1877 in music

Events

• March 4 – The premiere of the ballet Swan Lake with score by Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky is given at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow. It is not well received at this performance although remains in the repertory.
• April 30 – French poet Charles Cros describes a method of recording sound, the Paleophone.
• May 7 – 29 – Wagner Festival at the Royal Albert Hall in London. Richard Wagner conducts some of his own works and Hans Richter makes his British conducting debut.
• July 18 – Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky marries Antonina Milyukova in Moscow. After 6 weeks, the couple separate permanently.
• November 21 – Thomas Edison announces his invention of the phonograph in the United States.
• December 30 – The premiere of Brahms' Symphony No. 2 is given in Vienna by the Vienna Philharmonic under the direction of Hans Richter.
• Ludwig Thuille and Richard Strauss meet as students at Innsbruck. They become lifelong friends.

  Published popular music

• "Abdul Abulbul Amir" w.m. Percy French
• "Captain Cuff" w.m. G. W. Hunt
• "Chopsticks" m. Arthur de Lulli
• "Dear Old Pals" w.m. G. W. Hunt
• "Early In De Mornin'" w.m. Will Hays
• "In The Gloaming" w. Meta Orred m. Annie Fortescue Harrison
• "Little Daisy's Request" by Arabella M. Root
• "The Lost Chord" w. Adelaide Anne Procter m. Sir Arthur Sullivan
• "My Name Is John Wellington Wells" w. W. S. Gilbert m. Arthur Sullivan
• "Phelim O'Toole" by Harry Banks
• "Time Was When Love And I Were Well Acquainted" w. W. S. Gilbert m. Arthur Sullivan

  Classical music

• Johannes Brahms – Symphony No. 2, Op. 73 in D
• Anton Bruckner – Symphony No. 3 in D minor
• Felix Draeseke – Fata Morgana, Op. 13
• Antonín Dvořák – String Quartet No. 9, Op. 34 in D minor
• Robert Fuchs – Violin Sonata No. 1, Op. 20 in F minor
• Karl Goldmark – Violin Concerto No. 1, Op. 28 in A minor
• Franz Liszt – Les Jeux d'eaux à la Villa d'Este for piano.
• Leon Minkus – La Bayadère
• Joachim Raff – Violin Concerto No. 2, Op. 206 in A minor
• Josef Rheinberger – Violin Sonata No. 2, Op. 105 in E minor
• Camille Saint-Saëns – La Jeunesse d'Hercule, Six Études for piano
• Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky – Swan Lake

  Opera

• Emmanuel Chabrier – L'étoile
• Peter Heise – Monarch and Constable
• Jules Massenet – Le roi de Lahore
• Camille Saint-Saëns – Samson et Dalila
• Charles Villiers Stanford – The Veiled Prophet of Khorossan

  Musical theater

• The Chimes of Normandy, adapted from Les Cloches de Corneville, Broadway production opened at the Fifth Avenue Theatre on October 22 and ran for 16 performances
• Les Cloches de Corneville by Robert Planquette, Paris production opened at the Folies-Dramatique on April 19 and ran for 408 performances
• Le Grand Mogol, Marseilles production
• Orpheus in the Underworld by Jacques Offenbach, London revival
• The Sorcerer, Gilbert & Sullivan London production opened at the Opera Comique on November 17 and ran for 175 performances

  Births

• January 12 – Maude Nugent, songwriter
• February 16 – Sergei Bortkiewicz, Russian composer and pianist
• May 25 – Billy Murray, singer
• June 8 – Thorvald Aagaard, Danish composer
• July 14 – Agnes Nicholls, operatic soprano
• July 17 – Edward Madden, American lyricist
• July 24 – Percy Scholes, English musicologist
• July 27 – Ernő Dohnányi, Hungarian composer, conductor and pianist
• September 6 – Buddy Bolden, ragtime musician
• September 7 – Petar Stojanović, violinist and composer )
• September 15 – Daisy Wood, music hall singer
• September 26 – Alfred Cortot, Franco-Swiss pianist
• October 24 – Ernst Mielck, Finnish composer
• November 21 – Sigfrid Karg-Elert, German composer

  Deaths

• January 1 – Julie Berwald, opera singer, member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music.
• January 18 – George Tolhurst, composer
• March 23 – Caroline Unger, operatic contralto
• April 7 – Errico Petrella, opera composer
• April 26 – Louise Bertin, composer and poet
• June 3 – Ludwig Ritter von Köchel, cataloguer of the works of Mozart
• June 13 – Cesare Ciardi, flautist and composer
• June 29 – Clorinda Corradi, operatic contralto
• August 5 – Luigi Legnani, guitarist and composer
• September 12 – Julius Rietz, German cellist, composer and teacher, editor of an edition of Mendelssohn's complete works
• October 3 – Thérèse Tietjens, operatic soprano