Milton Adolphus

Irving Milton Adolphus (January 27, 1913 – August 16, 1988) was an American pianist and composer. Biography Milton Adolphus (January 27, 1913 – August 16, 1988) was an American composer, pianist, and music administrator whose career spanned popular music, classical composition, and public service. His output includes more than 200 orchestral, chamber, and vocal works, among them 13 symphonies and 35 string quartets, including one unnumbered quartet. He was also active in music education, arts administration, and civil rights organizations. Adolphus was born in the Bronx, New York City, and received his early musical training there. He later attended Yale University, where he studied music before continuing advanced compositional studies in Philadelphia with Rosario Scalero, a teacher known for his emphasis on formal clarity and structural discipline and for his influence on a generation of American composers. During the early 1930s, Adolphus worked as a pianist and arranger in stage shows and dance bands, participating in the professional popular-music environment of the period. In 1930, while still in his teens, he composed the melody later known as “Dream a Little Dream of Me.” C