1861 in music

Events

• February 18 – To celebrate the opening of the parliament of the new Italian nation at Turin, Giuseppe Verdi's opera La Favorita is performed in the Teatro Regio. Verdi himself is a deputy in the new parliament.
• March 13 – Tannhäuser scandal in Paris.
• November – Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov is introduced by his teacher Feodor A. Kanille to Mily Balakirev. This completes the Russian Five. He begins his Symphony in E flat under Balakirev's guidance.
• Tchaikovsky starts to attend RMS classes in music theory taught by Nikolai Zaremba at the Mikhailovsky Palace

  Published popular music

• "Abide With Me", w. Rev Henry Francis Lyte m. William Henry Monk
• "Alice, Where Art Thou", w. Wellington Guernsey m. Joseph Ascher
• "Aura Lea", w. W. W. Fosdick m. George R. Poulton
• "The Bonnie Blue Flag", w. Mrs Annie Chambers Ketchum m. Harry Macarthy
• "Eternal Father, Strong to Save", w. William Whiting m. Rev. John Bacchus Dykes
• "Go Down, Moses", trad spiritual
• "Holy! Holy! Holy! Lord God Almighty", w. Reginald Heber m. John Bacchus Dykes
• "I'm Going Home to Dixie", w. Dan Emmett arr. C. S. Grafully
• "John Brown's Body", w. anon m. William Steffe
• "Maryland, My Maryland", w. James Ryder Randall m. Walter de Mapers
• "The Privateer", w.m. anon
• "The Vacant Chair", w. Henry S. Washburne m. George Frederick Root

  Classical music

• Antonín Dvořák – String Quintet No. 1 in A minor, Op. 1
• Hermann Goetz – Piano Concerto in E-flat
• Alexander Borodin – Piano Trio in D major
• Johannes Brahms – Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel
• Henri Vieuxtemps – Violin Concerto No. 5

  Opera

• Ferenc Erkel – Bánk bán
• Stanislaw Moniuszko – Verbum Nobile
• Amilcare Ponchielli – La Savoiarda

  Musical theater

• Orpheus In The Underworld by Offenbach, New York production

  Births

• February 21 – Pierre de Bréville, composer
• April 7 – Clara Novello Davies, singer, conductor and music teacher
• April 26 – Ferdinand Buescher, instrument manufacturer
• May 19 – Nellie Melba, operatic soprano
• June 11 – Sigismund Zaremba, composer
• June 15 – Ernestine Schumann-Heink, operatic contralto
• June 17 – Sidney Jones, composer of musical comedies
• June 27 – Fanny Davies, pianist
• August 11 – Anton Arensky, pianist and composer
• August 19 – Sadie Martinot, actress and soprano singer
• November 29 – Spyridon Samaras, Greek opera composer, who also set to music the Olympic Anthem
• December 5 – James Thornton, English-born US songwriter and vaudeville comedian
• December 18 – Lionel Monckton, composer of musical comedies
• date unknown
• *Camille D'elmar, opera singer
• *Giuseppe Fiorini, musical instrument maker
• *Ferdinand Ellsworth Olds, instrument manufacturer

  Deaths

• January 17 – Lola Montez, dancer
• January 22 – Giovanni Velluti, castrato singer
• February 12 – Hippolyte André Jean Baptiste Chélard, conductor and composer
• February 20 – Eugène Scribe, librettist
• March 14 – Louis Niedermeyer, composer
• May 3 – Anthony Philip Heinrich, composer
• August 9 – Vincent Novello, composer and music publisher
• October 24 – Elisabeth Frösslind, opera singer
• December 14 – Heinrich Marschner, composer
• December 16 – Karol Lipiński, violinist and composer
• December 18 – Ernst Anschütz, organist, composer and poet
• December 25 – Natale Abbadia, composer