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On June 6, Denmark awarded the prestigious Léonie Sonning Music Prize to Germany's greatest singing-actress, soprano Hildegard Behrens - acclaimed for her supreme artistry, especially in her portrayal of such signature operatic roles as Brünnhilde and Salome, among others.
(Press Play button to hear clip from Salome by Richard Strauss. Real Player plug-in required to hear music.) 
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| Last April 17, the 1998 Sonning Prize was given at the University of Copenhagen to the country's greatest living architect, Jørn Utzon, creator of the Sydney Opera House and other world-famous buildings. |
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These then are the 1998 winners of the prizes that bear the Sonning name. Sonning may not be exactly a household name, indeed people often confuse one prize for the other, but the prizes certainly are to be coveted. And why not? Sonning Prize winners are among the icons of modern civilization. To be sure, a few are household names - like Winston Churchill, Laurence Olivier and Albert Schweitzer, although many are not - names like Niels Bohr, Hannah Arendt and Karl Barth. But whether they be statesman, actor, humanitarian, scientist, philosopher, or theologian - their exemplary deeds and extraordinary ideas shape history and move the world. And what of the Léonie Sonning Music Prize winners? The names, to mention a few, may not be instantly familiar to the man on the street - but can anyone who knows of them not but sing praises to the likes of Igor Stravinsky or Leonard Bernstein or Jean-Pierre Rampal or Birgit Nilsson? Composer, conductor, instrumentalist, singer - they are today's icons of music, artists of the highest order whose music, in being the sweet delight of civilization, moves the world as well. |
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