Problem: Victor August Herbert (February 1, 1859 - May 26, 1924) was an Irish-born, German-raised American composer, cellist and conductor. Although Herbert enjoyed important careers as a cello soloist and conductor, he is best known for composing many successful operettas that premiered on Broadway from the 1890s to World War I. He was also prominent among the tin pan alley composers and was later a founder of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). A prolific composer, Herbert produced two operas, a cantata, 43 operettas, incidental music to 10 plays, 31 compositions for orchestra, nine band compositions, nine cello compositions, five violin compositions with piano or orchestra, 22 piano compositions and numerous songs, choral compositions and orchestrations of works by other composers, among other music.

In 1894 Herbert composed his first operetta, Prince Ananias, for a popular troupe known as The Bostonians. The piece was well received, and Herbert soon composed three more operettas for Broadway, The Wizard of the Nile (1895), The Serenade (1897), which enjoyed international success, and The Fortune Teller (1898), starring Alice Nielsen. Although these achieved popularity, Herbert did not produce any more stage works for several years, focusing on his work with the Pittsburgh Symphony until 1904. Just before leaving that orchestra, he returned to Broadway with his first major hit, Babes in Toyland (1903). Two more successes followed, Mlle. Modiste (1905) and The Red Mill (1906), which solidified Herbert as one of the best-known American composers. He was elected to the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1908. Although Herbert's reputation lies with his operettas, he also composed two grand operas. He searched for several years for a libretto that appealed to him, finally finding one by Joseph D. Redding called Natoma that concerned a historical story set in California. He composed the work from 1909 to 1910, and it premiered in Philadelphia on 25 February 1911 with soprano Mary Garden in the title role and the young Irish tenor John McCormack in his opera debut. The opera was well received and was repeated as part of the company's repertory during the next three seasons. It also enjoyed performances in New York City, making its debut there on February 28, 1911. Herbert's other opera, Madeleine, was a much lighter work in one act. On 24 January 1914, it had its premiere at the Metropolitan Opera, but it was not revived beyond that season. During this period, Herbert continued to compose operettas, producing two of his most successful works, Naughty Marietta (1910) and Sweethearts (1913). Another operetta, Eileen (1917, originally entitled Hearts of Erin), was the fulfillment of Herbert's desire to compose an Irish-themed operetta. The piece treats the Irish Rebellion of 1798 and boasts a rich score. This was the end of Herbert's greatest period of producing full scores for operettas. By World War I, with the birth of jazz, ragtime and new dance styles like the foxtrot and tango, Herbert reluctantly switched to writing musical comedies. These featured less elaborate ensembles and simpler songs for less classically trained singers than the European-style operettas that had dominated his earlier career. Herbert, during the last years of his career, was frequently asked to compose ballet music for the elaborate production numbers in Broadway revues and the shows of Irving Berlin and Jerome Kern, among others. He was also a contributor to the Ziegfeld Follies every year from 1917 to 1924.

What stage music did he sing?

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Problem: Born in New Orleans, Louisiana, Capote was the son of 17-year-old Lillie Mae Faulk and salesman Archulus Persons. His parents divorced when he was four, and he was sent to Monroeville, Alabama, where, for the following four to five years, he was raised by his mother's relatives. He formed a fast bond with his mother's distant relative, Nanny Rumbley Faulk, whom Truman called "Sook". "Her face is remarkable - not unlike Lincoln's, craggy like that, and tinted by sun and wind", is how Capote described Sook in "A Christmas Memory" (1956).

The critical success of one of his short stories, "Miriam" (1945), attracted the attention of the publisher Bennett Cerf, resulting in a contract with Random House to write a novel. With an advance of $1,500, Capote returned to Monroeville and began Other Voices, Other Rooms, continuing to work on the manuscript in New Orleans, Saratoga Springs, New York, and North Carolina, eventually completing it in Nantucket, Massachusetts. It was published in 1948. Capote described this symbolic tale as "a poetic explosion in highly suppressed emotion". The novel is a semi-autobiographical refraction of Capote's Alabama childhood. Decades later, writing in The Dogs Bark (1973), he commented: Other Voices, Other Rooms was an attempt to exorcise demons, an unconscious, altogether intuitive attempt, for I was not aware, except for a few incidents and descriptions, of its being in any serious degree autobiographical. Rereading it now, I find such self-deception unpardonable. The story focuses on 13-year-old Joel Knox following the loss of his mother. Joel is sent from New Orleans to live with his father, who abandoned him at the time of his birth. Arriving at Skully's Landing, a vast, decaying mansion in rural Alabama, Joel meets his sullen stepmother Amy, debauched transvestite Randolph, and defiant Idabel, a girl who becomes his friend. He also sees a spectral "queer lady" with "fat dribbling curls" watching him from a top window. Despite Joel's queries, the whereabouts of his father remain a mystery. When he finally is allowed to see his father, Joel is stunned to find he is a quadriplegic, having tumbled down a flight of stairs after being inadvertently shot by Randolph. Joel runs away with Idabel but catches pneumonia and eventually returns to the Landing, where he is nursed back to health by Randolph. The implication in the final paragraph is that the "queer lady" beckoning from the window is Randolph in his old Mardi Gras costume. Gerald Clarke, in Capote: A Biography (1988) described the conclusion: Finally, when he goes to join the queer lady in the window, Joel accepts his destiny, which is to be homosexual, to always hear other voices and live in other rooms. Yet acceptance is not a surrender; it is a liberation. "I am me", he whoops. "I am Joel, we are the same people." So, in a sense, had Truman rejoiced when he made peace with his own identity.

what struggles does he endure?

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Joel accepts his destiny, which is to be homosexual,