Throwback Thursday: November 12th

November 12th, 2026 by Sophia Thornberg

Time for another Throwback Thursday! Let’s take a look at what happened on this day in music history…

November 12, 1931- Jean Sibelius and Fredrick Aston’s ballet Lady of Shalott premiered in London. Based on the poem written by Lord Alfred Tennyson, the ballet follows Lady of Shalott who is trapped in a tower and can only experience the real world through glimpses of her mirror.

November 12, 1973- Dimitri Shostakovich’s 14th String Quartet premiered in Leningrad. It was the last of his “Quartet of Quartets,” which were quartets dedicated to each original member of the Beethoven String Quartet.

November 12, 2011- The opera Silent Night by Kevin Puts opened at the Ordway Theater in St. Paul. This opera was inspired by the true events of the 1914 Christmas Truce and was the winner of the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Music.