Charles Schulz, the creator of the popular “Peanuts” comic strip, was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on today’s date in 1922.

Music—Beethoven’s music in particular—played an important role in the life of Schroeder, a piano-playing character in “Peanuts,” but even NEW music snuck in the strip on occasion. In a 1990 installment, Peppermint Patty attends a young people's concert. Informed that the program would contain a piece by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, who had just won the Pulitzer Prize for Music, Peppermint Patty stands up and yells, ''Way to go, Ellen!''

The strip was inspired by a real-life incident. Schulz had heard a piece by Zwilich at a concert by the Sonoma County Symphony in Northern California, and was impressed. ''Every time I go to the symphony, it stirs up my brain,'' said Schultz.

Zwilich and Schultz struck up a friendship, and when Zwilich was asked to write a new work for a young people’s concert by New York’s Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, the result was a suite entitled “Peanuts Gallery.”

The 1997 premiere of “Peanuts Gallery” at Carnegie Hall was even acknowledged by Schultz in a Sunday “Peanuts” strip that had Schroeder telling Lucy about the new work. ``We're all in it,'' he says, and goes on to list the movements: “Schroeder's Beethoven Fantasy,” “Lullaby for Linus,” “Lucy Freaks Out,” etc.

After looking at a copy of the score, Lucy's only comment is: “MY part should be longer.''