Mortimer Wilson

Mortimer Wilson (August 6, 1876 – January 27, 1932) was an American composer of classical music. He also scored several musical and dramatic films in the 1920s. Wilson was born in Chariton, Iowa in Lucas County, a rural area in the south-central portion of the state. He studied organ, violin and composition with Frederick Grant Gleason at the Chicago Music College. He then studied in Leipzig, Germany with Max Reger. Upon return to the USA in 1911 he taught composition at the Atlanta Conservatory and conducted the Atlanta Philharmonic Orchestra. In 1916, he moved to Brenau College in Gainesville, Georgia. The suite for piano trio From My Youth Op. 5 was published in 1911 (in two books of four pieces each) and premiered by the Sitting Trio. It has been recorded by the Rawlins Piano Trio. The short piano suite Silhouettes from the Screen, Op. 55 (1919) includes miniature musical portraits of William S. Hart, Charles Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Theda Bara (who is portrayed in an atonal, expressionistic style) and Douglas Fairbanks). For the 1924 film The Thief of Bagdad. Douglas Fairbanks encouraged Wilson to provide a fully-fledged classical score, unusual at the time. Wilson composed lei