitar (except track 12)\n Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni – lead vocals and lead guitar (track 12)\n Alhassane Ag Touhami –backing vocals (all tracks)\n Eyadou Ag Leche – bass, guitar, percussion, backing vocals (all tracks), lead vocals (track 3)\n Elaga Ag Hamid – guitar, backing vocals (all tracks)\n Said Ag Ayad – percussion, backing vocals (all tracks)\n Mohamad Ag Tahada – percussion, backing vocals (all tracks)\n Mustapha Ag Ahmed – backing vocals (all tracks)\n Aroune Ag Alhabib – guitar, backing vocals (track 11)\n Kyp Malone – guitar (tracks 3, 5, 11), vocals (tracks 2, 11)\n Tunde Adebimpe – vocals (tracks 3, 5, 7)\n Nels Cline – guitar (track 1)\n Dirty Dozen Brass Band – horns (track 4)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Slideshow at New York Times\n - a video documentary about the recording of Tassili\n Original Tuareg lyrics and English translation at the official Tinariwen website\n Performance of Imidiwan Ma Tenam on The Colbert Report\n \n Tenere Taqqim Tossam on SoundCloud\n Interview with Tinariwen about Tassili at Mondomix\n\n2011 albums\nAnti- (record label) albums\nGrammy Award for Best World Music Album\nTinariwen albums" ]
[ "Tinariwen", "Early years", "When did Tinariwen form?", "Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who at age four witnessed the execution of his father (a Tuareg rebel) during a 1963 uprising in Mali.", "Who are the other members of Tinariwen?", "Ag Alhabib joined with other musicians in the Tuareg rebel community, exploring the radical chaabi protest music of Moroccan groups" ]	C_b0cf644ab3764721ad182de5751f068f_1	What here did Tinariwen release their first song?	3	What here did Tinariwen release their first song?	Tinariwen	Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who at age four witnessed the execution of his father (a Tuareg rebel) during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a tin can, a stick and bicycle brake wire. He started to play old Tuareg and modern Arabic pop tunes. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he received a guitar from a local Arab man. Later, he resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. In the late 1970s, Ag Alhabib joined with other musicians in the Tuareg rebel community, exploring the radical chaabi protest music of Moroccan groups like Nass El Ghiwane and Jil Jilala; Algerian pop rai; and western rock and pop artists like Elvis Presley, Led Zeppelin, Carlos Santana, Dire Straits, Jimi Hendrix, Boney M, and Bob Marley. Ag Alhabib formed a group with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil in Tamanrasset, Algeria to play at parties and weddings. Ag Alhabib acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as "The People of the Deserts" or "The Desert Boys." In 1980, Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of the best young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. They answered a similar call in 1985, this time by leaders of the Tuareg rebel movement in Libya, and met fellow musicians Keddou Ag Ossade, Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais"), Sweiloum, Abouhadid, and Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. All sang and played guitar in various permutations. The musicians joined together in a collective (now known as Tinariwen) in order to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people, built a makeshift studio, and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region. In 1989, the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the military and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Tinariwen (Tamasheq: , with vowels , pronounced tinariwen "deserts", plural of ténéré "desert") is a group of Tuareg musicians from the Sahara Desert region of northern Mali. The band was formed in 1979 in Tamanrasset, Algeria, but returned to Mali after a peace accord between 1990 and 1995. Considered a pioneer of desert blues, the group first started to gain a following outside the Sahara region in 2001 with the release of the album The Radio Tisdas Sessions, and with performances at Festival au Désert in Mali and the Roskilde Festival in Denmark. Their popularity rose internationally with the release of the critically acclaimed album Aman Iman in 2007. NPR calls the group "music's true rebels", AllMusic deems the group's music "a grassroots voice of rebellion", and Slate calls the group "rock 'n' roll rebels whose rebellion, for once, wasn't just metaphorical". Biography Early years Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib who, at age four witnessed the execution of his father, a Tuareg rebel, during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a "plastic water can, a stick and some fishing wire", according to future bandmate Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he was given a guitar from a local Arab man. Later, Ag Alhabib resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. He acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. During this period he formed a band with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil to play at parties and weddings. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as "The People of the Deserts" or "The Desert Boys." In 1980 Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. During such exercises, the band met additional Tuareg musicians and formed a loosely-organized collective, now known as Tinariwen, to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people. They built a makeshift studio and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region. In 1989 the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the rebel movement and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people. International recognition (1998–2009) In 1998 Tinariwen came to the attention of the French world music ensemble Lo'Jo and their manager Philippe Brix. That group traveled to a music festival in Bamako and met two members of the Tinariwen collective. In 1999, some members of Tinariwen traveled to France and performed with Lo'Jo under the name Azawad. The two groups organized the January 2001 Festival au Désert in Essakane, Mali with Tinariwen as the headliners, and in cooperation with the Belgian Sfinks Festival. Their debut commercial album, The Radio Tisdas Sessions, was recorded by Justin Adams and Jean-Paul Romann at the radio station of the same name in Kidal, Mali (the only Tamashek-speaking station in the region) and released in 2001. It was Tinariwen's first recording to be released outside of northern Africa. Since 2001 Tinariwen have toured regularly in Europe, North America, Japan, and Australia. Their 2004 album Amassakoul ("The Traveller" in Tamashek) and the 2007 album Aman Iman ("Water Is Life" in Tamashek) were released worldwide and gained the notice of celebrity fans including Carlos Santana, Robert Plant, Bono and the Edge of U2, Thom Yorke of Radiohead, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Henry Rollins, Brian Eno, and members of TV On The Radio. In 2005, Tinariwen received a BBC Award for World Music, and in 2008, they received Germany's prestigious Praetorius Music Prize. The band's 2009 album Imidiwan: Companions was recorded in a mobile studio by Jean-Paul Romann in the village of Tessalit, Mali. The band appeared at Glastonbury in 2009. Also since 2001 the Tinariwen collective has added several younger Tuareg musicians who did not live through the military conflicts experienced by the older members but have contributed to the collective's multi-generational evolution. New members include bassist Eyadou Ag Leche, percussionist Said Ag Ayad, guitarist Elaga Ag Hamid, guitarist Abdallah Ag Lamida, and vocalists Wonou Walet Sidati and the Walet Oumar sisters. Further international success (2010–present) In 2010 Tinariwen represented Algeria in the opening ceremony of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, and completed a lengthy American tour. The band released their fifth album Tassili on August 30, 2011. Tassili included guest appearances by Nels Cline, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio. Ian Brennan produced the album with engineer, Jean Paul Romman. The album later won the Award for Best World Music Album at the 54th Grammy Awards. In July 2011, the collective set out for a new world tour that included performances at the End of the Road Festival in September and All Tomorrow's Parties in December. Tinariwen appeared on The Colbert Report on November 29, 2011 with Adebimpe and Malone to play "Tenere Taqqim Tossam" and "Imidiwan Ma Tenam" from Tassili. Group members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Alhassane Ag Touhami, and Eyadou Ag Leche participated in a translated interview with Colbert. In early 2012 there was another Tuareg rebellion in Tinariwen's home region of northern Mali, with the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) declaring independence and forming the short-lived unrecognized state Azawad. In August 2012, another party in the rebellion, the militant Islamist group Ansar Dine, denounced the presence of popular music in the territory and stated "We do not want Satan's music. In its place will be Quranic verses. Sharia demands this. What God commands must be done." Tinariwen was targeted specifically during this campaign. In a January 2013 confrontation, most band members evaded capture, except Abdallah Ag Lamida who was abducted while trying to save his guitars. A few weeks later, Tinariwen reported that Ag Lamida had been released and was "safe and free." During Ag Lamida's captivity, several other members of Tinariwen fled from the conflict and resettled temporarily in the southwestern United States to record their sixth album, Emmaarproduced by Patrick Vo Tan, with guests including Josh Klinghoffer, Fats Kaplin, Matt Sweeney, and Saul Williams. Recording took place at Joshua Tree National Park in California, which features a desert environment similar to that of Tinariwen's homeland. Emmaar was released worldwide in February 2014. Tinariwen then embarked on a tour of Europe and North America, but without group leader Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who decided to remain in Mali to attend to family issues caused by the latest political crisis. Bassist Eyadou Ag Leche assumed the role of musical director, and a new singer/guitarist named Iyad Abderrahmane was recruited to perform Ag Alhabib's parts during the tour. In 2016, the group returned to Joshua Tree National Park and spent few days at Rancho De La Luna to record part of their seventh album, Elwan, with additional recording in France and a two weeks session in a town called M'hamed El Ghizlane in Southern Morocco, an oasis very near the Algerian border and home to its own Saharan music festival. The album was released in February 2017 and features guest appearances by Matt Sweeney, Kurt Vile, Mark Lanegan, and Alain Johannes. Tinariwen then embarked on an American tour with Dengue Fever as support. The group also toured Europe and Asia in 2017, and toured Australia, New Zealand, and North America in 2018. Upon returning from the international tour in support of Elwan in 2018, Tinariwen were unable to return to their home area in northern Mali due to ongoing sectarian violence and threats from Islamist militants. The group instead decamped in Morocco and embarked on a multi-month journey through Western Sahara and Mauritania, collaborating with local musicians at several stops along the way and writing songs while camped out in the desert. Their eighth full-length album Amadjar was recorded outdoors with mobile equipment near Nouakchott and was released on September 6, 2019. Amadjar features guest appearances by Noura Mint Seymali, Micah Nelson, Cass McCombs, Stephen O'Malley, Warren Ellis, and Rodolphe Burger. Musical style and influence The Tinariwen sound is primarily guitar-driven in the style known as assouf among the Tuareg people. The Tinariwen guitar style has its roots in West African music and other traditional styles practiced by the Tuareg and Berber peoples, and has often been categorized as "desert blues". Tinariwen was also influenced by traditional Malian musicians, most notably Ali Farka Touré, and regional pop singers like Rabah Driassa. While the Tinariwen style is possibly a distant relative of blues music, via West African music, members of Tinariwen claim to have never heard actual American blues music until they began to travel internationally in the early 2000s. Tinariwen was also influenced by American and British rock bands whose bootlegged albums had made it to the Sahara region, such as Dire Straits, Santana, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, and Jimi Hendrix. Tinariwen has been named as a formative influence on a growing Tuareg rock scene, made up of younger musicians who were not rebels like the members of Tinariwen but have experienced their region's recent struggles with poverty and terrorism. The band Imarhan is led by Sadam Iyad Moussa Ben Abderamane, who has collaborated with Tinariwen and is the nephew of longtime Tinariwen bassist Eyadu ag Leche. Kel Assouf and Tamikrest have also gained notice as younger Tuareg rock bands that cite Tinariwen as a fundamental influence. Band members Tinariwen is a collective of singers, songwriters, and musicians who come together in different combinations to play concerts and to record. This is because of the nomadic lifestyle of the Tuareg people and the difficulties of transportation and communication in the Sahara region. The group has never brought exactly the same line-up on its international tours, though several members tour regularly. One of the group's founder members, Inteyeden Ag Ablil (brother of guitarist Liya Ag Ablil) died of a virus in the desert in 1994, and singer Wonou Walet Oumar died of a kidney infection in 2005. Mohamed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais") died on 14 February 2021 from a heart attack. Active touring members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib – guitar, vocals Alhassane Ag Touhami – guitar, vocals Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni – acoustic guitar, guitar, vocals Eyadou Ag Leche – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, calabash, vocals, backing vocals Said Ag Ayad – percussion, backing vocals Elaga Ag Hamid – guitar, backing vocals Non-touring or previous members Abdallah Ag Lamida ("Intidao") – guitar, backing vocals Mohammed Ag Tahada – percussion Iyad Moussa Abderrahmane – guitar, vocals Inteyeden Ag Ablil (died 1994) – guitar, vocals Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais") (died 2021) – guitar, vocals Kedou Ag Ossad – guitar, vocals Liya Ag Ablil – rhythm guitar, vocals Sweiloum – guitar, vocals Foy Foy – guitar, vocals Abouhadid – guitar, vocals Wonou Walet Sidati – vocals Kesa Malet Hamid – vocals Mina Walet Oumar – vocals Wonou Walet Oumar (died 2005) – vocals Awards In 2012 Tinariwen won Best Group at the Songlines Music Awards. In 2012 Tassili won the Grammy Award for Best World Music Album. In 2017 Elwan was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best World Music Album. In 2020 Amadjar was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best Global Music Album. In 2020 Amadjar won the Libera Award for best world music album. Discography Albums Others Contributing artist The Rough Guide to Desert Blues (2010) The Imagine Project – Herbie Hancock (2010) ("Tamatant Tilay/Exodus" with K'naan and Los Lobos) References External links Official Tinariwen site Malian musical groups Tuareg culture Wrasse Records artists Berber music Grammy Award winners Outside Music albums Independiente Records artists Algerian music Desert blues	false	[ "The Radio Tisdas Sessions is a 2001 (see 2001 in music) album by the Malian group Tinariwen. The album was recorded at Kidal's local Tuareg station, Radio Tisdas, by producers Justin Adams and Lo'Jo. While Tinariwen had previously recorded several cassette-only albums for regional markets, The Radio Tisdas Sessions was their first on CD and their first to be distributed worldwide.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences \n\n2001 albums\nTinariwen albums", "Tinariwen (Tamasheq: , with vowels , pronounced tinariwen \"deserts\", plural of ténéré \"desert\") is a group of Tuareg musicians from the Sahara Desert region of northern Mali. The band was formed in 1979 in Tamanrasset, Algeria, but returned to Mali after a peace accord between 1990 and 1995. Considered a pioneer of desert blues, the group first started to gain a following outside the Sahara region in 2001 with the release of the album The Radio Tisdas Sessions, and with performances at Festival au Désert in Mali and the Roskilde Festival in Denmark.\n\nTheir popularity rose internationally with the release of the critically acclaimed album Aman Iman in 2007. NPR calls the group \"music's true rebels\", AllMusic deems the group's music \"a grassroots voice of rebellion\", and Slate calls the group \"rock 'n' roll rebels whose rebellion, for once, wasn't just metaphorical\".\n\nBiography\n\nEarly years\nTinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib who, at age four witnessed the execution of his father, a Tuareg rebel, during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a \"plastic water can, a stick and some fishing wire\", according to future bandmate Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he was given a guitar from a local Arab man.\n\nLater, Ag Alhabib resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. He acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. During this period he formed a band with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil to play at parties and weddings. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as \"The People of the Deserts\" or \"The Desert Boys.\"\n\nIn 1980 Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. During such exercises, the band met additional Tuareg musicians and formed a loosely-organized collective, now known as Tinariwen, to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people. They built a makeshift studio and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region.\n\nIn 1989 the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the rebel movement and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people.\n\nInternational recognition (1998–2009)\n\nIn 1998 Tinariwen came to the attention of the French world music ensemble Lo'Jo and their manager Philippe Brix. That group traveled to a music festival in Bamako and met two members of the Tinariwen collective. In 1999, some members of Tinariwen traveled to France and performed with Lo'Jo under the name Azawad. The two groups organized the January 2001 Festival au Désert in Essakane, Mali with Tinariwen as the headliners, and in cooperation with the Belgian Sfinks Festival. Their debut commercial album, The Radio Tisdas Sessions, was recorded by Justin Adams and Jean-Paul Romann at the radio station of the same name in Kidal, Mali (the only Tamashek-speaking station in the region) and released in 2001. It was Tinariwen's first recording to be released outside of northern Africa.\n\nSince 2001 Tinariwen have toured regularly in Europe, North America, Japan, and Australia. Their 2004 album Amassakoul (\"The Traveller\" in Tamashek) and the 2007 album Aman Iman (\"Water Is Life\" in Tamashek) were released worldwide and gained the notice of celebrity fans including Carlos Santana, Robert Plant, Bono and the Edge of U2, Thom Yorke of Radiohead, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Henry Rollins, Brian Eno, and members of TV On The Radio. In 2005, Tinariwen received a BBC Award for World Music, and in 2008, they received Germany's prestigious Praetorius Music Prize. The band's 2009 album Imidiwan: Companions was recorded in a mobile studio by Jean-Paul Romann in the village of Tessalit, Mali. The band appeared at Glastonbury in 2009.\n\nAlso since 2001 the Tinariwen collective has added several younger Tuareg musicians who did not live through the military conflicts experienced by the older members but have contributed to the collective's multi-generational evolution. New members include bassist Eyadou Ag Leche, percussionist Said Ag Ayad, guitarist Elaga Ag Hamid, guitarist Abdallah Ag Lamida, and vocalists Wonou Walet Sidati and the Walet Oumar sisters.\n\nFurther international success (2010–present)\n\nIn 2010 Tinariwen represented Algeria in the opening ceremony of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, and completed a lengthy American tour. The band released their fifth album Tassili on August 30, 2011. Tassili included guest appearances by Nels Cline, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio. Ian Brennan produced the album with engineer, Jean Paul Romman. The album later won the Award for Best World Music Album at the 54th Grammy Awards. In July 2011, the collective set out for a new world tour that included performances at the End of the Road Festival in September and All Tomorrow's Parties in December. Tinariwen appeared on The Colbert Report on November 29, 2011 with Adebimpe and Malone to play \"Tenere Taqqim Tossam\" and \"Imidiwan Ma Tenam\" from Tassili. Group members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Alhassane Ag Touhami, and Eyadou Ag Leche participated in a translated interview with Colbert.\n\nIn early 2012 there was another Tuareg rebellion in Tinariwen's home region of northern Mali, with the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) declaring independence and forming the short-lived unrecognized state Azawad. In August 2012, another party in the rebellion, the militant Islamist group Ansar Dine, denounced the presence of popular music in the territory and stated \"We do not want Satan's music. In its place will be Quranic verses. Sharia demands this. What God commands must be done.\" Tinariwen was targeted specifically during this campaign. In a January 2013 confrontation, most band members evaded capture, except Abdallah Ag Lamida who was abducted while trying to save his guitars. A few weeks later, Tinariwen reported that Ag Lamida had been released and was \"safe and free.\"\n\nDuring Ag Lamida's captivity, several other members of Tinariwen fled from the conflict and resettled temporarily in the southwestern United States to record their sixth album, Emmaarproduced by Patrick Vo Tan, with guests including Josh Klinghoffer, Fats Kaplin, Matt Sweeney, and Saul Williams. Recording took place at Joshua Tree National Park in California, which features a desert environment similar to that of Tinariwen's homeland. Emmaar was released worldwide in February 2014. Tinariwen then embarked on a tour of Europe and North America, but without group leader Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who decided to remain in Mali to attend to family issues caused by the latest political crisis. Bassist Eyadou Ag Leche assumed the role of musical director, and a new singer/guitarist named Iyad Abderrahmane was recruited to perform Ag Alhabib's parts during the tour. In 2016, the group returned to Joshua Tree National Park and spent few days at Rancho De La Luna to record part of their seventh album, Elwan, with additional recording in France and a two weeks session in a town called M'hamed El Ghizlane in Southern Morocco, an oasis very near the Algerian border and home to its own Saharan music festival. The album was released in February 2017 and features guest appearances by Matt Sweeney, Kurt Vile, Mark Lanegan, and Alain Johannes. Tinariwen then embarked on an American tour with Dengue Fever as support. The group also toured Europe and Asia in 2017, and toured Australia, New Zealand, and North America in 2018.\n\nUpon returning from the international tour in support of Elwan in 2018, Tinariwen were unable to return to their home area in northern Mali due to ongoing sectarian violence and threats from Islamist militants. The group instead decamped in Morocco and embarked on a multi-month journey through Western Sahara and Mauritania, collaborating with local musicians at several stops along the way and writing songs while camped out in the desert. Their eighth full-length album Amadjar was recorded outdoors with mobile equipment near Nouakchott and was released on September 6, 2019. Amadjar features guest appearances by Noura Mint Seymali, Micah Nelson, Cass McCombs, Stephen O'Malley, Warren Ellis, and Rodolphe Burger.\n\nMusical style and influence\nThe Tinariwen sound is primarily guitar-driven in the style known as assouf among the Tuareg people. The Tinariwen guitar style has its roots in West African music and other traditional styles practiced by the Tuareg and Berber peoples, and has often been categorized as \"desert blues\". Tinariwen was also influenced by traditional Malian musicians, most notably Ali Farka Touré, and regional pop singers like Rabah Driassa. While the Tinariwen style is possibly a distant relative of blues music, via West African music, members of Tinariwen claim to have never heard actual American blues music until they began to travel internationally in the early 2000s. Tinariwen was also influenced by American and British rock bands whose bootlegged albums had made it to the Sahara region, such as Dire Straits, Santana, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, and Jimi Hendrix.\n\nTinariwen has been named as a formative influence on a growing Tuareg rock scene, made up of younger musicians who were not rebels like the members of Tinariwen but have experienced their region's recent struggles with poverty and terrorism. The band Imarhan is led by Sadam Iyad Moussa Ben Abderamane, who has collaborated with Tinariwen and is the nephew of longtime Tinariwen bassist Eyadu ag Leche. Kel Assouf and Tamikrest have also gained notice as younger Tuareg rock bands that cite Tinariwen as a fundamental influence.\n\nBand members\n\nTinariwen is a collective of singers, songwriters, and musicians who come together in different combinations to play concerts and to record. This is because of the nomadic lifestyle of the Tuareg people and the difficulties of transportation and communication in the Sahara region. The group has never brought exactly the same line-up on its international tours, though several members tour regularly.\n\nOne of the group's founder members, Inteyeden Ag Ablil (brother of guitarist Liya Ag Ablil) died of a virus in the desert in 1994, and singer Wonou Walet Oumar died of a kidney infection in 2005. Mohamed Ag Itlale (aka \"Japonais\") died on 14 February 2021 from a heart attack.\n\nActive touring members\n Ibrahim Ag Alhabib – guitar, vocals\n Alhassane Ag Touhami – guitar, vocals\n Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni – acoustic guitar, guitar, vocals\n Eyadou Ag Leche – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, calabash, vocals, backing vocals\n Said Ag Ayad – percussion, backing vocals\n Elaga Ag Hamid – guitar, backing vocals\n\nNon-touring or previous members\n\n Abdallah Ag Lamida (\"Intidao\") – guitar, backing vocals\n Mohammed Ag Tahada – percussion\n Iyad Moussa Abderrahmane – guitar, vocals\n Inteyeden Ag Ablil (died 1994) – guitar, vocals\n Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka \"Japonais\") (died 2021) – guitar, vocals\n Kedou Ag Ossad – guitar, vocals\n Liya Ag Ablil – rhythm guitar, vocals\n Sweiloum – guitar, vocals\n Foy Foy – guitar, vocals\n Abouhadid – guitar, vocals\n Wonou Walet Sidati – vocals\n Kesa Malet Hamid – vocals\n Mina Walet Oumar – vocals\n Wonou Walet Oumar (died 2005) – vocals\n\nAwards\n In 2012 Tinariwen won Best Group at the Songlines Music Awards.\n In 2012 Tassili won the Grammy Award for Best World Music Album.\nIn 2017 Elwan was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best World Music Album.\n In 2020 Amadjar was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best Global Music Album.\n In 2020 Amadjar won the Libera Award for best world music album.\n\nDiscography\n\nAlbums\n\nOthers\n\nContributing artist\n The Rough Guide to Desert Blues (2010)\n The Imagine Project – Herbie Hancock (2010) (\"Tamatant Tilay/Exodus\" with K'naan and Los Lobos)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n Official Tinariwen site\n\nMalian musical groups\nTuareg culture\nWrasse Records artists\nBerber music\nGrammy Award winners\nOutside Music albums\nIndependiente Records artists\nAlgerian music\nDesert blues" ]
[ "Tinariwen", "Early years", "When did Tinariwen form?", "Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who at age four witnessed the execution of his father (a Tuareg rebel) during a 1963 uprising in Mali.", "Who are the other members of Tinariwen?", "Ag Alhabib joined with other musicians in the Tuareg rebel community, exploring the radical chaabi protest music of Moroccan groups", "What here did Tinariwen release their first song?", "I don't know." ]	C_b0cf644ab3764721ad182de5751f068f_1	Do they have instruments in their band?	4	Do they have instruments in the band Tinariwen ?	Tinariwen	Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who at age four witnessed the execution of his father (a Tuareg rebel) during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a tin can, a stick and bicycle brake wire. He started to play old Tuareg and modern Arabic pop tunes. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he received a guitar from a local Arab man. Later, he resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. In the late 1970s, Ag Alhabib joined with other musicians in the Tuareg rebel community, exploring the radical chaabi protest music of Moroccan groups like Nass El Ghiwane and Jil Jilala; Algerian pop rai; and western rock and pop artists like Elvis Presley, Led Zeppelin, Carlos Santana, Dire Straits, Jimi Hendrix, Boney M, and Bob Marley. Ag Alhabib formed a group with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil in Tamanrasset, Algeria to play at parties and weddings. Ag Alhabib acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as "The People of the Deserts" or "The Desert Boys." In 1980, Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of the best young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. They answered a similar call in 1985, this time by leaders of the Tuareg rebel movement in Libya, and met fellow musicians Keddou Ag Ossade, Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais"), Sweiloum, Abouhadid, and Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. All sang and played guitar in various permutations. The musicians joined together in a collective (now known as Tinariwen) in order to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people, built a makeshift studio, and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region. In 1989, the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the military and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people. CANNOTANSWER	built his own guitar	Tinariwen (Tamasheq: , with vowels , pronounced tinariwen "deserts", plural of ténéré "desert") is a group of Tuareg musicians from the Sahara Desert region of northern Mali. The band was formed in 1979 in Tamanrasset, Algeria, but returned to Mali after a peace accord between 1990 and 1995. Considered a pioneer of desert blues, the group first started to gain a following outside the Sahara region in 2001 with the release of the album The Radio Tisdas Sessions, and with performances at Festival au Désert in Mali and the Roskilde Festival in Denmark. Their popularity rose internationally with the release of the critically acclaimed album Aman Iman in 2007. NPR calls the group "music's true rebels", AllMusic deems the group's music "a grassroots voice of rebellion", and Slate calls the group "rock 'n' roll rebels whose rebellion, for once, wasn't just metaphorical". Biography Early years Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib who, at age four witnessed the execution of his father, a Tuareg rebel, during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a "plastic water can, a stick and some fishing wire", according to future bandmate Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he was given a guitar from a local Arab man. Later, Ag Alhabib resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. He acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. During this period he formed a band with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil to play at parties and weddings. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as "The People of the Deserts" or "The Desert Boys." In 1980 Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. During such exercises, the band met additional Tuareg musicians and formed a loosely-organized collective, now known as Tinariwen, to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people. They built a makeshift studio and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region. In 1989 the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the rebel movement and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people. International recognition (1998–2009) In 1998 Tinariwen came to the attention of the French world music ensemble Lo'Jo and their manager Philippe Brix. That group traveled to a music festival in Bamako and met two members of the Tinariwen collective. In 1999, some members of Tinariwen traveled to France and performed with Lo'Jo under the name Azawad. The two groups organized the January 2001 Festival au Désert in Essakane, Mali with Tinariwen as the headliners, and in cooperation with the Belgian Sfinks Festival. Their debut commercial album, The Radio Tisdas Sessions, was recorded by Justin Adams and Jean-Paul Romann at the radio station of the same name in Kidal, Mali (the only Tamashek-speaking station in the region) and released in 2001. It was Tinariwen's first recording to be released outside of northern Africa. Since 2001 Tinariwen have toured regularly in Europe, North America, Japan, and Australia. Their 2004 album Amassakoul ("The Traveller" in Tamashek) and the 2007 album Aman Iman ("Water Is Life" in Tamashek) were released worldwide and gained the notice of celebrity fans including Carlos Santana, Robert Plant, Bono and the Edge of U2, Thom Yorke of Radiohead, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Henry Rollins, Brian Eno, and members of TV On The Radio. In 2005, Tinariwen received a BBC Award for World Music, and in 2008, they received Germany's prestigious Praetorius Music Prize. The band's 2009 album Imidiwan: Companions was recorded in a mobile studio by Jean-Paul Romann in the village of Tessalit, Mali. The band appeared at Glastonbury in 2009. Also since 2001 the Tinariwen collective has added several younger Tuareg musicians who did not live through the military conflicts experienced by the older members but have contributed to the collective's multi-generational evolution. New members include bassist Eyadou Ag Leche, percussionist Said Ag Ayad, guitarist Elaga Ag Hamid, guitarist Abdallah Ag Lamida, and vocalists Wonou Walet Sidati and the Walet Oumar sisters. Further international success (2010–present) In 2010 Tinariwen represented Algeria in the opening ceremony of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, and completed a lengthy American tour. The band released their fifth album Tassili on August 30, 2011. Tassili included guest appearances by Nels Cline, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio. Ian Brennan produced the album with engineer, Jean Paul Romman. The album later won the Award for Best World Music Album at the 54th Grammy Awards. In July 2011, the collective set out for a new world tour that included performances at the End of the Road Festival in September and All Tomorrow's Parties in December. Tinariwen appeared on The Colbert Report on November 29, 2011 with Adebimpe and Malone to play "Tenere Taqqim Tossam" and "Imidiwan Ma Tenam" from Tassili. Group members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Alhassane Ag Touhami, and Eyadou Ag Leche participated in a translated interview with Colbert. In early 2012 there was another Tuareg rebellion in Tinariwen's home region of northern Mali, with the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) declaring independence and forming the short-lived unrecognized state Azawad. In August 2012, another party in the rebellion, the militant Islamist group Ansar Dine, denounced the presence of popular music in the territory and stated "We do not want Satan's music. In its place will be Quranic verses. Sharia demands this. What God commands must be done." Tinariwen was targeted specifically during this campaign. In a January 2013 confrontation, most band members evaded capture, except Abdallah Ag Lamida who was abducted while trying to save his guitars. A few weeks later, Tinariwen reported that Ag Lamida had been released and was "safe and free." During Ag Lamida's captivity, several other members of Tinariwen fled from the conflict and resettled temporarily in the southwestern United States to record their sixth album, Emmaarproduced by Patrick Vo Tan, with guests including Josh Klinghoffer, Fats Kaplin, Matt Sweeney, and Saul Williams. Recording took place at Joshua Tree National Park in California, which features a desert environment similar to that of Tinariwen's homeland. Emmaar was released worldwide in February 2014. Tinariwen then embarked on a tour of Europe and North America, but without group leader Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who decided to remain in Mali to attend to family issues caused by the latest political crisis. Bassist Eyadou Ag Leche assumed the role of musical director, and a new singer/guitarist named Iyad Abderrahmane was recruited to perform Ag Alhabib's parts during the tour. In 2016, the group returned to Joshua Tree National Park and spent few days at Rancho De La Luna to record part of their seventh album, Elwan, with additional recording in France and a two weeks session in a town called M'hamed El Ghizlane in Southern Morocco, an oasis very near the Algerian border and home to its own Saharan music festival. The album was released in February 2017 and features guest appearances by Matt Sweeney, Kurt Vile, Mark Lanegan, and Alain Johannes. Tinariwen then embarked on an American tour with Dengue Fever as support. The group also toured Europe and Asia in 2017, and toured Australia, New Zealand, and North America in 2018. Upon returning from the international tour in support of Elwan in 2018, Tinariwen were unable to return to their home area in northern Mali due to ongoing sectarian violence and threats from Islamist militants. The group instead decamped in Morocco and embarked on a multi-month journey through Western Sahara and Mauritania, collaborating with local musicians at several stops along the way and writing songs while camped out in the desert. Their eighth full-length album Amadjar was recorded outdoors with mobile equipment near Nouakchott and was released on September 6, 2019. Amadjar features guest appearances by Noura Mint Seymali, Micah Nelson, Cass McCombs, Stephen O'Malley, Warren Ellis, and Rodolphe Burger. Musical style and influence The Tinariwen sound is primarily guitar-driven in the style known as assouf among the Tuareg people. The Tinariwen guitar style has its roots in West African music and other traditional styles practiced by the Tuareg and Berber peoples, and has often been categorized as "desert blues". Tinariwen was also influenced by traditional Malian musicians, most notably Ali Farka Touré, and regional pop singers like Rabah Driassa. While the Tinariwen style is possibly a distant relative of blues music, via West African music, members of Tinariwen claim to have never heard actual American blues music until they began to travel internationally in the early 2000s. Tinariwen was also influenced by American and British rock bands whose bootlegged albums had made it to the Sahara region, such as Dire Straits, Santana, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, and Jimi Hendrix. Tinariwen has been named as a formative influence on a growing Tuareg rock scene, made up of younger musicians who were not rebels like the members of Tinariwen but have experienced their region's recent struggles with poverty and terrorism. The band Imarhan is led by Sadam Iyad Moussa Ben Abderamane, who has collaborated with Tinariwen and is the nephew of longtime Tinariwen bassist Eyadu ag Leche. Kel Assouf and Tamikrest have also gained notice as younger Tuareg rock bands that cite Tinariwen as a fundamental influence. Band members Tinariwen is a collective of singers, songwriters, and musicians who come together in different combinations to play concerts and to record. This is because of the nomadic lifestyle of the Tuareg people and the difficulties of transportation and communication in the Sahara region. The group has never brought exactly the same line-up on its international tours, though several members tour regularly. One of the group's founder members, Inteyeden Ag Ablil (brother of guitarist Liya Ag Ablil) died of a virus in the desert in 1994, and singer Wonou Walet Oumar died of a kidney infection in 2005. Mohamed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais") died on 14 February 2021 from a heart attack. Active touring members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib – guitar, vocals Alhassane Ag Touhami – guitar, vocals Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni – acoustic guitar, guitar, vocals Eyadou Ag Leche – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, calabash, vocals, backing vocals Said Ag Ayad – percussion, backing vocals Elaga Ag Hamid – guitar, backing vocals Non-touring or previous members Abdallah Ag Lamida ("Intidao") – guitar, backing vocals Mohammed Ag Tahada – percussion Iyad Moussa Abderrahmane – guitar, vocals Inteyeden Ag Ablil (died 1994) – guitar, vocals Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais") (died 2021) – guitar, vocals Kedou Ag Ossad – guitar, vocals Liya Ag Ablil – rhythm guitar, vocals Sweiloum – guitar, vocals Foy Foy – guitar, vocals Abouhadid – guitar, vocals Wonou Walet Sidati – vocals Kesa Malet Hamid – vocals Mina Walet Oumar – vocals Wonou Walet Oumar (died 2005) – vocals Awards In 2012 Tinariwen won Best Group at the Songlines Music Awards. In 2012 Tassili won the Grammy Award for Best World Music Album. In 2017 Elwan was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best World Music Album. In 2020 Amadjar was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best Global Music Album. In 2020 Amadjar won the Libera Award for best world music album. Discography Albums Others Contributing artist The Rough Guide to Desert Blues (2010) The Imagine Project – Herbie Hancock (2010) ("Tamatant Tilay/Exodus" with K'naan and Los Lobos) References External links Official Tinariwen site Malian musical groups Tuareg culture Wrasse Records artists Berber music Grammy Award winners Outside Music albums Independiente Records artists Algerian music Desert blues	true	[ "Daikaiju (stylized \"DaiKaiju\") is a kaiju-themed surf rock revival band from Huntsville, Alabama, now based out of Houston, usually consisting of two guitarists, a bassist, and a drummer. The band formed in the winter of 1999 and first performed in January 2000. The band has played shows across Europe, eastern Asia, and North America. As of 2021, the band is still actively touring.\n\nHistory \n\nDaikaiju originally formed in the winter of 1999.\n\nIn 2005, the band released their first full-length album, self-titled Daikaiju. Of the album's ten tracks, five were previously recorded (in an earlier form) on 2001's Monster Surf, and two more were previously heard on 2002's The Phasing Spider Menace. The album received mostly positive reviews from critics, with Pitchfork Media giving the album a 7.8/10, praising the band's \"prog muscle\" and calling it an \"impressive full-length debut\".\n\nIn 2010, the band released their second full-length album, titled Phase 2.\n\nIn a 2012 interview with Florida Geek Scene, the band was asked about the change in personnel between Daikaiju (album) and Phase 2. Daikaiju, in response, referred to the departing members as \"casualties\".\n\nIn 2013, the band toured the Far East visiting China, South Korea, and Japan. Its visit to Japan, in particular, was highly anticipated by fans and the band itself. Daikaiju tied Public Image Ltd. as the 'Best show by a foreign touring act' in Time Out Beijing's \"Year's end roundup: the best of Beijing music\" for 2013.\n\nPerforming style \n\nDaikaiju performs while wearing kabuki masks, and using pseudonyms. They do not speak during performances, instead communicating using hand signals. The band often sets fire to their instruments during live shows.\n\nInteraction with media \n\nDue to how secretive the band is, they rarely grant interviews, and do not mention their real names or private lives (apart from their opinions on monster movies such as Tristar's \"Godzilla\", which they agreed to call Godzilla \"in name only\") in the interviews they do agree to.\n\nIt is a reflection of how wild Daikaiju's live performances are that, on their own website as well as in interviews, they refer to these performances as \"attacks\"; or instead, in a 2013 interview with Time Out Beijing, referring to them as \"Most exciting shower of golden radiance!!!\". This likely refers to the band's tendency to use lighter fluid to spray their instruments while the instruments are on fire.\n\nSimilarity to Man or Astro-man \n\nThe similarity of the band's sound to Man or Astro-man? has fueled some unconfirmed speculation that the band may contain members of that band. The band's only response to this speculation, a denial (though characteristically vague), appeared in an August 2012 interview:\n\n\"Daikaiju have many member of man: secret-man, rock-man, hit-man, and mobile-man!!! Daikaiju also like taste of astro-man but have preference of lizard-man... or aqua-man!!!\"\n\nDiscography \n\nThe band has released two EPs, two studio albums, and two singles.\n\nSee also\nLaika & the Cosmonauts\nMan or Astro-man?\nInstrumental surf\nThe Mermen\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\ndaikaiju.org\n\nSurf music groups", "Idiotape is a South Korean electronic music band. They released their debut EP 0805 in July 2010 and their first album 11111101, a year later, which won \"Best Dance & Electronic Album\" at the 2012 Korean Music Awards. They have performed at multiple music festivals at home and around the world.\n\nHistory\n\nFormation and members\nThe members are Dguru (producer and deejay), Zeze (synth) and DR (drums).\n\nThe band was initially formed in 2007, when members Dguru and Zeze met in the Seoul club scene, and started the band with a guitarist, who later left. The current band was formed in 2010, when drummer DR, formerly of the Seoul pop punk, pop rock band Sugar Donut, joined them.\n\nTheir name is a combination of the words \"idiot\" and \"tape\", which combined, minus one \"t\", also produced \"idiot\" and \"ape\"; and is a reflection of their nostalgia for cassettes, which they grew up with, and the use of analog equipment, which they favored.\n\nSound and influence\nThey were influenced by Korean classic rock from the 1960s and 1970s, and a wide range of bands, including The Doors, Radiohead, Metallica and Pantera. They are known for their analog sound, but still credit their rock influences. During a 2014 interview with WNUR-FM's Danny Hwang in Chicago Zeze said, \"We for starters, began because we wanted to do electronic music, make an electronic band. But generally, in a way, I don't think we're too different from the average rock band. It's just that sounds we like happen to be synthesizers or other electronic instruments and I think we make the music we like using those instruments. And we try not to limit ourselves in terms of the sound or genre. It's more like we're doing whatever we want to do.\"\n\nTouring and festivals\nIn March 2011, they were part of the first group of Seoulsonic bands, along with Vidulgi OoyoO and Galaxy Express, who performed at the Canadian Music Week in Toronto and SXSW in Austin, Texas, following up with a U.S. tour, including concerts in New York (The Knitting Factory) and Los Angeles (The Roxy). They performed at SXSW again in 2014 at K-Pop Night Out at SXSW. They have also opened for Fatboy Slim at Global Gathering Korea and performed at other festivals, including, the Pentaport Rock Festival, Glastonbury Festival, Exit Festival, Rencontres Trans Musicales, Summer Sonic Festival, Future Music Festival, Fusion Festival, Paléo Festival, Mundial Festival Netherlands, FMM Sines, Ansan Valley Rock Festival, Midem, and Ultra Korea 2016.\n\nDiscography\n\nStudio albums\n\nExtended plays\n\nAwards and nominations\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nSouth Korean electronic music groups" ]
[ "Tinariwen", "Early years", "When did Tinariwen form?", "Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who at age four witnessed the execution of his father (a Tuareg rebel) during a 1963 uprising in Mali.", "Who are the other members of Tinariwen?", "Ag Alhabib joined with other musicians in the Tuareg rebel community, exploring the radical chaabi protest music of Moroccan groups", "What here did Tinariwen release their first song?", "I don't know.", "Do they have instruments in their band?", "built his own guitar" ]	C_b0cf644ab3764721ad182de5751f068f_1	What else is interesting about the group?	5	What else is interesting about the band Tinariwen other than Ibrahim Ag Alhabib building his own guitar ?	Tinariwen	Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who at age four witnessed the execution of his father (a Tuareg rebel) during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a tin can, a stick and bicycle brake wire. He started to play old Tuareg and modern Arabic pop tunes. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he received a guitar from a local Arab man. Later, he resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. In the late 1970s, Ag Alhabib joined with other musicians in the Tuareg rebel community, exploring the radical chaabi protest music of Moroccan groups like Nass El Ghiwane and Jil Jilala; Algerian pop rai; and western rock and pop artists like Elvis Presley, Led Zeppelin, Carlos Santana, Dire Straits, Jimi Hendrix, Boney M, and Bob Marley. Ag Alhabib formed a group with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil in Tamanrasset, Algeria to play at parties and weddings. Ag Alhabib acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as "The People of the Deserts" or "The Desert Boys." In 1980, Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of the best young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. They answered a similar call in 1985, this time by leaders of the Tuareg rebel movement in Libya, and met fellow musicians Keddou Ag Ossade, Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais"), Sweiloum, Abouhadid, and Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. All sang and played guitar in various permutations. The musicians joined together in a collective (now known as Tinariwen) in order to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people, built a makeshift studio, and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region. In 1989, the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the military and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people. CANNOTANSWER	In 1980, Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training.	Tinariwen (Tamasheq: , with vowels , pronounced tinariwen "deserts", plural of ténéré "desert") is a group of Tuareg musicians from the Sahara Desert region of northern Mali. The band was formed in 1979 in Tamanrasset, Algeria, but returned to Mali after a peace accord between 1990 and 1995. Considered a pioneer of desert blues, the group first started to gain a following outside the Sahara region in 2001 with the release of the album The Radio Tisdas Sessions, and with performances at Festival au Désert in Mali and the Roskilde Festival in Denmark. Their popularity rose internationally with the release of the critically acclaimed album Aman Iman in 2007. NPR calls the group "music's true rebels", AllMusic deems the group's music "a grassroots voice of rebellion", and Slate calls the group "rock 'n' roll rebels whose rebellion, for once, wasn't just metaphorical". Biography Early years Tinariwen was founded by Ibrahim Ag Alhabib who, at age four witnessed the execution of his father, a Tuareg rebel, during a 1963 uprising in Mali. As a child he saw a western film in which a cowboy played a guitar. Ag Alhabib built his own guitar out of a "plastic water can, a stick and some fishing wire", according to future bandmate Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni. Ag Alhabib first lived in Algeria in refugee camps near Bordj Badji Mokhtar and in the deserts around the southern city of Tamanrasset, where he was given a guitar from a local Arab man. Later, Ag Alhabib resided with other Tuareg exiles in Libya and Algeria. He acquired his first real acoustic guitar in 1979. During this period he formed a band with Alhassane Ag Touhami and brothers Inteyeden Ag Ablil and Liya Ag Ablil to play at parties and weddings. While the group had no official name, people began to call them Kel Tinariwen, which in the Tamashek language translates as "The People of the Deserts" or "The Desert Boys." In 1980 Libyan ruler Muammar al-Gaddafi put out a decree inviting all young Tuareg men who were living illegally in Libya to receive full military training. Gaddafi dreamed of forming a Saharan regiment, made up of young Tuareg fighters, to further his territorial ambitions in Chad, Niger, and elsewhere. Ag Alhabib and his bandmates answered the call and received nine months of training. During such exercises, the band met additional Tuareg musicians and formed a loosely-organized collective, now known as Tinariwen, to create songs about the issues facing the Tuareg people. They built a makeshift studio and vowed to record music for free for anyone who supplied a blank cassette tape. The resulting homemade cassettes were traded widely throughout the Sahara region. In 1989 the collective left Libya and moved to Ag Alhabib's home country of Mali, where he returned to his home village of Tessalit for the first time in 26 years. In 1990 the Tuareg people of Mali revolted against the government, with some members of Tinariwen participating as rebel fighters. After a peace agreement known as the Tamanrasset Accords was reached in January 1991, the musicians left the rebel movement and devoted themselves to music full-time. In 1992 some of the members of Tinariwen went to Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire to record a cassette at JBZ studios. They played occasional gigs for far-flung Tuareg communities throughout the Sahara region, gaining word-of-mouth popularity among the Tuareg people. International recognition (1998–2009) In 1998 Tinariwen came to the attention of the French world music ensemble Lo'Jo and their manager Philippe Brix. That group traveled to a music festival in Bamako and met two members of the Tinariwen collective. In 1999, some members of Tinariwen traveled to France and performed with Lo'Jo under the name Azawad. The two groups organized the January 2001 Festival au Désert in Essakane, Mali with Tinariwen as the headliners, and in cooperation with the Belgian Sfinks Festival. Their debut commercial album, The Radio Tisdas Sessions, was recorded by Justin Adams and Jean-Paul Romann at the radio station of the same name in Kidal, Mali (the only Tamashek-speaking station in the region) and released in 2001. It was Tinariwen's first recording to be released outside of northern Africa. Since 2001 Tinariwen have toured regularly in Europe, North America, Japan, and Australia. Their 2004 album Amassakoul ("The Traveller" in Tamashek) and the 2007 album Aman Iman ("Water Is Life" in Tamashek) were released worldwide and gained the notice of celebrity fans including Carlos Santana, Robert Plant, Bono and the Edge of U2, Thom Yorke of Radiohead, Chris Martin of Coldplay, Henry Rollins, Brian Eno, and members of TV On The Radio. In 2005, Tinariwen received a BBC Award for World Music, and in 2008, they received Germany's prestigious Praetorius Music Prize. The band's 2009 album Imidiwan: Companions was recorded in a mobile studio by Jean-Paul Romann in the village of Tessalit, Mali. The band appeared at Glastonbury in 2009. Also since 2001 the Tinariwen collective has added several younger Tuareg musicians who did not live through the military conflicts experienced by the older members but have contributed to the collective's multi-generational evolution. New members include bassist Eyadou Ag Leche, percussionist Said Ag Ayad, guitarist Elaga Ag Hamid, guitarist Abdallah Ag Lamida, and vocalists Wonou Walet Sidati and the Walet Oumar sisters. Further international success (2010–present) In 2010 Tinariwen represented Algeria in the opening ceremony of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, and completed a lengthy American tour. The band released their fifth album Tassili on August 30, 2011. Tassili included guest appearances by Nels Cline, The Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio. Ian Brennan produced the album with engineer, Jean Paul Romman. The album later won the Award for Best World Music Album at the 54th Grammy Awards. In July 2011, the collective set out for a new world tour that included performances at the End of the Road Festival in September and All Tomorrow's Parties in December. Tinariwen appeared on The Colbert Report on November 29, 2011 with Adebimpe and Malone to play "Tenere Taqqim Tossam" and "Imidiwan Ma Tenam" from Tassili. Group members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Alhassane Ag Touhami, and Eyadou Ag Leche participated in a translated interview with Colbert. In early 2012 there was another Tuareg rebellion in Tinariwen's home region of northern Mali, with the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) declaring independence and forming the short-lived unrecognized state Azawad. In August 2012, another party in the rebellion, the militant Islamist group Ansar Dine, denounced the presence of popular music in the territory and stated "We do not want Satan's music. In its place will be Quranic verses. Sharia demands this. What God commands must be done." Tinariwen was targeted specifically during this campaign. In a January 2013 confrontation, most band members evaded capture, except Abdallah Ag Lamida who was abducted while trying to save his guitars. A few weeks later, Tinariwen reported that Ag Lamida had been released and was "safe and free." During Ag Lamida's captivity, several other members of Tinariwen fled from the conflict and resettled temporarily in the southwestern United States to record their sixth album, Emmaarproduced by Patrick Vo Tan, with guests including Josh Klinghoffer, Fats Kaplin, Matt Sweeney, and Saul Williams. Recording took place at Joshua Tree National Park in California, which features a desert environment similar to that of Tinariwen's homeland. Emmaar was released worldwide in February 2014. Tinariwen then embarked on a tour of Europe and North America, but without group leader Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who decided to remain in Mali to attend to family issues caused by the latest political crisis. Bassist Eyadou Ag Leche assumed the role of musical director, and a new singer/guitarist named Iyad Abderrahmane was recruited to perform Ag Alhabib's parts during the tour. In 2016, the group returned to Joshua Tree National Park and spent few days at Rancho De La Luna to record part of their seventh album, Elwan, with additional recording in France and a two weeks session in a town called M'hamed El Ghizlane in Southern Morocco, an oasis very near the Algerian border and home to its own Saharan music festival. The album was released in February 2017 and features guest appearances by Matt Sweeney, Kurt Vile, Mark Lanegan, and Alain Johannes. Tinariwen then embarked on an American tour with Dengue Fever as support. The group also toured Europe and Asia in 2017, and toured Australia, New Zealand, and North America in 2018. Upon returning from the international tour in support of Elwan in 2018, Tinariwen were unable to return to their home area in northern Mali due to ongoing sectarian violence and threats from Islamist militants. The group instead decamped in Morocco and embarked on a multi-month journey through Western Sahara and Mauritania, collaborating with local musicians at several stops along the way and writing songs while camped out in the desert. Their eighth full-length album Amadjar was recorded outdoors with mobile equipment near Nouakchott and was released on September 6, 2019. Amadjar features guest appearances by Noura Mint Seymali, Micah Nelson, Cass McCombs, Stephen O'Malley, Warren Ellis, and Rodolphe Burger. Musical style and influence The Tinariwen sound is primarily guitar-driven in the style known as assouf among the Tuareg people. The Tinariwen guitar style has its roots in West African music and other traditional styles practiced by the Tuareg and Berber peoples, and has often been categorized as "desert blues". Tinariwen was also influenced by traditional Malian musicians, most notably Ali Farka Touré, and regional pop singers like Rabah Driassa. While the Tinariwen style is possibly a distant relative of blues music, via West African music, members of Tinariwen claim to have never heard actual American blues music until they began to travel internationally in the early 2000s. Tinariwen was also influenced by American and British rock bands whose bootlegged albums had made it to the Sahara region, such as Dire Straits, Santana, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, and Jimi Hendrix. Tinariwen has been named as a formative influence on a growing Tuareg rock scene, made up of younger musicians who were not rebels like the members of Tinariwen but have experienced their region's recent struggles with poverty and terrorism. The band Imarhan is led by Sadam Iyad Moussa Ben Abderamane, who has collaborated with Tinariwen and is the nephew of longtime Tinariwen bassist Eyadu ag Leche. Kel Assouf and Tamikrest have also gained notice as younger Tuareg rock bands that cite Tinariwen as a fundamental influence. Band members Tinariwen is a collective of singers, songwriters, and musicians who come together in different combinations to play concerts and to record. This is because of the nomadic lifestyle of the Tuareg people and the difficulties of transportation and communication in the Sahara region. The group has never brought exactly the same line-up on its international tours, though several members tour regularly. One of the group's founder members, Inteyeden Ag Ablil (brother of guitarist Liya Ag Ablil) died of a virus in the desert in 1994, and singer Wonou Walet Oumar died of a kidney infection in 2005. Mohamed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais") died on 14 February 2021 from a heart attack. Active touring members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib – guitar, vocals Alhassane Ag Touhami – guitar, vocals Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni – acoustic guitar, guitar, vocals Eyadou Ag Leche – bass guitar, acoustic guitar, calabash, vocals, backing vocals Said Ag Ayad – percussion, backing vocals Elaga Ag Hamid – guitar, backing vocals Non-touring or previous members Abdallah Ag Lamida ("Intidao") – guitar, backing vocals Mohammed Ag Tahada – percussion Iyad Moussa Abderrahmane – guitar, vocals Inteyeden Ag Ablil (died 1994) – guitar, vocals Mohammed Ag Itlale (aka "Japonais") (died 2021) – guitar, vocals Kedou Ag Ossad – guitar, vocals Liya Ag Ablil – rhythm guitar, vocals Sweiloum – guitar, vocals Foy Foy – guitar, vocals Abouhadid – guitar, vocals Wonou Walet Sidati – vocals Kesa Malet Hamid – vocals Mina Walet Oumar – vocals Wonou Walet Oumar (died 2005) – vocals Awards In 2012 Tinariwen won Best Group at the Songlines Music Awards. In 2012 Tassili won the Grammy Award for Best World Music Album. In 2017 Elwan was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best World Music Album. In 2020 Amadjar was nominated for the Grammy Award for the best Best Global Music Album. In 2020 Amadjar won the Libera Award for best world music album. Discography Albums Others Contributing artist The Rough Guide to Desert Blues (2010) The Imagine Project – Herbie Hancock (2010) ("Tamatant Tilay/Exodus" with K'naan and Los Lobos) References External links Official Tinariwen site Malian musical groups Tuareg culture Wrasse Records artists Berber music Grammy Award winners Outside Music albums Independiente Records artists Algerian music Desert blues	false	[ "\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer", "DiscoveryBox is a children's magazine by Bayard Presse. It is targeted at children from 9 to 12 years old. Inside there are topics about science, animals, current events, nature, history and the world. It also includes games and quizzes. It is designed for the completely independent reader and is the 3rd and final instalment of the Box series (after StoryBox and AdventureBox).\n\nDiscoveryBox is mostly non fictional and is designed to answer questions and expand the knowledge of its readers in the subjects that it covers each month.\n\nThere is a current shortage in this type of information rich magazine for this age group at the moment and children find the magazine very interesting. It is designed to build on what they have learned in School and it takes many of its subjects from the British Curriculum so reinforces what they have learned as well as adding additional interesting facts that they may not have previously known about.\n\nBecause there is a shortage of information magazines for children this age, both ESL and English speaking students like to read this book as the information is specially presented for them. As it is specifically designed for the ages 9 to 12 the magazine takes subjects that they would find interesting such as The Olympic Games, Space Exploration and Avalanches being just a few of the previous topics covered.\n\nIn July 2009 DiscoveryBox collaborated with the movie Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs with a behind-the-scenes look at 3D animation.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n DiscoveryBox Website\n DiscoveryBox Information Page\n Bayard English magazine Website\n\nChildren's magazines published in France\nFrench-language magazines\nMonthly magazines published in France\nMagazines established in 1995" ]
[ "P. G. Wodehouse", "Broadway: 1915-19" ]	C_14a60ae6a0404de9a8adfd5f0367ce69_1	What did he do in Broadway?	1	What did P. G. Wodehouse do in Broadway?	P. G. Wodehouse	A third milestone in Wodehouse's life came towards the end of 1915: his old songwriting partner Jerome Kern introduced him to the writer Guy Bolton, who became Wodehouse's closest friend and a regular collaborator. Bolton and Kern had a musical, Very Good Eddie, running at the Princess Theatre in New York. The show was successful, but they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor. This was Miss Springtime (1916), which ran for 227 performances--a good run by the standards of the day. The team produced several more successes, including Leave It to Jane (1917), Oh, Boy! (1917-18) and Oh, Lady! Lady!! (1918), and Wodehouse and Bolton wrote a few more shows with other composers. In these musicals Wodehouse's lyrics won high praise from critics as well as fellow lyricists such as Ira Gershwin. Unlike his original model, Gilbert, Wodehouse preferred the music to be written first, fitting his words into the melodies. Donaldson suggests that this is the reason why his lyrics have largely been overlooked in recent years: they fit the music perfectly, but do not stand on their own in verse form as Gilbert's do. Nonetheless, Donaldson adds, the book and lyrics for the Princess Theatre shows made the collaborators an enormous fortune and played an important part in the development of the American musical. In the Grove Dictionary of American Music Larry Stempel writes, "By presenting naturalistic stories and characters and attempting to integrate the songs and lyrics into the action of the libretto, these works brought a new level of intimacy, cohesion, and sophistication to American musical comedy." The theatre writer Gerald Bordman calls Wodehouse "the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day". The composer Richard Rodgers wrote, "Before Larry Hart, only P.G. Wodehouse had made any real assault on the intelligence of the song-listening public." In the years after the war, Wodehouse steadily increased his sales, polished his existing characters and introduced new ones. Bertie and Jeeves, Lord Emsworth and his circle, and Ukridge appeared in novels and short stories; Psmith made his fourth and last appearance; two new characters were the Oldest Member, narrating his series of golfing stories, and Mr Mulliner, telling his particularly tall tales to fellow patrons of the bar at the Angler's Rest. Various other young men-about-town appeared in short stories about members of the Drones Club. The Wodehouses returned to England, where they had a house in London for some years, but Wodehouse continued to cross the Atlantic frequently, spending substantial periods in New York. He continued to work in the theatre. During the 1920s he collaborated on nine musical comedies produced on Broadway or in the West End, including the long-running Sally (1920, New York), The Cabaret Girl (1922, London) and Rosalie (1928, New York). He also wrote non-musical plays, including The Play's the Thing (1926), adapted from Ferenc Molnar, and A Damsel in Distress (1928), a dramatisation of his 1919 novel. Though never a naturally gregarious man, Wodehouse was more sociable in the 1920s than at other periods. Donaldson lists among those with whom he was on friendly terms writers including A.A. Milne, Ian Hay, Frederick Lonsdale and E. Phillips Oppenheim, and stage performers including George Grossmith, Jr., Heather Thatcher and Dorothy Dickson. CANNOTANSWER	Wodehouse "the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day".	Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, ( ; 15 October 188114 February 1975) was an English author and one of the most widely read humorists of the 20th century. His creations include the feather-brained Bertie Wooster and his sagacious valet, Jeeves; the immaculate and loquacious Psmith; Lord Emsworth and the Blandings Castle set; the Oldest Member, with stories about golf; and Mr Mulliner, with tall tales on subjects ranging from bibulous bishops to megalomaniac movie moguls. Born in Guildford, the third son of a British magistrate based in Hong Kong, Wodehouse spent happy teenage years at Dulwich College, to which he remained devoted all his life. After leaving school he was employed by a bank but disliked the work and turned to writing in his spare time. His early novels were mostly school stories, but he later switched to comic fiction. Most of Wodehouse's fiction is set in his native United Kingdom, although he spent much of his life in the US and used New York and Hollywood as settings for some of his novels and short stories. He wrote a series of Broadway musical comedies during and after the First World War, together with Guy Bolton and Jerome Kern, that played an important part in the development of the American musical. He began the 1930s writing for MGM in Hollywood. In a 1931 interview, his naive revelations of incompetence and extravagance in the studios caused a furore. In the same decade, his literary career reached a new peak. In 1934 Wodehouse moved to France for tax reasons; in 1940 he was taken prisoner at Le Touquet by the invading Germans and interned for nearly a year. After his release he made six broadcasts from German radio in Berlin to the US, which had not yet entered the war. The talks were comic and apolitical, but his broadcasting over enemy radio prompted anger and strident controversy in Britain, and a threat of prosecution. Wodehouse never returned to England. From 1947 until his death he lived in the US, taking dual British-American citizenship in 1955. He died in 1975, at the age of 93, in Southampton, New York. Wodehouse was a prolific writer throughout his life, publishing more than ninety books, forty plays, two hundred short stories and other writings between 1902 and 1974. He worked extensively on his books, sometimes having two or more in preparation simultaneously. He would take up to two years to build a plot and write a scenario of about thirty thousand words. After the scenario was complete he would write the story. Early in his career Wodehouse would produce a novel in about three months, but he slowed in old age to around six months. He used a mixture of Edwardian slang, quotations from and allusions to numerous poets, and several literary techniques to produce a prose style that has been compared to comic poetry and musical comedy. Some critics of Wodehouse have considered his work flippant, but among his fans are former British prime ministers and many of his fellow writers. Life and career Early years Wodehouse was born in Guildford, Surrey, the third son of Henry Ernest Wodehouse (1845–1929), a magistrate resident in the British colony of Hong Kong, and his wife, Eleanor (1861–1941), daughter of the Rev John Bathurst Deane. The Wodehouses, who traced their ancestry back to the 13th century, belonged to a cadet branch of the family of the earls of Kimberley. Eleanor Wodehouse was also of ancient aristocratic ancestry. She was visiting her sister in Guildford when Wodehouse was born there prematurely. The boy was baptised at the Church of St Nicolas, Guildford, and was named after his godfather, Pelham von Donop. Wodehouse wrote in 1957, "If you ask me to tell you frankly if I like the name Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, I must confess that I do not.... I was named after a godfather, and not a thing to show for it but a small silver mug which I lost in 1897." The first name was rapidly elided to "Plum", the name by which Wodehouse became known to family and friends. Mother and son sailed for Hong Kong, where for his first two years Wodehouse was raised by a Chinese amah (nurse), alongside his elder brothers Peveril (1877–1951) and Armine (1879–1936). When he was two, the brothers were brought to England, where they were placed under the care of an English nanny in a house adjoining that of Eleanor's father and mother. The boys' parents returned to Hong Kong and became virtual strangers to their sons. Such an arrangement was then normal for middle-class families based in the colonies. The lack of parental contact, and the harsh regime of some of those in loco parentis, left permanent emotional scars on many children from similar backgrounds, including the writers Thackeray, Saki, Kipling and Walpole. Wodehouse was more fortunate; his nanny, Emma Roper, was strict but not unkind, and both with her and later at his different schools Wodehouse had a generally happy childhood. His recollection was that "it went like a breeze from start to finish, with everybody I met understanding me perfectly". The biographer Robert McCrum suggests that nonetheless Wodehouse's isolation from his parents left a psychological mark, causing him to avoid emotional engagement both in life and in his works. Another biographer, Frances Donaldson, writes, "Deprived so early, not merely of maternal love, but of home life and even a stable background, Wodehouse consoled himself from the youngest age in an imaginary world of his own." In 1886 the brothers were sent to a dame-school in Croydon, where they spent three years. Peveril was then found to have a "weak chest"; sea air was prescribed, and the three boys were moved to Elizabeth College on the island of Guernsey. In 1891 Wodehouse went on to Malvern House Preparatory School in Kent, which concentrated on preparing its pupils for entry to the Royal Navy. His father had planned a naval career for him, but the boy's eyesight was found to be too poor for it. He was unimpressed by the school's narrow curriculum and zealous discipline; he later parodied it in his novels, with Bertie Wooster recalling his early years as a pupil at a "penitentiary... with the outward guise of a prep school" called Malvern House. Throughout their school years the brothers were sent to stay during the holidays with various uncles and aunts from both sides of the family. In the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Iain Sproat counts twenty aunts and considers that they played an important part not only in Wodehouse's early life, but, thinly disguised, in his mature novels, as the formidable aunts who dominate the action in the Wooster, Blandings, and other stories. The boys had fifteen uncles, four of whom were clergymen. Sproat writes that they inspired Wodehouse's "pious but fallible curates, vicars, and bishops, of which he wrote with friendly irreverence but without mockery". At the age of twelve in 1894, to his great joy, Wodehouse was able to follow his brother Armine to Dulwich College. He was entirely at home there; Donaldson comments that Dulwich gave him, for the first time, "some continuity and a stable and ordered life". He loved the camaraderie, distinguished himself at cricket, rugby and boxing, and was a good, if not consistently diligent, student. The headmaster at the time was A. H. Gilkes, a respected classicist, who was a strong influence on Wodehouse. In a study of Wodehouse's works, Richard Usborne argues that "only a writer who was himself a scholar and had had his face ground into Latin and Greek (especially Thucydides) as a boy" could sustain the complex sequences of subordinate clauses sometimes found in Wodehouse's comic prose. Wodehouse's six years at Dulwich were among the happiest of his life: "To me the years between 1894 and 1900 were like heaven." In addition to his sporting achievements he was a good singer and enjoyed taking part in school concerts; his literary leanings found an outlet in editing the school magazine, The Alleynian. For the rest of his life he remained devoted to the school. The biographer Barry Phelps writes that Wodehouse "loved the college as much as he loved anything or anybody". Reluctant banker; budding writer: 1900–1908 Wodehouse expected to follow Armine to the University of Oxford, but the family's finances took a turn for the worse at the crucial moment. Ernest Wodehouse had retired in 1895, and his pension was paid in rupees; fluctuation against the pound reduced its value in Britain. Wodehouse recalled, "The wolf was not actually whining at the door and there was always a little something in the kitty for the butcher and the grocer, but the finances would not run to anything in the nature of a splash". Instead of a university career, in September 1900 Wodehouse was engaged in a junior position in the London office of the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank. He was unsuited to it and found the work baffling and uncongenial. He later wrote a humorous account of his experiences at the bank, but at the time he longed for the end of each working day, when he could return to his rented lodgings in Chelsea and write. At first he concentrated, with some success, on serious articles about school sports for Public School Magazine. In November 1900 his first comic piece, "Men Who Missed Their Own Weddings", was accepted by Tit-Bits. A new magazine for boys, The Captain, provided further well-paid opportunities, and during his two years at the bank, Wodehouse had eighty pieces published in a total of nine magazines. In 1901, with the help of a former Dulwich master, William Beach Thomas, Wodehouse secured an appointment—at first temporary and later permanent—writing for The Globes popular "By the Way" column. He held the post until 1909. At around the same time his first novel was published—a school story called The Pothunters, serialised incomplete in Public School Magazine in early 1902, and issued in full in hardback in September. He resigned from the bank that month to devote himself to writing full-time. Between the publication of The Pothunters 1902 and that of Mike in 1909, Wodehouse wrote eight novels and co-wrote another two. The critic R. D. B. French writes that, of Wodehouse's work from this period, almost all that deserves to survive is the school fiction. Looking back in the 1950s Wodehouse viewed these as his apprentice years: "I was practically in swaddling clothes and it is extremely creditable to me that I was able to write at all." From his boyhood Wodehouse had been fascinated by America, which he conceived of as "a land of romance"; he "yearned" to visit the country, and by 1904 he had earned enough to do so. In April he sailed to New York, which he found greatly to his liking. He noted in his diary: "In New York gathering experience. Worth many guineas in the future but none for the moment." This prediction proved correct: few British writers had first-hand experience of the US, and his articles about life in New York brought him higher than usual fees. He later recalled that "in 1904 anyone in the London writing world who had been to America was regarded with awe and looked upon as an authority on that terra incognita.... After that trip to New York I was a man who counted.... My income rose like a rocketing pheasant." Wodehouse's other new venture in 1904 was writing for the stage. Towards the end of the year the librettist Owen Hall invited him to contribute an additional lyric for a musical comedy Sergeant Brue. Wodehouse had loved theatre since his first visit, aged thirteen, when Gilbert and Sullivan's Patience had made him "drunk with ecstasy". His lyric for Hall, "Put Me in My Little Cell", was a Gilbertian number for a trio of comic crooks, with music by Frederick Rosse; it was well received and launched Wodehouse on a career as a theatre writer that spanned three decades. Although it made little impact on its first publication, the 1906 novel Love Among the Chickens contained what French calls the author's first original comic creation: Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge. The character, an amoral, bungling opportunist, is partly based on Wodehouse's Globe colleague Herbert Westbrook. The two collaborated between 1907 and 1913 on two books, two music hall sketches, and a play, Brother Alfred. Wodehouse would return to the character in short stories over the next six decades. In early 1906 the actor-manager Seymour Hicks invited Wodehouse to become resident lyricist at the Aldwych Theatre, to add topical verses to newly imported or long-running shows. Hicks had already recruited the young Jerome Kern to write the music for such songs. The first Kern-Wodehouse collaboration, a comic number for The Beauty of Bath titled "Mr [Joseph] Chamberlain", was a show-stopper and was briefly the most popular song in London. Psmith, Blandings, Wooster and Jeeves: 1908–1915 Wodehouse's early period as a writer came to an end in 1908 with the serialisation of The Lost Lambs, published the following year in book form as the second half of the novel Mike. The work begins as a conventional school story, but Wodehouse introduces a new and strikingly original character, Psmith, whose creation both Evelyn Waugh and George Orwell regarded as a watershed in Wodehouse's development. Wodehouse said that he based Psmith on the hotelier and impresario Rupert D'Oyly Carte—"the only thing in my literary career which was handed to me on a silver plate with watercress around it". Wodehouse wrote in the 1970s that a cousin of his who had been at school with Carte told him of the latter's monocle, studied suavity, and stateliness of speech, all of which Wodehouse adopted for his new character. Psmith featured in three more novels: Psmith in the City (1910), a burlesque of banking; Psmith, Journalist (1915) set in New York; and Leave It to Psmith (1923), set at Blandings Castle. In May 1909 Wodehouse made his second visit to New York, where he sold two short stories to Cosmopolitan and Collier's for a total of $500, a much higher fee than he had commanded previously. He resigned from The Globe and stayed in New York for nearly a year. He sold many more stories, but none of the American publications offered a permanent relationship and guaranteed income. Wodehouse returned to England in late 1910, rejoining The Globe and also contributing regularly to The Strand Magazine. Between then and the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 he revisited America frequently. Wodehouse was in New York when the war began. Ineligible for military service because of his poor eyesight, he remained in the US throughout the war, detached from the conflict in Europe and absorbed in his theatrical and literary concerns. In September 1914 he married Ethel May Wayman, née Newton (1885–1984), an English widow. The marriage proved happy and lifelong. Ethel's personality was in contrast with her husband's: he was shy and impractical; she was gregarious, decisive and well organised. In Sproat's phrase, she "took charge of Wodehouse's life and made certain that he had the peace and quiet he needed to write". There were no children of the marriage, but Wodehouse came to love Ethel's daughter Leonora (1905–1944) and legally adopted her. Wodehouse experimented with different genres of fiction in these years; Psmith, Journalist, mixing comedy with social comment on slum landlords and racketeers, was published in 1915. In the same year The Saturday Evening Post paid $3,500 to serialise Something New, the first of what became a series of novels set at Blandings Castle. It was published in hardback in the US and the UK in the same year (the British edition being retitled Something Fresh). It was Wodehouse's first farcical novel; it was also his first best-seller, and although his later books included some gentler, lightly sentimental stories, it was as a farceur that he became known. Later in the same year "Extricating Young Gussie", the first story about Bertie and Jeeves, was published. These stories introduced two sets of characters about whom Wodehouse wrote for the rest of his life. The Blandings Castle stories, set in an English stately home, depict the attempts of the placid Lord Emsworth to evade the many distractions around him, which include successive pairs of young lovers, the machinations of his exuberant brother Galahad, the demands of his domineering sisters and super-efficient secretaries, and anything detrimental to his prize sow, the Empress of Blandings. The Bertie and Jeeves stories feature an amiable young man-about-town, regularly rescued from the consequences of his idiocy by the benign interference of his valet. Broadway: 1915–1919 A third milestone in Wodehouse's life came towards the end of 1915: his old songwriting partner Jerome Kern introduced him to the writer Guy Bolton, who became Wodehouse's closest friend and a regular collaborator. Bolton and Kern had a musical, Very Good Eddie, running at the Princess Theatre in New York. The show was successful, but they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor. This was Miss Springtime (1916), which ran for 227 performances—a good run by the standards of the day. The team produced several more successes, including Leave It to Jane (1917), Oh, Boy! (1917–18) and Oh, Lady! Lady!! (1918), and Wodehouse and Bolton wrote a few more shows with other composers. In these musicals Wodehouse's lyrics won high praise from critics as well as fellow lyricists such as Ira Gershwin. Unlike his original model, Gilbert, Wodehouse preferred the music to be written first, fitting his words into the melodies. Donaldson suggests that this is the reason why his lyrics have largely been overlooked in recent years: they fit the music perfectly, but do not stand on their own in verse form as Gilbert's do. Nonetheless, Donaldson adds, the book and lyrics for the Princess Theatre shows made the collaborators an enormous fortune and played an important part in the development of the American musical. In the Grove Dictionary of American Music Larry Stempel writes, "By presenting naturalistic stories and characters and attempting to integrate the songs and lyrics into the action of the libretto, these works brought a new level of intimacy, cohesion, and sophistication to American musical comedy." The theatre writer Gerald Bordman calls Wodehouse "the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day". The composer Richard Rodgers wrote, "Before Larry Hart, only P.G. Wodehouse had made any real assault on the intelligence of the song-listening public." 1920s In the years after the war, Wodehouse steadily increased his sales, polished his existing characters and introduced new ones. Bertie and Jeeves, Lord Emsworth and his circle, and Ukridge appeared in novels and short stories; Psmith made his fourth and last appearance; two new characters were the Oldest Member, narrating his series of golfing stories, and Mr Mulliner, telling his particularly tall tales to fellow patrons of the bar at the Angler's Rest. Various other young men-about-town appeared in short stories about members of the Drones Club. The Wodehouses returned to England, where they had a house in London for some years, but Wodehouse continued to cross the Atlantic frequently, spending substantial periods in New York. He continued to work in the theatre. During the 1920s he collaborated on nine musical comedies produced on Broadway or in the West End, including the long-running Sally (1920, New York), The Cabaret Girl (1922, London) and Rosalie (1928, New York). He also wrote non-musical plays, including The Play's the Thing (1926), adapted from Ferenc Molnár, and A Damsel in Distress (1928), a dramatisation of his 1919 novel. Though never a naturally gregarious man, Wodehouse was more sociable in the 1920s than at other periods. Donaldson lists among those with whom he was on friendly terms writers including A. A. Milne, Ian Hay, Frederick Lonsdale and E. Phillips Oppenheim, and stage performers including George Grossmith Jr., Heather Thatcher and Dorothy Dickson. Hollywood: 1929–1931 There had been films of Wodehouse stories since 1915, when A Gentleman of Leisure was based on his 1910 novel of the same name. Further screen adaptations of his books were made between then and 1927, but it was not until 1929 that Wodehouse went to Hollywood where Bolton was working as a highly paid writer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Ethel was taken with both the financial and social aspects of Hollywood life, and she negotiated a contract with MGM on her husband's behalf under which he would be paid $2,000 a week. This large salary was particularly welcome because the couple had lost considerable sums in the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The contract started in May 1930, but the studio found little for Wodehouse to do, and he had spare time to write a novel and nine short stories. He commented, "It's odd how soon one comes to look on every minute as wasted that is given to earning one's salary." Even when the studio found a project for him to work on, the interventions of committees and constant rewriting by numerous contract authors meant that his ideas were rarely used. In a 2005 study of Wodehouse in Hollywood, Brian Taves writes that Those Three French Girls (1930) was "as close to a success as Wodehouse was to have at MGM. His only other credits were minimal, and the other projects he worked on were not produced." Wodehouse's contract ended after a year and was not renewed. At MGM's request, he gave an interview to The Los Angeles Times. Wodehouse was described by Herbert Warren Wind as "politically naive [and] fundamentally unworldly", and he caused a sensation by saying publicly what he had already told his friends privately about Hollywood's inefficiency, arbitrary decision-making, and waste of expensive talent. The interview was reprinted in The New York Times, and there was much editorial comment about the state of the film industry. Many writers have considered that the interview precipitated a radical overhaul of the studio system, but Taves believes it to have been "a storm in a teacup", and Donaldson comments that, in the straitened post-crash era, the reforms would have been inevitable. Wind's view of Wodehouse's naïveté is not universally held. Biographers including Donaldson, McCrum and Phelps suggest that his unworldliness was only part of a complex character, and that in some respects he was highly astute. He was unsparing of the studio owners in his early-1930s short stories set in Hollywood, which contain what Taves considers Wodehouse's sharpest and most biting satire. Best-seller: 1930s During the 1930s Wodehouse's theatrical work tailed off. He wrote or adapted four plays for the West End; Leave it to Psmith (1930), which he adapted in collaboration with Ian Hay, was the only one to have a long run. The reviewer in The Manchester Guardian praised the play, but commented: "It is Mr Wodehouse's own inimitable narrative comments and descriptions in his own person of the antics of his puppets that one misses. They cannot be got into a play and they are at least half the fun of the novels." In 1934 Wodehouse collaborated with Bolton on the book for Cole Porter's Anything Goes (Porter wrote his own lyrics), but at the last minute their version was almost entirely rewritten by others at the instigation of the producer, who disliked the original script. Concentrating on writing novels and short stories, Wodehouse reached the peak of his productivity in this decade, averaging two books each year, and grossing an annual £100,000. His practice of dividing his time between Britain and America caused Wodehouse difficulties with the tax authorities of both countries. Both the UK Inland Revenue and the US Internal Revenue Service sought to tax him as a resident. The matter was settled after lengthy negotiations, but the Wodehouses decided to change their residential status beyond doubt by moving to France, where they bought a house near Le Touquet in the north. In 1935 Wodehouse created the last of his regular cast of principal characters, Lord Ickenham, otherwise known as Uncle Fred, who, in Usborne's words, "leads the dance in four novels and a short story... a whirring dynamo of misrule". His other books from the decade include Right Ho, Jeeves, which Donaldson judged his best work, Uncle Fred in the Springtime, which the writer Bernard Levin considered the best, and Blandings Castle, which contains "Lord Emsworth and the Girl Friend", which Rudyard Kipling thought "one of the most perfect short stories I have ever read". Other leading literary figures who admired Wodehouse were A. E. Housman, Max Beerbohm and Hilaire Belloc; on the radio and in print Belloc called Wodehouse "the best writer of our time: the best living writer of English... the head of my profession". Wodehouse regarded Belloc's plaudit as "a gag, to get a rise out of serious-minded authors whom he disliked". Wodehouse was never sure that his books had literary merit as well as popular appeal, and, Donaldson suggests, must have been overwhelmed when the University of Oxford conferred an honorary doctorate of letters on him in June 1939. His visit to England for the awarding ceremony was the last time he set foot in his native land. Second World War: internment and broadcasts At the start of the Second World War Wodehouse and his wife remained at their Le Touquet house, where, during the Phoney War, he worked on Joy in the Morning. With the advance of the Germans, the nearby Royal Air Force base withdrew; Wodehouse was offered the sole spare seat in one of the fighter aircraft, but he turned down the opportunity as it would have meant leaving behind Ethel and their dog. On 21 May 1940, with German troops advancing through northern France, the Wodehouses decided to drive to Portugal and fly from there to the US. Two miles from home their car broke down, so they returned and borrowed a car from a neighbour; with the routes blocked with refugees, they returned home again. The Germans occupied Le Touquet on 22 May 1940 and Wodehouse had to report to the authorities daily. After two months of occupation the Germans interned all male enemy nationals under 60, and Wodehouse was sent to a former prison in Loos, a suburb of Lille, on 21 July; Ethel remained in Le Touquet. The internees were placed four to a cell, each of which had been designed for one man. One bed was available per cell, which was made available to the eldest man—not Wodehouse, who slept on the granite floor. The prisoners were not kept long in Loos before they were transported in cattle trucks to a former barracks in Liège, Belgium, which was run as a prison by the SS. After a week the men were transferred to Huy in Liège, where they were incarcerated in the local citadel. They remained there until September 1940, when they were transported to Tost in Upper Silesia (then Germany, now Toszek in Poland). Wodehouse's family and friends had not had any news of his location after the fall of France, but an article from an Associated Press reporter who had visited Tost in December 1940 led to pressure on the German authorities to release the novelist. This included a petition from influential people in the US; Senator W. Warren Barbour presented it to the German ambassador. Although his captors refused to release him, Wodehouse was provided with a typewriter and, to pass the time, he wrote Money in the Bank. Throughout his time in Tost, he sent postcards to his US literary agent asking for $5 to be sent to various people in Canada, mentioning his name. These were the families of Canadian prisoners of war, and the news from Wodehouse was the first indication that their sons were alive and well. Wodehouse risked severe punishment for the communication, but managed to evade the German censor. On 21 June 1941, while he was in the middle of playing a game of cricket, Wodehouse received a visit from two members of the Gestapo. He was given ten minutes to pack his things before he was taken to the Hotel Adlon, a top luxury hotel in Berlin. He stayed there at his own expense; royalties from the German editions of his books had been put into a special frozen bank account at the outset of the war, and Wodehouse was permitted to draw upon this money he had earned while staying in Berlin. He was thus released from internment a few months before his sixtieth birthday—the age at which civilian internees were released by the Nazis. Shortly afterwards Wodehouse was, in the words of Phelps, "cleverly trapped" into making five broadcasts to the US via German radio, with the Berlin-based correspondent of the Columbia Broadcasting System. The broadcasts—aired on 28 June, 9, 23 and 30 July and 6 August—were titled How to be an Internee Without Previous Training, and comprised humorous anecdotes about Wodehouse's experiences as a prisoner, including some gentle mocking of his captors. The German propaganda ministry arranged for the recordings to be broadcast to Britain in August. The day after Wodehouse recorded his final programme, Ethel joined him in Berlin, having sold most of her jewellery to pay for the journey. Aftermath: reactions and investigation The reaction in Britain to Wodehouse's broadcasts was hostile, and he was "reviled ... as a traitor, collaborator, Nazi propagandist, and a coward", although, Phelps observes, many of those who decried his actions had not heard the content of the programmes. A front-page article in The Daily Mirror stated that Wodehouse "lived luxuriously because Britain laughed with him, but when the laughter was out of his country's heart, ... [he] was not ready to share her suffering. He hadn't the guts ... even to stick it out in the internment camp." In the House of Commons Anthony Eden, the Foreign Secretary, regretted Wodehouse's actions. Several libraries removed Wodehouse novels from their shelves. On 15 July the journalist William Connor, under his pen name Cassandra, broadcast a postscript to the news programme railing against Wodehouse. According to The Times, the broadcast "provoked a storm of complaint ... from listeners all over the country". Wodehouse's biographer, Joseph Connolly, thinks the broadcast "inaccurate, spiteful and slanderous"; Phelps calls it "probably the most vituperative attack on an individual ever heard on British radio". The broadcast was made at the direct instruction of Duff Cooper, the Minister of Information, who overruled strong protests made by the BBC against the decision to air the programme. Numerous letters appeared in the British press, both supporting and criticising Wodehouse. The letters page of The Daily Telegraph became a focus for censuring Wodehouse, including one from Wodehouse's friend, ; a reply from their fellow author Compton Mackenzie in defence of Wodehouse was not published because the editor claimed a lack of space. Most of those defending Wodehouse against accusations of disloyalty, including Sax Rohmer, Dorothy L. Sayers and Gilbert Frankau, conceded that he had acted stupidly. Some members of the public wrote to the newspapers to say that the full facts were not yet known and a fair judgment could not be made until they were. The management of the BBC, who considered Wodehouse's actions no worse than "ill advised", pointed out to Cooper that there was no evidence at that point whether Wodehouse had acted voluntarily or under compulsion. When Wodehouse heard of the furore the broadcasts had caused, he contacted the Foreign Office—through the Swiss embassy in Berlin—to explain his actions, and attempted to return home via neutral countries, but the German authorities refused to let him leave. In Performing Flea, a 1953 collection of letters, Wodehouse wrote, "Of course I ought to have had the sense to see that it was a loony thing to do to use the German radio for even the most harmless stuff, but I didn't. I suppose prison life saps the intellect". The reaction in America was mixed: the left-leaning publication PM accused Wodehouse of "play[ing] Jeeves to the Nazis", but the Department of War used the interviews as an ideal representation of anti-Nazi propaganda. The Wodehouses remained in Germany until September 1943, when, because of the Allied bombings, they were allowed to move back to Paris. They were living there when the city was liberated on 25 August 1944; Wodehouse reported to the American authorities the following day, asking them to inform the British of his whereabouts. He was subsequently visited by Malcolm Muggeridge, recently arrived in Paris as an intelligence officer with MI6. The young officer quickly came to like Wodehouse and considered the question of treasonable behaviour as "ludicrous"; he summed up the writer as "ill-fitted to live in an age of ideological conflict". On 9 September Wodehouse was visited by an MI5 officer and former barrister, Major Edward Cussen, who formally investigated him, a process that stretched over four days. On 28 September Cussen filed his report, which states that in regard to the broadcasts, Wodehouse's behaviour "has been unwise", but advised against further action. On 23 November Theobald Matthew, the Director of Public Prosecutions, decided there was no evidence to justify prosecuting Wodehouse. In November 1944 Duff Cooper was appointed British ambassador to France and was provided accommodation at the Hôtel Le Bristol, where the Wodehouses were living. Cooper complained to the French authorities, and the couple were moved to a different hotel. They were subsequently arrested by French police and placed under preventive detention, despite no charges being presented. When Muggeridge tracked them down later, he managed to get Ethel released straight away and, four days later, ensured that the French authorities declared Wodehouse unwell and put him in a nearby hospital, which was more comfortable than where they had been detained. While in this hospital, Wodehouse worked on his novel Uncle Dynamite. While still detained by the French, Wodehouse was again mentioned in questions in the House of Commons in December 1944 when MPs wondered if the French authorities could repatriate him to stand trial. Eden stated that the "matter has been gone into, and, according to the advice given, there are no grounds upon which we could take action". Two months later, Orwell wrote the essay "In Defence of P.G. Wodehouse", where he stated that "it is important to realise that the events of 1941 do not convict Wodehouse of anything worse than stupidity". Orwell's rationale was that Wodehouse's "moral outlook has remained that of a public-school boy, and according to the public-school code, treachery in time of war is the most unforgivable of all the sins", which was compounded by his "complete lack—so far as one can judge from his printed works—of political awareness". On 15 January 1945 the French authorities released Wodehouse, but they did not inform him, until June 1946, that he would not face any official charges and was free to leave the country. American exile: 1946–1975 Having secured American visas in July 1946, the Wodehouses made preparations to return to New York. They were delayed by Ethel's insistence on acquiring suitable new clothes and by Wodehouse's wish to finish writing his current novel, The Mating Season, in the peace of the French countryside. In April 1947 they sailed to New York, where Wodehouse was relieved at the friendly reception he received from the large press contingent awaiting his arrival. Ethel secured a comfortable penthouse apartment in Manhattan's Upper East Side, but Wodehouse was not at ease. The New York that he had known before the war was much changed. The magazines that had paid lavishly for his stories were in decline, and those that remained were not much interested in him. He was sounded out about writing for Broadway, but he was not at home in the post-war theatre; he had money problems, with large sums temporarily tied up in Britain, and for the first time in his career he had no ideas for a new novel. He did not complete one until 1951. Wodehouse remained unsettled until he and Ethel left New York City for Long Island. Bolton and his wife lived in the prosperous hamlet of Remsenburg, part of the Southampton area of Long Island, east of Manhattan. Wodehouse stayed with them frequently, and in 1952 he and Ethel bought a house nearby. They lived at Remsenburg for the rest of their lives. Between 1952 and 1975 he published more than twenty novels, as well as two collections of short stories, a heavily edited collection of his letters, a volume of memoirs, and a selection of his magazine articles. He continued to hanker after a revival of his theatrical career. A 1959 off-Broadway revival of the 1917 Bolton-Wodehouse-Kern Leave It to Jane was a surprise hit, running for 928 performances, but his few post-war stage works, some in collaboration with Bolton, made little impression. Although Ethel made a return visit to England in 1948 to shop and visit family and friends, Wodehouse never left America after his arrival in 1947. It was not until 1965 that the British government indicated privately that he could return without fear of legal proceedings, and by then he felt too old to make the journey. The biographers Benny Green and Robert McCrum both take the view that this exile benefited Wodehouse's writing, helping him to go on depicting an idealised England seen in his mind's eye, rather than as it actually was in the post-war decades. During their years in Long Island, the couple often took in stray animals and contributed substantial funds to a local animal shelter. In 1955 Wodehouse became an American citizen, though he remained a British subject, and was therefore still eligible for UK state honours. He was considered for the award of a knighthood three times from 1967, but the honour was twice blocked by British officials. In 1974 the British prime minister, Harold Wilson, intervened to secure a knighthood (KBE) for Wodehouse, which was announced in the January 1975 New Year Honours list. The Times commented that Wodehouse's honour signalled "official forgiveness for his wartime indiscretion.... It is late, but not too late, to take the sting out of that unhappy incident." The following month Wodehouse entered Southampton Hospital, Long Island, for treatment of a skin complaint. While there, he suffered a heart attack and died on 14 February 1975 at the age of 93. He was buried at Remsenburg Presbyterian Church four days later. Ethel outlived him by more than nine years; Leonora had predeceased him, dying suddenly in 1944. Writing Technique and approach Before starting a book Wodehouse would write up to four hundred pages of notes bringing together an outline of the plot; he acknowledged that "It's the plots that I find so hard to work out. It takes such a long time to work one out." He always completed the plot before working on specific character actions. For a novel the note-writing process could take up to two years, and he would usually have two or more novels in preparation simultaneously. After he had completed his notes, he would draw up a fuller scenario of about thirty thousand words, which ensured plot holes were avoided, and allowed for the dialogue to begin to develop. When interviewed in 1975 he revealed that "For a humorous novel you've got to have a scenario, and you've got to test it so that you know where the comedy comes in, where the situations come in ... splitting it up into scenes (you can make a scene of almost anything) and have as little stuff in between as possible." He preferred working between 4 and 7 pm—but never after dinner—and would work seven days a week. In his younger years, he would write around two to three thousand words a day, although he slowed as he aged, so that in his nineties he would produce a thousand. The reduced speed in writing slowed his production of books: when younger he would produce a novel in about three months, while Bachelors Anonymous, published in 1973, took around six months. Although studies of language production in normal healthy ageing show a marked decline from the mid-70s on, a study of Wodehouse's works did not find any evidence of a decline in linguistic ability with age. Wodehouse believed that one of the factors that made his stories humorous was his view of life, and he stated that "If you take life fairly easily, then you take a humorous view of things. It's probably because you were born that way." He carried this view through into his writing, describing the approach as "making the thing a sort of musical comedy without music, and ignoring real life altogether". The literary critic Edward L. Galligan considers Wodehouse's stories to show his mastery in adapting the form of the American musical comedy for his writings. Wodehouse would ensure that his first draft was as carefully and accurately done as possible, correcting and refining the prose as he wrote, and would then make another good copy, before proofreading again and then making a final copy for his publisher. Most of Wodehouse's canon is set in an undated period around the 1920s and 1930s. The critic Anthony Lejeune describes the settings of Wodehouse's novels, such as the Drones Club and Blandings Castle, as "a fairyland". Although some critics thought Wodehouse's fiction was based on a world that had never existed, Wodehouse affirmed that "it did. It was going strong between the wars", although he agreed that his version was to some extent "a sort of artificial world of my own creation". The novels showed a largely unchanging world, regardless of when they were written, and only rarely—and mistakenly in McCrum's view—did Wodehouse allow modernity to intrude, as he did in the 1966 story "Bingo Bans the Bomb". When dealing with the dialogue in his novels, Wodehouse would consider the book's characters as if they were actors in a play, ensuring that the main roles were kept suitably employed throughout the storyline, which must be strong: "If they aren't in interesting situations, characters can't be major characters, not even if you have the rest of the troop talk their heads off about them." Many of Wodehouse's parts were stereotypes, and he acknowledged that "a real character in one of my books sticks out like a sore thumb." The publisher Michael Joseph identifies that even within the stereotypes Wodehouse understood human nature, and therefore "shares with [Charles] Dickens and Charles Chaplin the ability to present the comic resistance of the individual against those superior forces to which we are all subject". Much of Wodehouse's use of slang terms reflects the influence of his time at school in Dulwich, and partly reflects Edwardian slang. As a young man he enjoyed the literary works of Arthur Conan Doyle and Jerome K. Jerome, and the operatic works of Gilbert and Sullivan. Wodehouse quotes from and alludes to numerous poets throughout his work. The scholar Clarke Olney lists those quoted, including Milton, Byron, Longfellow, Coleridge, Swinburne, Tennyson, Wordsworth and Shakespeare. Another favoured source was the King James Bible. Language In 1941 the Concise Cambridge History of English Literature opined that Wodehouse had "a gift for highly original aptness of phrase that almost suggests a poet struggling for release among the wild extravagances of farce", while McCrum thinks that Wodehouse manages to combine "high farce with the inverted poetry of his mature comic style", particularly in The Code of the Woosters; the novelist Anthony Powell believes Wodehouse to be a "comic poet". Robert A. Hall Jr., in his study of Wodehouse's style and technique, describes the author as a master of prose, an opinion also shared by Levin, who considers Wodehouse "one of the finest and purest writers of English prose". Hall identifies several techniques used by Wodehouse to achieve comic effect, including the creation of new words through adding or removing prefixes and suffixes, so when Pongo Twistleton removes the housemaid Elsie Bean from a cupboard, Wodehouse writes that the character "de-Beaned the cupboard". Wodehouse created new words by splitting others in two, thus Wodehouse divides "hobnobbing" when he writes: "To offer a housemaid a cigarette is not hobbing. Nor, when you light it for her, does that constitute nobbing." Richard Voorhees, Wodehouse's biographer, believes that the author used clichés in a deliberate and ironic manner. His opinion is shared by the academic Stephen Medcalf, who deems Wodehouse's skill is to "bring a cliché just enough to life to kill it", although Pamela March, writing in The Christian Science Monitor, considers Wodehouse to have "an ability to decliché a cliché". Medcalf provides an example from Right Ho, Jeeves in which the teetotal Gussie Fink-Nottle has surreptitiously been given whisky and gin in a punch prior to a prize-giving: 'It seems to me, Jeeves, that the ceremony may be one fraught with considerable interest.' 'Yes, sir.' 'What, in your opinion, will the harvest be?' 'One finds it difficult to hazard a conjecture, sir.' 'You mean imagination boggles?' 'Yes, sir.' I inspected my imagination. He was right. It boggled. The stylistic device most commonly found in Wodehouse's work is his use of comparative imagery that includes similes. Hall opines that the humour comes from Wodehouse's ability to accentuate "resemblances which at first glance seem highly incongruous". Examples can be seen in Joy in the Morning, Chapter 29: "There was a sound in the background like a distant sheep coughing gently on a mountainside. Jeeves sailing into action", or Psmith, Chapter 7: "A sound like two or three pigs feeding rather noisily in the middle of a thunderstorm interrupted his meditation." Hall also identifies that periodically Wodehouse used the stylistic device of a transferred epithet, with an adjective that properly belongs to a person applied instead to some inanimate object. The form of expression is used sparingly by Wodehouse in comparison with other mechanisms, only once or twice in a story or novel, according to Hall. "I balanced a thoughtful lump of sugar on the teaspoon." —Joy in the Morning, Chapter 5 "As I sat in the bath-tub, soaping a meditative foot ..." —Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, Chapter 1 "The first thing he did was to prod Jeeves in the lower ribs with an uncouth forefinger." —Much Obliged, Jeeves, Chapter 4 Wordplay is a key element in Wodehouse's writing. This can take the form of puns, such as in Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, when Bertie is released after a night in the police cells, and says that he has "a pinched look" about him. Linguistic confusion is another humorous mechanism, such as in Uncle Dynamite when Constable Potter says he has been "assaulted by the duck pond". In reply, Sir Aylmer, confusing the two meanings of the word "by", asks: "How the devil can you be assaulted by a duck pond?" Wodehouse also uses metaphor and mixed metaphor to add humour. Some come through exaggeration, such as Bingo Little's infant child who "not only has the aspect of a mass murderer, but that of a mass murderer suffering from an ingrown toenail", or Wooster's complaint that "the rumpuses that Bobbie Wickham is already starting may be amusing to her, but not to the unfortunate toads beneath the harrow whom she ruthlessly plunges into the soup." Bertie Wooster's half-forgotten vocabulary also provides a further humorous device. In Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit Bertie asks Jeeves "Let a plugugly like young Thos loose in the community with a cosh, and you are inviting disaster and ... what's the word? Something about cats." Jeeves replies, "Cataclysms, sir?" Reception and reputation Literary reception Wodehouse's early career as a lyricist and playwright was profitable, and his work with Bolton, according to The Guardian, "was one of the most successful in the history of musical comedy". At the outbreak of the Second World War he was earning £40,000 a year from his work, which had broadened to include novels and short stories. Following the furore ensuing from the wartime broadcasts, he suffered a downturn in his popularity and book sales; The Saturday Evening Post stopped publishing his short stories, a stance they reversed in 1965, although his popularity—and the sales figures—slowly recovered over time. Wodehouse received great praise from many of his contemporaries, including Max Beerbohm, Rudyard Kipling, A. E. Housman and Evelyn Waugh—the last of whom opines, "One has to regard a man as a Master who can produce on average three uniquely brilliant and entirely original similes on each page." There are dissenters to the praise. The writer Alan Bennett thinks that "inspired though his language is, I can never take more than ten pages of the novels at a time, their relentless flippancy wearing and tedious", while the literary critic Q. D. Leavis writes that Wodehouse had a "stereotyped humour ... of ingenious variations on a laugh in one place". In a 2010 study of Wodehouse's few relatively serious novels, such as The Coming of Bill (1919), Jill the Reckless (1920) and The Adventures of Sally (1922), David Heddendorf concludes that though their literary quality does not match that of the farcical novels, they show a range of empathy and interests that in real life—and in his most comic works—the author seemed to lack. "Never oblivious to grief and despair, he opts in clear-eyed awareness for his timeless world of spats and woolly-headed peers. It's an austere, almost bloodless preference for pristine artifice over the pain and messy outcomes of actual existence, but it's a case of Wodehouse keeping faith with his own unique art." The American literary analyst Robert F. Kiernan, defining "camp" as "excessive stylization of whatever kind", brackets Wodehouse as "a master of the camp novel", along with Thomas Love Peacock, Max Beerbohm, Ronald Firbank, E. F. Benson and Ivy Compton-Burnett. The literary critic and writer Cyril Connolly calls Wodehouse a "politicians' author"—one who does "not like art to be exacting and difficult". Two former British prime ministers, H. H. Asquith and Tony Blair, are on record as Wodehouse aficionados, and the latter became a patron of the Wodehouse Society. Seán O'Casey, a successful playwright of the 1920s, thought little of Wodehouse; he commented in 1941 that it was damaging to England's dignity that the public or "the academic government of Oxford, dead from the chin up" considered Wodehouse an important figure in English literature. His jibe that Wodehouse was "English literature's performing flea" provided his target with the title of his collected letters, published in 1953. McCrum, writing in 2004, observes, "Wodehouse is more popular today than on the day he died", and "his comic vision has an absolutely secure place in the English literary imagination." Honours and influence The proposed nominations of Wodehouse for a knighthood in 1967 and 1971 were blocked for fear that such an award would "revive the controversy of his wartime behaviour and give currency to a Bertie Wooster image of the British character which the embassy was doing its best to eradicate". When Wodehouse was awarded the knighthood, only four years later, the journalist Dennis Barker wrote in The Guardian that the writer was "the solitary surviving English literary comic genius". After his death six weeks later, the journalist Michael Davie, writing in the same paper, observed that "Many people regarded ... [Wodehouse] as he regarded Beachcomber, as 'one, if not more than one, of England's greatest men'", while in the view of the obituarist for The Times Wodehouse "was a comic genius recognized in his lifetime as a classic and an old master of farce". In September 2019 Wodehouse was commemorated with a memorial stone in Westminster Abbey; the dedication was held two days after it was installed. Since Wodehouse's death there have been numerous adaptations and dramatisations of his work on television and film; Wodehouse himself has been portrayed on radio and screen numerous times. There are several literary societies dedicated to Wodehouse. The P.G. Wodehouse Society (UK) was founded in 1997 and has over 1,000 members as at 2015. The president of the society as at 2017 is Alexander Armstrong; past presidents have included Terry Wogan and Richard Briers. There are also other groups of Wodehouse fans in Australia, Belgium, France, Finland, India, Italy, Russia, Sweden and the US. As at 2015 the Oxford English Dictionary contains over 1,750 quotations from Wodehouse, illustrating terms from crispish to zippiness. Voorhees, while acknowledging that Wodehouse's antecedents in literature range from Ben Jonson to Oscar Wilde, writes: Notes, references and sources Notes References Sources External links P. G. Wodehouse collection at One More Library P.G. Wodehouse Archive on loan to the British Library The Wodehouse Society The P. G. Wodehouse Society (UK) Transcripts of Wodehouse's Berlin Broadcasts "P. G. Wodehouse: An English Master of American Slang" from The American Legion Weekly, 24 October 1919 Orwell, George "In Defence of P.G. Wodehouse" 1881 births 1975 deaths 20th-century English novelists 20th-century British dramatists and playwrights British emigrants to the United States English lyricists Knights Commander of the Order of the British Empire English male dramatists and playwrights British male novelists People educated at Dulwich College People educated at Elizabeth College, Guernsey People from Guildford People from Long Island PG People interned during World War II English humorists 20th-century American novelists American dramatists and playwrights American humorists American lyricists American male novelists Novelists from New York (state) Literature controversies English broadcasters for Nazi Germany 20th-century American male writers	true	[ "What Did We Do Wrong? is a comedy play about a businessman who turns hippie. The original Broadway production starred Paul Ford and cost $75,000. It only had a short run.\n\nThe play was profiled in the William Goldman book The Season: A Candid Look at Broadway.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1967 plays\nComedy plays", "\nThe Eugene Trilogy refers to three plays written by Neil Simon, the \"quasi-autobiographical trilogy\" Brighton Beach Memoirs, Biloxi Blues and Broadway Bound.\n\nHistory\nThe trilogy tells the story of Eugene Jerome from his adolescence in New York City, to his time spent in basic training in Biloxi, Mississippi during World War II, and finally to the beginning of his career as an aspiring comedy writer. The trilogy is a semi-autobiographical account of Neil Simon's own early life and career.\n\nIn an interview in 1986, Simon said: \" 'Brighton Beach' was going to be another singular play....Again, I still hadn't thought of a trilogy. But I decided to take Eugene the next step chronologically in my life, which was the army. But even after I wrote 'Biloxi Blues', I still didn't think about a sequel, because if it turned out to be a bomb, why would one want to do a sequel? So I just waited to see what would happen. Well, Biloxi enjoyed enormous success, and I thought of a third part.\"\n\nStage\nBrighton Beach Memoirs premiered on Broadway on March 22, 1983; Biloxi Blues premiered on Broadway on March 28, 1985 and Broadway Bound premiered on Broadway on December 4, 1986.\n\nFilm\nBrighton Beach Memoirs and Biloxi Blues were made into films, while Broadway Bound was adapted as a made-for-TV movie. On screen the role of Eugene Jerome was played by Jonathan Silverman in Brighton Beach Memoirs (he also played Stanley in the film version of Broadway Bound), Matthew Broderick in Biloxi Blues (he also played Eugene in the Broadway productions of both Brighton Beach and Biloxi Blues), and Corey Parker in Broadway Bound.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nBrighton Beach Memoirs at the Playbill Vault\nBiloxi Blues at the Playbill Vault\nBroadway Bound at the Playbill Vault\n\nPlays by Neil Simon" ]
[ "P. G. Wodehouse", "Broadway: 1915-19", "What did he do in Broadway?", "Wodehouse \"the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day\"." ]	C_14a60ae6a0404de9a8adfd5f0367ce69_1	What prompted him to go to Broadway?	2	What prompted P. G. Wodehouse to go to Broadway?	P. G. Wodehouse	A third milestone in Wodehouse's life came towards the end of 1915: his old songwriting partner Jerome Kern introduced him to the writer Guy Bolton, who became Wodehouse's closest friend and a regular collaborator. Bolton and Kern had a musical, Very Good Eddie, running at the Princess Theatre in New York. The show was successful, but they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor. This was Miss Springtime (1916), which ran for 227 performances--a good run by the standards of the day. The team produced several more successes, including Leave It to Jane (1917), Oh, Boy! (1917-18) and Oh, Lady! Lady!! (1918), and Wodehouse and Bolton wrote a few more shows with other composers. In these musicals Wodehouse's lyrics won high praise from critics as well as fellow lyricists such as Ira Gershwin. Unlike his original model, Gilbert, Wodehouse preferred the music to be written first, fitting his words into the melodies. Donaldson suggests that this is the reason why his lyrics have largely been overlooked in recent years: they fit the music perfectly, but do not stand on their own in verse form as Gilbert's do. Nonetheless, Donaldson adds, the book and lyrics for the Princess Theatre shows made the collaborators an enormous fortune and played an important part in the development of the American musical. In the Grove Dictionary of American Music Larry Stempel writes, "By presenting naturalistic stories and characters and attempting to integrate the songs and lyrics into the action of the libretto, these works brought a new level of intimacy, cohesion, and sophistication to American musical comedy." The theatre writer Gerald Bordman calls Wodehouse "the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day". The composer Richard Rodgers wrote, "Before Larry Hart, only P.G. Wodehouse had made any real assault on the intelligence of the song-listening public." In the years after the war, Wodehouse steadily increased his sales, polished his existing characters and introduced new ones. Bertie and Jeeves, Lord Emsworth and his circle, and Ukridge appeared in novels and short stories; Psmith made his fourth and last appearance; two new characters were the Oldest Member, narrating his series of golfing stories, and Mr Mulliner, telling his particularly tall tales to fellow patrons of the bar at the Angler's Rest. Various other young men-about-town appeared in short stories about members of the Drones Club. The Wodehouses returned to England, where they had a house in London for some years, but Wodehouse continued to cross the Atlantic frequently, spending substantial periods in New York. He continued to work in the theatre. During the 1920s he collaborated on nine musical comedies produced on Broadway or in the West End, including the long-running Sally (1920, New York), The Cabaret Girl (1922, London) and Rosalie (1928, New York). He also wrote non-musical plays, including The Play's the Thing (1926), adapted from Ferenc Molnar, and A Damsel in Distress (1928), a dramatisation of his 1919 novel. Though never a naturally gregarious man, Wodehouse was more sociable in the 1920s than at other periods. Donaldson lists among those with whom he was on friendly terms writers including A.A. Milne, Ian Hay, Frederick Lonsdale and E. Phillips Oppenheim, and stage performers including George Grossmith, Jr., Heather Thatcher and Dorothy Dickson. CANNOTANSWER	they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor.	Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, ( ; 15 October 188114 February 1975) was an English author and one of the most widely read humorists of the 20th century. His creations include the feather-brained Bertie Wooster and his sagacious valet, Jeeves; the immaculate and loquacious Psmith; Lord Emsworth and the Blandings Castle set; the Oldest Member, with stories about golf; and Mr Mulliner, with tall tales on subjects ranging from bibulous bishops to megalomaniac movie moguls. Born in Guildford, the third son of a British magistrate based in Hong Kong, Wodehouse spent happy teenage years at Dulwich College, to which he remained devoted all his life. After leaving school he was employed by a bank but disliked the work and turned to writing in his spare time. His early novels were mostly school stories, but he later switched to comic fiction. Most of Wodehouse's fiction is set in his native United Kingdom, although he spent much of his life in the US and used New York and Hollywood as settings for some of his novels and short stories. He wrote a series of Broadway musical comedies during and after the First World War, together with Guy Bolton and Jerome Kern, that played an important part in the development of the American musical. He began the 1930s writing for MGM in Hollywood. In a 1931 interview, his naive revelations of incompetence and extravagance in the studios caused a furore. In the same decade, his literary career reached a new peak. In 1934 Wodehouse moved to France for tax reasons; in 1940 he was taken prisoner at Le Touquet by the invading Germans and interned for nearly a year. After his release he made six broadcasts from German radio in Berlin to the US, which had not yet entered the war. The talks were comic and apolitical, but his broadcasting over enemy radio prompted anger and strident controversy in Britain, and a threat of prosecution. Wodehouse never returned to England. From 1947 until his death he lived in the US, taking dual British-American citizenship in 1955. He died in 1975, at the age of 93, in Southampton, New York. Wodehouse was a prolific writer throughout his life, publishing more than ninety books, forty plays, two hundred short stories and other writings between 1902 and 1974. He worked extensively on his books, sometimes having two or more in preparation simultaneously. He would take up to two years to build a plot and write a scenario of about thirty thousand words. After the scenario was complete he would write the story. Early in his career Wodehouse would produce a novel in about three months, but he slowed in old age to around six months. He used a mixture of Edwardian slang, quotations from and allusions to numerous poets, and several literary techniques to produce a prose style that has been compared to comic poetry and musical comedy. Some critics of Wodehouse have considered his work flippant, but among his fans are former British prime ministers and many of his fellow writers. Life and career Early years Wodehouse was born in Guildford, Surrey, the third son of Henry Ernest Wodehouse (1845–1929), a magistrate resident in the British colony of Hong Kong, and his wife, Eleanor (1861–1941), daughter of the Rev John Bathurst Deane. The Wodehouses, who traced their ancestry back to the 13th century, belonged to a cadet branch of the family of the earls of Kimberley. Eleanor Wodehouse was also of ancient aristocratic ancestry. She was visiting her sister in Guildford when Wodehouse was born there prematurely. The boy was baptised at the Church of St Nicolas, Guildford, and was named after his godfather, Pelham von Donop. Wodehouse wrote in 1957, "If you ask me to tell you frankly if I like the name Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, I must confess that I do not.... I was named after a godfather, and not a thing to show for it but a small silver mug which I lost in 1897." The first name was rapidly elided to "Plum", the name by which Wodehouse became known to family and friends. Mother and son sailed for Hong Kong, where for his first two years Wodehouse was raised by a Chinese amah (nurse), alongside his elder brothers Peveril (1877–1951) and Armine (1879–1936). When he was two, the brothers were brought to England, where they were placed under the care of an English nanny in a house adjoining that of Eleanor's father and mother. The boys' parents returned to Hong Kong and became virtual strangers to their sons. Such an arrangement was then normal for middle-class families based in the colonies. The lack of parental contact, and the harsh regime of some of those in loco parentis, left permanent emotional scars on many children from similar backgrounds, including the writers Thackeray, Saki, Kipling and Walpole. Wodehouse was more fortunate; his nanny, Emma Roper, was strict but not unkind, and both with her and later at his different schools Wodehouse had a generally happy childhood. His recollection was that "it went like a breeze from start to finish, with everybody I met understanding me perfectly". The biographer Robert McCrum suggests that nonetheless Wodehouse's isolation from his parents left a psychological mark, causing him to avoid emotional engagement both in life and in his works. Another biographer, Frances Donaldson, writes, "Deprived so early, not merely of maternal love, but of home life and even a stable background, Wodehouse consoled himself from the youngest age in an imaginary world of his own." In 1886 the brothers were sent to a dame-school in Croydon, where they spent three years. Peveril was then found to have a "weak chest"; sea air was prescribed, and the three boys were moved to Elizabeth College on the island of Guernsey. In 1891 Wodehouse went on to Malvern House Preparatory School in Kent, which concentrated on preparing its pupils for entry to the Royal Navy. His father had planned a naval career for him, but the boy's eyesight was found to be too poor for it. He was unimpressed by the school's narrow curriculum and zealous discipline; he later parodied it in his novels, with Bertie Wooster recalling his early years as a pupil at a "penitentiary... with the outward guise of a prep school" called Malvern House. Throughout their school years the brothers were sent to stay during the holidays with various uncles and aunts from both sides of the family. In the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Iain Sproat counts twenty aunts and considers that they played an important part not only in Wodehouse's early life, but, thinly disguised, in his mature novels, as the formidable aunts who dominate the action in the Wooster, Blandings, and other stories. The boys had fifteen uncles, four of whom were clergymen. Sproat writes that they inspired Wodehouse's "pious but fallible curates, vicars, and bishops, of which he wrote with friendly irreverence but without mockery". At the age of twelve in 1894, to his great joy, Wodehouse was able to follow his brother Armine to Dulwich College. He was entirely at home there; Donaldson comments that Dulwich gave him, for the first time, "some continuity and a stable and ordered life". He loved the camaraderie, distinguished himself at cricket, rugby and boxing, and was a good, if not consistently diligent, student. The headmaster at the time was A. H. Gilkes, a respected classicist, who was a strong influence on Wodehouse. In a study of Wodehouse's works, Richard Usborne argues that "only a writer who was himself a scholar and had had his face ground into Latin and Greek (especially Thucydides) as a boy" could sustain the complex sequences of subordinate clauses sometimes found in Wodehouse's comic prose. Wodehouse's six years at Dulwich were among the happiest of his life: "To me the years between 1894 and 1900 were like heaven." In addition to his sporting achievements he was a good singer and enjoyed taking part in school concerts; his literary leanings found an outlet in editing the school magazine, The Alleynian. For the rest of his life he remained devoted to the school. The biographer Barry Phelps writes that Wodehouse "loved the college as much as he loved anything or anybody". Reluctant banker; budding writer: 1900–1908 Wodehouse expected to follow Armine to the University of Oxford, but the family's finances took a turn for the worse at the crucial moment. Ernest Wodehouse had retired in 1895, and his pension was paid in rupees; fluctuation against the pound reduced its value in Britain. Wodehouse recalled, "The wolf was not actually whining at the door and there was always a little something in the kitty for the butcher and the grocer, but the finances would not run to anything in the nature of a splash". Instead of a university career, in September 1900 Wodehouse was engaged in a junior position in the London office of the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank. He was unsuited to it and found the work baffling and uncongenial. He later wrote a humorous account of his experiences at the bank, but at the time he longed for the end of each working day, when he could return to his rented lodgings in Chelsea and write. At first he concentrated, with some success, on serious articles about school sports for Public School Magazine. In November 1900 his first comic piece, "Men Who Missed Their Own Weddings", was accepted by Tit-Bits. A new magazine for boys, The Captain, provided further well-paid opportunities, and during his two years at the bank, Wodehouse had eighty pieces published in a total of nine magazines. In 1901, with the help of a former Dulwich master, William Beach Thomas, Wodehouse secured an appointment—at first temporary and later permanent—writing for The Globes popular "By the Way" column. He held the post until 1909. At around the same time his first novel was published—a school story called The Pothunters, serialised incomplete in Public School Magazine in early 1902, and issued in full in hardback in September. He resigned from the bank that month to devote himself to writing full-time. Between the publication of The Pothunters 1902 and that of Mike in 1909, Wodehouse wrote eight novels and co-wrote another two. The critic R. D. B. French writes that, of Wodehouse's work from this period, almost all that deserves to survive is the school fiction. Looking back in the 1950s Wodehouse viewed these as his apprentice years: "I was practically in swaddling clothes and it is extremely creditable to me that I was able to write at all." From his boyhood Wodehouse had been fascinated by America, which he conceived of as "a land of romance"; he "yearned" to visit the country, and by 1904 he had earned enough to do so. In April he sailed to New York, which he found greatly to his liking. He noted in his diary: "In New York gathering experience. Worth many guineas in the future but none for the moment." This prediction proved correct: few British writers had first-hand experience of the US, and his articles about life in New York brought him higher than usual fees. He later recalled that "in 1904 anyone in the London writing world who had been to America was regarded with awe and looked upon as an authority on that terra incognita.... After that trip to New York I was a man who counted.... My income rose like a rocketing pheasant." Wodehouse's other new venture in 1904 was writing for the stage. Towards the end of the year the librettist Owen Hall invited him to contribute an additional lyric for a musical comedy Sergeant Brue. Wodehouse had loved theatre since his first visit, aged thirteen, when Gilbert and Sullivan's Patience had made him "drunk with ecstasy". His lyric for Hall, "Put Me in My Little Cell", was a Gilbertian number for a trio of comic crooks, with music by Frederick Rosse; it was well received and launched Wodehouse on a career as a theatre writer that spanned three decades. Although it made little impact on its first publication, the 1906 novel Love Among the Chickens contained what French calls the author's first original comic creation: Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge. The character, an amoral, bungling opportunist, is partly based on Wodehouse's Globe colleague Herbert Westbrook. The two collaborated between 1907 and 1913 on two books, two music hall sketches, and a play, Brother Alfred. Wodehouse would return to the character in short stories over the next six decades. In early 1906 the actor-manager Seymour Hicks invited Wodehouse to become resident lyricist at the Aldwych Theatre, to add topical verses to newly imported or long-running shows. Hicks had already recruited the young Jerome Kern to write the music for such songs. The first Kern-Wodehouse collaboration, a comic number for The Beauty of Bath titled "Mr [Joseph] Chamberlain", was a show-stopper and was briefly the most popular song in London. Psmith, Blandings, Wooster and Jeeves: 1908–1915 Wodehouse's early period as a writer came to an end in 1908 with the serialisation of The Lost Lambs, published the following year in book form as the second half of the novel Mike. The work begins as a conventional school story, but Wodehouse introduces a new and strikingly original character, Psmith, whose creation both Evelyn Waugh and George Orwell regarded as a watershed in Wodehouse's development. Wodehouse said that he based Psmith on the hotelier and impresario Rupert D'Oyly Carte—"the only thing in my literary career which was handed to me on a silver plate with watercress around it". Wodehouse wrote in the 1970s that a cousin of his who had been at school with Carte told him of the latter's monocle, studied suavity, and stateliness of speech, all of which Wodehouse adopted for his new character. Psmith featured in three more novels: Psmith in the City (1910), a burlesque of banking; Psmith, Journalist (1915) set in New York; and Leave It to Psmith (1923), set at Blandings Castle. In May 1909 Wodehouse made his second visit to New York, where he sold two short stories to Cosmopolitan and Collier's for a total of $500, a much higher fee than he had commanded previously. He resigned from The Globe and stayed in New York for nearly a year. He sold many more stories, but none of the American publications offered a permanent relationship and guaranteed income. Wodehouse returned to England in late 1910, rejoining The Globe and also contributing regularly to The Strand Magazine. Between then and the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 he revisited America frequently. Wodehouse was in New York when the war began. Ineligible for military service because of his poor eyesight, he remained in the US throughout the war, detached from the conflict in Europe and absorbed in his theatrical and literary concerns. In September 1914 he married Ethel May Wayman, née Newton (1885–1984), an English widow. The marriage proved happy and lifelong. Ethel's personality was in contrast with her husband's: he was shy and impractical; she was gregarious, decisive and well organised. In Sproat's phrase, she "took charge of Wodehouse's life and made certain that he had the peace and quiet he needed to write". There were no children of the marriage, but Wodehouse came to love Ethel's daughter Leonora (1905–1944) and legally adopted her. Wodehouse experimented with different genres of fiction in these years; Psmith, Journalist, mixing comedy with social comment on slum landlords and racketeers, was published in 1915. In the same year The Saturday Evening Post paid $3,500 to serialise Something New, the first of what became a series of novels set at Blandings Castle. It was published in hardback in the US and the UK in the same year (the British edition being retitled Something Fresh). It was Wodehouse's first farcical novel; it was also his first best-seller, and although his later books included some gentler, lightly sentimental stories, it was as a farceur that he became known. Later in the same year "Extricating Young Gussie", the first story about Bertie and Jeeves, was published. These stories introduced two sets of characters about whom Wodehouse wrote for the rest of his life. The Blandings Castle stories, set in an English stately home, depict the attempts of the placid Lord Emsworth to evade the many distractions around him, which include successive pairs of young lovers, the machinations of his exuberant brother Galahad, the demands of his domineering sisters and super-efficient secretaries, and anything detrimental to his prize sow, the Empress of Blandings. The Bertie and Jeeves stories feature an amiable young man-about-town, regularly rescued from the consequences of his idiocy by the benign interference of his valet. Broadway: 1915–1919 A third milestone in Wodehouse's life came towards the end of 1915: his old songwriting partner Jerome Kern introduced him to the writer Guy Bolton, who became Wodehouse's closest friend and a regular collaborator. Bolton and Kern had a musical, Very Good Eddie, running at the Princess Theatre in New York. The show was successful, but they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor. This was Miss Springtime (1916), which ran for 227 performances—a good run by the standards of the day. The team produced several more successes, including Leave It to Jane (1917), Oh, Boy! (1917–18) and Oh, Lady! Lady!! (1918), and Wodehouse and Bolton wrote a few more shows with other composers. In these musicals Wodehouse's lyrics won high praise from critics as well as fellow lyricists such as Ira Gershwin. Unlike his original model, Gilbert, Wodehouse preferred the music to be written first, fitting his words into the melodies. Donaldson suggests that this is the reason why his lyrics have largely been overlooked in recent years: they fit the music perfectly, but do not stand on their own in verse form as Gilbert's do. Nonetheless, Donaldson adds, the book and lyrics for the Princess Theatre shows made the collaborators an enormous fortune and played an important part in the development of the American musical. In the Grove Dictionary of American Music Larry Stempel writes, "By presenting naturalistic stories and characters and attempting to integrate the songs and lyrics into the action of the libretto, these works brought a new level of intimacy, cohesion, and sophistication to American musical comedy." The theatre writer Gerald Bordman calls Wodehouse "the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day". The composer Richard Rodgers wrote, "Before Larry Hart, only P.G. Wodehouse had made any real assault on the intelligence of the song-listening public." 1920s In the years after the war, Wodehouse steadily increased his sales, polished his existing characters and introduced new ones. Bertie and Jeeves, Lord Emsworth and his circle, and Ukridge appeared in novels and short stories; Psmith made his fourth and last appearance; two new characters were the Oldest Member, narrating his series of golfing stories, and Mr Mulliner, telling his particularly tall tales to fellow patrons of the bar at the Angler's Rest. Various other young men-about-town appeared in short stories about members of the Drones Club. The Wodehouses returned to England, where they had a house in London for some years, but Wodehouse continued to cross the Atlantic frequently, spending substantial periods in New York. He continued to work in the theatre. During the 1920s he collaborated on nine musical comedies produced on Broadway or in the West End, including the long-running Sally (1920, New York), The Cabaret Girl (1922, London) and Rosalie (1928, New York). He also wrote non-musical plays, including The Play's the Thing (1926), adapted from Ferenc Molnár, and A Damsel in Distress (1928), a dramatisation of his 1919 novel. Though never a naturally gregarious man, Wodehouse was more sociable in the 1920s than at other periods. Donaldson lists among those with whom he was on friendly terms writers including A. A. Milne, Ian Hay, Frederick Lonsdale and E. Phillips Oppenheim, and stage performers including George Grossmith Jr., Heather Thatcher and Dorothy Dickson. Hollywood: 1929–1931 There had been films of Wodehouse stories since 1915, when A Gentleman of Leisure was based on his 1910 novel of the same name. Further screen adaptations of his books were made between then and 1927, but it was not until 1929 that Wodehouse went to Hollywood where Bolton was working as a highly paid writer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Ethel was taken with both the financial and social aspects of Hollywood life, and she negotiated a contract with MGM on her husband's behalf under which he would be paid $2,000 a week. This large salary was particularly welcome because the couple had lost considerable sums in the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The contract started in May 1930, but the studio found little for Wodehouse to do, and he had spare time to write a novel and nine short stories. He commented, "It's odd how soon one comes to look on every minute as wasted that is given to earning one's salary." Even when the studio found a project for him to work on, the interventions of committees and constant rewriting by numerous contract authors meant that his ideas were rarely used. In a 2005 study of Wodehouse in Hollywood, Brian Taves writes that Those Three French Girls (1930) was "as close to a success as Wodehouse was to have at MGM. His only other credits were minimal, and the other projects he worked on were not produced." Wodehouse's contract ended after a year and was not renewed. At MGM's request, he gave an interview to The Los Angeles Times. Wodehouse was described by Herbert Warren Wind as "politically naive [and] fundamentally unworldly", and he caused a sensation by saying publicly what he had already told his friends privately about Hollywood's inefficiency, arbitrary decision-making, and waste of expensive talent. The interview was reprinted in The New York Times, and there was much editorial comment about the state of the film industry. Many writers have considered that the interview precipitated a radical overhaul of the studio system, but Taves believes it to have been "a storm in a teacup", and Donaldson comments that, in the straitened post-crash era, the reforms would have been inevitable. Wind's view of Wodehouse's naïveté is not universally held. Biographers including Donaldson, McCrum and Phelps suggest that his unworldliness was only part of a complex character, and that in some respects he was highly astute. He was unsparing of the studio owners in his early-1930s short stories set in Hollywood, which contain what Taves considers Wodehouse's sharpest and most biting satire. Best-seller: 1930s During the 1930s Wodehouse's theatrical work tailed off. He wrote or adapted four plays for the West End; Leave it to Psmith (1930), which he adapted in collaboration with Ian Hay, was the only one to have a long run. The reviewer in The Manchester Guardian praised the play, but commented: "It is Mr Wodehouse's own inimitable narrative comments and descriptions in his own person of the antics of his puppets that one misses. They cannot be got into a play and they are at least half the fun of the novels." In 1934 Wodehouse collaborated with Bolton on the book for Cole Porter's Anything Goes (Porter wrote his own lyrics), but at the last minute their version was almost entirely rewritten by others at the instigation of the producer, who disliked the original script. Concentrating on writing novels and short stories, Wodehouse reached the peak of his productivity in this decade, averaging two books each year, and grossing an annual £100,000. His practice of dividing his time between Britain and America caused Wodehouse difficulties with the tax authorities of both countries. Both the UK Inland Revenue and the US Internal Revenue Service sought to tax him as a resident. The matter was settled after lengthy negotiations, but the Wodehouses decided to change their residential status beyond doubt by moving to France, where they bought a house near Le Touquet in the north. In 1935 Wodehouse created the last of his regular cast of principal characters, Lord Ickenham, otherwise known as Uncle Fred, who, in Usborne's words, "leads the dance in four novels and a short story... a whirring dynamo of misrule". His other books from the decade include Right Ho, Jeeves, which Donaldson judged his best work, Uncle Fred in the Springtime, which the writer Bernard Levin considered the best, and Blandings Castle, which contains "Lord Emsworth and the Girl Friend", which Rudyard Kipling thought "one of the most perfect short stories I have ever read". Other leading literary figures who admired Wodehouse were A. E. Housman, Max Beerbohm and Hilaire Belloc; on the radio and in print Belloc called Wodehouse "the best writer of our time: the best living writer of English... the head of my profession". Wodehouse regarded Belloc's plaudit as "a gag, to get a rise out of serious-minded authors whom he disliked". Wodehouse was never sure that his books had literary merit as well as popular appeal, and, Donaldson suggests, must have been overwhelmed when the University of Oxford conferred an honorary doctorate of letters on him in June 1939. His visit to England for the awarding ceremony was the last time he set foot in his native land. Second World War: internment and broadcasts At the start of the Second World War Wodehouse and his wife remained at their Le Touquet house, where, during the Phoney War, he worked on Joy in the Morning. With the advance of the Germans, the nearby Royal Air Force base withdrew; Wodehouse was offered the sole spare seat in one of the fighter aircraft, but he turned down the opportunity as it would have meant leaving behind Ethel and their dog. On 21 May 1940, with German troops advancing through northern France, the Wodehouses decided to drive to Portugal and fly from there to the US. Two miles from home their car broke down, so they returned and borrowed a car from a neighbour; with the routes blocked with refugees, they returned home again. The Germans occupied Le Touquet on 22 May 1940 and Wodehouse had to report to the authorities daily. After two months of occupation the Germans interned all male enemy nationals under 60, and Wodehouse was sent to a former prison in Loos, a suburb of Lille, on 21 July; Ethel remained in Le Touquet. The internees were placed four to a cell, each of which had been designed for one man. One bed was available per cell, which was made available to the eldest man—not Wodehouse, who slept on the granite floor. The prisoners were not kept long in Loos before they were transported in cattle trucks to a former barracks in Liège, Belgium, which was run as a prison by the SS. After a week the men were transferred to Huy in Liège, where they were incarcerated in the local citadel. They remained there until September 1940, when they were transported to Tost in Upper Silesia (then Germany, now Toszek in Poland). Wodehouse's family and friends had not had any news of his location after the fall of France, but an article from an Associated Press reporter who had visited Tost in December 1940 led to pressure on the German authorities to release the novelist. This included a petition from influential people in the US; Senator W. Warren Barbour presented it to the German ambassador. Although his captors refused to release him, Wodehouse was provided with a typewriter and, to pass the time, he wrote Money in the Bank. Throughout his time in Tost, he sent postcards to his US literary agent asking for $5 to be sent to various people in Canada, mentioning his name. These were the families of Canadian prisoners of war, and the news from Wodehouse was the first indication that their sons were alive and well. Wodehouse risked severe punishment for the communication, but managed to evade the German censor. On 21 June 1941, while he was in the middle of playing a game of cricket, Wodehouse received a visit from two members of the Gestapo. He was given ten minutes to pack his things before he was taken to the Hotel Adlon, a top luxury hotel in Berlin. He stayed there at his own expense; royalties from the German editions of his books had been put into a special frozen bank account at the outset of the war, and Wodehouse was permitted to draw upon this money he had earned while staying in Berlin. He was thus released from internment a few months before his sixtieth birthday—the age at which civilian internees were released by the Nazis. Shortly afterwards Wodehouse was, in the words of Phelps, "cleverly trapped" into making five broadcasts to the US via German radio, with the Berlin-based correspondent of the Columbia Broadcasting System. The broadcasts—aired on 28 June, 9, 23 and 30 July and 6 August—were titled How to be an Internee Without Previous Training, and comprised humorous anecdotes about Wodehouse's experiences as a prisoner, including some gentle mocking of his captors. The German propaganda ministry arranged for the recordings to be broadcast to Britain in August. The day after Wodehouse recorded his final programme, Ethel joined him in Berlin, having sold most of her jewellery to pay for the journey. Aftermath: reactions and investigation The reaction in Britain to Wodehouse's broadcasts was hostile, and he was "reviled ... as a traitor, collaborator, Nazi propagandist, and a coward", although, Phelps observes, many of those who decried his actions had not heard the content of the programmes. A front-page article in The Daily Mirror stated that Wodehouse "lived luxuriously because Britain laughed with him, but when the laughter was out of his country's heart, ... [he] was not ready to share her suffering. He hadn't the guts ... even to stick it out in the internment camp." In the House of Commons Anthony Eden, the Foreign Secretary, regretted Wodehouse's actions. Several libraries removed Wodehouse novels from their shelves. On 15 July the journalist William Connor, under his pen name Cassandra, broadcast a postscript to the news programme railing against Wodehouse. According to The Times, the broadcast "provoked a storm of complaint ... from listeners all over the country". Wodehouse's biographer, Joseph Connolly, thinks the broadcast "inaccurate, spiteful and slanderous"; Phelps calls it "probably the most vituperative attack on an individual ever heard on British radio". The broadcast was made at the direct instruction of Duff Cooper, the Minister of Information, who overruled strong protests made by the BBC against the decision to air the programme. Numerous letters appeared in the British press, both supporting and criticising Wodehouse. The letters page of The Daily Telegraph became a focus for censuring Wodehouse, including one from Wodehouse's friend, ; a reply from their fellow author Compton Mackenzie in defence of Wodehouse was not published because the editor claimed a lack of space. Most of those defending Wodehouse against accusations of disloyalty, including Sax Rohmer, Dorothy L. Sayers and Gilbert Frankau, conceded that he had acted stupidly. Some members of the public wrote to the newspapers to say that the full facts were not yet known and a fair judgment could not be made until they were. The management of the BBC, who considered Wodehouse's actions no worse than "ill advised", pointed out to Cooper that there was no evidence at that point whether Wodehouse had acted voluntarily or under compulsion. When Wodehouse heard of the furore the broadcasts had caused, he contacted the Foreign Office—through the Swiss embassy in Berlin—to explain his actions, and attempted to return home via neutral countries, but the German authorities refused to let him leave. In Performing Flea, a 1953 collection of letters, Wodehouse wrote, "Of course I ought to have had the sense to see that it was a loony thing to do to use the German radio for even the most harmless stuff, but I didn't. I suppose prison life saps the intellect". The reaction in America was mixed: the left-leaning publication PM accused Wodehouse of "play[ing] Jeeves to the Nazis", but the Department of War used the interviews as an ideal representation of anti-Nazi propaganda. The Wodehouses remained in Germany until September 1943, when, because of the Allied bombings, they were allowed to move back to Paris. They were living there when the city was liberated on 25 August 1944; Wodehouse reported to the American authorities the following day, asking them to inform the British of his whereabouts. He was subsequently visited by Malcolm Muggeridge, recently arrived in Paris as an intelligence officer with MI6. The young officer quickly came to like Wodehouse and considered the question of treasonable behaviour as "ludicrous"; he summed up the writer as "ill-fitted to live in an age of ideological conflict". On 9 September Wodehouse was visited by an MI5 officer and former barrister, Major Edward Cussen, who formally investigated him, a process that stretched over four days. On 28 September Cussen filed his report, which states that in regard to the broadcasts, Wodehouse's behaviour "has been unwise", but advised against further action. On 23 November Theobald Matthew, the Director of Public Prosecutions, decided there was no evidence to justify prosecuting Wodehouse. In November 1944 Duff Cooper was appointed British ambassador to France and was provided accommodation at the Hôtel Le Bristol, where the Wodehouses were living. Cooper complained to the French authorities, and the couple were moved to a different hotel. They were subsequently arrested by French police and placed under preventive detention, despite no charges being presented. When Muggeridge tracked them down later, he managed to get Ethel released straight away and, four days later, ensured that the French authorities declared Wodehouse unwell and put him in a nearby hospital, which was more comfortable than where they had been detained. While in this hospital, Wodehouse worked on his novel Uncle Dynamite. While still detained by the French, Wodehouse was again mentioned in questions in the House of Commons in December 1944 when MPs wondered if the French authorities could repatriate him to stand trial. Eden stated that the "matter has been gone into, and, according to the advice given, there are no grounds upon which we could take action". Two months later, Orwell wrote the essay "In Defence of P.G. Wodehouse", where he stated that "it is important to realise that the events of 1941 do not convict Wodehouse of anything worse than stupidity". Orwell's rationale was that Wodehouse's "moral outlook has remained that of a public-school boy, and according to the public-school code, treachery in time of war is the most unforgivable of all the sins", which was compounded by his "complete lack—so far as one can judge from his printed works—of political awareness". On 15 January 1945 the French authorities released Wodehouse, but they did not inform him, until June 1946, that he would not face any official charges and was free to leave the country. American exile: 1946–1975 Having secured American visas in July 1946, the Wodehouses made preparations to return to New York. They were delayed by Ethel's insistence on acquiring suitable new clothes and by Wodehouse's wish to finish writing his current novel, The Mating Season, in the peace of the French countryside. In April 1947 they sailed to New York, where Wodehouse was relieved at the friendly reception he received from the large press contingent awaiting his arrival. Ethel secured a comfortable penthouse apartment in Manhattan's Upper East Side, but Wodehouse was not at ease. The New York that he had known before the war was much changed. The magazines that had paid lavishly for his stories were in decline, and those that remained were not much interested in him. He was sounded out about writing for Broadway, but he was not at home in the post-war theatre; he had money problems, with large sums temporarily tied up in Britain, and for the first time in his career he had no ideas for a new novel. He did not complete one until 1951. Wodehouse remained unsettled until he and Ethel left New York City for Long Island. Bolton and his wife lived in the prosperous hamlet of Remsenburg, part of the Southampton area of Long Island, east of Manhattan. Wodehouse stayed with them frequently, and in 1952 he and Ethel bought a house nearby. They lived at Remsenburg for the rest of their lives. Between 1952 and 1975 he published more than twenty novels, as well as two collections of short stories, a heavily edited collection of his letters, a volume of memoirs, and a selection of his magazine articles. He continued to hanker after a revival of his theatrical career. A 1959 off-Broadway revival of the 1917 Bolton-Wodehouse-Kern Leave It to Jane was a surprise hit, running for 928 performances, but his few post-war stage works, some in collaboration with Bolton, made little impression. Although Ethel made a return visit to England in 1948 to shop and visit family and friends, Wodehouse never left America after his arrival in 1947. It was not until 1965 that the British government indicated privately that he could return without fear of legal proceedings, and by then he felt too old to make the journey. The biographers Benny Green and Robert McCrum both take the view that this exile benefited Wodehouse's writing, helping him to go on depicting an idealised England seen in his mind's eye, rather than as it actually was in the post-war decades. During their years in Long Island, the couple often took in stray animals and contributed substantial funds to a local animal shelter. In 1955 Wodehouse became an American citizen, though he remained a British subject, and was therefore still eligible for UK state honours. He was considered for the award of a knighthood three times from 1967, but the honour was twice blocked by British officials. In 1974 the British prime minister, Harold Wilson, intervened to secure a knighthood (KBE) for Wodehouse, which was announced in the January 1975 New Year Honours list. The Times commented that Wodehouse's honour signalled "official forgiveness for his wartime indiscretion.... It is late, but not too late, to take the sting out of that unhappy incident." The following month Wodehouse entered Southampton Hospital, Long Island, for treatment of a skin complaint. While there, he suffered a heart attack and died on 14 February 1975 at the age of 93. He was buried at Remsenburg Presbyterian Church four days later. Ethel outlived him by more than nine years; Leonora had predeceased him, dying suddenly in 1944. Writing Technique and approach Before starting a book Wodehouse would write up to four hundred pages of notes bringing together an outline of the plot; he acknowledged that "It's the plots that I find so hard to work out. It takes such a long time to work one out." He always completed the plot before working on specific character actions. For a novel the note-writing process could take up to two years, and he would usually have two or more novels in preparation simultaneously. After he had completed his notes, he would draw up a fuller scenario of about thirty thousand words, which ensured plot holes were avoided, and allowed for the dialogue to begin to develop. When interviewed in 1975 he revealed that "For a humorous novel you've got to have a scenario, and you've got to test it so that you know where the comedy comes in, where the situations come in ... splitting it up into scenes (you can make a scene of almost anything) and have as little stuff in between as possible." He preferred working between 4 and 7 pm—but never after dinner—and would work seven days a week. In his younger years, he would write around two to three thousand words a day, although he slowed as he aged, so that in his nineties he would produce a thousand. The reduced speed in writing slowed his production of books: when younger he would produce a novel in about three months, while Bachelors Anonymous, published in 1973, took around six months. Although studies of language production in normal healthy ageing show a marked decline from the mid-70s on, a study of Wodehouse's works did not find any evidence of a decline in linguistic ability with age. Wodehouse believed that one of the factors that made his stories humorous was his view of life, and he stated that "If you take life fairly easily, then you take a humorous view of things. It's probably because you were born that way." He carried this view through into his writing, describing the approach as "making the thing a sort of musical comedy without music, and ignoring real life altogether". The literary critic Edward L. Galligan considers Wodehouse's stories to show his mastery in adapting the form of the American musical comedy for his writings. Wodehouse would ensure that his first draft was as carefully and accurately done as possible, correcting and refining the prose as he wrote, and would then make another good copy, before proofreading again and then making a final copy for his publisher. Most of Wodehouse's canon is set in an undated period around the 1920s and 1930s. The critic Anthony Lejeune describes the settings of Wodehouse's novels, such as the Drones Club and Blandings Castle, as "a fairyland". Although some critics thought Wodehouse's fiction was based on a world that had never existed, Wodehouse affirmed that "it did. It was going strong between the wars", although he agreed that his version was to some extent "a sort of artificial world of my own creation". The novels showed a largely unchanging world, regardless of when they were written, and only rarely—and mistakenly in McCrum's view—did Wodehouse allow modernity to intrude, as he did in the 1966 story "Bingo Bans the Bomb". When dealing with the dialogue in his novels, Wodehouse would consider the book's characters as if they were actors in a play, ensuring that the main roles were kept suitably employed throughout the storyline, which must be strong: "If they aren't in interesting situations, characters can't be major characters, not even if you have the rest of the troop talk their heads off about them." Many of Wodehouse's parts were stereotypes, and he acknowledged that "a real character in one of my books sticks out like a sore thumb." The publisher Michael Joseph identifies that even within the stereotypes Wodehouse understood human nature, and therefore "shares with [Charles] Dickens and Charles Chaplin the ability to present the comic resistance of the individual against those superior forces to which we are all subject". Much of Wodehouse's use of slang terms reflects the influence of his time at school in Dulwich, and partly reflects Edwardian slang. As a young man he enjoyed the literary works of Arthur Conan Doyle and Jerome K. Jerome, and the operatic works of Gilbert and Sullivan. Wodehouse quotes from and alludes to numerous poets throughout his work. The scholar Clarke Olney lists those quoted, including Milton, Byron, Longfellow, Coleridge, Swinburne, Tennyson, Wordsworth and Shakespeare. Another favoured source was the King James Bible. Language In 1941 the Concise Cambridge History of English Literature opined that Wodehouse had "a gift for highly original aptness of phrase that almost suggests a poet struggling for release among the wild extravagances of farce", while McCrum thinks that Wodehouse manages to combine "high farce with the inverted poetry of his mature comic style", particularly in The Code of the Woosters; the novelist Anthony Powell believes Wodehouse to be a "comic poet". Robert A. Hall Jr., in his study of Wodehouse's style and technique, describes the author as a master of prose, an opinion also shared by Levin, who considers Wodehouse "one of the finest and purest writers of English prose". Hall identifies several techniques used by Wodehouse to achieve comic effect, including the creation of new words through adding or removing prefixes and suffixes, so when Pongo Twistleton removes the housemaid Elsie Bean from a cupboard, Wodehouse writes that the character "de-Beaned the cupboard". Wodehouse created new words by splitting others in two, thus Wodehouse divides "hobnobbing" when he writes: "To offer a housemaid a cigarette is not hobbing. Nor, when you light it for her, does that constitute nobbing." Richard Voorhees, Wodehouse's biographer, believes that the author used clichés in a deliberate and ironic manner. His opinion is shared by the academic Stephen Medcalf, who deems Wodehouse's skill is to "bring a cliché just enough to life to kill it", although Pamela March, writing in The Christian Science Monitor, considers Wodehouse to have "an ability to decliché a cliché". Medcalf provides an example from Right Ho, Jeeves in which the teetotal Gussie Fink-Nottle has surreptitiously been given whisky and gin in a punch prior to a prize-giving: 'It seems to me, Jeeves, that the ceremony may be one fraught with considerable interest.' 'Yes, sir.' 'What, in your opinion, will the harvest be?' 'One finds it difficult to hazard a conjecture, sir.' 'You mean imagination boggles?' 'Yes, sir.' I inspected my imagination. He was right. It boggled. The stylistic device most commonly found in Wodehouse's work is his use of comparative imagery that includes similes. Hall opines that the humour comes from Wodehouse's ability to accentuate "resemblances which at first glance seem highly incongruous". Examples can be seen in Joy in the Morning, Chapter 29: "There was a sound in the background like a distant sheep coughing gently on a mountainside. Jeeves sailing into action", or Psmith, Chapter 7: "A sound like two or three pigs feeding rather noisily in the middle of a thunderstorm interrupted his meditation." Hall also identifies that periodically Wodehouse used the stylistic device of a transferred epithet, with an adjective that properly belongs to a person applied instead to some inanimate object. The form of expression is used sparingly by Wodehouse in comparison with other mechanisms, only once or twice in a story or novel, according to Hall. "I balanced a thoughtful lump of sugar on the teaspoon." —Joy in the Morning, Chapter 5 "As I sat in the bath-tub, soaping a meditative foot ..." —Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, Chapter 1 "The first thing he did was to prod Jeeves in the lower ribs with an uncouth forefinger." —Much Obliged, Jeeves, Chapter 4 Wordplay is a key element in Wodehouse's writing. This can take the form of puns, such as in Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, when Bertie is released after a night in the police cells, and says that he has "a pinched look" about him. Linguistic confusion is another humorous mechanism, such as in Uncle Dynamite when Constable Potter says he has been "assaulted by the duck pond". In reply, Sir Aylmer, confusing the two meanings of the word "by", asks: "How the devil can you be assaulted by a duck pond?" Wodehouse also uses metaphor and mixed metaphor to add humour. Some come through exaggeration, such as Bingo Little's infant child who "not only has the aspect of a mass murderer, but that of a mass murderer suffering from an ingrown toenail", or Wooster's complaint that "the rumpuses that Bobbie Wickham is already starting may be amusing to her, but not to the unfortunate toads beneath the harrow whom she ruthlessly plunges into the soup." Bertie Wooster's half-forgotten vocabulary also provides a further humorous device. In Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit Bertie asks Jeeves "Let a plugugly like young Thos loose in the community with a cosh, and you are inviting disaster and ... what's the word? Something about cats." Jeeves replies, "Cataclysms, sir?" Reception and reputation Literary reception Wodehouse's early career as a lyricist and playwright was profitable, and his work with Bolton, according to The Guardian, "was one of the most successful in the history of musical comedy". At the outbreak of the Second World War he was earning £40,000 a year from his work, which had broadened to include novels and short stories. Following the furore ensuing from the wartime broadcasts, he suffered a downturn in his popularity and book sales; The Saturday Evening Post stopped publishing his short stories, a stance they reversed in 1965, although his popularity—and the sales figures—slowly recovered over time. Wodehouse received great praise from many of his contemporaries, including Max Beerbohm, Rudyard Kipling, A. E. Housman and Evelyn Waugh—the last of whom opines, "One has to regard a man as a Master who can produce on average three uniquely brilliant and entirely original similes on each page." There are dissenters to the praise. The writer Alan Bennett thinks that "inspired though his language is, I can never take more than ten pages of the novels at a time, their relentless flippancy wearing and tedious", while the literary critic Q. D. Leavis writes that Wodehouse had a "stereotyped humour ... of ingenious variations on a laugh in one place". In a 2010 study of Wodehouse's few relatively serious novels, such as The Coming of Bill (1919), Jill the Reckless (1920) and The Adventures of Sally (1922), David Heddendorf concludes that though their literary quality does not match that of the farcical novels, they show a range of empathy and interests that in real life—and in his most comic works—the author seemed to lack. "Never oblivious to grief and despair, he opts in clear-eyed awareness for his timeless world of spats and woolly-headed peers. It's an austere, almost bloodless preference for pristine artifice over the pain and messy outcomes of actual existence, but it's a case of Wodehouse keeping faith with his own unique art." The American literary analyst Robert F. Kiernan, defining "camp" as "excessive stylization of whatever kind", brackets Wodehouse as "a master of the camp novel", along with Thomas Love Peacock, Max Beerbohm, Ronald Firbank, E. F. Benson and Ivy Compton-Burnett. The literary critic and writer Cyril Connolly calls Wodehouse a "politicians' author"—one who does "not like art to be exacting and difficult". Two former British prime ministers, H. H. Asquith and Tony Blair, are on record as Wodehouse aficionados, and the latter became a patron of the Wodehouse Society. Seán O'Casey, a successful playwright of the 1920s, thought little of Wodehouse; he commented in 1941 that it was damaging to England's dignity that the public or "the academic government of Oxford, dead from the chin up" considered Wodehouse an important figure in English literature. His jibe that Wodehouse was "English literature's performing flea" provided his target with the title of his collected letters, published in 1953. McCrum, writing in 2004, observes, "Wodehouse is more popular today than on the day he died", and "his comic vision has an absolutely secure place in the English literary imagination." Honours and influence The proposed nominations of Wodehouse for a knighthood in 1967 and 1971 were blocked for fear that such an award would "revive the controversy of his wartime behaviour and give currency to a Bertie Wooster image of the British character which the embassy was doing its best to eradicate". When Wodehouse was awarded the knighthood, only four years later, the journalist Dennis Barker wrote in The Guardian that the writer was "the solitary surviving English literary comic genius". After his death six weeks later, the journalist Michael Davie, writing in the same paper, observed that "Many people regarded ... [Wodehouse] as he regarded Beachcomber, as 'one, if not more than one, of England's greatest men'", while in the view of the obituarist for The Times Wodehouse "was a comic genius recognized in his lifetime as a classic and an old master of farce". In September 2019 Wodehouse was commemorated with a memorial stone in Westminster Abbey; the dedication was held two days after it was installed. Since Wodehouse's death there have been numerous adaptations and dramatisations of his work on television and film; Wodehouse himself has been portrayed on radio and screen numerous times. There are several literary societies dedicated to Wodehouse. The P.G. Wodehouse Society (UK) was founded in 1997 and has over 1,000 members as at 2015. The president of the society as at 2017 is Alexander Armstrong; past presidents have included Terry Wogan and Richard Briers. There are also other groups of Wodehouse fans in Australia, Belgium, France, Finland, India, Italy, Russia, Sweden and the US. As at 2015 the Oxford English Dictionary contains over 1,750 quotations from Wodehouse, illustrating terms from crispish to zippiness. Voorhees, while acknowledging that Wodehouse's antecedents in literature range from Ben Jonson to Oscar Wilde, writes: Notes, references and sources Notes References Sources External links P. G. Wodehouse collection at One More Library P.G. Wodehouse Archive on loan to the British Library The Wodehouse Society The P. G. Wodehouse Society (UK) Transcripts of Wodehouse's Berlin Broadcasts "P. G. Wodehouse: An English Master of American Slang" from The American Legion Weekly, 24 October 1919 Orwell, George "In Defence of P.G. Wodehouse" 1881 births 1975 deaths 20th-century English novelists 20th-century British dramatists and playwrights British emigrants to the United States English lyricists Knights Commander of the Order of the British Empire English male dramatists and playwrights British male novelists People educated at Dulwich College People educated at Elizabeth College, Guernsey People from Guildford People from Long Island PG People interned during World War II English humorists 20th-century American novelists American dramatists and playwrights American humorists American lyricists American male novelists Novelists from New York (state) Literature controversies English broadcasters for Nazi Germany 20th-century American male writers	true	[ "The West Side Waltz is a play by Ernest Thompson.\n\nThe play focuses on Margaret Mary Elderdice, an aging, widowed pianist living in a dreary Upper West Side apartment, and her relationships with a prim, virginal violinist neighbor and the young companion who moves in for an extended stay. Thompson was prompted to write the piece when screenwriter George Seaton offered him a grant to write a new play following the success of his previous work, On Golden Pond.\n\nThe play originally was presented off-Broadway in 1978. After three previews, the Broadway production, directed by Noel William, opened on November 19, 1981, at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre. Despite the presence of screen legend Katharine Hepburn, supported by Dorothy Loudon, Regina Baff, and David Margulies, it ran for only 126 performances. Hepburn was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play, but lost to Zoe Caldwell (Medea).\n\nThompson wrote the teleplay for and directed a CBS production that originally aired on Thanksgiving night in 1995. The cast included Shirley MacLaine, Liza Minnelli, Kathy Bates, Jennifer Grey, Estelle Harris, and Robert Pastorelli.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nInternet Broadway Database listing\nInternet Movie Database listing\n\n1978 plays\nBroadway plays\nAmerican plays\n1995 films", "Ralf Marc (R.M.) Walker (May 20, 1872 Bellevue Township, Eaton County, Michigan — August 28, 1935, New York City, buried Glendale, California) was an American department store executive.\n\nIn his native Bellevue, Michigan, Walker worked in a grocery store for a certain Mr. C. D. Kimberley. He would later spend time in Wisconsin and Detroit before heading to Los Angeles where Arthur Letts trained him at Letts' Broadway department store, Walker was the co-founder/co-worker owner of the 125,000-square-foot department store known as the Fifth Street Store at Fifth and Broadway in downtown Los Angeles, established in 1905. Walker also owned what would later become known as the Houdini Mansion in Laurel Canyon. He died six months before the opening in San Diego of the first Walker Scott store – which would go on to become a regional chain – on October 3, 1935.\n\nReferences\n\n1872 births\n1935 deaths\nAmerican retail chief executives\nBusinesspeople from San Diego" ]
[ "P. G. Wodehouse", "Broadway: 1915-19", "What did he do in Broadway?", "Wodehouse \"the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day\".", "What prompted him to go to Broadway?", "they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor." ]	C_14a60ae6a0404de9a8adfd5f0367ce69_1	How many musicals did he write?	3	How many musicals did P. G. Wodehouse write?	P. G. Wodehouse	A third milestone in Wodehouse's life came towards the end of 1915: his old songwriting partner Jerome Kern introduced him to the writer Guy Bolton, who became Wodehouse's closest friend and a regular collaborator. Bolton and Kern had a musical, Very Good Eddie, running at the Princess Theatre in New York. The show was successful, but they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor. This was Miss Springtime (1916), which ran for 227 performances--a good run by the standards of the day. The team produced several more successes, including Leave It to Jane (1917), Oh, Boy! (1917-18) and Oh, Lady! Lady!! (1918), and Wodehouse and Bolton wrote a few more shows with other composers. In these musicals Wodehouse's lyrics won high praise from critics as well as fellow lyricists such as Ira Gershwin. Unlike his original model, Gilbert, Wodehouse preferred the music to be written first, fitting his words into the melodies. Donaldson suggests that this is the reason why his lyrics have largely been overlooked in recent years: they fit the music perfectly, but do not stand on their own in verse form as Gilbert's do. Nonetheless, Donaldson adds, the book and lyrics for the Princess Theatre shows made the collaborators an enormous fortune and played an important part in the development of the American musical. In the Grove Dictionary of American Music Larry Stempel writes, "By presenting naturalistic stories and characters and attempting to integrate the songs and lyrics into the action of the libretto, these works brought a new level of intimacy, cohesion, and sophistication to American musical comedy." The theatre writer Gerald Bordman calls Wodehouse "the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day". The composer Richard Rodgers wrote, "Before Larry Hart, only P.G. Wodehouse had made any real assault on the intelligence of the song-listening public." In the years after the war, Wodehouse steadily increased his sales, polished his existing characters and introduced new ones. Bertie and Jeeves, Lord Emsworth and his circle, and Ukridge appeared in novels and short stories; Psmith made his fourth and last appearance; two new characters were the Oldest Member, narrating his series of golfing stories, and Mr Mulliner, telling his particularly tall tales to fellow patrons of the bar at the Angler's Rest. Various other young men-about-town appeared in short stories about members of the Drones Club. The Wodehouses returned to England, where they had a house in London for some years, but Wodehouse continued to cross the Atlantic frequently, spending substantial periods in New York. He continued to work in the theatre. During the 1920s he collaborated on nine musical comedies produced on Broadway or in the West End, including the long-running Sally (1920, New York), The Cabaret Girl (1922, London) and Rosalie (1928, New York). He also wrote non-musical plays, including The Play's the Thing (1926), adapted from Ferenc Molnar, and A Damsel in Distress (1928), a dramatisation of his 1919 novel. Though never a naturally gregarious man, Wodehouse was more sociable in the 1920s than at other periods. Donaldson lists among those with whom he was on friendly terms writers including A.A. Milne, Ian Hay, Frederick Lonsdale and E. Phillips Oppenheim, and stage performers including George Grossmith, Jr., Heather Thatcher and Dorothy Dickson. CANNOTANSWER	CANNOTANSWER	Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, ( ; 15 October 188114 February 1975) was an English author and one of the most widely read humorists of the 20th century. His creations include the feather-brained Bertie Wooster and his sagacious valet, Jeeves; the immaculate and loquacious Psmith; Lord Emsworth and the Blandings Castle set; the Oldest Member, with stories about golf; and Mr Mulliner, with tall tales on subjects ranging from bibulous bishops to megalomaniac movie moguls. Born in Guildford, the third son of a British magistrate based in Hong Kong, Wodehouse spent happy teenage years at Dulwich College, to which he remained devoted all his life. After leaving school he was employed by a bank but disliked the work and turned to writing in his spare time. His early novels were mostly school stories, but he later switched to comic fiction. Most of Wodehouse's fiction is set in his native United Kingdom, although he spent much of his life in the US and used New York and Hollywood as settings for some of his novels and short stories. He wrote a series of Broadway musical comedies during and after the First World War, together with Guy Bolton and Jerome Kern, that played an important part in the development of the American musical. He began the 1930s writing for MGM in Hollywood. In a 1931 interview, his naive revelations of incompetence and extravagance in the studios caused a furore. In the same decade, his literary career reached a new peak. In 1934 Wodehouse moved to France for tax reasons; in 1940 he was taken prisoner at Le Touquet by the invading Germans and interned for nearly a year. After his release he made six broadcasts from German radio in Berlin to the US, which had not yet entered the war. The talks were comic and apolitical, but his broadcasting over enemy radio prompted anger and strident controversy in Britain, and a threat of prosecution. Wodehouse never returned to England. From 1947 until his death he lived in the US, taking dual British-American citizenship in 1955. He died in 1975, at the age of 93, in Southampton, New York. Wodehouse was a prolific writer throughout his life, publishing more than ninety books, forty plays, two hundred short stories and other writings between 1902 and 1974. He worked extensively on his books, sometimes having two or more in preparation simultaneously. He would take up to two years to build a plot and write a scenario of about thirty thousand words. After the scenario was complete he would write the story. Early in his career Wodehouse would produce a novel in about three months, but he slowed in old age to around six months. He used a mixture of Edwardian slang, quotations from and allusions to numerous poets, and several literary techniques to produce a prose style that has been compared to comic poetry and musical comedy. Some critics of Wodehouse have considered his work flippant, but among his fans are former British prime ministers and many of his fellow writers. Life and career Early years Wodehouse was born in Guildford, Surrey, the third son of Henry Ernest Wodehouse (1845–1929), a magistrate resident in the British colony of Hong Kong, and his wife, Eleanor (1861–1941), daughter of the Rev John Bathurst Deane. The Wodehouses, who traced their ancestry back to the 13th century, belonged to a cadet branch of the family of the earls of Kimberley. Eleanor Wodehouse was also of ancient aristocratic ancestry. She was visiting her sister in Guildford when Wodehouse was born there prematurely. The boy was baptised at the Church of St Nicolas, Guildford, and was named after his godfather, Pelham von Donop. Wodehouse wrote in 1957, "If you ask me to tell you frankly if I like the name Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, I must confess that I do not.... I was named after a godfather, and not a thing to show for it but a small silver mug which I lost in 1897." The first name was rapidly elided to "Plum", the name by which Wodehouse became known to family and friends. Mother and son sailed for Hong Kong, where for his first two years Wodehouse was raised by a Chinese amah (nurse), alongside his elder brothers Peveril (1877–1951) and Armine (1879–1936). When he was two, the brothers were brought to England, where they were placed under the care of an English nanny in a house adjoining that of Eleanor's father and mother. The boys' parents returned to Hong Kong and became virtual strangers to their sons. Such an arrangement was then normal for middle-class families based in the colonies. The lack of parental contact, and the harsh regime of some of those in loco parentis, left permanent emotional scars on many children from similar backgrounds, including the writers Thackeray, Saki, Kipling and Walpole. Wodehouse was more fortunate; his nanny, Emma Roper, was strict but not unkind, and both with her and later at his different schools Wodehouse had a generally happy childhood. His recollection was that "it went like a breeze from start to finish, with everybody I met understanding me perfectly". The biographer Robert McCrum suggests that nonetheless Wodehouse's isolation from his parents left a psychological mark, causing him to avoid emotional engagement both in life and in his works. Another biographer, Frances Donaldson, writes, "Deprived so early, not merely of maternal love, but of home life and even a stable background, Wodehouse consoled himself from the youngest age in an imaginary world of his own." In 1886 the brothers were sent to a dame-school in Croydon, where they spent three years. Peveril was then found to have a "weak chest"; sea air was prescribed, and the three boys were moved to Elizabeth College on the island of Guernsey. In 1891 Wodehouse went on to Malvern House Preparatory School in Kent, which concentrated on preparing its pupils for entry to the Royal Navy. His father had planned a naval career for him, but the boy's eyesight was found to be too poor for it. He was unimpressed by the school's narrow curriculum and zealous discipline; he later parodied it in his novels, with Bertie Wooster recalling his early years as a pupil at a "penitentiary... with the outward guise of a prep school" called Malvern House. Throughout their school years the brothers were sent to stay during the holidays with various uncles and aunts from both sides of the family. In the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Iain Sproat counts twenty aunts and considers that they played an important part not only in Wodehouse's early life, but, thinly disguised, in his mature novels, as the formidable aunts who dominate the action in the Wooster, Blandings, and other stories. The boys had fifteen uncles, four of whom were clergymen. Sproat writes that they inspired Wodehouse's "pious but fallible curates, vicars, and bishops, of which he wrote with friendly irreverence but without mockery". At the age of twelve in 1894, to his great joy, Wodehouse was able to follow his brother Armine to Dulwich College. He was entirely at home there; Donaldson comments that Dulwich gave him, for the first time, "some continuity and a stable and ordered life". He loved the camaraderie, distinguished himself at cricket, rugby and boxing, and was a good, if not consistently diligent, student. The headmaster at the time was A. H. Gilkes, a respected classicist, who was a strong influence on Wodehouse. In a study of Wodehouse's works, Richard Usborne argues that "only a writer who was himself a scholar and had had his face ground into Latin and Greek (especially Thucydides) as a boy" could sustain the complex sequences of subordinate clauses sometimes found in Wodehouse's comic prose. Wodehouse's six years at Dulwich were among the happiest of his life: "To me the years between 1894 and 1900 were like heaven." In addition to his sporting achievements he was a good singer and enjoyed taking part in school concerts; his literary leanings found an outlet in editing the school magazine, The Alleynian. For the rest of his life he remained devoted to the school. The biographer Barry Phelps writes that Wodehouse "loved the college as much as he loved anything or anybody". Reluctant banker; budding writer: 1900–1908 Wodehouse expected to follow Armine to the University of Oxford, but the family's finances took a turn for the worse at the crucial moment. Ernest Wodehouse had retired in 1895, and his pension was paid in rupees; fluctuation against the pound reduced its value in Britain. Wodehouse recalled, "The wolf was not actually whining at the door and there was always a little something in the kitty for the butcher and the grocer, but the finances would not run to anything in the nature of a splash". Instead of a university career, in September 1900 Wodehouse was engaged in a junior position in the London office of the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank. He was unsuited to it and found the work baffling and uncongenial. He later wrote a humorous account of his experiences at the bank, but at the time he longed for the end of each working day, when he could return to his rented lodgings in Chelsea and write. At first he concentrated, with some success, on serious articles about school sports for Public School Magazine. In November 1900 his first comic piece, "Men Who Missed Their Own Weddings", was accepted by Tit-Bits. A new magazine for boys, The Captain, provided further well-paid opportunities, and during his two years at the bank, Wodehouse had eighty pieces published in a total of nine magazines. In 1901, with the help of a former Dulwich master, William Beach Thomas, Wodehouse secured an appointment—at first temporary and later permanent—writing for The Globes popular "By the Way" column. He held the post until 1909. At around the same time his first novel was published—a school story called The Pothunters, serialised incomplete in Public School Magazine in early 1902, and issued in full in hardback in September. He resigned from the bank that month to devote himself to writing full-time. Between the publication of The Pothunters 1902 and that of Mike in 1909, Wodehouse wrote eight novels and co-wrote another two. The critic R. D. B. French writes that, of Wodehouse's work from this period, almost all that deserves to survive is the school fiction. Looking back in the 1950s Wodehouse viewed these as his apprentice years: "I was practically in swaddling clothes and it is extremely creditable to me that I was able to write at all." From his boyhood Wodehouse had been fascinated by America, which he conceived of as "a land of romance"; he "yearned" to visit the country, and by 1904 he had earned enough to do so. In April he sailed to New York, which he found greatly to his liking. He noted in his diary: "In New York gathering experience. Worth many guineas in the future but none for the moment." This prediction proved correct: few British writers had first-hand experience of the US, and his articles about life in New York brought him higher than usual fees. He later recalled that "in 1904 anyone in the London writing world who had been to America was regarded with awe and looked upon as an authority on that terra incognita.... After that trip to New York I was a man who counted.... My income rose like a rocketing pheasant." Wodehouse's other new venture in 1904 was writing for the stage. Towards the end of the year the librettist Owen Hall invited him to contribute an additional lyric for a musical comedy Sergeant Brue. Wodehouse had loved theatre since his first visit, aged thirteen, when Gilbert and Sullivan's Patience had made him "drunk with ecstasy". His lyric for Hall, "Put Me in My Little Cell", was a Gilbertian number for a trio of comic crooks, with music by Frederick Rosse; it was well received and launched Wodehouse on a career as a theatre writer that spanned three decades. Although it made little impact on its first publication, the 1906 novel Love Among the Chickens contained what French calls the author's first original comic creation: Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge. The character, an amoral, bungling opportunist, is partly based on Wodehouse's Globe colleague Herbert Westbrook. The two collaborated between 1907 and 1913 on two books, two music hall sketches, and a play, Brother Alfred. Wodehouse would return to the character in short stories over the next six decades. In early 1906 the actor-manager Seymour Hicks invited Wodehouse to become resident lyricist at the Aldwych Theatre, to add topical verses to newly imported or long-running shows. Hicks had already recruited the young Jerome Kern to write the music for such songs. The first Kern-Wodehouse collaboration, a comic number for The Beauty of Bath titled "Mr [Joseph] Chamberlain", was a show-stopper and was briefly the most popular song in London. Psmith, Blandings, Wooster and Jeeves: 1908–1915 Wodehouse's early period as a writer came to an end in 1908 with the serialisation of The Lost Lambs, published the following year in book form as the second half of the novel Mike. The work begins as a conventional school story, but Wodehouse introduces a new and strikingly original character, Psmith, whose creation both Evelyn Waugh and George Orwell regarded as a watershed in Wodehouse's development. Wodehouse said that he based Psmith on the hotelier and impresario Rupert D'Oyly Carte—"the only thing in my literary career which was handed to me on a silver plate with watercress around it". Wodehouse wrote in the 1970s that a cousin of his who had been at school with Carte told him of the latter's monocle, studied suavity, and stateliness of speech, all of which Wodehouse adopted for his new character. Psmith featured in three more novels: Psmith in the City (1910), a burlesque of banking; Psmith, Journalist (1915) set in New York; and Leave It to Psmith (1923), set at Blandings Castle. In May 1909 Wodehouse made his second visit to New York, where he sold two short stories to Cosmopolitan and Collier's for a total of $500, a much higher fee than he had commanded previously. He resigned from The Globe and stayed in New York for nearly a year. He sold many more stories, but none of the American publications offered a permanent relationship and guaranteed income. Wodehouse returned to England in late 1910, rejoining The Globe and also contributing regularly to The Strand Magazine. Between then and the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 he revisited America frequently. Wodehouse was in New York when the war began. Ineligible for military service because of his poor eyesight, he remained in the US throughout the war, detached from the conflict in Europe and absorbed in his theatrical and literary concerns. In September 1914 he married Ethel May Wayman, née Newton (1885–1984), an English widow. The marriage proved happy and lifelong. Ethel's personality was in contrast with her husband's: he was shy and impractical; she was gregarious, decisive and well organised. In Sproat's phrase, she "took charge of Wodehouse's life and made certain that he had the peace and quiet he needed to write". There were no children of the marriage, but Wodehouse came to love Ethel's daughter Leonora (1905–1944) and legally adopted her. Wodehouse experimented with different genres of fiction in these years; Psmith, Journalist, mixing comedy with social comment on slum landlords and racketeers, was published in 1915. In the same year The Saturday Evening Post paid $3,500 to serialise Something New, the first of what became a series of novels set at Blandings Castle. It was published in hardback in the US and the UK in the same year (the British edition being retitled Something Fresh). It was Wodehouse's first farcical novel; it was also his first best-seller, and although his later books included some gentler, lightly sentimental stories, it was as a farceur that he became known. Later in the same year "Extricating Young Gussie", the first story about Bertie and Jeeves, was published. These stories introduced two sets of characters about whom Wodehouse wrote for the rest of his life. The Blandings Castle stories, set in an English stately home, depict the attempts of the placid Lord Emsworth to evade the many distractions around him, which include successive pairs of young lovers, the machinations of his exuberant brother Galahad, the demands of his domineering sisters and super-efficient secretaries, and anything detrimental to his prize sow, the Empress of Blandings. The Bertie and Jeeves stories feature an amiable young man-about-town, regularly rescued from the consequences of his idiocy by the benign interference of his valet. Broadway: 1915–1919 A third milestone in Wodehouse's life came towards the end of 1915: his old songwriting partner Jerome Kern introduced him to the writer Guy Bolton, who became Wodehouse's closest friend and a regular collaborator. Bolton and Kern had a musical, Very Good Eddie, running at the Princess Theatre in New York. The show was successful, but they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor. This was Miss Springtime (1916), which ran for 227 performances—a good run by the standards of the day. The team produced several more successes, including Leave It to Jane (1917), Oh, Boy! (1917–18) and Oh, Lady! Lady!! (1918), and Wodehouse and Bolton wrote a few more shows with other composers. In these musicals Wodehouse's lyrics won high praise from critics as well as fellow lyricists such as Ira Gershwin. Unlike his original model, Gilbert, Wodehouse preferred the music to be written first, fitting his words into the melodies. Donaldson suggests that this is the reason why his lyrics have largely been overlooked in recent years: they fit the music perfectly, but do not stand on their own in verse form as Gilbert's do. Nonetheless, Donaldson adds, the book and lyrics for the Princess Theatre shows made the collaborators an enormous fortune and played an important part in the development of the American musical. In the Grove Dictionary of American Music Larry Stempel writes, "By presenting naturalistic stories and characters and attempting to integrate the songs and lyrics into the action of the libretto, these works brought a new level of intimacy, cohesion, and sophistication to American musical comedy." The theatre writer Gerald Bordman calls Wodehouse "the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day". The composer Richard Rodgers wrote, "Before Larry Hart, only P.G. Wodehouse had made any real assault on the intelligence of the song-listening public." 1920s In the years after the war, Wodehouse steadily increased his sales, polished his existing characters and introduced new ones. Bertie and Jeeves, Lord Emsworth and his circle, and Ukridge appeared in novels and short stories; Psmith made his fourth and last appearance; two new characters were the Oldest Member, narrating his series of golfing stories, and Mr Mulliner, telling his particularly tall tales to fellow patrons of the bar at the Angler's Rest. Various other young men-about-town appeared in short stories about members of the Drones Club. The Wodehouses returned to England, where they had a house in London for some years, but Wodehouse continued to cross the Atlantic frequently, spending substantial periods in New York. He continued to work in the theatre. During the 1920s he collaborated on nine musical comedies produced on Broadway or in the West End, including the long-running Sally (1920, New York), The Cabaret Girl (1922, London) and Rosalie (1928, New York). He also wrote non-musical plays, including The Play's the Thing (1926), adapted from Ferenc Molnár, and A Damsel in Distress (1928), a dramatisation of his 1919 novel. Though never a naturally gregarious man, Wodehouse was more sociable in the 1920s than at other periods. Donaldson lists among those with whom he was on friendly terms writers including A. A. Milne, Ian Hay, Frederick Lonsdale and E. Phillips Oppenheim, and stage performers including George Grossmith Jr., Heather Thatcher and Dorothy Dickson. Hollywood: 1929–1931 There had been films of Wodehouse stories since 1915, when A Gentleman of Leisure was based on his 1910 novel of the same name. Further screen adaptations of his books were made between then and 1927, but it was not until 1929 that Wodehouse went to Hollywood where Bolton was working as a highly paid writer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Ethel was taken with both the financial and social aspects of Hollywood life, and she negotiated a contract with MGM on her husband's behalf under which he would be paid $2,000 a week. This large salary was particularly welcome because the couple had lost considerable sums in the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The contract started in May 1930, but the studio found little for Wodehouse to do, and he had spare time to write a novel and nine short stories. He commented, "It's odd how soon one comes to look on every minute as wasted that is given to earning one's salary." Even when the studio found a project for him to work on, the interventions of committees and constant rewriting by numerous contract authors meant that his ideas were rarely used. In a 2005 study of Wodehouse in Hollywood, Brian Taves writes that Those Three French Girls (1930) was "as close to a success as Wodehouse was to have at MGM. His only other credits were minimal, and the other projects he worked on were not produced." Wodehouse's contract ended after a year and was not renewed. At MGM's request, he gave an interview to The Los Angeles Times. Wodehouse was described by Herbert Warren Wind as "politically naive [and] fundamentally unworldly", and he caused a sensation by saying publicly what he had already told his friends privately about Hollywood's inefficiency, arbitrary decision-making, and waste of expensive talent. The interview was reprinted in The New York Times, and there was much editorial comment about the state of the film industry. Many writers have considered that the interview precipitated a radical overhaul of the studio system, but Taves believes it to have been "a storm in a teacup", and Donaldson comments that, in the straitened post-crash era, the reforms would have been inevitable. Wind's view of Wodehouse's naïveté is not universally held. Biographers including Donaldson, McCrum and Phelps suggest that his unworldliness was only part of a complex character, and that in some respects he was highly astute. He was unsparing of the studio owners in his early-1930s short stories set in Hollywood, which contain what Taves considers Wodehouse's sharpest and most biting satire. Best-seller: 1930s During the 1930s Wodehouse's theatrical work tailed off. He wrote or adapted four plays for the West End; Leave it to Psmith (1930), which he adapted in collaboration with Ian Hay, was the only one to have a long run. The reviewer in The Manchester Guardian praised the play, but commented: "It is Mr Wodehouse's own inimitable narrative comments and descriptions in his own person of the antics of his puppets that one misses. They cannot be got into a play and they are at least half the fun of the novels." In 1934 Wodehouse collaborated with Bolton on the book for Cole Porter's Anything Goes (Porter wrote his own lyrics), but at the last minute their version was almost entirely rewritten by others at the instigation of the producer, who disliked the original script. Concentrating on writing novels and short stories, Wodehouse reached the peak of his productivity in this decade, averaging two books each year, and grossing an annual £100,000. His practice of dividing his time between Britain and America caused Wodehouse difficulties with the tax authorities of both countries. Both the UK Inland Revenue and the US Internal Revenue Service sought to tax him as a resident. The matter was settled after lengthy negotiations, but the Wodehouses decided to change their residential status beyond doubt by moving to France, where they bought a house near Le Touquet in the north. In 1935 Wodehouse created the last of his regular cast of principal characters, Lord Ickenham, otherwise known as Uncle Fred, who, in Usborne's words, "leads the dance in four novels and a short story... a whirring dynamo of misrule". His other books from the decade include Right Ho, Jeeves, which Donaldson judged his best work, Uncle Fred in the Springtime, which the writer Bernard Levin considered the best, and Blandings Castle, which contains "Lord Emsworth and the Girl Friend", which Rudyard Kipling thought "one of the most perfect short stories I have ever read". Other leading literary figures who admired Wodehouse were A. E. Housman, Max Beerbohm and Hilaire Belloc; on the radio and in print Belloc called Wodehouse "the best writer of our time: the best living writer of English... the head of my profession". Wodehouse regarded Belloc's plaudit as "a gag, to get a rise out of serious-minded authors whom he disliked". Wodehouse was never sure that his books had literary merit as well as popular appeal, and, Donaldson suggests, must have been overwhelmed when the University of Oxford conferred an honorary doctorate of letters on him in June 1939. His visit to England for the awarding ceremony was the last time he set foot in his native land. Second World War: internment and broadcasts At the start of the Second World War Wodehouse and his wife remained at their Le Touquet house, where, during the Phoney War, he worked on Joy in the Morning. With the advance of the Germans, the nearby Royal Air Force base withdrew; Wodehouse was offered the sole spare seat in one of the fighter aircraft, but he turned down the opportunity as it would have meant leaving behind Ethel and their dog. On 21 May 1940, with German troops advancing through northern France, the Wodehouses decided to drive to Portugal and fly from there to the US. Two miles from home their car broke down, so they returned and borrowed a car from a neighbour; with the routes blocked with refugees, they returned home again. The Germans occupied Le Touquet on 22 May 1940 and Wodehouse had to report to the authorities daily. After two months of occupation the Germans interned all male enemy nationals under 60, and Wodehouse was sent to a former prison in Loos, a suburb of Lille, on 21 July; Ethel remained in Le Touquet. The internees were placed four to a cell, each of which had been designed for one man. One bed was available per cell, which was made available to the eldest man—not Wodehouse, who slept on the granite floor. The prisoners were not kept long in Loos before they were transported in cattle trucks to a former barracks in Liège, Belgium, which was run as a prison by the SS. After a week the men were transferred to Huy in Liège, where they were incarcerated in the local citadel. They remained there until September 1940, when they were transported to Tost in Upper Silesia (then Germany, now Toszek in Poland). Wodehouse's family and friends had not had any news of his location after the fall of France, but an article from an Associated Press reporter who had visited Tost in December 1940 led to pressure on the German authorities to release the novelist. This included a petition from influential people in the US; Senator W. Warren Barbour presented it to the German ambassador. Although his captors refused to release him, Wodehouse was provided with a typewriter and, to pass the time, he wrote Money in the Bank. Throughout his time in Tost, he sent postcards to his US literary agent asking for $5 to be sent to various people in Canada, mentioning his name. These were the families of Canadian prisoners of war, and the news from Wodehouse was the first indication that their sons were alive and well. Wodehouse risked severe punishment for the communication, but managed to evade the German censor. On 21 June 1941, while he was in the middle of playing a game of cricket, Wodehouse received a visit from two members of the Gestapo. He was given ten minutes to pack his things before he was taken to the Hotel Adlon, a top luxury hotel in Berlin. He stayed there at his own expense; royalties from the German editions of his books had been put into a special frozen bank account at the outset of the war, and Wodehouse was permitted to draw upon this money he had earned while staying in Berlin. He was thus released from internment a few months before his sixtieth birthday—the age at which civilian internees were released by the Nazis. Shortly afterwards Wodehouse was, in the words of Phelps, "cleverly trapped" into making five broadcasts to the US via German radio, with the Berlin-based correspondent of the Columbia Broadcasting System. The broadcasts—aired on 28 June, 9, 23 and 30 July and 6 August—were titled How to be an Internee Without Previous Training, and comprised humorous anecdotes about Wodehouse's experiences as a prisoner, including some gentle mocking of his captors. The German propaganda ministry arranged for the recordings to be broadcast to Britain in August. The day after Wodehouse recorded his final programme, Ethel joined him in Berlin, having sold most of her jewellery to pay for the journey. Aftermath: reactions and investigation The reaction in Britain to Wodehouse's broadcasts was hostile, and he was "reviled ... as a traitor, collaborator, Nazi propagandist, and a coward", although, Phelps observes, many of those who decried his actions had not heard the content of the programmes. A front-page article in The Daily Mirror stated that Wodehouse "lived luxuriously because Britain laughed with him, but when the laughter was out of his country's heart, ... [he] was not ready to share her suffering. He hadn't the guts ... even to stick it out in the internment camp." In the House of Commons Anthony Eden, the Foreign Secretary, regretted Wodehouse's actions. Several libraries removed Wodehouse novels from their shelves. On 15 July the journalist William Connor, under his pen name Cassandra, broadcast a postscript to the news programme railing against Wodehouse. According to The Times, the broadcast "provoked a storm of complaint ... from listeners all over the country". Wodehouse's biographer, Joseph Connolly, thinks the broadcast "inaccurate, spiteful and slanderous"; Phelps calls it "probably the most vituperative attack on an individual ever heard on British radio". The broadcast was made at the direct instruction of Duff Cooper, the Minister of Information, who overruled strong protests made by the BBC against the decision to air the programme. Numerous letters appeared in the British press, both supporting and criticising Wodehouse. The letters page of The Daily Telegraph became a focus for censuring Wodehouse, including one from Wodehouse's friend, ; a reply from their fellow author Compton Mackenzie in defence of Wodehouse was not published because the editor claimed a lack of space. Most of those defending Wodehouse against accusations of disloyalty, including Sax Rohmer, Dorothy L. Sayers and Gilbert Frankau, conceded that he had acted stupidly. Some members of the public wrote to the newspapers to say that the full facts were not yet known and a fair judgment could not be made until they were. The management of the BBC, who considered Wodehouse's actions no worse than "ill advised", pointed out to Cooper that there was no evidence at that point whether Wodehouse had acted voluntarily or under compulsion. When Wodehouse heard of the furore the broadcasts had caused, he contacted the Foreign Office—through the Swiss embassy in Berlin—to explain his actions, and attempted to return home via neutral countries, but the German authorities refused to let him leave. In Performing Flea, a 1953 collection of letters, Wodehouse wrote, "Of course I ought to have had the sense to see that it was a loony thing to do to use the German radio for even the most harmless stuff, but I didn't. I suppose prison life saps the intellect". The reaction in America was mixed: the left-leaning publication PM accused Wodehouse of "play[ing] Jeeves to the Nazis", but the Department of War used the interviews as an ideal representation of anti-Nazi propaganda. The Wodehouses remained in Germany until September 1943, when, because of the Allied bombings, they were allowed to move back to Paris. They were living there when the city was liberated on 25 August 1944; Wodehouse reported to the American authorities the following day, asking them to inform the British of his whereabouts. He was subsequently visited by Malcolm Muggeridge, recently arrived in Paris as an intelligence officer with MI6. The young officer quickly came to like Wodehouse and considered the question of treasonable behaviour as "ludicrous"; he summed up the writer as "ill-fitted to live in an age of ideological conflict". On 9 September Wodehouse was visited by an MI5 officer and former barrister, Major Edward Cussen, who formally investigated him, a process that stretched over four days. On 28 September Cussen filed his report, which states that in regard to the broadcasts, Wodehouse's behaviour "has been unwise", but advised against further action. On 23 November Theobald Matthew, the Director of Public Prosecutions, decided there was no evidence to justify prosecuting Wodehouse. In November 1944 Duff Cooper was appointed British ambassador to France and was provided accommodation at the Hôtel Le Bristol, where the Wodehouses were living. Cooper complained to the French authorities, and the couple were moved to a different hotel. They were subsequently arrested by French police and placed under preventive detention, despite no charges being presented. When Muggeridge tracked them down later, he managed to get Ethel released straight away and, four days later, ensured that the French authorities declared Wodehouse unwell and put him in a nearby hospital, which was more comfortable than where they had been detained. While in this hospital, Wodehouse worked on his novel Uncle Dynamite. While still detained by the French, Wodehouse was again mentioned in questions in the House of Commons in December 1944 when MPs wondered if the French authorities could repatriate him to stand trial. Eden stated that the "matter has been gone into, and, according to the advice given, there are no grounds upon which we could take action". Two months later, Orwell wrote the essay "In Defence of P.G. Wodehouse", where he stated that "it is important to realise that the events of 1941 do not convict Wodehouse of anything worse than stupidity". Orwell's rationale was that Wodehouse's "moral outlook has remained that of a public-school boy, and according to the public-school code, treachery in time of war is the most unforgivable of all the sins", which was compounded by his "complete lack—so far as one can judge from his printed works—of political awareness". On 15 January 1945 the French authorities released Wodehouse, but they did not inform him, until June 1946, that he would not face any official charges and was free to leave the country. American exile: 1946–1975 Having secured American visas in July 1946, the Wodehouses made preparations to return to New York. They were delayed by Ethel's insistence on acquiring suitable new clothes and by Wodehouse's wish to finish writing his current novel, The Mating Season, in the peace of the French countryside. In April 1947 they sailed to New York, where Wodehouse was relieved at the friendly reception he received from the large press contingent awaiting his arrival. Ethel secured a comfortable penthouse apartment in Manhattan's Upper East Side, but Wodehouse was not at ease. The New York that he had known before the war was much changed. The magazines that had paid lavishly for his stories were in decline, and those that remained were not much interested in him. He was sounded out about writing for Broadway, but he was not at home in the post-war theatre; he had money problems, with large sums temporarily tied up in Britain, and for the first time in his career he had no ideas for a new novel. He did not complete one until 1951. Wodehouse remained unsettled until he and Ethel left New York City for Long Island. Bolton and his wife lived in the prosperous hamlet of Remsenburg, part of the Southampton area of Long Island, east of Manhattan. Wodehouse stayed with them frequently, and in 1952 he and Ethel bought a house nearby. They lived at Remsenburg for the rest of their lives. Between 1952 and 1975 he published more than twenty novels, as well as two collections of short stories, a heavily edited collection of his letters, a volume of memoirs, and a selection of his magazine articles. He continued to hanker after a revival of his theatrical career. A 1959 off-Broadway revival of the 1917 Bolton-Wodehouse-Kern Leave It to Jane was a surprise hit, running for 928 performances, but his few post-war stage works, some in collaboration with Bolton, made little impression. Although Ethel made a return visit to England in 1948 to shop and visit family and friends, Wodehouse never left America after his arrival in 1947. It was not until 1965 that the British government indicated privately that he could return without fear of legal proceedings, and by then he felt too old to make the journey. The biographers Benny Green and Robert McCrum both take the view that this exile benefited Wodehouse's writing, helping him to go on depicting an idealised England seen in his mind's eye, rather than as it actually was in the post-war decades. During their years in Long Island, the couple often took in stray animals and contributed substantial funds to a local animal shelter. In 1955 Wodehouse became an American citizen, though he remained a British subject, and was therefore still eligible for UK state honours. He was considered for the award of a knighthood three times from 1967, but the honour was twice blocked by British officials. In 1974 the British prime minister, Harold Wilson, intervened to secure a knighthood (KBE) for Wodehouse, which was announced in the January 1975 New Year Honours list. The Times commented that Wodehouse's honour signalled "official forgiveness for his wartime indiscretion.... It is late, but not too late, to take the sting out of that unhappy incident." The following month Wodehouse entered Southampton Hospital, Long Island, for treatment of a skin complaint. While there, he suffered a heart attack and died on 14 February 1975 at the age of 93. He was buried at Remsenburg Presbyterian Church four days later. Ethel outlived him by more than nine years; Leonora had predeceased him, dying suddenly in 1944. Writing Technique and approach Before starting a book Wodehouse would write up to four hundred pages of notes bringing together an outline of the plot; he acknowledged that "It's the plots that I find so hard to work out. It takes such a long time to work one out." He always completed the plot before working on specific character actions. For a novel the note-writing process could take up to two years, and he would usually have two or more novels in preparation simultaneously. After he had completed his notes, he would draw up a fuller scenario of about thirty thousand words, which ensured plot holes were avoided, and allowed for the dialogue to begin to develop. When interviewed in 1975 he revealed that "For a humorous novel you've got to have a scenario, and you've got to test it so that you know where the comedy comes in, where the situations come in ... splitting it up into scenes (you can make a scene of almost anything) and have as little stuff in between as possible." He preferred working between 4 and 7 pm—but never after dinner—and would work seven days a week. In his younger years, he would write around two to three thousand words a day, although he slowed as he aged, so that in his nineties he would produce a thousand. The reduced speed in writing slowed his production of books: when younger he would produce a novel in about three months, while Bachelors Anonymous, published in 1973, took around six months. Although studies of language production in normal healthy ageing show a marked decline from the mid-70s on, a study of Wodehouse's works did not find any evidence of a decline in linguistic ability with age. Wodehouse believed that one of the factors that made his stories humorous was his view of life, and he stated that "If you take life fairly easily, then you take a humorous view of things. It's probably because you were born that way." He carried this view through into his writing, describing the approach as "making the thing a sort of musical comedy without music, and ignoring real life altogether". The literary critic Edward L. Galligan considers Wodehouse's stories to show his mastery in adapting the form of the American musical comedy for his writings. Wodehouse would ensure that his first draft was as carefully and accurately done as possible, correcting and refining the prose as he wrote, and would then make another good copy, before proofreading again and then making a final copy for his publisher. Most of Wodehouse's canon is set in an undated period around the 1920s and 1930s. The critic Anthony Lejeune describes the settings of Wodehouse's novels, such as the Drones Club and Blandings Castle, as "a fairyland". Although some critics thought Wodehouse's fiction was based on a world that had never existed, Wodehouse affirmed that "it did. It was going strong between the wars", although he agreed that his version was to some extent "a sort of artificial world of my own creation". The novels showed a largely unchanging world, regardless of when they were written, and only rarely—and mistakenly in McCrum's view—did Wodehouse allow modernity to intrude, as he did in the 1966 story "Bingo Bans the Bomb". When dealing with the dialogue in his novels, Wodehouse would consider the book's characters as if they were actors in a play, ensuring that the main roles were kept suitably employed throughout the storyline, which must be strong: "If they aren't in interesting situations, characters can't be major characters, not even if you have the rest of the troop talk their heads off about them." Many of Wodehouse's parts were stereotypes, and he acknowledged that "a real character in one of my books sticks out like a sore thumb." The publisher Michael Joseph identifies that even within the stereotypes Wodehouse understood human nature, and therefore "shares with [Charles] Dickens and Charles Chaplin the ability to present the comic resistance of the individual against those superior forces to which we are all subject". Much of Wodehouse's use of slang terms reflects the influence of his time at school in Dulwich, and partly reflects Edwardian slang. As a young man he enjoyed the literary works of Arthur Conan Doyle and Jerome K. Jerome, and the operatic works of Gilbert and Sullivan. Wodehouse quotes from and alludes to numerous poets throughout his work. The scholar Clarke Olney lists those quoted, including Milton, Byron, Longfellow, Coleridge, Swinburne, Tennyson, Wordsworth and Shakespeare. Another favoured source was the King James Bible. Language In 1941 the Concise Cambridge History of English Literature opined that Wodehouse had "a gift for highly original aptness of phrase that almost suggests a poet struggling for release among the wild extravagances of farce", while McCrum thinks that Wodehouse manages to combine "high farce with the inverted poetry of his mature comic style", particularly in The Code of the Woosters; the novelist Anthony Powell believes Wodehouse to be a "comic poet". Robert A. Hall Jr., in his study of Wodehouse's style and technique, describes the author as a master of prose, an opinion also shared by Levin, who considers Wodehouse "one of the finest and purest writers of English prose". Hall identifies several techniques used by Wodehouse to achieve comic effect, including the creation of new words through adding or removing prefixes and suffixes, so when Pongo Twistleton removes the housemaid Elsie Bean from a cupboard, Wodehouse writes that the character "de-Beaned the cupboard". Wodehouse created new words by splitting others in two, thus Wodehouse divides "hobnobbing" when he writes: "To offer a housemaid a cigarette is not hobbing. Nor, when you light it for her, does that constitute nobbing." Richard Voorhees, Wodehouse's biographer, believes that the author used clichés in a deliberate and ironic manner. His opinion is shared by the academic Stephen Medcalf, who deems Wodehouse's skill is to "bring a cliché just enough to life to kill it", although Pamela March, writing in The Christian Science Monitor, considers Wodehouse to have "an ability to decliché a cliché". Medcalf provides an example from Right Ho, Jeeves in which the teetotal Gussie Fink-Nottle has surreptitiously been given whisky and gin in a punch prior to a prize-giving: 'It seems to me, Jeeves, that the ceremony may be one fraught with considerable interest.' 'Yes, sir.' 'What, in your opinion, will the harvest be?' 'One finds it difficult to hazard a conjecture, sir.' 'You mean imagination boggles?' 'Yes, sir.' I inspected my imagination. He was right. It boggled. The stylistic device most commonly found in Wodehouse's work is his use of comparative imagery that includes similes. Hall opines that the humour comes from Wodehouse's ability to accentuate "resemblances which at first glance seem highly incongruous". Examples can be seen in Joy in the Morning, Chapter 29: "There was a sound in the background like a distant sheep coughing gently on a mountainside. Jeeves sailing into action", or Psmith, Chapter 7: "A sound like two or three pigs feeding rather noisily in the middle of a thunderstorm interrupted his meditation." Hall also identifies that periodically Wodehouse used the stylistic device of a transferred epithet, with an adjective that properly belongs to a person applied instead to some inanimate object. The form of expression is used sparingly by Wodehouse in comparison with other mechanisms, only once or twice in a story or novel, according to Hall. "I balanced a thoughtful lump of sugar on the teaspoon." —Joy in the Morning, Chapter 5 "As I sat in the bath-tub, soaping a meditative foot ..." —Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, Chapter 1 "The first thing he did was to prod Jeeves in the lower ribs with an uncouth forefinger." —Much Obliged, Jeeves, Chapter 4 Wordplay is a key element in Wodehouse's writing. This can take the form of puns, such as in Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, when Bertie is released after a night in the police cells, and says that he has "a pinched look" about him. Linguistic confusion is another humorous mechanism, such as in Uncle Dynamite when Constable Potter says he has been "assaulted by the duck pond". In reply, Sir Aylmer, confusing the two meanings of the word "by", asks: "How the devil can you be assaulted by a duck pond?" Wodehouse also uses metaphor and mixed metaphor to add humour. Some come through exaggeration, such as Bingo Little's infant child who "not only has the aspect of a mass murderer, but that of a mass murderer suffering from an ingrown toenail", or Wooster's complaint that "the rumpuses that Bobbie Wickham is already starting may be amusing to her, but not to the unfortunate toads beneath the harrow whom she ruthlessly plunges into the soup." Bertie Wooster's half-forgotten vocabulary also provides a further humorous device. In Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit Bertie asks Jeeves "Let a plugugly like young Thos loose in the community with a cosh, and you are inviting disaster and ... what's the word? Something about cats." Jeeves replies, "Cataclysms, sir?" Reception and reputation Literary reception Wodehouse's early career as a lyricist and playwright was profitable, and his work with Bolton, according to The Guardian, "was one of the most successful in the history of musical comedy". At the outbreak of the Second World War he was earning £40,000 a year from his work, which had broadened to include novels and short stories. Following the furore ensuing from the wartime broadcasts, he suffered a downturn in his popularity and book sales; The Saturday Evening Post stopped publishing his short stories, a stance they reversed in 1965, although his popularity—and the sales figures—slowly recovered over time. Wodehouse received great praise from many of his contemporaries, including Max Beerbohm, Rudyard Kipling, A. E. Housman and Evelyn Waugh—the last of whom opines, "One has to regard a man as a Master who can produce on average three uniquely brilliant and entirely original similes on each page." There are dissenters to the praise. The writer Alan Bennett thinks that "inspired though his language is, I can never take more than ten pages of the novels at a time, their relentless flippancy wearing and tedious", while the literary critic Q. D. Leavis writes that Wodehouse had a "stereotyped humour ... of ingenious variations on a laugh in one place". In a 2010 study of Wodehouse's few relatively serious novels, such as The Coming of Bill (1919), Jill the Reckless (1920) and The Adventures of Sally (1922), David Heddendorf concludes that though their literary quality does not match that of the farcical novels, they show a range of empathy and interests that in real life—and in his most comic works—the author seemed to lack. "Never oblivious to grief and despair, he opts in clear-eyed awareness for his timeless world of spats and woolly-headed peers. It's an austere, almost bloodless preference for pristine artifice over the pain and messy outcomes of actual existence, but it's a case of Wodehouse keeping faith with his own unique art." The American literary analyst Robert F. Kiernan, defining "camp" as "excessive stylization of whatever kind", brackets Wodehouse as "a master of the camp novel", along with Thomas Love Peacock, Max Beerbohm, Ronald Firbank, E. F. Benson and Ivy Compton-Burnett. The literary critic and writer Cyril Connolly calls Wodehouse a "politicians' author"—one who does "not like art to be exacting and difficult". Two former British prime ministers, H. H. Asquith and Tony Blair, are on record as Wodehouse aficionados, and the latter became a patron of the Wodehouse Society. Seán O'Casey, a successful playwright of the 1920s, thought little of Wodehouse; he commented in 1941 that it was damaging to England's dignity that the public or "the academic government of Oxford, dead from the chin up" considered Wodehouse an important figure in English literature. His jibe that Wodehouse was "English literature's performing flea" provided his target with the title of his collected letters, published in 1953. McCrum, writing in 2004, observes, "Wodehouse is more popular today than on the day he died", and "his comic vision has an absolutely secure place in the English literary imagination." Honours and influence The proposed nominations of Wodehouse for a knighthood in 1967 and 1971 were blocked for fear that such an award would "revive the controversy of his wartime behaviour and give currency to a Bertie Wooster image of the British character which the embassy was doing its best to eradicate". When Wodehouse was awarded the knighthood, only four years later, the journalist Dennis Barker wrote in The Guardian that the writer was "the solitary surviving English literary comic genius". After his death six weeks later, the journalist Michael Davie, writing in the same paper, observed that "Many people regarded ... [Wodehouse] as he regarded Beachcomber, as 'one, if not more than one, of England's greatest men'", while in the view of the obituarist for The Times Wodehouse "was a comic genius recognized in his lifetime as a classic and an old master of farce". In September 2019 Wodehouse was commemorated with a memorial stone in Westminster Abbey; the dedication was held two days after it was installed. Since Wodehouse's death there have been numerous adaptations and dramatisations of his work on television and film; Wodehouse himself has been portrayed on radio and screen numerous times. There are several literary societies dedicated to Wodehouse. The P.G. Wodehouse Society (UK) was founded in 1997 and has over 1,000 members as at 2015. The president of the society as at 2017 is Alexander Armstrong; past presidents have included Terry Wogan and Richard Briers. There are also other groups of Wodehouse fans in Australia, Belgium, France, Finland, India, Italy, Russia, Sweden and the US. As at 2015 the Oxford English Dictionary contains over 1,750 quotations from Wodehouse, illustrating terms from crispish to zippiness. Voorhees, while acknowledging that Wodehouse's antecedents in literature range from Ben Jonson to Oscar Wilde, writes: Notes, references and sources Notes References Sources External links P. G. Wodehouse collection at One More Library P.G. Wodehouse Archive on loan to the British Library The Wodehouse Society The P. G. Wodehouse Society (UK) Transcripts of Wodehouse's Berlin Broadcasts "P. G. Wodehouse: An English Master of American Slang" from The American Legion Weekly, 24 October 1919 Orwell, George "In Defence of P.G. Wodehouse" 1881 births 1975 deaths 20th-century English novelists 20th-century British dramatists and playwrights British emigrants to the United States English lyricists Knights Commander of the Order of the British Empire English male dramatists and playwrights British male novelists People educated at Dulwich College People educated at Elizabeth College, Guernsey People from Guildford People from Long Island PG People interned during World War II English humorists 20th-century American novelists American dramatists and playwrights American humorists American lyricists American male novelists Novelists from New York (state) Literature controversies English broadcasters for Nazi Germany 20th-century American male writers	false	[ "Much Ado, Bernard J. Taylor's musical version of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing, was recorded as a concept album in 1995, featuring Paul McGann, Peter Karrie and other West End stars. It received its world premiere at Stratford-on-Avon in 1996. It was partly inspired by the Kenneth Branagh film version. The most recent production was in Budapest, Hungary, opening in June 2007.\n\nTerry Wardrope, critic for the European musicals magazine Words and Music, wrote: \"The usual fine cast once again give full throat to a grand selection of songs. One of the strongest facets of Mr Taylor's musical talents I have found is his ability to write music in the style befitting the age his work is set, as MUCH ADO so admirably demonstrates. Paul McGann's singing voice adds style. and panache to his solo numbers (If I Could Write A Sonnet and The Strange Affliction Called Love) as well as a pleasing accompaniment to the redoubtable Claire Moore In Disdain\" and Then Kill For Me. Of course, as always Claire Moore gives a breathtaking performance with (among others) I'll Never Marry and How Can This Be, but then that lady can do no wrong in my book. It's another impressive piece from Bernard Taylor, reinforcing my impression that he is one of the finest British musical talents we have.\"\n\nMike Gibb, editor of Masquerade, the British musicals review magazine, wrote: \"It proves to be yet another fine slab of musical writing, full of invention and, as with all BJT offerings, dripping with melody. It also succeeds in capturing the mood of the period courtesy of a medieval English feel amongst the diverse musical influences. Paul McGann and Simon Burke must have been delighted with the quality of the material they were offered with the likes of I'll Never Love Again and If I Could Write A Sonnet - both grade 'A' Taylor ballads - gentle, flowing, melodious.\"\n\nExternal links\nBernard J. Taylor's website\nHungarian report \nHungarian review \nHungarian translator's website \nKarl Logue website\n\nReferences\n\nBronte archives\nLarkin, Colin; John Martland (1999). The Virgin Encyclopedia of Stage and Film Musicals. London: Virgin in association with Muze UK Ltd. . \nBernard J. Taylor's website\nHungarian report \nHungarian review \nHungarian translator's website \n\n1995 musicals", "A , also known as an anime musical, is a type of modern Japanese musical theatre production based exclusively on popular Japanese anime, manga, or video games. The term \"2.5D musical\" was coined to describe stories presented in a two-dimensional medium being brought to real life.\n\nApproximately 70 2.5D musicals were produced in 2013 and attracted at least 1.6 million people, most of them young women in their teens and 20s. 2.5D musicals are often seen as the starting point of many young actors in Japan.\n\nDefinition\n\n2.5D musicals are defined through make-up and costuming that accurately depicts the actor as the original character, along with exaggerated acting that mimics the expressions in the original work. It also include special effects and stunts that reenact the setting and tone of the original work. Directors of the musicals are usually the ones who write the lyrics to the songs. With the evolution of technology, some of the modern 2.5D musicals uses projection mapping, in which backgrounds and special effects are projected onto the stage and screens. According to the Japan 2.5-Dimensional Musical Association, the term not only applies to musicals, but also plays, comedies, and dramas.\n\nHistory\n\nThe first successful manga-based musical production was The Rose of Versailles in 1974 by the Takarazuka Revue. At the time, these plays were simply known as \"musicals\" or \"anime musicals.\" Around the 1990s, a number of musicals and small stage skits produced were based on anime and manga series aimed at elementary school girls, such as Sailor Moon, Akazukin Chacha, and Hime-chan's Ribbon, which performed moderately well, but were not popular and were known as . However, in 2000, Hunter x Hunter was considered revolutionary for the time because the voice cast for the original anime series had also played the characters onstage.\n\nJapanese media-based musicals rose to popularity in 2003 with Musical: The Prince of Tennis through word-of-mouth and social media, which soon became a starting point for many up-and-coming actors. The shows attracted more than 2 million people during its run and was notable for using stage effects to simulate a tennis match, and it was popular enough to include its first overseas shows in South Korea and Taiwan in 2008. After its success, many productions based on anime, manga, and video games soon followed, some of the well-documented ones including Naruto, Yowamushi Pedal, Hyper Projection Engeki: Haikyu!! among others. Unlike productions featuring the Takarazuka Revue, which are supported by fans of the troupe, these musicals mainly draw anime and manga fans and other audiences that usually do not see plays on a regular basis.\n\nThe term \"2.5D musical\" was codified in 2014 when the initial director of Musical: The Prince of Tennis, Makoto Matsuda, first established the Japan 2.5-Dimensional Musical Association. At first, despite the success of Musical: The Prince of Tennis, he did not consider it a formal stage production on par with most modern theater performances imported from Western works such as Broadway productions. However, after a group of South Korean musical professionals had acknowledged Black Butler'''s production value and standards in performing arts, Matsuda decided to bring the genre worldwide. Plays certified by the Japan 2.5-Dimensional Musical Association offer theater glasses that contain subtitles in four other languages for people who do not speak Japanese. Since 2014, many 2.5D musicals have also been performed abroad in places like China, Taiwan, the United States, and parts of Europe.\n\nIn 2018, \"2.5D Musical Studies\" was added as a program at the Tokyo School of Anime. In April 2018, actor Kenta Suga, who has starred as Gaara in Naruto and Hinata in Hyper Projection Engeki: Haikyu!!'', was appointed as overseas ambassador by the Japan 2.5-Dimensional Musical Association, succeeding Ryo Kato. By the end of 2018, the 2.5D musical market had increased by 44.9% over the previous year, grossing .\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Japan 2.5-Dimensional Musical Association\n\nAnime\nAnime and manga terminology\nJapanese musicals\n2.5D musicals\nJapan\nJapanese culture\nMusical theatre\nMusicals based on anime and manga\nMusicals based on video games\nOtaku\nPerforming arts in Japan\nTheatre in Japan\nTheatre" ]
[ "P. G. Wodehouse", "Broadway: 1915-19", "What did he do in Broadway?", "Wodehouse \"the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day\".", "What prompted him to go to Broadway?", "they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor.", "How many musicals did he write?", "I don't know." ]	C_14a60ae6a0404de9a8adfd5f0367ce69_1	Who invited him to Broadway?	4	Who invited P. G. Wodehouse to Broadway?	P. G. Wodehouse	A third milestone in Wodehouse's life came towards the end of 1915: his old songwriting partner Jerome Kern introduced him to the writer Guy Bolton, who became Wodehouse's closest friend and a regular collaborator. Bolton and Kern had a musical, Very Good Eddie, running at the Princess Theatre in New York. The show was successful, but they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor. This was Miss Springtime (1916), which ran for 227 performances--a good run by the standards of the day. The team produced several more successes, including Leave It to Jane (1917), Oh, Boy! (1917-18) and Oh, Lady! Lady!! (1918), and Wodehouse and Bolton wrote a few more shows with other composers. In these musicals Wodehouse's lyrics won high praise from critics as well as fellow lyricists such as Ira Gershwin. Unlike his original model, Gilbert, Wodehouse preferred the music to be written first, fitting his words into the melodies. Donaldson suggests that this is the reason why his lyrics have largely been overlooked in recent years: they fit the music perfectly, but do not stand on their own in verse form as Gilbert's do. Nonetheless, Donaldson adds, the book and lyrics for the Princess Theatre shows made the collaborators an enormous fortune and played an important part in the development of the American musical. In the Grove Dictionary of American Music Larry Stempel writes, "By presenting naturalistic stories and characters and attempting to integrate the songs and lyrics into the action of the libretto, these works brought a new level of intimacy, cohesion, and sophistication to American musical comedy." The theatre writer Gerald Bordman calls Wodehouse "the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day". The composer Richard Rodgers wrote, "Before Larry Hart, only P.G. Wodehouse had made any real assault on the intelligence of the song-listening public." In the years after the war, Wodehouse steadily increased his sales, polished his existing characters and introduced new ones. Bertie and Jeeves, Lord Emsworth and his circle, and Ukridge appeared in novels and short stories; Psmith made his fourth and last appearance; two new characters were the Oldest Member, narrating his series of golfing stories, and Mr Mulliner, telling his particularly tall tales to fellow patrons of the bar at the Angler's Rest. Various other young men-about-town appeared in short stories about members of the Drones Club. The Wodehouses returned to England, where they had a house in London for some years, but Wodehouse continued to cross the Atlantic frequently, spending substantial periods in New York. He continued to work in the theatre. During the 1920s he collaborated on nine musical comedies produced on Broadway or in the West End, including the long-running Sally (1920, New York), The Cabaret Girl (1922, London) and Rosalie (1928, New York). He also wrote non-musical plays, including The Play's the Thing (1926), adapted from Ferenc Molnar, and A Damsel in Distress (1928), a dramatisation of his 1919 novel. Though never a naturally gregarious man, Wodehouse was more sociable in the 1920s than at other periods. Donaldson lists among those with whom he was on friendly terms writers including A.A. Milne, Ian Hay, Frederick Lonsdale and E. Phillips Oppenheim, and stage performers including George Grossmith, Jr., Heather Thatcher and Dorothy Dickson. CANNOTANSWER	Jerome Kern introduced him to the writer Guy Bolton, who became Wodehouse's closest friend and a regular collaborator.	Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, ( ; 15 October 188114 February 1975) was an English author and one of the most widely read humorists of the 20th century. His creations include the feather-brained Bertie Wooster and his sagacious valet, Jeeves; the immaculate and loquacious Psmith; Lord Emsworth and the Blandings Castle set; the Oldest Member, with stories about golf; and Mr Mulliner, with tall tales on subjects ranging from bibulous bishops to megalomaniac movie moguls. Born in Guildford, the third son of a British magistrate based in Hong Kong, Wodehouse spent happy teenage years at Dulwich College, to which he remained devoted all his life. After leaving school he was employed by a bank but disliked the work and turned to writing in his spare time. His early novels were mostly school stories, but he later switched to comic fiction. Most of Wodehouse's fiction is set in his native United Kingdom, although he spent much of his life in the US and used New York and Hollywood as settings for some of his novels and short stories. He wrote a series of Broadway musical comedies during and after the First World War, together with Guy Bolton and Jerome Kern, that played an important part in the development of the American musical. He began the 1930s writing for MGM in Hollywood. In a 1931 interview, his naive revelations of incompetence and extravagance in the studios caused a furore. In the same decade, his literary career reached a new peak. In 1934 Wodehouse moved to France for tax reasons; in 1940 he was taken prisoner at Le Touquet by the invading Germans and interned for nearly a year. After his release he made six broadcasts from German radio in Berlin to the US, which had not yet entered the war. The talks were comic and apolitical, but his broadcasting over enemy radio prompted anger and strident controversy in Britain, and a threat of prosecution. Wodehouse never returned to England. From 1947 until his death he lived in the US, taking dual British-American citizenship in 1955. He died in 1975, at the age of 93, in Southampton, New York. Wodehouse was a prolific writer throughout his life, publishing more than ninety books, forty plays, two hundred short stories and other writings between 1902 and 1974. He worked extensively on his books, sometimes having two or more in preparation simultaneously. He would take up to two years to build a plot and write a scenario of about thirty thousand words. After the scenario was complete he would write the story. Early in his career Wodehouse would produce a novel in about three months, but he slowed in old age to around six months. He used a mixture of Edwardian slang, quotations from and allusions to numerous poets, and several literary techniques to produce a prose style that has been compared to comic poetry and musical comedy. Some critics of Wodehouse have considered his work flippant, but among his fans are former British prime ministers and many of his fellow writers. Life and career Early years Wodehouse was born in Guildford, Surrey, the third son of Henry Ernest Wodehouse (1845–1929), a magistrate resident in the British colony of Hong Kong, and his wife, Eleanor (1861–1941), daughter of the Rev John Bathurst Deane. The Wodehouses, who traced their ancestry back to the 13th century, belonged to a cadet branch of the family of the earls of Kimberley. Eleanor Wodehouse was also of ancient aristocratic ancestry. She was visiting her sister in Guildford when Wodehouse was born there prematurely. The boy was baptised at the Church of St Nicolas, Guildford, and was named after his godfather, Pelham von Donop. Wodehouse wrote in 1957, "If you ask me to tell you frankly if I like the name Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, I must confess that I do not.... I was named after a godfather, and not a thing to show for it but a small silver mug which I lost in 1897." The first name was rapidly elided to "Plum", the name by which Wodehouse became known to family and friends. Mother and son sailed for Hong Kong, where for his first two years Wodehouse was raised by a Chinese amah (nurse), alongside his elder brothers Peveril (1877–1951) and Armine (1879–1936). When he was two, the brothers were brought to England, where they were placed under the care of an English nanny in a house adjoining that of Eleanor's father and mother. The boys' parents returned to Hong Kong and became virtual strangers to their sons. Such an arrangement was then normal for middle-class families based in the colonies. The lack of parental contact, and the harsh regime of some of those in loco parentis, left permanent emotional scars on many children from similar backgrounds, including the writers Thackeray, Saki, Kipling and Walpole. Wodehouse was more fortunate; his nanny, Emma Roper, was strict but not unkind, and both with her and later at his different schools Wodehouse had a generally happy childhood. His recollection was that "it went like a breeze from start to finish, with everybody I met understanding me perfectly". The biographer Robert McCrum suggests that nonetheless Wodehouse's isolation from his parents left a psychological mark, causing him to avoid emotional engagement both in life and in his works. Another biographer, Frances Donaldson, writes, "Deprived so early, not merely of maternal love, but of home life and even a stable background, Wodehouse consoled himself from the youngest age in an imaginary world of his own." In 1886 the brothers were sent to a dame-school in Croydon, where they spent three years. Peveril was then found to have a "weak chest"; sea air was prescribed, and the three boys were moved to Elizabeth College on the island of Guernsey. In 1891 Wodehouse went on to Malvern House Preparatory School in Kent, which concentrated on preparing its pupils for entry to the Royal Navy. His father had planned a naval career for him, but the boy's eyesight was found to be too poor for it. He was unimpressed by the school's narrow curriculum and zealous discipline; he later parodied it in his novels, with Bertie Wooster recalling his early years as a pupil at a "penitentiary... with the outward guise of a prep school" called Malvern House. Throughout their school years the brothers were sent to stay during the holidays with various uncles and aunts from both sides of the family. In the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Iain Sproat counts twenty aunts and considers that they played an important part not only in Wodehouse's early life, but, thinly disguised, in his mature novels, as the formidable aunts who dominate the action in the Wooster, Blandings, and other stories. The boys had fifteen uncles, four of whom were clergymen. Sproat writes that they inspired Wodehouse's "pious but fallible curates, vicars, and bishops, of which he wrote with friendly irreverence but without mockery". At the age of twelve in 1894, to his great joy, Wodehouse was able to follow his brother Armine to Dulwich College. He was entirely at home there; Donaldson comments that Dulwich gave him, for the first time, "some continuity and a stable and ordered life". He loved the camaraderie, distinguished himself at cricket, rugby and boxing, and was a good, if not consistently diligent, student. The headmaster at the time was A. H. Gilkes, a respected classicist, who was a strong influence on Wodehouse. In a study of Wodehouse's works, Richard Usborne argues that "only a writer who was himself a scholar and had had his face ground into Latin and Greek (especially Thucydides) as a boy" could sustain the complex sequences of subordinate clauses sometimes found in Wodehouse's comic prose. Wodehouse's six years at Dulwich were among the happiest of his life: "To me the years between 1894 and 1900 were like heaven." In addition to his sporting achievements he was a good singer and enjoyed taking part in school concerts; his literary leanings found an outlet in editing the school magazine, The Alleynian. For the rest of his life he remained devoted to the school. The biographer Barry Phelps writes that Wodehouse "loved the college as much as he loved anything or anybody". Reluctant banker; budding writer: 1900–1908 Wodehouse expected to follow Armine to the University of Oxford, but the family's finances took a turn for the worse at the crucial moment. Ernest Wodehouse had retired in 1895, and his pension was paid in rupees; fluctuation against the pound reduced its value in Britain. Wodehouse recalled, "The wolf was not actually whining at the door and there was always a little something in the kitty for the butcher and the grocer, but the finances would not run to anything in the nature of a splash". Instead of a university career, in September 1900 Wodehouse was engaged in a junior position in the London office of the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank. He was unsuited to it and found the work baffling and uncongenial. He later wrote a humorous account of his experiences at the bank, but at the time he longed for the end of each working day, when he could return to his rented lodgings in Chelsea and write. At first he concentrated, with some success, on serious articles about school sports for Public School Magazine. In November 1900 his first comic piece, "Men Who Missed Their Own Weddings", was accepted by Tit-Bits. A new magazine for boys, The Captain, provided further well-paid opportunities, and during his two years at the bank, Wodehouse had eighty pieces published in a total of nine magazines. In 1901, with the help of a former Dulwich master, William Beach Thomas, Wodehouse secured an appointment—at first temporary and later permanent—writing for The Globes popular "By the Way" column. He held the post until 1909. At around the same time his first novel was published—a school story called The Pothunters, serialised incomplete in Public School Magazine in early 1902, and issued in full in hardback in September. He resigned from the bank that month to devote himself to writing full-time. Between the publication of The Pothunters 1902 and that of Mike in 1909, Wodehouse wrote eight novels and co-wrote another two. The critic R. D. B. French writes that, of Wodehouse's work from this period, almost all that deserves to survive is the school fiction. Looking back in the 1950s Wodehouse viewed these as his apprentice years: "I was practically in swaddling clothes and it is extremely creditable to me that I was able to write at all." From his boyhood Wodehouse had been fascinated by America, which he conceived of as "a land of romance"; he "yearned" to visit the country, and by 1904 he had earned enough to do so. In April he sailed to New York, which he found greatly to his liking. He noted in his diary: "In New York gathering experience. Worth many guineas in the future but none for the moment." This prediction proved correct: few British writers had first-hand experience of the US, and his articles about life in New York brought him higher than usual fees. He later recalled that "in 1904 anyone in the London writing world who had been to America was regarded with awe and looked upon as an authority on that terra incognita.... After that trip to New York I was a man who counted.... My income rose like a rocketing pheasant." Wodehouse's other new venture in 1904 was writing for the stage. Towards the end of the year the librettist Owen Hall invited him to contribute an additional lyric for a musical comedy Sergeant Brue. Wodehouse had loved theatre since his first visit, aged thirteen, when Gilbert and Sullivan's Patience had made him "drunk with ecstasy". His lyric for Hall, "Put Me in My Little Cell", was a Gilbertian number for a trio of comic crooks, with music by Frederick Rosse; it was well received and launched Wodehouse on a career as a theatre writer that spanned three decades. Although it made little impact on its first publication, the 1906 novel Love Among the Chickens contained what French calls the author's first original comic creation: Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge. The character, an amoral, bungling opportunist, is partly based on Wodehouse's Globe colleague Herbert Westbrook. The two collaborated between 1907 and 1913 on two books, two music hall sketches, and a play, Brother Alfred. Wodehouse would return to the character in short stories over the next six decades. In early 1906 the actor-manager Seymour Hicks invited Wodehouse to become resident lyricist at the Aldwych Theatre, to add topical verses to newly imported or long-running shows. Hicks had already recruited the young Jerome Kern to write the music for such songs. The first Kern-Wodehouse collaboration, a comic number for The Beauty of Bath titled "Mr [Joseph] Chamberlain", was a show-stopper and was briefly the most popular song in London. Psmith, Blandings, Wooster and Jeeves: 1908–1915 Wodehouse's early period as a writer came to an end in 1908 with the serialisation of The Lost Lambs, published the following year in book form as the second half of the novel Mike. The work begins as a conventional school story, but Wodehouse introduces a new and strikingly original character, Psmith, whose creation both Evelyn Waugh and George Orwell regarded as a watershed in Wodehouse's development. Wodehouse said that he based Psmith on the hotelier and impresario Rupert D'Oyly Carte—"the only thing in my literary career which was handed to me on a silver plate with watercress around it". Wodehouse wrote in the 1970s that a cousin of his who had been at school with Carte told him of the latter's monocle, studied suavity, and stateliness of speech, all of which Wodehouse adopted for his new character. Psmith featured in three more novels: Psmith in the City (1910), a burlesque of banking; Psmith, Journalist (1915) set in New York; and Leave It to Psmith (1923), set at Blandings Castle. In May 1909 Wodehouse made his second visit to New York, where he sold two short stories to Cosmopolitan and Collier's for a total of $500, a much higher fee than he had commanded previously. He resigned from The Globe and stayed in New York for nearly a year. He sold many more stories, but none of the American publications offered a permanent relationship and guaranteed income. Wodehouse returned to England in late 1910, rejoining The Globe and also contributing regularly to The Strand Magazine. Between then and the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 he revisited America frequently. Wodehouse was in New York when the war began. Ineligible for military service because of his poor eyesight, he remained in the US throughout the war, detached from the conflict in Europe and absorbed in his theatrical and literary concerns. In September 1914 he married Ethel May Wayman, née Newton (1885–1984), an English widow. The marriage proved happy and lifelong. Ethel's personality was in contrast with her husband's: he was shy and impractical; she was gregarious, decisive and well organised. In Sproat's phrase, she "took charge of Wodehouse's life and made certain that he had the peace and quiet he needed to write". There were no children of the marriage, but Wodehouse came to love Ethel's daughter Leonora (1905–1944) and legally adopted her. Wodehouse experimented with different genres of fiction in these years; Psmith, Journalist, mixing comedy with social comment on slum landlords and racketeers, was published in 1915. In the same year The Saturday Evening Post paid $3,500 to serialise Something New, the first of what became a series of novels set at Blandings Castle. It was published in hardback in the US and the UK in the same year (the British edition being retitled Something Fresh). It was Wodehouse's first farcical novel; it was also his first best-seller, and although his later books included some gentler, lightly sentimental stories, it was as a farceur that he became known. Later in the same year "Extricating Young Gussie", the first story about Bertie and Jeeves, was published. These stories introduced two sets of characters about whom Wodehouse wrote for the rest of his life. The Blandings Castle stories, set in an English stately home, depict the attempts of the placid Lord Emsworth to evade the many distractions around him, which include successive pairs of young lovers, the machinations of his exuberant brother Galahad, the demands of his domineering sisters and super-efficient secretaries, and anything detrimental to his prize sow, the Empress of Blandings. The Bertie and Jeeves stories feature an amiable young man-about-town, regularly rescued from the consequences of his idiocy by the benign interference of his valet. Broadway: 1915–1919 A third milestone in Wodehouse's life came towards the end of 1915: his old songwriting partner Jerome Kern introduced him to the writer Guy Bolton, who became Wodehouse's closest friend and a regular collaborator. Bolton and Kern had a musical, Very Good Eddie, running at the Princess Theatre in New York. The show was successful, but they thought the song lyrics weak and invited Wodehouse to join them on its successor. This was Miss Springtime (1916), which ran for 227 performances—a good run by the standards of the day. The team produced several more successes, including Leave It to Jane (1917), Oh, Boy! (1917–18) and Oh, Lady! Lady!! (1918), and Wodehouse and Bolton wrote a few more shows with other composers. In these musicals Wodehouse's lyrics won high praise from critics as well as fellow lyricists such as Ira Gershwin. Unlike his original model, Gilbert, Wodehouse preferred the music to be written first, fitting his words into the melodies. Donaldson suggests that this is the reason why his lyrics have largely been overlooked in recent years: they fit the music perfectly, but do not stand on their own in verse form as Gilbert's do. Nonetheless, Donaldson adds, the book and lyrics for the Princess Theatre shows made the collaborators an enormous fortune and played an important part in the development of the American musical. In the Grove Dictionary of American Music Larry Stempel writes, "By presenting naturalistic stories and characters and attempting to integrate the songs and lyrics into the action of the libretto, these works brought a new level of intimacy, cohesion, and sophistication to American musical comedy." The theatre writer Gerald Bordman calls Wodehouse "the most observant, literate, and witty lyricist of his day". The composer Richard Rodgers wrote, "Before Larry Hart, only P.G. Wodehouse had made any real assault on the intelligence of the song-listening public." 1920s In the years after the war, Wodehouse steadily increased his sales, polished his existing characters and introduced new ones. Bertie and Jeeves, Lord Emsworth and his circle, and Ukridge appeared in novels and short stories; Psmith made his fourth and last appearance; two new characters were the Oldest Member, narrating his series of golfing stories, and Mr Mulliner, telling his particularly tall tales to fellow patrons of the bar at the Angler's Rest. Various other young men-about-town appeared in short stories about members of the Drones Club. The Wodehouses returned to England, where they had a house in London for some years, but Wodehouse continued to cross the Atlantic frequently, spending substantial periods in New York. He continued to work in the theatre. During the 1920s he collaborated on nine musical comedies produced on Broadway or in the West End, including the long-running Sally (1920, New York), The Cabaret Girl (1922, London) and Rosalie (1928, New York). He also wrote non-musical plays, including The Play's the Thing (1926), adapted from Ferenc Molnár, and A Damsel in Distress (1928), a dramatisation of his 1919 novel. Though never a naturally gregarious man, Wodehouse was more sociable in the 1920s than at other periods. Donaldson lists among those with whom he was on friendly terms writers including A. A. Milne, Ian Hay, Frederick Lonsdale and E. Phillips Oppenheim, and stage performers including George Grossmith Jr., Heather Thatcher and Dorothy Dickson. Hollywood: 1929–1931 There had been films of Wodehouse stories since 1915, when A Gentleman of Leisure was based on his 1910 novel of the same name. Further screen adaptations of his books were made between then and 1927, but it was not until 1929 that Wodehouse went to Hollywood where Bolton was working as a highly paid writer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Ethel was taken with both the financial and social aspects of Hollywood life, and she negotiated a contract with MGM on her husband's behalf under which he would be paid $2,000 a week. This large salary was particularly welcome because the couple had lost considerable sums in the Wall Street Crash of 1929. The contract started in May 1930, but the studio found little for Wodehouse to do, and he had spare time to write a novel and nine short stories. He commented, "It's odd how soon one comes to look on every minute as wasted that is given to earning one's salary." Even when the studio found a project for him to work on, the interventions of committees and constant rewriting by numerous contract authors meant that his ideas were rarely used. In a 2005 study of Wodehouse in Hollywood, Brian Taves writes that Those Three French Girls (1930) was "as close to a success as Wodehouse was to have at MGM. His only other credits were minimal, and the other projects he worked on were not produced." Wodehouse's contract ended after a year and was not renewed. At MGM's request, he gave an interview to The Los Angeles Times. Wodehouse was described by Herbert Warren Wind as "politically naive [and] fundamentally unworldly", and he caused a sensation by saying publicly what he had already told his friends privately about Hollywood's inefficiency, arbitrary decision-making, and waste of expensive talent. The interview was reprinted in The New York Times, and there was much editorial comment about the state of the film industry. Many writers have considered that the interview precipitated a radical overhaul of the studio system, but Taves believes it to have been "a storm in a teacup", and Donaldson comments that, in the straitened post-crash era, the reforms would have been inevitable. Wind's view of Wodehouse's naïveté is not universally held. Biographers including Donaldson, McCrum and Phelps suggest that his unworldliness was only part of a complex character, and that in some respects he was highly astute. He was unsparing of the studio owners in his early-1930s short stories set in Hollywood, which contain what Taves considers Wodehouse's sharpest and most biting satire. Best-seller: 1930s During the 1930s Wodehouse's theatrical work tailed off. He wrote or adapted four plays for the West End; Leave it to Psmith (1930), which he adapted in collaboration with Ian Hay, was the only one to have a long run. The reviewer in The Manchester Guardian praised the play, but commented: "It is Mr Wodehouse's own inimitable narrative comments and descriptions in his own person of the antics of his puppets that one misses. They cannot be got into a play and they are at least half the fun of the novels." In 1934 Wodehouse collaborated with Bolton on the book for Cole Porter's Anything Goes (Porter wrote his own lyrics), but at the last minute their version was almost entirely rewritten by others at the instigation of the producer, who disliked the original script. Concentrating on writing novels and short stories, Wodehouse reached the peak of his productivity in this decade, averaging two books each year, and grossing an annual £100,000. His practice of dividing his time between Britain and America caused Wodehouse difficulties with the tax authorities of both countries. Both the UK Inland Revenue and the US Internal Revenue Service sought to tax him as a resident. The matter was settled after lengthy negotiations, but the Wodehouses decided to change their residential status beyond doubt by moving to France, where they bought a house near Le Touquet in the north. In 1935 Wodehouse created the last of his regular cast of principal characters, Lord Ickenham, otherwise known as Uncle Fred, who, in Usborne's words, "leads the dance in four novels and a short story... a whirring dynamo of misrule". His other books from the decade include Right Ho, Jeeves, which Donaldson judged his best work, Uncle Fred in the Springtime, which the writer Bernard Levin considered the best, and Blandings Castle, which contains "Lord Emsworth and the Girl Friend", which Rudyard Kipling thought "one of the most perfect short stories I have ever read". Other leading literary figures who admired Wodehouse were A. E. Housman, Max Beerbohm and Hilaire Belloc; on the radio and in print Belloc called Wodehouse "the best writer of our time: the best living writer of English... the head of my profession". Wodehouse regarded Belloc's plaudit as "a gag, to get a rise out of serious-minded authors whom he disliked". Wodehouse was never sure that his books had literary merit as well as popular appeal, and, Donaldson suggests, must have been overwhelmed when the University of Oxford conferred an honorary doctorate of letters on him in June 1939. His visit to England for the awarding ceremony was the last time he set foot in his native land. Second World War: internment and broadcasts At the start of the Second World War Wodehouse and his wife remained at their Le Touquet house, where, during the Phoney War, he worked on Joy in the Morning. With the advance of the Germans, the nearby Royal Air Force base withdrew; Wodehouse was offered the sole spare seat in one of the fighter aircraft, but he turned down the opportunity as it would have meant leaving behind Ethel and their dog. On 21 May 1940, with German troops advancing through northern France, the Wodehouses decided to drive to Portugal and fly from there to the US. Two miles from home their car broke down, so they returned and borrowed a car from a neighbour; with the routes blocked with refugees, they returned home again. The Germans occupied Le Touquet on 22 May 1940 and Wodehouse had to report to the authorities daily. After two months of occupation the Germans interned all male enemy nationals under 60, and Wodehouse was sent to a former prison in Loos, a suburb of Lille, on 21 July; Ethel remained in Le Touquet. The internees were placed four to a cell, each of which had been designed for one man. One bed was available per cell, which was made available to the eldest man—not Wodehouse, who slept on the granite floor. The prisoners were not kept long in Loos before they were transported in cattle trucks to a former barracks in Liège, Belgium, which was run as a prison by the SS. After a week the men were transferred to Huy in Liège, where they were incarcerated in the local citadel. They remained there until September 1940, when they were transported to Tost in Upper Silesia (then Germany, now Toszek in Poland). Wodehouse's family and friends had not had any news of his location after the fall of France, but an article from an Associated Press reporter who had visited Tost in December 1940 led to pressure on the German authorities to release the novelist. This included a petition from influential people in the US; Senator W. Warren Barbour presented it to the German ambassador. Although his captors refused to release him, Wodehouse was provided with a typewriter and, to pass the time, he wrote Money in the Bank. Throughout his time in Tost, he sent postcards to his US literary agent asking for $5 to be sent to various people in Canada, mentioning his name. These were the families of Canadian prisoners of war, and the news from Wodehouse was the first indication that their sons were alive and well. Wodehouse risked severe punishment for the communication, but managed to evade the German censor. On 21 June 1941, while he was in the middle of playing a game of cricket, Wodehouse received a visit from two members of the Gestapo. He was given ten minutes to pack his things before he was taken to the Hotel Adlon, a top luxury hotel in Berlin. He stayed there at his own expense; royalties from the German editions of his books had been put into a special frozen bank account at the outset of the war, and Wodehouse was permitted to draw upon this money he had earned while staying in Berlin. He was thus released from internment a few months before his sixtieth birthday—the age at which civilian internees were released by the Nazis. Shortly afterwards Wodehouse was, in the words of Phelps, "cleverly trapped" into making five broadcasts to the US via German radio, with the Berlin-based correspondent of the Columbia Broadcasting System. The broadcasts—aired on 28 June, 9, 23 and 30 July and 6 August—were titled How to be an Internee Without Previous Training, and comprised humorous anecdotes about Wodehouse's experiences as a prisoner, including some gentle mocking of his captors. The German propaganda ministry arranged for the recordings to be broadcast to Britain in August. The day after Wodehouse recorded his final programme, Ethel joined him in Berlin, having sold most of her jewellery to pay for the journey. Aftermath: reactions and investigation The reaction in Britain to Wodehouse's broadcasts was hostile, and he was "reviled ... as a traitor, collaborator, Nazi propagandist, and a coward", although, Phelps observes, many of those who decried his actions had not heard the content of the programmes. A front-page article in The Daily Mirror stated that Wodehouse "lived luxuriously because Britain laughed with him, but when the laughter was out of his country's heart, ... [he] was not ready to share her suffering. He hadn't the guts ... even to stick it out in the internment camp." In the House of Commons Anthony Eden, the Foreign Secretary, regretted Wodehouse's actions. Several libraries removed Wodehouse novels from their shelves. On 15 July the journalist William Connor, under his pen name Cassandra, broadcast a postscript to the news programme railing against Wodehouse. According to The Times, the broadcast "provoked a storm of complaint ... from listeners all over the country". Wodehouse's biographer, Joseph Connolly, thinks the broadcast "inaccurate, spiteful and slanderous"; Phelps calls it "probably the most vituperative attack on an individual ever heard on British radio". The broadcast was made at the direct instruction of Duff Cooper, the Minister of Information, who overruled strong protests made by the BBC against the decision to air the programme. Numerous letters appeared in the British press, both supporting and criticising Wodehouse. The letters page of The Daily Telegraph became a focus for censuring Wodehouse, including one from Wodehouse's friend, ; a reply from their fellow author Compton Mackenzie in defence of Wodehouse was not published because the editor claimed a lack of space. Most of those defending Wodehouse against accusations of disloyalty, including Sax Rohmer, Dorothy L. Sayers and Gilbert Frankau, conceded that he had acted stupidly. Some members of the public wrote to the newspapers to say that the full facts were not yet known and a fair judgment could not be made until they were. The management of the BBC, who considered Wodehouse's actions no worse than "ill advised", pointed out to Cooper that there was no evidence at that point whether Wodehouse had acted voluntarily or under compulsion. When Wodehouse heard of the furore the broadcasts had caused, he contacted the Foreign Office—through the Swiss embassy in Berlin—to explain his actions, and attempted to return home via neutral countries, but the German authorities refused to let him leave. In Performing Flea, a 1953 collection of letters, Wodehouse wrote, "Of course I ought to have had the sense to see that it was a loony thing to do to use the German radio for even the most harmless stuff, but I didn't. I suppose prison life saps the intellect". The reaction in America was mixed: the left-leaning publication PM accused Wodehouse of "play[ing] Jeeves to the Nazis", but the Department of War used the interviews as an ideal representation of anti-Nazi propaganda. The Wodehouses remained in Germany until September 1943, when, because of the Allied bombings, they were allowed to move back to Paris. They were living there when the city was liberated on 25 August 1944; Wodehouse reported to the American authorities the following day, asking them to inform the British of his whereabouts. He was subsequently visited by Malcolm Muggeridge, recently arrived in Paris as an intelligence officer with MI6. The young officer quickly came to like Wodehouse and considered the question of treasonable behaviour as "ludicrous"; he summed up the writer as "ill-fitted to live in an age of ideological conflict". On 9 September Wodehouse was visited by an MI5 officer and former barrister, Major Edward Cussen, who formally investigated him, a process that stretched over four days. On 28 September Cussen filed his report, which states that in regard to the broadcasts, Wodehouse's behaviour "has been unwise", but advised against further action. On 23 November Theobald Matthew, the Director of Public Prosecutions, decided there was no evidence to justify prosecuting Wodehouse. In November 1944 Duff Cooper was appointed British ambassador to France and was provided accommodation at the Hôtel Le Bristol, where the Wodehouses were living. Cooper complained to the French authorities, and the couple were moved to a different hotel. They were subsequently arrested by French police and placed under preventive detention, despite no charges being presented. When Muggeridge tracked them down later, he managed to get Ethel released straight away and, four days later, ensured that the French authorities declared Wodehouse unwell and put him in a nearby hospital, which was more comfortable than where they had been detained. While in this hospital, Wodehouse worked on his novel Uncle Dynamite. While still detained by the French, Wodehouse was again mentioned in questions in the House of Commons in December 1944 when MPs wondered if the French authorities could repatriate him to stand trial. Eden stated that the "matter has been gone into, and, according to the advice given, there are no grounds upon which we could take action". Two months later, Orwell wrote the essay "In Defence of P.G. Wodehouse", where he stated that "it is important to realise that the events of 1941 do not convict Wodehouse of anything worse than stupidity". Orwell's rationale was that Wodehouse's "moral outlook has remained that of a public-school boy, and according to the public-school code, treachery in time of war is the most unforgivable of all the sins", which was compounded by his "complete lack—so far as one can judge from his printed works—of political awareness". On 15 January 1945 the French authorities released Wodehouse, but they did not inform him, until June 1946, that he would not face any official charges and was free to leave the country. American exile: 1946–1975 Having secured American visas in July 1946, the Wodehouses made preparations to return to New York. They were delayed by Ethel's insistence on acquiring suitable new clothes and by Wodehouse's wish to finish writing his current novel, The Mating Season, in the peace of the French countryside. In April 1947 they sailed to New York, where Wodehouse was relieved at the friendly reception he received from the large press contingent awaiting his arrival. Ethel secured a comfortable penthouse apartment in Manhattan's Upper East Side, but Wodehouse was not at ease. The New York that he had known before the war was much changed. The magazines that had paid lavishly for his stories were in decline, and those that remained were not much interested in him. He was sounded out about writing for Broadway, but he was not at home in the post-war theatre; he had money problems, with large sums temporarily tied up in Britain, and for the first time in his career he had no ideas for a new novel. He did not complete one until 1951. Wodehouse remained unsettled until he and Ethel left New York City for Long Island. Bolton and his wife lived in the prosperous hamlet of Remsenburg, part of the Southampton area of Long Island, east of Manhattan. Wodehouse stayed with them frequently, and in 1952 he and Ethel bought a house nearby. They lived at Remsenburg for the rest of their lives. Between 1952 and 1975 he published more than twenty novels, as well as two collections of short stories, a heavily edited collection of his letters, a volume of memoirs, and a selection of his magazine articles. He continued to hanker after a revival of his theatrical career. A 1959 off-Broadway revival of the 1917 Bolton-Wodehouse-Kern Leave It to Jane was a surprise hit, running for 928 performances, but his few post-war stage works, some in collaboration with Bolton, made little impression. Although Ethel made a return visit to England in 1948 to shop and visit family and friends, Wodehouse never left America after his arrival in 1947. It was not until 1965 that the British government indicated privately that he could return without fear of legal proceedings, and by then he felt too old to make the journey. The biographers Benny Green and Robert McCrum both take the view that this exile benefited Wodehouse's writing, helping him to go on depicting an idealised England seen in his mind's eye, rather than as it actually was in the post-war decades. During their years in Long Island, the couple often took in stray animals and contributed substantial funds to a local animal shelter. In 1955 Wodehouse became an American citizen, though he remained a British subject, and was therefore still eligible for UK state honours. He was considered for the award of a knighthood three times from 1967, but the honour was twice blocked by British officials. In 1974 the British prime minister, Harold Wilson, intervened to secure a knighthood (KBE) for Wodehouse, which was announced in the January 1975 New Year Honours list. The Times commented that Wodehouse's honour signalled "official forgiveness for his wartime indiscretion.... It is late, but not too late, to take the sting out of that unhappy incident." The following month Wodehouse entered Southampton Hospital, Long Island, for treatment of a skin complaint. While there, he suffered a heart attack and died on 14 February 1975 at the age of 93. He was buried at Remsenburg Presbyterian Church four days later. Ethel outlived him by more than nine years; Leonora had predeceased him, dying suddenly in 1944. Writing Technique and approach Before starting a book Wodehouse would write up to four hundred pages of notes bringing together an outline of the plot; he acknowledged that "It's the plots that I find so hard to work out. It takes such a long time to work one out." He always completed the plot before working on specific character actions. For a novel the note-writing process could take up to two years, and he would usually have two or more novels in preparation simultaneously. After he had completed his notes, he would draw up a fuller scenario of about thirty thousand words, which ensured plot holes were avoided, and allowed for the dialogue to begin to develop. When interviewed in 1975 he revealed that "For a humorous novel you've got to have a scenario, and you've got to test it so that you know where the comedy comes in, where the situations come in ... splitting it up into scenes (you can make a scene of almost anything) and have as little stuff in between as possible." He preferred working between 4 and 7 pm—but never after dinner—and would work seven days a week. In his younger years, he would write around two to three thousand words a day, although he slowed as he aged, so that in his nineties he would produce a thousand. The reduced speed in writing slowed his production of books: when younger he would produce a novel in about three months, while Bachelors Anonymous, published in 1973, took around six months. Although studies of language production in normal healthy ageing show a marked decline from the mid-70s on, a study of Wodehouse's works did not find any evidence of a decline in linguistic ability with age. Wodehouse believed that one of the factors that made his stories humorous was his view of life, and he stated that "If you take life fairly easily, then you take a humorous view of things. It's probably because you were born that way." He carried this view through into his writing, describing the approach as "making the thing a sort of musical comedy without music, and ignoring real life altogether". The literary critic Edward L. Galligan considers Wodehouse's stories to show his mastery in adapting the form of the American musical comedy for his writings. Wodehouse would ensure that his first draft was as carefully and accurately done as possible, correcting and refining the prose as he wrote, and would then make another good copy, before proofreading again and then making a final copy for his publisher. Most of Wodehouse's canon is set in an undated period around the 1920s and 1930s. The critic Anthony Lejeune describes the settings of Wodehouse's novels, such as the Drones Club and Blandings Castle, as "a fairyland". Although some critics thought Wodehouse's fiction was based on a world that had never existed, Wodehouse affirmed that "it did. It was going strong between the wars", although he agreed that his version was to some extent "a sort of artificial world of my own creation". The novels showed a largely unchanging world, regardless of when they were written, and only rarely—and mistakenly in McCrum's view—did Wodehouse allow modernity to intrude, as he did in the 1966 story "Bingo Bans the Bomb". When dealing with the dialogue in his novels, Wodehouse would consider the book's characters as if they were actors in a play, ensuring that the main roles were kept suitably employed throughout the storyline, which must be strong: "If they aren't in interesting situations, characters can't be major characters, not even if you have the rest of the troop talk their heads off about them." Many of Wodehouse's parts were stereotypes, and he acknowledged that "a real character in one of my books sticks out like a sore thumb." The publisher Michael Joseph identifies that even within the stereotypes Wodehouse understood human nature, and therefore "shares with [Charles] Dickens and Charles Chaplin the ability to present the comic resistance of the individual against those superior forces to which we are all subject". Much of Wodehouse's use of slang terms reflects the influence of his time at school in Dulwich, and partly reflects Edwardian slang. As a young man he enjoyed the literary works of Arthur Conan Doyle and Jerome K. Jerome, and the operatic works of Gilbert and Sullivan. Wodehouse quotes from and alludes to numerous poets throughout his work. The scholar Clarke Olney lists those quoted, including Milton, Byron, Longfellow, Coleridge, Swinburne, Tennyson, Wordsworth and Shakespeare. Another favoured source was the King James Bible. Language In 1941 the Concise Cambridge History of English Literature opined that Wodehouse had "a gift for highly original aptness of phrase that almost suggests a poet struggling for release among the wild extravagances of farce", while McCrum thinks that Wodehouse manages to combine "high farce with the inverted poetry of his mature comic style", particularly in The Code of the Woosters; the novelist Anthony Powell believes Wodehouse to be a "comic poet". Robert A. Hall Jr., in his study of Wodehouse's style and technique, describes the author as a master of prose, an opinion also shared by Levin, who considers Wodehouse "one of the finest and purest writers of English prose". Hall identifies several techniques used by Wodehouse to achieve comic effect, including the creation of new words through adding or removing prefixes and suffixes, so when Pongo Twistleton removes the housemaid Elsie Bean from a cupboard, Wodehouse writes that the character "de-Beaned the cupboard". Wodehouse created new words by splitting others in two, thus Wodehouse divides "hobnobbing" when he writes: "To offer a housemaid a cigarette is not hobbing. Nor, when you light it for her, does that constitute nobbing." Richard Voorhees, Wodehouse's biographer, believes that the author used clichés in a deliberate and ironic manner. His opinion is shared by the academic Stephen Medcalf, who deems Wodehouse's skill is to "bring a cliché just enough to life to kill it", although Pamela March, writing in The Christian Science Monitor, considers Wodehouse to have "an ability to decliché a cliché". Medcalf provides an example from Right Ho, Jeeves in which the teetotal Gussie Fink-Nottle has surreptitiously been given whisky and gin in a punch prior to a prize-giving: 'It seems to me, Jeeves, that the ceremony may be one fraught with considerable interest.' 'Yes, sir.' 'What, in your opinion, will the harvest be?' 'One finds it difficult to hazard a conjecture, sir.' 'You mean imagination boggles?' 'Yes, sir.' I inspected my imagination. He was right. It boggled. The stylistic device most commonly found in Wodehouse's work is his use of comparative imagery that includes similes. Hall opines that the humour comes from Wodehouse's ability to accentuate "resemblances which at first glance seem highly incongruous". Examples can be seen in Joy in the Morning, Chapter 29: "There was a sound in the background like a distant sheep coughing gently on a mountainside. Jeeves sailing into action", or Psmith, Chapter 7: "A sound like two or three pigs feeding rather noisily in the middle of a thunderstorm interrupted his meditation." Hall also identifies that periodically Wodehouse used the stylistic device of a transferred epithet, with an adjective that properly belongs to a person applied instead to some inanimate object. The form of expression is used sparingly by Wodehouse in comparison with other mechanisms, only once or twice in a story or novel, according to Hall. "I balanced a thoughtful lump of sugar on the teaspoon." —Joy in the Morning, Chapter 5 "As I sat in the bath-tub, soaping a meditative foot ..." —Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, Chapter 1 "The first thing he did was to prod Jeeves in the lower ribs with an uncouth forefinger." —Much Obliged, Jeeves, Chapter 4 Wordplay is a key element in Wodehouse's writing. This can take the form of puns, such as in Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit, when Bertie is released after a night in the police cells, and says that he has "a pinched look" about him. Linguistic confusion is another humorous mechanism, such as in Uncle Dynamite when Constable Potter says he has been "assaulted by the duck pond". In reply, Sir Aylmer, confusing the two meanings of the word "by", asks: "How the devil can you be assaulted by a duck pond?" Wodehouse also uses metaphor and mixed metaphor to add humour. Some come through exaggeration, such as Bingo Little's infant child who "not only has the aspect of a mass murderer, but that of a mass murderer suffering from an ingrown toenail", or Wooster's complaint that "the rumpuses that Bobbie Wickham is already starting may be amusing to her, but not to the unfortunate toads beneath the harrow whom she ruthlessly plunges into the soup." Bertie Wooster's half-forgotten vocabulary also provides a further humorous device. In Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit Bertie asks Jeeves "Let a plugugly like young Thos loose in the community with a cosh, and you are inviting disaster and ... what's the word? Something about cats." Jeeves replies, "Cataclysms, sir?" Reception and reputation Literary reception Wodehouse's early career as a lyricist and playwright was profitable, and his work with Bolton, according to The Guardian, "was one of the most successful in the history of musical comedy". At the outbreak of the Second World War he was earning £40,000 a year from his work, which had broadened to include novels and short stories. Following the furore ensuing from the wartime broadcasts, he suffered a downturn in his popularity and book sales; The Saturday Evening Post stopped publishing his short stories, a stance they reversed in 1965, although his popularity—and the sales figures—slowly recovered over time. Wodehouse received great praise from many of his contemporaries, including Max Beerbohm, Rudyard Kipling, A. E. Housman and Evelyn Waugh—the last of whom opines, "One has to regard a man as a Master who can produce on average three uniquely brilliant and entirely original similes on each page." There are dissenters to the praise. The writer Alan Bennett thinks that "inspired though his language is, I can never take more than ten pages of the novels at a time, their relentless flippancy wearing and tedious", while the literary critic Q. D. Leavis writes that Wodehouse had a "stereotyped humour ... of ingenious variations on a laugh in one place". In a 2010 study of Wodehouse's few relatively serious novels, such as The Coming of Bill (1919), Jill the Reckless (1920) and The Adventures of Sally (1922), David Heddendorf concludes that though their literary quality does not match that of the farcical novels, they show a range of empathy and interests that in real life—and in his most comic works—the author seemed to lack. "Never oblivious to grief and despair, he opts in clear-eyed awareness for his timeless world of spats and woolly-headed peers. It's an austere, almost bloodless preference for pristine artifice over the pain and messy outcomes of actual existence, but it's a case of Wodehouse keeping faith with his own unique art." The American literary analyst Robert F. Kiernan, defining "camp" as "excessive stylization of whatever kind", brackets Wodehouse as "a master of the camp novel", along with Thomas Love Peacock, Max Beerbohm, Ronald Firbank, E. F. Benson and Ivy Compton-Burnett. The literary critic and writer Cyril Connolly calls Wodehouse a "politicians' author"—one who does "not like art to be exacting and difficult". Two former British prime ministers, H. H. Asquith and Tony Blair, are on record as Wodehouse aficionados, and the latter became a patron of the Wodehouse Society. Seán O'Casey, a successful playwright of the 1920s, thought little of Wodehouse; he commented in 1941 that it was damaging to England's dignity that the public or "the academic government of Oxford, dead from the chin up" considered Wodehouse an important figure in English literature. His jibe that Wodehouse was "English literature's performing flea" provided his target with the title of his collected letters, published in 1953. McCrum, writing in 2004, observes, "Wodehouse is more popular today than on the day he died", and "his comic vision has an absolutely secure place in the English literary imagination." Honours and influence The proposed nominations of Wodehouse for a knighthood in 1967 and 1971 were blocked for fear that such an award would "revive the controversy of his wartime behaviour and give currency to a Bertie Wooster image of the British character which the embassy was doing its best to eradicate". When Wodehouse was awarded the knighthood, only four years later, the journalist Dennis Barker wrote in The Guardian that the writer was "the solitary surviving English literary comic genius". After his death six weeks later, the journalist Michael Davie, writing in the same paper, observed that "Many people regarded ... [Wodehouse] as he regarded Beachcomber, as 'one, if not more than one, of England's greatest men'", while in the view of the obituarist for The Times Wodehouse "was a comic genius recognized in his lifetime as a classic and an old master of farce". In September 2019 Wodehouse was commemorated with a memorial stone in Westminster Abbey; the dedication was held two days after it was installed. Since Wodehouse's death there have been numerous adaptations and dramatisations of his work on television and film; Wodehouse himself has been portrayed on radio and screen numerous times. There are several literary societies dedicated to Wodehouse. The P.G. Wodehouse Society (UK) was founded in 1997 and has over 1,000 members as at 2015. The president of the society as at 2017 is Alexander Armstrong; past presidents have included Terry Wogan and Richard Briers. There are also other groups of Wodehouse fans in Australia, Belgium, France, Finland, India, Italy, Russia, Sweden and the US. As at 2015 the Oxford English Dictionary contains over 1,750 quotations from Wodehouse, illustrating terms from crispish to zippiness. Voorhees, while acknowledging that Wodehouse's antecedents in literature range from Ben Jonson to Oscar Wilde, writes: Notes, references and sources Notes References Sources External links P. G. Wodehouse collection at One More Library P.G. Wodehouse Archive on loan to the British Library The Wodehouse Society The P. G. Wodehouse Society (UK) Transcripts of Wodehouse's Berlin Broadcasts "P. G. Wodehouse: An English Master of American Slang" from The American Legion Weekly, 24 October 1919 Orwell, George "In Defence of P.G. Wodehouse" 1881 births 1975 deaths 20th-century English novelists 20th-century British dramatists and playwrights British emigrants to the United States English lyricists Knights Commander of the Order of the British Empire English male dramatists and playwrights British male novelists People educated at Dulwich College People educated at Elizabeth College, Guernsey People from Guildford People from Long Island PG People interned during World War II English humorists 20th-century American novelists American dramatists and playwrights American humorists American lyricists American male novelists Novelists from New York (state) Literature controversies English broadcasters for Nazi Germany 20th-century American male writers	true	[ "The Warrens of Virginia is a dramatic play set during the American Civil War by playwright William C. de Mille. It was produced on Broadway by David Belasco in 1907 and was the basis for two films in 1915 (directed by the playwright's brother, Cecil B. DeMille) and in 1924. The play was also the basis for a novelization by author George Cary Eggleston in 1908.\n\nBroadway run\nThe Warrens of Virginia premiered in New York at the Belasco Theater (formerly the Stuyvesant Theater) on December 3, 1907. The production ran for a total of 380 performances, finally closing in October, 1908. The producer was Broadway impresario David Belasco, and the show starred Charles Waldron as Lt. Ned Burton and Charlotte Walker as Agatha Warren. The production marked the Broadway debut of supporting player Mary Pickford as Betty Warren, her first major professional role after years of touring in small regional troupes under her given name, Gladys Smith.\n\nIt was at Belasco's insistence that she adopted the stage name \"Mary Pickford\" for the show. Another notable supporting player, in the role of Arthur Warren, was the playwright's brother, Cecil B. DeMille, who went on to direct The Warrens of Virginia in a silent film version in 1915. Actor DeWitt Jennings was the only cast member to appear in both the Broadway production and the 1915 film.\n\nPrincipal roles and 1907 cast\n\nThe original Broadway cast is listed at the Internet Broadway Database.\n\nSynopsis\nAt the Virginia plantation of Gen. Warren, the general hosts an elegant ball to honor his old comrade in the Mexican War, General Griffin. Griffin's nephew, Ned Burton, who has been courting Gen. Warren's daughter, Agatha, now proposes marriage to her. But before she can answer, a courier arrives with news of the shelling of Fort Sumter. The Confederate States will declare their secession from the Union. Ned - torn by his love for Agatha, a Southern sympathizer, and love of country - decides to join the Union Army as a Lieutenant while Agatha's father, Gen. Warren, takes command of his Confederate forces.\n\nFour years later, starving Confederate troops wait desperately for a supply train and reinforcements. After Ned is invited to call at the Warren home, Gen. Griffin plants phony orders on him so that they will be found and the train re-routed. The ruse works and the supply train is destroyed. When Ned is about to be shot as a spy, Agatha arranges his escape, but he is too proud to accept her help. When Lee surrenders, Ned is freed. Thinking that he betrayed her, Agatha rebukes Ned, but Gen. Griffin explains his deceptive ploy, and Agatha now accepts Ned's marriage proposal.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1907 plays\nAmerican plays adapted into films\nBroadway plays", "Rose Marie Brown (April 15, 1919 – January 19, 2015) was an American theater actress who was crowned Miss Virginia in 1939. Then known by her birth name, Rose Marie Elliott, she placed fourth in the 13th Miss America pageant in Atlantic City. However, despite losing the pageant, she was discovered by Rodgers and Hammerstein, which led to a career on Broadway during the late 1930s and 1940s.\n\nBiography\nBrown was born Rose Marie Elliott on April 15, 1919, in Suffolk, Virginia, to Rosa Marie (née Bruce) Elliott and Milton T. Elliott III. She attended Simmons College before entering local beauty pageants.\n\nIn 1939, Elliott won her first local pageant, winning the title Miss Peanut. She went on to win the sixth Miss Virginia pageant later that year. Elliott competed as Miss Virginia in the 13th Miss America competition in 1939, the last to be held at the Steel Pier in Atlantic City, New Jersey. She ultimately placed fourth, losing to Miss Michigan Patricia Donnelly. However, Elliott was spotted by a talent agent with MCA Inc., Maynard Morris, who invited her to audition for roles on Broadway. He reportedly told her father, \"She’s got talent — you should send her to New York City.\"\n\nElliott moved to New York, where she enrolled as student at American Academy of Dramatic Arts, then located at Carnegie Hall. She accompanied a roommate to an audition, where she was noticed by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, who were in the audience observing the auditions. Rodgers and Hammerstein invited her to meet with them at their office the next morning. She was soon cast in her first Broadway production, One Touch of Venus, opposite actress Mary Martin. Elliott appeared in a string of Broadway productions, including the 1946 musical Annie Get Your Gun with Bert Lahr and Ethel Merman.\n\nShe married her husband, W. Donald Brown, following a meeting at a party, taking the name Rose Marie Brown. The couple, who had two sons, Josh Brown and Jeffrey Brown, were longtime residents of Darien, Connecticut. She died in her sleep at the Edgehill retirement community in Stamford, Connecticut, on January 19, 2015, at the age of 95. She was survived by her sons. Her husband died in 1999.\n\nReferences\n\n1919 births\n2015 deaths\nMiss Virginia winners\nAmerican stage actresses\nAmerican musical theatre actresses\nAmerican Academy of Dramatic Arts alumni\nPeople from Darien, Connecticut\nActresses from Stamford, Connecticut\nPeople from Suffolk, Virginia\n21st-century American women" ]

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