United States on Music Theory Print

A. J. Turner

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Augustus John Turner (October 12, 1818 – May 14, 1905), known as “A. J. Turner”, was an American composer, band leader and music professor. He was the first director of the Stonewall Brigade Band of Staunton, Virginia, the oldest continuous community band funded by tax moneys in the United States. They were mustered into the Stonewall Brigade under Stonewall Jackson of the Confederacy during the Civil War. Turner served through the Valley Campaign, the Seven Days Battles, and was at the Battle of Cedar Mountain. Turner was a professor of music at the Wesleyan Female Institute, the Staunton Male Academy, and the Deaf, Dumb, and Blind Institute. He also played a part in the temperance movement. Ancestry and early years Augustus John Turner was born on October 12, 1818, in Spartanburg County, South Carolina, to Samuel M. Turner and Mahala Johnson Chapman. His father Samuel was a farmer living near the site of Fort Prince. Both Turner’s grandfathers fought in the Revolutionary War. His father Samuel’s father was James Turner, who settled in South Carolina near Coulter’s Ford on the Pacolet River with his father George Henry Turner, after the death of his mother Hannah Middleton in Virg

Aaron Avshalomov

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Aaron Avshalomov (; 11 November 1894 – 16 April 1965) was a Russian-born Jewish composer. His work included several ballets, two operas, a violin concerto, four symphonies and a flute concerto. Early life Born into a Mountain Jewish family in Nikolayevsk-on-Amur, Russia, Avshalomov was sent for medical studies to Zürich. After the October Revolution in 1917, which made further studies in Europe impossible, his family sent him to the United States. Career Less than a year later, he chose to move to China, Between 1918 and 1947, he worked to create a synthesis of Chinese musical elements and Western techniques of orchestral composition. Among the first works of this type that he created was the opera Kuan Yin, which premiered in Peking in 1925. In the spring of 1935, at the invitation of He Luting, he orchestrated the newly composed March of the Volunteers by Nie Er for the film Children of Troubled Times (1935), making him the first to orchestrate what would become the national anthem of the People’s Republic of China. Avshalomov made his main livelihood at bookstores and libraries. He was the head librarian of the Public Library, Shanghai Municipal Council for 15 years from 1928 un

Aaron Copland

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Early years#

Aaron Copland was born in Brooklyn, New York, on November 14, 1900. He was the youngest of five children in a Conservative Jewish immigrant family of Lithuanian origin. While emigrating from Russia to the United States, Copland’s father, Harris Morris Copland, lived and worked in Scotland for two to three years to pay for his boat fare to the United States. It was there that Copland’s father may have Anglicized his surname “Kaplan” to “Copland”, though Copland himself believed for many years that the change had been caused by an Ellis Island immigration official when his father entered the country. Copland was unaware until late in his life that the family name had been Kaplan, his parents having never told him. on the corner of Dean Street and Washington Avenue, and most of the children helped out in the store. His father was a staunch Democrat. The family members were active in Congregation Baith Israel Anshei Emes, where Aaron celebrated his bar mitzvah, for which he studied under Israel Goldfarb. Not especially athletic, the sensitive young man became an avid reader and often read Horatio Alger stories on his front steps. Copland’s father had no musical interest. His mother, Sarah Mittenthal Copland, sang, played the piano, and arranged music lessons for her children. Copland had four older siblings: two brothers, Ralph and Leon, and two sisters, Laurine and Josephine. Of his siblings, his oldest brother Ralph was the most advanced musically; he was proficient on the violin. Laurine had the strongest connection with Aaron; she gave him his first piano lessons, promoted his musical education, and supported him in his musical career. A student at the Metropolitan Opera School and frequent opera-goer, Laurine also brought home libretti for Aaron to study. Copland attended Boys High School and in the summer went to various camps. Most of his early exposure to music was at Jewish weddings and ceremonies, and occasional family musicales. Copland began writing songs at the age of eight and a half. His earliest notated music, about seven bars he wrote when age 11, was for an opera scenario he created and called Zenatello. From 1913 to 1917 he took piano lessons with Leopold Wolfsohn, who taught him the standard classical fare. Copland’s first public music performance was at a Wanamaker’s recital. By age 15, after attending a concert by Polish composer-pianist Ignacy Jan Paderewski, Copland decided to become a composer. At 16, he heard his first symphony, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. After attempts to further his music study from a correspondence course, Copland took formal lessons in harmony, theory, and composition from Rubin Goldmark, a noted teacher and composer of American music (who had given George Gershwin three lessons). Goldmark, with whom Copland studied between 1917 and 1921, gave the young Copland a solid foundation, especially in the Germanic tradition. As Copland later said: “This was a stroke of luck for me. I was spared the floundering that so many musicians have suffered through incompetent teaching.” But Copland also said that Goldmark had “little sympathy for the advanced musical idioms of the day” and his “approved” composers ended with Richard Strauss. Copland’s graduation piece from his studies with Goldmark was a three-movement piano sonata in a Romantic style. But he had also composed more original and daring pieces that he did not share with his teacher. In addition to regularly attending the Metropolitan Opera and the New York Symphony, where he heard the standard classical repertory, Copland continued his musical development through an expanding circle of musical friends. After graduating from high school, he played in dance bands. Continuing his musical education, he received further piano lessons from Victor Wittgenstein, who found him “quiet, shy, well-mannered, and gracious in accepting criticism”. Copland’s fascination with the Russian Revolution and its promise for freeing the lower classes drew a rebuke from his father and uncles. In spite of that, in his early adult life, Copland developed friendships with people who had socialist and communist leanings.

Aaron Jay Kernis

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Aaron Jay Kernis (born January 15, 1960) is a Pulitzer Prize- and Grammy Award-winning American composer serving as a member of the Yale School of Music faculty. Kernis spent 15 years as the music advisor to the Minnesota Orchestra and as director of the Minnesota Orchestra’s Composers’ Institute, and was the workshop director of the Nashville Symphony Composer Lab. He has received numerous awards and honors throughout his thirty-five-year career. Background, early life, and education Aaron Jay Kernis was born in Philadelphia, and grew up in neighboring Bensalem Township, Pennsylvania. He is Jewish and has said that Jewish history and music have influenced his own compositions. He began his musical career by playing the violin and piano. His composition career began at age 13, and he was awarded three BMI Foundation Student Composers Awards throughout his time as a student. He studied composition with John Adams at the San Francisco Conservatory; Charles Wuorinen at the Manhattan School of Music; and Morton Subotnick, Bernard Rands, and Jacob Druckman at Yale University. His wide range of teachers and time spent on both the east and west coasts helps to define his eclectic musical

Aaron Robinson (composer)

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Aaron Robinson is an American composer, conductor, and musicologist. In 2013, he was nominated for an Emmy Award for composing Maine Public Broadcasting Network’s Maine Arts series theme music. Personal background Robinson attended Medomak Valley High School in Waldoboro, Maine. At 16 years of age—a self-taught musician who never took piano lessons By his late teens, he was creating, performing and producing concerts and theatrical productions, including the musical Moody Blue for which he wrote both the music and lyrics. According to a 2013 interview, Robinson studied composition and piano performance at the Boston Conservatory of Music with composers John Adams and Larry Thomas Bell, as well as film scoring with John Williams at the Berklee School of Music; but chose not to graduate with a degree. Instead, he “went out and lived the life of music,” as he said in a 2017 interview. In 2001, he became organist and choirmaster for “Music at Immanuel” at the Immanuel Baptist Church in Portland, Maine. Robinson lives on the coast of Maine. In 1997, Robinson conducted Treemonisha: The Concert Version by ragtime composer Scott Joplin at the Rockport Opera House in Rockport, Maine, with a

Aaron Seeman

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Aaron Seeman is an American composer, pianist, and accordion player, who has distinguished himself by adapting punk rock, popular music, show tunes, and cartoon theme songs for the accordion, as Duckmandu. Duckmandu’s repertoire also includes adaptations of Klezmer, Classical Country, and Polka pieces, as well as conventional accordion repertoire - polkas and tangos - at bar mitzvahs, weddings and Oktoberfest celebrations. Duckmandu performance sets include such diverse material as the Dead Kennedys, Beethoven, the Power Puff Girls theme song, and a musical rendition of the Periodic Table of the Elements. Maximum Rock ’n Roll, the premier punk magazine, pronounced him “warble for warble spot-on Jello” for his note-for-note renditions of the entire first Dead Kennedys album, Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables. He currently resides in Oakland, California. Bands Seeman was a founding member of the eclectic Romanian Music-inspired folk group Fishtank Ensemble. Seeman is a founding member, arranger, and vocalist with San Francisco’s Punk Rock Orchestra, which performs full scale orchestral versions of classic punk songs. He also plays accordion in the bands Shamalamacord, Polkacide, and

Aaron Zigman

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Aaron Zigman (born January 6, 1963) is a classically trained American composer, producer, arranger, songwriter, conductor, and musician who has scored music for films including The Notebook, The Company Men, Bridge to Terabithia, John Q., The Proposal, Flicka, For Colored Girls, Flash of Genius, Sex & the City, Alpha Dog, and Escape from Planet Earth. He has also written, arranged and produced over 50 hit albums, and co-written songs with legendary and contemporary artists including Quincy Jones, Christina Aguilera, Phil Collins, Was (Not Was), John Legend, Dionne Warwick, Ray Charles, Natalie Cole, Aretha Franklin, Tina Turner, and Seal. Early life and career Zigman was born in San Diego, California. His mother, a pianist and harpist, was his first music teacher, and he developed an early interest in jazz and concert music, studying with Rocky Slight, Gene Hartwell (a San Diego jazz player), and Florence Stephenson. A graduate of Point Loma High School, he studied at the University of California, Los Angeles. In 1983, he began studying with his cousin George Bassman (who orchestrated The Wizard of Oz and wrote the music for the films Marty and The Postman Always Rings Twice). In t

Abbie Betinis

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Abbie Betinis (born January 21, 1980) is an American composer. She has composed music for a variety of musical ensembles, and is best known for her choral music and other vocal works. Early life and education Born in Stevens Point, Wisconsin, Betinis began Suzuki piano and ear training at age 4 at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point’s American Suzuki Talent Education Center (now Aber Suzuki Center). Valedictorian of her high school class, she enrolled in St. Olaf College on a piano scholarship, but during her sophomore year was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma and was forced to return home to begin chemotherapy. When she returned to St. Olaf, she changed course to pursue music composition and linguistics, graduating in 2001. She later earned a M.A. in music composition from the University of Minnesota, and studied harmony and counterpoint in the tradition of Nadia Boulanger at the European American Musical Alliance (EAMA) Summer Institute in Paris, France. Her teachers have included Mary Ellen Childs, Peter Hamlin, Philip Lasser, and Judith Lang Zaimont. Career The music of Abbie Betinis has been described as “inventive and richly melodic” (The New York Times), “the highligh

Abbie Gerrish-Jones

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Abbie Jane Gerrish-Jones (September 10, 1863 – February 5, 1929) was an American composer, librettist and music writer. Early life and education Abbie Gerrish was born in Vallejo, California, and grew up in Sacramento, the daughter of Samuel Howard Gerrish and Sarah Jane Rogers Gerrish. Both of her parents were born in New England; her father kept weather records for Sacramento. She began playing piano and composing at an early age and studied with Charles Winter. Career Gerrish-Jones composed nine operas. She also wrote over 100 songs. Her opera Priscilla is considered the first complete opera with both libretto and score composed by an American woman. One of her compositions won the Josef Hoffmann prize for “best American piano work”. Her songs for children were used in California public schools. Several concerts were given in California which featured Gerrish-Jones’s music exclusively, including “The Evening of Song” in Sacramento in 1906, and another in San Francisco in 1913. “They are the expression of a melodic gift which is often of great charm,” wrote critic Redfern Mason about Gerrish-Jones’ compositions in 1914, “supplemented by a keen sensibility to exotic influences and

Abby Hutchinson Patton

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Abby Hutchinson Patton (August 29, 1829 – November 24, 1892) was an American singer and poet. She performed with siblings as part of a family group, the Hutchinson Family Singers. Early life Abby Hutchinson was born in Milford, New Hampshire, on August 29, 1829. She was the fourth daughter and the sixteenth and youngest child of Jesse Hutchinson (1778–1851) and Mary Hastings Leavitt (1783–1868), descendants of the Pilgrims. Thirteen of those children lived to adult age, but in 1892, only John and Abby were living. References External links * *

Abe Holzmann

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Abraham Holzmann (19 August 1874 – 16 January 1939) was an American composer, famous for his march “Blaze Away!”. Life and career Abraham Holzmann was born in New York City on 19 August 1874. His parents were Jacob Holzmann, a Hungarian-Jewish immigrant and Isabella Holzmann, a native of Louisiana. The young Holzmann learned music in Germany. A review originally published by the New York Herald on Sunday, 13 January 1901, entitled German Composer who Writes American Cakewalk Music describes " h is knowledge of bass and counterpoint is thorough, and his standard compositions bear the stamp of harmonic lore, which makes his proclivity for the writing of the popular style of music the more remarkable." Abe married Isabelle Fishblatt around 1908, and he became the manager of the Orchestra Department at Jerome Remick & Company, music publisher in New York. He was an early member (1923) of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP). He earned his livelihood as composer/arranger for Tin Pan Alley publishers, including Leo Feist. He later was advertising manager for the American Federation of Musicians publication, International Musician. He was a member of Freemason

Abraham Binder

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Abraham Wolf Binder (January 1895 – October 1966) was an American composer, conductor, educator, and a leading figure in the development of American Jewish liturgical music. Early life and education Binder was born on the Lower East Side of New York City into a family of cantorial background. His father was a baal tefillah who had learned synagogue music from his own father, a cantor in Galicia (Eastern Europe). At age four Binder began singing in his father’s synagogue choir, and from age seven to fourteen he sang as an alto soloist in the professional choir of Cantor Abraham Frachtenberg. Frachtenberg’s emphasis on choral discipline and composition strongly influenced Binder’s later approach to synagogue music. At fourteen Binder became choir director of the Kamenitzer Schul in Manhattan under Cantor Abraham Singer. Honors and death In 1960 Binder received the Frank L. Weil Award from the National Jewish Welfare Board for distinguished contribution to American Jewish culture. * Two Hassidic Moods (string quartet) * Orchestral suites (various) * Symphonic workshop compositions for the 92nd Street Y Folk song arrangements and collections Binder was an early American arranger of Pal

Abraham Ellstein

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Abraham “Abe” Ellstein (, , July 7, 1907 – March 22, 1963) was an American composer, bandleader and recording artist in the Yiddish theatre and Yiddish popular music milieu. Along with Sholom Secunda, Joseph Rumshinsky, and Alexander Olshanetsky, Ellstein was one of the “big four” composers of his era in New York City’s Yiddish Theater District scene. His musical Yidl Mitn Fidl became one of the greatest hits of Yiddish-language cinema. Life and career He was born on the Lower East Side, Manhattan, at that time an Eastern European Jewish immigrant area. His musical education began at the Third Street Music School Settlement. From the age of nine to thirteen, he studied piano with Frederick Jacobi. He was the conductor of the boy’s choir of the Broadway production Richard III, at only thirteen years old. He went on to study at the Graduate School of Juilliard, training as a conductor, with a major in composition. Ellstein’s only opera, The Golem, had its world premiere at the New York City Opera under the baton of music director Julius Rudel on March 23, 1962. The libretto was created by the composer and his wife, Sylvia Regan, based on the mythical Golem tale of the Central Europea

Adam Fong

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Adam Fong (born June 21, 1980) is an American composer, performer and producer active in the San Francisco Bay area. He studied English and Music at Stanford University earning an M.A. in 2004. He then completed an M.F.A. in media studies at Cal Arts in 2006 where his teachers included James Tenney and Wadada Leo Smith. Career He began working with Charles Amirkhanian for the well known concert organization Other Minds in 2006 where he served as Associate Director. In addition he co-founded Emerging Arts Professionals, a network for people working in the arts sector in or near San Francisco. He continues to be a part of the Leadership Group of this organization. He is active as a performer with various groups in the bay area. Center for New Music San Francisco, Inc. The Center for New Music San Francisco, Inc.was founded in 2012, and is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporation. The Center was conceived in 2011 by Adam Fong and Brent Miller. Partial List of Compositions *Yizkor (2002) for clarinet, piano and cello Premiered May, 2003 at Stanford *String Quartet No. 1 (2003) Premiered May, 2003 at Stanford *Five Times Remembered (for Bill Evans, 2004) for piano and tape Premiered Novem

Adam Gwon

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Adam Gwon is an American composer and lyricist living in New York City. Personal life Gwon was born in Boston, and spent his childhood in Baltimore before attending New York University Tisch School of the Arts. While studying acting at NYU, Gwon was encouraged to pursue writing by a teacher, David Bucknam, and was later mentored by the musical theater writing team of Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty. Gwon is of Chinese-American and Jewish descent. Professional life Gwon made his off-Broadway debut in 2009 with Ordinary Days, the first musical production in Roundabout Theatre Company’s black box space, Roundabout Underground. In 2011, Signature Theatre in Arlington, Virginia, premiered Gwon’s musical The Boy Detective Fails, based on the novel by Joe Meno, as part of their American Musical Voices Project. South Coast Repertory commissioned and premiered his musical Cloudlands, written with Octavio Solis, in 2012. In 2015, Gwon had two simultaneous world premieres, both co-written with Julia Jordan: Bernice Bobs Her Hair, adapted from the F. Scott Fitzgerald short story, at the Lyric Theatre of Oklahoma, and Cake Off at Signature Theatre in Arlington, Virginia. Cake Off received a He

Adam Schoenberg

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Adam Schoenberg (born November 15, 1980) is an American composer. A member of the Atlanta School of Composers, his works have been performed by numerous orchestras and ensembles in the U.S. Schoenberg was the 2010–2012 guest composer for the Aspen Music Festival, the 2012–2013 composer-in-residence for the Kansas City Symphony, the 2013–2014 composer-in-residence for the Lexington Philharmonic, and the 2015–2017 composer-in-residence for the Fort Worth Symphony. Schoenberg’s honors include a 2009 and 2010 MacDowell Colony fellowship, the 2007 Morton Gould Young Composer Award from ASCAP, and the 2006 Charles Ives Prize from the American Academy of Arts & Letters. A graduate of Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Schoenberg earned his master’s degree and Doctor of Musical Arts from The Juilliard School, where he studied composition with John Corigliano and Robert Beaser and wrote his thesis about noted film composer Thomas Newman. While at Juilliard, Schoenberg was awarded the Palmer-Dixon Prize (for “Most Outstanding Composition”). A resident of Los Angeles, Schoenberg is assistant professor of Composition at Occidental College. He is married to playwright and screenwriter Janine Salina

Adam Wingard

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Adam Wingard ( ; born December 3, 1982) is an American filmmaker. He has served as a film director, producer, screenwriter, editor, cinematographer, actor, and composer on numerous American films. Following an early career as a member of the mumblecore movement, he became notable for his works in the horror and action genres, especially the films You’re Next (2011), and The Guest (2014), and the bigger-budget franchise films Blair Witch (2016), Death Note (2017), Godzilla vs. Kong (2021), and its sequel Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (2024). Early life Wingard was born in Oak Ridge, Tennessee and graduated from Full Sail University in 2002. Career His first feature, the horror comedy Home Sick, starring Bill Moseley and Tiffany Shepis, was a stepping stone to his second feature, the psychotropic ghost story horror film Pop Skull. Made on a total budget of $2,000, Pop Skull had its international premiere at the Rome Film Festival and its domestic premiere at the AFI Film Festival in 2007. A Horrible Way to Die (2010) and What Fun We Were Having (2011) that followed. The romantic horror film A Horrible Way to Die premiered at the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival in the Vangu

Addie Anderson Wilson

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Addie Anderson Wilson (August 17, 1876 – October 8, 1966) was an American composer, organist and carillonist who was born in Lawrenceville, Alabama, and lived in Alabama for most of her life. She studied music with Mary Carr Moore and M. Wilson. She married William Sidney Wilson on November 9, 1892, and they had one son. Life and career Wilson was active in civic affairs and music organizations, winning awards and holding several elected positions, such as: *First Vice President, Alabama Federation of Music Clubs *President, Harmony Club of Dothan, Alabama *President, Music Study Club *Woman of the Year, Dothan, Alabama Works Wilson composed several operettas and piano pieces, which were initially published by George Willig & Co and Carl Fischer Music. She also composed: Piano *“Southern Breezes” Vocal *“Apple Blossoms” *“Evening Song” *“Faith” (text from Mark X:36–52) *“Goodnight, Mr. Moon” *“Hi, Mr. Sunshine” *“I Will Give You Rest” (a cappella chorus; text from Matthew XI:28–30) *“Lullaby” *“Under the Rose” (words by Richard Henry Stoddard) *“Whenever Skies are Gray” References

Adegoke Steve Colson

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Adegoke Steve Colson is an American jazz pianist, composer, and educator. A member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) since the early 1970s, Colson has performed and recorded with musicians including Joseph Jarman, Reggie Workman, David Murray, Henry Threadgill, Malachi Favors, Kahil El’Zabar, among many others. His work incorporates themes of African American identity and social consciousness, and has been reviewed in publications such as The New York Times, JazzTimes, All About Jazz, and The New York City Jazz Record. Early life and education Colson was born in Newark, New Jersey, and raised in East Orange, where he graduated from East Orange High School. He studied piano at Northwestern University’s School of Music beginning in 1967 and also studied alto saxophone with Fred Hemke. He earned a Bachelor of Music Education (BME) in 1971. where he is referenced alongside his spouse, vocalist, composer and educator Iqua Colson, as part of the AACM’s second generation Career Colson’s early recordings were with The Unity Troupe, a group he founded in the 1970s. Their debut album, Triumph!, was released in 1979 and followed by No Reservation in 1980 on t

Adel Heinrich

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Adel Verna Heinrich (July 20, 1926 – August 10, 2022) was an American composer, organist, and university teacher. She taught music at Colby College until her retirement in 1988. Personal life and career Born in Cleveland, Ohio, Heinrich graduated from Flora Stone Mather College with a Bachelor of Arts in 1951, and a master’s degree in sacred music from the Union Theological Seminary in 1954. In 1976, she received a doctorate from the University of Wisconsin–Madison based on her thesis Bach’s Die Kunst der Fuge : a living compendium of fugal procedures. Her book Organ and Harpsichord Music by Women Composers was published in 1991. Her compositions for organ include A Carol is Born (a music drama for two sopranos, alto, flute, organ) and the oratorio The Nazarene. Heinrich taught at Colby College in Waterville, Maine, from 1964 to 1988, where she was associate professor of music and director of chapel music. Heinrich died on August 10, 2022, at the age of 96. Awards Heinrich received the Award of Merit from the National Federation of Music Clubs and the Clemens Award in music. She also received three grants, the Maximum Humanities Travel Grant to use and study old organs in Europe, a

Adeline Frances Fitz

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Adeline Frances “Fanny” Slade Fitz (July 12, 1861 – March 7, 1938) was an American composer and clubwoman, based in Boston. She was state president of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR), and also held national office in the organization. Early life and education Slade was born in Chelsea, Massachusetts, the daughter of David Slade and Elizabeth Wilson Whitaker Slade. Her father was a spice importer; her mother was born in England. She was a student at Carolyn Johnson’s School for Girls in Boston. She also studied voice with Mrs. L. P. Morrill. Career Fitz was Massachusetts state regent of the Daughters of the American Revolution, and held national offices in the organization as well. She was also a founding member of the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities, and the Society of Colonial Dames. Compositions Slade wrote music and songs for school and community use, including children’s songs, patriotic songs, and hymns. * “The Sweetest Flower that Blows” (lyrics by Frederick Peterson) * “The Dandelion and the Daisy” * “The Siren of Old” * “Alouette” * “Sailing Away to Slumberland” (lyrics by Grace Lawrence) * “Christ the Lord is Risen Today” (lyrics by F

Adolf Busch

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Adolf Georg Wilhelm Busch (8 August 1891 – 9 June 1952) was a German-Swiss violinist, conductor, and composer. Life and career Busch was born in Siegen in Westphalia. He studied at the Cologne Conservatory with Willy Hess and Bram Eldering. His composition teacher was Fritz Steinbach but he also learned much from his future father-in-law Hugo Grüters in Bonn. In 1912, Busch founded the Vienna Konzertverein Quartet, consisting of the principals from the Konzertverein orchestra, which made its debut at the 1913 Salzburg Festival. After World War I, he founded the Busch Quartet, which from the 1920–21 season included Gösta Andreasson, violin, Karl Doktor, viola, and Paul Grümmer, cello. The quartet was in existence with varying personnel until 1951. The additional member of the circle was Rudolf Serkin, who became Busch’s duo partner at 18 and eventually married Busch’s daughter, Irene, 1935 in Basel. The Busch Quartet and Serkin became the nucleus of the Busch Chamber Players, founded in Basel, a forerunner of modern chamber orchestras. In 1927, with the rise of Adolf Hitler, Busch decided he could not in good conscience stay in Germany, so he emigrated to Basel, Switzerland. Busch w

Adolphus Hailstork

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Adolphus Cunningham Hailstork III (born April 17, 1941) is an American composer and educator. He was born in Rochester, New York, and grew up in Albany, New York, where he studied violin, piano, organ, and voice. He currently resides in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Career Hailstork began his musical career in 1963, when he studied composition with Mark Fax at Howard University, Washington, D.C. (BMus 1963). In the summer of 1963 he attended the American Conservatory at Fontainebleau, France, where he studied with Nadia Boulanger. In 1965, Hailstork received a Bachelor of Music from the Manhattan School of Music, where he studied under Vittorio Giannini and David Diamond, and in 1966 received a Master of Music at the same institution. In October 2022, he was featured as “Composer of the Week” on BBC Radio 3. Hailstork married in 2007. * 1977: Belwin-Mills Max Winkler Award, presented by the Band Directors National Association ** Out of Depths * 1987: Fulbright fellowship for study in Guyana * 1992: named a Cultural Laureate of the Commonwealth of Virginia * 1999: Brock Commission from the American Choral Directors Association *2001: Doctor of Humane Letters honorary doctorate from the

Adrian Younge

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Adrian Younge (born May 7, 1978) is an American composer, arranger and music producer based in the Los Angeles area. Background Younge grew up in Fontana, California, United States. His father is a lawyer and Younge himself earned a Juris Doctor degree from the American College of Law in Orange County. Younge has worked as a lawyer and law professor—having taught entertainment law at his alma mater. Early in his career, Younge worked for the legal department of MTV. He played bass and keyboards in a band during the late 1990s, and began composing after sampling records with an MPC. He quickly learned to play several instruments and experimented with analog recordings which resulted in the Italian influenced Venice Dawn, which he released on EP. In 2009, his soundtrack for the film Black Dynamite was released on the Wax Poetics label. In 2011, Younge revived and expanded Venice Dawn into a longer work called Something about April. In 2013, he released Adrian Younge Presents the Delfonics with William Hart of the Delfonics and Twelve Reasons to Die with Ghostface Killah. Younge also operates a vinyl record store in Los Angeles called Artform Studio. and Something About April III (202

Al Lerner (composer)

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Al Lerner (1919 – January 19, 2014) was an American pianist, composer, arranger, and conductor from the big band era. He was a member of the Harry James band for many years, playing piano. He wrote music for several artists, including Allan Sherman and Liza Minnelli. He also wrote the music for “So Until I See You”, the closing theme for The Tonight Show with Jack Paar in the early 1960s, and was the pianist for A Tribute to Eddie Duchin, which was a soundtrack for the 1956 biographical film pic The Eddy Duchin Story. Biography Lerner was born on April 7, 1919, in Cleveland, the youngest of three children. Their father Abraham had died on November 11, 1918, before Al’s birth, a victim of the 1918 flu pandemic. Lerner’s mother Jennie Takiff then married a sheet metal worker named Abe Lerner, who became Al’s adopted father. During the American Prohibition banning the sale of alcohol, Abe Lerner used his metalworking abilities on the side to make stills for Cleveland gangsters and bootleggers, and used his seven-year-old son Al as a courier for payments. It was a rough neighborhood with regular mob wars between rival gangsters, multiple killings on Lerner’s street, and payoffs to the

Alan Chang

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Alan Peijei Chang (born December 4, 1979) is an American pianist and songwriter, best known for his work with Michael Bublé. Biography Originally from San Jose, California, he graduated from the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music with a degree in jazz studies in 2002. Chang began his passion for jazz at Castillero Middle School. At the age of 13, Chang began accompanying nearby Pioneer High School with their daily musical rehearsals as well as a local dance studio. When Chang attended Pioneer High School, he soon received local recognition for his playing, and by his senior year he had recorded an independent “senior project”. The CD included original compositions and was sold locally to recoup recording expenses. Later that year Chang was selected as one of two pianists to the San Francisco High School Grammy Band. After graduating from USC’s Thornton School of Music, Chang was discovered and asked to audition for an up-and-coming artist, Michael Bublé. Since 2003, Chang has been Bublé’s musical director and pianist, traveling the world to sold-out shows, radio, and television appearances. Works In 2005, Chang co-wrote “Home” with Bublé and Amy Foster-Gil

Alan Hovhaness

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Alan Hovhaness (; born Alan Vaness Chakmakjian; March 8, 1911 – June 21, 2000) was an American composer. He was one of the most prolific 20th-century composers, with his official catalog comprising 67 numbered symphonies (surviving manuscripts indicate over 70) and 434 opus numbers. The true tally is well over 500 surviving works, since many opus numbers comprise two or more distinct works. The Boston Globe music critic Richard Buell wrote: “Although he has been stereotyped as a self-consciously Armenian composer (rather as Ernest Bloch is seen as a Jewish composer), his output assimilates the music of many cultures. What may be most American about all of it is the way it turns its materials into a kind of exoticism. The atmosphere is hushed, reverential, mystical, nostalgic.” Early life and education He was born Alan Vaness Chakmakjian () in Somerville, Massachusetts, to Haroutioun Hovanes Chakmakjian (an Armenian chemistry professor at Tufts College who had been born in Adana, present-day Turkey) and Madeleine Scott (an American of Scottish descent who had graduated from Wellesley College). When he was five, his family moved from Somerville to Arlington, Massachusetts. A Hovhanes

Alan Lloyd (composer)

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Alan Huber Lloyd (10 January 1943 – 31 March 1986) was an American composer, primarily known for his scores for the theatrical works of Robert Wilson and the ballets of Andy de Groat. His score for Wilson’s A Letter for Queen Victoria was nominated for Best Original Score at the 29th Tony Awards. He also composed works for solo piano and for chamber ensembles in a conservative tonal style. Life and career Lloyd was born in Baltimore, Maryland, the son of Mary née Grant and Allen Huber Lloyd. His father was a mechanical engineer who founded the toy company Multifold Inc. in Milford, Ohio. Lloyd received his BA in Music from Antioch College where he studied under the composer Donald Keats. According to Laurence Shyer in Robert Wilson and his collaborators, Lloyd was the first of several composers with whom Robert Wilson would work. Their collaboration began when Lloyd composed the incidental music for Wilson’s 1969 production of The King of Spain. Lloyd also played the title role and constructed the gigantic pair of cat’s legs which hung from the proscenium throughout the play. Lloyd went on to compose incidental piano music for several more early works by Wilson, sometimes performin

Alan Mauritz Swanson

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Alan Mauritz Swanson (born Chicago, Illinois October 29, 1941) is an American composer and academic who lives in the Netherlands. He took his BA (1963) and MA (1965) at Indiana University and his PhD at the University of Chicago (1973). In between he studied at Stockholm University. As an academic, he taught at Augustana College (Rock Island, Illinois), Brigham Young University (Provo, Utah), and the University of Groningen (the Netherlands), and came to specialize in the theatre and opera of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Trained as a singer, many of his early compositions are for voice, but recent work has tended to be varied in form: string quartets, a viola concerto, a partita for piano, and others. In 2006, he was honored for his academic and community work by being appointed Officer in the Order of Oranje-Nassau. Partial works list Vocal Choral * 1970: Prairie Conversation 2 voices Alto, Baritone * 1970: Carol “Child, sleeping, do not wake” Trebles, solo instrumental * 1971: Magnificat Choir SATB * 1975: God is gone up SSA, Triangle * 1980: Good Shepherd Variations for Choir, SSA * 1980: Preliminary Look at Gerard Manley Hopkins’ “Pied Beauty” Baritone solo * 1986

Alan Shulman

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Alan Shulman (4 June 1915 – 10 July 2002) was an American composer and cellist. He wrote a considerable amount of symphonic music, chamber music, and jazz music. Trumpeter Eddie Bailey said, “Alan had the greatest ear of any musician I ever came across. He had better than perfect pitch. I’ve simply never met anyone like him.” Some of his more well known works include his 1940 Neo-Classical Theme and Variations for Viola and Piano and his A Laurentian Overture, which was premiered by the New York Philharmonic in 1952 under the baton of Guido Cantelli. Also of note is his 1948 Concerto for Cello and Orchestra which was also premiered by the New York Philharmonic with cellist Leonard Rose and conductor Dimitri Mitropoulos. Many of Shulman’s works have been recorded, and the violinist Jascha Heifetz and jazz clarinetist Artie Shaw have been particular exponents of his work both in performance and on recordings. Biography Early life and education Shulman was born in Baltimore, Maryland, the son of a Russian immigrant father and Jewish mother. His father, who died when Shulman was one and a half, worked as a pharmacist and was a skilled amateur flautist. He had two siblings, Sylvan Shulm

Alan Silvestri

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Alan Anthony Silvestri (born March 26, 1950) is an American composer, conductor, orchestrator and music producer of film scores. He has received two Grammy Awards and two Primetime Emmy Awards as well as nominations for two Academy Awards and two Golden Globe Awards. He has been associated with director Robert Zemeckis since 1984, composing music for nearly all of his feature films, including the Back to the Future film series (1985–1990), Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), Death Becomes Her (1992), Forrest Gump (1994), Contact (1997), What Lies Beneath (2000), Cast Away (2000), The Polar Express (2004), Beowulf (2007), Flight (2012) and The Walk (2015). Silvestri also scored many other popular movies, including Predator (1987), The Abyss (1989), Father of the Bride (1991), The Bodyguard (1992), Eraser (1996), The Parent Trap (1998), Practical Magic (1998), Stuart Little (1999), The Mummy Returns (2001), Lilo & Stitch (2002), Van Helsing (2004), the first three Night at the Museum films, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (2009), The A-Team (2010), Ready Player One (2018), and five Marvel Cinematic Universe films including Captain America: The First Avenger (2011), The Avengers (2012), Aveng

Albert Gumble

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Albert Gumble (September 10, 1883 – November 30, 1946) was an American composer, pianist, music arranger, and songwriter. After graduating from the Auditorium School of Music in Cincinnati, he lived and worked briefly in Chicago during the early years of the twentieth century before moving to New York City where he worked as a Tin Pan Alley composer of ragtime pieces and songs. As a songwriter he was particularly associated with dixie tunes. He also was a prolific music arranger and contributed music to several Broadway musicals. From 1938 until his death in 1946 he was a resident pianist at the Ansonia Hotel. Life and career Albert Gumble was born in North Vernon, Indiana, on September 10, 1883. He was the younger brother of pianist, songwriter, and publisher Moses Edwin Gumble. He was educated at the Auditorium School of Music (later known as the Ohio Conservatory of Music) in Cincinnati where he was a pupil of Clarence Adler After graduating, he moved to Chicago where he began composing in the early 1900s. He composed several more rags for the music publisher Jerome H. Remick, including the “Bolo Rag” (1908), “Minstrel Band Rag” (1909), “Georgia Rag” (1910), and “Red Fox Trot” (

Albert Hay Malotte

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Albert Hay Malotte (May 19, 1895 – November 16, 1964) was an American pianist, organist, composer and educator, best known for his musical setting of “The Lord’s Prayer”. Biography and career Malotte was the son of Charles and Katherine (Donavon) Malotte. He was in Boy Scouts of America Troop 1, the first Boy Scout troop in Philadelphia. Malotte graduated from Tioga High School and sang at Saint James Episcopal Church in Philadelphia as a choir boy. He studied with Victor Herbert, W. S. Stansfield, and later in Paris with organist Georges Jacob. His career as an organist began in Chicago where he played for silent pictures, and he later concertized throughout the US and Europe. During World War II he held the rank of captain in the Special Services for two years while he toured with the USO and entertained troops in New Guinea, Australia and Europe. At one point he sponsored his own troupe of entertainers that included Judith Anderson, Anne Triola and Helen McClure Preister. Malotte was an amateur pilot, avid golfer and even boxed with Jack Dempsey in Memphis, Tennessee. He spent most of his career as a composer in Hollywood. Malotte married Marguerite Stevens Hester on August 23,

Albert Pieczonka

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Albert Emil Theodor Pieczonka (February 10, 1828 – April 12, 1912) was a composer, pianist and music instructor who resided in Germany, England, and the United States. His most famous work, the “Tarantella in A Minor”, remains a popular piano standard more than 100 years after his death. Early life and education Albert Pieczonka was born in Königsberg on the Baltic coast of East Prussia. Pieczonka was the youngest of three children born to Gotthilf Immanuel (1801–1872) and Friederike Caroline Dorothea (Rehlander) Pieczonka (1803-1853). He briefly attended the University of Königsberg before enrolling in the Leipzig Conservatory in 1847. This institution, the oldest music university in Germany, was founded by composer Felix Mendelssohn in 1843. While at the conservatory, Pieczonka studied under famed pianist Ignaz Moscheles (1794–1870). He may have also studied under Franz Liszt before undertaking a solo career. Career In 1858, or thereabout, the Pieczonka family emigrated from continental Europe to London, England. In England, Pieczonka performed concerts and gave music lessons to children of the wealthy. During the 1880s, Pieczonka, his wife, and his daughters performed together t

Albert Richard Sendrey

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Albert Richard Sendrey, also Albert Richard Szendrei, (26 December 1911 – 18 May 2003) was an American composer, conductor and arranger of Austro-Hungarian origin. Sendrey is the son of the Hungarian-born composer, conductor and musicologist Alfred Szendrei. His mother, Eugenie (birth name: Eugenie Weisz), worked as a soprano at the Vienna State Opera under Gustav Mahler. Life and career Sendrey was born into a family of musicians in Chicago in 1911 during his father’s time as a theatre conductor. He studied with his father and attended the University of Music and Theatre Leipzig and the Conservatoire de Paris, as well as the Trinity College of Music in London. He was a student of Albert Coats, John Barbirolli and Henry Geehl. From 1935 to 1937, he worked as an arranger for film companies in Paris and from 1937 to 1944 in London. As a Jew, Sendrey fled from the National Socialists around 1933, first to Paris with his family. The Battle of France in May and June 1940 forced the family to flee further to the United States where they changed their Hungarian surname “Szendrei” to the Americanized spelling “Sendrey”. Albert Sendrey settled in Hollywood. Among other works, Sendrey wrote

Albert Stoessel

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Albert Frederic Stoessel (October 11, 1894 – May 12, 1943) was an American composer, violinist and conductor. Biography He was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1894. He studied music at the Berlin Hochschule as a pupil of Emanuel Wirth and Willy Hess. At 19 he began his professional playing career with the Hess String Quartet, and toured as a violin soloist in Switzerland, the Netherlands, and Germany. He returned to the United States in 1915 for a concert tour, appeared with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra and the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and lived in Boston until 1917 while pursuing his career as a violinist and composer. Stoessel enlisted in the United States Army in 1917, becoming a lieutenant in the 301st Infantry American Expeditionary Forces and leader of the regimental band at Camp Devens. Stoessel went to France in 1918 with the 76th Division as bandmaster of the 301st. He became director of the AEF Bandmaster’s School of Chaumont, France, organized by Walter Damrosch, after studying there with André Caplet. After his discharge in 1919, Stoessel performed as a soloist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and toured with Enrico Caruso’s last tour. In 1921 he became the ass

Albert Szirmai

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Albert Szirmai (sometimes credited as Albert Sirmay) (2 July 1880 –15 January 1967) was a Hungarian operetta composer and music editor. Szirmai was a graduate of the Budapest Academy of Music, studying piano and composition (with Hans Koessler). Szirmai received a doctorate in music from the University of Budapest, and was devoted to creating works for the stage. He wrote music for 12 one-act plays and over 300 songs for the Budapest theater Népszínház-Vígopera, at which he was musical director. When his first operetta, The Yellow Domino, met with success, he decided to continue in the genre; it is due to the works of Szirmai, Emmerich Kálmán, and Victor Jacobi, among others, that the Hungarian operetta gained recognition internationally at the beginning of the 20th century. Szirmai was born in Budapest. On September 3, 1923, he arrived in New York City aboard the and took a post as music director for Chappell Music (a publishing house now owned by Warner Music Group). He was music editor for such Broadway luminaries as Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, Richard Rodgers and George Gershwin, and for a collection of the British duo Gilbert and Sullivan. Szirmai made headlines in 1965, when he

Alden Jenks

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Alden Jenks (born August 10, 1940) is an American composer. Biography Alden Jenks was born in Michigan and received a B.A. from Yale University and an M.A. from the University of California, Berkeley. He studied composition with Lawrence Moss, Andrew Imbrie and Seymour Shifrin. He also studied composition in 1967 with Karlheinz Stockhausen at the University of California, Davis, and electronic music with David Tudor and Anthony Gnazzo. As a performer, he served as a controller of the live electronics for Stockhausen’s 1967 Darmstadt collective-composition project, Ensemble, and performed on synthesizer in the 25th anniversary concert of Terry Riley’s In C in 1989, released as a recording in 1995 on New Albion Records CD NA071. As a composer he is primarily known for his work in electronic media, and was Professor of Composition and Director of the E. L. Wiegand Composition Studio at the San Francisco Conservatory. John Adams has cited him as an influential colleague, crediting Jenks with introducing him to Wagner His composition Nagasaki won the Bourges Electronic Music Competition, and Marrying Music won the Viotti-Valsesia International Music Competition award. Compositions (sele

Alec Wilder

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Alexander Lafayette Chew Wilder (February 16, 1907 – December 24, 1980) was an American composer, author, and radio host. Considered one of the most inventive and lyrical American composers, he wrote thousands of pieces of music across various genres, including American popular song and classical music. Though his musical compositions were not always widely known during his lifetime, he became a notable figure in musical history for his 1972 book, American Popular Song: The Great Innovators, 1900–1950, which is widely regarded as a definitive work on the subject. He also hosted a Peabody Award-winning radio series, American Popular Song with Alec Wilder and Friends, on National Public Radio (NPR) in the mid-1970s. Biography Wilder was born in Rochester, New York, United States, While there, he edited a humor magazine and scored music for short films directed by James Sibley Watson. Wilder was eventually awarded an honorary degree in 1973. He was good friends with Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee, Tony Bennett and others who helped develop the American popular music canon. Among the popular songs he wrote or co-wrote were “I’ll Be Around” (a hit for the Mills Brothers), “While We’re Young”

Aleksandra Vrebalov

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Aleksandra Vrebalov (born September 22, 1970) is a Serbian-American composer based in New York City and Novi Sad, Serbia. Biography Vrebalov was born in the former Yugoslavia and came to the United States for study in 1995. She became a U.S. citizen in 2015. Vrebalov studied composition with Miroslav Statkic at Novi Sad University, then with Zoran Erić at Belgrade University, Elinor Armer at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and Ivana Loudová at the Prague Academy of Music. She was Composition Fellow of the Tanglewood Music Center in summer 1999. Vrebalov earned her Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Michigan where she studied with Evan Chambers and Michael Daugherty. Aleksandra Vrebalov’s more than 100 works range from concert music and opera to music for modern dance and film. Her music has been performed by the Kronos Quartet, Glimmerglass Opera with Cincinnati Opera, Serbian National Theater, English National Ballet, Rambert Dance, Sybarite5, Jorge Caballero, the Sausalito Quartet, ETHEL string quartet, Dušan Týnek Dance Theatre, Ijsbreker, Moravian Philharmonic, Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra, and Festival Ballet Providence, among others. Vrebalov’s c

Alex Bradford

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Alex Bradford (January 23, 1927 – February 15, 1978) was an American gospel composer, singer, arranger and choir director, who was an influence on artists such as Little Richard, Bob Marley and Ray Charles, and who helped bring about the modern mass choir movement in gospel. Biography Born in Bessemer, Alabama, United States, he first appeared on stage at the age of four, then joined a children’s gospel group at the age of 13, soon obtaining his own radio show. He organized another group after his mother sent him to New York City following a racial incident; he continued singing after returning to attend the Snow Hill Institute in Snow Hill, Alabama, where he acquired the title “Professor” while teaching as a student. He moved to Chicago in 1947, where he worked briefly with Roberta Martin and toured with Mahalia Jackson, then struck out on his own with his own group, the Bradford Singers, followed by another group, the Bradford Specials. He recorded his first hit record, “Too Close To Heaven” (1954), billed as Professor Alex Bradford and the Bradford Specials, sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc, then followed it with a number of other successes in the rest o

Alex Burtzos

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Alex Burtzos (born 1985 in Denver, Colorado, United States) is an American composer based in New York City and Orlando, Florida. Life and career Alex Burtzos was born in Denver, Colorado, and grew up in nearby Colorado Springs. He studied music at Loyola University New Orleans before moving to New York City in 2010, where he earned his doctorate in composition from Manhattan School of Music in 2016. His primary teachers include James Paton Walsh, J. Mark Stambaugh, and Reiko Fueting. Burtzos’ music has been performed across four continents, and has received awards from numerous organizations within the United States. He has received particular attention for his compositions for authentic baroque-era instruments. Other of Burtzos’ compositions utilize rappers, metal guitar, and other sounds drawn from popular music. Burtzos is the founder of ICEBERG New Music, a composers collective based in New York City. In 2018, he was named the Endowed Chair of Composition Studies at The University of Central Florida. Compositions Solo * pWr (2021) for Cello Solo * Perforation (2018) for Piano Solo * Should the Wide World Roll Away (2018) for Piano Solo * Wilfred Owen at the Gates (2015) for Pia

Alex Shapiro

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Alex Shapiro (born January 11, 1962, in New York City, NY) is an American composer and creator advocate. Her acoustic and electroacoustic music concert works are characterized by their genre eclecticism incorporating influences including minimalism, 12-tone serialism, pop, jazz, electronic dance music, and cinematically inspired sound worlds. Education Alex Shapiro was born in Manhattan and raised in its Yorkville neighborhood. Her early education began at the 92nd Street Y, followed by two years of elementary school at P.S. 158, and then entering The Ethical Culture Fieldston School, from which she graduated high school in 1980. Shapiro began composing at age 9 and in 1977 at age 15 began formal composition lessons when she enrolled in Mannes College of Music summer classes, studying electronic music with David Tcimpidis and composition with Leo Edwards. and studied ear training with George Tsontakis at the Aspen Music School and Festival in 1978 and 1979, and was accepted as a composition major at the Pre-College Division of The Juilliard School in 1979 where she was a student of Craig Shuler and Bruce Adolphe, graduating in 1980. and theory with Ludmila Ulehla. In the summer of

Alexander Courage

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Alexander Mair Courage Jr. (December 10, 1919 – May 15, 2008) familiarly known as “Sandy” Courage, was an American orchestrator, arranger, and composer of music, primarily for television and film. He is best known as the composer of the theme music for the original Star Trek series. Early life The son of a Scottish father and a French-American mother, Alexander “Sandy” Mair Courage was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. His father Alexander Sr. immigrated to the United States in 1913 and obtained work in a munitions factory supplying France during World War I, where he met his future wife. They married in 1917. While Sandy was still a young child, his father joined the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company as a salesman and moved the family to New Jersey. The family relocated regularly as his father earned promotions, requiring Sandy to switch schools. His gift for music was noticed and encouraged at an early age. Courage’s father arranged for young Sandy to learn the bugle as his own father had been in a band and he himself was an enthusiastic parlor singer. When Courage wanted to learn the cornet, his father got him one. Courage developed an uncanny ear for accompaniment. His tendenc

Alexander Gretchaninov

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Alexander Tikhonovich Gretchaninov (; 25 October 1864 – 3 January 1956) was a Russian Romantic composer. Life Gretchaninov started his musical studies rather late, because his father, a businessman, had expected the boy to take over the family firm. Gretchaninov himself related that he did not see a piano until he was 14 and began his studies at the Moscow Conservatory in 1881 against his father’s wishes and without his knowledge. His main teachers there were Sergei Taneyev and Anton Arensky. In the late 1880s, after a quarrel with Arensky, he moved to St. Petersburg where he studied composition and orchestration with Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov until 1893. Rimsky-Korsakov immediately recognized Gretchaninov’s extraordinary musical imagination and talent and gave him much extra time as well as considerable financial help. This allowed the young man, whose parents were not supporting him, to survive. Out of this came an important friendship, which only ended in 1908 with Rimsky’s death. As such, it is not surprising that Rimsky’s influence can be heard in Gretchaninov’s early works, such as his String Quartet No. 1, a prize-winning composition. Around 1896, Gretchaninov returned to Mosc

Alexander Ledkovsky

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Alexander Borisovich Ledkovsky (June 3, 1944 – December 24, 2004) was an American conductor, composer, and music editor of Russian descent. Life Alexander Ledkovsky was born in Teupitz, Germany during war-time to parents Marina Viktorovna Ledkovsky (née Fasolt) and Boris Mikhailovich Ledkovsky, a prominent choral director and composer/arranger of Russian Orthodox Church music. Having emigrated to the United States in 1951, Alexander was educated at Trinity School and Columbia University, where he earned a B.A. in Music. Although he developed a successful career as a computer expert and software developer, his life’s love was his work as a musician of the Russian Orthodox Church. Having studied choir direction both at university and under his father’s tutelage, he took on responsibilities as assistant choirmaster at the Russian Orthodox Synod Cathedral “Our Lady of the Sign” located on Park Avenue at 93rd Street in New York. He also ran a secondary choir for the cathedral’s English-speaking parish in the late 1960s. When his father’s health declined, Alexander assumed full responsibility for the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia (ROCOR)’s flagship choir, on Forgiveness Sunday i

Alexander Olshanetsky

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Alexander Olshanetsky (October 23, 1892 – June 3, 1946) was a Russian-American composer, conductor, and violinist. He was a major figure within the Yiddish theatre scene in New York City from the mid-1920s until his death in 1946. Biography Early life and education Olshanetsky was born in Odessa of Lithuanian Jewish descent into a non-musical family. After showing early talent on the violin, Olshanetsky studied from age 6 to 15 at the Odessa Royal Music School, studying multiple instruments. In 1911 he joined the orchestra of the Odessa Opera and Ballet Theater; notably touring with the ensemble throughout Imperial Russia. He quit to become chorusmaster for a touring operetta troupe in Russia. Immigration to the United States In 1922 Olshanetsky emigrated to the United States, where he was introduced to the Yiddish theater scene by his uncle Hyman Mayzel, an actor and playwright. Within two years he had two shows produced: Hayntige Meydlekh (Today’s Girls) written by Jacob Jacobs staged at Lenox Theater, and Zise Libe (Sweet Love) co-composed by Louis Gilrod and staged at Rolland’s Liberty Theater. Later years By the 1930s, Yiddish music had become so popular that Olshanetsky and o

Alexander Peloquin

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C. Alexander Peloquin (June 16, 1918 – February 27, 1997) was an American composer of liturgical music, pianist, teacher, cathedral organist and director of music ministries. Inspired by the Second Vatican Council reforms, he is known for composing the first Roman Catholic Mass sung in English. Biography Peloquin was born in Northbridge, Massachusetts, the son of Noe G. and Marie Louise (Bernard) Peloquin. Peloquin began his musical training at the age of eight, studying piano and organ. At the age of eleven, he performed classical piano on his own radio program for WTAG in Worcester, Massachusetts. Peloquin went on to study at the New England Conservatory where he earned a Boston Symphony Orchestra Scholarship to the Berkshire Music Center at Tanglewood. At Tanglewood, Peloquin served as piano soloist for Leonard Bernstein and his orchestra. Also at that time, Peloquin had the privilege of knowing Aaron Copland. Peloquin was awarded honorary degrees by institutions including Brown University. During World War II, Peloquin served in the Army where he achieved the rank of Lieutenant. He served as bandmaster for the 314th Army Band and performed the music of George Gershwin for servicem

Alexander Tcherepnin

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Alexander Nikolayevich Tcherepnin (; 21 January 1899 – 29 September 1977) was a Russian-born composer and pianist. His father, Nikolai Tcherepnin (pupil of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov), and his sons, Serge Tcherepnin and Ivan Tcherepnin, as well as two of his grandsons (sons of Ivan), Sergei and Stefan, were composers. His son Serge was involved in the earliest development of electronic music and instruments. His mother was a member of the artistic Benois family, a niece of Alexandre Benois. Biography He was born in Saint Petersburg, Russia, and played the piano and composed prolifically from a very early age. He was stimulated in this activity by the atmosphere at home, which—thanks to his family’s Benois-Diaghilev connection—was a meeting place for many well-known musicians and artists of the day. By the time he began formal theory and composition studies in his late teens, he had already composed hundreds of pieces, including more than a dozen piano sonatas. Among his teachers in Russia were composer Victor Belyayev (pupil of Anatoly Lyadov and Alexander Glazunov), who prepared Tcherepnin for Saint Petersburg Conservatory; Leokadiya Kashperova (renowned pianist, protégée of Anton Ru

Alexandra Gardner

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Alexandra Gardner (born 1967) is an American contemporary composer based in Baltimore, Maryland. Her music employs diverse acoustic instrumentation and electronics, drawing on minimalist and modernist influences as well as extra-musical sources and sounds. Critics note her work for its blend of contemplative and expressive qualities, clear structure and unexpected evolution, and complex rhythms. In a 2007 New Yorker essay, music critic Alex Ross placed Gardner among a “vital group of composers” creating a “new kind of interstitial music” that blurs genre boundaries. Gardner’s work has been performed in solo, chamber and orchestral contexts and as scoring for dance, theater and visual art performances, at venues including Kennedy Center, Aspen Music Festival, Centro de Cultura Contemporania de Barcelona, Strathmore Music Center and Symphony Space, among others. Gardner’s music is recorded on the Innova, Ars Harmonica, and Naxos labels. Early life and career Alexandra Gardner was born in 1967 and raised in Washington, DC. She studied percussion (focusing on marimba), composition and electronic music with Charles Barbour, Annea Lockwood and Richard Edward Wilson at Vassar College. In

Alexandra Pierce

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Alexandra Pierce (February 21, 1934 – February 1, 2021) was an American composer, pianist, music theorist, movement educator, author, and Emerita Research Professor of Music and Movement at the University of Redlands. Early life and education Born and raised in Philadelphia, her family later moved to Washington, D.C., where she studied piano with contemporary music specialist, Margaret Tolson. She received a Bachelor of Music, Phi Beta Kappa (1955), from the University of Michigan, where she majored in piano performance and medieval history; a Master of Music in piano performance from the New England Conservatory of Music (1958); a Master of Arts in music history from Harvard University (1959); and a Ph.D. in music theory and composition from Brandeis University (1968), where her teachers included composers Irving Fine and Harold Shapero. Her dissertation, written at Brandeis, is entitled The Analysis of Rhythm in Tonal Music. Career Pierce taught from 1968 to 2001 at the University of Redlands, where she was Professor of Music and Movement, and where she integrated movement research with the teaching of music theory, piano, and with her own composing. Prior to her arrival in Redla

Alfred Bartles

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Alfred Howell Bartles (November 10, 1930 – December 28, 2006) was an American composer and musician. He played the cello and piano and he is best known for Music for Symphony Orchestra and Jazz Ensemble, a work that has been described as pioneering of the crossover between jazz and classical music. Bartles grew up in Nashville, Tennessee, He moved back to Nashville in 1997, where he spent the remainder of his career. At the University of Mississippi, he became interested in the cello as an instrument to take up despite not knowing much about it. Because of his musical past and devotion towards it, the learning curve was easier. Also while there he met Claus Adam, a cellist for the Juilliard String Quartet who would later become his mentor. At the University of Mississippi he met a piano student Martha Jean Smith. They married January 31, 1954, in the middle of their graduate studies at Ohio University (Athens Ohio). It was at Ohio University where Bartles studied composition with Karl Ahrendt and Roy Harris. Bartles received his master’s degree in composition from Ohio University in 1954. Alfred and Martha moved to New York City later that year where Bartles studied music theory wi

Alfred Newman

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Alfred Newman (March 17, 1900 – February 17, 1970) was an American composer, arranger, and conductor of film music. From his start as a music prodigy, he came to be regarded as a respected figure in the history of film music. He won nine Academy Awards and was nominated 45 times, contributing to the extended Newman family being the most Academy Award-nominated family with a collective 92 nominations in various music categories. In a career spanning more than four decades, Newman composed the scores for over 200 motion pictures. Some of his most famous scores include Wuthering Heights, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Mark of Zorro, How Green Was My Valley, The Song of Bernadette, Captain from Castile, All About Eve, Love Is a Many Splendored Thing, Anastasia, The Diary of Anne Frank, How the West Was Won, The Greatest Story Ever Told, and his final score, Airport, all of which were nominated for or won Academy Awards. He is perhaps best known for composing the fanfare which accompanies the studio logo at the beginning of 20th Century Fox’s productions. Prior to commencing his employment with 20th Century Fox, Newman composed the fanfares which are most often associated with Samuel

Alfred Reed

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Alfred Reed (born as Alfred Friedman) (January 25, 1921 – September 17, 2005) was an American neoclassical composer, with more than two hundred published works for concert band, orchestra, chorus, and chamber ensemble to his name. He also traveled extensively as a guest conductor (most notably for the Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra after the retirement of Frederick Fennell) and served as a professor at the University of Miami School of Music. Life Alfred Friedman was born on January 25, 1921, in Manhattan, New York City, to Austrian immigrants Carl Friedemann von Mark and Elizabeth Strasser. Because of anti-German sentiment during World War I, Carl changed the family surname to Friedman shortly before having Alfred. Alfred began his formal music training at the age of ten studying cornet at the New York Schools of Music. In 1938, he started working in the Radio Workshop in New York as a staff arranger and assistant conductor. In the early 1930s, Reed hired an agent to help market himself around the New York circles. The agent suggested changing his original surname to something less Jewish- and German-sounding to help avoid discrimination. The agent took a syllable from “Friedman”, sho

Alice Parker

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Alice Stuart Parker Pyle (December 16, 1925 – December 24, 2023), known professionally as Alice Parker, was an American composer, arranger, conductor and teacher. Early life and education Parker was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on December 16, 1925, to Gordon Parker, who worked in the hardwood business, and Mary Shumate Stuart, who founded and directed a plastics laminate company. Career Having begun her career as a high school teacher, Parker also collaborated with Robert Shaw on arrangements of materials to be recorded by the Robert Shaw Chorale, In addition to her work with the Chorale, Parker wrote a total of 5 operas, 11 song-cycles, 33 cantatas, 11 works for chorus and orchestra, 47 choral suites, and more than 40 original hymns. She also arranged spirituals, hymns, and folk songs, including French, Spanish, Hebrew, and Ladino folk songs, many of which have become part of the repertoire of choirs around the world. Having divided her time between a New York apartment and her home in Hawley, Massachusetts, Parker decided, at the age of 70, to move permanently to Singing Brook Farm in Hawley, which her father had purchased in 1920 and where she had spent her childhood summers.

Alice Shields

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Alice Shields (born Alice Ferree Shields, Manhattan, New York, February 18, 1943) is an American classical composer. She is one of the pioneers of electronic music, and is particularly known for her cross-cultural operas. Her work is influenced by non-Western forms of music drama including Indian Bharata Natyam and Japanese Noh Theater, and has been performed by the New York City Opera VOX Festival of New American Operas, the Akademie der Künste and SAVVY-Contemporary in Berlin, the Venice Biennale, NYC-Electroacoustic Music Festival, American Chamber Opera Company, The Composers Chamber Theater, The American Virtuosi Baroque Opera Co., Association for the Promotion of New Music, New York Consort of Viols, American Composers Alliance, Ensemble Pi, Iktus Percussion, Dance Alloy (Pittsburgh), and the Arangham Dance Theater (India). Education Shields earned three degrees from Columbia University including the Doctor of Musical Arts in music composition, studying with Vladimir Ussachevsky, Jack Beeson, Otto Luening and Chou Wen-Chung. She served as Associate Director of the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center and Director for Development of the Columbia University Computer Music

Alla Pavlova

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Alla Yevgenyevna Pavlova (born July 13, 1952, in Ukraine) is a Russian composer. Pavlova was born and initially raised in Vinnytsia, Ukraine. She and her family moved to Moscow in 1961, and she then moved to Brooklyn, New York in 1990, where she has settled. She is best known for her symphonic work. Biography Soviet life During the Soviet era, the Pavlova family was transferred to Moscow in 1961. There Alla received her bachelor’s degree in 1975 from the Ippolitov–Ivanov Music Institute, and in 1983 her master’s degree from the Gnessin State Musical College. She studied with Armen Shakhbagyan, a composer with a reputation established in the 1970s, and paid special attention to the works of Anna Akhmatova. This influenced a good part of her output until the 1990s. Following the achievement of her master’s in 1983, Pavlova moved to the Bulgarian capital of Sofia, where she worked at the Union of Bulgarian Composers and the Bulgarian National Opera. She returned to Moscow three years later. From 1986, Pavlova worked for the Russian Musical Society Board in Moscow, before relocating in 1990 to New York City. American life Lieder and chamber music Following her arrival in New York, Pavl

Allan Blank

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Allan Blank (December 27, 1925 – November 12, 2013) was an American composer who has more than 60 published works. He attended the Juilliard School of Music (1945–47) and obtained a bachelor’s degree from Washington Square College (1948). He received a master’s degree from the University of Minnesota (1970) and also studied at the University of Iowa. He was a violinist in the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra (1950–52). He taught composition at Western Illinois University (1966–68), Paterson State Teachers College (1968–70), Lehman College (1970–77), and at Virginia Commonwealth University (1978–96). In 1985 he received a commission from the New York State Council on the Arts’ Presenting Organization to compose “Quintet for Clarinet and String Quartet” for the Roxbury Chamber Players. Other awards mentioned in his University of Akron Bierce Library Archives composer profile are: First Prize in the George Eastman Competition (1985) sponsored by the Eastman School of Music for his Duo for Bassoon & Piano, and a grant (1985) from the National Endowment for the Arts to support his one-act opera, The Magic Bonbons. The Virginia Shakespeare Festival at Williamsburg commissioned Blank to write m

Allee Willis

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Alta Sherral “Allee” Willis (November 10, 1947 – December 24, 2019) was an American songwriter and art director. Willis co-wrote hit songs including “September” and “Boogie Wonderland” by Earth, Wind & Fire and “What Have I Done to Deserve This?” by Pet Shop Boys featuring Dusty Springfield. She won two Grammy Awards for Beverly Hills Cop and The Color Purple, the latter of which was also nominated for a Tony Award. She was also nominated for an Emmy Award for “I’ll Be There for You”, which was used as the theme song for the sitcom Friends. Her compositions sold over 60 million records and she was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2018. In June 2024, Willis was also inducted posthumously into the Women Songwriters Hall of Fame. Early life Willis was born and grew up in Detroit, Michigan, where she attended Mumford High School. She attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison as a journalism major, was a member of the Sigma Delta Tau sorority and later became an activist, “marching and demonstrating” during the 60s. Willis also wrote songs for artists including Debby Boone, Rita Coolidge, Crystal Gayle, Sister Sledge, Jennifer Holliday, Gladys Knight & the Pips, Cyndi La

Allen Cohen (composer)

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Allen Cohen (born 1951) is an American composer, arranger, conductor, vocal coach, pianist and university professor. Education Cohen holds his Bachelor of Arts degree in Music and Drama from Ripon College and Master of Fine Arts in Music Composition from the State University of New York at Purchase. He received a doctorate in composition from the City University of New York, where he studied with Thea Musgrave, Bruce Saylor, and David Del Tredici. Awards Allen Cohen has received a Meet the Composer grant and several ASCAP Plus awards. Compositions Cohen’s work includes music for orchestra, chamber ensembles, solo instruments, and voice. His pieces on compact disc include Autumn Morning for orchestra (Vienna Modern Masters), Duo-Partita for cello and guitar (Artek), Grace for piano solo (New Ariel), Sonata for Trumpet and Piano (Song of Myself) and Wings of Desire for flugelhorn and piano (Capstone). He has written incidental scores for films and off-Broadway plays, and has arranged dance music for five Broadway musicals. Performance career He has conducted many operetta and musical theater productions on Broadway and elsewhere, and has performed extensively as a pianist. Teaching c

Allen Shawn

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Allen Evan Shawn (born August 27, 1948) is an American composer, pianist, educator, and author based in Vermont. His music Shawn began composing at the age of ten, but dates his mature work from 1977. He has written a dozen orchestral works, including a symphony, two piano concertos, a cello concerto, and a violin concerto; three chamber operas; five piano sonatas and many additional works for piano; and a large catalogue of chamber music, songs and choral music. Among Shawn’s available recordings are several of chamber music, four CDs of piano music, including a CD devoted to his piano work by German pianist Julia Bartha, a piano concerto performed by Ursula Oppens with the Albany Symphony Orchestra under the direction of David Alan Miller, and the chamber opera The Music Teacher, with a libretto by his brother, Wallace Shawn. As author Shawn is the author of a book about Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg, Arnold Schoenberg’s Journey, and a book about Leonard Bernstein, Leonard Bernstein: An American Musician. He is also the author of Wish I Could Be There: Notes from a Phobic Life, which examines his experiences with anxiety and panic disorder, as well as his relationship with

Allison Loggins-Hull

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Allison Loggins-Hull is an American composer and flutist known for her work with the Cleveland Orchestra, Lizzo, Frank Ocean, Hans Zimmer, and as one half of the flute duo Flutronix. Loggins-Hull was named the Daniel R. Lewis Composition Fellow of the Cleveland Orchestra, a three-season residency, in 2022. The Cleveland Orchestra released an album of her music in 2026, titled Allison Loggins-Hull: The Cleveland Residency, the orchestra’s first portrait album of work by a living composer. A second album of her chamber works, Patchwork, was released in 2026 as well, performed by Cleveland Orchestra Musicians alongside Loggins-Hull. She is the New Jersey Symphony’s Resident Artistic Partner. She was named 2026 Susan D. Boyd Composer-in-Residence at the Spoleto Festival USA. Her work has been commissioned and performed by institutions including The Knights, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, The Seattle Symphony, The Boston Symphony Orchestra, The National Orchestral Institute, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Roomful of Teeth, and Third Coast Percussion. Loggins-Hull wrote the original score for “Maurice Hines: Bring Them Back”, a documentary about Maurice Hines

Allyn Ferguson

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Allyn Malcolm Ferguson Jr. (October 18, 1924 – June 23, 2010) was an American composer whose works include the themes for 1970s television programs Barney Miller (1975—1982) and Charlie’s Angels (1976—1981), which he co-wrote with Jack Elliott. In its obituary, Variety called him “among the most prolific composers of TV-movie scores in the past 40 years.” After graduating from San Jose State University, he traveled to Paris, where he studied with Nadia Boulanger and at Tanglewood with Aaron Copland. During the 1970s, he collaborated extensively with composer Jack Elliott, co-writing the themes to Barney Miller and Charlie’s Angels. University of Southern California music historian Jon Burlingame called the themes “iconic in the sense that most people who were around in that era can easily recall those tunes”. Discography * Pictures at an Exhibition Framed in Jazz (1963) * Kenneth Patchen Reads With Allyn Ferguson And The Chamber Jazz Sextet (1983) * Master Of The Game (1984) * The Film Music of Allyn Ferguson Volume 1 (1993) * The Film Music of Allyn Ferguson Volume 2 (1994) * The Film Music of Allyn Ferguson Volume 3 (1997) See also * * References External links * *

Alma Bazel Androzzo

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Alma Bazel Androzzo (17 October 1912 - 11 October 2001) was an American composer, pianist and songwriter. Biography Alma Androzzo was born Alma Irene Bazel in Harriman, Tennessee, USA. She had no formal musical education but was introduced to the piano at the age of five by her father Carl Frederick Bazel, who was a truck driver. She is buried in Mount Hope Cemetery, Chicago. Published songs * If I can help somebody published by Boosey & Hawkes Ltd., London 1945 * Bless His name published by Martin and Morris Music Inc., Chicago Illinois 1950 * Keep marching on published by Martin and Morris Music Inc., Chicago Illinois 1950 * Deliver me from evil published by Martin and Morris Music Inc., Chicago Illinois 1950 * I’ll make it somehow published by Martin and Morris Music Inc., Chicago Illinois 1950 * I will walk with Jesus published by Martin and Morris Music Studio, Chicago Illinois 1952 * He’s such a great Saviour published by Martin and Morris Music Studio, Chicago Illinois c.1952 * Little me published by Hill and Range Songs Inc., New York City 1956 * Live in the sunlight published by Boosey & Hawkes, London 1964 * I have something to give copyright Alma Bazel Androzzo 17 Januar

Alma Sanders

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Alma M. Sanders (1882 – December 15, 1956) was an American songwriter and composer of popular music, including several Broadway musicals, with her composer husband, Monte Carlo. Early life Sanders was born in Chicago, Illinois. She studied music there, and sang in concerts and as a church soloist. Music On Broadway, Alma Sanders’ compositions and songs were heard in the shows The Voice of McConnell (1918–1919), Tangerine (1921–1922), Elsie (1923), The Chiffon Girl (1924), Princess April (1924), Oh! Oh! Nurse (1925–1926), Mystery Moon (1930), and Louisiana Lady (1947). She also co-wrote the score of a film, Ireland Today. included “Two Lips are Roses”, “Honeymoon Home”, “Sweet Lady”, “Every Tear is a Smile (in an Irishman’s Heart)”, “Goodbye Broadway, Hello France!”, “Sleepytime Rag: Pickaninny Lullaby” (1914, lyrics by Florence Cooke), “Some Pepp” (1915), “Along the Road to Singapore” (1915, lyrics by Richard Pascoe), “That Dear Old Mother of Mine” (1915, lyrics by Richard Pascoe), “Dance of the Teenie-Weenies” (1916), “Ev’ry Sammy needs his smokin’ over there” (1917, lyrics by Monte Carlo), “Hong Kong” (1917, lyrics by Richard Pascoe), “The Wild Irish Rose That God Gave Me” (1917,

Alvin Curran

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Alvin Curran (born December 13, 1938) is an American composer, performer, improviser, sound artist, and writer. He was born in Providence, Rhode Island, and lives and works in Rome, Italy. He is the co-founder, with Frederic Rzewski and Richard Teitelbaum, of Musica Elettronica Viva, and a former student of Elliott Carter. Curran’s music often makes use of electronics and environmental found sounds. He was a professor of music at Mills College in California until 2006 and now teaches privately in Rome and sporadically at various institutions. He is an artistic advisor at the American Academy in Rome. His works include solo performance pieces such as Endangered Species, TransDadaExpress, and Shofar; radio works such as Crystal Psalms, Un Altro Ferragosto, I Dreamt John Cage Yodeling at the Zurich Hauptbahnhof, and Living Room Music; large-scale musical choreographic works such as Oh Brass on the Grass Alas, for 300 amateur brass-band musicians, and the Maritime Rites series of performances on and near water; sound installation works such as Magic Carpet, Floor Plan, The Twentieth Century, and Gardening with John; chamber music such as For Cornelius for piano, the trio Schtyx, the st

Alvin Etler

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Alvin Derald Etler (February 19, 1913 – June 13, 1973) was an American composer and oboist. Career A student of Paul Hindemith, Etler is noted for his highly rhythmic, harmonically and texturally complex compositional style, taking inspiration from the works of Bartók and Copland as well as the dissonant and accented styles of jazz. Though he played with the Indianapolis Symphony in 1938, he abandoned his orchestral life shortly thereafter to focus on his increasingly successful compositional career (which earned him two Guggenheim Fellowships during this period). In 1942 he joined the faculty at Yale University as conductor of the university band and instructor of wind instruments, where he began his studies with Hindemith. He also taught at Cornell University and University of Illinois before accepting a position at Smith College, which he held until his death. Notable works include his two woodwind quintets (from 1955 and 1957), a bassoon sonata, the 1963 “Quintet for Brass Instruments”, and “Fragments” for woodwind quartet. Etler is also the author of Making Music: An Introduction to Theory, an introductory-level theory text published posthumously in 1974. Works list Orchestral

Alvin Lucier

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Alvin Augustus Lucier Jr. (May 14, 1931 – December 1, 2021) was an American experimental composer and sound artist. A long-time music professor at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut, Lucier was a member of the influential Sonic Arts Union, which also included Robert Ashley, David Behrman, and Gordon Mumma. Much of Lucier’s work explores psychoacoustic phenomena and the physical properties of sound. Early life Alvin Augustus Lucier Jr. was born on May 14, 1931, in Nashua, New Hampshire, to Kathryn E. Lemery, a pianist, and Alvin Augustus Lucier Sr., a lawyer and politician who served as mayor of Nashua from 1934 to 1937. He was educated in Nashua public and parochial schools; the Portsmouth Abbey School in Portsmouth, Rhode Island; Yale University; and Brandeis University. In 1970, Lucier left Brandeis for Wesleyan University, where he would remain until his retirement. In 1972, Lucier became a musical director of the Viola Farber Dance Company, a position he held until 1979. Personal life Lucier was married to his first wife, Mary, until their divorce in 1972. He then married Wendy Stokes; they had one daughter and remained together until his death. Other works Other ke

Alvin Singleton

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Alvin Singleton (born December 28, 1940, in Brooklyn, New York) is a composer from the United States. Born and raised in New York City, he received his music education from New York University (B.A.), studying with Hall Overton and Charles Wuorinen. Singleton then moved to study at Yale School of Music (M.M.), studying with Yehudi Wyner and Mel Powell. Singleton was a Fulbright Scholar, he studied with Goffredo Petrassi at Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome from 1971-1985. After living and working in Europe for fourteen years, Singleton returned to the United States to become a Composer-in-Residence with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (1985-88). He subsequently served as Resident Composer at Spelman College in Atlanta (1988-91), as UNISYS Composer-in-Residence with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra (1996-97), and was the 2002–03 Composer-in-Residence with the Ritz Chamber Players of Jacksonville, Florida. In addition, he has served as Visiting Professor of Composition at the Yale University School of Music. Awards * Recipient of 2003 Guggenheim Fellowship Singleton’s music shows the evidence of a wide range of influences - “from Mahler to Monk, Bird to Bernstein, James Baldw

Amanda Jones (composer)

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Amanda Jones is an American composer and musician who has composed scores for films, commercials, and television series. She is a member of the indie rock band The Anti-Job and has earned the distinction of becoming the first African American woman nominated in a score category at the Emmys for her work on the Apple TV+ series Home. Life Jones was born on October 26, 1988, in Columbia, Maryland and began playing piano at the age of three and guitar around the age of fourteen. Jones attended Vassar College intending to study chemistry but subsequently changed her major to music. Her work during that time included the films How to Train Your Dragon 2 and Kingsman: The Secret Service. In 2018, Jones got an opportunity to score her first feature film, One Angry Black Man. Jones has since scored numerous short and feature films, including Andre Hormann’s documentary feature Ringside; Smriti Mundhra and Sami Khan’s Oscar-nominated documentary St. Louis Superman; and Sujata Day’s feature film Definition Please. Jones television credits include OWN’s anthology series Cherish the Day, produced by Ava DuVernay; BET’s Twenties produced by Lena Waithe; HBO’s A Black Lady Sketch Show produced b

Amber Ferenz

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Amber Ferenz (born 1972) is an American musician, music educator and composer. Life Amber Ferenz graduated with a bachelor’s degree in bassoon performance from the North Carolina School of the Arts, and a Master of Fine Arts in orchestral performance from the California Institute of the Arts, and they studied with Mark Popkin, Julie Feves and Steven Dibner. After completing their studies, they worked as a bassoonist, becoming principal bassoonist of the Fayetteville Symphony, and the second bassoonist with the Asheville Symphony. They have also taught bassoon at California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo, California Institute of the Arts, the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, and Wake Forest University. Ferenz is also a violinist and has been a fellow at the Aspen Music Festival. They are a founding member of the Los Angeles-based chamber music collective inauthentica and have performed with the Open Dream Ensemble. Works Ferenz composes mainly for solo bassoon and chamber ensemble. Selected works include: *Love Medicine *Unfinished Conversations *Ice Cream Truck, for bassoon quartet *Songs for Wicked children *Los Angeles Sketches, for 4 bassoons *Ice Crea

Ambrose Akinmusire

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Ambrose Olusiji Akinmusire ( born May 1, 1982) is an American avant-garde jazz trumpeter and composer. Biography Born and raised in Oakland, California, Akinmusire was a member of the Berkeley High School Jazz Ensemble, where he caught the attention of saxophonist Steve Coleman, who was visiting the school to lead a workshop. Coleman hired him as a member of his Five Elements band for a European tour. Akinmusire was also a member of the Monterey Jazz Festival’s Next Generation Jazz Orchestra. The same year, he released his debut recording, Prelude… to Cora, on the Fresh Sound New Talent label. Akinmusire made his debut on the Blue Note label in 2011 with the album When the Heart Emerges Glistening, featuring his quintet of tenor saxophonist Walter Smith III, pianist Gerald Clayton, bassist Harish Raghavan, and drummer Justin Brown. Akinmusire’s third album, entitled The Imagined Savior Is Far Easier to Paint, was released in 2014. His album Origami Harvest was included in The New York Times Best Jazz of 2018. His sixth studio album, On the Tender Spot of Every Calloused Moment, again with his quartet of longtime bandmates and received a Grammy nomination for Best Jazz Instrumenta

Amnon Wolman

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Amnon Wolman (; born 1955) an Israeli-American musician. He holds a doctorate degree in music composition. His catalogue of compositions includes works involving computer generated and processed sounds, symphonic works, vocal and chamber pieces for different ensembles, film music, and music for theater and dance. His recently premiered pieces include “Picnic Site” used for a choreography by Trisha Brown and Steve Paxton for the Lyon Biannale; “End Divided Road” for Flute and electronics for Mario Carolli at the TRAIETTORIE Festival in Parma, Italy; “Cruising Prohibited when Lights Flashing” for the Gay Gotham Chorus at the Greenwich House, New York; and “and her mind moves upon silence”, for harpsichord and electronic sounds, for Vivienne Spiteri in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Career His scores are published by the Israel Music Institute and the Israel Music Center. Before Joining the faculty at Brooklyn College he taught at Northwestern University, Tel Aviv University, Stanford University and the University of California, Berkeley. At Brooklyn College he was a member of the composition faculty and Director of the Brooklyn College Center for Computer Music (BC-CCM). Wolman’s film mus

Amy Beach

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Amy Marcy Cheney Beach (September 5, 1867 – December 27, 1944) was an American composer and pianist. She was the first successful American female composer of large-scale art music. Her “Gaelic” Symphony, premiered by the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1896, was the first symphony composed and published by an American woman. She was one of the first American composers of her era to succeed without the benefit of European training, and was known as one of the most respected American composers. She was acclaimed for piano concerts she gave, featuring her own music, in the United States and Europe. Life Early years and musical education Amy Marcy Cheney was born in Henniker, New Hampshire, on September 5, 1867 to Charles Abbott Cheney (nephew of Oren B. Cheney, who co-founded Bates College) and Clara Imogene (Marcy) Cheney. Amy was an only child. Artistic ability ran in the family: Clara was reputedly an “excellent pianist and singer,” while Amy showed every sign of being a child prodigy. She was able to sing forty songs accurately by age one, she was capable of improvising counter-melody by age two, and she taught herself to read at age three. At four, she composed three waltzes for piano

Amy Fay

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Amelia Muller Fay (May 21, 1844 – November 9, 1928) was an American concert pianist, manager of the New York Women’s Philharmonic Society, and chronicler best known for her memoirs of the European classical music scene. A pupil of Theodor Kullak, Fay traveled to Europe to study with Franz Liszt. Her letters home from Germany, including descriptions of her training and the concerts she attended, were published in 1880 as Music Study in Germany. These memoirs include a comprehensive biographical sketch of Liszt. Fay was born in 1844 in Bayou Goula, Louisiana. She was the third of six daughters and the fifth of nine children of the Rev. Charles Fay and Emily (Hopkins) Fay of Louisiana and St. Albans, Vermont. She was Charles Jerome Hopkins’s niece. Her sister Rose Emily Fay married the conductor Theodore Thomas, and her sister Melusina Fay Peirce was the wife of the American philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce. Amy Fay studied piano under Professor John Knowles Paine of Harvard and at the New England Conservatory of Music. From 1869 to 1875, she continued her lessons in Germany. She had made it her goal to become a pupil of Carl Tausig who had just opened a piano class in Berlin. She w

Amy Scurria

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Amy Scurria (born September 24, 1973) is an American composer. Biography Amy Scurria was born into a military family and showed an early interest in music, memorizing the piano assignments of her sister Jackie. At age 11 she took lessons under the Suzuki method and began composing. Scurria graduated from Rice University in Houston, Texas, in 1995 with a bachelor’s degree in composition. In 1998, she received a master’s degree in composition from Johns Hopkins University. She completed her doctoral degree in 2015 from Duke University in Durham. Dr. Scurria has also studied at La Schola Cantorum in Paris, France. Teachers she studied with include: Chen Yi, Robert Sirota, Narcis Bonet, Anthony Kelley, and Stephen Jaffe. Her compositions have been performed in the United States, England, Brazil, Spain, Portugal, France, and Japan. She was a composer-in-residence at Shepherd College in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, in 2001. Personal life In 2004, Amy Scurria married Zane Corriher. They have a daughter, Lily, Works Selected works include: * Beyond All Walking for Full Orchestra, (1998) * A Prayer for SATB Choir, (1999) * And He Shall Be Like a Tree for SATB Choir and Organ/Piano, (2000)

Amy Upham Thomson McKean

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Amy Upham Thomson-McKean (b. 22 February 1893 d. 1972) was an American pianist, songwriter and composer. Amy Thomson’s father, Ralph E. emigrated from Glasgow in Scotland as a young man. Her mother was Anna J. Thomson and she had one brother Robert Stanley Thomson. She married Alexander Mathew McKean Sept. 17, 1917 at Lafayette Presbyterian Church, Brooklyn, and had a daughter, Elaine (May 4, 1924) and son, Robert Alexander (September 25, 1918). Amy Thomson attended high school in Boston where she studied with Felix Fox at the Fox-Buonamici School of Pianoforte at 403 Marlborough Street. She began to write compositions, and studied with Bainbridge Christ and went on to publish songs and short works for violin and piano under both the names Amy Upham Thomson and Amy Thomson-McKean. Thomson-McKean appeared on concert and recital programs in Brooklyn in the 1910s - 1930s. She broadcast on Margaret Speaks on WOR NY in the 1920s. Her papers are archived by her great-niece, artist Jamieson Thomas of Wilmington, DE. Selected works *“The Throstle” (text by Tennyson) *“A Day in June” *“Liebislied” *“Tone Poem” *“Bolero” *“Chason du Soir” *“Little Boy Blue” *“Forever” *“Dream in Town” *“At S

Amy Williams (composer)

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Amy Williams (born 1969) is an American composer and pianist. She was born in Buffalo, New York, into a musical family, with her mother, a violist with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, and her father Jan Williams, percussionist and professor emeritus at the university at Buffalo. One of Williams’s most notable works is her ambitious Cineshape series of chamber pieces inspired by different films. This was presented in May 2016 with live performances by the JACK Quartet, flautist Lindsey Goodman and percussionist Scott Christian, with a new video component by Aaron Henderson. Education Williams began playing piano at the age of four and took up the flute a few years later with Robert Dick. Throughout her childhood, she was exposed to the latest contemporary music performed at the Center for the Creative and Performing Arts, meeting composers who would later become great influences on her own works, including John Cage, Morton Feldman, Lukas Foss and Elliott Carter. She made the decision to devote her life to performing and composing contemporary music whilst studying at Bennington College and after a fellowship year in Denmark, she completed a master’s degree in piano performance

André J. Thomas

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André Jerome Thomas (born 15 August 1952) is an American composer and conductor. He served as a professor of music at the College of Music at Florida State University and the artistic director for the Tallahassee Community Chorus. In addition to his conducting and composition credits, Thomas is a published author, having written Way Over in Beulah Lan’: Understanding and Performing the Negro Spiritual, and numerous journal articles. Early life Thomas grew up in Wichita, Kansas with his two sisters and mother. Thomas’s mother cleaned buses for Continental Trailways and sang in church. According to Thomas, this singing initiated his fascination with music. Upon entering junior high school, Thomas decided to pursue piano formally. He began taking lessons at Wichita State University, and by eighth grade, he won the Federated Music Clubs Piano Competition. While the discomfort may have continued throughout high school, it did not stop him from being actively involved in music and composition. At 16, Thomas accepted the role of Minister of Music at Tabernacle Baptist Church. He began arranging music to meet the needs of his choir. However, his time as a music minister was not easy. Many

André Previn

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André George Previn (; born Andreas Ludwig Priwin; April 6, 1929 – February 28, 2019) was a German and American conductor, composer, and pianist. His career had three facets: Hollywood films, jazz, and classical music. In each he achieved success, and the latter two were part of his life until the end. In movies, he arranged and composed music. In jazz, he was a celebrated pianist, accompanist to singers, and interpreter of songs from the “Great American Songbook”. In classical music, he also performed as a pianist but gained television fame as a conductor, and during his last thirty years created his legacy as a composer. Before the age of twenty, Previn began arranging and composing for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. He would go on to be involved in the music of more than fifty films and would win four Academy Awards. He won ten Grammy Awards, for recordings in all three areas of his career, and then one more, for lifetime achievement. He served as music director of the Houston Symphony Orchestra (1967–1969), principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra (1968–1979), music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra (1976–1984), of the Los Angeles Philharmonic (1985–1989), chief c

André Vida

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André Vida (born 1974) is an American-born German saxophonist, lyricist, avant-garde musician, and experimental composer. Vida has been on the forefront of several major developments in experimental music, including his membership in Anthony Braxton’s original Ghost Trance Ensemble, as founding member of New York collective the CTIA, performances with The Tower Recordings and subsequent ‘freak folk’ groups. He is based in Berlin. His father was Julius A. Vida (1928–2018), a Hungarian refugee to the U.S. during the Hungarian Revolution of 1956; and a prominent chemist and pharmaceutical businessperson in Greenwich, Connecticut, U.S.. In 1995, Vida moved to New York City and co-founded the Creative Trans-Informational Alliance Presents (CTIA) with Brandon Evans and Dominique Eade. Vida graduated from Wesleyan University in 1997. He received a M.F.A. degree in experimental sound practices in 2005 from the school of music at California Institute of the Arts (CalArts). Career In 2001, Vida moved to Berlin and soon after launched the Kreuzberg suite, a once a week concert series with Vida and a frequently changing musical guest creating improvisational music around the subject of “Fish A

Andrea Centazzo

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Andrea Centazzo (born 1948) is an Italian-born American composer, percussionist, multimedia artist and record label founder. Music career Centazzo was born in Udine, Italy. In the 1970s he played percussion in avant-garde jazz with John Zorn, Steve Lacy, and Don Cherry, and became “a leading figure in the European avant-garde”. After 1986 he turned to video making and composed operas, film soundtracks and orchestral compositions. Centazzo has recorded over 60 LP’s and CD’s, and has composed 350 musical works of diverse types, in addition to writing eight musicology books. In 2012 the Library of the University of Bologna opened the “Fondo Andrea Centazzo” with a collection of his works and documents. Instrumental innovations During his earlier career Centazzo developed a number of percussion instruments, including the icebell, a bowl-shaped instrument made from a bronze alloy. In his 1980 work Indian Tapes he introduced the ogororo, lokole, tampang, tubophone and square bell, based on Native American instruments. ICTUS The ICTUS record label was founded in 1976 by Centazzo and his wife, Carla Lugli. Its first release was Clangs by Centazzo and Steve Lacy. Subsequent albums also feat

Andrea Clearfield

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Andrea Clearfield (born 1960) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Her works include music for opera, orchestra, chorus, soloists, chamber ensembles, dance, film, and multimedia collaborations. Biography Early life Clearfield was born on August 29, 1960, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and grew up in Bala-Cynwyd, a suburb of Philadelphia. She was raised in an artistic family and studied piano from age 5. She began exploring composition as a young teen, arranging pop songs for voice, strings and percussion. She founded The Salon, a performance series in her home featuring contemporary, classical, jazz, electronic, dance, and world music since 1986. Compositional style Clearfield’s catalog includes works for orchestra, opera, chorus, chamber ensemble, dance, and multimedia collaborations. Her music has its roots in a variety of cultural and artistic traditions. Among her works are seventeen cantatas including Kabo Omowale (Welcome Home, Child) commissioned and premiered by The Philadelphia Orchestra in collaboration with writer and storyteller Charlotte Blake Alston. Other works, including her choral cantata Tse Go La, are inspired by Tibetan music fieldwork that s

Andrea Reinkemeyer

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Andrea Reinkemeyer (born 1976) is an American composer from Portland, Oregon. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree from the University of Oregon and continued her studies in composition at the University of Michigan, graduating with a master’s and doctoral degree. She was awarded a 2017 Virginia B. Toulmin Orchestral Commission, 2022-23 Edith Green Distinguished Professor and 2019 Julie Olds and Thomas Hellie Creative Achievement Award for Linfield Faculty; her Smoulder for Wind Ensemble was awarded the 2021 Alex Shapiro Prize in the 40th Annual Search for New Music by the International Alliance of Women in Music (IAWM) and named a 2020 finalist for the National Band Association William D. Revelli Composition Contest. Her music has been described as “haunting”, “clever, funky, jazzy and virtuosic”. While at the University of Michigan, Reinkemeyer taught as a graduate student instructor in electronic composition. After completing her education, she took a position teaching composition, theory and technology at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. She previously served as Associate Professor of Music Composition and Theory and Chair of the Department of Music at Linfield Univers

Andreia Pinto Correia

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Andreia Pinto-Correia (born 23 August 1971) is a Portuguese composer based in the United States. A 2015 Guggenheim Fellow, she has performed for the Minnesota Orchestra Composer Institute and New York Philharmonic. Biography Andreia Pinto-Correia was born on 23 August 1971 in Lisbon. She is the daughter of literature professors, with her father João David Pinto Correia being one of her creative collaborators. Raised in her birthplace, she was influenced by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, whose stories her mother did Portuguese-language translations of, as well as the medieval literature her father would read to her before bedtime. She performed at the 2012 Minnesota Orchestra Composer Institute; Rob Hubbard of the St. Paul Pioneer Press said that her “evocative soundscapes … certainly have a future there”. Joshua Kosman criticized her symphonic poem “Alfama” at its 2013 premiere at the Berkeley Symphony, saying that its layered nature “is so gray and unattractive – densely dissonant without pointing in any clear harmonic direction – that the effect is muted”. In 2015, Pinto-Correia was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in music composition. In 2020, she was awarded an American Academy

Andrew Cadima

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Andrew William Cadima (born October 8, 1984) is an American composer and painter. Biography Cadima is currently residing in the San Francisco Bay Area. He has written for a wide variety of instruments and ensembles ranging from solo harp to large orchestra and for events and venues ranging from rock concerts to symphony halls. Cadima began his studies in composition in Austin, Texas, with Joe Harchanko at the University of Texas at Austin. Subsequently, he received B.M. and M.M. degrees in composition from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, studying under Dan Becker and David Garner. During his studies at the San Francisco Conservatory, Cadima was the recipient of the Agnes Albert Scholarship. He has also studied abroad and performed on the piano, guitar, and violin in cities including Vienna, Paris, and Valencia, Spain. Cadima’s music has been performed both locally and internationally by many soloists and ensembles including members of the San Francisco Symphony and Philadelphia Orchestra, The Curtis Institute of Music Chamber Orchestra, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music Orchestra, the SFCM New Music Ensemble (Nicole Paiement, director), the SFCM Chorus, the Huntingto

Andrew Imbrie

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Andrew Welsh Imbrie (April 6, 1921 – December 5, 2007) was an American contemporary classical music composer and pianist. Career Imbrie was born in New York City and began his musical training as a pianist when he was 4. In 1937, he went to Paris to study composition briefly with Nadia Boulanger and piano with Robert Casadesus. His notable students include Larry Austin, Tamar Diesendruck, Richard Festinger, Alden Jenks, Frank La Rocca, Neil Rolnick, Valerie Samson, Allen Shearer, Laura Schwendinger, Nils Frykdahl, Kurt Rohde, Hi Kyung Kim, Leslie Wildman and Carolyn Yarnell. Style Imbrie’s style was influenced early by Béla Bartók, and then by Roger Sessions, his teacher at both Princeton and Berkeley. Imbrie preferred harmony that was non-triadic, * Three Against Christmas (1960 opera) * Angle of Repose (1976 opera) * Dandelion Wine (1961 for chamber ensemble) * To a Traveler (1971 for chamber ensemble) * Sextet for Six Friends (2007 for chamber ensemble) * Drumtaps for chorus with orchestra (text by Whitman) * Prometheus Bound for chorus with orchestra (text by Green after Aeschylus) * Adam for chorus with orchestra (text from medieval and Civil War sources) * Requiem (1984, chor

Andrew Norman

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Andrew Norman (born October 31, 1979) is an American composer of contemporary classical music whose texturally complex music is influenced by architecture and the visual arts. His string trio The Companion Guide to Rome (2010), was a runner-up for the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Music. While composer-in-residence for the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, he first gained international attention for the orchestral work Play (2013), which was nominated for the 2016 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition and won the 2017 Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition. He received another Grammy nomination for the orchestral work Sustain (2018), a commission from the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Other noted works include the fantasy for piano and orchestra Split (2015) and the opera A Trip to the Moon (2017). Norman was on the composition faculty of the Juilliard School and is currently teaching at the USC Thornton School of Music. Biography Norman studied composition at the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music and Yale School of Music. Much of his music is influenced by architecture and visual arts, in which he has had a lifelong interest. He was composer-in-r

Andrew Thomas (composer)

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Andrew William Thomas (October 8, 1939 - April 19, 2026) was an American composer. He studied with Karel Husa at Cornell University, with Nadia Boulanger in Paris, and earned his M.M. and D.M.A. Degrees in Composition at the Juilliard School. At Juilliard he studied with Luciano Berio, Elliott Carter, and Otto Luening. Dr. Thomas taught and served as chairman of the Composition Department in the Juilliard Pre-College Division from 1969 to 1994, and in 1994 he was appointed Director of the Pre-College Division at the Juilliard School. In addition to composing, Thomas performed as a pianist and conductor, and was a guest teacher, throughout the world. His awards included a grant from The National Endowment for the Arts and a Distinguished Teacher Citation from The White House Commission on Presidential Scholars. Career Although he taught throughout the world, from 2000 on, Thomas was a regular guest of the People’s Republic of China. Under the auspices of the Chinese government, Thomas performed his composition for solo piano, Music at Twilight, in Hong Kong and Guangzhou. Thomas was an Advisor of the Guangxi Arts College and a guest conductor of the Guangxi Arts College Youth Orches

Andrew Waggoner

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Andrew Waggoner (born November 10, 1960) is an American composer and violinist. Biography Andrew Waggoner grew up in New Orleans, Minneapolis and Atlanta, and studied at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts, the Eastman School of Music and Cornell University. His music has been commissioned and performed by the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Saint Louis, Denver, Syracuse, and Winnipeg Symphonies, the Cassatt, Corigliano, Miro, and Villiers Quartets, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, the California EAR Unit, pianist Gloria Cheng, violist Melia Watras, ‘cellist Robert Burkhart, the Bohuslav Martinu Philharmonic of Zlin, Czech Republic, Sequitur, the Empyrean Ensemble, Buglisi-Foreman Dance, Ensemble X, CELLO, Flexible Music, Ensemble Nordlys, of Denmark, and Ensemble Accroche Note, of France. Together with his wife, cellist Caroline Stinson, he is Co-Artistic Director of the Catskills-based Weekend of Chamber Music. Waggoner was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2005. A Fromm Foundation Commission supported Waggoner’s Fifth String Quartet, written for the Lydian String Quartet. Compositions String chamber works *Down/Up for ob., vn., va.,

Andrew York (guitarist)

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Andrew York (born 1958) is an American Grammy Award winning classical guitarist and composer. Biography York was born in 1958 in Atlanta, Georgia, United States, and grew up in Virginia. He received degrees from James Madison University in Virginia and the University of Southern California (USC). He studied in Spain, where he met classical guitarist John Williams. Williams has performed and recorded compositions by York. In 1989, York released his debut solo album, Perfect Sky (Timeless, 1989). He was a member of the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet from 1990 to 2006. York is the only alumnus in USC’s history to have received their Distinguished Alumni Award twice, in 1997 as a member of the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet and again in 2003 for his solo music career. He played lute with the USC Early Music Ensemble. In addition to his solo career, recording and performing his own compositions, York’s recent collaborations include projects with Andy Summers, W. A. Mathieu, Dai Kimura, and Mitsuko Kado. York’s tour schedule has included concerts in thirty countries. York’s compositions and arrangements for guitar have been performed and recorded by guitarists John Williams, Christopher Parkenin

Andrey Kasparov

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Andrey Rafailovich Kasparov (; ; born 6 April 1966) is an Armenian-American pianist, composer, and professor, who holds both American and Russian citizenship. Biography Early life and education Kasparov was born on 6 April 1966 in Baku, Azerbaijan, to a family of Armenian descent. He began his musical studies at the age of six, and he moved to Moscow at fifteen. He later entered the Moscow State Conservatory, graduating with honors in Music Composition and Piano, in 1989 and 1990, respectively. At the Conservatory, he studied harmony and counterpoint were with Yuri Kholopov, a famous Russian musicologist. Among his keyboard instructors were Nina Emelianova, Vladimir Bunin, Sergei Dizhur, Dmitri Sakharov, and Victor Merzhanov. His composition studies began with Tatyana Chudova and Tikhon Khrennikov; he later continued them in the independent studio of Alexandr Chaikovsky. In 1985, he was awarded a Third Prize for his Toccata for piano, and in 1987, was awarded Second Prize for his Six Aphorisms for flute, violin and cello, at the All-USSR Composition Competition. Kasparov pursued subsequent doctoral studies in composition at the Jacobs School of Music and the Indiana University at B

Andy Akiho

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Andy Akiho (born February 7, 1979, Columbia, South Carolina) is an American musician and composer of contemporary classical music. A virtuoso percussionist based in New York City, his primary performance instrument is steel pans. He took interest in becoming a percussionist when his older sister introduced him to a drum set at the age of 9. Akiho first tried his hand at the steel pan when he became an undergraduate at the University of South Carolina. He began taking several trips to Trinidad after college to learn and play music. From there, he started writing pieces of his own. He is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in composition at Princeton University. Career Akiho has tried to learn everything he could with what was available to him at the time as a percussionist while at the University of South Carolina. He has played in a percussion ensemble as a classical percussionist, concert band, and in orchestras. Akiho had also joined a local West African percussion ensemble, Brazilian drumming ensembles, and steel bands. He began to realize once he finished at South Carolina that he truly loved playing the pans the most and from there he traveled to Trinidad several times without knowing

Andy Sturmer

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Marvin Andrew Sturmer (born March 11, 1965) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, and composer who co-founded the rock band Jellyfish in 1989. He was the group’s lead vocalist, drummer, and primary songwriter. Following their break-up in 1994, Sturmer became involved with Tamio Okuda, as writer and producer for the Japanese pop duo Puffy AmiYumi. Although Sturmer maintains a low public profile, he continues working as a songwriter for cartoons produced by Disney and Cartoon Network. While their records earned critical praise and they toured the world several times, Jellyfish failed to meet commercial expectations, and intra-group friction led to Jellyfish’s dissolution in early 1994. In a May 1994 article published in the San Francisco Chronicle, it was reported that Sturmer and Manning would form new bands in the aftermath of Jellyfish. Sturmer nearly released a solo album on Virgin Records before deciding against the proposal. He was already a friend of main Puffy composer and producer Tamio Okuda and was credited as “godfather” of the band for giving the group their name. Sturmer also worked with the Swedish pop band the Merrymakers, who tracked him down through the Inter

Angélica Negrón

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Angélica Negrón (born 1981) is a Puerto-Rican composer and multi-instrumentalist recognized for composing music for accordions, robotic instruments, toys, and electronics, as well as for chamber ensembles, orchestras, choirs, and films. Negrón is a founding member of the electronic indie band Balún, where she sings and plays the accordion. She is based in Brooklyn, New York, where she is a teaching artist for New York Philharmonic’s Very Young Composers program and Lincoln Center Education. She grew up in San Juan where she received her early education in piano and violin at the Conservatory of Music of Puerto Rico. Caribbean influences can be heard in her work, most notably in Balún, the indie dream-pop band she founded. Negrón is an artist in residence at National Sawdust working on a lip sync opera, Chimera, for drag queen performers and chamber ensemble exploring the ideas of fantasy and illusion as well as the intricacies of identity. Life Angélica Negrón is a Puerto Rican native, born in San Juan, who lives in Brooklyn, New York. As a child, she studied piano and violin at the Conservatory of Music of Puerto Rico. She earned her master’s degree at New York University and is w

Ann Callaway

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Ann Marie Callaway (born October 28, 1949) is an American composer. Life and career Callaway was born in Washington, D.C., and grew up in Langley Park. She began her musical training in Baltimore under Grace Newsom Cushman and later studied with Alvin Etler at Smith College, George Crumb at University of Pennsylvania and with Jack Beeson, Fred Lerdahl and George Edwards at Columbia University, where she earned her D.M.A. in 1991. Callaway’s compositions have been widely broadcast in the U.S., and she is the subject of a documentary produced by Swedish Radio. She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, commissions from the National Endowment for the Arts and the American Guild of Organists, and has held residencies at Yaddo, the MacDowell Colony, Voci and the Leighton Artist Colony in Banff. She is a recipient of the Fred Waring Award, and the Miriam Gideon Prize. In 1984 Callaway was one of the founders of the New York Women Composers, Inc., an organization that supports women composers in the State of New York and the Greater New York City area through catalogs, events and grants. Works Her principal publisher is Subito Music. Recordings * The Gregg Smith Singers American Choral Mas

Ann Millikan

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Ann E. Millikan (born June 10, 1963) is an American composer. Life and career Ann Millikan was born in San Diego County, California. Millikan composes in several genres, including orchestral, opera, choral and instrumental, and her works have been used for purposes such as installation, theatre and dance. Millikan’s works have been performed internationally and are widely available on recorded media. She currently resides in Minnesota. Honors and awards Millikan has received grants and awards from the following: *2011 MN State Arts Board Artist Initiative *2010 McKnight Composer Fellowship *California Arts Council *American Music Center *ASCAP awards *American Composers Forum *Meet The Composer *Argosy Foundation Contemporary Music Fund *Jerome Foundation *Zellerbach Family Fund *Berkeley Civic Arts Program *Waging Peace Through Singing (Highest Honors) Works Selected works include: ;Orchestra *Trilhas de Sombra *Ballad Nocturne *Landing Inside the Inside of an Animal *Red Migration for orchestra ;Chamber *Thunder Woman *Kuiper Belt Wamfle *The Woodcarver & The Blacksmith *Cantando para a Onça *Choro do Zeitgeist *Red Migration *221B Baker Street *Trens Coloridos para Gabriela *Thr

Anna Gardner Goodwin

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Anna Gardner Goodwin (October 1874 – 1959) was a Black American composer of classical music. Early life Anna Gardner was born in Augusta, Georgia, in 1874 to Daniel and Anna Gardner. Daniel Gardner was remembered as “the March King of Augusta”, a cornet player who ran a Sunday afternoon concert series for Black Augustans. “To dance and watch my father blow his cornet with such enthusiasm created within me a desire to make music,” Anna Gardner Goodwin wrote. Personal life and legacy In 1895, Anna Gardner married the Rev. George A. Goodwin, a professor of theology at Morehouse College, Atlanta, Georgia. Together they had four children: a son, George Jr., and three daughters: Janie, Anna, and Eunice. In summer 1913, Mrs. Goodwin earned a scholarship to the University of Pennsylvania to study the “method and supervision of public-school sic music” in the summer of 1913. Her granddaughter, Jane Alexander Robinson, became one of the founders of the Michigan Association of Black Psychologists. Jane’s grandsons, David E. Robinson III and Richard Robinson, both became professional musicians and composers. Anna Gardner Goodwin’s great-grandson, Richard Robinson, became a full member of the D

Anna Rubin

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Anna Rubin (born 1946) is an American composer of electroacoustic and instrumental music. Biography Anna Rubin studied with composers Mel Powell, Earle Brown, and Pauline Oliveros while completing her MFA at California Institute of the Arts. She also holds a doctorate in composition from Princeton University where she studied with Paul Lansky. After completing her studies, she taught composition at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and Lafayette College. From 2002 to 2018, she taught at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Rubin is a member of the American Music Center, is a co-founder of the Independent Composers Association of LA, serves on the editorial board of Perspectives of New Music, and has served as president of the International Alliance for Women in Music. Rubin is the author of professional articles on the work of composer Francis Dhomont. Honors and awards *Two awards, Maryland State Arts Council *Fellow, National Orchestral Association *Delta Ensemble Gaudeamus Prize for De Nacht: Lament for Malcolm X, 1984 *Jury prize, Aether Festival #1 - International Radio Art/Radio Station KUNM, Albuquerque, NM, for Family Stories: Sophie, Sally, with Laurie Hollander S

Anna Weesner

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Anna Weesner (born 1965) is an American classical composer. Originally a flute student, educator, and performer, she later shifted towards composing in the 1990s. A 2009 Guggenheim Fellow, she has released two albums – Small and Mighty Forces (2014) and My Mother in Love (2024) – and she is Dr. Robert Weiss Professor of Music at the University of Pennsylvania. Early life and career Anna Weesner was born in 1965 in Iowa City, Iowa. She was later raised in Durham, New Hampshire, where her father worked at the University of New Hampshire at the time. Bernard Holland of The New York Times said that in a 1996 performance in Voices of the Spirit at the 92nd Street Y, she “offer ed a spiritual vision that prefers hard truths to warm reassurance.” In 2000, Peter Dobrin of The Philadelphia Inquirer said that the instrumental ranges of her piece “Sudden, Unbidden” “mak e for an unattractive, expressive skittishness”; the next year, he praised her for “knowing the value of repetition” and being “especially communicative” in the first song of her composition series Early, After, Ever, Now. Weesner’s 2002 piece “Still Things Move”, commissioned for the Metamorphosen Chamber Orchestra, was comme

Anne La Berge

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Anne La Berge was born in Palo Alto, California, in 1955. Her father, David LaBerge is a neuropsychology scientist and her mother, Jane Schuneman, a violinist. She is a composer, performer and improviser, currently residing in Amsterdam. Her work grows from the social and political issues that shape the world she moves through. Many of her pieces are multi level structures where performers make choices, follow flexible cues, and shape the music together in real time. She performs internationally as a multimedia musician and is a longtime member of the Amsterdam ensemble MAZE. She has served on the faculty at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague and worked as a coach for many organizations including the SPLICE Festival, US and the European Cortona Sessions. She has been an invited artist at both the Civitella Ranieri Foundation and the Headlands Center for the Arts. Her instruments include the flute, electronics, controllers, live processing, and spoken text, forming her signature sound world. She builds pieces that let performers interact with computer programs through phones, tablets, and laptops, giving them real time agency in how the music unfolds. Her performances shift freely

Anne LeBaron

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Alice Anne LeBaron (born May 30, 1953) is an American composer, harpist, academic, and writer. Frequently combining tonal and atonal techniques with an experimental approach, LeBaron’s compositions utilize elements of blues, jazz, pop, rock, and folk music. She explores environmental, cultural, philosophical and cultural themes, incorporating theater, mixed media, literature, and humor. As an improvising harpist, she employs a wide array of electronic enhancements and extended techniques for the harp, including preparing the harp and bowing the strings. Among other venues, LeBaron’s work has been performed at Carnegie Hall, the Hollywood Bowl, and the Kennedy Center, by orchestras including the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the National Symphony Orchestra. She is the recipient of an Alpert Award in the Arts, a Toulmin grant from Opera America, a Guggenheim fellowship, and a Fulbright Full Scholarship. She has been commissioned by the Fromm Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts and the Library of Congress, among other organizations. She also served as chair of the Board of the American Composers Forum from 2018 to 2020. LeBaron was a professor at California Institute of the

Anne Mathilde Bilbro

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Anne Mathilde Bilbro was an American composer and music educator. Early life and career A native of Tuskegee, Alabama, who spent the lion’s share of years 20 through 49 in Gadsden, and the remainder divided primarily between New York, Birmingham, and St. Petersburg, Bilbro was the only daughter of five children born to Francina A. “Franke” (née Mason) and Judge James Andrew Bilbro. She attended the Alabama Conference Female College, graduating in 1887, and later studied music in Atlanta and New York. Bilbro published over 600 works, primarily in the field of music education. Her compositions included piano pieces, pianologues, song stories, piano duets and trios, and complete collections of piano music. Her teaching methods were recognized for their novelty in the context of children’s piano instruction. Bilbro operated a music studio in Gadsden, Alabama, from the 1890s to 1900s, and conducted master classes in multiple states. Beyond her work in music, she wrote short stories, a novel, articles for The Etude, and the “Legend of Noccalula,” a text associated with Noccalula Falls in Alabama. In her later years, Bilbro experienced hearing loss but continued to engage with music. In 1

Annea Lockwood

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Annea Lockwood (born July 29, 1939) is a New Zealand-born American composer. Her work incorporates microtonal, electroacoustic, and vocal music, as well as field recordings; she has also composed Fluxus-inspired pieces involving intentionally damaging pianos. She taught electronic music at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, from 1982 until her retirement. Early life and education Lockwood studied composition and completed a Bachelor of Music degree with honours from the University of Canterbury in Christchurch. Her composition studies continued with Peter Racine Fricker at the Royal College of Music in London from 1961 to 1963; with Gottfried Michael Koenig at the Darmstädter Ferienkurse from 1963 to 1964; and at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln. She also studied in the Netherlands. Lockwood settled in London in 1964. Career and style During the late 1960s and early 1970s, Lockwood performed and composed around Europe. Her compositions featured non-conventional instruments such as glass tubing used in The Glass Concert (1967). This work was published in the magazine Source: Music of the Avant Garde and later recorded and released by Tangent Records. In the 1970s, Lockw

Annelu Burns

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Annelu Burns (November 12, 1889 – July 11, 1942) was an American lyricist and violinist from Selma, Alabama. She wrote lyrics for songs, theater productions, and films. She frequently wrote songs together with Madelyn Sheppard, a musician and composer who was also from Selma. *Just Because (c. 1919), musical comedy with book by Anna Wynne O’Ryan and music by Madelyn Sheppard External links *

Annie Gosfield

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Annie Gosfield (born September 11, 1960) is a New-York-based composer who works on the boundaries between notated and improvised music, electronic and acoustic sounds, refined timbres and noise. She composes for others and performs with her own group, taking her music to festivals, factories, clubs, art spaces and concert halls. Much of her work combines acoustic instruments with electronic sounds, incorporating unusual sources such as satellite sounds, machine sounds, detuned or out-of-tune samples and industrial noises. Her work often contains improvisation and frequently uses extended techniques and/or altered musical instruments. She won a 2012 Berlin Prize. She was born in Philadelphia. Work Gosfield’s work includes large-scale compositions, opera, orchestral work, chamber music, electronic music, video projects, and music for dance. She uses traditional notation, improvisation and extended techniques to explore relationships between music and noise. Her music is often inspired by non-musical sounds, such as machines, destroyed pianos, warped 78 rpm records, and detuned radios. She often collaborated with musicians to emphasize their unique qualities. Gosfield’s compositions h

Antal Doráti

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Antal Doráti (, , ; 9 April 1906 – 13 November 1988) was a Hungarian-born conductor and composer who became a naturalized American citizen in 1943. Biography Antal Doráti was born in Budapest to a Jewish family. His father Alexander Doráti was a violinist with the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra and his mother Margit Kunwald was a piano teacher. He studied at the Franz Liszt Academy with Zoltán Kodály and Leó Weiner for composition and Béla Bartók for piano. His links with Bartók continued for many years: he conducted the world premiere of Bartók’s Viola Concerto, as completed by Tibor Serly, with the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra in 1949, with William Primrose as the soloist. He made his conducting debut in 1924 with the Budapest Royal Opera. As well as composing original works, he compiled and arranged pieces by Johann Strauss II for the ballet Graduation Ball (1940), premiered by the Original Ballet Russe in Sydney, Australia, with himself on the conductor’s podium. For Ballet Theatre (later renamed American Ballet Theatre) he created scores for the ballets Bluebeard (1941) from music by Jacques Offenbach and The Fair at Sorochinsk (1943) from music by Modest Mussorgsky. After

Anthony Brandt

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Anthony K. Brandt (born 1961) is an American composer, academic, and writer. He is Professor of Composition and Theory at Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music and the co-author with neuroscientist David Eagleman of the 2017 book The Runaway Species: How Human Creativity Remakes the World. As a composer, his works include three chamber operas, an oratorio, and orchestral, chamber, and vocal music. External links * *Brandt, Anthony and Eagleman, David (October 2017). “How Your Brain Takes Good Ideas and Makes Them Better”. Psychology Today (article explaining the main tenets of their book The Runaway Species) *Video: Maternity on the official YouTube channel of Musiqa Houston. (Brandt discussing the compositional process of his oratorio Maternity with excerpts of the music)

Anthony Braxton

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Anthony Braxton (born June 4, 1945) is an American experimental composer, educator, music theorist, improviser, and multi-instrumentalist who is best known for playing saxophones, particularly the alto sax. He grew up on the South Side of Chicago and was a key early member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians. He received great acclaim for his 1969 double-LP record For Alto, the first full-length album of solo saxophone music. A prolific composer with a vast body of cross-genre work, the MacArthur Fellow and NEA Jazz Master has released hundreds of recordings and compositions. During six years that he was signed to Arista Records, the diversity of his output encompassed work with many members of the AACM including duets with co-founder and first president Muhal Richard Abrams; collaborations with electronic musician Richard Teitelbaum; a saxophone quartet with Julius Hemphill, Oliver Lake and Hamiet Bluiett; compositions for four orchestras; and the ensemble arrangements of Creative Orchestra Music 1976, which was named the 1977 DownBeat Critics’ Poll Album of the Year. Many of Braxton’s projects are ongoing including the Diamond Curtain Wall works, in which

Anthony Davis (composer)

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Anthony Davis (born February 20, 1951) is an American pianist and composer. He incorporates several styles including jazz, rhythm ’n’ blues, gospel, non-Western, African, European classical, Indonesian gamelan, and experimental music. He has played with several groups and is also a professor of music at the University of California, San Diego. Davis is perhaps best known for his operas; he has been called “the dean of African-American opera composers.” Biography Davis was born in Paterson, New Jersey in 1951. He has a 1975 degree from Yale University, and has taught at Yale and Harvard University. Davis is a Distinguished Professor of Music at the University of California, San Diego, having joined the department in 1996. He has received acclaim as a free-jazz pianist, a co-leader or sideman with various ensembles. In 1997 his opera Amistad, with a libretto by his cousin Thulani Davis, premiered at the Chicago Lyric Opera. Its ambition was recognized but the production received mixed reviews. It was accepted for production in 2008 at Spoleto Festival USA. It underwent a major revision and the production was highly praised. Opera Today said that the revised Amistad was “much leaner,

Anthony Heinrich

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Anthony Philip Heinrich (March 11, 1781 – May 3, 1861) was the first “full-time” American composer, and the most prominent before the American Civil War. He did not start composing until he was 36, after losing his business fortune in the Napoleonic Wars. For most of his career he was known as “Father Heinrich,” an emeritus figure of America’s small classical music community. He chaired the founding meeting of the New York Philharmonic Society in 1842. Life Born in modest circumstances in Schönbüchel (now Krásný Buk, part of Krásná Lípa), Bohemia, Heinrich was given into the care of a rich uncle, whose thriving business empire he inherited in 1800. In 1810 he became stranded in Boston by the loss of his entire fortune in the Napoleonic Wars and the ensuing economic crash. Penniless, he resolved to take up his long-time avocation and become a professional violinist and conductor. A formative experience for him was a 700-mile journey, on foot and by boat, into the wilderness of Pennsylvania and then along the Ohio River into Kentucky. The sights and sounds of the new American frontier inspired some of the most original, if not strange, program music of the nineteenth century. Settlin

Anthony Iannaccone

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Anthony Joseph Iannaccone (born October 14, 1943 in Brooklyn, New York) is an American composer and conductor. His music has been performed by major orchestras and chamber ensembles, and he has conducted numerous regional and metropolitan orchestras in the United States and in Europe. He was a conductor and professor at Eastern Michigan University, from which he retired at the end of the winter semester of 2013. He studied with Aaron Copland (1959–1964); with David Diamond, Vittorio Giannini, and Ludmila Ulehla at the Manhattan School of Music, from which he earned a master’s degree (1962–1968); and with Samuel Adler at the Eastman School of Music, from which he earned a doctoral degree. During the 1960s he supported himself as an orchestral violinist, and taught at the Manhattan School of Music from 1966 to 1968. He taught at Eastern Michigan University from 1971, where he founded an electronic music studio, taught composition, and for 30 years conducted the Collegium Chamber Orchestra and Chorus, focusing on late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century repertory. He won first prize from the National Band Association in 1988 for Apparitions, won the SAI/C.F. Peters Competition in

Anthony Suter

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Anthony Suter is an American composer and music educator. Dr. Suter has a deep interest in mentoring younger musicians and is a vocal advocate for public school music programs, often serving as a guest conductor and clinician for K-12 music programs. He resides in Redlands, California, just outside Los Angeles. Dr. Suter’s music has been heard in nearly every major U.S. city, as well as a growing list of international venues. Dr. Suter joined the University of Redlands faculty in the Fall of 2008, where he teaches composition and music theory. He earned his B.M. in Music Theory and Composition from the University of Southern California, his M.M. in Music Composition from the University of Michigan, and his D.M.A. from the University of Texas at Austin. His works include three chamber operas, chamber and orchestral music, and several works for wind ensemble. Upcoming projects include Sex Sting, a collaborative electro-acoustic opera with playwright Doris Baizley and the electronic music duo MLuM (Marco Schindelmann and Michael Raco-Rands), as well as a new choral work for the University of Redlands Madrigals group (Nicholle Andrews, director). Recent projects have included works for

Antonina Armato

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Antonina Armato is an American songwriter, record producer, music producer and businesswoman. She is the co-founder and member of Rock Mafia, a record production/songwriting team. She has worked with Justin Bieber, Zedd, Gwen Stefani, Demi Lovato, Christina Aguilera, Vanessa Hudgens, Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, No Doubt, Wyclef Jean, Green Day, Sheena Easton, Mariah Carey, Ariana Grande, Flo Rida, Ellie Goulding, Tokio Hotel, AGNEZ MO, Jojo Siwa, and BTS. She has produced and written songs for the soundtracks of the films Descendants 3 and Descendants: The Rise of Red. Career 1980s–1990s One of Armato’s first major hits was “I Still Believe”, which reached number 13 on the Billboard Hot 100 for Brenda K. Starr after being featured on her self-titled album. The track was later covered by Mariah Carey. Armato wrote the song about her first love, later recalling that she “felt every word of it”. She wrote the Top 40 radio hit “Come Back To Me” for singer Vanessa Hudgens. She also wrote and produced the top 5 single, “Love You like a Love Song” for Selena Gomez. She co-wrote and produced Miley Cyrus’s Top 10 singles “See You Again” and “7 Things” and her single “Fly on the Wall”. She co

Arlene Sierra

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Arlene Sierra (b. June 1, 1970) is an American composer of contemporary classical music, working in London, United Kingdom. Education Sierra studied at Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, Yale University School of Music and the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, receiving a DMA in 1999; her principal teachers were Martin Bresnick, Michael Daugherty and Jacob Druckman. A composition fellow at the Britten-Pears School (Aldeburgh Festival) in 2000 and Tanglewood in 2001, teachers included Louis Andriessen, Magnus Lindberg, and Colin Matthews. She also worked with Judith Weir at the Dartington International Summer School in 1999, Paul-Heinz Dittrich in Berlin in 1997-8, and Betsy Jolas at The American Conservatory of Fontainebleau Schools in 1993. Career Sierra’s music has been commissioned by organizations including the Seattle Symphony, Tanglewood Music Festival, the New York Philharmonic, the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, the Albany Symphony, the Detroit Symphony, the Cheltenham International Festival, the Jerome, PRS and Cheswatyr Foundations, and the Ralph Vaughan Williams Trust. Performers of her work have included New York City Opera VOX, the London Sinfonietta, I

Arlene Zallman

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Arlene Zallman (9 September 193425 November 2006) was an American composer and music educator. Life Zallman was born in Philadelphia and graduated from the Juilliard School of Music. She received a master’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania, where she studied composition with Vincent Persichetti and George Crumb. In 1959 she received a two-year Fulbright Scholarship to Florence, Italy, to study with Luigi Dallapiccola. She held positions on the faculty of the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music and Yale University and then became a professor of composition at Wellesley, Massachusetts in 1976. She received the Marion S. Freschl Award for Vocal Composition, and awards from Meet the Composer, the Mellon Foundation, the Massachusetts Council for the Arts and Humanities, and the Guggenheim Foundation. Her Three Songs from Quasimodo won awards from both the National Endowment for the Arts and the International Society for Contemporary Music. She held fellowships at the MacDowell Colony, where she received the Faye Barnaby Kent Fellow. During 2001-2, she was a Fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. In 2003 Zallman was a guest composer-in-residence at the Rocca di

Arnie Roth

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Arnold “Arnie” Roth (born April 28, 1953) is an American conductor, composer, and record producer, known for his expansive career in the music industry. Roth began his career as a professional violinist before founding AWR Music, where Roth became more involved as a producer of orchestral concerts and recordings. Roth is perhaps best known as the co-creator (along with composer Nobuo Uematsu) and Music Director of Distant Worlds: music from FINAL FANTASY, produced in collaboration with the video game company Square Enix. Distant Worlds has performed hundreds of sold-out concerts around the world and has produced seven full-length albums of orchestral Final Fantasy music. Roth’s son Eric (born 1977) is also a famed conductor. Career Roth is a classically trained violinist. As a freelance violinist in Chicago throughout the ’70s and ’80s, Roth worked with dozens of notable musicians and bands like Styx, Curtis Mayfield, and the Chi-Lites. He was also a performing member of the Grammy Award-winning music group Mannheim Steamroller for decades. In the early 2000s, Roth composed, arranged, and conducted the music for eight of Mattel’s sixteen animated Barbie movies. He won the Best Scor

Arnold Dreyblatt

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Arnold Dreyblatt (born 1953) is an American composer, performance artist and visual artist from the second generation of New York minimal composers. His musical compositions are usually based on just intonation harmonics that he performs by a bowing technique he developed for his modified double bass and other modified and conventional instruments which he specially tunes. In his installations, performances and media works, Dreyblatt creates complex textual and spatial metaphors for memory which serves as a media discourse on recollection and the archive. His installations, public artworks and performances have been exhibited and staged extensively in Europe. Biography Arnold Dreyblatt was born in 1953 in New York City. His mother, Lucille Wallenrod (1918–1998), was a painter. Dreyblatt started his studies at Wesleyan University in the 1970s. He transferred to the Center for Media Study at the University at Buffalo. Dreyblatt studied music with Pauline Oliveros, La Monte Young and Alvin Lucier (at Wesleyan University), and new media art with Steina and Woody Vasulka. Dreyblatt originally used a steady pulse provided by the bowing motion on his double bass (placing his music in the

Arnold Franchetti

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Arnold Franchetti (1911–1993) was a composer born in Lucca, Italy who later emigrated to the United States. Early life As a boy, Franchetti studied composition and piano with his father, Baron Alberto Franchetti (1860–1942). After a brief stint with the Italian army during World War II, Franchetti joined the anti-Mussolini underground resistance in the Italian Alps where he helped Allied airmen escape. where he became chair of the theory and composition department, remaining there until his retirement in 1979. Joel Pelletier, Robert Beaser, Martin Bresnick, Henry Gwiazda, Norman Dinerstein, Gwynneth Van Anden Walker, others. During his 45 years in the United States, Franchetti received composition honors and awards from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, National Institute of Arts and Letters, and many other prestigious organizations. References

Arnold Rosner

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Arnold Rosner (November 8, 1945 in New York City – November 8, 2013) was an American composer of classical music. Biography Rosner got his training at State University of New York at Buffalo, New York. According to his own account, he “learned practically nothing” there. Rosner developed an individual style that fused elements of Renaissance music with the heightened drama and rich sonorities of late romanticism. He composed three operas, eight symphonies, six string quartets, chamber music and songs. Many of his compositions were influenced by his Jewish background, but also by Catholicism. Most of his music is available on recording. Principal works Operas * Chronicle of Nine: The Tragedy of Queen Jane, Op. 81 (1984); libretto by Florence Stevenson * Bontsche Schweig, Chamber Opera, Op. 102 (1994) * Spinoza, Chamber Opera, Op. 123 (2011); libretto by the composer, including some prayers and historical documents Symphonies * Symphony No. 1, Op. 3 (1961) * Symphony No. 2, Op. 8 (1961) * Symphony No. 3, Op. 20 (1963) * Symphony No. 4, Op. 29 (1964) * Symphony No. 5 Missa sine Cantoribus super “Salve Regina”, Op. 57 (1973) * Symphony No. 6, Op. 64 (1976) * Symphony No. 7 in A minor T

Arnold Schoenberg

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1874–1894: Upbringing#

Arnold Schönberg was born on 13 September 1874 at Obere Donaustraße 5 in Vienna’s Leopoldstadt (historically a Jewish ghetto), into a lower-middle-class Jewish family. His father, Samuel, a shoe shopkeeper from Szécsény, Hungary, had moved to Vienna via Pozsony (Pressburg; now Bratislava). His mother Pauline Nachod was from a Prague family belonging to the Old New Synagogue. He began violin at eight and soon started writing music autodidactically by arranging and imitating what he played or heard, like military band repertoire, for informal performance. Juvenilia survive from as early as 1882, sometimes only as fragments or parts. They include a birthday march and arrangements of Gustav Pick’s Fiakerlied and Vincenzo Bellini’s “Ite su colle”. He composed violin duets after Ignaz Pleyel and Giovanni Battista Viotti, and advanced to string trios (for two violins and viola) without clear models.

Art Phillips (composer)

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Art Phillips (born 1955, Erie, Pennsylvania) is a composer of film, television, and popular music. He has been working in film and television for over 50 years. Education and early career Phillips’s career began in the early 1970s in Los Angeles, where he was a session guitarist, composer, and orchestrator working and recording for popular artists including Barry Manilow, Minnie Riperton, Demis Roussos, The Carpenters, Smokey Robinson, Dory Previn, Burl Ives, and The Lettermen. He did work on television series and feature films before moving to Sydney, Australia in 1987. He was musical director, conductor, and orchestrator on live concert tours for Demis Roussos, Dory Previn, and John Rowles, and toured as guitarist for Barry Manilow for over three years. He produced recordings for Demis Roussos, Barry Manilow, Sally Kellerman, and John Rowles, achieving a Gold Record Award for his production work on the album Another Chapter for Rowles. Phillips’s earlier composition credits include background music for The Love Boat. He wrote the R&B single “Here We Go” for Minnie Riperton, and co-wrote the Motown Records release “Now That I Have You” for artist Teena Marie. He holds a Master of

Arthur B. Rubinstein

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Arthur Benjamin Rubinstein (March 31, 1938 – April 23, 2018) was an American Emmy Award-winning composer. He composed several television series soundtracks and songs for film scores. He was frequently hired by film director John Badham, and the majority of his movie soundtracks are found in Badham’s work, including Whose Life Is It Anyway? (1981), WarGames (1983), Rubinstein also created a very unusual sound by placing a microphone inside a large empty water bottle and placing it underneath a Steinway grand piano. His other film and TV movie scores include The House Without a Christmas Tree (1972), The Great Bank Hoax (1977), The Great American Traffic Jam (1980), On the Right Track (1981), The Phoenix (1982), Deal of the Century (1983), The Cartier Affair (1984), It Came Upon the Midnight Clear (1984), Lost in America (1985), Murder in Space (1985), The Best of Times (1986), Hyper Sapien: People from Another Star (1986), Love Among Thieves (1987),Once Upon a Texas Train (1988), Inherit the Wind (1988), several Season Two episodes of The Simpsons and Dead Man’s Island (1996). He died on April 23, 2018, from cancer at the age of 80. He was among those honored at the 2019 Grammy awar

Arthur Batelle Whiting

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Arthur Batelle Whiting (June 20, 1861 – July 20, 1936) was an American teacher, pianist, composer, and writer on music, known for his conservative compositional style, espousal of early music, and his long-running university lecture-recital series. Biography Whiting was born on June 20, 1861, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, son of Charles Edward and Emma Reeves Leland Whiting. He began studying piano at the age of 8 with his mother. A few years later, he left school and was placed under the instruction of his uncle, organist and composer George E. Whiting, who gave him lessons in the organ. He continued studying the piano; in 1873 or 1874, at the age of 13, he began his career as a concert pianist, in a concert in Worcester, Massachusetts. Whiting also studied piano with Prof. Hans Bussmeyer (1853–1930), head of the piano department at the School * Organ music * Chamber music for various combinations of instruments * Arrangements of French and English folk songs * Transcriptions for piano of toccatas and suites of Bach and Handel References External links * Whiting Collection at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts *Whiting biography in American Choral Music section of

Arthur Berger (composer)

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Arthur Victor Berger (May 15, 1912 – October 7, 2003) was an American composer and music critic who has been described as a New Mannerist. Biography Born in New York City, of Jewish descent, Berger studied as an undergraduate at New York University, during which time he joined the Young Composer’s Group, as a graduate student under Walter Piston at Harvard, and with Nadia Boulanger and at the Sorbonne under a Paine Fellowship. He taught briefly at Mills College and Brooklyn College, then worked briefly at the New York Sun and then for a longer period of time at the New York Herald Tribune. In 1953 he left the paper to teach at Brandeis University where he was eventually named the Irving Fine Professor Emeritus. His notable students there included Gustav Ciamaga and Richard Wernick. He taught occasionally at the New England Conservatory during his retirement. He co-founded (with Benjamin Boretz), in 1962, Perspectives of New Music, which he edited until 1964. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1971. He wrote the first book on Aaron Copland (reprinted 1990, Da Capo Press), and coined the terms octatonic scale and pitch centricity in his “Problems

Arthur Bergh

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Arthur Oscar Bergh (March 24, 1882 – February 11, 1962 ) was an American composer, conductor and accompanist. He performed on the piano, violin and organ. Bergh was born in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Bergh became the recording manager at Emerson Records in 1916; he had previously been employed by Columbia Records, and was convinced to move to Victor Emerson’s new company after Emerson himself left Columbia. In his later life, Bergh worked as a librarian with Hollywood film companies. He died in Los Angeles on February 11, 1962. After Bergh’s death, Geraldyne married Los Angeles Superior Court judge McIntyre Faries on December 3, 1965. Geraldyne died in 1998 and was buried in Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale. Works He composed a number of operas and operettas, including adaptations of Robert Browning’s The Pied Piper of Hamelin and Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven. His Lieder include music to Walt Whitman’s The Imprisoned Soul (1939), Percy Bysshe Shelley’s Music, When Soft Voices Die (1947), Emily Dickinson’s The Grass (1954), and John Greenleaf Whittier’s Dear Lord and Father of Mankind (1955). * 1908 – The Raven, Op. 20 (Edgar Allan Poe) * 1910 – December, Op. 9 No. 1 (Thomas Bailey Al

Arthur Foote

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Arthur William Foote (March 5, 1853 in Salem, Massachusetts – April 8, 1937 in Boston, Massachusetts) was an American classical composer, and a member of the “Boston Six.” The other five were George Whitefield Chadwick, Amy Beach, Edward MacDowell, John Knowles Paine, and Horatio Parker. Biography Foote was appointed organist of the First Church in Boston (Unitarian) in 1878, remaining there 32 years. A founder of the American Guild of Organists, he was one of the examiners at the first Guild Fellowship examination. He helped organize the New England chapter of the AGO, and from 1909 to 1912 (when the office was discontinued) he served as National Honorary President of the AGO, succeeding Horatio Parker in that position. He was one of the editors of Hymns of the Church Universal, a Unitarian hymnal published in 1890. The modern tendency is to view Foote’s music as “Romantic” and “European” in the light of the later generation of American composers such as Aaron Copland, Roy Harris and William Schuman, all of whom helped to develop a recognizably American sound in classical music. A Harvard graduate and the first noted American classical composer to be trained entirely in the U.S.,

Arthur H. Bird

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Arthur Homer Bird (23 July 1856 – 22 December 1923) was an American composer, for many years resident in Germany. Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, he studied organ and composition in Berlin and spent a year at Weimar with Franz Liszt. He composed a symphonic poem, Eine Karneval-Szene, Op. 5, and a Symphony in A major, Op. 8 (both in 1886); three orchestral suites; some works for wind instruments alone including a Suite in D; some music for the ballet; a comic opera; and some chamber music; he was also commissioned by the Mason and Hamlin company to write a suite of short pieces for the reed organ. He married Wilhelmine Waldemann in Peterborough, England in 1888. Selected Compositions * Eine Karneval-Szene, Op. 5, symphonic poem (1886) * Symphony in A Major, Op. 8 (1886) * Suite in D, for wind dectet * Serenade for wind dectet * Marche miniature, for woodwind nonet References * External links *

Arthur Johnston (composer)

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Arthur James Johnston (January 10, 1898 – May 1, 1954) was an American composer, conductor, pianist and arranger. Life and career Born in New York City, he began playing piano in movie houses, and went to work for Fred Fisher’s music publishing company at the age of 16. He met, and was soon hired by, Irving Berlin, becoming Berlin’s personal arranger, and director of early Music Box Revues. His first hit song was “Mandy Make Up Your Mind”, co-written with George W. Meyer, Roy Turk and Grant Clarke for Florence Mills to sing in the show Dixie to Broadway. In 1929, he moved to Hollywood, where he orchestrated and arranged the music for films including Puttin’ On the Ritz and Charlie Chaplin’s City Lights. He worked with Sam Coslow on such songs as “Just One More Chance” (1932) and “Cocktails for Two” (1934). He became closely associated with Bing Crosby, writing songs for the films College Humor (1933), Too Much Harmony (1933), and Pennies From Heaven (1936), the first film on which he worked with lyricist Johnny Burke. He visited Britain in 1938, writing the music for the Jessie Matthews film Sailing Along, and served in the US Army in World War II. After returning to Hollywood, he

Arthur Kay (musician)

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Arthur Kay, né Kautzenbach (16 January 1882 in Grottkau/Grodków (Silesia), Germany; † 19 December, 1969 in Los Angeles (CA), United States) was a German-American conductor, composer, arranger, and cellist. Educated in Silesia and Berlin, he emigrated to the United States in 1907, where, after a few seasons as cellist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra, he embarked on a career as conductor, composer, and arranger in operetta, silent film, and talkies, first primarily on the East Coast and from 1918 on the West Coast. Biography Family and education Arthur Kautzenbach came from a Catholic family in Silesia in which there had already been musicians in earlier generations. He was the first of eight children of the cartwright and musician Ferdinand Kautzenbach (1856–1942) and his wife Bertha Kautzenbach, née Großmann (1861–1923). Kautzenbach’s main instrument was the cello, but he learned other instruments during his training in his father’s apprentice orchestras in Grottkau, Frankenstein, and Reichenbach im Eulengebirge. His sisters learned piano, his brothers string instruments. His sister Maria Kautzenbach, married Folgmann (1884–1915), and his

Arthur Russell

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Charles Arthur Russell Jr. (May 21, 1951 – April 4, 1992) was an American cellist, composer, producer, singer, and musician from Iowa, whose work spanned a disparate range of styles. After studying contemporary composition and Indian classical music in California, Russell relocated to New York City in the mid-1970s, where he became involved in Lower Manhattan’s avant-garde community and later the city’s burgeoning disco scene. His eclectic music was often marked by adventurous production choices and his soft tenor vocals. Russell worked as musical director of the New York avant-garde venue The Kitchen in 1974 and 1975, but later embraced dance music, producing or co-producing several underground club hits under names such as Dinosaur L, Loose Joints, and Indian Ocean between 1978 and 1988. He co-founded the independent label Sleeping Bag Records with Will Socolov in 1981, and collaborated with a wide variety of artists, including musicians Peter Gordon, Peter Zummo, and Talking Heads, DJs such as Walter Gibbons, Nicky Siano, and Steve D’Acquisto; and poet Allen Ginsberg. The only full-length studio albums Russell issued under his name were the orchestral recording Tower of Meaning

Augusta Browne

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Augusta Browne (1820–1882) was an American composer, publisher, and author. She started the first wave of female composers in the country. Wake, Lady Mine, written in 1845, is one of her best known works. Biography Augusta Browne Garrett was born in 1820 in Dublin, Ireland. She was one of nine children. In 1826 her father David moved to Boston, US and opened a music academy. Augusta was known as a child prodigy, playing Dussek at the age of seven, and by age sixteen she was playing her own compositions in public. Judith Tick notes that Browne was known as one of “the most prolific woman composer in America before 1870.” She composed over 200 works for piano and voice, along with numerous hymns and secular pieces. Browne often collaborated with lyricists, creating musical settings to accompany the text. In addition to her musical works, Browne published two books; The Precious Stones of the Heavenly Foundations and Hamilton, the Young Artist (written about her younger brother after his death). She also wrote numerous essays, religious tracts, poetry, and short stories. Rather than writing on issues such as home or family life, she wrote on the subjects most important to her; music,

Augusta Read Thomas

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Augusta Read Thomas (born April 24, 1964) is an American composer and University Professor of Composition in the Department of Music at the University of Chicago, where she is also director of the Chicago Center for Contemporary Composition. Biography Thomas studied composition with Oliver Knussen at the Tanglewood Music Center; Jacob Druckman at Yale University; Alan Stout and Bill Karlins at Northwestern University; and at the Royal Academy of Music in London. She was a Bunting Fellow at Radcliffe College in 1990–91 and a Junior Fellow in the Society of Fellows at Harvard University from 1991 to 1994. Thomas was the longest-serving Mead Composer-in-Residence with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, from 1997 to 2006. This residency culminated in the premiere of Astral Canticle for solo flute, solo violin, and orchestra, a finalist for the 2007 Pulitzer Prize in Music. During her residency, Thomas premiered nine commissioned orchestral works and helped establish the MusicNOW series. A former chairperson of the American Music Center, she is on many boards and, according to Wise Music Classical, “has become one of the most recognizable and widely loved figures in American music.” Commis

Aurelio Giorni

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Aurelio Carlo Pietro Teodoro Giorni (15 September 1895 – 23 September 1938) was an Italian-American pianist and composer. After emigrating to the United States in 1914, he toured the nation as a soloist and with the Elshuco Trio. He composed chamber music, orchestral music, études, as well as a sonata for piano and cello. Early life Aurelio was born on 15 September 1895, in Perugia, Italy, the first of two sons born to Carlo Giuseppe Giorni, a Roman landscape painter, and Linda Bergner Giorni, an American mezzo-soprano. Aurelio was the great-grandson of Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen. Aurelio’s parents had him tutored privately at home until, at age 13, he attended Santa Cecilia Conservatory of Music and studied piano with Maestro Giovanni Sgambati and Ferruccio Busoni from 1909 to 1911. He performed joint recitals with his mother Linda as early as February 1908, when he was 12 years old. One such performance took place at the Hotel Excelsior in Rome on 23 March 1911. The press notice read as follows: The Giorni Concert at the Hotel Excelsior, attracted a very large number of ladies and gentlemen who are already aware of the unusual musical gifts possessed by Madame Linda Giorn

Aurora Nealand

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Aurora Nealand is an American multi-instrumentalist (saxophone, clarinet, accordion), singer and composer. Among her many musical endeavors, she leads her own traditional jazz band, Aurora Nealand and the Royal Roses. Early life and education Nealand was born the youngest of four children in Pacifica, California, In 2001, Nealand earned a degree in music composition from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, where she created her own major in music composition. Nealand moved to New Orleans in 2004. Along with the Royal Roses, Nealand also performs as a member of the rockabilly band Rory Danger and the Danger Dangers and solo under the name The Monocle. In 2019, Nealand, under the name Monocle, brought her project “KindHumanKind” to the New Orleans Contemporary Arts Center, receiving a positive review from OffBeat magazine. Nealand began playing musical scores to the silent films of comedian Buster Keaton. Awards and honors * 2021: South Arts: Jazz Road Creative Residencies grant recipient * 2020: Downbeat Rising Star: Soprano Saxophone; Clarinet * 2018: Offbeat Best of the Beat Award: Best Saxophonist * 2018: Downbeat Rising Star: Soprano Saxophone; Clarinet * 2017: Downbeat Rising St

Avery Robinson

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Avery Robinson (January 21, 1878 – May 11, 1965 ) was an American classical composer who worked with, among others, Roland Hayes and Paul Robeson. Biography Avery Robinson was born on January 21, 1878, in Louisville, Kentucky. His father was a local mill owner there. After graduating from MIT, Avery returned to Louisville to work for his father and for another mill owner, W. E. Chess. In 1907 he married Chess’s daughter Mary, who would later found the Mary Chess Company, a perfume manufacturer. In 1909 their daughter Carley was born. In 1920 Robinson left Louisville for London where he was employed as treasurer to the Royal Philharmonic Society. While there his daughter attended the newly founded Montessori School, and later studied musical composition with Nadia Boulanger. After returning to the United States Avery was employed by the Mary Chess Company. Avery Robinson died in Pittsfield, Mass. on May 11, 1965. Works Pieces composed by (or in part by) Robinson include: *“Waterboy” *“I’ve Been Driving on Bald Mountain” References External links * * Avery Robinson on Allmusic: classical , jazz * Avery Robinson papers at the University of Oregon

Avo Sõmer

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Avo Sõmer (June 27, 1934 – May 30, 2024) was an Estonian-born American musicologist, music theorist and composer of Estonian birth. Sõmer was born in Estonia. He emigrated from Estonia with his parents in 1944, when he was ten years old, first to Germany and then to the United States. He had already begun playing the piano as a child in Pärnu. In Germany he took some piano lessons and instruction in theory, and began to compose, but systematic instruction in music came only later. He majored in music education, piano performance, and composition at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan, followed by graduate studies at the University of Michigan where, in 1957, he earned an M. A. with a thesis on Monteverdi’s madrigals, and then, in 1963, a PhD with a dissertation “The Keyboard Music of Johann Jakob Froberger”. In 1962 he joined the faculty of the University of Connecticut, where he remained until his retirement in 2000. Since that time he has increased his activity as a writer, and has spoken at conferences in Estonia on the music of Eduard Tubin, twentieth-century music in general, and the theories of Heinrich Schenker. He is best known for his analytical publications on ear

Axel Christensen

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Axel Waldemar Christensen (March 23, 1881 – August 17, 1955) was an American composer, arranger, publisher, pianist and music instructor. He was the founder of the Christensen School of Popular Music, under which he published various instruction books about the playing of syncopated music. The school enrolled upwards of 500,000 students in its numerous branches across the United States, making it one of the first and most successful examples of standardizing the instruction of popular music. The school also published the music magazine ‘Christensen Ragtime Review’. His formal attire and preference for grand pianos gave him the vaudeville title ‘Czar of Ragtime’. Life and career Axel Christensen was born in 1881 in Chicago, Illinois to Danish parents Charles and Mary Christensen. Playing classical music from an early age, he would first delve into the popular ragtime music in his teenage years. He would marry Reine Annette Swanson in 1903, a marriage that would last until his death. They had one child, Carle Christensen, in 1909. In 1902, Christensen made his first publication, a ragtime arrangement of Felix Mendelssohn’s Wedding March. The following year, he opened the Christensen

Ayuo Takahashi

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Ayuo Takahashi (born October 19, 1960) is a Japanese-born American composer, poet, lyricist, singer, and performer of plucked string instruments including guitar, bouzouki, Irish harp, Chinese zheng, Japanese koto, and medieval European psaltery. He is adept at adapting the ancient music of Japan, China, Persia, Greece, and medieval Europe to create a new and original music without abandoning their strict forms while simultaneously making them relevant to contemporary music styles. He has composed for classical ensembles including string quartets, piano, various chamber ensembles, and orchestra, as well as composed, produced and performed with rock, jazz and musicians of various traditional music from around the world. He has also composed many music theater pieces, some of which has been released on CD in the United States and Japan. Biography Much of the biography here is a summary from Ayuo’s autobiography first published in Japanese on his homepage (ayuo.net) and later expanded in his autobiographical book, “Outside Society” published by Getsuyosha in Japan. This book will be published in English in 2025. Most profiles of Ayuo as seen on websites such as All Music and Tzadik ar

Barbara Benary

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Barbara Benary (April 7, 1946 – March 17, 2019) was an American composer and ethnomusicologist specializing in Indonesian and Indian music. Benary composed music for a number of theatrical productions at La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club during the 1970s. She composed music for the ETC Company of La MaMa’s repertory production of The Only Jealousy of Emer, which was produced during the early 1970s at La MaMa’s East Village theater and on tour. She composed music for Gauntlet or the Moon’s on Fire, written and directed by John Braswell and produced at La MaMa in 1976. In 1976, she co-founded Gamelan Son of Lion with Philip Corner and Daniel Goode. She constructed most of the group’s instruments. Benary performed with Gamelan Son of Lion in a production called 1001 Instruments You’ve Never Seen or Heard at La MaMa in 1979. Her major works include two shadow puppet operas entitled Karna and The Story of Esther. Personal life Barbara Benary was born in 1946 in Bay Shore, NY. Daughter of Harold and Blanche Benary. She received a B.A. from Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, NY and an M.A. and Ph.D. from Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT where her areas of specialization were music

Barbara Jazwinski

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Barbara Jazwinski is a Polish-American composer and pianist known for her contributions to contemporary music. She is Head of the Composition Program at the Newcomb Music Department, Tulane University in New Orleans. She was honored with the Prince Pierre of Monaco Composition Award for her work on the Sextet, and she also secured the top position in the Nicola De Lorenzo Composition Contest for her composition of Music for Chamber Orchestra. Education She studied composition and theory at the Fryderyk Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw and earned her M.A. in composition and piano from Stanford University and her Ph.D. in composition from the City University of New York. Career Jazwinski’s music has been selected for programming at Diffrazioni Multimedia Festival in Florence, the London Festival of American Music, Laboratorium Muzyki Wspolczesnej in Poland, Washington Square Contemporary Music Series, the New York University New Music Ensemble, and the International Music by Women Festival in Oxford, Mississippi. Her works have been performed or recorded by ensembles and organizations such as the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, the Polish Radio and TV Orchestra of Cracow, the Kos

Barbara Kolb

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Barbara Kolb (February 10, 1938 – October 21, 2024) was an American composer and educator, the first woman to win the Rome Prize in musical composition. Her music features sound masses of colorful textures, impressionistic sounds and atonal vocabulary, with influences from literary and visual arts. She taught at the Third Street Music School Settlement, Rhode Island College and Eastman School of Music. Life and music Kolb was born in Hartford, Connecticut, on February 10, 1938 (many sources erroneously state her birth year as 1939). As her father was the music director of WTIC there, she was exposed to music early, meeting musicians. She went to jazz clubs with her parents. At the Berkshire Music Center in Tanglewood, she studied composition with Lukas Foss and Gunther Schuller. Following her graduation, Kolb relocated to Vienna, Austria, from 1966 to 1967 with a Fulbright Fellowship grant. Kolb’s composition Soundings was premiered by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in 1972. It was performed in a revised version for orchestra in 1975, played by the New York Philharmonic conducted by Pierre Boulez, with the orchestra positioned in three groups on the stage. From 1979 to

Barbara White (composer)

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Barbara White (born December 3, 1965) is an American composer, clarinetist, and musicologist. A 2003 Guggenheim Fellow, she has released four albums, all but one of which she performs as the clarinetist, and she is a professor of music at Princeton University. Biography Barbara White was born on December 3, 1965, in Boston, Massachusetts. She obtained her BA (1987) from Radcliffe College and MA (1994) and PhD (1997) from University of Pittsburgh; During her early career, White was awarded a 1995 American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers Young Composer Award, as well as both a 1997 Charles Ives Prize and Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Interdisciplinary Arts Award. She was later a 1999-2000 Continental Harmony Composer-in-Residence and a 2000 New Jersey State Council on the Arts Fellow, In The New York Times review of Speculum Musicae’s 2002 concert at Merkin Hall, Paul Griffiths praised White’s piece “Learning to See” as “a real discovery” because “she writes no more notes than she needs, and she has a way of making straightforward quotations (from Varése, Stravinsky and others) her own”. In 2002, her composition album When the Smoke Clears was released; it later recei

Barney Childs

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Barney Sanford Childs (February 13, 1926 – January 11, 2000) was an American composer and teacher. Born in Spokane, Washington, he taught and composed avant-garde music and literature at universities in the United States and United Kingdom. Childs and Elliott Schwartz edited the 1967 anthology Contemporary Composers on Contemporary Music; a revised and expanded edition, co-edited with Jim Fox, was published in 1998 by Da Capo Press. Music He was a musical autodidact till his association in the 1950s with Leonard Ratner and Elliott Carter in New York and with Aaron Copland and Carlos Chavez at Tanglewood . He was associated later with double bass player Bertram Turetzky and clarinet player Phillip Rehfeldt. He wrote several pieces for these and other players, often using extended techniques. Much of his music employs improvisation and indeterminacy (see his “Roachville Project,” 1967). However, his influences are diverse and include jazz artists, John Cage, Charles Ives, and Paul Hindemith. Childs won the Koussevitzky Award at Tanglewood in 1954. Education and teaching career Trained originally as a literary scholar, Childs studied at Deep Springs College (1943–45), the University o

Barton McLean

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Barton McLean (born 8 April 1938) is an American composer, performer, music reviewer, and writer. Life Barton McLean was born in Poughkeepsie, New York, the son of John and Grace McLean, on April 8, 1938. He graduated from State University of New York (SUNY) Potsdam (BS 1960), Eastman School of Music (MM 1965), where he was a student of Henry Cowell, and Indiana University (DMA 1972). He taught music theory and double bass at SUNY (1960–66), while performing on double bass in jazz groups and the Hudson Valley Philharmonic Orchestra. From 1969–76 he taught music composition and theory at Indiana University South Bend. From 1969–76 he directed the Electronic Music Center at the University of Texas at Austin. In 1967 he married fellow composer Priscilla Taylor, and by 1974 they began professional touring as The McLean Mix, presenting their electro-acoustic music, which became a full-time occupation by 1983. He created a series of solo instrument and stereo tape pieces, best known of which is Dimensions II (1974), championed by pianist David Burge, who performed it extensively for several years. Another extensively performed set in this series, Dimensions III and IV for saxophone and s

Basil Poledouris

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Basil Konstantine Poledouris (; August 21, 1945 – November 8, 2006) was an American composer, conductor, and orchestrator of film and television scores, best known for his long-running collaborations with directors Simon Wincer, John Milius and Paul Verhoeven. Among his works are scores for the films Conan the Barbarian (1982), Red Dawn (1984), Iron Eagle (1986), RoboCop (1987), The Hunt for Red October (1990), Free Willy (1993), Starship Troopers (1997) and Les Misérables (1998). Poledouris won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Limited Series, Movie, or Special for his work on the four-part miniseries Lonesome Dove in 1989, and was a four-time recipient of the BMI Film Music Award. Life and career Born in Kansas City, Missouri, to Greek immigrant parents from Messenia, he credited two influences with guiding him towards music: the first was composer Miklós Rózsa; the second his own Greek Orthodox heritage. Poledouris was raised in the Church, and he used to sit in services enthralled by the choir’s sound. At the age of seven, Poledouris began piano lessons, and after graduation from Garden Grove High School, he enrolled at the University of Southern

Beata Moon

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Beata Moon (born 1969) is a Korean-American classical pianist and composer. Biography Moon was born in North Dakota and raised in Indiana. She made her musical debut at age 8 with the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. Moon trained as a pianist at the Juilliard School with Adele Marcus earning both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees there. She is self-taught as a composer. Work Moon’s compositions are compared to post-minimalist, but defy a strict definition of genre. She released Perigee & Apogee in 2001 on the Albany label and Earthshine on her own label, Bibimbop Records in 2004. In 2007, Naxos Records added a CD of her works for solo piano, performed by Moon herself, to their catalog of important 21st-century composers. Her work has been acclaimed by Kyle Gann, Gramophone, Allmusic, and others. Moon has frequently collaborated with choreographer Henning Rübsam and his company SENSEDANCE. “After Yet Another Fall” (1992), “Dolphins and Antelopes” (1996), “Moonpaths” (1998), “Dinner is West” (2005) and “Tenancy” (2011) are among her commissions for the company. Rübsam choreographed to other works by Moon, including her “In Transit” from 1999 which was used for the choreographer’s "

Beatrice Schroeder Rose

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Beatrice Schroeder Rose (15 November 1922 – 12 October 2014) was an author, composer, harpist and teacher who was best known for her classic reference work, The Harp in the Orchestra: A Reference Book for Harpists, Teachers, Composers and Conductors. She was the principal harpist of Houston Symphony for 31 years. Life Rose was born in Ridgewood, New Jersey, to Ida LeHovey and Henry William Schroeder. She performed on the harp as a student at Ridgewood High School. She studied harp at Blue Ridge College in New Windsor, Maryland, and at Mannes School of Music. Her teachers included Lucile Lawrence and Carlos Salzedo. In 1936, Rose received First Prize in the Federated Music Clubs contest. Rose debuted as a harpist at the 1939 New York World’s Fair. In 1940, she performed on the Damrosch Music Appreciation Hour and in 1945, she won the New York Hour of Music award. She was an associate harpist in the Radio City Music Hall Orchestra from 1944 to 1950. In 1952, then a resident of Bergenfield, New Jersey, she travelled to Europe for a tour of France, Italy and Switzerland that included a performance in Genoa that was attended by the United States Ambassador to Italy. She joined the Houst

Béla Bartók

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Childhood and early years (1881–1898)#

Bartók was born in the Banatian town of Nagyszentmiklós in the Kingdom of Hungary, part of Austria-Hungary (present-day Sânnicolau Mare, Romania) on 25 March 1881. On his father’s side, the Bartók family was a Hungarian lower noble family, originating from Borsodszirák, Borsod. His paternal grandmother was a Catholic of Bunjevci origin, but considered herself Hungarian. Bartók’s father (1855–1888) was also named . Bartók’s mother, (1857–1939), spoke Hungarian fluently. A native of Turócszentmárton (present-day Martin, Slovakia), she had German, Hungarian and Slovak or Polish ancestry. Béla displayed notable musical talent very early in life. According to his mother, he could distinguish between different dance rhythms that she played on the piano before he learned to speak in complete sentences. By the age of four he was able to play 40 pieces on the piano, and his mother began formally teaching him the next year. In 1888, when he was seven, his father, the director of an agricultural school, died suddenly. His mother then took Béla and his sister, Erzsébet, to live in Nagyszőlős (present-day Vynohradiv, Ukraine) and then in Pressburg (present-day Bratislava, Slovakia). Béla gave his first public recital aged 11 in Nagyszőlős, to positive critical reception. Among the pieces he played was his own first composition, written two years previously: a short piece called “The Course of the Danube”. Shortly thereafter, accepted him as a pupil.

Ben Goldberg

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Ben Goldberg (born August 8, 1959) is an American clarinet player and composer. Career In the early 1990s, Ben Goldberg performed alongside electric bassist Dan Seamans and percussionist Kenny Wollesen as the New Klezmer Trio. They went on to produce three albums and the free improvisation on “Masks and Faces” was described as having “kicked open the door for radical experiments with Ashkenazi roots music.” Goldberg’s musicality has influenced and inspired local musicians in the San Francisco Bay Area. Goldberg is also the founder of the music label BAG Production. Recently Goldberg has branched out into songwriting. His “Orphic Machine” project, largely commissioned by Chamber Music America, was performed in Los Angeles. Regarding songwriting and composing, in a 2010 profile piece in All About Jazz, Goldberg said, “I don’t just want to give people something that they can appreciate or understand, or that makes them think, or something like that. I used to kind of feel that that’s what I wanted to do, but that’s not what I want anymore. I want to give people something that they can love.” In 2011, Goldberg was named the No. 1 Rising Star Clarinetist by the Down Beat Critic’s Poll.

Ben Jerome

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Benjamin M. Jerome (1881 – March 29, 1938), was an American composer, arranger, lyricist, songwriter, pianist, and conductor. In his early career he worked in New York City as a Tin Pan Alley composer of popular music, and was a notable arranger of ragtime music. He also composed music and/or wrote lyrics to several musicals staged on Broadway. Jerome died in Chicago on March 29, 1938, after a five-day illness. Broadway premiere at the Sam H. Harris Theatre on October 3, 1927 References External links * *

Ben Johnston (composer)

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Benjamin Burwell Johnston Jr. (March 15, 1926 – July 21, 2019) was an American contemporary music composer, known for his use of just intonation. He was called “one of the foremost composers of microtonal music” by Philip Bush and “one of the best non-famous composers this country has to offer” by John Rockwell. Biography Johnston was born in Macon, Georgia, and taught composition and theory at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign from 1951 to 1986, before retiring to North Carolina. During his time teaching, he was in contact with avant-garde figures such as John Cage, La Monte Young, and Iannis Xenakis. Johnston’s students included Stuart Saunders Smith, Neely Bruce, Thomas Albert, Michael Pisaro, Manfred Stahnke, and Kyle Gann. He also considered his practice of just intonation to have influenced other composers, including Larry Polansky. In 1946 he married dance band singer Dorothy Haines, but they soon divorced. In 1950 he married artist Betty Hall, who died in 2007. Johnston began as a traditional composer of art music before working with Harry Partch. He helped the senior musician to build instruments and use them in the performance and recording of new composition

Ben Moore (composer)

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Ben Moore (born January 2, 1960) is an American composer whose works include art song, musical theatre, cabaret, chamber music, choral music and opera. His songs have been recorded by Deborah Voigt, Susan Graham Nathan Gunn and Lawrence Brownlee on the EMI, Sony BMG, Warner Classics and Opus Arte labels. Other singers who have performed his music include Frederica von Stade, Jerry Hadley, Robert White, and Audra McDonald. Biography Ben Moore – 14 songs was published by G. Schirmer in 2006. The Metropolitan Opera’s farewell gala for Joseph Volpe, broadcast nationally on PBS in 2006, featured two of his operatic parody songs. His song cycles include So Free Am I commissioned by the Marilyn Horne Foundation, Ode to a Nightingale and Dear Theo. Moore wrote the score for the opera Enemies, a Love Story which premiered at Palm Beach Opera in February, 2015, and for Odyssey, commissioned by the Glimmerglass Festival. Moore was born in Syracuse, New York and received a B.A. from Hamilton College and an M.F.A. from the Parsons School of Design. *Henry and Company (musical theatre) *Bye Bye Broadway (musical theatre) References External links * Official website

Ben Neill

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Ben Neill (born November 14, 1957) is an American composer, trumpeter, producer, author, and educator. He is the inventor of the “Mutantrumpet”, a hybrid electro-acoustic instrument. Early life, family and education Neill was born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. His early studies included the North Carolina School of the Arts and Eastern Music Festival, where he played alongside many notable young musicians including Wynton Marsalis. He attended the Dana School of Music at Youngstown State University, where he earned Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees. His primary trumpet teacher was Esotto Pellegrini, but he also studied trumpet with Bernard Adelstein and James Darling. In 1983 he moved to New York City, and earned a Doctorate of Musical Arts degree from Manhattan School of Music. He also studied privately with La Monte Young and was mentored by Jon Hassell. Career In 1980 Neill formed The B-Minors, a new wave band with drummer Don Yallech, and became an active participant in the Northeast Ohio punk/new wave scene, frequently performing at The Bank in Akron, JB’s in Kent, and the Cedars in Youngstown. Neill began writing his own music and developed the prototype for h

Benjamin Boretz

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Benjamin Aaron Boretz (born October 3, 1934) is an American composer and music theorist. Life and work Benjamin Boretz was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Abraham Jacob Boretz and Leah (Yullis) Boretz. He graduated with a degree in music from Brooklyn College in 1954, studied composition with Tadeusz Kassern, and later studied composition at Brandeis University with Arthur Berger and Irving Fine, with Darius Milhaud at the Aspen Music Festival and School, with Lukas Foss at UCLA, and with Milton Babbitt and Roger Sessions at Princeton University. Boretz was one of the first composers to work with computer-synthesized sound (Group Variations II, 1970–72). In the late 1970s and 1980s he converged his compositional and pedagogical practices in a project of real-time improvisational music-making, culminating in the formation at Bard College of the music-learning program called Music Program Zero, which flourished until 1995. He has written extensively on musical issues, as critic, theorist, and musical philosopher, from the perspective of a practicing composer. His earliest (1970) large-scale music-intellectual essay was the book-length “Meta-Variations, Studies in the Foundations of Mu

Benjamin C. S. Boyle

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Benjamin C. S. Boyle (born September 1, 1979) is an American composer of contemporary classical music and pianist. Life and career Benjamin C. S. Boyle was born on September 1, 1979, in Monterey, California, United States. His compositional output includes opera, orchestral music, chamber music, choral music, art songs, and works for piano. Notable performances include the premiere of Boyle’s Hudson Sinfonia for brass ensemble premiered by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra at Riverside Church in New York City in April 2009. His Concerto for Marimba and Orchestra was premiered with marimbist Makoto Nakura and Montreal Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Wanda Kalusny in June 2015. Chicago Lyric Opera premiered Boyle’s choral work The Holly and the Ivy in December 2008. His Concerto for Organ and Orchestra was commissioned by Hope College Orchestra and premiered with organist Huw Lewis, conducted by Richard Piippo in November 2007. In May 2005, Bachanalia Orchestra, conducted by Vladimir Lande, premiered the Cantata To One in Paradise for string orchestra and four vocal soloists at Merkin Hall in New York . That same year he won the Young Concert Artists composition competition. He has b

Benjamin Franklin Baker (musician)

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Benjamin Franklin Baker (July 10, 1811 – March 11, 1889) was an American educator and composer. Biography Benjamin Franklin Baker was born on July 10, 1811, in Wenham, Massachusetts, to John and Sally Baker. When he was 14 years old, his family moved to Salem, Massachusetts, where he began his musical studies. After this he moved to Bangor, Maine, for a time, making a living as a businessman, but moved to Boston in 1837. With his cousin Isaac Baker Woodbury, he began a series of teacher’s conventions. Beginning in 1839, he spent the next 24 years in Boston in the capacity of music conductor for various churches there. That same year he married Sabra L. Heywood. During this time period, he continued performing, often as featured soloist with the Handel and Haydn Society. By the late 1850s he was traveling to other parts of the United States as a conductor. Towards the end of his career in the 1870s, Baker was the editor of the Boston Music Journal. Publications Baker published more than 25 collections of hymns, songs, and music theory books. *Baker’s American School Music Book (1844) Compositions Baker composed numerous anthems, hymns, and other various vocal works. Of particular no

Benjamin Franklin White

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Benjamin Franklin White (September 20, 1800 – December 5, 1879) was a shape note “singing master”, and compiler of the shape note tunebook known as The Sacred Harp. He was born near Cross Keys in Union County, South Carolina, the twelfth child of Robert and Mildred White. Musical career White and Elisha J. King published The Sacred Harp in 1844, using the four-shape shape note notation. King died in 1844. In 1845, White led in the establishment of the Southern Musical Convention. In 1850, he issued a second edition of The Sacred Harp, adding 97 songs and 103 pages. With the 1850 and future editions, White was assisted by a musical committee appointed by the Southern Musical Convention. In 1859, a third edition of The Sacred Harp was released, adding 74 more songs on 63 pages. A fourth edition came out in 1869. For the first time, in this revision White replaced old songs with new ones, rather than simply adding the new songs to the back of the book. A year later, he released a copyright of the same book signed only by himself and his son, D. P. White, perhaps clarifying ownership. In 1911, White’s youngest son, James Landrum White, reissued this fourth edition with a supplement of

Benjamin Lazar Davis

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Benjamin Lazar Davis is an American multi-instrumentalist, singer-songwriter, arranger, composer, and record producer. He is a member of several bands, including Okkervil River and Cuddle Magic. Davis attended New England Conservatory of Music. Early life Davis was raised in Saratoga Springs, New York. His father, Peter, started being a musician at the age of five. Davis has a brother and two sisters. He collaborates with his brother Tim on songs. Bands and collaborations In 2006 while students at The New England Conservatory of Music Davis, Alec Spiegelman, Christopher McDonald, Kristin Slipp, Cole Kamen-Green, and David Flaherty founded Cuddle Magic in 2006. The band is known for collaborations with many artists including Fred Frith, Ran Blake, the David Wax Museum, Larkin Grimm, Mike & Ruthy (formerly of the Mammals), Phyllis Chen, Joy Kills Sorrow. Individuals from Cuddle Magic have also performed with Dirty Projectors, Bridget Kearney, Railbird, Sister Sparrow and the Dirty Birds, Baby States, Ronald Reagan, Bird Fly Yellow, Margaret Glaspy, The People’s Champs, Girls Guns and Glory, Lake Street Dive, Petal Shield, Split Red, Yapp! and The Superpowers Horns. Davis went to West

Benjamin Verdery

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Benjamin Verdery (born 1955) is an American classical guitarist, composer and teacher. Verdery has performed at venues including Carnegie Hall, Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Lincoln Center, the Metropolitan Opera, and Wigmore Hall (London). He has played and recorded with a wide range of classical and other musicians, including guitarists William Coulter, Leo Kottke, Paco Peña, Andy Summers and John Williams, vocalist Hermann Prey, composer Anthony Newman, and his wife, flutist Rie Schmidt. New York Times classical music critic Allan Kozinn described Verdery as “one of the guitar’s grand individualists” and “an iconoclastic player,” known as much for his devotion to new music and transcriptions of Jimi Hendrix songs as for inventive interpretations of Bach. As of 2021, Verdery had released 19 albums and been featured on several others. He has taught at the Yale School of Music since 1985. He became interested in music after hearing The Beatles’ “I Saw Her Standing There” in 1963. After learning four pieces in order to audition for conservatory, he was accepted at SUNY Purchase in 1974, where he studied with composer-organist Anthony Newman and guitarist-composer Frederic Hand, and ear

Berenice Wyer

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Annie Berenice Crumb Wyer (October 5, 1873 – January 29, 1960) was an American pianist, composer, and lecturer. Wyer composed for both piano and organ, and wrote art song and works for violin. She collaborated with Ethan Allen Taussig in performances of spoken recitation accompanied by the piano. Early life Annie Berenice Crumb was born in North Windham, Connecticut, on October 5, 1873, to Ellen V. (née Peck) and Desevignè Starks Crumb, but spent most of her childhood in Missouri. In 1911 Wyer lectured before the Piano Club of Kirkwood and gave lecture recitals in St. Louis. Wyer also composed for both piano and organ, as well as works for violin and for voice and piano. As of 1922, they were unpublished. Her solo piano compositions included “Concert Etude in D flat”, the ballades “Chivalric Poem” and “Of Romance”, and a Ballade in C-sharp minor that won the Prize for a Piano Composition in the 1916 St. Louis Art League Music Competition; organ works included “Etude in D minor”, “Lento Assai”, and “Meditation”. Her works for violin included “Serenade”, “Spring Fantasie”, and “Twilight in the Garden”. Personal life and family Back home from her European tour, on June 11, 1901, Beren

Bernard B. Brown

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Bernard B. Brown (July 24, 1898 – February 20, 1981) was an American sound engineer and composer, who wrote the scores for many early animated cartoons produced by Leon Schlesinger Productions for distribution by Warner Bros. Pictures. He won an Academy Award in the category Sound Recording and was nominated for seven more in the same category. He was also nominated three times in the category Best Visual Effects. He worked on more than 520 films between 1930 and 1958. Composer In 1933, animation producer Leon Schlesinger set up his new animation studio: Leon Schlesinger Productions. The company would later be known as Warner Bros. Cartoons. Schlesinger had to hire new staff for his studio. According to animation historian Michael Barrier, Schlesinger “knew almost nothing about making cartoons” and took help wherever he could find it. Among his new employees was Bernard Brown, who was in charge of recording sound and scores for the studio’s films. According to a later interview with Brown, he worked on animated short films in addition to his regular work. This “regular work” was recording film scores for the feature films of Warner Bros. Pictures. Brown would reportedly spend many

Bernard Rands

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Bernard Rands (2 March 1934 – 4 March 2026) was a British and American contemporary classical composer and professor. He composed orchestral works and chamber music, often with a vocal element, and a series of Memos for solo instruments. His Canti del Sole for tenor and orchestra received the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1984. He taught at Harvard University from 1988 to 2005. Life and career Rands was born on 2 March 1934. He studied music and English literature at the University of Wales, Bangor, and composition with Pierre Boulez and Bruno Maderna at the Darmstädter Ferienkurse, and with Luigi Dallapiccola and Luciano Berio in Milan. He taught at the University of California, San Diego, the Juilliard School, Yale University, and Boston University. Rands was married to American composer Augusta Read Thomas. Works Rands’s music was published by Schott. The publisher maintains works and their performances on its website. Opera *Belladonna (1999) *:opera in two acts, with a libretto by Leslie Dunton Downer, commissioned by the Aspen Festival. Première: 1999, Aspen Music Festival, Colorado *Vincent (c. 1973–2010) *:opera based on the life of Vincent van Gogh, with libretto by J. D. Mc

Bernard Rogers

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Bernard Rogers (4 February 1893 – 24 May 1968) was an American composer. His best known work is The Passion, an oratorio written in 1942. Life and career Rogers was born in New York City. He studied with Arthur Farwell, Ernest Bloch, Percy Goetschius, and Nadia Boulanger. He taught at the Cleveland Institute of Music, The Hartt School, and the Eastman School of Music. His pupils included Stephen Albert, Dominick Argento, Jacob Avshalomov, William Bergsma, David Borden, Will Gay Bottje, David Diamond, Walter Hartley, Ronald Lo Presti, Ulysses Kay, Louis Mennini, John La Montaine, W. Francis McBeth, Ron Nelson, Burrill Phillips, Alice McElroy Procter, Gardner Read, H. Owen Reed, Margaret Vardell Sandresky, Robert Ward, John Weinzweig, Norma Wendelburg, Richard Lane, Clifton Williams and Laurence Rosenthal among others. He joined the Eastman faculty in 1929. He composed five operas, five symphonies, other works for orchestra, chamber music, three cantatas, choral music and Lieder. His one-act opera “The Warrior,” for which Norman Corwin wrote the libretto, received its premiere at The Metropolitan Opera on January 11, 1947. Rogers retired from Eastman in 1967. He died in Rochester on

Bernhard Heiden

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Bernhard Heiden (b. Frankfurt am Main, August 24, 1910; d. Bloomington, Indiana, April 30, 2000) was a Jewish emigre from Nazi Germany and a German-American composer who taught as a professor at the Indiana University School of Music from 1946 until his retirement in 1981. The son of Martha (née Heiden-Heimer) and Ernst Levi, Heiden was originally named Bernhard Levi and later changed his name. Drawn to music as a youngster, he composed his first pieces at age six. When he began formal music lessons, he learned music theory in addition to three instruments: piano, clarinet, and violin. Following his secondary schooling at Frankfurt’s noted Goethe Gymnasium, where a classmate was the later émigré author Richard Plant, Heiden enrolled at the Hochschule für Musik in Berlin in 1929 at the age of nineteen and studied music composition under Paul Hindemith, one of the foremost German composers of the twentieth century. In 1933, his last year at the Berlin conservatory, he was awarded the Mendelssohn Prize in composition. He was subsequently employed as an orchestral clarinetist. In 1934 Heiden married pianist Cola de Joncheere, who had been a classmate at the Hochschule für Musik. In 193

Bernhard Kaun

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Bernhard Kaun (5 April 1899 – 3 January 1980) was an American composer and orchestrator. He is known for the Frankenstein (1931) theme. Filmography *Platinum Blonde (1931) *Frankenstein (1931) *What Price Hollywood? (1932) *Doctor X (1932) *The Most Dangerous Game (1932) *Thirteen Women (1932) *A Bill of Divorcement (1932) *I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang (1932) *A Farewell to Arms (1932) *20,000 Years in Sing Sing (1932) *Frisco Jenny (1932) *Employees’ Entrance (1933) *Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933) *King Kong (1933) *I Loved a Woman (1933) *The Kennel Murder Case (1933) *Little Women (1933) *Lady Killer (1933) *Son of Kong (1933) *Flying Down to Rio (1933) *The Lost Patrol (1934) *The Gay Divorcee (1934) *The Little Minister (1934) *The Informer (1935) *Becky Sharp (1935) *She (1935) *The Three Musketeers (1935) *The Last Days of Pompeii (1935) *Peter Ibbetson (1935) *The Petrified Forest (1936) *Modern Times (1936) *The Walking Dead (1936) *The Story of Louis Pasteur (1936) *Little Lord Fauntleroy (1936) *Hearts Divided (1936) *China Clipper (1936) *The Garden of Allah (1936) *Black Legion (1937) *Marked Woman (1937) *Lost Horizon (1937) *A Star Is Born (1937) *Souls at Sea

Bernice Johnson Reagon

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Bernice Johnson Reagon (October 4, 1942 – July 16, 2024) was an American song leader, composer, professor of American history, curator at the Smithsonian, and social activist. In the early 1960s, she was a founding member of the Freedom Singers, organized by the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in the Albany Movement for civil rights in Georgia. In 1973, she founded the all-black female a cappella ensemble Sweet Honey in the Rock, based in Washington, D.C. She was the founder/the 1st member of Sweet Honey in the Rock from 1973 to 2006. Reagon, along with other members of the SNCC Freedom Singers, realized the power of collective singing to unify the disparate groups who began to work together in the 1964 Freedom Summer protests in the South. The Albany Singing Movement became a vital catalyst for change through music in the early 1960s protests of the Civil Rights era. Reagon devoted her life to social justice through music via recordings, activism, community singing, and scholarship. She earned her Ph.D. from Howard University, becoming a cultural historian, centered on the role of music. She was professor emerita in the Department of History at the American Unive

Bert Potter (composer)

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Albert Lincoln “Bert” Potter (March11, 1874 – January29, 1930) was a composer of popular songs active between 1904 and 1917. Biography Bert Potter, born in Boston, was the first child of Algernon S. and Flora E. Potter. Algernon was a wholesale dealer in clothing, and Bert was raised in an upper-middle-class family, with two Irish servants in the household. After his marriage to Eleanor Dodge (August 2, 1898), Bert worked in his father’s business; but early in the twentieth century he migrated into music, publishing his first songs in 1904. Shortly afterwards he settled in Dorchester, in a house that he occupied the rest of his life. The 1908 city directory identified him as a “musician”, and at least from 1910 to 1914 he worked as a salesman in piano stores. By 1918, however, he had abandoned the musical profession and become an agent with John Hancock Mutual Insurance Co., serving in that capacity until his death. Composer Between 1904 and 1907 eighteen publications by Potter were copyrighted; in 1912 there were two more, and in 1917 a single, final one. He wrote piano pieces and songs, the latter usually to his own texts. Most pieces are uptempo rags, marches, and novelties; at lea

Bertha Des Verney

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Bertha Des Verney (October 5, 1890 – January 1, 1975) was an American pianist, composer, music educator, singer, and playwright. She was choir and drama director at the Mother African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church in Harlem for over forty years, director of the Washington Music School in Albany, New York, and organized the Ministers of Music and Drama League. She was active in the National Association of Negro Musicians. Early life Bertha Wheeler was born in Dallas, Texas, the daughter of Sam Wheeler and Sarah J. Spence Wheeler (later Sarah J. Whitaker). Her mother was a music teacher. As a child she won a gold medal for singing at the State Fair of Texas. She trained as a teacher at Prairie View State Normal and Industrial College, and studied music at the A. Smythe Music Conservatory in Oak Cliff, Texas. In New York after 1912, she took further classes, at the City College of New York, and the New York School of Social Work Administration. Career Bertha Des Verney (her married surname is sometimes written as Desverney or DesVerney) was choir director at Mother AME Zion Church in Harlem for over forty years, director of the Washington Music School in Albany, New York, and organi

Bertha Weber

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Bertha Anna Weber (March 31, 1887 – April 17, 1961) was an American composer and organist. Life and career Weber was born in New Baden, Illinois, to John and Elizabeth Weber. The family moved to Pomona, California, in 1887. Weber studied music at Pomona College, the University of Southern California, and in Europe. She was an organist at Pomona First Presbyterian Church in 1907, and later at Trinity Methodist Church for a number of years. She moved to Berkeley and maintained a studio at the Hotel Claremont there from around 1924 until she moved to Oakland in 1947. She continued composing and giving music lessons and recitals until her death in 1961, when she committed suicide by stepping in front of a train. She was a member of the professional music fraternity Sigma Alpha Iota. Works Weber’s compositions were published by Willis Music Company. They include: Opera *The Mysterious Characters of Mr. Fu (1932) Vocal *“Abraham Lincoln” *“Angels and Shepherds Song” *“Lincoln So Brave and True” References

Bertram Shapleigh

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Bertram Lincoln Shapleigh (15 January 1871 – 2 July 1940) was an American composer, heavily interested in the culture of Asia. Education He studied composition with G.E. Whiting and George Whitefield Chadwick at the New England Conservatory; graduating in 1891. He continued his studies with Edward MacDowell in the United States, and gave piano recitals and accompanied singers in the Boston area. He also studied in France and Germany. A man of wide interests, he entered the Vermont Medical College, graduating with an MD degree in 1893. Career He became a lecturer on the arts, but a developing concern with South Asian music that led him to give his attention fully to music and to composition. He played the piano and cello, and gave lecture-recitals on music history, Eastern music and Wagner’s operas. In 1898 he left the United States for Europe, living in Cologne and Brussels, eventually settling in Longfield, Kent in his home he named “Weird Wood”. He became an editor for Breitkopf & Härtel. However, after his house, with his library of 7000 volumes, had been destroyed by fire, he returned to the USA in 1917, settling in Chicago and then Washington DC, to serve as an adviser to Brei

Bertram Turetzky

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Bertram Jay Turetzky (born February 14, 1933) is an American double bass player, composer, teacher, and author of The Contemporary Contrabass (1974). Early life and education Turetzky was born in Norwich, Connecticut, He received a master’s degree in music history from the University of Hartford. He started out playing classic jazz. Career Turetzky has performed and recorded many pieces written by and for him. Turetzky’s first recording was in 1964, featuring the work of American composers George Perle, Jay Sydeman, Donald Martino, Kenneth Gaburo, Ben Johnston, and Charles Whittenberg. His recording activities continued with records on labels Nonesuch, Son Nova, Ars Antigua, and Desto. He also made a series of recordings on the Nine Winds label with improvisational musicians George E. Lewis, Vinny Golia, Wadada Leo Smith, Mike Wofford, and others. Turetzky is the most widely recorded double bass soloist, with seven albums on the Advance Records, Ars Nova Records, Nonesuch, Takoma, Desto, and Finnadar Records music labels. Turetzky plays chamber music, baroque music, jazz, renaissance music, improvisational music, klezmer music and many other genres of world music. Bernard Jacobson

Beth Anderson (composer)

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Beth Anderson is an American neo-romantic composer. She studied with John Cage, Terry Riley, Robert Ashley, and Larry Austin, among others. She studied at the University of Kentucky, UC Davis, New York University and Mills College. Education Anderson attended the University of Kentucky after graduating from high school. After two years there she transferred to the University of California at Davis. After completing her undergraduate degree she received her Master of Fine Arts Degree in Piano Performance. Shortly before completing that degree, her piece Peachy Keen-O was performed at Mills College. Bob Ashley, director of the Mills College Center for Contemporary Music, upon hearing the performance, urged her to stay there and study. She completed her M.A. in Composition there. Later life In California, Anderson became known as one of the prominent “avant-garde feminist composers, critics, and poets.” External links * Listening *NewMusicJukeBox.org: Beth Anderson

Beth Denisch

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Beth Denisch (born Augusta, Georgia, Feb. 25, 1958) is an American composer. She received a Bachelor of Music degree from North Texas State University in Denton, Texas, and an MM and (in 1993) a DMA from Boston University, where her teachers in composition were John Harbison and Bernard Rands. She has taught at UMass Dartmouth and Northeastern University. She is currently Professor of Composition at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. In 1996 she founded the New England chapter of the American Composers Forum, and she served as their director until 2005. She presently serves as Co-Chair of Gender Research in Music and Education International. Denisch’s music has had many prominent performances, and she has received notable prizes and commissions. For instance in 2002, the Handel and Haydn Society performed her “Sorrow and Tenderness” as part of a collaborative youth concert at Brockton High School in Massachusetts. Her “Fire Mountain Intermezzo” for string orchestra was performed by Chamber Orchestra Kremlin (directed by Misha Rachlevsky) in Moscow and New York City, after it was one of the winners of their Homage to Mozart competition. Writing in The New York Times, Bernard Ho

Betty Ann Wong

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Betty Ann (Siu Junn) Wong (born September 6, 1938) is an American author, composer, and multi-media musician. She received the 1988 Hollywood Dramalogue Critics Award for Outstanding Achievement for Original Music Theater for her work on Eugene O’Neill’s Marco Millions. She has also composed film scores for Academy Award-winning movie producers Allie Light and Irving Saraf. Early life and training A native of San Francisco, Wong and her twin sister Shirley grew up speaking Cantonese at home as well as English. Wong began piano lessons at age seven with Eva Chan, then studied with Lev Shorr. She received a B.A. in music from Mills College in 1960, where she studied with Morton Subotnick, Nathan Rubin, and Colin Hampton, and performed with Hysteresis, a women’s creative arts group that included several Bay-area artists. In 1971, she completed a master’s degree in music at the University of California, San Diego, where she studied composition with Pauline Oliveros, Robert Erickson, and Kenneth Gaburo. Wong also studied Chinese music with David Liang, Lawrence Lui, and Leo Lew. Career In addition to piano, Wong plays sitar, guzheng, saz (a Turkish lute), kanjira and several other tradi

Betty Jackson King

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Betty Jackson King (Feb 17, 1928 – June 1, 1994) was an American pianist, singer, teacher, choral conductor, and composer. She was best known for her vocal works. Biography King, who was of African American heritage, was born in 1928 in Chicago. She first started learning music from her mother, Gertrude Jackson Taylor. King’s father, Reverend Frederick D. Jackson a pastor at the Community Church of Woodlawn, helped expose her to church hymns and spirituals. Along with her mother and sister Catherine, she sang in the Jacksonian Trio. She was married to Vincent King, had one daughter, Rochelle King, and has two granddaughters Vincena and Joysaleen. King wrote arrangements of spirituals, operas (Saul of Tarsus, My Servant Job), a cantata (Simon of Cyrene) and a requiem. Saul of Tarsus has had several performances since it was premiered in 1952. She wrote a ballet, Kids in School With Me, and various other chamber and choral compositions. Piano and Organ * Aftermath (A Tone Poem) (1975) * Four Seasonal Sketches for piano (1973) * Mother Goose Parade (1971) * Nuptial Suite for organ (1969) Songs * A Lullaby for You (1973) * A Set of Three Dunbar Poems (1975) * Calvary (1954) * Climbing

Beverly Grigsby

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Beverly Grigsby (née Pinsky, January 11, 1928 – August 22, 2022) was an American composer, musicologist and electronic/computer music pioneer. Early life Beverly Pinsky was born in Chicago, Illinois, and studied music and ballet as a child. She danced in Chicago Civic Opera’s ballet chorus. She moved to California with her family at the age of 13 and graduated from Fairfax High School at age 16. Education Grigsby entered the University of Southern California to study pre-med, and also studied composition with Ernst Krenek at the Southern California School of Music and the Arts. She earned Bachelor of Arts (in 1961) and Master of Arts (in 1963) degrees in composition from San Fernando Valley State College (now California State University, Northridge); upon graduation she was hired to teach at her alma mater. In 1971 she earned a Doctorate of Musical Arts in composition from the University of Southern California. She later studied computer music generation at Stanford University’s Center for Artificial Intelligence (CCRMA) and at M.I.T. in 1975-1976. She taught theory, composition, and musicology there until her retirement in 1993. Her studio focused on analog synthesis, electronic m

Bill Brown (composer)

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Bill Brown IV (born 1969) is an American composer of music for video games, films, and television productions. He is best known for creating the system sounds and tour software music for Microsoft’s Windows XP operating system, as well as his work on the soundtracks of CSI: NY and several Quake, Rainbow Six, Ghost Recon, Command & Conquer, and Wolfenstein games in the 1990s and 2000s. His father was New York City radio disc jockey Bill Brown III (d. 2011). Filmography Video games *Quake II (1997) *Trespasser (1998) *Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six (1998) *Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six: Rogue Spear (1999) *Disney’s Villains’ Revenge (1999) *Quake III (1999) *Timeline (2000) *Shadow Watch (2000) *Return to Castle Wolfenstein (2001) *Clive Barker’s Undying (2001) *Anachronox (2001) *Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon (2001) *Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six: Black Thorn (2001) *The Sum of All Fears (2002) *Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Island Thunder (2002) *Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon 2 (2004) – theme co-written with Tom Salta *Command & Conquer: Generals (2003) *Command & Conquer: Generals Zero Hour (2003) *Lineage II: The Chaotic Chronicle (2003) with Inon Zur *Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six 3: Raven Shield (2003) *Wolfenst

Bill Fontana

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Bill Fontana (born April 25, 1947 in Cleveland, Ohio) is known internationally for his pioneering experiments in sound art. Life and career Fontana attended the New School for Social Research in New York and studied both music and philosophy. He traveled to Australia, and also stayed in Japan and Germany composing. Fontana began making sound sculptures in 1976. In a career spanning 40 years, Fontana’s sound sculptures use the urban environment as a living source of musical information, all with the potential to conjure up visual imagery in the mind of the listener. He has made works all over the world and has presented his sound sculptures extensively, including at the Venice Biennale (1999), the Museo Reina Sofia, Madrid (1995), The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (1991), Tate Modern, London (2006), Madison Square Park, New York (2007), and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (1987, 1997, 2010). Some of his more famous works include Distant Trains, Satellite Ear Bridge Cologne-San Francisco, Journey Through My Sound Sculptures, The Sound of an Unblown Flute, Panoramic Echoes and “Acoustical Visions of the Golden Gate Bridge” In 2005, Fontana was an Artadia Awardee. Fon

Bill Justis

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William Everett Justis Jr. (October 14, 1926 – July 16, 1982) was an American pioneer rock and roll musician, composer, and musical arranger, best known for his 1957 Grammy Hall of Fame song, “Raunchy”. As a songwriter, he was also often credited as Bill Everette. Biography Justis was born in Birmingham, Alabama, United States, but grew up in Memphis, Tennessee and studied music at Christian Brothers College (high school department) and Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana. A trumpet and saxophone player, while in university he performed with local jazz and dance bands. He returned home to Memphis in 1951 and was eventually taken on by Sam Phillips at Sun Records where he recorded music for himself as well as arranged the music for Sun artists such as Jerry Lee Lewis, Roy Orbison, Johnny Cash, and Charlie Rich, the latter of which he is credited with discovering. and reached No. 11 in the UK Singles Chart. It sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc. Justis had one other significant hit record, “College Man”, that went to U.S. No. 42, and No. 11 in Canada In 1961, Justis moved to Nashville where he became a successful record producer and music arranger for b

Bill Lee (musician)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

William James Edwards Lee III (July 23, 1928 – May 24, 2023) was an American jazz bassist and composer, known for his collaborations with Bob Dylan and Aretha Franklin, his compositions for jazz percussionist Max Roach, and his session work as a “first-call” musician and band leader to many of the twentieth-century’s most significant musical artists, including Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, Harry Belafonte, Peter, Paul and Mary, Simon and Garfunkel, Judy Collins, Arlo Guthrie, Billy Strayhorn, Woody Guthrie, and Pete Seeger, among many others. Lee recorded three critically acclaimed albums at the Black independent label Strata-East Records: (1) The Descendants of Mike and Phoebe: A Spirit Speaks; (2) The Brass Company: Colors, in collaboration with his two sisters; and (3) The New York Bass Violin Choir, a collaboration of seven basses, which JazzdaGama described as “a true Holy Grail for all musicians,” and which Lee classified as one of his “narrative folk, jazz operas” along with “One Mile East,” both of which were inspired by memories of the former slave quarters near his childhood home. Stagings at New York City’s Central Park, Lincoln Center and Newport Jazz Festival followe

Bill Milbrodt

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Bill Milbrodt is a composer and creator of the Car Music Project, a band that plays music on instruments made from car parts. The instruments have names like “exhaustaphone”, “tank bass”, “doorimba”, “tube flute”, and “percarsion”. The band plays music that is written by Milbrodt and also does improvising in which the written music is played by some members of the band while other members improvise, sometimes several at one time. Milbrodt won an Emmy Award in New York City for a 1991 musical score he composed electronically for a short avant-garde video called “American Venus”. He made his living mainly as a composer of music for commercial purposes, and as a sound designer, and did occasional performances for the Car Music Project. In 2005 he formed an ensemble called “The Car Music Project”, with regular members/sidemen, for the purpose of performing on a regular basis. Milbrodt is a self-taught composer. He studied Film Production at the New York University Film School, and graduated in 1977. He refers to some of his compositions as “sonic pantomimes”. Car Music Project The Car Music Project is both the name of a project and the name of a band conceived and led by American compo

Bill Russell (composer)

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William Russell (February 26, 1905 – August 9, 1992) was an American music historian and modernist composer. Named Russell William Wagner at birth, when he decided to become a classical music composer, he dropped his last name—as it already “was taken” by Richard Wagner. He was commonly known as “Bill Russell”. Composer Born in the small Missouri city of Canton, Bill Russell was a leading figure in percussion music composition, influenced by his acquaintances John Cage and Henry Cowell. In turn, Russell also influenced Cage, in his emphasis of percussion. During the 1930s, predating Cage’s main work, Russell’s percussion works called for vernacular textures such as Jack Daniels bottles, suitcases, and Haitian drums, as well as “prepared pianos”, although it is not clear how specifically he wanted the piano to be prepared. One notable performance of his “Fugue for eight percussion instruments” took place in 1933, with the ubiquitous and influential critic-writer-performer Nicholas Slonimsky conducting. The fugue was performed at Carnegie Hall on a program that included Varèse’s iconic percussion composition “Ionisation.” These performances took place under the auspices of the Pan-Am

Bill Sherman

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Bill Sherman is an American composer, producer, arranger, and orchestrator. He is known for his work on In the Heights, Hamilton, and Sesame Street. Sherman is also a member of Team Supreme that co-hosts the Questlove Supreme podcast. Biography Sherman was born in New York to Susan B. Sherman and Dr. Fredrick T. Sherman. Sherman graduated from Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut in 2002. In 2003, he joined his roommate Lin-Manuel Miranda to form the freestyle rap group Freestyle Love Supreme, while also working with Miranda to orchestrate and arrange the music for In the Heights. His work on In the Heights won him the 2008 Tony Award for Best Orchestrations and the 2008 Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album. He collaborated again with Miranda to produce the Hamilton album, for which he won the 2015 Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album. Sherman is the musical director for several Sesame Workshop shows, including Sesame Street, for which he has written over 3000 songs. He has won three Daytime Entertainment Creative Arts Emmy Awards for “Outstanding Original Song – Children’s and Animation” for his work on Sesame street: “What I Am” in 2011, “The Power of Yet” in

Billy Burnette

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Dorsey William Burnette III (born May 8, 1953, in Memphis, Tennessee, United States) is an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter who was part of the band Fleetwood Mac from 1987 to 1996. Burnette also had a brief career in acting. Family background The son of Dorsey Burnette and Alberta Burnette, Billy Burnette was born into a musical family. He toured with Brenda Lee After Fleetwood Mac went on hiatus in 1996, Burnette and Bramlett formed the country duo Bekka & Billy. They moved to Nashville and attracted the attention of producer Garth Fundis. They released the album Bekka and Billy in 1997 but they broke up in 1998. Discography Albums * Billy Burnette (Entrance, 1972) * Billy Burnette (Polydor, 1979) * Between Friends (Polydor, 1979) * Billy Burnette (Columbia, 1980) * Gimme You (Columbia, 1981) * Try Me (Curb, 1985) * Soldier of Love (Curb, 1986) * Brother to Brother (Curb, 1988) * Coming Home (Capricorn, 1993) * Bekka & Billy (Almo, 1997) (with Bekka Bramlett) * All Night Long (Grand Avenue, 1999) * Are You With Me Baby (Free Falls, 2000) * Memphis in Manhattan (Chesky, 2006) * The Bluegrass Elvises, Volume 1 (American Roots, 2007) (with Shawn Camp) * Rock & Roll With It

Billy Goldenberg

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William Leon Goldenberg (February 10, 1936 – August 3, 2020) was an American composer and songwriter, best known for his work on television and film. Early life Goldenberg was born on February 10, 1936 in Brooklyn, New York, New York. His mother played the violin, and she taught him how to play the violin and the viola. Then he played it in chamber and symphonic groups. His father was a staff percussionist at WOR and the NBC Symphonic Orchestra. At age five, he played piano and sang Broadway shows. He wanted a musical career but since his father was laid off, he was dissuaded in the early 1950s. Instead of attending Juilliard, he studied physics and mathematics at Columbia College. Career After college, Goldenberg was a computer programmer, but he quit the job due to an ulcer. He found work as a pianist and arranger. He was hired to write the soundtrack for comedy sketches of Mike Nichols and Elaine May in the Broadway show, An Evening with Nichols and May. In the mid-1960s, Goldenberg met Steven Spielberg at Universal Studios. He started to compose music for Spielberg’s television episodes on shows such as The Name Of The Game, Night Gallery and the 1971 TV film, Duel. His other f

Billy Peterson

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Billy Peterson (born Willard Peterson in Minnesota) is an American bass player, songwriter, composer, session musician and producer. Peterson, who grew up in a family of professional musicians, became involved with music at a very young age. Billy is the brother of Paul Peterson (bass guitarist/singer/songwriter/keyboardist) and Ricky Peterson (keyboardist/singer/song writer/producer). Career Early career In 1967, Peterson joined The Righteous Brothers on a summer tour. While in school, he played bass and drums in local orchestras, big bands, and R&B bands, and toured with the Lawrence Welk Show All Stars. After graduating high school, he played bass with trumpet legend Clifford Brown’s pianist Billy Wallace until 1973. Peterson was the bassist on three of folk guitarist Leo Kottke’s albums in the mid ’70s, and played electric and upright bass on Bob Dylan’s multi-platinum Blood On The Tracks for Columbia Records. Peterson joined the Gibson guitar staff in 1976, giving him the opportunity to perform with B.B. King, Johnny Smith, Lenny Breau, Les Paul, and Howard Roberts. During this decade, record producer and engineer David Rivkin (aka David Z, who produced Prince in the 1980s) in

Billy Strayhorn

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William Thomas Strayhorn (November 29, 1915 – May 31, 1967) was an American jazz composer, pianist, lyricist, and arranger who collaborated with bandleader and composer Duke Ellington for nearly three decades. His compositions include “Take the ‘A’ Train”, “Chelsea Bridge”, “A Flower Is a Lovesome Thing”, and “Lush Life”. Early life Strayhorn was born in Dayton, Ohio, United States. Return to Pittsburgh and meeting Ellington Strayhorn returned to Pittsburgh while still in grade school. He worked odd jobs to earn enough money to buy his first piano and took lessons from Charlotte Enty Catlin. He attended Westinghouse High School, later also attended by jazz pianists Erroll Garner and Ahmad Jamal. He played in the school band, and studied under Carl McVicker, who had also instructed Erroll Garner and Mary Lou Williams. He studied classical music for a time at the Pittsburgh Music Institute, writing a musical, forming a trio that played daily on a local radio station, and writing/composing the songs “Life Is Lonely” (later renamed “Lush Life”), “My Little Brown Book”, and “Something to Live For”. By age 19, he was writing for a professional musical, Fantastic Rhythm. Strayhorn’s origi

Blake Allen

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Blake Liahona Allen (born July 21, 1988, in Tucson, Arizona) is an American composer and viola player who is most known for writing Insomnia—which debuted at Carnegie Hall— and The Shards of an Honor Code Junkie, music directing the 2019 revival of Over Here!, writing the theme song for the talk show Doris Dear’s Gurl Talk, and appearing on Shade: Queens of NYC. Early life and education Blake Liahona Allen was born in Tucson, Arizona on July 21, 1988, the fourth child of pianist Marsha Allen (née Wilcox) and San Allen, an engineer and chief operating officer for Winchester Electronics. His family moved to St. Petersburg, Florida shortly after his birth, then to Gainesville before eventually settling in El Paso, Texas, where he spent most of his youth. He grew up a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and was in the viola sections of both the El Paso Symphony Orchestra and Las Cruces Symphony while attending Franklin High School. Allen studied viola performance at Brigham Young University and worked at the Primrose International Viola Archive at Lee Library. Career Allen was artist-in-residence at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity in 2014 and was principal of

Blanche Robinson

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Blanche Robinson (Mrs. Martin Hennion Robinson, née Williams; 18 May 1883, near Liberty, Kansas – 19 August 1969, Los Angeles) was an American composer and well-known piano accompanist. During her prolific years as a composer, she lived in New York City. During her more active years as a piano accompanist, she lived in Los Angeles. In her published music, she was known as Mrs. M. Hennion Robinson or Mrs. M. Hennion-Robinson. Music career Robinson became a pupil in composition of Frederick Stephenson in Los Angeles. Her The Woman at Home, a chorus for women’s voices, was performed with much success by the Lyric Club. Among her better-known compositions are Songs of You, The Mystic Hour, Youth, Fairies, Butterflies, The Dawn of Dawns, and a chorus for men’s voices, A Song for Heroes. She performed under the management of Mr. Behymer in concert work. She also performed with Ebell Club, the Friday Morning Club, the Gamut Club, and many leading artists who toured Los Angeles. Family * Father: Oliver David Williams (1854 Kentucky – 1932, Venice, California) * Mother: Joanna Williams, née Dickerson (25 Oct 1855 Crawfordsville, Indiana – Oct 1949, Venice, California) ** Husband: Martin Hen

Bob Belden

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James Robert Belden (October 31, 1956 – May 20, 2015) was an American saxophonist, arranger, composer, bandleader, and producer. As a producer, he was mostly associated with the remastering of recordings by trumpeter Miles Davis for Columbia Records. Biography Belden, born in Evanston, Illinois, grew up in the Charleston, South Carolina suburb of Goose Creek. He briefly attended the University of South Carolina where he met composer Jay Knowles who introduced him to the music of Gil Evans. He then studied saxophone and composition at the University of North Texas before joining the Woody Herman band. He recorded his first album Treasure Island in 1990. This was followed by a series of adventurous albums featuring jazz-tinged arrangements of contemporary pop songs culminating with Black Dahlia in 2001. In 2008, he arranged and produced Miles from India, a world fusion music recording based on the compositions of Miles Davis for which he assembled a group made up of Davis alumni and musicians from India. In addition to his work as arranger, composer, conductor and A & R director, Belden contributed numerous liner notes for noted recordings, such as “Lou’s Blues” by Lou Marini and the

Bob Cobert

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Robert W. Cobert (October 26, 1924 – February 19, 2020) was an American composer of film and television scores. He is best known for his work with producer/director Dan Curtis, notably the scores for the ABC gothic fiction soap opera Dark Shadows (1966–71) and the TV mini-series The Winds of War (1983) and its sequel War and Remembrance (1988), for which he received an Emmy Award nomination. Together, the latter two scores constitute the longest film music ever written for a film. Early years Cobert was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1924. and wrote songs for bandleader Freddy Martin and jazz singer Frances Wayne. and the two tie-in feature films House of Dark Shadows (1970) and Night of Dark Shadows (1971). Cobert composed the scores for the 1972 TV movie The Night Stalker, the sequel The Night Strangler (1973), and the offshoot 1974–75 television series Kolchak: The Night Stalker. His other scores include the horror films Burnt Offerings (1976) and Scalpel (1977), the comedy film Me and the Kid (1993), and the television movies The Norliss Tapes (1973), Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1974), Scream of the Wolf (1974), Melvin Purvis: G-Man (1974) and the 1975 sequel The Kansas City Massacre

Bob Cole (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Robert Allen Cole Jr. (July 1, 1868 – August 2, 1911 ) was an American composer, actor, and playwright who produced and directed stage shows. In collaboration with Billy Johnson, he wrote and produced A Trip to Coontown (1898), the first musical entirely created and owned by black showmen. The popular song La Hoola Boola (1898) was a result of their collaboration. Cole later partnered with brothers J. Rosamond Johnson, a pianist and singer, and James Weldon Johnson, a pianist, guitarist and lawyer, creating more than 200 songs. Their vaudeville act featured classical piano pieces and their musicals featured sophisticated lyrics without the usual stereotypes such as “hot-mamas” and watermelons. Success enabled Cole and Rosamond to tour America and Europe with their act. The trio’s most popular songs were “Louisiana Lize” and “Under the Bamboo Tree” (1901?). Their more successful musicals were The Shoo-Fly Regiment (1906) and The Red Moon (1908, written without Weldon). Cole was the preeminent leader in the world of black musical theater both as a composer and as a performer. His skills in acting, writing, and directing were brought to the public eye through his early works: first, h

Bob Curnow

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Robert Harry Curnow (born November 1, 1941) is an American musician who served as a trombonist, staff arranger and producer for the Stan Kenton Orchestra during the 1960s and 1970s. As a composer and arranger, he has become well known for large ensemble jazz music set to contemporary fusion and rock music of groups such as Chicago, Blood, Sweat and Tears, and the Yellowjackets. Most notably, he arranged the music for and produced the award-winning and critically acclaimed CD, Bob Curnow’s L.A. Big Band Plays The Music of Pat Metheny and Lyle Mays. His compositions and arrangements are heavily influenced by earlier writers for the Stan Kenton Orchestra such as Pete Rugolo, Bill Russo, Johnny Richards and Bill Holman. Curnow is currently owner and President of Sierra Music Publications, Inc., he is also prominent in the instrumental music and jazz education fields. Early life, musical education and influences Bob Curnow was born and grew up in Easton, Pennsylvania and was first exposed to music through learning the trumpet at age 9 but then switched to baritone horn. He ultimately started to play the trombone at age 12. Curnow had started high school when he first heard the Stan Kent

Bob Hardwick

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Bob Hardwick was an American bandleader, pianist, and composer. He is best known as the bandleader of two long-established dance orchestras based in New York City, The Bob Hardwick Sound and The Bob Hardwick Sound Sensation. The Bob Hardwick Sound is a multi-style big band dance orchestra that performs swing, society/two-step, rock, pop, soul, funk, R&B, disco, jazz, and latin. The Bob Hardwick Sound Sensation is primarily a pop-rock band, performing a full range of current and past Top 40 hits including rock ‘n’ roll, disco, funk, and R&B. Hardwick and his musicians continue to be society regulars throughout the decades, performing for royalty, five Presidential Inaugural Balls, charity balls, and collaborating with musicians such as Paul McCartney and Natalie Cole. Early life and education Hardwick was born in Louisville, Kentucky to parents John H. Hardwick, a banker and chairman of Louisville Trust, and June Warden, a model. Born with perfect pitch, he began playing the piano and composing at age four. He began taking classes at the University of Louisville School of Music when he was twelve. Hardwick earned a B.A. from Centre College in Danville, KY, and continued his educatio

Bohuslav Martinů

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

1890–1923: Polička and Prague#

The setting of Martinů’s birth was unusual. He was born in the tower of the St. Jakub Church in Polička, a town in Bohemia, close to the Moravian border. His father, Ferdinand, a shoemaker, also worked as the church sexton and town fire watchman. For this, he and his family were allowed to live in the tower apartment. As a small boy Bohuslav was sickly, and frequently had to be carried up the 193 steps to the tower on the back of his father or his older sister. In school he was known to be very shy, and did not participate in the plays or pageants with his classmates. But as violinist, he excelled and developed a strong reputation, giving his first public concert in his hometown in 1905. The townspeople raised enough money to fund his schooling, and in 1906 he left the countryside to begin studies at the Prague Conservatory. Whilst there he fared poorly as a student, showing little interest in the rigid pedagogy or the hours of violin practice required. He was far more interested in exploring Prague and learning on his own, attending concerts and reading books on many subjects. This was in contrast to his roommate, Stanislav Novák, an excellent student and brilliant violinist. They frequently attended concerts together at which Martinů became engrossed in analyzing new music, particularly French impressionist works. He could memorize much of it, to the extent that when back in their room, he could write out large parts of the score almost perfectly. Novák was astonished at how meticulously Martinů could do this. He became convinced that his roommate, while lacking in other subjects, possessed an incredible brain for analyzing and memorizing music. They became friends for life. Dropped from the violin program, Martinů was moved to the organ department that taught composition, but dismissed in 1910 for “incorrigible negligence”. Martinů spent the next several years living back home in Polička, attempting to gain some standing in the musical world. He had written several compositions by this time, including the Elegie for violin and piano, and the symphonic poems Angel of Death (Anděl smrti) and Death of Tintagiles (Smrt Tintagilova), and submitted samples of his work to Josef Suk, a leading Czech composer. Suk encouraged him to pursue formal composition training, but this would not be possible for years. In the meantime, he passed the state teaching examination and maintained a studio in Polička throughout World War I, while continuing to compose and study on his own. It was during this time that he studied the ancient choral hymns of the Bohemian Brethren, which influenced his style and musical scope. As World War I drew to a close and Czechoslovakia was declared an independent republic, Martinů composed the celebratory cantata Czech Rhapsody (Česká rapsodie), which premiered in 1919 to great acclaim. He toured Europe as a violinist with the National Theatre Orchestra, and in 1920 became a full member of the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra that was led by the inspired young conductor Václav Talich, who was the first major conductor to promote Martinů. He also began formal composition study under Suk. During these last years in Prague he completed his first string quartet and two ballets: Who is the Most Powerful in the World? (Kdo je na světě nejmocnější?) and Istar.

Boris Midney

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Boris Midney (born October 22, 1937) is a Soviet-born American musician, producer, composer and conductor. Biography Midney was born in Moscow to a conductor and pianist father and classical singer mother. He studied classical composition and clarinet also teaching himself to play saxophone. In 1964 he defected from the USSR via the US embassy in Japan. After arriving in New York City, he formed The Russian Jazz Quartet with whom he recorded an album for Impulse Records. In the 1960s, Midney married Tania Armour from the Armour & Company family. Later, Midney became a prolific composer and producer of disco music although he rarely was credited under his own name. Using guises such as USA-European Connection, Masquerade, Double Discovery, Caress, Companion and Festival, Midney produced a large body of disco music. He is recognised as being among the first producers to take full advantage of 48-track recording and one of the creators of the Eurodisco genre. Among his productions were disco adaptations of the Broadway musical Evita and of the score for The Empire Strikes Back. Describing his disco music, critics Alan Jones and Jussi Kantonen wrote: On the Mount Olympus of disco there

Børns

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Garrett Clark Borns (born January 7, 1992), better known by his stage name Børns (stylized in all caps), is an American singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. Born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan, Børns began performing in his youth. In 2012, he released his debut album, A Dream Between, through REZidual Records. His first major label release was the Candy EP (2014), through Geffen and Interscope. The EP peaked at number two on the Billboard Heatseekers chart. The Dopamine tour followed, preceding his debut studio album Dopamine in 2015. The album was a commercial success, peaking at number 24 in the US and generating numerous singles include the platinum-certified, “Electric Love”. Børns then embarked on tours with artists including Charli XCX, Bleachers, and Halsey, as a supporting act, along with a set at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in 2016. His second album, Blue Madonna, was released on January 12, 2018. The record spawned several singles, including “God Save Our Young Blood” with Lana Del Rey, which charted on the US rock chart. To further promote the LP, he headlined the MoneyMan Tour (2017–18) and supported Del Rey on her LA to the Moon Tour. Bø

Božidar Kantušer

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Božidar Kantušer (Bozidar Kantuser) (December 5, 1921, Pavlovski Vrh, Slovenia – May 9, 1999, Paris) was a Slovene composer of classical music. He was a Slovenian citizen and an American citizen. Kantušer is the author of symphonic music, ballets, chamber music and solo pieces. He lived in France since 1950. He was married to the American painter Grace Renzi. Since 1968, Kantušer was the director of the International Library of Contemporary Music (B.I.M.C.). He is buried in Paris, at the Père Lachaise Cemetery. Music List of compositions by Božidar Kantušer Life Božidar Kantušer was born on the farm of Pavlovski vrh, in the countryside of northeastern Slovenia. He was the first of the five children of Blaž Kantušer and his wife Katarina, born Hočevar. The father, from a family of farmers near Celje, and the mother, from a family of blacksmiths from Kamnik, were both employed in Ljutomer after World War I and lived at Pavlovski vrh, close to Ljutomer, from 1919 to 1929. The rural environment, the cultural heritage and the nature of his native Prlekija, where he lived the first seven years, left a lasting impression on the composer. The dances of masks of pagan origin (Kurenti) and t

Bradley Joseph

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Bradley Joseph (born September 2, 1965) is an American composer, arranger, and producer of contemporary instrumental music. His compositions include works for orchestras, chamber ensembles, and solo piano pieces. He has also played various instruments in rock bands throughout the Midwestern United States. Early life and education Bradley Joseph was born in 1965 in Bird Island, Minnesota and raised in Willmar, Minnesota. While attending, he played saxophone and guitar in local bands but left to focus on piano. Between tours, Joseph worked as a studio musician. Joseph then signed a record deal with Narada Productions, Artistry Musical style Hear the Masses and Rapture are two of Joseph’s best-known full orchestrations, combining smooth jazz with contemporary instrumental themes. A review of Rapture in New Age Voice stated that Joseph “paints romantic pictures in sound with voices and instruments that escalate from quiet, intimate passages to big, energetic movements”. In contrast, albums such as Solo Journey and The Journey Continues are described as “stripped back and basic”. For the 2002 album One Deep Breath, he combines “structured melodic pieces and free-form ambient composition

Bram Inscore

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Bram Katz Inscore (January 11, 1982 – December 19, 2023) was an American musician, songwriter, and producer. Born and raised in California, he wrote and produced many pop songs, including for Troye Sivan, as well as K-pop songs popular in South Korea. Early life Bram Katz Inscore Career Inscore began his career as a touring musician with Jem, Beck, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Thurston Moore, and Twin Shadow. As a session musician, he played the electric bass on Beck’s 2014 album Morning Phase, on Gainsbourg’s IRM, and on a number of other projects. Inscore co-wrote and co-produced several songs on Troye Sivan’s 2015 Blue Neighborhood album, including “Talk Me Down” and “Youth”, and on his 2018 album Bloom, including “The Good Side” and “Animal”. According to The New Indian Express, “his work with Troye Sivan continues to stand out.” Besides Sivan, Inscore co-wrote songs for Allie X, Ben Platt, Chloe & Halle, Claud, Duncan Laurence, Hayley Kiyoko, Mayer Hawthorne, Niki, Rina Sawayama, as well as other songs for NCT 127, SuperM, Baekhyun, and Taemin. Inscore co-wrote the music score of the 2018 film Sierra Burgess Is a Loser. A year later, he was a co-writer of Andy Grammer’s “Don’t Give U

Brandon Moore (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Brandon Moore (born November 25, 1976) is an American composer known for Universal’s Aliens Ate My Homework (2018) and the sequel Aliens Stole My Body (2020) featuring the voice talents of William Shatner and George Takei. He’s also known for the comedy-horror series Killer Sisters’ Midnight Hour (2012) for Hulu, and the IFS Festival’s Best Drama winner The Year I Did Nothing (2019). Brandon has been a musician since an early age and a life-long film music fan. Upon completing his undergrad in music theory and composition in Fort Worth, TX, he moved to Los Angeles to attend USC’s Film Scoring program. Brandon has composed a wide range of scores for a variety of film projects and genres. His music has played in film festivals all over the world for as long as he’s been an active composer in Hollywood. Biography Early life Brandon Moore grew up listening to film scores and performing music in his native Arlington, Texas. His father John Moore (1942-2011) was an architect and his mother Cheryl Ford-Mente, a communications director for non-profit organizations, was heavily involved in Dallas-Fort Worth community theater as an actress and fundraiser and host of a local cable talk show "

Brian Balmages

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Brian Philip Balmages (born January 24, 1975) He is best known for composing educational music for wind instruments. Early life and education Brian Balmages obtained a Bachelor’s of Music degree in music industry from James Madison University, with a focus on trumpet performance, and a Master’s of Music in media scoring and production from the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami. Career Brian Balmages was the director of bands and orchestras at Towson University. He has been the guest conductor of orchestras around the US, in Canada, Italy, and Australia. Balmages was the Director of Instrumental Publications for the FJH Music Company for over 20 years. Currently, he is the Director of MakeMusic Publications and since 2022 the Director of Digital Education for Alfred and MakeMusic. Works For wind instruments * Pele for Solo horn and Wind Ensemble (2004) * Moscow 1941 for Concert Band (2006) * Apollo for Soprano Saxophone and Wind Ensemble (2008) * Summer Resounding! for Concert Band (2008) * Three Celtic Dances for Concert Band (2008) * Arabian Dances for Symphonic Band (2009) * Elements for Concert Band (2010) * Escape from the Deep (2010) * Incantation and Ritual for

Brian Head (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Brian Head (born October 14, 1964) is an American composer, guitarist, and music theory and composition professor. He performs frequently as a soloist and collaboratively with numerous groups, including the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Opera, New World Symphony, inauthentica, Jacaranda and Xtet. His compositions have been widely performed throughout the U.S. and abroad. Brian Head holds an unusual dual appointment at the Thornton School of Music at the University of Southern California, where he is a member of both the Classical Guitar and the Composition faculties, positions he has held since 2001. He maintains an active guitar studio there, lectures on a wide range of subjects, and directs the music theory program. As of 2010, he is the acting chair of the Classical Guitar department and Assistant Dean for curriculum. Heads is Artistic Director of the Guitar Foundation of America. From 2004 to 2010, he was its president. Training Raised in Adelphi, Maryland, Brian Head is the son of the noted trumpeter Emerson Head and his first wife Linda Head, a piano teacher and professional accompanist. He received undergraduate degrees from the University of Maryland in both Mus

Brian Keane

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Brian Keane (born January 18, 1953) is an American composer, music producer, and guitarist. Keane has been described as “a musician’s musician, a composer’s composer, and one of the most talented producers of a generation” by Billboard magazine. Keane grew up in Westport, Connecticut, and started his career as a guitarist, eventually touring and recording in a duo with Larry Coryell. Best known as a composer, Keane’s first music score for a documentary came in 1980 with Against Wind and Tide: A Cuban Odyssey, which was nominated for an Academy Award. As the cable television business bloomed in the 1980s, Keane quickly became one of the foremost pioneers in documentary music scoring. By the 1990s The Hollywood Reporter respectfully called him “the John Williams of the documentary”. Keane has worked with every major network, and many multi award-winning filmmakers including Barry Levinson, Ric Burns, Susan Lacy, Henry Hampton, Stephen King, and Thomas Lennon, scoring some of the most memorable documentaries in television history such as the epic Burns history of New York in New York: A Documentary Film, the inspiring story of the 1980 Olympic hockey team in Do You Believe in Miracles

Bridget Kearney

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Bridget Kearney (kə́ːnɪj, car’-nee) is an American musician and songwriter. She is a founding member of the band Lake Street Dive and winner of the 2005 John Lennon Songwriting Contest in the Jazz category. Kearney’s solo recording work began with her debut solo album, Won’t Let You Down, which recordings took place over three years, largely encouraged and supported by drummer/engineer/producer Robin MacMillan in his Brooklyn Studio, and released by Signature Sounds Recordings in 2017. A number of singles followed, some of which found their way onto Kearney’s second solo album, Snakes of Paradise self-released in 2023. Similarly, singles from her third album,Comeback Kid were also released in advance of the April 12, 2024 release by Keeled Scales for that album on an expanding number of streaming platforms and social media sites such as Apple Music, Spotify, YouTube and Instagram as well as physical media outlet channels such as Bandcamp. Early life, influences and education Kearney was born and grew up in Iowa City, Iowa. Her mother played flute. Her father played bass with “Langston Hughes Memorial Eclectic Improvisational Jazz Exposition”. Her grandmothers, Ellen and Vickey, wer

Bright Sheng

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Bright Sheng (; born December 6, 1955) is a Chinese and American composer, pianist and conductor. Sheng has earned many honors for his music and compositions, including a MacArthur Fellowship in 2001; he also was a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist. His music has been commissioned and performed by virtually every major American symphony orchestra, in addition to the Orchestre de Paris, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, London Sinfonietta, St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, Russian National Orchestra, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra of Taiwan, Shanghai Philharmonic Orchestra, Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra among numerous others. His music has been performed by such musicians as the conductors Leonard Bernstein, Kurt Masur, Christoph Eschenbach, Charles Dutoit, Michael Tilson Thomas, Leonard Slatkin, Gerard Schwarz, David Robertson, David Zinman, Neeme Järvi, Robert Spano, Hugh Wolff; the cellists Yo-Yo Ma, Lynn Harrell, and Alisa Weilerstein; the pianists Emanuel Ax, Yefim Bronfman, and Peter Serkin; the violinists Gil Shaham and Cho-Liang

Brittney Boykin

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Brittney Elizabeth Boykin (born 1989) Early life and education Boykin is from Alexandria, Virginia. She is African American. She grew up in a musical family, and began learning piano at age seven. She graduated in May 2013 with a Master of Music in Sacred Music, concentrating in choral studies. Boykin is Assistant Professor of Music at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Awards & Recognition During high school, Boykin won first place three consecutive years in the NAACP’s Afro-Academic, Cultural, Technological and Scientific Olympics. Style & Influence Boykin mainly writes choral music but in 2023 she had her first opera debut. References

Brody Brown

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Christopher Steven “Brody” Brown is an American songwriter and record producer. He met Bruno Mars in 2008, and in 2015 formed the production team Shampoo Press & Curl He is also a member of the production group 1500 or Nothin’, alongside James Fauntleroy, Lamar Edwards and Larrance Dopson. Brown has written or produced for artists including Nipsey Hussle, CeeLo Green, Kesha, Adele, Lukas Graham, Ed Sheeran, Snoop Dogg, Wiz Khalifa, and Mark Ronson. Early life Brown was born in Compton, California. Growing up, although he listened to some jazz, he mainly listened to the gospel that he was surrounded by at home. As a child, he taught himself to read music and play the drums, bass, guitar and piano. In junior high school, in addition to playing with the school band, he played with rock, salsa, and jazz bands. He also performed regularly at local churches. Brown was a member of The Crips. He was shot at and jailed as a teenager. In a 2016 interview he said that music “kept him from becoming another statistic in a hard neighborhood.” Career Brown joined 1500 or Nothin’ in 2003, and prior to dropping out of high school in 2005, began writing and playing with Bobby Valentino, whom he met

Bruce Adolphe

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Bruce Adolphe (born May 31, 1955) is a composer, music scholar, the author of several books on music, and pianist. He is currently Resident Lecturer and Director of Family Concerts of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, where he has been a key figure since 1992. From 2002 to 2025, Adolphe performed his weekly “Piano Puzzler” segment on the nationally broadcast Performance Today classical music radio program hosted by Fred Child. The program is also available as a podcast and from iTunes. Mr. Adolphe was also founding artistic director of Off the Hook Arts Festival, an interdisciplinary festival combining music, science, and visual arts, based in Fort Collins, Colorado, from 2010 to 2022. Adolphe’s recent books include Visions and Decisions: Imagination and Technique in Music Composition published in 2023 by Cambridge University Press in the Elements series on Imagination and Creativity, edited by Anna Abraham. In 2021, Oxford University Press published an expanded third edition of Adolphe’s book The Mind’s Ear:Exercises for Improving the Musical Imagination for Composers, Performers, and Listeners. Adolphe contributed a chapter to The Routledge Companion to Music and Human

Bruce Babcock

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Bruce H. Babcock (born 1951) is an American composer. He is known for his works in television, film, and the concert hall. He has composed for various television series, including Murder, She Wrote, Matlock, and Father Dowling Mysteries. He has also composed for many films, including Lethal Weapon, the Die Hard franchise, and King Kong. Babcock credits his study with other composers such as Hugo Friedhofer, Earle Hagen and Paul Glass as an important contributor to his music. Babcock spent more than 25 years in media music before returning to his classical roots, leading to performances of his concert works across the United States. Early life and education Bruce Babcock grew up in Santa Barbara, California. He is the son of astronomer Horace W. Babcock and grandson of astronomer Harold D. Babcock. Bruce went on to earn both Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in music composition from California State University at Northridge in the mid-1970s. Career Babcock began studying with Swiss-American classical composer Paul Glass in 1971 and won the Young Musicians Foundation composition prize in 1976 for his “Music for String Orchestra,” performed at UCLA’s Royce Hall under the baton of Calvi

Bruce Broughton

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Bruce Harold Broughton (born March 8, 1945 ) is an American composer of television, film, and video game scores and concert works. He composed the 1994 version of the 20th Century Fox fanfare. He has won ten Emmy Awards and has been nominated once for the Academy Award for Best Original Score. Broughton is currently a lecturer in composition at University of California, Los Angeles. Career Broughton has composed the score for many notable films including Disney films such as The Rescuers Down Under (1990), Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey (1993) and its sequel, Lost in San Francisco (1996), as well as popular westerns such as Silverado (1985) and Tombstone (1993). Other films scored by Broughton include Young Sherlock Holmes (1985), Baby’s Day Out (1994), Harry and the Hendersons (1987), Miracle on 34th Street (1994), and The Boy Who Could Fly (1986). Additionally, he composed music for the video game Heart of Darkness and the animated TV series Tiny Toon Adventures. Broughton composed music for Disney theme park attractions including Soarin’, Spaceship Earth, and Ellen’s Energy Adventure. Silverado earned him an Academy Award nomination, losing to Out of Africa. He has won n

Bruce MacCombie

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Bruce MacCombie (1943 in Providence, Rhode Island – May 2, 2012, in Amherst, Massachusetts) was an American composer. He studied at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Freiburg Conservatory, and holds a Ph.D. in music from the University of Iowa. He was appointed to the music faculty of Yale University in 1975, and one year later joined the composition faculty of the Yale School of Music. MacCombie was Director of Publications for G. Schirmer and Associated Music Publishers from 1980 to 1986, Dean of the Juilliard School from 1986 to 1992 and Dean of the School for the Arts at Boston University from 1992 to 2001. Since 2002 he has been Professor of Music at the University of Massachusetts Amherst at Amherst. He was succeeded by Derek Gordon in 2004. References External links * Profile at University of Massachusetts Amherst * Five Colleges New Music Festival profile * Juilliard School press release * Boston University’s B.U. Bridge News on MacCombie * Schott Music profile * Schott Music promoting Color and Time * Schott Music promoting Elegy

Bruce Wolosoff

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Bruce Wolosoff (born March 27, 1955) is an American classical composer, pianist, and educator. He lives in Shelter Island, New York with his wife, the artist Margaret Garrett. He has two daughters, the singer-songwriter Juliet Garrett and the sculptor and mixed media artist Katya Wolosoff. Biography Wolosoff was born Bruce Germont, the son of Jeanette (née Rothenberg) and Marc Germont. After his father’s death when Wolosoff was five years old, his mother remarried to Alvin Bibbs Wolosoff. As a teenager, Wolosoff played in a variety of rock bands while pursuing studies in classical piano performance. He received a B.A. at Bard College, where he studied with Joan Tower and ran an improvisational group with multi-instrumentalist and composer Elliott Sharp, and an M.M. in piano performance from the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. It was at the New England Conservatory that he met jazz composer-pianist Jaki Byard, an artist who exerted enormous influence on Wolosoff’s musical development. Wolosoff studied composition and orchestration with Lawrence Widdoes, and pursued post-graduate studies at the Dalcroze School of Music with Dr. Hilda Schuster. Wolosoff’s principal piano

Bryan E. Miller

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Bryan E. Miller (born September 23, 1965) is an American film composer, pianist, and music producer based in Los Angeles, California. Miller has scored several documentaries including America: Imagine The World Without Her. TOC Career After leaving his hometown of Albuquerque, New Mexico to pursue a career in film composition, Miller began studying at the Grove School of Music and the UCLA Extension film-scoring program. Early in his career Miller assisted composer Mark Waters on numerous Disney TV episodes, and worked as an orchestrator and conductor for Academy Award-winning composer Mychael Danna. Miller’s compositions can be heard on numerous film, TV, documentary, and commercial projects. He works regularly for clients such as NBCUniversal, Lionsgate, Disney, CBS, ABC, and A&E. He has also provided music for Super Bowl commercials and brands such as Microsoft, Taco Bell, Campbell’s, Dodge, Wells Fargo, Yamaha, Nike, and the Comcast logo. This documentary became the sixth highest grossing political documentary of all time. Milan Records released the feature film’s soundtrack in 2014. In 2015, Miller was chosen to compose the original score for Te Ata. The film, based on a t

Buck Warnick

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Henry Clay Warnick, Jr., also known as Buck Warnick, Clay Warnick, and H. Clay Warnick, (born, December 14, 1915, Tacoma, Washington — died February 8, 1995, West Orange, New Jersey) He had an active career on Broadway from 1942 through 1963, and was also a prolific composer of jingles for advertisements on radio and television with the Young and Rubicam (Y & R) agency. His undergraduate education was from Colgate University where he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa and Delta Epsilon. He was musical director of Your Show of Shows from 1950 through 1954. He also served as musical director or arranger for numerous television programs including Caesar’s Hour, The United States Steel Hour, and Your Hit Parade. With Y & R, Warnick produced music for more than 10,000 spots on radio and television. Some of his more famous jingles include “The Dogs Kids Love to Bite” for Armour Hot Dogs. and “Should a gentleman offer a tiparillo to a lady?” for Tiparillo Cigars. The latter song won Warnick a Clio Award in 1974. His best known song is “Number One To The Sun” which he composed for Eastern Airlines. That song was performed and recorded by the New York Philharmonic. References External links *Bu

Burr Van Nostrand

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Burr Van Nostrand (born 1945) is an American classical composer and cellist. He is known for his avant-garde works which use aleatory and graphic notation and were composed from the 1960s through the 1980s. Van Nostrand was born in Los Angeles and began composing while still in high school in San Diego. He studied cello at Yale with Aldo Parisot and composition at the New England Conservatory under Robert Cogan. After his graduation from the NEC with a Masters in Music in 1971, he spent four years in the Netherlands at the Gaudeamus Foundation where several of his works were premiered. He stopped composing in the late 1980s but remained active as a cellist until 2000. There was renewed interest in his music following a concert of his early works at the New England Conservatory in 2012 and the release of a CD the following year containing his 1969 Voyage in a White Building I and two other works from that period. Life and career Van Nostrand was born in Los Angeles, California. Both his parents were visual artists. He grew up in San Diego where he studied painting, piano, and cello and later composition with John Glasier and Howard Brubeck. He also became acquainted with the music a

Burrill Phillips

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Leroy Burrill Phillips (November 9, 1907 – June 22, 1988) was an American composer, teacher, and pianist. Biography Phillips was born in Omaha, Nebraska. He studied at the College of Music at the University of Denver with Edwin Stringham and at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, with Howard Hanson and Bernard Rogers. On September 17, 1928, he married Alberta Corinne Mayfield (1907–1979) who wrote many of his librettos. In 1931 the couple had a daughter who, under the stage name Ann Todd, became a child actress in films. She continued acting into her early twenties, but left the entertainment industry in 1954 and died in 2020. A second child, son Stephen, was born in 1937. He died in 1986, two years before his father. Phillips’s first important work was Selections from McGuffey’s Reader, for orchestra, based on poems by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. Immediately successful, the work established his reputation as a composer with a “consciously American style”. By the 1940s he had turned to a more astringent and expressive idiom. In 1960, his String Quartet No. 2 was premiered at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. by the Paganini Qua

Byron Adams

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Byron Adams (born 1955) is an American musicologist, composer, and conductor. Education Adams received his bachelor of music degree from Jacksonville University, his master of music degree from the University of Southern California, and his doctor of musical arts degree from Cornell University. Career Adams is a composer of tonal music. His music was performed at the Warsaw Autumn, Bargemusic, the Da Camera Society of Los Angeles, and the Conservatoire Américain de Fontainebleau in Fontainebleau, France (where he taught in the summer of 1992), as well as by such ensembles as Cantus, the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra, and the Philharmonia Orchestra. As a musicologist, Adams specializes in British and French music of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. and Music & Letters. In 2007, he was appointed scholar-in-residence and a member of the program committee for the Bard Music Festival, for which he was the editor of Edward Elgar and His World (Princeton, 2007). He also gave pre-concert lectures and contributed program notes. Other notable organizations for which he has written programs notes include the Philadelphia Orchestra and the American Symphony Orchestra, among others. I

C. Curtis-Smith

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Curtis Curtis-Smith (September 9, 1941, Walla Walla, Washington – October 10, 2014, Kalamazoo Michigan), better known as C. Curtis-Smith or C.C. Smith, was a modernist American composer and pianist. Education Curtis-Smith was born in Walla Walla, Washington, and received a bachelor’s degree from Whitman College, where he studied with John Ringgold and David Burge. He received a Master of Music degree in piano at Northwestern University where he studied with Alan Stout and Guy Mombaerts. He pursued further studies at the University of Illinois with Kenneth Gaburo, the Tanglewood Music Center with Bruno Maderna, and in master classes at the Blossom Music Festival with Pierre Boulez. Curtis-Smith was an adjunct professor then full-time faculty at Western Michigan University from 1965-2012. Career In 1972, he pioneered the technique of bowing the piano. Pianist David Burge wrote about the technique, saying “Loose bows made of strands of fishline are woven throughout the piano strings at various places in the instrument … to give the pianist the possibility of crescendo and diminuendo on a single note or group of notes.” Curtis-Smith performed at Carnegie Hall in 1968, and had several

C. Mortimer Wiske

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Charles Mortimer Wiske (also spelled Whiskey or Wiskey), (January 12, 1853 – July 9, 1934) was an American choral conductor, organist, and composer. Born in Bennington, Vermont, and raised in Troy, New York, Wiske began working as an organist at the age of twelve. In 1872 he moved to New York City where he became a prominent organist and choir director in Brooklyn. He founded and/or led several notable choirs, among them the Amphion Musical Society, the Brooklyn Choral Society, the Orpheus Glee Club, and the Caecilia Ladies Vocal Society. He spent five years as choirmaster for Theodore Thomas and his orchestra. In 1896 he moved to Paterson, New Jersey where he worked for several churches. He was the longtime director of the Patterson Music Festival and Newark Music Festival, the latter of which he founded in 1915. He continued to lead these New Jersey music festivals until his retirement in 1930. In his later life he divided his time between his home in Paterson and a farm/inn he built in Woodstock, New York where he also operated a music camp. Early life and career Born in Bennington, Vermont on January 12, 1853, Charles Mortimer Wiskey (later consistently spelled Wiske) was the s

Callie Bonney Marble

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Callie Bonney Marble was an American author and lyricist. Early life Callie Bonney was born in Peoria, Illinois, where her father, Charles C. Bonney, was a young lawyer just beginning practice. He shortly afterward moved to Chicago, Illinois, and later became known as President of the World’s Congresses at the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893. In 1903 Bonney wrote Charles Carroll Bonney. In Memoriam for The Open Court. Bonney attended the best schools in Chicago, and afterward was graduated from the Chestnut Street Seminary for young ladies, then located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, but later moved to Ogontz, Pennsylvania, cofounded in 1850 by Mary Bonney. Personal life In 1889 in San Francisco, Callie Bonney married Earl Marble (July 1837 - 1917), a well-known editor, art and dramatic critic, and author, and they resided in Chicago. References

Calvin Jackson (pianist)

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John Calvin Jackson (May 26, 1919 – December 9, 1985) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and bandleader. Background He was born in Philadelphia in 1919 to Harry and Margaret Jackson. His mother was a concert singer in Philadelphia. Jackson played piano from childhood, having lessons with private teacher. He studied at Juilliard and New York University. Career At the beginning of his career Jackson worked with Frankie Fairfax. From 1943–47 he worked in Hollywood as an assistant director of music for MGM on productions including Meet Me in St. Louis and Anchors Aweigh. In 1947 he recorded with Phil Moore and also as a solo pianist for Discovery Records. He played Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 on piano for the 1947 Tom and Jerry cartoon The Cat Concerto. In Summer 1948, he played with a singer Mildred Bailey and a dancer Avon Long at Café Society in New York City. In 1950, he moved to Toronto, where he often played on television and radio. Over the course of the 1950s and early 1960s he released several LPs for labels such as Columbia Records. In 1957 he returned to Los Angeles, where he resumed work as a composer and orchestrator for television and hit musicals like Where the

Calvin Jones (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Calvin P. Jones (born May 3, 1966) is an American musician, record producer, composer, songwriter, and pianist. He composed the hit song “Whitewater Chopped Sticks” popular in talent shows, recitals and pageants. “Whitewater Chopped Sticks” was edited by Jones and performed by Miss Nebraska, Teresa Scanlan to win the 2011 Miss America Pageant with over 14 million viewers watching on ABC TV. Jones has composed music for many soundtracks, including the hit documentary 2016: Obama’s America. Produced by Gerald R. Molen (Schindler’s List, Jurassic Park), 2016 was a major theatrical release, grossing over $33.45 million at the box office, making it the second highest domestic-grossing political documentary in the United States since 1982. Jones has worked with Producer Jerry Marcellino (Michael Jackson, Diana Ross), Kerry Livgren of the group Kansas (“Dust in the Wind”, “Carry On Wayward Son”) and director Jim Hanon (End of the Spear) among others. Early life Jones was born in Eureka, South Dakota, to parents Norman and Lena Jones. Shortly thereafter the family relocated to Sutton, Nebraska, where his father was pastor of the Hope Reformed Church. As with many artists, Jones’ first expo

Camara Kambon

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Camara Kambon (born February 4, 1973) is an American film composer, songwriter, pianist, music producer and educator. He is known for collaborating with Dr. Dre on Chronic 2001, as well as Eminem on The Slim Shady LP and The Marshall Mathers LP. He co-wrote the Mary J. Blige song Family Affair, composed the theme for the Mara Brock Akil produced CW sitcom, Girlfriends, and the score for the DreamWorks’ feature film, Biker Boyz. Kambon has received an Emmy Award, two Emmy nominations, three Grammy nominations, a BMI Pop Award and a BMI Film/TV Award. Early life and career Camara Kambon grew up in Baltimore, Maryland and began piano studies at an early age. At 10, Kambon received the Jacques Kahn scholarship to attend the Peabody Preparatory School of the Johns Hopkins University, to study jazz, classical piano, and musicianship. Later at 14, he performed with jazz trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie at Blues Alley in Washington, D.C. In the same year, he met Bill Cosby collaborator, Stu Gardner, which led to an interest in composing for TV and film. In the same year, Kambon was hired to work with rapper and record producer Dr. Dre as his keyboardist, music director and orchestrator in residen

Camilla Kolchinsky

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Camilla Alexandrovna Kolchinsky (Russian: Камилла Александровна Кольчинская; 25 December 1931 – 16 February 2016) was a Jewish conductor who was born in Russia. She was born in Moscow and made her debut as a conductor in Leningrad, now is known as St. Petersburg, while still a student. In 1976 she emigrated to Israel. She had conducted performances of the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra and according to Gramophone was “one of the few Russian women to have made a successful international career as a conductor.” At the time of her death she was the emeritus director of the El Camino Youth Orchestra. Recordings *Glazunov/Dvorák Violin Concertos – Ilya Kaler (violin), Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Camilla Kolchinsky (conductor). Label: Naxos References External links * (Internet Archive)

Canary Burton

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Canary Lee Burton (born September 16, 1942) is an American keyboardist, composer and writer. Biography Burton was born on September 16, 1942, in Richmond, California. In 1972 she moved to Moscow, Idaho, to attend the University of Idaho where she was one of the first women to be accepted into the music composition program. After passing her third-year piano exam, she left to form her own rock ’n roll band and play in various rock and jazz ensembles. She attracted followers through her gigs, but she came to find performance unfulfilling and turned to composition. She relocated to Washington D.C., where she worked at WPFW Pacifica radio for three years. She then moved to Cape Cod, Massachusetts, where she established her own contemporary music radio show, The Latest Score, on WOMR in Provincetown. She worked as a music teacher from 1996 to 2000. Selected pieces of her work were included in the published collection Music of Living Composers, compiled by the Campbell University piano professor and composer Betty Wishart in 1997. In 2014, Southern River won the PatsyLu Prize in the annual Search for New Music competition of the International Alliance for Women in Music. Burton’s works h

Carl Baermann (pianist)

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Carl Baermann (9 July 1839 – 17 January 1913) was a German-born American pianist and composer. He should not be confused with his father, the clarinetist and composer Carl Baermann. Life and career The son of clarinetist and composer Carl Baermann, Carl Baermann was born in Munich, Germany on 9 July 1839. His grandfather was clarinet virtuoso Heinrich Baermann and his grandmother was operatic soprano . He studied the piano at the Royal Bavarian Music School with Christian Wanner and Andreas Wohlmuth (1809–1884), and composition with Franz Lachner and Peter Cornelius in Munich. He later became a student and friend of Franz Liszt. He taught at the Royal Bavarian Music School (now the University of Music and Theatre Munich), being made professor there in 1876. Some of his notable pupils at that institution included Lothar Kempter and Bruno Klein. In 1881 Baermann immigrated to the United States to join the faculty of the New England Conservatory where he taught until his death more than 30 years later. He composed a number of works for piano solo and with orchestra; among his published works of the former include 12 Etüden, Op. 4 (in Offenbach by the firm Johann André, 1887) and Polon

Carl Faia

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Carl Faia (born 1962 at Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma) is an American composer and live electronics designer and performer. Faia studied composition at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Florida State University and the Royal Danish Academy of Music on a Fulbright grant. Some of his past teachers include Edward Applebaum, Peter Racine Fricker, Per Nørgård and Karl Aage Rasmussen. Later, he participated in masterclasses with Tristan Murail, Philippe Manoury and Harrison Birtwistle. Since 1995 he has been active as a live electronics designer working at IRCAM in Paris, at the CIRM in Nice where he has also been studio manager and a freelancer. He has collaborated with numerous composers including James Dillon, Jonathan Harvey, Harrison Birtwistle, Fausto Romitelli, Luca Francesconi, Alejandro Viñao, Philippe Leroux, as well as the National Jazz Orchestra of France. He has collaborated with artists to present new works with computer electronics in various festivals throughout Europe including Ars Musica (Brussels), Holland Festival (Amsterdam), Musica (Strasbourg), Agora (Paris), Gaida (Vilnius), MaerzMusik (Berlin), Lille 2004 as well as the Casa da Música (Porto, Spain

Carl Lachmund

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Carl V. Lachmund (27 March 185320 February 1928) was an American classical pianist, teacher, conductor, composer, and diarist. He was a student of Franz Liszt for three years, and his detailed diaries of his time with Liszt provide an invaluable insight into that composer’s teaching methods and some aspects of his character. He founded the Lachmund Conservatory in New York and ran it for 22 years, and he founded the Women’s String Orchestra, conducting it for 12 seasons. Biography Carl Valentine Lachmund was born in Boonville, Missouri in 1853, but spent most of his early life in Iowa. His parents Gustav Otto Lachmund and Sophia née Schmidt were immigrants from Germany. His musical talent was recognised early. He went to Europe at the age of 16 and studied for six years, graduating in 1875 from the Cologne Conservatory, where his teachers were Ferdinand Hiller, Adolf Jensen, Friedrich Gernsheim and Isidor Seiss. He continued his studies in Berlin with Moritz Moszkowski, Friedrich Kiel (Paderewski was a fellow student), and Xaver and Philipp Scharwenka. In 1877 he founded the German Conservatory of Music in Clinton, Iowa. He accompanied the violinist August Wilhelmj on his 1880 Euro

Carl Ruggles

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Carl Ruggles (born Charles Sprague Ruggles; March 11, 1876 – October 24, 1971) was an American composer, painter and teacher. His pieces employed “dissonant counterpoint”, a term coined by fellow composer and musicologist Charles Seeger to describe Ruggles’ music. His method of atonal counterpoint was based on a non-serial technique of avoiding repeating a pitch class until a generally fixed number of eight pitch classes intervened. He is considered a founder of the ultramodernist movement of American composers that included Henry Cowell and Ruth Crawford Seeger, among others. He had no formal musical education, yet was an extreme perfectionist—writing music at a painstakingly slow rate and leaving behind a very small output. Famous for his prickly personality, Ruggles was nonetheless close friends with Cowell, Seeger, Edgard Varèse, Charles Ives, and the painter Thomas Hart Benton. His students include the experimental composers James Tenney and Merton Brown. Conductor Michael Tilson Thomas has championed Ruggles’ music, recording the complete works with the Buffalo Philharmonic and occasionally performing Sun-Treader with the San Francisco Symphony. Especially later in life, Rugg

Carl Stone

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Carl Stone (born Carl Joseph Stone, February 10, 1953) is an American composer, primarily working in the field of live electronic music. His works have been performed in the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia, Australia, South America, and the Near East. Biography From 1966 to 1969 he formed a band with Z’EV and James Stewart, performing jazz rock. After auditioning for Frank Zappa’s Bizarre Records, the band ceased activities and both he and Z’EV went on to attend CalArts. Stone studied composition at the California Institute of the Arts with Morton Subotnick and James Tenney and has composed electro-acoustic music almost exclusively since 1972. Stone utilizes a laptop computer as his primary instrument and his works often feature very slowly developing manipulations of samples of acoustic music, speech, or other sounds. Because of this, as well as his preference for tonal melodic and harmonic materials similar to those used in popular musics, Stone’s work has been associated with the movement known as minimalism. Prior to his settling on the laptop, in the 1980s, he created a number of electronic and collage works utilizing various electronic equipment as well as turntables. Pro

Carl W. Stalling

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Carl William Stalling (November 10, 1891 – November 29, 1972) was an American composer, voice actor and arranger for music in animated films. He is most closely associated with the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts produced by Warner Bros. Cartoons, where he averaged one complete score each week, for 22 years. Life and career Stalling was born to Ernest and Sophia C. Stalling. His parents were from Germany; his father arrived in the United States in 1883. The family settled in Lexington, Missouri where his father was a carpenter. He started playing piano at six. By the age of 12, he was the principal piano accompanist in his hometown’s silent movie house. For a short period, he was also the theatre organist at the St. Louis Theater. By his early 20s, he was conducting his own orchestra and improvising on the organ at the Isis Movie Theatre in Kansas City. His actual job at the time was to play organ accompaniment for silent films. During that time, he met and befriended a young Walt Disney, who was producing animated comedy shorts in Kansas City. According to music critic Neil Strauss, the chance meeting between Stalling and Disney in the early 1920s was of great importance t

Carla Scaletti

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Carla Scaletti (born April 28, 1956) is an American harpist, composer, music technologist and the inventor of the Kyma Sound Design Environment as well as president of Symbolic Sound. Biography Carla Scaletti was born in Ithaca, New York. She graduated from the public schools in Albuquerque, New Mexico, then completed a Bachelor of Music from the University of New Mexico, a Master of Music from Texas Tech University, a master’s in computer science from the University of Illinois and a doctorate in music composition from the same school. In the 1970s, she worked as principal harpist in the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra and Lubbock Symphony Orchestra, and composed for acoustic instruments, but later she developed an interest in computer generated music. After completing her education, she worked as a researcher at the CERL Sound Group, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and later as a visiting assistant professor at the University of Illinois before leaving the university to launch the Symbolic Sound Corporation. Scaletti designed the Kyma sound generation computer language and co-founded Symbolic Sound Corporation with Kurt J. Hebel in 1989 as a spinoff of the CERL Sound Gr

Carlisle Floyd

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Carlisle Sessions Floyd (June 11, 1926 – September 30, 2021) was an American composer primarily known for his operas. These stage works, for which he wrote not only the music but also the librettos, typically engage with themes from the American South, particularly the Post-civil war South, the Great Depression and rural life. His best known opera, Susannah, is based on a story from the Biblical Apocrypha, transferred to contemporary rural Tennessee, and written for a Southern dialect. It was premiered at Florida State University in 1955, with Phyllis Curtin in the title role. When it was staged at the New York City Opera the following year, the reception was initially mixed; some considered it a masterpiece, while others degraded it as a ‘folk opera’. Subsequent performances led to an increase in Susannah ’ s reputation and the opera quickly became among the most performed of American operas. In 1976, he became M. D. Anderson professor at the University of Houston. He co-founded the Houston Opera Studio for the training of young singers. Floyd is regarded as the “Father of American opera”. Life and career Youth and education Floyd was born in Latta, South Carolina, on June 11, 1926,

Carlos Simon (composer)

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Carlos Simon (born 1986) is an American composer of Western classical music. He is the composer-in-residence at the Kennedy Center, inaugural composer chair for the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and associate professor at Georgetown University. Early life and career Simon, who is of African American heritage, was born in Washington, D.C., and raised in Atlanta. He is the son of a preacher and grew up in a household where he was forbidden to listen to anything other than gospel music. He said that gospel’s improvisatory nature was a critical influence in the development of his own compositional style, He completed degrees at Morehouse College and Georgia State University; he continued doctoral studies at the University of Michigan with Michael Daugherty and Evan Chambers. Formerly on the music faculty of Spelman College and Morehouse College, in 2019 Simon became a professor in the department of performing arts at Georgetown University. In 2024, the Boston Symphony Orchestra appointed Simon the inaugural Deborah and Philip Edmundson Composer Chair, a position lasting three-seasons in which he will lead educational and outreach concerts, collaborate with Andris Nelsons to curate program

Carlos Surinach

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Carlos Suriñach (or Carles Suriñach) i Wrokona (; March 4, 1915 – November 12, 1997) was a Spanish-born composer and conductor. Early life Carlos Suriñach was born in Barcelona, Spain on March 6 of 1915. His Austrian-Polish mother was a house pianist, introducing him to music at a young age. He began playing the piano between ages 5–6 and started the formal study of music at around age 10. His father was involved in business as a stockbroker. He did not approve of Suriñach pursuing music and confided in their other son, who followed in his footsteps of business. He said that he was never serious about music but always loved it. Taught by his mother through age 14, he studied piano and music theory at the Caminals Academy of Music. He held conducting posts at the Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona and the Gran Teatre del Liceu. He studied composition and orchestration under Enrique Morera, who was the director of Barcelona Conservatory. He then went to Madrid before moving to Germany, where he studied in Berlin with Max Trapp and Richard Strauss, taking five of Strauss’ seminars. In 1944, he returned to Barcelona as the new conductor of the Barcelona Philharmonic Orchestra, where his

Carlos Villalobos (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Carlos Jonathan VillaLobos, Jr. (born January 28, 1975) is an American composer and multi-instrumentalist musician, who writes and produces original music for rock and pop artists, and composes modern orchestral music for trailers, television shows and films. Career Esperanza Esperanza is VillaLobos’s Latin-new age flamenco project, on which he performed all instruments, and engineered, recorded, produced, and mixed the albums, with guest guitarist Andre Barboza appearing on both La Esperanza and Esperanza II (2001), and bass player Rob Hagopian on the first release, La Esperanza. The group released its self-titled debut LP on the Higher Octave label on September 22, 1998. JazzTimes described the album as “swirling, fleet flamenco guitar work meets modern dance rhythms with many rewarding layers to uncover”. In 1999, the group appeared on the compilation album Chicago Rapid Transit: Grooves 99 with a remix track named “Spanish Eyes/Flamenc Tronic Mix”. The season finale of Sex and the City, “Ex and the City”, which aired on October 3, 1999, featured four Esperanza songs: “La Punta”, “El Loco”, “Love & Lust”, and “Cara Mia.” La Esperanza released Esperanza II on July 17, 2001, again

Carlton Cooley

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Samuel Carlton Cooley (April 15, 1898 in Milford, New Jersey – November 1981 in Stockton, New Jersey) was an American violist and composer. Biography Cooley studied at the Philadelphia Musical Academy with Frederick Hahn and Camille Zeckwer, and later with Percy Goetschius and Louis Svečenski at the Institute of Musical Art (Juilliard School) in New York City. In 1919, Cooley joined the viola section of the Philadelphia Orchestra for one year before he was appointed Principal Violist of the Cleveland Orchestra in 1922, a position in which he remained until 1937. He was Principal Violist of the NBC Symphony Orchestra from 1937 to 1954 during the years of Arturo Toscanini’s tenure. In 1954, upon Toscanini’s retirement, Cooley joined the Philadelphia Orchestra viola section under Eugene Ormandy and was appointed Principal Violist in 1956, succeeding Harry Zaratzian. He remained with the Philadelphia Orchestra until his retirement in 1963. Cooley was also violist with the Cleveland String Quartet and NBC String Quartet. Recordings ;Viola * Richard Strauss: Don Quixote – Emanuel Feuermann (cello); Carlton Cooley (viola); Arturo Toscanini (conductor); NBC Symphony Orchestra (1938) * Wolf

Carlton Gamer

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Carlton Edwin Wesley Gamer (February 13, 1929 – July 14, 2023) was an American composer and music theorist. Gamer composed more than seventy works in a variety of genres, including songs, music for dance, solo piano pieces, chamber music, choral works, orchestral works, and computer music. His compositional approach has been fundamentally shaped by his theoretical interests, the latter influenced by an interest in mathematics. He taught at Colorado College, Princeton University, and the University of Michigan; he studied at Northwestern University and Boston University and later privately with Roger Sessions. Life and career Gamer was born in Chicago on February 13, 1929. He grew up in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, where his father taught at the University of Illinois. At the age of eight he began to study piano with Tanya Kessler and composition with her husband Hubert Kessler. From 1942 to 1946, Gamer attended University High School in Bloomington-Normal, Illinois. In New York City, from 1951 to 1953, Gamer founded a workshop of composer-performers (“The Seven”) He was also the pianist, composer, and music director for dancer and choreographer Ilka Suarez and her company. After stu

Carmine Coppola

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Carmine Valentino Coppola (; June 11, 1910 – April 26, 1991) was an American composer, flutist, pianist, and songwriter who contributed original music to the films The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, Apocalypse Now, The Outsiders, The Black Stallion, and The Godfather Part III. He is the father of film director Francis Ford Coppola. In the course of his career, he won both the Academy Award for Best Original Score and the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score, in addition to nominations for the BAFTA Award for Best Original Music and Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack for Visual Media. Personal life Coppola was born in New York City, the son of Maria (née Zasa) and Agostino Coppola, who came to the United States from Bernalda, Basilicata. His brother was opera conductor and composer Anton Coppola. He was the father of August Coppola, Francis Ford Coppola Both Coppola and his wife are buried at San Fernando Mission Cemetery. Career Coppola played the flute. He studied at Juilliard, later at the Manhattan School of Music and privately with Joseph Schillinger. During the 1940s, Coppola worked under Arturo Toscanini with the NBC Symphony Orchestra. Then in 1951, Coppola left

Carmino Ravosa

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Carmino Ravosa (January 29, 1930 – July 19, 2015) was an American composer and lyricist, singer, pianist, as well as a producer, director, and musical historian. Ravosa, who wrote music for children for decades, The two were married for almost 60 years. Performances Ravosa performed his music at many historic landmarks, including: His musical “Seneca Falls: A Documusical on the History of Women’s Rights and Achievements”, a work about the history of women’s rights, was performed at the National Women’s Hall of Fame. External links *Personal website

Caro Roma

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Caro Roma (September 10, 1866 – September 22, 1937) was the stage name of Carrie Northey, an American singer and composer known for Tin Pan Alley era songs. Early life and education Carrie Northey was born in Oakland, California, the daughter of Vernal Sidney Northey, who operated a forge. She studied in Boston at the New England Conservatory of Music, graduating in 1888. Career Northey began performing on stage at age three, and as a teenager toured in Canada as orchestra conductor for a French opera company. She became prima donna with the Henry Savage Opera Company in Boston and sang opera in the United States and in Europe, where she performed for royalty including King Edward VII. She made recordings as early as 1899. Northey wrote songs and poetry as a child and developed her composition skills during her years as a performer. She sang whole recitals of her own works as early as 1909, She received a best song award from the American National Composers’ and Authors’ Association in 1924. Roma married Jesse Douglas. *Faded Rose *The Angelus *Thinking of Thee *Resignation *Lullaby In collaboration with composer Ernest R. Ball, she also wrote the lyrics for: *In The Garden Of My H

Carol E. Barnett

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Carol Edith Barnett (born 23 May 1949) is an American composer. She was born in Dubuque, Iowa, and studied at the University of Minnesota with Dominick Argento and Paul Fetler (composition), Bernard Weiser (piano) and Emil J. Niosi (flute). She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in music theory and composition in 1972 and a masters in theory and composition in 1976. After completing her education, Barnett went on the road, playing keyboard and singing background vocals with Mexican guitar player Ben Peña, worked as a freelance music copyist (1976-1997), and played in the Children’s Theatre pit and various community orchestras (1980-2016). She married Minnesota Orchestra violist John Tartaglia in 1985. Barnett was composer-in-residence with the Dale Warland Singers from 1991 to 2001, and an adjunct instructor in music theory and composition at Augsburg College in Minneapolis from 2000 to 2015. She was awarded the 2003 Nancy Van de Vate International Prize for Opera for her chamber opera, Snow, and her music theater work Meeting at Seneca Falls was featured at the 2006 Diversity Festival in Red Wing, MN. The World Beloved: A Bluegrass Mass, commissioned in 2006 by VocalEssence and wr

Carol Hall

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Carol Hall (April 3, 1936 – October 11, 2018) was an American songwriter. She was best known for composing the music and lyrics for the Broadway stage musical The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (1978, adapted as a film in 1982). Her other works include the Broadway sequel The Best Little Whorehouse Goes Public (1994), as well as the Off-Broadway musical To Whom It May Concern (c. 1986). Career Hall was born in 1936 in Abilene, Texas, United States. She graduated with a B.A. from Sarah Lawrence College in 1960 and joined ASCAP in 1970. She penned eight one-act plays, all under the title “The Days Are As Grass”. The work was acquired by Samuel French for publication and theatrical licensing. In 2012 a production was mounted at Theater of the Spirit, Newcastle, Maine. Her career included singing in clubs and similar venues. In 1970, she signed to Elektra Records as a singer-songwriter and had two albums released on the label in 1971 and 1972, If I Be Your Lady and Beads and Feathers. Her album Hallways: The Songs of Carol Hall was released in 2009 on the LML Music label. In 1972, Hall was invited by Marlo Thomas to create three songs for the album Free to Be… You and Me (1972) and

Caroline Lloyd

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Caroline Grace Parkhurst Lloyd (April 12, 1924 – 1980) was an American composer, pianist and music director. Her best-known composition was the Spanish-language opera Doña Bárbara performed in the Teatro Municipal of Caracas, July 1967. The opera’s libretto was provided by Isaac Chocrón and orchestrated by Hershy Kay. Other compositions include works for voice, solo piano and chamber ensemble; of note is the (). Life and career Caroline Grace Parkhurst was born in Uniontown, Alabama, US, on April 12, 1924. The daughter of “Mr. and Ms. T. Harmon Parkhurst”, she was raised in Santa Fe, New Mexico. She received a Bachelor of Music from the University of New Mexico (UNM) in 1945, after piano study with both Nina Ancona and George Robert, and composition study with John Donald Robb. Her UNM education was partially funded by a scholarship from the Sigma Iota fraternity. At UNM she met Andrew Richard Lloyd, whom she married in 1946, adopting her husband’s surname. The Lloyds had four children: Timothy, Angela, Richard and Christopher. Like her mother, Angela later later pursued a career in the arts as a storyteller-entertainer. Caroline Lloyd later studied with Bernard Rogers at the Eastm

Caroline Shaw

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Caroline Adelaide Shaw (born August 1, 1982) is an American composer of contemporary classical music, violinist, and singer. She is a founding member of the vocal ensemble Roomful of Teeth. In 2013 she won the Pulitzer Prize for Music for her a cappella piece Partita for 8 Voices, and received the 2022 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition for her Narrow Sea. She also won the 2025 Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance for her Rectangles and Circumstance. Early life and education Caroline Adelaide Shaw was born on August 1, 1982, in Greenville, North Carolina. She is related through her mother to Chang and Eng Bunker, conjoined twins from then-Siam (now Thailand), who are her great-great-grandfather and great-great-great-uncle. At two years old, Shaw began playing the violin, being initially taught the Suzuki method by her mother Jon, a violinist and singer. Early influences included the choir of her local Episcopal church and the organist there who frequently played Bach. NPR’s Elena Saavedra Buckley notes that Shaw’s “personal place of worship was in front of her Sony boombox radio. She would call into the classical station and request a

Carolyn Yarnell

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Carolyn Yarnell (born 1961) is an American composer and visual artist. A recipient of the Rome Prize, Charles Ives Prize, and a Guggenheim Fellowship, she is particularly noted for works which combine visual and musical depictions of landscape and light, many of which were inspired by the landscapes of her native California. Background Yarnell grew up in the Sierra Nevada region of California. She studied composition at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music where she received a Bachelor of Music in 1986 and at Yale University where she received her master’s degree in 1989. Yarnell is a long-time member of the Common Sense Composers Collective who via collaborations with groups such as the New Millennium and American Baroque ensembles have premiered many contemporary works by their members and other composers. The collective has produced several CDs including TIC (2007) and The Shock of the Old (2002). The latter featured contemporary compositions played on baroque period instruments. Selected works *The Same Sky, for piano, electronics and video projection (2000) * Symphony No. 1. *Living Mountains, tone poem for orchestra *Film score for La Souriante Madame Beudet (1927 silent f

Carrie B. Wilson Adams

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Carrie Belle (Wilson) Adams (1859–1940) was the first American woman to conduct a public performance of Handel’s oratorio, “Messiah.” An Ohio native and musical child prodigy who performed in concert for the first time at age seven, she spent much of her life in Indiana, where she was a choral conductor and organist. By the time of her death in Portland, Oregon, she had also become one of the most prolific American composers, completing 4,000 anthems, 12 cantatas, and 28 operettas during her lifetime. Formative years Born in Oxford, Ohio on July 28, 1858 (alternate birth date June 29, 1859), Carrie Belle Wilson was the oldest child of Allie (Myers) Wilson and David Wilson, a songwriter and music educator. Among the works completed in later life was the cantata, “The Easter Triumph.” Completed in 1940, it was published posthumously. * “Easter Praise” (cantata). New York, New York: Lorenz Publishing Co., 1908. * “Jesus, Thou Source of Calm Repose.” Dayton, Ohio: Lorenz Publishing Co., 1906. * “How Beautiful Jesus’ Love!” in International Praise: for the Sunday school and church. Chicago, Illinois: E. O. Excell, 1902. * “Redeemer and King” (cantata). New York, New York: Lorenz Publish

Catherine Lamb

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Catherine Lamb (born 1982 in Olympia, Washington) is an American composer and violist, and a winner of the 2020 Ernst von Siemens Composer Prize. Career Lamb describes her music as exploring “the interaction of tone, summations of shapes and shadows, phenomenological expansions, the architecture of the liminal (states in between outside/inside), and the long introduction form”. Most of her works explore extended harmonic spaces in just intonation. Lamb explained her compositional philosophy in The Wire: “I follow the philosophy that the most intense sound is not the most intensive… I don’t agree with those who believe that sounds need to be pushed in order to be physical, or that they need to be loud in order to hear difference or summation tones. Particularly when working with particular tonal colourations and shadings, the more the tones are played in a plain and relaxed manner with room to blossom, the more expressive and generative they might become.” Lamb was also the film score composer for Anhe Ghore Da Daan. She has collaborated with Éliane Radigue, Marc Sabat, and Johnny Chang; received commissions from the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Ensemble Dedalus, Ensemble Musi

Catherine Murphy Urner

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Catherine Murphy Urner Shatto (March 23, 1891 – April 30, 1942) was an American composer. Early life and education Catherine Murphy Urner was born in Mitchell, Indiana, the third of seven children of Southern Illinois Normal College principal Edward Everett Urner (later a Methodist minister) and writer Jessie Robertson Urner. She studied piano, voice and composition at Goucher College in Baltimore, Maryland, Peabody Conservatory and Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1912. She continued her studies at the University of California at Berkeley where she was the first to win the George Ladd Prix de Paris for composition in 1918. Later in 1918, Koechlin was in San Francisco as part of Theodore Reinach’s French cultural mission, where William McCoy recommended Urner as a student. The Prize enabled her to move to Paris to study with Charles Koechlin from 1919 to 1921. She returned to Paris intermittently during the period from 1923–1926 to resume composition studies with Koechlin as well as vocal study with Mademoiselle Andree d’Otemar. Career Urner worked as a professor and director of vocal music at Mills College in Oakland, California from 1

Cecil Effinger

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Cecil Effinger (July 22, 1914 – December 22, 1990) was an American composer, oboist, and inventor. Life Effinger was born in Colorado Springs, Colorado and resided in the state for most of his life. Reversing the usual cliché, he was the son of musicians and teachers, but initially studied mathematics at Colorado College, receiving a BA in 1935, before deciding to follow in his parents’ footsteps. In the meantime, he had studied harmony and counterpoint with Frederick Boothroyd in 1934–36, and went to Paris in 1939 to study composition with Nadia Boulanger. He was first oboe in the orchestras of Colorado Springs (1934–41) and Denver (1937–41) and taught at the Colorado College before the Second World War (1936–41). A lifelong friendship with Roy Harris began in 1941. During the Second World War he served as conductor of the 506th US Army Band in Fort Logan. After the war, he resumed his position at the Colorado College from 1946 to 1948, when he was appointed professor of composition at the University of Colorado in Boulder. He remained in that position, becoming the head of the composition department until 1981, and was composer-in-residence there until his retirement in 1984. In

Cecil Mack

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Cecil Mack (November 6, 1873 – August 1, 1944) was an American composer, lyricist and music publisher. Biography Born as Richard Cecil McPherson in Portsmouth, Virginia, he attended the Norfolk Mission College and Lincoln University in Pennsylvania (class of 1897) before leaving to go to New York City where the 1900 Federal Census lists his occupation as a stenographer. Mack started writing song lyrics, starting with “Good Morning, Carrie” in 1901. He co-founded the Gotham-Attucks Music Publishing Company in May 1905, in New York City; it was likely the first black-owned music publishing company. In July 1906, an article in The New York Age referred to Mack as the company’s “secretary and treasurer and general business director.” In 1907 he wrote the lyrics for the musical The Black Politician. In 1925 he co-wrote the book for the musical Mooching Along. Mack also formed a choir, the Southland Singers, that year. In 1931 he co-wrote the music for the musical Rhapsody in Black. Birth date His birthdate is also given as 1880 and 1883, and an 1876 date is shown by his World War I Draft Registration card, as referenced above, and the 1900 US Census, but an 1891 Navy Enlistment Record a

Celius Dougherty

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Celius Hudson Dougherty (May 27, 1902 – December 22, 1986) was an American pianist and composer of art songs and other music. Biography Celius Hudson Dougherty was born to William Francis Dougherty and Louise Martha Dougherty in Glenwood, Minnesota. Celius was interested in music and poetry from childhood. He claimed that he wrote his first song when he was seven years old. He was part of a musical family, and his mother, a music teacher and church musician, organized her seven children into a band. Celius performed as accompanist for one of his mother’s song recitals at age ten. where he studied piano with Donald Ferguson and composition. As an undergraduate, he performed his own piano concerto with the school orchestra. He toured as an accompanist to several important singers, such as Maggie Teyte, Eva Gauthier, Povla Frijsh, Jennie Tourel, Marian Anderson, and Alexander Kipnis. These performers often included Dougherty’s songs on their programs. Beginning in 1939, he also toured with Vincenz Ruzicka in duo-piano recitals. During the next 16 years, they gave the first performances of duets by Igor Stravinsky, Arnold Schoenberg, Alban Berg, Paul Hindemith, Darius Milhaud, and othe

Charity Bailey

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Charity Alberta Bailey (September 7, 1904 – September 15, 1978) was an African American music educator in New York City and a children’s television pioneer who hosted the programs Sing-A-Song (1954–1956) and Here’s Charity (late 1960s). In both her classroom and educational programs, Bailey featured songs and instruments from around the world, with particular influence from Creole music and folk music. Bailey was a teacher at the Little Red School House in Manhattan and the Heathcote School in Scarsdale, New York, as well as other schools. She released children’s music recordings throughout her life. In the early 1950s she published the bestselling children’s song book Playtime with Music. Early life and education Charity Bailey was born in 1904 to a prominent African American family in Providence, Rhode Island. At age 16, she was described as a music prodigy with “sympathetic feeling as an accompanist” by The New York Age. Her sister Amy Bailey was noted as a soprano. In 1927, Bailey graduated with a degree in education from the Rhode Island College. Due to racial discrimination in Providence, she moved to Atlanta to teach at Spelman College Laboratory School, which was associated

Charity Sunshine Tillemann-Dick

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Charity Sunshine Tillemann-Dick was an American soprano and presenter. A recipient of two bilateral (double) lung transplants, she spoke and performed frequently at concerts, conferences and events around the United States. Early life Tillemann-Dick was born in Denver, Colorado, the fifth of eleven children, including siblings diplomat and technologist Tomicah S. Tillemann, and author Levi Tillemann. She received a bachelor’s degree with high honors from Regis University and studied music at the Peabody Institute at Johns Hopkins University and the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, where she was also a Fulbright scholar. Music A full lyric coloratura soprano, Tillemann-Dick performed across the United States, Europe, and Asia in venues as diverse as The Rose Theater at Lincoln Center in New York City; The Kennedy Center in Washington, DC; Severance Hall in Cleveland, Ohio; The National Symphony Hall in Budapest, Hungary; the American Embassy in Beijing, China; and the National Statuary Hall in the United States Capitol. She collaborated or performed with noted conductors and musicians including Bruno Rigacci, Joella Jones, Marvin Hamlisch, Bono, Zoltán Kocsis, Joan Dorneman

Charlemagne Palestine

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Chaim Moshe Tzadik Palestine (born August 15, 1945 or ‘47), known professionally as Charlemagne Palestine, is an American visual artist and musician. He has been described as being one of the founders of New York school of minimalist music, first initiated by La Monte Young, Terry Riley, Steve Reich, Philip Glass and Phil Niblock, although he prefers to call himself a maximalist. Formational years Born in Brooklyn, New York, From 1962 to 1969, Palestine was carillonneur for the Saint Thomas Episcopal Church in Manhattan, eventually creating a piece that consisted of 1,500 15-minute performances. From 1968 to 1972, Palestine studied vocal interpretation with Pandit Pran Nath, in Tribeca in the company of his bevy of stuffed animals. From 1980 to 1995, Palestine performed only rarely, exhibiting instead at Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; the Moderna Museet, Stockholm; and in documenta 8. During that time, he also founded the Ethnology Cinema Project in New York, which is dedicated to preserving films that document disappearing traditional cultures. After moving to Europe in 1995, he settled in Brussels. In addition to creating exhibitions, Palestine performed regularly, re-releasing old

Charles A. Zimmermann

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Charles A. Zimmermann (1861 – January 16, 1916) was an American composer of marches and popular music. A graduate of the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore, he was appointed bandmaster at the United States Naval Academy in 1887 at the age of 26. Zimmermann served as the academy’s bandmaster until his death from a brain hemorrhage in 1916. Zimmermann is buried at the Naval Academy cemetery. Zimmermann composed his most famous march, “Anchors Aweigh”, in 1906 when he was a lieutenant in the United States Navy. The lyrics were written by Alfred Hart Miles, a midshipman. The march was intended from the beginning to serve as a rousing tune for football games. The familiar strain is actually the trio of the larger work. Zimmermann also composed numerous songs for the 1902 stage play The Wizard of Oz. List of compositions *with Frank Keesee: **Only You (Sir Dashemoff Daily) *with Mr. Hollister: **When the Heart is Sad (Sir Dashemoff Daily) *with Vincent Bryan: **Marching Thro’ Georgia (Scarecrow and Tin Woodman) **Sitting Bull (Scarecrow) **Football (Scarecrow and Tin Woodman) **Marching Through Port Arthur (Scarecrow and Tin Woodman) Bibliography *Holsinger, M. Paul, ed. (1999).

Charles Amirkhanian

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Charles Benjamin Amirkhanian (born January 19, 1945; Fresno, California) is an American composer. He is a percussionist, sound poet, and radio producer of Armenian origin. He is mostly known for his electroacoustic and text-sound music. Career Amirkhanian received his Master of Fine Arts from Mills College in 1980, where he studied electronic music and techniques of sound recording. He was music director of Pacifica Radio’s KPFA-FM in Berkeley, California, from 1969 to 1992, where he initiated the long-running program dedicated to avant-garde music, Ode to Gravity. He was also a lecturer in the Interdisciplinary Creative Arts Department at San Francisco State University from 1977 to 1980. In 1984, the American Music Center awarded him its Letter of Distinction for service to American composers through his work at KPFA FM in Berkeley, California. This was followed in 2005 by another for his co-founding and directing the Other Minds Festival in San Francisco. From ASCAP in 1989 he received the Deems Taylor Award, also for service to American composers. Amirkhanian received a 1997 Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award. In 2009, Chamber Music America and ASCAP honore

Charles Bernstein (composer)

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Charles Bernstein (born February 28, 1943) is an American composer of film and television scores. He is a Daytime Emmy Award winner, and a two-time Primetime Emmy Award nominee. Since 1995, he has been a member of the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Music Branch. He has also been a member of the Board of Directors for both the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers and the Society of Composers & Lyricists. Early life and education Bernstein was born in Minneapolis to mother Mildred Wolf (1910–2011) and father Charles Bernstein, Sr. (). Western horror film Hex (also 1973). His first score for a major Hollywood studio was for the United Artists film, White Lightning (1973), starring Burt Reynolds. The film marked the first of many collaborations between Bernstein and director Joseph Sargent. He even wrote the dance music in the latter film. Bernstein also scored non-horror films such as Foolin’ Around (1980). Bernstein reunited with Cujo director Lewis Teague to score his independent films, Cante Jondo (2007) and Charlotta-TS (2010). A Nightmare on Elm Street Under the recommendation of his agent, Bernstein met with Wes Craven and

Charles Boone (composer)

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Charles Boone (born Cleveland, on June 21, 1939) is an American composer of contemporary classical music, living in San Francisco. Biography Charles Boone studied at the Akademie für Musik und darstellende Kunst in Vienna, the University of Southern California, and San Francisco State College. Karl Schiske, Adolph Weiss, and Ernst Krenek were among his teachers. He has been awarded three National Endowment for the Arts Commissions as well as a two-year Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) artist-in-residency in Berlin. His works have been performed by the San Francisco Symphony, the Chicago Symphony, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, as well as the Berlin, Avignon, and Ojai Festivals. Performers have included Seiji Ozawa, Edo de Waart, Michael Tilson Thomas, Phyllis Bryn-Julson, Jan Williams, Bertram Turetzky, and Karl Kohn. An archive of the composer’s scores, manuscripts, recordings, letters, and other documents is being gathered at the Jean Gray Hargrove Music Library, University of California, Berkeley. Boone has encountered a number of young people, through teaching and otherwise, who have been meaningful to him. They include Jon Beacham, Dicky Bahto, Claire Jackel, P

Charles Curtis (musician)

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Charles Curtis is a performer and composer of a wide variety of music, with particular emphasis on the avant-garde. Curtis is most strongly associated with minimalism, modern classical, and so-called “downtown music.” A graduate of Juilliard School, Curtis has since been involved with the music department at Princeton University and at the University of California, San Diego. He has served as Professor of Contemporary Music Performance at UCSD since 2000, where he serves as artistic director for the chamber music series Camera Lucida. Curtis has studied under such masters as vocalist Pandit Pran Nath and composer La Monte Young and still regularly records and performs. He has also worked closely with composers such as Éliane Radigue and Alvin Lucier. Selected discography External links *Charles Curtis UCSD faculty page *Charles Curtis main page at Squealer Music *Biography at Kunst im Regenbogenstadl

Charles Dodge (composer)

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Charles Malcolm Dodge (born June 5, 1942 in Ames, Iowa) is an American composer best known for his electronic music, specifically his computer music. He is a former student of Darius Milhaud and Gunther Schuller. Education and teaching career Dodge earned a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Iowa in 1964, studying composition with Richard Hervig. He studied with Jack Beeson, Chou Wen-chung, Otto Luening, and Vladimir Ussachevsky during a Master of Arts (1966) and Doctor of Arts (1970) from Columbia University. There he was active in the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center. At Princeton University (1969–1970), he studied computer music with Godfrey Winham. Dodge became a leading innovator in computer music composition, as distinct from the analog electronic composition norm through the 1970s. He taught at Columbia (1970–1977), then founded the Brooklyn College Center for Computer Music in 1977 at Brooklyn College (City University of New York), serving as Professor of Music. In recent years he is best known, with his wife Katharine, as co-owner of the Putney Mountain Winery in Putney, Vermont, which has grown annually since its 1998 founding. Music Dodge created many work

Charles E. King

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Charles Edward King (January 29, 1874 – February 27, 1950) was a Hawaiian-born American educator, Hawaii territorial legislator, and a songwriter who is most widely known as the composer of “Ke Kali Nei Au”. King was inducted into the Hawaiian Music Hall of Fame in 1995. Music historian George Kanahele regarded King as the “Dean of Hawaiian Music”, although this sobriquet is more associated with John Kameaaloha Almeida. Teaching and legislative career Charles E. King was born of part Hawaiian ancestry, at the Nuʻuanu Valley estate of Queen Emma of Hawaii, in Honolulu, to Walter and Mary Ann Brash. He was adopted by his maternal grandfather John Lewis King after the death of his mother, and was christened by his godmother Queen Emma at St. Andrew’s Cathedral. King was educated in public schools in Hawaii and the Kamehameha School for Boys. In 1914, Kamehameha alumni circulated a petition requesting that King be named school principal, but Ernest C. Webster was chosen instead. When Bishop Estate trustee Samuel Mills Damon resigned in 1916, the trustees named former teacher William Williamson, a white man, to fill the vacancy. As established by the original trust deed, any trustee app

Charles Fussell

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Charles Clement Fussell (born February 14, 1938, in Winston-Salem, North Carolina) is an American composer and conductor of contemporary classical music. He has composed six symphonies and three operas. His symphony Wilde for solo baritone and orchestra, based on the life of Oscar Wilde and premiered by the Newton Symphony Orchestra and the baritone Sanford Sylvan in 1990, was a finalist for the 1991 Pulitzer Prize for Music. He received a citation and award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1992. Fussell received advanced degrees in composition and conducting from the Eastman School of Music, where he studied with Thomas Canning and Bernard Rogers. He received a Fulbright grant to study at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik, where he worked with Boris Blacher. He also attended the Bayreuth masterclasses of Friedelind Wagner. He was an assistant and close friend of the composer Virgil Thomson. He served as the president of the Thomson Foundation for many years. Fussell has served on the faculty of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, the North Carolina School of the Arts (1976–1977), Boston University (1983–2003), and Rutgers University. Catalogue of works Late 1

Charles Gross

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Charles Gross (May 13, 1934 – March 24, 2026) was an American film and television composer who lived in New York City. Life and career Gross was born in Boston, Massachusetts on May 13, 1934. He was educated at Harvard University (BA), the New England Conservatory and Mills College (teaching fellowship), and a student of Darius Milhaud. He arranged for the West Point Band for three years, and served in the US Army. Later, he became a writer for industrial films and cartoons. He wrote original music for the 1976 Broadway production of The Eccentricities of a Nightingale. His film and television scores included Valdez Is Coming (1971), The Tenth Level (1976), Blue Sunshine (1977), The Dain Curse (1978), Heartland (1979), My Body, My Child (1982), Terrible Joe Moran (1984), Country (1984), The Burning Bed (1984), The Night They Saved Christmas (1984), Arthur the King (1985), Sweet Dreams (1985), Between Two Women (1986), Punchline (1988), Turner & Hooch (1989), Air America (1990), Another You (1991), A Family Thing (1996), and Fakin’ Da Funk (1997). Gross died on March 24, 2026, at the age of 91. References External links *

Charles Hamm

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Charles Edward Hamm (April 21, 1925 – October 16, 2011) was an American musicologist, writer, composer, and music educator. He is credited with being the first music historian to seriously study and write about American popular music. He also was one of the founders of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music (IASPM). Born in Charlottesville, Virginia, Hamm graduated from the University of Virginia in 1947 where he was a member of the Virginia Glee Club. Zachary Woolfe wrote in The New York Times that “Mr. Hamm was one of the first scholars to study the history of American popular music with musicological rigor and sensitivity to complex racial and ethnic dynamics, and both oral and written traditions. He traced pop’s history not just to its full recent flowering in the 1950s or to the 19th century and Stephen Foster, but also to the colonial-era compositions that created the context for all that followed.” Hamm was a 1967 Guggenheim Fellowship recipient. In 2002 he was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Society for American Music. He died of pneumonia, leaving 3 sons. Works *Yesterdays: Popular Song in America (1979) *Music in the New World (1983) *Put

Charles Hommann

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Charles Hommann (July 25, 1803-?1872) was an American composer. A native of Philadelphia, he was among the first American-born composers to produce chamber and orchestral music successfully. Life Charles Hommann was the son of John C. Hommann and his wife Constantia. His father, who had immigrated to the United States from Germany in the 1790s, worked as a music promoter and publisher in Philadelphia. Charles Hommann was one of the first American composers to be trained exclusively in the United States, though his musical training likely came mostly from his German father. Early in his career, Charles held positions at St James’s Church and the Third Dutch Reformed Church in Philadelphia. As a violinist and violist for the Musical Fund Society of Philadelphia, Hommann was exposed to the works of the major European composers of his time. His own music was performed by the Bethlehem Philharmonic Society as well as the Philadelphia Philharmonic Society, and he won a gold medal prize from the latter for his overture in D in 1835. Although his music was relatively unknown by the time of his death, he left behind a significant body of orchestral, chamber, and church music that is importa

Charles Ives

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Life and career#

Ives was born in Danbury, Connecticut, on October 20, 1874, the son of George (Edward) Ives, a US Army bandleader in the American Civil War, and his wife, Mary Elizabeth Ives. The Iveses, descended from founding colonists of Connecticut, were one of Danbury’s leading families, and they were prominent in business and civic improvement. They were similarly active in progressive social movements of the 19th century, including the abolition of slavery. George Ives directed bands, choirs, and orchestras, and taught music theory and a number of instruments. Charles got his influences by sitting in the Danbury town square and listening to his father’s marching band and other bands on other sides of the square simultaneously. His father taught him and his brother (Joseph) Moss Ives (February 5, 1876 – April 7, 1939 ) music, Ives moved to New Haven, Connecticut, in 1893, enrolling in the Hopkins School, where he captained the baseball team. In September 1894, Ives entered Yale University, studying under Horatio Parker. Here he composed in a choral style similar to his mentor, writing church music and even an 1896 campaign song for William McKinley. On November 4, 1894, his father died, a crushing blow to him, but to a large degree, he continued the musical experimentation he had begun with him. His brother Moss later became a lawyer. At Yale, Ives was a prominent figure; he was a member of HeBoule, Delta Kappa Epsilon (Phi chapter) and Wolf’s Head Society, and sat as chairman of the Ivy Committee. he started work in the actuarial department of the Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York. In 1899, Ives moved to employment with the insurance agency Charles H. Raymond & Co., where he stayed until 1906. In 1907, upon the failure of Raymond & Co., he and his friend Julian Myrick formed their own insurance agency Ives & Co., which later became Ives & Myrick, where he remained until he retired. During his career as an insurance executive and actuary, Ives devised creative ways to structure life-insurance packages for people of means, which laid the foundation of the modern practice of estate planning. His Life Insurance with Relation to Inheritance Tax, published in 1918, was well received. As a result of this he achieved considerable fame in the insurance industry of his time, with many of his business peers surprised to learn that he was also a composer. In his spare time, he composed music and, until his marriage, worked as an organist in Danbury and New Haven as well as Bloomfield, New Jersey, and New York City. Following his recovery from the 1907 attack, Ives entered into one of the most creative periods of his life as a composer. In 1908, he married Harmony Twichell, daughter of Congregational minister Joseph Twichell and his wife, Julia Harmony Cushman. There have been numerous theories advanced to explain the silence of his late years. It seems as mysterious as the last several decades of the life of Jean Sibelius, who stopped composing at almost the same time. While Ives had stopped composing, and was increasingly plagued by health problems, he continued to revise and refine his earlier work, as well as oversee premieres of his music. were privately printed in 1920). Ives died of a stroke in 1954 in New York City. His widow, who died in 1969 at age 92, bequeathed the royalties from his music to the American Academy of Arts and Letters for the Charles Ives Prize.

Charles Jerome Hopkins

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Charles Jerome Hopkins (April 4, 1836 November 4, 1898) was a 19th-century musician, Composer and Champion of the Arts. He is often confused, in historical texts, with his nephew, Edward Hopkins, who was also a musician and composer. Early life and inspirations Charles Jerome Hopkins was born April 4, 1836, in Burlington, Vermont. He was the 9th child of that state’s first Episcopal Bishop, John Henry Hopkins, and Mellusina Muller Hopkins. Born prematurely, with a weak heart, it was uncertain that he would live beyond infancy. In a letter addressed to him from his aunt Amelia, many years later, it was observed that Charles labored at breathing when he was a child, suffered a lifelong heart murmur and was missing the “pinkie toe” on one of his feet – this latter physical feature responsible for keeping him out of the service during the Civil War. Charles did survive though he lived a protected and, some would say, a spoiled life due to his delicate health. From the earliest ages right up through adolescence he was exempt from the work that was required of his older brothers who helped clear land, cut forest, plant an apple orchard and help build the family home and their father’s sc

Charles Knox (composer)

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Charles C. Knox (April 19, 1929 – December 11, 2019 ) was an American composer and music educator. He is particularly noted for his music for brass instruments and chamber music, among his over 100 compositions. Knox received a B.F.A. in music from the University of Georgia, where he joined the Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia music fraternity (Epsilon Lambda chapter) in 1950 and was later elected to Phi Beta Kappa. He subsequently earned both his Master of Music and Ph.D. from Indiana University School of Music, where he studied composition with Bernhard Heiden. Knox was professor of music at Georgia State University for over three decades. In 2001 he was recipient of a Mayor’s Fellowship in the Arts from the City of Atlanta. Examples of Knox’s chamber works can be found in audio format on two compact discs, Clouds Are Not Spheres (1997, Albany Records #254) and 2002: Chamber Music of Charles Knox (2000, ACA Digital #ACD 20066). Selected works *Music for Brass Quintet (1953, revised 1967) *Symphony for band (1955) *Concert Piece for bassoon and orchestra (1959) *Suite for piano 4-hands (1959) *A Dedication Litany for mixed chorus a cappella (1960) *Solo for trumpet with brass trio (1966) *So

Charles Lucien Lambert

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Charles Lucien Lambert (1828–1896), also known as Lucien Lambert, Sr. or Lucien Lambert père, was an American pianist, music teacher and composer. Born a free person of color in New Orleans, he was part of a family of prominent Creole composers who gained international acclaim. Early life and education Lambert was born in New Orleans to Charles-Richard Lambert, a native of New York, and his wife, a free Creole woman of color. They were a very musical family. After his mother’s death, his father married Coralie Suzanne Orzy, also a free woman of color. They had a son Sidney Lambert, born in 1838, and the half-brothers learned to be musicians together. Marriage and family Lambert married a French woman. Their son Lucien-Léon Guillaume Lambert, born in Paris in 1858, became a musician and composer, more well-known than his father. He was sometimes called Lucien Lambert fils (son), Sometime in the 1860s, he moved his family to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where he served as chief musician in Dom Pedro’s court. Lambert died in Rio. Numerous of his compositions are held by the Bibliothèque nationale de Paris. References

Charles Martin Loeffler

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Charles Martin Tornov Loeffler (January 30, 1861 – May 19, 1935) was a German-born American violinist, composer, and viola d’amore player. Family background Charles Martin Loeffler was born Martin Karl Löffler on January 30, 1861, in Schöneberg near Berlin to parents who were both from Berlin families. The family moved repeatedly, first to Alsace, and then to Smila, 200 km from Kiev , while Loeffler was still a small child, and then to Debrecen, in Hungary, where his father Karl taught at the Royal Academy of Agriculture. Later he lived in Switzerland. The father, Karl Löffler, was an agricultural chemist who espoused republican ideals in writing as a journalist under the name “Tornow” or “Tornov”. When his son was about twelve years old, Prussian authorities arrested Karl Loeffler and he died of a stroke in prison. Throughout his career, Charles Martin Loeffler claimed to have been born in Mulhouse, Alsace; in his lifetime, articles were published dissecting his “typically Alsatian” temperament. He sometimes used his father’s pseudonyms as one of his middle names. Career Loeffler decided to become a violinist and studied in Berlin with Joseph Joachim, Friedrich Kiel and Woldemar B

Charles Naginski

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Charles Naginski (Cairo, Egypt, May 29, 1909 – Lenox, Massachusetts, August 4, 1940) was an American composer of art songs and other musical works. Biography Charles Naginski was the son of Russian Jewish parents. His father, who was his first piano teacher, recognized his talent for music and composition at a very early age. From 1928 to 1933 Naginski held a fellowship at the Juilliard Graduate School as a pupil of Rubin Goldmark. Other students there at the time included composers Paul Nordoff, Sergius Kagen, Celius Dougherty, and Vittorio Giannini. One of his other Juilliard colleagues, George Newton, reported that he “spoke five languages, including English, all equally badly.” As a result, the Juilliard dean asked Newton to help Naginski with his English, so the two traded lessons in English grammar for accompanying lessons. He also studied with Roger Sessions. Later he studied at the American Academy in Rome, winning the American Rome Prize in 1938. In the summer of 1940 he went to the Tanglewood institute to study with Paul Hindemith. He died by drowning in Lenox, Massachusetts, on August 4, 1940. Music As a student, Naginski composed several large instrumental works and cha

Charles Sanford Skilton

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Charles Sanford Skilton (August 16, 1868 – March 12, 1941) was an American composer, teacher and musicologist. Along with Charles Wakefield Cadman, Blair Fairchild, Arthur Nevin, and Arthur Farwell, among others, he was one of the leading Indianist composers of the early twentieth century. Life Skilton was born in Northampton, Massachusetts, and received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Yale University in 1889. From that year until 1891 he taught languages at a preparatory school in Newburgh, New York; while there, he studied composition with Dudley Buck and organ with Harry Rowe Shelley. Skilton traveled to Berlin for further study in 1891, remaining there until 1893 and studying at the Hochschule für Musik with Woldemar Bargiel and Otis Boise. Returning to the United States, he became director of music at the Salem Academy and College in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, in which position he served until 1896. In 1897 he found work as an instructor of piano and music theory at the State Normal School in Trenton, New Jersey (now The College of New Jersey); he moved west in 1903, when he became a professor of organ, theory and history at the University of Kansas. He served as the Dean

Charles Shere

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Charles Shere (August 20, 1935 — December 15, 2020) was an American composer. He studied composition briefly with Robert Erickson and Luciano Berio but was largely self-taught. His music was primarily in unconventional notations and open form through the 1970s and early 1980s, but turned to more conventional forms (though not expression) thereafter. He was Music Director of radio KPFA in Berkeley in the late 1960s, a producer at KQED-TV in San Francisco from 1967 to 1971, and music critic of the Oakland (California) Tribune from 1971 to his retirement in 1988, and taught music history (and occasionally composition) at Mills College (Oakland, California) from 1971 to 1986. Principal work includes the opera The Bride stripped bare by her bachelors, even (1964–1986), after the painting by Marcel Duchamp, a Symphony in three movements (1989), concerti for piano and for violin (1964; 1989), a number of songs, the piano sonatas Bachelor machine (1985) and Compositio ut explicatio (2006), and various pieces for chamber ensembles. His books include Thinking sound music: the life and work of Robert Erickson, “How I Read Stein,” “How I Saw Duchamp,” and (as co-editor) Everbest ever: correspo

Charles Tomlinson Griffes

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Charles Tomlinson Griffes ( ; September 17, 1884 – April 8, 1920) was an American composer for piano, chamber ensembles and voice. His initial works are influenced by German Romanticism, but after he relinquished the German style, After early studies on piano and organ in his home town, on recommendation of Broughton, he went to Berlin to study with pianist Ernst Jedliczka and Gottfried Galston at the Stern Conservatory. Although recognised as a performer, Griffes grew more interested in composition. Despite being advised against it by Broughton, he left the conservatory and was briefly taught by composer Engelbert Humperdinck. His post has been described as “grim and unrewarding”, though it gave him financial stability. He continued to compose at Hackley in his free time and promoted his music during the summer. In 1918, Ito gave three dance recitals interpreting White Peacock, with Griffes at the piano. Personal life Griffes died of influenza in New York City during the 1918 worldwide Spanish flu pandemic at the age of 35 and is buried in Bloomfield Cemetery in Bloomfield, New Jersey. His papers passed to his younger sister Marguerite, who chose to destroy many that explicitly re

Charles Wakefield Cadman

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Charles Wakefield Cadman (December 24, 1881 – December 30, 1946) was an American composer. For 40 years, he worked closely with Nelle Richmond Eberhart, who wrote most of the texts to his songs, including Four American Indian Songs. She also wrote the librettos for his five operas, two of which were based on Indian themes. He composed in a wide variety of genres. Life and career Cadman’s musical education, unlike that of most of his American contemporaries, was completely American. Born in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, he began piano lessons at 13. Eventually, he went to nearby Pittsburgh where he studied harmony, theory, and orchestration with Luigi von Kunits and Emil Paur, then concertmaster and conductor, respectively, of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. This was the sum of his formal training, although he has been said to have been a pupil of Anna Priscilla Risher as well. By the age of eighteen, he was working as a clerk in a railroad office in Homestead, also in steel country. On the side, he continued writing music. In 1902 he met neighbor Nelle Richmond Eberhart and learned that she was interested in music. They began to work together, she writing the text and he the music fo

Charles Wuorinen

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Charles Peter Wuorinen (, ; June 9, 1938 – March 11, 2020) was an American composer of contemporary classical music based in New York City. He also performed as a pianist and conductor. Wuorinen composed more than 270 works: orchestral music, chamber music, solo instrumental and vocal works, and operas, such as Brokeback Mountain (2014). His work was termed serialist but he came to disparage that idea as meaningless. Time’s Encomium, his only purely electronic piece, received the 1970 Pulitzer Prize. Wuorinen taught at several institutions, including Columbia University, Rutgers University and the Manhattan School of Music. Life and career Background Wuorinen was born in New York City on June 9, 1938. His father, John H. Wuorinen, the chair of the Columbia University history department, with Paul Zukofsky and the BSO conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas. In 1976 Wuorinen completed his Percussion Symphony, a five-movement work for 24 players including two pianos for the New Jersey Percussion Ensemble and his longtime colleague Raymond Des Roches, as well as his opera subtitled “a baroque burlesque”, The W. of Babylon with an original libretto by Renaud Charles Bruce. The New Jersey Pe

Charley Straight

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Charles Theodore “Charley” Straight (January 16, 1891 – September 22, 1940) During the 1920s, Straight worked with Roy Bargy on the latter’s eight Piano Syncopations. In describing “Rufenreddy”, the fifth in the series, the ragtime historian “Perfessor” Bill Edwards stated: :The actual parentage of this piece will likely remain obscured to some degree, since Bargy’s collaborator, Charley Straight, more or less may have let Bargy take credit when the piano rolls of the Eight Piano Syncopations were transcribed into sheet music form. It is likely that Straight wrote the bulk of the composition in 1918, and Bargy added many of his individual touches to it in the performance, the end result being that there is some of each of them within. Straight died in Chicago on the evening of September 22, 1940, after being struck by a car. See also *List of ragtime composers References Sources * External links * * “Work-in-progress YouTube playlist of recordings and piano rolls made by Charley Straight” * Charley Straight recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings.

Charlie Parker

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Charles Parker Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), nicknamed “Bird” or “Yardbird”, was an American jazz saxophonist, bandleader, and composer. Parker was a highly influential soloist and leading figure in the development of bebop, a form of jazz characterized by fast tempos, virtuosic technique, and advanced harmonies. He was a virtuoso and introduced revolutionary rhythmic and harmonic ideas into jazz, including rapid passing chords, new variants of altered chords, and chord substitutions. Parker primarily played the alto saxophone. Parker was an icon for the hipster subculture and later the Beat Generation, personifying the jazz musician as an uncompromising artist and intellectual rather than just an entertainer. Early life Charles Parker Jr. was born on August 29, 1920, in Kansas City, Kansas, to Charles Parker Sr. and Adelaide “Addie” Bailey, who was of mixed Choctaw and African-American background. He was raised in Kansas City, Missouri, near Westport Road. His father, a Pullman waiter and chef on the railways, was often required to travel for work, but provided some musical influence because he was a pianist, dancer, and singer on the Theatre Owners Booking Association c

Charlotte Blake

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Charlotte M. Blake (May 30, 1885 – August 21, 1979) was an American composer of waltzes, marches and ragtime. Blake was the oldest of six children born to Edward and Caroline Blake of Ohio. At age 18, she got a job as a writer and arranger for Jerome H. Remick. Her first published composition, “King Cupid” appeared in 1903. After retiring from the music business, she worked as a clerk at Douglas Aircraft Company for two decades. * “King Cupid” (1903) * “The Missouri Mule March” (1904) * “Dainty Dames - A Novelette” (1905) * “The Mascot” (march, 1905) * “My Lady Laughter” (waltzes, 1905) * “Love Is King” (waltzes, 1906) * “Could You Read My Heart” (with words by Arthur Gillespie, 1906) * “A Night, A Girl, A Moon” (1907) * “Curly: March And Two Step” (1907) * “Orchids, Novelette Three Step” (1907) * “Hip Hip Hoorah” (march, 1907) * “The Last Kiss” (waltzes, 1907) * “I Wonder If It’s You” (with words by Vincent P. Bryan, 1907) * “Bogie Man - A Creep-Mouse Tune” (1907) * “So Near and Yet So Far” (with Arthur Gillespie, 1907) * “Love Tree” (1908) * “The Gravel Rag” (1908) * “In Mem’ry of You, Sweetheart” (song, with words by Arthur Gillespie, 1908) * “It Makes A Lot Of Difference When Y

Charlotte Schlesinger

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Charlotte Schlesinger (1909–1976) was a German pianist and composer. She was a student of Franz Schreker at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik from 1925 to 1930. In 1935 she left the Vienna Conservatory to teach at the Ukrainian S.S.S.R. Conservatory. Schlesinger migrated to America as a refugee in 1938. She taught piano at Black Mountain College from fall 1946 through spring 1949, when she resigned along with several other faculty, including Theodore Dreier, Josef Albers, Anni Albers, and Trude Guermonprez. She went on to teach for many years at the Wilson School of Music in Yakima, Washington. Recordings * EntArteOper Festival - Kammermusik & Lieder songs : Es ziehen die Reihe lang; Wie hell das Licht mir scheinet; Was hör ich - on recital Hermine Haselböck (soprano) References

Charlotte W. Hawes

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Charlotte White Hawes (7 February 1840 – 5 September 1926) was an American composer, lecturer, music educator, poet and critic from Massachusetts. “God Bless the Soldier”, written in 1890, was dedicated to the Grand Army of the Republic. Early years and education Born in Wrentham, Massachusetts, she was of Puritan ancestry, her ancestors on the father’s side having settled in Massachusetts in 1635. A large part of her early education was received in at home. She was the oldest daughter of a large family and became a close companion of her father, from whom she inherited her musical talent. She had her preliminary musical training in Boston and New York City, continuing her studies in Germany, in Berlin and Dresden, under the’ direction of Friedrich Wieck. During her stay in Dresden she formed the acquaintance of many eminent musicians, among them the most notable being Franz Liszt. In 1877, she returned to Boston, where she made her home. Career She was notables as a composer of music, a musical lecturer and critic, and a teacher of music. She was well versed in the literature of music. One of her popular achievements in the double role of composer and poet was, “God Bless the Sold

Chelsea Chen

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Chelsea Chen (born December 30, 1983, in San Diego) is an internationally renowned American organist and composer. Chen has been successful in establishing a concert career in North America, Europe and Asia. She has composed several original compositions, and has adapted music ranging from major classical repertoire to video game soundtracks to Taiwanese folk songs for the organ and other instruments. Education and career Chen began piano studies at a young age, studying with Jane Smisor Bastien and Lori Bastien Vickers. At age 15, she began studying organ, first with Leslie Robb, and later with Monte Maxwell, Chapel Organist for the United States Naval Academy. After only two years of lessons, she was accepted into the Juilliard School, where she studied first with John Weaver and then with Paul Jacobs, completing her undergraduate degree in 2005 and her graduate degree in 2006. In 2006, she was accepted for a Fulbright Fellowship and spent the next year composing and performing in Taiwan, where she played an important role in increasing exposure to the pipe organ in that country. In 2007, she was accepted into the Artist Diploma program at Yale University, where she studied with

Chester Biscardi

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Chester Biscardi (b. Kenosha, Wisconsin, October 19, 1948; nicknamed Chet) is an Italian American composer and educator. He received a B.A. degree in English literature from the University of Wisconsin–Madison (1970); he studied during 1969–1970 at the University of Bologna and the Conservatorio di Musica “G. B. Martini”; he received an M.A. in Italian literature from the University of Wisconsin–Madison (1972); he received an M.M. in composition from the University of Wisconsin–Madison (1974); he received a M.M.A. in composition from Yale University (1976); and he received a D.M.A. in composition from Yale University (1980). His composition instructors have included Les Thimmig, Mario Davidovsky, Robert Morris, Frank Lewin, Yehudi Wyner, Krzysztof Penderecki and Tōru Takemitsu. He has been a member of the faculty of Sarah Lawrence College since 1977. He is openly gay. Biscardi’s music has been released on the Albany, American Modern Recordings, Bridge, CRI (New World Records), Furious Artisans, Intim Musik (Sweden), Naxos, New Albion, New Ariel, North/South Recordings, Perfect Enemy Records, and Sept Jardins (Canada) labels. Selected works : Works by Biscardi are published by Merio

Chihchun Chi-sun Lee

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Chihchun Chi-sun Lee (, born 1970) is a composer of contemporary classical music. Lee is originally from Kaohsiung, Taiwan, and is currently an invited professor of composition at Ewha Womans University, in Seoul, Korea, She received a doctoral degree from the University of Michigan, two master’s degrees from Ohio University, and a bachelor’s degree from Soochow University in Taiwan. Her teachers included William Albright, William Bolcom, Bright Sheng, Yen Lu, Mark Phillips, Yann-Jong Hwang and Loong-Hsing Wen. She has previously taught music at Johnson County Community College, Washburn University, Rhodes College, and the University of Michigan, and is currently on the faculty of the University of South Florida. She has received numerous honors; these include winning the 1st Brandenburg Biennial Composers Competition , the Guggenheim Fellowship, the Harvard Fromm Music Fellowship, Taiwan National Culture and Arts Foundation commissions, Theodore Front Prize from International Alliance for Women in Music, ISCM/League of Composers Competition, International Festival of Women Composers Composition Prize, Florida Artist Enhancement Grant, Arts Council of Hillsborough County Individual

Chinary Ung

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Chinary Ung ( ) (born November 24, 1942, in Takéo, Cambodia) is a composer currently living in California, United States. Career After arriving in the US in 1965 to study clarinet, he turned to composition studies with Chou Wen-chung and Mario Davidovsky, receiving a Doctor of Musical Arts from Columbia University in 1974. In 1988, he became the first American to win the University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award for musical composition. Additionally, he received the Kennedy Center Friedheim Award, as well as awards from The American Academy of Arts and Letters, Asia Foundation, Asian Cultural Council, Rockefeller Foundation, Ford Foundation, Guggenheim Foundation, Joyce Foundation, and The National Endowment for the Arts. In October 2007 the Del Sol String Quartet was invited to premiere the composer’s Spiral X playing the Library of Congress’ collection of Stradivarius instruments. Ung taught music at Northern Illinois University, Connecticut College, the University of Pennsylvania, and Arizona State University, before being appointed to the faculty at the University of California, San Diego. In 2013, UC San Diego promoted Ung to the rank of Distinguished Professor. Ung’s music is

Chou Wen-chung

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Chou Wen-chung (; July 28, 1923 – October 25, 2019) was a Chinese American composer of contemporary classical music. He emigrated in 1946 to the United States and received his music training at the New England Conservatory and Columbia University. Chou is credited by Nicolas Slonimsky as one of the first Chinese composers who attempted to translate authentic East Asian melo-rhythms into the terms of modern Western music. Life Early years in China Chou was born in Yantai (Chefoo), Shandong. He grew up in China and developed an early love for music. (“Sights and Sounds” is an essay by Chou on early influences on his music.) Qin music, in particular, has proved fertile ground for his future exploration. Chou described his early explorations of musical instruments: While in Qingdao, I first discovered the meaning of music in life when I heard our household help enjoying their free time by playing instruments, singing, and drinking. I also became fascinated with harmonium pedals, which I played with at first as a car accelerator, and then discovered their dynamic effect… However, it was in Wuhan that I discovered the violin when my older brothers and I bought a child-size violin as a

Chris Botti

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Christopher Stephen Botti ( ; born October 12, 1962) is an American trumpeter and composer. In 2013, Botti won the Grammy Award in the Best Pop Instrumental Album category, for the album Impressions. He was also nominated in 2008 for his album Italia and received three nominations in 2010 for the live album Chris Botti in Boston. Four of his albums have reached the No. 1 position on the Billboard jazz albums chart. Coming to prominence with the 2001 recording of his Night Sessions album, Botti established a reputation as a versatile musician in both jazz and pop music for his ability to fuse both styles together. Early life Botti was born in Portland, Oregon, and raised in Corvallis, although he also spent two years of his childhood in Italy. His earliest musical influence was his mother, a classically trained pianist and part-time piano teacher. He started playing the trumpet at nine years old, and committed to the instrument at age 12 when he heard Miles Davis play “My Funny Valentine”. In 1981, he was selected as a member of McDonald’s All American High School Jazz Band, which marked his first Carnegie Hall performance. At the age of 17, he ended up at Mount Hood Community Colle

Chris Brown (composer)

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Chris Brown (born 1953) is an American composer, pianist and electronic musician, who creates music for acoustic instruments with interactive electronics, for computer networks, and for improvising ensembles. He was active early in his career as an inventor and builder of electroacoustic instruments; he has also performed widely as an improviser and pianist with groups as “Room” and the “Glenn Spearman Double Trio.” In 1986 he co-founded the pioneering computer network music ensemble “The Hub”. He is also known for his recorded performances of music by Henry Cowell, Luc Ferrari, and John Zorn. He has received commissions from the Berkeley Symphony, the Rova Saxophone Quartet, the Abel-Steinberg-Winant Trio, the Gerbode Foundation, the Phonos Foundation and the Creative Work Fund. His recent music includes the poly-rhythm installation “Talking Drum”, the “Inventions” series for computers and interactive performers, and the radio performance “Transmissions” series, with composer Guillermo Galindo. His 1992 electroacoustic work “Lava”, for brass, percussion, and electronics is produced by Tzadik Records. He teaches Composition and Electronic Music at Mills College in Oakland, where he

Chris Field (composer)

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Chris Field is a Los Angeles-based composer, songwriter, producer and musician, best known as a founding member of X-Ray Dog. He was raised in the San Fernando Valley, and played guitar in Los Angeles for groups among multiple genres including electric guitar, jazz, and rock music. He learned how to compose music by inputting compositions from Ludwig van Beethoven and Sergei Prokofiev into his computer. Through his music associates, he became acquainted with two friends who started X-Ray Dog, and he began to contribute musical compositions to this company. Field also works with Extreme Music, and through them, Field’s music has been placed in numerous television shows. In December 2014, a part of Field’s catalogue was acquired by BMG Chrysalis, with whom he continues to work, on major film and television campaigns. Field’s work as a musical composer for movie theatrical trailers has included Valerian, X-Men, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, XXX, Austin Powers in Goldmember, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Hotel Rwanda, Kinsey, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, and The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of

Chris Jones (American musician)

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Chris Jones (November 11, 1958 – September 13, 2005) was an American singer and guitarist who worked mainly in Europe, having moved to Germany after he joined the United States Army. He often recorded with the German audiophile label Stockfisch Records. Biography Christopher Paul Jones was born in Reno, Nevada. At the age of five, he began playing the guitar. A few years later, he decided to become a professional musician, and when he was 11 years old, he was admitted to a program at the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore, Maryland. There he discovered Johann Sebastian Bach, to whom he dedicated his student composition “Sonata in D”, and for which Jones was awarded the conservatory’s “Young Composer of the Year” award. Shortly thereafter, he discovered the blues and started listening to Robert Johnson, James Taylor, and Little Feat. In 1976, Jones joined the U.S. Army and was stationed in Adenine’s, Germany. During this time, the foundation for his musical career in Europe was laid. Over the following decades, he played guitar on albums of artists such as Sara K., Allan Taylor, and Reinhard Mey. He toured and recorded solo and with the blues harmonica musician Steve Baker.

Chris Tilton

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Chris Tilton (born June 9, 1979 in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States) is an American soundtrack composer and has helped compose several television, film and video game scores. He has collaborated with Michael Giacchino and J. J. Abrams on several of his projects. His projects include the video games Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction, Black, Fracture, SimCity, Assassin’s Creed Unity, and the television series Zoo and Fringefrom season 2 to season 6. He also collaborated with Giacchino and Andrea Datzman for J. J. Abrams’ series Undercovers,. He also composed the score for the serie “From” Video games References External links * Official web site *

Christiaan Kriens

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Christiaan Pieter Wilhelm Kriens (April 29, 1881 – December 17, 1934) was an American composer, pianist, violinist and conductor of Dutch parentage. He was born in Germany while his father, clarinetist Christiaan Pieter Willem Kriens, was playing with the Sächsische Staatskapelle in Dresden during the 1880/1881 season. he came to the United States in 1906. He wrote a number of pieces for orchestra, including two symphonies (when he was very young); he also composed songs and some chamber music, including a string quartet. He received his education from his father and at the Haagse Muziekschool. When he was fourteen he gave a concert with the orchestra led by his father, during which he was the violin soloist in the Violin Concerto by Ludwig van Beethoven, and the pianist the Piano Concerto No. 5 by the same composer and led his own second symphony as a conductor. He became solo violinist in the Haarlemse Orkest Vereeniging (predecessor of Noordhollands Philharmonisch Orkest) before joining orchestras in France and the United States. He ran an orchestra school in Carnegie Hall (Kriens Symphony Club) and a string quartet. In November 1910, Musical America published an interview with

Christian Wolff (composer)

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Christian G. Wolff (born March 8, 1934) is an American composer of experimental classical music and classicist. Biography Wolff was born in Nice, France, to the German literary publishers Helen and Kurt Wolff, who had published works by Franz Kafka, Robert Musil, and Walter Benjamin. After relocating to the U.S. in 1941, they helped to found Pantheon Books with other European intellectuals who had fled Europe during the rise of fascism. The Wolffs published a series of notable English translations of European literature, mostly, as well as an edition of the I Ching that came to greatly impress John Cage after Wolff had given him a copy. Wolff became an American citizen in 1946. When he was sixteen (in 1950) his piano teacher Grete Sultan sent him for lessons in composition to the new music composer John Cage. Wolff soon became a close associate of Cage and his artistic circle which was part of the New York School and included the fellow composers Earle Brown and Morton Feldman, the pianist David Tudor, and the dancer and choreographer Merce Cunningham. Cage relates several anecdotes about Wolff in his one-minute Indeterminacy pieces. Almost completely self-taught as composer, Wolff

Christine Asdurian

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Christine Asdurian (born Armenia; February 17, 1893 – April 29, 1963) was an American pianist who composed the music to the University of Miami Alma Mater in 1926, (lyrics by William Seth Lampe). She was enrolled as a music student at the University of Miami in 1926 and 1927 as one of its 646 first enrolled students. She studied piano with Earl Chester Smith. Bertha Foster, UM’s first music dean, also mentored Christine. Bowman F. Ashe, The University of Miami’s first president, was known to recruit her to perform in civic functions and donor appreciation events. At age 3, Asdurian traveled with her father, a clergyman, to the United States; he died soon after. She was adopted by two sisters, Sarah A. Thompson and Esther H. Thompson, of Litchfield, Connecticut, and her name was changed to Christine Oviatt Thompson. Asdurian attended Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio, Converse College in Spartanburg, South Carolina, and earned an M.A. in comparative literature from Columbia University, New York in 1917. In 1924 and 1925, Asdurian was a staff pianist for Gimbels, a department store chain, performing throughout the New York tri-state area for a recurring broadcast radio show on WEAF, W

Christine Berl

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Christine Berl (born 1943) is an American composer, pianist, and Egyptian-style Oriental dancer. Biography Christine Berl is the daughter of Paul Berl, longtime accompanist of Victoria de los Ángeles. She was born in New York City, and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in piano from Mannes College of Music in 1964. She continued her education at Queen’s College, graduating with a Master of Arts degree in composition in 1970. She also studied Schenkerian studies with Ernst Oster and Carl Schachter. As a dancer, she studied ballet for many years in New York with Russian teachers Vera Nemtchinova and Vladimir Dokoudovsky. Then she studied Egyptian-style Oriental dance for many years with the famous Egyptian choreographer Yousry Sharif, as well as with choreographer Mahmoud Reda in Cairo. Career Berl’s music has innovated what she calls a Chakra form, arrived at using serial techniques and interval cycle theory connected to the Passacaglia form. “Elegy” (1974) is completely in this form, “The Lord of the Dance” (1989) ends with a chakra and there are several chakras in “Masmoudi” for violin and piano (2012). She has served as artistic consultant for Tirreno Records. Peter Serkin

Christine Southworth

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Christine Southworth (b. Boston, Massachusetts, January 2, 1978) is an American composer of postminimal music and works with combinations of Western ensembles, electronics, and world music ensembles including Balinese gamelan and bagpipes. She performs Balinese gamelan and gender wayang with Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Gamelan Galak Tika, as well as Galician Gaita and Great Highland Bagpipes. She co-founded Ensemble Robot, a cooperative of engineers, artists and musicians working together to invent robotic musical instruments. She was also the general manager of Gamelan Galak Tika from 2004 through 2013. Her own music incorporates her work with Balinese gamelan and with technology and electronics, as well as reaching beyond these influences with an expanded palette of contemporary classical, jazz and rock, and world music from Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe. Southworth has released four albums on Airplane Ears Music: Zap! Music for Van de Graaff Generator, Tesla Coils, Instruments and Voices (2008), Gamelan Galak Tika: Bronze Age Space Age (2009), Christine Southworth: String Quartets (2013). and In My Mind and In My Car (2013). Southworth’s compositions have been performed thr

Christopher Adler (musician)

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Christopher Adler (born 1972) is a musician, composer and music professor at University of San Diego. A virtuoso player of the khaen, a reed instrument native to Laos and Thailand, he has been composing works for the khaen both as a solo instrument and in combination with western instruments since 1996. His works for solo piano include the three-part Bear Woman Dances, commissioned to accompany a dance depicting a Korean creation myth and largely based the Korean musical system nongak. Four of his compositions have been broadcast internationally on WGBH’s Art of the States series. His composition for sheng, viola and percussion, Music for a Royal Palace, was commissioned by Carnegie Hall for Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Project. An homage to Thailand’s Bang Pa-In Palace, the work incorporates traditional Thai melody and embellishments. It was performed at Zankel Hall in 2006 and recorded at the Tanglewood Music Center that same year. His Serpent of Five Tongues for sheng and guanzi (traditional Chinese instruments) premiered at the 2011 MATA Festival. Biography Adler was born in Mountain View, California and grew up in Falls Church, Virginia. He developed a connection with music at a young

Christopher Jessup (composer)

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Christopher North (composer)

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Christopher North Renquist (born February 6, 1969), known professionally as Christopher North, is an American composer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist musician, conductor, producer, and educator. Working most notably as a film composer, he has also composed and written for orchestra, theater, and dance, His songs are heard around the globe on children’s television, in films, on radio, and on streaming platforms. North has conducted at Carnegie Hall, sang at Lincoln Center and played in Broadway theater as a bassist and guitarist. Biography Sources: Born Christopher North Renquist in Austin, Texas, on February 6, 1969, Christopher North is a multi-instrumental composer and singer-songwriter based in New York City. As a composer his works have been performed at venues in Europe (London, Berlin and Edinburgh) and the US (Texas, California, Illinois, Ohio, Hawaii and New York) including collaborations with filmmakers (Tribeca, Big Apple and SXSW Film Festivals), theater companies (including Workshop Theater, NY and Edinburgh Fringe), choreographers (Wave Hill, Joyce SOHO) and concerts including the 92nd Street Y. His children’s songs can be heard on the Disney Channel and Noggin, wh

Christopher Rouse (composer)

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Christopher Chapman Rouse III (February 15, 1949 – September 21, 2019) was an American composer. Though he wrote for various ensembles, Rouse is primarily known for his orchestral compositions, including a Requiem, a dozen concertos, and six symphonies. His work received numerous accolades, including the Kennedy Center Friedheim Award, the Grammy Award for Best Classical Contemporary Composition, and the Pulitzer Prize for Music. He also served as the composer-in-residence for the New York Philharmonic from 2012 to 2015. Biography Rouse was born in Baltimore, Maryland, the son of Christopher Rouse Jr., a salesman at Pitney Bowes, and Margorie or Margery Rouse, a radiology secretary. and his Trombone Concerto was awarded the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for Music. In 2002, Rouse was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Also in that year, he won a Grammy Award for Best Classical Contemporary Composition for his Concert de Gaudí composed for guitarist Sharon Isbin. In 2009, Rouse was named Musical Americas Composer of the Year and the New York Philharmonic’s Composer-in-Residence in 2012. Rouse also served as Composer-in-Residence with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra (1985–88)

Christopher Theofanidis

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Christopher Theofanidis (born December 18, 1967, in Dallas, Texas ) is an American composer whose works have been performed by leading orchestras from around the world, including the London Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Moscow Soloists, the National, Atlanta, Baltimore, St. Louis, Detroit, and many others. He participated in the Young American Composer-in-Residence Program with Barry Jekowsky and the California Symphony from 1994 to 1996 and, more recently, served as Composer of the Year for the Pittsburgh Symphony during their 2006–2007 Season, for which he wrote a violin concerto for Sarah Chang. the Rome Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship, six ASCAP Gould Prizes, a Fulbright Fellowship to France, a Tanglewood Fellowship, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Charles Ives Fellowship. Theofanidis composed the ballet Artemis, which was premiered on May 20, 2003, by the American Ballet Theatre with choreography by Lar Lubovitch. He also wrote the orchestral work Muse for the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra (as part of their “New Brandenburg” series), which they premiered on December 1, 2007 at Carnegie Hall. His opera Heart of a Soldier, concerning 9/11, was prem

Christopher Tin

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Christopher Chiyan Tin (born May 21, 1976) is an American composer and conductor. His work is primarily orchestral and choral, often with a world music influence. He is a two-time Grammy Award winner, and has won various awards for his work in video game soundtracks and studio albums. Tin is best known for his work on title themes for the Civilization video game series, specifically the main theme “Baba Yetu” from the video game Civilization IV, which, at the 53rd Annual Grammy Awards in 2011, became the first piece of video game music to win a Grammy Award. This Grammy win has been considered a significant milestone for the critical acceptance of music from video games, and following this win the Recording Academy retitled their visual media categories to become more inclusive of video game soundtracks, before eventually creating a dedicated Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack for Video Games and Other Interactive Media in 2022. Early life and education Tin was born May 21, 1976 in Palo Alto, California, to immigrant parents from Hong Kong. He attended Stanford University, and had a brief period as an exchange student at the University of Oxford. He double majored in music comp

Christopher Trapani

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Christopher Trapani (born 1980) is an American/Italian composer of contemporary classical music. In 2007 he won the Gaudeamus Award of the Dutch Gaudeamus Foundation. A CD of his music, Waterlines, was released in 2018. A second release of Waterlines by the Ictus Ensemble was named one of the top 5 classical releases of 2020 by De Standaard. In 2021–2022 he was a visiting assistant professor at the Thornton School of Music of the University of Southern California. Reception In 2007 Trapani won the Gaudeamus Award for young contemporary composers for his composition Sparrow Episodes, for ensemble with solo electric guitar, which was performed in the Muziekgebouw aan ’t IJ in Amsterdam by the Asko Ensemble under Étienne Siebens, with Trapani on guitar. In September 2008, his commissioned piece Üsküdar was performed in the same hall by the Nieuw Ensemble. His composition Rust and Stardust was performed during the Tectonics Festival in Glasgow in 2015; the Guardian reviewer found it “accomplished and dreary”, while The Scotsman spoke of “kaleidoscopic explosions that … gave structure and shape to its insistently concise material”. Also in 2015, Trapani was among the recipients of a C

Claire Polin

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Claire Polin (January 1, 1926 – December 6, 1995) was an American composer of contemporary classical music, musicologist, and flutist. Education She obtained three degrees in music from the Philadelphia Conservatory: a Bachelor, Masters and Doctorate in Music. List of works Note: This is not a complete list. In some cases, the dates listed may have been the original publication date as opposed to the year it was written. Many pieces were published several times in new editions. Compositions * Sonata No. 1 for Flute 1959 * Symphony in two movements 1960 * No-Rai: Songs from Korea, 1963? Soprano Voice, Flute, Double Bass * Sonata for Flute and Harp 1964/73 * No Man is an Island, SATB chorus, piano, 196_ * Serpentine: Lyrical instances for solo viola and imaginary dancer, 1965 * Structures for Solo Flute 1965 * Consecutivo: Study on a Requiem, 1966 * Summer Settings, harp, 1967 * Makimono, flute, clarinet, violin, violoncello, piano, 1969 * Second Sonata for flute and harp (From the Painter’s Brush), 197x * Music for the Prince of Wales: Hen ganiadau gwanwyn, medium high voice (male or female) with cello accompaniment * Cader Idris: Landscape for Brass Quintet, 1971 * Infinito: A Requ

Claire Ritter

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Claire Ritter (born May 31, 1952, Charlotte, North Carolina) is an American composer and pianist working in a style that fuses jazz with classical, new music, and occasionally other world music cultures. Early life and study Ritter grew up on a horse farm in rural Weddington, North Carolina, and began piano lessons in the public school system at the age of seven. As a teenager, she studied with jazz pianist-arranger Ziggy Hurwitz. In 1974, she received a B.S. in Education from Appalachian State University, where she was also an amateur athlete, competing in tennis, softball, soccer, field hockey, and basketball. to study with pianist Ran Blake and attend New England Conservatory. She lived in Boston for 16 years, during which time her compositions were performed and recorded with artists such as Steve Swallow, Ricky Ford, and Dave Holland, and Boston-area musicians such as Dominique Eade, Ran Blake, and Stan Strickland. In 1996, she served on the faculty of the New England Conservatory Contemporary Improvisation Department and taught Contemporary Songwriting. Her composition, “In Between”, was recorded in 1986 by Ran Blake on The Short Life of Barbara Monk and by Franz Koglmann on

Clara Anna Korn

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Clara Anna Korn (née Gerlach, January 30, 1866–July 14, 1940) was an American pianist, composer, and music writer. She sometimes wrote under a pseudonym, C. Gerhard. She was born in Germany, and moved to New Jersey with her family at the age of 3. She graduated from Jersey City High School in 1881. She initially embarked on a career as a concert pianist, and had early studies with William G. Vogt. When Tchaikovsky was in New York in 1891 he had read some of her composition manuscripts (probably when he was visiting with Schirmer), and sent her a letter of encouragement. She then pivoted towards composition, entering the National Conservatory of Music in New York, where she studied under Bruno Oscar Klein and Horatio Parker and was listed as an “unofficial” composition student of Antonín Dvořák. After graduation from the National Conservatory, she taught there from 1893 to 1898. She also taught in New Jersey public schools, and was head of the piano department at the DeBauer School of Music and Languages in New York City. Korn contributed articles to several music journals and helped to found the Women’s Philharmonic Orchestra, the National Federation of Music Clubs, and the Manuscr

Clara Edwards

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Clara Edwards (April 17, 1880 – January 17, 1974) was an American singer, pianist, and composer of art songs. She also used the pseudonym Bernard Haigh. Biography She was born Clara Gerlich in Decoria Township, Blue Earth County, Minnesota. She received her education from the Mankato State Normal School and the Cosmopolitan School of Music in Chicago. She married physician John Milton Edwards before finishing her degree, and the couple moved to Vienna, where she continued musical studies and had a daughter. In Europe she prepared for a career as a singer, and gave concerts in both the United States and Europe joining the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) in 1925. She toured in Vaudeville at about the same time, and organized the Chautauqua Concert Company in 1934. She often collaborated with Jack Lawrence, but also wrote many of the lyrics to her own songs. Music Edwards composed over 100 works and published over 60 songs. Several of her songs are sacred, and she wrote choral arrangements for some of them. She also composed music for solo piano, for children’s marionette plays and animated films. Her songs have been recorded and issued on CD and used in

Clara H. Scott

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Clara H. Scott (December 3, 1841 – June 21, 1897 ), née Fiske, was an American composer, hymnwriter and publisher. Along with Anna Bartlett Warner, Phoebe Palmer, and Fanny Crosby, Scott was among a wave of late 19th century women gospel poets. She was the first woman to publish a volume of anthems, the Royal Anthem Book, in 1882. Scott was also well known for her hymn, Open My Eyes, That I May See, written in 1895. The hymn was inspired by Psalm 119, verse 18. She died in 1897 after being thrown from her carriage by a spooked horse. References External links *Free scores at the Mutopia Project *Scott, Clara at Hymnary.org

Clara Kathleen Rogers

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Clara Kathleen Barnett Rogers (January 14, 1844 – March 8, 1931), was an English-born American composer, singer, writer, and music educator. She wrote books about singing and her career. Early life and education Rogers was born in Cheltenham, England, into a musical family. Her grandfather, Robert Lindley, was a cellist; her parents, composer John Barnett and Eliza, a singer, were her first music teachers. When Rogers was twelve, her family moved to Germany to further their children’s musical education. Clara was admitted to the Leipzig Conservatory at the age of twelve and studied piano with Ignaz Moscheles, Louis Plaidy, and Hans von Bülow. Two of her older siblings also attended the conservatory. During this time, her father returned to England while her mother stayed with her children, a situation which continued throughout the early part of Rogers’s career. Besides piano, Rogers also studied harmony, part writing, violin, cello, and voice while in Leipzig. Composition classes were not open to women at the conservatory until 1859, after conservatory administrators heard the string quartet Rogers had composed at the age of 13. Her classmate, Arthur Sullivan, copied parts for her

Clare Kummer

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Clare Kummer (January 9, 1873 – April 21, 1958) was an American composer, lyricist, and playwright. Early life Kummer was born Clare Rodman Beecher in Brooklyn, New York, the granddaughter of Rev. Edward Beecher and great-granddaughter of Lyman Beecher. Her great-uncle was Henry Ward Beecher, and her great-aunt was Harriet Beecher Stowe, among other notable members of their family. Her parents were Eugene Francis Beecher and Susan Wood Beecher. Career Kummer wrote songs for musicals in New York beginning in 1903 such as in Sergeant Blue (1905) and A Knight For a Day (1908), before she started writing whole shows, usually musical comedies. Her plays included Noah’s Ark (1906), The Opera Ball (1912), The Choir Rehearsal (1914), Good Gracious, Annabelle (1916-1917), A Successful Calamity (1917), The Rescuing Angel (1917), Be Calm, Camilla (1918), Rollo’s Wild Oat (1920), The Choir Rehearsal (1921, one-act), Chinese Love (1921, one-act), The Robbery (1921, one-act), Bridges (1921, one-act), The Mountain Man (1921), Banco (1922), One Kiss (1923), Annie Dear (1924), Madame Pompadour (1924), Pomeroy’s Past (1926), So’s Your Old Antique (1930), Amourette (1933), Her Master’s Voice (1933),

Clare Shore

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Clare Shore (born 1954) is an American composer, music educator mezzo-soprano, and conductor. She continued her studies in composition with Charles Eakin and Cecil Effinger, and voice with Louis Cunningham, graduating with a Master of Music degree in 1977 from the University of Colorado at Boulder. She studied with David Diamond, Vincent Persichetti, Roger Sessions, and later with Gunther Schuller and was the second woman to earn a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in composition from the Juilliard School in 1984. She was awarded a prestigious fellowship to MacDowell, and was in residence there in 1985. In addition to her work as a composer, Shore has taught music at The Juilliard School, Fordham University, Manhattan School of Music, the University of Virginia, George Mason University and Palm Beach Atlantic University. Her compositions have been performed internationally. She resides in West Palm Beach, Florida. Honors and awards *Irving Berlin Fellowship in Memory of Jerome Kern *Alexandre Gretchaninov Memorial Award *Grant to Young Composers 1983 *ASCAP Standard Awards since 1982 *Composers Assistance Grants from the American Music Center *MacDowell Colony Fellowship *Atlantic Cent

Clarence Cameron White

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Clarence Cameron White (August 10, 1880 – June 30, 1960) was an American neoromantic composer and concert violinist. Dramatic works by the composer were his best-known, such as the incidental music for the play Tambour and the opera Ouanga. During the first decades of the twentieth century, White was considered the foremost black violinist. He was a member of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity. Early years Born in Clarksville, Tennessee, to James W. White, a doctor and school principal, and Jennie Scott White, a violinist who studied at Oberlin Conservatory of Music. His father died when he was only two years old. White relocated with his mother and younger brother to Oberlin, Ohio, to live with her parents, where he was first exposed to the violin: My mother took me to hear The Messiah sung at the conservatory and I came away humming snatches of it. Mother thought I had a good musical ear and persuaded my grandfather, who was a religious man, to give me his violin…I was only six at the time, nevertheless, my grandfather pouted, “I’ll give him the violin. But if he ever plays at a dance I’ll take it back.” In 1890, Mrs. White remarried and White relocated with his family to Washington, D

Clarence L. Partee

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Clarence Lockhart Partee (born Concord, North Carolina January 20, 1864, died Manhattan, New York April 17, 1915) was an American composer and arranger and music publisher. He was also founder, editor and publisher of The Cadenza magazine, and devoted his life to teaching and advancing the banjo, mandolin and guitar, arranging more than 150 works for these three instruments. Partee took up the banjo as a profession after his parents died before he was 14, and he moved to Chicago to pursue that goal. He also began studying the guitar and the mandolin. He also branched out adding sections to the magazine for voice, violin, harp and piano. Jacobs ceased publication in 1924. * American Conservatory banjo method (1895) written with his brother Charles H. Partee * Practical hints on modern guitar playing (1899) * American Conservatory Mandolin Method … containing also arrangements by Mrs. C. L. Partee (1898) * Book of harmony and composition : for the violin, mandolin, guitar and banjo (1907) Music * De Coontown Jubilee. Cake Walk. Banjo Solo by Clarence L Partee (1897) * Prairie rose waltz. By Clarence L. Partee and J.C. Groene & Co, (1890) See also * List of mandolinists (sorted) Ref

Claude Baker

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W. Claude Baker Jr. (born April 12, 1948 Lenoir, North Carolina) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Biography Claude Baker attained a B.M. degree, magna cum laude, from East Carolina University in 1970. He subsequently studied composition at the Eastman School of Music with Samuel Adler and Warren Benson, and holds M.M. (1973) and D.M.A. (1975) degrees from that institution. He is currently Class of 1956 Chancellor’s Professor Emeritus of Composition in the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University, Bloomington, where he is also the recipient of the university-wide Tracy M. Sonneborn Award for accomplishments in the areas of teaching and research. Before his appointment at Indiana, he served on the faculties of the University of Georgia and the University of Louisville, and was a visiting professor at the Eastman School of Music. In the eight-year period from 1991 to 1999, he held the position of Composer-in-Residence of the St. Louis Symphony, one of the longest such residencies with any major orchestra in the country. During this time, he initiated numerous community-based projects, the most notable of which was the establishment of composition programs a

Claude Demetrius

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Claude Demetrius (August 3, 1916 – May 1, 1988) was an American songwriter. He was known for his rockabilly songs, some of which were made famous by singers such as Elvis Presley. Biography Demetrius was born in Bath, Maine, United States. By his early twenties he was in New York City writing music for and/or with Louis Armstrong. Demetrius wrote the 1945 musical comedy short film Open the Door, Richard. During the 1940s, he was closely associated with Louis Jordan. He wrote songs with Jordan that included material for the 1946 Black musical film Beware in which Jordan had the starring role. Some of Demetrius’ best-known compositions from that era were co-written with Jordan’s wife, Fleecie Moore, including the song “Ain’t That Just Like a Woman (They’ll Do It Every Time).” For two decades, Claude Demetrius made a reasonably good living but in 1956 his income would change dramatically after he began writing for Gladys Music, Inc. Newly formed by Jean and Julian Aberbach, the company owned the exclusive publishing rights to the music of Elvis Presley. Working for Gladys Music, Demetrius co-wrote a song called “I Was The One” that was the B-side to Presley’s first RCA single, “Heartb

Claudio S. Grafulla

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Claudio S. Grafulla (1812–1880) was a composer in the United States during the 19th Century, most noted for martial music for regimental bands during the early days of the American Civil War. Biography Grafulla was born on October 31, 1812 on Menorca, an island off the coast of Spain that was occupied by the British after the Napoleonic Wars. At the age of 28, he emigrated to the United States, where he became a French horn player in Napier Lothian’s New York Brass Band in New York City. This band was attached to the 7th Regiment of the New York National Guard, which was honored in 1922 by John Philip Sousa’s The Gallant Seventh march. In 1860, he added woodwinds to a reorganized band and continued to serve as its director until his death at New York on December 2, 1880. Grafulla was a quiet, unassuming man who never married; his whole life centered on his music. His remarkable technical and musical skills allowed him to become well known as a composer, often writing music to order, and as an arranger. As a director of the 7th Regiment Band, his fame spread widely. Grafulla was a member of William Magear “Boss” Tweed’s exclusive Americus Club. He performed regularly at Americus Clu

Claudio Spies

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Carlos Claudio Spies (March 26, 1925 – April 2, 2020) was a Chilean American composer. Biography Early life Born in Santiago, Chile, of German Jewish parents, Spies completed primary and secondary education in Santiago in 1941, when he passed the Bachillerato. Erich Kleiber and Fritz Busch were mentors to Spies at an early age. Spies came to the United States in August 1942 to study music at New England Conservatory and Longy School of Music, where he studied with Nadia Boulanger and, after her departure for California, with Harold Shapero. He entered Harvard College in February 1947. One of his most influential teachers at Harvard was Irving Fine, and another was Otto Gombosi. He wrote his dissertation on “The concept of form in the symphonies and concertos of Strawinsky.” He graduated in June 1950, and received the John K. Paine Traveling Fellowship, which took him to Paris, where he spent a year composing. He returned to Harvard as a graduate student and received his MA degree in composition in 1954. Career Spies has taught music at many institutions: * Harvard University (1953–1957) * Vassar College (1957–1958) * Swarthmore College (1958–1970) * Princeton University (Professor

Clay Christiansen (organist)

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Clay Christiansen ( ) is an American organist who previously played for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir (Choir), often on the Salt Lake Tabernacle organ. He accompanied the Choir in Salt Lake City and when it was on tour. Christiansen also provided organ recitals in the Salt Lake Tabernacle and the Conference Center. Early life Christiansen had a fascination with music from an early age. He was born in 1949 in the small city of Emery, Utah. He would play the piano for hours on end. When neighbor children would come to play, he would rather stay in and practice the piano. As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), he played his first piano solo, “We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet”, in church at the age of six. He played by ear until the age of eight when he took his first piano lessons. He was the accompanist for his church Sunday School and priesthood services, and a substitute ward organist at the age of eleven. Christiansen received a bachelor’s degree in organ performance from Brigham Young University, and master’s and Ph.D. degrees in music composition from the University of Utah. Career From 1972 to 1982, Christiansen was the organist for St. Ma

Clayton Counts

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Clayton Counts (August 19, 1973 – November 22, 2016) was an American musician and composer, a former DJ, and one half of the experimental band Bull of Heaven. Early life Counts was born with detached retinas in both his eyes. A series of surgeries at a young age complicated this, leaving him blind in his right eye, and weakened in his left. Counts was initially located in Austin, Texas. In the 1990s, Counts became notorious with his prank phone calls to the Austin Community Access Center, in particular Alex Jones’s show. An incident occurred – though with varying claims from both sides – in which Counts was involved in the assault of Jones in a parking lot with three other individuals. As a follow-up, it was claimed that Jones used FBI connections to label Counts a terrorist and claimed he possessed child pornography. Federal agents raided the FringeWare Review bookstore, headquarters of an early cyberculture magazine that Counts wrote articles for. The case was later dropped. In 2000, Counts relocated to Chicago. While there, he met Neil Keener, who would later join Counts in the band Bull of Heaven. DJ work In the 2000s, Counts worked as a DJ to afford a living. He worked at vari

Cliff Eidelman

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Clifford Glen Eidelman (born December 5, 1964) is an American composer and conductor who has scored films including Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Free Willy 3: The Rescue, and Christopher Columbus: The Discovery. Career Eidelman began his formal training in violin at the age of eight and continued with multi-instrument training ranging from piano and guitar in genres such as jazz to classic music in his youth. After studying music at Santa Monica College and the University of Southern California, he scored his first feature film Magdalene in 1989. His breakthrough composition was the 1991 score to Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. In the years after, Eidelman continued to compose dramatic and epic scores such as Christopher Columbus: The Discovery. As Eidelman’s style of composing changed towards more sentimental and minimalistic scores, so did the films for which he scored. Eidelman currently resides in Santa Monica, California and continues to score movies. Notable scores (concert music) * Symphony No. 2 First recording performed by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. Conducted by Cliff Eidelman (2024) * Bridges: For solo Piano (2021) * The Five Tales for Solo

Cliff Hess

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Clifford Hess, better known as Cliff Hess, (June 19, 1894 – June 8, 1959) was an American songwriter, composer, lyricist, and pianist. He began his career as pianist while a young teenager working on passenger riverboats on the Mississippi River. He met Irving Berlin while working in the Chicago branch of the music publisher Waterson, Berlin & Snyder, Inc. By 1911 he was working as Berlin’s secretary, and appeared on Broadway that year with Berlin as his accompanist in performances of his songs. He served as Berlin’s secretary until 1918 and was largely responsible for not only notating Berlin’s songs into sheet music, but also editing his works into playable keys and simplifying works to make them accessible for commercial sale. After leaving Berlin, he became a successful songwriter in his own right with many tunes being recorded for Victor Records and Columbia Records. He also wrote songs for films during the 1930s and some of his tunes were interpolated into musicals. Life and career Clifford “Cliff” Hess was born in Cincinnati, Ohio on June 19, 1894. While a young teenager, he began his career as a pianist on passenger riverboats traversing the Mississippi River. He got a job

Clotilde Arias

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Clotilde Arias Chávarri Anduaga de Ferrero (20 June 1901 – 6 May 1959) was a Peruvian-American composer and lyricist. She is best known for her composition of the song “Huiracocha”, popular in Peru and sung worldwide; and for her translation of “The Star-Spangled Banner”, the United States national anthem, into lyrical Spanish, commissioned by the U.S. Department of State in 1946. Arias was also an integral part of the Pan-American movement during the 1940s, as well as an advocate for Spanish-language education in the United States. Life Arias was born in 1901 in Iquitos, Peru, on the shores of the Amazon. She spent many of her early years in Barbados, where she attended elementary school. She began writing and composing songs during her teenage years. Arias’s artistic talents in music, painting, and composing including playing for silent movies emerged early in Iquitos. She achieved scholastic and artistic recognition, with numerous honors. Her perfect pitch and exceptional ability to sight read made her a highly sought accompanist. Throughout Peruvian history, the Charango was a common instrument of their culture. While Arias focused on composing, she also mastered this instrumen

Cole M.G.N.

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Cole Marsden Greif-Neill, (born March 7, 1985) known professionally as Cole M.G.N., is an American musician, record producer, songwriter, and mixer. He is a former member of Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti. Cole has worked with Beck, Julia Holter, Christine and the Queens, DāM-FunK, Ariel Pink, Real Estate, The Vaccines, Thurston Moore, Snoop Dogg, NxWorries, Kossisko, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Blood Orange, and Nite Jewel. In 2016, Cole M.G.N. released his self-titled debut extended play. As of 2021, he has won six Grammy Awards for his work with Beck. Career He was a member of Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti before becoming Beck’s engineer and his current work with Stones Throw. In recent years he has been involved in producing and mixing on records for the likes of Julia Holter, Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti and Snoop Dogg, and Dam-Funk’s collaborative project, 7 Days Of Funk. He won three Grammy Awards for his work on Beck’s 2014 album Morning Phase, two Grammy Awards for his work on Beck’s 2017 album Colors and one Grammy Award for his work on Beck’s 2019 album Hyperspace. Cole is published by Kobalt Music Group for the world. Personal life In January 2006, he married Ramona Gonzalez

Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson

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Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson (June 14, 1932, Manhattan, New York or possibly (unconfirmed) Winston-Salem, North Carolina – March 9, 2004, Chicago) was an American composer whose interests spanned the worlds of jazz, dance, pop, film, television, and classical music. Professionally he was often known as “Coleridge Perkinson”. Life and career Perkinson was African-American and was named after the Black British composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875–1912). Perkinson’s mother was active in music and the arts as a piano teacher, church organist, and director of a theater company. Perkinson attended the High School of Music and Art in New York City and New York University. He later transferred to the Manhattan School of Music, where he studied composition with Vittorio Giannini and Charles Mills. He received bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Manhattan School of Music. He also studied with Earl Kim at Princeton University. He was on the faculty of Brooklyn College (1959–1962) and studied conducting in the summers of 1960, 1962, and 1963 in the Netherlands with Franco Ferrara and Dean Dixon and also learned conducting in 1960 at the Mozarteum in Salzburg. Perkinson co-founded the Symp

Colin O'Malley

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Colin O’Malley (born December 9, 1973) is a composer, songwriter, and producer. He is a two-time Emmy nominee for Outstanding Music Composition from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (The Last Reunion/PBS, Woman In Motion/Paramount+). Colin has worked as an orchestrator and arranger for the recording artist Yanni, most notably on Inspirato, which featured performances by Plácido Domingo, Renée Fleming, Russell Watson, Katherine Jenkins, and other world-renowned vocalists. The album debuted at #1 on the Billboard Classical chart. Colin has also collaborated with renowned tenor Nathan Pacheco, whom he first met while working on Yanni Voices. Colin’s soaring ballad “Prendi I Miei Sogni” was performed by Pacheco with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Pacheco subsequently performed the song in Carnegie Hall. Beyond his composition work, Colin is a longtime innovator in orchestral sampling and music technology. He has worked extensively with 8Dio.com, producing flagship virtual instruments including the Century Orchestra Project, Adagio/Agitato Strings, Claire Woodwinds, AGE, Studio Sopranos, CAGE, 8W, and more. These tools are used by composers worldwide and have been feat

Colleen Lovett

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Colleen Lovett (born November 3, 1946, in Texas) is an American singer, composer, and arranger who, since the age of six, has flourished as a recording artist and performer in North America, Asia Pacific, and Europe in nightclubs, musical theater, and television. Before marrying bandleader Teddy Phillips, she was known as one of the Lovett Sisters, a singing duo with her sister, Charlotte Lovett, who had been married to bandleader Ray Herrera. Formal education Entering as a freshman in the fall of 1963, Lovett earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of North Texas and studied at the Berklee School of Music. She also studied at Pierce College in Woodland Hills, California, California State University in Northridge, and UCLA in Los Angeles. She studied film scoring with composer Earle Hagen. She also studied film scoring and twelve-tone orchestration for several years with George Tremblay, who was well known for creating the definitive cycle, a serial technique of composition. Selected compositions * “Until I Love You” * “Freckle-Face Soldier” * “Asleep in His Arms” * “To Tommy With Love” * “Wait for Me Sue” * “Love’s Melody” * “Birds With Broken Wings” * “Come and Taste

Conlon Nancarrow

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Samuel Conlon Nancarrow (; October 27, 1912 – August 10, 1997) was a US-born Mexican composer. Nancarrow is best remembered for his Studies for Player Piano, being one of the first composers to use auto-playing musical instruments, realizing their potential to play far beyond human performance ability. He lived most of his life in relative isolation and did not become widely known until the 1980s. Biography Early years Nancarrow was born in Texarkana, Arkansas, United States. He played trumpet in a jazz band in his youth before studying music, first in Cincinnati and later in Boston, with Roger Sessions, Walter Piston and Nicolas Slonimsky. He attended the National Music Camp and later met Arnold Schoenberg during that composer’s brief stay in Boston in 1933. At the age of 15, Nancarrow enrolled at Vanderbilt University School of Engineering at the insistence of his father. In Boston, Nancarrow joined the Communist Party USA. When the Spanish Civil War broke out, he traveled to Spain to join the XV International Brigade, which fought on the Republican side. He was interned at the Gurs internment camp in France in 1939. Upon his return to the United States in 1939, he learned that h

Conrad Cummings

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Conrad Cummings (born February 10, 1948) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. His compositions include works for orchestra, as well as operatic and chamber works. Many of his works are composed in a minimalist style reminiscent of that of Philip Glass. Cummings was born in San Francisco, California, United States. He studied at Yale University, State University of New York at Stony Brook, and Columbia University, from which he received a doctorate. His teachers include Bülent Arel, Mario Davidovsky, and Jacob Druckman. He later conducted post-doctoral research at IRCAM in Paris under Pierre Boulez. He is a former professor at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. Cummings lives in New York City, where he serves on the faculty of The Juilliard School, teaching composition in the Evening Division. Four recordings of his music have been released on CRI’s Emergency Music label. The Golden Gate, an opera in two acts with music by Conrad Cummings and libretto from the novel-in-verse by Vikram Seth, adapted by the composer, is currently (2010) in development by LivelyWorks and American Opera Projects and receives a staged workshop production at the Rose Studio at Lincoln

Conrad Pope

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Conrad Pope is an American orchestrator and film composer. He has worked on numerous films and has collaborated with composers such as John Williams, James Newton Howard, Alan Silvestri, Danny Elfman, Mark Isham, James Horner, John Powell, Alexandre Desplat, and Howard Shore. In 2025, he received an honorary doctorate in music from the New England Conservatory of Music. Filmography * Patriot Games (1992) original music * Jurassic Park (1993) orchestration * Once Upon a Forest (1993) orchestration * The Santa Clause (1994) orchestration, song arrangement (The Bells of Christmas) * The Set Up (1995) composer * Project Metalbeast (1995) composer * The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996) original music * My Fellow Americans (1996) original music * Eraser (1996) original music * The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) orchestration * A Smile Like Yours (1997) original music * Volcano (1997) original music * Mouse Hunt (1997) original music * Jungle 2 Jungle (1997) original music * Home Alone 3 (1997) original music * Butch Camp (1997) music * Amistad (1997) orchestration * The Matrix (1999) original music * Stuart Little (1999) orchestration * Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999) orches

Conrad Susa

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Conrad Stephen Susa (April 26, 1935 – November 21, 2013) was an American composer. Born in Springdale, Pennsylvania, Susa studied at the Carnegie Institute of Technology and the Juilliard School, where his teachers included William Bergsma, Vincent Persichetti and, by his own claim, P. D. Q. Bach, the fictitious spoof character created by American composer Peter Schickele. From 1959 to 1994, Susa was composer-in-residence for the Old Globe Theater (San Diego, California), where he wrote incidental music for over 200 productions there. In 1988, he joined the faculty of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and remained there as a professor of composition until his death. Susa became particularly known for his 5 operas. His 1973 chamber opera, Transformations, set to texts from the poems of Anne Sexton, is one of the most frequently performed operas by an American composer. His other compositions include choral works and incidental music for various plays. His music is published by the E.C. Schirmer Music Company. Selected works Operas *Transformations (1973) *Black River (1975, revised 1981) *The Love of Don Perlimplin (1984) *The Wise Women (1994) *The Dangerous Liaisons (1994,

Constance Faunt Le Roy Runcie

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Constance Faunt Le Roy Runcie (or Fauntleroy) (January 15, 1836 – May 17, 1911) was an American pianist, author and composer. Biography She was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, the granddaughter of Welsh industrial reformer Robert Owen. After her father’s death, she studied composition and piano in Germany from 1852 to 1861 and then returned to Indiana. Faunt Le Roy married minister James Runcie and had four children. The couple lived in St. Joseph, Missouri, where Constance Runcie founded a woman’s club to further cultural development of the area. Her daughter Ellinor Dale Runcie was also a writer. Her papers are housed at Missouri Western State University. Works Constance Runcie is the author of works including short stories, plays and music compositions. Selected works include: Literary: *The Burning Question non-fiction *Divinely Led non-fiction *Woman, an essay *The Bab, a novel She composed for orchestra, chamber ensemble and a number of songs. Selected works include: *Hear Us, Oh, Hear Us *Round the Throne *Silence of the Sea *Merry Life *Tone Poems *Take My Soul, Oh Lord *I Never Told Him *Dover of Peace *I Hold My Heart So Still *My Spirit Rests References External links *

Corey Dargel

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Corey Dargel (born October 19, 1977, in McAllen, Texas) is a composer, lyricist, and singer who makes a mix of contemporary classical and electronic pop music. Career Formally trained in music composition, Dargel studied with Pauline Oliveros, John Luther Adams, and Brenda Hutchinson, and received a Bachelor of Music from Oberlin. Dargel writes and composes all of his songs. In his earlier compositions, he accompanied his own voice with prepared electronics. His debut album, Less Famous Than You, released in May 2006 with Use Your Teeth records, is in the singer-songwriter style and incorporates totalist rhythmic relationships. His next album, Other People’s Love Songs, released in 2008 with the contemporary classical label New Amsterdam Records, combines indie pop and postminimalist contemporary classical music. In May 2010, New Amsterdam released a two-CD set entitled Someone Will Take Care of Me, which combines two song cycles performed by Dargel and other musicians live. The instrumentation for these two cycles is in the classical song cycle tradition. Discography Studio albums * Less Famous Than You (Use Your Teeth, 2006) * Other People’s Love Songs (New Amsterdam Records, 200

Craig Bohmler

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Craig Bohmler (born April 7, 1956) is an American composer who specializes in opera and musical theater. His musicals include Gunmetal Blues (1991), which has had well over 100 professional productions; Enter the Guardsman (1997), which won the international Musical of the Year award and received an Olivier Award nomination; and Mountain Days (2000), celebrating the life of John Muir. His operas include Riders of the Purple Sage (2017), an adaptation of Zane Grey’s book of the same title which was broadcast nationwide in November 2017 and internationally in 2018. Bohmler has also composed numerous song cycles and other works for solo voice, choral works, and instrumental music pieces, and he is also a musical-theater director, vocal coach, and pianist. Early life and education Bohmler was born in Houston in 1956. He started piano lessons at the age of six, and began composing music as a teenager. He attended the University of North Texas’s College of Music, graduating in 1978 with a Bachelor of Music degree. In 1980 he received a Master of Music degree in piano performance from the University of Houston, where he studied piano and composition with Carlisle Floyd, who became his com

Craig First

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

C. P. First (Craig P. First, born March 16, 1960) is an American composer of the avant-garde. He was born in New York City where he currently resides. Recognized primarily for his chamber music, he has also composed opera, orchestral and electronic music. His music is characterized by its taut, often disturbing drama, and carefully calculated, discordant atonal language. Biography Whilst still in his early teens, C. P. First began composing works of an experimental nature. During his primary education, he studied in New York City with Pulitzer prize-winning composer John Corigliano. First then pursued composition studies in Chicago, Illinois, where he studied at the University of Chicago with Pulitzer prize-winning composer Shulamit Ran. He earned his Masters and Doctoral degree (1990) from Northwestern University. During his years as a graduate student, First became deeply entrenched in the electronic and computer media that often reside at the core of his compositional output. Whilst an undergraduate student, First was commissioned by Charles Moore and the ACM Chamber Opera of Chicago to write the one-act opera, The Soul of Rose Dede. His work caught the attention of influential

Cristian Amigo

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Cristian Amigo (born 1963) is an American composer, improviser, guitarist, sound designer, and ethnomusicologist. His compositional and performing output includes blues and soul, music for the theater, chamber and orchestral music, opera, avant-jazz and rock music, and art/pop song. He has also recorded solo albums on the innova, Deep Ecology and BA labels. Amigo earned a Ph.D. in ethnomusicology from UCLA where he focused on the music of Chile, Peru, and Argentina, as well as anthropological theory, critical studies, and intercultural aesthetics. While in graduate school, he was second guitarist to the Peruvian Afro-Criollo guitarist Carlos Hayre, with whom he played in concerts and festivals including the World Festival of Sacred Music. He is currently composer-in-residence at INTAR Theater in New York City and Music/Design/Production Faculty @ CalArts School of Theater Department of Experience Design and Production in Valencia, California. His awards include the John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship in music composition, a Senior Fulbright Scholar/Teacher/Artist Award (Bolivia 2016–2019), and the Van Leir Fellowship from Meet the Composer. His work has also been supported and/or prod

Cristina Spinei

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Cristina Spinei (born February 29, 1984) is a Nashville-based American composer. She is best known for her work with ballet; she has been commissioned by the Nashville ballet, the New York Choreographic Institute, and the Pacific Northwest Ballet. Biography Cristina Spinei was born in Connecticut and started playing piano by the age of 9. She graduated with bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Juilliard School where she studied with Christopher Rouse. She has been called “one of the most talented young composers in America” by Grammy award-winning composer/conductor José Serebrier. Spinei is recipient of the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism Grant for Composition, the Composer Assistance Award from the American Music Center, the Foundation for Contemporary Arts composition grant, the New York State Council on the Arts composition grant, and the Composition Award from the Arts Recognition and Talent Search. Spinei’s ballets and other compositions have been performed throughout the United States and internationally. She also Performs her own music, most notably with the Nashville Ballet in 2017, 2018, and 2020. She is co-founder of Blind Ear Music, a New York-based gr

Curtis Roads

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Curtis Roads (born May 9, 1951) is an American composer, author, and computer programmer. He composes electronic and electroacoustic music, specializing in granular and pulsar synthesis. Career and music Born in Cleveland, Ohio, Roads studied composition at the California Institute of the Arts, the University of California, San Diego, and Paris 8 University. He is the former chair and vice chair of the Media Arts and Technology Program and former associate director of the Center for Research in Electronic Art Technology at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He had previously taught at the University of Naples Federico II, Publications * Roads, Curtis (2015). Composing Electronic Music. Oxford University Press. * Roads, Curtis (2001). Microsound. Cambridge: MIT Press. * Roads, Curtis (1996). The Computer Music Tutorial. MIT Press. * Roads, Curtis, Pope, Stephen Travis, Piccialli, Aldo and De Poli, Giovanni, eds (1997). Musical Signal Processing. Routledge. * Roads, Curtis and Strawn, John, eds (1987). Foundations of Computer Music. MIT Press. Compositions *POINT LINE CLOUD (2005) @Asphodel (Excerpt @ youtube) *Half-life (1998–1999) *Clang-Tint (1991–1994) *nscor (1980) Ref

Cynthia Cozette Lee

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Cynthia Cozette Lee, also known as Cynthia Cozette or Nazik Cynthia Cozette (born October 19, 1953, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) is a contemporary African-American classical music composer and librettist. Cozette was the first African-American woman to graduate from the University of Pennsylvania with a Master of Arts degree in music composition. Cozette was also the first African-American woman graduate of the University of Pennsylvania to be instructed in music composition by the American composers, George Crumb and George Rochberg. She began her formal music training at 8 years old by studying piano with Carmen Rummo, a Duquesne University professor. She began studying flute at 10 years old. Her early flute teachers were Alois Hrabak, a former flutist with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, and Bernard Goldberg, the principal flutist of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. She received the Victor Saudek Flute Award in 1969 to study with Goldberg. She began her musical composition training at 16 years old with Joseph Willcox Jenkins, a Duquesne University music composition professor. Her prize for winning an honorable mention award in the Pittsburgh Flute Club Composition Contest i

Dafna Naphtali

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Dafna Naphtali is an American composer, guitarist, and singer. A 2023 Guggenheim Fellow, she formed the duo Mechanique(s) and released the album What Is It Like To Be A Bat? (2003). Biography After spending a few years playing piano as a child, she began composing while she was a student at Stuyvesant High School. She studied at New York University, where she got a Bachelor of Music degree in jazz vocal performance and a Master of Music degree in music technology. While at NYU, she discovered Max, a MIDI software which she would later use for most of her compositions. She and Hans Tammen formed the duo Mechanique(s); Allan Kozinn of The New York Times said that they “had the most direct ties to classical electronic experimentalism” of all the work at the 2002 Electronic X-travaganza. She performed for the electroacoustic InterAction series in February 2002. In 2003, she and Kitty Brazelton released the album What Is It Like To Be A Bat?, with Naphtali as electric guitarist and vocalist. She was guest vocalist for Barbez’s 2013 concert at (Le) Poisson Rouge. In 2023, she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in Music Composition. She worked for NYU as an adjunct faculty member, before

Dafnis Prieto

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Dafnis Prieto (born July 31, 1974) is a Cuban-American drummer, composer, bandleader, and educator. Career In his home town of Santa Clara, Cuba, Prieto studied percussion and guitar. During his teens, he moved to Havana to study at the National School of Music. He concentrated on classical music and Afro-Cuban music before paying more attention to jazz. In 1999, when he was twenty-five, Prieto moved to New York City, where he worked with Eddie Palmieri, Carlos Barbosa-Lima, Arturo O’Farrill, Dave Samuels, and Michel Camilo, among many others. Prieto has conducted master classes, clinics, and workshops. From 2005 to 2015, he was a member of the music faculty at New York University. Since 2015, he has taught at the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami in Miami, Florida. Awards and honors * 2007 Grammy nomination, Best Latin Jazz Album, Dafnis Prieto Absolute Quintet (Zoho Music) * 2007 Latin Grammy nomination, Best New Artist * 2011 MacArthur Fellow * 2018 Latin Grammy nomination, Best Latin Jazz Album, Back to the Sunset * 2018 Grammy Award, Best Latin Jazz Album, Back to the Sunset * 2021 Grammy nomination, Best Latin Jazz Album, Transparency Discography As leader * Ab

Dagmar Nordstrom

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Dagmar Nordstrom (December 12, 1903 – April 9, 1976) was an American composer, pianist and singer. She performed together with her sister Siggie as a cabaret singing duo known as The Nordstrom Sisters. Background Dagmar Nordstrom was born in Chicago, Illinois. She was the second daughter of Anna and Alexander Nordstrom. The family were of Swedish and Norwegian extraction. Dagmar was married briefly to a society playboy, but lived most of her life with her older sister after the death of Siggie’s husband, Samuel Ferebee Williams. Career Dagmar and Siggie had a flat in London for a year in 1939 when they were the resident performers at The Ritz. With the exception of their October trips to Bad Gastein for the baths, they regularly performed either in clubs in New York City or on board transatlantic ocean liners, most commonly on the Cunard Line and Norwegian America Line. The duo were on the maiden around the world voyage of the combined ocean liner/cruise ship MS Sagafjord. Dagmar wrote the music for “Remembering You”, a foxtrot which was published as sheet music and a full orchestration in 1940. During the 1940s she and her sister were often on the radio and through the 1960s when

Dale Barlow

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dale Barlow (born Sydney, Australia, 25 December 1959) is a jazz saxophonist, flute player and composer. He has a Masters of Music degree begun at City College New York under Ron Carter and completed at ANU Canberra. He has received ARIA Awards, Album of the Year/ Jazz performer of the year/ International Artist of the Year/ Bicentennial Artist of the Year, four Mo Awards and grants. Career Barlow briefly studied at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music in the late 1970s. In the early 1980s Barlow moved to New York, where he was a member of two groups, the Cedar Walton Quartet and Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers. He studied saxophone with George Coleman and Dave Liebman, piano with Barry Harris, and Hal Galper, and won a BMI scholarship to study at the “Jazz composers workshop” with Bob Brookmeyer and Manny Album. Barlow has also toured and recorded with many other jazz greats including Sonny Stitt, Chet Baker, Gil Evans, Jackie McLean, Billy Cobham, Dizzy Gillespie, Curtis Fuller, Eddie Palmieri, Benny Golson, Lee Konitz, Helen Merrill, Mulgrew Miller, Kenny Barron, Ray Drummond, Dave Kikoski, Richie Cole, Dizzy Gillespie, Billy Higgins, Freddie Hubbard and Wynton Marsalis, Cindy Blackm

Dale Warland

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Dale Warland (born April 14, 1932, Fort Dodge, Iowa ) is an American conductor, composer, founder of the Grammy-nominated Dale Warland Singers, scholar, teacher, choral consultant, and renowned champion of contemporary choral composers. Warland is one of only two choral conductors (along with Robert Shaw) inducted into the American Classical Music Hall of Fame. Professional biography (in brief) While enrolled at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota, Warland began rehearsing and performing with choirs. After graduating, he spent two years in the U.S. Air Force where he started a choir of servicemen. The choir was invited to perform for then-Vice President Richard Nixon. Warland continues to function as a choral composer, editor of choral publications, consultant to publishing companies, scholar, teacher, and guest conductor. The Dale Warland Singers In 1972, while on the faculty at Macalester College, Warland was asked by the Walker Art Center (in Minneapolis) to form a choir for a special project. This group of 40 singers became the Dale Warland Singers. Under his direction, the Singers toured Europe and were awarded the ASCAP Margaret Hillis Achievement Award, ASCAP awards fo

Dalmazio Santini

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Dalmazio Santini (September 11, 1923 – October 4, 2001) was an Italian-born American composer. Early life Santini was born in Capestrano in the Abruzzo province of Italy. He immigrated to the United States at age 14. He attended public schools in White Plains, New York. He was inducted into the US Armed Forces and served in World War II, eventually settling in Valhalla, New York. Following the war, the G.I. Bill allowed him the opportunity to study composition at Manhattanville College and the Mannes College of Music. Santini studied composition with Felix Salzer and Tadeusz Kassern, and conducting with Milton Forstat. Musical career Santini developed a system of composition using 21-tone rows. This system is similar to the more familiar 12-tone system of serial composition, but the rows Santini used as the basis of his 21-tone compositions also include all alternative enharmonic spellings for each note in the chromatic scale (except the notes D, G, and A, which have no enharmonic spellings). Thus, the available tones for a 21-tone row would include B-sharp, C, C-sharp, D-flat, D, D-sharp, E-flat, E, F-flat, E-sharp, F, F-sharp, G-flat, G, G-sharp, A-flat, A, A-sharp, B-flat, B, an

Damien Geter

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Damien Geter (born 1980) is an American composer, bass-baritone, and conductor. He is the Music Director of Portland Opera and the Composer-in-Residence for the Richmond Symphony. Geter is known for such large-scale classical works as An African American Requiem (2022) and the operas American Apollo (2024) and Loving v. Virginia (2025). Early life and education Geter was born in Petersburg, Virginia, and raised in Chesterfield County, Virginia. He grew up in a musical family; his mother and grandmother were active in church music, which influenced his early musical development. He subsequently earned a Master of Music in Conducting from Indiana State University in 2004. Career Composition Geter’s compositions have received acclaim for their fusion of classical forms with styles from the Black diaspora. His choral-orchestral work, An African American Requiem, premiered in May 2022. Commissioned by the Resonance Ensemble, the work is a setting of the traditional Latin Requiem mass integrated with spirituals and texts related to racial violence in the United States, including the last words of Eric Garner and a speech by Ida B. Wells. The Washington Post reviewed the East Coast premie

Damon Elliott

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Damon William Elliott (born March 21, 1973) is an American record producer, songwriter and composer. Throughout his career he has worked with various artists spanning across hip hop, R&B, pop, pop rock, gospel, reggae and country. He also produced the Academy Award-nominated song “Applause” from the 2022 film Tell It Like a Woman. Elliott is the son of Dionne Warwick and Bill Elliott. Career Elliott’s first production project credits include Bone Thugs-n-Harmony member Flesh-n-Bone (1996). Other credits include work with Mya, Destiny’s Child (including Beyonce’s, Kelly Rowland’s and Michelle Williams’s solo projects), P!nk, Jessica Simpson, Macy Gray, Athena Cage, Solange Knowles, Keyshia Cole, Kelis, Brooke Allison, Brooke Hogan, Yasmeen Sulieman, rappers Layzie Bone, Yukmouth, Sticky Fingaz, Ol’ Dirty Bastard, and former boxing champion Mike Tyson. He has written and produced theme songs for the television shows Holly’s World, Kendra on Top and The Lylas. As a singer, Elliott contributed to N-Tyce, Tina Harris and Beat Funktion. He co-wrote “Blow Me” and “Catwalk” for American entrepreneur Jeffree Star. Since 2014, with the support of Billy Ray Cyrus, Elliott began releasing hick

Damon Fox (writer)

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Damon Fox (born May 17, 1966) is an American writer and producer. His works as a screenwriter include Traces of Death (1993) and Traces of Death II (1994). Career During the 1990s, Fox formed Foxx Entertainment Enterprises Inc. With this production company, he created, scripted and narrated the shockumentary films Traces of Death I and II. In the 1980s, he formed the power-metal band Stormtrooper and only produced one EP, Armies of the Night. Selected filmography Self * Traces of Death (1993) – narrator, host * Traces of Death II (1994) – narrator * The Coroner’s Camera (1997) – narrator Producer * Traces of Death (1993) – co-executive producer * Traces of Death II (1994) – co-executive producer * The Coroner’s Camera (1997) – producer Writer * Traces of Death (1993) * Traces of Death II (1994) * The Coroner’s Camera (1997) Composer * The Coroner’s Camera (1997) * The Kid & I (2005) Director * The Coroner’s Camera (1997) References External links *

Dan Forrest

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Daniel Ernest Forrest Jr. (born January 7, 1978) is an American composer, pianist, educator, and music editor. Biography Dan Forrest was born in Breesport, New York, and began piano lessons with his elementary school music teacher at age 8. In high school Forrest won numerous piano awards, accompanied honors choirs, and performed the Grieg Piano Concerto with the Elmira Symphony. He majored in piano at Bob Jones University, earning a B.Mus. and an M.Mus. in Piano Performance, studying advanced theory and composition with Joan Pinkston and Dwight Gustafson. After teaching piano in South Carolina for three years, he moved to Kansas, where he earned a D.M.A. in composition from the University of Kansas, studying with wind band composer James Barnes. Forrest also studied with Alice Parker, whom he counts as a foremost influence. Forrest’s compositions include choral, instrumental, orchestral, and wind band works. His music appears in the catalogs of numerous publishers, primarily Beckenhorst Press (church music) and Hinshaw Music (concert music), but also Choristers Guild. In 2018, he began self-publishing his own concert music The Music of Dan Forrest, which is distributed by Beckenho

Dan Locklair

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Dan Locklair (born 1949) is an American composer. He holds the position of Composer-in-Residence and Professor of Music, Emeritus, at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. His output includes symphonic works, a ballet, an opera and numerous solo, vocal and choral compositions. He is often noted for his sacred music, but has also composed many secular works. Early life Locklair was born on August 7, 1949 in Charlotte, North Carolina. Locklair was a professional organist by age 14. Career Locklair is a composer, organist, conductor, and Professor of Music. He has been based at Wake Forest University as Composer-in-Residence and Professor of Music since 1982. Prior to Wake Forest, Locklair was Organist/Choirmaster at First Presbyterian Church in Binghamton, NY and Instructor of Music at Hartwick College in Oneonta, New York. His works are performed in the United States and throughout the world, including in England, Canada, Germany, France, Denmark, Hungary, Poland, Sweden, Korea, Japan, South Africa, Finland and Russia. “Locklair’s music has been premiered and/or performed by such ensembles as the Helsinki (Finland) and Buffalo Philharmonics, the Saint Louis, North

Dana Kletter

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Dana Kletter (born October 21, 1959) is an American musician and writer. Early life and education Kletter and her twin sister Karen were born in Baltimore, Maryland and raised in New York. Dana began playing piano at age four. She attended American University in Washington, D.C. where she studied piano with Alan Mandel. She left music school and submerged herself in the DC Hardcore punk rock scene at its apex, in the early 1980s. There she met the friends who would become part of her professional musical life. Career blackgirls Dana moved to Raleigh, North Carolina in 1985 and formed blackgirls, described by the Chicago Reader as a “dark art-folk trio,” with Eugenia Lee Johnson and Hollis Brown. The band performed for several years and released a single as part of the Evil I Do Not To Nod I Live boxset with four other North Carolina bands (including the early bands of Superchunk guitarist and Merge Records mastermind Mac McCaughan), and a five song EP, Speechless. In his Spin magazine review of Speechless, Tony Fletcher noted, “…hints of absolute greatness within, most noticeably on “Queen Anne,” a ballad in which Dana Kletter’s vocals lean towards the sultry peaks of Nico and Mari

Dane Rudhyar

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Dane Rudhyar (March 23, 1895 – September 13, 1985), born Daniel Chennevière, was an American author, modernist composer, painter and humanistic astrologer. He was a pioneer of modern transpersonal astrology. Biography Dane Rudhyar was born in Paris on March 23, 1895. At the age of 12, a severe illness and surgery disabled him, and he turned to music and intellectual development to compensate for his lack of physical agility. He studied at the Sorbonne, University of Paris (graduating at the age of 16), and at the Paris Conservatoire. His early ventures into philosophy and his association with the artistic community in Paris led to his conviction that all existence is cyclical in character. Influenced by Nietzsche as a youth, Rudhyar envisioned himself as a “seed man” of new age cultural evolution. In November 1916, Rudhyar’s music brought him to New York City, by the New York Metropolitan Opera. This was one of the first polytonal pieces of music performed in the United States. He also met Sasaki Roshi, one of the early Japanese Zen teachers in America, who led him in the study of Oriental philosophy and occultism. He stayed in California (often commuting to New York) through the 1

Daniel Asia

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Daniel Asia (born June 27, 1953) is an American composer. He was born in Seattle, Washington, in the United States of America. Biography He received a B.A. degree from Hampshire College and a M.M. from the Yale School of Music. His major teachers include Jacob Druckman, Stephen Albert, Gunther Schuller, and Isang Yun in composition, and Arthur Weisberg in conducting. Asia’s works ranges from solo pieces to large-scale multi-movement works for orchestra, including five symphonies. He served on the faculty of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music as Assistant Professor of Contemporary Music and Wind Ensemble from 1981 to 1986. In 1986–88, a UK Fulbright Arts Fellowship and a Guggenheim Fellowship enabled him to work in London as a visiting lecturer at City University. Since 1988, he has been Professor of Composition and head of the composition department at the University of Arizona in Tucson. He conducts the New York-based contemporary chamber ensemble The Musical Elements, which he co-founded in 1977. Asia founded and directs the American Culture and Ideas Initiative. As a blogger, Asia contributes articles on music and culture to The Huffington Post. In 2013, he gained notoriety after

Daniel B. Towner

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Daniel Brink Towner (March 5, 1850 – October 3, 1919) was an American church music director, college professor, and composer of over 2,000 hymns and gospel songs , many of which are still popular today, the most notable being “Trust and Obey”. He was also associated with other great evangelicals of the late 19th century, including evangelist Dwight L. Moody and songwriter Philip P. Bliss. Younger Years Born in Rome, Pennsylvania, Towner was the second child and oldest son of “Professor” J. G. Towner, a teacher and director of singing schools in the Rome area; two younger brothers came along later. When he was seven years old, he had his first introduction to Philip P. Bliss, when Bliss came to teach at the school he attended, Rome Academy. His musical talents were recognized by his father early in life; in fact, when J. G. realized how well his son could sing, he was moved to tears, calling him “The Prince of Singers”. When “Professor” Towner taught at various singing schools, he would often take Daniel along with him; by the age of 17, he became known as the “Wonderful Boy Bass”. He went on to study at the Susquehanna Collegiate Institute in Towanda, Pennsylvania, where Philip P.

Daniel Bernard Roumain

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Daniel Bernard Roumain (; known by his initials, DBR; born 1970 ) is a composer, performer, violinist, and band-leader, whose work combines classical music with jazz, hip-hop and rock. Composer In September 2010, Dancers, Dreamers, and Presidents — an orchestral tone poem inspired by Ellen DeGeneres and then-senator Barack Obama — premiered at the New World Symphony. DBR composed the opera, “We Shall Not Be Moved,” in collaboration with librettist Marc Bamuthi Joseph, and director and choreographer Bill T. Jones. The opera premiered at Opera Philadelphia on September 16, 2017. Discography *Threads with David S. Ware (Thirsty Ear, 2003) *I, Composer (2004) *String Quartet (2004) *Pulsing (DBR Music, 2006) *Etudes4Violin&Electronix (Thirsty Ear, 2007) *The Need to Be with Ryuichi Sakamoto on the DJ Spooky album “Sound Unbound” (2008) *Woodbox Beats & Balladry (Thirsty Ear, 2010) References External links * *Guide to the Daniel Bernard Roumain Collection, Center for Black Music Research, Columbia College Chicago *Collision: Bill T. Jones and Daniel Bernard Roumain *Interview on CBS News *Performing at Cusp Conference 2009 (video)

Daniel Dorff

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Daniel Dorff (born March 7, 1956) is an American classical musician and classical composer. Biography and career Dorff was born in New Rochelle, New York, and grew up in Flower Hill, New York, graduating from Roslyn High School. Dorff graduated magna cum laude from Cornell University and earned his master’s degree in composition from the University of Pennsylvania, studying composition with George Crumb, George Rochberg, Karel Husa, Henry Brant, Ralph Shapey, Elie Siegmeister, and Richard Wernick. Dorff served from 1996 through 2015 as composer-in-residence for Symphony in C (formerly The Haddonfield Symphony) in Camden, New Jersey (USA). His works have been commissioned by such ensembles as the Philadelphia Orchestra and Minnesota Orchestra, and performed by groups and individuals including the Baltimore Symphony, Eastman Wind Ensemble, flutists and clarinetists of the Chicago Symphony and Berlin Philharmonic, pianist Marc-André Hamelin, and flutists Jean-Pierre Rampal, Jasmine Choi, Denis Bouriakov, and frequent collaborator Cindy Anne Broz. He has also created arrangements for Sir James Galway and pop musicians Keith Emerson and Lisa Loeb. Dorff has written many frequently-perfo

Daniel Dutton

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Daniel Dutton (born 1959 near Somerset, Kentucky) Daniel Dutton lives in Somerset, Kentucky. ;Other sources *Tagami, Ty, “MUSICAL AMBASSADOR - MAKER OF RARE JAPANESE LUTE WILL PLAY IN SOMERSET”, Lexington Herald, 20 February 1999. p. A1: “Ohashi came to Somerset to visit friends and to perform with local artist Daniel Dutton, whom he met in Japan two years ago. Dutton traveled to Japan in 1997 with a Japanese couple living in Somerset, playing old Appalachian ballads on dulcimer and guitar for a Japanese audience. Dutton, who is the artistic director and musical composer for the opera, invited Ohashi to come to Kentucky and open the show.” *Unk, “‘SECRET’ GETTING EASIER TO FIGURE OUT”, Lexington Herald, 14 February 1999, p. J3: “Daniel Dutton hopes people will leave the world premiere of Love & Time - the third in his series of four opera-modern dance productions called The Secret Commonwealth saying: “I kind of understand what was happening there.” The Somerset-based director/composer knows he has tested audiences with the first two chapters: The Changeling and the Bear and The Road. External links * * Rivera-Dutton Sculpture Studio * Art Appreciation and the Poetics of Space (Ken

Daniel E. Gawthrop

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Daniel E. Gawthrop (born 1949 in Fort Wayne, Indiana) is an American composer, primarily of choral music. His output also includes a substantial body of works for the organ as well as orchestral and instrumental works. He has been the recipient of over one hundred commissions to write original music. His works have been published by Warner Brothers, Theodore Presser, Sacred Music Press, and others. Biography Gawthrop attended Michigan State University, and Brigham Young University. He served for three years as Composer-in-Residence to the Fairfax Symphony Orchestra (of Fairfax, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C.) beginning in 1990, and has been the recipient of four grants from the Barlow Endowment for Musical Composition. He has been commissioned by various institutions including the American Choral Directors Association through their Brock Commission, and has had works première in the Concert Hall of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Salt Lake City Mormon Tabernacle, and Washington National Cathedral. His choral pieces have been performed and recorded by such eminent ensembles as the United States Air Force Singing Sergeants, the Gregg Smith Singers, the

Daniel Goode

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Daniel Goode (born January 24, 1936) is an American composer and clarinetist. Daniel Goode was born in New York City. After graduating in 1957 from Oberlin College, he studied composition at Columbia University with Henry Cowell and Otto Luening, receiving an MA 1962. He pursued further studies at the University of San Diego with Pauline Oliveros and Kenneth Gaburo (Benary and Sandow 2001). Goode’s works show influence from several sources, including bird song, Cape Breton fiddling, drone, Indonesian gamelan music, and minimal music (specifically music as a gradual process). Often two or more of these elements are combined in a single composition. Goode created and served as Director of the Electronic Music Studio of Livingston College, Rutgers University from 1971 to 1998 and is co-director of the DownTown Ensemble which he co-founded in New York in 1983 (Benary and Sandow 2001). As a clarinetist he is proficient in the technique of circular breathing, which he uses frequently in performances with the group. Since 1976, Goode has been a member of Gamelan Son of Lion, a Javanese-style iron gamelan ensemble dedicated to new music, for which he has composed many works. He has develop

Daniel Gregory Mason

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Daniel Gregory Mason (November 20, 1873 – December 4, 1953) was an American composer and music critic. Biography Mason was born in Brookline, Massachusetts. He came from a long line of notable American musicians, including his father Henry Mason, and his grandfather Lowell Mason. His cousin, John B. Mason, was a popular actor on the American and British stage. Daniel Mason studied under John Knowles Paine at Harvard University from 1891 to 1895, continuing his studies with George Chadwick and Percy Goetschius. He also studied with Arthur Whiting and later wrote a biographical journal article about him. In 1894 he published his Opus 1, a set of keyboard waltzes, but soon after began writing about music as his primary career. He became a lecturer at Columbia University in 1905, where he would remain until his retirement in 1942, successively being awarded the positions of assistant professor (1910), MacDowell professor (1929) and head of the music department (1929-1940). He was elected a member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia fraternity, the national fraternity for men in music, in 1914 by the Fraternity’s Alpha chapter at the New England Conservatory in Boston. After 1907, Mason began devo

Daniel Hart (musician)

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Daniel Frederick Hart is an American musician, composer and classically trained violinist. He has released music as a soloist and with his bands the Physics of Meaning and Dark Rooms. He has also toured and recorded with numerous bands, including St. Vincent, Other Lives, John Vanderslice, Swans, the Rosebuds, Annuals, Glasser, Broken Social Scene, Pattern Is Movement, Mount Moriah, the Polyphonic Spree and Sarah Jaffe. In 2012, he wrote and recorded the score for David Lowery’s film Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, which premiered at Sundance Film Festival in 2013. He wrote the scores for Pete’s Dragon (2016), A Ghost Story (2017) and The Green Knight (2021). He lives in Los Angeles. He began playing the violin at age three. Career Music Hart moved to North Carolina in 2002 and, along with David Karsten Daniels, John Ribo, Perry Wright and Alex Lazara, founded the Bu Hanan record label. He formed the band the Physics of Meaning, releasing two studio albums, Hart also performed and recorded with the group Project Mastana, playing violin on their record Backroads to Bollywood. Composing In 2009, director David Lowery asked Hart to write two compositions for his first feature film, St. Nick

Daniel James Wolf

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Daniel James Wolf (born September 13, 1961) is an American composer. Studies He was born in Upland, California. Wolf studied composition with Gordon Mumma, Alvin Lucier, and La Monte Young, as well as musical tunings with Erv Wilson and Douglas Leedy and ethnomusicology (M.A., Ph.D. 1990 Wesleyan University ). Important contacts with Lou Harrison, John Cage, Walter Zimmermann. Managing Editor of the journal Xenharmonikon, 1985-89. Based in Europe from 1989, he is known as a member of the “Material” group of composers, along with Hauke Harder and others. Compositions Wolf’s compositions apply an experimental approach to musical materials, with a special interest in intonation, yet often display a surface that playfully - if accidentally - recalls historical music. Works include The White Canoe, an opera seria for hand puppets to the libretto by Edward Gorey, six string quartets, Figure & Ground for string trio, Field Study for vn, tb, ban, gui, Decoherence for x orchestras of x players, Twoity fl,pf and A Beckett Gray Code for wind quintet. Much of his music is in just intonation, but his work with alternative tunings includes a collection of Etudes in all equal temperaments between

Daniel Kellogg (composer)

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Daniel Kellogg (born 1976 in Wilton, Connecticut) is an American composer. Kellogg is Assistant Professor of Music at the College of Music of the University of Colorado at Boulder, teaching music composition, counterpoint and orchestration. Life Kellogg received his Bachelor of Music in 1999 from the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, and Master of Music in 2001, Master of Musical Arts in 2003, and Doctor of Musical Arts in 2007 from the Yale School of Music. He also studied at Indiana University School of Music (1994-1996), the Aspen Music Festival and School (1995-1996), and the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival as a 1997 fellow. His teachers have included Martin Bresnick, Jacob Druckman, Don Freund, Jennifer Higdon, Ezra Laderman, Ned Rorem, and Joseph Schwantner. Kellogg’s notable students include Lawrence Wilde. Career Kellogg’s music has been performed by the National Symphony Orchestra, Colorado Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the San Diego Symphony, the Kansas City Symphony, the Green Bay Symphony, the South Dakota Symphony, the Santa Barbara Symphony, the Yale Philharmonic, the Ensemble Orchestral de Paris, the President’s Own United States Marine Band

Daniel Lentz

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Daniel Lentz (March 10, 1942 – July 25, 2025) was an American classical composer, musician and artist whose works focused on minimalist and electronic music. Life and career Lentz was born in Latrobe, Pennsylvania on March 10, 1942. He achieved notability as a musician while a student at St. Vincent College and at Brandeis University, when he was awarded a fellowship in composition at Tanglewood in the summer of 1966. This was followed by a Fulbright Fellowship in Electronic Music in 1967–68, which was completed in Stockholm, Sweden. He then became a visiting lecturer at the University of California, Santa Barbara from 1968 to 1970. In 1970 he focused more on composing and performing. At this time he also formed a music ensemble, the California Time Machine, which toured North America and Europe. In 1972, Lentz was the first American to win the Gaudeamus International Composers Award. Later, he won a number of other awards and grants. and released several recordings in Europe. Returning to California, Lentz formed the Daniel Lentz Group in Los Angeles. This ensemble has toured much of the world and has released a number of recordings. His 1987 album The Crack in the Bell was the fi

Daniel Léo Simpson

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Daniel Léo Simpson (born 28 December 1959) is an American composer. Background Simpson first studied music theory with Wes Humphrey at Buena High School in Sierra Vista, Arizona and composed its Alma Mater which he conducted at the première performance there February 9, 2012. He studied as an undergraduate with Anna Mae Sharp and Henry Johnson at the University of Arizona, Tucson and continued his graduate work there with Robert McBride and Robert Muczynski to receive his master’s degree in composition. He won first place in the First Annual International Schillinger composition contest sponsored by The Schillinger School of Music for his composition The Art of Schillinger. He was also first-place winner of the 2010 Alabama Orchestra Association Festival competition contest for his composition Tuscaloosa Tango which received its world première at the University of Alabama, February 14, 2011, (A division of Alabama Music Educators Association). It has now also been performed by the Iraqi National Symphony Orchestra conducted by maestro Mohammed Amin Ezzat as well as the Orquestra Sinfônica da Paraíba of Brazil conducted by maestro Luiz Carlos Durier. His “Ave Maria” for two sopranos

Daniel Pinkham

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Daniel Rogers Pinkham Jr. (June 5, 1923 – December 18, 2006) was an American composer, organist, and harpsichordist. Early life and education Born in Lynn, Massachusetts, into a prominent family engaged in the manufacture of patent medicines (his great-grandmother was Lydia E. Pinkham), he studied organ performance and music theory at Phillips Academy with Carl F. Pfatteicher. “The single event that changed my life was a concert at Andover by the Trapp Family Singers in 1939, right after they had escaped from Germany,” Pinkham once recalled. “Here, suddenly, I was hearing clarity, simplicity. It shaped my whole outlook,” he said in a 1981 interview with The Boston Globe. At Harvard University, he studied with Walter Piston; Aaron Copland, Archibald T. Davison, and Arthur Tillman Merritt were also among his teachers. There he completed a bachelor’s degree in 1942 and a master’s in 1944. He also studied harpsichord with Putnam Aldrich and Wanda Landowska, and organ with E. Power Biggs. At Tanglewood, he studied composition with Samuel Barber and Arthur Honegger, and subsequently with Nadia Boulanger. Career Pinkham taught at the Boston Conservatory beginning in 1946, and at the New E

Daniel Read

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Daniel Read (November 16, 1757 – December 4, 1836) was an American composer of the First New England School, and one of the primary figures in early American classical music. Life and work Read, along with his contemporaries William Billings, Oliver Holden, Supply Belcher, and Justin Morgan, was one of the primary members of a group of American composers called the Yankee tunesmiths or the First New England School. While the classical music era was in its heyday in Europe, American composers of “serious” music were setting hymn tunes in three- and four-part a cappella style, with simple folklike melodies and little regard for functional harmony. Many of these works were fuguing tunes, which begin with all voices singing together (with a melody usually based on a Protestant hymn), come to a stop, and continue with each voice entering one at a time. Nearly all were hymn tunes, developed for the use of the newly-forming singing societies. Once a private in the Massachusetts militia, later a comb-maker and owner of a general store in New Haven, Connecticut, Read was only the third American composer to put out a collection of his own music (after William Billings and Simeon Jocyln). Thi

Daniel Sternberg

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Daniel Arie Sternberg (29 March 1913 – 26 August 2000) was a Polish conductor, pianist, composer, and educator. He lived and worked in Central and Eastern Europe until 1939, when he emigrated to the United States to escape World War II. Biography Sternberg was born on 29 March 1913 in Lemberg, Austria-Hungary. The son of music-loving parents, he began piano lessons at age five and added the cello. He graduated at the top of his class from the Vienna Conservatory, where he studied conducting. Upon graduation, he became assistant conductor (under Fritz Stiedry) of the Leningrad Opera and the Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra. It was in Leningrad, in 1935, that Sternberg first met cellist Lev Aronson, whom he recommended for the post of principal cellist. It was also in Leningrad, in 1936, that he conducted the first performance outside Germany of Paul Hindemith’s Mathis der Maler symphony. After serving as music director of the Tbilisi State Symphony Orchestra, he lived in Vienna, Riga, and Stockholm. After the German invasion of Poland ignited World War II in the fall of 1939, Sternberg and his wife, the Romanian-born Felicitas Gobineau Sternberg, emigrated to the United States. Ster

Daniel Steven Crafts

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Daniel Steven Crafts (born September 22, 1949) is an American composer. He was born in Detroit, Michigan, but has spent most of his life in the San Francisco Bay Area before moving to New Mexico. Composition style Daniel Steven Crafts has chosen to oppose what he considers unjustifiably dissonant formalism prevalent in late 20th-century classical music. Instead, he emphasizes tonality in a dialectic between form and content. Known for his strong sense of melody, the composer has written a variety of styles including operas, orchestral works, chamber music, concertos, and satirical pieces. Among Crafts’ most well-known works is The Song & the Slogan, a collaboration with legendary opera star Jerry Hadley. Written for voice and orchestra, the piece is based on the poetry of Carl Sandburg. The work was made into a TV program for the PBS network and was aired nationally in 2004 with host David Hartman. The Song & the Slogan was awarded an Emmy Award in 2003 for Best Music by the Mid-America Chapter of the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. Crafts also created the first comic-strip opera called Too Much Coffee Man in collaboration with Shannon Wheeler and Damian Willcox. He

Daniel W. McCarthy

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Daniel William McCarthy (born 1955, Onekama, Michigan) is an American composer, author, conductor, professor, and black belt martial artist. He has been professor and chair of music composition and theory studies at The University of Akron: School of Music and held the Theodor Dreiser Distinguished Research/Creativity Award at Indiana State University School of Music. He is co-author of “Theory for Today’s Musician” with Ralph Turek, published by Routledge Francis & Taylor, NYC ? His career as a conductor included serving on the conducting staff of the Cleveland Chamber Symphony, four seasons as music director of the Interlochen Festival Orchestra, Interlochen, Michigan, as well as conducting the University of Akron Symphony Orchestra and the Terre Haute Symphony Youth Orchestra. McCarthy, a dedicated martial artist, was promoted to 3rd Degree Black Belt in Chun Ma Tae Kwon Do in May 2012. A student of Grand Master Jeon Gyeong Ho, Akron, Ohio https://web.archive.org/web/20141008223026/http://www.wcmkicks.com/new/, he pursued additional studies in Asian Weapons, American Kenpo, and Chin Na Kung Fu with Grand Master Sifu James Adkins in Traverse City, Michigan Career Daniel McCarthy’

Daniele Amfitheatrof

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Daniele Alexandrovich Amfitheatrof (, 29 October 1901 – 4 June 1983) was a Russian, American, and Italian composer and conductor. Biography Amfitheatrof was born in Saint Petersburg, Russia on 29 October 1901; his grandfather was Nikolay Sokolov. In his youth, Amfitheatrof studied first with Jāzeps Vītols at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory, then Jaroslav Křička in Prague. Most of Amfitheatrof’s studies took place in Rome, where he completed his studies in composition at the Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia under Ottorino Respighi. Amfitheatrof also graduated in organ playing from the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music. His career began as a répétiteur at the Teatro Augusteo, where he eventually became assistant conductor to Bernardino Molinari. After obtaining a number of positions in Italy, including house conductor and manager at the EIAR station in Turin, Amfitheatrof left to become associate conductor of the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra under music director Dimitri Mitropoulos. In 1939, Amfitheatrof relocated to Hollywood, California, where he established himself as a film composer. He became a naturalized American citizen in 1944. Altogether, Amfitheatrof scored more than

Danny Baranowsky

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Danny Baranowsky (born April 5, 1984), also known as Danny B or by the company name dB Soundworks, is an American electronic music composer, composing music mainly for indie films and indie games. He founded dB Soundworks to sell and promote his music. He is most known for providing the music for games such as Canabalt, Super Meat Boy, The Binding of Isaac, and Crypt of the NecroDancer. Baranowsky has also contributed to the soundtrack of the 2016 Amplitude remake. Career Baranowsky first came into contact with video game music in 2001, when he became a member of online game remix community OverClocked ReMix. At this time, Baranowsky was hoping to become a film composer. When Adam Saltsman, who would later develop Canabalt, sent Baranowsky an incomplete version of Gravity Hook, which Saltsman intended to keep free of music, Baranowsky decided to write a track for it anyway. When Baranowsky sent “Track A” back to Saltsman, he was really impressed by the music. After finishing the soundtrack of Gravity Hook, Saltsman introduced Baranowsky to Edmund McMillen, for whom he later composed the soundtrack of Super Meat Boy and The Binding of Isaac. He co-composed Desktop Dungeons with Gran

Daria Semegen

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Daria Semegen (born June 27, 1946) is a contemporary American composer of classical music. While she has composed pieces for traditional instruments – her Jeux des quatres (1970), for example, is scored for clarinet, trombone, cello, and piano – she is best known as a “respected electronic composer.” She is a figure on the academic side of the electronic music genre, connected with the conservatory and the university (like her older contemporary Karlheinz Stockhausen), rather than the more popular expression of the genre that followed upon the widespread availability of synthesizers and personal computers in the 1970s and after. Her writing covers a range of topics related to musical composition and has been the subject of studies by other scholars. Biography Born in Bamberg, West Germany of Ukrainian heritage, Semegen pursued an academic career in music, earning her MA from Yale University in 1971; she has studied at the Eastman School of Music and the Rochester Institute of Technology. She taught at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center (1971–75). She studied composition under Bülent Arel and Alexander Goehr, and in turn has taught other composers, including Joseph DiPon

Daron Hagen

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Daron Aric Hagen ( ; born November 4, 1961) is an American composer, writer, and filmmaker. Biography Early life Daron Hagen was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and grew up in New Berlin, a suburb west of Milwaukee. Hagen was the youngest of the three sons of Gwen Hagen, a visual artist, writer and advertising executive who studied creative writing with Mari Sandoz and enjoyed a successful advertising career as creative director of Exclusively Yours Magazine and Earl Hagen (an attorney). Hagen began composing prolifically in 1974, when his older brother Kevin gave him a recording and score of Benjamin Britten’s Billy Budd. Two years later, at the age of fifteen, he conducted the premiere of his first orchestral work, a recording and score of which came to the attention of Leonard Bernstein, who enthusiastically urged Hagen to attend Juilliard to study with David Diamond. He studied piano with Adam Klescewski, and studied composition, piano, and conducting at the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music (where his teachers included Duane Dishaw and Judy Kramer) while attending Brookfield Central High School. While a student of Rorem’s at Curtis, he studied piano with Marion Zarzeczna and also

Darrell Calker

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Darrell Wallace Calker (February 18, 1905 – February 20, 1964) was an American composer and arranger who worked on films and animated cartoons. Early life and education Calker was born in Washington, D.C. to Morris H. and Lugenia E. (Lily) Wallace of Philadelphia. He grew up with his younger sister Rena in the District of Columbia, where he attended Episcopal Cathedral School and sang with a church choir in his teens. He studied with Edgar Priest and David Pell, graduating from the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. Career Calker’s early work in Hollywood included orchestration for Victor Young. He was also active as the composer of scores for the Ballets Russes de Monte Carlo and Sadlers Wells Royal Ballet. Among his compositions were the suites for orchestra, Golden Land and Penguin Island. After arriving in Los Angeles by the mid-1930s, Calker worked as a session musician, and composed songs including Strings Full of Swing and Dixieland Strut. He formed his own band, which appeared on radio in the early 1940s. It was at this time Walter Lantz hired Calker to be his musical director in December 1940, replacing former Warner Bros. composer Frank Marsales. Calker was an unc

Darryl Kubian

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Darryl Kubian (born February 19, 1966) is an American composer, thereminist, violinist, and audio/video engineer. His compositions have been commissioned and performed by North American orchestras, such as the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra and Omaha Symphony, and he has written soundtrack scores for the Wildlife Conservation Society, National Geographic, Discovery Channel, Pangolin Pictures, NHK, CBS, The Learning Channel, and others. Darryl performs and records as a thereminist, including chamber and solo works by Herb Deutsch, Martinu, and others, and has also been a featured soloist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Philharmonia of New York, and the NJ Symphony on theremin. He was the featured theremin soloist for the Lincoln Center Festival production of Danny Elfman’s Music from the Films of Tim Burton. Darryl Kubian is a member of the first violin section of the NJ Symphony, and was the principal second violinist of the Brooklyn Philharmonic. Indigo Fox Media, Kubian’s New Jersey–based audio/video production company, has recorded artists such as the Emerson String Quartet, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, members of the NY Philharmonic, New Jersey Symphony, and the Metro

Dary John Mizelle

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Dary John Mizelle (born June 14, 1940) is an American composer of avant-garde classical and jazz music. Life and career Mizelle studied trombone (B.A. California State University, Sacramento) as well as composition (M.A. University of California, Davis, Ph.D. University of California, San Diego) and while at U.C. Davis participated in the New Music Ensemble (a pioneering free improvisation group that dispensed with scores). He was an original member of the group that founded Source: Music of the Avant Garde magazine. His mentors include: Larry Austin, Richard Swift, Jerome Rosen, Karlheinz Stockhausen, David Tudor, Roger Reynolds, Robert Erickson, Pauline Oliveros, and Kenneth Gaburo. His music involves mastery of instrumental, electronic and vocal resources as well as his own performance on several different instruments and voice. He works in many different genres and media. His SPANDA project consists of thirteen days of music with a coherent macrostructure, which includes music theater, opera, orchestra works, choral works, electronic music, chamber music, solo instrumental and vocal music as well as combinations and integrations of all these. A prolific composer with works in a

Dave Black (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dave Black (born 1959) is an American composer and co-author of numerous books, including Alfred’s Drum Method, Alfred’s Beginning Drumset Method, Alfred’s Kid’s Drum Course, Contemporary Brush Techniques, Drumset Independence and Syncopation, Living Praise, Cymals: A Crash Course, The Essential Dictionary of Orchestration, A Jazz Diary, and Sound Innovations for Concert Band. He has also written a number of articles, concert reviews, and book reviews for publications including The Instrumentalist, Down Beat, Modern Percussionist, Modern Drummer, Drums and Drumming, Drum Tracks, Jazz Educators Journal, Grammy Pulse, and Music Connection. More than 60 of his compositions and arrangements have been published by Alfred Music Publishing, CPP/Belwin, Highland/Etling, Barnhouse, TRN, and Warner Brothers, many of which have been recorded. He has written with, and for the bands of Louie Bellson, Sammy Nestico, Bill Watrous, Bobby Shew, Ed Shaughnessy, Gordon Brisker and the CSUN Jazz Ensemble. Black has received numerous awards and commissions, including 21 consecutive ASCAP Popular Composer Awards and two Grammy nomination certificate. Many of his compositions have been used as background

Dave Kerman

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David Kerman (born August 24, 1959) is an American experimental rock drummer and composer, best known as the founder and member of the Los Angeles avant-rock group 5uu’s. He is also a member of the Belgian progressive rock band Present and the Israeli avant-rock band Ahvak. Kerman has been a member of the United States bands U Totem and Thinking Plague, and the Dutch band Blast. He has collaborated with several musicians, including Bob Drake, Chris Cutler and Fred Frith. Kerman lived in Israel between 2000 and 2003 and holds dual American and Israeli citizenship. He established RēR USA in 2003, the North American distributor of the British independent record label, Recommended Records, and RēR USA’s own record label, AD Hoc Records in 2006. Biography Dave Kerman was born in Torrance, California, south of Los Angeles. At the age of six he started playing with the drum sticks, and at nine he auditioned for a percussionist in his school band. In spite of failing the audition, Grateful Dead keyboardist Keith Godchaux, family friend and neighbor, recognised potential in Kerman and suggested to Kerman’s parents that they buy him a set of drums. Kerman’s first public performance was at th

Dave Newhouse

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Newhouse (born 1953) is an American progressive rock and avant-garde jazz multi-instrumentalist and composer. He was one on the founding members of the Maryland-based progressive rock/avant-jazz band, the Muffins, and has recorded nine solo albums, five of them as Manna/Mirage, a solo project he created in 2015. Biography Newhouse was born in Hawaii in 1953, but moved with his family to Maryland the same year. He began playing clarinet at school when he was nine years old, then took up tenor saxophone in junior high school. His father had played alto saxophone in his own high school band. Newhouse taught himself keyboards on his parents’ upright piano. Newhouse played in two bands, Sledge and Tunc before forming the Muffins in Maryland with guitarist Michael Zentner and bassist Billy Swann in 1973. Saxophonist Thomas Scott and drummer Paul Sears joined the Muffins a few years later. The Muffins recorded their first album, Manna/Mirage in 1978, which attracted the attention of Fred Frith and Chris Cutler of the English experimental rock group, Henry Cow. When Henry Cow disbanded later in 1978, Frith moved to New York City and performed with the Muffins in Washington, D.C. He a

Dave Porter (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dave Porter is an American composer, best known for his original score for the television series Breaking Bad (2008–2013), its prequel spin-off Better Call Saul (2015–2022) and the epilogue film El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie (2019). At Sarah Lawrence College, Porter studied classical and electronic music composition. Breaking Bad For his work on Breaking Bad, Porter has won an ASCAP Award. Bryan Cranston, who portrays Walter White, stated “With his music, Dave Porter has created another character for Breaking Bad. Evocative and meaningful, Dave’s work is an essential part of the storytelling.” Porter stated that influences on the series’ music came from discussions with Vince Gilligan, the creator of Breaking Bad, about the show having aspects of a post-modern western. For the final episodes of the series, Porter incorporated four important themes that were in previous seasons. Other work Porter has also composed music for NBC’s crime thriller The Blacklist. Personal life Porter has a wife, Jeanine, a son, and a daughter. *Released: August 28, 2012 *Label: Madison Gate Records *Formats: CD, Vinyl, digital download - ! scope=“row” Breaking Bad: Original Score From The Television S

Dave Sardy

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Stuart Sardy (born 1967), more commonly known as D. Sardy, is an American composer, musician, songwriter, and multiple Grammy winning record producer. He came to prominence as the leader of 1990s noise rock band Barkmarket before turning mostly to production work, often with alternative rock, hard rock, electronic related genres, and then to scoring feature films. Biography In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Sardy was active as a singer, songwriter and guitarist (most notably with his group Barkmarket), but since the mid-1990s, he has been more active as a producer, writer, composer and mixer. He has worked with an eclectic mix of rock, punk, alternative, electronic and industrial rock performers, and critics have called him a “Hardcore super-producer.” In 2006, Sardy won six ARIA Awards for his work with Jet and again in 2008, three more ARIA awards for Wolfmother; he has also received five Grammy Awards (for Toots and the Maytals, Rodrigo y Gabriela, OK Go, Wolfmother and Marilyn Manson) and multiple Brit Awards for Oasis, Marilyn Manson, Wolfmother and The Ting Tings. He was Grammy-nominated again in 2007 for LCD Soundsystem’s Sound of Silver and in 2010 for the Band of Ho

Dave Willey

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dave Willey (born 1963)

David A. Jaffe

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David Aaron Jaffe (born April 29, 1955) is an American electronic music composer. His compositions include over 90 pieces for orchestra, chorus, chamber ensembles, and electronic ensembles. He composed the computer music piece Silicon Valley Breakdown and published research on physical modeling of plucked and bowed strings. He also worked with Julius O. Smith to develop the Music Kit for NeXT Computers. Biography Jaffe attended Ithaca College, where he studied violin performance and music composition, completing his composition studies with Karel Husa. He then attended Bennington College to study composition, orchestration, and counterpoint with Henry Brant and electronic music with Joel Chadabe. He received a B.A. in Music and Mathematics in 1979. Jaffe received a doctorate in Musical Arts from Stanford in 1984, where he was part of the computer music group at the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab and, later, the Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA). In addition to his musical work, he researched physical modelling and ensemble timing. Composing career Jaffe has taught composition at Stanford, the University of California, San Diego, Princeton University,

David Amram

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Werner Amram III (born November 17, 1930) is an American composer, arranger, and conductor of orchestral, chamber, and choral works, many with jazz flavorings. He plays piano, French horn, Spanish guitar, and pennywhistle, and sings. Early life and education Amram was born in Philadelphia, the son of legal scholar Philip Werner Amram. He studied at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music in 1948–1949, and earned a bachelor’s degree in European history from George Washington University in 1952. Under Schuller he studied French horn. He has also worked with a wide range of folk, pop, and country figures, such as Bob Dylan, the Roche sisters, Pete Seeger, Odetta, Willie Nelson, Oscar Brand, Judy Collins, Peter Yarrow, Tom Paxton, Phil Ochs, Josh White, Patti Smith, Arlo Guthrie, Jerry Jeff Walker and others. In 1956, producer Joseph Papp hired Amram to compose scores for the New York Shakespeare Festival. Over the years, Amram composed scores for 25 of Papp’s productions, including a number of Shakespeare in the Park presentations. In 1957, Amram, along with Jack Kerouac and poets Howard Hart and Philip Lamantia, staged one of the first poetry readings with jazz at the Brata Art Galle

David Arnott

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Arnott (born 1963) is an American actor, screenwriter, living in Southern California. Among his credits, Arnott co-wrote Last Action Hero, and starred in The Last Man with Jeri Ryan. David is a member of the legendary “Pad O’ Guys” screenwriting group, including Shane Black and Fred Dekker, and is the son of banjo player Peter R. Arnott. He also provided additional voices in Happy Feet Two and Finding Dory. Arnott also appeared as “Cal Evans” in the 1995 UPN sitcom Pig Sty. He also appeared in a 1992 television remake of the classic film, Christmas in Connecticut directed by Arnold Schwarzenegger. This gives Arnott the probably unique distinction of both having written for, and having been directed by Schwarzenegger. David is also a board game enthusiast, and can be seen on GameNight!, a YouTube web series in which he and 2-4 other participants play different designer board games. Partial filmography * Amazing Stories (1986) (Umpire) (Magic Saturday) *You Again? (1986) (Dirk) (Sports Fantasy) *House II: The Second Story (1987) (Banana) * The Facts of Life (1987) (Nick Drexler) (Rumor Has It) *Three Fugitives (1989) (Bank teller) * Day by Day (1989) (Fantasy David Gannon) (The

David Avshalomov

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Avshalomov (born 6 May 1946 ) is a third generation classical composer, singer, and conductor. David is the son of Jacob Avshalomov and grandson of Aaron Avshalomov who were both distinguished classical musicians. As a composer, he has been commissioned by several orchestras such as the San Jose Chamber Orchestra, Mission Chamber Orchestra, Oddysea Chorus of Lisbon, and the Anglican Chorale of Southern California. He is also a vocalist - having served in the United States Air Force as a Singing Sergeant - and conductor. Life Son of composer Jacob Avshalomov and his wife Doris, David Avshalomov was born on May 6, 1946, in New York City, New York. He grew up in Oregon where his father, Jacob, served as the music director for the Portland Junior Symphony. Avshalomov enjoyed music from a young age, claiming that he “learned the joys of madrigal singing at home”. He studied music theory and composition throughout grade school, and eventually continued these studies at both Harvard University and the University of Washington. He later graduated from Harvard in 1967 with a baccalaureate in Music. Avshalomov was one of ninety-nine seniors to receive honors from the Phi Beta Kappa cha

David B. Doty

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David B. Doty (born 1950) is an American composer and authority on just intonation. He is the author of The Just Intonation Primer (1993, 1994, 2002). Inspired in part by the work of Harry Partch, Doty began composing in 1970 and in 1975 co-founded the San Francisco-based ensemble Other Music with Henry S. Rosenthal and Dale S. Soules. After Doty studied intonation with Lou Harrison, members of Other Music built an American gamelan based on a 14-tone-per-octave just tuning designed by Doty and Soules (see Systêma Ametabolon for comparison). Other Music performed extensively in Northern California using these instruments during the years 1977–1981. Three of Doty’s compositions from this period were featured on Other Music’s 1980 LP Prime Numbers. Other Music ceased performing publicly in 1981, but in 1983 recorded and released a studio album, Incidents Out of Context, featuring compositions combining gamelan with synthesizers and other acoustic and electro-acoustic instruments. After the dissolution of Other Music in 1983, Doty began composing for MIDI instruments and sequencers, which he has continued to do into the 21st century. Seven of these compositions in just intonation are i

David Baker (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Nathaniel Baker Jr. (December 21, 1931 – March 26, 2016) was an American jazz composer, conductor, and musician from Indianapolis, as well as a professor of jazz studies at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. Baker is best known as an educator and founder of the jazz studies program. From 1991 to 2012, he was conductor and musical and artistic director for the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra. He has more than 65 recordings, 70 books, and 400 articles to his credit. He received the James Smithson Medal from the Smithsonian Institution, an American Jazz Masters Award, a National Association of Jazz Educators Hall of Fame Award, a Sagamore of the Wabash award, and a Governor’s Arts Award from the State of Indiana. Baker also held leadership positions in several arts and music associations. The Indiana Historical Society named Baker an Indiana Living Legend in 2001. The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts named him a Living Jazz Legend in 2007. Early life and education David Nathaniel Baker Jr. was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, on December 21, 1931, to Patress Lasley Baker and David N. Baker Sr., a postal carrier. His siblings included two sisters, S

David Behrman

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Behrman (born August 16, 1937) is an American composer and a pioneer of computer music. In 1966, Behrman co-founded Sonic Arts Union with fellow composers Robert Ashley, Alvin Lucier and Gordon Mumma. He was also the producer of Columbia Records’ late 1960s Music of Our Time series, which introduced recordings by Terry Riley, John Cage, Steve Reich, and Pauline Oliveros to a wider audience. Behrman wrote the music for Merce Cunningham’s dances Walkaround Time (1968), Rebus (1975), Pictures (1984) and Eyespace 40 (2007). In 1978, he released his debut album On the Other Ocean, a pioneering work combining computer music with live performance. Biography Early life and education Behrman’s father, S. N. Behrman, was a successful playwright and Hollywood screenplay writer. His mother Elza Heifetz Behrman was the sister of violinist Jascha Heifetz. Behrman attended the Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, where his classmates included Carl Andre, Hollis Frampton and Frank Stella. There he also developed a lifelong friendship with composer and pianist Frederic Rzewski. While attending summer camp at Indian Hill in 1953 he was taught modern music by Wallingford Riegger. He rece

David Borden

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Russell Borden (born December 25, 1938, in Boston, Massachusetts) is an American composer and keyboard player of minimalist music. David Borden was educated at the Eastman School of Music and Harvard University. At Harvard he studied with Leon Kirchner and Randall Thompson, and at Eastman with Bernard Rogers and Howard Hanson. He was also a Fulbright student in Berlin Germany, where he studied at the Hochschule für Musik. His first composition teachers were jazz musicians Jimmy Giuffre and Jaki Byard. He collaborates and performs with his son, Gabriel Borden and stepson, Sam Godin. Borden resides in Ithaca, NY with his wife, Rebecca Godin. He is the retired founder and Director of the Digital Music Program (now the Cornell Electroacoustic Music Center) at Cornell University. In addition to his work with electronics and the Mother Mallard ensemble, Borden has written music for various chamber and vocal ensembles. He is also an accomplished jazz pianist. Borden’s compositions are similar to the repetitive minimalist style of Philip Glass, Steve Reich, and Terry Riley. Borden is also very interested in counterpoint, best demonstrated in his large scale series of works The Contin

David Braham

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Braham (c.1834 – April 11, 1905) was a London-born musical theatre composer, most famous for his work with his son-in-law Edward Harrigan (1844-1911), and Tony Hart (1855-1891). He has been called “the American Offenbach”. Early life (1834–1873) David Braham was born in London in 1834. As a young man, he aspired to become a professional musician and began studying the harp. However, because he was unable to get his bulky instrument on board a stagecoach, he later switched to the violin. He proved to be an adept violinist, performing in concerts at a young age. The Braham family immigrated to New York City when David was 15. Upon arriving in New York, Braham began working as a violinist in the orchestra accompanying the Pony Moore Minstrels. He played in the pit orchestras of various New York auditoriums, headed an 18-piece orchestra at the New Canterbury concert saloon at 585 Broadway, produced by William Horace Lingard at the Theatre Comique in 1869. Braham’s success as a composer continued through the early 1870s, during which time he wrote numbers for such performers as James McKee, then-child star Annie Yeamans, and P. T. Barnum performer General Tom Thumb. In 1985, a mus

David C. Johnson

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David C. Johnson (January 30, 1940, in Batavia, New York – October 28, 2021, in Basel) was an American composer, flautist, and performer of live electronic music. Life and career Johnson studied, among other places, at Harvard University (M.A. in composition 1964), with Nadia Boulanger in Paris, and at the Cologne Courses for New Music in 1964–1965, 1965–1966, and 1966–1967. In 1966–1967, he was an independent collaborator at the Electronic Studio of the WDR, where he assisted Karlheinz Stockhausen with the production of his electronic work Hymnen. He also operated the live-electronics in the first performances of the chamber-orchestra version of Stockhausen’s Mixtur (1967), and in the Darmstadt collaborative works directed by Stockhausen, Ensemble in 1967 and Musik für ein Haus in 1968. In 1968, Johnson was instructor of electronic music at the Cologne Courses for New Music. From its formation in Cologne in 1968, he collaborated with the experimental beat group, later known as Can, formed by bass guitarist Holger Schüring (later known as Holger Czukay), keyboardist Irmin Schmidt, guitarist Michael Karoli and drummer Jaki Liebezeit. He left in 1969, disappointed at their growing ro

David Chesky

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Chesky is an American pianist, composer, producer, arranger, and co-founder of the independent, audiophile label Chesky Records. He is also co-founder and CEO of HDtracks, an online music store that sells high-resolution digital music. Chesky is considered a technological and musical innovator with eclectic interests. He has won Independent Music Awards and received Grammy Award nominations. He has written jazz tunes, orchestral and chamber music, opera, ballet, and a rap symphony. Beginnings At his mother’s insistence, Chesky started piano lessons at the age of 5. In his teens he had less interest in rock and roll music, with its verse-chorus structure, than in classical and jazz. He liked Oscar Peterson, the Buddy Rich Big Band, George Gershwin, and the Latin music he heard while growing up in Miami. In 1974, at the age of 17, he moved to New York City to pursue a career as a musician. He studied privately with classical composer David Del Tredici and jazz pianist John Lewis. Writing, recording, and performing In 1978, he formed a jazz fusion group called the David Chesky Big Band, which included Michael Brecker, Randy Brecker, and Bob James, and released the album Rush Hou

David Conte

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Conte (born December 20, 1955) is an American composer who has written over 150 works published by E.C. Schirmer (a division of ECS Publishing), including six operas, a musical, works for chorus, solo voice, orchestra, chamber music, organ, piano, guitar, and harp. Conte has received commissions from Chanticleer, the Oakland Symphony, Dayton Philharmonic, Stockton Symphony, the Atlantic Classical Orchestra, the San Francisco Symphony Chorus, Harvard University Chorus, the Men’s Glee Clubs of Cornell University and the University of Notre Dame, GALA Choruses from the cities of San Francisco, New York, Boston, Atlanta, Seattle, and Washington, D.C., the American Guild of Organists (2004, 2009, 2014, 2024, 2025), Sonoma City Opera, and the Gerbode Foundation (for his opera America Tropical). He was honored with the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA) Brock Commission in 2007 for his work The Nine Muses, and in 2016 he won the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) Art Song Composition Award for his work American Death Ballads. In 2024, he was named “Composer of the Year” by the American Guild of Organists. Education and career Conte attended public schools i

David Cope

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Howell Cope (May 17, 1941 – May 4, 2025) was an American author, composer, scientist and Dickerson Professor of Music at UC Santa Cruz. His primary area of research involved artificial intelligence and music; he wrote programs and algorithms that can analyze existing music and create new compositions in the style of the original input music. He taught the groundbreaking summer workshop in Workshop in Algorithmic Computer Music (WACM) that was open to the public as well as a general education course entitled Artificial Intelligence and Music for enrolled UCSC students. Cope was also co-founder and CTO Emeritus of Recombinant Inc., a music technology company. He died of congestive heart failure on May 4, 2025, at the age of 83. Composition EMI His EMI (Experiments in Musical Intelligence, pronounced “Emmy” ) software has produced works in the style of various composers, some of which have been commercially recorded—ranging from short pieces to full-length operas. In 1981, he received a commission to compose an opera, but had a “composer’s block”, so he began writing EMI (on an Apple desktop computer) to understand and modify his own style, and 8 years after receiving the commis

David Cornwall

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Randolph Cornwall (May 18, 1937 – November 7, 2006) was an American composer and systems engineer. He wrote music for piano, horns, woodwinds and orchestra, composing more than 40 works in a span of less than five years leading up to the time of his death in November 2006. Biography Cornwall was born in Denver, Colorado. Trained as a trombonist, Cornwall performed professionally with the New York City Opera and D’Oyly Carte Opera Company at the Central City Opera, where he performed in the world premiere of The Ballad of Baby Doe by Douglas Moore. After studying math and physics at Harvard College for one and a half years, he dropped out in 1957. Returning to Denver, he worked a systems engineer for United Airlines while performing for the Denver Philharmonic Orchestra (then known as the Denver Businessmen’s Orchestra) and studying under its conductor, Antonia Brico. He was drafted by the US Army in 1961 and contributed to developing large systems for the Pentagon’s National Military Command and Control Center, where he was named Chief Programmer for global nuclear war-game exercises. After receiving an honorable discharge from the army, Cornwall returned to the airline indus

David Darling (musician)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Darling (March 4, 1941 – January 8, 2021) Music career Darling was born on March 4, 1941, in Elkhart, Indiana. He was interested in music from an early age, beginning piano when he was four, cello at ten, and string bass in high school. He studied classical cello at Indiana State University and after graduating remained there another four years as a teacher. He worked as a studio musician in Nashville, Tennessee and was a member of the Paul Winter Consort until 1978. During the following year, he was part of the chamber jazz group Gallery with Ralph Towner and released his first solo album, Journal October. In 2007 he recorded The Darling Conversations, with Julie Weber discussing his music philosophy. It was issued by Manifest Spirit Records. In January 2009, Darling released the Grammy-winning Prayer for Compassion, a follow-up of his earlier 8-String Religion, both on the Curve Blue label. Other activities In 1986, Darling joined Young Audiences, an organization that seeks to educate children about music and the arts through school programs. In the same year, he founded Music for People, which seeks to encourage self-expression through musical improvisation. His teaching m

David DeBoor Canfield

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David DeBoor Canfield (born September 23, 1950) is an American composer of classical music. Early life and education David DeBoor Canfield (birth name, David Ellis Canfield) was born in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on September 23, 1950. Early musical studies were with his father, John Canfield, who taught his son piano, violin and music theory beginning when he was six years old. Canfield’s first juvenile compositions date from 1957 when he was seven, but throughout high school and the first two and a half years of college, he pursued studies in chemistry, only changing his major to music halfway through his junior year. Graduate studies in composition were undertaken at Indiana University, where Canfield studied primarily with John Eaton, as well as with Frederick Fox and Bernhard Heiden. He received his Master of Music in 1977 and Doctor of Music in 1983. Not wishing to pursue a career in academia, he instead began in 1978 a business, Ars Antiqua, selling classical LP records around the world, becoming the largest such dealer for several decades. All the while, however, he continued to compose, building up a catalog of around 200 mature works. It was in graduate school that he repl

David Del Tredici

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Walter Del Tredici (March 16, 1937 – November 18, 2023) was an American composer. He won a Pulitzer Prize for Music and was a Guggenheim and Woodrow Wilson fellow. Del Tredici is considered a pioneer of the neo-romantic movement. He was also described by the Los Angeles Times as “one of our most flamboyant outsider composers”. He came from a non-musical family and began his musical life as an aspiring concert pianist at the age of twelve, taking piano lessons with German concert pianist Bernhard Abramovitch. If he had not been a pianist, he said, he would have become a florist. Abramovitsch encouraged him to be “very creative” in his playing, which he later cited as prepared him for composing. “I was only interested in playing … great sprawling things like the Schumann Fantasy, that the performer had to mold and shape”, he reflected. Thus he learned how to “sustain a musical thread so that it was never broken”. He debuted with the San Francisco Symphony at age 16 and later performed Liszt and Tchaikovsky concertos under Arthur Fiedler. Then he attended the University of California, Berkeley, where he continued studying piano. He played primarily Romantic works. He also play

David Diamond (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Leo Diamond (July 9, 1915 – June 13, 2005) was an American composer of classical music. He is considered one of the preeminent American composers of his generation. Many of his works are tonal or modal. His early compositions are typically triadic, often with widely spaced harmonies, giving them a distinctly American tone, but some of his works are consciously French in style. His later style became more chromatic. Life and career He was born in Rochester, New York, and studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music and the Eastman School of Music under Bernard Rogers, also receiving lessons from Roger Sessions in New York City and Nadia Boulanger in Paris. He won a number of awards including three Guggenheim Fellowships. Diamond’s most popular piece is Rounds (1944) for string orchestra. Among his other works are eleven symphonies (the last in 1993), concertos including three for violin, eleven string quartets, music for wind ensemble, other chamber music, piano pieces and vocal music. He composed the musical theme heard on the CBS Radio Network broadcast Hear It Now (1950–51) and its TV successor, See It Now (1951–58). Diamond was named honorary composer-in-residence of the Se

David Evan Jones (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Evan Jones (born 1946) is an American pianist and composer of chamber music, opera, and computer music. Jones was a student of composers Roger Reynolds and Pauline Oliveros at University of California, San Diego. After serving as Composer-in-Residence at York University (England), he joined the faculty at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire in the 1980s before becoming professor of music at University of California, Santa Cruz. Jones has composed in residence at IRCAM in Paris, Elektronmusikstudion (EMS) in Stockholm, and at Bregman Electronic Music Studio at Dartmouth College where he co-founded, with Jon Appleton, the Dartmouth graduate program in Electro-Acoustic Music. Works Jones has written articles and created compositions that explore structural relationships between music and phonetics. These include compositions such as Pashanti—The Nine Billion Names of God, Scritto, Still Life in Wood and Metal, Still Life Dancing, and the five pieces featured on Centaur Records CRC3500 entitled News from Afar. He has also written libretti and music for two chamber operas. Bardos, the most prominent of these, had its professional premier in 2004 in Hoam Hall, Seoul, Korea. Jones also

David First

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David First (born David Hirsch, August 20, 1953) is an American composer and guitarist. His music most often deals with drones and interference beats, the latter aligning his music with that of Alvin Lucier. He has led the World Casio Quartet, Joy Buzzers, and The Notekillers which originally existed from 1977–81 and reformed in 2004. He is also a member of Matter Waves, which includes Kid Millions on drums and Bernard Gann on bass, and the music collective New Party Systems. Career David First played with Cecil Taylor at Carnegie Hall. He studied guitar & jazz theory with Dennis Sandole. He also audited analog & computer synthesis classes at Princeton University. He befriended a grad-student there who allowed him unlimited access to the largely abandoned electronic music studio. He composed his first works in the medium there in after-hours sessions. His albums include 1991’s Resolver, instrumental pieces influenced by minimalism and 2002’s relatively pop-oriented Universary, which consists of “songs and drones”. More recent releases include 2010’s We’re Here to Help (Prophase Records) by The Notekillers and Privacy Issues, a 3-CD set of droneworks on the XI label. In 1995 First,

David Fleming (composer)

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David Fleming is an American composer for films, television, and interactive media. He is known for collaborating with various Remote Control Productions composers including Hans Zimmer, Atli Örvarsson, Lorne Balfe, Steve Jablonsky and Tom Holkenborg. In 2024, he won the ASCAP Screen Music Award for Television Score of the Year for his work on HBO’s The Last of Us with Gustavo Santaolalla. He is also known for scoring films and series such as Blue Planet II, Hillbilly Elegy, Americana, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Damsel, The Alto Knights and Superman. Career Early career David Fleming studied musical composition at State University of New York at Purchase. From there, he started his career in New York advertising companies, creating music for ringtones and liquor commercials. He won the BMI Foundation’s Pete Carpenter Fellowship and moved to Los Angeles where he began writing music for major films. 2017–present In 2017, Fleming co-composed the BBC series Blue Planet II (2017) alongside Hans Zimmer, starting a collaborative relationship that saw Fleming contribute to films like The Lion King (2019), Dune (2021), and Top Gun: Maverick (2022), and co-compose films together such as Hillbilly Ele

David Garner (composer)

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David Ross Garner (born August 4, 1954) is an American composer of opera and vocal, instrumental, and chamber music. He is also an educator, on faculty at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. Early life, education, and personal life David Garner was born in South Side, Chicago. He spent most of his childhood in Lincoln, Nebraska and Lake Oswego, Oregon upon his parents’ relocations for academic positions. He was given piano and cello lessons throughout his childhood and performed in recitals and with youth orchestras. Garner attended UCLA as a Classics major for two years before deciding that music was a better match. He left in 1974 and returned home to Oregon where he pursued music privately, playing blues, rock fusion, and classical piano while he prepared to audition at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music for the piano performance program. He was originally rejected from the program and spent six months as an adult extension student before auditioning again and being accepted in 1976. He remained in that position until 2000, when he elected to take a position in the Composition Department. He has remained in that position since and currently teaches composition to a sel

David Gillingham

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David R. Gillingham (born October 20, 1947) is an American contemporary composer, who is known for his works for concert band and percussion ensemble. Biography He attended the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh for his undergraduate degree in Music Education, after which he went to Vietnam where he served in the army, playing in various army bands. After returning to America, he became a band teacher for a few years, before going to Michigan State University for his PhD in Music Composition/Music Theory, after which he pursued a career as a composer while also serving as a university professor. In 1990, his concert band piece Heroes Lost and Fallen, a piece about the Vietnam War, won the International Barlow Composition Contest. He retired as professor of music theory and composition at Central Michigan University in 2016. Selected works Some of his recent works which have become very popular in the concert band and percussion repertoire include: *Paschal Dances (1988) *Heroes Lost and Fallen (1990) *Serenade for Winds and Percussion (1990) *Stained Glass (1992) *Sacrificial Rite (1993) *Apocalyptic Dreams (1995) *Prophecy of the Earth (1995) *Waking Angels (1996) *Concertino for Fou

David Hegarty

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David Howard Hegarty (born March 1, 1945, in Mount Clemens, Michigan) is an American organist and composer. He has served as organist at the Castro Theatre in San Francisco since 1978. Career Hegarty’s interest in music was inspired at an early age by his father, who was a trombonist. He began playing the accordion at age 7, but was soon introduced to the organ at the church where his mother did cleaning. In an interview Hegarty recounted that when his mother went to the church to clean in the evenings, “I wouldn’t miss it. I’d go there with her so I could play the organ.” Hegarty taught himself how to play the organ, and by the time he reached high school he had a job as a church organist. He continued his study of music and the organ in college, receiving a B.A. in music from Loma Linda University in 1968, and going on to earn a master’s degree in organ performance from Andrews University in 1970 where he studied organ with C. Warren Becker. He also published articles on organ performance technique. In 1993 he founded Hegarty Music Press to develop and publish instructional material for organ performance, and to publish his original compositions. He also published works by the le

David Hogan (composer)

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H. David Hogan (July 1, 1949 – July 17, 1996 off East Moriches, New York) was an American composer and musical director of CIGAP (Le Choeur Int’l Gai de Paris), Hogan and CIGAP baritone Jean-Paul Galland were killed when TWA Flight 800 exploded off the coast of Long Island, killing all 230 passengers and crew on board. Career A native of Virginia, Hogan graduated from the Peabody Institute at Johns Hopkins University with a bachelor’s degree in 1971, Prior to his work in France, Hogan helped develop the choir at San Francisco’s St. Francis Lutheran Church. When the previous musical director of CIGAP resigned three weeks before its auditions, Hogan was tapped to fill in the position. During his career, Hogan had also been tenor soloist with the Washington National Cathedral (Episcopal) in Washington, DC. Personal life Hogan was married to East Bay singer and choir conductor Terry Hogan Johnson. The couple had a daughter named Hilary, who also attended the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore. Choral works *Magnificat and Nunc dimittis “Washington”, unison treble or SATB/organ (written for the Choir Washington National Cathedral and Douglas Major) *O Gracious Light, unison choi

David Holcenberg

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David Holcenberg is an American musical director, orchestrator, musical arranger, conductor, composer, and keyboardist. He is best known for his musical direction of Broadway works such as Seussical, Mamma Mia!, Ghost, Bye Bye Birdie, The Story of My Life, Good Vibrations, Titanic, Rocky, Show Boat, Matilda the Musical, Groundhog Day, and MJ the Musical. Holcenberg wrote music and lyrics for Bingo! The Winning Musical alongside Michael Heitzman and Ilene Reid. Bingo first premiered in 2001 at the Hermosa Beach Playhouse. Following a production at the Ordway Center of the Performing Arts the same year and at the Adirondack Theatre Festival in 2003, Bingo premiered off-broadway at St. Luke’s Theater on November 7, 2005. Bingo! The Winning Musical is available for licensing by Concord Theatricals. Holcenberg was nominated for a Tony Award and won a Drama Desk Award in 2022 for orchestrations for MJ the Musical. He was also nominated for a Grammy in 2023 for Best Musical Theater Album for MJ The Musical. Holcenberg was the music director for Bartram and Hill’s adaptation of Timothy Findley’s 1984 novel Not Wanted on the Voyage, staged at Northwestern University in 2010 as part of the A

David Holsinger

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David Rex Holsinger is an American composer and conductor writing primarily for concert band. Holsinger is a graduate of Hardin-Central High School in Hardin, Missouri, Central Methodist University, the University of Central Missouri, and the University of Kansas. Conducting positions In February 1992, Holsinger guest conducted the District VI Symphonic Band in Virginia. In 1999, following 15 years of service as music minister, worship leader, and composer in residence to Shady Grove Church in Grand Prairie, Texas, he joined the School of Music faculty at Lee University, Cleveland, Tennessee, creating the Lee University Wind Ensemble, which he conducted until 2023. Holsinger’s duties included teaching advanced instrumental conducting and composition. In 1999, Holsinger conducted the Kentucky All-State Symphonic Band. Some of his works that were played and recorded included To Tame The Perilous Skies, Consider the Uncommon Man, and On An American Spiritual. In the spring of 2000, Holsinger conducted the Georgia Southern Symphonic Band and the Georgia Southern Symphonic Wind Ensemble in Statesboro, GA. Over the past several years, Holsinger has been named a National Patron of Delta O

David Laganella

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David Laganella (born 1974) is an American composer based in the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in the United States. Formative years and family Raised in Haddonfield, New Jersey, Laganella graduated from Haddonfield Memorial High School in 1992, studied Guitar and Jazz at Berklee College of Music then pursued music composition degrees from New York University and the University of Pennsylvania, where he received his PhD in music composition at the age of 27. He has resided in Woodbury, New Jersey with his wife and their son. Career His music has received awards from The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), The Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, The American Composers Orchestra, The Meet the Composer Fund and The American Composers Forum. He currently holds the position of Professor of Music and Department Chair at Wesley College, Delaware. Laganella is the author of the book, The Composer’s Guide to the Electric Guitar (Mel Bay) which is a guide for composers who want to use the instrument in their music. References External links *https://web.archive.org/web/20100617083415/http://music.wesley.edu/faculty.php *https://web.archive.org/web/20110722133246

David Lang (composer)

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David Lang (born January 8, 1957) is an American composer living in New York City. Co-founder of the musical collective Bang on a Can, he was awarded the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Music for The Little Match Girl Passion, which went on to win a 2010 Grammy Award for Best Small Ensemble Performance by Paul Hillier and Theatre of Voices. Lang was nominated for an Academy Award for “Simple Song #3” from the film Youth. Early life and education Lang was born in Los Angeles, California. Lang is of Jewish descent. In his youth he played trombone. After completing his undergraduate degree at Stanford University, he went to the University of Iowa; he says, “There was a teacher in composition at the University of Iowa named Martin Jenni, and he had come to Stanford as a leave replacement to teach for a semester. And I just thought he was amazing. He knew a lot of stuff that I’d never heard of before. So when I thought about grad school, I went to Iowa. I was happy I did. It was really a kind of golden age. I really loved it.” Lang went on to earn a Doctorate of Musical Arts at Yale University in 1989. In addition to Jenni, his teachers have included Henri Lazarof, Lou Harrison, Richard Hervig,

David Liptak

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David Liptak (born December 18, 1949) is an American composer and music educator who is a professor of composition and the current chair of the Composition Department at the Eastman School of Music of the University of Rochester in Rochester, New York. Formative years and family Liptak was born on December 18, 1949 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and has been a resident of Rochester, New York for more than thirty years. Music career Since 1987, Liptak has been a member of the composition faculty of the Eastman School of Music of the University of Rochester, where he holds the positions of professor of composition and chair of the Composition Department. From 1976 to 1980, Liptak was a member of the composition and theory faculty of Michigan State University, where he initiated and taught courses in Schenker analysis and conducted the student New Music Ensemble. In 1980 he joined the faculty of the University of Illinois, where his duties included directing the Contemporary Chamber Players, a professional new music ensemble, with which he presented a number of premiere performances. Residencies have included the Seal Bay Music Festival in the summer of 1999 and the Brevard Music Festiv

David Loeb (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Loeb (born May 11, 1939) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Born in New York City, he has written extensively for early music instruments such as the viol, as well as instruments from China and Japan. He teaches at the Mannes College The New School for Music, and has additionally served as a member of the composition faculty at the Curtis Institute of Music. His notable students include Jennifer Higdon, Jeremy Beck, and Craig Walsh. Works * Ancient Legends * Andorran Fantasy * Balinese Fantasies (Published by ALRY Publications) * Between Sea and Sky * Cantata for Oboe and String Orchestra * Caprices for Solo Mandolin Vol. 1-2 * Chanson Malagache * A Distant Land Unfurled * Fantasia on a Theme of Yuize * Fantasia on Pyong-si-jo No. 1-2 * Fantasia sobre “Una Hiji Tiene del Rey” * Fantasias for the Japanese Consort * Ganya * Imagined Landscapes * Keisho for Theorbo Solo * The Meeting of Sea and Clouds * Nocturne for Mandolin and Guitar * Prelude for Two Consorts * Quartet for flute, guitar, violin, and cello * Riddles * Rivermist in Summer * Sonata No. 1-6 for Cello Solo * Sonata for Trombone and Piano No. 1 (1998) * Sonata for Trombone and Piano No. 2 (200

David Lucas (composer)

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David Lucas (born David Helfman April 21, 1937) is an American rock and roll composer, singer, and music producer. He has written thousands of commercial jingles, such as AT&T’s “Reach Out and Touch Someone.” In 1981, he received a Clio Award for composing the music to Pepsi’s “Catch That Pepsi Spirit.” As a record producer, he worked with many new artists such as Blue Öyster Cult. On the 1976 Blue Öyster Cult song “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper” which he co-produced, Lucas sang backup vocals and came up with the idea for using a cowbell, parodied by Christopher Walken in the “More cowbell” skit on Saturday Night Live. In June 2011, Lucas was inducted into Buffalo’s Music Hall of Fame. Biography Early years (1940s–1960s) Lucas was born David Helfman on April 21, 1937, in Buffalo, New York. By the age of four, he was singing with his parents in the Buffalo area, both at venues and on local radio. At the age of nineteen, Lucas started promoting records, choosing artists such as the young Paul Anka, Frankie Avalon, Sam Cooke, and The Everly Brothers, and encouraging local DJs to play their music. He was the top record promotion man in the northeastern United States until he was drafted into

David Maslanka

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David Maslanka (August 30, 1943 – August 7, 2017) was an American composer of Polish descent who wrote for a variety of genres, including works for choir, wind ensemble, chamber music, and symphony orchestra. Best known for his wind ensemble compositions, Maslanka published over 150 pieces, including ten symphonies, eight of them for concert band, over 15 concerti, and a full Mass. His compositional style is rhythmically intense and complex, highly tonal and melodically oriented. His compositions have been performed throughout the United States, Europe, Australia, Canada, and Japan. His Tenth Symphony was orchestrated by his son, Matthew Maslanka, as it was incomplete at the composer’s death. Life Maslanka received his Bachelor of Music from the Oberlin Conservatory (1961–1965) and went on to earn a Master of Music and Doctor of Philosophy from Michigan State University (1965–71). During his undergraduate work, Maslanka also spent one year studying abroad at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria (1963–64). He served on the faculty of the State University of New York at Geneseo from 1970 to 1974; of Sarah Lawrence College from 1975 to 1980; of New York University from 1980 to 1981; and

David Newman (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Louis Newman (born March 11, 1954) is an American composer and conductor known particularly for his film scores. In a career spanning more than thirty years, he has composed music for nearly 100 feature films, as well as the 1997 and 1998 versions of the 20th Century Fox fanfare. He received an Academy Award nomination for writing the score to the 1997 film Anastasia, contributing to the Newmans being the most nominated Academy Award extended family, with a collective 92 nominations in various music categories. Life and career Newman was born on March 11, 1954, in Los Angeles, California, the son of Mississippi-born Martha Louis (née Montgomery) and Hollywood composer Alfred Newman. His paternal grandparents were Russian Jewish immigrants. He is the older brother of Thomas Newman, Maria Newman and the cousin of Randy Newman, all of whom are also composers. He is also the nephew of composers Lionel Newman and Emil Newman, and first cousin, once removed, of musician Joey Newman. An accomplished violinist, and successful concert conductor, Newman was educated at the University of Southern California. From the late 1970s until the early 1980s he played violin on most of John Will

David Noon

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Noon (born 23 July 1946) is a contemporary classical composer and educator. He has written over 200 works from opera to chamber music. Noon’s composition teachers have included Karl Kohn, Darius Milhaud, Charles Jones, Yehudi Wyner, Mario Davidovsky, and Wlodzimierz Kotonski. He was a distinguished member of the faculty at the Manhattan School of Music for 30 years. Biography David Noon was born on 23 July 1946 in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. He is of Pennsylvania Dutch, Welsh, and American Indian heritage. His formal musical education began at the age of 8 when he learned to play the clarinet. Subsequently, he took bassoon, flute, piccolo, and piano lessons. Throughout his childhood, he frequently performed in choirs, bands, orchestras, and chamber music ensembles. During his collegiate years at Pomona College, he continued to sing and play bassoon and piano. He also began the systematic study of composition. Following his undergraduate education, he attended New York University to study Medieval music with Gustave Reese. After receiving an MA in musicology at NYU, he attended Yale University, where he received an MMA and a DMA in composition. In 1972–73, he was a Fulbright Fell

David P. Sartor

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David Sartor (rhymes with “Carter”) is an American composer, conductor, and educator, and is the founder and music director of the Parthenon Chamber Orchestra. Composing and Conducting Sartor is the composer of Synergistic Parable for symphonic band, which won the American Bandmasters Association’s Ostwald Award for Symphonic Band Music, and of Polygon, for brass quintet, which received the National Fine Arts Award. Other notable works include Metamorphic Fanfare, commissioned by the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra; Thy Light Is Come for chorus, organ, brass and timpani, commissioned by Christ Episcopal Church in Nashville and showcased at the Washington National Cathedral by the Cathedral Choral Society; Black Ball Counts Double for string orchestra, which received a commendation in England’s Oare International Composing Competition; Reveries, for string orchestra, winner of the Burlington (Vermont) Chamber Orchestra’s 2009 Composer Competition as well as a finalist in the Fauxharmonic Orchestra’s Adagio Composition Contest; and Concerto for Orchestra, a finalist in the Columbia Symphony Orchestra’s American Composer Competition. A fourteen-time honoree in the American Prizes, nation

David Robidoux

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Robidoux is an American score composer. He writes film scores for various sporting films and networks, and primarily composes for NFL Films. Career Robidoux is originally from Reading, Pennsylvania. After graduating from Berklee College of Music with degrees in audio engineering and film scoring, he began working for NFL Films in 1991 as an audio engineer, and began composing alongside music director Tom Hedden, who had joined the company the year before. Their first score, 75 Seasons: The History of the NFL, earned them the Emmy Award for Best Musical Score. They would win four more Emmys for 75 Seasons, along with the productions Favre 4ever, Emmitt Smith: Run With History, NFL Century: In Their Own Words and Unitas. In 2000, Robidoux worked with vocal group Boyz II Men on the song So Amazing. The theme would also be used in EA Sports’ NASCAR video games starting with that year’s NASCAR 2005: Chase for the Cup (which uses a rock version of the theme). The following year, a modified version of the music was used in the film Herbie: Fully Loaded (which mixes the “Thunder” theme with the Herbie theme) Also in 2005, Robidoux created The Lombardi Trophy Theme, which became the o

David Roitman

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David Roitman (November 1, 1884 – April 4, 1943) was a Russian-American hazzan and composer. Early in his career he worked as cantor in villages and cities in Russia such as Vilna and Odessa. In 1921 he immigrated to the United States and eventually joined the Congregation Shaare Zedek. Renowned for his lyric tenor compositional recordings and cantorial recitatives, Roitman became known as “the poet of the pulpit”. Biography Roitman was born to Mordecai and Mariom Roitman on November 1, 1884 at the Jusefpol village in the Russian province of Podolia. At the age of 12, he became the choral assistant to a cantor at the nearby town Lidvinke. He was then apprenticed to a series of cantors starting with Yankel Sorover and including Zeidel Rovner. Roitman would remain with Rovner throughout his teenage years. He studied music at Yeshiva College and continued his studies as a post-graduate at the Leningrad Conservatory. Roitman worked as a cantor for five years at the Jewish Temple of Elisavetgrad, starting in 1904. From 1909 to 1912, he worked as cantor at Vilna. He became the chief cantor at the Ginsbourgh Synagogue in Leningrad starting in 1912, until the October Revolution of 1917 des

David Rosenboom

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Rosenboom (born 1947 in Fairfield, Iowa) is a composer, performer, interdisciplinary artist, author, and educator known for his work in American experimental music. Rosenboom has explored various forms of music, languages for improvisation, new techniques in scoring for ensembles, multi-disciplinary composition and performance, cross-cultural collaborations, performance art and literature, interactive multi-media, new instrument technologies, generative algorithmic systems, art-science research and philosophy, and extended musical interface with the human nervous system. He is a pioneer in the use of neurofeedback and compositional algorithms. An active teacher, he was Faculty at The Herb Alpert School of Music at California Institute of the Arts from 1990 to 2023, and before that taught at other institutions such as Mills College, York University, and the Center for Creative and Performing Arts at the State University of New York in Buffalo. His students include Jin Hi Kim and Gino Robair. As a young student, he studied (never finishing an undergraduate degree) composition, performance, and electronic music at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with Salvatore Mar

David Rothenberg

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David Rothenberg (born 1962) is a professor of philosophy and music at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, with a special interest in animal sounds as music. He is also a composer and jazz musician whose books and recordings reflect a longtime interest in understanding other species such as singing insects by making music with them. Life and work Rothenberg graduated from Harvard and took his PhD from Boston University. As an undergraduate at Harvard, Rothenberg created his own major to combine music with communication. He traveled in Europe after graduation, playing jazz clarinet. Listening to the recorded song of a hermit thrush, he heard structure that reminded him of a Miles Davis solo. Because of Rothenberg’s study of animal song and his experimental interactions with animal music, he is often called an “interspecies musician.” Rothenberg is a professor of philosophy and music at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, with a special interest in animal sounds as music. Publications Books Rothenberg’s book Why Birds Sing: A Journey into the Mystery of Bird Song (Basic Books, 2005) was inspired by an impromptu duet in March 2000 with a laughingthrush at the National Aviary i

David Sanford (composer)

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David William Sanford (born 1963 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) is an American composer who is also a jazz bandleader. Biography Sanford was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1963, into a musical family. His parents and one of his grandfathers were choir leaders, his other grandfather was a jazz trumpeter, and his great-grandmother Mozie Bass had composed songs, and music for church pageants; he also has a brother who is a music teacher and singer in Colorado, where the family moved. The young David Sanford acquired an enthusiasm for big band music early on, playing trombone from around the age of ten. He went on to major in music at the University of Northern Colorado, and earned master’s degrees in theory and composition at the New England Conservatory of Music. In 1991, supported partly by a Guggenheim Fellowship and partly by a job in the financial services industry, he undertook doctoral studies at Princeton, where he completed his dissertation on Miles Davis in 1998. That same year he joined the faculty at Mount Holyoke College, where he teaches theory, composition, and various history courses, including one on music of the 1970s. In 2002, the Rome Prize took Sanford to Italy fo

David Snow (composer)

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David Jason Snow (born 1954 in Providence, Rhode Island) is an American composer. Snow studied composition with Samuel Adler, Warren Benson, and Joseph Schwantner at the Eastman School of Music, Jacob Druckman at the Yale School of Music, and Arthur Berger and Martin Boykan at Brandeis University. At the Eastman School, Snow was awarded the Sernoffsky, McCurdy, and Howard Hanson prizes in composition; Yale awarded him a Bradley-Keeler Memorial Scholarship and the Frances E. Osborne Kellogg Prize in composition. Snow has been the recipient of awards, fellowships, residencies and commissions from BMI, the National Association of Composers/USA, the National Federation of Music Clubs, the Annapolis Fine Arts Foundation, the ASCAP Foundation, the College Band Directors Association, the National Endowment for the Arts, Res Musica Baltimore, the Maryland State Arts Council, the Renée B. Fisher Foundation, Trio Indiana, SoundMoves, Pastiche, the Arts Council of Montgomery County (Maryland), Yaddo, and the Millay Colony for the Arts. Music Snow’s music has been performed in concert by the Ensemble InterContemporain, the American Brass Quintet, the Manhattan Chamber Orchestra, the Eastman Pe

David Strother

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Strother is an American musician and composer. Strother is based in Los Angeles and plays alternative violin. He has been featured in recordings, on stage and in film since the 1980s. Strother has played for numerous local Los Angeles bands, including Lawrence Lebo, Long John Oliva, and The Radio Ranch Straight Shooters. He ranges in style from jazz, blues and swing to avant garde/alternative, but proclaims his passion lies in alternative, both in performance and composition. Life and career Strother attended both Cal State Los Angeles, where he earned a B.A. in classical composition, and Los Angeles City College. Strother has been featured on movie and television soundtracks including for David Lynch in “The Straight Story,” “Philadelphia Experiment II,” “Doug”, and “The Rookie." Strother still occasionally appears with The Radio Ranch Straight Shooters, who were important members of the LA Roots/Rockabilly/Punk scene. RRSS played on the same stage with The Blasters, X, and Big Sandy & His Fly-Rite Boys. Strother played alongside DJ Bonebrake, Bill Bateman (drummer, The Blasters), Chas Smith, Smokey Hormel, Hank Van Sickle, Denny Croy (former Moon Martin bassist) and Nick Ka

David Thomas Roberts

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David Thomas Roberts (born January 16, 1955) is an American composer and musician, known primarily as a modern ragtime composer. Roberts is also a painter in a primitivist style. Born in Moss Point, Mississippi, United States, his first recording, “Music For a Pretty Baby”, appeared in 1978. Pieces such as “The Early Life of Larry Hoffer”, “Roberto Clemente”, “Pinelands Memoir”, “Through the Bottomlands”, and the suite, “New Orleans Streets” have caused Roberts to be considered one of the leading contemporary ragtime-based composers. The New Orleans historian Al Rose called him “the most important composer of this half of the century in America.” Roberts coined the term “Terra Verde” (meaning “green earth”) as a label for compositions which can not be considered as conventional ragtime, mostly by contemporary ragtime writers such as himself, Frank French, Scott Kirby, Hal Isbitz and others. Roberts also works as a writer and visual artist. His mixed-media art appears in the magazine of visionary art, Raw Vision, and his poetry has been anthologized in Another South, a collection of experimental writing published in 2003 by the University of Alabama Press. Selected discography From

David Torn

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David M. Torn (born May 26, 1953) is an American guitarist, composer, and producer. He is known for combining electronic and acoustic instruments and for his use of looping. Background Torn has contributed to recordings by artists as diverse as David Bowie, k.d. lang, John Legend, Madonna, Tori Amos, Bill Bruford, Tony Levin, Mick Karn, David Sylvian, Chocolate Genius, Michael Shrieve, Steve Roach, Patrick O’Hearn, Andy Rinehart, Matt Chamberlain, Meshell Ndegeocello, Tim Berne, and Don Cherry. In addition to his composition work, Torn’s music has been featured in a wide variety of films, including Friday Night Lights, Velvet Goldmine, Adaptation, The Big Lebowski, The Departed, Fur, The Hoax, Kalifornia, Traffic, Reversal of Fortune, Tibet, and Three Kings. He studied with Leonard Bernstein (within the “Music for Young Composers” series), as well as with guitarists John Abercrombie, Pat Martino, Paul Weiss, and Arthur Basile. Torn works out of his personal studios, known as Cell Labs; occasionally, he uses the pseudonym “splattercell.” The New York Times described Torn’s 2015 solo release, Only Sky, as " an abstract landscape that is both immersive and deftly disorienting." Biogra

David Tudor

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David Eugene Tudor (January 20, 1926 – August 13, 1996) was an American pianist and composer of experimental music. After playing the U.S. premiere of the Piano Sonata No. 2 by Pierre Boulez in 1950, he premiered works by New York School composers including Morton Feldman and especially John Cage written for him; Karlheinz Stockhausen dedicated a work to him, reflecting his similar degree of integration with the Darmstadt School. He turned to composing, including many projects for the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. After Cage’s death in 1992, he succeeded him as music director of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. Life and career Tudor was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on January 20, 1926. Tudor began his career as an organist, The two worked closely together on many of Cage’s works for piano and electroacoustic works, including for the Smithsonian Folkways album Indeterminacy: New Aspect of Form in Instrumental and Electronic Music (1959). Tudor also performs on several recordings of Cage’s music, including the Mainstream record of Cartridge Music, the recording on Columbia Records of Variations II, and the two Everest records of Variations IV. Tudor taught at the Darmstäd

David Van Vactor

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Van Vactor (May 8, 1906 – March 24, 1994) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. He was born in Plymouth, Indiana, and received Bachelor of Music (1928) and Master of Music (1935) degrees from Northwestern University. He studied with Arne Oldberg, Mark Wessel, Ernst Nolte (composer), Leo Sowerby, Paul Dukas, Franz Schmidt, and Arnold Schoenberg. He was the assistant conductor of the Chicago Civic Orchestra (1933–34) and was both the flute section leader and assistant conductor of the Kansas City Philharmonic Orchestra from 1943 to 1947. He served as the conductor of the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra from 1947 until 1972. He also appeared as guest conductor with the New York Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Frankfurt Radio Symphony, and the orchestras of Rio de Janeiro and Santiago, Chile. In 1938 his Symphony in D won the Second Annual Competition of the New York Philharmonic-Symphony Society for a major symphonic work by a U. S. composer (his former teacher Mark Wessel received the sole Honorable Mention in the same competition). The Symphony was premiered on Jan

David Wallis Reeves

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David Wallis Reeves (February 14, 1838 – March 8, 1900), also known as D. W. Reeves or Wally Reeves, was an American composer, cornetist, and bandleader. He developed the American march style, later made famous by the likes of John Philip Sousa, and his innovations include adding a countermelody to the American march form in 1876. Sousa called Reeves “The Father of Band Music in America”, and stated he wished he himself had written Reeves’ “Second Regiment Connecticut National Guard March”. Charles Ives also borrowed from the “Second Connecticut” on four occasions. Biography Reeves was born on February 14, 1838, in Oswego, New York. In the early 1850s, he joined the Oswego band as an alto horn player, but soon moved to cornet, the instrument for which he would become famous. He occasionally performed with Jules Levy, another famous cornetist of the period. In 1871, he married Sarah Blanding. Blanding had a daughter from a previous marriage, and they were later to have a son, David W. Reeves Jr. In the 1870s, he created the first local orchestra in Providence, the Providence Symphony Orchestra. Reeves accepted the directorship of Patrick Gilmore’s Twenty-Second New York Regiment ban

David Ward-Steinman

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David Ward-Steinman (November 6, 1936 – April 14, 2015) was an American composer and professor. He was the author of Toward a Comparative Structural Theory of the Arts, and co-authored Comparative Anthology of Musical Forms. Ward-Steinman spent his remaining days dividing his time between San Diego State University and Indiana University in Bloomington. He was formerly Composer-in-Residence and Professor of Music at San Diego State, and then became Distinguished Professor of Music Emeritus there, and also an adjunct professor of Music at Indiana, where he taught in the spring. Biography Ward-Steinman studied at Florida State University and the University of Illinois, where he received the Kinley Memorial Fellowship for foreign study. After receiving his doctorate, he was a fellow at Princeton University from 1970. His teachers included John Boda, Burrill Phillips, Darius Milhaud (at Aspen, Colorado), Milton Babbitt (at Tanglewood) and Nadia Boulanger. He studied piano under Edward Kilenyi, and in 1995 attended a course at IRCAM. From 1970 to 1972, Ward-Steinman was the Ford Foundation composer-in-residence for the Tampa Bay area of Florida and he spent 1989–90 in Australia under a

David Woodard

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

David James Woodard (; born 1964) is an American conductor and writer known for his controversial performances. Through the 1990s and 2000s, Woodard constructed and sold replica Dreamachines, or stroboscopic light devices. He also coined the term prequiem, meaning preemptive requiem, to describe musical compositions that he made “for the soon-to-be-deceased”. He created prequiems for people such as baseball player Joe DiMaggio and terrorist Timothy McVeigh. He also wrote music for neo-Nazi activist William Luther Pierce and attempted to memorialize the 9/11 hijackers. Woodard is interested in Nueva Germania, a district in Paraguay founded by German settlers. He stated that he was drawn to the settlement as what he called “an Aryan vacuum in the middle of the jungle”, although he has denied being a white supremacist. Early life Woodard was born in Santa Barbara, California, Woodard claimed in 2001 that his interest in death stemmed from the fact that, when he was a teenager, his girlfriend was mysteriously found dead; in another instance he said that she had killed herself and her parents had blamed him. Woodard studied at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, before he moved to

David Yazbek

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David Norman Yazbek (born 1961) is an American writer, musician, composer, and lyricist. He wrote the music and lyrics for the Broadway musicals The Full Monty (2000), Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (2004), Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (2010), The Band’s Visit (2017), Tootsie (2019), and Dead Outlaw (2025). He won a Tony Award and a Grammy Award for The Band’s Visit. He also consulted on the musical Buena Vista Social Club, for which he won another Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album. Early life David Yazbek was born in New York City. His father is of Lebanese descent, and his mother was of half-Italian and half-Jewish ancestry. He began cello lessons in elementary school and took up the piano as a teenager. He attended Riverdale Country School. While attending Brown University as an undergraduate, he wrote an original musical with the production group Brownbrokers before graduating in 1982. He also directed a production of Hair with the student theatre group Production Workshop, for which he composed an original song to complement the classic score. Career After college Yazbek got a job writing for David Letterman’s late-night television show Late Night with David Le

Davis Daniel

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Robert Andrykowski (born March 1, 1961) is an American country music artist who records under the name Davis Daniel. Between 1991 and 1996, he recorded three studio albums on various divisions of Polygram Records: 1991’s Fighting Fire with Fire, 1994’s Davis Daniel, and 1995’s I Know a Place. In that same time span, seven of his singles entered the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks (now Hot Country Songs) charts, including the Top 40 hits “Picture Me”, “For Crying Out Loud” and “Fighting Fire with Fire.” Biography Robert Andrykowski was born in Arlington Heights, Illinois, on March 1, 1961. Over time, his family moved to Nebraska, and subsequently to Denver, Colorado. As a teenager, he found work singing at various nightclubs throughout Denver, Colorado. By the late 1980s, he moved to Nashville, Tennessee, eventually adopting the stage name Davis Daniel and landing a record deal with Mercury/Polygram Records in 1991 with the help of his music producer Ron Haffkine. Fighting Fire with Fire was issued that year. It produced four singles on the country charts: “Picture Me” at number 28, followed by “For Crying Out Loud” at number 13, the title track at number 27 and “Still Got a

Dean Drummond

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dean Drummond (January 22, 1949 – April 13, 2013) was an American composer, arranger, conductor and musician. His music featured microtonality, electronics, and a variety of percussion. He invented a 31-tone instrument called the zoomoozophone in 1978. From 1990 to his death he was the conservator of the Harry Partch instrumentarium. Biography Born in Los Angeles, Drummond studied trumpet and composition at the University of Southern California and California Institute of the Arts. He studied trumpet with Don Ellis and John Clyman, and studied composition with Leonard Stein. Drummond then worked as a musician for and assistant to the maverick composer and instrument builder Harry Partch. He performed in the premieres of Partch’s large-scale works Daphne of the Dunes, And on the Seventh Day Petals Fell in Petaluma, and Delusion of the Fury. Drummond also participated in recordings made by Partch for the Columbia Masterworks label in the late 1960s. In 1976, Drummond moved to New York City. A year later he co-founded (with flutist Stefani Starin) the contemporary music ensemble Newband. Newband recorded works by Partch, John Zorn, Joan LaBarbara, John Cage, Anne LeBaron, James Puglie

Dean Rosenthal

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dean Rosenthal is an American composer of instrumental and electronic music, sound installations, and field recordings. His pieces have included field recordings, text scores, digital pastiche, and instrumental works focussed on natural observations of properties in mathematics such as perfect tilings, combinations, graph theory, and permutations. He has conducted and performed internationally since 1996. He is the composer of the ongoing international community experimental music work Stones/Water/Time/Breath that is celebrated annually by Fête de la Musique in multiple cities across North America and Europe. He also serves as co-editor of The Open Space Web Magazine and is a contributing editor to The Open Space Magazine. He has worked closely with Guggenheim Fellow David Parker’s dance company The Bang Group on several works, including their collaboration Turing Tests. Most recently, he was commissioned by the Oral History of American Music at Yale to compose a new work on the life of Vivian Perlis. This piece, There Was Only One of Her (Vivian Perlis), was placed in the Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Hi

Deborah Drattell

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Deborah Drattell (born 1956) is an American composer. She was born in Brooklyn, New York and started her career in music as a violinist. She has been lauded as “a remarkably original voice” by Opera News and is noted for her contributions to contemporary classical music. Her compositions have been performed by the New York Philharmonic, Orchestra of St. Luke’s, the Tanglewood and Caramoor Music Festivals, and many other groups and venues. She rewrote the role of the villain in Nicholas and Alexandra, Rasputin, from baritone to tenor when Plácido Domingo expressed interest in singing the role. Early Life and Education Drattell was born in Brooklyn, New York. She developed her musical foundation as a violinist before shifting her focus to composition. She earned a Ph.D. in composition from the University of Chicago, where she studied under Ralph Shapey. Career Opera Her operas include: “Festival of Regrets" (1999): A one-act opera with a libretto by Wendy Wasserstein, premiered at the Glimmerglass Opera and later performed as part of the Central Park trilogy at the New York City Opera. “Lilith” (2001): A full-length opera exploring the biblical figure of Adam’s first wife, premiered

Deborah Lurie

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Deborah Ruth Lurie (born March 9, 1974) is an American composer, arranger, and music producer. She has scored several films such as Sleepover (2004), An Unfinished Life, Mozart and the Whale, (both 2005), Sydney White (2007), Dear John (2010), One for the Money (2012), Safe Haven (2013), and Poms (2019). She has been a string arranger for musicians such as Brandi Carlile, Kelly Clarkson, Allison Iraheta, Adam Lambert, and Katy Perry. Lurie has also been a string arranger for several rock bands such as 3 Doors Down, Bon Jovi, Creed, Halestorm, Papa Roach, Simple Plan, The All-American Rejects, and Three Days Grace, though her best known collaborations have been with Hoobastank and Theory of a Deadman. In 2015, the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers awarded Lurie the Shirley Walker Award for her contributions to the diversity of film and television music. She was one of the composers interviewed in Score: A Film Music Documentary. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences extended membership to Lurie in 2016 for her contributions to motion pictures. Filmography Composer Arranger/Producer *The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water (song arranger) *Annie (additi

Dee Libbey

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Anastasia Delores Rohde Libbey (1 November 1919 – 4 July 1988) was an American composer who studied with Nadia Boulanger and wrote classical music as well as popular hit songs like “Mango”. She published her music under the name Dee Libbey and the pseudonym Q’Adrianne Rohde. Life and career Libbey was born in Deland, Florida, to Anastasia Delores Shumate and Clifford Kahrwald Rohde. She won awards for playing xylophone in high school, then studied music at Stetson University; the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau, France, and Chicago; and privately with several teachers. She sang tenor in at least one church choir. Her teachers included Nadia Boulanger, Dr. William Duckwitz, the xylophonist John Heney, and Leo Sowerby. She married Edwin B. Libbey and they had one son. As Q’Adrianne Rohde, Libbey copyrighted a drawing in 1973 called The Unity Eagle. Her works were recorded by Columbia Records and published by G. Schirmer Inc. and Lawson Gould Music Publishers. Operetta *Gretchen’s Dream (for children) Vocal *“Chinchilla” *Cry Out (chorus) *Tolling Bells (chorus) *Wee Little Boy (women’s chorus) *“Wild Horses Run Free” References External links *Hear Rosemary Clooney sing “Mango

Deems Taylor

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Joseph Deems Taylor (December 22, 1885 – July 3, 1966) was an American composer, radio commentator, music critic, and author. Nat Benchley, co-editor of The Lost Algonquin Roundtable, referred to him as “the dean of American music.” He was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1934. Early life and family Deems Taylor was born in New York City to JoJo and Katherine Taylor. He attended Ethical Culture Elementary School, followed by New York University. Taylor married three times. His first wife was Jane Anderson. They were married in 1910, but divorced in 1918. In 1921, he married Mary Kennedy, who was an actress and a writer. They had a daughter, Joan Kennedy Taylor, in 1926, and divorced in 1934. He was involved romantically with soprano Colette D’Arville after his divorce. Taylor married a third and last time in 1945, to costume designer Lucille Watson-Little. They were divorced eight years later. Taylor died on July 3, 1966, of leukemia at the age of 80. He is interred at Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, New York. Career Composer Taylor initially planned to become an architect; however, despite minimal musical training he soon took to music composition. The resul

Delaney Bramlett

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Delaine Alvin “Delaney” Bramlett (July 1, 1939 – December 27, 2008) was an American singer and guitarist. He was best known for his musical partnership with his wife Bonnie Bramlett in the band Delaney & Bonnie and Friends, which included a wide variety of other musicians, many of whom were successful in other contexts. Early life Bramlett was born in Pontotoc, Mississippi. He began playing guitar when he was 8 years old, but did not get serious about the instrument until he was a teenager. He started singing in school and at twelve he had a quartet. Bramlett joined the United States Navy before he was 17, serving for two and a half to three years. He took boot camp at Naval Station Great Lakes, spending over half his hitch there. After his discharge, he moved to Los Angeles in the early 1960s, where he worked as a bartender before he started performing in clubs. Career Bramlett was performing at the Palomino Club in North Hollywood when he was asked to appear in a pilot for a new television show, Shindig!. During this time, he worked with J.J. Cale and Leon Russell and released some unsuccessful solo singles. Bramlett was the first artist signed to Independence Records, headed by

Delores Dufner

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Delores Dufner is an American sacred music composer, librettist, and organist whose works have been included in Catholic hymnals in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia. Dufner is a nun of the Order of Saint Benedict at Saint Benedict’s Monastery in Saint Joseph, Minnesota. She is on the faculty of Saint Benedict’s College and Saint John’s University, Collegeville, Minnesota. “One of the best-known hymn writers in the church today. More than twenty different publishers have included her texts in their hymnals and hymn collections. In 2017 Dufner received the Christus Rex (“Christ the King”) award from the Lutheran Valparaiso University. References External links *WPL Biography *Delores Dufner profile at Allmusic *Books of hymn texts

Dem Jointz

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dwayne Allen Abernathy Jr. (born July 17, 1976), known professionally as Dem Jointz, is an American record producer, songwriter and singer. He has been credited with production work for artists including Kanye West, Rihanna, Anderson .Paak, Eminem, Snoop Dogg, Chris Brown, Jennie, NCT 127, Exo, Aespa, Itzy, and Nmixx, among others. He served as in-house talent for Dr. Dre’s Aftermath Entertainment in 2015, during which he produced four tracks on Dre’s third album, Compton (2015). That same year, he produced several tracks on Janet Jackson’s Billboard 200-number one album, Unbreakable (2015). Since 2020, Abernathy has contributed production or backing vocals to West’s albums Donda (2021) and Donda 2 (2022), as well as on his 2020 single “Nah Nah Nah”. His record label, U Made Us What We Are, was founded in 2015 and has signed artists including Maryland-based rapper K.A.A.N., gospel singer Keedron Bryant, and his spouse, singer Stalone. He formed the supergroup Read the PDF with fellow Aftermath producers, Mr. Porter and Focus… in 2022. He has won a Grammy Award from two nominations. Early life Dem Jointz was born on July 17, 1976, in Compton, California. He was inclined to music a

Denes Agay

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Denes Agay (June 10, 1911 – January 24, 2007) was a Hungarian-born, Hungarian-American composer, music educator, arranger and author. Agay is known for compiling the million-selling music collection Best Loved Songs of the American People (1975). Early life and career Agay was born on June 10, 1911 in Kiskunfélegyháza, Austria-Hungary (present-day, Hungary) to Hungarian-Jewish family. Agay began playing piano at the age of three. In 1934 he completed his musical studies at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest. He was simultaneously studying law at the University of Budapest, but dropped out a year before earning his degree to concentrate on music. Agay conducted the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra in a performance of a symphony which he composed. He worked as a film composer; one film assignment was writing the background music for Hedy Lamarr’s nude scene in the 1933 film Ecstasy. Move to the US Agay was Jewish, and after the rise of Nazism, he emigrated to New York in 1939. His parents were murdered in Auschwitz. In 1942 he became an American citizen and joined the military, entertaining patients in the hospital wards in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. After the war Agay returned to

Dennis Báthory-Kitsz

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dennis Báthory-Kitsz (born March 14, 1949, in Plainfield, New Jersey) (pseudonyms: Dennis Bathory, Dennis Kitsz, Dennis J. Kitsz, Dennis Bathory Kitsz, Kalvos Gesamte, Grey Shadé, D.B. Cowell, Brady Kynans, Kalvos Zondrios, Báthory Dénes, Orra Maussade, Don Johnson, Kerry Merritt, Calvin Dion, Enimtu Bemanyna) is a Hungarian-American author and composer. Aside from music, he was an author during the first generation of personal computers (1979–85), and interviewed Bill Gates. His career in technology is evident in over 600 articles and books on the subject. He was involved in the post-Fluxus art movement (1973–78), and was also director of Vermont’s Alliance of Independent Country Stores (2001–2010). Since 2010 he has been adjunct professor composition, theory, and music technology at Johnson State College. Báthory lives in Northfield, Vermont. He claims to be a descendant of the Báthory family, a prominent central European clan during the Middle Ages but no proof of this can be found. Music and works A prolific composer, Báthory-Kitsz has more than 1,100 compositions, sound installations, and electronic works for all manner of vocal and instrumental combinations. His compositions

Dennis Eberhard

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dennis Eberhard (1943-2005 ) was an American composer. In his youth he was crippled by polio, which contributed to respiratory problems that contributed to his death in 2005. Eberhard was an active composer for more than 30 years and was a member of the Cleveland Composers Guild and Vox Novus. Education He was educated at Cleveland Institute of Music, Kent State University, the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign and the Chopin Institute in Warsaw, Poland. His teachers included: Marie Martin, Frederic Coulter, Salvatore Martirano, Wlodzimierz Kotonski, Gordon Mumma and Herbert Brün. Career Composing both concert music and music for film and theater, Mr. Eberhard also worked with John Cage and Lejaren Hiller, participating in the realization of their compositions Music Circus and HPSCHD. He taught at the University of Illinois, Western Illinois University, the University of Nebraska, Oberlin Conservatory of Music, and Cleveland State University, while lecturing widely on his own music at such institutions as the Cleveland Institute of Music, Cornell University, Penn State, the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, the University of New Mexico, and the São Paulo State University i

Dennis Johnson (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dennis Lee Johnson (November 19, 1938 – December 20, 2018) was a mathematician and minimal composer. He is the namesake of the Johnson homomorphism in the study of mapping class groups of surfaces. which was written for solo piano in 1959 and later revised. The creation of November was inspired by Johnson’s UCLA college friend La Monte Young’s Trio for Strings, written in 1958. November is a pensive piano piece that runs for nearly six hours and predates all other known minimalist works in its use of additive process and diatonic tonality. Part of it was recorded by Johnson in 1962 on audio cassette. November was in return an inspiration for Young’s later 1964 The Well-Tuned Piano work. Young gave, from his archive, a cassette copy of November to composer, musicologist and writer Kyle Gann. From it Gann made a new recording of it, as well as producing six pages of the original score. Gann first performed a four-and-a-half-hour version in 2009 with Sarah Cahill and he has produced a new performance score based on the original material that R. Andrew Lee recorded in a five hour version released in 2013 by Irritable Hedgehog Music, after receiving good reviews. In 2017 the Dutch piani

Dennis McCarthy (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dennis McCarthy (born July 3, 1945) is an American composer of television and film scores. His soundtrack credits include several entries in the Star Trek franchise, including underscores for The Next Generation, His other television credits include Dynasty, V, MacGyver, Sliders, Dawson’s Creek, and Project Greenlight. McCarthy has won 18 ASCAP awards and a Primetime Emmy Award for his theme on Deep Space Nine, in addition to nine Emmy nominations for his various Star Trek-related work. He also shares one Emmy for his music direction for the 63rd Academy Awards. Filmography Feature films Television Other media References External links *

Dennis Tobenski

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dennis Tobenski (born April 18, 1982, in Kankakee, Illinois) is an American composer of contemporary classical music and art song. Life Born on April 18, 1982, Dennis M. Tobenski grew up in Kankakee, IL. In 2004, he graduated from Illinois State University, where he studied Vocal Performance with baritone John M. Koch, and Music Theory & Composition with Stephen Andrew Taylor, David Feurzeig and Serra Hwang. After graduating from ISU in 2004, he was invited to move to New York City to study privately with composer Daron Hagen. Tobenski was commissioned by the ISU School of Theatre to compose music for Shakespeare’s The Tempest: the inaugural production of the newly constructed Center for the Performing Arts, which led him to write for several subsequent School of Theatre mainstage productions. These included Bertolt Brecht’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle, Frank McGuinness’ adaptation of Sophocles’ Electra. The ISU College of Fine Arts commissioned the 2002 Elegy, a work for choir and chamber ensemble commemorating the events of September 11, 2001, and the 2004 Soliloquy for solo flute. Tobenski was commissioned in 2002 by baritone John M. Koch (whose 1996 performance of Il barbiere di

Derek Bermel

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Derek Bermel (born 1967, in New York City) is an American composer, clarinetist and conductor whose music blends various facets of world music, funk and jazz with largely classical performing forces and musical vocabulary. He is the recipient of various awards including a Guggenheim Fellowship and the American Academy in Rome’s Rome Prize awarded to artists for a year-long residency in Rome. Life Bermel earned his B.A. at Yale University and later studied at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor with William Bolcom and William Albright. He also studied with Louis Andriessen in Amsterdam and Henri Dutilleux at Tanglewood. Later, his interest in a wide range of musical cultures sent him to Jerusalem to study ethnomusicology with André Hajdu, Bulgaria to investigate Thracian folk style with Nikola Iliev, Brazil to learn caxixi with Julio Góes, and to Ghana to study Lobi xylophone with Ngmen Baaru. Bermel’s output includes pieces for a variety of performing forces, including solo vocal songs, pieces for large and small chamber ensembles, and fourteen orchestral works. Though the ensembles he writes for are largely classical, his voice as a composer has been heavily influenced by both h

Derek Keller

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Derek Lawrence Keller (born 1971) is an American composer, guitarist, vocalist, and teacher. Keller previously served as a visiting assistant professor of music composition at Oberlin Conservatory of Music, and he currently curates the music series for St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, focusing on highlighting original avant-garde and improvisational music. He also works as an adjunct professor at William Jessup University. Keller earned a B.Mus. in music composition and guitar as well as an M.M. in music composition at the University of Georgia. He holds a Ph.D. in music composition from University of California at San Diego, where he studied under the direction of Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Roger Reynolds. He has also studied composition with Anthony Davis, Chaya Czernowin, Rand Steiger, George Crumb, Jean-Luc Hervé, Brian Ferneyhough, David Lang, and Charles Wuorinen. Keller has received many commissions, including from John Zorn, RedFishBlueFish, Groundworks Dance Theater, Cappella Gloriana, Athens Master Chorale, Truman State University, and MACRO Analysis Creative Research Organization. Keller was born in Philadelphia. He has lived in St. Louis, Atlanta, and La Jolla. He curr

Devon Rose

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Devon Rose (formerly Lani Renaldo) known professionally by their stage name dev.m4a, is an American songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and blogger from Los Angeles, CA. Their music has been recommended by American Songwriter, Wonderland, The Line of Best Fit, Billboard, Wild Honey Pie and LADYGUNN. Early life Rose was born October 21, 1995, in Los Angeles, CA. They graduated from Crossroads School for Arts and Sciences in 2014. They graduated from the University of Southern California in 2018. Career In 2012, Rose was picked to go to the GRAMMY Foundation’s GRAMMY CAMP in New York to participate as a songwriter. They appeared in the Samsung Level Music Lab with Halsey. They later opened for her, along with the BadSuns at the Shrine Expo Hall on a date of the Badlands Tour. Rose has written for PopWrapped and was a Campus Editor-At-Large for the Huffington Post. In 2015, they appeared on the daytime talk show The Doctors, after having written an open letter complaining about clothes not fitting. In September 2021, Rose became the face of the color “GRAVEDIGGER,” for Good Dye Young’s campaign “METALHEADS.” Personal life Rose is as queer. They came out as nonbinary in October 2021, an

Dianaruthe Wharton

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dianaruthe Wharton (born May 7, 1951) is an American musician. A 1990 Guggenheim Fellow, she was a pianist and singer for Sweet Honey in the Rock joining as the 5th member of the group in 1974 until leaving the group in 1978. and released the album African Pop from the New World. Biography Dianaruthe Wharton was born in Baltimore on May 7, 1951. She also worked at RCA Records as an editor and proofreader. In 1983, she was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship for Jazz Composers, which she then used for her work Fulani Me. Mike Joyce of The Washington Post said that her 1989 Baird Auditorium concert, where she was pianist and vocalist, “bore witness to the inspiration she draws from the music, dance and culture of her ancestral home, Africa”. In 1990, Wharton was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in music composition. As part of her work with the Fellowship, she and her family spent time in Senegal. In 2015, she was composer for Mai Sennaar’s play The Fall of the Kings. Wharton worked for the Howard County Public School System as a music teacher. Wharton and her husband have two children, In 1991, she lived in the western area of Baltimore. Discography * African Pop fro

Diane Thome

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Diane Thome (January 25, 1942 - January 12, 2025) was an American composer. She studied piano with Dorothy Taubman and Orazio Frugoni and composition with Robert Strassburg, Roy Harris, Darius Milhaud, A.U. Boscovich, and Milton Babbitt. Life and work Thome graduated with two undergraduate degrees from Eastman School of Music with distinction in piano and composition, a Master of Arts in theory and composition from the University of Pennsylvania and a Master of Fine Arts and Ph.D in composition from Princeton University. She was the first woman to receive a Ph.D. in music from Princeton University. After completing her studies, Thome became a professor and then chair of the Composition Program at the University of Washington School of Music. Thome’s compositions have been performed in Europe, China, Australia, Canada, Israel and the United States. She has been composer-in-residence at the University of Sussex and the Chamber Music Conference and Composers’ Forum of the East (Bennington, Vermont). Her compositions have been featured on French radio. Thome has received commissions from organizations including the Bremerton Symphony Association, Seattle Symphony, New Jersey Symphony O

Dianne Goolkasian Rahbee

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Dianne Goolkasian Rahbee (born February 9, 1938) is an Armenian-American contemporary classical composer and pedagogue. Biography Rahbee was born in Somerville, Massachusetts and raised in Waltham, Massachusetts. Her father, Peter Aharon Goolkasian, was a survivor of the 1915 Armenian genocide. Rahbee began her early musical training as a pianist with Antoine Louis Moeldner, and continued study at Juilliard School as a piano major. She continued her work at the Mozarteum University of Salzburg in Salzburg, Austria. She later studied piano with David Saperton in New York and Lily Dumont, Russell Sherman, and Veronica Jochum in Boston. At age 40, Rahbee began concentrating on composing and produced a large body of works. Her music has been described as “postserial in persuasion”, and marries influences of Armenian folk music, neo-tonal musicality and rhythmic drive. Maurice Hinson in Guide To The Pianist’s Repertoire commented that Goolkasian-Rahbee’s pedagogical works for piano are among the finest such works. Rahbee traces her lineage of piano study directly to Ludwig van Beethoven through Antoine Louis Moeldner. Moeldner studied with Helen Hopekirk and Ignacy Jan Paderewski, who b

Dick Higgins

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dick Higgins (15 March 1938 – 25 October 1998) was an American artist, composer, art theorist, poet, publisher, printmaker, and a co-founder of the Fluxus international artistic movement (and community). Inspired by John Cage, Higgins was an early pioneer of electronic correspondence. Higgins coined the word intermedia to describe his artistic activities, defining it in a 1965 essay by the same name, published in the first number of the Something Else Newsletter. His most notable audio contributions include Danger Music scores and the Intermedia concept to describe the ineffable inter-disciplinary activities that became prevalent in the 1960s. Life Dick Higgins was the son of Carter Chapin Higgins and Katherine Huntington Bigelow. He was born in Cambridge, England in 1938 into a rather rich family, due to his father owning Worcester Pressed Steel in Worcester, Massachusetts. He grew up with a brother and sister, Mark and Lisa. His younger brother Mark Huntington Higgins was murdered in the Congo in 1960. As a boy, Higgins grew up and was educated in private boarding schools around the New England area, including Worcester, Massachusetts; Putney, Vermont; and Concord, New Hampshire.

Dick Rogers

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Richard Rogers (1912–1970) was a singer, comedian, songwriter, and pianist, who wrote the lyrics for “Harlem Nocturne”. Rogers was associated with Will Osborne, a “star crooner” who was on the radio in the 1930s. Osborne’s band was on the decline in 1940. The magazine called him capable, saying he could sing, compose, play and lead. * “Spaghetti Rag” (music by Lyons and Yosco) (1950) * “Magazines (Are Magic for Lonely People)” (sung by Theresa Brewer) (1958) * “I Guess I’ll Get the Papers and Go Home” (sung by the Mills Brothers, written with Hughie Prince, Hal Kanner) (1946) * “Would’st Could I But Kiss Thy Hand, Oh Babe” (written with Will Osborne) (sung by “Doghouse” Dale Jones) * “Between 18th And 19th On Chestnut Street” (written with Will Osborne) (sung by Dale Jones and Dick Rogers) (1939) * Dozens more. Footnotes External links * Billboard magazine, Rogers talked about. * Dick Rogers talked about in the book Serge Chaloff: A Musical Biography and Discography By Vladimir Simosko

Dina Koston

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dina Koston (b. 1929?, d. 2009, Washington, D.C.) was an American pianist, music educator and composer. Life and career Dina Koston began the study of music at age two with her mother. She continued her studies at the American Conservatory of Music and later studied with Gavin Williamson in harpsichord, Mieczyslaw Horszowski and Leon Fleisher in piano, and with Luciano Berio and Nadia Boulanger. She spent one summer studying at Darmstadt. Koston taught at the Peabody Conservatory and at Tanglewood. She wrote music for theatrical productions at Café La Mama and the Arena Stage. With Leon Fleisher she co-founded and co-directed the Theater Chamber Players from 1968-2003, which was the first resident chamber ensemble of the Smithsonian Institution and of The Kennedy Center. Koston married Dr. Roger L. Shapiro (1927-2002), a research psychiatrist and psychoanalyst. She suffered from a long illness at the end of her life and died in Washington, D.C. A bequest after her death established the Dina Koston and Roger Shapiro Fund for New Music. This fund provides for commissions and performance of new music at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. Works Koston composed for a variety of

Dominick Argento

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Dominick Argento (October 27, 1927 – February 20, 2019) was an American composer best known for his operatic and choral music. His compositions include the operas Postcard from Morocco, Miss Havisham’s Fire, The Masque of Angels, and The Aspern Papers. His song cycle From the Diary of Virginia Woolf won the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1975. Argento spent most of his time in Minnesota, where he taught at the University of Minnesota. Critics have described his style as blending tonal and atonal elements, sometimes incorporating twelve-tone technique. During the 1950s, Argento spent extended periods in both the United States and Italy, often working in Florence, where he spent some time each year. As a university professor, he taught theory and composition. In 1963, he helped establish the Center Opera Company (now the Minnesota Opera). Argento wrote 14 operas and numerous song cycles, orchestral works, and choral pieces for both small and large ensembles. Many of these were commissioned for and premiered by Minnesota-based artists. His wife, soprano Carolyn Bailey, frequently performed his compositions. Bailey died in 2006. In 2009, Argento received the Brock Commission from the Amer

Donald Erb

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Donald Erb (January 17, 1927 – August 12, 2008) was an American composer best known for large orchestral works such as Concerto for Brass and Orchestra and Ritual Observances. Early years Erb was born in Youngstown, Ohio, graduated from Lakewood High School, a Cleveland suburb, and gained early recognition as a trumpet player for a local dance band. Following a stint in the Navy during World War II, he continued his career as a jazz trumpeter and enrolled at Kent State University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science degree in music in 1950. Honors and awards In the course of his career, Erb earned considerable recognition. He received the 1992 Rome Prize and was composer-in-residence with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. He was Distinguished Professor of Composition, Emeritus, at the Cleveland Institute of Music in Cleveland, Ohio. Selected works * 1966 Concerto for Solo Percussionist * 1964 Symphony of Overtures * 1965 Phantasma for four musicians * 1966 Diversion For Two (other than sex) for trumpet and percussion * 1966 String Trio for violin, electric guitar and violoncello * 1967 Reconnaissance for instruments and electronic sounds * 1968 In No Strange Land for instruments

Donald Harris (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Donald Harris (April 7, 1931, in St. Paul, Minnesota March 29, 2016, in Columbus, Ohio) was an American composer who taught music at Ohio State University for 22 years. He was Dean of the College of the Arts from 1988 to 1997. Harris earned a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in music from the University of Michigan. He completed further studies at the Tanglewood Music Center and the Centre Français d’Humanisme Musical in Aix-en-Provence. He studied with Ross Lee Finney, Max Deutsch, Nadia Boulanger, Boris Blacher, Lukas Foss, and André Jolivet. He founded the Contemporary Music Festival at Ohio State in 2000. Prior to joining the faculty at Ohio State, he served on the faculties and as an administrator of the New England Conservatory of Music and the Hartt School of Music. From 1954 to 1968, Harris lived in Paris, where he served as music consultant to the United States Information Agency and produced the city’s first postwar Festival of Contemporary American Music. A documentary about Harris entitled Sonata 1957 was produced by Daniel Beliavsky through opus1films in 2011. It explores Harris’s development in mid-20th-century Paris, when pre-war musical thought bridged with p

Donald Knaack

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Donald Knaack is an American percussionist. He performs on and composes for recycled materials exclusively. His album Junk Music was nominated for a Grammy Award, and he has played in many prominent venues worldwide, including the Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, the Vans Warped Tour, the Sundance Film Festival, the Burlington Discover Jazz Festival, the Kansas City International Jazz Festival and more. Biography Donald Knaack (aka The Junkman) is a classically trained percussionist and composer who has used recycled materials as his instruments of music since long before the eco-green movement was cool. He calls it Junk Music and it all began with his mentor and collaborator, John Cage encouraged the further development of his attraction to the sounds of found objects. He’s performed at Lincoln Center, The Van’s Warped Tour (with Eminem, Black Eyed Peas and Blink-182), The United Nations, The Kennedy Center, Sundance Film Festival, concerts with Phish, Seoul Drum Festival, Summer Series Dubai, many schools and colleges and a solo concert at the United Nation’s COP 16 Conference on Climate Change in Cancun, Mexico, where he was awarded the “Cantando por el Planeta” award by the

Donald Martino

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Donald James Martino (May 16, 1931 – December 8, 2005) was a Pulitzer Prize winning American composer. Biography Born in Plainfield, New Jersey, Martino attended Plainfield High School. He began as a clarinetist, playing jazz for fun and profit. He attended Syracuse University, where he studied composition with Ernst Bacon, who encouraged him in that direction. He then attended Princeton University as a graduate student, where he worked with composers Roger Sessions and Milton Babbitt. He also studied with Luigi Dallapiccola in Italy as a Fulbright Scholar. He became a lecturer and teacher himself, working with students at Yale University, the New England Conservatory of Music (where he became chair of the composition department), Brandeis University, and Harvard University. He won the Pulitzer Prize for music in 1974 for his chamber work Notturno. In 1991, the journal Perspectives of New Music published a 292-page tribute to Martino. Martino died in Antigua in 2005. A memorial concert was held at the New England Conservatory on May 8, 2007. A recording of the concert was released by Navona Records in 2009. Music Most of Martino’s mature works (including pseudo-tonal works such as

Donald Sur

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Donald Young Sur (1 February 1935 – 24 May 1999) was a Korean American composer and musicologist. Although he is best known for his large-scale oratorio, Slavery Documents, most of his works were composed for small chamber ensembles. Sur was born in Honolulu and moved with his family to Los Angeles after World War II. He studied at the University of California and Princeton before spending four years in Korea researching ancient Korean court music. After receiving his doctorate from Harvard in 1972, he settled in Boston, Massachusetts, where many of his works were premiered and where he taught at several local universities, including Harvard, MIT, and Tufts. Life and career Donald Sur was born in Honolulu in 1935 to parents of Korean descent. His paternal grandfather had emigrated to Hawaii in 1903 to work in the sugarcane plantations. His mother was a Korean picture bride. The first instrument he learned to play as a child was the ukulele; the second was the mandolin, which remained his favorite instrument throughout his life and figures in several of his scores. Sur’s family moved to the mainland United States in 1951 and eventually settled in Los Angeles. He studied ethnomusicol

Dorothea Austin

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Dorothea Austin Banner (1921 – 25 June 2011) was an Austrian-born American pianist and composer who specialized in electronic and computer generated music. Biography Austin was born Dorothea Blaukopf into a Jewish family in Vienna, Austria. As a child, she was already performing as a concert pianist. She fled to England before World War II on the last Kindertransport sponsored by the Red Cross. Her brother Viktor and her parents died during the war. In England she worked at a factory for a while to support herself, but was eventually taken in by Quaker philanthropists Nelly and Rachel Leighton. She studied piano at the Royal College of Music and the Royal Academy of Music with Tobias Matthay in London, and afterward worked as a concert pianist. She married Dr. Hermann Augapfel (Harry Austin), who was held during the war in a British camp for foreigners from enemy countries. She began serving as a piano teacher at that time, and continued this work after the couple emigrated to the United States in 1949. The Austins settled in Valley Stream, Long Island, where they lived until Harry Austin died in 1974. As her performing career had been interrupted by the war, Austin attended Queens

Dorothy Hindman

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Dorothy Hindman (born March 13, 1966) is an American composer and music educator. Early life and studies Born in Miami, Florida on March 13, 1966, Hindman had intense early exposure to classical music from her mother, Dorothy Hindman Lyon, a gifted classical pianist and scientist, and her father, William Murphy Hindman, an actor and manager at that time of WTMI, Miami’s classical radio station. Formal music study began late for her, at age 16, when she entered Miami-Dade College as a piano major with the intention to study synthesis. This path led her to avant-garde electronic music and at 19 she began a composition major at the University of Miami, studying with composer Dennis Kam, and graduating magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Music in 1988. Her studies continued at Duke University with Stephen Jaffe and Thomas Oboe Lee, receiving her Master of Arts in the composition in 1989. In 1990, she became a University Fellow at the University of Miami, resuming her studies with Dennis Kam, with whom she shared deep interests in philosophy, musical meaning, individual perception, originality, and profundity. In November–December 1994, she completed additional studies at the Atlantic Ce

Dorothy Lawson

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Dorothy Lawson is a Canadian cellist and composer based in New York City. She is best known as a co-founder and artistic director of the string quartet ETHEL. On the founding of ETHEL she says, “we… realized that we were in the middle of a really powerful new upsurge of creative energy in music of our time that we were kind of the perfect vehicle for.” Prior to ETHEL, Lawson toured with Mikhail Baryshnikov’s White Oak Dance Project, Bang on a Can All-Stars and Orpheus Chamber Orchestra. She was a founding member of the Rossetti and Roerich String Quartets, and served 10 years as faculty of Joseph Fuchs’ Alfred University Summer Chamber Music Institute. Lawson was an orchestra member of the 2002 Off-Broadway production of Jason Robert Brown’s The Last Five Years and the 2005 Broadway production of The Woman in White. She has been a member of the Ron Carter Nonet. Lawson appears on multiple recordings, including the GRAMMY Award-winning album Dedicated to You: Kurt Elling Sings the Music of Coltrane and Hartman She is a member of acclaimed Brazilian jazz pianist Marcelo Zarvos +Group. Lawson is a graduate of the Juilliard School and a current faculty at the Preparatory Division of

Dorothy Rudd Moore

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Dorothy Rudd Moore (June 4, 1940 – March 30, 2022) was an American composer and music educator. She was one of the co-founders of the Society of Black Composers. She is considered one of the leading women composers of color for her generation and did commissions for the National Symphony, Opera Ebony, the Buffalo Philharmonic, and solo artists. She was a member of the American Composers Alliance, BMI, New York Singing Teachers Association, and New York Women Composers. Her works were unpublished, but are available through the American Composers Alliance. Biography Moore was born in New Castle, Delaware. She was born to a musical family, her mother encouraged her to pursue studies in music and to explore all of her interests one of them being piano lessons Moore knew she wanted to become a composer at a young age and took piano lessons as a child at the Wilmington School of Music, where she studied with Harry Andrews. She learned to play clarinet in order to join the Howard High all-male band. Moore started her undergraduate studies at Howard University as a music education major but later switched to composition, as she was constantly inventing songs and melodies when she played, "

Dorsey Dixon

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Dorsey Murdock Dixon (October 14, 1897 – April 18, 1968) was an American old-time and country music songwriter and musician. He was also a millworker who spent much of his life working in textile mills in North and South Carolina. Dixon’s best known songs were “Wreck on the Highway”, which resulted in a copyright dispute with country musician Roy Acuff, and “Babies in the Mill”, which was about the Southern textile industry’s exploitation of child labor in the early 20th century. Biography Dixon was born on October 14, 1897, in Darlington, South Carolina. He was one of seven children, all of whom, together with their father, worked at the local textile mill, Darlington Cotton Manufacturing Company. References Cited works * Further reading * *Russell, Tony, and Bob Pinson. Country Music Records: A Discography, 1921–1942 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), p. 321 External links *“The Wreck on the Highway” at Documenting the American South – contains the lyrics and an audio file of the song performed by Dorsey Dixon. *Illustrated Dixon Brothers discography

Douglas Allanbrook

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Douglas Allanbrook (April 1, 1921 – January 29, 2003) was an American composer, concert pianist and harpsichordist. He was associated with a group of mid-twentieth century Boston composers who were students of Nadia Boulanger. His compositions are described by the Kennedy Center as “smooth, showing astute sense, assertiveness, and originality.” Early life Allanbrook was born on April 1, 1921, in Melrose, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston. He had one sister, Jean. Education After high school, Allanbrook studied at Boston University for one year. In 1939 he was hired as a music teacher at the Mary Wheeler finishing school, She heard some of Allanbrook’s music and immediately took him under her wing. When the war ended, he returned to Boston to enter Harvard University Although he taught part-time at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore he chose to stay at St. John’s for the duration of his teaching career. Allanbrook was on the faculty at St. John’s for 45 years, teaching music, math, philosophy, Greek, and French. He retired from the college in May 1986, he continued to teach and perform there until his death. For many years, he was a member of the board at the Yaddo artists colony

Douglas Leedy

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Douglas Leedy (March 3, 1938; Portland, Oregon – March 28, 2015; Corvallis, Oregon ) was an American composer, performer and music scholar. Biography Born in Portland, Oregon, Leedy studied with Karl Kohn at Pomona College and at the University of California, Berkeley, where he was in a composition seminar with membership including La Monte Young and Terry Riley. An orchestral hornist, harpsichordist, and singer, he studied South Indian music in Madras with K. V. Narayanaswamy, North Indian vocal music with Pandit Pran Nath, and was first music director of the Portland Baroque Orchestra and the musical director of the 1985 Portland Handel Festival, during which he conducted complete, period-instrument performances of Handel’s oratorios Jephtha and Theodora. He taught music at UCLA, the Centro Simon Bolivar (Caracas), and at Reed College. He founded the electronic music studio at UCLA, and his synthesized music was among the earliest commissioned album-length recordings of the Moog Synthesizer and Buchla Synthesizer. The triple album Entropical Paradise was both the first triple album of synthesized “musical environments”—perhaps the first recording of explicitly ambient music—and f

Douglas Moore

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Douglas Stuart Moore (August 10, 1893 – July 25, 1969) was an American composer, songwriter, organist, pianist, conductor, educator, actor, and author. A composer who mainly wrote works with an American subject, his music is generally characterized by lyricism in a popular or conservative style which generally eschewed the more experimental progressive trends of musical modernism. Composer Virgil Thomson described Moore as a neoromantic composer who was influenced by American folk music. While several of his works enjoyed popularity during his lifetime, only his folk opera The Ballad of Baby Doe (1956) has remained well known into the 21st century. His father built another nearby home for his family on the Moore family’s farm, named Quawksnest, in which Moore and his family spent their summers. As an adult Moore lived on the family’s Cutchogue property until his death in 1969. Moore’s father made a living as a publisher of among other things the literary magazine Ladies’ World, a business which he sold to S. S. McClure upon his retirement in 1913. At the age of 13 he matriculated to the Fessenden School, a boys boarding school in West Newton, Massachusetts which he attended for the

Douglas Townsend

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Douglas Townsend (New York, November 8, 1921 – New York, August 1, 2012) was an American composer and musicologist. Born in Manhattan, Townsend became interested in composition while a student at the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, in New York City. He taught himself composition, counterpoint and orchestration. In 1941, he began studying composition privately, with Tibor Serly, Stefan Wolpe, Aaron Copland, Otto Luening and Felix Greissle, among others. Townsend taught at Brooklyn College, CUNY (1958–69), Lehman College, CUNY (1970–71), the University of Bridgeport (Connecticut; 1973–5) and Purchase College (also known as SUNY Purchase) (1973–6). From 1977 to 1980, he was editor of Musical Heritage Review. Townsend’s research into 18th- and 19th-century music has resulted in editions, recordings and performances, most notably of a Carl Czerny overture and a mass by Sigismund Neukomm. He received research grants from the Martha Baird Rockefeller Fund (1965) and the New York State Council on the Arts (1975). Townsend’s compositions include several orchestral works, chamber music pieces, choral works, film and television scores, three operettas, an

Drew Louis

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Andrew Louis Klemm (born March 28, 2000), known professionally as Drew Louis (), is an American record producer, singer, and songwriter. He has written and produced songs for Jennifer Lopez, Trixie Mattel, Bonnie McKee, A Twink and a Redhead, Trisha Paytas, Yena, Vincint, Jillian Rossi, Matt Rogers, Bijou, Trinity the Tuck, The Gospellers, and more. Career Louis’s professional musical career began while studying at the Los Angeles College of Music, where he met K-pop and J-pop singer-songwriter Mayu Wakisaka. In 2021, Louis and Wakisaka co-wrote “Loving Out Loud” for The Gospellers. They then co-wrote “Vacay” & “Lxxk 2 U” for Yena’s debut mini-album Smiley, as well as the title track of her third mini-album Good Morning in 2024. In October 2023, Louis was awarded the Music Forward LGBTQ+ Emerging Artist Award by Live Nation. In May 2023, Drew produced the titular single for the Drag Isn’t Dangerous digital fundraiser. In November 2023, Louis executive produced and co-wrote Trinity Ruins Christmas: The Musical with Trinity the Tuck. He then produced “My Kitty” for Amanda Tori Meating, which premiered on RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 16 in January 2024. “A Twink and a Redhead” was nomina

Du Yun

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Du Yun (traditional Chinese: 杜韻, simplified Chinese: 杜韵) is a Chinese-born American composer, performer, musician and performance artist. She won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Music for her opera Angel’s Bone, with libretto by Royce Vavrek. Du Yun was named as one of the 38 Great Immigrants by the Carnegie Corporation of New York in 2018, and received a 2019 Grammy nomination in the category of Best Classical Contemporary Composition for her work Air Glow. In its decade review, UK’s Classic FM listed Du Yun’s winning of the Pulitzer as No. 6 in “10 ways the 2010s changed classical music forever.” Rolling Stone Italia named her as one of the women composers who defined the 2010s. In 2024, Du Yun was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Early life and education Du Yun was born in Shanghai, China. She began studying piano at the age of four, attending the primary school Shanghai Conservatory of Music for piano. She studied composition at the middle school Shanghai Conservatory of Music with Deng Erbo. Du Yun later went to the United States for college and graduated from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music with a Bachelor of Music degree in composition, under Randolph Cole

Duke Ellington

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Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington (April 29, 1899 – May 24, 1974) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and leader of his eponymous jazz orchestra from 1924 through the rest of his life. Music critic Ralph J. Gleason called him “America’s most important composer”. With Strayhorn, he composed multiple extended compositions, or suites, as well as many short pieces. For a few years at the beginning of Strayhorn’s involvement, Ellington’s orchestra featured bassist Jimmy Blanton and tenor saxophonist Ben Webster, and reached what many claim to be a creative peak for the group. Some years later, following a low-profile period, an appearance by Ellington and his orchestra at the Newport Jazz Festival in July 1956 led to a major revival and regular world tours. Ellington recorded for most American record companies of his era, performed in and scored several films, and composed a handful of stage musicals. Although a pivotal figure in the history of jazz, in the opinion of Gunther Schuller and Barry Kernfeld, “the most significant composer of the genre”, Ellington himself embraced the phrase “beyond category”, considering it a liberating principle, and referring to his music as part of the mo

Dušan Bogdanović

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Dušan Bogdanović () (born 1955) is a Serbian-born American composer and classical guitarist. He has explored musical languages which are reflected in his style today: a synthesis of classical, jazz, and ethnic music. As a soloist and in collaboration with other artists, he has toured extensively throughout Europe, Japan, and the U.S. Milcho Leviev, Arto Tunçboyacıyan, and others. Notably, he is a co-author with Sting on “Prisms (Six Song by Sting)” published by Singidunum Music and Steerpike Overseas Limited. Dušan Bogdanović’s recording credits include close to twenty albums (on Intuition, Doberman, Ess.a.y, M.A. Recordings, GSP and other labels), ranging from Bach Trio Sonatas to contemporary works. Over two hundred of his compositions are published by Bèrben Editions (Italy), Doberman-Yppan (Canada) and Guitar Solo publications (San Francisco). His theoretical work includes polyrhythmic and polymetric studies, as well as a bilingual publication covering three-voice counterpoint and Renaissance improvisation for guitar (Bèrben) and Ex Ovo. (Doberman-Yppan). He has also collaborated on multi-disciplinary projects involving music, psychology, philosophy, and fine arts. Partial disc

Dwight Gustafson

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Dwight Leonard Gustafson (April 20, 1930 – January 28, 2014) was an American composer, conductor, and dean of the School of Fine Arts at Bob Jones University. Biography Gustafson was born in Seattle, Washington to Leonard Gustafson, a meat dealer and lay preacher, and Rachel Gustafson, a pianist, harpist, and artist. His childhood home was on Lake Sammamish, and he graduated in 1948 from Queen Anne High School. Despite early violin training, Gustafson was attracted to a career in art and design. As a sophomore at Bob Jones University, he was asked to make sketches for a production of Cyrano de Bergerac and ended by designing the sets. In 1954, shortly before graduating from BJU with an M.A. in music, he was flabbergasted to be asked by the then-president, Bob Jones Jr., to become dean of the School of Fine Arts. Gustafson was 24. Eventually he also earned a D. Mus. in composition from Florida State University, and in 1960, he was selected as one of ten young conductors to study at the Aspen School of Music. Gustafson quickly proved himself a competent administrator who brought to his position a working knowledge of art, music, and drama. He also regularly conducted campus choirs an

Earl Kim

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Earl Kim (1920–1998; né Eul Kim) was an American composer, and music pedagogue. He was of Korean descent. Early life, education, and training Kim was born on January 6, 1920, in Dinuba, California, to immigrant Korean parents. He began piano studies at age 9, studying under Homer Grun, After the war, he returned to study at UC Berkeley under Ernest Bloch, and Roger Sessions; In 1971 and 1972, Kim collaborated with his wife dancer Mimi Kagan on the work “Exercises en Route”, which toured and featured text by Samuel Beckett, and soprano soloist performer Benita Valente. His art songs have been performed by Bethany Beardslee, Karol Bennett, Merja Sargon, Benita Valente, He died on November 19, 1998, of lung cancer at his home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, at the age of 78. and Martha Potter (in 1977); and he had two daughters. Discography *Where grief slumbers. Dawn Upshaw, soprano; Elektra Nonesuch 79262-2 *Ophelia. Margit Kern, accordion; Deutschlandfunk/Genuin GEN 13267 *Two Bagatelles. Robert Helps, piano; Composers Recordings, Inc. CRI CD 874 *Earthlight. Merja Sargon, soprano; Martha Potter, violin. New World Records NW 237 *Exercises en route; Now and Then; Three Poems in French

Earl Louis Stewart

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Earl Louis Stewart (born August 11, 1950) is an author, essayist, poet, professor emeritus of The College of Creative Studies and the Black Studies department at the University of California Santa Barbara and an American composer of intellectual jazz as represented by the American Composer’s Alliance. In the past fifty years, Stewart has written several hundred compositions for chamber ensembles, chamber orchestras, symphony orchestras, quartets, soloists, and choir. Biography Stewart’s career began at age fourteen when writing head arrangements with pick-up bands headlined by visiting black-soul artists from across the United States, and performing as a trumpeter with notables like Percy Sledge, Syl Johnson, King Floyd, Garland Green amongst others traveling on the Chitlin’ Circuit. Following the development of his experience as a jazz musician, Stewart attended Southern University Baton Rouge’s Jazz Institute, studying jazz composition under Alvin Batiste, an American jazz clarinetist, as preparation for him to earn his doctorate at the University of Texas in Austin. Stewart studied Western-European-classical-music composition with composer Karl Korte, orchestrator and author Ken

Earl Robinson

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Earl Hawley Robinson (July 2, 1910 – July 20, 1991) was an American composer, arranger and folk music singer-songwriter from Seattle, Washington. Robinson is remembered for his music, including the cantata “Ballad for Americans” and songs such as “Joe Hill” and “Black and White”, which expressed his left-leaning political views. He wrote many popular songs and music for Hollywood films, including his collaboration with Lewis Allan on the 1940s hit “The House I Live In” from the Academy Award winning film of the same name. He was a member of the Communist Party from the 1930s to the 1950s. The jazz clarinetist Perry Robinson (19382018) was his son. Career in music Robinson studied violin, viola and piano as a child, and studied composition at the University of Washington, receiving a BM and teaching certificate in 1933. While at Washington, Robinson was a member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, a men’s music fraternity. In 1934 he moved to New York City where he studied with Hanns Eisler and Aaron Copland. He was also involved with the depression-era WPA Federal Theatre Project, and was actively involved in the anti-fascist movement and was the musical director at the Communist-run Camp Un

Earl Rose (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Earl Alexander Rose (born September 5, 1946) is an American composer, pianist, arranger, and conductor. In addition to writing film and television music, he has also composed several well-known Pop and R&B songs. His film scores include Alan Pakula:Going For Truth, Always at the Carlyle, Johnny Carson: King of Late Night, a PBS American Masters presentation, and the Peabody Winning documentary, Inventing L.A.: The Chandlers and Their Times. Early life Earl Rose was born in New York City and began taking music and began his music and piano instruction at the age of seven years old. He attended and, having studied with Frances Dillon and Edith Oppens, graduated with a major in piano from Mannes College of Music of Music in 1970. During his second year of college, he studied at the Vienna Academy of Music. He also conducted at the Juilliard School. Life and career Rose began his composing and conducting career in the late sixties, while still in college, as Assistant Music Conductor for NBC’s The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson, when the show was based in New York. One of his first television composing credits, beginning in 1976, was co-writing songs with lyricist Judy Spencer for

Easley Blackwood Jr.

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Easley Rutland Blackwood Jr. (April 21, 1933 – January 22, 2023) was an American professor of music, concert pianist, composer (sometimes using unusual tunings), and the author of books on music theory, including his research into the properties of microtonal tunings and traditional harmony. Biography Blackwood was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, on April 21, 1933. He studied piano there and was doing solo appearances at the age of 14 with the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. After studies at many places (including Yale University, where he earned his Master of Arts degree) in the United States, he went to Paris to study from 1954 to 1956. His teachers include Olivier Messiaen, Paul Hindemith, and Nadia Boulanger. For forty years, from 1958 to 1997, Blackwood taught at the University of Chicago, most of the time with the title of Professor. He then became Professor Emeritus at the university. He received the Quantrell Award. Blackwood’s initial compositions were not particularly unconventional although in them he employed polyrhythm and wide melodic contours. This early music by Blackwood has been characterized as in an atonal yet a formally conservative style. In 1980–81 Blackwood

Ed Bogas

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Edgar Noel “Ed” Bogas (born February 2, 1942), sometimes credited as Edward Bogas, is an American musician and composer whose work has been featured in films, animations, and video games. Career Bogas’ contributions span four decades and several genres. In the 1960s, Bogas was a member of the experimental rock band The United States of America, and in the 1970s, he contributed the music for films by Ralph Bakshi and for television specials for the Peanuts series, succeeding Vince Guaraldi after his death in 1976. In the 1980s, he started composing music for Commodore 64 computer games such as Hardball!. He also wrote music for Children’s Television Workshop (Sesame Street) games for Atari such as Oscar’s Trash Race and Big Bird’s Egg Catch. In 1977, Bogas voiced and composed many shows for Chuck E. Cheese’s Pizza Time Theatre. He also voiced Crusty the Cat. In 1980, Bogas composed the score for the CBS television movie A Christmas Without Snow, in which he also appeared in the part of the accompanist to the choirmaster portrayed by John Houseman. He continued writing music for Peanuts television specials through 1989 (This Is America, Charlie Brown), and in 1982 he also began contr

Ed Di Lello

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Ed Di Lello (born 1952) is an American composer, choreographer, theatre director, dancer, and actor who made work during the 1970s and 1980s. He is currently an attorney practicing in New York City. Di Lello was born in New York City to Vincent and Angela (née Salvatore), and received a bachelor’s degree from Sarah Lawrence College in 1974. Early theatrical work From 1967 to 1970, Di Lello worked with the Everyman Company and the Chalk Circle Players in Brooklyn, under the direction of Geraldine Fitzgerald and Brother Jonathan O.S.F. In February 1970, the Chalk Circle Players premiered Pieces, a “collage theater” work for which Di Lello wrote, directed, and choreographed Mommy/Daddy; played the title role in St. Francis; and composed and performed the songs Pieces, Runnin’ Away, Tickle My Soul, and Hey Who Are You. From 1971 to 1973, Di Lello performed with the E.T.C. Company at La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club in Manhattan, under the direction of Wilford Leach and John Braswell. He had featured roles in the company’s repertory productions of Demon and Carmilla. Also at La MaMa he performed in Everything for Anybody (1972) and The Wonderful Beast (1976), both written by Louisa Ros

Eda Rapoport

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Eda Rothstein Rapoport (25 December 1890 – 9 May 1968 in New York City She emigrated to the United States, where she married noted anesthetist Boris Rapoport (1888–1948) and lived much of her life in New York City. Rapoport studied composition with Walter Piston, Aaron Copland and Arnold Schoenberg. She composed several hundred works including music for piano, violin, voice and symphony orchestra. In 1943 she presented a program of her own compositions in Carnegie Chamber Music Hall (now Weill Recital Hall), and was also accompanist for her songs. The Columbia University Department of Music sponsors the Boris and Eda Rapoport Prize in Composition. Selected works Several of Rapoport’s compositions have been published by Transcontinental Music, White-Smith Music Publishing, Maxwell Weaner, Axelrod Publications, Associated Music Publishers, and El. Cantor Music. ;Stage * The Fisherman and His Wife, Opera-Fantasy in 1 act; libretto after the Grimm’s fairy tale * GI Joe, Opera in 1 act, 3 scenes; libretto by Boris Rapoport * The Hobo and the Old Maid, Ballet ;Orchestral * Adagietto for strings and flute * Adagio for string orchestra * Israfel, Tone Picture after Edgar Allan Poe for flut

Eddie Kilfeather

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Edward Vincent (Eddie) Kilfeather (April 5, 1900, Portland, Oregon - January 13, 1950, Los Angeles, California) was a musical composer and arranger who worked at the Screen Gems animation studio. Kilfeather was born in 1900 to Edward and Hannah Kilfeather and grew up in Portland, Oregon. His father was a well-known Democrat found guilty of jury bribing in 1898. The young Kilfeather hooked up with another Portlander, George Olsen, who had formed a band and was its pianist, conductor and arranger. The band headed south and in San Francisco when it was hired by Flo Ziegfeld in 1923 to come to New Year to play music for the show Kid Boots. Kilfeather co-wrote the song Goin’ Home Blues for the show. Ziegfeld became enraged with the band after the opening of Whoopee! in 1928. While on the road in Pittsburgh, he fired Kilfeather and replaced him with a personal favorite. Olsen protested by having his musicians refuse to play for the replacement. Ziegfeld relented and gave Kilfeather his job back. The Olsen band quit when the week was over. Kilfeather wrote a number of songs that Olsen recorded on RCA Records, including She’s a Corn Fed Indiana Girl. (1926) He was so taken with the cornet

Edgar Warren Williams

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Edgar Warren Williams (born June 12, 1949) is an American composer, conductor, and music theorist. Williams obtained a bachelor’s degree in composition from Duke University in 1971, then obtained a master’s degree at Columbia University in 1973, studying with Charles Wuorinen, Mario Davidovsky, and Harvey Sollberger. He then matriculated at Princeton, where he received a Master’s in Fine Arts in 1977 and a Ph.D. in 1982 and studied with Milton Babbitt and James K. Randall. He was a faculty member and orchestral conductor at the College of William & Mary from 1979. Williams’s compositional work is noted for its orchestrational and timbral complexity, and its use of pitch collections as melodic and thematic elements. Compositions Orchestral * 1969 Of Orphalese * 1984 Landscapes with figure * 1998 Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror * 1999 Suite on “Nosferatu” For concert band * 1968 “To my Father” Prologue * 1978 Across a Bridge of Dreams * 1991 Into the dark * 1993 Now showing! * 2002 Music from behind the Moon * Prologue Musicals * 1970 Music for In the Dark of the Moon * 1982 Music for The Merry Wives of Windsor – text by William Shakespeare * 1985 Music for Richard II – text by Willi

Edith Borroff

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Edith Borroff (August 2, 1925 – March 10, 2019) was an American musicologist and composer. Her compositions include over 60 commissioned works, including pieces for the stage; for her primary instrument—the organ; choral, vocal, and orchestral music; and several critical editions of works by previous composers such as Jubilate by J.-J. Cassanéa de Mondonville (Pittsburgh, 1961). She also wrote at least 7 books, including the textbook Music in Europe and the United States: a History (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1971/R), as well as various peer-reviewed articles and publications. Life and career Borroff was born in New York City, the daughter of professional musicians Marie Bergerson and (Albert) Ramon Borroff, Her dissertation was titled The instrumental works of Jean-Joseph Cassanéa de Mondonville. In a 2011 interview with the American Composers Alliance, Borroff shared that she had always considered herself a composer. She started composing at a very young age. According to her, she was not allowed to pursue a degree in composition and settled for a degree in historical musicology but continued to compose and had over 60 commissions as a composer. An extensive, yet selective, list of he

Edmond Dédé

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Edmond Dédé (November 20, 1827 – January 5, 1901) was an American musician and composer. A free-born Creole, he moved to Europe in 1855. He worked in Bordeaux for more than forty years, first as assistant conductor at the Grand Théâtre and then as a conductor of orchestras at other local theaters. His compositions include works for orchestra and for various voices with orchestra or piano, as well as an opera Morgiane, completed in 1887, for which the score was unknown until 2007. Morgiane is the earliest known opera by an African-American composer. It received its first complete concert performances in February 2025. Biography Early years Dédé was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, on November 20, 1827, his mother was the fourth generation of a free family of that city. His father was a marketman, poultry dealer, and music teacher who had migrated from French Caribbean colonies to New Orleans in 1809 after the Haitian Revolution where his father was a militia unit bandmaster. As a boy, Dédé first learned the clarinet, but soon switched to the violin, on which he was considered a prodigy. He later performed compositions of his own as well as those by Rodolphe Kreutzer, a favorite compo

Edmund Jenkins

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Edmund Thornton Jenkins (1894–1926) was an American composer who spent much of his life in Europe. Biography Charleston Jenkins was born in Charleston, South Carolina where his Baptist-minister father, Reverend Daniel Joseph Jenkins, had set up and run the Jenkins Orphanage, which became internationally well-known for its wind band. Edmund Jenkins studied clarinet, piano and violin at the Atlanta Baptist College (now Morehouse College), and played in and directed the Jenkins Orphanage Band. London In 1914 the orphanage band travelled to England to perform at the Anglo-American Exposition in London. Edmund remained in London where, aged 20, he enrolled at the Royal Academy of Music (RAM) to study clarinet, piano, singing and composition. At the RAM he was awarded an orchestral scholarship (1915–17), prizes for singing, clarinet and piano playing, the Charles Lucas prize for composition (1918), Battison Haynes prize for composition (1918) and the Ross Scholarship (1919–21). On leaving the RAM he was made an Associate of the Royal Academy of Music. While in London Edmund Jenkins worked as an orchestral musician in theatre orchestras and dance bands resulting in his participation in a

Edward Ballantine

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Edward Ballantine (August 6, 1886 – July 2, 1971), was an American composer and professor of music. Early life Edward Ballantine was born in Oberlin, Ohio, on August 6, 1886, the son of William Gay Ballantine, the fourth president of Oberlin College, and Emma Frances Atwood. One brother, Arthur Atwood, was the senior member of the New York law firm of Root, Clark, Buckner & Ballantine—later Dewey, Ballantine, Bushby, Palmer & Wood. Another brother, Henry Winthrop, was Professor of Law, at Boalt Hall School of Law. Education and career He studied with Walter Spalding and Frederick Converse at Harvard University, where he received a BA in 1907. He was awarded highest final honors in music at Harvard University and an orchestral composition of his was played by the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Boston, Massachusetts, on June 14, 1907. He then pursued his studies with Artur Schnabel, Rudolf Ganz, and Philippe Rüferthen in Berlin from 1907 to 1909. He returned to the United States where he joined the Harvard music faculty in 1912, where he remained until his retirement in 1947. His best-known compositions are two sets of piano variations on “Mary Had a Little Lamb” (1924, 1943), in which

Edward Boatner

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Edward Hammond Boatner (13 November 1898–16 June 1981) was an American composer who wrote many popular concert arrangements of Black American spirituals. Biography Boatner was educated at Western University in Quindaro, Kansas, Boston Conservatory and received a Bachelor of Music from the Chicago Music College (Now the College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University). He also studied music privately. He began as a Concert singer with the encouragement and assistance of Roland Hayes — who performed many of Boatner’s works on his concert programs—and choral director R. Nathaniel Dett. He also sang leading roles with the National Negro Opera Company. For the National Baptist Convention, he served as the director of music from 1925 to 1931. Boatner was a professor for Samuel Huston College (now Huston–Tillotson University) and Wiley College in Marshall, TX. He then settled in New York conducting a studio and directed community and church choirs. This allowed him to concentrate more on composing. Boatner was the natural father of the sax player Sonny Stitt, but the boy - named Edward Boatner, Jr. - was placed for adoption early on to the Stitt family, growing up in Saginaw, Michigan.

Edward Gold

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Edward Gold (July 25, 1936 – March 2, 2022) was an American pianist and composer. Early life and education Gold was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York and lived most of his adult life in Manhattan. Gold attended public schools and majored in music at CCNY (today part of the City University of New York). He received his masters from Yale University School of Music where he studied with Ellsworth Grumman, Mel Powell and H. Leroy Baumgartner. Edward also studied with Nadia Reisenberg at the Mannes College of Music. Career After completing his studies, Gold worked as a pianist and toured internationally. The recording of Gottschalk Piano Music (1973) on which he performed was named a “Recording of Special Merit” by Stereo Review. His recordings were also noted by The American Record Guide and The Musical Quarterly. Early on, Edward’s music was in the style of atonality (mostly Schoenberg), but with a traditional structural style using atonal and twelve-tone techniques crossed with some Stravinsky. But he largely turned away from these styles after leaving Yale. Over the course of his career, Gold’s work was both eclectic and independent. He composed most often for orchestra, piano,

Edward Joseph Collins

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Edward Joseph Collins (November 10, 1886 – December 1, 1951) was an American pianist, conductor and composer of classical music in a neoromantic style. Life and career Collins was born in Joliet, Illinois, into an Irish family – his father was from County Meath and his mother from Belfast. From age 14, he studied with Rudolph Ganz in Chicago, and in 1906 went with Ganz to Berlin, where he studied performance and composition at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik under Max Bruch and Engelbert Humperdinck. Upon graduation, he had a successful concert piano debut in Berlin. He returned to the United States in 1912 and toured with the contralto Ernestine Schumann-Heink. He was an assistant conductor with the Century Opera Company in New York City and with the Bayreuth Festival in Germany. During World War I, Collins served in the U.S. Army (88th Division of the Intelligence Unit in France) as an interpreter and entertained the troops as pianist. From Private he rose up to the rank of Lieutenant during the war. After the war he returned to Chicago and joined 1919 the faculty of Chicago Musical College as one of the principal piano teachers. Collins married a voice student, Frieda Mayer, who

Edward Knight (composer)

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Edward Knight (born November 4, 1961) is an American composer. His work eschews easy classification, moving freely between jazz, theatrical and concert worlds. Background Knight was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and was introduced to music by his grandmother, Kathryn Dyer Knight, a concert pianist who taught piano later in life. He excelled at trumpet; as a teenager, he toured three summers with Musical Youth International, performing in Russia, Scandinavia, the British Isles, and several European capitals. Knight earned his undergraduate degree from Eastern Michigan University and his master’s and doctorate in composition from University of Texas at Austin. He spent a year studying privately with John Corigliano in New York, and won a Rotary Scholarship for post-doctoral study at London’s Royal College of Music, where he studied with John Lambert. At the Royal College, he became the first American to win the Arthur Bliss Memorial for outstanding postgraduate composer. Early orchestral works Knight came to national attention with four large-scale orchestral works in the late 1980s and early 1990s: Of Perpetual Solace, Total Eclipse, Granite Island, and Big Shoulders. Of Perpetual So

Edward MacDowell

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Edward Alexander MacDowell (December 18, 1860 January 23, 1908) was an American composer and pianist of the late Romantic period. He was best known for his second piano concerto and his piano suites Woodland Sketches, Sea Pieces and New England Idylls. Woodland Sketches includes his most popular short piece, “To a Wild Rose”. In 1904 he was one of the first seven Americans honored by membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Studies Edward MacDowell was born in New York City to Thomas MacDowell, a Manhattan milk dealer, and Frances “Fanny” Mary Knapp. He received his first piano lessons from Juan Buitrago, a Colombian violinist who was living with the MacDowell family at the time. He also received music lessons from friends of Buitrago, including the Cuban pianist Pablo Desverine and Venezuelan pianist and composer Teresa Carreño. After two years of studies under Antoine François Marmontel and being at the top of his class, he continued his education at Dr. Hoch’s Conservatory in Frankfurt, Germany, where he studied piano with Carl Heymann and composition with Joachim Raff. When Franz Liszt and Clara Schumann visited the conservatory in early 1880 and attended a recit

Edward Mack

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Edward L. Mack (24 August 1826 – 7 January 1882), also credited as E. Mack, was a German born American composer, pianist, teacher, and piano professional best known for his prolific output of parlor pieces and military marches published chiefly in Philadelphia. His marches and patriotic pieces were widely circulated during and after the American Civil War, and numerous titles by Mack survive in major sheet music collections. Early Life and Education Edward L. Mack was born on 24 August 1826 in Stuttgart, Baden Württemberg, Germany, and was baptized at the Evangelische Leonhardskirche on 3 September 1826. He emigrated to the United States with his parents in 1831, at about five years of age. In 1844, at approximately eighteen years old, Mack was admitted to the Pennsylvania Institution for the Instruction of the Blind in Philadelphia, where he received formal training that shaped his early musical formation. Career By the 1850s Mack had established himself in Philadelphia as a pianist, music teacher, and composer. He wrote music aimed at the parlor market—marches, waltzes, and variations on popular melodies—designed to be both appealing and playable by amateur home pianists. His par

Edward Mollenhauer

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Edward Mollenhauer (1827–1914) was an American violinist and composer. Biography Mollenhauer was born in Erfurt, Prussia. He studied under Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst and Louis Spohr, and had become famous in Germany and at Saint Petersburg before he was twenty-five years old. To escape conscription, he went to England, where he met conductor Louis-Antoine Jullien, and accompanied him to New York City in 1853. He settled there and became a founder in America of the Conservatory method of teaching the violin. Mollenhauer’s best-known compositions for the violin are his quartets. He also wrote the operas, The Corsican Bride (1861), Love among the Breakers (also known as Down among the Breakers; 1878), and The Masked Ball (also known as The Wager; 1879). He soloed with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra for six years. He also created 2 pieces for violin with piano accompaniment, “The Boy Paganini” and “The Infant Paganini” both are still played worldwide. Among those he taught were African-American soloist and orchestra director, Walter F. Craig. See also *List of string quartet composers References Attribution *

Edward Shearmur

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Edward Shearmur (also known as Ed Shearmur; born 28 February 1966) is a British film composer. Born in London, England, at age seven he sang in the boys’ choir at Westminster Cathedral. Educated at Eton College, he studied at the Royal College of Music and went on to a scholarship at Pembroke College, Cambridge. He worked as orchestration and conducting assistant to Michael Kamen on such films as Licence to Kill, Die Hard, Lethal Weapon and the acclaimed Don Juan DeMarco before scoring his first full-length feature film The Cement Garden In 2023 he composed the soundtrack for the film adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s last novel Across the River and into the Trees. In addition to his film work, Shearmur has collaborated as keyboardist and arranger with a number of prominent rock musicians, including Eric Clapton, Peter Gabriel, Annie Lennox, Pink Floyd, Marianne Faithfull, Bryan Adams, Echo & the Bunnymen, and Jimmy Page and Robert Plant. Ambient artist David Helpling has cited Shearmur’s compositional style as a major influence on his work. Shearmur was married to film producer Allison Shearmur (née Brecker) until her death from lung cancer in January 2018. They have two children.

Edward T. Cone

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Edward Toner Cone (May 4, 1917 – October 23, 2004) was an American composer, music theorist, pianist, and philanthropist. Life and career Cone was born in Greensboro, North Carolina. He studied composition under Roger Sessions at Princeton University, receiving his bachelor’s in 1939 (Latin salutatorian and the first Princeton student to submit a musical composition as his senior thesis). Cone and Milton Babbitt were the first to earn graduate degrees in musical composition from Princeton (MFA, 1942). He studied piano with Karl Ulrich Schnabel and Edward Steuermann. During the Second World War, Cone served first in the army (as a pianist) and later in the Office of Strategic Services. Beginning in 1946, he taught at Princeton. He was the co-editor of the journal Perspectives of New Music between 1965 and 1969. Cone, known for his contributions to music criticism and analysis, also composed a significant body of music. His scholarly work addressed musical form and aesthetics, particularly questions of rhythm and musical phrasing. He died in Princeton, New Jersey, aged 87. Cone was the companion of Princeton philosophy professor George Pitcher for nearly 48 years. Cone’s students inc

Edward Ward (composer)

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Edward Ward (April 2, 1896– September 26, 1971) was an American film composer and music director who was nominated for seven Academy Awards. Academy Award nominations *1939 Best Original Song for “Always and Always” from Mannequin *1942 Best Scoring of a Dramatic Picture (Cheers for Miss Bishop) *1942 Best Scoring of a Dramatic Picture (Tanks a Million) *1942 Best Scoring of a Musical Picture (All-American Co-Ed) *1943 Best Original Song for “Pennies for Peppino” from Flying with Music *1943 Best Scoring of a Musical Picture (Flying with Music) *1944 Best Scoring of a Musical Picture (Phantom of the Opera) Additional credits *Paris (1929) *No, No, Nanette (1930) *Kismet (1930) *Great Expectations (1934) *The Bishop Misbehaves (1935) *The Mystery of Edwin Drood (1935) *San Francisco (1936) *Camille (1936) *The Gorgeous Hussy (1936) *Night Must Fall (1937) *Maytime (1937) *Saratoga (1937) *A Yank at Oxford (1938) *The Shopworn Angel (1938) *Boys Town (1938) *The Women (1939) * Ali Baba And The Forty Thieves (1944) * Gypsy Wildcat (1944) * Ghost Catchers (1944) * It Happened on 5th Avenue (1947) *The Babe Ruth Story (1948) *Man of a Thousand Faces (1957) References External links * *

Edwin Eugene Bagley

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Edwin Eugene “E. E.” Bagley (May 29, 1857 – January 29, 1922) was an American composer most famous for composing the march National Emblem. Bagley was born in Craftsbury, Vermont on May 29, 1857. He began his music career at age nine as a vocalist and comedian with Leavitt’s Bellringers, a company of entertainers that toured many of the larger cities of the United States. Bagley began playing the cornet, traveling with the Swiss Bellringers for six years. After his touring days, Bagley joined Blaisdell’s Orchestra of Concord, New Hampshire. In 1880, Bagley came to Boston as a solo cornet player at The Park Theater. For nine years, he traveled with the Bostonians, an opera company. While with this company, Bagley changed from cornet to trombone. He also performed with the Germania Band of Boston and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. In the early 1900s, Bagley played with Wheeler’s Band in Bellows Falls, Vermont. Wheeler’s Band was the first to publicly perform Bagley’s “National Emblem March” in 1906. Bagley is best known for composing marches, particularly the famous march National Emblem. This piece is played as a patriotic tune on Independence Day celebrations in the United States a

Edwin Franko Goldman

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Edwin Franko Goldman (January 1, 1878 – February 21, 1956) was an American composer and conductor. One of the most significant American band composers of the early 20th century, Goldman composed over 150 works, but is best known for his marches. He founded the renowned Goldman Band of New York City and the American Bandmasters Association. Goldman’s works are characterized by their pleasant and catchy tunes, as well as their fine trios and solos. He also encouraged audiences to whistle/hum along to his marches. He wrote singing and whistling into the score of “On the Mall” (which vies with “Chimes of Liberty” as his two most-enduring marches). Early life and education Goldman was born January 1, 1878, in Louisville, Kentucky, the son of David Henry and Selma Franko Goldman. The family moved to Evansville, Indiana in 1879 and, finally, to Terre Haute, Indiana. His father died in Terre Haute on December 18, 1886, when Goldman was only eight years old, and the following year, Selma and her four children, Edwin, Mayer, Irma and Alfred, moved to New York City. Before her marriage, Goldman’s mother was a professional pianist and part of the Franko Family, which made its debut at Steinway

Edwin Penhorwood

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Edwin Penhorwood (born 1939) is an American composer who is an assistant professor at the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University. Biography Penhorwood is a native of Toledo, Ohio, and studied music at the University of Iowa. He has taught at the International School of Zurich, Switzerland, at the Church Music Conservatory in Berlin, the University of Missouri, and Indiana University, and has accompanied singers and instrumentalists in North America and in Europe for many years. Penhorwood joined the faculty of Indiana University in 1993. He is the musical director of the Graduate Opera Workshop and has taught Accompanying. Penhorwood is the composer of many choral and vocal compositions. Penhorwood’s songs have been broadcast by NPR, the Paris and Berlin radio networks and have been featured at Glimmerglass Opera, The Chautauqua Opera, the National NATS Convention, and Marilyn Horne’s 70th Birthday Celebration. In 1999, the Indianapolis Symphonic Chorus, through the Lilly Foundation, presented Penhorwood with a commission for a choral work, The Christmas Story. Penhorwood’s compositions have been published by Carl Fischer, Abingdon, Hinshaw Music, and T.I.S. Publications. In

Effie F. Kamman

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Effie F. Kamman (1868–1933) was an American composer, pianist, music teacher, and vaudeville performer. She was known for composing “The Dance of the Brownies” (1893), a popular tune inspired by the children’s books by Palmer Cox. Early life Effie F. Kamman was from Detroit, the daughter of Frederick Kamman and Minerva A. Howlett Kamman. Her father was a butcher. Career Kamman was a music teacher in Detroit, who also gained notice as a performer in vaudeville. She toured in several shows, including The Fencing Master (1894), Run on the Bank (1895), The Governors (1897), Hunting for Hawkins (1901), and On the Stroke of 12 (1903). She sang soprano parts, but also sometimes toured as a “lady baritone” novelty singing act. She was also the music and art editor for the newspaper Detroit Journal. Later in her career, she played piano on radio, and in theatres during silent films. Published works by Kamman included *“The Dance of the Brownies” (1893) *“The American Two-Step” (1895) *“Dance of the White Rats” (1901) *“Hunting for Hawkins” (1901) *“I Love You Yet” (1903) *“Skirmish” (1903), *“What’s Your Hurry?” (1922) *“The Old Fashioned Love of the Days Long Ago” (1928) *“In Twilight Land

Efraín Amaya

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Efraín Amaya (born 1959 Caracas, Venezuela) is a Venezuelan-born American composer. Biography Amaya studied piano and composition at Indiana University until 1985 and orchestral conducting at the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University until 1988. He was a piano student of Shigeo Neriki, Zadel Skolovsky and Harriet Serr, a composition student of John Eaton, Juan Orrego-Salas, Frederick Fox, Ellsworth Milburn, Daniel Börtz and Ib Nørholm, and learned orchestral conducting from Samuel Jones, Uri Mayer and Benjamin Zander. During his studies, he directed the Campanile Orchestra at Rice University from 1985 to 1988. After his return to Venezuela, he was music director of the youth symphony orchestra Núcleo La Rinconada from 1989 to 1992 and conducted various other Venezuelan orchestras. From 1996 to 2002 he was music director and conductor of the Westmoreland Youth Symphony Orchestra and from 2000 to 2006 of the Three Rivers Young Peoples Orchestra, and he also worked as a guest conductor with other orchestras. He teaches on the School Music faculty at Carnegie Mellon University, is music director and conductor of the Greensburg America Opera, and of The Point Chamber Orchestra, wh

Egon Kenton

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Egon Francis Kenton (born Egon Ferenc Kornstein; May 22, 1891 – December 3, 1987) was a Hungarian and American musicologist, violist, music librarian, and educator born in the Transylvanian village of Nagyszalonta, Austro-Hungarian Empire (now Salonta, Romania) on May 22, 1891 and died in Paris on December 3, 1987. Kenton began studying viola and violin at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music (known at the time as the National Royal Hungarian Academy of Music) in 1905 and graduated in 1911. Upon graduation he played in the , known simply at the time as the Hungarian Quartet, or as Kenton remarked, “the old one—the first Hungarian quartet.” Kenton’s tenure with this group led to encounters and friendships with some of the most significant composers of the twentieth century. The group performed Claude Debussy’s Quartet in Budapest with the composer in attendance, who was so impressed that he arranged for them to perform the work again in Paris. On his trip to Paris, Kenton became well-acquainted with Debussy and his family, having recounted instances of the French composer’s penchant for sarcasm. Of a performance by a well-known Hungarian pianist, Debussy commented, “‘I myself can’t go t

Elaine Barkin

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Elaine “Ray” Barkin (née Radoff, December 15, 1932 – February 22, 2023) was an American composer, writer, and educator. Early life Elaine Radoff was born in The Bronx, New York City, lived in the Amalgamated Houses, attended Bronx High School of Science, Third Street Music School Settlement, and Queens College (BA in 1954), where she studied composition and theory with Karol Rathaus, Sol Berkowitz, Leo Kraft, and Saul Novack. At Brandeis University (MFA in 1956, PhD in 1971), her mentors in composition and theory were Irving Fine, Harold Shapero, Arthur Berger, and Seymour Shifrin. In the summer of 1955 she worked with Boris Blacher at Tanglewood and then in 1956 and 1957 at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik on a Fulbright fellowship. In 1963, Barkin was asked by Benjamin Boretz, founding editor of the composers’ journal Perspectives of New Music, to join as editor, a post she held until 1985. Barkin published books and professional articles in journals including Perspectives of New Music. Personal life and death In 1957 she married writer, editor, and computer programmer George J. Barkin (1928–2020). They had three sons: Victor, Jesse, and Gabriel. Works Principal compositions *Four

Elaine Bearer

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Elaine L. Bearer is an American brain scientist, neuropathologist, and composer of classical music. Education Bearer received her Bachelor’s of Music from The Manhattan School of Music in Theory, in June 1970. She received the Masters of Art from New York University, where her thesis was entitled Structural Innovation in the String Quartets of Haydn. Prior to studies at The Manhattan School, Bearer was a pupil of Nadia Boulanger, first at the Ecole Americaine des Beaux Arts of the Fontainebleau Schools and continuing in Boulanger’s home on Rue Ballu in Paris. After several years as a tenure-track professor in music at a small liberal arts college in San Francisco, Lone Mountain College, she studied Human Biology at Stanford, was Donald Kennedy’s teaching assistant, worked as a graduate research assistant in Neurobiology with John G. Nicholls and proceeded to be admitted to the combined MD-PhD Medical Scientist Training Program funded by NIH at University of California San Francisco (UCSF) ,where she graduated with the combined degree in a record 6 years. Career After a one-year post-doctoral fellowship with Lelio Orci in Geneva, at the Centre medical universitaire (CMU), Bearer ret

Elaine Fine

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Elaine Fine (born 30 April 1959 in Cleveland, Ohio) is an American musician and composer. Education Fine’s parents were both musicians; her mother played the flute and her father was a violist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. She began taking violin lessons when she was 7 and switched to the flute at 14. After graduating high school, she moved from her hometown of Boston to New York to study at the Juilliard School. External links *List of arrangements at International Music Score Library Project *List of compositions at International Music Score Library Project

Elainie Lillios

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Elainie Lillios is a musician specializing in electronic and electroacoustic composition and performance. Lillios studied composition with Larry Austin, Jonty Harrison, Jon Christopher Nelson, Joseph Klein, and others. She has been a professor at Bowling Green State University since 2000. She was awarded First Prize in the 36th International Competition of Electroacoustic Music and Sonic Art in Bourges in 2009. In 2012, she was awarded a commission from the Groupe de Recherches Musicales in Paris. Her works have been included in several festivals such as Electronic Music Midwest Vox Novus’s Fifteen Minutes of Fame, and 60x60 Education Works Source: Compositions * Oceanus IV (1986) * Eclectronic (1988) * Pieces of Partch (1988) * Cactus, Rock, Beaters (1991) * Textural Visions (1991), 10:00 * CELLAR for fixed media (1994–95), 5:02 * of a Single Mind? for alto saxophone and electronics (1995), 12:07 * Au deuxième étage for fixed media (1996), 3:00 * Supplications (1996) * Sounds from the second floor (1996–97), 7:00 * Arturo for fixed media (1998), 13:35 * Threads for fixed media (1998), 4:50 * Stumbling Dance for fixed media (1998–99), 14:45 * Earth Ascending for female voice and el

Eleanor Everest Freer

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Eleanor Everest Freer (14 May 1864 – 13 Dec 1942) was an American composer and philanthropist. Life Eleanor Everest was born in Philadelphia, the daughter of Cornelius Everest and Ellen Amelia (Clark) Everest, and studied singing in Paris with Mathilde Marchesi and composition with Benjamin Godard. She taught music in Philadelphia and New York City, and married Chicago doctor Archibald Freer in 1893. The couple had one daughter and moved to Chicago in 1899, where Eleanor Freer studied music theory with Bernard Ziehn. In 1934, she received a D.Mus. from the Boguslawski College of Music. Freer was an active advocate for American opera, and opera sung in English. To this end, she helped to found the Opera in Our Language Foundation (OOLF) in 1921, and the David Bispham Memorial Fund in 1922 to promote concerts of American composers’ works and award a Bispham Medal. The two organizations merged in 1924 to become the American Opera Society of Chicago. Freer’s one-act opera The Legend of the Piper was performed numerous times by the American Opera Company from 1928 through 1929. She died in Chicago in 1942. Works Freer composed eleven operas and more than 150 songs, many of which were pu

Eleanor Hovda

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Eleanor Hovda (March 27, 1940 – November 12, 2009) was a composer and dancer from the United States of America. She was born in Duluth, Minnesota and died in Springdale, Arkansas. She received her Bachelor of Arts in music at American University in Washington, D.C., and her MFA in dance at Sarah Lawrence College. Her music has been performed extensively in the U.S. and abroad by ensembles including the Netherlands Wind Ensemble, KlangForum (Vienna), the Cassatt and Kronos Quartets, Zeitgeist, Bang on a Can All-Stars, the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players, the Boston Musica Viva, The California Ear Unit, the Minneapolis Guitar Quartet and the St. Louis Symphony. Performance venues have included Ozawa Hall (Tanglewood), Alice Tully, Carnegie Hall Weill, Miller, Walter Reade and Merkin Concert Halls; The Kitchen, Bang on a Can Festival and The Alternative Museum (NYC) the Purcell Room (London), The American Academy (Rome), the American Center (Paris), the WDR (Cologne), Cervantino Festival (Mexico), New Music Forum (Mexico City), Holland Festival (Amsterdam), Vienna, Madrid, Barcelona, Tokyo and Asahikawa (Japan); colleges and universities including Princeton, Harvard, Yale, Co

Elena Ruehr

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Elena Ruehr (born 1963) is an American musician, music educator and composer. Life and career Elena Ruehr was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, as the daughter of a mathematician and an English professor. She grew up in Houghton, Michigan and began piano lessons at age four. She studied composition at the University of Michigan with William Bolcom and at The Juilliard School with Vincent Persichetti and Bernard Rands. She also studied dance and has performed with Javanese and West African ensembles. In 1992, Ruehr took a teaching position at MIT. Her compositions have been performed internationally and many have been recorded and are available on media. Many of Ruehr’s compositions involve setting poetry to music. Ruehr is married to Seward Rutkove and they have one daughter, Sophie. Selected works Ruehr has composed works for orchestra, chamber ensemble, solo instruments and vocals. *Ladder to the Moon (2003) for orchestra *Toussaint Before the Spirits (2003), opera *Cloud Atlas (2011), cello concerto *Song of the Silkie (2000) for baritone, string quartet, text by Laura Harrington *Sky Above Clouds (1993) for orchestra *Bel Canto for string quartet *Averno for choir *It’s About Time (

Elia Cmíral

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Elia David Cmíral (; born October 1, 1950) is a Czech composer for film, television, ballet, and video games. He has worked on numerous projects across multiple genres, though he is arguably best known for his work in the thriller and horror cinema, and has collaborated with filmmakers like Wes Craven, John Frankenheimer, John Travolta, and Ernest Dickerson. Early life and career Cmíral was born in Czechoslovakia, to an actress and a stage director, and was the grandson of one of Antonín Dvořák’s pupils. Cmiral attended the Prague Conservatory, where he studied composition and double bass. His first scoring opportunity came with his father’s production of Cyrano de Bergerac. He also composed music for the award-winning adventure game The Last Express and the third-person shooter Spec Ops: The Line. As well as working in Hollywood, he has also composed numerous scores for films made in Sweden and the Czech Republic. Personal life Cmíral currently resides in Sherman Oaks, Los Angeles. Filmography Feature films *2019 - Safe Inside *2016 - Doubles *2015 - Any Day *2014 - Atlas Shrugged Part III: Who Is John Galt? *2014 - Cam2Cam *2012 - Piranha 3DD *2012 - Rites of Passage *2011 - Atla

Elie Siegmeister

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Elie Siegmeister (also published under pseudonym L. E. Swift; January 15, 1909, in New York City – March 10, 1991, in Manhasset, New York) was an American composer, educator and author. Early life and education Elie Siegmeister was born January 15, 1909, in New York City. Both parents were of Russian-Jewish ancestry. His father was a surgeon. His parents, William and Bessie Siegmeister, were both born in Russia. His older brother Walter Siegmeister was an esoteric writer and promoter of Hollow Earth theory and UFOs. he had studied music theory with Seth Bingham. He studied conducting with Albert Stoessel at the Juilliard School and counterpoint with Wallingford Riegger. He was among the numerous American composers, including Aaron Copland and Virgil Thomson, who were students of the influential teacher Nadia Boulanger in Paris. Career His varied musical output showed his concern with the development of an authentic American musical vocabulary. Jazz, blues and folk melodies and rhythms are frequent themes in his many song cycles, his nine operas, his eight symphonies, and his many choral, chamber, and solo works. His 37 orchestral works have been performed by leading orchestras thro

Elinor Armer

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Elinor Armer (born October 6, 1939) is an American pianist, music educator and composer. Biography Elinor Armer was born in Oakland, California but at the age of 2 months moved to Davis, California with her family where she would spend most of her childhood. Armer’s father worked as an engineer and worked for the Agricultural Engineering Department for the University in Davis, which prompted the family’s move. Her father was an acoustical engineer and used to set up speakers in the family’s living room, exposing Elinor to acoustics at a young age. Elinor first began sight-reading music and enjoying four-part harmony because of many hymnals found in the Armer home, due to her father’s Methodist Evangelist background. Armer comes from a family of California artists, her grandfather was a commercial artist and her grandmother was an author. Her mother was a writer as well and who sang and played the piano. Elinor shared her love of piano with her mother; they frequently sang and played together throughout her childhood. Armer was eight years old when she began playing the piano Though her mother played the piano also, Elinor was taught to play by a neighbor, Fritz Berens, who happened

Elisabeth Le Guin

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Elisabeth Covel Le Guin She attended the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where she obtained BMus in Cello in 1979. She later did graduate studies at University of California, Berkeley, where she obtained an MA in 1992 and PhD in music in 1997; her doctoral dissertation “As My Works Show Me To Be”: Physicality as Compositional Technique in the Instrumental Music of Luigi Boccherini was supervised by Daniel Heartz. In 1997, she joined the University of California, Los Angeles. In 2005, she published Boccherini’s Body, which focuses on the work of Classical-era composer Luigi Boccherini. She won the 2015 Otto Kinkeldey Award for her book The Tonadilla in Performance (2013), In 2022, she retired from UCLA and became professor emeritus. providing funding for Si Yo Fuera Una Canción, a bilingual podcast about the musical interests of people in Santa Ana, California. She was elected Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2021. Bibliography *Boccherini’s Body (2005) *The Tonadilla in Performance (2013) References

Eliza Mazzucato Young

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Eliza Mazzucato Young (July 7, 1846 – March 27, 1937) was an Italian-born American composer, musician, and educator. She wrote Mr. Sampson of Omaha (1888), one of the first operas by a woman to be produced in the United States. Early life Elisa Mazzucato was born in Milan, the daughter of opera composer Alberto Mazzucato and Teresa Bolza, a daughter of Count , Austrian police commissioner in Milan. Her father was the director of the conservatory at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan. She studied music with her father, and in London. Career Eliza Mazzucato taught at the National Training School of Music in London, before it closed in 1882, and then at the Royal College of Music. She resigned in 1883 when she married one of the students, an American baritone named Bicknell Young. The couple moved to Salt Lake City in 1885, to open a music school, Young composed the music for the comic opera Mr. Sampson of Omaha (1888), one of the first operas by a woman to be produced in the United States; the libretto was by Fred Nye. Sheet music for songs from the opera continued to be published for years after its debut. Other compositions by Young included a one-act opera, The Maiden and the Reaper,

Elizabeth Alexander (composer)

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Elizabeth Alexander (born August 6, 1962) is an American composer. Her works include orchestral, chamber, piano and vocal works. She is best known for her over 80 choral pieces, which have been performed internationally by thousands of choirs. Alexander is also known for her liturgical works, and themes centering on social justice. Biography Sarah Elizabeth Alexander was born in South Carolina in 1962. After several years in South and North Carolina, her family moved to the Ohio River city of Portsmouth, Ohio in 1972. Trained as a classical pianist, Alexander studied composition with Jack Gallagher and received her Bachelor of Music in Composition from The College of Wooster in 1984. She received her doctorate in Music Composition from Cornell University in 1987, where she studied with noted composers Steven Stucky, Karel Husa, and Yehudi Wyner. She currently resides in St. Paul, Minnesota, and is one of the most performed composers in the Unitarian Universalist Musicians Network. Music Choral music makes up the core of Alexander’s works and performances, noted for her “accessible style that is well tailored to the requirements of both semi-pro and amateur choruses.” Her style comb

Elizabeth Bell (composer)

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Elizabeth Bell (December 1, 1928 – December 19, 2016) was an American composer. Life and education Elizabeth Bell was born in Cincinnati in 1928. She was awarded her Bachelor of Arts degree in music from Wellesley College in 1950, and went on to earn a Bachelor of Music in composition from Juilliard in 1953. Elizabeth Bell died on December 19, 2016, in Tarrytown, New York. Awards and commissions * 1986 First prize for Perne in a Gyre * 1996 Grand prize for Spectra, Utah composers competition * 1994 Delius prize for Duovarios, Jacksonville, Florida Bell has had numerous commissions including * The New York State Council on the Arts * The Bradshaw/Buono duo * The Inoue Chamber Ensemble * The North/South Consonance * The Putnam Valley Orchestra * The Vienna Modern Masters * Max Lifchitz Of an Eleanor Elkins recital Bell said: “My piece, Night music, was something of a revelation. Max Lifchitz (who commissioned it) has played it numerous times, and recorded it on the Vienna Modern Masters label. His interpretation is brilliant and satisfying. Eleanor’s was entirely different: also brilliant, but more sombre and angry, more suggestive of ’night music.’ I like them both, and am delighted

Elizabeth Brown (musician)

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Elizabeth Brown (born 1953) is an American contemporary composer and performer, known for music described as otherworldly, which employs microtonal expression, unique instrumentation and a morphing, freewheeling language. Her work is frequently commissioned for specific ensembles (e.g., Newband, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra) and has been performed internationally in solo, chamber and orchestral contexts at venues including Carnegie Hall, Boston’s Symphony Hall, the Smithsonian Institution, and the Hanoi National Conservatory of Music. She has written extensively for flute, unconventional instruments such as the Partch complement and theremin, and the traditional Asian shakuhachi and đàn bầu; she combines them in original ways that mix Western and Eastern, ancient and modern, and experimental and conventionally melodic sensibilities. Composer and critic Robert Carl calls Brown a “gentle maverick” whose avant-gardism bends and subverts traditional tropes with an unironic, unpretentious manner “that is fresh and imaginative, but never afraid of beauty, nor of humane warmth.” As a multi-instrumentalist, Brown is best known for flute, shakuhachi and theremin. She has performed at Lincoln C

Elizabeth Gyring

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Elizabeth Gyring (1886–1970) was an American composer born in Vienna, Austria. Early life and education Gyring’s father was Leopold Rethy, a laryngologist. Gyring attended the Vienna Academy of Music, studying harmony with Joseph Marx and piano with Ludwig Gzaczkes, then in 1910 composition with Arnold Schoenburg. Career Gyring had several of her early works performed in concerts and broadcast on the radio by players from the Vienna and Berlin Philharmonic Orchestras. Following her emigration to the United States, she had a successful compositional career, with her works performed and recorded by American soloists and ensembles. In 1944 Gyring became an American citizen. *Piano Sonata No.2 (1957) *Hymn of Gratitude (1948) *Arabesque for bassoon (1963-1964) *String Quartets *Violin Concerto Several of her works were recorded on Phonograph. References

Elizabeth Hayden Pizer

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Elizabeth Faw Hayden Pizer (born September 1, 1954) is an American composer, music journalist, archivist and broadcast producer. She was born in Watertown, New York, and studied at the Boston Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. Hayden married musician and composer Charles Pizer. She was awarded the First Prize in the 1982 Delius Composition Contest. Works Selected works include: * Elegy for Strings for string orchestra (or string quartet) (1977/79) * Fanfare Overture for symphonic band (1977/79) * Look Down, Fair Moon for voice & piano (1976) * Quilisoly for flute & piano, or violin & piano (1976) * String Quartet (1981) * Five Haiku for soprano & chamber ensemble (or soprano & piano reduction) (1978) * Five Haiku, II for mezzo-soprano & piano (1979) * Ten Haiku for saxophone & piano (1978/79; arr. 1983) * Nightsongs for medium voice & piano (texts by Milton Drake) (1986) * Shakespeare Set for unaccompanied voice (1978–87) * Sunken Flutes (electronic tape) (1979) * Arlington (electronic tape) (1989) * Embryonic Climactus (electronic tape) (1989) * The Infinite Sea for electronic tape, or electronic tape & narrator (1990) * Aquasphere (electronic tape) (1990) Her work ha

Elizabeth Ogonek

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Elizabeth Ogonek (born May 26, 1989) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Biography Ogonek was born in Anoka, Minnesota and was raised in New York City. There she began her studies in the Preparatory Division at the Manhattan School of Music. Ogonek received her BM from the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University in 2009. After this, she went on to receive her MM from USC Thornton School of Music in 2012. Some of her notable compositions include the chamber violin concerto In Silence and the orchestral dance suite All These Lighted Things. Ogonek was assistant professor of composition at Oberlin College and Conservatory (Oberlin Conservatory of Music) from 2015 until 2021, when she joined the composition faculty at Cornell University. Musical style Ogonek’s music often is led by and has a strong connection with the words and poetry used. This has led her to work with several young writers, including Sophia Veltfort, Ghazal Mosadeq, Ralph Nazareth, and Jonathan Dubow. *Lightenings: A work commissioned by the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival for Julianne Lee (violin), Romie de Guise-Langlois (clarinet), Alexis Corbin (percussion) and Juho Pohjonen (piano). Ref

Elizabeth R. Austin

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Elizabeth R. Austin (born 1938) is an American composer. Life Born in Baltimore, Elizabeth R. Austin received her early musical training at The Peabody Conservatory. When Nadia Boulanger visited Goucher College (Towson, MD), she awarded the composer a scholarship to study at the Conservatoire Americaine in Fontainebleau, France, after hearing Austin’s song cycle Drei Rilke Lieder. Her association with the Hartt School of Music (University of Hartford), where she earned a Master’s in Music while on the faculty, included the establishment of a faculty/student exchange with the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik, Heidelberg-Mannheim. While studying for her Ph.D. at The University of Connecticut, Elizabeth Austin won First Prize in the Lipscomb Electronic Music Competition (with her Klavier Double for piano and tape). Her awards have included a Connecticut Commission on the Arts grant, selection by GEDOK (Society of Women Artists in Germany/Austria) to represent the Mannheim region in its 70th anniversary exhibition, and First Prize in IAWM’s 1998 Miriam Gideon Competition (for Homage for Hildegard von Bingen, and a Rockefeller Foundation residency at Bellagio, Italy (2001). Performed in

Elizabeth Swados

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Elizabeth Swados (February 5, 1951 – January 5, 2016) was an American writer, composer, musician, choreographer, and theatre director. Swados received Tony Award nominations for Best Musical, Best Direction of a Musical, Best Book of a Musical, Best Original Score, and Best Choreography. Life Swados was born on February 5, 1951, in Buffalo, New York. Her father, Robert O. Swados, was a successful attorney who helped Seymour H. Knox III establish the National Hockey League Buffalo Sabres. He was a first cousin of Harvey Swados, a prominent social critic and writer. His autobiography, Counsel in the Crease: A Big League Player in the Hockey Wars, was published by Prometheus Books in 2005. Swados’ mother, an actress and poet, struggled with depression, and committed suicide in 1974; Swados’ elder brother and only sibling, Lincoln, had schizophrenia, and died in 1989. Swados also had depression, which she discussed in her book, My Depression: A Picture Book, which was published by Seven Stories Press in 2014. Swados died on January 5, 2016, from complications following surgery early the previous year for esophageal cancer. Swados’ musical compositions for Fragments of a Greek Trilogy (

Elizabeth Walton Vercoe

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Elizabeth Vercoe (born April 23, 1941) is an American musician, music educator and composer. Biography Born in Washington, D.C., Elizabeth Vercoe grew up in a musical family and studied the classical piano and the violin while attending the National Cathedral School. From 1958 to 1962, she studied music theory at Wellesley College where she was awarded the Hubert Weldon Lamb Prize in Composition. Following college, Vercoe began graduate school at the University of Michigan where she pursued a Masters of Music degree in composition, studying under George Wilson, Ross Lee Finney and Leslie Bassett. In 1974, Vercoe entered the doctoral program in music composition at Boston University where she was mentored by the composer, Gardner Read and was awarded First Prize in Music Theory and Composition and was elected to Pi Kappa Lambda, the national music honor society. Her teaching posts have included a position in music theory on the faculty at Westminster Choir College in Princeton, New Jersey, a year at Framingham State College in Massachusetts, and her current job since 1997 as an adjunct professor at Regis College. Vercoe has won a number of national and international composition comp

Ellen Fullman

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Ellen Fullman (born 1957) is an American composer, instrument builder, and performer. She is known for her 70-foot (21-meter) Long String instrument, tuned in just intonation and played with rosin-coated fingers. Biography and work Fullman studied sculpture at the Kansas City Art Institute before moving to New York in the early 1980s. In Kansas City she created and performed in an amplified metal sound-producing skirt and wrote art songs which she recorded in New York for a small cassette label. In 1981, she began developing the Long String Instrument at her studio in Brooklyn, consisting of dozens of metallic strings played with rosin-coated fingers and producing a chorus of organ-like partials. This instrument has been compared to the experience of standing inside an enormous grand piano. She has recorded extensively with this unusual instrument and has collaborated with such luminary figures as composer Pauline Oliveros, choreographer Deborah Hay, the Kronos Quartet, and Frances-Marie Uitti. In 1985, she was in residence at the Apollohuis in the Netherlands, where she recorded The Long String Instrument (LP) for Apollo Records. Recognition Fullman has been the recipient of numer

Ellen Reid (composer)

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Ellen Reid (born 1983) is an American composer originally from Oak Ridge, Tennessee who lives and works in New York City and Los Angeles. Reid is a multi-genre composer whose work spans classical, opera, sound installations, film scores, avant-pop, ensemble and choral writing. She is known for her Pulitzer Prize-winning opera, p r i s m, Ellen Reid SOUNDWALK and her work with various orchestras, including the album isomonstrosity. Early life Reid grew up in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. writing incidental music for plays and scoring films. Her inspiration began with the sounds of her environment. After college, she lived in Thailand for two and a half years, working and learning alongside Thai musicians writing operatic works that draw from both Western and Thai traditions. Career Classical Reid’s work has been performed by the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, RTÉ, American Composers Orchestra, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, and other institutions around the world. Reid is the first person to have been commissioned by and have world premieres by all four of Los Angeles’s major classical music institution

Ellen Taaffe Zwilich

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Ellen Taaffe Zwilich ( ; born April 30, 1939) is an American composer, the first female composer to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music. Her early works are marked by atonal exploration, but by the late 1980s, she had shifted to a postmodernist, neoromantic style. She was a 1994 inductee into the Florida Artists Hall of Fame. Zwilich has served as the Francis Eppes Distinguished Professor at Florida State University. Biography Ellen Taaffe was born in Miami, Florida. Some of her work during this period was written for her husband, violinist Joseph Zwilich, who played in the orchestra of the Metropolitan Opera. while there, she created the “Making Music” concert series, which focuses on performances and lectures by living composers, a series that is still in existence. She has received a number of other honors, including the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Chamber Music Prize, the Arturo Toscanini Music Critics Award, the Ernst von Dohnányi Citation, an Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, and four Grammy nominations. She was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and in 1

Elliot Goldenthal

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Elliot Goldenthal (born May 2, 1954) is an American composer of contemporary classical music and film and theatrical scores. He studied formally with John Corigliano and was deeply influenced and mentored by Aaron Copland, developing a distinctive style and ability to blend various musical styles and techniques in original and inventive ways. He is known for wide-ranging body of work spanning film, opera, ballet, theater and concert music, including Academy Award for Best Original Score in 2002 for his score to the motion picture Frida, directed by his longtime partner Julie Taymor. Early life and education Goldenthal was born on May 2, 1954, the youngest son of a Jewish housepainter father and a Catholic seamstress mother in Brooklyn, New York City, where he was influenced from an early age by music from all cultures and genres. Goldenthal’s maternal grandparents immigrated to the United States from Poland. Goldenthal lived in a multi-cultural part of town, and this is reflected in his works. He attended John Dewey High School in Brooklyn where, at the age of 14, he had his very first ballet Variations on Early Glimpses performed; he continued to display his eclectic musical range

Elliott Carter

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Elliott Cook Carter Jr. (December 11, 1908 – November 5, 2012) was an American modernist composer who was one of the most respected composers of the second half of the 20th century. He combined elements of European modernism and American “ultra-modernism” into a distinctive style with a personal harmonic and rhythmic language, after an early neoclassical phase. His compositions are performed throughout the world, and include orchestral, chamber music, solo instrumental, and vocal works. Carter was the recipient of many awards – he was twice awarded the Pulitzer Prize for his string quartets. He also wrote the large-scale orchestral triptych Symphonia: sum fluxae pretium spei. Carter was born in New York City. He developed an interest in modern music in the 1920s. He was later introduced to Charles Ives, and he soon came to appreciate the American ultra-modernists. After studying at Harvard University with Edward Burlingame Hill, Gustav Holst and Walter Piston, he studied with Nadia Boulanger in Paris in the 1930s, then returned to the United States. Carter was productive in his later years, publishing more than 40 works between the ages of 90 and 100, and over 20 more after he turn

Ellsworth Snyder

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Ellsworth Snyder (May 13, 1931 – August 11, 2005) was an American abstract painter, professional pianist, conductor and scholar. He was known as a champion of avant-garde art and music and is associated with composer John Cage and the Fluxus art movement. He preferred that his name be spelled ellsworth snyder, using all lower-case letters. As pianist and music scholar Snyder’s interest in the avant-garde art movement developed out his formal training in classical music. A native of Springfield, Ohio, Snyder attended The Cincinnati Conservatory of Music (now the College-Conservatory of Music of the University of Cincinnati) where he studied with noted pianist Robert Goldsand and the Austro-Hungarian pianist and composer Jenő Takács while earning both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees. He also took several classes in Cincinnati with the American musicologist and composer Charles Hamm, who subsequently wrote several piano pieces for Snyder. In 1960 Snyder accepted a position as music instructor at Newcomb College of Tulane University in New Orleans where he began an experimental new music series titled “You’ve never heard anything like it”. The programs ranged from the twelve-tone c

Elodie Lauten

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Elodie Lauten (October 20, 1950 – June 3, 2014) was a French-born American composer described as postminimalist or a microtonalist. Biography Born in Paris, France as Genevieve Schecroun, and educated in Paris at the Lycée Claude Monet, the Conservatoire (piano) and the Institut d’Etudes Politiques. Her father was Errol Parker (né Raphaël Schecroun), an Algerian-born jazz musician; her mother was a classical pianist. Lauten was classically trained as a pianist since age 7. She contributed to the early punk-rock scene in Paris in 1975 and 1976. After relocating to New York City, she received a Master’s in composition from New York University where she studied Western composition with Dinu Ghezzo, and Indian classical music with Ahkmal Parwez. She became an American citizen in 1984. She received awards from the NEA, ASCAP, MTC, and the American Music Center, as well as chamber and orchestral commissions. A writer of operas, theater pieces, orchestral, chamber and instrumental music, she was recognized in North America and Europe as a pioneer of postminimalism and a force on the new music scene with over 20 releases on a number of labels including Lovely Music, Point/Polygram, 4-Tay,

Emil Cadkin

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Emil Milton Cadkin (August 26, 1920 – December 16, 2020) was an American TV and film composer who worked mainly as a production music composer. He worked with William Loose (1910–1991) and Harry Bluestone (1907–1992). Some of his music was also featured on APM Music. Cadkin composed music for 1940s, 1950s and 1960s TV series, films and cartoons including Gumby and Hanna-Barbera’s Augie Doggie. Early life He was born in August 1920 in Cleveland, Ohio, the youngest of three children to Isadore and Sarah Cadkin, who had emigrated from the Russian Empire in 1905. His father was a cabinet maker in Los Angeles by 1936. Cadkin attended Yale University, where he majored in music, with special emphasis in Music Composition and Music Theory. He was in Los Angeles writing and teaching music by the time he enlisted in the Air Force in 1942. His song I Have Everything I Want But You was copyrighted in 1938. Career After being discharged from the Air Force, he scored films like “The Big Fix” for bottom-of-the-barrel studio PRC. Cadkin was an associate editor of ASCAP’s ‘The Score’ when it was created in 1948, and got a job in 1958 as musical director at Ritco Productions, a low-budget company th

Emil Liebling

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Emil Liebling (April 12, 1851 – January 20, 1914) was a German-American pianist and composer. Biography Liebling was born into a Jewish family in the Duchy of Pless, Kingdom of Prussia. Liebling was from a famous family of musicians. His three brothers, George, Max, and Solly Liebling, were also successful pianists, and all four of them were trained on the piano by Franz Liszt in Weimar. In 1867 he came to the United States, where he settled as a music teacher at a seminary in Kentucky where he remained on the faculty until 1871. His compositions include piano pieces and songs in the popular style of his day. Liebling served as visiting director of piano at the Frances Shimer Academy in Mount Carroll, Illinois, from 1904 to 1913. The position involved visiting the school several times per year to perform a concert and inspect student progress. He also held a similar position at Milwaukee-Downer College in Wisconsin. References External links * *

Emil Newman

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Emil Newman (January 20, 1911 – August 30, 1984) was an American music director and conductor who worked on more than 200 films and TV series. He was nominated for an Oscar for his musical direction on the classic Sun Valley Serenade (1941), contributing to the Newmans being the most nominated Academy Award extended family, with a collective 95 nominations in various music categories. Biography A native of Connecticut, Newman entered films in 1940 as the musical director on 13 films. He was credited on 25 films in 1941 and 28 in 1942, one of which, Whispering Ghosts, contained his first (uncredited) contribution as a composer. He had 15 titles in 1943, including “Musical Direction” (screen credit) for the all-black musical Stormy Weather and the 20th Century Fox wartime film Chetniks! The Fighting Guerrillas, 19 in 1944, 17 in 1945 and 16 in 1946, including Hugo Friedhofer’s Academy Award score for The Best Years of Our Lives, which he also conducted. Between 1950 and 1965, Newman was the composer on 23 films, most of which were lower-budget B movies, although they also included prestigious pictures such as Hondo (1953). He also provided the music for numerous 1950s TV shows. Newma

Emily Bruce Roelofson

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Emily Bruce Roelofson (1832–1921) was an American composer, pianist, poet and singer. She composed songs and collections through at least opus number 15. Roelofson grew up in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Her father, Alec W. Bruce, was an organist and dry goods merchant. Roelofson and her three sisters performed as the Bruce vocal quartet. She married Frederic Eugene Roelofson and they had a son and a daughter. and S. Brainard Sons. Poetry *Forget Me Not (set to music by Alba Rosa Vietor) *Carpe Diem, opus 15 no. 6 (text from A Masque of Poets) *From the Close Shut Window, opus 15 no. 5 (text by James Russell Lowell) *Sands of O’Dee, opus 15 no. 1 *Sea Shell, opus 15 no. 2 (text by Richard Henry Stoddard) *Winter Song References

Emma Lou Diemer

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Emma Lou Diemer (November 24, 1927 – June 2, 2024) She wrote many works for orchestra, chamber ensemble, keyboard, voice, chorus, and electronic media. Diemer was a keyboard performer and gave concerts of her own organ works at Washington National Cathedral, The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles, Grace Cathedral and St. Mary’s Cathedral in San Francisco, and others. Works include many collections and single pieces for organ as well as many for solo piano, piano 4 hands, and two pianos. Her major chamber works include a piano quartet, string quartet, two piano trios, and sonatas and suites for flute, violin, cello, and piano as well as settings of the psalms for organ with other instruments. Diemer wrote many choral works as well. She wrote numerous hymns, several of which appear in church hymnals. Her songs number in the dozens, using texts by many contemporary and early poets including Walt Whitman, Amy Lowell, Sara Teasdale, Alice Meynell, Thomas Campion, Shakespeare, John Donne, her sister Dorothy Diemer Hendry, Emily Dickinson, Robert Lowell, and many others. Diemer’s compositional style over the years varied from tonal to atonal, from traditional to experiment

Emma Marcy Raymond

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Emma Marcy Raymond (pseudonym, Salvator Sylvain; 1839 – November 7, 1913) was an American musician, composer, and author of operetta, songs and piano music. She was one of very few women in her day who had composed the entire music of an opera and lived to see it produced. Early life and education Emma P. Marcy was born in 1839 in Hartford, Connecticut, the oldest daughter of Dr. Erastus Egerton Marcy and Emeline Babcock (Kilbourn) Marcy, whose father was Henry Kilbourn of Hartford. Her father was a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and later a homeopathic specialist, who apparently lived for many years on Fifth Avenue on the site opposite Tiffany’s. She showed a remarkable aptitude for music at a very early age, having composed her first song before six years of age. She inherited her musical talents from her parents, both of whom were gifted amateurs. She was reared in an atmosphere of music, and studied under the best teachers who visited the United States. She studied the piano with Louis Moreau Gottschalk and Raccoman, vocal music with Giorgio Ronconi, and counterpoint and harmony with the best German masters. Career Her musical sympathies were almost entirely with th

Emma Nyra

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Emma Chukwugoziam Obi (born July 18, 1988), professionally known as Emma Nyra, is a Nigerian-American singer, songwriter, actress, and model. Her associate acts include Iyanya, Selebobo, Davido, Cynthia Morgan, Victoria Kimani, and Patoranking. Early life Emma Nyra was born and raised in Tyler, Texas, where she had her early education. She is of Igbo descent from Delta State, located in the south-southern region of Nigeria. In 2012, she left for Nigeria to pursue a career in music and modelling. Education She is an alumna of Texas Southern University, where she graduated with a degree in Health Care Administration. Career Music Emma Nyra released her debut singles titled “Do It” and “Everything I Do” in 2011 while in the U.S. Upon her return to Nigeria in 2012, she started working with D’Tunes and Iyanya who she had met in 2010 while in the U.S. In March 2012, she signed a recording contract with Made Men Music Group before she went on to make her first major debut in the Nigerian music industry. After that she made a vocal appearance in Iyanya’s “Ur Waist”. In 2013, Emma Nyra was voted the “Most Promising Act to Watch” at the 2013 edition of the Nigeria Entertainment Awards. Her d

Emma Roberto Steiner

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Emma Roberta Steiner (1856 – February 27, 1929) was an American composer and conductor. She was one of the first women in the United States to make a living from conducting, and did so at more than 6,000 performances during her lifetime. She was additionally the first woman to conduct a Theatre orchestra in New York. Her career spanned nearly five decades, from the 1870s, when she first began conducting for touring comic opera companies, until her death in 1929. In the early 1900s, she took a decade-long hiatus from her musical career to move to Alaska, where she was a prospector and traveler. Steiner wrote hundreds of musical pieces, including seven operas. Biography Steiner was born in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1856. Her father, Colonel Frederick Steiner, was a Mexican War hero and her mother an accomplished pianist. Thus, she was exposed to music at a young age, composing songs by age 7 and a piano duet at 9. Others recognized her talents early, and even suggested to her father that he send her to Paris to study music, but her parents refused and did not encourage her to develop the talent. She nonetheless continued composing, starting on an opera at age 11, Aminaide, one scene of wh

Emmerich Kálmán

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Emmerich Kálmán ( ; 24 October 1882 – 30 October 1953) was a Hungarian composer of operettas and a prominent figure in the development of Viennese operetta in the 20th century. Among his most popular works are Die Csárdásfürstin (1915) and Gräfin Mariza (1924). Influences on his compositional style include Hungarian folk music (such as the csárdás), the Viennese style of precursors such as Johann Strauss II and Franz Lehár, and, in his later works, American jazz. As a result of the Anschluss, Kálmán and his family fled to Paris and then to the United States. He eventually returned to Europe in 1949 and died in Paris in 1953. Biography Kálmán was born Imre Koppstein in Siófok, then in Austria-Hungary, on the southern shore of Lake Balaton, to a Jewish family. Kálmán initially intended to become a concert pianist, but because of early-onset arthritis, he focused on composition instead. He studied music theory and composition at the National Hungarian Royal Academy of Music (then the Budapest Academy of Music), where he was a fellow student of Béla Bartók and Zoltán Kodály under Hans Kössler. His early symphonic poems Saturnalia and Endre és Johanna were well-received, although he fai

Eric Banks (composer)

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Eric Banks (born January 25, 1969) is a Seattle-based composer, choral conductor, and ethnomusicologist. Life Banks was born in Roscoe, New York, United States in 1969. He is the founding director of the vocal ensembles, The Esoterics and Ædonis. As a composer, Banks writes primarily for a cappella chorus. He is a polyglot and frequently sets texts in languages other than his native English, including dead languages such as Epic Greek and Avestan. Eric Banks earned his BA in composition (1990) at Yale University, and his Master’s and Doctoral degrees in Music Theory and Choral Studies at the University of Washington. In 1997, he was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to study at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Stockholm; there he performed with several groups, including the Swedish Radio Choir and the Eric Ericson Chamber Choir. In 1992, while still in graduate school, Banks founded the professional-caliber chamber chorus, The Esoterics, which performs rarely heard compositions of contemporary music for unaccompanied voices. The Esoterics has performed over 300 concerts throughout the Pacific Northwest, has commissioned and premiered over 150 new works for a cappella voices in dozen

Eric Ewazen

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Eric Ewazen (; born March 1, 1954, Cleveland, Ohio) is an American composer and teacher. Biography Ewazen studied composition under Samuel Adler, Milton Babbitt, Gunther Schuller, Joseph Schwantner, Warren Benson, and Eugene Kurtz at the Eastman School of Music and The Juilliard School (where he received numerous composition awards, prizes, and fellowships). He has been on the faculty of The Juilliard School since 1980, and has been a lecturer for the New York Philharmonic’s Musical Encounters Series. He has also served on the faculties of the Hebrew Arts School and the Lincoln Center Institute. He served as Vice President of the League of Composers – International Society for Contemporary Music from 1982–1989, and was also composer-in-residence for the Orchestra of St. Luke’s. Music Ewazen’s compositions have been performed by numerous ensembles and orchestras around the world, such as the Cleveland Orchestra, and at festivals such as Woodstock, Tanglewood, Aspen, Caramoor, Tidewater, and the Music Academy of the West, among others. In recent years, he has increasingly written for brass instruments. Many of these works are performed regularly. His works have been commissioned and

Eric Funk

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Eric Funk (born 1949) is an American contemporary classical composer and conductor. Originally from Deer Lodge, Montana, he currently resides in Bozeman, Montana, where he taught music courses at Montana State University. He is also the Artistic Director and Host for Montana PBS’s 11th & Grant with Eric Funk, an Emmy Award-winning show broadcast on Montana PBS featuring local musicians. Career From 1994 to 2002, Eric was conductor of the Helena Symphony Orchestra in Helena, Montana. From 1994 to 1999, he was also the conductor of the Gallatin Chamber Orchestra in Bozeman, Montana. Dr. Funk was featured on the Charles Osgood CBS Sunday Morning show in October 1998, which in turn followed on the heels of a front-page story in the New York Times “Arts & Leisure” section (April 14, 1998). More recently, Dr. Funk was featured on the nationally syndicated NPR radio show, “Theme & Variations” (August 23–30, 2002). Funk has taught music in Oregon, Texas and Montana, and spent 20 years as an adjunct professor in the School of Music at Montana State University. Numerous compositions of Dr. Funk have been recorded commercially. These include three releases on the MMC label, featuring three of

Eric Knechtges

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Eric Thomas Knechtges, DM (born April 16, 1978 in Lansing, MI) is an American composer. He has written works for a wide variety of performing mediums including: concert band, orchestra, a cappella choir, and chamber ensembles (including some works using computer music technology). Biography Eric Knechtges has studied at the Indiana University (Bloomington) Jacobs School of Music (DM), Bowling Green State University (MM) and Michigan State University (BMusEd); he has also taught music (band, chorus, and music appreciation) at Addison Community Schools in Michigan. He has been an active conductor of bands and orchestras, including the Pride of Indy Band and Color Guard. His composition, Broken Silents, was recognized for Special Distinction in the second annual American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers ASCAP/CBDNA Frederick Fennell Competition. He has also been recognized in the National Bandmasters Association Young Composers Mentor Project, the National Association of Composers, USA Young Composers Competition, and the San Francisco Choral Artists New Voices Composition Competition, and the “Juan Bautista Comes” Choral Competition. His works have been performed by ensem

Eric Mandat

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Eric Paul Mandat (born 1957) is an American clarinetist and composer. Mandat began his clarinet studies under the tutelage of Richard Joiner of the Denver Symphony. He later studied with Lee Gibson, Keith Wilson, D. Stanley Hasty, and Charles Neidich. He received his undergraduate education at the University of North Texas and graduate degrees from Yale School of Music and Eastman School of Music. He has performed in the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s MusicNOW Series (including as principal clarinet for Pierre Boulez’s 80th Birthday Concert under Boulez’s baton and a performance of Osvaldo Golijov’s Ayre with Dawn Upshaw). He also performs with the Tone Road Ramblers, a band specializing in experimental and improvised music. His reviews of clarinet recordings have appeared in The Clarinet. Mandat’s recordings include The Extended Clarinet as well as recordings with the Tone Road Ramblers and the Transatlantic Trio. Mandat has taught at Southern Illinois University Carbondale and Indiana University. His students from Carbondale include Sean Osborn of the Metropolitan Opera Michael Norsworthy, and Boja Kragulj. Mandat uses extended techniques such as multiphonics and microtones. In a N

Eric Moe (composer)

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Eric Moe (born October 24, 1954) is an American composer and pianist. He has received awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters the Koussevitzky Music Foundation and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Moe was born in Durham, NC. He studied musical composition at Princeton University (BA) and at the University of California at Berkeley (MA, PhD). Currently, he is the Professor of Composition and Theory at the University of Pittsburgh where he co-directs the Music on the Edge new music concert series. At the University of Pennsylvania and Princeton University, he has held visiting professorships. Moe is also active as a concert pianist, having performed works by hundreds of composers, from John Cage and Anthony Davis to Stefan Wolpe. In 2003 Moe completed a 45-minute work for mezzo-soprano and ten players, setting a text of David Foster Wallace. Moe wrote about setting Wallace for Fiction Writers Review. Selected compositions * Spirit Mountain for five players (2010) * Strenuous Pleasures for six players (2010) * Frozen Hours Melt Melodiously Into The Past for six players (2009) * Jozaphine Freedom an entertainment on text of Denise Duhamel, for soprano, clarinet/bcl, piano/keyboard

Eric Salzman

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Eric Salzman (September 8, 1933 – November 12, 2017) was an American composer, scholar, author, impresario, music critic, and record producer. He is best known for his contributions to ‘New Music Theater,’ a concept he advanced through both his compositions and writings. He established it as an independent art form, distinct from grand opera and popular musicals, both aesthetically and economically. He co-founded the American Music Theater Festival and was, at the time of his death in 2017, Composer-in-Residence at the Center for Contemporary Opera. Performers of his works include the New York Philharmonic, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Brooklyn Philharmonic; conductors Pierre Boulez, Stanisław Skrowaczewski, Dennis Russell Davies and Lukas Foss; ensembles Western Wind and Kronos Quartet; soloists Philip Langridge, Mary Thomas, Elise Ross, Stanley Silverman, Alan Titus, Rinde Eckert, Igor Kipnis, Paul Zukofsky, Theo Bleckmann, Thomas Young; actors Stacy Keach, John O’Hurley and Paul Hecht. Early life Salzman was born September 8, 1933, in New York City and attended Forest Hills High School (1946–1950). After studying composition privately (1949–51) with Morris Lawner

Eric Stern

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Eric Stern is an American vocalist, accordionist, composer, arranger, and pianist based in Portland, Oregon, best known as the founder and artistic director of the band Vagabond Opera. He also performs as a soloist, as well as with the Eric Stern Trio. Stern, with Vagabond Opera, has appeared on NPR and performed at the Kennedy Center, the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco, Joe’s Pub in New York City. Career Stern was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and trained as a vocalist at the Delaware Valley Opera Company. At the age of 21, Stern decided to pursue writing and moved to Paris, returning to the U.S., and to music, a year and a half later. In 2002, Stern founded the group Vagabond Opera, known for their blend of eclectic musical styles, including German cabaret, Klezmer, and jazz. With the band, Stern also wrote, composed and performed the 2010 opera Queen of Knives, in collaboration with Wanderlust Circus. Stern has recorded and performed with a variety of musical acts including The Decemberists, Balkan Beat Box, Unwoman, Pink Martini, and DeVotchka. In 2011, Stern composed the score for the Tears of Joy Puppet Theatre’s production of Pinocchio. In March 2015, Stern'

Eric Tingstad

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Eric Tingstad (born December 16, 1954) is an American record producer, musician, songwriter and composer. He was born and raised in Seattle, Washington. Best known as a fingerstyle guitarist, Tingstad has performed, recorded, and produced alternative country, blues, americana, rock, smooth jazz, ambient, and New-age music. Tingstad frequently collaborates with woodwinds player Nancy Rumbel as Tingstad and Rumbel. Background Eric Tingstad cites early rock and roll influences such as the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, and King Crimson. Other influences include The Kingston Trio, Flatt and Scruggs, pianist and composer Martin Denny, sitar virtuoso Ravi Shankar, Mason Williams’s “Classical Gas” and the Hawaiian slack-key guitar. In the mid 1970s, while playing lead guitar and bass with Seattle-based rock band Pegasus, Tingstad began studies under masters of techniques pioneered by Spanish classical guitarist and innovator Andrés Segovia. Those techniques, combined with innovations of his own, have shaped Tingstad’s stylings and the instrumental compositions for which he is known. His innovative work inspired Will Ackerman, founder of Windham Hill Records, to create the Windham Hill Guitar Samp

Eric Watson (musician)

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Eric Watson (born July 5, 1955) is an American jazz pianist. Early life and education Watson was born in Wellesley, Massachusetts. He began playing piano as a child and performed in rock bands in Massachusetts. He studied classical music at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music in Oberlin, Ohio. Career After graduating from college in 1978, Watson moved to Paris, where he performed jazz and classical music and worked as an accompanist for a dance group. is signed to a long-term recording contract with ACT Music. and Steve Lacy. Discography * Bulls Blood (1980) * Conspiracy (1982) * Child in the Sky (1985) * Piano One (1985) * Your Tonight Is My Tomorrow (1987) * Charles Ives (1991) * Palimpseste (1991) * Listen to the Night (1994) * Punk Circus (1994) * Silent Hearts (1999) * Full Metal Quartet (2000) * Sketches of Solitude (2002) * Road Movies (2004) * Midnight Torsion (2009) * Memories of Paris (2010) With Steve Lacy *Spirit of Mingus (Free Lance, 1992) *Clangs (hat ART, 1993) References External links and sources * http://nfo.net/calendar/jul05.htm * http://www.actmusic.com/artist_detail.php?bio=1&manufacturers_id=28

Eric Whitacre

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Eric Edward Whitacre (born January2, 1970) is an American composer, conductor, and speaker best known for his choral music. Early life Whitacre was born in Reno, Nevada, to Ross and Roxanne Whitacre. He studied piano intermittently as a child and joined a junior high marching band under band leader Jim Burnett. Later Whitacre played a synthesizer in a techno-pop band, dreaming of being a rock star. Though he was unable to read music at the time, Whitacre began his full musical training while he was an undergraduate at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He eventually earned a bachelor’s degree in Music Composition. At the age of 23 he completed his first piece for wind orchestra, “Ghost Train”, which has now been recorded more than 40 times. Tom Leslie contributed to his interest in writing for wind ensembles. won a Grammy Award in 2012, and became the No.1 classical album on the US and UK charts within a week of release. Whitacre’s second album, Water Night, was released on Decca in April2012 and featured performances from his professional choir the Eric Whitacre Singers, the London Symphony Orchestra, Julian Lloyd Webber and Hila Plitmann. Around January 25, 2011, Whitacre began

Erica Muhl

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Erica Muhl (born October 26, 1961) is an American composer and conductor who was the president of Berklee College of Music until July 24, 2023. Early life Erica Muhl grew up in Los Angeles, where her father Edward Muhl was the head of Universal Pictures from 1953 to 1973, and her mother, Barbara, an author and opera singer. She trained as both a composer and a conductor, with much of her studies completed in Europe. At sixteen she was invited to take part in private composition studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. She returned to the United States from Europe, completing a Bachelor of Music in composition at California State University, Northridge, but upon completion, she once again traveled while undergoing graduate studies at the Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome and the Accademia Chigiana in Siena. She studied conducting in Los Angeles with Fritz Zweig. This was followed by the completion of a Doctorate of Musical Arts at the University of Southern California in 1991. Its premiere was at the Rykestrasse Synagogue in Prenzlauer Berg, Berlin, in November 2010. Another commission, Burn the Box, also premiered in 2010, at a private gala in celebration of the inauguration of USC

Erich Katz

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Erich Katz (July 31, 1900 – July 30, 1973) was a German-born musicologist, composer, music critic, musician and professor. He fled the Nazis in 1939, arriving first in England, emigrating to the United States in 1943, where he became a citizen. He was a driving force behind the early music and recorder movements in the United States. Bernard Krainis, a co-founder of New York Pro Musica studied with Katz. Biographical details Katz was born into a prosperous Jewish family in Posen, then part of Prussia, now Poznań, Poland. His father was Albert Katz, a jeweler and watchmaker, the son of a baker. Katz initially began studying engineering, but switched to music after one semester. Katz was married to Adelheid Soltau, who was not Jewish, in 1926. Katz also directed the New York Musician’s Workshop, a group of singers and instrumentalists which performed early and contemporary music. Most of those in the group were students of his from the college. He reorganized ARS in 1947 and remained its music director until 1959. His classes were influential for many students. His music history class was described as including not just discussion and listening, but students also performed the music,

Erich Wolfgang Korngold

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Erich Wolfgang Korngold (; May 29, 1897 – November 29, 1957) was an Austrian composer and conductor, who left Europe in the mid-1930s and later adopted US nationality. A child prodigy, he became one of the most important and influential composers in Hollywood history. During the 1920s he re-orchestrated, re-arranged and nearly re-composed several operettas by Johann Strauss II. By 1931 he was a professor of music at the Vienna State Academy. At the request of motion picture director Max Reinhardt, and due to the rise of the Nazi regime, Korngold moved to Hollywood in 1934 to write music for films. His first was Reinhardt’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1935). He subsequently wrote scores for such films as Captain Blood (1935), which helped boost the career of its starring newcomer, Errol Flynn. His score for Anthony Adverse (1936) won an Oscar; two years later he won another Oscar for The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). Korngold scored 16 Hollywood films in all, and received two more nominations for Oscars. Along with Max Steiner and Alfred Newman, he is one of the founders of American film music. Although his late-Romantic style of classical composition was no longer as popular when

Erik Friedlander

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Erik Friedlander (born July 1, 1960) A veteran of New York City’s experimental downtown scene, Friedlander has worked in many contexts, but is perhaps best known for his frequent collaborations with saxophonist John Zorn. Friedlander grew up in a home filled with art and music: his father is photographer Lee Friedlander, noted for the cover photographs he took for Atlantic Records. He is of Jewish descent from his father and of Finnish descent through his paternal grandmother. His father’s fondness for R&B and jazz helped shape Friedlander’s taste in music. He graduated from Columbia University in 1982. Friedlander started playing guitar at age six and added cello two years later. Apart from his work with Zorn, Friedlander has worked with Laurie Anderson, Courtney Love, the Mountain Goats, and Alanis Morissette, and is a member of the jazz/fusion quartet Topaz. He created the original music for the historical documentary Kingdom of David: The Saga of the Israelites. Discography * Chimera (with Chimera) (Avant, 1995) * The Watchman (with Chimera) (Tzadik, 1996) * Topaz (with Topaz) (SIAM, 1999) * Skin (with Topaz) (SIAM, 2000) also released on DVD * Grains of Paradise (Tzadik, 2002)

Erin Gee (composer)

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Erin Elizabeth Gee (born 1974) (born San Luis Obispo, California) is an American composer and vocalist. Among the fellowships she has held are the Guggenheim and the Radcliffe Institute Fellowships, and among the awards she has won for her compositions are the Herb Alpert Award in the Arts, the Rome Prize and the first prize of the International Rostrum of Composers. She was on the faculty of the University of Illinois in Urbana as Assistant Professor of Composition-Theory and is currently Associate Professor of Composition at Brandeis University. Education In 1997 Gee received her B.M. with honors and highest distinction in Piano Performance from the University of Iowa; there she also earned an M.A. in composition in 2002. In 2007, she earned her Ph.D. in music theory from the University of Music and Dramatic Arts, Graz, Austria where she studied musical composition with Beat Furrer. Career With her brother Colin Gee, she performed at the Whitney Museum of Art In 2015, she received the Charles Ives Fellowship of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. The puzzle video game app Blek contains excerpts of Erin Gee’s work. Gee is one of the Kronos Quartet 50 for the Future composers

Erling Wold

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Erling Wold (born January 30, 1958, in Burbank, California) is a San Francisco-based composer of opera and contemporary classical music. He is best known for his later chamber operas, and his early experiments as a microtonalist. Life Wold was born into a religious family, the son of Erling Henry Wold Sr, a Lutheran minister and Margaret Barth Wold, an author of inspirational books and plays. He was given piano lessons at an early age but showed little interest in music until his teen years, when he became infatuated, teaching himself to play a variety of instruments and embracing the music of many of the modernist composers. It was also at this point that he started to write music. He first studied composition at Occidental College with Robert Gross where he was awarded the Elinor Remick Warren Composition Award in 1978. Later teachers included Gerard Grisey, Andrew Imbrie and John Chowning at the University of California, Berkeley and Stanford University, where he primarily studied computer music, gaining a facility with the mathematics of signal processing. While at Berkeley, he married Lynn Murdock, for whom he wrote a number of his early works. In 1985, they had a son, Duncan

Ernest Bloch

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Ernest Bloch (; ; July 24, 1880 – July 15, 1959) was a Swiss-born American composer. Several of his most notable compositions reflect his Jewish heritage. As well as producing musical scores, Bloch had an academic career that culminated in his recognition as Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley in 1952. Biography Bloch was born in Geneva on July 24, 1880, to Jewish parents. He began playing the violin at age 9, and began composing soon after. He studied music at the conservatory in Brussels, where his teachers included the celebrated Belgian violinist Eugène Ysaÿe. He then traveled around Europe, moving to Germany (where he studied composition from 1900 to 1901 with Iwan Knorr at the Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt), on to Paris in 1903 and back to Geneva before settling in the United States in 1916, taking US citizenship in 1924. He held several teaching appointments in the US, where his pupils included George Antheil, Frederick Jacobi, Quincy Porter, Bernard Rogers, and Roger Sessions. In 1917, Bloch became the first teacher of composition at the Mannes School of Music, a post he held for three years. In December 1920 he was appointed the first musical dire

Ernest Charles

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Ernest Charles (Minneapolis, Minnesota, November 21, 1895 – Beverly Hills, California, April 16, 1984) was an American composer of art songs. Life and musical career Charles was born in Minnesota with the surname Grosskopf. He attended The University of Southern California as a college student and studied singing with Charles Modini Wood. He eventually went to New York City, changed his surname to Charles, and began his professional life as a singer, performing in vaudeville and Broadway reviews, including Earl Carroll’s Vanities in 1928 and the George White Scandals in 1929. His songs became widely known after 1932, when John Charles Thomas performed his song Clouds in a New York recital. Following that success, he continued to compose songs regularly until about 1950. At that time he lived with his wife, a mezzo-soprano, in New York City, and produced the radio program Great Moments in Music. He returned to California in 1953, settling in Beverly Hills, where he spent the remaining years of his life. He was selected as a National Patron of Delta Omicron, an international professional music fraternity. He was a member of Phi Mu Alpha, an honorary member of the Apollo Club of Minne

Ernest Gold

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Ernst Sigmund Goldner (July 13, 1921 – March 17, 1999), known professionally as Ernest Gold, was an Austrian-American composer of film and television scores. He won an Academy Award and two Grammy Awards for his work on the film Exodus (1960), and a Golden Globe for On the Beach (1959). He received an additional three Oscar nominations throughout his career, and was the first composer to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Early life Gold was born in 1921 in Vienna, the son of Elisabeth (Stransky) and Gustav Goldner. Gold’s father’s mother (Jaiteles) ancestry from Szeged, Hungary and mother’s mother (Therese Sprung) from Temesvár (at the time part of Hungary and now in Romania) and Budapest (Spitzer). Ernest Gold came from a musical family. His father played the violin and his mother sang. His father also studied under Richard Heuberger. Ernest Gold said he learned to read music before he learned to read words. Gold went to movie theaters as a teenager, not only to watch the films but to listen to the musical score. Among prominent film composers of the time, he admired Max Steiner. In New York City, he earned money by working as an accompanist and writing popular songs.

Ernest Kanitz

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Ernest Kanitz (born Ernst Kanitz; 9 April 1894 – 7 April 1978) was an Austrian-American composer and pedagogue. Biography Kanitz was born in Vienna, Austria-Hungary on 9 April 1894. Born Ernst, he changed his name to Ernest in order to differentiate himself from a Viennese concert manager of the same name. He studied law at the University of Vienna concurrently pursuing piano lessons and studying theory and music composition. He graduated in 1918. Schreker conducted the first performance of his Lustige Ouvertüre (Cheerful Overture) in the autumn of 1918. Following the performance, the overture was described as “a witty, pretty composition” and referred to as his best-known work in Musikblätter des Anbruch (1921). In 1921, he received initial exposure through the première under Alexander von Zemlinsky of his oratorio Das Hohelied (The Song of Songs). This enabled him to take a professorship which commenced in 1922 at the Neues Konservatorium where he taught analysis, theory and composition for 16 years. On 4 February 1926, Austrian conductor Clemens Krauss gave the successful première of Kanitz’s Four Orchestral Songs. He founded the Vienna Women’s Chorus in 1930 which he conducted

Ernest Manheim

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Ernest Manheim (27 January 1900 – 28 July 2002), known as Ernő until 1920, Ernst until 1934, and then Ernest in the United States, was an American sociologist, anthropologist, and composer born in Hungary, at that time part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Life Manheim attended a secondary school in Budapest from 1909 and graduated in 1917. Then he enrolled in the Military Academy for the Royal Hungarian Home Defense in Budapest and at the same time started chemistry studies at the der Royal Technical Joseph-Academy in Budapest. In 1918 he became a soldier in the Austro-Hungarian army ranking as a corporal. After World War I he resumed his studies in chemistry and mathematics at the Budapest University, and additionally attended lectures in philosophy, music and literature. From March to July 1919 Manheim was a volunteer in the Hungarian Soviet Republic or Republic of Councils founded by Béla Kun and was taken prisoner. He fled from the Romanian prison camp but could not stay in Budapest for long, since he had to face arrest as a supporter of the Soviet Republic. So he escaped to Austria in 1920, where he resumed his studies at the University of Vienna, first chemistry and physics a

Ernest Schelling

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Ernest Henry Schelling (July 26, 1876 – December 8, 1939) was an American pianist, composer, and conductor, and music director. He was the conductor of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra from 1935 to 1937. His first wife was Lucie Howe Draper, whom he married on May 3, 1905, in Manhattan, New York City. She died on February 4, 1938, at their summer home in Lausanne, Switzerland. He married his second wife, Helen Huntington “Peggy” Marshall, on August 11, 1939, when she was 21 and he was 63. She was the stepdaughter of the philanthropist Brooke Astor, and a niece of Vincent Astor. He died of a cerebral embolism at his home in Manhattan, New York City, on December 8, 1939. His bride of four months was at his deathbed side. Composer Schelling wrote numerous works for piano, orchestra and chamber groups which were often performed during his lifetime, but have since fallen from the repertoire. His most popular work was A Victory Ball, a symphonic poem for orchestra based on an anti-war poem by Alfred Noyes. Willem Mengelberg and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra made an early electrical recording of the music for the Victor Talking Machine Company. Honours He was elected an honorary mem

Ernest Trow Carter

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Ernest Trow Carter (September 3, 1866 – June 22, 1953) was an organist and composer who won the Bispham Award. Biography He was born on September 3, 1866, in Orange, New Jersey to Aaron Carter and Sarah Swift Trow. At age seven, in 1873 he started what would become eight years of study of piano with Mary Bradshaw as his teacher. At age thirteen, in 1879, he organized an amateur orchestra, studied the cornet, was assistant conductor of the school orchestra; and at sixteen he was playing cornet in a professional orchestra. Operas *The White Bird *The Blonde Donna References External links *

Ernie Stires

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Ernest Stires (December 17, 1925 – May 4, 2008) was an American composer, musician, and mentor. His jazz-based classical music has been performed both throughout the United States and abroad. Stires was born in Alexandria, Virginia, to a family of musicians. His maternal grandparents were the mezzo-soprano Louise Homer and the American art song composer Sidney Homer, while his cousin was the composer Samuel Barber. His paternal grandparents were Bishop Ernest Milmore Stires and Sarah Stires. He was educated first at the Episcopal High School in Alexandria and then at Harvard and Dartmouth, finally graduating from Trinity College in Connecticut. After service as a U.S. Navy pilot in World War II, Stires worked as a television advertising executive, first for NBC in California and then later for CBS in Boston. Although he had begun improvising jazz on the piano while still a small child, he did not devote himself to music as a career until 1962 when he studied composition with Nicolas Slonimsky and Francis Judd Cooke. Ernie has three children: Sarah Stires, Ernie Stires, and Elizabeth Stires. He moved to Vermont in 1967 where he was an administrator for the Vermont Symphony Orchestra

Ernst Bacon

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Ernst Lecher Bacon (May 26, 1898 – March 16, 1990) was an American composer, pianist, and conductor. A prolific composer, Bacon wrote over 250 songs over his career. He was awarded three Guggenheim Fellowships and a Pulitzer Scholarship in 1932 for his Second Symphony. Personal life Bacon was born in Chicago, Illinois, on May 26, 1898 to Marie von Rosthorn Bacon (sister of Alfons von Rosthorn and Arthur von Rosthorn) and Dr. Charles S. Bacon. At the age of 19, he enrolled at Northwestern University where he pursued a degree in mathematics. After three years of study, he moved to the University of Chicago. Bacon finished his education at the University of California at Berkeley, where he received a master’s degree for the composition of The Song of the Preacher in 1935. Bacon was married four times. He married his first wife, Mary Prentice Lillie, granddaughter of Richard Teller Crane, in 1927. They had two children, Margaret and Joseph. His second wife was cellist Analee Camp. They had two sons, Paul and Arthur. Paul died at the age of 18, which had a deep and lasting effect on Bacon. In 1952, he married his third wife, Peggy Camp (no relation to Anna Lee). He met his fourth wife E

Ernst Krenek

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Ernst Heinrich Krenek (23 August 1900 – 22 December 1991) was an Austrian, later American, composer. He explored atonality and other modern styles and wrote a number of books, including Music Here and Now (1939), a study of Johannes Ockeghem (1953), and Horizons Circled: Reflections on my Music (1974). Krenek wrote two pieces using the pseudonym Thornton Winsloe. Life Born Ernst Heinrich Křenek in Vienna (then in Austria-Hungary), he was the son of a Czech soldier in the Austro-Hungarian army. He studied there and in Berlin with Franz Schreker before working in a number of German opera houses as conductor. During World War I, Krenek was drafted into the Austrian army, but he was stationed in Vienna, allowing him to go on with his musical studies. In 1922 he met Alma Mahler, widow of Gustav Mahler, and her daughter, Anna, to whom he dedicated his Symphony No. 2, and whom he married in January 1924. That marriage ended in divorce before its first anniversary. At the time of his marriage to Anna Mahler, Krenek was completing his Violin Concerto No. 1, Op. 29. The Australian violinist Alma Moodie assisted Krenek, not with the scoring of the violin part, but with obtaining financial ass

Ernst Perabo

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Johann Ernst Perabo (November 14, 1845 – October 29, 1920) was a German-born American composer and pianist. Biography Ernst Perabo was born in Wiesbaden, Duchy of Nassau on November 14, 1845. In 1852, he immigrated with his family to New York City. He began his musical training with his father, then with William Schultze from the Mendelssohn Quintette Club and eventually came back to Europe to study at the Leipzig Conservatory with Carl Reinecke, Ignaz Moscheles, and Ernst Richter. From 1885 onwards, Perabo lived in Boston, where he led a career as a pianist, composer, and music teacher. He gave private lessons: his most famous student, who studied with him from 1876 through 1882, was the pianist and composer Amy Beach. He also taught at the New England Conservatory. Besides original compositions for the piano (including one Scherzo; three Studies; Pensées; and Prelude, Romance und Toccatina), he wrote numerous transcriptions of and fantasies on operas and orchestral works. He married Louisa Elizabeth Schmidt on June 1, 1889. Perabo collected a number of manuscripts and first editions of works by Bach, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert, which are now preserved in the British Library.

Este Haim

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Este Arielle Haim (born March 14, 1986) is an American musician. She is the bassist and a vocalist of the pop-rock trio Haim, which she formed with her younger sisters Alana and Danielle in 2006. She co-writes all of Haim’s songs. Since 2021, Este has composed scores for film and television. She acted as a music consultant for the second season of HBO’s The White Lotus. Este was also the executive music producer for the mini-series A Small Light (2023). Early life Este grew up in the San Fernando Valley, California and studied at LA County’s High School For The Arts. Her family is Jewish. Este’s father, Mordechai “Moti” Haim, is an Israeli-born retired professional soccer player who moved to the United States in 1980. Her mother, Donna Rose, is a former elementary school art teacher from Philadelphia. Este’s paternal grandmother was originally from Bulgaria. The Haim sisters were taught to play instruments from an early age by their parents, with Este being encouraged to learn bass guitar by her father. She has described being influenced by bassist Tina Weymouth after her father showed her the Talking Heads concert film Stop Making Sense. Donna, Moti, and their children formed a fa

Esther Allan

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Esther Allan (née Boyarsky; April 28, 1914 – July 21, 1985) was an American composer, pianist and organist. Early years Esther Allan was born Esther Boyarsky in Suwałki, Poland. Her father was a cantor. She began playing the piano when she was only five, and took her first piano lessons with her mother. Her family moved to England when she was very young, and then to America. Career She began working in New York City, both as a “classical” pianist (for example she performed Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 2 and Gershwin’s Concerto in F during a recital at Carnegie Hall) and as a “jazz” pianist, in the vein of the “classical jazz” initiated by George Gershwin and Dana Suesse. On June 16, 1935, she married in Detroit American jeweler and department store owner Norman Allan (1912–1999) , to whom she later dedicated her Norman Concerto, a 6-minute piece for piano and orchestra in the vein of the Warsaw Concerto, which gained some success at the time and launched her as a composer. Once married, she used only her “American” name Allan, abandoning her maiden name. as well as an affiliate pianist of Aileen Shirley’s all-girl orchestra, “The Minoco Maids Of Melody”. As a composer, aside from "

Esther Ballou

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Esther Williamson Ballou (17 July 1915 – 12 March 1973) was an American composer, music educator, organist, pianist, and accompanist. She was born in Elmira, New York, and died in Chichester, England. Career Ballou began piano lessons at 4 years old, organ lessons at age 13, and began composing in her twenties. She graduated from Bennington College in 1937 with a Bachelor of Arts, Mills College in 1938 with a Master of Arts, and The Juilliard School of Music in 1943 for a graduate fellowship. During her time at Bennington College, Ballou fostered a musical interest in Modern Dance and Ballet, and began composing music. While a student there, she composed two ballets, Earth Sage for Louise Kloepper, and Lysistrata for José Limón. Until 1942, she toured the United States with multiple dance troupes as an accompanist and composer, including for Marion Van Tuyl’s dance group. She won fellowships to the MacDowell Colony in 1944, 1945, 1954, and 1955. She also participated in the Middlebury Composer’s Conference and the Bennington Composer’s Conference as a member of the composer’s staff. Ballou describes her music as ‘tending towards classicism in that it stresses clarity of design and

Ethelbert Nevin

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Ethelbert Woodbridge Nevin (November 25, 1862 – February 17, 1901) was an American pianist and composer. Early life Nevin was born on November 25, 1862, at Vineacre, on the banks of the Ohio River, in Edgeworth, Pennsylvania. There he spent the first sixteen years of his life, and received all his schooling, most of it from his father, Robert Peebles Nevin, editor and proprietor of a Pittsburgh newspaper, and a contributor to many magazines. (Robert Nevin also composed several campaign songs, among them the popular “Our Nominee,” used in the day of James K. Polk’s candidacy.) Nevin’s mother, Elizabeth Duncan Oliphant, was a pianist. The first grand piano ever taken across the Allegheny Mountains was carted over for Nevin’s mother. Other members of the Nevin family showed musical inclinations as well; Nevin’s younger brother, Arthur, also achieved some renown as a composer, as did his cousins George and Gordon Balch Nevin. Musical education From a young age, Nevin was musically inclined. He began playing the piano by the age of four, although he needed cushions piled on the pedals to enable him to reach them. Nevin’s father provided for his son both vocal and instrumental instruction.

Etilmon J. Stark

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Etilmon “Til” Justus Stark (May 1867 – January 1, 1962) was an American ragtime composer and arranger, the eldest son of ragtime publisher John Stark. His best-known works include the pieces “Trombone Johnsen” (1902), “Billiken Rag” (1913), and “Gum Shoe” (1917), and the arrangements for the collection “Fifteen Standard High Class Rags” (1912), popularly known as “The Red Back Book”. Biography Stark was born in May 1867, in Gosport, Indiana, though his birth date is sometimes erroneously cited as 1868. Stark moved to Missouri with his family in his youth. In 1885, his father, who previously had been a farmer and ice cream store proprietor, took the family to Sedalia, Missouri, and opened a music store, John Stark and Son. John Stark later became a music publisher and made his fortune by publishing Scott Joplin’s The Maple Leaf Rag. All of the Stark children, including sister Eleanor and brother William were talented musically, but Stark was the one who achieved greatest success. He died in Maplewood, Missouri, on January 1, 1962. Career Stark became a music instructor, first at the Marmaduke Military Academy in Sweet Springs, Missouri. When Marmaduke burned in 1896, Stark moved to

Eugene Bonner

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Eugene Bonner, sometimes given as Eugene MacDonald Bonner (June 24, 1889 – December 8, 1983) was an American composer and music critic. As a composer he was particularly known for his operas. In 1931 his opera The Venetian Glass Nephew was staged at the Vanderbilt Theatre on Broadway. He wrote as a music critic for a variety of publications in Europe and the United States, including The Outlook, the Daily Mirror, the Brooklyn Eagle, Cue, and the New York Herald Tribune. He also served as managing editor of the journal The Musical Record. In 1907 Bonner began music studies at the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore; earning an organ scholarship at that institution the following year. Composing career While studying in England, Bonner published his first music composition with the London publishing house, Weeks & Co. Career as a music critic Later life In 1955 Bonner moved to Taormina, Sicily. He lived there until his death in Taormina on December 8, 1983. Partial list of works Operas *Barbara Frietchie (1921) *Celui qui Épousa une Femme Muette (1923) *The Venetian Glass Nephew (1927) *The Gods of the Mountain (1936) *Frankie and Johnnie (1945) Other stage works *The Young Ale

Eugene Kurtz

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Eugene Allen Kurtz (December 27, 1923 – July 7, 2006) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. He received an M.A. in music from the Eastman School of Music in 1949. His instructors included Arthur Honegger, Darius Milhaud, and Max Deutsch. He served as a guest professor of composition at the University of Michigan, the Eastman School of Music, and several other universities. His notable students include John Burke, Roger Briggs, John S. Hilliard, and Robert Morris. His best-known composition is The Last Contrabass in Las Vegas (1974), for double bass and female narrator, which was composed for Bertram Turetzky and his wife Nancy Turetzky, who have performed it frequently. He was also commissioned by Radio France. Kurtz was born in Atlanta and served in the U.S. Army during World War II; he first arrived in France in 1944. He settled in Paris in 1952, living there until his death there of a lung infection at the age of 82. References External links *Eugene Kurtz entry from International Who’s Who in Music *Eugene Kurtz biography *Obituary (French) *Eugene Kurtz remembrance *Audio sample of The Last Contrabass in Las Vegas

Eugene O'Brien (composer)

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Eugene O’Brien (born April 24, 1945) is an American composer who has been a member of the faculty at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music since 1987. He was chair of the Composition Department from 1994 to 1999, and is currently executive associate dean. He has been a member of the composition faculties at Cleveland Institute of Music in Cleveland, and Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. Early life and education O’Brien was born in Paterson, New Jersey. He attended the University of Nebraska, where he received his undergraduate and graduate degree and undertook post-graduate studies at the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik in Köln, Germany as a Fulbright Scholar, and received his Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Cleveland Institute of Music / Case Western Reserve University. He studied composition with Robert Beadell, John Eaton, Donald Erb, Iannis Xenakis, and Bernd Alois Zimmermann, Career O’Brien’s music has been heard in concerts by the Cleveland Orchestra, the Italian Radio (RAI) Orchestras of Rome and Turin, the Omaha Symphony, as part of the Saint Louis Symphony Discovery series, the Louisville Orchestra New Dimensions series, and in numerous other co

Eugene Zador

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Eugene Zador (born Jenő Zádor; 5 November 1894, Bátaszék, Hungary – 4 April 1977, Hollywood, California) was a Hungarian and American composer. Life Born into a Jewish family, his parents were Paula Biermann and József Zádor (originally Zucker) . He studied at the Vienna Music Academy and in Leipzig with Max Reger. He taught from 1921 at the new New Vienna Conservatory and later at the Budapest Academy of Music. Fearful for his safety due to his Jewish identity, he left Austria on the day of the Anschluss to return to Hungary. He actively sought employment in the United States out of fear of the rise of Nazi Germany, and was able to successfully earn a post on the faculty of the New York College of Music. The college was able to obtain an American visa for him, and he sailed to America in 1939. On that voyage he composed the music to his opera Christopher Columbus. Music Zádor wrote a number of operas in which the characterization and orchestration are worthy of note. He claimed to occupy a position “exactly between La Traviata and Lulu”. His orchestral pieces are written in a late romantic style that owed something to Max Reger and Richard Strauss. They include the popular Hungari

Eugénie Rocherolle

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Eugénie Ricau Rocherolle (August 24, 1936 – March 4, 2025) was an American composer, pianist, lyricist, and teacher who began her composing career with choral and band music. Biography Rocherolle was born and raised in New Orleans. She graduated from St. Martin’s Episcopal School and graduated with a BA in music from the Newcomb College of Tulane University. Tidings of Joy (1996), Romancing the Piano (1998), and Touch of Blue (2008). For many years she maintained a private music studio where she taught piano and composition. She and her husband, Didier Rocherolle, whom she met while returning home from her Junior Year in Paris, were long-time residents of Connecticut. They had four children. Rocherolle died on March 4, 2025, at the age of 88. Works The following works are published at Neil A. Kjos Music Company and are succeeded by their edition number: Piano solo *A Creative Christmas (GP359) *American Sampler (GP322) *Bayou Reflections (GP338) *Blockbuster (GP346) *Boogie Bonanaza (GP373) *Christmas Anew (GP367) *Christmas Around the Piano (GP337) *Christmas Joy (GP404) *Classical Theme and Variations (GP370) *Cuatro Rumores Hispanicos (GP418) *Discoveries (GP361) *Extravaganza (

Eun Young Lee

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Eun Young Lee is a South Korean composer based in the United States. She is a 2023 Guggenheim Fellow and an associate professor at the Boston Conservatory at Berklee. Biography Eun Young Lee studied at Ewha Womans University where she obtained a BM and MM in music theory, and the Manhattan School of Music, where she obtained her MM in composition. She won the first-place prize at the 2006 Tsang-Houei Hsu International Music Composition Competition. In 2010, she was awarded a MacDowell Fellowship, for work on her commissions for the Sejong Cultural Society and University of Cincinnati – College-Conservatory of Music, as well as a Virginia Center for the Creative Arts Fellowship. David Schulenberg praised Antico Moderno’s 2016 performance of her piece Gil as “imaginative use of the ensemble’s distinctive sonorities”. One of her pieces, “Mool”, was performed in Liza Stepanova’s 2017 piano album E Pluribus Unum. She was awarded a Guggenheim Fellow in Music Composition in 2023 and another MacDowell Fellowship in 2024; References

Eunice Lea Kettering

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Eunice Lea Kettering (April 4, 1906 – March 9, 2000) was an American composer and professor. Kettering wrote many compositions and almost 20,000 copies of her work were published. She was the first woman in the United States to become a Fellow in the American Guild of Organists. Early life and death Kettering was born in Savannah, Ohio on April 4, 1906. She became an orphan at the age of three and was adopted by Adam and Cora Kettering in Ashland, Ohio. Adam Kettering was a car dealer and was the brother of inventor Charles F. Kettering. She started composing music at age six. Kettering died in Albuquerque, New Mexico on March 9, 2000, at the age of 93. Career Kettering was a professor at Madison University in Virginia for three years and then taught music for 23 years at Ashland University in Ohio. During her time at Ashland University, she composed and performed many of her works. After retiring early from teaching, she moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico in 1959 and then later moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico in 1962. While in Albuquerque, she composed the majority of her work and two of her compositions were recorded. Her compositions were performed in colleges, churches, universitie

Eva Jessye

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Eva Jessye (January 20, 1895 – February 21, 1992) was an American conductor and composer who was the first black woman to receive international distinction as a professional choral conductor. She is notable as a choral conductor during the Harlem Renaissance. She created her own choral group which featured widely in performance. Her professional influence extended for decades through her teaching as well. Her accomplishments in this field were historic for any woman. She collaborated in productions of groundbreaking works, directing her choir and working with Virgil Thomson and Gertrude Stein on Four Saints in Three Acts (1933), and serving as musical director with George Gershwin on his innovative opera Porgy and Bess (1935). Early life and education Eva Jessye was born January 20, 1895, in Coffeyville, Kansas. She was educated at Western University, a historically black university in Kansas, and Langston University in Oklahoma. She later studied privately with Will Marion Cook in New York City. In 1919, Jessye began work as the choir director at Morgan State College in Baltimore. She returned west for a time to teach at an African Methodist Episcopal Church school in Oklahoma. In

Evan Call

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Evan Call (born June 29, 1988) is an American composer and arranger working in Japan. He has composed music for multiple anime series, such as Violet Evergarden, Muv-Luv Alternative and Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End. Call is affiliated with the Japanese agency Miracle Bus and was previously a member of the musical group Elements Garden. Biography Call was born in California, U.S., on June 29, 1988, and grew up in the city of Lincoln. As a teenager, Call was diagnosed with occipital neuralgia and had to take a break from going to school. During that time, he learned to play bluegrass guitar from a local teacher. Call later made a friend in his hometown who taught him about Japanese anime and video games, which prompted him to start composing orchestral music. He joined the choir club when he entered high school. After graduating, Call enrolled at the Berklee College of Music, where he majored in film scoring. After graduating from college, he debated if he should pursue a career in film music in Hollywood. In the end, he decided to move to Japan on a tourist visa to work in the anime and game industry. Call would continue to compose soundtracks for other anime series and films such

Evan Hause

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Evan Hause (born 1967) is an American composer, percussionist and conductor. Hause has composed over one hundred works ranging from rock music to opera. Biography and career After growing up in Greenville, North Carolina, he earned the Doctor of Music Arts and Master of Music degrees in composition from the University of Michigan, and the Bachelor of Music degree from the Oberlin Conservatory in composition and percussion, where he was awarded the Herbert Elwell Award. He attended the North Carolina School of the Arts as a percussionist. He studied composition with Sherwood Shaffer, Randolph Coleman, Richard Hoffmann (at the Schoenberg Haus in Moedling, Austria, in an Oberlin abroad program), William Albright, William Bolcom and Leslie Bassett, among others. He has been commissioned by the Albany Symphony Orchestra, Riverside Symphony Orchestra, Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, Tales & Scales, Alarm Will Sound, University of Michigan School of Music, Theater, and Dance, and the Carolina Chamber Music Festival. He has been awarded residencies at the MacDowell Colony, Atlantic Center for the Arts, the Aspen Music Festival, June in Buffalo and the Edward Albee “Barn” at Montauk, NY. Hau

Evan Marshall (musician)

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Evan Marshall is a virtuoso mandolinist, prominent as an arranger of classical music pieces for the mandolin and proponent of the duo style of playing. His name comes up in mandolin-oriented music circles as one of the best of modern mandolin players, one who has taken the techniques of early mandolin soloists to new levels. He is also a recording artist with Rounder Records and teaches mandolin. He has given classes for the Classical Mandolin Society of America, the Mandolin Symposium and the American Mandolin and Guitar Summer School, and has been associated with the Conservatory of Music at Biola University. As a performer, he has worked as a featured guest with several symphony orchestras, including the Houston Symphony, Phoenix Symphony, and Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra. He is a former member of Billy Hill and the Hillbillies. Early beginnings Marshall played the violin from the time he was 7-years old, playing classical. Duo style is a technique in which the mandolin player plays both the melody line of music, as well as harmonic parts, sounding like more than one instrument. produced by Mark O’Connor * Mandolin Magic (1990) Rounder Records, produced and Engineered by David

Evan Ziporyn

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Evan Ziporyn (b. Chicago, Illinois, December 14, 1959) is an American composer of post-minimalist music with a cross-cultural orientation, drawing equally from classical music, avant-garde, various world music traditions, and jazz. Ziporyn has composed for a wide range of ensembles, including symphony orchestras, wind ensembles, many types of chamber groups, and solo instruments, sometimes involving electronics. He has composed numerous works for Balinese gamelan. He is known for his solo performances on clarinet and bass clarinet; additionally, Ziporyn plays gender wayang and other Balinese instruments, saxophones, piano and keyboards, EWI, and Shona mbira. Ziporyn is the Kenan Sahin Distinguished Professor of Music at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as well as director of MIT’s Center for Art, Science & Technology (CAST). At MIT he directs Gamelan Galak Tika, an ensemble he founded in 1993, a group of 30 MIT students, staff and community members, devoted to the study and performance of new works for Balinese Gamelan. He is currently a member of the Eviyan Trio, with Czech violinist and vocalist Iva Bittová and American guitarist Gyan Riley. He has released albums on Can

Eve Beglarian

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Eve Beglarian (born Ann Arbor, Michigan, U.S., July 22, 1958) is a contemporary American composer, performer and audio producer of Armenian descent. Her music is often characterized as postminimalist. Her chamber, choral, and orchestral music has been commissioned and widely performed by The Los Angeles Master Chorale, the Bang on a Can All-Stars, The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, The California EAR Unit, The Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Relâche, The Paul Dresher Ensemble, Sequitur, and The American Composers Orchestra, among many others. Discography Albums *Overstepping (1998) *Tell the Birds (2006) Collaborations *Dream Cum Go Down - Eve Beglarian and Juliana Luecking (1995) *Dancing in Place - Elizabeth Panzer (1999) *Play Nice - Twisted Tutu (1999) *Almost Human (Beiser) - Maya Beiser (2007) Compilations *Lesbian American Composers (1998) *Emergency Music (1998) *Messiah Remix (2004) *To Have and to Hold (2007) *60x60 (2004-2005) (2007) *Ceci n’est pas une guitare (Stradivarius, 2007) *Electric Creatures (Sussidiaria, 2018) References External links *Composer Finds a Muse in the Mississippi (The New York Times) *EVBVD Music: Eve Beglarian *Recommended composers: Eve Begl

Evelyn LaRue Pittman

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Evelyn LaRue Pittman (January 6, 1910 – December 1992) was an American composer, choral director and music educator. Life and career Early life Evelyn LaRue Pittman was born on January 6, 1910 in McAlester, Oklahoma. Her interest in music began at a young age, and she began composing songs in the first grade. Her musical interest continued into high school, where she participated in school musicals and sang in their “well-known choir”, of which she was the first Black member. Later life Pittman attended public school in Oklahoma City, and later attended Spelman College and Oklahoma University, where she received her master’s degree. While in school, Pittman studied violin, trombone, and harmony. She also received a life certificate from Langston University to teach music and social studies in the state of Oklahoma. In New York, Pittman received a permanent certificate from Columbia University to teach public school music on any level in the New York Education Department, and ended up teaching in the Greenburgh School District. Pittman then studied composition at the Juilliard School of Music and was likely the first black Oklahoman to study at the school. She then collaborated with

Eyvind Kang

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Eyvindur Y. Kang (born 23 June 1971) is an American composer and multi-instrumentalist. His primary instrument is viola, but has also performed on violin, tuba, keyboards and others. In addition to his solo work, Kang has worked extensively with Bill Frisell and John Zorn. His wife and musical partner is vocalist Jessika Kenney. Biography Eyvindur Y. Kang was born 23 June 1971 in Corvallis, Oregon, United States. His mother is the Icelandic-Canadian scholar and writer Kristjana Gunnars. He was raised in Canada, Iceland, and the United States, and has since lived and worked in countries ranging from Italy to Iceland. He studied piano and violin as a child, and as a teen played bass guitar in a reggae band. In 2014 Kang visited Vossajazz in western Norway, for a gig with Bill Frisell’s trio Beautiful Dreamers, including drummer Rudy Royston, for the opening concert. During the concert Norwegian trumpeter Arve Henriksen joined in for a tune. Discography Solo albums *1996: Sweetness of Sickness (RGI Industries) *1996: 7 NADEs (Tzadik) *1998: Theater of Mineral NADEs (Tzadik) *2000: The Story of Iceland (Tzadik) *2002: Live Low To The Earth, In The Iron Age (Abduction) *2003: Virginal C

Ezra Laderman

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Ezra Laderman (29 June 1924 – 28 February 2015) was an American composer of classical music. He was born in Brooklyn. Biography Laderman was of Jewish heritage. His parents, Isidor and Leah, both emigrated to the United States from Poland. Though poor, the family had a piano. He wrote, “At four, I was improvising at the piano; at seven, I began to compose music, writing it down. I hardly knew it then, but I had at a very early age made a giant step to becoming a composer.” He attended New York City’s High School of Music and Art. On April 25, 1943, Laderman was inducted into the United States Army and served as a radio operator with the 69th Infantry Division during World War II. He wrote: We were in Caversham, England poised to enter the war. It was here that I learned that my brother Jack had been shot down and killed in Germany. The Battle of the Bulge, crossing the Rhine at Remagen, liberating Leipzig, meeting the Russians at Torgau on the bank of the Elbe were the points in this constellation that was filled with tension and waiting, victory and grief. We became aware of the horror, and what we now call the ‘holocaust,’ while freeing Leipzig. During the weeks after the war was

Ezra Sims

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Ezra Sims (January 16, 1928 in Birmingham, Alabama — January 30, 2015 in Boston, Massachusetts) was one of the pioneers in the field of microtonal composition. He invented a system of notation that was adopted by many microtonal composers after him, including Joseph Maneri. His professional debut (12 note ET music) occurred on a Composers Forum program in New York, 1959. In 1960, compelled by his ear, he began writing microtonal music, and continued to do so for the rest of his life, with the occasional exception being taped music for dancers. His last composition in quarter tones (his sixth microtonal one) was his Third Quartet (1962). Since 1971, whatever music he has composed that is not purely electronic has employed a system of asymmetrical modes of 18 pitches per octave, drawn from a 72-note division of the octave. I seem finally to have identified and made transcribable what my ear was after all along: a set of pitches ordered in an asymmetrical scale of 18 (or 19) notes, some of them acoustically more important than others, transposable through a chromatic of 72 pitches in the octave. He has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Koussevitsky commission, and an American Academ

Fannie Charles Dillon

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Fannie Charles Dillon (March 16, 1881 – February 21, 1947) was an American pianist, music educator and composer. Life Fannie Charles Dillon was born in Denver, Colorado in 1881. She moved with her family to Long Beach, California in 1890. She graduated from Pomona College and studied composition with Heinrich Urban, Hugo Kaun and Rubin Goldmark, and piano with Leopold Godowsky in Berlin. Personal life and marriage After completing her studies, Dillon worked as a pianist, teacher, performer and composer in Los Angeles. She taught at Pomona College from 1910 to 1913 and in the Los Angeles high school system from 1918 to 1941. She founded Woodland Theater at Fawnskin, Big Bear Lake, California, in 1924 and served as its general manager from 1926 to 1929. She married Cypriot theater actor James Christo. Dillon died in Altadena, California. Her papers are stored by the UCLA library. As a composer, Dillon was known for adapting bird calls into her scores. While she was teaching at Los Angeles High School in the late 1920s, future composer John Cage was among her students. Works Dillon composed for piano, voice, orchestra and chamber ensemble, as well as for outdoor dramas. Selected works in

Fannie Morris Spencer

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Fannie Morris Spencer (August 15, 1865 – April 9, 1943) was an American composer and organist who wrote a collection of 32 hymns and was a founding member of the American Guild of Organists. Spencer was born in Newburgh, New York, to Cynthia McCollum and Timothy W. Spencer. She studied music in New York City with Alexander Lambert and Samuel P. Warren, then taught and worked as a church organist. She taught at the Dr. Holbrook’s Military School and Miss Fuller’s School for Girls in Ossining, and at Miss Spence’s School for Girls (today the Spence School) in New York City. She was an organist at Fourth Presbyterian Church, Lexington Avenue Baptist Church, and Pilgrim Congregational Church, all in New York City. Spencer chaired the music committee of the Professional Women’s League and served as vice president of the New York State Music Teachers Association, where she worked with Florence Sutro. She also chaired the music committee of the 1895 Cotton States and International Exposition in Atlanta. In 1896, Spencer was one of 145 organists (and only four women) to found the American Guild of Organists. *Magnificat in C *“Lord’s Prayer” *“When I Know” References

Faustina Hasse Hodges

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Faustina Hasse Hodges (7 August 1822 – 4 February 1895) was an English-American organist and composer. Life and work She was born in Malmesbury, England, in 1822, as one of four children born to the organist and composer Edward Hodges. All of the children became organists. Edward Hodges emigrated to New York in 1838 and Faustina joined him there in 1841 at the age of 19. Selected musical works Selected compositions include: *L’Amicizia (Friendship) *Tantum Ergo Opus 65, No. 2 *A psalm of life (Text: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) *Dreams: a reverie (Text: H.C.L.) *Robin Adair *The dreary day (Text: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) *The holy dead (Text: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow after Ernst Stockmann) *The rose bush (Text: W. W. Caldwell) Selected written works * Hodges, F. H. (1896). Edward Hodges: Doctor in Music of Sydney Sussex College, Cambridge; Organist… Bristol, England, 1819–1838; Organist and Director in Trinity Parish, New York, 1839–1859. GP Putnam’s sons. References External links * *Finding Aid (PDF) to the Hodges Papers at the Library of Congress

Fay Foster

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Fay Foster (November 8, 1886 – April 17, 1960) was an American pianist, composer, and teacher. Biography Foster was born in Leavenworth, Kansas on November 8, 1886. She was a child prodigy, performing publicly by the age of 5, and professionally as organist and choir director by age 12. In Chicago she studied piano under William Hall Sherwood, voice under Mme Dove-Boitte, and theory with Frederick Grant Gleason. At the age of 17 she went on a national tour playing the piano for Sherwood’s Grand Opera Company. Following her Chicago studies, at the age of 19, she was appointed director of the Grand Prairie Seminary’s Conservatory of Music in Onarga, Illinois. In 1897 she opened a studio in Chicago’s Steinway Hall to teach piano and theory. In 1899 she travelled to Europe for twelve years, studying further under Heinrich Schwartz, Moritz Rosenthal, and Sofie Menter in Munich, and under Theodore Wiehmeyer, Alfred Reisenauer, and Salomon Jadassohn at the Leipzig Conservatory. She studied singing under Siga Garso, Hans Weinhoppel and Alexander Heinemann. She performed opera for two years in Italy. In 1910, Berlin’s Die Woche sponsored an international contest for a waltz modelled on the

Faye-Ellen Silverman

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Faye-Ellen Silverman (born October 2, 1947) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. She is also an author and an educator. Life and education Born in New York, New York, Silverman began studying music at the Dalcroze School of Music shortly before her fourth birthday. At thirteen she won the Parents’ League Competition, judged by Leopold Stokowski, In the summer of 2004 Silverman participated in the Center for World Music’s workshop held in Bali. In 2013, she was chosen for the ASDP China Field Seminar “China’s Encounter with the West: Past, Present, and Future”. In addition to memberships in ASCAP, CMS, IAWM, and NYWC, she is a Founding Board Member of the International Women’s Brass Conference (for which she has served as composer-in-residence), a founding member of Music Under Construction, a composers’ collective, and a founding member of the International Women’s Review Board (ABI). Composing Silverman became a published composer in her mid-twenties when Seesaw Music Corporation accepted Three Movements for Saxophone Alone. She became a member of ASCAP that same year. Seesaw Music published all of her subsequent compositions until the death of its owner, Raoul

Federico Smith

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Federico Smith, born as Frederick Anthony Smith (1929–1977) was a Cuban composer born in the United States. Biography Composer and professor Federico Smith was born in Manhattan, New York City, on March 2, 1929. Smith began his musical studies in his country, and in 1950 travelled to Mexico where he lived for the next 12 years. There, Smith continued his studies and contributed as a music critic to the Política magazine, an important leftist Mexican publication. That participation suggests an ideological tendency that had already manifested in his involvement with American communist organizations and his studies of Marxist philosophy. In 1962, Smith travelled to Havana, Cuba, invited by renowned Mexican artist and director Alfonso Arau with the purpose of collaborating in the reorganization project of the “Teatro Musical de La Habana”, and in Cuba he stayed until his death in 1977. His interest for the utilization of mathematical models in analysis and musical composition exerted an important influence in the development of composition techniques such as aleatorism, stochastic and electro-acoustic music in Cuba. * Matanzas 281 – Homage to the 281th anniversary of the City of Matanz

Felix Arndt

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Felix Arndt (May 20, 1889 – October 16, 1918) was an American pianist and composer of popular music. His mother was the Countess Fevrier, who was related to Napoleon III. His father, Hugo Arndt, was Swiss-born. Educated in New York (his music teachers included Carl Lachmund), Arndt composed songs for the famous vaudeville team of Jack Norworth and Nora Bayes, and recorded over 3000 piano rolls for Duo-Art and QRS Records. He died in New York City from the “Spanish flu” influenza. Arndt is interred at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Tarrytown, NY. Arndt is best remembered for his 1915 composition “Nola,” written as an engagement gift to his fiancée (and later wife), Nola Locke. It is sometimes considered to be the first example of the novelty piano or “novelty ragtime” genre, published by Sam Fox Publishing Company. It was the signature theme of the Vincent Lopez orchestra, and a top ten hit for Les Paul in 1950. A vocal recording by Billy Williams, featuring lyrics by Sunny Skylar, became a minor hit in 1959. Piano solos * 71st Regiment – Waltz (1908) * A Symphonic Nightmare – Desecration Rag No. 1 (1914) * From Soup to Nuts – One Step Turkey Trot (1914) * Kakuda – One Step Turkey Trot (1914)

Felix Mills

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Gordon “Felix” Mills (born July 28, 1901) was a composer, arranger and conductor during the Golden Age of Radio in the 1930s and 1940s. Born in Fort Collins, Colorado , he was the musical director for The Mickey Mouse Theater of the Air, a Disney radio show of the 1930s. Mills created a “gadget band” with wild instruments for Donald Duck to direct on some episodes. He also created arrangements for the show. Mills conducted his own band , and appeared in the Hollywood Bowl. Mills was also the musical director for CBS Radio’s Silver Theater from 1937 to 1947. Mills chose to retire rather than fire some band members during the Red Inquisition; he built a home in Morro Bay, California, to pursue his favorite hobbies, sailing and slide photography. Mills died on April 5, 1987, in Morro Bay, California. References *

Ferde Grofé

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Ferdinand Rudolph von Grofé (March 27, 1892 April 3, 1972), known as Ferde Grofé () was an American composer, arranger, pianist, and instrumentalist. He is best known for his 1931 five-movement symphonic poem the Grand Canyon Suite, and for orchestrating George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue for its 1924 premiere. During the 1920s and 1930s, he went by the name Ferdie Grofé. Early life Grofé was born on 127 East Third Street, New York City, in 1892 to German immigrants. He came by his extensive musical interests naturally. His family included several musicians. His father, Emil von Grofé, was a baritone who mainly performed in light opera. His mother, Elsa Johanna Bierlich von Grofé, was a professional cellist and a versatile music teacher who taught Ferde to play both the violin and the piano. Elsa’s father, Bernard Bierlich, was a cellist in the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in New York, and her brother, Julius Bierlich, was the first violinist and concertmaster of the Los Angeles Symphony. Musical education Ferde’s father died in 1899, after which his mother took him abroad to study piano, viola, and composition in Leipzig, Germany. Ferde became proficient on a wide range of instrum

Fidelis Zitterbart

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Fidelis Zitterbart Jr. (April 8, 1845 – August 30, 1915) was an American composer. Life and works Zitterbart was born in Pittsburgh in 1845. His father, Fidelis Zitterbart Sr. had emigrated from Austria, and was a career violinist and conductor, who taught his son music from an early age. At the age of 16 the young Zitterbart went abroad to Dresden, where he studied with Francois Schubert and Julius Rühlmann, to complete his musical studies there. Upon his return to the US, he worked as a violinist and violist in NY until 1873 when he returned to Pittsburgh and took a teaching position at the Andrew Williams American Conservatory of Music until the closure of the Conservatory compelled him to start his own music school, the Zitterbart Conservatory. In 1868 he married Catherine Riedl of Worcester, MA (1850–1913) and together they had 4 children. His father, who had composed as well, tore up his compositions upon seeing that the compositions of his son outshone his own. Zitterbart composed more than a thousand compositions, nearly all of them remained unpublished during his lifetime. In 1930, his son Ralph Zitterbart donated the manuscripts to the University of Pittsburgh following s

Fisher Tull

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Fisher Aubrey Tull, Jr. (September 23, 1934 – August 23, 1994), known professionally as Fisher A. Tull, Mickey Tull, was an American composer, arranger, educator, administrator, and trumpeter. Life and career Tull was born in Waco, Texas, where he attended public schools. He eventually earned three degrees from the University of North Texas: a B.M. in music education (1956), a M.M. in music theory (1957), and a Ph.D. in music composition (1965). He studied trumpet with John Haynie and composition with Samuel Adler. While an undergraduate, he played trumpet in and arranged for various jazz and dance bands, including the University of North Texas Lab Bands. In 1957 Tull became a faculty member at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Texas, serving as Chairman of the Department of Music since 1965. Tull entered into serious composition beginning in the early 1960s. His works are generally tonal but harmonically adventurous and rhythmically vigorous, and show a strong influence of Medieval and Renaissance music. His catalog of compositions include over 80 published works for orchestra, band, chorus, and chamber ensemble, although he is known particularly for his works for concer

Fleta Jan Brown Spencer

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Fleta Jan Brown Spencer (March 8, 1882 – September 2, 1938) was an American songwriter, composer, pianist, and singer. Early life Fleta Jan Brown was born near Sioux Rapids, Iowa, the daughter of William Edward Brown and Jennie Etta Watkins Brown. Her father was a barber. She trained as a pianist and composer at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music. Career Brown moved to St. Louis, Missouri, after her studies in Cincinnati, and published her first three songs in 1905. After she married fellow songwriter Herbert Spencer, the pair moved to New York, and there were prolific songwriters, sharing credit on dozens of songs published by M. Witmark & Sons, and by Jerome H. Remick. They also performed together at times, both as singers and pianists, in concerts and on the vaudeville stage. Songs with music, lyrics, or both by Brown included “Tangle Foot Rag” (1907), “Fancies” (1908), “I Wish I was in Heaven Sittin’ Down” (1908), “The Party That Wrote ‘Home Sweet Home’ Never Was a Married Man” (1908, later covered by Jerry Garcia), “O Wondrous Night in June” (1909), “I Know a Blossom” (1909), “In the Dusk” (1909), “The Birth of Love” (1909), “Tickle Toes” (1910), “Back to the Old Folks At Ho

Florence Price

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Florence Beatrice Price (née Smith; April 9, 1887 – June 3, 1953) was an American classical composer, pianist, organist, and music teacher. Born in Little Rock, Arkansas, Price was educated at the New England Conservatory of Music, and was active in Chicago from 1927 until her death in 1953. Price is noted as the first African-American woman to be recognized as a symphonic composer, and the first to have a composition played by a major orchestra. Price composed over 300 works: four symphonies, four concertos, as well as choral works, art songs, chamber music, and music for solo instruments. In 2009, a substantial collection of her works and papers was found in her abandoned summer home. Biography Early life and education Florence Beatrice Smith was born to Florence (Gulliver) and James H. Smith on April 9, 1887, in Little Rock, Arkansas, one of three children in a mixed-race family. Despite racial issues of the era, her family was well respected and did well within their community. She took piano lessons from her mother at the age of three and gave her first piano performance at the age of four; her first composition is published at the age of 11. She attended school at a Catholic

Florence Turner-Maley

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Florence Turner-Maley (August 23, 1871 – January 3, 1962) was an American composer, singer, and teacher. Florence Turner was born in Jersey City, New Jersey, to William Hayward and Mathilde (Holwill) Turner. Her father had been a boy soprano. She attended the Hasbrouck Institute in New York She married actor Stephen Maley in 1901. and with conductors Edward Morris Bowman, Alfred Hallam, Victor Harris, and Arthur Mees. the Musicians Club of New York, and the New York Singing Teachers’ Association. Her music is included on the following commercial recordings: *Edison 5839 (1917) *Columbia 77628 (1918) *Columbia 77735 (1918) *Edison 7224 (1920) *Edison 7521 (1920) *Columbia 80464 (1922) *Victor BVE-33610 (1925) *Victor BVE-37388 (1927) Turner-Maley’s music was published by Allen and Co., G. Schirmer Inc., Huntzinger and Dilworth, John Church Co., M. Witmark and Sons, and Oliver Ditson and Co. *Hark! What Mean Those Holy Voices? *Pastoral (men’s choir) Songs *“A Call” *“Ah Sweet Is Tipperary in the Spring” *“Fields of Ballyclare” (text by Dennis A. McCarthy) *“God Grant Us Repose” *“In a Little Town Nearby” (text by Amy Ashmore Clark) *“Jesus, Thou Joy of Loving Hearts” (text by T. R.

Florizel von Reuter

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Florizel von Reuter (21 January 1890 – 10 May 1985) was an American-born violinist and composer, a child prodigy who went on to an adult career, mainly in Germany, as distinguished soloist and teacher of violin. He was also a psychic and medium and the author of several books on his alleged mediumistic communications with deceased musicians, and other works. Early life Born on 21 January 1890, Florizel Reuter at Davenport, Iowa, U.S., he was the son of Jacob and Grace Reuter. His father was a musician and minor composer. Florizel had his first violin lessons with his mother. He showed extraordinary talent at a very young age, and went to London to study in 1899. He was taught by Max Bendix, Emile Sauret (who had also taught his father Jacob), César Thomson and Henri Marteau. In 1901 he graduated from the Geneva Conservatory, where there was a debate as to whether he should be allowed to graduate (presumably owing to his age). Several teachers refused to graduate any other pupils unless he was approved, and so the matter was settled. His first professional concert was at La Chaux-de-Fonds in Switzerland in 1900. After giving 30 concerts in that country he began to tour in America, w

Floy Little Bartlett

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Floy Little Bartlett (January 1, 1883 – March 7, 1956) was an American composer. She wrote many compositions, with one of them appearing in the 1930 sound version of the 1925 silent film The Big Parade. Bartlett also wrote a book for children in 1931 titled The Busy Book. Early life Bartlett was born in 1883 to Esther Palmer Little and Dr. George Little in Burlington, Iowa. She attended the Congressional Church in Burlington, where her brother played the organ for 35 years. At 23 years old, Bartlett traveled to Paris to study the violin, and after her trip she was a concert violinist. She married Sidney F. Bartlett of Burlington when she was 25 years old, and the two of them later moved to LaGrange, Illinois. After a move to New York, their son Jack was born, and their daughter Miriam was born six years later. In 1935, she received an honorary degree in music from Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois. Career On March 20, 1917, the Asbury Park Press said that Bartlett is “one of the most talented of America’s women composers” about her later performing at the First M.E. Church. Bartlett sang some of her songs that were for children at the church. On February 14, 1920, Buffalo Evening

Frances McCollin

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Frances McCollin (October 24, 1892 – February 25, 1960) was an American composer and musician, who was blind from early childhood. She was the first woman to win the Clemson Prize from the American Guild of Organists. In 1951, she was named a Distinguished Daughter of Pennsylvania. Early life and education Frances McCollin was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1892, the daughter of and Alice Graham Lanigan McCollin. Her father, a lawyer, had studied musical composition in college, and he wrote and performed music as a side interest throughout his life. He was one of the founders of the Manuscript Music Society of Philadelphia. and the mother of Edward Arnett. When Frances McCollin was five years old, she became blind, probably from congenital glaucoma. Her parents and extended family took an energetic approach to her education at home, focused on music. When she started to compose in girlhood, her father was her first teacher and transcriber. As a child, she described sensations consistent with synaesthesia and perfect pitch. the organist at St. Stephen’s Church in Philadelphia, and with William Wallace Gilchrist and H. Alexander Matthews at the Pennsylvania Institute for Instr

Frances White (composer)

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Frances White (born August 30, 1960) is an American composer. A 2004 Guggenheim Fellow, she composes for the Japanese flute instrument shakuhachi and her work includes the album She Lost Her Voice, That’s How We Knew (2015). Biography White was born on August 30, 1960, to an electrical engineer father and teacher mother, and raised in Bowie, Maryland. White composes for shakuhachi, having become interested in the instrument due to its sound. In 1999, she composed the shakuhachi/tape piece Centre Bridge, inspired by the Centre Bridge–Stockton Bridge. Michelle Nagai of Organised Sound said that “White, through a process of deep immersion in an actual sounding place, and subsequently in her recordings of that place, is able to internalise her experiences as a listener” through that piece. Another piece inspired by the bridge, Center Bridge (Dark River), premiered in 2003 at the New Jersey Symphony. Susan Van Dongen of PrincetonInfo said that “her sensuous, atmospheric compositions … blend her writing with natural and ambient sounds”. In 2004, she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. White composed the album She Lost Her Voice, That’s How We Knew, released in 2015 by Ravello Records.

Frances Ziffer

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Frances Ziffer (June 5, 1917 – November 7, 1996) was an American composer, conductor, and pianist. She attended the Peabody Institute and studied with Carl Friedberg and David Saperton. She was a music director for theater groups and wrote lyrics or composed music for at least six musicals, as well as for numerous songs. Ziffer married Joseph Burgio but published her works under the name “Ziffer,” sometimes collaborating with Hortense Belson. Her compositions include: Musicals * A Streetcar Named Desire (play by Tennessee Williams; music by Frances Ziffer) *Dakota (book by Tom Hill; music and lyrics by Hortense Belson, Hardy Wieder, Frances Ziffer) *Dames at Sea * Little Brown Jug (book by Tom Hill; lyrics by Hortense Belson; music by Frances Ziffer) * Surprise Package (book by Tom Hill; music and lyrics by Hortense Belson, Hardy Wieder and Frances Ziffer) Songs Source: * “Faith Alone” (with Martin Kalmanoff and Hardy Wieder) * “Reward, Reward” * “Running Through My Mind” * “Say When” (with Martin Kalmanoff and Hardy Wieder) * “The Pleasure’s All Mine” * “There’s Only One You” * “Which Way is the Way to Your Heart” References

Francesco Fanciulli

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Francesco Fanciulli (May 29, 1853 – July 17, 1915) was a Grand Duchy of Tuscany-born naturalized American band director and composer. Between 1892 and 1897 he led the United States Marine Band. Biography Francesco Luigi Fanciulli was born in Porto Santo Stefano. He learned cornet at a young age and played in a local band. Displaying talent, he was sent to study at the Florence Conservatory, where he obtained his diploma. At age twenty he became the first cornettist at the Teatro della Pergola in Florence, and in 1875 he obtained a position in the orchestra of the Politeama Fiorentino. He was also engaged as a conductor at the Teatro Goldoni, at the Politeama, and at the Teatro Nazionale. In 1876 he emigrated to the United States to teach privately for a wealthy New York family. Arriving in New York on September 24, 1876, he also began working as an organist at St. Peter’s Church in Brooklyn and as a teacher of piano and singing. He composed works for Patrick Gilmore’s band. Among his compositions was a piece transcribed from his first opera The Voyage of Columbus that Gilmore described as “the most beautiful piece of descriptive music ever written.” In 1892, Fanciulli’s reputation

Francis Boott (composer)

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Francis Boott (June 24, 1813 in Boston, Massachusetts – March 1, 1904 in Cambridge, Massachusetts) and at Round Hill School, followed by Harvard College from which he graduated in 1831. and continued to compose music. He died on 1 March 1904 at the age of 90 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Boott bequeathed $10,000 to Harvard University as a prize fund for the best 4-part vocal work written by a Harvard student. Music Boott’s first six songs appeared in 1846 under the pen name of Telford; Upton described them as “quite undistinguished”. In 1857 eight songs were published, followed by many individual songs in the following years. Boott composed at least 140 songs during his long life, as well as a handful of duets, choral works, part-songs, and instrumental works. He also composed hymns for church services, many of which were included in the hymnal for King’s Chapel in Boston. his choices of texts were sophisticated, embracing the literary world of his time. In 1857 John Sullivan Dwight wrote that his songs are “not strikingly original, but graceful and facile, much to be preferred to the popular sweetish, sentimental type”. Musical compositions Songs for voice and piano : under the pse

Francis Johnson (composer)

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Francis Johnson (June 16, 1792 – April 6, 1844 ) was an American musician and prolific composer during the Antebellum period. African American composers were rare in the U.S. during this period, but Johnson was among the few who were successful. Performing as a virtuoso of the (now rare) keyed Kent bugle and the violin, he wrote more than two hundred compositions of various styles—operatic airs, Ethiopian minstrel songs, patriotic marches, ballads, cotillions, quadrilles, quicksteps and other dances. Only manuscripts and piano transcriptions survive today. Johnson was the first African American composer to have his works published as sheet music. He also was the first African American to give public concerts and the first to participate in racially integrated concerts in the United States. He led the first American musical ensemble to present concerts abroad, and he introduced the promenade concert style to America. Biography Francis “Frank” Johnson was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on June 16, 1792, and baptized three months later at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church on September 23. He directed military bands and society dance orchestras, taught music, and performed on the violin

Francis Judd Cooke

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Francis Judd Cooke (December 28, 1910 – May 18, 1995) was an American composer, organist, cellist, pianist, conductor, choir director, and professor. Life Cooke was born December 28, 1910, in Honolulu, Hawaii, to a family of New England missionaries turned cattle ranchers. He was the great grandson of Gerrit P. Judd, the first doctor to reside in Hawaii, and grandson of Albert Francis Judd, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Hawaii. His mother was Sophie Boyd Judd, and father was George Paul Cooke, grandson of Amos Starr Cooke and Juliette Montague Cooke, founders of the Royal School of Hawaii. Cooke began composing at an early age and his first serious pieces date from age 14. He received a B.A. in music from Yale University in 1933, where he was a member of Skull and Bones. He then studied for two years with Charles Martin Loeffler in Medfield, Massachusetts. In 1935 he went to Scotland to study with Donald Francis Tovey at the University of Edinburgh, receiving a Mus. Bac. (Bachelor of Music) degree with First Class Honours in 1938. While studying in Scotland he met and married violist May Ludwig. They settled in Lexington, Massachusetts, where they raised six children. In 19

Francis MacMillen

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Francis Rea MacMillen (October 14, 1885 – July 14, 1973) was an American violinist. Biography Francis MacMillen was born in Marietta, Ohio on October 14, 1885. At the age of seven, he began studying at Chicago Musical College, where his teacher was . From 1895 to 1899, he studied with (a student of Joseph Joachim) and with Karl Halir in Berlin and from 1900 to 1902 with César Thomson at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels, where he received two prizes. In the fall of 1902, he made his debut in a Vauxhall in Brussels, followed by a concert tour through Belgium, Germany and England. In the fall of 1903, he played in London and undertook another concert tour through England. His American debut took place on December 7, 1906 at Carnegie Hall with the New York Symphony Society under the direction of Walter Damrosch. He is also the author of several compositions for the violin: Barcarole, Serenade Nègre, Causerie, Liebeslied, Nijinsky et al. MacMillen died in Lausanne on July 14, 1973. References Further reading * Oscar Thompson (edit.), Nicolas Slonimsky (edit.): MacMillen, Francis. In The International Cyclopedia of Music and Musicians, 4th edition, Dodd, Mead & Company, New York 1946,

Francis Thorne

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Francis Thorne (June 23, 1922 – March 7, 2017) was an American composer of contemporary classical music and grandson of the writer Gustav Kobbé. Life Francis Burritt Thorne, Jr. was born in Bay Shore, New York. His father was a ragtime pianist. His grandfather, Gustav Kobbé, author of The Complete Opera Book, was a musical critic, particularly of the Wagnerian canon. Thorne was a student of Paul Hindemith at Yale University, before entering the U.S. Navy in 1942 where he served during World War II. After the war, he pursued a career on Wall Street and later, as a jazz pianist, after Duke Ellington heard him play the piano, and arranged an engagement for him at a New York jazz club. From 1959 to 1961, he studied composition in Florence, Italy with David Diamond, who encouraged Thorne to incorporate his jazz sensitivities into his symphonic compositions. In December 1961, Thorne’s first opera, Fortuna, premiered in New York City. In 1964 Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra premiered his Elegy for Orchestra. In 1968, he was inducted into the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. He spent much of his career championing the works of emerging composers. He served

Frank Comstock

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Frank G. Comstock (September 20, 1922 – May 21, 2013) was an American composer, arranger, conductor, and trombonist. For television, Comstock wrote and arranged music for major situation comedies and variety shows. His theme and incidental music for Rocky and His Friends (1959–1964) are probably his best-remembered works. Additionally, his music for Adam-12 earned him a 1971 Emmy nomination. Comstock’s recording credits include eight Hi-Lo’s albums and backing arrangements for major recording stars. His 1962 instrumental album, Project: Comstock - Music from Outer Space became a classic and was released on CD in 2004. Recently, Comstock wrote new big-band arrangements for Brian Setzer’s Wolfgang’s Big Night Out (2007) and Songs from Lonely Avenue (2009) CDs. He started his arranging career in the dance bands of Sonny Dunham and Benny Carter, and with Les Brown from 1943 to 1955. When dance bands fell out of favor after World War II, Comstock and Doris Day left the Les Brown band. Comstock’s backing arrangements for Doris Day’s Warner Brothers screen tests impressed studio executives and resulted in a staff arranger position at Warner where he demonstrated his ability to write for l

Frank Felice

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Frank Felice (born October 13, 1961, in Great Falls, Montana) is an American composer of contemporary classical music and associate professor of composition, theory, and electronic music in the Jordan College of Arts at Butler University. Background Felice grew up in Hamilton, Montana, playing piano, guitar, and double bass in a variety of settings, including several rock bands. He attended Concordia College (Moorhead), the University of Colorado Boulder, and Butler University. Felice received his PhD from the University of Minnesota in 1998. Felice has studied composition under Dominick Argento, Judith Lang Zaimont, Luiz Gonzalez, James Day, Michael Schelle, and Daniel Breedon. He describes himself as “an eclectic composer who writes with a postmodern mischievousness: pieces can be comedic/ironic, simple/complex, or humble/reverent.” He is member of the Society for Electro-Acoustic Music in the United States, the American Composers Forum, the American Music Center, The Society of Composers Inc., and the Christian Fellowship of Art Music Composers. Activities and collaborations Performances and commissions Felice’s music has been performed in the U.S., Brazil, Argentina, Japan, Gre

Frank Ferko

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Frank Ferko (born June 18, 1950) is an American composer. Born in Barberton, Ohio, Ferko played piano from childhood, and worked as an organist and conductor in his teens. His first compositions were primarily liturgical in nature, with Lutheran composer Richard Wienhorst being an early influence. He attended Valparaiso University as an undergraduate, where he studied composition and counterpoint under Wienhorst and organ under Philip Gehring. Ferko took particular interest in early music and the compositional and theoretical output of Olivier Messiaen. He received a bachelor’s from Valparaiso in 1972 in piano and organ performance, and then took his master’s at Syracuse University in music theory. There he studied theory under Howard Boatright and organ under Will Headlee, and wrote his thesis on one of the extended piano works of Messiaen. Following this, Ferko served as Director of Music at various midwestern churches before entering Northwestern University. At Northwestern he first pursued a Ph.D. in music theory but shifted his attention to music composition which he studied under Alan Stout. During his time at Northwestern he worked as a teaching assistant in the School of Mu

Frank H. Losey

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Frank Hoyt Losey (March 18, 1870 – 3 May 1931) was an American musician, composer, and arranger of band and orchestra music. He is credited with over 400 compositions and 2,500 arrangements including his most recognized composition, “Gloria March”. Losey was born in Rochester, New Jersey and raised in Lawrenceeville. While it has been commonly cited that he was born in 1872 or 1875, his presence as an infant in the 1870 Census shows these references to be incorrect, as well as his correct age of 61 on his death certificate. Frank studied music at an early age, learning to play cornet, violin, and piano. Losey was a cornetist for local and regional bands until he suffered from lip paralysis which forced him to switch to trombone and euphonium and limited him to smaller theater performances. Starting in 1902, Losey composed and arranged music for Carl Fischer and became editor-in-chief of the Vandersloot Music Publishing Company. In 1919, Thomas Edison selected Losey to be the music adviser for Edison’s phonograph company. He was also approached by Henry Ford to arrange music for the Ford Orchestra in Detroit. Losey died in Erie, Pennsylvania in 1931. The Historic American Sheet Musi

Frank La Forge

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Frank La Forge (October 22, 1879 – May 5, 1953) was an American pianist, vocal coach, teacher, composer and arranger of art songs. Biography He was born on October 22, 1879, in Rockford, Illinois. La Forge was a boy soprano. He first studied piano with his older sister, and went to Vienna in 1900 to study with Theodor Leschetizky. He recorded prolifically for the Victor Talking Machine Company, as both a soloist and accompanist starting in 1906. As a soloist, he recorded works by Chopin, Liszt and MacDowell. In performance he usually accompanied entirely from memory, considered an unusual feat for an accompanist. In his biography Pathways of Song, La Forge claimed that he had ‘a repertoire of over five thousand memorized accompaniments embracing all schools’. He toured Europe, Russia, and the United States as an accompanist to Marcella Sembrich. La Forge moved to New York City in 1920, where he became a music teacher, coach, and accompanist. He taught a number of important American singers, including Marian Anderson, Lawrence Tibbett, Marie Powers, Emma Otero and Richard Crooks. He served as accompanist for many vocal stars and instrumentalists of the day including Johanna Gadski,

Frank Lewin

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Frank Lewin (March 27, 1925 – January 18, 2008) was an American composer and teacher. Biography Frank Lewin was born March 27, 1925, in Breslau, Germany. He and his family escaped from Germany in 1939, spent a year in Cuba, and came to the United States in 1940. Lewin studied composition with Felix Deyo at the Baldwin Conservatory (Long Island, New York); Jack Frederick Kilpatrick and Hans David at Southern Methodist University; Roy Harris in Logan, Utah; and Richard Donovan and Paul Hindemith at the Yale School of Music, where he received his Bachelor of Music degree in 1951. Lewin composed and edited music for feature, documentary, and television films, including dozens of original scores for The Defenders and The Nurses. He wrote incidental music for plays from William Shakespeare to Tennessee Williams, and composed scores for historical outdoor dramas by Paul Green and others, in various parts of the country. He also wrote a number of concert compositions including two operas, several orchestral works, concertos for viola and harmonica, song cycles, and choral music. Lewin was a professor at the Yale School of Music from 1971 to 1992, teaching composition for film; and at the C

Frank Ticheli

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Frank Ticheli ( ; born January 21, 1958) is an American composer of orchestral, choral, chamber, and concert band works. Ticheli is a Professor Emeritus of Composition at the University of Southern California and was formerly the Pacific Symphony’s composer-in-residence from 1991 to 1998, composing numerous works for that orchestra. A number of his works have become standards in concert band repertoire. Early life and education Frank Ticheli was born on January 21, 1958 in Monroe, Louisiana. He graduated from Lloyd V. Berkner High School in Richardson, Texas and earned a Bachelor of Music in Composition and Music Education from Southern Methodist University, where he studied with Donald Erb and Jack Waldenmaier. He went on to receive his master’s and doctoral degrees in composition from the University of Michigan, where he studied with William Albright, Leslie Bassett, George Wilson, and William Bolcom. Grants and commissions for Ticheli’s works have come from Chamber Music America, the American Music Center, Pacific Symphony, Pacific Chorale, Worldwide Concurrent Premieres, Inc., Prince George’s Philharmonic Orchestra, Adrian Symphony, City of San Antonio, Stephen F. Austin State

Frank William Erickson

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Frank William Erickson (September 1, 1923 – October 21, 1996) was an American composer, conductor, arranger, writer, and trumpet player. Growing up The son of Frank O.. Myrtle Erickson, Frank Erickson was born and raised in Spokane, Washington. He began his instrumental career at the age of eight, playing piano, and at age ten, playing trumpet. In high school, he wrote his first composition for the band, The Fall of Evening. ; World War II World War II began when Erickson was 16. He served with the United States Army Air Forces from 1942 to 1946, working as a weather forecaster and arranging music for several army bands. ; Post World War II After the war, Erickson worked as a jazz arranger, namely for Earle Spencer and His Orchestra (1946); and he played trumpet. He also studied composition with Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco during this time period. As he wrote the music and studied composition, Frank Erickson developed an interest in getting a degree and eventually enrolled at University of Southern California to further his studies in composition. While there, he began arranging half-time shows for the USC marching band. By the time he graduated, he had many published band compositio

Frank Zappa

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Frank Vincent Zappa (December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993) was an American composer, songwriter, guitarist, conductor, actor, satirist, filmmaker, and activist. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa composed rock, pop, jazz, jazz fusion, orchestral and musique concrète works; he additionally produced nearly all the 60-plus albums he released with his band the Mothers of Invention and as a solo artist. His discography is characterized by nonconformity, improvisation, sonic experimentation, musical virtuosity and satire of American culture. As a mostly self-taught composer and performer, Zappa had diverse musical influences that led him to create music that was sometimes difficult to categorize. While in his teens, he acquired a taste for 20th-century classical modernism, African-American rhythm and blues, and doo-wop music. He began writing classical music in high school, while simultaneously playing drums in rhythm-and-blues bands, later switching to electric guitar. His debut studio album with the Mothers of Invention, Freak Out! (1966), combined satirical but seemingly conventional rock-and-roll songs with extended sound collages. He continued this eclectic and experimen

Franklin Cox

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Franklin Cox (born Charleston, Illinois, 1961) is an American composer, scholar, and cellist. Life Cox studied with Brian Ferneyhough at the University of California, San Diego, and at the Darmstädter Ferienkurse. He is currently (2020) associate professor of theory, composition, and cello at Wright State University. His ongoing concert series, The New Cello, features his work in addition to other composers that explore new possibilities on the instrument through extended techniques and microtonality.) Cox has also been co-editor of Search: Journal for New Music and Culture since its founding in 2007. 3 Music Franklin Cox’s work advances a range of features and concepts associated with “New Complexity; his performances range widely between new music to classical and common-practice chamber works. Works with considerable recognition include Chronopolis, for solo flute (1988–89), Di-remption, for solo percussionist (1993), If on a Winter’s Night …, for solo clarinet (1988) and a landmark series of solo string compositions: the Clairvoyance set for violin solo, with a version for cello (1989), and Recoil, for cello solo (1994), along with a range of cello etudes. Cox’s cycle Spiegel

Fred Lerdahl

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Alfred Whitford (Fred) Lerdahl (born March 10, 1943) is an American music theorist and composer. Best known for his work on musical grammar, cognition, rhythmic theory, and pitch space, he and the linguist Ray Jackendoff developed the Chomsky-inspired generative theory of tonal music. Lerdahl has written numerous orchestral and chamber works, three of which were finalists for the Pulitzer Prize for Music: Time after Time in 2001, String Quartet No. 3 in 2010, and Arches in 2011. He is a Professor Emeritus of Musical Composition at Columbia University. Life Alfred Whitford “Fred” Lerdahl was born on March 10, 1943, in Madison, Wisconsin. His maternal uncle was the astronomer Albert Whitford. Lerdahl studied with James Ming at Lawrence University, where he earned his BMus in 1965, and with Milton Babbitt, Edward T. Cone, and Earl Kim at Princeton University, where he earned his MFA in 1967. At Tanglewood he studied with Arthur Berger in 1964 and Roger Sessions in 1966. He then studied with Wolfgang Fortner at the Hochschule für Musik in Freiburg/Breisgau in 1968–69, on a Fulbright Scholarship. From 1991 to 2018 Lerdahl was Fritz Reiner Professor of Musical Composition at Columbia Uni

Frederic Archer

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Frederic Archer (16 June 1838 – 22 October 1901) was a British composer, conductor and organist, born in Oxford. He moved to the US in 1880, where he established the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. Education and UK career From the age of eleven he was a chorister at All Saints, Margaret Street, and afterwards studied at Leipzig. He held various musical positions in England and Scotland, including organist at the Panopticon in Leicester Square (succeeding Edmund Chipp), Merton College Oxford and (from 1878) the first organist at the Alexandra Palace in London, where his many public recitals on the original and then on the restored organ (post fire) drew large crowds. He conducted the Glasgow Select Choir between 1878 and 1880, arranging part songs based on Scotch airs for the choir. During this period he was also an Examiner at Glasgow University. New York and Pittsburgh In 1880 he moved to the United States, becoming organist of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn, New York, and a year later at the Episcopal Church of the Incarnation in Manhattan. Author and composer In 1883 Archer founded a music journal, The Keynote, which for a time he edited, and also published several books and numerou

Frederic Rzewski

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Frederic Anthony Rzewski ( ; April 13, 1938 – June 26, 2021) was an American composer and pianist, considered to be one of the most important American composer-pianists of his time. which has been called “a modern classic”. Early life and education Rzewski was born on April 13, 1938, in Westfield, Massachusetts, to parents of Polish descent, and raised Catholic. He began playing piano at age 5 and attended Phillips Academy, Harvard, and Princeton, where his teachers included Randall Thompson, Roger Sessions, Walter Piston, and Milton Babbitt. In 1960, he went to Italy on a Fulbright grant, a trip which was formative in his future musical development. In addition to studying with Luigi Dallapiccola in Florence on a Fulbright scholarship he began a career as a performer of new piano music, often with an improvisatory element. In 1977, Rzewski became Professor of Composition at the Conservatoire Royal de Musique in Liège, Belgium, then directed by Henri Pousseur. Occasionally, he taught for short periods at schools and universities throughout the U.S. and Europe, including Yale University, the University of Cincinnati, the California Institute of the Arts, the University of California

Frederick A. Fox

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Frederick A. Fox (January 17, 1931 – August 24, 2011) was an American composer and former music educator specializing in contemporary classical music. Early years Frederick Alfred Fox Jr. was born January 17, 1931, in Detroit, Michigan. His early musical training in his native Detroit encompassed the saxophone (with Laurence “Larry” Teal) and music theory and arranging (with Ray McConnell). He subsequently studied composition with Ruth Shaw Wylie and received the B.Mus. degree from Wayne State University in 1953. He worked for a year with Ross Lee Finney at the University of Michigan, but took a leave from his studies to tour as a jazz saxophonist (tenor and baritone), a career he gave up in 1956–57 to return to serious composing. Fox then went to Indiana University School of Music (now the Jacobs School of Music) in Bloomington, where he studied composition with Bernhard Heiden, and from which he was graduated with the Masters of Music (1957) and Doctor of Music (1959). Composer, teacher After serving in various faculty and foundation posts in the United States, Fox returned to the Indiana University School of Music in 1974 as professor of composition. One of his first undertaking

Frederick Converse

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Frederick Shepherd Converse (January 5, 1871 – June 8, 1940), was an American composer of classical music, whose works include four operas and five symphonies. Life and career Converse was born in Newton, Massachusetts, the son of Edmund Winchester and Charlotte Augusta (Shepherd) Converse. His father was a successful merchant, and president of the National Tube Works and the Conanicut Mills. Frederick Converse’s higher education was at Harvard College, where he came under the influence of the composer John K. Paine. Converse had already received instruction in piano playing, and the study of musical theory was a most important part of his college course. Upon his graduation in 1893, his violin sonata (op. 1) was performed and won him highest honors in music. After six months of business life, for which his father had intended him, he returned to the study of composing, Carl Baermann being his teacher in piano, and George W. Chadwick in composition. He then spent two years at the Royal Academy of Music in Munich, where he studied with Joseph Rheinberger, completing the course in 1898. His Symphony in D minor had its first performance on the occasion of his graduation. During 1899–1

Frederick J. Bacon

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Frederick J. Bacon (1871-1948) was a late 19th to mid 20th century performer and recording artist on the five string banjo. He was also an inventor and entrepreneur, educator, composer, At the height of his performance career he played the banjo nationally. Along with Fred Van Eps and Vess Ossman he was part of a group of banjoists labeled “virtuoso” in the newspapers. Musicianship Across his career, Fred J. Bacon played a variety of musical styles on the five-string banjo and snare drum. His performances included his own compositions such as The Fascinator and The Conqueror march, classical compositions such as Minuette a l’Antique by Paderewski, and arrangements of folk music or minstrel songs, including Massa’s in the Cold, Cold Ground. Known mainly as a banjo player, he also continued to bring his drum on stage throughout his career, doing drum solos, and in 1936 advertised as a teacher of banjo, guitar, drums and violin. Growing up in Connecticut, he took banjo lessons from Alfred A. Farland when he was 12-years old. His earliest acts included roles with “Hornsby’s Oats” (a stage show in Boston) and with Broncho John’s Wild West Show as “Nebraska Fred.” In 1918 Bacon was adver

Frederick Jacobi

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Frederick Jacobi (May 4, 1891 – October 24, 1952) was a Jewish-American composer and teacher. His works include symphonies, concerti, chamber music, works for solo piano and for solo organ, lieder, and one opera. He taught at Juilliard School of Music from 1936 to 1950, where his pupils included Mark Bucci, Alexei Haieff, Vera Nicolaevna Preobrajenska, Julia Frances Smith, Robert Starer, John Verrall, and Robert Ward. He also served as the director of the American section of the International Society for Contemporary Music and was a founding member of the League of Composers. He died on October 24, 1952, in New York City of heart failure. Biography Early life Jacobi was the son of San Francisco wholesale wine merchant, Frederick Jacobi Sr. and Flora Brandenstein (daughter of tobacco wholesaler Joseph Brandenstein), whom Frederick Sr. had married in 1876. During the composer’s childhood years, he demonstrated his musical talent, composing short pieces at the piano and playing tunes from contemporary musical comedies by ear. In these years the family traveled each summer to visit relatives in New York City. The scenery of those cross-country train rides later provided the themes of a

Frederick W. Hager

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Frederick W. Hager (December 31, 1874 - March 3, 1958) was an American musician, recording artist, composer, and music director active between 1895 and 1923. Biography Early life and recording and bandleader Hager was born in New Milford, Pennsylvania in 1874 and began studying violin at 8 years old. He received a scholarship to study violin at the National Conservatory, and led his own band in New York City at the age of 21. In 1898 he began recording for Harms, Kaiser and Hagen, a recently formed independent record company based in New York and in September of that year won the Phonoscope gold medal for best violin record for Schumann’s Traumerei. He began recording for Edison in 1899 and Zonophone and Columbia in 1900. Between 1900 and 1907 Hager served as a bandleader for Edison (Edison’s Concert Band), Zonophone (Hager’s Orchestra), and Columbia (Columbia Orchestra, Climax Orchestra) recording hundreds of sides and becoming the nation’s leading recording orchestra. Composing He was composing at the same time, and beginning around 1903 published a number of successful popular songs, including Laughing Water, The Midnight Flyer, and My Ramapoo. Music publishing and directing He

Frederick Zech Jr.

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Frederick Zech Jr. (May 10, 1858 – October 15, 1926) was an American composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher. Zech was born in Philadelphia on May 10, 1858 and lived in San Francisco from 1860, where he studied with L. Heckmanns and R. Schumacher. From 1877 he studied with Theodor Kullak (piano), Emil Breslaur (theory), and Franz Neumann (composition) in Berlin. He taught piano at the Neue Akademie der Tonkunst from 1880 to 1882. Zech returned to San Francisco in 1882, where he organized an orchestral concert of his own compositions on November 30, 1882. Zech became a teacher of advanced piano playing, organized and conducted concerts in the city (1882–1902), From 1902 to 1903 he organized and directed symphony concerts of his tone poems. Later Zech taught at the Notre Dame de Namur University. He died in San Francisco on October 15, 1926. The composer’s manuscripts are kept at the Music Library of the University of California, Berkeley. Among his compositions are five symphonies, five symphonic poems, concertos, sonatas, songs, and two operas. His symphonic poems were performed in Germany and San Francisco. Zech wrote two operas: La Paloma in Spanish style, and Wa-Kin-Yon, a Nor

Fredric Kroll

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Fredric Joseph Kroll (7 February 1945 – 12 February 2026) was an American-German composer and writer. Life and career Kroll was born in Brooklyn, New York, on 7 February 1945, as the only child of the piano teacher and schoolteacher Alexander Kroll, born in New York City as the fourth child of White Russian Jewish immigrants, and the elementary school teacher Sarah Kroll, née Mahler, born in Warsaw. At the age of eleven, he began to compose a cycle of 30 piano pieces in all tonalities, including the enharmonic relationships, to explore the potentials of each tonality to express different emotions. He called them “Episodes,” in order to distinguish them from Chopin’s “Préludes.” Although of uneven quality, they represent a quarry of thematic material (partially with Russian Jewish flavor) from which Kroll was later to draw in his magnum opus, his four-act opera The Scarlet Letter. He had written but five of the “Episodes” when, shortly after his twelfth birthday, he composed his Piano Sonata in B Minor which, albeit still brief, is a harbinger of his later ability to create in large forms. His Symphony in G Minor, written from 1957 to 1959, has a performance duration of about half a

Fredrick Kaufman

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Fredrick Kaufman (born March 24, 1936) is an American composer. Before Fame Kaufman was born in Brooklyn, New York and studied trumpet, composition and jazz at the Manhattan School of Music (BMus 1959, MMus 1960). In addition, he studied composition with Vincent Persichetti and Vittorio Giannini at the Juilliard School. Career He played trumpet with the New York City Ballet Orchestra, taught at Yankton College and later became professor of composition at the University of Wisconsin. After serving as dean of the Philadelphia College for the Performing Arts from 1982 to 1985, and Professor of Music until 1993, he became the director of the School of Music at Florida International University in 1993 until 2008. Kaufman is a former Fulbright Scholar and author of The African Roots of Jazz, a groundbreaking study that drew heavily on his early musical life as a jazz trumpet player with the Woody Herman Band. He is the recipient of the Darius Milhaud Award in Composition from the Aspen Music Festival, and honors and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller, Guggenheim and Ford Foundations, the California, Montana and Pennsylvania Arts Councils as well as the

Fritz Kreisler

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Friedrich “Fritz” Kreisler (February 2, 1875 – January 29, 1962) was an Austrian and American violinist and composer. Of Jewish descent, he was however baptised at the age of 12. At age seven, Kreisler entered the Vienna Conservatory where he studied under Anton Bruckner, Jakob Dont and Joseph Hellmesberger Jr., and studied composition and violin at the Paris Conservatory between 1885 and 1887, where his teachers included Léo Delibes, Lambert Massart and Jules Massenet. He graduated from the Paris Conservatory with the highest “Premier Prix” in violin at the age of 12, competing against 40 other players, most of whom were at least 20 years of age. He made his United States debut at the Steinway Hall in New York City on November 10, 1888, and his first tour of the United States in 1888–1889 with Moriz Rosenthal. He then returned to Austria and applied for a position in the Vienna Philharmonic, but was turned down by the concertmaster Arnold Rosé. As a result, he left music to study medicine. He spent a brief time in the army before returning to the violin in 1899, when he gave a concert with the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Arthur Nikisch. It was this concert and a series of Ame

Fritz Spielmann (composer)

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Fritz Spielmann (20 November 190621 March 1997) was an Austrian composer, pianist, singer and cabaret artist. As an émigré in America from 1939 he composed under the name Fred Spielman. Early life Born in Vienna, Spielmann began studying piano and composition the Vienna Academy of Music from 1918, where his teachers included Joseph Marx and Hans Gál. He worked as an accompanist and conductor in Berlin and Breslau, and from 1931 he was one of the founders of the literary cabaret Der Liebe Augustin with Stella Kadmon. He became well known as a cabaret pianist and entertainer, mixing jazz and Viennese song. From 1934 until 1937 he formed a song-writing team with Stephan Weiss (1899-1989). The song ‘Schinkenfleckerln!’, taken up by Hermann Leopoldi was one of their biggest successes. Following the Anschluss he emigrated from Vienna to Paris in May 1938 - while most of his family fell victim to the Nazis. The following year he moved to New York and began working with fellow exiles Leopoldi and lyricist Jimmy Berg (1909-1988), changing his given name to Fred. America Written with Kermit Goell, Spielmann’s song ‘Shepherd Serenade’ was recorded by Bing Crosby, selling over a million copies

G. Estabrook

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G. Estabrook is the pen name used by composer and singer Caroline Augusta “Gussie” Clowry (October 23, 1845 – April 18, 1897), whose opera The Joust was the first opera by an American woman to be published. With musical talent from an early age, “Gussie” had many songs published throughout her life, one of which “reached the extraordinary sale of over one million copies.” Biography Born on October 23, 1845, in Geneva, Wisconsin, she was the only daughter of General Experience Estabrook and Caroline Augusta Maxwell. She had one brother, Henry Dodge, who was nine years younger. In January 1855, General Experience Estabrook moved with his family to Omaha, Nebraska after being appointed United States Attorney by President Franklin Pierce. In 1860, at the age of 15, she met Colonel Robert Charles Clowry of Chicago, the superintendent of the Missouri and Western Union Telegraph Company; and later, president and general manager of the Western Union Telegraph Company. They were wed five years later, on August 29, 1865, in Omaha, Nebraska. By 1879, the couple had moved to St. Louis before settling in Chicago. In 1882, the first production of “The Joust” was performed in her home town of Oma

Gabriel Jenks

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Gabriel Jenks (born 1981) is an American composer of concert music who has taught at Yale School of Music, Mannes School of Music, and the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. Biography Gabriel Jenks was formerly known as Han/Hannah Lash. Some of his earlier music appears under those names. Gabriel Jenks was born in Alfred, New York, USA on November 22, 1981, under the name Hannah Lash. He began his studies in music during early childhood, and continued to pursue music throughout his education. Jenks obtained a bachelor’s degree in composition from the Eastman School of Music in 2004, a performance degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music in 2008, a PhD from Harvard University in 2010, and an Artist Diploma from the Yale School of Music in 2012. His primary teachers include Martin Bresnick, Bernard Rands, Julian Anderson, Steven Stucky, Augusta Read Thomas, and Robert Morris. Jenks was appointed to the composition faculty of the Yale School of Music in 2013. During the 2013–14 season, Jenks served as Composer in Residence with the Alabama Symphony Orchestra, as well as being the Sound Investment Composer with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra. In 2016, Jenks composed new

Gabriel von Wayditch

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Gabriel von Wayditch (28 December 1888, Budapest28 July 1969 New York City) was a Hungarian-American composer whose output consisted primarily of 14 grand operas. The son of Dr. Aloysious (Lajos) von Wayditch von Verbovac (Verbovác), a nobleman and inventor who had taught physics at the University of Pécs, and Helena von Dönhoff, a Prussian baroness, who was according to familytrees related to the ancient magyar Árpád dynasty. Gabriel (Wayditch Gábor) was born in Budapest. He studied piano, conducting, and composition at the National Hungarian Academy of Music (now the Franz Liszt Academy of Music) where his teachers included Franz Liszt’s pupil Emil von Sauer and Hans von Koessler, who was also the teacher of composers Béla Bartók, Zoltán Kodály, Ernő Dohnányi, and Kálmán Emmerich. Life and career In 1910, Gabriel von Wayditch began composing his first opera, , for which he also wrote his own Hungarian libretto. But after his parents separated, he emigrated to the United States with his father before completing it, arriving in New York harbor in 1911. In New York City, Wayditch worked as a theater conductor while completing Ópium Álmok, which lasts 4 hours and requires an orchestr

Gabriela Lena Frank

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Gabriela Lena Frank (born September 26, 1972) is an American pianist and composer of contemporary classical music. Biography Gabriela Lena Frank was born in Berkeley, California, United States. Her father is of Lithuanian Jewish heritage and her mother is Peruvian, of Chinese descent. She grew up in Berkeley, California. Her parents met when her father was a Peace Corps volunteer in Peru in the 1960s. Frank received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Rice University and a Doctorate in Music Composition from the University of Michigan in 2001. She has studied composition with Paul Cooper, William Albright, Leslie Bassett, William Bolcom, Michael Daugherty, and Samuel Jones. Style Frank’s work often draws on her multicultural background, especially her mother’s Peruvian heritage. In many of her compositions, she elicits the sounds of Latin American instruments such as Peruvian pan flute or charango guitar, although the works are typically scored for Western classical instruments and ensembles such as the symphony orchestra or string quartet. She has said, “I think the music can be seen as a by-product of my always trying to figure out how Latina I am and how gringa I am.” Profe

Gabriella Smith

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Gabriella Smith (born December 26, 1991) is an American composer from Berkeley, California. Life Gabriella Smith was born December 26, 1991, in Berkeley, California. As a teenager, she was very interested in biology, ecology, and conservation, and she spent five years volunteering on a songbird research project in Point Reyes, California. Smith began learning the violin at age seven and began composing soon thereafter. She received her Bachelors of Music in composition from the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia in 2013 where she studied with David Ludwig. She attended Princeton University for graduate school Oslo, Norway; and Seattle, USA. In January 2019, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, conducted by John Adams, performed the piece as part of its centennial season. In 2023, the piece was performed by Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and Esa-Pekka Salonen at the Nobel Prize Concert. Her string quartet Carrot Revolution was written in 2015 for the Aizuri Quartet, having been commissioned by the Barnes Foundation for their exhibition The Order of Things. In November 2019, it was performed by members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic as a part of their Green Umbrella concert

Gail Kubik

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Gail Thompson Kubik (September 5, 1914 – July 20, 1984) was an American composer, music director, violinist, and teacher. He first gained widespread recognition for his scores for World War II documentary films, including Memphis Belle: A Story of a Flying Fortress (1944). He is best remembered for winning the 1952 Pulitzer Prize for Music for his Symphony Concertante, and for his score for Gerald McBoing-Boing. Early life and education Kubik was born in South Coffeyville, Oklahoma, the second of three sons to Henry and Evalyn O. Kubik, a singer who had studied with Schumann-Heink. In the 1930s his mother and her sons formed the Kubik Ensemble (Gail on violin, Howard on piano, and Henry Jr. on cello) and toured the midwest. All three brothers studied at the Eastman School of Music, where Kubik studied composition with Howard Hanson and violin with Samuel Belov and Scott Willits. It is likely that Kubik played violin in Eastman’s orchestra, taking part in the American Composers’ Concerts and getting nationally broadcast on NBC. Kubik graduated with distinction in 1934 in a class that included Wayne Barlow and Kent Kennan. Kubik then received his master’s degree in music in 1935 at t

Gardner Read

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Gardner Read (January 2, 1913 in Evanston, Illinois – November 10, 2005 in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts) was an American composer and musical scholar. His first musical studies were in piano and organ, and he also took lessons in counterpoint and composition at the School of Music at Northwestern University. In 1932 he was awarded a four-year scholarship to the Eastman School of Music (B.M. and M.M.), where he studied with Bernard Rogers and Howard Hanson. In the late 1930s he also studied briefly with Ildebrando Pizzetti, and Aaron Copland. After heading the composition departments of the St. Louis Institute of Music, the Kansas City Conservatory of Music and the Cleveland Institute of Music, Read became Composer-in-Residence and Professor of Composition at the School of Music at Boston University. He remained in this post until his retirement in 1978. His Symphony No. 1, op. 30 (1937, premiered by Sir John Barbirolli) won first prize at the New York Philharmonic-Symphony Society’s American Composers’ Contest, while his second symphony (op. 45, 1943) won first prize in the Paderewski Fund Competition. Another first prize came in the 1986 National Association of Teachers of

Gareth Loy

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Gareth Loy is an American author, composer, musician and mathematician. He is the author of the two volume series about the intersection of music and mathematics titled Musimathics. The series received generally favourable ratings. He was an early practitioner of music synthesis at Stanford, and wrote the first software compiler for the Systems Concepts Digital Synthesizer (Samson Box). More recently, he has published the freeware music programming language Musimat, designed specifically for subjects covered in Musimathics, available as a free download. Although Musimathics was first published in 2006 and 2007, the series continues to evolve with updates by the author and publishers. The texts are being used in numerous mathematics and music classes at both the graduate and undergraduate level, with more current reviews noting that the originally targeted academic distribution is now reaching a much wider audience. Biographical background Loy was born in Los Angeles in 1945. He was an early employee at Apple Computer, and is the brother of the late Tom Loy, a molecular archaeologist, and member of the team that researched Oetzi the Iceman. In the 1960s and 1970s, CCRMA – the Center

Garrett Byrnes

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Garrett Byrnes (born December 30, 1971) is an American composer. Byrnes was born in Bad Kreuznach, Germany while his father was stationed at the U.S. Army Base there, and relocated to New Jersey in the United States. He studied music composition, receiving his bachelor’s degree from the Boston Conservatory, his master’s degree from the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University, and his doctorate from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. Since embarking on his professional career, Byrnes has worked with numerous performers both in the United States and abroad. His music has been read and performed by ensembles including the Minnesota Orchestra, Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, Contra Costa Chamber Orchestra, Chesapeake Youth Repertory Orchestra, Peabody Symphony and Concert orchestras, Indiana University New Music Ensemble, Cleveland Chamber Collective, Tarab Cello Ensemble, and Tonus Percussion Group. Byrnes’ orchestral music in particular is currently gaining wider recognition. In 2004 the Indiana University New Music Ensemble premiered his Concerto for Piano and Chamber Orchestra. Later that same year his work “Red Moon”

Garrett List

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Garrett List (September 10, 1943 – December 27, 2019) was an American trombonist, vocalist, and composer. List was born in Phoenix, Arizona. He studied at California State University, Long Beach, and the Juilliard School. He was a member of Italian band Musica Elettronica Viva from 1971. In 1980, he began teaching at the Royal Conservatory of Liège. List died in Liège, Belgium, aged 76. Discography As leader * Your Own Self (Opus One, 1972) * American Images (Horo, 1978) * Fire & Ice (Lovely Music, 1982) * The Real Live Orchestra (Igloo, 1986) * The Unbearably Light (Music for Treesasbl, 1995) * The Voyage (Carbon 7, 1998) * The New York Takes (Carbon 7, 1998) As sideman With Anthony Braxton * Creative Orchestra Music 1976 (Arista, 1976) * Four Compositions (Solo, Duo & Trio) 1982/1988 (hatART, 1989) With Willem Breuker * Driebergen Zeist (BV Haast, 1983) * To Remain (BV Haast, 1989) * The Parrot (BV Haast, 1996) * Kurt Weill (BV Haast, 1998) With Johnny Copeland * Copeland Special (Demon, 1981) * Texas Party (Orbis, 1995) With Arthur Russell * First Thought Best Thought (Audika, 2006) * Love Is Overtaking Me (Audika, 2008) With others * Morton Feldman, Morton Feldman (Edition, 199

Garry Schyman

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Garry Schyman is an American film, television, and video game music composer. He graduated from the University of Southern California with a degree in music composition in 1978, and began work in the television industry, writing music for television series such as Magnum, P.I. and The A-Team. By 1986, he was composing for movies such as Judgement and Hit List. At the request of a friend in 1993, he composed the music for the video game Voyeur, but after creating the music for two more games he left the industry, citing the low budgets and poor quality of video game music at the time. He continued to compose for film and television, only to return to video games for 2005’s Destroy All Humans!. Finding that in his absence the quality and perceived importance of video game music had risen substantially, he has since composed for several games, writing the scores to BioShock and Dante’s Inferno among others. He still composes for film however, his latest being Brush with Danger directed by young Indonesian director Livi Zheng. He has won numerous awards for his video game scores, including several “soundtrack of the year” awards. During his career, he has worked on over 25 television s

Gary Bias

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Gary Bias is an American saxophonist, flutist and composer. Bias is a longtime member of the Earth, Wind & Fire Horns. During 1987 Bias also won a Grammy Award within the category of Best Rhythm & Blues Song for co-composing Anita Baker’s “Sweet Love”. Within the same year he went on to join up with Earth, Wind & Fire. Bias then played and composed upon the band’s 1990 album Heritage. As well he featured as a saxophonist on Whitney Houston’s album of the same year being I’m Your Baby Tonight. Bias then played upon MC Hammer’s 1991 album Too Legit to Quit and Salif Keita’s 1991 LP Amen. In 1999 Bias released his sophomore LP entitled “2 B Free” upon Thunderbop Records. Discography *“East 101” (Nimbus, 1981) *“2 B Free” (Thunderbop, 1999) References

Gary Geld

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Gary Geld (October 18, 1935 – June 17, 2015) was an American composer known for his work creating musicals and popular songs with his lyricist partner Peter Udell. Life and career Geld was born on October 18, 1935. Raised in Clifton, New Jersey, he graduated from Clifton High School, where he won a songwriting competition. Gary Geld is an American composer, songwriter, author, publisher, and producer. He studied composition at New York University and business at the Juilliard School. In 1959, he co-founded the Geld-Udell Music Corporation with longtime collaborator Peter Udell, followed by the formation of Geld-Udell Productions in 1962. He joined ASCAP in 1961. Throughout the 1960s, Geld wrote and produced music for popular artists including Connie Francis, Brian Hyland, Jackie Wilson, Gene Pitney, and Skeeter Davis. He is best known for co-writing the hit song “Sealed With a Kiss.” Other notable compositions include “Ginny Come Lately” and “Let Me Belong to You.” Geld and Udell co-created the Broadway musicals Purlie (1970, a nominee for the Tony Award for Best Musical), Shenandoah (1975), and Angel (1978). His music for Shenandoah was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Origin

Gary Kuo

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Gary Kuo is an American composer and violinist. He has worked as a composer on Another Night (2003), As the World Turns and All My Children. He played the violin for the film The Glass Shield in 1994, and instructed on the violin for Mirror, Mirror 2: Raven Dance that same year. Biography Gary Kuo, originally from Connecticut, moved to New York City to accept a scholarship to Juilliard School, where he received his bachelor of arts degree in violin performance. After completion of his studies at Juilliard School, he received a scholarship to the media writing and production graduate program at the University of Miami. Following his graduation, he relocated to Los Angeles, where he composes for and performs on a variety of television programs and motion pictures. Awards and nominations Daytime Emmy awards: *Won, 1999, Outstanding Music Direction and Composition for a Drama Series for: All My Children (shared with Paul F. Antonelli, Pamela Magee, Dominic Messinger, Ron Goodman, Robbie Kondor, Mike Renzi, and Terry Walker) *Nominated, 2000, Outstanding Achievement in Music Direction and Composition for a Drama Series for: All My Children (shared with Terry Walker, Jerry Pilato, Domini

Gary Lee Nelson

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Gary Lee Nelson (born Albion, Michigan, 1940) is a composer and media artist who taught at Oberlin College in the TIMARA (Technology in Music and Related Arts) department. He specializes in algorithmic composition, real-time interactive sound and video along with digital film making. Biography In 1964, Nelson attended Utrecht University’s Institute of Sonology in the Netherlands. He earned his composition doctorate at Washington University in St. Louis, where he studied with Paul Pisk and Robert Wykes. He has taught at Purdue University and Bowling Green State University. He was a faculty member at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music from 1974 until his retirement in 2007. Research Nelson has worked at Bell Laboratories, the Swedish Radio Electronic Music Studios in Stockholm and at the Institute for Research and Coordination of Acoustics and Music (IRCAM) in Paris. He has been composer in residence and guest researcher at the University of Melbourne, Australia, Taiwan’s National Chiao Tung and Soochow Universities, Hong Kong Baptist University, the National University of Singapore, Moscow Conservatory of Music and Yunan State University in the People’s Republic of China. Teaching Ne

Gary M. Green

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Gary M. Green (born 20th century) is a musician, author, television host, gaming consultant and entrepreneur. He was vice president of marketing for The Trump Organization and appeared on the television reality game show The Apprentice. He was also on the 2004 television special New Year’s Eve with Carson Daly. In 2016 it was announced that he would host a television series called “Casino Rescue”. Career Music Green recorded three folk-music albums from 1977 to 1982 with Folkways Records, which worked with other folk artists including Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger. Folkways was later acquired by the Smithsonian Institution as part of the “Smithsonian Folkways” exhibition. He earned two Pulitzer Prize nominations for his writing. Other activities In the early 1990s, Green purchased part of a Russian circus. He established it as a Euro Circus attraction at Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. After he sold the circus, he joined Smith-Gardner, a Florida catalog software company. At Smith-Gardner, Green aided in development of software to take orders online when the company changed their focus from telephone and mail orders. He patented a casino-management system based on customer relationshi

Gaston Allaire

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Joseph Georges-Émile Gaston Allaire (18 June 1916 – 15 January 2011) was a Canadian musicologist, organist, pianist, composer, and music educator of American birth. His compositional output includes several preludes for organ, an organ work on French carols, some motets and other choral works, a communion service, a prelude and fugue for string orchestra, and a polyphonic mass. He also wrote Suite laurentienne for orchestra from which the Poème and the Menuet were premiered by the Quebec Symphony Orchestra in 1949, and composed the music for the 1953 film The Man on the Beach. His Marche (1964) and Petite Suite (1965) were both written for the Royal Canadian Ordnance Corps Band. Early life and education Born in Berlin, New Hampshire to parents Marie and Xavier, Allaire moved with his family to Danville, Quebec when he was just two years old. His mother was a homemaker and his father was the station master for the Danville train station. The eldest of 9 children, he began studying the organ and piano as a child. He began professional studies in the organ in Victoriaville in 1934, continuing with his education in Quebec City in 1936. He entered the Conservatoire national de musique i

Gaston Dethier

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Gaston Marie Dethier (1875 – 1958) was an American organist, pianist, and composer of Belgian birth. Early life Born in Liège, he was the son of organist Emile Jean Joseph Dethier (1849-1933), the brother of violinist Edouard Dethier, and the uncle of physiologist Vincent Dethier. He studied at the Royal Conservatory in his native city with Alexandre Guilmant. He was awarded premiers prix in organ, piano, harmony, and fugue from the conservatory. In 1886, at just 11 years of age, Dethier was appointed organist at the Église Saint-Jacques-le-Mineur de Liège. He eventually left there to work in the same capacity at the Église Saint-Christophe de Liège. Relocation to United States He emigrated to the United States in 1894 where he eventually became a naturalized citizen. He was organist at The Church of St. Francis Xavier from 1894 until 1907. After he left in 1907 the position was filled by Italian organist Pietro Yon who would eventually become organist at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Juilliard School He taught organ on the faculty of the Juilliard School from 1907 until 1945. Among his notable pupils were Ray Lev, Marcelle Martin, Carl McKinley, Georges-Émile Tanguay, and Powell Weaver

Gavin Mikhail

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Gavin Mikhail (born March 26, 1975) is an American composer, pianist and singer-songwriter from Nashville, Tennessee. The winner of the 2007 “Lay It Down and Mix It Up in the UK” fan-vote contest, Turning his attention to mainstream music, Mikhail spent the next four years at Purdue University, in West Lafayette, performing in bands as lead vocalist and keyboardist while pursuing a degree in finance. Graduating in 1995, he moved to Nashville to begin a career in the music industry. Giant Records and independent songwriting (1997–2001) In 1997, after a year of part-time work at various music companies, Mikhail began working at Giant Records, the label started by Irving Azoff. Originally hired into the finance department, Mikhail transferred to a position on the artists and repertoire (A&R) staff within four months. Throughout the next two years in his A&R role, Mikhail assisted in the signings and promotion of acts including Blake Shelton, Clay Walker, Daryle Singletary, The Wilkinsons and Georgia Middleman. Leaving Giant at the end of 1998 to pursue songwriting and production, he spent several years working with independent artists and began to focus more heavily on his own writing

Gene Krupa

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Eugene Bertram Krupa (January 15, 1909 – October 16, 1973) was an American jazz drummer, bandleader, and composer. Krupa is widely regarded as one of the most influential drummers in the history of popular music. His drum solo on Benny Goodman’s 1937 recording of “Sing, Sing, Sing” elevated the role of the drummer from that of an accompanist to that of an important solo voice in the band. In collaboration with the Slingerland drum and Zildjian cymbal manufacturers, he became a major force in defining the standard band-drummer’s kit. Modern Drummer magazine regards Krupa as “the founding father of modern drumset playing”. Upon his death, The New York Times labeled Krupa a “revolutionary” known for “frenzied, flashy” drumming, with his work having generated a significant musical legacy that started “in jazz and has continued on through the rock era”. Early life The youngest of Anna (née Oslowski) and Bartłomiej Krupa’s nine children, Gene Krupa was born in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Bartłomiej was an immigrant from Poland born in the village of Łęki Górne, southeastern Poland. Anna was born in Shamokin, Pennsylvania, and was also of Polish descent. His parents were Roman Catho

Gene Tyranny

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Robert Nathan Sheff (January 1, 1945 – December 12, 2020 ), known professionally as “Blue” Gene Tyranny, was an American avant-garde composer and pianist. “His memorable pseudonym, coined during his brief stint with Iggy and the Stooges, was derived partly from Jean, his adoptive mother’s middle name,” wrote Steve Smith, in his New York Times obituary for Tyranny. “It also referred to what he called ’the tyranny of the genes’ — a predisposition to being ‘strongly overcome by emotion,’ he said in Just for the Record: Conversations With and About ‘Blue’ Gene Tyranny, a documentary film.” Early life Tyranny was born Joseph Gantic in San Antonio on January 1, 1945, to William and Eleanor Gantic. Later that year, after his birth father, an Army paratrooper, went missing in the Asian theater of World War II, his mother put him up for adoption. He was adopted by Dorothy and Meyer Sheff of San Antonio, who changed his name to Robert Nathan Sheff. Tyranny was raised in the Lutheran church. He studied piano with Meta Hertwig and Rodney Hoare, and composition with Otto Wick and Frank Hughes. Career Tyranny began his performance career in high school, playing pieces by major composers (such as

Gentry Densley

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Gentry Densley is an American singer, guitarist, and songwriter. A longtime fixture on Salt Lake City’s punk, metal, and experimental music scenes, Densley has been involved in numerous bands but is best known for leading the groups Iceburn, Ascend, and Eagle Twin. Critic Gregory Heaney describes him as “One of music’s great scientists”. Biography A Salt Lake City native, Densley is a graduate of the University of Utah in music composition. His first notable group was Iceburn (1991–2001), which initially started as a punk/metal power trio with progressive rock flourishes before moving into free jazz and free improvisation. During the Iceburn era, Densley became friends with Greg Anderson; Iceburn released a split EP with Anderson’s group Engine Kid before Anderson formed of Goatsnake and Sunn O))). The pair later collaborated in the experimental doom metal project Ascend. In 2007 Densley formed Eagle Twin, who released their debut on Southern Lord Recordings in 2009. His younger brother, Tyler Densley, was the singer for hardcore band Lewd Acts. References

Geoff Muldaur

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Geoff Muldaur (born August 12, 1943) is an American singer, guitarist and composer, who was a founding member of the Jim Kweskin Jug Band and a member of Paul Butterfield’s Better Days. Career Having established a reputation with the Kweskin Jug Band during the 1960s, Geoff and his then-wife Maria Muldaur recorded their first album, Pottery Pie, for Warner Bros. Records in 1968. This album contained his version of “Brazil” (“Aquarela do Brasil”), which became the theme for the film Brazil (1985) directed by Terry Gilliam. After recording the album, the Muldaurs moved to Woodstock, New York. and Geoff Muldaur and the Nite Lites for Hannibal Records. He wrote scores for film and television, won an Emmy Award, and produced albums for Lenny Pickett and Richard Greene. In 2003, Deutsche Grammophon released his album, Private Astronomy: A Vision of the Music of Bix Beiderbecke. After the Kweskin group broke up, the couple produced two albums. Maria Muldaur began her solo career when their marriage ended in 1972 and retained her married name. His sister is actress Diana Muldaur. His daughters Jenni and Clare are also musicians. Discography As leader * Sleepy Man Blues (Prestige, 1964) * P

Geoff Zanelli

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Geoffrey Zanelli (born September 28, 1974) is an American composer working primarily in the medium of film, television, and video game scores. His early career was notable for scoring additional music on roughly 30 film scores written by Hans Zimmer, Klaus Badelt, John Powell, Harry Gregson-Williams, Ramin Djawadi, Danny Elfman, and Steve Jablonsky including several blockbuster films. He has since moved on to more solo work, winning a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Limited Series, Movie, or Special for his score to the miniseries Into the West. Aside from film and television scores, Zanelli also works with recording artists, writing arrangements for Steve Martin, Edie Brickell, Robbie Williams, The Webb Sisters, Mest and Story of the Year. He is credited as a guitarist, bassist, and keyboardist on the song “I’m Not Dead” from recording artist Pink. Early life and education Zanelli was born on September 28, 1974, in Westminster, California. He graduated in 1996 from Berklee College of Music. Career In 1994, at 19 years old, Zanelli met Hans Zimmer, believing him to be a promising young talent, Zimmer invited him to Los Angeles to join his group of film

George Antheil

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

George Johann Carl Antheil ( ; July 8, 1900 – February 12, 1959) was an American avant-garde composer, pianist, author, and inventor whose modernist musical compositions explored the sounds – musical, industrial, and mechanical – of the early 20th century. Spending much of the 1920s in Europe, Antheil returned to the United States in the 1930s, and thereafter composed music for films, and eventually, television. As a result of this work, his style became more tonal. A man of diverse interests and talents, Antheil was constantly reinventing himself. He wrote magazine articles, an autobiography, a mystery novel, and newspaper and music columns. In 1941, Antheil and the actress Hedy Lamarr developed a radio guidance system for Allied torpedoes that used a code (stored on a punched paper tape) to synchronize frequency changes, referred to as frequency hopping, between the transmitter and receiver. It is one of the spread spectrum techniques that became widely used in modern telecommunications. This work led to their induction into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2014. Early life Antheil was born George Johann Carl Antheil, and grew up in a family of German immigrants in Trenton,

George Balch Wilson

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George Balch Wilson (January 28, 1927 – October 12, 2021) was an American composer who is known for his contributions to electronic music. In 1955 he won the Prix de Rome for composition. He taught for more than 30 years on the faculty of the University of Michigan where he founded and directed the school’s electronic music studio. Upon his retirement he was made a professor emeritus. Early life Born in Grand Island, Nebraska, Wilson grew up in Lincoln. His father was an amateur flutist and clarinetist and his mother was a pianist who had earned money for his family accompanying silent films during the Great Depression. His parents often played duets together at home and took Wilson to local concerts by ensembles like the Lincoln Symphony. He also received music lessons from them. Although this exposure instilled a love for music within Wilson, the nervousness of public performance led to his eventual refusal to pursue further musical studies in his childhood. He later took piano lessons intermittently during his teenage years. His grandfather was a doctor in the small town of Rushville, Nebraska located near the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and thus the family had opportunities d

George Botsford

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

George Botsford (February 24, 1874 – February 1, 1949) was an American composer of ragtime and other forms of music. Early life and education Botsford was born in Sioux Falls, Dakota Territory. He grew up mostly in Clermont, Iowa. Botsford married singer Della Mae Wilson, and, in 1900, they began touring with the Hoyle Stock Company troupe. An ad promoting Botsford and his wife as musicians appeared in the New York Clipper in 1901, which may indicate the first time that Botsford visited New York City. Career Botsford’s first copyrighted number was “The Katy Flyer”, published in 1899 in Centerville, Iowa. Other early numbers followed themes of relaxation and wide open space, with “Dance of the Water Nymphs”, which was sold as Hawaiian mood music, and Western-themed “In Dear Old Arizona” and “Pride of the Prairie”. This would change when Botsford moved to New York City, where he joined an assortment of Tin Pan Alley composers and began writing ragtime almost exclusively. Botsford secured his first songwriting contract with New York’s J. H. Remick & Co. after selling them “Pride of the Prairie”. It was while on that contract that he published “Black and White Rag”, which stands as per

George Brunner (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

George Brunner is an American composer and performer born in Philadelphia. He has founded the International Electroacoustic Music Festival at Brooklyn College in 1995 where he has produced renowned composers such as Pauline Oliveros and Noah Creshevsky. He is also the founder of the Brooklyn College Electroacoustic Music Ensemble. Currently, he is the Director of the Music Technology Program for the Conservatory of Music at Brooklyn College and on the faculty of the Brooklyn College Center for Computer Music (BC-CCM). George Brunner has presented his lecture, “Text Sound: Interlingua, Intermedia, Electronica”, at the Spark festival. His works have been performed around the world festivals and concerts including the Spark Festival, the Electronic Music Midwest Festival (EMM), Experimental Intermedia, Compendium International - Bourges (2003), and the 60x60 project in 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006. George Brunner is also a sound engineer who has recorded well known composers such as Morton Feldman Joan La Barbara. and Richard Kostelanetz Reviews and articles *“Ingenuity and madness?”, Malcolm Miller, “Music & Vision Daily”, December 24, 2005 *“Bass Works of Good Humor”, John Rockwell, "

George Crumb

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

George Henry Crumb Jr. (24 October 1929 – 6 February 2022) was an American composer of avant-garde contemporary classical music. Early in his life he rejected the widespread modernist usage of serialism, developing a highly personal musical language which “range s in mood from peaceful to nightmarish”. Crumb’s compositions are known for pushing the limits of technical prowess by way of frequent use of extended techniques. The unusual timbres he employs evoke a surrealist atmosphere which portray emotions of considerable intensity with vast and sometimes haunting soundscapes. His few large-scale works include Echoes of Time and the River (1967), which won the 1968 Pulitzer Prize for Music, and Star-Child (1977), which won the 2001 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition; however, his output consists of mostly music for chamber ensembles or solo instrumentalists. Among his best known compositions are Black Angels (1970), a striking commentary on the Vietnam War for electric string quartet; Ancient Voices of Children (1970) for a mixed chamber ensemble; and Vox Balaenae (1971), a musical evocation of the humpback whale, for electric flute, electric cello, and amplifie

George Dallas Sherman

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

George Dallas Sherman (August 23, 1844 – November 3, 1927) was an American bandleader. Sherman was born in Richmond, Vermont, United States, the son of Hathaway and Relief Sherman. At the age of 14, he joined the Richmond Cornet Band and soon became its leader. He left this band in 1864 to join the 9th Vermont Infantry as a musician during the American Civil War. After the war he came to live in Winooski, where he married Mary A. Thompson and became a band teacher. In 1878 he organized, with much coaxing from the citizens of Burlington, Sherman’s Military Band, made up of musicians from the dormant Queen City Band. This band came to be well known all over the East as one of the finest touring Military Bands. After Sherman retired from the band in 1917, the group became known as the Burlington Military Band under the exceptional directorship of Dr. Joseph Lechnyr, an influential Vermont musician. George Sherman continued to live on Sherman Street (which many erroneously believe to be named after him) until November 3, 1927, the date of the great flood. On that day, while crossing the street near his home at the corner of Sherman and Battery Street (on the park side of Battery St.) a

George E. Lewis

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George Emanuel Lewis (born July 14, 1952) is an American composer, trombonist, and musicologist. He has been a member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM) since 1971, when he joined the organization at the age of 19. His music spans genres including avant-garde jazz, contemporary classical and experimental music. He is renowned for his work as an improvising trombonist and considered a pioneer of computer music, which he began pursuing in the late 1970s; in the 1980s he created Voyager, an improvising software that he has used in interactive performances. and the American Book Award Lewis is the Edwin H. Case Professor of American Music, Composition & Historical Musicology at Columbia University. Early life George E. Lewis was born on July 14, 1952, in Chicago, Illinois. His father, George Thomas Lewis, was a postal worker who studied electronics under the GI Bill and had a deep love of jazz music; his mother, Cornelia Griffith Lewis, liked blues, soul, and R&B singers. An African-American teacher convinced Lewis’s parents to enroll him at the University of Chicago Laboratory School, where he started classes at the age of nine. Lewis attended the Lab

George Frederick Bristow

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George Frederick Bristow (December 19, 1825 – December 13, 1898) was an American composer, conductor, violinist, and educator, born in Brooklyn, New York. A prominent advocate for American classical music during a period of European dominance in U.S. concert life, Bristow worked to promote native composers and establish a national musical identity. His body of work includes five symphonies, two operas, oratorios, choral pieces, and chamber music. His Fifth Symphony, titled Niagara, premiered at Carnegie Hall in January 1898, only months before his death. Through his compositions and advocacy, Bristow helped lay the foundation for a distinctly American tradition in classical music. He figured prominently in a public dispute with critic William Henry Fry and the New York Philharmonic Society, criticizing the society’s decision to exclude American composers. Early life George Frederick Bristow was born on December 19, 1825, in Brooklyn, New York. He was named after German-British composer George Frideric Handel. His father, William Richard Bristow, a composer and music teacher, had emigrated from England to the United States around 1822 with his own father, Thomas Bristow. The Bristow

George Frederick McKay

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George Frederick McKay (June 11, 1899 – October 4, 1970) was a prolific modern American composer. Biography McKay was born in the small frontier wheat farming town of Harrington, Washington. His family later moved to Spokane, where he attended school up to his college years. He was attracted to American folk-song, including jazz and blues and Native American themes, and to a great degree, his music contains a poignant evocation of the West Coast American spirit, including glimpses of a populist era of street marches, honky-tonk dance halls and social chaos along with a recognition of the great natural beauty of his home region and the vitality of its people (i.e. Harbor Narrative-1934). He admired composers who involved national folk-culture in their music, e.g. Heitor Villa-Lobos, Carlos Chávez, William Grant Still, Antonín Dvořák and Béla Bartók. Many of McKay’s symphonic works center on folk themes and include pieces dedicated to Native American music. He was famous for his intellectual and moral support of young composers who studied with him in Seattle, such as William Bolcom, Goddard Lieberson and Earl Robinson. He also founded the Composition Department at the University of

George Gershwin

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Ancestors#

Gershwin’s parents were both Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire. His paternal grandfather, Jakov Gershovitz, was born in Odessa, then part of the Russian Empire, and had served for 25 years as a mechanic for the Imperial Russian Army to earn the right of free travel and residence as a Jew, finally retiring near Saint Petersburg, Russia. Jakov’s teenage son, Moishe, George Gershwin’s father, worked as a leather cutter for women’s shoes. George’s mother, Roza Bruskina, was born in Saint Petersburg. Moishe met Roza in Vilna, Russian Empire (now Vilnius, Lithuania), where her father worked as a furrier. She and her family moved to New York because of increasing anti-Jewish sentiment in Russia, changing her first name to Rose. Moishe, faced with compulsory military service if he remained in Russia, moved to America as soon as he could afford to (arrived on August 14, 1890). Once in New York, he changed his first name to Morris. Gershovitz lived with a maternal uncle in Brooklyn, working as a foreman in a women’s shoe factory. He married Rose on July 21, 1895, and Gershovitz soon Anglicized his name to Gershwine. Their first child, Ira Gershwin, was born on December 6, 1896, after which the family moved into a second-floor apartment at 242 Snediker Avenue in the East New York neighborhood of Brooklyn.

George James Webb

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George James Webb (June 24, 1803 - October 7, 1887) was an English-born American composer, conductor, music educator, and organist. He was known for writing “Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus”. Webb composed the hymn-tune known as “Webb” whilst sailing from England to the United States: the tune is also known as “Morning Light”. Life and career George James Webb was born in Salisbury, Wiltshire, England on June 24, 1803. He trained as a musician in his native city under Alexander Lucas, and began his career as an organist in Falmouth, Cornwall. In 1830 he resigned his post and immigrated to the United States where he initially settled in Boston, Massachusetts as the organist at Old South Church. In Boston, Webb taught on the faculty of the Boston Academy of Music where he was conductor of the school’s orchestra. He also worked as conductor of both the Handel and Haydn Society and The Musical Fund Society. He became a protege of Lowell Mason, and collaborated with him on a variety of music, education, and publication projects; including co-editing music periodicals together and building choral collections together. Webb’s daughter married Mason’s son, the composer William Mason. Referenc

George Kleinsinger

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George Kleinsinger (February 13, 1914 – July 28, 1982) was an American composer mostly known for children’s compositions, Broadway scores, and film/television scores. He is best-known for a string of children’s compositions in collaboration with lyricist Paul Tripp (most notably Tubby the Tuba) and a series of works in collaboration with Joe Darion (including the musical Shinbone Alley) based on Don Marquis’ Archy and Mehitabel columns. Biography Early life, career, and death Born in San Bernardino, California to a Polish-Jewish family. In 1930, Kleinsinger graduated from DeWitt Clinton High School. He earned a B.A. degree in music from New York University, then further studied composition at Juilliard. He began his career playing in bands on the Borscht Belt, including playing with trumpeter Frankie Newton. He collaborated with Paul Tripp on a number of orchestral/vocal works for a young audience, beginning with “Tubby the Tuba”. In 1948, he wrote music for the original Max Fleischer/Jam Handy animated adaptation of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. This led to him being commissioned to set the song to music for the 1964 Rankin-Bass adaptation. The producers elected to use the Johnn

George L. Spaulding

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George Lawson Spaulding (December 26, 1864 – June 1, 1921) was an American composer, songwriter, and a successful publisher of music. He also composed operettas for children, and easy piano pieces and technical books for elementary level students. Family and early life Spaulding was born in Newburgh, New York. Spaulding’s mother was Mary Spaulding, née Lee. William Douglas Spaulding, his father, was a pattern maker by trade and also a well known singer in the local area who appeared in amateur comic opera productions. George was a paternal grandson of John D. Spaulding, the founder of the Newburgh Gazette, and the Newburgh Journal. Spaulding studied piano with local teachers, Also in 1883, one of Spaulding’s composed songs appeared in a book, with lyrics by his father. This song was called “Sail Ho! (A Sea Song)”. Between 1884 and 1885, several other songs were published with George Spaulding as the composer and his father as the lyricist. A piano piece by Spaulding was published in 1884, titled “Jim Blaine’s Galop”. On the front cover of the sheet music was written “Jim Blaine of Maine. His Galop To The White House”. It referred to James G. Blaine, who ended up being narrowly defe

George Lynn (composer)

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George Alfred Lynn (October 5, 1915 – March 16, 1989) was an American composer, conductor, pianist, organist, singer, and music educator who was born in Edwardsville, Pennsylvania and died in Colorado Springs, Colorado. A longtime member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, his compositional output encompasses more than 200 orchestral and choral pieces; many of which have been performed by major American symphony orchestras like the Denver Symphony, the American Symphony Orchestra under Leopold Stokowski, and the Philadelphia Orchestra. He taught on the music faculties of several prominent American colleges, notably conducting several university choirs. Throughout his life he was active as a conductor, organist, and pianist for various church and community choirs. Life and career Born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, George Lynn was the son of immigrants from Sweden. He began working as a professional church organist in 1927 at the age of twelve. He entered Westminster Choir College in 1934 where he earned a Bachelor of Music in 1938. Among his teachers were Paul Boepple (conducting), Roy Harris (composition), Carl Weinrich (organ), and John Finley Williamson

George Perle

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George Perle (6 May 1915 – 23 January 2009) was an American composer and music theorist. As a composer, his music was largely atonal, using methods similar to the twelve-tone technique of the Second Viennese School. This serialist style, and atonality in general, was the subject of much of his theoretical writings. His 1962 book, Serial Composition and Atonality: An Introduction to the Music of Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern remains a standard text for 20th-century classical music theory. Among Perle’s awards was the 1986 Pulitzer Prize for Music for his Wind Quintet No. 4. Life and career Perle was born in Bayonne, New Jersey, to Russian Jewish parents. He graduated from DePaul University, where he studied with Wesley LaViolette and received private lessons from Ernst Krenek. Later, he served as a technician fifth grade in the United States Army during World War II. He earned his doctorate at New York University in 1956. Perle composed with a technique of his own devising called “twelve-tone tonality”. This technique was different from, but related to, the twelve-tone technique of the Second Viennese School, of which he was an “early admirer” and whose techniques he used aspects of

George Rochberg

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George Rochberg (July 5, 1918 – May 29, 2005) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. Long a serial composer, Rochberg abandoned the technique after his teenage son died in 1964, saying it had proved inadequate to express his grief and was empty of expressive power. By the 1970s, Rochberg’s use of tonal passages in his music had provoked controversy among critics and fellow composers. A professor at the University of Pennsylvania until 1983, Rochberg chaired its music department until 1968. He became the first Annenberg Professor of the Humanities in 1978. Life Born in Paterson, New Jersey, Rochberg attended first the Mannes College of Music, where his teachers included George Szell and Hans Weisse, then the Curtis Institute of Music, where he studied with Rosario Scalero and Gian Carlo Menotti. He served in the United States Army in the infantry during World War II. He was Jewish. Rochberg chaired the music department at the University of Pennsylvania until 1968 and continued to teach there until 1983. In 1978, he was named the first Annenberg Professor of the Humanities. He married Gene Rosenfeld in 1941, and had two children, Paul and Francesca. In 1964, his son d

George Russell (composer)

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George Allen Russell (June 23, 1923 – July 27, 2009) was an American jazz pianist, composer, arranger and theorist. He is considered one of the first jazz musicians to contribute to general music theory with a theory of harmony based on jazz rather than European music, in his book Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization (1953). Early life Russell was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, on June 23, 1923, He was adopted by a nurse and a chef on the B & O Railroad, Bessie and Joseph Russell. He made his stage debut at age seven, singing “Moon Over Miami” with Fats Waller. Surrounded by the music of the black church and the big bands which played on the Ohio Riverboats, and with a father who was a music educator at Oberlin College, he began playing drums with the Boy Scouts and Bugle Corps, receiving a scholarship to Wilberforce University, where he joined the Collegians, a band noted as a breeding ground for jazz musicians including Ben Webster, Coleman Hawkins, Charles Freeman Lee, Frank Foster, and Benny Carter. Russell served in that band at the same time as another noted jazz composer, Ernie Wilkins. When called up for the draft at the beginning of World War II, he was hospitalized w

George Sarah

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George Shimeall, known professionally by his stage name George Sarah, is an American composer, based in Los Angeles, California. History George Sarah rose to notoriety in the electronic music scene with Stereotaxic Device, a band he was in from 1988 until 1992, when he began his solo career under the moniker T.H.C., which he used until 1999. In 2000, Sarah’s demo, “Sonata for Petra,” reached No. 1 on the influential L.A. radio station KCRW. The following year, he was invited by Nic Harcourt, along with his string trio, for a live performance of his electronic chamber music on KCRW’s Morning Becomes Eclectic. In 2002, he recorded his CD “Music for Elevators,” a collaboration with actor Anthony Stewart Head, whom he met when performing on season 4 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In 2003, he released a CD of his compositions for the Discovery Health Channel, called “Ossia,” consisting mostly of songs from the series Plastic Surgery: Before and After for Original Productions. The CD was the No. 1 add on CMJ’s RPM chart on May 5, 2003. and was nominated for best electronic song in a TV series by the American Dance Music Awards. Also in 2003, Sarah was named ‘Best Electronic Artist in L.A.’

George Secor

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George Secor (November 8, 1943 – March 2, 2020 ) was an American musician, composer and music-theorist from Chicago. He was the discoverer of miracle temperament and eponym of the secor. As an inventor, Secor and Hermann Pedtke’s Motorola Scalatron (1974) is an example of a Bosanquet generalized keyboard featuring a multicolored arrangement of 240 tunable oval keys, about which Secor said: “There is not much point in using this alternative keyboard for systems below 31 tones in the octave.” However, “even if it were completely impractical musically, it would make a wonderful prop for a futuristic movie.” It is approximated in 31 , 41 , and 72 equal temperament . ;s is a secor, q is the difference between 10 secors and 1 octave, and r is the difference between s and q. If the Miracle scale is: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 s s s s s s s s s s +q q +r q +r q +r q +r q +r q +r q +r q +r q +r q +r +q ;then the Blackjack scale is: 0 >0 1 >1 2 >2 3 >3 4 >4 5 >5 6 >6 7 >7 8 >8 9 >9 0 >1 >2 >3 >4 >5 >6 >7 >8 >9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 <0 s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s References Further reading *Secor, George (1975). “A New Look at the Partch Monophonic Fabric” Xenharmonikon 3. Frog Peak, N.H

George Stone (composer)

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George Stone (born January 19, 1965) is a musician and educator. He had composed and arranged music for instrumental and vocal ensembles, with the bulk of his material for the big band format. He is best known for his 1990 MIDI composition CANYON.MID (“Trip Through the Grand Canyon”), which was included in the MEDIA directory in Microsoft Windows versions 3.0 with Multimedia Extensions to 2000. Born and raised in Newhall, CA, George was a product of the local music programs and teachers of the Santa Clarita Valley. He graduated from Hart High School and received his degrees from Cal State University Northridge, where he was a member of the Jazz A-Band. According to his (now defunct) website, he has collaborated with “Maynard Ferguson, Clare Fischer, Dave Grusin, Tom Scott, the American Jazz Philharmonic (SJO) and the Tonight Show Orchestra with Doc Severinsen,” and “has composed for CBS, NBC, HBO, ABC and Disney.” After graduation from Cal State Northridge he taught music at William S. Hart High School. A move to Cambria, CA, brought him to the music faculty at Cuesta College, San Luis Obispo, CA, where he currently teaches Audio Technology and Music Theory/Composition. George Ston

George Szell

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George Szell (; June 7, 1897 – July 30, 1970), originally György Széll, György Endre Széll, or Georg Szell, was an Austro-Hungarian-born American conductor, composer, and pianist. Considered one of the twentieth century’s greatest conductors, he was music director of the Cleveland Orchestra of Cleveland, Ohio, and recorded much of the standard classical repertoire in Cleveland and with other orchestras. Szell came to Cleveland in 1946 to take over its respected if undersized orchestra, which was struggling to recover from the disruptions of World War II. By the time of his death he was credited, to quote the critic Donal Henahan, with having built it into “what many critics regarded as the world’s keenest symphonic instrument.” Through his recordings, Szell has remained a presence in the classical music world long after his death, and his name remains synonymous with that of the Cleveland Orchestra. While on tour with the orchestra in the late 1980s, then-music director Christoph von Dohnányi remarked, “We give a great concert, and George Szell gets a great review.” Life and career Early life György Endre Széll was born in Budapest but grew up in Vienna. His family was of Jewish or

George Templeton Strong (composer)

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George Templeton Strong (May 26, 1856 – June 27, 1948) was an American composer of classical music and a professional painter. His work has been described as Romantic. He moved to Vevey, Switzerland, in 1897 and lived there and in Geneva for the remainder of his life. Although his career was in Europe, he is considered an American composer. Early life and education George Templeton Strong was born in New York City to Ellen (Ruggles) and George Templeton Strong, an attorney. The family was musical; both parents were amateur musicians and his father, an amateur organist, was on the board of the New York Philharmonic Society. He occasionally played as an oboist and English horn player with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. After his 1891 return to the United States, Strong taught counterpoint and composition at the New England Conservatory in Boston. He disliked the work, and his health suffered. In 1897 he moved back to Europe to Vevey, Switzerland, on Lake Geneva. For the next several years he studied watercolor painting and worked as professional artist. About 1912, he moved to Geneva, where he began to compose music again. He lived in Geneva for the rest of his life and painted se

George Tremblay

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George Amédée Tremblay (14 January 1911 – 14 July 1982) was a Canadian (and later, naturalized American citizen) pianist, composer, and author who was active in the United States. Although his works display a broad range of stylistic influences, he is primarily associated with the twelve-tone technique. He is the author of the musical treatise The Definitive Cycle of the Twelve Tone Row. Tremblay was also noted for his unique capacity to extemporize on the piano and frequently performed as an improviser. Biography Born in Ottawa, Ontario, Tremblay was the son of composer and organist Amédée Tremblay and Rosa Martel Tremblay. As the son of an active composer and performer, young George was exposed to not only the classics, but to more contemporary composers; his father, Amédée, was an early champion of Cesar Franck, Max Reger, and Claude Debussy for Canadian audiences. He was a recurring panel member on the Sunday evening radio quiz show, Are You Musical?, on Los Angeles station KMPC. where he was receiving treatment for cirrhosis. The Definitive Cycle of the Twelve Tone Row The Definitive Cycle of the Twelve Tone Row (1974) is a music theory and composition treatise that is the res

George Tsontakis

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George Tsontakis (born Astoria, Queens, New York City, October 24, 1951) is an American composer and conductor. Early life and education Tsontakis was born in New York City, and is of Greek descent. He studied composition with Hugo Weisgall and Roger Sessions at the Juilliard School from 1974 to 1978, and later with Franco Donatoni at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome. Career His music has been performed and broadcast by major orchestras, chamber ensembles, and festivals throughout North and South America, Europe, and Japan. Tsontakis was honored with the “Academy Award” in 1995 from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and was the fourth recipient of the Ives Living Fellowship, in 2007. Pianist Stephen Hough’s recording of Tsontakis’s “Ghost Variations” on Hyperion Records was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition, and was the only classical recording among Time magazine’s 1998 Top Ten Recordings. Tsontakis received the Berlin Prize from the American Academy in Berlin in 2002, and the University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition for his Violin Concerto No. 2 in 2005. A proficient conductor of orchestral and c

George Walker (composer)

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George Theophilus Walker (June 27, 1922 – August 23, 2018) was an American composer, pianist, and organist, and the first African American to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music, which he received for his work Lilacs in 1996. Biography Walker was first exposed to music at the age of five when he began to play the piano. A graduate of Dunbar High School (Washington, D.C.), he was admitted to the Oberlin Conservatory at fourteen, and later to the Curtis Institute of Music to study piano with Rudolf Serkin, chamber music with William Primrose and Gregor Piatigorsky, and composition with Rosario Scalero, teacher of Samuel Barber. He received his doctorate from the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester. Walker taught at Rutgers University in New Jersey for several years, retiring in 1992. Walker’s first major orchestral work was the Address for Orchestra. His Lyric for Strings is his most performed orchestral work. He composed many works including five sonatas for piano, a mass, cantata, many songs, choral works, organ pieces, sonatas for cello and piano, violin and piano and viola and piano, a brass quintet and a woodwind quintet. He published over 90 works and received c

George Whitefield Chadwick

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George Whitefield Chadwick (November 13, 1854 – April 4, 1931) was an American composer. Along with John Knowles Paine, Horatio Parker, Amy Beach, Arthur Foote, and Edward MacDowell, he was a representative composer of what is called the Second New England School of American composers of the late 19th century. Chadwick’s works are influenced by the Realist movement in the arts, characterized by a down-to-earth depiction of people’s lives. His works included several operas, three symphonies, five string quartets, tone poems, incidental music, songs and choral anthems. Along with a group of other composers collectively known as the Boston Six, Chadwick was one of those responsible for the first significant body of concert music by composers from the United States. Early life Born in a rural part of Lowell, Massachusetts, Chadwick received some early musical training from organ lessons given by his older brother, Fitz Henry. He developed an independent, self-reliant character early in his life. Dropping out of high school in 1871, Chadwick assisted briefly in his father’s insurance business. The experience enabled him to travel to Boston and other cities, where he attended concerts an

George Whiting

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George Elbridge Whiting (September 14, 1840 – October 14, 1923) was an American composer of classical music. Early life and career George Whiting was born in Holliston, Massachusetts on September 14, 1840. He founded the Beethoven Society in Hartford, Connecticut when he was fifteen years old. He moved to Boston, Massachusetts in 1862 and later to New York City. Whiting was a student of George Washbourne Morgan. He went to Liverpool, England, and studied with William Thomas Best. Whiting was also for a time head of the organ department in the New England Conservatory. Among his pupils was Henry Morton Dunham. Death Whiting died in Jamaica Plain, Boston on October 14, 1923. Musical works His compositions include: *Mass in C minor (1872) *Mass in F minor (1874) *Mass in F minor (undated) *Dream Pictures (1874) *The Tale of the Viking (1878 cantata) *Leonora (1893 opera) *Henry of Navarre (cantata) *March of the Monks of Bangor (cantata) *some pieces for orchestra *several songs *music for organ *music for piano He wrote several published texts, including: *The Organist (Boston, 1870) *The First Six Months on the Organ (Boston, 1871) References External links * *

Georgia Shreve

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Georgia Shreve is a composer, writer, playwright, poet, and multimedia artist known for her interdisciplinary approach to the arts. Since the 1990s, she has created more than 100 original compositions, plays, poems, and novels.

Gerald Busby

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Gerald Busby (born December 16, 1935) is an American composer. Biography Busby was born in Tyler, Texas, United States. He studied piano as a child, playing with the Houston Symphony when he was 15 years old. He attended Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, where he studied music in college, but once graduated, began working as a traveling salesman. At the age of 40, he had an “epiphany” and began to compose, a direction that surprised him. In 1977, with the assistance of composer Virgil Thomson, Busby moved to the Hotel Chelsea in New York City, where he has written most of his work. Living at the Hotel Chelsea brought him into contact with numerous cultural figures. One of them was dancer Rudolf Nureyev and his then-partner Wallace Potts. Potts gave choreographer Paul Taylor a recording of Busby’s music, which led to Busby writing the score for Taylor’s dance Runes. Regarding his scores for Paul Taylor’s dance Runes and Robert Altman’s film 3 Women, Busby said: “Those two pieces are acknowledged as masterpieces, so that I know they’ll last beyond me. … Not because what I did was a masterpiece, but I was part of it.” In 1985, Busby was diagnosed with HIV, as was his partne

Gerald Cohen (composer)

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Gerald Cohen (born 1960 in New York, NY) is an American composer and cantor. He is currently the cantor at Shaarei Tikvah in Scarsdale, New York and is based in Yonkers. Cohen serves on the faculties of Jewish Theological Seminary and Hebrew Union College. Cohen’s compositions are published by Oxford University Press, G. Schirmer/AMP, and Transcontinental Music Publications. Cohen’s music has been commissioned by chamber ensembles including: the Cassatt String Quartet, Verdehr Trio, Franciscan String Quartet, Chesapeake Chamber Music, Grneta Ensemble, Wave Hill Trio, Bronx Arts Ensemble, and Brooklyn Philharmonic Brass Quintet; by choruses including the New York Virtuoso Singers, Canticum Novum Singers, Syracuse Children’s Chorus, Zamir Chorale of Boston, Usdan Center Chorus, the Cantors Assembly of America, and the Westchester Youth Symphony. Battery Dance Company commissioned his Songs of Tagore which accompanied dance performances on tours throughout India and Eastern Europe. Cohen’s music has been performed by the Borromeo String Quartet, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, San Diego Symphony, Music and style Cohen’s music reflects his embracing of both Western classical traditions

Gerald Fried

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Gerald Fried (February 13, 1928 – February 17, 2023) was an American composer, conductor, and oboist known for his film and television scores. He composed music for well-known television series of the 1960s and 1970s, including Mission: Impossible, Gilligan’s Island, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Shotgun Slade, Roots, and Star Trek. Early in his career, he collaborated with Stanley Kubrick, scoring several of his earliest films. Fried was nominated for five Primetime Emmy Awards, winning once in 1977 for Roots, and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Score for the documentary Birds Do It, Bees Do It (1974). Life and career Born and raised in The Bronx, New York City, Fried attended The Juilliard School of Music. He attended High School of Music & Art, graduating in 1945, and entered the world of film soundtracks when he composed the scores for five of Stanley Kubrick’s earliest films. After moving to Los Angeles he began composing and arranging music for several films such as Terror in a Texas Town and television shows such as The Man from U.N.C.L.E., working with Robert Drasnin, and also the original Star Trek, for which he composed the famous musical underscore “The R

Gerald Levinson

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Gerald Charles Levinson (born June 22, 1951 in Westport, Connecticut) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Life At university, he studied with George Crumb, Richard Wernick, and George Rochberg. He received his doctorate in 1977 from the University of Chicago. After college, Levinson went to study composition with Olivier Messiaen at the Paris Conservatory. He was inspired by Messiaen’s use of birdsong and his unique harmonic ideas, as well as the musics of Bali and India. Levinson has also worked with Simon Rattle, Ralph Shapey, and Seiji Ozawa. His notable works include Anahata, Symphony No. 2, and Black Magic/White Magic (1981), a collaboration with his wife, poet Nanine Valen. Numerous CDs of his music have been released, and his scores are published by Theodore Presser. He has taught music at Swarthmore College since 1977. His works have previously been performed by orchestras such as the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. A new work for organ and orchestra by Levinson was premiered by the Philadelphia Orchestra in its 2005–2006 season. He has two children, Adam Valen Levinson, and Ari Valen Levinson. Awards *Guggenheim Fellowship (198

Gerald Shapiro (composer)

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Gerald M. Shapiro (born 1942 in Philadelphia) is an American composer of acoustic and electronic music. He has been a longtime faculty member at Brown University, where he served as Professor of Music and multiple terms as chair of the Department of Music. His compositions span orchestral, chamber, choral, electronic, and interdisciplinary works, and he is recognized as an early pioneer in audience-participation performance and live electronic music. Education Shapiro studied first at the Eastman School of Music, where he received a Bachelor of Music degree with distinction in 1964. He continued graduate study at Mills College, where he studied composition with Darius Milhaud and received a Master of Arts in 1967. His training also included study at the San Francisco Tape Music Center with Morton Subotnick; at the Conservatoire National in Paris with Olivier Messiaen; at the École Normale Supérieure de Musique in Paris with Nadia Boulanger; and at the University of California, Davis, where he studied with Karlheinz Stockhausen. Compositions (selective list) * Antiphonies I, for piano and tape (1965) * Winter Birch, for interactive audience participation and live electronics (1972)

Gerald Strang

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Gerald Strang (February 13, 1908 – November 2, 1983) was an American composer who later in life turned to electronic and computer music. Early in his career he worked with Arnold Schoenberg as a teaching assistant and became one of the disciples of Schoenberg’s American period. Strang was born in Claresholm, Alberta and studied at Stanford University and the University of Southern California, where he completed a PhD in 1948. His teachers included Charles Koechlin and Ernst Toch. He was Arnold Schoenberg’s teaching assistant at UCLA between 1936 and 1938. In 1967 Strang edited Schoenberg’s Fundamentals of Musical Composition for publication. Strang became a lifelong teacher, at Long Beach City College (1938–58), San Fernando Valley State College (1958–65, where he founded the music department and taught Harold Budd), and California State University, then returning to Long Beach (1965–9) and UCLA (1969–74). In the 1930s he contributed to and (from 1936) acted as the managing editor of the New Music Society of California’s New Music journal. During the war he interrupted his musical activities, working as an engineer at the Douglas Aircraft Company. Cowell’s direct influence is evide

Gerard Carbonara

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Gerard Carbonara (8 December 1886, New York City – 11 January 1959, Sherman Oaks) was an American composer, conductor, opera coach and concert violinist. He received his formal music education at the National Conservatory of Music in New York on a scholarship. In 1908 he travelled abroad to Naples, where he continued his studies at the Naples Conservatory with composer Martucci Dworczak. He was employed as an opera coach in Milan in 1910. Later, he toured Europe as a concert violinist and conducted operas throughout Europe and, later, the US. Carbonara began his film music career at the end of the silent film era. In the 1930s and 1940s he scored numerous films at Paramount Pictures, including American Empire, The Shepherd of the Hills, as well as a series of Mutt and Jeff cartoons (with co-composer James Bradford). Carbonara composed several cues for Stagecoach (1939), but did not receive screen credit because of a clause in his contract. Although the score, which featured the music of several composers, won an Oscar, Carbonara was not counted among the winners. However, he was nominated for The Kansan in 1943. In the 1940s, especially after World War II, he composed and arranged

Gérard Pape

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Gérard Pape (born April 22, 1955 in Brooklyn, New York) is a composer of electronic music, author, and Lacanian psychologist. He is a former student of David Winkler, George Cacioppo, William Albright, and George Balch Wilson. He became the director of Les Ateliers UPIC (now CCMIX) in 1991 and in 2015 authored a French-English bi-lingual book Musipoesc: Writings About Music that was published by Éditions Michel de Maule. Pape has lived and worked in France since the early 1990s. Biography Gérard Pape studied clinical psychology and music simultaneously at the University of Michigan, and is a practicing Lacanian psychoanalyst as well as a composer. After moving to France at the beginning of the 1990s, his compositions came under the influence of the Mexican composer Julio Estrada. Estrada shares with Pape an interest in psychoanalysis and focuses on what he calls “sound fantasies”—fantasies that occur “inside the head of the composer and take the form of sequences of sounds”. Pape extended Estrada’s conception by treating chaos as a formal concept. For example, in his opera-in-progress, Weaveworld, Pape “employs sudden and unpredictable patterns in streams of sound in a plasma that

Gerardo Iasilli

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Gerardo Iasilli (November 10, 1880 – May 10, 1969) was an Italian-American saxophonist, conductor, and composer. He was born in Muro Lucano, Italy, and immigrated to the United States in 1904. He first joined the Silvio Mancini Band, where he eventually became assistant conductor and arranger. He later joined the Giuseppe Creatore Orchestra. He then formed and led his own band Orchestrina Italiana Gerardo Iasilli. He composed and arranged mostly brass and band music. He composed a number of marches, including the “American Army”, “America”, and “Blue Eagle” marches. He wrote many books of etudes and exercises for saxophone, and published many arrangements for band and for saxophone. * Blue Eagle March * Generale Umberto Nobile * Do re mi * Furore d’Una Banda (Furor of the Band) Many of these compositions were recorded on early Victor and Columbia phonographs, where he is credited variously as Iasilli, Issilli, and Jasilli. References

Gertrude Price Wollner

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Gertrude Price Wollner (May 15, 1900 – March 1985) was an American writer and composer. Her teachers included Albert Stossel, E. Robert Schmitz, and Emile Jacques Dalcroze. She married Herbert J. Wollner on April 2, 1926 and they had a daughter named Zelda. She taught music lessons to her grandson, David Ethan Sussman, who would later become an internationally touring opera conductor. She published several articles about music education and one book, Improvisation in Music: Ways Toward Capturing Musical Ideas and Developing Them (1963). Wollner taught at Boston University, New England Conservatory of Music, and New York University. She believed that “For any age, a childlike attitude and tenacity of search are essential, and rewarding. Not all “creative” music-making needs to be great music that lasts forever. Through the doing, something genuine occurs which enhances all future music experience for the individual.” Wollner was an honorary member of Sigma Alpha Iota, the international music fraternity for women. Selected works Her compositions include: Chamber *Allegro (oboe and bassoon; 1950) *Cello Sonata (1946) *Quartet (English horn, violin, viola, and cello) *Trio (clarinet, v

Gertrude Rivers Robinson

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Gertrude Eloise Rivers Robinson (June 30, 1927 – March 12, 1995) was an American educator, musician, ethnomusicologist, and composer. She was a professor at Loyola Marymount University from 1970 to 1995. She studied, wrote, recorded, performed, and taught music for gamelan ensemble. Early life and education Rivers was born in Camden, South Carolina, After moving to California, she worked as an accompanist and collaborator with choreographer Lester Horton. She studied and performed gamelan music at UCLA, and traveled to Bali several times for further research. She lectured on dance at UCLA and UC Riverside in 1966, in programs with Eubie Blake and Noble Sissle, Her collected recordings were released as Bali South: Compositions of Wajan Gandera, Teacher, Composer, Gamelan Master, Peliatan, Bali (1973). Other projects took her to India, Trinidad, and Ghana. She served two terms as president of the Southern California chapter of the Society for Ethnomusicology. She was named Woman of the Year by LMU’s chapter of California Women in Higher Education in 1993. Compositions * “Child”, “Cry”, “Sooth Song”, “The Heart”, “The Unfound Door”, and “American Dance Story” (1948, for Cornell Dance

Gil Trythall

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Harry Gilbert Trythall (October 28, 1930 – February 17, 2023) was an American composer, electronic music pioneer, keyboardist, pianist of jazz and contemporary classical music, a lifelong educator, and a multimedia enthusiast. He often collaborated with artists (notably Prof. Don Evans (Vanderbilt-Nashville) to create engrossing public experiences. Dr. Trythall founded the Electronic Music Plus Festival in the late 1960s and hosted events at universities across the United States. As a musician, Trythall is best known for his experiments and compositions in electronic music. For instance, “Planet” by Four Tet and “myriad.industries” by Oneohtrix Point Never sample his 1980 compositions “Echospace” and “Luxicon II”. As a twentieth century composer of both traditional and electronic works, Gilbert Trythall combined the large scale sonorities reminiscent of Paul Hindemith and Wallingford Riegger with the expanded capabilities of both electronic and conventional instruments. His Symphony No. 1 (1958) is a demanding work for large orchestra, and his Hecuba and Polyxena of the same period is a severe, brilliant twelve-tone work. Beginning with the Moog synthesizer in the early 1960s, Tryt

Gilda Lyons

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Gilda Lyons (born January 11, 1975, Rhinebeck, New York) is an American composer, vocalist, and visual artist who writes music that “combines elements of renaissance, neo-baroque, spectral, agitprop Music Theater, and extended vocalism”. Education and early career Lyons attended Bard College, where she studied with Joan Tower and Daron Hagen, and in 1997 received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Music Composition, Vocal Performance, and Visual Arts. She then attended the University of Pittsburgh, where she studied with Eric Moe and Anne LeBaron, and received a Master of Arts degree in Music Composition and Theory in 2001. She studied with Daria Semegen and Peter Winkler at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, receiving a Doctor of Philosophy degree in 2005. Lyons also studied voice, first at Bard with Arthur Burrows, then privately with heldentenor Barry Busse. American Opera Projects in New York City chose her doctoral dissertation, “The Walled Up Wife” (opera, libretto and music by Lyons, 2005), for development and concert premiere. Her critically successful 2015 opera, A New Kind of Fallout, commissioned and premiered by the Opera Theater of Pittsburgh with a libretto by

Gitta Steiner

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Gitta Hana Steiner (April 17, 1932 – January 1, 1990) was a Czech-American composer and pianist who is best known for her works for percussion instruments. Steiner was born in Prague to Erna Bondy and Erhard (Eric) Steiner. The family moved to New York in 1940, Steiner earned a B. Mus. and M.S. from the Juilliard School, where she received the Abraham Ellstein Scholarship. She was a fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center in 1967. Her teachers included Elliott Carter, Vincent Persichetti, and Gunther Schuller. She taught piano and theory privately and at the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music. Steiner received awards and honors which included the 1972 American Society of Composers and Publishers (ASCAP) Award, the Donell Library Composer’s Forum Honor, the Gretchaninoff Memorial Prize, and the Marion Freschl Award. Her music was published by Seesaw Music Corporation (today Subito Music Corporation). References

Gladys Nordenstrom

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Gladys Mercedes Nordenstrom (May 23, 1924 – July 5, 2016) was an American composer. Life Gladys Nordenstrom was born in Mora, Minnesota. She studied music at the Institute of Fine Arts at Hamline University in Saint Paul, Minnesota, where she received bachelor’s and master’s degrees. She studied under Austrian composer Ernst Krenek there and married him in 1950. After completing her studies, Nordenstrom worked as an elementary school teacher until she moved with Krenek to California. In the following years, she accompanied Krenek to visiting professorships in various locations and sometimes collaborated on musical works. After Krenek died in 1991, Nordenstrom was instrumental in founding the Ernst Krenek Institute in 1998 and the private foundation Krems die Ernst Krenek in 2004 in Vienna, Austria. She expended much effort to find ways to promote performances and recordings of Krenek’s music. Nordenstrom died on July 5, 2016, in Palm Springs, California, aged 92. At the time of her death, she was at work on a project to record the complete Krenek piano concertos. Works Selected works include: *Theme and Variations for piano (1944) *No Leaf Is Left for soprano and piano (1945, text

Gladys Smuckler Moskowitz

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Gladys Smuckler Moskowitz (January 25, 1928 – May 24, 2024) was an American singer, composer and teacher. She graduated from Brooklyn College with bachelor’s and master’s degrees, and worked as a teacher, choir director and composer. As Gladys Young she performed in the United States and Europe as a folk singer. In 2003 her chamber opera The Fountain of Youth, based on Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Dr. Heidegger’s Experiment,” won a special commendation at the Nancy Van de Vate International Opera Competition for Women. Her music is performed internationally. Moskowitz died on May 24, 2024, at the age of 96. Works Moskowitz is known for songs and chamber opera. Selected works include: *Grass, on a poem by Carl Sandburg *Chicken Little, The Sky Is Falling! A Satirical Chamber Opera, performed by Bluegrass Chamber Orchestra and Opera, Lexington, Kentucky, 2009. *More than a Voice *The Fountain of Youth, chamber opera *Three Love Songs on Poems of Sara Teasdale: “Joy”; “Advice to a Girl”; “Gifts.” Premiere in New York City, 2008. *Psalm 23, for piano, oboe, cello and voice *The Masque of the Red Death, music drama in two acts after Poe *The Buried Life, for mezzo-soprano and piano *Three Son

Glenn Branca

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Glenn Branca (October 6, 1948 – May 13, 2018) was an American avant-garde composer, guitarist, and luthier. Known for his use of volume, alternative guitar tunings, repetition, droning, and the harmonic series, he was a driving force behind the genres of no wave, totalism and noise rock. Branca received a 2009 Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award. Life and work Beginnings: 1960s and early 1970s Born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Branca started playing the guitar at age 15. He also created a number of tape sound art collage pieces for his own amusement. After attending York College in 1966–1967, he started the short-lived cover band The Crystal Ship with Al Whiteside and Dave Speece in the summer of 1967. In the early 1970s, Branca studied theater at Emerson College in Boston. In 1973, he moved from Boston to London with his then girlfriend Meg English. After moving back to Boston in 1974, he met John Rehberger. While there, he began experimenting with sound as the founder of an experimental theater group called Bastard Theatre in 1975. Working out of a loft on Massachusetts Avenue they wrote and produced the music/theater piece Anthropophagoi for a two-week run.

Glenn Miller

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Alton Glen “Glenn” Miller (March 1, 1904 – December 15, 1944) was an American big band conductor, arranger, composer, trombonist, and recording artist before and during World War II, when he was an officer in the US Army Air Forces. Glenn Miller and his Orchestra was the best-selling recording band from 1939 to 1942. Unlike his military unit, Miller’s civilian band did not have a string section, but it did have a stand-up bass in the rhythm section. It was also a touring band that played multiple radio broadcasts nearly every day. Its best-selling records include Miller’s theme song, “Moonlight Serenade”, and the first gold record ever made, “Chattanooga Choo Choo”, a song on the soundtrack of Miller’s first film, Sun Valley Serenade, and the number-one song in the United States on December 7, 1941. The following tunes are also on that best-seller list: “In the Mood”, “Pennsylvania 6-5000” (printed as “Pennsylvania Six-Five Thousand” on record labels), “A String of Pearls”, “Moonlight Cocktail”, “At Last”, “(I’ve Got a Gal In) Kalamazoo”, “American Patrol”, “Tuxedo Junction”, “Elmer’s Tune”, “Little Brown Jug”, and “Anvil Chorus”. Including “Chattanooga Choo Choo”, five songs playe

Gloria Coates

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Gloria Coates (née Kannenberg; October 10, 1933 – August 19, 2023) was an American composer who lived in Munich from 1969 until her death. She trained and worked also as actress, stage director, singer, author and painter. She is known for her many symphonies, and also wrote chamber music, and vocal music for large and small ensembles. Her compositions have been performed internationally and recorded by notable orchestras. She ran a concert series for new music in Munich. Her First Symphony “Music on Open Strings” was played at the 1978 Warsaw Autumn and was the first composition by a woman in the musica viva series of Bayerischer Rundfunk. Life and career Gloria Kannenberg was born in Wausau, Wisconsin, on October 10, 1933; Music Coates composed symphonies, chamber music for different ensembles, vocal music and multimedia works. She experimented with vocal works for many voices. Instrumental music Works with orchestra * Symphony No. 1 “Music on Open Strings” (1972-1974) * Symphony No. 2 “Music on Abstract Lines / Illuminatio in Tenebris” (1973/74) * Symphony No. 3 “Symphony for Strings” / “Symphony Nocturne” (1974) * Symphony No. 3, second version (Violin Concerto) (2006) * Sympho

Gloria Wilson Swisher

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Gloria Wilson Swisher (March 12, 1935 – July 23, 2023) was an American composer, music educator and pianist. Biography Gloria Wilson Swisher was born in Seattle, Washington. She graduated from the University of Washington in Seattle where she received a Bachelor of Music degree, summa cum laude, Mills College in Oakland, California, where she earned a Master of Music in composition, and the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, where she earned a Ph.D. in 1960. She studied composition under John Verrall, Darius Milhaud, Bernard Rogers, and Howard Hanson. She was a member of The International Association of Women in Music, the Darius Milhaud Society and the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers. Swisher was awarded the Sigma Alpha Iota Inter-American prize for her composition Salutations for oboe and piano. Swisher was the subject of a 2009 University of Washington dissertation, The choral music of Gloria Wilson Swisher, by Robert Bigley. Swisher taught at Washington State University in Pullman, Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Shoreline Community College (1969–1998) in Seattle, and the University of Washington in Seattle. She was a Professor Emerita

Gordon Mumma

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Gordon Mumma (born March 30, 1935, in Framingham, Massachusetts) is an American composer. He is known most for his work with electronics, many devices of which he builds himself, and for his performances on horn. Biography Mumma entered the University of Michigan in 1952 at age 17, after dropping out of high school. He dropped out of Michigan after a year, but the connections he made in Ann Arbor were the foundation of much of his musical career. His early work was in piano, and his musical development drew on traditional composers such as Bach and Haydn, as well as modern composers such as Bartók, Schoenberg, Webern, and Ives. Mumma’s performances on piano were often in the context of piano ensembles, partnered with John Cage, David Tudor, and other performers. He toured internationally in the 1960s in a two-piano performance collaboration with Robert Ashley. He cofounded Ann Arbor’s Cooperative Studio for Electronic Music with Ashley in 1958–66, was a cofounder of the ONCE Festival in 1961–66 in Ann Arbor, was a resident composer with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company alongside Cage and Tudor from 1966–74, and was a member of the Sonic Arts Union with Ashley, Alvin Lucier, and D

Gordon Sherwood

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Gordon Sherwood (August 25, 1929 – May 2, 2013) was an American classical composer. Known in Germany as the “Beggar-Composer”, his works exhibit various early 20th-century European and American classical music styles, as well as showing influences from blues, Arabic, Indian and Asian music. The New York Philharmonic under Dimitri Mitropoulos gave his career a promising start as a prize-winning young composer at Carnegie Hall in 1957. Aaron Copland said he was “his most gifted student”. He studied with famous teachers and won more awards and stipends in academia, but drifted into virtual anonymity until the mid-1990s. He began begging on the streets of Paris and two stipends from the financed composition studies with Philipp Jarnach at the , Germany. During a break from his fellowship studies in Hamburg in 1960, Sherwood was arrested for vandalising an Elvis poster in the New York City Subway. According to his autobiography, he worked for a New York City music publisher. Out of frustration with his job, dispatching heavy boxes of sheet music orders that were mostly Elvis Presley’s songs, he defaced a poster with red paint and profanity. This was the year in which his supporter, frie

Gottlieb Graupner

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NOTOC Johann Christian Gottlieb Graupner (6 October 1767 – 16 April 1836) was a musician, composer, conductor, educator and publisher. Born in Hanover, Germany, he played oboe in Joseph Haydn’s orchestra in London. After moving to the United States in the 1790s, he co-founded the Philharmonic Society (ca. 1810–1825) and the Handel and Haydn Society (est. 1815) in Boston, Massachusetts. Some historians call Graupner “the father of Negro songs”, based on the reminiscences of performer Charles T. White (1821-1891). One historian of jazz writes: “In 1795…Graupner…arrived in Charleston, Virginia, from Hanover, Germany, listened to banjo music and Negro songs, and learned. In 1799, donning blackface, he introduced himself as ‘The Gay Negro Boy’ in an interlude between acts at the Federal Street Theatre in Boston. This was the beginning of Negro minstrels and minstrelsy.” According to another account, thereafter “he specialized in popularizing Negro songs.” However, more recent historians have cast doubt upon these claims. In 1801, with fellow musicians Philip Trajetta and François Mallet, he founded a music academy in Boston, called the American Conservatorio of Boston. It was th

Grace Adele Freebey

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Grace Adele Freebey (January 25, 1885 – March 30, 1943) was an American pianist, music teacher and composer. Early life and education Freebey was born on January 25 1885, in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, to Charles Peter Freebey and Joanna Estelle Walsh Freebey. Her mother was born in Canada. In childhood, she moved to Los Angeles with her parents and siblings. She studied piano with A. J. Stamm, Marie von Unschuld, Louis Bachner, and Ernest Hutcheson, and composition with conductor Henry Schoenefeld. Career Freebey performed as a concert pianist, and was accompanist for singers Ernestine Schumann-Heink and Ellen Beach Yaw, and cellists May Mukle and Alfred Wallenstein. In 1914, she toured in vaudeville with Wallenstein, a child prodigy. She was a member of the Schliewen Trio, with Wallenstein and violinist Richard Schliewen. She was business manager and accompanist of the all-woman Sunny Southland Trio. Freebey taught piano classes at her own studio in Los Angeles, and at the Wilson-Greene School of Music, and as head of the piano department at Martha Washington Seminary in Washington, D.C. “O Golden Sun” (1912), “North Wind”, “Wind of the West”, “May Day”, “Calling You”, “Somebody’s Comi

Grace Leboy

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Grace Leboy Kahn (September 22, 1890 – May 24, 1983) was an American composer. A prolific songwriter, among her best known works are “I Wish I Had A Girl” (1908) and selections from the Jumping Jupiter musical. Life and career Leboy was born in Brooklyn, New York to Samuel LeBoy (originally Lebovitch) and Celia Leboy (née Liborski), both Jewish immigrants. She grew up in Illinois and was the sixth of seven children. Leboy was a precocious musician, gaining employment as a pianist by age 15, and fame by age 18 with her song “I Wish I Had A Girl”. By age 21 she had songs on the Broadway stage in Jumping Jupiter. Notable performers of her day recorded her songs and compositions. Lyrics for many of her songs were written by Gus Kahn whom she married in 1916. They were the parents of Donald Gustave Kahn (July 17, 1918 – April 11, 2008) and Irene Kahn (1922–1985). Grace was played by Doris Day in I’ll See You in My Dreams, a film that portrays the lives and times of Leboy and Kahn. Selected compositions *Are You Lonesome 1909 *Bring Along Your Dancing Shoes 1915 *Dublin Bay 1912 *Early In The Morning (Down On The Farm) 1916 *Everybody Rag With Me 1914 *The Good Ship Mary Ann 1914 *Henry,

Gregoria Karides Suchy

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Gregoria Karides Suchy (November 14, 1923 – October 3, 2018) was an American composer and educator. Her music uses electroacoustic and Greek musical elements. Biography Karides Suchy was the daughter of Greek immigrants and was born on November 14, 1923 in Milwaukee. In 1945, she graduated from the Milwaukee State Teachers College, later University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, (UWM) and began teaching soon after. Karides Suchy died on October 3, 2018. UWM offers a scholarship in her name for Music students. Work Karides Suchy began to create electroacoustic music in the 1960s. She also incorporated non-traditional items, like beer bottles and spliced tape, in her compositions. She called her experimental compositions “soundscaping.” Karides Suchy’s work has been performed both in the United States and internationally. References External links * Greek Rhapsody (video)

Gregory Short

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Gregory Norman Short (August 14, 1938 – April 1, 1999) was a composer, educator, and performer. He was born in Toppenish, Washington, the largest city in the Yakima Indian Reservation. Later, he attended the Juilliard School and University of Washington. He received a Doctor of Musical Arts in Composition from the University of Oregon. Biography In 1961, Short began teaching piano students in performance and music theory. He created new music that blended classical European–American styles with American–Indian melodies that earned recognition beyond the Northwest. He combined Native–American influences with European–American music for a sound that was compelling rather than being a cliche. He used ethnic themes in many of the 300 compositions he created over 35 years. Short was named the 1989 Washington State Centennial Artist. He taught at the college and university level for decades. As a member of the Washington State Teachers Association, Short served as an adjudicator. In 1989, WTA selected him as Composer of the Year and commissioned him to write a piece. The prominent American folklorist Stacy I. Morgan points out that he crosses musical categories, “the boundaries between f

Gregory Spears

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Gregory Spears is an American composer of instrumental and operatic works that blend aspects of romanticism, minimalism, and early music. Among his best known works are the operas Fellow Travelers and Paul’s Case, as well as his Requiem. Early life and education Spears grew up in Virginia. He attended Eastman School of Music, received a master’s degree at Yale University, and earned his Ph.D. at Princeton University. He studied with Hans Abrahamsen and Per Nørgård while a Fulbright Scholar at the Royal Danish Academy of Music. Career His opera Fellow Travelers, adapted from the novel of the same name by Thomas Mallon with a libretto by Greg Pierce, premiered at Cincinnati Opera on June 17, 2016 and has since then been produced across the United States and has garnered many positive reviews. Anthony Tommasini in The New York Times wrote: “Originality in the arts is a vague and overhyped virtue. Few works are completely original. All creative artists borrow from others, both masters they revere and contemporaries they may be in competition with. Still, originality just comes through sometimes, as the composer Gregory Spears demonstrates in his personal, boldly quirky score for the wr

Gregory Vajda

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Gregory Vajda (born Gergely Vajda; August 13, 1973) is a Hungarian clarinetist, composer and conductor. Early life and education He was born in Budapest in 1973 to bassoonist József Vajda (1947-2016) and operatic soprano Veronika Kincses. Vajda studied conducting at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music under Professor Ervin Lukács. He was also a conducting and composition pupil of well-known composer and conductor, Péter Eötvös. Career Conducting Following performances with the Montreal Symphony in Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle and Schoenberg’s Erwartung, Gregory Vajda gained international recognition. In 2011, he was appointed the sixth music director of the Huntsville Symphony. After completing his three-year tenure as Principal Conductor, he was named Principal Guest Conductor of the Hungarian Radio Symphony (MR Symphony) in 2014. Vajda also serves as the Artistic Director of the International Armel Opera Festival. In addition to his duties with these organizations, upcoming guest-conducting engagements during 2015-16 season include the Danubia Symphony, the Hungarian State Opera, the Pannon Philharmonic, the Szeged Symphony, the Launaudiere Festival and the Portland Festival Symphony

Gregory Wanamaker

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Gregory Wanamaker (born 1968) is an American composer, musician, and professor of music composition and theory. Education He studied at Shenandoah University from 1987 to 1991, where he received a 2016 Distinguished Alumni Award for Professional Achievement, and Florida State University from 1991 to 1996. His composition instructors included Anthony Branker, William Averitt, Thomas Albert, and Ladislav Kubík. Life and career Wanamaker was born in Livonia, Michigan, and spent most of his youth in Skaneateles, New York. He is currently Professor of Composition and Music Theory at the Crane School of Music at the State University of New York at Potsdam, where he has served since 1997. Wanamaker’s commissions include works for the Society for New Music, Timothy McAllister, Akropolis Reed Quintet, PRISM Quartet, Capitol Quartet, and independent consortiums of musicians. Works Wanamaker is best known for his works that feature the saxophone as a solo instrument or as part of a chamber ensemble. His Sonata deus sax machina was premiered at the 12th World Saxophone Congress by Timothy McAllister and David Heinick in July 2000, and has served as one of the required works for the semi-final

Guillermo Venegas Lloveras

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Guillermo Segundo Venegas Lloveras (Quebradillas, Puerto Rico October 12, 1915 – Santurce, Puerto Rico July 23, 1993) was a Puerto Rican songwriter. After success in his youth with popular boleros, waltzes, tangos, marches, and danzas, in later life he returned to classical music. A two-hour television program was produced by Puerto Rico Lyric Theatre director Jesús Quiñones Ledesma (otherwise known by stage name as the operatic tenor Ricardo Ledesma). After his death the rights to his songs were disputed. Guillermo Venegas Lloveras died of stomach cancer on July 23, 1993 at Pavia Hospital in Santurce, Puerto Rico. Works *Génesis (Lucecita Benítez song) 1969 References

Gunther Schuller

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Gunther Alexander Schuller (November 22, 1925 – June 21, 2015) He studied at the Saint Thomas Choir School and became an accomplished French horn player and flute player. At age 15, he was already playing horn professionally with the American Ballet Theatre (1943) followed by an appointment as principal hornist with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra (1943–45), and then the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in New York, where he stayed until 1959. During his youth, he attended the Precollege Division at the Manhattan School of Music, later going on to teach at the school. But, already a high school dropout because he wanted to play professionally, Schuller never obtained a degree from any institution. He began his career in jazz by recording as a horn player with Miles Davis (1949–50). Performance and growth In 1955, Schuller and jazz pianist John Lewis founded the Modern Jazz Society, Concertino (1959, for jazz quartet and orchestra), Abstraction (1959, for nine instruments), and Variants on a Theme of Thelonious Monk (1960, for 13 instruments) utilizing Eric Dolphy and Ornette Coleman. He also orchestrated Scott Joplin’s only known surviving opera Treemonisha for the Houston Grand Opera’s

Gustav Hinrichs

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Gustav Ludwig Wilhelm Hinrichs (10 December 1850 - 26 March 1942) was a German-born American conductor and composer. He immigrated to the United States at the age of 19, where he became known especially as a conductor of opera in San Francisco, New York, and Philadelphia. His compositions include four operas, many songs and instrumental works, and musical scores for silent films, including the 1925 version of The Phantom of the Opera. Career Gustav Hinrichs was born in Grabow near Ludwigslust, Germany to August Hinrichs and Sophie née Havekoss. He studied clarinet, violin, and piano with his father, and composition with Angelo Reisland and Eduard Marxsen in Hamburg. While still a teenager he began playing with the Hamburg State Opera orchestra. At the age of 19, in order to avoid military service, Hinrichs emigrated to the United States. He sailed from Hamburg via Le Havre on SS Silesia and arrived in New York on 4 April 1870. He then traveled by train across the continent to San Francisco, where friends of his parents lived, arriving on 6 May 1870. In San Francisco Hinrichs quickly found work as a musician. He gave piano lessons, played the organ at St. Mark’s church, conducted fo

Gustav Strube

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Gustav Strube (3 March 1867 – 2 February 1953) was a German-born conductor and composer. He was the founding conductor of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra in 1916, and taught at the Peabody Conservatory. He wrote two operas, Ramona, which premiered in 1916, and The Captive, which premiered at the Lyric Theatre in Baltimore in February 1938. He was also a member of Baltimore’s famous Saturday Night Club with H. L. Mencken. Strube was born in the Harz Mountains of Ballenstadt in 1867 and came from a musically gifted family. By the age of 10, Strube was in his father’s symphony, and at the age of 16 he entered the Leipzig Conservatory. Strube used to earn pocket money by making dance music for Saturday night dance parties. Upon graduation he entered the Gewandhaus Orchestra, and played under Johann Strauss, the younger, while teaching at the Mannheim Conservatory. In 1889 Strube and conductor Artur Nikisch immigrated to the United States to play in the Boston Symphony Orchestra, he said. Strube played in the Boston Symphony Orchestra for 23 years, and eventually became concert maestro. Strube was one of the first conductors of the Boston Pops, formed because of the success of “march m

Gustave J. Stoeckel

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Gustave Jakob Stoeckel (November 9, 1819 – May 14, 1907) was a longtime music instructor and college organist at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. Biography Born in Maikammer, Bavarian Palatinate, Stoeckel graduated from the seminary in Kaiserslautern in 1838, and then pursued a post-graduate course in musical composition under Joseph Krebs. He was a teacher and organist until 1847, when he emigrated to the United States. He joined Yale University in 1849 when he became a music teacher there, and was appointed organist of Yale College Chapel. Yale gave him the degree of Mus.D. in 1864. He pioneered Yale’s program in music and was one of its first faculty. In 1868, he became the first faculty director of the Yale Glee Club, Yale’s oldest singing group, now a professionally led 80-voice choir of international fame. He held the position of organist at Yale’s chapel for over 30 years, beginning in 1860 until his resignation in May 1894. He made his last appearance as a professor of music performing preludes and postludes for the graduating class at the commencement exercises held in Battell Chapel on Sunday, June 24, 1894. Battell Chapel is named for Joseph Battell (1774–1841)

Gwen Laster

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Gwen Laster (born 1957/1958) is an American violinist and composer. Born and raised in Detroit, she obtained her music degrees at the University of Michigan and performed as a jazz violinist. A 2025 Guggenheim Fellow, her work includes three albums, as well as a “Black Lives Matter Suite”. Biography Laster was born in 1957 or 1958 raised in a working-class family. She obtained her BM and MM at the University of Michigan. In 1992, she won the Cognac Hennessy Best of Detroit Jazz Search contest as part of the group Gwen Laster Featuring Larry Fratangelo. She released two albums through her own label Muffymarie: Sneak Preview (1996) and I Hear You Smiling (2004). In June 2006, she played for a concert at Somers High School raising funds for the Costa Rican refugee camp La Carpio. In 2008, she performed at a concert for the first inauguration of Barack Obama. Laster had been inspired to write the “Black Lives Matter Suite” of their album Blue Lotus by her experiences in police custody, where she recalled passing out and being traumatized with a near-death experience. while Haviland S Nichols of Chronogram called it proof that “black lives still matter”. During the COVID-19 pandemic in

Gwyneth Van Anden Walker

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Gwyneth Van Anden Walker (born 22 March 1947) is an American music educator and composer. Biography Walker was born in New York to a Quaker family and grew up in New Canaan, Connecticut. She began her first efforts at composition at an early age and went on to receive BA (1968) from Brown University, and MM (1970) and DMA (1976) degrees in Music Composition from the Hartt School of Music, University of Hartford, where she studied under Arnold Franchetti. She taught music for fourteen years at Hartt School of Music, the Hartford Conservatory and the Oberlin College Conservatory, and then moved to a dairy farm in Vermont and went to work as a full-time composer. In 1988, she helped found the Consortium of Vermont Composers and later became the director of the organization. Walker currently spends time in New Canaan, Connecticut, Sarasota, Florida, and Randolph, Vermont. The Chord The original Gwyneth Walker Chord is heard in the opening bars of Gwyneth Walker’s Earth-Shaking Choral piece ‘Tell the Earth to Shake’ for SATB Chorus and Chamber Orchestra or Piano. It is made up of the notes A, Bb, D, and E: Awards *1999 Brock Commission (American Choral Directors Association) *2000 Lifet

H. Owen Reed

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Herbert Owen Reed (June 17, 1910 – January 6, 2014) was an American composer, conductor, and author. Early life and education Reed was raised in rural Odessa, Missouri, where his first exposure to music was his father’s playing of the old-time fiddle, accompanied by his mother at the piano. In addition to his childhood with musically-inclined parents, he was also attracted to the popular piano music of the 1920s, such as the novelty piano tunes of Zez Confrey, and his family’s player piano, which played popular tunes. He studied piano with Odessa’s only piano teacher, Mrs. Felts, who attempted to interest him in the music of Bach and Beethoven. In 1937 he enrolled at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, where he studied composition with Howard Hanson and Bernard Rogers, conducting with Paul White, musicology with Howard Gleason, and music theory with Allen I. McHose. He received a Ph.D. in composition in 1939. In 1942, at the Berkshire Music Center in Tanglewood, Massachusetts, he studied composition with Bohuslav Martinů, and contemporary music with Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein and Stanley Chappel. In the summer of 1947, he studied composition with Roy Harris at

Haig Gudenian

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Hayk Kyutenyan (Armenian: Հայկ Կիւտէնեան), anglicized as Haig Gudenian (19 May 1885 – 12 May 1972), was an Armenian American violinist, composer, and author. He left his home city of Constantinople in 1904 and went to western Europe where he studied music and violin under Vítězslav Novák, Otakar Sevcik, César Thomson, and Mathieu Crickboom. Playing a rare 18th-century Spanish violin in his concert performances, he was known for his virtuoso skill as a violinist, and for introducing Middle Eastern music, especially that of Anatolia and the Caucasus, to European and American audiences; almost all of his numerous compositions were inspired by the diverse cultural heritage of the region. Among his compositions are works such as “The Armenian Shepherd”, “Armenian Love Song”, and “The Arabian Boy”, that depict the lives and ideals of the Armenian people. Violinists Jascha Heifetz and Max Rosen, as well as pianist Percy Grainger, included various works of his in their repertoires. Early years Born in the city of Kayseri (Caesarea) in the Ottoman Empire, Gudenian attended the Turkish University of Constantinople, then moved to Brussels in 1904, where he studied violin under César Thomson a

Haig Mardirosian

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Haig Mardirosian (born 1947 in New York City) is Dean Emeritus of the College of Arts and Letters at the University of Tampa, Professor Emeritus at American University in Washington, DC, a concert organist, composer, and conductor. He has performed in many of the most important concert venues throughout North America and Europe. He has over a dozen commercial recordings to his credit including well known and respected performances of the organ works of Bach, Brahms, Liszt, Petr Eben, and Jean Langlais. Performing career In 1977, Haig Mardirosian was invited to be the first American to perform in the International Organ Week in Bonn, Germany. In 1989, he was one of two Americans performing in the first (and only) Soviet-American Organ Music Festival. This broadcast work includes important broadcasts from the famed Busch-Reisinger Museum at Harvard University. His new Requiem for choir, strings, and percussion was premiered in November, 2007 in Washington, DC. Writer For 25 years, Mardirosian served as a critic for Fanfare Magazine, the leading recording review journal in the United States, and for 26 years he has written reviews of recordings, scores, books, and New Media for The Am

Hale A. VanderCook

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Hale Ascher VanderCook (3 September 1864 – 16 October 1949) was a composer, conductor, and cornetist best known for his marches and brass solos. He was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan and began composing at the age of sixteen. He was performing in bands by the age of 14, and became conductor of the J.H. LaPearl Circus Band in 1891. He conducted circus and theater bands for much of the 1890s. VanderCook composed over 70 marches as well as numerous series for solo brass instruments. Among his most famous marches are American Stride, Olevine, Pacific Fleet, Pageant of Columbia and S.S. Theodore Roosevelt. He published his Course in Band and Orchestra Directing in 1916. VanderCook studied cornet with Frank Holton and A.F. Weldon. He founded VanderCook College of Music (originally called VanderCook Cornet School) in 1909. VanderCook composed scores of student-level solo works for the cornet and other brass instruments, often grouped into topical sets such as the Trumpet Stars (Arcturus, Orion, Vega, etc.), birds (The Warbler, The Starling, The Meadowlark, etc.) and flowers (Columbine, Peony, Chrysanthemum, etc.). Many of the solos were included in the curriculum of his mail order cornet cou

Hale Smith

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Hale Smith (June 29, 1925 – November 24, 2009) was an American composer, arranger, and pianist. Biography Born in Cleveland, Ohio, he learned piano at an early age and played mellophone in the high school band. As a teenager, he played jazz piano in local nightclubs. His composition Four Songs won the first student composer award given by BMI. With Chico Hamilton he wrote music for the movie Mr. Ricco (1975). In 1948, he married Juanita Hancock. He has a daughter, Robin, who resides in Manhattan, and three sons: Michael from Freeport, Eric from York, PA, and Marcel from Harpursville, NY. Additionally, he has three grandchildren. His compositions include The Valley Wind (1952), In Memoriam, Beryl Rubinstein (1953), Sonata for Cello and Piano (1955), Contours for Orchestra (1961), Faces of Jazz (1965), Evocation (1966), Ritual and Incantation (1974), Innerflexions (1977), Toussaint L’Ouverture (1979), Solemn Music (1979), Three Patterson Lyrics (1985), and Dialogues and Commentaries (1991) * Four Songs for Medium Voice (1952) * The Valley Wind (1952) * In Memoriam – Beryl Rubinstein (1953) * Sonata for Violoncello and Piano (1955) * Two Love Songs of John Donne (1958) * Feathers (196

Halim El-Dabh

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Halim Abdul Messieh El-Dabh (, Ḥalīm ʻAbd al-Masīḥ al-Ḍabʻ; 4 March 1921 – 2 September 2017) was an Egyptian-American composer, musician, ethnomusicologist, and educator, who had a career spanning six decades. He is particularly known as an early pioneer of electronic music. In 1944 he composed one of the earliest known works of tape music, or musique concrète. From the late 1950s to early 1960s he produced influential work at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center. Early life El-Dabh was born and grew up in Sakakini, Cairo, Egypt, a member of a large and affluent Coptic Christian family that had earlier emigrated from Abutig in the Upper Egyptian province of Asyut. The family name means “the hyena” and is not uncommon in Egypt. In 1932 the family relocated to the Cairo suburb of Heliopolis. Following his father’s profession of agriculture, he graduated from Fuad I University in 1945 with a degree in agricultural engineering, while also informally studying, performing, and composing music. Although his main income was derived from his job as an agricultural consultant, he achieved recognition in Egypt from the mid- to late 1940s for his innovative compositions and piano tec

Halsey Stevens

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Halsey Stevens (December 3, 1908 – January 20, 1989) was a music professor, biographer, and composer of American music. Life Halsey Stevens was born in Scott, New York and educated at Syracuse University and the University of California, Berkeley. He studied with William Berwald at Syracuse and with the composer Ernest Bloch at Berkeley. Stevens served as a faculty member at Syracuse University (1935–1937), Dakota Wesleyan University (1937–1941), Bradley University (1941–1946), the University of Redlands (1946), and then at the University of Southern California from 1946 until his retirement in 1976. His notable students there included Charles Lloyd, Houston Bright, Benjamin Lees, Morten Lauridsen, and Williametta Spencer. He died in a Long Beach, California, medical facility on January 20, 1989, after a long battle with Parkinson’s disease. Music His recorded music includes, in chronological order of composition: * “Go, Lovely Rose,” for mixed chorus (SATB) a cappella (1942) * Quintet for Flute, Piano, Violin, Viola, and Cello (1945) * Symphony No. 1 (1945) * Three Inventions for Piano (1948) * Sonata for French Horn and Piano (1953) * Triskelion, for orchestra (1953) * Five Duos

Hanns Eisler

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Hanns Eisler (; 6 July 1898 – 6 September 1962) was an Austrian and German composer. He is best known for composing the national anthem of East Germany, for his long artistic association with Bertolt Brecht, and for the scores he wrote for films. The Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler Berlin is named after him. Family background Johannes Eisler was born in Leipzig, Saxony, on 6 July 1898 – the third child of Rudolf Eisler and Marie Ida Fischer. His father was a philosophy professor and an atheist of Jewish descent, and his mother was Lutheran of Swabian descent. In 1901, the family moved to Vienna. His older brother Gerhart was a communist journalist, At age 14, Eisler joined a socialist youth group. In 1917, one year after Eisler graduated high school, the 18-year-old Eisler was drafted into the Austro-Hungarian Army to fight during World War I, where he served as a front-line soldier. He found this time physically demanding, due to his poor health and small stature, and was injured several times in combat. Returning to Vienna after Austria’s defeat, he studied from 1919 to 1923 under Arnold Schoenberg. Eisler was the first of Schoenberg’s disciples to compose in the twelve-tone or

Hans Balatka

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Hans Balatka (March 5, 1827 – April 17, 1899) was an American conductor and composer. His efforts contributed much to the great increase in popularity of European classical music in the United States during the late 19th century. He began his musical career as conductor for singing societies. beginning in 1851. He produced several oratorios and operas, and conducted musical festivals in Cleveland, Cincinnati, Detroit, Chicago, and Pittsburgh. to become leader of the newly founded Philharmonic Society of Chicago. In 1867 he became director of the Germania Männerchor, and in the same year conducted the group at Nord-Amerikanischer Sängerbund held in Indianapolis, where they performed the works of Franz Abt. In 1868, he directed a musical festival at Chicago, which was pronounced the greatest that had been held in this country up to that time. Works Balatka’s compositions are few in number. Besides his addition of a climax to Chopin’s “Funeral March,” in place of its abrupt ending, he composed a grand aria for soprano with accompaniment, a piano quartet, a sonata, and several songs. He was the author of A Condensed History of Music (1888), A History of Orchestra Music in Chicago, and

Hans Spialek

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Hans Spialek (April 17, 1894 – November 20, 1983) was an Austrian-born American composer and orchestrator. Raised in Vienna and given an early musical education, he continued his studies in Moscow, at first as a prisoner of war during World War I, before settling in the US in 1924. He studied composing and conducting at the Vienna Conservatory, before fighting in the First World War. He was taken prisoner by Russian forces, but was allowed to continue his musical studies, and he conducted a prisoners’ orchestra. At Chappell, he shared an office with Robert Russell Bennett, with whom he collaborated on dozens of shows. Among the shows from the 1920s on which Spialek worked are Rosalie (1928), The New Moon (1928) and Fifty Million Frenchmen (1929). His many shows from the 1930s include The New Yorkers (1930), Gay Divorce (1932), Anything Goes (1934), On Your Toes (1936), Babes in Arms (1937), I Married an Angel (1938) and The Boys from Syracuse (1938). His 1940s shows include Pal Joey (1940), Panama Hattie (1940), Something for the Boys (1943), Are You with It? (1945), and Where’s Charley? (1948). an orchestral Sinfonietta (1936); and Manhattan Watercolors (“An Orchestral Entertainme

Harl McDonald

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Harl McDonald (July 27, 1899 – March 30, 1955) was an American composer, conductor, pianist and teacher. McDonald was born in Boulder, Colorado, and studied at the University of California, Berkeley, the University of Redlands, and the Leipzig Conservatory. He was appointed a lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania in 1927 and enjoyed other appointments at the University including the Director of the Music Department and Director of the University’s Choral Society and the University of Pennsylvania Glee Club. Among his students there was Ann Wyeth McCoy. In addition to his administrative duties with the University, McDonald composed numerous musical works and served on the board of directors of the Philadelphia Orchestra Association. Performances were given at Constitution Hall in Washington D.C., Baltimore, and the Academy of Music in Philadelphia. His other works include a concerto for two pianos, two piano trios, and choral music. His 1938 Lament for the Stolen, for women’s chorus and orchestra, was written in commemoration of the Lindbergh kidnapping. External links * Guide to the Harl McDonald Recordings, 1937 - 1944 at the University of Pennsylvania * Grove Music Online *"

Harley Gaber

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Harley Gaber (June 5, 1943 – June 16, 2011) was a visual artist and composer known for his minimalist and spectral approaches to time and sound. With his emphasis on quiet sustained sonorities and textures, Gaber is counted among the early American minimalist composers, and considered to be a forerunner of drone and spectralism. His best known recorded composition, The Winds Rise in the North, has been called by musician Keith Fullerton Whitman “one of the holy grails of minimalism in music in the 20th century.” In 1978, he stopped composing, moved from New York City to San Diego, California, and began creating photo-collages, mixed media collages, paintings, and pen-and-ink works he called graphic music. However, in 1993 he started work on Die Plage (The Plague), an art-historical narrative of Germany from the Weimar Republic to the end of World War II, completing it in 2002. It grew to become a massive work of approximately 4,200 photomontaged canvases measuring 16 by 20 . In the final three years of his life Gaber composed two works: I Saw My Mother Ascending Mt Fuji and In Memoriam 2010. The album of his last work was released two weeks before Gaber committed suicide in June 20

Harold Boatrite

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Harold Boatrite (April 2, 1932 – April 26, 2021) was an American composer. After early studies with Stanley Hollingsworth, Harold Boatrite was awarded a fellowship to the Tanglewood Music Center where he studied composition with Lukas Foss and took part in the orchestration seminars of Aaron Copland. In 1961 he was invited by Rudolf Serkin to be composer-in-residence at the Marlboro Music Festival. He received an honorary doctorate in 1967 from the Combs College of Music and was subsequently appointed to the faculty of Haverford College, where he taught theory and composition until 1980. During that time ( 1974 to 1977 ) he served on the music panel of Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. In honor of his fiftieth birthday in 1982, a series of concerts devoted exclusively to his music were presented by the Pennsylvania Alliance for American Music. Among the participants in the series were the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, the Thomas Jefferson University Choir and the Mendelssohn Club of Philadelphia. Boatrite has written in a wide variety of media ranging from solo and chamber pieces to large-scale choral and orchestral works. His music has been heard throughout the United States

Harold Budd

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Harold Montgomory Budd (May 24, 1936 – December 8, 2020) was an American composer and poet. Born in Los Angeles and raised in the Mojave Desert, he became a respected composer in the minimal music and avant-garde scene of Southern California in the late 1960s, and later became better known for his work with figures such as Brian Eno and Robin Guthrie. Budd developed what he called a “soft pedal” technique for playing piano, with use of slow playing and prominent sustain. Early life Budd was born on May 24, 1936, in Los Angeles, California, and grew up in Victorville, on the southwestern edge of the Mojave Desert. Jazz saxophonist Albert Ayler was drafted at the same time and was also a member of the band. Budd’s experience of the Army made him determined to get an education. He switched to a course in harmony and renaissance counterpoint and his musical talent was spotted by a teacher who encouraged him to compose. Budd studied music at California State University, Northridge, under Gerald Strang (a protégé of Arnold Schoenberg) and Aurelio de la Vega. He graduated from California State University, Northridge, and then went on full scholarship to the University of Southern California,

Harold L. Walters

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Harold Laurence Walters (September 29, 1918 — October 22, 1984) was an American composer. He also used the pseudonym Fred L. Frank. Walters began taking music lessons and playing cornet at the age of eight. During his five years as a tuba player and arranger with the US Navy Band, he completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Cincinnati’s College Conservatory of Music (CCM) in Cincinnati, Ohio, under Nadia Boulanger. Walters also studied at the American University in Washington, D.C. and at the Washington College of Music, where he received his doctorate in 1943. Walters later worked as a conductor and composer in Washington and New York City for theaters, film and various orchestras; including the well-known orchestra of Sigmund Romberg. After 1947, he was associated with the music publisher Rubank, Inc. as a composer, arranger, and editor. Walters’ work includes around 1,500 compositions and arrangements as well as books on instrumental instruction. Walters conducted wind bands and orchestras all over the world. " T he smallest," he recalled, “was a 9-piece circus band and the largest was the 12,800-piece massed band at the University of Michigan.” He died on Octobe

Harold Meltzer

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Harold Meltzer (June 8, 1966 – August 12, 2024) was an American composer. Meltzer was inspired by a wide variety of stimuli, from architectural spaces to postmodern fairy tales and messages inscribed in fortune cookies. In Fanfare Magazine, Robert Carl commented that he “seems to write pieces of scrupulous craft and exceptional freshness, which makes each seem like an important contribution.” The first recording devoted to his music, released in 2010 by Naxos on its American Classics label, was named one of the CDs of the year in The New York Times and in Fanfare; new all-Meltzer recordings issued from Open G Records (2017), Bridge Records (2018), and BMOP/Sound (2019). A Pulitzer Prize Finalist in 2009 for his sextet Brion, Meltzer has been awarded the Rome Prize, the Barlow Prize; a Guggenheim Fellowship, and both the Arts and Letters Award in Music and the Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Among his late works are Vision Machine (2016), commissioned by NewMusicUSA for the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra; Bride of the Island (2016), a song cycle to poems of Ted Hughes commissioned by the Minnesota Commissioning Club for tenor Paul Appleby and pianis

Harold Morris (composer)

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Harold Cecil Morris (March 17, 1890 – May 6, 1964) was an American pianist, composer and educator. Morris was born in San Antonio, Texas. He graduated from the University of Texas in 1910 and received his master’s degree from the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music in 1922. He married Cosby Dansby, August 20, 1914; the couple had one daughter. Morris moved from his native San Antonio, Texas to New York in 1916. Performances and compositions Morris toured extensively as a recitalist and soloist and his compositions were performed frequently during his lifetime. He made his New York concert debut in recital in January 1921 at Aeolian Hall, with a program of Brahms, Busoni, Chopin, Godowsky, Cyril Scott and Charles Tomlinson Griffes. On November 21, 1931, Morris was the piano soloist for a performance of his Piano Concerto with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. Morris’ composition, Poem was performed by violinist and conductor Eugène Ysaÿe in Cincinnati, Ohio with the Cincinnati Orchestra on November 29, 1918. Violinist Josef Stransky performed the work at Carnegie Hall with the Philadelphia Orchestra three months later. Morris’ Violin Concerto received its world premiere o

Harold Shapero

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Harold Samuel Shapero (April 29, 1920 – May 17, 2013) was an American composer. Early years Shapero was born in Lynn, Massachusetts, on April 29, 1920. He and his family later moved to nearby Newton. He learned to play the piano as a child, and for some years was a pianist in dance orchestras. With a friend, he founded the Hal Kenny Orchestra, a swing-era jazz band. He was more interested in classical music. In his teens some of his teachers included Nicolas Slonimsky (editor of Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of Musicians) in 1936 and Ernst Krenek in 1937. At 18 he entered Harvard, where he became friends with Leonard Bernstein and studied composition with Walter Piston in 1938. Shapero was one of the first students at Tanglewood following its founding in the 1940s. When Igor Stravinsky was Norton Professor at Harvard in 1940, Shapero showed Stravinsky his Nine-Minute Overture. Shapero hoped to get the Overture played at Tanglewood that summer, but Hindemith ordered that no student compositions would be played that season. Aaron Copland hastily put together an orchestra to play student compositions, including Shapero’s Overture. Shapero was awarded the Rome Prize in 1941 for his N

Harold Van Heuvelen

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Harold John Van Heuvelen (March 30, 1919 – April 26, 2017) was an American composer and musician known principally for his Symphony No. 1 (opus 7), which was composed during World War II and which premiered 67 years later in 2012. Personal life Van Heuvelen was raised in Huron, South Dakota, the son of Carrie Catherine and Berend Van Heuvelen. Harold Van Heuvelen graduated from Huron High School. He spent a year at Huron College, before enrolling at Hope College in Holland, Michigan, graduating in 1940 with a degree in music. He also received a master’s degree in violin performance from the University of Michigan. After the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, Van Heuvelen enlisted in the United States Army and served as a recruiter during World War II, eventually rising to the rank of colonel. He spent a further 33 years as an Army reservist. Around 1943, he married Fran Van Heuvelen and later became a music teacher in the Bismarck, North Dakota public schools from 1946 to 1948. In 2007, after the deaths of their respective spouses, Harold married Alma Van Heuvelen (née Viswat), whom he had met while they were both students at Hope College decades before. Music As a teenager, Van Heuvelen

Harold Vincent Milligan

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Harold Vincent Milligan was an American professional musician and musical writer. He is best known for his biography about the life of Stephen Foster. Early life His first public performance was at the age of 12. At 17 he was the organist for Calvary Presbyterian Church in Portland and a Portland synagogue. Milligan is best known for his biography of the 19th century composer and lyricist Stephen Foster. He spent much effort in collecting and editing undiscovered American songs from the 18th-century. Most of these newly discovered music manuscripts were written by Francis Hopkinson. Milligan wrote the first biography of Stephen Foster in (1920). He was very much involved with the opera during his lifetime. He was a commentator and associate director for the Metropolitan Opera radio programs. He was a lecturer on opera for Columbia University. He also worked for the Diapason and The New Music Review as their music critic. He contributed content for the American Organist and the Woman’s Home Companion. He was knowledgeable on other topics related to music of the times. He wrote “Stories of Famous Operas in 1950. Milligan was the editor of “The Best Known Hymns and Prayers of the Amer

Harriet Bolz

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Harriet Seymour Hallock Bolz (November 24, 1909 – March 9, 1995) was an American composer based in Ohio. Early life and education Harriet Seymour Hallock was born in Columbus, Ohio, the daughter of Roscoe Scott Hallock and Anna Druzilla Griffith Hallock. Both of her parents were also born in Ohio. Her father was a physician. She graduated from the Cleveland Institute of Music, and earned a bachelor’s degree from Case Western Reserve University. She completed a master’s degree in composition at Ohio State University. She studied with Paul Creston and Leo Sowerby. In 1965 she was recognized by the National Federation of Music Clubs (NFMC) as winner of an adult non-professional composition competition. A piano quartet by Bolz had its premiere performance at an NFMC convention in 1983. and a 1986 harp recital at the University of Iowa. After a 1985 concert at Georgia State University, a reviewer described her Floret, a short piece for piano, as “witty, brilliantly pianistic.” She attended a 1992 concert at the Lancaster Festival composers’ symposium, saying “I’m always happy to have things performed. That’s how you learn.” Since her death, works by Bolz continue to appear on concert pr

Harriet Padberg

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Harriet Padberg, RSCJ was an American mathematician, composer, music therapist, and Catholic religious sister. She was a pioneer in the music therapy field, and also held significant contributions in the field of computer-composed music. Padberg wrote Computer-Composed Canon and Free Fugue as part of her 1964 dissertation in Mathematics and Music at Saint Louis University. She was a professor for over 35 years, before retiring in her mid-70’s and working as a music therapist. Education and Vocation Padberg attended the Academy of the Sacred Heart in St. Louis, Missouri, and was awarded a scholarship to Maryville College, now Maryville University, where she graduated in 1943 with a Bachelor of Arts in Math and Music. Soon after, she joined the Society of the Sacred Heart, serving briefly at Schools of the Sacred Heart around the nation, including Grand Coteau, Louisiana. In 1948 she returned to serve at the Academy of the Sacred Heart of St. Charles, while simultaneously earning her master’s degree in Music and Organ from the College Conservatory of Music, in 1949. Padberg made her final profession in 1951, becoming a professed Sister of the Sacred Heart. In 1951, Padberg returned t

Harriet Ware (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Harriet Ware (August 26, 1877 – February 9, 1962) was an American composer, pianist, and music educator. Early life Harriet Ware was born in Waupun, Wisconsin, the daughter of Silas Edward Ware and Emily Sperry Ware. She showed musical promise from an early age, and graduated from Pillsbury Conservatory of Music in 1895, with further studies in Paris and Berlin. Career Harriet Ware composed songs, choral works, piano pieces, and at least one opera, Undine. Her “Hindu Slumber Song” (1909) and Call of Râdha (1909) were settings of poems by Sarojini Naidu. She also wrote settings of poems by Thomas Moore, Edwin Markham, Cale Young Rice, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Richard Lovelace, Bayard Taylor, Joyce Kilmer, and Marie Van Vorst. She also wrote musical plays, The Morning Glory and The Varying Shore, both with Zoë Akins. Her “Women’s Triumphal March” was the official song of the General Federation of Women’s Clubs in 1929, and her setting of Daniel A. Poling’s poem “The Rose is Red” was the song of the American Mothers Association. Harriet Ware’s works were especially popular in programs of American song, or in programs focused on women composers. Harriet Ware saw the importance of wo

Harry Archer (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Harry Archer (February 21, 1888 – April 23, 1960) was an American composer and orchestra leader. He is best remembered for six Broadway shows from the 2nd and 3rd decades of the 20th-century, but also made several popular recordings in the 1920s for Brunswick Records. Biography Harry Archer was born as Harry Auracher on February 21, 1888 in Creston, Iowa. He received his high-school education at Michigan Military Academy, Archer’s compositions had appeared in plays as early as 1911, This show was a huge success, and was not only staged on Broadway but also as far afield as Germany and Hungary. The breakout song was “I Love You”, which was the biggest hit of Archer’s career. Often the same recording would be used on both labels, but a pseudonym of The Vanderbilt Orchestra was used on the Vocalion label. In 1926 his recording of “Sweet and Low-Down” (Brunswick 3096) is listed at #10. “When Day Is Done” (Brunswick 3399) from 1927 is listed at #14. His last recording session took place on January 23, 1928, but a final #20 hit from March, 1928 “Thinking of You” (Brunswick 3704) was to follow. Shows *1912 – Pearl Maiden *1919 – Love for Sale *1921 – Peek-a-boo *1922 – Paradise Alley *192

Harry Burleigh

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Harry Burleigh (born Henry Thacker Burleigh, December 2, 1866 – September 12, 1949) was an American classical composer, arranger, and professional singer known for his baritone voice. The first black composer who was instrumental in developing characteristically American music, Burleigh made black music available to classically trained artists both by introducing them to spirituals and by arranging spirituals in a more classical form. Burleigh also introduced Antonín Dvořák to Black American music, which influenced some of Dvořák’s most famous compositions and led him to say that Black music would be the basis of an American classical music. Early and family life Henry “Harry” Thacker Burleigh was born in Erie, Pennsylvania, in 1866 to Elizabeth Burleigh and Henry Thacker. Burleigh’s maternal grandfather, Hamilton Waters, was granted manumission from slavery in Somerset County, Maryland, after paying $55 ($50 for him and $5 for his mother) in 1832 and receiving a certificate of freedom in 1835. They traveled to Ithaca, New York, where two of Waters’s half-brothers lived. After his mother died, Waters married Lucinda Duncanson. Their first child, Elizabeth Lovey Waters (who would be

Harry Partch

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Harry Partch (June 24, 1901 – September 3, 1974) was an American composer, music theorist, and creator of unique musical instruments. He composed using scales of unequal intervals in just intonation, and was one of the first 20th-century composers in the West to work systematically with microtonal scales, alongside Lou Harrison. He built his own instruments in these tunings on which to play his compositions, and described the method behind his theory and practice in his book Genesis of a Music (1947). Partch composed with scales dividing the octave into 43 unequal tones derived from the natural harmonic series; these scales allowed for more tones of smaller intervals than in standard Western tuning, which uses twelve equal intervals to the octave. To play his music, Partch built many unique instruments, with such names as the Chromelodeon, the Quadrangularis Reversum, and the Zymo-Xyl. Partch described his music as “corporeal” (emphasizing its physical/visceral elements), and distinguished it from abstract music, which he perceived as the dominant trend in Western music since the time of J.S. Bach, whose seminal book of preludes and fugues called The Well-tempered Clavier (in Germa

Harry Rowe Shelley

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Harry Rowe Shelley (June 8, 1858 – September 12, 1947) was an American composer, organist (church and concert), and professor of music. Born in New Haven, Connecticut, Shelley studied with Gustave J. Stoeckel at Yale College, Dudley Buck, Max (Wilhelm Carl) Vogrich, and Antonín Dvořák in New York, and completed his musical education in London and Paris. According to his New York Times obituary, Shelley “penned church music that won him wide popularity. For 60 years a host of English-speaking peoples throughout the world sang his hymns.” Shelley attended Hopkins Grammar School in New Haven, Connecticut, and at fourteen played the organ at Center Church on the Green in New Haven. Although he entered Yale, he did not complete his freshman year. Shelley was organist at the Church of the Pilgrims during the ministry of Henry Ward Beecher and played at his funeral. Shelley died at age 89 in Short Beach, Connecticut. Shelley taught at the American Institute of Applied Music, where his students included composers Mabel Madison Watson and Gertrude Hoag Wilson, among others. Positions held * 1878–1881 – Organist, Church of the Pilgrims, Brooklyn * 1881–1887 – Organist, Plymouth Church (same)

Harvey B. Dodworth

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Harvey B. Dodworth (November 16, 1822 – January 24, 1891) was a bandmaster and conductor of the 13th Regiment Band as well as the Dodworth Band, and was the first person in the United States to arrange Richard Wagner’s music for military bands. He conducted with a band of sixty musicians in between salutes and boxing matches, as well as opening in Madison Square Garden, in which he had plans to lease in 1879 to turn it into a “music garden”, where he would conduct a 123-piece band. Dodworth’s band also had free weekly concerts in Central Park, which drew large crowds. Formative years He was born in Sheffield, England, and played the piccolo at the age of ten in the New York Park Theater. He played for 51 years in his father’s band until October 1890. Music compositions created *“Captain Ellis’ artillery quick step.” New York, New York: Firth & Hall, 1846. *“Friendship’s offering.” New York, New York: Firth, Hall, and Pond, 1846. *“Santa Clause quadrilles.” New York, New York: Firth, Hall, and Pond, 1846. *The woodbine." New York, New York: Firth, Hall, and Pond, 1847. *“The Mercer House medley.” New York, New York: Wm. Hall and Son, 1848. *“Diligent Hose Co. quick step.” New York,

Harvey J. Stokes

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Harvey J. Stokes (born 1957) is an American composer and oboist. As of 2020, he is Professor of Music at Hampton University in Hampton, Virginia, where he founded and directs a Computer Music Laboratory. Stokes earned his PhD from Michigan State University, where he studied with Jere Hutcheson and Charles Ruggerio, his MM from the University of Georgia, and his BM from East Carolina University. His previous teaching appointments include Miami University, Christopher Newport University, and the College of William and Mary. Stokes is a highly-prolific composer, whose output includes 11 piano sonatas, 8 string quartets, at least 4 symphonies, and many other works for ensembles large and small. His style could be described as neoclassical, with tonal centers and a focus on polyphony. His work has been programmed by numerous prominent organizations, including the Richmond Symphony, the Lancaster Symphony, the Virginia Beach Symphony, the Oxford String Quartet, and the New England Conservatory Contemporary Ensemble. A respected educator, Stokes received the 2017-18 Edward L. Hamm Sr. Distinguished Teaching Award at Hampton University, and has been a consultant for The College Board, the

Harvey Sollberger

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Harvey Sollberger (born May 11, 1938 in Cedar Rapids, Iowa) is an American composer, flutist, and conductor specializing in contemporary classical music. Life Sollberger holds an M.A. degree from Columbia University, where his composition instructors included Jack Beeson and Otto Luening. In 1962 he co-founded (with Charles Wuorinen) The Group for Contemporary Music in New York City, which he directed for 27 years. He is emeritus professor of music at the University of California, San Diego. He taught at Columbia University, the Manhattan School of Music, and Indiana University. From 1997 to 2005, he served as music director of the La Jolla Symphony and Chorus. Sollberger has established a distinguished career in composition, earning two Guggenheim Fellowships and an award from the National Institute of Arts and Letters. His work has been commissioned by a wide range of institutions, including the San Francisco Symphony, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Koussevitzky Foundation, and the New York State Council for the Arts. His music has been released on Composers Recordings, Inc. He currently lives in Strawberry Point, Iowa. Awards * 1969 Guggenheim Fellowship * Fromm commis

Héctor Campos Parsi

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Héctor Campos Parsi (October 1, 1922 – January 30, 1998) was a Puerto Rican composer. He studied at the New England Conservatory with Francis Judd Cooke, he also studied with Paul Hindemith. In Tanglewood he studied with Olivier Messiaen and Aaron Copland and in France with Nadia Boulanger. Early years Héctor Campos Parsi was born in Ponce, Puerto Rico. His father was José Miguel Campos and his mother was Elisa Parsi Bernard. He only had one sibling, a sister, Mercedes Campos Parsi. He graduated from the University of Puerto Rico with a bachelor’s degree in humanities. He then enrolled at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México pursuing a degree in medicine, but discontinued his training there for health reasons. Subsequently, he completed a master’s degree in humanities at the “Centro de Estudios Superiores de Puerto Rico y el Caribe”, for which he wrote a thesis titled Unos bailan y otros lloran (Some dance and others cry). Musical training In Mexico City he met composer Carlos Chávez. On a scholarship from the Puerto Rico Department of Public Instruction, Campos Parsi studied at the New England Conservatory in Boston. During the summers of 1949 and 1950 he trained with vario

Heinrich Schalit

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Heinrich Schalit (January 2, 1886 – February 3, 1976) was an Austrian-American, Jewish composer and musician; best known for his sacred music, art songs, and chamber music. Along with other Jewish composers such as Isadore Freed, Hugo Chaim Adler and Abraham Binder, Schalit modernized Jewish sacred music in the first half of the 20th century. His most popular work is Freitagabend-Liturgie (Friday Evening Liturgy). Life and career Education Heinrich Schalit was born in Vienna, Austria on January 2, 1886 to Joseph Schalit and Josefine Fischer. He had four siblings, including first secretary of the Zionist Office, Isidor Schalit. Schalit began his musical education and career without any connection or influence to Jewish music. He studied organ, piano and composition privately in 1898 with Josef Labor; and in 1903 he began studying at the Conservatory of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna. His teachers included Polish pianist Theodor Leschetizky and composer Robert Fuchs. In 1906, he graduated and received the Austrian State Prize for Students of Composition for his Piano Quartet in E minor. Schalit moved to Munich in 1907, where he worked as a private music teacher and composed nume

Heinz Roemheld

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Heinz Roemheld (May 1, 1901 – February 11, 1985) was an American composer. Early life and career Born Heinz Eric Roemheld in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, he was one of four children of German immigrant Heinrich Roemheld and his wife Fanny Rauterberg Roemheld. Heinrich was a pharmacist, but all the members of the family were musical. His brother Edgar Roemheld (1898–1964) became a conductor. His sister Irmgard Roemheld (1904–1995) became a well-known Milwaukee music teacher and radio broadcaster. Roemheld was a child prodigy who began playing the piano at four. He graduated from the Milwaukee College of Music at 19 and performed in theaters to earn money to study piano in Europe. In 1920, he went to Berlin, where he studied with Hugo Kaun, Ferruccio Busoni, and Egon Petri. While there, he appeared in concert with the Berlin Philharmonic. When he returned to America, Roemheld became involved in music for silent movies, both as a pianist and conductor. In 1925, he was sent back to Berlin as head of Universal Pictures theaters there but had to leave in 1929 due to the rise of Nazism. Back in America, Roemheld moved to Los Angeles and became a prominent cinema composer. He scored some scenes i

Helen Eugenia Hagan

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Helen Eugenia Hagan (January 10, 1891 – March 6, 1964) was an American composer, pianist and music educator of African descent. Life Helen Eugenia Hagan was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, the daughter of John A. and Mary Estella Neal Hagan. She studied piano with her mother and then in the public schools of New Haven, Connecticut. Around the age of nine, she began playing organ for the Dixwell Avenue Congregational United Church in New Haven. She studied at Yale School of Music with pianist H Stanley Knight and composer Horatio Parker, graduating in 1912 with a bachelor’s degree in music. In doing so, she became the first known African American woman to earn a Yale degree. She performed as soloist on her own Piano Concerto in C Minor in May 1912 with the New Haven Symphony Orchestra conducted by Parker. She received the Samuel Simmons Stanford scholarship to study in Paris, with Blanche Selva and Vincent d’Indy, and graduated from Schola Cantorum in 1914. and Wheeling (WV) in May. In February 1916 she performed in St. Joseph (MO). A 1917 Tulsa newspaper article publicizing her 12 February appearance there excerpted Hagen’s recent reviews from Chicago, Quincy (IL), Dallas, Mobil

Helen Hopekirk

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Helen Hopekirk (20 May 1856 – 19 November 1945) was a Scottish-born American pianist and composer, who after the age of 40, lived and worked in Boston, Massachusetts. Life and career Helen Hopekirk was born in Portobello, Edinburgh in Scotland, a daughter of music shop owners Adam and Helen (née Croall) Hopekirk. She studied music with George Lichtenstein and Scottish composer Alexander Mackenzie, and made her debut as a soloist in 1874 with the Edinburgh Amateur Orchestral Society. After other successful performances and the death of her father, she relocated to study composition with Carl Reinecke in Leipzig. After successful debuts in Leipzig and London, she began regular concert tours of Europe. In 1882 Hopekirk married Edinburgh merchant and music critic William A. Wilson (d. 1926), who began serving as her manager. She made her American debut in 1883 with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and commenced concert tours in the United States. She planned to continue her studies with Franz Liszt, but after his death studied instead with Theodor Leschetizky in Vienna and Czech composer Karel Navrátil in Prague. She and her husband lived in Vienna until 1892, and then moved to Paris, whe

Helen May Butler

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Helen May Butler (1867–1957) was an American bandleader and composer who has been called “The female Sousa”. Leading an all-women’s band from 1898 to 1912, she had an extremely successful career at a time when women were discouraged from such public activities. She died on June 16, 1957, in Covington. External Links * Cosmopolitan America March for band

Helen Taylor (composer)

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Helen Taylor Johannesen (August 24, 1915—October 5, 1950) was an American composer. Biography Helen Taylor, who died in 1950, was a Juilliard-trained composer and the wife of pianist Grant Johannesen. Taylor grew up in Salt Lake City. She studied piano at the McCune School of Music. She received her BM from the University of Utah in 1937, her MM from Columbia Teachers College in 1941, and her degree in composition from Juilliard in 1945, where she completed a three-movement symphony. She worked at the Martha Graham Dance Company as a composition pianist and worked with Aaron Copland on “Appalachian Spring.” In this role, she honed her skills as an improviser. In 1948, her violin sonata was recognized with a National Association of Composers and Conductors Award. Helen Taylor Johannesen Scholarship Taylor’s sister, Beverly Sorensen, established the Helen Taylor Johannesen Memorial Endowed Scholarship at Brigham Young University. The scholarship supports a music composition major by paying for their tuition and lesson fees. References External links * Utah International Music Academy & Helen Taylor Johannesen Piano Competition, University of Utah.

Helena Stone Torgerson

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Helena Stone Torgerson (1878 – September 9, 1941) was an American harpist and composer of harp music, based in Chicago. Early life Helena Stone was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, the daughter of Frank A. Stone and India E. Colestock Stone. Her father was a manufacturer. Career Helena Stone played harp at public events from her teenaged years. In 1899 she replaced Edmund Schuecker as harpist of the Bruno Steindel Concert Company. She was listed among the best-known women harpists in the United States in 1908, and in 1926 Torgerson was described as “Chicago’s best woman harpist.” Torgerson performed as a solo harpist and in ensemble, and sometimes played her own compositions. She also gave talks about harp music and the history of the instrument. She had a custom-made concert harp, “built on larger scale than is commonly used”, for “bigness and resonance of the tone”. “Mrs. Torgerson plays the harp in an altogether superior way,” commented one writer in 1913, adding that “besides possessing transcendent technic for the instrument, she is a thorough musician and has abundant good taste in interpretation.” Torgerson also taught harp and composed harp music. She studied composition wit

Helmut Calabrese

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Helmut Christoferus Calabrese (born 1957) is a German-born composer and poet who immigrated to the U.S. in 1962. He trained at the Philadelphia College of Performing Arts and at New York University and is one of the founders of the music publishers Calabrese Brothers Music, LLC. His song, “The Most Beautiful Lady in the World: Statue of Liberty Anthem”, was the subject of two bills in the New Jersey Legislature and the United States House of Representatives calling on the United States Congress to designate it as the official anthem of the Statue of Liberty. The Philadelphia Inquirer said of it: “The music sounds like a love ballad, but the lyrics are a flag waving salute to America”. Compositions Instrumental music * Seeking for Solo Drumset, 2009, dedicated to Peter Jarvis, 5 minutes duration * Time for Solo Clarinet in B flat, 2008, 8 minutes in duration * Mudgrave for Marimba and Vibraphone, 2007, dedicated to Peter Jarvis, 5 minutes in duration * Love’s Tango for Orchestra, 2007, 3 minutes in duration * Tears of Love for Orchestra, 2007, 3 minutes in duration * A Little Night Music for Solo Timpani, 2005, dedicated to Peter Jarvis, 10 minutes duration * There Is Love for Solo

Henning Lohner

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Henning Lohner (born 17 July 1961) is a German-American composer and filmmaker. He is best known for his film scores written as a long-standing member of Hans Zimmer’s music cooperative Remote Control Productions. Lohner has written scores to various international films, among them The Ring Two and Incident at Loch Ness. Additionally, he has authored documentaries and art films, and has gained international recognition as creator of the Active Images media art projects. Background and education Born to German emigrant parents, Henning Lohner was raised near Palo Alto, California, where his father Edgar Lohner taught Comparative Literature at Stanford University and his mother Marlene Lohner taught German Literature. Lohner has one brother, Peter, who is a lawyer turned writer-producer for film and television. Lohner returned to Germany to study musicology, art history, and Romanic languages at Frankfurt University, from which he graduated as Master of Arts in 1987. In 1982, he took a year at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, studying Jazz Improvisation with Gary Burton and Film Scoring with Jerry Goldsmith and David Raksin. In 1985, Lohner was awarded a grant for music compos

Henriette Blanke-Belcher

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Henriette Blanke-Belcher (February 16, 1882 – March 1958), also known as Henrietta Blanke-Belcher and later as Henriette B. Melson, was an American composer of popular music, especially waltzes and ragtime tunes. Early life Henriette Berger Blanke was born in Kansas City, Missouri, the eldest of four daughters of Max Blanke and Dora Berger Blanke. Her father was an immigrant from Romania; her mother was from New York City. Henriette was raised in Chicago, and Detroit; her father died in the latter city when she was a teenager. Career Henriette Blanke worked for Whitney-Warner Publishing Company and Jerome H. Remick, music publishing companies in Detroit. They published many of her compositions. She performed in vaudeville in 1909, and a number of recordings of her compositions were made between 1905 and 1926. “I want to become known as a waltz writer exclusively,” she said in 1902, but she also wrote ballads and novelty songs. Compositions by Blanke-Belcher included “Lazarre Waltzes” (1901), “Francezka Waltzes” (1902, named for the novel by Molly Eliot Seawell), “Hearts Courageous: Waltzes” (1902), “Cubanola: A Spanish Love Serenade” (1902), “Hearts’ Haven Waltzes” (1905), “When th

Henry Brant

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Henry Dreyfuss Brant (September 15, 1913 – April 26, 2008) was a Canadian-born American composer. An expert orchestrator with a flair for experimentation, many of Brant’s works featured spatialization techniques. Biography Brant was born in Montreal, to American parents (his father was a violinist), in 1913. Something of a child prodigy, he began composing at the age of eight, and studied first at the McGill Conservatorium (1926–29) and then in New York City (1929–34). He played violin, flute, tin whistle, piano, organ, and percussion at a professional level and was fluent with the playing techniques for all of the standard orchestral instruments. As a 19-year-old, Brant was the youngest composer included in Henry Cowell’s landmark book from 1933, American Composers on American Music; and Cowell realized that Brant had already demonstrated an early identification with the American experimental musical tradition. He was represented in Cowell’s anthology by an essay on oblique harmony, an idea which presaged some of the techniques used in his mature spatial compositions. Thereafter Brant composed, orchestrated, and conducted for radio, film, ballet, and jazz groups. The stylistic div

Henry Christian Timm

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Henry Christian Timm (July 11, 1811 – September 5, 1895) was a German-born American pianist, conductor, and composer. Biography Timm was born in Hamburg. He worked in New York City as a concert pianist, teacher, organist, and chamber musician. He also helped conduct the New York Philharmonic and served as the president of the city’s Philharmonic Society from 1847 to 1864. He composed a Great Mass and many part songs, besides transcribing the works of other composers into versions for two pianos. He died in New York. References

Henry Clay Work

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Henry Clay Work (October 1, 1832, Middletown – June 8, 1884, Hartford) was an American songwriter and composer. He is best remembered for his musical contributions to the Union in the Civil War—songs documenting the afflictions of slavery, the hardships of army life, and Northern triumphs in the conflict. Besides patriotic pieces, he composed sentimental ballads, some of which promoted the growing temperance movement. Many of Work’s compositions were performed at minstrel shows and Civil War veteran reunions. Although largely forgotten nowadays, he was one of the most successful musicians of his time, comparable to Stephen Foster and George F. Root in sales and sheer influence. Work’s father, Alanson, was an abolitionist who strove to free fugitive slaves. While a youth, Henry initiated a career in printing, one that lasted his entire life. Although lacking formal music training, his passion for song manifested itself early on as he wrote poems for newspapers. Work first published a complete musical piece in 1853, whose moderate success drove him to pursue songwriting further. His career came of age at the Civil War’s outbreak; Work collaborated with the Chicagoan publishing firm R

Henry Cowell

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Henry Dixon Cowell (; March 11, 1897 – December 10, 1965) was an American composer, writer, pianist, publisher, and music teacher. Earning a reputation as an extremely controversial performer and eccentric composer, Cowell became a leading figure of American avant-garde music for the first half of the 20th century. His writings and music served as a great influence on composers such as Lou Harrison, George Antheil, and John Cage. He is considered one of the most important and influential composers from the United States. Cowell was mostly self-taught and developed a unique musical language, often blending folk melodies, dissonant counterpoint, unconventional orchestration, and influences from ancient Celtic religion. He was an early proponent and innovator of many modernist compositional techniques and sensibilities, including string piano, prepared piano, tone clusters, and graphic notation. The Tides of Manaunaun, originally a theatrical prelude, is the best-known and most widely-performed of Cowell’s tone cluster pieces for piano. He was married to ethnomusicologist Sidney Robertson Cowell. Early life Childhood Cowell was born on March 11, 1897, in rural Menlo Park, California.

Henry Eichheim

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Henry Eichheim (January 3, 1870 – August 22, 1942) was an American composer, conductor, violinist, organologist, and ethnomusicologist. He is best known as one of the first American composers to combine the sound of indigenous Asian instruments with western orchestral colors. Life He was born in Chicago, where he studied at the Chicago Musical College. He later went to Boston to play with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. After about 1912 he became more interested in conducting and composition than in violin performance; he was an early promoter of the works of contemporary French composers, particularly Debussy, Ravel and Gabriel Fauré, in the United States. Following some trips to east Asia, including Korea, Japan, and China, he began to study the music of those cultures, and as a result began to use both the instruments from east Asia and Indonesia in his compositions, as well as some of the rhythmic and melodic elements of the indigenous music. He moved to Santa Barbara, California in 1922, although he continued to travel widely. On two of his trips–to Bali, and India—he went with Leopold Stokowski, a friend of his. After Eichheim’s death, the University of California, Santa Barba

Henry Fillmore

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Henry Fillmore (December 3, 1881 – December 7, 1956) was an American musician, composer, publisher, and bandleader, best known for his many marches and screamers, a few of which he wrote for the Band of the Hour at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida. Early life and education Fillmore was born in Cincinnati, Ohio as the eldest of five children. In his youth, he mastered piano, guitar, violin, flute, and slide trombone. He kept his trombone activities a secret at first, as his circumspect religious father James Henry Fillmore (1849–1936)—a composer of gospel songs, often in collaboration with Jessie Brown Pounds —believed it an uncouth and sinful instrument. Henry’s mother secretly bought a used trombone for him and obscured from Henry’s father the son’s learning to play the instrument. Fillmore, whose uncle, Frederick A. Fillmore (1856–1925) was also a tune-composer for gospel songs, was a singer for his church choir as a boy. He began composing at 18, with his first published march “Hingham”, named after a line of brass instruments. Fillmore attended the Miami Military Institute in Germantown, Ohio from 1899 to 1901, and then entered the Cincinnati Conservatory of Mus

Henry Gwiazda

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Henry Gwiazda (born 1952, silent i, Polish for star) is a composer who specializes in virtual audio, the simulation of a three-dimensional sound space in either headphones or precisely positioned speakers. He composes what may be called musique concrète, using samples usually without “tinker ing ” with them. Gwiazda is credited with sound effects, sampler, electric guitar and voice. He also composed, published, produced and engineered. Focal Point 3D Audio by Bo Gehring. *“Gwiazda produces ‘animated’ audioscapes, oddly situating twisted and chopped real-sound samples . . . combining elements that don’t have any clear relationship into compositions of surprising unity.” - reviewed in CMJ by Robin Edgerton Douglas Wolk. Gwiazda studied at the Eastman School of Music, and at the Hartt School (University of Hartford), where he was a student of Arnold Franchetti. Recordings The CD , contains the following compositions: # (1990) # (1989) # (1992) # (1990) # (1991), Jeffrey Krieger, electronic cello # (1995), virtual audio-for headphones only, Ann LaBerge, electronic flute # Speaker Placement Instructions # (1994), virtual audio-for speakers only # Un Nuit Dystopia/Hommage Michel Foucault

Henry Holden Huss

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Henry Holden Huss (June 21, 1862 in Newark, New Jersey – September 17, 1953 in New York City) was an American composer, pianist and music teacher. Huss grew up in New York City, the son of German immigrant parents. After studying piano and organ locally with a teacher who had trained at the Leipzig Conservatory, Huss traveled to Munich to study at the Royal Conservatory with Josef Rheinberger. His fellow students at the Royal Music School in Munich included Arthur Whiting and Horatio Parker. After graduating, he returned to the States and embarked on a career as a touring piano virtuoso. As a composer, he was regarded as one of the best of his generation by those who counted, but it was at a time when American composers could rarely get a hearing for their works. An exhaustive study of Huss’ life and music, with a complete catalog of compositions, has been published: Henry Holden Huss: An American Composer’s Life, by Gary A. Greene (1995, Scarecrow Press (Metuchen NJ and London)), . His niece was philosopher Helen Huss Parkhurst. Works His 1886 Piano Trio in D minor, Op. 23, subtitled “The Munich” and dedicated to Rheinberger, was premiered with considerable acclaim and a number of

Henry Kimball Hadley

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Henry Kimball Hadley (20 December 1871 – 6 September 1937) was an American composer and conductor. Early life Hadley was born in Somerville, Massachusetts, to a musical family. His father, from whom he received his first musical instruction in violin and piano, was a secondary school music teacher, his mother was active in church music, and his brother Arthur went on to a successful career as a professional cellist. In the Hadley home, the two brothers played string quartets with their father on viola and the composer Henry F. Gilbert on second violin. Hadley also studied harmony with his father and with Stephen A. Emery, and, from the age of fourteen, he studied composition with the prominent American composer George Whitefield Chadwick. Under Chadwick’s tutelage, Hadley composed many works, including songs, chamber music, a musical, and an orchestral overture. In 1893, Hadley toured with the Laura Schirmer-Mapleson Opera Company as a violinist. But he left the tour when the company encountered financial difficulties and was unable to pay his salary. In 1894, he travelled to Vienna to further his studies with Eusebius Mandyczewski. During this period Hadley also befriended the Ger

Henry Mancini

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Henry Mancini ( ; born Enrico Nicola Mancini; April 16, 1924 – June 14, 1994) he won four Academy Awards, a Golden Globe, and twenty Grammy Awards, plus a posthumous Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1995. His best-known works include the theme and soundtrack for the television series Peter Gunn, as well as the music for The Pink Panther film series (“The Pink Panther Theme”) and the song “Moon River” from Breakfast at Tiffany’s. The Music from Peter Gunn won the inaugural Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 1958. “Moon River” and the title song from Days of Wine and Roses, both cowritten with lyricist Johnny Mercer, won the Grammy Awards for both Record of the Year and Song of the Year in 1961 and 1963 respectively. Mancini enjoyed a long collaboration in composing for film director Blake Edwards. Mancini also scored a No. 1 single on the Hot 100 in 1969 with his arrangement and recording of the “Love Theme from Romeo and Juliet”. Early life Henry Mancini was born Enrico Nicola Mancini in Cleveland, Ohio, and raised in West Aliquippa, Pennsylvania. Both his parents were Italian immigrants. Originally from Scanno, Abruzzo, his father Quintiliano “Quinto” Mancini was a laborer

Henry Schoenefeld

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Henry Schoenefeld, also spelled Henry Schoenfeld (October 4, 1857 in Milwaukee – August 4, 1936 in Los Angeles) was an American composer. Schoenfeld studied in the German Empire at the Weimar Conservatory. He moved to Chicago in 1879, when he began conducting Germania Männerchor that year and a mixed choir there from 1891 to 1902. In 1904, he again became a choir master and conducted the Woman’s Symphony Orchestra in Los Angeles. His compositions included two operas, a Rural Symphony, a suite on Indian themes for strings, and two Indian legends, as well as numerous pieces for piano. Schoenfeld taught at UCLA and many of his students, such as Roy Harris, went on to have successful careers. His son was the harpsichordist George Schoenefeld. References

Henry Sullivan (composer)

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Henry Anthony Sullivan (1895–1975) was a composer, songwriter, and pianist. Early life He attended the Worcester Academy and Dartmouth College. Career In 1929, he wrote his first complete show, Almanac, From the show, I May Be Wrong (but I Think You’re Wonderful) was composed, with Sullivan writing the music and Harry Ruskin writing the lyrics. The song would go on to become a popular song with multiple cover versions. With Anderson’s 1931 production of Bow Bells, Sullivan wrote the music for Mona Lisa and other songs in the show. Sullivan would later write the music for the Broadway show Thumbs Up! (1934), with Anderson staging the show as well writing some of the lyrics. Together, they would write five songs for the film The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), along with other copyrighted songs as well. Broadway shows Source: Discography References External links *

Herbert Elwell

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Herbert Elwell (May 10, 1898 – April 17, 1974) was an American composer and music critic. A native of Minneapolis, he was (with Aaron Copland and Virgil Thomson) among the first Americans to study in France with Nadia Boulanger. While in Paris his Quintet for Piano and Strings (1924) garnered more praise than George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, which was premiered at the same concert. He began his studies in music at the University of Minnesota, and went on to work with Ernest Bloch prior to his sojourn in France. He also attended the American Academy in Rome during which time he composed his most frequently performed work, the ballet The Happy Hypocrite (1925). He also served as the music critic for The Plain Dealer for 32 years (from 1932 to 1964). As a composer, Elwell wrote a considerable body of chamber music and vocal music. Many of his vocal pieces were written for soprano Marie Simmelink Kraft. He also composed a number of orchestral works which were extolled by such conductors as Artur Rodzinski, Leopold Stokowski, William Steinberg and Howard Hanson. In 1961 he was awarded the first Cleveland Arts Prize for Music. His other accolades include the Paderewski Prize, the Marj

Herman Berlinski

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Herman Berlinski (18 August 1910 – 27 September 2001) was a German-born American composer, organist, pianist, musicologist and choir conductor. Life Family background; early upbringing Before he was born, Herman Berlinski’s parents, Boris and Deborah Wygodzki Berlinski lived in the Jewish community of Łódź at the time when civil and political unrest was well underway in Russia from 1905, and growing discontent in Poland against the Russian rule had led to many uprisings. The largest of these, commonly called the June Days Uprising or the 1905 Łódź insurrection, took place in that same year. At that point, the Berlinskis fled to Leipzig, where they remained after the end of World War I, for although Poland was reconstituted in 1918, turmoil between Poland and the Soviet States of Russia and Ukraine continued until early 1921 as Russia attempted to reclaim the territory that had belonged to it in the days of the empire. Furthermore, by contrast with the relative poverty he had experienced working as a factory labourer in Łódź, Boris Berlinski had been able to gain a stable income in Leipzig from haberdashery. In any case, as Poland had regained its independent statehood, the Berlinsk

Herman Wohl

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Herman Wohl (; 1877–1936) was a Jewish–American composer closely associated with the American Yiddish Theatre. Galicia Wohl was born in Otyniia near Stanislavov (now called Ivano-Frankivsk) in eastern Galicia, now Ukraine. He was raised in a Chasidic home and studied with cantors from the age of 9. He soon began composing, directing choirs, and singing as a Hazzan himself. At the age of 16 he joined Kalman Juvelier’s troupe in Galicia, acting, singing in the chorus, and writing songs for their repertoire. America In 1896 he was brought to America to teach; he soon began writing for several theater troupes. He partnered with Aaron (Arnold) Perlmutter and over the course of 16 years they wrote music for many operettas including , and dozens of others by Moshe Hurwitz (Horowitz), Anshel Shor’s (The Widow) and (One should be a decent person) also Motashevski’s , and Working with Edelstein in the People’s Theater, he composed music to * Mikhl Goldberg’s musical comedy (Lived and laughed) * Adam Mesko’s operetta (The night of love) * Boris Thomashefsky’s (The holy song) * Itskhok Lesh’s , 1921 * Israel Rozenberg’s * Tomashevski’s Lebedik un freylekh and Thousand and One Nights * William

Herschel Garfein

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Herschel Garfein (born January 17, 1958) is an American composer, librettist, stage director, and faculty member of the Steinhardt School of Music at New York University, where he teaches Script Analysis. Garfein is widely known for his libretto written for Robert Aldridge’s Elmer Gantry, which won two 2012 Grammy Awards including “Best Contemporary Classical Composition” won by Garfein and Aldridge. He also collaborated with Aldridge on the oratorio Parables. In his compositions for the musical Suenos he found an inspiration in Hispanic rhythms. Garfein also composed the music and libretto for an opera based on the Tom Stoppard play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. Garfein’s parents are actress Carroll Baker and film director Jack Garfein, a Czechoslovak Jew, who survived the Holocaust. His sister is actress Blanche Baker. Awards and honors * 54th Annual Grammy Awards, 2011: Grammy Award, “Best Contemporary Classical Composition,” with Robert Aldridge, for “Elmer Gantry.” Herschel Garfein, Librettist. * 60th Annual Grammy Awards, 2017: Grammy Award, “Grammy Award for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album” for “Presidential Suite: Eight Variations on Freedom,” by Ted Nash Big Band.

Hershy Kay

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Hershy Kay (November 17, 1919 – December 2, 1981) was an American composer, arranger, and orchestrator. He is most noteworthy for the orchestrations of several Broadway shows, and for the ballets he arranged for George Balanchine’s New York City Ballet. Biography The son of a Philadelphia printer, Kay became a student at Philadelphia’s Curtis Institute (1936–1940) where he studied cello and composition under Randall Thompson, in whose classes he was a classmate of Leonard Bernstein. In New York he played in various pit orchestras and started arranging music to escape playing the cello. Self-taught as an orchestrator, for his first professional project Kay orchestrated several songs for Brazilian soprano Elsie Houston’s show at the Rainbow Room in 1940. When Leonard Bernstein commissioned Kay to orchestrate his musical comedy On the Town in 1944, Kay became one of the most sought after orchestrators on Broadway. later choreographed by Balanchine as Tarantella, led to a renewed interest in Gottschalk’s music. He also composed music for an LP, Mother Goose, with the actors Boris Karloff, Cyril Ritchard and Celeste Holm; this was first released on Caedmon in 1958. In 1961, Kay conducte

Holly Butler

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Holly Gaye Butler is an American actress, singer/songwriter, dancer and former aerobics instructor who appeared in the :20 Minute Workout Television Show’s first season (1983). Crime Story, Reasonable Doubts, In Living Color, Mike Hammer, Private Eye, Rags to Riches, Moloney and A Peaceable Kingdom. Holly had a starring role in the short lived teen soap opera Tribes which aired on the Fox network in 1990. Holly toured the U.S. throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s as Universal Studios Hollywood’s premier Marilyn Monroe impersonator and appeared in the film Netherworld appearing as Marilyn Monroe. As a songwriter, Holly had a country single, “What a Shame” recorded by Rebecca Lynn Howard in 2003. References

Homer Keller

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Homer T. Keller (February 17, 1915 – May 12, 1996) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. He graduated from Oxnard Union High School in Oxnard, California in 1933, after which he attended the Eastman School of Music, where he studied with Howard Hanson, obtaining B.M. (1937) and M.M. (1938) degrees. In 1939 he was awarded US$500 in the 1939 Henry Hadley Foundation competition. He taught at the University of Michigan (where his notable students included Leslie Bassett, George Balch Wilson, Norma Wendelburg, and Donald Harris) then at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon from 1958 to 1976. His notable students at the University of Oregon include Ralph Towner, Dean C. Taylor, Stephen Scott, and Robert Scott Thompson. Also at the University of Oregon, Keller worked with Jon Appleton to set up that university’s electronic music studio. While at the University of Michigan he also served on the Interlochen Music Camp staff where he helped and influenced many aspiring young musicians including notable Dwight Beckham in 1950. His music has been conducted by William Strickland. It is published by the American Composers Alliance. Keller’s last residence was Montclair,

Honiball Joseph

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Honiball Joseph is an American composer, conductor, pianist, music educator, and cultural advocate known for his contributions to music and cultural preservation. He is also an advocate for preserving minority identities, particularly those of Assyrians, amidst political and cultural challenges. Joseph is the former director of the Beneil Music Academy and the founder of both the Messiah Ensemble and the Gilgamesh Arts & Culture Foundation. Early life and education Joseph was born on January 2, 1971, in Mashhad, Iran. In 1986, he entered the Tehran Conservatory of Music, where he studied violin under the guidance of Behrouz Vahidi Azar. He also studied composition with prominent Iranian masters such as Morteza Hannaneh and Sharif lotfi. After completing his military service, Joseph pursued higher education at Azad University of Art and Architecture in 1996, majoring in music. He studied piano as his principal instrument and received short-term training in composition with Thomas Christian David and Tengiz Shavlokhashvili. Career Joseph began teaching music in 1986 and focused on composing and arranging choral music for churches in Iran and abroad. In 1999, he founded the Messiah En

Horatio Parker

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Horatio William Parker (September 15, 1863 – December 18, 1919) was an American composer, organist and teacher. He was a central figure in musical life in New Haven, Connecticut in the late 19th century, and is best remembered as the undergraduate teacher of Charles Ives while the composer attended Yale University. Biography He was born in Auburndale, Massachusetts. His earliest lessons were with his mother. He then studied in Boston with George Whitefield Chadwick, Stephen A. Emery, and John Orth. His first professional position was playing the organ at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Dedham, Massachusetts. He was paid a salary of roughly $300 a year from September 1880 to January 1882. included Arthur Whiting and H. H. Huss. In Munich Parker composed his first significant works, including a symphony and a dramatic cantata. He also premiered Joseph Rheinberger’s Organ Concerto No. 1 in F Major from 1884 there. After his return to the United States in 1885, he was for two years professor of music in the Cathedral School of St. Paul in Garden City, Long Island. From 1888 to 1893, he was organist of Trinity Church, New York City, and from 1893 to 1901 organist of Trinity Church, Bosto

Howard Frazin

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Howard Frazin (born 1962) is a composer based in Somerville, Massachusetts. His works are published by Edition Peters and he has served as president of Composers in Red Sneakers. He served on the faculty of the Longy School of Music and has taught at New England Conservatory, Northeastern University, and Roxbury Latin School. Life Howard Frazin was raised in Lincolnwood, Illinois, and graduated from Niles West High School. He received a bachelor of arts in English from the University of Michigan in 1985 before beginning his formal musical training at the New England Conservatory, where he studied between 1984 and 1989. In 1994, he earned a master of arts in music composition from the University of Minnesota, where he studied with Dominick Argento. Frazin subsequently settled in Massachusetts, living in Cambridge and Somerville. Music Frazin’s music is for the most part recognizably tonal, described by New Music Connoisseur as inhabiting “a slightly clouded tonal world that ably weds aspects of Leonard Bernstein and Olivier Messiaen.” Among his most noted works is the oratorio, The Voice of Isaac, commissioned by PALS Children’s Chorus and published by Edition Peters. The piece is a

Howard Hanson

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Howard Harold Hanson (October 28, 1896 – February 26, 1981) was an American composer, conductor, educator and music theorist. As director for forty years of the Eastman School of Music, he raised its quality and provided opportunities for commissioning and performing American classical music. In 1944, he won a Pulitzer Prize for his Symphony No. 4, and received numerous other awards, including the George Foster Peabody Award for Outstanding Entertainment in Music in 1946. Early life and education Hanson was born in Wahoo, Nebraska, to Swedish immigrant parents, Hans and Hilma (née Eckstrom) Hanson. In his youth he studied music with his mother. Later, he studied at Luther College in Wahoo, receiving a diploma in 1911, then at the Institute of Musical Art, the forerunner of the Juilliard School, in New York City, where he studied with the composer and music theorist Percy Goetschius in 1914. Afterward he attended Northwestern University, where he studied composition with church music expert Peter C. Lutkin and Arne Oldberg. Hanson also studied piano, cello, and trombone. He earned his BA degree in music from Northwestern in 1916, and began his teaching career as a teacher’s assistan

Howard L. Quilling

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Howard Lee Quilling (December 16, 1935 – February 26, 2016) was an American composer and music teacher. He died in Bakersfield, California, on February 26, 2016, at the age of 80. Compositions Pieces for orchestra * 1979 · Music, for guitar and strings. * 1982 · Textures, four miniatures for orchestra. Pieces for wind orchestra * 1967 · Intermezzo. * 1968 · Introspections. * 1970 · Suite, for alto saxophone and wind orchestra. * 1973 · Symfonie. * No Date · Chardy, for brass ensemble and wind orchestra. * No Date · Diversions. Pieces for choir * 1973 · The Clouds of night are passed away, for mixed choir and piano. * 1983 · Two anthems, for mixed choir and piano (or organ). * 1985 · O Thou, who art the shepherd, for mixed choir and organ. * 1986 · Upon a wintery night, for mixed choir and organ. Vocal music * 1958 · Two songs of Rupert Brooke, for voice and piano. * 1967 · That holy thing, for voice and accordion. * 1980 · What will you do on Tuesday, love?, for voice and piano. * 1987 · Two love songs, for soprano, flute, clarinet, guitar, viola and double bass. * 1993 · The Earth Remembers, vocal cycle for soprano, mixed choir and piano (or orchestra). *# The Earth Remembers. *#

Howard Sandroff

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Howard Sandroff (born October 28, 1949, in Chicago, Illinois ) is an American composer, sound artist, sculptor, and music educator. Sandroff studied at the Chicago Musical College of Roosevelt University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His composition instructors included Robert Lombardo and Ben Johnston. He has received composition and research fellowships and the National Endowment for the Arts, the University of Chicago and the Yamaha Music Foundation. He founded, directed and conducted Chicago’s New Art Ensemble. In 2016, Sandroff retired from the University of Chicago where he was Director of the Computer Music Studio and Senior Lecturer in Music. He is also a professor emeritus of Audio Arts & Acoustics at Columbia College Chicago. In June 1996, Pierre Boulez invited Sandroff to attend the dedication of the new IRCAM facility at the Centre Georges Pompidou. His composition Tephillah, for clarinet and computer, was performed at the dedication by Alain Damiens, clarinetist with the Ensemble Intercontemporain. Sandroff has collaborated with clarinetist John Bruce Yeh, performing Boulez’s 1985 work for clarinet and electronics, Dialogue de l’ombre double. Among San

Howard Stelzer

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Howard Stelzer is a composer of electronic music, whose work is made primarily from sounds generated by cassette tapes and tape players. From 1997 until 2012, he ran the independent record label Intransitive Recordings. Early years Stelzer began making music using cassette tapes and metal percussion while he was a teenager in Boca Raton, Florida. After attempting unsuccessfully to learn how to play conventional instruments, he decided instead to use cassette tapes as the source of his music. Beginning in 1996, all of Stelzer’s music would be made with manipulated cassette tapes. I think tapes are simply the language that I speak. When I think about music ideas, I only and always think of them in terms of how they’d be articulated via cassette tapes. – 2016 interview with Tabs Out Podcast Stelzer explained how he first became “fascinated with (cassette tapes) as sound-producing objects: “When I was in high school (1989–1992) and banging on trash cans in my parents’ garage with a boom box recording in the corner, I discovered how the sound captured on the cassette was different from the acoustic sound in the room while I was making the music. From then on, I experimented with making

Howie Smith

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Howie Smith (born February 25, 1943), is a saxophonist, composer, jazz musician and educator Howie Smith was born in Pottsville, Pennsylvania in 1943. He was an instructor for the University of Illinois Division of Music Extension from 1970 to 1973 and also taught at Northern Illinois University in 1971. In 1973, under a Fulbright grant, he set up the first tertiary level jazz studies program in Australia at the New South Wales State Conservatorium (now named the Sydney Conservatorium of Music). He remained as Director of Jazz Studies through 1976, and was a member of the Australian group Jazz Co/op from 1974 through 1976. Howie Smith is a full professor at Cleveland State University, has been a frequent performer with the Cleveland Orchestra and soloist with the Cleveland Chamber Symphony since 1982, and has presented numerous concerts and workshops throughout the United States, Canada, South America, Europe and Australia. Biography Born in Pottsville, Pennsylvania in 1943; Howie Smith graduated from Reading Senior High School in 1961. Early studies with his first music teacher, J. Carl Borelli, included clarinet and saxophone pieces from the classical and jazz repertoire. At Mr.

Hubert Klyne Headley

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Hubert Klyne Headley (1906–1996) was an American composer, musician, and educator. Early life and education Headley was born at Parkersburg, West Virginia on June 19, 1906. When he was six, his family moved to Fresno, California. His father, Lewis Lee Headley, was Superintendent of Schools, and his mother, Belle Cook Headley, was an organist. At the age of ten he was introduced to Maurice Ravel, whose music had a strong effect on him. He studied music at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California, graduating in 1928. While there, he met Flora Denius of Vallejo, also a student at the college’s music conservatory, whom he married in 1929. For eight years, Headley served as director of instrumental music for California high schools, Career In the fall of 1935, Headley joined the music department of Fresno State College, replacing Assistant Professor Arthur C. Berdahl. Monteux later conducted part of the work in a radio concert for The Standard Symphony Hour. Headley’s works would be performed regularly on this program for the next several years. Also in 1939, Headley joined the faculty at Santa Barbara State College, and succeeded Maurice Faulkner as conductor of the Univer

Huck Hodge

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Huck Hodge (born July 14, 1977) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Hodge’s first musical training took place in Oregon. In 1999, he began a course of study in Germany at the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Stuttgart with funding from the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst. Between 2002 and 2008, he was an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Fellow at Columbia University where he studied composition under Tristan Murail and Fred Lerdahl. Hodge graduated with MA and DMA degrees from Columbia. Hodge is the winner of the Charles Ives Living, awarded by the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2018, a 2012 Guggenheim Fellowship, the 2010–11 Rome Prize, the 2008 Gaudeamus Prize, commissions from the Fromm and Koussevitzky Music Foundations, and the Aaron Copland Residency Award from the Aaron Copland House. He is professor and chair of music composition at the University of Washington, Seattle. Compositional style Two salient elements in Hodge’s music are the incorporation of timbre as an integral form-bearing compositional device and an approach to musical structure that emphasizes gradual change over time. As such, his music bears traces o

Hugh Aitken (composer)

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Hugh Aitken (September 7, 1924 – December 24, 2012 ) was a 20th-century American composer. Biography Aitken was born in New York City to Hugh Aitken Sr. and Florence Aitken. He grew up in the Bronx and attended Evander Child High School. There were artists of all kinds in his family; his father was a musician, playing the violin and also composing, his mother danced in vaudeville in her youth, one cousin was a radio, stage, and television actress (Joan Swenson) and another danced in the Balanchine company. He studied chemistry for two years at New York University, but quit to join the Army. He served as a navigator in the Air Force in the Second World War, realized during the War that composing was his true vocation, so he used the GI Bill to enroll at Juilliard from 1946-50. He studied composition under Bernard Wagenaar, Vincent Persichetti, and Robert Ward, receiving a MS degree in 1950. He married Laura Tapia (1924-2017) in 1946. Aitken taught at Juilliard from 1960 until 1970, and was then appointed Professor of Music at William Paterson College in New Jersey. He died at home in Oakland, New Jersey on Dec. 24, 2012. He is survived by children Peter Gil Aitken and Alexandra Eliz

Hugo Friedhofer

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Hugo Wilhelm Friedhofer (May 3, 1901 – May 17, 1981) was an American composer and cellist, known for his film scores. He won an Academy Award for Best Original Score for The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), out of nine total nominations. Biography Hugo Wilhelm Friedhofer was born in San Francisco, California, United States. In 1929, he relocated to Hollywood, where he performed as a musician for Fox Studios productions such as Sunny Side Up (1929) and Grand Canary (1934). In 1946, Friedhofer was hired to compose the score for the 1946 William Wyler directed film, The Best Years of Our Lives, which earned him an Oscar for Best Original Score at the 1947 Academy Awards, A new recording of the score, released in 1979 by Entr’acte Recording Society, was favorably received at the time. Friedhofer was also nominated for eight other films, including The Woman in the Window, The Bishop’s Wife, Joan of Arc, Above and Beyond, Between Heaven and Hell, Boy on a Dolphin and An Affair to Remember (both nominated in 1958 ), as well as The Young Lions. Friedhofer, who was greatly admired by his colleagues, was also noted for his caustic, self-deprecating wit. When asked by fellow composer David Rak

Hugo Montenegro

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Hugo Mario Montenegro (September 2, 1925 – February 6, 1981) was an American orchestra leader and composer of film soundtracks. His best-known work is interpretations of the music from Spaghetti Westerns, especially his cover version of Ennio Morricone’s main theme from the 1966 film The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. He composed the score for the 1969 Western Charro!, which starred Elvis Presley. He also wrote for various television series, most notably the theme to “I Dream of Jeannie” Biography Montenegro was born in New York City in 1925. He served in the U.S. Navy for two years, mostly as an arranger for the Newport Naval Base band in Newport, Rhode Island. After the war he attended Manhattan College while studying composition and leading his own band for school dances. No. 3 in the Canadian RPM Magazine charts, and spending four weeks atop the UK Singles Chart in 1968. It sold over one and a quarter million copies and was awarded a gold disc. His version of the main theme from Hang ’em High reached No. 59 in Canada. In 1968, his hit “Aces High” placed at No. 11 on the Billboard Year-End Chart of the Top Hits of 1968. In the late 1970s severe emphysema forced an end to his musica

Hunter Johnson (composer)

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Hunter Johnson (April 14, 1906 – August 27, 1998) was an American composer. His compositions include a piano sonata and the orchestral music for Martha Graham’s ballets Letter to the World, based on the life and poetry of Emily Dickinson, and Deaths and Entrances. His musical style was a combination of neoclassic, neoromantic, and nationalist. Johnson was born near Benson, North Carolina. He attended Benson High School and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill before leaving the state to finish his undergraduate studies at the Eastman School of Music in 1929. UNC later awarded him an honorary doctorate. He taught at the University of Michigan (1929–33), the University of Manitoba (1944–47), Cornell (1948–53), the University of Illinois (1959–65) and the University of Texas (1966–71). He retired in 1971 and returned to the family farm in Benson. He was the first composer laureate of North Carolina, an award he received in 1991. Footnotes References * *Albany Records product information *Database of Recorded American Music article *Monaco, Richard A. (1960), “The Music of Hunter Johnson”. Ph.D. diss. Ithaca: Cornell University. *Monaco, Richard A., and Michael Meckna (2001)

Idabelle Smith Firestone

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Idabelle Smith Firestone (November 10, 1874 July 7, 1954) was an American composer and songwriter. Biography She was born in Minnesota City, Minnesota, to Eliza B. Allen (18431923) and George T. Smith (18411921), the youngest of five children. Her father was the inventor of a flour milling process that turns out “Patent” and “Half Patent” flour. She learned to play piano and organ as a girl and studied music at Alma College, Ontario. On 20 November 1895, she married Harvey S. Firestone, who had begun the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company five years earlier. She was the mother of Harvey S. Firestone Jr., and Leonard Firestone, the grandmother of Brooks Firestone, and the great-grandmother of William Clay Ford Jr., Andrew Firestone, and Nick Firestone. She was not the only composer in the Firestone family. Her granddaughter Elizabeth Firestone (b. 1922) composed music for the film Once More, My Darling (1949), which starred Robert Montgomery and Ann Blyth. She died in her sleep at her home, Harbel Manor, after a long illness on July 7, 1954, at age 79 in Akron, Ohio. Musical career She became a member of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) in 1948. Her

Ignace Strasfogel

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Ignace Strasfogel (17 July 1909 – 6 February 1994) was a Polish pianist, composer and conductor. Biography Born in Warsaw, Strasfogel studied at the Hochschule fur Musik in Berlin where he was a pupil of modernist composer Franz Schreker. He began his career as a pianist and vocal coach; notably serving as an accompanist for prestigious artists such as Joseph Szigeti, Gregor Piatigorsky, and Lauritz Melchior among other soloists. In 1926, at the age of 17, his two piano sonatas won the Mendelssohn Prize. In 1934, Strasfogel was forced to emigrate from Nazi Germany to the United States. In America, he worked as a pianist and won fame as conductor of the New York Philharmonic and the Metropolitan Opera. During the years of 1940 to 1941, and 1962, he conducted the Naumburg Orchestral Concerts, in the Naumburg Bandshell, Central Park, in the summer series. In 1983, Strasfogel ended a 35-year break from composing, producing works for piano, orchestra, chamber music and songs. Strasfogel died in New York City. His son (born 1940) is an opera director and librettist. Selected works Piano * 1923/1924 Capriccio mit alten Tänzen nach acht Kupferstichen von Jakob Callot * Oktober 1924 Scherzo

Ignacy Jan Paderewski

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Ignacy Jan Paderewski (; 6 November 1860 or 1859 – 29 June 1941) was a Polish pianist, composer, philanthropist, and statesman. As a politician and diplomat, Paderewski was vital to securing international recognition of the newly formed Second Polish Republic in 1919. A musical virtuoso, he rose to prominence as a musician and composer in the late 1880s and toured widely in Europe and the United States. He wrote orchestral, instrumental, and vocal works and an opera, Manru (premiered 1901), which remains the only opera by a Polish composer performed by the Metropolitan Opera. Paderewski’s renown allowed access to influential political and cultural circles in the West. During World War I, he largely suspended concert touring to focus on political advocacy and fundraising, working with organizations such as the Polish National Committee in Paris and relief initiatives in Britain and the United States. In the United States, he met President Woodrow Wilson and contributed to efforts that helped make an independent Poland part of the postwar settlement. In newly independent Poland, Józef Piłsudski appointed Paderewski prime minister and minister of foreign affairs (January–December 191

Igor Raykhelson

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Igor Raykhelson (; born 24 April 1961 in Leningrad) is a Russian born American classical and jazz pianist and composer. He studied classical and jazz piano as a teenager at Leningrad Conservatory from 1976 then in 1979 his family moved to New York City where Igor continued his education at New York University under Alexander Edelman. His Jazz Suite and works for viola performed by Yuri Bashmet were well received by Gramophone Magazine in 2007. Works, editions and recordings * Igor Raykhelson: Jazz Suite and other works. Little Symphony for Strings in G minor. Reflections for Violin, Viola and Strings. Adagio for Viola and Strings. Jazz Suite for Viola, Saxophone and Orchestra. Elena Revich, violin, Igor Butman, saxophone. Igor Raykhelson, piano. Yuri Golubev, double-bass. Eduard Zizak, drums. Moscow-Soloists, ensemble. Yuri Bashmet, viola, conductor. * Igor Raykhelson: Violin Concerto in C minor. Viola Concerto in A minor. Yuri Bashmet, viola, Nikolay Sachenko, violin. Novaya Rossiya Orchestra, orchestra Claudio Vandelli, conductor Alexander Sladkovsky, conductor Legal issues Raykhelson is chairman of the Switzerland-based titanium company Interlink Metals and Chemicals, which has

Igor Stravinsky

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Early life in Russia, 1882–1901#

Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky was born in Oranienbaum, Russia—a town renamed Lomonosov in 1948, about 50 km mi west of Saint Petersburg—on 17 June 1882. Oranienbaum was then part of Petergofsky Uyezd in the Saint Petersburg Governorate of the Russian Empire and is now part of Petrodvortsovy District in Saint Petersburg. His mother, Anna Kirillovna Stravinskaya (), was an amateur singer and pianist from an established family of landowners. His father, Fyodor Ignatyevich Stravinsky, was a bass at the Mariinsky Theater in Saint Petersburg, descended from a line of Polish landowners. The name “Stravinsky” is of Polish origin, deriving from the Strava river in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The family was originally called “Soulima-Stravinsky”, bearing the Soulima arms, but “Soulima” was dropped after the partitions of Poland. The Stravinsky family vacationed in Oranienbaum during summers, and their primary residence was an apartment along the Kryukov Canal in central Saint Petersburg, near the Mariinsky Theater. Stravinsky was baptized hours after birth and joined to the Russian Orthodox Church in St. Nicholas Cathedral. Constantly in fear of the short-tempered Fyodor and indifferent towards Anna, Stravinsky lived there for the first 27 years of his life with three siblings: Roman and Yury, his older siblings who irritated him immensely, and Gury, his close younger brother with whom he said he found “the love and understanding denied us by our parents”. Stravinsky was educated by the family’s governess until the age of 11, when he began attending the Second Saint Petersburg Gymnasium in present-day Admiralteysky District, a school that he recalled hating because he had few friends. From the age of nine, Stravinsky studied privately with a piano teacher. He later wrote that Fyodor and Anna saw no musical talent in him due to his lack of technical skills; Stravinsky frequently improvised instead of practicing assigned pieces. His excellent sight-reading skill prompted him to frequently read vocal scores from Fyodor’s vast personal library. At around the age of 10, Stravinsky began regularly attending performances at the Mariinsky Theater, where he was introduced to Russian repertoire as well as Italian and French opera; by the age of 16, he attended rehearsals at the theater five or six days a week. By the age of 14, Stravinsky had mastered the solo part of Mendelssohn’s Piano Concerto No. 1, and at the age of 15, he transcribed for solo piano a string quartet by Alexander Glazunov.

Ingolf Dahl

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Ingolf Dahl (June 9, 1912 – August 6, 1970) was a German-born American composer, pianist, conductor, and educator. Biography Dahl was born Walter Ingolf Marcus in Hamburg, Germany, to a German Jewish father, attorney Paul Marcus, and his Swedish wife Hilda Maria Dahl. He had two brothers, Gert Marcus (1914–2008; a noted Swedish artist and sculptor, and a recipient of the Prince Eugen Medal), and Holger, and one sister, Anna-Britta. In Hamburg, Dahl studied piano under Edith Weiss-Mann, a harpsichordist, pianist, and a proponent of early music. Dahl studied with Philipp Jarnach at the Hochschule für Musik Köln (1930–32). Dahl left Germany as the Nazi Party was coming to power and continued his studies at the University of Zurich, along with Volkmar Andreae and . Living with relatives and working at the Zürich Opera for more than six years, he rose from an internship to the rank of assistant conductor. He served as a vocal coach and chorus master for the world premieres of Alban Berg’s Lulu and Paul Hindemith’s Mathis der Maler. He settled in Los Angeles and joined the community of expatriate musicians that included Ernst Krenek, Darius Milhaud, Arnold Schoenberg, Igor Stravinsky, an

Ingram Marshall

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Ingram Douglass Marshall (May 10, 1942 – May 31, 2022 ) was an American composer and a onetime student of Vladimir Ussachevsky and Morton Subotnick. Early life and education Marshall was born in Mount Vernon, New York. He was the son of Bernice Douglass and Harry Reinhard Marshall, Sr. Marshall’s early interest in music was the result of encouragement provided by his mother, herself an accomplished pianist and vocalist. As a youth, he performed as a soprano in the Boy’s Choir at the Mt. Vernon Community Church, and during his high school years was influenced early by noted music instructor Victor Laslo. After graduating from the Fox Lane High School in 1960, he pursued musical studies at Lake Forest College and Columbia University, becoming affiliated with the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center. In 1970 he became a graduate assistant to Morton Subotnick at Cal Arts, staying on to teach for several years after receiving his MFA in 1971. Career Though the composer used the term “expressivist” to describe his music, Marshall’s music is often associated with post-minimalism. His music often reflects an interest in world music, particularly Balinese gamelan tradition, as well as in

Ira D. Sankey

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Ira David Sankey (August 28, 1840 – August 13, 1908) was an American gospel singer and composer, known for his long association with Dwight L. Moody in a series of religious revival campaigns in America and Britain during the closing decades of the 19th century. Sankey was a pioneer in the introduction of a musical style that influenced church services and evangelical campaigns for generations, and the hymns that he wrote or popularized continued to be sung well into the 21st century. Sankey, born in Pennsylvania, was an amateur singer and church worker when he was recruited by Moody in 1870 after the latter heard him sing at a convention. Until Moody died in 1899 the two campaigned together, Moody preaching while Sankey sang both old and new hymns, inspired by writers such as Fanny Crosby and Philip Bliss. Sankey also became a prolific composer of hymn tunes, and a compiler and editor of popular hymn collections, in particular Sacred Songs and Solos and Gospel Hymns and Sacred Songs. The proceeds from these publishing ventures were used for a range of charitable purposes. After Moody’s death, Sankey attempted to carry on the work alone but was defeated by ill-health and the eventu

Irene Britton Smith

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Irene Britton Smith (December 22, 1907 – February 15, 1999) was an American classical composer and educator. Biography Childhood and youth Irene Britton Smith was born on December 22, 1907, in Chicago, Illinois as the youngest of four siblings. She was of African-American, Crow, and Cherokee descent. Adult life Smith wanted to study music at Northwestern University but her family could not afford to send her there. Smith was an advocate of the phono-visual method of teaching reading and Chicago University Press published her monograph on the topic, Methods and Materials for Teaching Word Perception in Kindergarten Through Grade Three, in 1960. Musical activity As a child Smith studied piano with V. Emanuel Johnson and took violin lessons. From 1946 to 1947 Smith took a sabbatical from teaching to complete graduate work at the Juilliard School of Music, where she studied composition with Vittorio Giannini. Works This is a list of works by Smith. Violin * Reminiscence for violin, piano, 1941 * Sonata for Violin and Piano, 1947 (published by Vivace Press in 1996) Piano * Invention in Two Voices, 1940 * Passacaglia and Fugue in C-sharp Minor, 1940 (published by Vivace Press in 2001) *

Irene Cozad

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Irene Cozad (July 4, 1888 – August 2, 1970), later known as Irene Cozad-Sherer, was an American pianist, piano teacher, and composer of ragtime music. Early life Irene Bazelle Cozad was born in Lineville, Iowa, one of the nine children of Joseph Addison Cozad and Olive Jane Vanderbeck Cozad. Her father was a school teacher and worked at a newspaper. Career Cozad played and taught piano in Kansas City, Missouri. “The Minute Circle Whirl” (1916), “Because”, and “Kansas City Town” (1920). The last, “Kansas City Town”, was written for a contest marking the year that the city’s population reached one million. Her compositions are considered an example of the Kansas City Folk Rag genre. Personal life Irene Cozad married Joseph Whitman Sherer, a medical doctor, in 1912. They had a daughter, Jeanne, and a son, Joseph Jr. Her husband died in a car accident in 1940; she died in Kansas City in 1970, aged 82 years. Her compositions are sometimes featured in recordings and performances of ragtime works by women, including the collections Pickles and Peppers (1987) and Fluffy Ruffle Girls: Women in Ragtime (1999), both by Virginia Eskin. References External links * *

Irene M. Giblin

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Irene Marie Giblin (August 12, 1888 – May 12, 1974), also known as Irene Giblin O’Brien, was an American pianist and composer of ragtime. She published a total of ten pieces between 1905 and 1911. Her song “Chicken Chowder” of 1905 was her biggest success. Early life Irene M. Giblin was born to Richard T. Giblin, a printer, and Nora Reardon Giblin in 1888, in St. Louis, Missouri. She was the eldest of six children. Music Giblin was a popular young woman in the Irish-American community in St. Louis. She worked at music stores Grand Leader and Stix, Baer and Fuller, playing the piano for several hours a day to convince the customers to buy the latest scores. Giblin published a total of ten ragtime songs over a period of six years, from 1905 to 1911. Among them, “Sleepy Lou” and “The Aviator Rag” were popular sellers. However, it was her first rag, “Chicken Chowder” (1905) that was her most successful. She published her last rag in 1911, “The Dixie Rag”. Personal life Giblin married Edward Patrick O’Brien, an accountant for the Missouri Pacific Railway Company, in 1908. They had two sons: Richard in 1911 and Edward Jr. in 1915. Her husband died in 1958; Irene Giblin O’Brien died in 19

Irving Berlin

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Irving Berlin (born Israel Isidore Beilin; May 11, 1888 – September 22, 1989) was a Russian-born American songwriter. His music forms a large part of the Great American Songbook. Berlin received numerous honors including an Academy Award, a Grammy Award, and a Tony Award. He also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Gerald R. Ford in 1977. The broadcast journalist Walter Cronkite stated he “helped write the story of this country, capturing the best of who we are and the dreams that shape our lives”. Born in Russia, Berlin arrived in the United States at the age of five. His family left Russia to escape pogroms against the Jewish village of Tolochin. He published his first song, “Marie from Sunny Italy”, in 1907, receiving 33 cents for the publishing rights, and became known as the composer of numerous international hits, starting with 1911’s “Alexander’s Ragtime Band”. He also was an owner of the Music Box Theatre on Broadway. For much of his career, Berlin could not read sheet music, and was such a limited piano player that he could only play in the key of F-sharp; he used his custom piano equipped with a transposing lever when he needed to play in keys other

Irving Fine

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Irving Gifford Fine (December 3, 1914 – August 23, 1962) was an American composer. Fine’s work assimilated neoclassical, romantic, and serial elements. Composer Virgil Thomson described Fine’s “unusual melodic grace” while Aaron Copland noted the “elegance, style, finish and…convincing continuity” of Fine’s music. Fine was a member of a close-knit group of Boston composers in the mid-20th century who were sometimes called the “Boston School.” Other members of the Boston School included Arthur Berger, Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, Lukas Foss, and Harold Shapero. Life Fine was born in Boston, Massachusetts, where he studied piano, and received both bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Harvard University, where he was a pupil of Walter Piston. Fine was a conducting pupil of Serge Koussevitzky, served as pianist for the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and studied composition with Nadia Boulanger at the Fontainebleau School of Music in Paris and at Radcliffe College. From 1939 until 1950, he taught music theory at Harvard and conducted its Glee Club, becoming a close associate of Leonard Bernstein, Igor Stravinsky and Aaron Copland. From 1950, he taught at Brandeis University, where he

Irwin Bazelon

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Irwin Bazelon (June 4, 1922 in Evanston, Illinois – August 2, 1995) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. Contemporary American composer Irwin Bazelon’s music is known for its interesting rhythms and its emphasis on the brass and percussion sections. In total, Bazelon composed nine symphonies and over sixty orchestral, chamber, and instrumental works. Some of his most famous works are Short Symphony, Churchill Downs, and Propulsions, which is written for 113 percussion instruments to be played by seven performers. His music is recorded on Composers Recordings, Inc. and on Albany Records. Artists who recorded his music include conductors Harold Farberman and Gianmaria Griglio, soprano Nancy Allen Lundy, pianist Scott Dunn, and percussionists William Moersch, Eliseo Rael, and William Klymus. Bazelon’s music lacks any regular pulse, instead it is characterized by unpredictable syncopation, irregular groupings, unexpected triplets, and off-beat accents. His theme music for NBC News opened the show from 1962 to 1977.Early life Irwin Bazelon was the elder of two sons born to Roy and Jeanette Bazelon. His grandparents emigrated from Russia to the US in the 1890s. Early

Irwin Heilner

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Irwin Heilner (May 14, 1908 – January 18, 1991) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. His works are published by American Composers Alliance. Early life and education Heilner was born in New York City, the son of Julius Heilner and Genevieve Stern Heilner. His father was a confectioner, and his mother was a soprano singer. Career In 1932, Heilner was a member of the Young Composers’ Group, which was founded by the composer Elie Siegmeister and at the home of the composer Aaron Copland. Heilner studied briefly with Nadia Boulanger beginning in the late spring of 1932, on the recommendation of Aaron Copland. In 1936, violinist Lea Luboshutz included a composition by Heilner in her Carnegie Hall recital, and his “Suite for Orchestra” was performed by the New York Women’s Symphony Orchestra, also at Carnegie Hall. In 1945, compositions by Heilner were performed at a free concert at the Teachers Union Lounge on Astor Place. His music was conducted and recorded by William Strickland. Heilner also worked as a librarian at the Julius Forstman Library in Passaic, New Jersey. Personal life Heilner was married to Florence Heilner and had two children. He died in 1991, at t

Irwin Leroy Fischer

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Irwin Leroy Fischer (July 5, 1903 ) was an American composer and organist. He was a long-standing Dean of Faculty of the American Conservatory of Music and organist for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for 22 years. Fischer was also a recording artist, radio performer and author. After being appointed to teach at the American Conservatory of Music in 1928, Fischer also studied with Boulanger in Paris in 1931 and with Kodály in Budapest in 1936. His works were favorable reviewed by notable critics such as the Chicago Tribune’s “fearsome” Claudia Cassidy. Selected publications * Roberts, Stella and Fischer, Irwin (1967), “Handbook of Modal Counterpoint”. Free Press; 1st edition, 160 pages. . * Fischer, Irwin Leroy (1950). “Harmony.” * Hundreds of published musical scores. * Coffee House Music References Further reading * External links * Short Biography * Longer Biography * Chicago Tribune Obituary * Irwin Leroy Fischer’s Music on Spotify *Irwin Fischer Papers at the Newberry Library

Irwin Swack

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Irwin Swack (November 8, 1916 – January 2, 2006) was an American composer of contemporary classical music from West Salem, Ohio. He held degrees from the Cleveland Institute of Music (where he studied violin, graduating with a B.M. in 1939), the Juilliard School, Northwestern University (master’s degree), He studied with Henry Cowell (at Columbia University), Gunther Schuller (at Tanglewood), Vittorio Giannini (at Juilliard), Paul Creston (at Columbia University), and Normand Lockwood. His music was recorded on the Centaur, CRS, Opus One, and Living Artist Recordings labels. His music is published by Carl Fischer, Shawnee Press, Theodore Presser, and Galaxy Music. His last residence was in Bellmore, New York. Awards and grants * ASCAP Standard Awards * Ford Foundation grant * Meet-the-Composer grant * New York State Council on the Arts grant Works *Duets for Violin and Viola *Fantasie Concertante, string orchestra *Profiles, clarinet, violin and cello *Sonata for Flute and Piano *String Quartet no. 1 *String Quartet no. 2 *String Quartet no. 3 *String Quartet no. 4 *String Quartet no. 5 *Symphony no. 1 *Symphony no. 2 *The Visions of Isaiah, mixed choir and orchestra References Ext

Isabel McNeill Carley

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Isabel McNeill Carley (4 December 1918 – 14 July 2011) was a published writer, editor, composer and music teacher. She is considered one of the leaders of the Orff Schulwerk when it began to take hold in the United States in the 1960s. As a co-founder of the American Orff-Schulwerk Association (AOSA), Carley contributed greatly to the organization’s beginnings, serving as a board member and magazine editor. Carley devoted much of her life to musical instruction, publishing a series of books titled Recorder Improvisation and Technique. Carley died on 14 July 2011, at her home in Gaithersburg, Maryland. Early life and education Daughter of John T. and Netta H. McNeill, Isabel McNeill was born on 4 December 1918, in Chicago, Illinois, and grew up there and in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. For the next ten years, she and her family lived in New York, Oregon and Texas. In 1953, they moved to Indianapolis, Indiana. Carley completed a three-year education program in one year and earned a Specialist Diploma with honors to become the first American honors graduate at the institute. Philosophical views In her classes from pre-school to adult, Carley taught the importance of improvisation, speech

Isadore Freed

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Isadore Freed (March 26, 1900 – November 10, 1960) was a Jewish composer of Belarusian birth. Biography Born in Brest-Litovsk, in what is now Brest, Belarus, Freed’s family emigrated to the United States when Freed was three years old and settled in Philadelphia, where his father owned a music store. Freed began playing piano at age seven, and began composing at age nine. Freed’s formal music education was at the University of Pennsylvania, where he earned a bachelor’s degree at the age of 18. After graduation from Penn, Freed briefly held a teaching post at The Curtis Institute of Music. In 1924, he married Riva Hoffmann, a dancer in Isadora Duncan’s troupe. Following this Freed went to Berlin where he briefly studied piano with Josef Weiss, and then to Paris where he studied composition with Ernest Bloch, Nadia Boulanger, Louis Vierne and Vincent d’Indy. He also studied piano with Józef Hofmann and George Bayle, and organ with Rollo Maitland. Freed returned to the United States in 1934, and shortly after he was employed by the composition department at Temple University from the mid-1930s until the mid-1940s, but sources disagree as to the dates of his appointment. In 1944, Freed

Ivan Tcherepnin

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Ivan Alexandrovich Tcherepnin (Russian: Ива́н Алекса́ндрович Черепни́н) (February 5, 1943 in Issy-les-Moulineaux, France – April 11, 1998 in Boston, USA) was an experimental, then later modernist/postmodernist, composer and a noted innovator in the field of electronics and modular synthesizers. Ivan was born into a highly musical family, his father and grandfather, Alexander and Nikolai, being distinguished Russian composers, and his mother Ming (born: Lee Hsien Ming) a well-known pianist. His elder brother, Serge is also a composer. He studied with Leon Kirchner, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Henri Pousseur, and Pierre Boulez. After teaching briefly at both the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and Stanford University, he became director of the Harvard University Electronic Music Studio from 1972, remaining there until his death in 1998. The Tcherepnin legacy continues with two of Ivan’s sons, Stefan and Sergei. Ivan Tcherepnin was the winner of the 1996 Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition for his Double Concerto for Violin, Cello and Orchestra. His other honors include awards from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (1963–1995) and the National Endowment for t

Ivana Marburger Themmen

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Ivana Marburger Themmen (born April 7, 1935) is an American composer and pianist, whose Concerto for Guitar was a finalist in the 1982 Kennedy Center Friedheim Composition Competition. Career Themmen was born on April 7, 1935, in New York City, where she began studying piano at age 7. She attended the New England Conservatory of Music, where she met and married Harold B. Themmen. They had three children, Paris, Allegra, and Tania. Tania is married to voice actress Susan Blu. In addition to the New England Conservatory, Themmen studied in Europe, at the Eastman School of Music, and at the Tanglewood Music Center. Her teachers included Francis Judd Cooke, Nicolas Flagello, Lukas Foss, Carl McKinley, Jean Rosenblum, and Otto Schulhof. Themmen taught at the Hampton Conservatory and also worked as an accompanist for the American Ballet Theatre. She received grants from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, Queens Symphony, and the New York State Council on the Arts. Her music was published by Lyra Music Company. Discography Chamber music *Circles (flute, French horn and piano) *Concept V (clarinet and viola) *Tetrachiron (piano four hands) Orchestra *Concerto for Guitar *Fasching *R

Ivor Darreg

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Ivor Darreg (May 5, 1917 – February 12, 1994) was an American composer and leading proponent of microtonal or “xenharmonic” music. He also created a series of experimental musical instruments. Biography Darreg, a contemporary of Harry Partch and a close colleague of John H. Chalmers, Erv Wilson, and Joel Mandelbaum, was one of America’s leading theorists and practitioners of experimental intonation and experimental instrument building. Frequently he published his writings in his own Xenharmonic Bulletin. Darreg was born Kenneth Vincent Gerard O’Hara in Portland, Oregon. His father John O’Hara was editor of the (Portland) Catholic Sentinel newspaper and his mother was an artist. (His Uncle, Edwin Vincent O’Hara, was a Roman Catholic Bishop. ) He dropped out of school as a teenager, but he had both self-taught facility in at least ten languages and a basic understanding of all the sciences. His real love was music and electronics. Because of his choice of music, his father cast him out, and he and his mother set out on their own with little help from anyone. At that point he took on the name “Ivor,” which means “man with bow” (from his cello-playing talents) and “Drareg” (the retrogr

J. Bodewalt Lampe

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Jens Bodewalt Lampe (November 8, 1869 – May 26, 1929) was a Danish-born American composer, arranger, performer and band-leader of ragtime and syncopated dance music. Lampe was born in Ribe, Denmark to Christian and Sophia Lampe. In 1873, his family moved to St. Paul, Minnesota, where his father took over leadership of the Great Western Band. Lampe was a child prodigy on the violin and became the first chair violinist for the Minneapolis Symphony at age 16. He met and married his wife, Josephine, while receiving tuition in Chicago in 1888. In the early 1890s, he and his wife moved to Buffalo, where they had four children, Walter, Petra, Dorothy and Joseph Dell (known later as “Dell”). At this time, he began composing and publishing his own music and led a dance orchestra. In 1900, a year after the success of Joplin’s “Maple Leaf Rag”, he published his most successful and enduring song “Creole Belles”, a rag or cakewalk that sold more than a million copies in sheet music. The song was recorded by Sousa’s Band in 1902 and has been a staple of jazz bands and ragtime pianists into the 21st century. He also collected, and may possibly have composed, Mysterioso Pizzicato, the piece of pho

J. D. Parran

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J. D. Parran is an American multi-woodwind player, educator, and composer specializing in jazz and free improvisation. He plays the soprano, alto, tenor, baritone, and bass saxophone, as well as the E-flat clarinet, alto clarinet, bass clarinet, contra-alto clarinet, piccolo, alto flute, bamboo flute, Native American flute, bamboo saxophone, and nagaswaram. Career Parran spent his college years in St. Louis, Missouri, where he attended Webster University and received an M.A. in music education from Washington University in St. Louis. While a university student, he joined the Black Artists’ Group with Hamiet Bluiett. He moved to New York City in 1971 and has served as chairman of the music department and the director of Jazz and African American Music Studies at The Harlem School of the Arts. He has taught at the City University of New York and Greenwich House Music School. Parran has recorded with Stevie Wonder and John Lennon. For fifteen years he was a member of the experimental woodwind trio New Winds with Robert Dick and Ned Rothenberg, and is a member of Anthony Davis’s Episteme ensemble. He also performs and records with Anthony Braxton’s ensembles and has collaborated with L

J. Emory Shaw

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J. Emory D. Shaw (1863 – June 10, 1943) was an American musician, educator, and academic administrator. He served as the musical director of Wilson College, president of Kee Mar College, and director of fine arts at Southwestern University. Early life and education J. Emory Shaw was born in Baltimore in 1863, the son of Greenbury Washington Shaw, a sailmaker, and Ann Eliza Travers. He began to study the piano at the age of 15, and at 19 he took up vocal instruction for which he had the strongest predilection. At his parents’ request, he continued studying piano and theory. Shaw received private instruction at home and abroad. In 1906, Shaw became president of Kee Mar College. By November 1906, he reported issues with nervous prostration. Shaw resigned in April 1907 due to his health issues. Shaw was the head master and teacher of voice and organ in the Paris Texas School of Singing and Organ Instruction. In 1912, Shaw became director of fine arts at Southwestern University. He was also the director of the choir of the First Methodist church in Georgetown, Texas. Shaw was a vocalist specialized in voice culture, conductor, and organist. He was experienced in orchestra and the art of

J. Harold Brown

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J. Harold Brown (1902 – September 17, 1982) was an American composer and musician best known for his production of The Saga of Zip Zan Rinkle, about a man who sleeps between 1948 and 1968 to witness large cultural changes in the United States. He trained the Karamu Quartet and traveled with Jimmie Lunceford’s band. Brown was dean of music at Florida A&M University and taught in high schools and colleges in Atlanta, Cleveland, and Indianapolis. Personal life and death Brown was born in Lakeland, Florida in 1902. He was married and had three daughters. Brown died in Atlanta, Georgia on September 17, 1982, at the age of 79. References Further reading * * *

J. Leubrie Hill

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John Leubrie Hill (1873 – August 30, 1916) was a composer and writer. He wrote songs and musicals. Life and career The son of John W. and Rachel Hill, John Leubrie Hill was born in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1873. He grew up in Memphis, Tennessee where he was also educated as a musician. In New York he continued to work collaboratively as a songwriter with Alex Rogers; notably contributing some songs to the landmark African American musical In Dahomey (1903) as one of their early New York projects. He wrote the musical Hello Paris with J. Rosamond Johnson. He also wrote the musical My Friend from Dixie. He formed the Colored Vaudeville Exchange and in 1913 he produced and starred in My Friend from Kentucky at the Lafayette Theatre in Harlem. It was an influential hit with vibrant dance numbers that launched a trend of New York City theater patrons heading uptown for shows. It was also used in Laurel and Hardy’s 1937 film Way Out West, where the duo perform a dance to the accompaniment of a cowboy vocal quartet with guitar. The New York Public Library has an image of him with “his Darktown Follies”. Hill died in New York City on August 30, 1916. Discography *“Rock me in the cradle of

J. Mark Scearce

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J. Mark Scearce (born October 9, 1960) is an American composer known for his musical settings of more than 200 texts by forty poets—from art songs to operas to works for chorus and orchestra. Early life J. Mark Scearce was born in Edina, Missouri and grew up in neighboring Kirksville. There he graduated high school in 1979, and attended Northeast Missouri State University (now Truman State), graduating in 1983. At NMSU he triple-majored in music theory, horn performance, and philosophy & religion. During high school and college, Scearce established himself as a jazz trumpeter, winning outstanding soloist awards at regional jazz festivals (St. Charles, Wichita, Springfield). Despite acceptance at North Texas to pursue this trajectory, Scearce chose to become a contemporary classical composer after his undergraduate studies, attending Indiana University on the strength of his first composition, a brass quintet written for and recorded by the Chicago Brass Quintet. Scearce received his Masters and Doctorate in Music Composition from Indiana in 1986 and 1993 respectively. Career and influences Scearce’s catalogue of music compositions totals over a thousand performances of sixty works,

J. Rosamond Johnson

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John Rosamond Johnson (August 11, 1873 – November 11, 1954; usually referred to as J. Rosamond Johnson) was an American composer and singer during the Harlem Renaissance. Born in Jacksonville, Florida, much of his music career was in New York City. Johnson is hailed well over a century later as the music composer of the civic anthem “Lift Every Voice and Sing” first performed live by 500 Black American students from racially-segregated Jacksonville, Florida’s First Baptist Academy, in the pivotal year of 1900. The song was published by Joseph W. Stern & Co., Manhattan, New York (later the Edward B. Marks Music Company). J. Rosamond Johnson was the younger brother of poet and activist James Weldon Johnson, who wrote the lyrics for “Lift Every Voice and Sing”. The two also worked together in causes related to the NAACP. Biography J. Rosamond Johnson was born on August 11, 1873, to Helen Louise Dillet, a native of Nassau, Bahamas, and James Johnson. His maternal great-grandmother, Hester Argo, had escaped from Saint-Domingue (now Haiti) during the revolutionary upheaval in 1802, along with her three young children, including Johnson’s grandfather, Stephen Dillet (1797–1880). Although

J. T. Buck

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J. T. Buck (born 6 June 1978) is a composer, and lyricist, and stage director, and project coordinator. Born and raised in Akron, Buck graduated from Central-Hower High School in 1996. He spent his first few years post high school working as a freelance musician, actor, director, and music director. Buck spent two summers as musical director for the National Children’s Theatre School summer workshops in Vail Colorado, and three summers as music director for the Columbia Gorge School of Theatre in White Salmon, Washington. Buck received his BA in Theatre Arts with a minor in music from the University of Akron in 2004. He was twice a student of Tony-Winning Broadway producer Stuart Ostrow’s New Musical Theatre Lab. In 2006, Buck accepted the position of Arts Director at First Grace UCC in Akron. His work there involved directing worship-related music and arts, as well as producing and directing grass-roots theatre, music, dance and visual art in collaboration with local artists. Buck has directed a variety of pieces for the stage, including Corpus Christi, The Gospel According to Tammy Faye Buck wrote the lyrics and music for the musical The Gospel According to Tammy Faye written wit

Jack Beeson

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Jack Hamilton Beeson (July 15, 1921 – June 6, 2010) was an American composer. He was known particularly for his operas, the best known of which are Lizzie Borden, Hello Out There!, and The Sweet Bye and Bye. Early life Born in Muncie, Indiana, Beeson began with music when he started piano lessons with Luella Weimer in 1928, but it was not until 1933 that he began to compose. He decided to become an “opera-composer” after being influenced by Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts. From 1936 until 1939, he switched piano teachers and was with Percival Owen during this period of time. In 1938 he received certificates with first class honors in piano and theory from the Conservatory of Music at the University of Toronto, a very well earned accomplishment at the age of 21. From 1944 to 1945 he had private studies with Béla Bartók in New York City. At this time he was also associating with the Columbia University Opera Workshop and the opera productions of Columbia Theatre Associates. This led to the first performance of his music in New York City. Throughout 1946 and 1947 Beeson was adapting Paul Goodman’s play and composing the music for Jonah as well as writing and performing the Fifth S

Jack Behrens

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Jack Behrens (25 March 1935 – 9 December 2024) was a Canadian composer, pianist, and educator of American birth. A member of the Canadian League of Composers and an associate of the Canadian Music Centre, he studied at the Juilliard School (BSc 1958, MSc 1959) and at Harvard University (PhD 1973), where his teachers included William Bergsma, Vincent Persichetti, Peter Mennin, Leon Kirchner, and Roger Sessions. He also studied with Darius Milhaud at the Aspen Music Festival and with John Cage and Stefan Wolpe at the Emma Lake Composers-Artists Workshop in Saskatchewan. Life and career Born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Behrens was trained at the Juilliard School where he earned a Bachelor of Music in 1958 and a Master of Music in 1959. Among his teachers at Juilliard were William Bergsma, Vincent Persichetti, and Peter Mennin. In the summer of 1962 he studied at the Aspen Music Festival and School with Darius Milhaud and in the summers of 1964–1965 he studied with Stefan Wolpe and John Cage at the Emma Lake Composers-Artists Workshop in Saskatchewan. He later entered the graduate composition program at Harvard University where he earned a Doctor of Philosophy in music composition in 1

Jack Cooper (American musician)

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Jack Cooper (born John Thomas Cooper Jr., May 14, 1963) is an American composer, arranger, orchestrator, multireedist, and music educator. He has performed with, written music for and recorded by internationally known pop, jazz, and classical artists. Intro Cooper has performed with, written music for or recorded by internationally known pop, jazz, and classical artists including Sean Ardoin, Aaron Neville, Marc Secara, Jiggs Whigham, the Berlin Jazz Orchestra, Markus Burger, Lenny Pickett, Joyce Cobb, the BBB featuring Bernie Dresel, Duffy Jackson, Donald Brown, Young Voices Brandenburg, Jimi Tunnell, Christian McBride, the Westchester Jazz Orchestra, the U.S.A.F. Airmen of Note, the U.S. Army Jazz Ambassadors, the Dallas Winds, and the Memphis Symphony Orchestra. Early life, musical education and influences Jack Cooper was born in Whittier, California on May 14, 1963; his given birth name passed down from his great-grandfather and father, John Thomas Cooper. He was raised in the nearby, northeastern section of La Habra (remote, Southeastern base of the Puente Hills). He is the younger brother of artist and stylist Cathy Cooper, grandson of H.V. Cooper and also the grandson (x4) o

Jack Delano

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Jack Delano (born Yakov Ovcharov, ; August 1, 1914 – August 14, 1997) was a Russian Empire-born Ukrainian photographer, filmmaker, and composer, who spent much of his life in Puerto Rico. In the United States, he worked for the Works Progress Administration, United Fund, and most notably, the Farm Security Administration (FSA). He wore many hats as he also was a composer known for his use of Puerto Rican folk material, started a television production company, and was a cartoonist, poet, professor, and architectural designer. Early life Delano was born Yakov Ovcharov to a Jewish family in , Podolia Governorate, Russian Empire (now Ukraine). Delano, along with his parents and younger brother, emigrated to the United States in 1923. The family arrived in New York on July 5, 1923, on the SS Homeric, and settled in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, soon after. Career Farm Security Administration After graduating from the PAFA, Delano found it difficult to secure a career in painting, illustrating, or music, so he decided to look into a photography program he had heard about through the Federal Art Project (FAP). He had moved to New York and had been freelancing as a photographer at the time,

Jack Lathrop

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

John Marcus Lathrop (May 11, 1913 – January 9, 1987) was an American vocalist and guitarist with the Tune Twisters, Glenn Miller, and Hal McIntyre. Beginning around 1947, Lathrop was leader of the Drug Store Cowboys. Early life Lathrop was born in Sherburne, New York. His parents, Margaret Lathrop (née Margaret Lowell; 1893–1958) and John Marcos Lathrop (1891–1974) were married May 28, 1912, in Manhattan. According to the 1920 US Census, his mother was divorced; and in 1920, he, his sister Kathryn (1914–1962), and his mother lived with his widowed maternal grandmother, Kittie Isabel Lowell (née Kittie Isabel Purdy; 1863–1938), who owned and ran a private boarding house in White Plains, New York. Career Guitarist and vocalist in combos and big bands Tune Twisters In the mid 1930s, Lathrop was one of founding members of the Tune Twisters, a swing jazz vocal trio originally composed of Andy Love (1911–1982), Robert Wacker (1909–1985), and himself. The Tune Twisters were featured on radio broadcasts and also recorded and performed with jazz artists that included Ray Noble in 1935 (with Noble, the Tune Twisters were initially known as “The Freshmen”), Bob Crosby in 1935, Glenn Miller in

Jack Marshall (composer)

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Jack Wilton Marshall (November 23, 1921 – September 20, 1973) was an American jazz guitarist, composer, arranger, and record producer. He was married to Eva Katherine Pellegrini, and the father to four children: three sons, producer/director Frank Marshall, composer/arranger Phil Marshall, bassist Matt Marshall, and a daughter, Sally Marshall. Jack is also the cousin of classical guitarist Christopher Parkening. Biography Born in El Dorado, Kansas, Marshall was one of Capitol Records’ top producers in the late 1950s and 1960s. He had a varied career as a jazz, rock and classical guitarist and also as a composer, arranger and record producer. He released two solo albums with drummer Shelly Manne that featured his fingerstyle jazz guitar playing. He was a friend of Howard Roberts and Jack Sheldon and produced several of their albums for Capitol. He wrote his own arrangements, many with a big-band sound to them. He was credited with the arrangement for Peggy Lee’s “Fever”, with Joe Mondragon on bass, Shelly Manne on drums, and Howard Roberts adding the iconic finger snaps. Marshall composed the theme and incidental music for the 1960s TV series The Munsters and the 1966 tie-in film Mu

Jack Wall (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Jack Wall is an American video game music composer. He has worked on video game music for over 20 games including the Myst franchise, Splinter Cell, Jade Empire, Mass Effect, and Call of Duty. Wall earned a degree in civil engineering from Drexel University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and, after a brief stint working in civil engineering, transitioned into music production. He worked with musicians such as John Cale, David Byrne, and Patti Smith, and, after performing increasingly complex production and sound engineering tasks, moved into music composition in 1995. Wall’s first video game composition was the soundtrack to Vigilance. Primarily composing in an orchestral style, by 2001 he composed the soundtrack to Myst III: Exile, which was the title he says put him on the map as a video game composer. In 2002, Wall became one of around 20 co-founders of the Game Audio Network Guild (G.A.N.G.) as well as senior director. In 2005, Wall, along with G.A.N.G. founder and fellow composer Tommy Tallarico, produced the Video Games Live concert series, having served as the conductor for the international concert tour. His soundtracks for Myst III: Exile, Myst IV: Revelation, Rise of the

Jack Woodbridge

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Jack Woodbridge (1956 - 2023) was an American-born pianist, singer and composer from Scranton, Pennsylvania. Woodbridge was known for his collaborations with independent film director Flavio Alves and award-winning guitarist/producer Dean Bailin as well as for his theatrical scores and two albums, Picture This and Jack of Hearts. Early life Woodbridge was born and raised in the West Side neighborhood of Scranton, Pennsylvania. He was the son of John and Joan Kenney Woodbridge and was a 1974 graduate of West Scranton High School. He discovered his love for music at an early age and began playing the piano at age eight. He wrote his first song, “Debbie Dear,” at age 12 and began singing professionally following his graduation from high school. Woodbridge graduated with a B.A. in advertising from Pennsylvania State University in 1978. He self-designed his curriculum to include an emphasis on Music, Graphic Arts, Film and Photography. He had been a member of ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) since 1996. Career Woodbridge worked for many years as a keyboardist and vocalist for several bands in Northeastern Pennsylvania; including OFAY (1974), The Stones Show

Jack Yarber

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Jack Yarber (born March 15, 1967), also known by his stage name Jack Oblivian, is an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist based in Memphis, Tennessee. He was a founding member of the garage bands The Compulsive Gamblers, and The Oblivians and currently fronts Jack O & the Tennessee Tearjerkers. Yarber has also been a member, or contributed to: The End, Johnny Vomit & The Dry Heaves, Andre Williams, The Knaughty Knights, South Filthy, The Cool Jerks, The Limes, ‘68 Comeback, King Louie & His Loose Diamonds, Greg Oblivian & the Tip Tops, Jack Oblivian & The Cigarillos, The Natural Kicks and Tav Falco’s Panther Burns. Today, Yarber continues to write, record and tour as a solo artist. In January 2016, he released his seventh solo album, The Lone Ranger of Love. The record was released on his own label, Mony Records. Johnny Vomit and the Dry Heaves Jack Yarber began his professional music career in high school, appearing alongside high-school friend and future Squirrel Nut Zippers founder Jimbo Mathus in the Corinth, Mississippi, based Johnny Vomit & the Dry Heaves. Yarber played drums in the outfit, which credited him as Johnny Goopa. Johnny Vomit & the Dry Heaves would go on to

Jackson Berkey

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Jackson Berkey (born May 24, 1942) is an American composer, pianist and singer, best known for his work with Mannheim Steamroller, which he co-founded with Chip Davis in 1974. Early life and education Berkey was born in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania. He began playing the piano at age 5. His mother learned to play the piano by ear, but insisted that Jackson receive the training she had not. As a result, he was quite an accomplished pianist by the time he entered high school. He received a scholarship from the Huntingdon Music Club to attend the Chautauqua Music Festival in western New York state where he displayed his very serious demeanor as a musician. While his fellow students were enjoying the great outdoors that the area provided, Berkey was daily attending orchestra rehearsals of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra. After graduating from high school in 1960, Berkey briefly attended the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York. Unfortunately, because scholarships did not adequately cover all expenses, he dropped out of school and got a job as a programming director and announcer at the classical music station, WBBF-FM in Rochester. He kept up with his piano skills by keeping a k

Jacob Avshalomov

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Jacob Avshalomov (March 28, 1919 – April 25, 2013) was a composer and conductor. Early life and education Jacob Avshalomov was born on March 28, 1919, in Tsingtao, China. His father was Aaron Avshalomov, the Siberian-born composer known for “oriental musical materials cast in western forms and media”; his mother was from San Francisco. Aaron Avshalomov had become friends with Gershkovitch in the Orient (Jacob was three years old when the two met). However, because they did not hold permanent visas the family returned to China. During this time he studied with Gershkovitch and participated in the Portland Junior Symphony. Portland Youth Philharmonic Following Gershkovitch’s death in 1953, guest conductors lead the Portland Junior Symphony (now known as the Portland Youth Philharmonic) for its thirtieth season—one was Avshalomov. The year 1984 marked the orchestra’s sixtieth anniversary as well as Avshalomov’s thirtieth year as conductor. Avshalomov retired in 1995 after an estimated 640 concerts and 10,000 auditions. In 2011 Avshalomov was one of three honorees to be recognized by the Portland Center for the Performing Arts Foundation for outstanding contributions to Portland’s art

Jacob Cooper (composer)

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Jacob Mauney Cooper is an American composer living in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Biography After attending Amherst College for his bachelor’s degree in both geology and music, Cooper completed his graduate studies in composition at the Yale School of Music, and later formed the composers’ collective Sleeping Giant with several of his classmates. His works have been performed by the Calder Quartet, JACK Quartet, Eighth Blackbird, Minnesota Orchestra, Albany Symphony Orchestra, Ensemble ACJW, NOW Ensemble, Dither Quartet, Living Earth Show, Carmina Slovenica, Mellissa Hughes, Timo Andres, Theo Bleckmann, Jodie Landau, Ashley Bathgate, and Vicky Chow. Cooper’s national awards include a Music Alive Residency Award from New Music USA, a Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and a Morton Gould Young Composer Award from ASCAP. He was also the winner of the 2011 Carsblad Music Festival Composers’ Competition and has been hailed by the New York Times as “richly talented” and by The New Yorker as a “maverick song composer.” Cooper is an associate professor at West Chester University and previously served on the faculty at Amherst College. Works Cooper’s lar

Jacob Druckman

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Jacob Raphael Druckman (June 26, 1928 – May 24, 1996) was an American composer. Life A graduate of the Juilliard School in 1956, He was composer-in-residence of the New York Philharmonic from 1982 until 1985. Druckman taught at Juilliard, The Aspen Music Festival, Tanglewood, Brooklyn College, Bard College, and Yale University, among other appointments. He was Connecticut’s State Composer Laureate. Druckman died of lung cancer at age 67 in New Haven, Connecticut. His music is published by Boosey & Hawkes. He is the father of percussionist Daniel Druckman. The Aspen Music Festival gives out the Jacob Druckman award in his honor each festival season. The reward is given to an up-and-coming composer, who is then commissioned to write a piece to be performed in the next festival season. Notable musicians who recorded his works include David Zinman, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Zubin Mehta, Leonard Slatkin, Dawn Upshaw, Jan DeGaetani, the Dorian Wind Quintet, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and the American Brass Quintet. Notable students Major works * String Quartet No. 1 (1948) *The Seven Deadly Sins (1955), for piano *Dark Upon the Harp (1961–1962), for mezzo-soprano, brass, and percussion. S

Jacob French

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Jacob French (July 15, 1754 – May 1817) was a singing master and one of the first American composers, sometimes called Yankee tunesmiths. “A student of William Billings, French adopted Billings’ innovative approach to psalmody … His music tends to be more complex in its structure, rhythm, and counterpoint than most of his contemporaries.” “Along with William Billings, he is regarded as one of the finest composer of anthems in the New England tradition.” French’s Farewell Anthem appears in Southern Harmony, 1835, as well as The Sacred Harp from 1844 to the present. He was born in Stoughton, Massachusetts. His brother, Edward, also composed a few tunes. Some of French’s choral music was adapted by American composer John Cage for his Apartment House 1776 and subsequently arranged for string quartet as part of 44 Harmonies by violinist Irvine Arditti. These were recorded and issued by Mode Records along with adaptations by Cage of other Colonial-period hymnists. Publications *The New American Melody (1789) *The Psalmodist’s Companion (1793) *Harmony of Harmony (1802) List of works *Heavenly Vision *Beauty *Dormant *Happiness *Farewell Anthem (Scores available at the Choral Public Dom

Jacob Schaefer (composer)

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Jacob Schaefer (, 1888–1936) was a Russian-born Jewish American composer, political activist and choir director whose career ran from the 1910s to the 1930s. A committed Communist for the last two decades of his life, he founded and operated a number of workers’ orchestras and choirs in Chicago and New York, including most famously the Freiheit Gezang Farein. He composed a number of cantatas, oratorios and song arrangements which were performed by the ensembles he directed, as well as by their affiliated performing groups around the United States. Biography Early life Schaefer was born in Kremenets, Volhynian Governorate, Russian Empire (now located in Ternopil Oblast, Ukraine) on October 13, 1888. Jacob was born into a Jewish family of carpenters; his father, Moishe-Dovid, was a follower of Hasidic Judaism who knew many traditional songs and nigunim, and his mother was named Hania-Chava. (His father spelled the family name Soifer (), which Jacob occasionally did as well even after emigrating. It was through his new higher-paying music jobs that in 1911 he was able to purchase his own piano for the first time in his life. During the summer of 1914 there were extensive discussions a

Jacob Weinberg

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Jacob Weinberg (1 July 1879 – 2 November 1956) was a Russian-born American Jewish composer and pianist who composed over 135 works for piano and other instruments. He was one of the founders of the Jewish National Conservatory in Jerusalem before immigrating to the U.S. where he became “an influential voice in the promotion of American Jewish music” from the 1940s until his death. Life and career Weinberg was born in Odessa in the Russian Empire (present-day Ukraine) to Dora and Wolf (Zev) Weinberg. His family was middle class and his father was a merchant who died when Jacob was only 12. Jacob wrote an essay about how he had been sent to a synagogue to say the Kaddish prayer in mourning for his father. He wrote that he had not been raised in an Orthodox home and he was not familiar with the sounds of the Hebrew language in the prayer but he fell in love with the music of the language and the rhythm of the prayer. This sparked his interest in Jewish religion and Jewish music. One of his uncles was Peter (or Pyotr) Isaevich Weinberg (or “Veinberg”). (Peter was a very prominent translator of Shakespeare, Goethe, Heine and other luminaries into Russian. Peter was a friend of Anton Che

Jacques de Menasce

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Jacques de Menasce (August 19, 1905 – January 28, 1960) was a composer, pianist, and critic of Austrian, and later American, nationality. Jacques de Menasce was born in Bad Ischl, then in the German-speaking part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, into a Jewish family with roots in Egypt where they had amassed considerable wealth as merchants and bankers and played prominent roles in the Jewish community that centred in Alexandria. This was also the family from which sprang the Catholic writer Jean de Menasce, who was a first cousin of the composer’s father, Henri de Menasce. As a boy Jacques de Menasce’s portrait was painted by Oskar Kokoschka. He studied at the Vienna Music Academy as a young man under teachers who included Joseph Marx, Paul Pisk, and Emil von Sauer, and he was also much encouraged by Alban Berg, at whose instigation he composed his first piano concerto. His compositions include two piano concertos, the Sonata for Viola and Piano (championed by Lillian Fuchs), Hebrew Melodies for Violin and Piano, and the song cycles Quatre Chansons, Outrenuit, and Pour une Princesse. There exist a few recordings of his works. The first, on Vanguard Classics, contains performances o

Jacques-Louis Monod

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Jacques-Louis Monod (25 February 1927 – 21 September 2020) was a French composer, pianist and conductor of 20th century and contemporary music, particularly in the advancement of the music of Charles Ives, Edgard Varèse, Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern and uptown music; and was active primarily in New York City and London during the second half of the twentieth century. Biography Paris 1940s: early years Monod was born in Asnières (now Asnières-sur-Seine), a northwestern suburb of Paris, to an affluent family of privilege and of French Protestant affiliation with ancestral roots in French-speaking Switzerland His musical prowess was detected early when he enrolled in 1933 at the Paris Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique as a child prodigy at the age of six, below the official minimum age of nine. Monod attended the Paris Conservatoire intermittently but remained registered for nearly 20 years, obtaining his Doctorat in 1952. Monod’s teachers at the Conservatoire were Yves Nat and Olivier Messiaen; including master classes under the visiting conductor, Herbert von Karajan; he also studied with his godfather, Paul-Silva Hérard, the organist at Paris’s St. Ambroise Church. A d

Jake Heggie

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Jake Heggie (born March 31, 1961) is an American composer of opera, vocal, orchestral, and chamber music. He is best known for his operas and art songs as well as for his collaborations with internationally renowned performers and writers. Biography Childhood John (“Jake”) Stephen Heggie was born in West Palm Beach, Florida, Shortly thereafter, Heggie began writing music. A few years after his father’s death, the family moved to the San Francisco Bay Area, where Heggie completed high school and continued his studies in piano. Education and musical training As a teenager, Heggie studied composition privately with Ernst Bacon from 1977 to 1979. After graduating from high school, he spent two years studying at the American University in Paris. He later continued his studies at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where his teachers included Roger Bourland, Paul Des Marais, David Raksin, and Paul Reale. He graduated from UCLA with a Bachelor of Arts in 1984 and returned for graduate school from 1986 to 1988, where he won the Henry Mancini Award in 1987. Heggie’s most significant teacher during his studies at UCLA was Johana Harris, widow of composer Roy Harris. “She was a magn

Jake Monaco

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Jake Monaco is an American film and TV composer. He currently scores Amazon Prime Video’s The Stinky & Dirty Show, Netflix’s Dinotrux, and Warner Bros. Animation’s Be Cool, Scooby-Doo!. He also provided scores for Disney+ originals, specifically Cars on the Road, and Toy Story specials Lamp Life and Forky Asks a Question. Career Monaco began playing guitar in high school, later touring with a group while attending the University of Richmond in Virginia. A few years after graduating, his bandmates opted to take up non-musical professional careers. At the suggestion of a friend, Monaco enrolled in a film scoring course at University of Southern California. He has stated that although he had never had interest in scoring as a child, it was these classes that piqued his interest, explaining that he was “sucked in” Monaco credits the time he spent assisting Beck as key to his success as a scorer, and has described assistant positions as “some of the best education and experience a young composer can receive”. After assisting Christophe Beck for eight years, Monaco made the decision to begin scoring on his own. Discography Feature films Short films References External links * * Interview

Jake Runestad

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Jake Runestad (born May 20, 1986) is an American composer and conductor of classical music based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He has composed music for a wide variety of musical genres and ensembles, but has achieved greatest acclaim for his work in the genres of opera, orchestral music, choral music, and wind ensemble. One of his principal collaborators for musical texts has been Todd Boss. Biography Runestad was born in Rockford, Illinois. His post-secondary education in music began at Eastern Illinois University, which he attended in the years 2004 and 2005. He received his first degree in music (a B.S. in Music Education) from Winona State University, which he attended from 2005 until 2009, then pursued graduate studies at the Peabody Conservatory of the Johns Hopkins University between 2009 and 2011 to earn a M.Mus. degree in music composition. In 2020, he was a recipient of an Outstanding Recent Graduate Award from these institutions. His teachers at the Peabody Conservatory included Kevin Puts. He studied with the composer Libby Larsen and worked with Bernard Rands, David Lang, Tania León, John Musto, Christopher Rouse, Jake Heggie, and John Duffy. He received a Distinguished

James A. Beckel Jr.

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James Arthur Beckel Jr. (born July 16, 1948) is a contemporary American composer and musician best known for his contemporary compositions as well as his association with the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, where he was principal trombonist from 1969 to 2018. His compositions have been performed and recorded by the Baltimore, Atlanta, Indianapolis Symphonies, Ft. Wayne Philharmonic, United States Air Force Band, the DC Air Force Orchestra, and many other nationally recognized orchestras throughout the United States. Beckel is married, has two children, and is a member of the Carmel Brass Choir. Beckel maintains a trombone and euphonium studio at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana. Works list Toccata for Orchestra In the Mind’s Eye Glass Bead Game Fantasy after Schubert Liberty for All American Dream Gardens of Stone A Christmas Fanfare Symphony for Band I Am the American Flag Waltz of the Animals Night Visions Musica Mobilis A Gospel Christmas Inaugural Fanfare Overture for a New Age Make a Joyful Noise Celebrations Portraits Musical Masque (for the Seasons) Music for Winds, Piano, and Percussion Imagination Sonata for Trumpet and Organ American Journey String Quartet No. 1

James Baker (composer)

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James Baker is an American electro-acoustic composer, percussionist and conductor. Life and career James Baker graduated with degrees in music from State University of New York at Purchase and Juilliard, where he studied percussion and conducting. He began a long time collaboration with choreographer Tere O’Connor and has composed numerous works for Tere O’Connor Dance, including Bessie Award winner Heaven Up North. He was also the composer for Like Two Kevins for the Lyon Opera Ballet. His works have been performed internationally. Baker works as Principal Percussionist for the New York City Ballet Orchestra and serves as director of the Percussion Ensemble at the New School, Mannes College of Music. He also serves as music director of the Composers’ Conference at Wellesley College. Baker often leads the New York New Music Ensemble and Speculum Musicae, and is resident conductor at the University at Buffalo’s Center for 21st Century Music. He also appears as guest conductor with the Cygnus and Talea Ensembles. Baker appears as director on recordings including the CD, David Felder: Boxman (2002). He appears as percussionist on recordings including Millennial Masters Vol. 1. Works S

James Barnes (composer)

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James Charles Barnes (born September 9, 1949 in Hobart, Oklahoma, U.S.) is an American composer. Life and career Barnes studied composition and music theory at the University of Kansas, earning a Bachelor of Music in 1974, and Master of Music in 1975. He studied conducting privately with Zuohuang Chen. In 1977 he joined the faculty at the University of Kansas as professor of music theory and composition. He retired in August 2015, but retains his emeritus status at KU. Barnes is also a tubist and has performed with numerous professional organizations in the United States. Works Works for concert band * A Solemn Prelude for Symphonic Band, Op. 114 * A Light in the Wilderness * A Very American Overture, Op. 93 * All Pleasant Things - commissioned by the Northshore Concert Band * Alvamar Overture, Op. 45 * Appalachian Overture, Op. 51 * Arioso For Symphonic Band *Autumn Soliloquy for Oboe and Concert Band * Beautiful Oregon * Breckenridge * Brookshire Suite * Caribbean Hideaway * Carnaval in São Paulo * Centennial Celebration Overture * Century Tower Overture * Chorale and Jubiloso * Chorale Prelude on a German Folk Tune, Op. 61 *Citadel (2015) *Credo (2016) * Concerto for Tuba and Wi

James Brody

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James Brody (July 13, 1941 – April 11, 2010) was an American composer, born in Clearfield, Pennsylvania. Frank J. Oteri of the American Music Center’s New Music Box called Brody “an important figure in the development of electronic music in the Midwest.” He studied with Franz Kamin at the Indiana University School of Music, under the Greek composer Iannis Xenakis, where he received a master’s degree. Brody wrote the liner notes for the original Nonesuch LP of Iannis Xenakis – Electroacoustic Music. He taught composition, theory and electronic music at East Texas State University and was a lecturer at York College of Pennsylvania from 2005 to 2007. He also served on the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra’s Board of Directors. Brody was a guest composer at the Electronic and Computer Music Studio of the Peabody Institute and a member and past president of the Baltimore Composers Forum. He hosted a radio program on KUNM-FM in Albuquerque, New Mexico called Other Voices, Other Sounds. He was co-founder of music organizations in Bloomington, Indiana and San Antonio, Texas, dedicated to presenting and performing works by local composers. James Brody died in a car crash in Roseville, Minnesota

James Cohn

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James Cohn (February 12, 1928 – June 12, 2021) was a Newark, New Jersey-born American composer. After taking violin and piano lessons in his native town, he studied composition with Roy Harris, Wayne Barlow and Bernard Wagenaar, and majored in composition at Juilliard, graduating in 1950. He wrote solo, chamber, choral and orchestral works, among them 3 string quartets, 5 piano sonatas and 8 symphonies. He was awarded a Queen Elisabeth of Belgium Prize for his Symphony No. 2 (premiered at Brussels) and an A.I.D.E.M. prize for his Symphony No. 4 (premiered in Florence at the Maggio Musicale). The Detroit Free Press observed in the Symphony No. 3 “an economy of means . . . but no yielding of inventiveness or imaginative composition. Indeed, the work throughout is marked strongly by individuality, and comes as a refreshing experience in modern music.” Among his earlier works (1946, preceding the 1948 second symphony) is a concertino for piano and orchestra. Cohn often quoted popular tunes in many of his works, such as “Homage” (1959), based on The Star-Spangled Banner, and “A Song of the Waters,” Op. 53 (1976), a tone poem featuring variations on Shenandoah. In 1966 he composed a thre

James Cutler Dunn Parker

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James Cutler Dunn Parker (June 2, 1828 – November 27, 1916) was an American organist, educator and composer. Biography James Cutler Dunn Parker was born in Boston on June 2, 1828, the son of Samuel Hale Parker. He graduated from Harvard in 1848. After graduating from Harvard Law School, Parker went to the Leipzig Conservatory in 1851, where he studied piano with Ignaz Moscheles and Louis Plaidy, composition with Julius Rietz and Ernst Richter, and music theory and harmony with Moritz Hauptmann. He married Maria Derby of Andover in 1859. They had one child. Notes References * (scroll down to entry for “Parker, James Cutler Dunn”) * External links *

James Dashow

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

James Dashow (born November 7, 1944, in Chicago, Illinois) is an American composer of electro-acoustic music, instrumental music and opera. Life and career Dashow was born in 1944, outside of Chicago. His musical studies began in high school with Horace Reisberg; his principal teachers at the university level were J. K. Randall, Arthur Berger and Seymour Shifrin. In 1969, Dashow went to Italy on a Fulbright Fellowship to complete his studies with Goffredo Petrassi. For many years, he studied the music of Luigi Dallapiccola independently. One of the first to compose music for digital audio synthesis (“computer music”), Dashow was invited by Graziano (Giuliano) Tisato to work at the computer center of the University of Padua, where he created the first computer music compositions in Italy. He was the first vice president of the International Computer Music Association, has taught at MIT and Princeton University, and continues to actively hold master classes, lectures and concerts in Europe and North America. In 2003 he was composer-in-residence at the 12th Annual Florida Electroacoustic Music Festival in Gainesville, Florida. For several years he and coproduced a weekly contemporary

James Di Pasquale

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James Di Pasquale (born April 7, 1941) is an American musician and composer of contemporary classical music and music for television and films. Biography Pasquale was born on April 7, 1941, in Chicago to Hugo and Lucille (née Ciccone) Di Pasquale, James Di Pasquale is a graduate of St. Mel’s High School in Chicago. He graduated from Northwestern University and the Manhattan School of Music. His teachers included David Diamond and Ludmila Uhlela. Before turning full-time to composition, he had a varied career as a woodwinds performer with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Bolshoi Ballet, and the Royal Ballet. He performed as a jazz musician with Gerry Mulligan, Ella Fitzgerald, Henry Mancini, and Barbra Streisand as well as many others. He was one of the original members of the Paul Winter Consort. In 1984, he served as the Organizing Chairman and first President of the Society of Composers and Lyricists. He also served as a member of the Board of Governors of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences and on the Writer’s Advisory Committee at the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). Music for television He wrote the musical scores to made-for-TV movies s

James Fei

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James Fei or Fei Cheng-ting (; born Taipei, Taiwan, 1974) is a contemporary classical music and electronic music composer and performer. He lives in the San Francisco Bay area. He plays the soprano, alto, and baritone saxophones, bass clarinet and contrabass clarinet. Recordings of his music have been released by Leo Records, Improvised Music from Japan, CRI, and Organized Sound labels. He has worked with the composers Anthony Braxton and Alvin Lucier. Fei received a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists award (2014). Fei joined the faculty of Mills College in California in 2006. He graduated from Princeton University in 1996 and received his M.A. from Wesleyan University in 1999. He has collaborated with Harald Bode (posthumously). Discography ;With Anthony Braxton * Duet (Other Minds) 2021, (Other Minds Records OM 1033-2 ) * Ninetet (Yoshi’s) 1997 Vol. 1 (Leo, 1997 2002 ) * Ninetet (Yoshi’s) 1997 Vol. 2 (Leo, 1997 2003 ) * Ninetet (Yoshi’s) 1997 Vol. 3 (Leo, 1997 2005 ) * Ninetet (Yoshi’s) 1997 Vol. 4 (Leo, 1997 2007 ) With Roscoe Mitchell *Bells for the South Side (ECM, 2017) References External links *James Fei official website

James G. Ellis (composer)

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James Garfield Ellis (February 12, 1880 Dayton, Ohio – April 1, 1966 Los Angeles) was an American violinist, silent film theater pioneer, composer, lyricist, and music publisher. Early life Ellis was the only male of eight children born to Jay Bartlett Ellis (born 1852), and Antonette Roberts (née Hall; 1856–1896), who were married in Elkhart, Indiana, May 28, 1875. Between 9 and 16 years of age, James G. Ellis lost six of his siblings—Pauline (died 1892), Jennie (1876–1889), Maud (1878–1896), Clara (1885–1888), Mary Winnifred (1887–1888), Mabel (1889–1991)—and also lost his mother, all to complications from diphtheria. His father became a homeopathic physician in 1891. His only surviving sister, Helen became a nurse. He lived during his childhood at 1212 Wayne Street, Dayton, Ohio. Ellis served in U.S. Army in the Spanish–American War (1898). Personal life James G. Ellis was married three times. He first married Edna Lenore Roberts (1884–1987) in Merced County, California, November 27, 1902. They had two daughters. Edna and James lived in Los Banos, California in 1903. Sometime between January 7, 1920, and 1930, James G. Ellis married Anna G. Long (born 1876). When Ellis died in 1

James Horner

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James Roy Horner (August 14, 1953 – June 22, 2015) was an American film composer and conductor. He is known for the integration of choral and electronic elements alongside traditional orchestrations, and for his use of motifs associated with Celtic music. Horner worked on more than 160 films and television productions between 1978 and 2015. He won two Academy Awards for his musical composition to James Cameron’s Titanic (1997), which became the best-selling orchestral film soundtrack of all time. He also wrote the score for the highest-grossing film of all time, Cameron’s Avatar (2009). Horner’s other Oscar-nominated scores were for Aliens (1986), An American Tail (1986), Field of Dreams (1989), Apollo 13 (1995), Braveheart (1995), A Beautiful Mind (2001), and House of Sand and Fog (2003). Horner’s other notable scores include Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982), Willow (1988), The Land Before Time (1988), Glory (1989), The Rocketeer (1991), Legends of the Fall (1994), Jumanji (1995), Casper (1995), Balto (1995), The Mask of Zorro (1998), Deep Impact (1998), The Perfect Storm (2000), How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000), Troy (2004), The New World (2005), The Legend of Zorro (2

James L. Venable

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James Lewis Venable (born May 19, 1967) is an American composer, working primarily in American film and television. He is known for his scores to the animated television series The Powerpuff Girls, Samurai Jack, and Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends. The latter was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Main Title Theme Music in 2005, the same score won a 2005 Annie Award—Venable’s third—for achievement in music for an animated series. Among Venable’s feature film scores are Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Scary Movie 3, 4, and 5 and EuroTrip. On August 3, 2004, Venable released an electronica album titled Holding Space with Screaming Fan Records. Filmography Film Television Video games References External links * * *

James Lentini

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James Lentini (born February 7, 1958, in Detroit, Michigan) is an American composer, guitarist, and academic administrator. After completing undergraduate studies at Wayne State University in guitar performance and composition, he pursued a master‘s degree in composition at Michigan State University and a doctorate from the University of Southern California, where he studied composition with Robert Linn and Morten Lauridsen. In addition to composing, Lentini is a guitarist who has studied with William Kanengiser, Joe Fava, and Charles Postlewate. Compositions His music has been performed by solo artists such as guitarist William Kanengiser and by international ensembles including the Krakow Philharmonic (Poland) and the Bohuslav Martinů Orchestra (Czech Republic). In addition to many commissions, his honors include first prize in the 2004 Choral Composition Contest at Bluffton University for his composition “Peace I Leave With You,” the 2002 Andrés Segovia International Composition Prize for his solo guitar piece “Westward Voyage,” the Atwater-Kent Composition Award (first Prize), the McHugh Composition Prize, a grant from “Meet the Composer,” and several awards from ASCAP. In 2003

James Lyon (composer)

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James Lyon (July 1, 1735 – October 12, 1794) was an American composer of the colonial and Federal eras in New England. Life James Lyon was born in Newark, New Jersey on July 1, 1735. It is known that his father was Zopher Lyon, but that he was orphaned at an early age. In 1750, Isaac Lyon and John Crane became James’ guardians, until the age of twenty-one. Lyon then attended college at Nassau Hall, and afterwards obtained a master’s degree from College of Philadelphia. Lyon became a Presbyterian minister, and left from Philadelphia for Nova Scotia, but he was unable to support his family, and subsequently accepted a job at the new settlement of Machias, Maine. After his first year there, the parish invited him to remain at a raised salary and he remained there with a few interruptions, until his death on October 12, 1794. Music The first evidence of Lyon composing was during his college days at the commencement of 1759 at Nassau Hall, when President Samuel Davies delivered an oration, and where the ceremony concluded with an ODE, set to music by Lyon. In 1761, when a candidate for a master’s degree at the College of Philadelphia, one of his works was performed on the same program a

James M. Stephenson

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James M. Stephenson (born February 4, 1969), also known as Jim Stephenson, is an American composer known for his versatility in writing contemporary classical music. His catalog spans across ensembles, with a significant number of works written for large ensembles (orchestra, opera, ballet, brass band, wind ensemble, and chorus) as well as chamber music and solo works. In addition to his career as a composer, Stephenson is also active as an arranger and conductor. Biography James M. Stephenson was born in Joliet, Illinois, and began playing trumpet at the age of 9. He stayed in the Midwest and attended the Interlochen Arts Academy until college, where he attended the New England Conservatory of Music for a degree in trumpet performance. At NEC, his teachers were Charles Schlueter, Gilbert Johnson, and John Lindenau. Following graduation in 1990, Stephenson joined the trumpet section of the Naples Philharmonic, a position he held for 17 seasons. As a member of the Naples Philharmonic Brass Quintet, he volunteered his time to begin arranging works for the groups. The Naples Philharmonic pops conductor, Erich Kunzel, took notice of this and asked Stephenson to arrange a work for orche

James Matheson (composer)

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James Matheson (born 1970 in Des Moines, Iowa) is an American composer. His works have been commissioned and performed by the Albany Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Borromeo String Quartet, Carnegie Hall and the St. Lawrence String Quartet. In December 2011, he received the Charles Ives Living from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, an award providing him with $100,000 for two years (2012-2014). Previously, he received the Academy’s Goddard Lieberson Fellowship in 2008 and Hinrichsen Award in 2002. He has also received awards from the Civitella Ranieri, Bogliasco and Sage Foundations, ASCAP, and the Robbins Prize. He was executive director of the MATA Festival of New Music in New York from 2005-2007 and has been a fellow at the Aspen Music Festival. Since September 2009, he has been the director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Composer Fellowship Program. Works by James Matheson Unchained (2017) for orchestra without strings Commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Gustavo Dudamel, Music Director. The premiere performances took place February 24, 25, and 26th with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, James Gaff

James Romig

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James Romig (born August 5, 1971) is an American composer. He was a finalist for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in Music. Biography James Romig was born August 5, 1971, in Long Beach, California. He earned BM and MA degrees in from the University of Iowa in percussion performance, and a PhD in composition from Rutgers University, where he studied with Charles Wuorinen. He studied additionally with Milton Babbitt, and both Babbitt and Wuorinen served on his dissertation committee. In 2001, after one-year visiting positions at Pittsburg State University and Bucknell University, Romig joined the faculty at Western Illinois University, where he heads the composition/theory area. He lives in Macomb, Illinois, with his wife Ashlee Mack (coordinator of piano instruction at Knox College). Career *2019 Pulitzer Prize in Music, finalist (Still, for solo piano) *2019 Copland House Award and Residency *2019 Petrified Forest National Park, Artist in Residence *2018 Guest Co-Editor of Perspectives of New Music issue celebrating Charles Wuorinen’s 80th year *2017 Everglades National Park, Artist in Residence *2012 Grand Canyon National Park, Artist in Residence *2011 Copland House Award and Residency *2

James Scott (composer)

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James Sylvester Scott (February 12, 1885 – August 30, 1938) was an American ragtime composer and pianist. He is regarded as one of the “Big Three” composers of classical ragtime along with Scott Joplin and Joseph Lamb. Early life and education Scott was born in Neosho, Missouri, to James Scott Sr. and Molly Thomas Scott, both former slaves. In 1901, his family moved to Carthage, Missouri, where he attended Lincoln High School. He was given a piano after taking music lessons. In 1902, he began working at the music store of Charles L. Dumars, first washing windows, then demonstrating music at the piano as a song plugger, including his own pieces. Demand for his music convinced Dumars to print the first of Scott’s published compositions, “A Summer Breeze - March and Two Step”, in 1903. Career Ragtime Historians Rudi Blesh and Harriet Janis recount that Scott went to St. Louis, Missouri, in search of his idol Scott Joplin in 1905. He located Joplin and asked if he would listen to one of his ragtime compositions. Upon hearing the rag, Joplin introduced him to his own publisher, John Stillwell Stark, and recommended he publish the work. Stark published the rag a year later as “Frog Legs

James Tenney

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James Tenney (August 10, 1934 – August 24, 2006) was an American composer, music theorist, and pianist. He made significant early musical contributions to plunderphonics, sound synthesis, algorithmic composition, process music, spectral music, and microtonal tuning systems including extended just intonation. His theoretical writings variously concern musical form, texture, timbre, consonance and dissonance, and harmonic perception. Biography James Tenney was born on August 10, 1934, in Silver City, New Mexico, and grew up in Arizona and Colorado. He attended the University of Denver, the Juilliard School, Bennington College (B.A., 1958), and the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (M.A., 1961). He studied piano with Eduard Steuermann and composition with Chou Wen-chung, Lionel Nowak, Paul Boepple, Henry Brant, Carl Ruggles, Kenneth Gaburo, John Cage, Harry Partch, and Edgard Varèse. He also studied acoustics, information theory and tape music composition under Lejaren Hiller. In 1961, Tenney completed an influential master’s thesis entitled Meta (+) Hodos that made one of the earliest applications of gestalt theory and cognitive science to music. His later writings include “Tem

James Yannatos

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James Yannatos (March 13, 1929 – October 19, 2011) was a composer, conductor, violinist and teacher. He was a senior lecturer at Harvard University until his retirement in 2009. Yannatos was born and educated in New York City. In 1943, he was invited to attend Camp Rising Sun, a tuition-free, international summer camp in upstate New York. He attended the High School of Music and Art and the Manhattan School of Music. Subsequent studies with Nadia Boulanger, Luigi Dallapiccola, Darius Milhaud, Paul Hindemith, and Philip Bezanson in composition, William Steinberg and Leonard Bernstein in conducting, and Hugo Kortschak and Ivan Galamian on violin took Yannatos to Yale University (B.M., M.M.), the University of Iowa (Ph.D.), Aspen, Tanglewood, and Paris. As a young violinist, he performed at the Casals Festival and elsewhere in various professional ensembles, including a piano trio, a string quartet, and early music groups with Hindemith and Boulanger. In 1964, he was appointed music director of the Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra, and led that group on tours to Europe, Russia, South America, and Asia. He organized and co-directed the New England Composers Orchestra and the Tanglewood Youn

Jan Bach

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Jan Bach (December 11, 1937 – October 30, 2020) was an American composer. He taught at the University of Tampa (Florida) from 1965 to 1966 and at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Illinois (music theory and composition) from 1966 to 2002. His primary performing instrument was the horn, and he was renowned among hornists for his horn pieces. He also played the piano. Bach died on October 30, 2020, at age 82. Early life and education Jan Bach was born on December 11, 1937, in Forrest, Illinois. He earned a Bachelor of Music degree in 1959 from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in composition there in 1971. He studied with Aaron Copland and Roberto Gerhard at Tanglewood in 1961 and with Thea Musgrave in Aldeburgh and London in 1974. Awards In 1957 he won the BMI Student Composers first prize. He later won the Koussevitsky competition at Tanglewood, the Harvey Gaul Composition Contest, the Mannes College opera competition, the Sigma Alpha Iota choral composition award, first prize at the First International Brass Congress in Montreux, Switzerland, grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Illinois Arts Council, the Br

Jan Gilbert

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Jan Gilbert (born August 6, 1946) is an American composer, cellist, and professor of music. Life and career Janet Monteith Gilbert was born in New York City, NY. She studied cello at the Naples Conservatory and was granted her bachelor of arts in music in 1969 from Douglass College. In 1972 she received a Master of Arts in composition from Villa Schifolianoia in Florence, Italy. Studying under Salvatore Martirano and Ben Johnston, she received her Doctorate of Musical Arts from the University of Illinois in 1979, where she specialized in electronic music. Other teachers include Piergtro Grossi, Charles Dodge and John Melby. She has taught at Middlebury College, St. Olaf College, University of Maine, and Macalester College. Music Gilbert’s works include electronic music, verbal improvisation, sacred vocal music, experimental hip-hop, chamber music and multimedia pieces with tape, theatre and dance collaboration. She has been commissioned by varying groups such as Chanticleer, the St Paul Civic Orchestra and the Dale Warland Singers. She draws material from many different cultures, including traditional stories of the Hmong People, legends from the Pacific Northwest Tlingit tribe, an

Jan Meyerowitz

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Jan Meyerowitz (23 April 1913 – 15 December 1998) was a German–American composer and writer. Life Meyerowitz was born Hans-Hermann Meyerowitz in Breslau (today Wrocław), the son of a manufacturer. From 1927, he studied in Berlin with and Alexander von Zemlinsky. In 1933, he was forced to leave Germany because he was Jewish and continue his education in Rome with Ottorino Respighi, Alfredo Casella and the conductor Bernardino Molinari. In 1938, he moved to Belgium and in 1939 to the South of France, where he made contact with the French Resistance. His future wife, the singer Marguerite Fricker, helped him in Marseille to survive the Nazi occupation of France. In 1946 Meyerowitz emigrated to the U.S. and became an assistant to Boris Goldovsky, director of the opera program at Tanglewood. In 1951 he became an American citizen. Meyerowitz taught at Brooklyn College (1956–1962) and at the City College of New York. In 1956 Meyerowitz was awarded the first of two Guggenheim Fellowships. After his retirement, he returned to France where he died in Colmar. Selected works Compositions Stage works * Simoon (1949). Opera in one act. Libretto: Peter John Stephens (after August Strindberg). Pre

Jan Swafford

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Jan Swafford (born September 10, 1946) is an American author and composer. He earned his Bachelor of Arts magna cum laude from Harvard College and his M.M.A. and D.M.A. from the Yale School of Music. His teachers included Earl Kim at Harvard, Jacob Druckman at Yale, and Betsy Jolas at Tanglewood. He has written respected musical biographies of Charles Ives, Johannes Brahms, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart as well as the Vintage Guide to Classical Music and the introduction to music “Language of the Spirit.” His books are widely translated, including editions in Spanish, Chinese, Italian, and Portuguese. He appeared in the award-winning 2018 German documentary The Unanswered Ives. Works Swafford has written columns on music and other subjects in Slate, and is heard as a commentator on NPR and the BBC. He is a regular program annotator for orchestras and venues including the Boston Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, Chicago Symphony, San Francisco Symphony, the Metropolitan Opera, and Carnegie Hall. He provided liner notes for two DGG collections of the complete Beethoven symphonies. His writing honors include a 2012 Deems Taylor Award for internet writing, a Mellon Fel

Jan Williams

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Jan Williams (born Jan Gardner Williams, July 17, 1939) is a percussionist, arts administrator, teacher, conductor, and composer who has championed avant-garde and progressive music in the United States. He is recognized as an important proponent of percussion performance and its literature. Biography Williams was born in Utica, New York, where he first studied drums in elementary school under George Claesgens. After experience playing snare drum in marching and concert bands, he began to study timpani while in high school. At Clarkson University (Potsdam, New York), then called Clarkson College, he elected an Electrical Engineering major because his teachers discouraged music as a career. Within a year, he was out of school, and the following fall he entered the Eastman School of Music to study with William Street, who advised Williams to study the keyboard percussion instruments seriously. Sometime during that year at Eastman, Williams read a magazine article that praised the work of Paul Price, a percussion teacher at the Manhattan School of Music who was performing new music for percussion ensemble. In the Fall of 1959, Williams moved to New York City to study with Price at the

Jane Corner Young

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Jane Corner Young (March 25, 1915 – March 9, 2001) was an American composer, music therapist, and pianist. She was born in Athens, Ohio, and graduated with a Bachelor of Music degree from Ohio University in 1936. She completed a master of music degree in piano and composition in 1953 at the Cleveland Institute of Music. Young studied piano with Beryl Rubinstein and Arthur Loesser; composition with Marcel Dick; and Dalcroze eurythmics with Elsa Findlay and Ann Lombardo. Young taught privately and in public schools for over 27 years, and was a faculty member at the Cleveland Institute of Music. She chaired the Cleveland Composers’ Guild when it was formed in 1957, and also served as the director of music therapy at Hawthornden State Hospital (today known as Northcoast Behavioral Healthcare) in Northfield, Ohio. *Mu Phi Epsilon (winner, composition contest; 1971) Young’s compositions include: Chamber *Essences (for two violins; won 1961 Cleveland Institute Alumni Award) *Blues Art Song: Who There to Know *Captive (with L. Kenney) *Fantasy (with L. Kenney) *How I Like a Wild Tame Bird (with piano) *(The) Story of Fay (with bassoon, flute, oboe, piano, trumpet, violin and zither) *Such

Jane O'Leary

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Jane O’Leary (born 13 October 1946) is an American-born Irish musician and composer who has been living in Ireland since 1972. Biography Jane O’Leary (née Strong) was born in Hartford, Connecticut. She graduated summa com laude from Vassar College and studied with Milton Babbitt at Princeton University, where she received a Ph.D. in composition. She lectured at Swarthmore College for a year and moved to Ireland in 1972. O’Leary’s music has been performed internationally at concert venues including, in the U.S., the Kennedy Center, the Lincoln Center, Chicago Cultural Center and Carnegie Hall. She is the founder (in 1976), artistic director and pianist of the ensemble Concorde, which regularly performs contemporary music. In 1981, she was one of the founders of the organisation ‘Music for Galway’ and served as its chairperson from 1984 to 1992. Other honorary positions included membership of the board of directors of the National Concert Hall, Dublin (1986–1996), member of the Irish Arts Council (1998–2003), chairperson of the Contemporary Music Centre, Dublin, and others. Since 1981 she has been a member of Aosdána, Ireland’s academy for creative artists. Since 2006, O’Leary teache

Janet Maguire

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Janet Maguire (1927–2019) was an American composer who was born in Chicago and resided in Venice, Italy. Biography Maguire is known particularly for her arrangement of the finale of Giacomo Puccini’s Turandot, in which she exclusively used the sketches Puccini left for it at his death. Maguire is also known for her dramatic contemporary opera in three acts, Hérésie, and has worked in a wide variety of musical expressions throughout some fifty orchestral, chamber, solo, vocal, choral and stage works. Born in Chicago and raised in New Rochelle, New York, Janet Maguire began musical studies at the age of six: on piano, French horn, and cornet. She completed a BA degree in Piano at Colorado College, then went to Paris to study composition with René Leibowitz for five years. They co-authored the book Thinking for Orchestra: Practical Exercises in Orchestration (published by G. Schirmer), and a book about the orchestration of some of Jacques Offenbach’s works, Nuits Parisiennes (RCA, Bote & Bock), as well as Carl Maria von Weber’s opera Die Drei Pintos. Several summers spent at the Darmstadt Ferienkurse influenced Maguire’s style, as did the music of György Ligeti, Luigi Nono, and Karlhe

Janice Giteck

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Janice Giteck (born June 27, 1946 in New York), is an American composer. Biography Giteck grew up in Hicksville, Long Island and moved to Arizona when she was twelve years old. She attended Mills College, completing her Master’s in 1969 and studying under Darius Milhaud. She later studied under Olivier Messiaen, and following this she studied Indonesian gamelan music with Daniel Schmidt and percussion with Obo Addy. Her works came into wide circulation in the 1970s and 1980s, with a style heavily influenced by world music and the music of American Indians. Awards for her music include the National Endowment for the Arts Composer’s award for Breathing Songs from a Turning Sky, and the Norman Fromm Composers Award for Thunder, Like a White Bear Dancing. Giteck returned to school and received a Master’s in psychology in 1986, and worked in the mental health field from 1986 to 1991. In a 1999 joint interview with composer Ann Sandifur, Giteck and Sandifur described themselves as “life-oriented, not career oriented,” noting that they sought to be “versatile rather than specialized.” Discography * New Performance Group in Music (Mode Records, 1988) * Home (Revisited) (New Albion, 1992) P

Janika Vandervelde

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Janika Vandervelde (born 1955) is an American composer, pianist, and music educator. Her work, notable for its feminist and ecological themes, has won numerous awards. Known for her music for orchestra, chorus, chamber ensembles and the stage, she also teaches composition. Biography Janika Vandervelde was born in Ripon, Wisconsin, and grew up in nearby Green Lake, playing horn and piano starting at age five. She began composing in her teens. After undergraduate studies in music education at the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire, Compositions Vandervelde is known especially for her choral music, which has been commissioned and performed by groups such as Chanticleer, the Dale Warland Singers, and the Oregon Repertory Singers, and by conductors including Sir David Willcocks. She has composed more than 100 works for orchestra, choir, chamber ensembles, and soloists, as well as two operas, Hildegard (1989) and Seven Sevens (1993), and has written extensively for young audiences. Among the fruits of her three-year tenure as composer-in-residence for the Minnesota Chorale and two other Twin Cities organizations was Adventures of the Black Dot, a “choral storybook” for children, with sto

Janis Mattox

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Janis Mattox (born March 18, 1949) is an American composer and pianist. An early creator of computer music, she is a 2006 Guggenheim Fellow. Biography Janis Mattox was born on March 18, 1949 in Saint Paul, Minnesota. She performed a hymn on Naut Humon’s album Swarm of Doves, which Paul Verna of Billboard called one of the album’s highlights. In 2002, she created the hour-long electronic piece Solombra, inspired by poet Cecília Meireles. She is also a Silicon Valley Fellow. Elizabeth Hinkle-Turner said that some of Mattox’s pieces “reflect her interest in combining live performers with computer-generated and processed sounds in an all-encompassing aural and visual experience”. She has also performed as a pianist, particularly for the Good Sound Band. She is based in Woodside, California. References

Jared Emerson-Johnson

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Jared Nathaniel Emerson-Johnson (born October 13, 1981) is an American video game music composer, sound designer, voice director and voice actor. Emerson-Johnson is the Music Supervisor and lead composer at Bay Area Sound, an audio production company specializing in sound design, music and voiceover for video games. His work has been predominantly featured in games developed by Telltale. Career Jared began his career as an assistant to composer Clint Bajakian on the score for LucasArts’ Indiana Jones and the Emperor’s Tomb. Emerson-Johnson has also worked as a sound designer for projects, including James Bond 007: Everything or Nothing, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Psychonauts, and Firewatch. Emerson-Johnson is perhaps best known as the composer behind multiple video games produced by Telltale Games, such as Bone, Sam & Max, Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Attractive People, Wallace & Gromit’s Grand Adventures, Poker Night at the Inventory, Back to the Future: The Game, Jurassic Park: The Game, The Walking Dead, The Wolf Among Us, Game of Thrones, Batman: The Telltale Series, and Guardians of the Galaxy: The Telltale Series. In all three seasons of Sam & Max, he voices

Jaromír Weinberger

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Jaromír Weinberger (8 January 1896 – August 8, 1967) was a Bohemian-born Jewish subject of the Austrian Empire, who became a naturalized American composer. Biography Weinberger was born in Prague, Austria-Hungary, into a family of Jewish origin. He heard Czech folksongs from time spent at his grandparents’ farm as a youth. He started playing the piano aged 5, and composing and conducting aged 10. He began musical studies with Jaroslav Křička, and later teachers included Václav Talich and Rudolf Karel. Between 1922 and 1926 he was professor of composition at the Ithaca Conservatory (now the music school of Ithaca College), New York. When he returned to Czechoslovakia he was appointed director of the National Theater in Bratislava, and later received appointments in Eger, Hungary, and Prague. In 1926 Weinberger completed Schwanda the Bagpiper (Švanda Dudák), which became highly successful, with thousands of performances in hundreds of theatres including the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. In later life, he developed cancer of the brain. This, together with money worries and the neglect of his music, prompted him to take a lethal sedative overdose in August 1967. His wife, Jane

Jason Brandt

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Jason Brandt (born 1973) is an American composer. Jason composed music for the films Camp Hideout (Christopher Lloyd, Corbin Bleu), Christmas Wonderland (Emily Osment) and F.R.E.D.I. (Kelly Hu, Harvey Guillén). Brandt won Best Original Score at the Burbank International Film Festival for his work on F.R.E.D.I. Other films include the Lifetime thrillers Mommy Be Mine and The Other Mother (Annie Wersching), A Christmas Reunion (Denise Richards, Patrick Muldoon), Night of the Living Dead 3D (Sid Haig) and the documentary That Guy Dick Miller premiered at SXSW 2014. Jason also co-executive produced and wrote music for Max Winslow and the House of Secrets, (starring Chad Michael Murray and Tanner Buchanan) which won Best Feature Film at the Burbank International Film Festival and Crystal Palace International Film Festival. Jason also creates original music for a wide range of national television programming, including Cartoon Network’s Teen Titans Go!, Mike Tyson Mysteries, Extra and TMZ. Other TV shows including American Idol, The Bachelor, The Bachelorette and many more. List of movies and series * The Passing (2005) * Inside (2006) * Night of the Living Dead 3D (2006) * TMZ (TV Show

Jason Eckardt

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Jason Eckardt (born 17 May 1971 in Princeton, New Jersey) is an American composer. He began his musical life playing guitar in heavy metal and jazz bands and abruptly moved to composing after discovering the music of Anton Webern. Compositions Atonal and microtonal harmony, intricate rhythms, highly polyphonic textures and large-scale transformational processes are prevalent in Eckardt’s compositions. Allan Kozinn of The New York Times wrote that Eckardt’s music “celebrates harmonic prickliness, rhythmic complexity and a density of ideas”. Though Eckardt has been associated with the New Complexity movement, he is also influenced by American composers Milton Babbitt and Elliott Carter. Major works include Passage (2018) for string quartet, After Serra (2000) for chamber ensemble, Tongues (2001) for soprano and chamber ensemble, Reul na Coille (2002) for percussion and orchestra, Trespass (2005) for piano and chamber orchestra and the Undersong cycle (2002–2008), a series of four chamber works (A way tracing , 16, Aperture, The Distance (This)) that, when played together without pause, form a concert-length supercomposition. Some of Eckardt’s compositions are inspired by extramusical

Jason Evigan

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Jason Gregory Evigan (born June 10, 1983) is an American singer, songwriter, and record producer best known as the vocalist for the rock band After Midnight Project, which was formed in 2004 before disbanding in 2012. His songwriting or production credits include the singles “Girls Like You” and “What Lovers Do” by Maroon 5, “Physical” by Dua Lipa, “Ghosttown” by Madonna, “Heart Attack” by Demi Lovato, “Talk Dirty” by Jason Derulo, “Lovers on the Sun” by David Guetta, and “Shed a Light” by Robin Schulz. Early and personal life Evigan was born in Los Angeles, California, the only son of Pamela C. Serpe, a dancer, model, and actress, and actor Greg Evigan. He has Polish and Italian heritage. He is the middle of three siblings, with elder sister Vanessa and younger sister Briana, both of whom are actresses. In August 2011, he married Victoria Janzen, with whom he has two children. The couple began a music project called Elephant Heart, and released singles such as “Hiya” and “Warfare” in 2018. Career He has worked with numerous recording artists including Maroon 5, Kelly Clarkson, Demi Lovato, Avicii, Madonna, Nick Jonas, Kiiara, Zedd, Rufus Du Sol, Bebe Rexha, Skylar Grey, Jon Bellio

Jason Staczek

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Jason Staczek (born December 4, 1965) is an American composer, record producer and keyboardist. Life and career Staczek was born in Washington, D.C., attended high school in Miami and studied physics at the University of Michigan. He played the Hammond organ in Seattle bands and sessions beginning in the 1990s. From 2002 to 2008 Staczek co-owned Chroma Sound, a music and film post-production studio and record label in Seattle. Clients of Chroma Sound included Presidents of the United States of America and Robyn Hitchcock. In 2003 Staczek was hired as staff composer for The Film Company, a Seattle film production studio, through which he met and developed a working relationship with Canadian director Guy Maddin. Staczek has composed music for the soundtracks to the films Brand Upon the Brain! (2006), My Winnipeg (2008), Keyhole (2011), Jobriath A.D. (2012), The Roper (2013) and Song of the New Earth (2014). Brand Upon the Brain! premiered at the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival, where the silent film was accompanied by a live orchestra conducted by Staczek, narrated by Louis Negin, with sound provided by three live Foley artists and a castrato-style singer. Staczek went on t

Jay Alan Yim

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Jay Alan Yim (born April 24, 1958) is an American composer of Chinese descent and recipient of a 1994 Guggenheim Fellowship. Early life and education Yim was born into a Chinese family in St. Louis, Missouri on April 24, 1958. He attended the University of California, Santa Barbara College of Creative Studies and graduated with a B.A. in 1980. He also received a M.Mus. in 1981 from the University of London and the Royal College of Music, with a Ph.D. from Harvard University earned in 1989. He currently serves as a professor of music at Northwestern University. Former students include composers Marcos Balter, Kirsten Broberg, Rodrigo Cadiz, Aaron Cassidy, and Mark Engebretson. Awards and honors Yim is a 1994 recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship for music composition in the creative arts category. He also placed third for the 1994 Kennedy Center Friedheim Award, tied with John Anthony Lennon. Personal life Yim is married to artist Marlena Novak. References External links * * Northwestern University biography

Jay Blackton

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Jay Blackton (March 25, 1909 – January 8, 1994) was an American composer and conductor. In 1956 he won an Academy Award in the category Best Scoring of a Musical Picture for the film Oklahoma! and was also nominated for Guys and Dolls. He was the music director, orchestrator or arranger for more than 25 Broadway productions and national tours. Born Jay Schwartzdorf in New York City, he studied piano and conducting at the Juilliard School. He began his career in opera, as an assistant conductor at New York Opera Comique and then as the conductor at St. Louis Municipal Opera from 1937 to 1942. In 1943 Rodgers and Hammerstein hired him to orchestrate and conduct Oklahoma! on Broadway, and he followed this engagement as music director and often orchestrator or arranger of such musicals as Annie Get Your Gun, Call Me Madam, Guys and Dolls, Hello, Dolly! and George M!. In addition, he toured with Bob Hope and others. Blackton died in January 1994 of heart failure at the Granada Hills Community Hospital in Granada Hills, California, at the age of 84. Selected filmography * The Merry Widow (1952) * Oklahoma! (1955; co-won with Robert Russell Bennett and Adolph Deutsch) * Guys and Dolls (19

Jay Chattaway

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Jay Chattaway (born July 8, 1946) is an American composer of film and television scores. He is mainly known for his work as composer for several Star Trek television series: Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager, and Star Trek: Enterprise. In 2001, he won an Emmy for Outstanding Music for a Series for the final episode of Star Trek: Voyager. Early life Chattaway was born in Monongahela, Pennsylvania and studied music at West Virginia University (WVU). College career At WVU, Chattaway was also a member of many student organizations, including the Mountaineer Marching Band, Lambda Chi Alpha social fraternity, Kappa Kappa Psi honorary band service fraternity, and Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia men’s music social fraternity. He was initiated into the Omicron chapter of Kappa Kappa Psi at WVU on December 6, 1965, and is currently an alumni brother of the fraternity. His initiation into the Epsilon Sigma chapter of Phi Mu Alpha took place on March 1, 1965. He became a regular member of a rhythm and blues band called the “Abductors” in which he played trumpet, wrote the musical scores, and was musical director. Music career Chattaway was drafted into the mi

Jay Graydon

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Jay Joseph Graydon (born October 8, 1949, Burbank, California) is an American songwriter, recording artist, guitarist, singer, keyboardist, producer, arranger, and recording engineer. He is the winner of two Grammy Awards (in the R&B category) with twelve Grammy nominations, among them the title “Producer of the Year” and “Best Engineered Recording”. He has mastered many different music styles and genres, and his recordings have been featured on record, film, television and the stage. History Graydon made his singing debut on his second birthday on the “Joe Graydon Show,” the first music/talk television show in Los Angeles, hosted by his father, Joe Graydon. During and for a brief time after his college days, Graydon played in the Don Ellis Band, whose style can be described as experimental post-bop jazz. He can be heard on the live double album Don Ellis at Fillmore and the studio albums The New Don Ellis Band Goes Underground, Connection and Soaring. L. A. session musician From the late 1960s to late 1970s Graydon was a session musician in Los Angeles, working with such artists as Gino Vannelli, Barbra Streisand, Dolly Parton, Diana Ross, The Jackson Five, Alice Cooper, Cheap Tri

Jay Greenberg (composer)

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Jay “Bluejay” Greenberg (born December 13, 1991) is an American composer and former child prodigy who studied at the Juilliard School pre-college in 2002 at age 10. Life and work Greenberg was born in New Haven, Connecticut. He caught the attention of the American media through the sponsorship of Juilliard instructor Samuel Zyman during a CBS News 60 Minutes broadcast on November 28, 2004, when Greenberg was 12, and again in November 2006. Zyman told 60 Minutes, “We are talking about a prodigy of the level of the greatest prodigies in history, when it comes to composition. I am talking about the likes of Mozart, and Mendelssohn, and Saint-Saëns.” Greenberg’s primary composition instructor was Samuel Adler. He composes primarily on his computer using a music notation program. He is mostly known for his work Overture to 9-11 about the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, which was featured on PRI’s From the Top. On 9/11, he was living in Republic of Macedonia but has since returned to the United States. Neither his father, Robert Greenberg, a professor of Slavic languages at Yale University, nor his Israeli-born mother have musical backgrounds, but Greenberg found himself attracted

Jay Gruska

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Jay Gruska (; born April 23, 1952) is an American songwriter and composer best known for his film and television scoring, and for writing hit songs for a variety of artists. He has composed musical scores for dozens of TV dramas, with over 500 hours of shows played internationally. Gruska has received three Emmy Award nominations, one Genie Award nomination, and eleven ASCAP awards. Some of his best-known scores are for the TV shows Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, Charmed, and Supernatural. Career Gruska started his career as a singer/songwriter. He was briefly a member of Three Dog Night in 1976, replacing Danny Hutton, until the group disbanded. He had recording contracts with ABC Records for his first solo album, and Warner Bros. Records with the band Maxus, for which he was the lead singer and songwriter. Warner Bros. Records later released his second solo album Which One of Us Is Me, which Gruska also produced. Gruska is also known for co-writing the hit duet “Tell Me I’m Not Dreamin’ (Too Good to Be True)”, for Jermaine and Michael Jackson, which was #1 on the Billboard dance charts; the Gloria Loring/Carl Anderson duet “Friends and Lovers”, which was #2 on the

Jay Livingston

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Jay Livingston (born Jacob Harold Levison; March 28, 1915 – October 17, 2001) was an American composer best known as half of a composing-songwriting duo with Ray Evans, with whom he specialized in composing film scores and original soundtrack songs. Livingston composed the music while Evans wrote the lyrics. Biography Early life and family Jay Livingston was born Jacob Harold Levison in McDonald, Pennsylvania, United States, to Jewish parents. He had an older sister, Vera, and a younger brother, Alan W. Livingston, who became an executive with Capitol Records and later with NBC television. Career Livingston studied piano with Harry Archer in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He attended the University of Pennsylvania, where he organized a dance band and met Evans, a fellow student in the band. Though they began writing together in 1937, Livingston and Evans did not hit the top until 1946, when they set the music publishing business on fire with “To Each His Own,” which reached number one on the Billboard charts for three different artists, and occupied the top five positions on the “Most Played On the Air” chart for four different weeks (August 24, 1946, and again on September 7, September

Jay Reise

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Jay Reise (born February 9, 1950) is an American composer and teacher. He is known for the opera Rasputin, premiered by the New York City Opera and later performed in the United States, Moscow, and Paris. He is Professor Emeritus of Music at the University of Pennsylvania. Biography Reise spent his childhood surrounded by classical music and jazz, but began his composition studies with Jimmy Giuffre and Hugh Hartwell in 1970. After graduating at Hamilton College in 1972, he pursued composition study at McGill University (with Bengt Hambraeus and Bruce Mather), the University of Pennsylvania (AM, 1975; George Crumb and Richard Wernick), Tanglewood, and Carnatic rhythm with Adrian L’Armand. He is currently Professor Emeritus of Music at the University of Pennsylvania. Reise is married to visual artist Cecilia Paredes Works written before the adoption of the rhythmic method include Symphony of Voices (1978) which was premiered at the Monadnock Festival with soprano Neva Pilgrim, and his Second Symphony (1980) premiered by the Syracuse Symphony, conducted by Christopher Keene, and performed subsequently by the Philadelphia Orchestra. His Third Symphony was premiered by Keene and the Lo

Jay Schwartz

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Jay Schwartz (born June 26, 1965) is an American composer based in Germany. Biography Schwartz was born in San Diego, California, in 1965. His father was a professional boxer who later worked in swimming pool maintenance, while his mother was a kindergarten teacher. Schwartz began playing the piano at a young age and was largely self-taught in composition. He studied music at Arizona State University, graduating in 1989 followed by graduate studies in musicology in Tübingen, Germany. Awards In 2000, Schwartz received the Bernd Alois Zimmermann Prize for composition in Cologne, Germany. He is also a three-time recipient of the Strobel Fellowship for electronic music from the Südwestrundfunk. In 2014, Schwartz was awarded a residency at the Cité internationale des arts in Paris, and he also received the Rome Prize for a residency at the Villa Massimo in Rome in both 2017 and 2018. In 2019, he was a fellow at the Civitella Ranieri Foundation in Italy. In 2020 he was awarded wit the Mario Merz Prize. Music Jay Schwartz’s compositional approach is grounded in the physical properties of sound, incorporating elements such as the overtone series, microtonality, and glissandi. He explores t

Jay Sydeman

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William Jay Sydeman (May 8, 1928 – May 27, 2021) was a prolific American composer. He was born in New York. He studied at Duke University, and received a B.S. degree in 1955 from the Mannes School of Music, having studied with Felix Salzer, Roy Travis, and Roger Sessions. He received his master’s in music from the Hartt School in 1958, studying under Arnold Franchetti and Goffredo Petrassi. In 1951 he married Hope Millholland, a pianist and fellow student at Mannes. Winning early acclaim for his avant-garde music (principally published by C. F. Peters), he felt trapped by the prevailing orthodoxies and moved to California in 1970, beginning a period of wandering during which he also studied Buddhism and Anthroposophy. He joined ASCAP in 1975. From 1980 to 1982 he taught at Rudolph Steiner College in Fair Oaks. In 1981 he settled in Sacramento and resumed composition at his former prolific rate, having newly embraced a neotonal musical language. He later moved to Mendocino. In 1966, his catalog (nearly 75 works by this date) was edited by Nancy B. Reich and published as an early exercise in machine-readable catalogs. A 2nd edition, published by NYU Department of Music Education, was

Jay Wadley

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Jay Wadley is an American composer and music producer based in New York City, known for his work in film, television, and contemporary classical music. He is a two-time winner of the Charles Ives Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and was nominated twice at the Hollywood Music in Media Awards under the best original score category in 2020 and 2021. Early life and education Wadley was born and raised in Edmond, Oklahoma. During his senior year at Edmond Memorial High School, he composed his first choir piece for 60 classmates to perform at a school talent show. After graduating in 2001, he studied music composition at Oklahoma City University under composer Edward Knight. After completing his undergraduate degree, Wadley pursued a Master’s degree in Music Composition at the Yale School of Music studying under Aaron Jay Kernis, Martin Bresnick and Ezra Laderman. During his time at Yale, he also worked as an assistant manager at the Yale Center for Studies in Music Technology, taught undergraduate composition and contributed to various projects, including orchestral works with the Yale Philharmonia. Career Film and television Wadley is best known for composing the sco

Jean Berger

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Jean Berger (; September 27, 1909 – May 28, 2002) was a German-born American pianist, composer, and music educator. He composed extensively for choral ensemble and solo voice. Early years Berger was born Arthur Schloßberg into a Jewish family in Hamm, Westphalia. He studied musicology at the universities of Vienna and Heidelberg, where he received his Ph.D. in 1931 with Heinrich Besseler as his advisor. He also studied composition with Louis Aubert in Paris. While working as the assistant conductor at an opera house in Mannheim, he was forcibly removed from a rehearsal by Nazi Brown Shirts. After the Nazi Party seized power in Germany in 1933, he moved to Paris, where he took the French name Jean Berger and toured widely as a pianist and accompanist. From 1939 to 1941, he was an assistant conductor at the Municipal Theater in Rio de Janeiro and on the faculty of the Brazilian Conservatory. He also toured widely throughout South America. In 1941, he moved to the United States and served in the U.S. Army starting in 1942. In 1943, he became a US citizen. He worked in the Office of War Information producing foreign-language broadcasts and USO shows until 1946. From 1946 to 1948, he wo

Jean Eichelberger Ivey

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Jean Eichelberger Ivey (July 3, 1923 – May 2, 2010) was an American composer who produced an extensive and diverse catalog of solo, chamber, vocal, and orchestral works as an innovator and “respected electronic composer.” Early life and education Born in 1923 to Joseph S. Eichelberger and Mary Elizabeth Pfeiffer, Jean B. Eichelberger Ivey attended high school at the Academy of Notre Dame in Washington, D.C. Though her childhood was impacted by the Great Depression and her father’s loss of his job as editor of the anti-feminist serial The Woman Patriot, Jean Eichelberger won a full-tuition scholarship at Trinity College in Washington, D.C. where she graduated magna cum laude with her bachelor’s degree in 1944. Subsequently, she earned master’s degrees in piano performance from Peabody Conservatory and composition from the Eastman School of Music where she studied under Wayne Barlow, Kent Kennan, and Bernard Rogers. In the late 1940s and throughout the 1950s she taught at Trinity College (1945-1955), the Peabody Conservatory (1946), and the Catholic University of America (1952-1955), and College Misericordia (1955-1957). From 1960 to 1962 she taught at Xavier University in New Orlean

Jean Joseph Bott

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Jean Joseph Bott (9 March 1826 – 28 April 1895) was a German violinist and composer who emigrated to the United States late in his life. Early life and education He was born in Cassel, Grand Duchy of Hesse, where he received his first musical instruction from his father, a court musician. At the age of 9, he was proficient enough to make a performance tour of the Netherlands with his father. After winning the Frankfurt Mozart scholarship in 1841, he began studies of theory and composition under Moritz Hauptmann and violin under Louis Spohr, and after two years of study entered the Cassel court orchestra, where he became concertmaster at the age of 17. Career In 1846, he left Cassel to travel through the German-speaking lands. He played before William I, the King of Prussia, and was accompanied by Liszt and Meyerbeer. In 1852, he was made second Hofkapellmeister at Cassel, but was dismissed in 1856. In 1857, he became court kapellmeister at Meiningen, and then in 1865 accepted a similar position in the Kingdom of Hanover. On 20 May 1877, Bott was drunk and fell off the podium while conducting a performance of Liszt’s oratorio Die Legende von der Heilige Elisabeth. He was pensioned o

Jean Schwartz

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Jean Schwartz (November 4, 1878 – November 30, 1956) was a Hungarian-born Jewish American composer and pianist. He is best known for his work writing the scores for more than 30 Broadway musicals, and for his creation of more than 1,000 popular songs with the lyricist William Jerome. At the age of 13, he immigrated with his family to the United States and settled with them in New York City. and he studied the piano under his older sister, Rosa, who had trained as a pianist under Franz Liszt. After working for a time as an office boy at a cigar factory and as an attendant at a Turkish bath house, Schwartz obtained employment in the sheet music department of the Siegel-Cooper Company, where his job was to play songs on the piano for customers in order to sell the sheet music. Other music jobs he held in his early years included working as a pianist with an orchestra at Coney Island and as a song-plugger for the Shapiro-Bernstein Publishing House of Tin Pan Alley. In 1914, he was one of the twelve founding members of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers. Work with William Jerome Schwartz remained at the Siegel-Cooper Company until 1901 when he took a job as the on

Jeanne Behrend

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Jeanne Behrend (11 May 1911 – 20 March 1988) was an American pianist, music educator, musicologist and composer. Life Jeanne Behrend was born in Philadelphia and graduated from the Curtis Institute in 1934, where she studied piano with Josef Hofmann and composition with Rosario Scalero. She made her debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1922 and at Carnegie Hall in 1937, playing one of her own compositions. After completing her education, Behrend worked as a pianist and composer and taught music at Curtis Institute of Music, Juilliard, the Philadelphia Conservatory of Music, and Temple University. Becoming aware of the lack of opportunity for American composers, she became a champion of American music and concentrated on her career as a performer. Behrend edited a selection of Louis Moreau Gottschalk piano scores and his autobiography, Notes of a Pianist. She also edited a collection of Stephen Foster songs and one of American fuguing tunes. She married twice. Her first husband, pianist Alexander Kelberine died in 1940, and her second husband, Americana book dealer George S. McManus died in 1967. Works Selected works include: *A Child’s Day, piano suite *From Dawn to Dusk for or

Jeannie G. Pool

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Jeannie Gayle Pool (born November 6, 1951) is an American composer, musicologist, filmmaker, producer, and lecturer. An expert on and advocate for women in classical and popular music, she founded the International Congress on Women in Music (now International Alliance for Women in Music), has published books and articles, and has had compositions performed internationally. Early life and education Pool was born in Paris, Illinois. At Columbia University, she studied musicology (1977–1980). She is a consultant for film and television music productions on music rights. Through her business Music Legacy Services, she documents and appraises film and TV music archival collections. She was Executive Director of the Society for the Preservation of Film Music (now The Film Music Society) from 1990 to 2002. She was consultant and music archivist for the Paramount Pictures Music Department from 1995 until 2012. Known as “a champion of twentieth-century American women musicians,” she has written books and articles. Before publication of the biography of jazz saxophonist Peggy Gilbert (1905–2007), she produced a documentary on the artist, narrated by Lily Tomlin, which has been screened thro

Jeff Miyahara

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Jeff Miyahara (born February 4, 1977) is a Japanese record producer and songwriter based in Tokyo, Japan. He is the chief creative officer for the Japanese branch of HYBE. Beginning his career in the music industry in 1999, he has worked with many Japanese artists such as JUJU, Kana Nishino, Namie Amuro, TVXQ, Weather Girls, as well as international artists like Boyz II Men, Girls’ Generation, and Timbaland. He has accrued many Oricon rated No. 1 Digital Download hits, including “Kimi No Subete Ni” by Spontania ft. JUJU and JASMINE’s “sad to say”. He was awarded several Gold Disc Awards by the Recording Industry Association of Japan in 2005, 2008, 2009, and was titled Nikkei Entertainment’s “Hitmaker of the Year” in 2010. He has sold over 40 million units to date. In 2009, Miyahara signed a deal with UM360, the management division of Universal Music Japan, after the success of his 2008 breakout hit “Kiminosubeteni”, a hip-pop track he produced for Spontania featuring JUJU, which sold over 5 million digital downloads. That same year he was involved in the release of over fifty CDs. He has also collaborated with performers from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Australia. Miyahara has cited his

Jeff Myers (composer)

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Jeff Myers (born August 11, 1977) is an American composer. Early life Born and raised in Fremont, California, Myers attended San Jose University (earning a Bachelor of Music degree), the Eastman School of Music (earning a Master of Arts degree), and the University of Michigan (earning a Doctor of Musical Arts degree while studying composition under Pulitzer Prize and Grammy Award-winning composer and pianist William Bolcom and Grammy Award-winning composer Michael Daugherty). Career In 2011, Grammy Award-winning violinist Hilary Hahn invited composers to submit pieces for inclusion on her In 27 Pieces: The Hilary Hahn Encores Album. From more than 400 submissions, Hahn chose Myers’s “The Angry Birds of Kauai” to perform as the 27th and final track. The album was released in 2013. Myers’s work has been presented at Carnegie Hall, the Library of Congress, Walt Disney Concert Hall, Kimmel Center, Darmstadt, Het Muziekgebouw aan ‘t IJ, Bard College, the Institute for Advanced Study, and Poisson Rouge, amongst others. Noted collaborators and commissioners include the New York City Opera, Beth Morrison Projects, Orchestre national de Lorraine, the Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra, the Univer

Jefferson Friedman

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Jefferson Friedman (born 1974) is an American composer. He has composed several orchestral pieces and television scores including Harley Quinn. Friedman was born in Swampscott, Massachusetts. He received an M.M. degree in music composition from The Juilliard School, where he studied with John Corigliano, and a B.A. from Columbia University, where he studied with David Rakowski and Jonathan Kramer. Friedman also studied with George Tsontakis and Christopher Rouse. He lives in Los Angeles. Career Friedman’s work has received positive reviews. His pieces have been performed throughout the United States and abroad, including at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall and Avery Fisher Hall, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, the Hollywood Bowl, and the American Academy in Rome. Friedman was commissioned by Leonard Slatkin to write three pieces for the National Symphony Orchestra: “March”, “The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations Millennium General Assembly”, and “Sacred Heart: Explosion” “March” is a brief closing piece, commissioned by the orchestra as part of the Hechinger Encores series. “The Throne” and “Sac

Jeffrey Brooks

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Jeffrey Brooks (born 1956) is an American composer living in Minneapolis. Brooks composed the popular work Dreadnought (for wind ensemble) as well as several works for Bang on a Can. Brooks holds degrees from the University of Minnesota and Yale University. He studied with Louis Andriessen, Gilbert Amy, Allen Forte and Martin Bresnick. In the mid-1980s, at Yale and Tanglewood, he met Steve Martland, Art Jarvinen, Eleanor Hovda, Michael Gordon and David Lang, who have remained the most important influences in his musical life to this day. Brooks has composed, with few exceptions, instrumental works, from the very small (What Bird am I Thinking of, for piano trio) to the very large (Dreadnought, John Henry, Funeral Music, and Providence), all for forces of 60-plus musicians. Works * The Passion (2017) * Capriccio on the Departure of a Beloved Brother (2015) *After the Treewatcher, piano and chamber orchestra (2013) *The Starry Messenger, SSATB (2011) *John Henry Symphony, concert wind ensemble (2010) *Funeral Music, concert wind ensemble (2009) *What Bird am I Thinking of, piano trio (2008) *Providence, double concerto for trumpet and trombone in three movements (2007) *Skeleton Crew

Jeffrey Mumford

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Jeffrey Mumford (born June 22, 1955) is a U.S. composer whose orchestral works have been performed by the National Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and American Composers Orchestra. His music has been especially praised by The New York Times as being “a philosophy of music making that embraced both raw passion and a gentle imagistic poetry.” Mumford’s compositions, though thoroughly modern, are evocative, exploring the sensuous and tactile nature of sound in subtle and sophisticated ways. Mumford was born in Washington, D.C., and holds degrees from the University of California, Irvine (B.A., 1977) and the University of California, San Diego (M.A., 1981). He was a student of Elliott Carter and Lawrence Moss. Mumford, along with poet Bruce Weigl, holds the rank of Distinguished Professor in the Division of Arts and Humanities at Lorain County Community College in Ohio. Formerly he taught at the Washington Conservatory of Music (1989–99), served as Artist-in-Residence at Bowling Green State University (1999-00), and served as assistant professor of composition and Compo

Jen Trynin

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Jennifer Trynin (born 1963), is an American singer-songwriter and author from Boston, Massachusetts. Career She recorded her debut album Cockamamie in 1994 while running her own desktop publishing business. The track “Better Than Nothing” received considerable airplay on alternative rock radio stations across the United States. She later released her second album, Gun Shy Trigger Happy, in 1997. Trynin would later release a book entitled Everything I’m Cracked Up to Be in 2006 about her experience in the music industry. Trynin played guitar for Dave Wanamaker’s band Loveless, who released an album, Gift to the World, in 2003. After Loveless broke up, she took a break from music to raise her daughter. In 2015, Trynin formed the band Cujo and began playing semi-regularly at small clubs in and around Boston. In 2018, Trynin joined Band of Their Own, an all-female supergroup formed to perform at Hot Stove Cool Music, the annual benefit show supporting the Foundation to be Named Later, the charity established by former Boston Red Sox and current Chicago Cubs executive Theo Epstein and his twin brother Paul Epstein. Band of Their Own also features among others Kay Hanley, Freda Love Smit

Jennifer Higdon

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Jennifer Elaine Higdon (born December 31, 1962 ) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. She has received many awards, including the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Music for her Violin Concerto and three Grammy Awards for Best Contemporary Classical Composition for her Percussion Concerto in 2010, Viola Concerto in 2018, and Harp Concerto in 2020. Elected a Member of the American Philosophical Society in 2019, she was a professor of composition at the Curtis Institute of Music from 1994 to 2021. Biography Higdon was born in Brooklyn, New York. She spent the first ten years of her life in Atlanta, Georgia before moving to Seymour, Tennessee. Her father, Charles Higdon, was a painter and made efforts to expose his children to different types of art. He took them to various exhibitions of new and experimental art that gave her her earliest exposure to art and helped her to form an idea of what art was. She also developed an interest in photography and writing at an early age. Despite her early introduction to art, she received very little exposure to classical music in her home. Instead, her early musical education came from listening to rock and folk music from the 1960s. I

Jeremiah Dencke

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Jeremiah Dencke was born October 2, 1725, in Langenbielau, Silesia and died May 28, 1795, in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He joined the Moravian Congregation at Gnadenfrei and was called to Moravian center in Herrnhut in 1748, where he became an organist. He emigrated to the American colonies in 1761 on the same ship with the father of Johann and Simon Peter. year. The oldest existing American Moravian art music is a set of seven solos and three duets Dencke composed for the Single Brethren’s observance in 1765. It was performed in both Nazareth and Bethlehem, whose diaries use the term Vest Psalm when referring to it. Jeremiah Dencke was a Moravian and one of the first American composers. List of works * Meine Seele erhebet dem Herrn * Gehet in dem Geruch Seines Brautigams-Namens * Gesegnet bist du, sein Volk * Meine Herz dichtet ein feines Lied Discography * Flowering Of Vocal Music In America 1767–1823 * Lost Music Of Early America – The Moravians * Music from 18th-Century Pennsylvania (1976) * Christmas in Early America (1994) * Giuseppe Martucci (1995) * America Sings, Volume I: The Founding Years (1995) References

Jeremiah Ingalls

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Jeremiah Ingalls (March 1, 1764 – April 6, 1838) was an early North-American composer, considered a part of the First New England School. Biography Jeremiah Ingalls was born in Andover, Massachusetts, in 1764. When he was thirteen, his father, Abijah Ingalls, died of hardships suffered during the American Revolutionary War. In 1791, Ingalls married Mary Bigelow of Westminster, Massachusetts, and while living in Vermont worked variously as a farmer, cooper, taverner and choirmaster. Ingalls served as the choirmaster at the Congregational Church in Newbury, Vermont from 1791 to 1805, and the choir gained a reputation attracting many people from the surrounding area. In 1805 Ingalls published The Christian Harmony. Ingalls served as a deacon in the church, but in 1810, he was excommunicated from that congregation. In 1819 he moved to Rochester, Vermont and then Hancock, Vermont. Ingalls was described as short and corpulent with a high voice and an advanced skill at the bass viol. Many of Ingalls’ family members were also known for their musical ability. Ingalls died in Hancock, Vermont, in 1838, aged 74. List of tunes *Northfield *Christian Song *New Jerusalem *Fillmore *Apple Tree *R

Jeremy Adelman (composer)

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Jeremy Adelman (born 1973) is an American composer for film and television, trumpet player and multi-instrumentalist, and major-label music producer and arranger in genres including funk, indie and jazz. He is primarily known as the composer and songwriter for prime-time CW TV series Hart of Dixie starring Rachel Bilson. Biography Early life and career Adelman was born in Amityville, New York. He performed as an orchestral trumpeter and moved to NY in 1989 to study at the Juilliard School of Music. During this period he cultivated an interest in Jazz and studied further in Manhattan School of Music’s world-renowned jazz program. Jeremy played in local blues, funk and R&B bands amidst the thriving NYC music scene of the early 90s. He then joined the Mercury Record’s funk band Milo Z, managed by David Sonenberg, and played shows with legendary artists like Bon Jovi, Al Green, Maceo Parker, The Neville Brothers, The Meters, Chuck Brown & the Soul Searchers & Toots and the Maytals. He would return to Juilliard in 2001 to study composition with Stanley Wolfe. Composing In 1996, Adelman composed for the 3rd season of Comedy Central’s Viva Variety created by Michael Ian Black, Ben Garant

Jeremy Beck

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Jeremy Beck (born 1960) is an American composer who “knows the importance of embracing the past while also going his own way.” The critic Mark Sebastian Jordan has said that “Beck was committed to tonality and a recognizable musical vernacular long before that became the hip bandwagon it is today. Indeed, he is … an original voice celebrating music.” Early life Jeremy Joseph Beck was born January 15, 1960, in Painesville, Ohio. His father, Albert William Beck (b. April 4, 1931, in Scranton, Pennsylvania; d. May 16, 2018 in Quincy, Illinois), known as “Al”, was a visual artist and poet who taught for many years at Culver–Stockton College in Canton, Missouri. His mother, Mila Katrine Aho (b. June 24, 1935, Painesville, Ohio; d. March 26, 2018 in Memphis, Tennessee), known as “Katrine”, was a pianist and organist who taught music privately. Beck’s parents married in 1958, but not without some controversy: the Beck family was Jewish and the Aho family was Lutheran. Albert’s parents agreed to support the wedding as long as the Ahos knew they were Jewish. Katrine’s parents agreed to support the wedding only if Katrine’s father – Gustav Axel Aho, also known as “G.A. Aho”, a Lutheran min

Jeremy Soule

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Jeremy Soule ( ) is an American composer of soundtracks for film, television, and video games. He has composed soundtracks for over 60 games and over a dozen other works during his career, including The Elder Scrolls, Guild Wars, Total Annihilation, and the Harry Potter series. He became an employee of Square in 1994 after several years of private composition studies. After finishing the soundtrack to Secret of Evermore in 1995, he left to join Humongous Entertainment, where he composed for several children’s games as well as Total Annihilation, his first award-winning score. In 2000, he left to form his own music production company, Soule Media, later called Artistry Entertainment. In 2005, he founded DirectSong, a record label that published digital versions of his soundtracks as well as those of classical composers. DirectSong remained active until 2019. Soule’s works have been played in several live concerts such as the Symphonic Game Music Concert in Germany and the international Play! A Video Game Symphony concert series. While many of his works are orchestral, he considers himself someone who creates more than just one type of music. Several of Soule’s soundtracks were creat

Jeremy Turner (composer)

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Jeremy Turner (born June 18, 1975 in Sewickley, Pennsylvania) is an American composer and multi-instrumentalist living in California. Biography Jeremy Turner began playing the piano and the cello as a young child. After his family moved to Michigan where his father was Director of Admissions at Michigan State University, Turner attended East Lansing High School. He then furthered his musical studies at The Juilliard School as a pupil of Harvey Shapiro. In 1997, before graduating Juilliard, Turner joined The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra at just 21 years old, becoming one of the youngest members ever to join the ensemble. At the end of his first season Turner was invited to join the Met Chamber Ensemble in its inaugural year. In 2005 he took a leave of absence from the Met to be the interim Principal Cellist of The Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra in New Zealand. After returning to the Met in 2006, Turner played his final season in 2011 before leaving the orchestra to pursue composition. Composer/performer Turner has recorded with musicians such as Paul McCartney, David Byrne, Sufjan Stevens, and The National, has performed with various artists that include Renee Fleming, Joshua Bell,

Jerod Impichchaachaaha' Tate

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Jerod Impichch a achaaha’ Tate (, ), born July 25, 1968) is a Chickasaw classical composer and pianist. His compositions are inspired by North American Indian history, culture and ethos. He has had several commissioned works, which have been performed by major orchestras in Washington, DC; San Francisco, Detroit, and Minneapolis, among others. When the San Francisco Symphony Chorus performed and recorded his work Iholba’ in 2008, it was the first time the chorus had sung any work in Chickasaw or any American Indian language. He is founder and artistic director of the Chickasaw Chamber Music Festival. He was Co-Founder and Composition Instructor for the Chickasaw Summer Arts Academy. Biography Jerod Impichch a achaaha’ Tate was born in 1968 in Norman, Oklahoma, is a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation in Oklahoma, and is dedicated to the development of American Indian classical composition. His middle name, Impichchaachaaha, means “his high corncrib” and is his inherited traditional Chickasaw house name. A corncrib is a small hut used for the storage of corn and other vegetables. In traditional Chickasaw culture, the corncrib was built high off the ground on stilts to keep its contents

Jerome Kitzke

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Jerome Kitzke (born 1955) is a composer who grew up along the southwestern shore of Lake Michigan in South Milwaukee, Wisconsin. History He received his B.F.A. from the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, and moved to New York City in 1984. In 1992 Kitzke formed his performing group Mad Coyote. His music has also been performed by the Milwaukee Symphony, the New Juilliard Ensemble, Essential Music, Present Music, Earplay, Zeitgeist, Guy Klucevsek, Margaret Leng Tan, ETHEL and Kathleen Supové. Kitzke has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, American Music Center, Meet the Composer, ASCAP, and BMI. In 2004 and 2006 he visited the Randolph School in Wappingers Falls, New York to compose music for their shows. He even put music to Allen Ginsberg’s poem “Green Automobile”, which was included on his most recent album The Paha Sapa Give-Back (Innova Recordings, 2014). He is a quarter Persian. Music Chamber works *A Keening Wish, narrator and ensemble *Alone On A Hill in Grandfather Night, mixed trio *Breath and Bone, accordion solo *Haunted America, mixed quartet *In Bone Colored Light, mixed sextet *Mad Coyote Madly Sings, large mixed ensemble *Present Music, large mi

Jeronimas Kačinskas

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Jeronimas Kačinskas (or Kacinskas; 17 April 1907 – 15 September 2005 ) was a Lithuanian-born American composer. Kačinskas was born in Viduklė, Kovno Governorate, Russian Empire, to the family of a church organist. He studied music at the National Conservatory of Lithuania in Klaipėda and at the Prague Conservatory. He later taught at the State Conservatory in Vilnius. His Nonet was premiered in London in 1938, and he married Elena Šlevaitė in 1941. In 1944, they escaped from Lithuania and travelled through Poland into Germany, where they were finally rescued by American troops. In 1949, they arrived in the United States, and Kačinskas became a church organist and choirmaster in Boston, Massachusetts. From 1967 to 1986, he taught at Berklee College of Music. In 1991 he was awarded Lithuanian National Prize. Works ;Opera * Juodas laivas (Black Ship) (1975); libretto by Algirdas Landsbergis ;Orchestral * Symphonic Fantasy No.1 (1940) * Giesmė į šviesą (Hymn to Light), Symphonic Poem (1947) * Atpirkimo misterija (Mystery of Redemption), Symphonic Poem (1956) * Lento, Symphonic Poem (1957) * Vilniaus siuita (Vilnius Suite) (1960) * Symphonic Fantasy No.2 (1960) * Transcendentinės išraiš

Jerry Bilik

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Jerry H. Bilik (born October 7, 1933 in New Rochelle, New York, United States) is an American composer, arranger, songwriter, conductor, and director of stage productions. He received a B.M.E. degree and a M.M. degree from the University of Michigan, which counts Bilik among its notable alumni. He also composed the “M Fanfare.” He has served as Vice President of creative development for Disney on Ice. References External links * *Jerry Bilik Music website - maintained by Jerry Bilik

Jerry Brubaker

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Jerry Brubaker (born 1946) is an American composer and arranger of more than 300 works of music for concert band, symphony, and chorus and a professional French horn soloist. Education and career In 1968, Brubaker received his undergraduate degree from the Eastman School of Music and later pursued a Master of Music degree from the Catholic University of America. Brubaker served for 30 years in the United States Navy Band in Washington, D.C., as a French horn soloist and composer and arranger. In 1985, he became the band’s chief arranger, and held that position until his retirement from the navy in 1998. After retiring from the military, Brubaker has performed and arranged for the Village Band of Estes Park (CO), City of Fairfax (VA) Band and the Virginia Grand Military Band and is the current president of the Association of Concert Bands. He is an exclusive composer and arranger for Alfred Publishing Co. Inc., and has written commissions for musical organizations across the United States, such as the East Winds Symphonic Band in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Personal life Brubaker was born in Altoona, Pennsylvania, in 1946 and was an active musician throughout his early years. During g

Jerry Calliste Jr.

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Gerald C. Calliste Jr. (born November 26, 1965), also known as Hashim, is an American entrepreneur, producer, songwriter, publisher, and former DJ who is best known for the hip hop, electro, and dance music song “Al-Naafiysh (The Soul)” (1983). Education Calliste attends the Ross School of Management & Leadership at Franklin University, where he is a double major student studying for a Bachelor of Science in Information Technology and a Bachelor of Science in Management Information Sciences. History In 1983, Calliste co-founded the New York Independent record label Cutting Records Inc. with two partners and recorded under the name Hashim. At the age of 16, Calliste used a $50 Casio keyboard (combo calculator) to teach himself how to play keyboards by ear. One year later, he went on to write and produce “Al-Naafiysh (The Soul)”. During the early 1980s, he “made it to #43 in the Billboards Dance Disco Charts”. Since 2001, Calliste Jr. is president and CEO of both Bassmint Music and Caldella Music. According to Kellman in 2007, Hashim was the work of Jerry Calliste Jr. He became involved with music as a teenager; he started DJ at the age of 12, and in the early 1980s, he promoted part

Jerry Hunt

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Jerry Edward Hunt (November 30, 1943 – November 27, 1993) was an American composer who created works using live electronics partly controlled by his ritualistic performance techniques which were influenced by his interest in the occult. He was considered a pioneer of live, electronic and computer-aided audio and video. Hunt lived his entire life in Texas, living in a house he built himself on his family’s ranchland. Hunt was often described as “hyperactive” and always on the move. and a relative of his was a Freemason. As a teenager, Hunt put ads in the local newspapers, offering mail-order instructions “in the path of the infinite.” When a Dallas couple visited and asked for “Master Jerry,” his parents became very concerned about his mental health. As a young adult, Hunt worked as a pianist for various nightclub acts in Texas. Work and artistic vision Jerry Hunt briefly taught at Southern Methodist University. Hunt rarely used traditional instruments in his work. He was a self-taught inventor of electrical and computer-aided musical devices. Hunt’s live performances were considered unique and honest by art-critics. Others have referred to his work as “wonderfully disorienting” bec

Jess Langston Turner

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Jess Langston Turner (born 1983) is an American composer, who is known primarily for his concert band and choir music. Biography Jess Langston Turner was born in Greenville, South Carolina in 1983, the son of Dan and Jamie Langston Turner, professors at Bob Jones University. He took piano lessons at age 8, and trumpet at age 11. He attended Bob Jones University, where he took bachelor’s and master’s degrees in trumpet performance. He then moved on to the University of Hartford, where he earned a master’s in musical composition. In 2015 he completed a doctorate in composition from Indiana University. Recordings Jess Langston Turner’s music has been recorded on five occasions, all by concert bands. Rumplestilzchen was recorded by the North Texas Wind Symphony and the Hartt School Wind Ensemble, the latter of which was released by Naxos; the West Chester University Wind Ensemble recorded him twice: Through the Looking Glass, on their album “Borrowed Inspirations” (2013), and Reanimations on their album “Reanimations” (2015); and the University of Louisville Wind Symphony, which also recorded Through the Looking Glass in 2017 for the American Bandmasters Association National Convention

Jessi (musician)

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Jessica Hyunju Ho (; born December 17, 1988), better known by the stage name Jessi (), is an American rapper and singer based in South Korea. She was born in New York City and raised in New Jersey. She moved to Seoul, South Korea, at the age of 15. Jessi originally debuted in South Korea in 2005 and briefly joined the Korean hip-hop group Uptown in 2006. After a hiatus, she returned to music as part of the hip-hop trio Lucky J and as a soloist under YMC Entertainment, until the group’s disbandment in 2016. She then signed with Psy’s record label P Nation in 2019 as its first artist, where she continued her solo career until her departure from the label in 2022. Several of her solo and collaborative singles have been commercially successful, with five Top 10 entries in the Gaon Digital Chart, including her highest-charting solo single “Nunu Nana” and the chart-topping single “Don’t Touch Me” as part of the Refund Sisters. Jessi is a prominent presence in Korean variety programs. She achieved mainstream popularity as part of the first season of Mnet hip hop competition show Unpretty Rapstar, where she placed second. She also served as a judge in competition shows High School Rapper a

Jessica Jung

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Jessica Jung (born April 18, 1989) is an American and South Korean singer-songwriter, actress, author, and businesswoman. She is best known for her work as a former member of the South Korean girl group Girls’ Generation. As an actress, Jung portrayed Elle Woods in the Korean version of the musical Legally Blonde in 2010 and played a role in the television drama Wild Romance in 2012. In August 2014, Jung established a fashion brand, Blanc & Eclare. The next month, she was dismissed from Girls’ Generation, and in 2015, she ended her contract with SM Entertainment. In 2016, Jung signed with Coridel Entertainment in 2016, prior to the release of her debut solo album With Love, J. In May 2018, she signed a contract with United Talent Agency. Her debut novel Shine was released in September 2020. Early life Jessica Jung was born on April 18, 1989, in San Francisco. While on vacation in South Korea, she and her sister, Krystal, were spotted in a shopping mall by a member of SM Entertainment; she later joined the company in 2000. She spent seven years as a trainee before debuting as part of the Korean girl group Girls’ Generation. Jung attended Korea Kent Foreign School during her teenage

Jessica Suchy-Pilalis

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Jessica Ray Suchy-Pilalis (born 1954) is an American harpist. She is specialist in the theory and practice of Byzantine chant. Life and career Jessica Suchy-Pilalis was born and grew up in Milwaukee. She became interested in playing the harp when she was in kindergarten. She graduated from Shorewood High School in 1972. Suchy-Pilalis went on to become an honor student at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee (UWM). Her mother, Gregoria Karides Suchy, who taught at UWM, was also a composer who has written harp music for her daughter. She received two grants to study Byzantine music and to perform in Greece between 1984 and 1985. During that year, she became a psalti, or cantor, at the Indianapolis Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church. She studied Byzantine music at Holy Cross Greek Orthodox Theological Seminary with Savas I. Savas and in Greece where she studied primarily with Dimitrios Sourlantzis. In 1988, she received a fellowship from the Indiana Arts Commission and National Endowment for the Arts. She received diplomas with honors in Byzantine Music from two conservatories in Thessaloniki, Greece, and is recognized/certified as an Hieropsalti (Chanter) by both the Greek Orthodox

Jessie Baetz

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Jessie Baetz (born Jessie Elizabeth Drummer; June 28, 1894 – November 28, 1980) the daughter of John Drummer and Esther Ann Oughtred Drummer. She studied and taught at the Toronto Conservatory of Music. Career She immigrated to New York City, where 1930s census records list her occupation as painter. Her art was included in a Christmas exhibit at the Jumble Shop on West 8th Street. She studied with modernist composer, Johanna Beyer, and played in her concerts for the New York Composers’ Forum. Baetz’s music was influenced by Beyer and Henry Cowell’s use of such techniques as tone clusters, polymeters, string piano, and playing the piano with forearms. Three of her works were performed at the Composers’ Forum on December 15, 1937, where they were part of a program that also included music by Rudolph Forst and Harrison Kerr. Her visual art consisted of “painting sculptures or spatial creations”, including colorful masks. 1966, and 1970. Personal life Jessie Drummer married fellow artist Walter Baetz in 1926. They lived in Shandaken, New York. In 1961 they were both rescued after a carbon monoxide accident in their home. Her husband died in 1978, and she died in November 1980, at a nu

Jessie Gaynor

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Jesse L. Smith Gaynor (February 17, 1863 - February 20, 1921) was an American composer of children’s music. She wrote the music for the well-known children’s lullaby “The Slumber Boat”, in collaboration with the children’s author, Alice C.D. Riley, who wrote the lyrics. Her daughter, Rose Gaynor Barrett (1884-1954), was an American visual artist as well as songwriter under her maiden name, Rose Fenimore Gaynor. Biography Jessie L. Smith was born in St. Louis, Missouri to a prominent businessman of that city and Susan Fenimore Taylor, from whom she inherited her love and talent for music and who was related to James Fenimore Cooper. As a child, Mrs. Gaynor sang correctly before she could talk. She was early placed under instruction, first in instrumental and later in vocal music, and continued her musical studies while in school and college. Aside from her piano study she became somewhat familiar with the cornet, double bass, and violin, and later studied the violin for two years. While at school, she played these various instruments in an amateur orchestra. She later studied piano and theory under Dr. Louis Maas of Boston. Afterward she studied voice under John Dennis Mehan, theory

Jessie Montgomery

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Jessie Montgomery (born December 8, 1981, New York City) is an American violinist, composer, chamber musician, and music educator. Her compositions focus on the vernacular, improvisation, language, and social justice. She is the 2025 Classical Woman of the Year, awarded by the radio program Performance Today. Early life and education Jessie Montgomery, who is of African American heritage, was raised in Manhattan’s Lower East Side by playwright and performer Robbie McCauley and composer Ed Montgomery. She began her violin studies at the Third Street Music School Settlement. She holds a bachelor’s degree in violin performance from the Juilliard School, and completed a master’s degree in Composition for Film and Multimedia at New York University in 2012. Starting in 1999, Montgomery became involved with the Sphinx Organization, a Detroit-based nonprofit that supports young African American and Latino string players. After receiving multiple Sphinx awards and grants as a young performer and composer, she now serves as composer-in-residence for the Sphinx Virtuosi, the organization’s professional touring ensemble. Career Montgomery devoted her early career to performance and to teaching

Jill Tracy

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Jill Tracy is a composer, singer, pianist, storyteller and “musical evocateur” based in San Francisco. Jill Tracy is listed in San Francisco Magazines Top 100 Creative Forces in the Bay Area, has been awarded “Best of the Bay” by the San Francisco Bay Guardian, and has been nominated for two California Music Awards and SF Weekly Music Awards. She has been hailed a “bad-ass icon” by SFist and “a femme fatale for the thinking man” by the San Francisco Chronicle, which is a moniker that is now frequently used to describe her. Career Following her 1996 solo debut CD Quintessentially Unreal, Tracy released Diabolical Streak (1999), her first studio album featuring The Malcontent Orchestra. The song “Evil Night Together” was awarded the SIBL international Grand Prize for songwriting. The album was listed among the “Top 10 Neo-Cabaret albums of all time” in Shift magazine. “Evil Night Together” has been featured on the CBS show NCIS, the feature film “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” (2008), and Showtime chose the tune to promote the final season of Dexter (2013) in a promo entitled “The Final Symphony.” “The Fine Art of Poisoning,” also from Diabolical Streak, became an animated short film in 20

Jim Johnston (composer)

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James Alan Johnston (born June 19, 1952 ) is an American music composer and musician best known for his time with professional wrestling promotion, WWE. Over the course of 3 decades, he composed and recorded entrance theme music for the promotion’s wrestlers, and compilations of his music released by WWE charted highly in several countries. Writing and recording mostly by himself, he wrote over 10,000 pieces of music, many of which are as highly regarded as the wrestlers themselves. In later years, he regularly collaborated with mainstream hip hop & rock musicians such as Motörhead, Disturbed, Kid Rock, Ice-T, Run-DMC, Mariah Carey, and Our Lady Peace for new music and different takes on existing entrance music. Johnston was released from WWE in 2017, replaced in the role by CFO$. Career Johnston studied music and design at Hampshire College. His career began composing soundtracks for animated and industrial films, which led to working for the television networks HBO and Showtime. While living in Connecticut in the mid-1980’s, Johnston met Brian Penry, art director for professional wrestling promotion World Wrestling Federation (WWF). Although not a fan of professional wrestling, W

Jim Stanton

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Jim Stanton is an American composer and political writer. Musician Stanton was a drummer with the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra in the mid-1960s. He played with various small groups and big bands through the 1960s and early 1970s. He co-led his own recording and performing group, Dialogue, in the 1970s. Composer, playwright, and writer Stanton wrote the score for an original radio production of The Trial of the Catonsville Nine by Daniel Berrigan, played on WBAI-FM in New York City in 1971. He wrote a two-person play, Chatoyant, in 1977, opening and performing it in the Philadelphia area with music played by Terry Gross on Fresh Air. Stanton composed sound and score for an original production of Shakespeare’s The Tempest in 1980 (People’s Light and Theatre Company, Malvern, Pennsylvania). He also composed in MIDI format at his home in the late 2000’s, sharing them on CD-R format. (The Music of Jim Stanton 2005/2006, Copper Beach Music) He would go on to write many independent orchestral pieces, scored for many different instrumental combinations. In the spring of 2008, he began writing his autobiography. Politics Stanton wrote many articles for the Philadelphia Weekly (Welcomat) and vario

Jim Steinman

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James Richard Steinman (November 1, 1947 – April 19, 2021) was an American composer, lyricist and record producer. He also worked as an arranger, pianist, and singer. His work included songs in the adult contemporary, rock, dance, pop, musical theater, and film score genres. He wrote albums for Bonnie Tyler and Meat Loaf, including Bat Out of Hell (one of the best-selling albums in history), and also wrote and produced Bat Out of Hell II: Back into Hell and Tyler’s Faster Than the Speed of Night. His most successful chart singles include Tyler’s “Total Eclipse of the Heart”, Air Supply’s “Making Love Out of Nothing at All”, Meat Loaf’s “I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)”, the Sisters of Mercy’s “This Corrosion” and “More”, Barry Manilow’s “Read ‘Em and Weep”, Take That’s “Never Forget”, Celine Dion’s cover of “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now” (originally released by Steinman’s project Pandora’s Box) and Boyzone’s “No Matter What”. Steinman’s only solo album, Bad for Good, was released in 1981. Steinman’s work also extended to musical theater, where he began his career. He was credited with the book, music, and lyrics for Bat Out of Hell: The Musical, lyrics for Whistle

Jimmy McHugh

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James Francis McHugh (July 10, 1894 – May 23, 1969) was an American composer. One of the most prolific songwriters from the 1920s to the 1950s, he is credited with over 500 songs. His songs were recorded by many artists, including Chet Baker, June Christy, Bing Crosby, Marlene Dietrich, Deanna Durbin, Ella Fitzgerald, Judy Garland, Adelaide Hall, Billie Holiday, Beverly Kenney, Bill Kenny, The Everly Brothers, Peggy Lee, Carmen Miranda, Nina Simone, Frank Sinatra, and Dinah Washington. Career McHugh who was of Irish descent began his career in his hometown of Boston, Massachusetts, United States, Eventually finding employment as a professional manager with the music publisher Jack Mills Inc., it was there that McHugh published his first real hit, “Emaline”, and briefly teamed up with Irving Mills as The Hotsy Totsy Boys to write the hit song “Everything Is Hotsy Totsy Now”. This songwriting partnership marked another of McHugh’s many collaborations, among them Ted Koehler (“I’m Shooting High”), Al Dubin (“South American Way”) and Harold Adamson (“It’s a Most Unusual Day”). As impressive as these master lyricists were, perhaps McHugh’s best symbiotic musical relationship was with th

Jimmy Vivino

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Jimmy Vivino (born January 10, 1955) is an American guitarist, keyboard player, singer, producer, and music director. He is best known as the leader of Jimmy Vivino and the Basic Cable Band, the house band for the TBS late night program Conan. He was also a member of the Tonight Show Band, the house band on The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien and its predecessor, Late Night with Conan O’Brien on NBC. Vivino has also played with many rock bands, including being a member of Beatles tribute band The Fab Faux. He is the younger brother of TV and stage performer “Uncle” Floyd Vivino and Basic Cable Band bandmate Jerry Vivino. Biography Born in Paterson, New Jersey, on January 10, 1955, Vivino grew up in Glen Rock, New Jersey. He attended Glen Rock High School where he played Tevye in a production of Fiddler on the Roof. He had an interest in music from a young age. He began working in New York clubs in the early 1980s and in 1984 was musical director of the play Leader of the Pack. Later he led “Jimmy Vivino and the Black Italians” and worked with Al Kooper. Kooper considered Vivino to be one of his “discoveries” and had him as musical director for fifteen years. Vivino served as the mu

Joan Franks Williams

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Joan Franks Williams (April 1, 1930 – January 30, 2003) was an American composer. Life Joan Franks Williams was born in Brooklyn, on April 1, 1930 to her father, Harold Franks, and her mother. Both of her parents enjoyed classical music, leading Williams to absorb the world of classical music through piano and viola lessons and frequent attendance to live concerts and performances. She attended the High School of Music and the Arts in Manhattan and continued with music into her college studies. Williams earned a bachelor’s in Music Education from the Eastman School of Music in 1952, and a Bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Manhattan School of Music 1961. While still in New York, she met her future husband Irving Williams on a blind date in Manhattan; suitingly, they enjoyed a live symphonic performance followed by dinner. Joann married Irving in 1954, and moved to Seattle with her family in 1962. In Seattle, she founded New Dimensions in Music (NDM), a non-profit organization that was one of the early and most influential promoters of new music in the Pacific Northwest. As a part of NDM she also established the first electronic music studio in Seattle. In 1971, the Williams f

Joan La Barbara

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Joan Linda Lotz La Barbara (born June 8, 1947) is an American vocalist and composer known for her explorations of non-conventional or “extended” vocal techniques. Considered to be a vocal virtuoso in the field of contemporary music, she is credited with advancing a new vocabulary of vocal sounds including trills, whispers, cries, sighs, inhaled tones, and multiphonics (singing two or more pitches simultaneously). Biography An influential figure in experimental music, La Barbara was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She is a classically trained singer who studied with soprano Helen Boatwright at Syracuse University, Phyllis Curtin at Tanglewood/Berkshire Music School and contralto Marion Szekeley Freschl at the Juilliard School in New York. Joan La Barbara’s early creative work (early to mid 1970s) focuses on experimentation and investigation of vocal sound as raw sonic material, including works that explore varied timbres on a single pitch,“circular singing” inhaled and exhaled singing inspired by horn players’ circular breathing techniques, and multiphonic or chordal singing i.e. double-stops for the voice . In the mid 1970s, she began creating more structured compositional work

Joan Szymko

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Joan Szymko (born 1957) is an American choral conductor, music educator and composer. She was born in Chicago and studied choral conducting and music education at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, graduating in 1978. She settled in Seattle, Washington, and worked as a music teacher, composer and choral conductor. In 1993 Szymko took a position directing the Aurora Chorus in Portland, Oregon. She founded the women’s choir Viriditas Vocal Ensemble in 1994. Szymko composed the music for the Broadway musical Do Jump! at the New Victory Theater and Jan Maher’s play Most Dangerous Women. Works Szymko composes mainly for theater and choral ensembles. Selected works include: *All Works of Love for the Brock Commission 2010 *Nothing But Mud (text: “The Church, Zillebeke, October 1918” by William Orpen from his An Onlooker in France, 1917–1919 (1921)) *The Call *Carpe Diem *Ein grosser Gesang (text: poems by Rainer Maria Rilke) *Entro en la vida (text: by Teresa of Ávila) *The Freshness (text: Rumi) *Hear Me! We Are One *Herbst (text: Rainer Maria Rilke) *How Did the Rose (text: Hafez) *I Lift My Eyes *I Dream a World (text: poem by Langston Hughes) *Illumina la tenebre (text: St

Joan Tower

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Joan Tower (born September 6, 1938) is a Grammy-winning contemporary American composer, concert pianist, and conductor. Her work has been performed worldwide. Since gaining recognition for her first orchestral composition, Sequoia (1981), a tone poem that structurally depicts a giant tree from trunk to needles, she has written a variety of instrumental works, including Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman—something of a response to Aaron Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man—the Island Prelude, five string quartets, and an assortment of other tone poems. Tower was the pianist and a founding member of the Naumburg Award-winning Da Capo Chamber Players, which commissioned and premiered many of her early works, including her widely performed Petroushskates. The New Yorker has called her “one of the most successful woman composers of all time”. Life and career Born in New Rochelle, New York, in 1938, Tower moved to Bolivia when she was nine years old, an experience she credits for making rhythm an integral part of her work. She discovered this love for rhythm in the local saint’s day celebrations. There, she learned how to play percussion and then started her musical journey. For the next dec

Joanne Metcalf

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Joanne Metcalf (born 1958) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Best known for her choral music, she has worked closely with the Hilliard Ensemble and Singer Pur, among other vocal ensembles. Life and career Joanne Metcalf was born in 1958 and studied music composition (BA, 1982) at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She was awarded first prize for the 1993 Search for New Music award from the International Alliance for Women in Music. While studying at Duke University with Stephen Jaffe and Scott Lindroth (MM, 1993), she met Dutch composer Louis Andriessen, then a guest at Duke. Inspired by “whatever it was that made Andriessen’s music so fresh and energizing”, Metcalf later studied with him for at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague through a Fulbright scholarship. Recordings References Citations :Primary :Secondary Sources * * * External links * *

Jody Diamond

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Jody Diamond (born Pasadena, California, April 23, 1953) is an American composer, performer, writer, publisher, editor, and educator. She specializes in traditional and new music for Indonesian gamelan and is active internationally as a scholar, performer, and publisher. Biography She received a B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley in 1977, and an M.A. from San Francisco State University in 1979, pursuing interdisciplinary studies in music, anthropology, and education. Diamond founded (in 1981) and directs the American Gamelan Institute and edits its journal, Balungan. She is also a co-founder and co-director, with Larry Polansky, of Frog Peak Music (a composers’ collective). She received a Fulbright Senior Scholar Regional Research Fellowship to survey contemporary music in Indonesia (1988–89), as well as two National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowships for work on Indonesian composers (1991), and for work on the gamelan music of Lou Harrison (2007). She has created numerous works for gamelan, some based on songs from various traditions. Her works have been performed internationally. She is often a guest composer/performer with Gamelan Son of Lion, notably for the

Joe Kraemer (composer)

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Joe Kraemer (born June 21, 1971) is an American composer and conductor of film and television scores. He has worked with director Christopher McQuarrie several times – The Way of the Gun (2000), Jack Reacher (2012), and Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015). Biography Kraemer was born in Buffalo, New York and raised in Albany, New York. His father and uncle were both musicians, and Kraemer began taking piano lessons at an early age. In high school he befriended an older boy named Scott Storm, who became a professional filmmaker. Kraemer’s first film score was for a Super-8 film written and directed by Storm, called Chiming Hour. Kraemer, who also acted in the film, was 15 at the time. Storm later introduced Kraemer to filmmakers Bryan Singer and Christopher McQuarrie. His credits also include the 2014 film Dawn Patrol, starring Scott Eastwood. Kraemer worked with McQuarrie and Cruise again when he scored the fifth film in the Mission: Impossible franchise, Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015). Since 2015, Kraemer has been providing music and sound design to a number of audio plays released by Big Finish Productions. These include spin-offs for Doctor Who characters such a

Joe Maneri

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Joseph Gabriel Esther Maneri (February 9, 1927 – August 24, 2009) was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, and composer. Violinist Mat Maneri is his son. He has performed with his son, Mat, Paul Bley (at the Montreal Jazz Festival), and Ted Harris, studied with Josef Schmid, and taught saxophonist Matana Roberts and pianists John Medeski, Jack Reilly and Matthew Shipp. Boston Microtonal Society In 1988, Maneri founded the Boston Microtonal Society, dedicated to microtonal music and tuning. It is currently led by James Bergin and Julia Werntz. Discography * Kalavinka (Cochlea, 1989) * Get Ready to Receive Yourself (Leo, 1995) * Three Men Walking with Mat Maneri and Joe Morris (ECM, 1996) * Dahabenzapple (hatART, 1996) * Let the Horse Go (Leo, 1996) * In Full Cry (ECM, 1997) * Coming Down the Mountain (hatOLOGY, 1997) * Paniots Nine (Avant, 1998) * Blessed with Mat Maneri (ECM, 1998) * Tales of Rohnlief with Mat Maneri and Barre Phillips (ECM, 1999) * Tenderly (hatOLOGY, 1999) * Out Right Now with Mat Maneri and Joe Morris (hatOLOGY, 2001) * Voices Lowered (Leo, 2001) * The Trio Concerts (Leo, 2001) * Going to Church (AUM Fidelity, 2002) * Angles of Repose (ECM, 2004) * Peace C

Joe Sample

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Joseph Leslie Sample (February 1, 1939 – September 12, 2014) in emulation of one of the leading progressive jazz bands of the day, Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers. Sample never took a degree from the university; instead, in 1960, he and the Jazz Crusaders made the move from Houston to Los Angeles. He was a member of Phi Beta Sigma fraternity. The group quickly found opportunities on the West Coast, making its first recording, Freedom Sound, in 1961 and releasing up to four albums a year over much of the 1960s. The Jazz Crusaders played at first in the dominant hard bop style of the day, standing out by virtue of their unusual front-line combination of saxophone (played by Wilton Felder) and Henderson’s trombone. Another distinctive quality was the funky, rhythmically appealing acoustic piano playing of Sample, who helped steer the group’s sound into a fusion between jazz and soul in the late 1960s. The Jazz Crusaders became a strong concert draw during those years. While Sample and his bandmates continued to work together, he and the other band members pursued individual work as well. In 1969, Sample made his first recording under his own name; Fancy Dance featured the pianist as part

Joel Mandelbaum

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Mayer Joel Mandelbaum (born October 12, 1932) is an American music composer and teacher, best known for his use of microtonal tuning (notably just intonation and 19 equal temperament and the 31 equal temperament). He wrote the first Ph.D. dissertation on microtonality in 1961. He is married to stained glass artist Ellen Mandelbaum, and is the nephew of Abraham Edel. Career Born in New York City, Mandelbaum received his Ph.D. from Indiana University School of Music in music theory in 1961. He also studied at the Harvard and Brandeis universities, as well as the Berkshire Music Center and the Berlin Hochschule für Musik. His composition teachers included Boris Blacher, Luigi Dallapiccola, Irving Fine, Walter Piston, and Harold Shapero. He was a teacher and chairman of the music department at Queens College, City University of New York, from 1961 to 1999. Mandelbaum became interested in microtonality after listening to a lecture by Paul Hindemith in which Hindemith inadequately debunked various alternative forms of tuning. He began a correspondence with Adriaan Fokker which led to a six-week stay in Haarlem, Netherlands, in 1963, during which he composed music using Euler’s genera und

Joel Puckett

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Joel Puckett (born in 1977 in Atlanta, Georgia) is an American composer. Joel completed his academic work at the University of Michigan, earning both a Masters of Music and a Doctorate of Musical Arts. His teachers include Michael Daugherty, William Bolcom, Bright Sheng, Will Averitt, and Thomas Albert. The September 11th tribute This Mourning—one of his most notable works—was commissioned by the Washington Chorus and is scored for 250 singers, full orchestra and a consort of 40 crystal glasses. This premiere took place at the main stage of the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. in late November 2006. Among his other notable pieces is his concerto for flute, flute choir, and wind ensemble The Shadow of Sirius, which was written to commemorate the loss of his child through miscarriage. Puckett is a Professor of Music Theory and Composition and serves as Chair of Music Theory, Ear Training and Piano Skills at the Peabody Conservatory of Johns Hopkins University. Previously he taught at Shenandoah University and Towson University. Puckett also served a term as the composer-in-residence for the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras. His first opera, The Fix, was premiered by Minnesota Opera

Joel Thome

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Joel Thome (born in Detroit, Michigan) is the conductor and artistic director of Orchestra of Our Time. A Grammy Award recipient, Thome has been acclaimed internationally as an accomplished conductor and composer of classical and contemporary orchestral music, as well as a strikingly effective conductor of opera and other music/theater works. His conducting credits include many prominent and international orchestras. He has worked with such noted artists as pianists Vladimir Feltsman and Lorin Hollander, violinist Jaime Laredo, Metropolitan Opera singers Florence Quivar and Roberta Alexander. His modern opera performances include the Weill/Brecht Threepenny Opera with the Opera Company of Boston and the Thomson/Stein Four Saints in Three Acts at Carnegie Hall. For thirteen years, Thome led the National Symphonic Orchestra of Mexico in concerts of classical and contemporary works. He has also conducted the Israel Chamber Orchestra, Group L’Itineraire in Paris, Brooklyn Philharmonic, the Orquestra Municipal of Caracas and the Milwaukee Symphony, and has been a regular guest conductor of the Monday Evening Concert Series in Los Angeles. A composer and conductor of many disciplines, Th

Johann Friedrich Peter

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Johann Friedrich Peter (sometimes John Frederick Peter) (May 19, 1746 – July 13, 1813) was an American composer of German origin and the one who first brought the music of Joseph Haydn to the United States. Bio Johann Friedrich Peter was born on May 19, 1746, in Heerendijk, Holland, to German parents Susannah Peter and Moravian pastor John Frederick Peter. Peter was educated in Holland and Germany before coming to America with his brother Simon in 1770. He began to compose music for the church shortly after his arrival in America, and for a time, served as an organist and violinist in the Moravian congregations of Nazareth, Bethlehem and Lititz in Pennsylvania. In 1780, he moved to Salem, North Carolina, and received his ordination as a Moravian deacon on September 16 of that year. He married Catharina Leinbach in 1786 in Salem, North Carolina and lived there until their departure in 1790. All of Peter’s known compositions are sacred concerted vocal works or anthems composed for worship services with the exception of the string quintets. His six string quintets for two violins, two violas, and a violoncello are among the earliest examples of chamber music known by a North American

Johanna Beyer

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Johanna Magdalena Beyer (July 11, 1888 – January 9, 1944) was a German-American composer and pianist. Among her best known compositions is IV for Percussion Ensemble (1935), the only work published during her lifetime. Biography Johanna Beyer was born in Leipzig, Germany, but very little is known about her life prior to her move to the United States in 1923. She sang for three years at the Leipziger Singakademie and graduated from the Deutscher Konservatorien and Musikseminare, having studied piano, harmony, theory, counterpoint, singing, and dancing. Colleagues in New York recalled that her pianism and musicianship were excellent and that her musical training seemed traditional and solid. She spent 1911–1914 in America, though nothing is known of her activities during those years. Returning to the U.S. in 1923 (according to the biographical notes she provided in a Composers’ Forum concert program), she studied at the Mannes College of Music, receiving two degrees by 1928. She taught piano to support herself, and may have taught at Greenwich House Music School, but struggled to make ends meet, resorting at times to WPA work and Ladies Home Aid. In the late 1920s or early thirties s

John A. Ross (composer)

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John Andrew Ross (December 15, 1940 – June 12, 2006) was an African American jazz musician, composer, musical director, and choral conductor. Ross was born and raised in Roxbury, Massachusetts and remained in the Boston, Massachusetts area for his whole life. While growing up in Roxbury, Ross’s home was frequently visited by his father’s college roommate, Langston Hughes. The relationship shared between Hughes and Ross would later manifest as Ross becoming the musical director of Langston Hughes’s gospel play “Black Nativity”. Biography Early life John Ross was born to Olga Evelyn White and Melvin Everand Ross on December 15, 1940. He grew up in Roxbury, Massachusetts, with his parents and sister Paula Ann Ross. His childhood was heavily influenced by music and the presence of Langston Hughes. Hughes would come and stay with Ross’s family when he lectured in Boston, Massachusetts because of his long-standing relationship with Ross’s father, Melvin. As a child, Ross was somewhat unaware of Hughes’s celebrity status and was able to maintain an organic relationship with the Harlem Renaissance writer. Education Ross began attending Boston University to pursue a concentrated degree in C

John Adam Hugo

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John Adam Hugo (1873–1945) was an American composer and pianist. A native of Bridgeport, Connecticut, Hugo studied from 1888 until 1897 at the Stuttgart Conservatory; his instructors there included , Immanuel Faisst, Árpád Doppler, and Hermann Zumpe. He embarked on a career as a concert pianist, appearing in Germany, England, and Italy before returning to his native country in 1899. That year he became an instructor of piano at the Peabody Institute in Baltimore, where he remained for only one year before becoming the director of the European Conservatory and director of the music department of its Woman’s College, in which positions he worked from 1901 until 1906. Beginning in the latter year he became a private teacher of piano in Baltimore. Hugo later returned to the city of his birth, where he died. References

John Adams

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Youth and early career#

John Coolidge Adams was born in Worcester, Massachusetts, on February 15, 1947. As an adolescent, he lived in Woodstock, Vermont, for five years before moving to East Concord, New Hampshire, and his family spent summers on the shores of Lake Winnipesaukee, where his grandfather ran a dance hall. Adams’s family did not own a television, and did not have a record player until he was ten. But both his parents were musicians, his mother a singer with big bands, and his father a clarinetist. He grew up with jazz, Americana, and Broadway musicals, once meeting Duke Ellington at his grandfather’s dance hall. Adams also played baseball as a boy. In the third grade, Adams took up the clarinet, initially taking lessons from his father, Carl Adams, and later with Boston Symphony Orchestra bass clarinetist Felix Viscuglia. He also played in various local orchestras, concert bands, and marching bands while a student. Adams began composing at age ten and first heard his music performed as a teenager. He graduated from Concord High School in 1965. Adams next enrolled in Harvard University, where he earned a bachelor of arts, magna cum laude, in 1969 and a master of arts in 1971, studying composition with Leon Kirchner, Roger Sessions, Earl Kim, Harold Shapero, and David Del Tredici. Adams also became engrossed by the strict modernism of the 20th century (such as that of Boulez) while at Harvard, and believed that music had to continue progressing, to the extent that he once wrote a letter to Leonard Bernstein criticizing the supposed stylistic reactionism of Chichester Psalms. But by night, Adams enjoyed listening to The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, and Bob Dylan, and has said he once stood in line at eight in the morning to purchase a copy of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. For his thesis, he wrote The Electric Wake for “electric” (i.e., amplified) soprano accompanied by an ensemble of “electric” strings, keyboards, harp, and percussion. A performance could not be put together at the time, and Adams has never heard the piece performed. He also wrote American Standard, comprising three movements, a march, a hymn, and a jazz ballad, which was recorded and released on Obscure Records in 1975.

John Alden Carpenter

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John Alden Carpenter (February 28, 1876 – April 26, 1951) was an American composer. Carpenter’s compositional style was considered to be mainly “mildly modernistic and impressionistic”; many of his works strive to encompass the spirit of America, including the patriotic The Home Road and several other jazz-inspired works. He was among the first classical composers to incorporate elements of jazz and ragtime in their pieces. Biography Carpenter was born in Park Ridge, Illinois on February 28, 1876 as a son of an American industrialist, and raised in a musical household. He was educated at Harvard University, later returning to the United States to study under Bernhard Ziehn in Chicago through 1912. possibly his best-known is Skyscrapers (1926), set in New York (it premiered at the Metropolitan Opera), but equally inspired by his native Chicago. One of his most famous works was 1914’s impressionistic orchestral suite Adventures in a Perambulator. It was recorded in stereo in 1956 by Howard Hanson and the Eastman-Rochester Orchestra for Mercury Records, which initially released it on LP; Philips later reissued the recording on CD. In 1932, Carpenter completed Song of Faith for the Geo

John Antes

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John Antes (24 March 1740 – 17 December 1811) was the first American Moravian Missionary to travel and work in Egypt, one of the earliest American-born chamber music composers, and the maker of perhaps the earliest surviving bowed string instrument made in America. Although Antes is often recognized for his choral works, such as Go Congregation Go! and Surely he has Bourne our Griefs, his three string trios have also attracted attention and the lost “six Quartettos” remain a tantalizing mystery. Biography John Antes was born on March 24, 1740, in Frederick, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. In 1745, Antes entered the Moravian Boys Boarding School, where he received music education from Johann Christoph Pyrlaeus. Although Pyrlaeus might now be first-known as a teacher of Antes, he was the founder of the Bethlehem collegium musicum, a capable singer, instrumentalist, and organist, and was also a missionary to Native Americans. In 1752, John entered the boys school in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and in 1760, was admitted into the Single Brethren’s choir, also in Bethlehem. Antes was ordained as a Moravian Minister in January 1769, and he left for Egypt that same month to serve as a missio

John Anthony Lennon

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John Anthony Lennon (born 1950 in Greensboro, North Carolina) is an American composer of contemporary classical music based in Georgia. Biography Early life and education John Anthony Lennon was born in Greensboro, North Carolina and raised in Mill Valley, California. He earned a B.A. degree in liberal arts from the University of San Francisco, first majoring in English and minoring in philosophy, later adding music courses. He received M.M. and D.M.A. degrees in music composition from the University of Michigan, where he studied composition with Leslie Bassett and William Bolcom. Academic career Lennon is Professor Emeritus of Music at Emory University in Atlanta. He formerly taught at the University of Tennessee (starting in 1977), and taught as a guest composer at Northwestern University in the spring of 1998. Composer Lennon is known particularly for his works for classical guitar (many of which were written for the American guitarist David Starobin), including Another’s Fandango (1981), Gigolo (1996), and the guitar concerto Zingari (1991), and for several contributions to the classical saxophone repertoire, including “Distances Within Me” (1980) for James Forger, “Symphonic R

John Barnes Chance

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John Barnes Chance (November 20, 1932 – August 16, 1972) was an American composer. Chance studied composition with Clifton Williams at the University of Texas, Austin, and is best known for his concert band works, which include Variations on a Korean Folk Song, Incantation and Dance, and Blue Lake Overture. Biography Chance is believed to be a descendant of Robert Chance, a Mississippi gambler who settled in southeast Texas in the late 1800s. His parents, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Floyd Chance, were natives of southeast Texas. Chance’s first musical experience started when he was 9 years old and began to take private piano lessons. In high school, Chance continued to perform in ensembles and met Arnold Whedbee, a band director, who would premiere the first movement of Chance’s Symphony 1 at his graduation. In Greensboro, Chance was able to understand the limitations of high school students and was then able to compose for them. His first major wind ensemble composition, Incantation and Dance, was composed and performed during his residency with Greensboro Senior High School. Because of Chance’s obligations of working with the entire district, he had to write music for many different grad

John Barry (composer)

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John Barry Prendergast (3 November 1933 – 30 January 2011) was an English composer and conductor of film music. Born in York, Barry spent his early years working in cinemas owned by his father. During his national service with the British Army in Cyprus, Barry began performing as a musician after learning to play the trumpet. Upon completing his national service, he formed a band in 1957, the John Barry Seven. He later developed an interest in composing and arranging music, making his début for television in 1958. He came to the notice of the filmmakers of the first James Bond film Dr. No, who were dissatisfied with a theme for James Bond given to them by Monty Norman. Noel Rogers, the head of music at United Artists, approached Barry. This started a successful association between Barry and the Bond series that lasted for 25 years. Barry composed the scores for eleven of the James Bond films between 1963 and 1987, as well as arranging and performing the “James Bond Theme” for the first film in the series, 1962’s Dr. No. He wrote the Grammy- and Academy Award-winning scores to the films Dances with Wolves (1990) and Out of Africa (1985), as well as the scores of The Scarlet Letter (

John Beal (composer)

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John Everett Beal (born January 20, 1947) is an American composer and conductor known for his work in the American film industry. He has conducted for major recording artists ranging from Olivia Newton-John to Deadmau5, movies in concert such as Star Wars, Top Gun: Maverick, Toy Story, Home Alone, Rocketman and the Harry Potter series, is the principal conductor of the Hollywood Symphony Orchestra, is considered by the New York Times as the pioneer of original scores for film trailer music, and has composed the music for numerous television series and films. Early life John Beal was born in Santa Monica, California, raised in La Cañada Flintridge, California, and graduated from John Muir High School (Pasadena, California), where he was honored for having written many of the drum cadences for the school’s internationally renowned Drum Corps, many of which are still used more than 50 years after his graduation. He was named to their Hall of Fame in 2008. He attended San Diego State University and, after being decorated for heroism and bravery in combat with the United States Marine Corps, he attended UCLA. He studied percussion with William Kraft and Bernie Mattinson, and drums with

John Cage

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John Milton Cage Jr. (September 5, 1912 – August 12, 1992) was an American composer, artist, and music theorist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde. Critics have lauded him as one of the most influential composers of the 20th century. He was also instrumental in the development of modern dance, mostly through his association with choreographer Merce Cunningham, who was also Cage’s romantic partner for most of their lives. Cage’s teachers included Henry Cowell (1933) and Arnold Schoenberg (1933–35), both known for their radical innovations in music, but Cage’s major influences lay in various East and South Asian cultures. Through his studies of Indian philosophy and Zen Buddhism in the late 1940s, Cage came to the idea of aleatoric or chance-controlled music, which he started composing in 1951. The I Ching, an ancient Chinese classic text and decision-making tool, became Cage’s standard composition tool for the rest of his life. In a 1957 lecture, “Experimental Music”, he described music as “a purposeless play” which is “an affirmation of life – not a

John Carpenter

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John Howard Carpenter (born January 16, 1948) is an American filmmaker, composer, and actor. Most commonly associated with horror, action, and science fiction films of the 1970s and 1980s, he is generally recognized as a master of the horror genre. At the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, the French Directors’ Guild gave him the Golden Coach Award and lauded him as “a creative genius of raw, fantastic, and spectacular emotions”. On April 3, 2025, he received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. founded by his wife, Sandy King, in 2013. Early life John Howard Carpenter was born in Carthage, New York, on January 16, 1948, the son of Milton Jean (née Carter) and music professor Howard Ralph Carpenter. In 1953, after his father accepted a job at Western Kentucky University, the family relocated to Bowling Green, Kentucky. For much of his childhood, he and his family lived in a log cabin on the university’s campus. He was interested in films from an early age, particularly the westerns of Howard Hawks and John Ford, as well as 1950s low-budget horror films such as The Thing from Another World (which he would remake as The Thing in 1982) and high-budget sci-fi like Godzilla and Forbidden Plane

John Chowning

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John M. Chowning (; born August 22, 1934, in Salem, New Jersey) is an American composer, musician, discoverer, and professor best known for his work at Stanford University, the founding of CCRMA – Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics in 1975 and his development of the digital implementation of FM synthesis and the digital sound spatialization while there. Contribution Chowning is known for having developed the FM synthesis algorithm in 1967. In FM (frequency modulation) synthesis, both the carrier frequency and the modulation frequency are within the audio band. In essence, the amplitude and frequency of one waveform modulates the frequency of another waveform producing a resultant waveform that can be periodic or non-periodic depending upon the ratio of the two frequencies. Chowning’s breakthrough allowed for simple—in terms of process—yet rich sounding timbres, which synthesized ‘metal striking’ or ‘bell like’ sounds, and which seemed incredibly similar to real percussion (Chowning was also a skilled percussionist). He spent six years turning his breakthrough into a system of musical importance and eventually was able to simulate a large number of musical sounds, i

John Corigliano

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John Paul Corigliano (born February 16, 1938) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. With over 100 compositions, he has won accolades including a Pulitzer Prize, five Grammy Awards, the Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition, and an Academy Award. He is a former distinguished professor of music at Lehman College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and part of the composition faculty at the Juilliard School. Corigliano is best known for his Symphony No. 1, a response to the AIDS epidemic, and his film score for François Girard’s The Red Violin (1997), which he adapted as his 2003 Concerto for Violin and Orchestra (“The Red Violin”) for Joshua Bell. Biography Before 1964 Corigliano was born in New York City to a musical family. His Italian-American father, John Paul Corigliano Sr., was concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic for 23 years. Corigliano’s mother, Rose Buzen, an educator and pianist, He attended P.S. 241 and Midwood High School in Brooklyn. He studied composition at Columbia University (BA 1959) and at the Manhattan School of Music. He studied with Otto Luening, Vittorio Giannini, and Paul Creston. Before achieving success as a

John Courter

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John Edward Courter (June 25, 1941 – June 21, 2010) was an American composer, organist, and carillonneur who served as a professor of music at Berea College in Berea, Kentucky, from 1971 until his death on June 21, 2010. A native of Lansing, Michigan, Courter earned a bachelor’s degree in choral music education from Michigan State University in 1962 and a Master’s of Music degree in organ in 1966 from the University of Michigan. He also studied at the North German Organ Academy and held diplomas from the Netherlands Carillon School. Courter was active both as a performer and composer and was considered one of the leading contemporary composers for the carillon, having won several international prizes with his original carillon compositions. Courter also served on the Keyboard Committee, an international keyboard committee, which drafted a recommendation for the technical norms for a world standard carillon keyboard that was accepted by the World Carillon Federation in 2006. Courter’s carillon works have been published in Germany, the Netherlands and the United States as well as performed on carillons throughout the world, and he has composed more than 20 pieces for the carillon, in

John Craton

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John Douglas Craton (born August 6, 1953) is an American classical composer. His works have been performed throughout the United States, Europe, and Japan. While his compositions cover a diverse range, he is best known for his operas, ballets, and works for classical mandolin. Biography Craton was born August 6, 1953, in Anniston, Alabama. Though neither of his parents was musical, his extended family included many musicians, both amateurs and professionals, among them his cousin, concert pianist and composer Barbara Gallagher. He began his formal musical training at age 10 studying violin under retired violinist and conductor, Robert Louis Barron. After graduating from Saks High School, he studied violin and piano at Jacksonville State University before transferring to Lipscomb University, where he earned his B.A. Craton studied theory and composition under John Maltese, Gerald Moore, and Henry Fusner. His graduate degree from Indiana University Bloomington was in audiology, and Craton practiced as a clinical audiologist for several years in Indiana before returning to his musical roots and devoting his full-time to teaching and composing. Craton’s music is highly tonal and in gen

John Davison (composer)

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John H. Davison (31 May 1930 – 5 March 1999) was an American composer and pianist. Life and career Born in Istanbul, Turkey, he grew up in Upstate New York and in New York City, and studied music at the Juilliard School’s lower school, Haverford College, then received his master’s degree from Harvard University, where he focused on Renaissance music, particularly the works of Orlando Gibbons. He earned his doctorate in creative composition from the Eastman School of Music. His teachers included Alfred Swan, Randall Thompson, Walter Piston, Bernard Rogers, Howard Hanson, Alan Hovhaness, and Robert Palmer. During 1964-1965, Davison was placed in the Kansas City (Missouri) Schools as part of the Music Educators National Conference’s Contemporary Music Project, where he composed numerous works for band, chorus, and orchestra. He was a friend of Aaron Copland and maintained a correspondence with him. He was also a conscientious objector. Davison’s music is generally tonal, strongly melodic, and influenced by such diverse musics as Western classical and Romantic music (particularly the music of Johannes Brahms, Renaissance and Baroque music, Irish music, English country dancing, Anglican

John Diercks

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John Diercks (1927 – April 2020) was an American composer born in Montclair, New Jersey, in 1927. He held degrees from Oberlin College, the Eastman School, and the University of Rochester (PhD). His composition teachers included Howard Hanson and Alan Hovhaness. For Asian music and dance he studied with Dorothy Kahananui and Halla Huhm. Dr. Diercks taught piano at the College of Wooster (1950–54), then began a long tenure at Hollins University, teaching theory and composition. He served as department chair from 1962 until 1990. Among many grants and awards he has received are those from the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Mellon and Danforth foundations (five times), the Southern Foundation for the Humanities, and ASCAP (fifteen times). As a composer he has enjoyed residence at the MacDowell Colony, Wolf Trap Farm, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. Much of Diercks’ music is influenced by exoticism, including microtonality and “unconventional” musical sounds. An early work, Cave Music for vocalise and three players on prepared piano, accompanied a dance performed in Virginia’s Dixie Caverns and broadcast on NBC-TV’s Today

John Donald Robb

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John Donald Robb (June 12, 1892 – January 6, 1989) was an American composer, ethnomusicologist, arts administrator, and attorney. Biography Early life A symphony concert in his hometown of Minneapolis when he was a pre-teen inspired Robb to pursue a career as a composer. He began studying cello, and then pipe organ. While pursuing an undergraduate degree in English literature at Yale University, Robb continued his music education, including a course taught by Horatio Parker. Despite his passion for music, Robb turned to a career in the law. He attended both the University of Minnesota Law School and Harvard Law School. Robb worked as an international bond lawyer in New York City, but also learned music. During a 1935–36 leave of absence from his law firm, he studied composition with Nadia Boulanger at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau, France. It was her encouragement that gave him the confidence to pursue his dream of being a composer. Throughout his life, he made time to study composition; his teachers included Horatio Parker, Darius Milhaud, Roy Harris, Paul Hindemith, and Nadia Boulanger. Professional shift In 1941, after 18 years as a lawyer, Robb left his New York la

John Dragonetti

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John Dragonetti is an American composer, songwriter, and music producer based in Los Angeles, California. He is also a founding member (along with Blake Hazard) of the band The Submarines. Early life Dragonetti was born in Jackson, MI. His family moved to Egypt, where his father was principal of the American School in Cairo, at age 5. He spent most of his childhood in Dubai, U.A.E before attending boarding school in Nicosia, Cyprus. After high school at TASIS in Cyprus, John moved to Boston to attend Berklee College of Music. Pop career Dragonetti played in several bands in Boston, including The British Norberts (later, just The Norberts) and Wadi Trip. The British Norberts released a single in 1987 on the band’s Moon Cheese label called “The Russians Are Playing With the Weather.” The B-side was “Calling Sherlock Holmes.” In 1996, Dragonetti began recording on 4-track cassette under the moniker Jack Drag. These home recordings were released by the Chapel Hill-based label, Hep-Cat. He later signed to A&M Records and released the band’s only major label LP, Dope Box, which was produced by Chris Shaw. Dragonetti released two more self-produced Jack Drag albums, Aviating and The Sun I

John Duffy (composer)

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John Duffy (June 23, 1926 – December 22, 2015) was an American composer who created more than 300 works from symphonic music and operas to music for the concert hall, theatre, and film and television. In 1974 he founded the organization Meet The Composer under the auspices of the New York State Council on the Arts and the American Music Center. The organization helped to create platforms for contemporary composers to discuss new works with audiences; notably coordinating summer festivals of contemporary music for the New York Philharmonic and helping to fund composer-in-residence programs with 32 symphony orchestras throughout the United States among many other successful projects. Biography Born in Manhattan, Duffy was one of fourteen children born to his Irish immigrant parents, Thomas Duffy and Anna Quirk. Raised in Woodlawn, Bronx, he enlisted in the United States Navy during World War II and fought in the Battle of Okinawa. After the war he studied music composition at The New School with Henry Cowell and Solomon Rosowsky, and with Aaron Copland at the Tanglewood Music Center. Soon after completing his studies, he became music director of the Antioch Shakespeare Festival which

John Eaton (composer)

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John Charles Eaton (March 30, 1935 – December 2, 2015) was an American composer. Born in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, Eaton attended Princeton University, where he graduated in 1957. He later lived in Rome (1957–68), returning to Princeton to earn a PhD in 1970. He subsequently held faculty appointments at Indiana University School of Music (1970–92) and the University of Chicago (1989–99). Eaton was a prominent composer of microtonal music, and worked with Paul Ketoff and Robert Moog during the 1960s in developing several types of synthesizer. Notably, he was involved in the development, use, and ultimately unsuccessful commercialization of the SynKet. He devised a compositional genre called pocket opera, operas scored for a small cast of vocalists and a chamber group, and composed such pocket opera works as Peer Gynt, Let’s Get This Show on the Road, and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. His operas include The Cry of Clytaemnestra (1980), a re-telling of some of the events surrounding the Trojan War from the perspective of Agamemnon’s wife Clytaemnestra, which has been hailed as the first feminist opera. It was premièred at the Indiana University Bloomington Opera Theater, on Marc

John Elwood Price

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John Elwood Price (June 21, 1935 – May 9, 1995) was an American composer, pianist, ethnomusicologist, and music teacher. He composed approximately 600 musical works in a wide variety of genres. His works are widely performed in the United States by professional groups. Biography Elwood began to study piano when he was five years old. He was a musical prodigy. In sixth grade he wrote a piece for piano that he performed at the graduation ceremony. In high school, he learned (and composed for) orchestral instruments. He earned a Bachelor of Music degree in piano and composition from Lincoln University in 1957. There he studied composition with David Baker. In 1963, he earned a Master of Music at the University of Tulsa, where he studied with Oscar Anderson Fuller and Bela Rozsa. He later studied music at Washington University in St. Louis, working with Robert Wykes and Harold Blumenfeld. From 1957 to 1959, Elwood was the staff pianist at the Karamu House, a historic Black theater in the Fairfax neighborhood on the east side of Cleveland, Ohio. He composed incidental music for theater and worked as a vocal coach. He taught at Florida Memorial College, where he was Chairman of Music and

John Ferritto

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John E. Ferritto (January 20, 1937 – January 7, 2010) was an American composer, conductor, and music professor. He graduated with honors in piano and violin performance from the Cleveland Institute of Music, and also holds a M.M. in composition from Yale University, where he studied piano with Ward Davenny, conducting with Gustav Meier, and composition with Mel Powell. He also studied at the American Academy in Rome and at Tanglewood, with Gunther Schuller, and Erich Leinsdorf. He made his conducting debut with the U.S. Seventh Army Symphony Orchestra on tour in Germany, France, and Italy. He was associate conductor of the New Haven Symphony, Conductor of the Chamber Orchestra of the North Shore in Chicago, and director/conductor of the American Federation of Musicians Congress of Strings in Cincinnati. As a guest conductor, he has appeared with the Radio Television Orchestra of Bucharest, the State Orchestra of Greece, the Toledo Symphony, the Columbus Symphony Orchestra (Ohio), the Charleston S.C. Symphony, the Michigan Chamber Orchestra, Eastern Music Festival, the New Haven Opera, the New Haven Ballet, and the American Ballet Theatre. He has conducted the Orchestras of both the

John Harbison

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John Harris Harbison (born December 20, 1938) is an American composer and academic. Life John Harris Harbison was born on December 20, 1938, in Orange, New Jersey, to the historian Elmore Harris Harbison and Janet German Harbison. The Harbisons were a musical family; Elmore had studied composition in his youth and Janet wrote songs. Harbison’s sisters Helen and Margaret were musicians as well. He won the prestigious BMI Foundation’s Student Composer Awards for composition at the age of 16 in 1954. He studied music at Harvard University (BA 1960), where he sang with the Harvard Glee Club, and later at the Berlin Musikhochschule and at Princeton (MFA 1963). He is an Institute Professor of music at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a former student of Walter Piston and Roger Sessions. His works include several symphonies, string quartets, and concerti for violin, viola, and double bass. Harbison won the Pulitzer Prize for music in 1987 for The Flight into Egypt, and in 1989 he received a $305,000 MacArthur Fellowship. In 1998, he received the 4th annual Heinz Award in the Arts and Humanities. He was awarded the Harvard Arts Medal in 2000. In 2006, a recording of his Mot

John Henry Hopkins Jr.

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John Henry Hopkins Jr. (October 28, 1820 – August 14, 1891) was an American clergyman and hymnodist, most famous for composing the song “We Three Kings of Orient Are” in 1857 (even though it does not appear in print until his Carols, Hymns, and Songs in 1863). Life Hopkins was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the son of John Henry Hopkins, an Episcopal bishop. Hopkins graduated from the University of Vermont with an A.B. in 1839, and then a Master’s Degree in 1845. After a stint as a journalist, he graduated from the General Theological Seminary in 1850, and became a deacon, author, illustrator, and designer. He was the seminary’s first music teacher from 1855 to 1857, composed several hymns, and edited the Church Journal. He wrote words and music to his most famous hymn, “We Three Kings”, as part of a Christmas pageant for his nieces and nephews. It is suggested to have been written in 1857 but did not appear in print until his Carols, Hymns, and Songs in 1863. Hopkins served as rector of Trinity Church in Plattsburgh, New York from 1872 to 1876 and of Christ Episcopal Church in Williamsport, Pennsylvania from 1876 to 1887. He delivered the eulogy at the funeral of President Ulys

John Howard Payne

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John Howard Payne (June 9, 1791 – April 10, 1852) was an American actor, poet, playwright, and writer who had nearly two decades of a theatrical career and success in London. He is today most remembered as the creator of “Home! Sweet Home!”, a song he wrote in 1822 that became widely popular in the United States and the English-speaking world. Its popularity was revived during the American Civil War, as troops on both sides embraced it. After his return to the United States in 1832, Payne spent time with the Cherokee in the Southeast and interviewed many elders. Intending to write about them, he amassed material about their culture, language and society, which have been useful to scholars. But his published theory that suggested their origin as one of the Ten Lost Tribes of ancient Israel has been thoroughly disproved. At that time, European Americans were still strongly influenced by a Biblical basis of history in trying to understand origins of the peoples in the Americas. Early life and education John Howard Payne was born in New York City on June 9, 1791, one of seven sons among nine children. Early in his childhood, the family moved to Boston, Massachusetts, where his father h

John J. Becker

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John Joseph Becker (January 22, 1886 – January 21, 1961) was an American composer of contemporary classical music, a pianist, a conductor, a writer on music, and a music administrator. In the early 1930s he was especially active as a conductor, giving midwestern premieres of works by his close friend Charles Ives, as well as music by fellow American composers Carl Ruggles and Wallingford Riegger. Life Becker was born in Henderson, Kentucky, and began his formal musical education at the Cincinnati Conservatory, receiving his diploma in 1905. He then pursued graduate studies at the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music in Milwaukee, where he earned a doctorate in composition in 1923. His composition teachers included Alexander von Fielitz, Carl Busch, and Wilhelm Middelschulte. After a period of comparative obscurity, his career as an educator and administrator began in 1917 at the University of Notre Dame, where he taught for ten years. A devout Catholic, he relocated to another Catholic institution, the College of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, where he taught from 1929 until 1933. From 1935 to 1941 he administered the Federal Music Project in Minnesota, and for a time was associate

John Jacob Niles

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John Jacob Niles (April 28, 1892 – March 1, 1980) was an American composer, singer and collector of traditional ballads. Called the “Dean of American Balladeers,” Niles was an important influence on the American folk music revival of the 1950s and 1960s, with Odetta, Joan Baez, Burl Ives, Peter, Paul and Mary and Bob Dylan, among others, recording his songs. Biography Born in Louisville, Kentucky, Niles learned music theory from his mother, and began writing down folk music as a teenager. He became a serious student of Appalachian folk music by transcribing traditional songs from oral sources while an itinerant employee of the Burroughs Corporation in eastern Kentucky, from 1910 to 1917. After serving in the U.S. Army Air Service during World War I, in which he was injured, he studied music in France, first in Lyon, then in Paris at the Schola Cantorum, also meeting Gertrude Stein. Returning to the United States in 1920, he continued his studies at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music working there with Ralph Lyford. He sang opera in Chicago and folk songs on early radio. In 1925, he moved to New York City and held various jobs in the entertainment industry. In the 1930s, he toured

John Kavanaugh

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John William Kavanaugh is an American composer, lyricist and musical director who is currently serving as one of several songwriters on Sofia the First: Royal Magic for Disney Television Animation. He is the recipient of 9 Emmy nominations and was awarded the 2014 Daytime Emmy Award for Sofia The First Main Title theme song with co-lyricist Craig Gerber. While working on Sofia The First, Kavanaugh was tapped to write songs for Disney’s first Latina princess, the award-winning Elena of Avalor. Kavanaugh penned the songs and served as music director on the series Alice’s Wonderland Bakery which premiered in February of 2022. In 2023, he earned an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Original Song for “The Hat Makes The Hatter,” co-written with lyricists Chelsea Beyl and Marisa Evans-Sanden, and the trio repeated their success in December 2024 with another nomination for “Let Your Wish Carry You Away” from season two. His songs can also be heard in several hit movies, including Disney’s Descendants 3 (My Once Upon a Time), Winnie The Pooh film Springtime with Roo and Nickelodeon’s Globehunters. He co-wrote the scores to Curious George Live for NBC Universal, Dreams are Universal for Univer

John Knowles Paine

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John Knowles Paine (January 9, 1839 – April 25, 1906) was the first American-born composer to achieve fame for large-scale orchestral music. The senior member of a group of composers collectively known as the Boston Six, Paine was one of those responsible for the first significant body of concert music by composers from the United States. The Boston Six’s other five members were Amy Beach, Arthur Foote, Edward MacDowell, George Chadwick, and Horatio Parker. Life Paine grew up in a musical family in Maine. His grandfather, an instrument maker, built the first pipe organ in the state of Maine and his father and uncles were all music teachers. His father carried on the family musical instrument business. One uncle was an organist. Another was a composer. In the 1850s Paine took lessons in organ and composition from Hermann Kotzschmar, completing his first composition, a string quartet, in 1855 at the age of 16. After his first organ recital in 1857, he was appointed organist of Portland’s Haydn Society, and gave a series of recitals with the object of funding a trip to Europe where he hoped to further his music education. On arrival in Europe, Paine studied organ with Carl August Haup

John La Montaine

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John Maynard La Montaine, also later LaMontaine, (March 17, 1920 – April 29, 2013) was an American pianist and composer, born in Oak Park, Illinois, who won the 1959 Pulitzer Prize for Music for his Piano Concerto No. 1 “In Time of War” (1958), which was premiered by Jorge Bolet. His teachers included Howard Hanson, Bernard Rogers, and Nadia Boulanger. His works have been performed by Leontyne Price, Jessye Norman, Adele Addison, Donald Gramm, Robert Silverman, Eleanor Steber and Jorge Bolet. In honor of the American Bicentennial celebration in 1976, he was commissioned to create a choral work for the Penn State Institute for Arts and Humanistic Studies. The opera, entitled Be Glad Then America, was performed by the University Choirs, under the direction of Sarah Caldwell. The folk singer Odetta appeared as the Muse for America. La Montaine lived in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California. His publishing company, Fredonia Press, is named for the street on which he lived. His business partner was the composer and pianist Paul J. Sifler (1911–2001). Selected works ;Opera * Novellis, Novellis, a Pageant Opera for narrator, soloists, chorus and orchestra, Op. 31 (1961); libretto adapted by

John Laurence Seymour

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John Laurence Seymour (January 18, 1893, in Los Angeles – February 1, 1986, in San Francisco) was an American composer and playwright. As a composer Seymour is best known for his operas, which have “complex orchestral textures and italianate lyricism”. in Los Angeles, California. His parents were John L. Symour and Rose Anna La Pointe. He grew up in Sacramento, California. He attended Polytechnic High. Selected works ;Stage * The Bachelor Belles, Operetta in 3 acts, Op. 13 (1935); libretto by Rose A. Seymour * In the Pasha’s Garden, Opera in 1 act, Op. 17 (1934); libretto by Henry Chester Tracy based on the book by Harrison Griswold Dwight; recipient of the Bispham Memorial Medal Award * The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Comic Operetta in 2 acts, Op. 35 (1937); libretto by Henry Chester Tracy after the play by William Shakespeare * Golden Days, Comic Operetta in 2 acts, Op. 40 (1936); libretto by Ralph Birchard * Hollywood Madness, Comic Opera in 3 acts, Op. 41 (1936); libretto by Ralph Birchard * Ming Toy, Musical Comedy in prologue and 2 acts (1949); book by Leslie H. Carter; lyrics and music by John Laurence Seymour * Ramona, Opera in 5 acts and epilogue; libretto by Henry Chester Tr

John Leslie McFarland

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John Leslie McFarland (May 12, 1926 – January 14, 1971) was an American popular music composer and arranger. Career Early in his career, McFarland wrote several songs for Bill Haley and His Comets: “Rockin’ Rollin’ Rover”, “You Hit The Wrong Note Billy Goat”, co-writing “Teenager’s Mother” with Curtis R. Lewis. One of McFarland’s earliest songs, co-written with Billy Moore Jr., was “You Dyed Your Hair Chartreuse”. It was recorded by Louis Jordan in 1950. In 1959, he co-wrote “Wang Dang Taffy Apple Tango” with Aaron Schroeder, and the song was recorded by Pat Boone. In 1960, McFarland also co-wrote the hit “Dreamin’” for Johnny Burnette with Aaron Schroeder. McFarland co-wrote the song “Stuck On You” with Aaron Schroeder for Elvis Presley. The song was Presley’s first hit single after two years in the US Army, recorded March 1960. The single rose to number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in late-April of that year, and became Presley’s thirteenth hit overall. “Stuck On You” was one of six Elvis Presley songs featured in the 2002 Disney movie Lilo & Stitch. McFarland arranged the songs on Aretha Franklin’s debut album for Columbia Records Aretha: With The Ray Bryant Combo and wrot

John Lessard

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John Lessard (July 3, 1920 – January 11, 2003) was an American composer and music educator noted among peers for his eloquent and dramatic neo-classical works for piano and voice, chamber ensembles, and orchestra, as well as for his playful pieces for mixed percussion ensembles. He was also an accomplished pianist and conductor. Early life Born John Ayres Lessard in San Francisco on July 3, 1920, he was raised in Palo Alto by parents with Quebec roots, quickly becoming fluent in both French and English. He began piano lessons at the age of five, then trumpet lessons at nine, and two years later joined the San Francisco Civic Symphony Orchestra. He studied piano and theory with Elise Belenky and also worked briefly with the composer Henry Cowell. At sixteen, he was offered a scholarship to study with Arnold Schoenberg, but felt so repelled by his music and the Vienna School outlook that he refused the scholarship and went to study in France. He then spent the duration of the war back in Europe with a unit assigned to liaison between American troops and allied French fighters and personnel. Death John Lessard died in East Setauket on January 11, 2003, aged 82. Awards and grants Lessa

John Loeffler

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John Loeffler (born June 3, 1951) is an American music industry executive and executive vice president, head of New York repertoire and marketing for BMG. In 2019, Loeffler’s output included new releases from John Fogerty, The Allman Betts Band feat. Devon Allman and Duane Betts, Marc Cohn and Blind Boys of Alabama, Perry Farrell, Sophie Auster, Jesse Colin Young and Stephen Bishop. Prior to being named EVP in January 2019 he served as executive director of global development for BMG and developed joint ventures with music and media companies beyond traditional music platforms. He also represented the label’s interests to forge new relationships with iconic artists including Roger Waters, Kenny Loggins, Bad Company, John Fogerty, and Earth, Wind & Fire. In 2011, Loeffler launched FieldHouse Music in association with BMG Music Rights and Universal Distribution. The venture established to discover and market new talent through licensing in film, TV and commercials. FieldHouse Music continues as a talent incubator for new artists and songwriters looking to be developed and promoted by a team of experienced professionals. As a songwriter, record producer and entrepreneur, Loeffler’s cr

John Luther Adams

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

John Luther Adams (born January 23, 1953) is an American composer. His history of environmental activism informs his music. His orchestral work Become Ocean was awarded the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Music. Early life Born in Meridian, Mississippi, Adams began playing music as a teenager as a drummer in rock bands. He attended the California Institute of the Arts as an undergraduate in the early 1970s, studying with James Tenney and Leonard Stein, and graduated in 1973. After graduating, Adams began work in environmental protection, and through this work Adams first travelled to Alaska in 1975. Adams moved to Alaska in 1978 and lived there until 2014. He subsequently divided his time between New York and the Sonoran desert in Mexico, though his time in Alaska continues to be a prominent influence in his music. From 1982 to 1989, he performed as timpanist and principal percussionist with the Fairbanks Symphony Orchestra and the Arctic Chamber Orchestra. Since January 2024, Adams and his wife now reside in Australia. Career Adams’s composition work spans many genres and media. He has composed for television, film, children’s theater, voice, acoustic instruments, orchestra, and electroni

John Mackey (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

John Mackey (born October 1, 1973) is an American composer of contemporary classical music, with an emphasis on music for wind band, as well as orchestra. For several years, he focused on music for modern dance and ballet. Biography John Mackey was born in New Philadelphia, Ohio and grew up in Westerville, Ohio, where he attended Westerville South High School. Though musicians themselves, Mackey’s parents did not provide him with music lessons, and he never formally studied an instrument. His grandfather, however, taught him to read music and introduced him to digital music notation. Through experimentation with programs intended for entertainment rather than education, Mackey began to compose his own music. He wrote his first piece, Lacrimosa, at age 11, after being inspired by the film Amadeus. As a young composer, he took some lessons from one of his mother’s friends, who had a Ph.D. in music. Mackey received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1995 from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he studied with Donald Erb. He then studied with John Corigliano at Juilliard, receiving a Master of Music degree in 1997. Mackey has stated his support for these institutions’ policies of n

John McGuire (composer)

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John McGuire (born June 27, 1942 in Artesia, California) is an American composer, pianist, organist, and music editor. Biography John McGuire initially studied composition with Robert Arthur Gross at Occidental College, where he earned a BA in 1964. He received a succession of three Alfred E. Hertz Traveling Scholarships from the University of California at Berkeley (1965–66, 1966–67, 1967–68), and a Fulbright Traveling Scholarship (1966–67), which together enabled him to study with Krzysztof Penderecki at the Folkwang Hochschule in Essen from 1966 to 1968, and at the Fourth Cologne Courses for New Music, under Karlheinz Stockhausen, in 1967. Two scholarships from the State of North Rhine–Westphalia for studies in Germany made it possible for him to participate in the composition studios given by Stockhausen at Darmstadt in 1967 and again in 1968. Returning to the United States, he continued his studies at the University of California, Berkeley, where his composition teachers included Ingolf Dahl and Seymour Shifrin. After completing his MA there in 1970, he once again moved to Europe, at first studying computer composition with Gottfried Michael Koenig at the Institute of Sonology

John Moran (composer)

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John Moran (born 1965) is an American composer, choreographer, and theater artist. and his works are variously described as “unconventional”, His works bring together a variety of mediums, including recorded music, spoken word, choreography and dance, mime, lip syncing, and video. Early life and education John Moran was born in Lincoln, Nebraska, in 1965. He lacks a formal education in composition and in fact never graduated from high school. He unsuccessfully attempted to study informally at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, where his father was the assistant dean of arts and sciences. He moved to New York City in 1988 at age 23, Career Early career: 1988–2000 Moran’s first opera, Jack Benny!, was created in 1988, and composed entirely of snippets of sound from The Jack Benny Program television series. The piece was staged at New York’s La Mama Experimental Theater Club, where it was presented by performance troupe Ridge Theater, and received strong praise in publications such as The New York Times. Although the work was considered a benchmark for modern composition at the time, the work itself was reportedly stolen in a Lower East Side apartment robbery, and has not been presen

John Musto

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John Musto (born 1954) is an American composer and pianist. As a composer, he is active in opera, orchestral and chamber music, song, vocal ensemble, and solo piano works. As a pianist, he performs frequently as a soloist, alone and with orchestra, as a chamber musician, and with singers. Career Born in 1954 in Brooklyn, New York, Musto studied at the Manhattan School of Music. After graduation from the conservatory with a reputation as a pianist, his compositions began to draw increasing attention and frequent performances. His long association with such institutions as the New York Festival of Song, the Wolf Trap Opera Company, the Caramoor Festival, Copland House, the Miller Theatre at Columbia University, and the Moab Festival have given him stable bases of operation and numerous commissions. He served as composer-in-residence at Caramoor for the 2005-2006 season. In 1986, he began to build a catalogue of published compositions at Peermusic Classical, which continues to grow steadily. Personal In 1984 John Musto married the soprano Amy Burton, a member of the New York City and Metropolitan Opera companies. He often appears with her as pianist in recital, cabaret and on recordin

John N. Klohr

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John Nicholas Klohr (July 27, 1869 – February 17, 1956) was a composer of band music. Klohr was born in Cincinnati, Ohio. A graduate of the Cincinnati public schools, Klohr set upon a career in music, especially vaudeville. He was a vaudeville trombonist by trade, but also performed as a member of Cincinnati’s musical life. He played in the Syrian Temple Shrine Band, led by fellow composer Henry Fillmore. From 1921 to 1926, Klohr was a trombonist in Henry Fillmore’s concert band. He was a member of the Syrian Temple for over 50 years, as well as a member of the Knights of Pythias and the Fraternal Order of Eagles. Klohr was also an early member of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers and worked as editor of the band and orchestra department of the John Church Company, a music publisher in Cincinnati. Klohr died of a heart attack in 1956, and was buried at St. Joseph Cemetery in Cincinnati. Compositions Names in parentheses are publishers and copyright dates * Arch of Steel March (Fillmore 1935) * The Billboard March (Church 1901) (His most famous march) * Blanchester March (Fillmore 1938) * Blazing the Trail March ( Fillmore 1938 ) * Breezing Along March (Fill

John Oliver (composer)

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John Oliver (born 21 September 1959) is a Canadian composer, guitarist, and conductor. An associate of the Canadian Music Centre and a member of the Canadian Electroacoustic Community, his music has been performed throughout North America, Europe, and China. In a 1989 article in The Music Scene, Oliver stated that he intended his music “to make sense without falling back on traditional models”. Early life and education Born Edward John Clavering Oliver in Vancouver, Oliver is the son of Vancouver artist Edward Oliver and playwright Thelma Oliver ( Melissa Cameron). He studied the guitar privately with Robert C. Jordan from 1972 to 1977. He attended the San Francisco Conservatory of Music from 1977 to 1979 where he studied guitar with George Sakellariou and composition with John Adams. He transferred to the University of British Columbia in 1979 where he earned a Bachelor of Music in 1982 and was a pupil of Stephen Chatman. He went on to pursue graduate studies in music composition at McGill University where he earned a Master of Music in 1984 and a Doctor of Musical Arts in 1992. His teachers at McGill included Bruce Mather and John Rea. From 1988 to 1989 he studied in Brussels wit

John Paesano

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John Paesano (born July 2, 1977) is an American composer working primarily in film, television, and video games. He is known for collaborating with director Wes Ball on the Maze Runner film trilogy and Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, as well as composing for the Marvel Television series Daredevil and The Defenders. As a video game composer, he has contributed music to the acclaimed titles Detroit: Become Human and the three installments in the Marvel’s Spider-Man series. Paesano won the BAFTA Games Award for Music (Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales), as well as the D.I.C.E. Award for Outstanding Achievement in Original Music Composition (Marvel’s Spider-Man 2). Biography Paesano was born in Birmingham, Michigan. He first studied classical music at Conservatoire de Paris located in Parc de la Villette, France before continuing his studies at Berklee College of Music pursuing a major in musical composition and film scoring. John knew from the age of nine years old, he wanted to become a music composer. He then worked under composers Jerry Goldsmith and John Williams providing additional music for the former, and orchestrating for the latter. Paesano cites Steven Spielberg’s 1987

John Philip Sousa

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John Philip Sousa (November 6, 1854 – March 6, 1932) was an American composer and conductor of the late Romantic era known primarily for US military marches. He is known as “The March King” (or the “American March King” to distinguish him from his British counterpart Kenneth J. Alford). Among Sousa’s best-known marches are “The Stars and Stripes Forever” (national march of the US), “Semper Fidelis” (official march of the United States Marine Corps), “The Liberty Bell”, “The Thunderer”, and “The Washington Post”. Sousa began his career playing violin and studying music theory and composition under John Esputa and George Felix Benkert. In 1868, Sousa’s father enlisted him in the United States Marine Band as an apprentice. Sousa left the band in 1875, and over the next five years, he performed as a violinist and learned to conduct. In 1880, Sousa rejoined the Marine Band and served there for 12 years as director. In 1892, he left the Marine Band and organized the civilian Sousa Band. From 1880 until his death, Sousa focused exclusively on conducting and writing music. He aided in the development of the sousaphone, a large brass instrument similar to the helicon and tuba. Upon the US j

John Prindle Scott

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John Prindle Scott (August 16, 1877 – December 2, 1932) was an American author, lecturer, educator and composer of art songs. Biography He was born in Norwich, New York, and was educated with private tutors in New York City Later he was a voice teacher in Saginaw, Michigan. He was also known as a singer (baritone) and concert soloist. For his 1916 setting of “Hymn to Nebraska,” the state of Nebraska awarded him a prize in composition. He also won a composition prize from Ohio University. He became a member of ASCAP in 1928. A couple of his songs and poems refer to the town, including “The Old Road” and “The Hills O’ McDonough”. He spent time with relatives in Syracuse, New York, where he died in December 1932. Scott’s song for high soprano, “The Wind’s in the South”, is considered a “good teaching piece for young coloratura sopranos “. His songs are typical of their time: dramatic, harmonically rich, and with full accompaniments. They often feature contrasting sections and a return to earlier musical material. Musical compositions Sacred songs for voice and piano *Arise, Shine, Sacred Song (Biblical Book of Isaiah), R. L. Huntzinger, 1923 *Christ Is Risen, Easter Song (unknown auth

John Rogers Thomas

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John Rogers Thomas (March 26, 1829 – April 5, 1896) was an American composer, pianist, and singer of Welsh descent. Biography Thomas was born in Newport, South Wales, on 26 March 1829. A baritone and composer, he first came to America with the Sequin English Opera Company and became interested in the music of America that was developing. He sang and toured with Bryant’s Minstrels and settled in New York City. He wrote more than one hundred popular American songs during the nineteenth century of which his most popular were The Cottage by the Sea (1856), Old Friends and Old Times (1856), Bonny Eloise—The Belle of Mohawk Vale (1858), Tis But a Little Faded Flower (1860), When the War Is Over, Mary (1864), Beautiful Isle of the Sea (1865), Croquet (1867), Eilleen Allanna (1873), and Rose of Killarney (1876). Thomas occasionally published material under the pseudonyms Charles Osborne, Arthur Percy and Harry Diamond. In addition to song writing, Thomas composed three larger works; The Picnic (1869), a children’s operetta with a libretto by George Cooper ; The Lady in the Mask (1870), an operetta with a libretto by George Cooper; and Diamond Cut Diamond (1876), a parlor opera in one act.

John Rox

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John Jefferson Rox (born John Arthur Barber; July 21, 1902 – August 5, 1957) was an American composer and lyricist. He wrote music for Broadway shows and the recording industry. His song “It’s a Big Wide Wonderful World” (1939) was used in the soundtrack of multiple films. His holiday tune “I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas” (1953) was a popular family-entertainment song, originally sung by ten-year-old Gayla Peevey. Many other artists also covered it. Early life John Arthur Barber was born on July 21, 1902, in Des Moines, Iowa, the only child of Arthur Grant Barber (1881–1948) and Ina Maureen (Dollie) Brown (1876–1942). His parents were married on September 7, 1901, but eventually divorced. His mother then remarried on April 3, 1907, to Earl Granville Herring, and bore two more sons, Donald Granville Herring and Robert Eugene Herring. Upon her remarriage, her eldest son John Arthur Barber was renamed John Jefferson Herring. After graduating from Winterset High School, he had attended Drake University in Des Moines and became a member of the Tau Psi fraternity in the early 1920s. The following year, he wrote and copyrighted “It’s a Big Wide Wonderful World” (1939). It has been us

John S. Hilliard

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John Stanley Hilliard (October 29, 1947 – November 15, 2019) was an American composer. Early life Born in Hot Springs, Arkansas, United states, into a family of musical amateurs, John Hilliard began his musical training by studying piano at the age of 6 from his cousin, Barbara Dodson, a local piano teacher and composer. His father, Sherlon Hilliard (of Irish and English descent), possessed a fine tenor voice and was a popular gospel-style singer with their county Protestant Church of the Nazarene congregations. While his mother, Laurine H. Hilliard (of Scottish descent), was an amateur accordionist and pianist. Hilliard’s grandfather, John Milton Hilliard, had also been well known as a congregational song leader (shaped-note tradition) for the rural areas of central Arkansas in the 1930s and 1940s. By age 11 Hilliard showed an interest in composing. At the age of 8, he had begun playing trumpet in the elementary band and was taught by the same elementary music teacher as President Bill Clinton, who was a childhood friend. They later both shared another influential music teacher, Virgil Spurlin, during their years together in the Hot Springs High School Band. In 1964 Hilliard playe

John Serry Sr.

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John Serry (born John Louis Serrapica; January 29, 1915 – September 14, 2003) was an American concert accordionist, arranger, composer, organist, and educator. He performed on the CBS Radio and Television networks and contributed to Voice of America’s cultural diplomacy initiatives during the Golden Age of Radio. He also concertized on the accordion as a member of several orchestras and jazz ensembles for nearly forty years between the 1930s and 1960s. Biography Serry’s career spanned over seven decades. As a proponent of Latin American music and the free-bass accordion, he performed as the piano accordionist on the radio music program Viva América, which was broadcast live to South America under the United States Department of State’s Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs’ cultural diplomacy initiative for Voice of America during World War II. Broadcasts of this show have been cited as helping to introduce Latin American music and the Mexican bolero to large audiences in the United States in the 1940s. Serry performed with big bands, symphony orchestras, radio and television orchestras, and Broadway orchestras at the Radio City Music Hall, the Rainbow Room at Rockefe

John Stepan Zamecnik

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John Stepan Zamecnik (May 14, 1872 in Cleveland, Ohio – June 13, 1953 in Los Angeles, California) was an American composer and conductor. He is best known for the “photoplay music” he composed for use during silent films by pianists, organists, and orchestras. Zamecnik used many pseudonyms, including Dorothy Lee, Lionel Baxter, R.L. (Robert) Creighton, Arturo de Castro, “Josh and Ted”, J. (Jane) Hathaway, Kathryn Hawthorne, Roberta Hudson, Ioane Kawelo, J. Edgar Lowell, Jules Reynard, F. (Frederick) Van Norman, Hal Vinton and Grant Wellesley. Early life John Zamecnik was born in Cleveland to Czech immigrants Josef Zámečník (1832-1915) and Kateřina Hrubecká (1838-1908). Josef was born in Budičovice and Kateřina was born in the nearby Skály. The couple married in Heřmaň in 1862. Josef’s brother Jan later married Kateřina’s sister Konstancie in the same place in 1869. Both couples immigrated to Ohio bringing Josef’s daughters and perhaps other relatives. Jan’s grandson was the geneticist Paul Zamecnik. Career Zamecnik studied at the Prague Conservatory of Music under Antonín Dvořák in the mid-1890s, completing his classes there in 1897. In 1899 Zamecnik finally returned to the United

John Tesh

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John Frank Tesh Jr. (born July 9, 1952) is an American musician and radio and television presenter. He wrote the NBA on NBC basketball theme “Roundball Rock” and hosts the Intelligence for Your Life radio show. In addition, since 2014, he has hosted Intelligence for Your Life TV with his wife, Connie Sellecca. Tesh has won six Emmys and has four gold albums, two Grammy nominations, and an Associated Press award for investigative journalism. Tesh has sold over eight million records. His live concerts have raised more than $7 million for PBS. He has co-hosted the television program Entertainment Tonight. He has previously worked as a sports commentator and host for the Olympic Games, Wimbledon, the US Open, the Tour de France, Ironman Triathlon, and as a news anchor and reporter. In 2018, Tesh was inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame. Early life Tesh was born in Garden City, New York, on Long Island, the son of Mildred (Bunny), a nurse, and John Frank Tesh Sr., a textile chemist, both from North Carolina. He graduated from Garden City High School in 1970. Playing piano and trumpet from the age of six, he was named to the New York State Symphonic Orchestra in high schoo

John Thomas Douglass

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John Thomas Douglass (1847–1886) was an American composer, virtuoso violinist, conductor and teacher. He is best known for composing Virginia’s Ball (1868), which is generally regarded as the first opera written by an African-American composer. The work is now lost, and his only extant composition is The Pilgrim: Grand Overture (1878) for piano. His biography from James Monroe Trotter’s Music and Some Highly Musical People (1878)—in which The Pilgrim survives—reports that he wrote many now lost pieces for piano, orchestra and particularly guitar, which he was known to play. A highly regarded violinist, Douglass’s violin playing received high praise during his lifetime. In addition to his solo career, he traveled with various groups throughout the 1870s, including the Hyers Sisters. He settled in New York by the 1880s and conducted both a music studio and string ensemble. Later in life he led a teaching studio, and among his students was David Mannes who became the concertmaster of the New York Symphony Orchestra. Nearly 30 years after Douglass’s death at age 38–39, Mannes founded the Colored Music Settlement School in the memory of his teacher. Life and career John Thomas Douglass

John Thow

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John Holland Thow (October 6, 1949 – March 4, 2007) was an American music composer. Thow produced an extensive and diverse body of work comprising solo, chamber, vocal, choral, operatic and orchestral repertoire. Born in Los Angeles in 1949, Thow grew up in Ventura, California. As a child he studied flute and piano, and later studied composition with Adolph Weiss, a pupil of Schoenberg’s, and conductor Frank Salazar. At University of Southern California he pursued his Bachelor of Music, studying composition with Ingolf Dahl. He continued his studies at Harvard with Earl Kim and Leon Kirchner, where he received his Ph.D. in composition in 1977. Thow received a Fulbright Fellowship, which allowed him to travel to Rome for the first time in 1973 to study composition with Luciano Berio, who would become an important mentor and influence. Thow later returned to Italy as a recipient of the prestigious Rome Prize. During that time he also studied with Luigi Dallapiccola and Franco Donatoni. After teaching at Boston University, Thow joined the University of California, Berkeley faculty in 1981, specializing in composition, orchestration, counterpoint, theory, in addition to teaching course

John Van Tongeren

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John Van Tongeren is an American keyboardist and composer for films and television. Biography Van Tongeren’s career in the entertainment business began as a keyboardist, with one of his earliest projects being the band Q, featuring Jon St. James and Stacey Swain (a.k.a. Stacey Q). Q then became SSQ, which released one album, Playback, on EMI records with John contributing four songs, most notably Anonymous. After leaving SSQ in the early ’80s, Van Tongeren became an in-demand session musician and began composing music for movies. As a musician, he has worked with Chicago, Roger Daltrey, Robbie Nevil, John Parr, The Chantoozies, Starship, Jeff Beck, Quincy Jones, Al Jarreau, The Pointer Sisters, Living in a Box, Stryper, and others. He currently works out of The Blue Room, a recording studio in Los Angeles. Van Tongeren began his film scoring career as one of the original members of Media Ventures (now Remote Control Productions). During his time at Media Ventures Van Tongeren worked on films such as Thelma & Louise, True Romance and Drop Zone with Hans Zimmer. He also collaborated with Mark Mancina on Speed, Moll Flanders, Fair Game, Assassins and Twister. Van Tongeren then began t

John Vincent (composer)

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John Nathaniel Vincent Jr. (May 17, 1902 – January 21, 1977) was an American composer, conductor, and music educator. Vincent was born in Birmingham, Alabama, and studied at the New England Conservatory of Music under Frederick Converse and George Chadwick graduating with a diploma in 1927. He continued his studies at George Peabody College where he earned a bachelor’s and a master’s degree followed by doctoral studies at Harvard University from 1933 to 1935. While at Harvard studying under Walter Piston he won the John Knowles Paine Traveling Fellowship for two years of study with Nadia Boulanger. He was able to study original manuscripts of all classical composers at the Bibliothèque nationale de France (French National Library). After transferring to Cornell University he earned his PhD in 1942. Made field recordings for Library of Congress with Alan Lomax, using Fairchild machine to preserve notables of the old South. Vincent was head of the music department at Western Kentucky University from 1937 to 1945 and Schoenberg’s successor as professor of composition at UCLA, a position he held from 1946 to 1969. He surveyed music schools to create UCLA’s state-of-art music building a

John W. Schaum

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John W. Schaum (January 27, 1905 – July 18, 1988) was an American pianist, composer, and educator who was born and died in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Education Schaum received a Bachelor of Music degree from Marquette University in 1931, a Bachelor of Music Education degree from University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, and a Master of Music degree from Northwestern University in 1934. Career Schaum began his career as a piano teacher in the late 1920s. In 1933 he founded the Schaum Piano School in Milwaukee. About the same time he began to compose piano music for teaching purposes. He also founded the first company to produce award stickers specifically for music students. Always on the lookout for better materials for his students, Schaum eventually decided to create his own books, beginning in 1941 with Piano Fun for Boys and Girls, which he later revised as the first in a series of nine piano method books that became the Schaum Piano Course, completed in 1945. These books are still widely used today. Over the course of his career, Schaum wrote many more books and hundreds of pieces of sheet music. His arrangement of the Marines’ Hymn, issued during World War II, sold more than a million co

John Wesley Work III

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John Wesley Work III (July 15, 1901 – May 17, 1967) was an American composer, educator, choral director, musicologist and scholar of African-American folklore and music. Biography He was born on July 15, 1901, in Tullahoma, Tennessee, to a family of professional musicians. His grandfather, John Wesley Work, was a church choir director in Nashville, where he wrote and arranged music for his choirs. Some of his choristers were members of the original Fisk Jubilee Singers. His father, John Wesley Work, Jr., was a singer, folksong collector and professor of music, Latin, and history at Fisk, and his mother, Agnes Haynes Work, was a singer who helped train the Fisk group. His uncle, Frederick Jerome Work, also collected and arranged folksongs, and his brother, Julian, became a professional musician and composer. Work began his musical training at the Fisk University Laboratory School, moving on to the Fisk High School and then the university, where he received a B.A. degree in 1923. After graduation, he attended the Institute of Musical Art in New York City (now the Juilliard School of Music), where he studied with Gardner Lamson. He returned to Fisk and began teaching in 1927, spending

John Whitney (animator)

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John Hales Whitney Sr. (April 8, 1917 – September 22, 1995) was an American animator, composer and inventor, widely considered to be one of the pioneers of computer animation. Life Whitney was born in Pasadena, California, and attended Pomona College. He is a descendant of the Whitney family through his father’s direct line. His first works in film were 8 mm movies of a lunar eclipse which he made using a home-made telescope. In 1937-38 he spent a year in Paris, studying twelve-tone composition under René Leibowitz. In 1939 he returned to America and began to collaborate with his brother James on a series of abstract films. Their work, Five Film Exercises (1940–45) was awarded a prize for sound at the First International Experimental Film Competition in Belgium in 1949. In 1948 he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. (dream sequences), and the graphic designer Saul Bass (titles). In 1960, he founded Motion Graphics Incorporated, which used the mechanical analog computer of his own invention to create motion picture and television title sequences and commercials. The following year, he assembled a record of the visual effects he had perfected using his device, titled simply Catalog. In

John Williams

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John Towner Williams (born February 8, 1932) is an American composer and conductor. Over his seven-decade career, he has composed many of the best known scores in film history. His compositional style blends romanticism, impressionism, and atonal music with complex orchestration. Best known for his collaborations with George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, he has received numerous accolades, including 27 Grammy Awards, five Academy Awards, seven BAFTA Awards, three Emmy Awards, and four Golden Globe Awards. With a total of 54 Academy Award nominations, he is the second-most nominated person in the award’s history, after Walt Disney. He is also the oldest Academy Award nominee in any category, receiving a nomination at 91 years old. Williams’s early work as a film composer includes None but the Brave (1965), Valley of the Dolls (1967), Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1969), Images, The Cowboys (both 1972), The Long Goodbye (1973) and The Towering Inferno (1974). He has collaborated with Spielberg since The Sugarland Express (1974), composing music for all but five of his feature films. He received five Academy Awards for Best Score/Best Score Adaptation for Fiddler on the Roof (1971; score adaptati

John Woods Duke

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John Woods Duke (July 30, 1899 – October 26, 1984) was an American composer and pianist. He is best known for his large output of art songs. Biography John Woods Duke was born in Cumberland, Maryland on July 30, 1899, the oldest child in a large musical family. After teaching him to read music at an early age and starting him on piano lessons at age 11, Duke’s mother (a talented singer herself) enrolled him in the Cumberland, MD Allegany Academy. By age 16 he had won a three-year scholarship to the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore. became very popular. His pieces were later selected for inclusion in such classic anthologies as Music for the Voice by Sergius Kagen and The Singer’s Repertoire by Berton Coffin. Donald Gramm notably sang John Duke’s settings of Edwin Arlington Robinson narrative poems, Three Poems by Edwin Arlington Robinson. Although Duke’s work covered a wide range of styles, it showed the particular influence of 19th-century German Lieder. Like those who influenced him, Duke had a passion for setting poems in his native language to music. Though he himself trained in piano, John Duke wrote almost all of his compositions for voice. When asked why, the composer repli

John Worley

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John C. Worley (1919-1999) was a saxophonist, conductor, professor, and a composer of classical, as well as more contemporary music for saxophone. He was born in Waltham, Massachusetts in 1919 and died on February 16, 1999. He served as conductor and director for many performing ensembles during his long teaching career, as well as a featured performer of saxophone and clarinet. Conducting & performing career highlights His early performances included a position as first clarinetist in the Columbus Symphony Orchestra, as well as first clarinetist in the Connecticut Symphony. While teaching at State University College at Oneonta, NY (aka “Oneonta State”, now SUNY Oneonta) Worley took charge of the community-based Oneonta Symphony (now the Catskill Symphony Orchestra) in 1947. The ensemble had been dormant since World War II decimated its ranks, and by 1953 Worley had succeeded in rejuvenating it to the point where a full concert was possible. By 1954, under his direction it had swelled to 57 musicians and began presenting local concerts for 400 people. While at Oneonta State, Worley also conducted the campus vocal group, the Choraleers, and served as music director for stage product

Johnny "Guitar" Watson

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John Watson Jr. (February 3, 1935 – May 17, 1996), often known professionally as Johnny “Guitar” Watson, was an American musician. A flamboyant showman and electric guitarist in the style of T-Bone Walker, his recording career spanned 40 years, and encompassed rhythm and blues, funk and soul music. Watson recorded throughout the 1950s and 1960s with some success. His 1954 instrumental single “Space Guitar” was the first of his recordings to showcase his electric guitar playing. His creative self-reinvention in the 1970s, with funk overtones, saw Watson have hits with “Ain’t That a Bitch” and “Superman Lover”. His highest-charting single was 1977’s “A Real Mother for Ya”. Early life Watson was born in Houston, Texas. His father John Sr. was a pianist, and taught his son the instrument. Early career In his new city, Watson won several local talent shows. This led to his employment, while still a teenager, with jump blues-style bands such as Chuck Higgins’s Mellotones and Amos Milburn. Watson affected a swaggering, yet humorous personality, indulging a taste for flashy clothes and wild showmanship on stage. According to music historian Larry Birnbaum, for “Space Guitar” he “came into

Johnny Bristol

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John William Bristol (February 3, 1939 – March 21, 2004) was an American musician, most famous as a songwriter and record producer for the Motown label in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He was a native of Morganton, North Carolina, about which he wrote an eponymous song. His composition “Love Me for a Reason” saw global success when covered by the Osmonds including a number one on the UK charts in 1974. The pair recorded two singles in 1959 for Anna Records, a label owned by Gwen Gordy (Berry Gordy’s sister) and Billy Davis and four 45s for Gwen Gordy and Harvey Fuqua’s Tri-Phi label, none of which was a success beyond the Midwestern United States. In the mid-1960s, Motown had absorbed Tri-Phi and Bristol began working with Fuqua as a songwriter and producer. Bristol is the male voice on the Supremes’ version of “Someday We’ll Be Together”, singing response to Diana Ross’ lead vocal. number 2 US R&B chart and number 3 UK), A deal for Ariola/Hansa saw him score with club hits “Love No Longer Has a Hold on Me” and “Take Me Down”. An accompanying album failed to consolidate his status, and it would be eight years before new product by Bristol appeared, with a 12" single “I’m Just a M

Johnny Mandel

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John Alfred Mandel (November 23, 1925 – June 29, 2020) was an American composer, multi-instrumentalist, and arranger of popular songs, film music and jazz. The musicians he worked with include Count Basie, Frank Sinatra, Peggy Lee, Anita O’Day, Barbra Streisand, Tony Bennett, Diane Schuur and Shirley Horn. He won five Grammy Awards, from 17 total nominations; his first nomination was for his debut film score for the multi-nominated 1958 film I Want to Live!. In 2011, he was named a Jazz Master by the National Endowment for the Arts. Among his other film accolades, Mandel also won an Academy Award for Best Original Song for “The Shadow of Your Smile” from The Sandpiper (1965), and was nominated three times each for a Primetime Emmy Award and a Golden Globe Award. He received the Grammy Trustees Award for his contributions to the music industry, in 2018. His father, Alfred, was a garment manufacturer who ran Mandel & Cash; his mother, Hannah (Hart-Rubin), had aimed to be an opera singer His family was Jewish. They moved to Los Angeles in 1934, after his father’s business collapsed during the Great Depression. He subsequently resided in Los Angeles, where he played the bass trumpet for Z

Johnny Pacheco

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Juan Pablo Knipping Pacheco (25 March 1935 – 15 February 2021), known as Johnny Pacheco, was a Dominican musician, arranger, composer, bandleader, and record producer. Born in the Dominican Republic, Pacheco became a leading figure in the New York salsa scene in the 1960s and 1970s as the founder and musical director of Fania Records. Pacheco was one of the leading exponents of pachanga, a blend of Cuban rhythms and Dominican merengue in the late 1950s. He popularized the use of the term “salsa” and established the Fania All-Stars to showcase the leading artists of the genre, which propelled him to worldwide fame and had an important role in the evolution of Latin music. Pacheco was a nine-time Grammy nominee and was awarded the Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award by the Latin Recording Academy in 2005. Early life and family Juan Pablo Pacheco Knipping was born on 25 March 1935 in Santiago de los Caballeros, a city in the Dominican Republic. He inherited his passion for music from his father, Rafael Azarías Pacheco, who was the leader and clarinetist of the Orquesta Santa Cecilia. One of the leading Dominican big bands of the 1930s, the Orquesta was the first to record Luis Alb

Jon Appleton

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Jon Howard Appleton (January 4, 1939 – January 30, 2022) was an American composer, an educator and a pioneer in electro-acoustic music. His earliest compositions in the medium, e.g. “Chef d’Oeuvre” and “Newark Airport Rock” (1967) attracted attention because they established a new tradition some have called programmatic electronic music. In 1970, he won Guggenheim, Fulbright and American-Scandinavian Foundation fellowships. When he was twenty-eight years old, he joined the faculty of Dartmouth College where he established one of the first electronic music studios in the United States. He remained there intermittently for forty-two years. In the mid-1970s, he left Dartmouth to briefly become the head of Elektronmusikstudion (EMS) (sv) in Stockholm, Sweden. In the late 1970s, together with Sydney Alonso and Cameron Jones, he helped develop the first commercial digital synthesizer called the Synclavier. For a decade he toured around the United States and Europe performing the compositions he composed for this instrument. In the early 1990s, he helped found the Theremin Center for Electronic Music at the Moscow Conservatory of Music. He also taught at Keio University (Mita) in Tokyo, J

Jon Gibson (minimalist musician)

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Jon Gibson (March 11, 1940 – October 11, 2020) was an American flutist, saxophonist, composer and visual artist, known as one of the founding members of the Philip Glass Ensemble. He was a key player on several seminal minimalist music compositions. He was born in Los Angeles to Charles and Muriel (née Taylor) Gibson, both educators, and grew up in El Monte, a suburb. Education Gibson studied at Sacramento State University and later at San Francisco State University with Henry Onderdonk and Wayne Peterson, where he earned a BA in 1964. His earliest work as an improviser and composer also dates from around this time, when he performed in the New Music Ensemble with composers Larry Austin, Richard Swift, and Stanley Lunetta. Career Gibson used various instruments from around the world in his performances of jazz and classical music. He was a founding member of the Philip Glass Ensemble, and his mastery of circular breathing techniques made him crucial to the development of Glass’ sound. Glass stated, “To put it bluntly, the music wouldn’t have happened without that.” Gibson performed in the premieres of In C by Terry Riley and Drumming by Steve Reich, as well as Reich’s 1967 composition

Jonathan Bepler

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Jonathan Bepler is an American composer of experimental music perhaps best known for his collaborative work with artists and choreographers, including many years of work with visual artist Matthew Barney. He is also multi-instrumentalist, singer, installation artist, and teacher. Early life and education Bepler was born in Media, Pennsylvania. He was self-taught on many instruments by the time he finished high school. His early interests included folk dance music, ancient and world music, jazz, and improvisation. In 1993 he received and M.F.A from Bennington College in Vermont, where he studied composition with Louis Calabro, Joel Chadabe and Vivian Fine, singing with Frank Baker and Theodor Uppman as well as musical performance with Milford Graves, Bill Dixon und Min Tanaka. In the later period of his studies he directed and sang in productions of Baroque opera such as Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice. He currently resides in Berlin. Career From 1985 to 1996, Bepler was guitarist with the Glenn Branca Ensemble, touring with them through Europe, the United States and Asia. Starting in 1987, his first operas were composed. From 1993, Bepler also dedicated himself to sound installations, as

Jonathan Kramer

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Jonathan Donald Kramer (December 7, 1942, Hartford, Connecticut – June 3, 2004, New York City) was an American composer and music theorist. Biography Kramer received his B.A. magna cum laude from Harvard University (1965) and his MA and PhD in music from the University of California, Berkeley (1967 and 1969). His composition teachers included Karlheinz Stockhausen, Roger Sessions, Leon Kirchner, Seymour Shifrin, Andrew Imbrie, Richard Felciano, Jean-Claude Éloy, Billy Jim Layton, Edwin Dugger, and Arnold Franchetti. He studied theory with David Lewin, criticism with Joseph Kerman, and computer music with John Chowning. Kramer was professor of composition and theory at Columbia University from 1988 until his death in 2004. He also taught at the Oberlin Conservatory, Yale University, and the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He held visiting appointments at Wesleyan University, King’s College London, the Canberra School of Music, the School of Music at the University of Western Australia, the Rockefeller Study Center in Bellagio (Italy), the Center for New Music and Technology (Berkeley), May in Miami, the ISCM Summer Workshop for Composers (Poland), and the Eur

Jonathan Leshnoff

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Jonathan Leshnoff (born September 8, 1973) is an American classical music composer. Early life and education Jonathan Leshnoff was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey to Susan and Steven Leshnoff; his mother was an artist, and his father an engineer. For his undergraduate studies, Leshnoff attended Johns Hopkins University and Peabody Conservatory concurrently, earning bachelor’s degrees in Anthropology and Music Composition, respectively. He went on to receive a Master’s of Music from Peabody, then received his Doctorate of Music from the University of Maryland. Leshnoff was raised observing Conservative Judaism. During his student years at Johns Hopkins, he delved deeper into his beliefs and began to practice Orthodox Judaism. Career Leshnoff lives in Baltimore, Maryland, where he composes and is a professor of music at Towson University. He has composed scores of works, including four string quartets, four oratorios, twelve concerti, and four symphonies. His compositions have been performed by more than eighty orchestras worldwide including the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Kansas City Symphony, Nashville Symphony Orchestra, P

Jonathan Price

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Jonathan Price was an American composer who is best known for his film scores to Ouija House and Necrosis, and for the opera ÆSOPERA. He died in January 2022 from glioblastoma multiforme, which is an inoperable brain tumor. Film *Sammyville, Creative Light Entertainment (1999) *Vampire Night, Cinematrix (2000) *Rustin, Showtime (2001) *Cyber Wars, New Line (2004) *Necrosis, American World Pictures (2009) *Girl Meets Boy, Screen Media Films (2013) *Inoperable, ITN (2017) *Ouija House, ITN (2018) *Clown Motel, ITN (2019) Television *American Dragon: Jake Long, Disney Channel, song “Hubba Hubba Hula” (lyrics by Jeff Goode) (2005) Opera *The Lion & the Wood Nymph (libretto by the composer), American Fork, VocalWorks (2007) *The Queen & the Dragon (libretto by Jan Michael Alejandro and the composer), North Hollywood, Secret Rose Theatre (2009) *The Gift of the Magi (libretto by Jan Michael Alejandro and the composer after the eponymous short story by O. Henry), North Hollywood, Secret Rose Theatre (2009) *ÆSOPERA (libretti by Jeff Goode, Jan Michael Alejandro, and the composer), Hollywood, SCLT (2013) Musicals *Escape From Eldorado (book & co-lyrics by Jeff Goode), Bar Harbor, The Unusu

Jonathan Russell (composer)

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Jonathan Russell (born 1979) is an American composer of classical music, clarinetist, and bass clarinetist. Russell was the founder of the Switchboard Music Festival, which will hold its 10th anniversary in the summer of 2018. His primary teachers have included Paul Lansky, Barbara White, Steve Mackey, Elinor Armer, and Eric Ewazen. Career Composer Russell has been commissioned by, worked with, and written for ensembles including the San Francisco Symphony, Prism Quartet, Symphony Number One, Empyrian Ensemble, Wild Rumpus, Woodstock Chamber Orchestra, and the JACK Quartet. The Imani Winds has a long-term relationship with Mr. Russell through the wind quintets Legacy Commissioning Project, which has led to three large scale arrangements of orchestral works for woodwind quintet. Clarinet and bass clarinet Soloist Russell frequently solos as a bass clarinetist, performing his own and other works. Among his own works, he premiered his Sonata for Bass Clarinet and Piano with pianist Kate Campbell which Campbell herself commissioned. Russell’s performance of Debussy’s Premiere Rhapsody was noted for giving, “increasing energy, leading to a smashingly tangy conclusion from a lurking open

Jorge Liderman

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Jorge Mario Liderman (November 16, 1957 – February 3, 2008) was an Argentine and American composer. He was awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship in 2003 to partially fund a new work for Duo46 titled Aires de Sefarad: 46 Spanish Songs for Violin and Guitar. Jorge went on to compose a second set of 46 songs for Duo46 titled Aires de Sefarad II shortly before his death in 2008. He taught composition at the University of California, Berkeley. Life Jorge Liderman was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1957. He studied at the Rubin School of Music in Jerusalem and earned a doctorate in composition from the University of Chicago in 1988. He joined the faculty of the University of California, Berkeley, in 1989. He died February 3, 2008, in an apparent suicide, struck by an incoming train at the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) station in El Cerrito. Selected works Orchestral *Shir Eres (1984) *Song of Songs (2001), cantata for soprano, tenor, female chorus & chamber orchestra *Open Strings for guitar orchestra & electric bass Operatic *Antigona Furiosa (1991), libretto by the composer after the drama by Griselda Gambaro, performed at the third Munich Biennale Chamber *Aires de Sefarad (2004) - 4

Jorge Martín (composer)

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Jorge Martín (born 1959) is an American composer. Early life and studies Jorge Martín was born in Santiago de Cuba, Cuba, and established his residence in the United States at an early age. He studied at Yale University and at Columbia University, where he earned a Master of Music and a Doctor of Music in composition. The Fort Worth Opera released a recording of the opera on Albany Records. Albany also released another recording of Martin’s compositions entitled Cello Music in 2012. Other compositions include “Beast and Superbeast”, a set of four one-act operas based on short stories by Saki; a Saxophone Quartet and Four Dances for Bassoon and String Quartet, which had its world premiere in Finland in July 1997. Awards In 2005, Martín received a fellowship award from the Bogliasco Foundation in Genoa. He is also the recipient of an American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Academy Award in Music, an ASCAP Standard Music Award, an artist’s residency at Yaddo in Saratoga Springs in 1993, Cintas for music in 1999 and a CINTAS Foundation “Brandon Fradd Fellowship in music composition” in 2011. His one-act opera Tobermory won first prize in 1993 in the National Opera Association’s Fifth Bie

José Julián Jiménez

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José Julián Jiménez (January 9, 1823–March 3, 1898), was a Cuban violinist and composer. Early life José Julián Jiménez was born in Trinidad, Cuba. Jiménez was part of a vibrant group of free black and mulato musicians who marked Cuba’s musical life in the nineteenth century. Career As an adolescent, he received his earliest training on the violin from his father, orchestra conductor, Nicasio Jimenez (Sr.), beginning at the age of fourteen. In 1849, he moved to Havana, where he studied with Italian violinist and composer Luigi Arditi. In the same year Jiménez founded a dance band in Havana and composed many danzas and guarachas for the ensemble. Later on, he traveled to Leipzig, Germany, where he studied piano, violin, and harmony. While residing there, he entered the Leipzig Conservatorium, where he studied violin with Ferdinand David, piano with Ignaz Moscheles, and harmony with Alexander Ritter. In Leipzig he performed as a member of the Gewandhaus Orchestra and is credited with being the first Black musician in the Gewandhaus Orchestra. Upon his graduation from the conservatory, Jiménez returned to Cuba, where his two sons were born. In 1869, he returned to Leipzig with his son

Josefina Benedetti

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Josefina Benedetti Punceles (born September 17, 1953) is a Venezuelan-American composer, musicologist and choral director. Biography Josefina Benedetti was born in New Haven, Connecticut to Venezuelan-born father. She studied piano in Caracas and London, finished her studies at the National Conservatory of Music, Juan José Landaeta, and studied choral conducting at the University Institute of Musical Studies, Magister Scientiarum, in Latin American. She received a musicology degree from the Universidad Central de Venezuela. She received the National Prize for Composition in 1989, 1993 and 1998, the Municipal Music Prize of the City of Caracas in 1990 and the José Antonio and Carmen Calcaño Foundation Composition Prize in 1993. She served as president of Jeunesses Musicales de Venezuela, (1991–96), the National Philharmonic Orchestra Foundation (1995–2000) and the music label Música y Tiempo (Music and Time). She has been Secretary General of the Venezuelan Music Council (UNESCO) and a member of the boards of the Venezuelan Society of Contemporary Music, the Teatro Teresa Carreño Foundation and Director of Culture of the Central University of Venezuela (2000–05). Works Benedetti is

Joseph Achron

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Joseph Yulyevich Achron, also seen as Akhron (Russian: Иосиф Юльевич Ахрон, Hebrew: יוסף אחרון) (May 1, 1886 – April 29, 1943) was a Russian composer and violinist, who settled in the United States. His preoccupation with Jewish elements and his desire to develop a “Jewish” harmonic and contrapuntal idiom, underscored and informed much of his work. His friend, the composer Arnold Schoenberg, described Achron in his obituary as “one of the most underrated modern composers”. Biography Achron was born in Lozdzieje, Russian Empire (now Lazdijai, Lithuania) to Julian and Bertha and began the study of the violin under his father, an amateur violinist, at the age of five. His first public performance followed three years later at age seven in Warsaw. This was followed by a prodigious childhood career including performances throughout Russia. Between 1899 and 1904 he studied violin under Leopold Auer and composition under Anatoly Lyadov, at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory. He joined the Society for Jewish Folk Music in 1911 and from that point occupied himself in theory and practice with the Jewish music tradition. His first “Jewish” work, Hebrew Melody, became immediately recognized throug

Joseph Alfidi

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Joseph Alfidi (May 28, 1949 – February 2, 2015) was an American pianist, composer, and conductor and initially a child prodigy. He was born in Yonkers, New York, as the son of American-born parents of Italian descent. His father, Frank Alfidi, was an accordion player who ran a music school in Yonkers. Known as “Joey” in his childhood, he was three when he started to play several instruments in his father’s studio. By the age of four, he frequently improvised little compositions at the piano, and soon became fascinated by symphonic music as well. Biography At the age of six, he had professional engagements to conduct the Miami Symphony Orchestra in Florida and members of the New York Philharmonic on Long Island. On November 18, 1956, the seven-year-old appeared in Carnegie Hall, conducting the Symphony of the Air. The ambitious program included two overtures, Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro and Rossini’s William Tell, as well as Haydn’s “Surprise” Symphony and Beethoven’s 5th Symphony. He appeared on two CBS Television Network Goodson-Todman produced game-shows. On November 14, 1956, he was a guest on I’ve Got a Secret starring Garry Moore where he performed on four different instru

Joseph Bertolozzi

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Joseph Bertolozzi (born 1959) is an American composer and musician with works ranging from full symphony orchestra and solo songs to immense sound-art installations. With increasingly numerous performances across Europe and the United States to his credit, his music is performed by groups ranging from the Grammy-winning Chestnut Brass Company to the Eastman School of Music, and he himself has played at such diverse venues as the Vatican and The US Tennis Open. Works and performances His most well known project is Tower Music: a musical composition using only sounds sampled from the surfaces of the Eiffel Tower itself, with no added digital manipulation or alteration of the sounds. The resulting 2016 album “Tower Music” (on the innova label #933), reached #11 on the iTunes Classical charts and #16 on the Billboard Classical Crossover Music chart. Tower Music is a sister project to Bridge Music. Like Tower Music, Bridge Music allows listeners to hear the sounds of New York’s Mid-Hudson Bridge played like a musical instrument. The work was created for New York’s 400th anniversary observance of Henry Hudson’s voyage up the Hudson River. Originally intended to be a live performance piec

Joseph Brody

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Joseph Brody ( ) (1876/1877 – 1937) was an American Jewish composer who wrote for the Yiddish theatre as well as liturgical Jewish works. He taught George Gershwin and was a friend of Yossele Rosenblatt. His daughter, Estelle Brody, was an actress. Early life Brody was born on March 12, 1877, according to his gravestone, in Lyakhavichy, Minsk Governorate, in the Russian Empire, although the Lexicon of Yiddish Theatre gives the date as February 12, and in own his naturalization application he stated his birthday was January 22, 1876. His father, Harris Brody, was a tailor and sent Joseph to a Cheder for his early education. His father emigrated to the United States in 1887, at which point Joseph entered a Yeshiva in Slonim, where he stayed for six years. During that time he developed an aptitude for music, and was greatly impressed by the military orchestras which regularly played in the park in Slonim during the summers. It was when he was hired by David Kessler from the Thalia Theatre in New York City that his career as a Jewish American composer began in earnest. His partnership with Kessler would last for several decades. Kessler, Bertha Kalich, and Sigmund Mogulesko starred in

Joseph Byrd

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Joseph Hunter Byrd Jr. (December 19, 1937 – November 2, 2025) was an American composer, musician and academic. After first becoming known as an experimental composer in New York City and Los Angeles, he became the leader of the psychedelic rock band The United States of America, an innovative but short-lived band which integrated psychedelic rock, electronic sound, and radical political ideas into rock music. In 1968 he recorded the album The American Metaphysical Circus, credited to Joe Byrd and the Field Hippies. After working as a record producer, arranger, and soundtrack composer, he became a university teacher in music history and theory. Early life and career Byrd was born in Louisville, Kentucky, and was raised in Tucson, Arizona, after his father purchased a mine near the Mexican border. His sister, Elizabeth would become a notable writer. As a teenager, Byrd played accordion and vibraphone in a series of pop and country bands, started writing his own arrangements, and performed on some local TV shows. He formed his first jazz quartet while a student at the University of Arizona, where he studied composition with Barney Childs (B.M., 1959). He began his graduate studies in

Joseph Carl Breil

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Joseph Carl Breil (29 June 1870 – 23 January 1926) was an American lyric tenor, stage director, composer and conductor. He was one of the earliest American composers to compose specific music for motion pictures. His first film was Les amours de la reine Élisabeth (1912) starring Sarah Bernhardt. He later composed and arranged scores for several other early motion pictures, including such epics as D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation (1915) and Intolerance (1916), as well as scoring the preview version of The Phantom of the Opera (1925), a score that is now lost. His love theme for “Birth of a Nation”, titled “The Perfect Song”, was published by Chappell & Co. in an arrangement for voice and keyboard. It was later used as the theme for the radio show Amos ’n’ Andy. Life Joseph was the first of four children born to Joseph and Margaret Breil of Pittsburgh. (Joseph Sr., a lawyer, was an immigrant from Prussia and his wife was born in Pennsylvania.) Breil graduated from Duquesne University (then the Pittsburgh Catholic College of the Holy Ghost) in 1888. He later composed the alma mater for the university, which was first performed in October 1920. He also pursued studies at St Fide

Joseph Curiale

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Joseph Curiale (born July 1, 1955) is an American composer, producer, songwriter, arranger and conductor. Education Born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Curiale attended the University of Bridgeport and earned a Degree in Music Education in 1976, studying jazz arranging with Neil Slater. In 2009, Curiale completed his Master of Music Composition at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. He completed a PhD in Music Composition from the University of Minnesota in 2015. Career Television From 1982 to 1992, Curiale worked as an arranger and composer for the Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson and his song “Sick of the Blues” was used as one of closing the themes. Curiale composed the opening and closing theme for Nick News with Linda Ellerbee. Film In 1983, Curiale was hired as the first staff songwriter at Columbia Pictures. Classical Curiale wrote two symphonic compositions: Awakening and The Music of Life. Awakening was recorded in 1997 by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and The Music of Life, in 2001 by the London Symphony Orchestra. The Music of Life premiered in the United States in April, 2002 and was performed by the Akron Symphony Orchestra. Curiale has also composed separate pieces

Joseph Dillon Ford

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Joseph Dillon Ford (February 6, 1952 – March 8, 2017) was an American composer and author. Life and career Ford was born in Americus, Georgia. He held undergraduate degrees in music and graduate degrees in both musicology and landscape architecture. Although he focused on keyboard performance during his college years, Ford completed his training at Harvard as a Variell Scholar specializing in historical musicology. He studied twentieth-century composers and compositional techniques with Ivan Tcherepnin, the works of Bach and Handel with Christoph Wolff, Dowland and the English lutenists with John Ward, and the music of medieval Aquitaine with David Hughes. His major works include three symphonies, a piano concerto, several harpsichord concertos and sonatas, choral music, and a large quantity of chamber and solo works for the piano and other instruments. Although most of his oeuvre is tonal—often very traditionally so, he also produced non-tonal work using both acoustic and electronic media, and developed synthetic chromatic dialects amenable to both idioms. Keenly interested in emergent music and telecommunications technologies and the rich potential they offer for international cr

Joseph Erskine Agnew

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Joseph Erskine Agnew (1868/69 – December 1, 1949 ) was a musician, arranger, music store proprietor, and music publisher in Des Moines, Iowa and later Newton, Iowa briefly. He played the mandolin. He became a nationally prominent band music publisher. Sheet music published by his Agnew Music Publishing Company is in the collections of the Library of Congress, the University of Missouri–Kansas City, and the University of Rochester. He was born in Ohio. He copyrighted a valse by Myron A. Bickford. He also copyrighted an arrangement of a work by J. Offenbach. He copyrighted an arrangement of concert waltzes by Guy Sterling (musician) for the mandolin. He wrote “The 20th Century Method for Guitar” (1901, 1907). He published “Musical Novelties for Mandolin Orchestra: The Cleveland Two Step”. In 1917 he advertised various compositions of New Band Music in the Musical Messenger. He moved his business to Newton, Iowa where he was a band leader. He sold his store to the Volkwein Brothers of Pittsburgh in 1939. References

Joseph Fennimore

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Joseph Fennimore (born 16 April 1940) is an American composer, pianist and teacher best known for his works for piano and chamber ensembles, ranked by Pulitzer Prize-winning critic Philip Kennicott as “one of this country’s finest composers.” His music has been performed and broadcast worldwide and included in the Metropolitan Opera Studio and New York City Ballet repertories. Early life and education Joseph Fennimore was born in Manhattan’s Bellevue Hospital. He began formal music studies in upstate New York at the Schenectady Conservatory of Music, his principal teacher being its founder and director, Joseph G. Derrick, graduate of the New England Conservatory in the piano class of Ethel Newcomb, Theodor Leschetizky’s first American assistant. In his twelfth year Fennimore was chosen to perform a piano concerto with the Schenectady Symphony Orchestra at that city’s historic Proctor’s Theater. Fennimore was one of eight high school juniors to participate in the Eastman School of Music’s experimental accelerated program in Rochester, New York, during which the first year of his baccalaureate was completed over the summer months before and after his senior year in high school. The f

Joseph Hallman

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Joseph Hallman (born Nov. 20, 1979) is an American composer. A functional orphan, Hallman was born and raised in the Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He attended Girard College from first to twelfth grades. Based in Philadelphia, Hallman’s works have been performed internationally. His music has been described as eclectic, merging classical, Renaissance, and contemporary popular styles. Hallman also teaches composition at Drexel University. Early life Hallman began composing at the age of 12. He graduated from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he studied with Margaret Brouwer. He continued his studies with masterclasses by George Crumb. Christopher Rouse, John Corigliano, Steven Mackey, John Harbison and others. Career Hallman is composer-in-residence at the Rosenbach Museum & Library of Philadelphia and the Pikes Falls Chamber Music Festival. He has collaborated with leading performers and ensembles. Cellist Alisa Weilerstein performed his concerto for cello and chamber ensemble with the St. Petersburg Chamber Philharmonic in Russia. A series of concerti grossi, inspired by Johann Sebastian Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, was performed by members of the P

Joseph Meyer (songwriter)

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Joseph Meyer (March 12, 1894 – June 22, 1987) was an American songwriter, who wrote some of the most notable songs of the first half of the twentieth century. Many of his songs were originally written for Broadway musicals. Early life and career Joseph Meyer was born in Modesto, California. He studied violin in Paris for a year in 1907–1908. He graduated from Lowell High School in San Francisco, where he later played his violin in a café. He wrote the melody to “A Cup of Coffee, a Sandwich, and You”, Meyer died in New York in June 1987, at the age of 93, following a long illness. Broadway musicals *Battling Buttler (1923) *Big Boy (1925) *Gay Paree (1925) *Charlot Revue (1925) *Sweetheart Time (1926) *Just Fancy (1927) *Here’s Howe (1928) *Lady Fingers (1929) *Jonica (1930) *Luana (1930) *Sweet and Low (1930) *Shoot the Works (1931) *Ziegfeld Follies of 1934 (1934) *New Faces of 1936 (1936) *Shuffle Along (1952, revival) *Perfectly Frank (1980) *Five Guys Named Moe (1993) References External links * *Joseph Meyer at IBDB * Joseph Meyer recordings at the Discography of American Historical Recordings.

Joseph R. Wood

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Joseph Wood (May 12, 1915 – June 3, 2000) was an American composer and music educator. He was a faculty member at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music where he taught music theory and composition from 1950 until his retirement in 1985. He performed and conducted widely, and his compositions for piano, chamber groups, and orchestra were performed around the world. Life and career Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Wood attended Bucknell University from 1932–1934. Afterwards, he began his formal music training at the Juilliard Institute of Musical Arts where he received a diploma in piano performance in 1936. Impressed with his work, the Juilliard School offered him a full four-year Juilliard fellowship from 1936–40. He continued his piano studies with Bernard Wagenear, completing his bachelor’s degree in 1949. In 1942 he won first prize for his opera The Mother in the Juilliard Opera Competition. On the basis of winning the opera prize he was given a Ditson Award from Columbia University, on which he lived and wrote music for a year. He went on to study composition with Otto Luening at Columbia University. He graduated with a M.A. in music composition in 1950. During his time at Juillia

Joseph Redding

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Joseph Deighn Redding (September 13, 1859 – November 21, 1932) was an American composer, librettist, lyricist, lawyer, and civil servant. He is best known for arguing the United States Supreme Court legal case United States v. Kagama and for his contributions to American opera which include writing the libretto to Victor Herbert’s Natoma (1911) and composing the score to Fay Yen Fah (1925). The latter work was the first grand opera composed by an American to have its premiere in Europe, an achievement for which Redding was awarded the Legion of Honour by the government of France. He served terms as president of the San Francisco Arts Administration and San Francisco’s Bohemian Club, and also served a term as commissioner of the California Department of Fish and Game. A talented chess polymath, he was an amateur chess player who won several games against recognized chess masters, including Johannes Zukertort and George H. D. Gossip. and the Central Pacific Railroad. He also was a regent for California State University and served a term as president of the board of the California Academy of Sciences. At the time of Benjamin Redding’s death in 1882 he was serving a term as commissione

Joseph Rumshinsky

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Joseph Rumshinsky (1881–1956) was a Jewish composer born near Vilna, Lithuania (then part of Russian Poland). Along with Sholom Secunda, Alexander Olshanetsky and Abraham Ellstein, he is considered one of the “big four” composers and conductors of American Yiddish theater. Biography Joseph Rumshinsky’s mother taught singing to local singers and badkhonim (wedding entertainers). As a child, he studied with a cantor. At the age of eight he was called “Yoshke der notn-freser” at the music school where he studied piano. He traveled until 1894 with various Hazzanim. In Grodno he first saw Yiddish theater (Abraham Goldfaden’s operetta Shulamis); In 1897 he became choir director for Borisov’s Russian opera/operetta; in 1888 he conducted a full production of Goldfaden’s Bar Kokhba. In 1899, in Łódź, he was hired as conductor of the new Hazomir Choral Society, studying and arranging folksongs as well as Haydn, Handel, and Mendelsohn oratorios. He studied with the Polish musician Henryk Meltzer and at the Warsaw Conservatory. In 1903 he left for London to avoid conscription in the czar’s army. At the time, many American Yiddish productions were deemed shund (trash) “that encompassed a world

Joseph Schillinger

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Joseph Moiseyevich Schillinger (; 1 September 1895 (other sources: 31 August 1895 ) – 23 March 1943) was a composer, music theorist, and composition teacher who originated the Schillinger System of Musical Composition. He was born in Kharkov, in the Kharkov Governorate of the Russian Empire (present-day Kharkiv, Ukraine) and died in New York City. He sometimes used the pseudonym “Frank Lynn”. Life and career The unprecedented migration of European knowledge and culture that swept from East to West during the first decades of the 20th century included figures such as Sergei Prokofiev and Sergei Rachmaninoff, composers who were the product of the Russian system of music education. Schillinger came from this background, dedicated to creating professional musicians, having been a student at the St Petersburg Imperial Conservatory of Music. He communicated his musical knowledge in the form of a written theory, using mathematical expressions to describe art, architecture, design and music. In New York, Schillinger flourished, becoming famous as an advisor to many leading American musicians and concert music composers, including George Gershwin, Earle Brown, Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, O

Joseph Schwantner

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Joseph Clyde Schwantner (born March 22, 1943) is an American composer, educator and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters since 2002. He was awarded the 1970 Charles Ives Prize. Schwantner is prolific, with many works to his credit. His style is coloristic and eclectic, drawing on such diverse elements as French impressionism, African drumming, and minimalism. His orchestral work Aftertones of Infinity received the 1979 Pulitzer Prize for Music. Biographical information Schwantner began his musical study at an early age in classical guitar; this study also incorporated the genres of jazz and folk. He also played the tuba in his high school orchestra. His first compositional aspirations were noticed by his guitar teacher who consistently experienced Schwantner elaborating on pieces he would be studying. From this, Schwantner’s teacher suggested he collect these ideas and create his own musical composition. One of his earliest compositions was in the jazz idiom. The piece Offbeats won the National Band Camp Award in 1959. Remaining in Chicago, he continued his musical study in composition at the city’s American Conservatory, where he graduated with a bachelor’s degree

Joseph Trapanese

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Joseph Trapanese (born August 7, 1984) is an American composer, conductor, arranger, and music producer. He works in the production of music for films, television, records, theater, concerts, and interactive media. Early life and education Raised in Jersey City, New Jersey, Trapanese attended Dr. Ronald E. McNair Academic High School before moving on to the Manhattan School of Music. Film and television music Early career Trapanese began his composing career by collaborating with Daft Punk (Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo) on the soundtrack for the Walt Disney Pictures film Tron: Legacy. His arrangements for the soundtrack have been described as “resolutely grand” and “stirring… ominous, hypnotic”. The BBC described the work as “a sophisticated integration of acoustic and electronic instrumentation… majestic… rich, solemn tones… saturnine orchestration and a muscular rhythm”. 2011–present Trapanese has composed for numerous projects, including Disney XD’s animated series Tron: Uprising, Sony Pictures Classics’ The Raid: Redemption (cocomposed with Mike Shinoda of Linkin Park), Sony Pictures Television’s original web series The Bannen Way, the independent featur

Joseph Waters

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Joseph Martin Waters (born 1952) is an American classical composer. He also mounts experimental electronic music festivals attempting to bridge the gap between contemporary popular genres and the avant-garde Western classical tradition. Creative projects May 31, 2025 Waters’ rock opera “El Sidd and the Healers” was premiered in concert form at The Cutting Room in NYC. The work is a reimagining of Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha set in California and Mexico in 1969. His first musical theater work, “El Colibrí Magico - The Magic Hummingbird” was premiered by Opera Tijuana in Mexico June 4th & 5th 2023. October 19, 2024 His work “Garden Mother” for traditional Korean instrument, Piri, along with vibraphone, was commissioned and performed by Jeongmin Son at the Gugak Center in Seoul, Korea. May 26, 2020 NWEAMO Festival (during pandemic) included a remote performance of “Things” from EUM Studio, Seoul Korea by Jaeonghyeon Joo (Haegeum) and Seunghee Han (harp). December 28, 2018 Ensemble Phase performed “Air, Earth, Ocean” in Ilshin Hall, Seoul, Korea. In 2011 Orchestra Nova conductor Jung-Ho Pak commissioned Waters to create a double concerto for violin (featuring Lindsay Deutsch) and alto s

Joseph Willcox Jenkins

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Joseph Willcox Jenkins (15 February 1928 – 31 January 2014) was an American composer, professor of music, and musician. During his military service in the Korean War, he became the first arranger for the United States Army Chorus. He ended his teaching career as Professor Emeritus at the Mary Pappert School of Music, Duquesne University, where he had been a professor since 1961, soon afterward, he started composing small pieces in elementary school. In high school, he wrote numerous arrangements as well as some original works for orchestra. In 1946, Jenkins began his tertiary studies at Saint Joseph’s University (then St. Joseph’s College) in Philadelphia, where he focused on pre-law with the ambition of becoming a lawyer. At the same time, he studied composition and counterpoint with Vincent Persichetti at the Philadelphia Conservatory (which became part of the University of the Arts in 1962). Jenkins completed his degree at St. Joseph’s in three years and enrolled in the Eastman School of Music in 1949. While there, he studied under important composers including Thomas Canning, Howard Barlow, Bernard Rogers, and Howard Hanson. Jenkins graduated from Eastman with a Masters of Musi

Josephine Trott

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Josephine Augusta Trott (December 24, 1874 - March 2, 1950) was an American author, composer, and music educator who sometimes wrote under the pseudonym Colin Shepherd. Her violin pedagogy books are still in use today. Trott was born in Wilmington, Illinois, to Dr. Stenson E. and Augusta J. Trott. Although she never married, she adopted a daughter, Riccarda McQuie, who went on to play violin in the Denver Symphony for 29 years. Trott’s book, On Demande une Maman, published under her pseudonym Colin Shepherd, was actually a fictionalized version of McQuie’s story. During this time, Trott helped established the Civic Symphony, which then became the Denver Symphony and today is the Colorado Symphony. The Denver Symphony gave its first performance on May 4, 1922. In 1932, Trott published an English translation of a French book on William the Conqueror by Lucie Delarue-Mardrus. She left the royalties from her publications to the Josephine Trott Memorial Scholarship Fund of the National Federation of Music Clubs. Her music was published by G. Schirmer Inc., Clayton F. Summy Co., and Weekes & Co. *Studies in Shifting *Two Tuneful Sketches (violin and piano) References External links * Dow

Joshua (American singer)

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Joshua Hong (born December 30, 1995), known mononymously as Joshua (), is an American singer based in South Korea. Managed by Pledis Entertainment, he is a member of the South Korean boy band Seventeen and its vocal team. Early life Joshua Hong was born in Los Angeles on December 30, 1995. He attended Downtown Magnets High School and graduated in 2013. Growing up, he attended church in Los Angeles’ Koreatown. Career 2013–2014: Pre-debut Joshua was scouted by an agent from Pledis during a visit to Koreatown, Los Angeles in 2013. He then moved to Seoul, South Korea, where he began training in singing and dancing. As a trainee, he joined from the second season onwards of Seventeen TV, an online reality show that introduced Pledis’ trainees and showed potential members of the boy group Seventeen before their official debut. The show was broadcast periodically on Ustream, where the trainees showed themselves training, singing, creating choreographies and playing games. The online show also included participation in concerts, titled Like Seventeen. 2015–present: Seventeen and solo activities In 2015, Joshua debuted as a member of the South Korean boy group Seventeen with the extended pla

Joshua Fineberg

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Joshua Fineberg (born July 26, 1969) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Biography Joshua Fineberg was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He began his musical studies at the age of five. He completed his undergraduate studies at the Peabody Conservatory with Morris Cotel where he won first prize in the bi-annual Virginia Carty de Lillo Composition Competition. Music career He has worked with many leading composers in the United States and France, including: George Crumb, Jacob Druckman, Robert Hall Lewis, Philippe Manoury, and André Boucourechliev. In 1991, he moved to Paris and studied with Tristan Murail. The following year he was selected by the Ensemble InterContemporain reading panel for the course in composition and musical technologies. In the fall of 1997, he returned to the US to pursue a doctorate in musical composition at Columbia University, which he completed in May 1999. After teaching at Columbia for a year, he went to Harvard University where he served as the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Humanities until 2007. In 2007 he joined the faculty of the Boston University School of Music and became the director of their electronic music studio. I

Joshua Rosenblum

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Joshua Rosenblum (born May 10, 1963) is an American composer, conductor, pianist, arranger, music journalist, and author. He has composed extensively for the concert hall as well as for musical theater, and currently teaches musical theater composition at Yale University, his alma mater, as well as both conducting and orchestration at New York University. As a pianist, he has performed frequently in the New York City area as soloist and accompanist, as well as in Broadway pit orchestras, and with the New York City Center Encores! Orchestra. He has conducted numerous Broadway and Off-Broadway shows, including How the Grinch Stole Christmas!, Wonderful Town, Falsettos, Miss Saigon, and Anything Goes. He served as pianist and associate conductor for the hit 2022 Broadway revival of Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Into the Woods, and can be heard playing on the Grammy-winning original cast recording. Education Rosenblum attended Marietta High School in his hometown of Marietta, Ohio, and spent summers at the Interlochen Arts Camp in Interlochen, Michigan. He graduated summa cum laude from Yale College in 1983 at the age of 20, and proceeded directly to graduate school at the Yale S

Joy Guidry

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Joy Guidry is an American bassoonist and composer. Early life Guidry was born in Houston and first became interested in music through her exposure to gospel music at church. Career Guidry graduated from the Peabody Institute in 2018 with a bachelor’s degree in bassoon performance, after which she participated in a fellowship at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. She earned a diploma from Mannes School of Music the following year. In 2021, Guidry was awarded the Berlin Prize for Young Artists for her Radical Self-Love program. Her debut album, Radical Acceptance, was released in February 2022. That year, she served on a panel of curators to select projects from new artists to be recorded on the American Composers Forum innova Recordings label. Guidry is currently pursuing a doctoral degree in music at University of California, San Diego. After touring with her dissertation project, AMEN, a recording of the work will be released in May 2024. Compositions Y’all don’t wanna listen In 2020, the National Sawdust Ensemble commissioned and premiered Y’all don’t wanna listen, a work by Guidry for cello, alto flute, and violin. A Prayer for Protection A Prayer for Protection, a work f

Joyce Barthelson

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Helen Joyce Holloway Barthelson Steigman (May 18, 1900 – December 1986) was an American composer who created five operas and numerous shorter pieces. She co-founded the Hoff-Barthelson Music School in Scarsdale, New York. Life and career Joyce Barthelson was born Helen Joyce Holloway in Yakima, Washington. She graduated from Oakland Technical High School in 1918. She studied music at the University of California, Berkeley under Julius Gold, Otto Cesana, Roy Harris, and Nicolas Flagello. In the late 1930s and early 1940s she was assistant conductor of the New York Women’s Symphony Orchestra and composer in residence at Western Maryland College. Operas * Chanticleer (1967), based on “The Nun’s Priest’s Tale” by Geoffrey Chaucer, won first prize in a nationwide opera contest held by the National Federation of Music Clubs. * Feathertop (1968), a two-act opera with a libretto by Barthelson based on the 1846 short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne. * Greenwich Village, 1910 (1969), a one-act opera based on the 1905 short story “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry, premiered at Scarsdale Junior High School. * The Devil’s Disciple (1977), a two-act opera with a libretto by Barthelson based on the

Joyce Mekeel

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Joyce Haviland Mekeel (July 6, 1931 in New Haven, CT – December 29, 1997, in Watertown, MA) was a composer, harpsichordist, teacher, anthropologist, and sculptor. Education Joyce Mekeel studied at the Longy School of Music (1952–55), Paris Conservatory (1955–57) and Yale University (BM 1959, MM 1960). In Paris her teachers included Nadia Boulanger; in the 1960s she studied with Earl Kim. At Yale she studied harpsichord with Gustav Leonhardt and theory with David Kraehenbuehl. Mekeel received a fellowship to MacDowell Colony and grants in composition from Ingram-Merrill in 1964 and Radcliffe Institute from 1969-1970. She was a member of Sigma Alpha Iota. Mekeel took up studying anthropology which brought her to West Africa twice, where she created many sculptures. Mekeel also attended Princeton University. She held two doctoral degrees, one in anthropology. Career Teaching Mekeel taught at the New England Conservatory (1964–70) and Boston University (from 1970). At Boston University, she directed the electronic music studio and taught private composition lessons, as well as classes in Advanced Counterpoint, Cannon and Fugue, (for graduate students), Pedagogy of Theory, Ear Training

Judith Dvorkin

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Judith Dvorkin (22 April 1928 – 24 July 1995) was an American composer and librettist. She also used the pseudonym Judy Spencer. Dvorkin was born in New York. She received a bachelor’s degree in music at Barnard College, where her teachers included Otto Luening. She received a master’s degree from Columbia University, where her teachers included Luening, Douglas Moore, and Elliott Carter. She continued her studies in seminars with Roger Sessions at the University of California at Berkeley, and with jazz pianist Teddy Wilson. She wrote lyrics for 23 songs for the Captain Kangaroo television program, which Earl Rose set to music. Other collaborators included Norris Turney, Jimmy Rowles, Paul Rosner, and Dick Chodosh. Most of her manuscripts and papers are archived at the New York Public Library’s American Music Center. *Marpessa: A Myth, for soprano, clarinet and piano *Cyrano, based on the play by Edmond Rostand, as translated by E.W. Dvorkin ca. 1964 *Maurice *Perspectives for flute *Song Cycle for choir *Four Women for voice. Premiered April 1981 in New Canaan, CT, a song cycle written for Jacqueline Sharpe based on texts by Emily Dickinson, Eleanor Roosevelt, Sarah Bernhardt, and

Judith Lang Zaimont

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Judith Lang Zaimont (; born November 8, 1945) is an American composer and pianist. Biography Judith Lang Zaimont was born in Memphis, Tennessee, to a Jewish family. Both Zaimont and her sister, Doris Lang Kosloff, began piano lessons with their mother, Bertha Lang, who was an accomplished pianist and singer. Bertha was very active in the music profession and served as a president of the New York State Music Teachers Association. Judith began lessons at Juilliard at age 12, where she studied piano and theory from 1958-1964. These lessons included piano with Rosina Lhévinne and theory and duo-piano with Ann Hull. Judith and Doris had a successful performance career as duo-pianists that included appearances on Lawrence Welk’s and Mitch Miller’s television programs and a Carnegie Hall debut in 1963. Judith’s musical ability was observed at an early age. Family members recall her singing in her sleep when she was a child. She also had an incredible ability to play by ear and sight read. She was drawn to the art of composing after performing Chopin. She was not fond of practicing since she did not like to play the same notes over and over. She states, “I like to mess around with the note

Judith Shatin

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Judith Shatin (Allen) (born November 21, 1949) is an American composer. Biography Shatin was born and raised in Albany, New York, to a clinical psychologist father and a microbiologist mother. At the age of five, her father bought her a piano and she fell in love with music. In her youth, she learned to play the flute. She holds degrees from Douglass College, the Juilliard School, and Princeton University, at which institution she was a pupil of Milton Babbitt. Currently, she is William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor at the University of Virginia. She also founded and is Director of the Virginia Center for Computer Music. In 2012 Shatin was honored as one of the Library of Virginia’s “Virginia Women in History”. References External links *Current performances and presentations of Judith Shatin compositions *Performance archive of Judith Shatin compositions *Complete list of Judith Shatin compositions *Video performances of Judith Shatin compositions *Available sheet music, CDs, and DVDs of Judith Shatin compositions *Judith Shatin’s biography (at the Library of Virginia website) *Curriculum Vitae of Judith Shatin (PDF format) *Judith Shatin’s website *Interview with Judith Shatin, May 26,

Judy Dunaway

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Judy Dunaway (born 1964, in Mississippi) is a conceptual sound artist, avant-garde composer, free improvisor and creator of sound installations who is primarily known for her sound works for latex balloons. Since 1990 she has created over thirty works for balloons as sound conduits and has also made this her main instrument for improvisation. Background Judy Dunaway has presented her compositions, improvisations and installations for balloons throughout North America and Europe at many venues including Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors, REDCAT, the SoHo Arts Festival, the Alternative Museum, the Knitting Factory, Performance Space 122, Roulette, Experimental Intermedia, Soundlab, the New Museum of Contemporary Art, the Bang on a Can Festival, the Guelph Jazz Festival, Podewil, Diapason, Galerie Rachel Haferkamp and ZKM. She has performed as a balloon player in compositions by John Zorn and Roscoe Mitchell, and in improvisations and/or collaborations with the FLUX Quartet, performance artist Annie Sprinkle, Fluxus artist Yasunao Tone, video artist Zev Robinson, visual artists Nancy Davidson and Ken Butler, percussionists John Hollenbeck and Matt Moran, the Illuminati big band, DJ Singe (B

Judy Klein

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Judy Klein (born 14 April 1943, in Chicago) is an American composer, music educator. She is the founder of the Computer Music Studio at New York University and served as its director in 1980’s. Her music is primarily acousmatic, —- Education Judy Klein earned her Bachelor in Arts at the University of California, Berkeley (1967), and continued her studies at the Music Academy in Basel, Switzerland (Diploma, 1977). She graduated with a Master of Arts degree from New York University (1987), after studying with Thomas Kessler, Reynold Weidenaar, Lilli Friedemann and Ruth Anderson. She continued her studies in computer generated music at the Brooklyn College Center for Computer Music with Charles Dodge. Musical career Klein began teaching electro-acoustic music composition at New York University (SEHNAP) in 1985, and later founded and directed the New York University Computer Music studio. Klein composes almost exclusively in the C programming language and the C sound computer music language. Her works are primarily acousmatic and increasingly combine her interest in sound with her commitment to animal rights, which she speaks about in an interview with Peter Shea about her piece “The

Jules Jordan (composer)

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Julius “Jules” Jordan (November 10, 1850 – March 5, 1927) was an American composer, operatic tenor, vocal instructor and conductor. Jordan took the leading part in two important American premieres: Berlioz’s La’ Damnation de Faust produced in 1880 at Steinway Hall, New York, under the direction of Leopold Damrosch, by the New York Oratorio Society in conjunction with the New York Arion Society and the Philharmonic Orchestra; and Gounod’s “Redemption,” produced in Boston in 1882 by the Boston Oratorio Society. In 1880, he formed The Arion Club in Providence, RI., a mass choir that he conducted for more than 40 years. The activities of Jordan and the Arion Club cover a significant period of musical development in America, and Rhode Island shared in this activity with great interest. In 1897, The New York Times included him in a “Famous Conductors” article, adding “Mr. Jordan is a talented composer, and many of his songs have attained widespread popularity.” Jordan’s most notable works include his musical setting of Whittier’s poem, Barbara Frietchie, his dramatic scene, Jael, debuted by Lillian Nordica, and his opera, Rip Van Winkle. His twin brother, Julian Jordan was also a compose

Julia Adolphe

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Julia Adolphe (born May 16, 1988 in New York City) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Her works include choral, orchestral, operatic, chamber and art song pieces. Her initial mainstream recognition was in November 2016 at the New York premiere of her viola concerto Unearth, Release, which was co-commissioned by the New York Philharmonic and the League of American Orchestras. Adolphe has a Bachelor of Arts from Cornell University and a Master of Music degree in music composition from USC and is pursuing her doctoral degree from the USC Thornton School of Music. She is the niece of composer Bruce Adolphe. Awards, prizes and grants List of compositions Opera Orchestral Choral Chamber Art song References External links *Official website

Julia Newman

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Julia Newman is an American composer best known for her television scores and her collaborations with her father, film composer Thomas Newman, and television showrunner Ryan Murphy. Early Life and Education Newman was born and raised in Los Angeles, one of three children of film composer Thomas Newman and Ann Marie Zirbes. Newman comes from a family of film composers, including her father, Thomas Newman; her grandfather, Alfred Newman; and uncles Randy Newman and David Newman. Julia Newman was exposed to film composing at an early age, and visited the recording studio named after her grandfather as a child. She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the California Institute of the Arts, and a Masters Degree from Screen Scoring program at the USC Thornton School of Music in 2020. While at USC, Newman begin scoring short films, before transitioning to feature films and television work. With her father, Thomas Newman, she composed the score for Feud: Capote vs. The Swans, the first of her collaborations with showrunner Ryan Murphy. Newman again collaborated with her father and Ryan Murphy in Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, which was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award fo

Julia Perry

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Julia Amanda Perry (March 25, 1924 – April 24, 1979) was an American classical composer and teacher who combined European classical and neo-classical training with her African-American heritage. Life and education Born in Lexington, Kentucky, on March 25, 1924, Julia Perry moved with her family while still a child to Akron, Ohio. She studied voice, piano, and composition at Westminster Choir College from 1943 to 1948, earning her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music. For her thesis she wrote a secular cantata titled Chicago. In 1952, Perry began studying under Nadia Boulanger in Paris and was awarded the Boulanger Grand Prix for her Viola Sonata. Perry also studied conducting at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena during the summers of 1956 and 1957, and in 1957 was sponsored by the U.S. Information Service to conduct a series of concerts in Europe. After five and a half years in Europe, Perry returned to the US and continued her work in composition. She took up teaching at Tallahassee’s Florida Agricultural and Mechanical College in 1967 and was also a visiting artist at Atlanta College. In 1964 her three-act opera-ballet The Selfish Giant won an American Academy of Arts and Lette

Julia Smith (composer)

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Julia Frances Smith ( January 25, 1905 – April 18, 1989 ) was an American composer, pianist and musicologist. Life and career She was born in Denton, Texas. She graduated from University of North Texas College of Music (1930) and then continued with graduate studies in piano and composition at the Juilliard School with Reuben Goldmark and Frederick Jacobi from 1932 to 1939, earning a diploma. She simultaneously studied at New York University earning a master’s degree in 1933 and a PhD in 1952. From 1932 to 1939, she served as pianist for the Orchestrette Classique of New York, a women’s orchestra. During this time, she also gave concerts of mostly American music in Latin America, Europe, and throughout the United States. As a performer, she became particularly associated with the works of Aaron Copland. From 1941 to 1946, she taught at the Hartt School, where she founded the department of music education. She collaborated with composer Cecile Vashaw on The Work and Play String Method, an instructional series for violin, viola, cello, and bass. She joined ASCAP in 1945. As a composer, Smith is best known for her operas and orchestral works, which have all been performed. Her music i

Julia Wolfe

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Julia Wolfe (born December 18, 1958) is an American composer and professor of music at New York University. According to The Wall Street Journal, Wolfe’s music has “long inhabited a terrain of its own, a place where classical forms are recharged by the repetitive patterns of minimalism and the driving energy of rock”. Her work Anthracite Fields, an oratorio for chorus and instruments, was awarded the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Music. She has also received the Herb Alpert Award (2015) and was named a MacArthur Fellow (2016). Life Born in Philadelphia, Wolfe has a twin brother and an older brother. As a teenager, she learned piano but she only began to study music seriously after taking a musicianship class at the University of Michigan, where she received a BA in music and theater as a member of Phi Beta Kappa in 1982. In her early twenties, Wolfe wrote music for an all-female theatre troupe. On a trip to New York, she became friends with composition students Michael Gordon and David Lang, both of whom had recently attended the Yale School of Music and who encouraged her to apply. She went to Yale in 1984 and studied primarily with Martin Bresnick, and she married Michael Gordon the sa

Julian Edwards

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Julian Edwards (December 11, 1855 - September 5, 1910) was an English composer of light operatic music, who composed many successful Broadway shows in the Progressive Era. He attempted to introduce new levels of musical sophistication to the genre. Some of his songs achieved popularity at the time. Early life Edwards was born in Manchester, England, and studied in Edinburgh and London. He became conductor of the Carl Rosa Opera Company. He also conducted at the Royal English Opera House, where he met his wife, prima donna Philippine Siedle. He composed a grand opera entitled Victorian, first performed at the Theatre Royal, Sheffield on 6 April 1883, which was also performed at Covent Garden Opera House on 19 January 1884. The libretto, by J F Reynolds-Anderson, was based on Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s play The Spanish Student. Broadway career He soon turned his attention to lighter music, moving to New York at the invitation of Broadway producer James C. Duff, and creating a number of Broadway shows, beginning with Jupiter (1892), to a libretto by Harry B. Smith. He followed it with 17 more musicals. His first big success was Madeleine, or the Magic Kiss (1893). This was his first

Julian Jordan (composer)

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Julian Jordan (November 10, 1850 – October 13, 1929) was an American composer, vocal instructor and singer. He worked with Willis Woodward & Co., a publisher in New York City’s Tin Pan Alley. In 1887, he wrote his most successful composition, “The Song That Reached My Heart.” The Song That Reached My Heart “Mr. Jordan tells the following story of how he came to write “The Song that Reached My Heart.” “Mr. Sayres, manager of the minstrel company, chanced to hear at one of the New York theaters a song entitled “The Song for Me,” which introduced “Home! Sweet Home!” as a finish. The following day Mr. Sayres and I met. He spoke of the song he had heard and said that he would like to have me get it for use in this minstrel company. Naturally I objected to taking the composition of another man, being a song writer myself, and so I told Mr. Sayres that if he was desirous of having a song which would introduce the melody of “Home, Sweet Home” I believed that I could compose one which would be as effective as the one he wished me to obtain. The idea was favorable to him, and Mr. Sayres at once suggested as a title for the song that I was to compose, “The Song That Reached My Heart.” “Take t

Julian Work

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Julian Cassander Work (September 25, 1910—June 15, 1995) was an arranger and composer. Work was born in Nashville, Tennessee, to a family of professional musicians. His grandfather, John Wesley Work (1848–1923) was a composer and arranger for the Fisk Jubilee Singers; his father, John Wesley Work Jr. (1871–1925) was the first African-American collector of folk songs and spirituals, and also a choral director, educator and songwriter; his brother John Wesley Work III (1901–1967) was a composer, educator, choral director, musicologist and scholar of African-American folklore and music; his mother, Agnes Hayes Work, was a singer who also helped train the Fisk Jubilee Singers. Work studied music with local teacher Mary E. Chamberlain and was involved in musical activities from an early age, participating in neighborhood musical groups and performing as a jazz pianist. By 1929 he had moved to New York City and was playing piano on the radio. He became a staff arranger for CBS Radio, becoming one of the first Black American composers to write music for radio and television. Work married Kathryn Holliday in 1953. Upon his retirement they moved to Tolland, Massachusetts, where he died. *My

Juliana Hall

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Juliana Hall (born 1958) is an American composer of art songs, monodramas, and vocal chamber music. She has been described by the National Association of Teachers of Singing’s (NATS) Journal of Singing as “one of our country’s most able and prolific art song composers for almost three decades” and, in discussing her 1989 song cycle Syllables of Velvet, Sentences of Plush, the journal went on to assert that “Even at this very early stage in her life and career, Hall knew something about crafting music whose beauty could enhance the text at hand without drawing attention away from that text. This is masterful writing in every respect.” Early life Juliana Hall was born in Huntington, West Virginia, in 1958 and grew up across the river in Chesapeake, Ohio. Her mother was a pianist and began teaching Juliana piano when she was six years old. She was active in the family church, where she played, sang, and wrote her first composition. Her grandparents also provided inspiration, exposing Juliana to folk music and poetry. Hall began her professional studies at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music as a piano major (studying with Jeanne Kirstein). Still, her work in a composition for

Julie Rivé-King

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Julie Rivé-King (October 30, 1854 July 28, 1937) was an American pianist and composer. Biography Julie Rivé-King was born on October 30, 1854, in Cincinnati, Ohio, of parents Caroline Staub Rivé and Léon Rivé. Her mother was a singer, teacher and composer who studied with Manuel Garcia in France, and her father was an artist and teacher. After a cholera epidemic that took three of their children in New Orleans, the couple moved to Baton Rouge, Louisville and then to Cincinnati where they found teaching positions and where Julie was born. Jullie took music lessons from her mother and appeared in recitals at age eight. She studied at the Cincinnati Conservatory with Henry Andrès and in 1870 in New York with Sebastian Bach Mills, William Mason, Francis Korbay and Dionys Pruckner. She also studied in Europe with Franz Liszt and Carl Reinecke and made her debut in Leipzig in 1873. She began a concert tour of Europe, but returned to the US when her father was killed in a railroad accident. She made a debut in Cincinnati in 1874, officially debuted the next year with the New York Philharmonic and then toured the Eastern and Midwestern US. In 1876 she married Frank H. King, her manager, an

Julius Dobos

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Gyula Julius Dobos (born in Budapest, Hungary) is a composer, synthesist and music producer, best known for his electronic and orchestral music releases worldwide, and for his film scores and music used in major motion pictures and television programs in Europe and in the United States. With Mountain Flying, his most popular album up to date, Dobos became the first Hungarian composer of a large-scale orchestral-choral-electronic music project to receive international attention. With eleven album releases, including a platinum album, countless film- and television scores, Dobos is one of the prominent living electronic music composers with a Central European origin. Dobos’ distinct musical style is characterized by emotionally deep, haunting melodies and monumental instrumentation, unique sound textures and the extensive use of synthesizers and other electronic musical instruments. Although classically trained, the composer generally disregards the formal rules of music composition. After winning several district piano competitions, his interest turned towards composition. It was in these pre-teen years, when his father introduced him to the 70’s and 80’s electronic music. The young

Julius Eastman

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Julius Eastman (October 27, 1940 – May 28, 1990) was an American composer. He was among the first composers to combine the processes of some minimalist music with other methods of extending and modifying his music as in some experimental music. He thus created what he called “organic music”. In compositions like Stay On It (1973), his melodic motifs were not unlike the catchy refrains of then pop music. He studied performance and composition in New York and contributed to new music scenes in New York, Buffalo, and Chicago, touring and recording as a performer and enjoying many performances of his own music. As a conductor, musician, and vocalist, he had a close artistic relationship with Arthur Russell and worked briefly with Meredith Monk and Pierre Boulez. His voice is that of Peter Maxwell Davies’ Mad King on Nonesuch Records. He worked in a variety of musical styles, including classical, jazz, and crossover. During the 1970s (and perhaps shortly thereafter), he openly expressed himself in terms of his race, sexual orientation, or both in at least one performance and also in his compositions, including Gay Guerrilla. These gestures were not well received. He began to contend wit

Julius Hemphill

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Julius Arthur Hemphill (January 24, 1938 – April 2, 1995) was a jazz composer and saxophone player. He performed mainly on alto saxophone, less often on soprano and tenor saxophones and flute. Biography Hemphill was born in Fort Worth, Texas, and attended I.M. Terrell High School (as did Ornette Coleman). He studied the clarinet with John Carter, Hemphill joined the United States Army in 1964, and served for several years in the United States Army Band. Hemphill left the World Saxophone Quartet in the early 1990s, and formed a saxophone quintet. Hemphill recorded over 20 albums as a leader, around 10 records with the World Saxophone Quartet and recorded or performed with Björk, Bill Frisell, Anthony Braxton and others. Late in his life, ill-health (including diabetes and heart surgery) forced Hemphill to stop playing saxophone, but he continued writing music until his death also released several albums of Hemphill’s music, but without Hemphill playing. The most recent is entitled The Hard Blues, recorded live in Lisbon after Hemphill’s death from diabetes. In 2021, New World Records released a retrospective seven-disc box set album titled The Boyé Multi-National Crusade for Harmony

June Weybright

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June Elizabeth Weybright Reeder (June 15, 1903 – November 15, 1996) was an American composer and music educator who is best known for her piano method books and compositions, published under the name June Weybright. She was born in Jeffersonville, Indiana, and studied at the Leo Miller Institute of Music (St. Louis, Missouri), Washington University, and the Juilliard School of Music. Her teachers included Kate Chittenden, Jessie L. Gaynor and Effa Ellis Perfield. Weybright began teaching in 1925, and married Leland Reeder in St. Louis on July 20, 1940. In addition to teaching, Weybright conducted choral groups and gave many lectures and workshops on topics such as “For a Musical America,” “Music in the Everyday Life of Our Juniors,” and “Reading Fluency for All Students.” She belonged to the Mu Phi Epsilon international music fraternity. Weybright composed or arranged over 300 piano pieces in 48 volumes, as well as pedagogical material on music theory, and music for four hands, six hands, and two pianos. She was published by Belwin Mills, which was later acquired by Alfred Music publishing company. Her best-known works include: *Belwin Piano Method (in five books) *Belwin Theory Wo

Juri Seo

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Juri Seo (; born December 31, 1981) is a South Korean composer. A 2016 Guggenheim Fellow, she has released several albums, two of which were with Innova Recordings. She is also Professor at the Princeton University Department of Music. Biography Juri Seo was born on December 31, 1981 in South Korea. She studied at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia under Ivan Fedele, and obtained her bachelor of arts degree at Yonsei University and her master of music and doctor of musical arts degrees at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. She is Professor of Music at the Princeton University Department of Music. She was awarded an American Academy of Arts and Letters Goddard Lieberson Fellowship in 2014. She released two albums with Innova Recordings: Mostly Piano (2017) and Respiri (2019). Andrew Stock of I Care If You Listen said that the latter “illuminates some of her core aesthetic preoccupations through a trio of key works”. In 2021, she was awarded an Andrew Imbrie Award in Music in 2021. She released another album Toy Store, a collaboration with violinist Jinjoo Cho, through Carrier Records on May 5, 2024. She performed the main titular piece for Wonkak Kim and Eunhye Grace Cho

Justin Dello Joio

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Justin Dello Joio (born October 18, 1955) is an American composer and the fifth-generation composer in the Dello Joio family. Early life and education Dello Joio completed his formal education at the Juilliard School, earning a Bachelor’s, Master’s, and a Doctoral degree in composition where he studied with Vincent Persichetti, Roger Sessions, and David Diamond. During his years at Juilliard, he was honored with an annual composition award. Life and career Dello Joio has worked as a composer throughout his adult life. He was honored with the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in Music in 2004, and the American Academy’s Virgil Thompson Award for his opera Blue Mountain. His music, although not part of the American Neo Romantic style, is noted for its communicative emotional content, structural clarity and colorful orchestration, and his early influences include music of composers Jacob Druckman and Witold Lutosławski. Dello Joio recent Concerto for Piano and Orchestra Oceans Apart was commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra for Garrick Ohlsson, and premiered with Ohlsson and Alan Gilbert conducting the Boston Symphony in Symphony Hall in January 2023. His music has be

Karel Husa

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Karel Husa (August 7, 1921 – December 14, 2016) was a Czech-born classical composer and conductor, winner of the 1969 Pulitzer Prize for Music and 1993 University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition. In 1954, he emigrated to the United States and became an American citizen in 1959. Overview Husa learned to play the violin and the piano in early childhood. After passing his final examination at high school, he enrolled in the Prague Conservatory in 1941, where he studied with Jaroslav Řídký, and attended courses in conducting led by Metod Doležil and Pavel Dědeček. After the end of the Second World War, Husa was admitted to the graduate school of the Prague Academy, where he attended courses led by Řídký and graduated in 1947. He then continued composition and conducting studies in Paris. In 1947, he studied with Arthur Honegger and Nadia Boulanger. He studied conducting at the École Normale de Musique de Paris and at the Conservatoire de Paris. His conducting teachers included Jean Fournet, Eugène Bigot and André Cluytens. He subsequently divided his career between composing and conducting. Husa’s String Quartet No. 1 received its premiere in June 1950, and won him

Karen P. Thomas

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Karen P. Thomas (born 1957), composer and conductor, is the Artistic Director and Conductor of Seattle Pro Musica and Director of Music at University Unitarian Church. With Seattle Pro Musica she has produced six CD recordings, and has received the Margaret Hillis Award for Choral Excellence and the ASCAP-Chorus America Award for Adventuresome Programming of Contemporary Music. Ms. Thomas has guest conducted at international festivals in Europe and North America, and has served on the boards of the American Choral Director’s Association for Washington State, the Conductor’s Guild, the League-ISCM and the International Alliance for Women in Music. Ms. Thomas is a recipient of grants and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, and ASCAP, among others. Her compositions have been awarded prizes in various competitions, and her commissions include works for the Grand Jubilee 2000 in Rome, the American Guild of Organists, and the Goodwill Arts Festival. Her compositions are regularly performed internationally, by groups such as The Hilliard Ensemble, and have been praised as “superb work of the utmost sensitivity and beauty.” H

Karen Tanaka

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Karen Tanaka (born April 7, 1961) is a Japanese composer. Biography Karen Tanaka was born in Tokyo where she started piano and composition lessons as a child. After studying composition with Akira Miyoshi and piano with Nobuko Amada at Toho Gakuen School of Music in Tokyo, she moved to Paris in 1986 with the aid of a French Government Scholarship to study with Tristan Murail and work at IRCAM as an intern. In 1987, she was awarded the Gaudeamus International Composers Award at the International Music Week in Amsterdam. She studied with Luciano Berio in Florence in 1990–91 with funds from the Nadia Boulanger Foundation and a Japanese Government Scholarship. In 1996, she received the Margaret Lee Crofts Fellowship at the Tanglewood Music Center. In 1998, she was appointed as Co-Artistic Director of the Yatsugatake Kogen Music Festival, previously directed by Toru Takemitsu. In 2005, she was awarded the Bekku Prize. In 2024, Karen Tanaka was appointed Composer-in-Association at Malmö Live Concert Hall & Malmö Symphony Orchestra for the 2025–27 seasons. In 2012, Tanaka was selected as a fellow of the Sundance Institute’s Composers Lab for Feature Film where she was mentored by Hollywoo

Karl Feininger

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Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Feininger (born in Durlach, Grand Duchy of Baden, 31 July 1844; died in New York City, 31 January 1922) was a German–American musician. Biography Feininger came to the United States with his parents in 1853. They settled in Columbia, South Carolina. Feininger was educated in St. Mary’s College there. He displayed a talent for music, and was placed with August Koepper for instruction. He made his debut at 14, playing the violin part of a Beethoven trio (Op. 70, No. 2). Afterward, he studied music in the Leipzig Conservatory in Germany where he studied with Ferdinand David. He led an orchestra in 1863. He returned to the United States in 1864 when the Civil War was in progress, and enlisted in the Union Army, serving under General Gillmore until the war ended. He was survived by his second wife, Jane Pottinger Feininger, a pianist and accompanist who toured with him until 1910. For several years, she was the piano accompanist of the London Handel Society. He was also survived by a son from his first marriage, Lyonel Feininger, a noted painter. Publications * Notes References Further reading Attribution: *

Karl Hajos

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Karl Hajos (born Hajós Károly, January 28, 1889 – February 1, 1950) was a Hungarian composer who worked on many film scores. Born in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Hajos emigrated to the United States in 1924 and worked in Hollywood. Beginning in the late silent era, he worked on over 100 films with a variety of directors and studios. He was one of nine composers employed on the 1931 Western Fighting Caravans. In 1934, he worked on Cecil B. Demille’s thriller Four Frightened People. He was nominated for two Academy Awards, in 1944 and 1945 in the Music Score of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture category for Summer Storm and The Man Who Walked Alone, respectively. Selected filmography * Loves of an Actress (1928) * The Woman from Moscow (1928) * Adoration (1928) * Beggars of Life (1928) * The Wolf of Wall Street (1929) * The Sea God (1930) * The Right to Love (1930) * The Night of Decision (1931) * Fighting Caravans (1931) * Four Frightened People (1934) * Werewolf of London (1935) * Summer Storm (1944) * Dangerous Intruder (1945) * The Man Who Walked Alone (1945) * Fog Island (1945) * Secrets of Linda Hamilton (1945) * The Mask of Diijon (1946) * Wild West (1946) * Wild Country (1947) * A

Karl Korte

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Karl Richard Korte (June 23, 1928 – March 27, 2022) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. He was born in Ossining, New York, and grew up in Englewood, New Jersey. He attended the Juilliard School, where he studied with Peter Mennin, William Bergsma, and Vincent Persichetti. He later studied composition with Otto Luening, Goffredo Petrassi, and Aaron Copland. Korte taught at the University of Texas at Austin from 1971 to 1997 and held the rank of emeritus professor. From 1997 to 2000, he was a visiting professor at Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts. He received many national and international awards for his work, including two Guggenheim Fellowships (1959 and 1970), Fulbright Awards to Italy and to New Zealand, and a Gold Medal from the Belgian Government in the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition. He died in Dobbs Ferry, New York. Selected works *1957 – Fantasy for violin and piano *1964 – Songs of Innocence (Blake), for women’s voices and piano *1967 – Matrix – 7 for woodwind quintet, piano and percussion. Written for the New York Woodwind Quintet *1968 – Aspects of Love, for SATB and piano *1968 – Sappho Says, for mezzo-soprano soloist with women’s

Karl L. King

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Karl L. King (February 21, 1891 – March 31, 1971) was a United States march music bandmaster and composer. He is best known as the composer of “Barnum and Bailey’s Favorite”. Early life Karl Lawrence King was born in the village of Paintersville, Ohio. He was the only child of Sandusky S. and Anna Lindsey King. The King family moved to Canton, Ohio, when he was eleven, the age he used newspaper carrier income to purchase his first musical instrument – a cornet. He studied with Emile Reinkendorff, director of the Grand Army Band of Canton, on this instrument. He grew up as a self-taught musician with very little schooling of any kind (he left school after the eighth grade, age fourteen). His only music instruction included assistance from local musicians when he played brass instruments in the Canton Marine Band. He also had four piano lessons and one harmony lesson from musical show director William Bradford. He learned to compose by studying scores. He quit school to learn the printing trade (while composing music at night), but soon switched to playing in and composing for bands. His first professional positions were in the Thayer Military Band in Canton, directed by William E. S

Karl Merz

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Karl Merz (September 10, 1834 – January 30, 1890) was an American composer, author, editor, and arranger of German descent. Biography Merz was born September 10, 1834, in Bensheim, near Frankfort-on-Main, Germany. . He received his early musical instruction from his father, a violinist and organist at the church in their hometown. But for the most part he is considered self-taught. By the age of eight or nine he was playing violin in a quartet club which met at the residence of Baron of Rodenstein. He is also known to have frequently played at “musical gatherings” at the castle of the baron of Rodenstein. At the age of eleven he had “assumed his father’s duties as organist” at the church. After returning to the North, around September 1861 he became a professor of music at Oxford Female College in Oxford, Ohio. He started his career as a musical writer in 1868 and made contributions to Brainard’s Musical World. He became known for his “musical hints.” As his popularity rose he was made assistant editor and in 1873 he became the sole editor. During his career he wrote a vast number of musical pieces consisting of operettas, sacred pieces, choruses, songs, piano solos, waltzes, dance

Karola Obermueller

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Karola Obermueller (born 21 March 1977, Darmstadt) is a German composer and teacher. Life Obermueller began her training at the Akademie für Tonkunst in Darmstadt. She studied composition with of the Meistersinger-Konservatorium and the Hochschule für Musik Nürnberg, Theo Brandmüller of the Hochschule für Musik Saar, and Adriana Hölszky of the Mozarteum Salzburg. In 2010, she completed a doctorate at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where she studied with Mario Davidovsky, Bernard Rands, Julian Anderson, Chaya Czernowin, Magnus Lindberg, and Harrison Birtwistle. She has taught at Wellesley College and the Young Composers Program at the Cleveland Institute of Music. Since 2010, Obermueller has been one of the directors of the composition program at the University of New Mexico. A portrait CD of hers was released as part of the WERGO Contemporary Music Edition by the German Music Council. as well as awards and commissions from the Fromm Foundation commission, the ASCAP Morton Gould Awards, and the Bohemians New York Musicians Club. She did a residency at the Deutsches Studienzentrum in Venedig. Obermueller frequently collaborates with her husband, American composer, Pe

Kate Gentile

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Kate Gentile is an American drummer, composer, and record label executive. A 2024 Guggenheim Fellow, her albums include Mannequins (2017), Biomei.i, and Find Letter X (both 2023). She also collaborates with pianist Matt Mitchell, with whom she co-founded Obliquity Records. Biography Gentile came from Buffalo, New York, where she recalls that during high school, she did not have a lot of exposure to music because she “was busy cramming for my music school auditions”. After moving to Toronto after her marriage to a Canadian, she had to work with rock and metal bands because she could not legally work in the country, before moving to Brooklyn. it was ranked #50 in the 2017 National Public Radio Music Jazz Critics Poll. In 2023, she released another album, Biomei.i. Will Layman of PopMatters characterized Gentile as “a power drummer, though she is always thinking orchestrally, arguably a modern Elvin Jones or Tony Williams”. Layman called their partnership is “central to the chemistry” of their duo. She also leads the band Find Letter X, She is also leader of jazz/noise rock trio Secret People. Discography References

Kate Soper (composer)

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Kate Soper (born 1981) is a composer and vocalist. She was a recent American Academy in Rome fellow and Guggenheim Fellow as well as a 2012–13 fellow of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. She was a finalist for the 2017 Pulitzer Prize in Music for her chamber opera, Ipsa Dixit. Style In addition to composing, Soper performs frequently as a new music soprano in her own works and the works of others, and many of her vocal works were developed with herself in mind as performer. Her compositional style has been deemed “exquisitely quirky” with “seamless commingling of not only lines but of actual instrumentation and fingering with another player.” Commissions Recent commissions for work as a performer/composer include a 2012 Guggenheim fellowship for a one-act opera with original libretto, Here Be Sirens; a Koussevitsky Commission for a music theatre work performed with Alarm Will Sound; and now is forever for soprano and orchestra from the American Composers Orchestra. Wet Ink Since 2006, Soper has served as a co-director and vocalist for Wet Ink, a New York-based new music ensemble founded in 1998 and dedicated to the presentation of programs of new music, with a focus on cr

Katherine Balch

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Katherine Elise Balch and she won an ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Award. She was the California Symphony Young American Composer-in-Residence from 2017 to 2020 (the first woman to hold the position), as well as Young Concert Artists’ William B. Butz Composition Chair from 2017 to 2019. In May 2019, she debuted her concerto Artifacts at the Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek, California; San Francisco Chronicle music critic Joshua Kosman said of the concerto that “she’s like some kind of musical Thomas Edison—you can just hear her tinkering around in her workshop, putting together new sounds and textural ideas”. Balch won the American Academy in Rome’s 2020 Elliott Carter Rome Prize. She composed “Apartment Sounds” for Yvonne Lam’s 2023 album Watch Over Us; American Record Guide called Balch “welcome purveyor of timbral variety in Apartment Sounds, as the recorded materials included in this short piece are relatively refreshing. Her piece Forgetting was performed at the Song Company’s March 2024 Superbloom production at the Sydney Opera House; Peter McCallum of WAtoday said it “began with stopped utterances and sounds in a state of almost silent inarticulateness and hes

Katherine Hoover

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Katherine Hoover (December 2, 1937 – September 21, 2018) was an American composer of contemporary classical music and chamber music, flutist, composition and theory educator, poet, and conductor. Her career as a composer began in the 1970s, when few women composers earned recognition in classical music. She composed pieces for solo flute, mixed ensembles, chamber orchestra, choir, full orchestra, and many other combinations of instruments and voice. Two works of hers were co-written under the pseudonym Kathryn Scott. Some of her flute pieces incorporate Native American themes. Her work has received many honors, including a National Endowment for the Arts Composer’s Fellowship, an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in composition, and the National Flute Association’s Lifetime Achievement Award, where she is remembered by as an “artist, flutist, teacher, entrepreneur, poet, and, most notably, a distinguished composer.” Life and career Katherine Lacey Hoover was born on December 2, 1937, in Elkins, West Virginia, where her mother’s family was from. They lived in Washington, D.C., at 2017 Hillyer Pl NW, near Dupont Circle. She remembers her love for music started at the age of

Katherine Kennicott Davis

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Katherine Kennicott Davis (June 25, 1892 – April 20, 1980) was an American composer, pianist, arranger, and teacher, whose best-known composition is the Christmas song “Carol of the Drum”, later known as “The Little Drummer Boy”. Life and career Katherine Davis was born in St. Joseph, Missouri, on June 25, 1892, to Maxwell Gaddis Davis and Jesse Foote Barton. She composed her first piece of music, “Shadow March”, at the age of 15. She graduated from St. Joseph Central High School in 1910. She then went on to study music at Wellesley College in Massachusetts. After graduation, she continued at Wellesley as an assistant in the Music Department, teaching music theory and piano; at the same time, she studied at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. She taught music at the Concord Academy in Concord, Massachusetts, and at the Shady Hill School for Girls in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She became a member of ASCAP in 1941. Katherine Davis was conferred an honorary doctorate from Stetson University, in DeLand, Florida. Davis continued writing music until she became ill, in the winter of 1979–1980. She died on April 20, 1980, at the age of 87, in Littleton, Massach

Katherine Ruth Heyman

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Katherine Ruth Willoughby Heyman (1877 – September 28, 1944), nicknamed “Kitty”, was an American pianist and composer. She was a proponent of the music of Alexander Scriabin, and she gave several recitals consisting solely of his music. Biography Early life Heyman was born in 1877, in Sacramento, California. Her father was violinist Arnold Heyman, a student of Louis Spohr. She studied in Berlin from 1881 to 1894, including piano with Karl Heinrich Barth. She later studied in Vienna and later London before returning to the United States for further studies. Career Heyman made her professional debut as a soloist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra on October 13, 1899. In 1905, she moved to London and often toured European cities, especially in Russia. During this time, she toured together with singers Ernestine Schumann-Heink and Marcella Sembrich. She met Ezra Pound, who dedicated the 1906 poem “Scriptor ignotus” to her, during this time. In addition to her performing activities, she also gave lectures about music. The Relation of Ultramodern to Archaic Music, a collection of her lectures was published in 1921 by Small, Maynard & Company. She was a noted proponent of Scriabin, and ga

Katherine Young (musician)

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Katherine Young is an American bassoonist and composer. She released her solo album Further Secret Origins in 2009 and is a 2021 Guggenheim Fellow. She is also a professor at Emory University. Biography Katherine Young studied classical music with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra’s Carl Nitchie, She later obtained her MA in Composition from Wesleyan University, where she studied under Anthony Braxton, her doctoral dissertation is Nothing Is as It Appears: Anthony Braxton’s Trillium J. Young’s music involves electroacoustic music and sonic art, and she also plays as a bassoonist in her work. Tamzin Elliott of San Francisco Classical Voice said of Young: “Her vocabulary of string techniques — bowing on the body of the instrument, grinding the bow into the string, playing behind the bridge, etc. — was markedly uniform between the pieces, to the point where I wondered about the intentionality of this similarity.” She later did another album in 2012, Pretty Monsters, for her quartet of the same name. Young said that solo recordings are “brutal”, noting they leave her with only a sound engineer to record with. Originally teaching at Berklee College of Music and the School of the Art Instit

Kathryn Alexander

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Kathryn Alexander (born 1955) is a Guggenheim Award-winning American composer and a professor of composition at Yale University. Early life and education Alexander was born in Texas and was involved with music from an early age. She earned a bachelor’s degree at Baylor University studying flute with Helen Ann Shanley, and went on to the Cleveland Institute of Music to study with Maurice Sharp. While at Cleveland, she began to compose. She sought guidance from Cleveland faculty Donald Erb and Eugene O’Brien, and went on to earn a DMA in composition at the Eastman School of Music, working with Samuel Adler, Barbara Kolb, Allan Schindler, and Joseph Schwantner. While at Eastman, she became one of the first women to teach in the Eastman Computer Music Center (now the Eastman Audio Research Studio). She pursued additional study with Leon Kirchner at the Tanglewood Music Center. Career Alexander serves on the faculty of the Department of Music at Yale University, where she has taught composition and music technology since 1996. She is the founding director of the Yale Music and Technology Lab (YaleMusT). She previously taught at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Dartmouth College, and t

Kathryn Bostic

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Kathryn Bostic is an American composer and artist known for her work on award-winning films, TV, and theater. In 2016, she became the first female African-American score composer to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and was the vice president of the Alliance for Women Film Composers from 2016 to 2018. Work Bostic has written scores and songs for film, television and stage, including award-winning films Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am and Amy Tan: Unintended Memoir, for which she received an Emmy Award nomination. Bostic also wrote and performed the Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am end-title song, “High Above the Water”, which was shortlisted for “Best Original Song” at the 2020 Oscars. Bostic’s scores also include Sundance award-winning film Clemency (on which she also served as an Executive Producer), Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go for It, HBO documentary Black Art: In the Absence of Light, and most recently, ABC’s limited series Women of the Movement from Emmy-nominated showrunner, Marissa Jo Cerar. Kathryn Bostic’s compositions have been performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, and the Bangor Symphony Orchestra. S

Kay Gardner (composer)

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Kay Gardner (February 8, 1941 – August 28, 2002), also known as Cosmos Wonder-Child, was an American musician, composer, author, and Dianic priestess known for using music for creative and healing purposes. She was very active in promoting the work of contemporary female musicians and was a pioneering figure in women’s music. Biography Born in Freeport, New York, Gardner wrote and performed her first piano composition at the age of four. When she was eight, she began learning how to play the flute. She subsequently went on to gain performance experience in chamber, orchestral, and vocal music. Gardner composed works for flute, piano, chamber ensemble, orchestra, and choir. She is considered a founding foremother of women’s music. She sued the Bangor Symphony Orchestra for sex discrimination because during their search for a new music director, they asked orchestra members if they could “tolerate a woman” as a conductor. She started her own independent record label, Even Keel Records, and produced 17 albums – both of her own music and the work of others. In 1974, Gardner and Alix Dobkin recorded and produced a nationally distributed album with explicitly lesbian-feminist lyrics (Lav

Kay Swift

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Katharine Faulkner “Kay” Swift (April 19, 1897 – January 28, 1993) was an American composer of popular and classical music, the first woman to score a hit musical completely. Written in 1930, the Broadway musical Fine and Dandy includes some of her best known songs; the song “Fine and Dandy” has become a jazz standard. “Can’t We Be Friends?” (1929) was her biggest hit song. Swift also arranged some of the music of George Gershwin posthumously, such as the prelude “Sleepless Night” (1946). Biography Katharine Faulkner Swift was born to English American Samuel Shippen Swift, a music critic, and Ellen Faulkner of England in New York City. Her father died when she was 17. Swift was educated at the Veltin School for Girls and then trained as a classical musician and composer at the Institute of Musical Art (today the Juilliard School), where she studied piano with Bertha Tapper. Her teacher of composition was Charles Martin Loeffler, while harmony and composition were taught to her by Percy Goetschius. Swift played professionally with the Edith Rubel Trio. While performing at a social event, she met the sister of her future husband, who arranged their meeting. James Paul “Jimmy” Warburg

Kemp Stillings

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Katharine Kemp Stillings (June 30, 1888 – April 30, 1967) was a violinist, composer, and music educator. Early life Katharine Kemp Stillings was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts, and began studying violin from a very early age. She went to Berlin to study with Joseph Joachim, and to Saint Petersburg for further studies with Leopold Auer. Career Katherine Stillings performed in Russia and Finland before World War I. She played with pianist Frances Nash in 1917 and 1918, in New York and several other American cities, and was a guest soloist with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra. She toured in South America in 1920. Stillings became suddenly blind in the 1920s, and after that focused on teaching. “It has been a handicap, but also a blessing,” she told an interviewer in 1940. “It has made my critical hearing ever so much more acute. Besides, something like this makes us so human.” She was on the faculty at the New Jersey College for Women from 1927 to 1952, and taught her own master classes in New York City, which were modeled on the pedagogy of Joachim and Auer. Her students included conductor Walter Eisenberg. Stillings published violin exercise boo

Ken Field

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Ken Field (born January 26, 1953) is a saxophonist, flautist, percussionist, and composer. Since 1988 he has been a member of the electrified modern music ensemble Birdsongs of the Mesozoic, with whom he has recorded eight CDs. Career Field has been Composer-in-Residence at the Ucross Foundation, Wyoming, the Fundación Valparaíso, Spain, the MacDowell Colony, and the Atlantic Center for the Arts, Florida. He has performed for President Bill Clinton, and with former J. Geils frontman Peter Wolf. Ken Field is a Vandoren Performing Artist. Field has also composed music for animation, film, and dance, including music for children’s television program Sesame Street. Field was named a Finalist in Music Composition by the Massachusetts Cultural Council in 2017. Revolutionary Snake Ensemble Field leads the Revolutionary Snake Ensemble, a New Orleans-inspired improvisational brass band. Their 2008 release Forked Tongue appeared on best-of-year lists in the Village Voice and the Estonian Postimees, as well as on lists in Georgia, Michigan, Ohio, Kansas, Wisconsin, and New York. Year of the Snake, the group’s 2003 debut release, was included on best-of-year lists from WNYC Radio, the Gambit W

Ken Ueno

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Ken Ueno (born January 11, 1970, in Bronxville, New York) is an American composer. Career Ueno pursued initial studies in music at the United States Military Academy in West Point, NY, but soon transferred to Berklee College of Music, where he earned a B.M. in Film Scoring/Composition Summa Cum Laude (1992); his graduate studies at Boston University and Yale School of Music earned him master’s degrees; he later completed a doctorate at Harvard University. Ueno has taught at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, and now teaches at the University of California, Berkeley. He has served as co-director of Minimum Security Composers Collective, and has earned the distinction of having earned the American Academy prizes for both the Berlin and Rome fellowships, and has worked with premier ensembles internationally to considerable critical acclaim. Works Ken Ueno has composed for modern orchestra, jazz ‘big band’, chamber ensembles including woodwind quintet, choreographed dance pieces, and in a variety of other genres. As a performer, Ueno has performed at the Flea, New York City, collaborated with violist Kim Kashkashian and percussionist Robyn Schulkowsky on the works Hypnomelodiam

Kendall Briggs

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Kendall Durelle Briggs is an American composer of classical music and music theorist. He is a professor of music theory, music history and analysis at the Juilliard School in New York City. He has authored two books on the subject, The Language and Materials of Music and Tonal Counterpoint. He is a recipient of the Charles Ives Prize in composition from The Academy of Arts and Letters. Biography Briggs was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, and grew up in Seattle, Washington. He was first exposed to music by his mother, a classical pianist. He later studied the cello as well. He attended Pacific Lutheran University, where he received a bachelor’s degree in composition, and later went on to study at the Juilliard School, where he received his master’s and doctoral degrees. He joined the faculty of The Juilliard School in 1994. Works Notable works include: * Rhapsody for Cello and Orchestra “. . . a riveder le stelle” * Sonata for Flute and Piano * Sonata for Cello and Piano * Sonata for French Horn and Piano * Sonata for Trumpet and Piano * Sonata for Viola and Piano * Sonatine for Flute and Piano * Sonatine for Piano 4-Hands * Petite Suite for Piano, Violin, Cello * Serenade for Chamber

Kenji Bunch

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Kenji Bunch (born July 27, 1973) is an American composer and violist based in Portland, Oregon. Bunch currently serves as the artistic director of Fear No Music and teaches at Portland State University, Reed College, and for the Portland Youth Philharmonic. He is also the director of MYSfits, the most advanced string ensemble of the Metropolitan Youth Symphony. Known for “amalgamating traditional American musical forms… and European-based classical music,” Bunch’s work for chamber ensemble, orchestra and ballet often incorporates elements of hip hop, jazz, bluegrass and funk to critical acclaim. Over sixty American orchestras have performed his music. His film credits include The Bellman Equation and The Argentum Prophecies. His discography includes recordings on Sony/BMG, EMI Classics, Koch, Kleos Classics, RCA, Naxos, Pony Canyon, GENUIN, Capstone, MSR Classics, Innova, ARS, and Crystal labels. Education Bunch graduated from Wilson High School (Portland, Oregon) in 1991 having performed in the Portland Youth Philharmonic for five years (1986–1991). He attended The Juilliard School, where he was the first student ever to receive dual Bachelor and Master of Music degrees in viola

Kenneth Fuchs

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Kenneth Daniel Fuchs (born July 1, 1956) is a Grammy Award-winning American composer. He currently serves as Professor of Music Composition at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, Connecticut. Music Kenneth Fuchs is the first living American composer recorded by the Sinfonia of London and its conductor, John Wilson (conductor). In June 2024, Chandos Records released Light Year, Orchestral Works, Volume 2, which includes two works for full orchestra and two concerti, one for alto saxophone performed by Timothy McAllister and the other for bass trombone performed by James Buckle. In July 2023, Chandos Records released Cloud Slant, Orchestral Works, Volume 1, which includes two works for full orchestra, a composition for strings, and a concerto for C and alto flute, performed by Adam Walker (flautist). Fuchs recorded for Naxos five albums with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by JoAnn Falletta, the last of which won the 2018 Grammy Award in the category Best Classical Compendium. The Recording Academy announced the accolade in the Classical category at the 61st annual awards ceremony at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, February 10, 2019. Fuchs has composed music for orche

Kenneth Gaburo

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Kenneth Louis Gaburo (July 5, 1926 – January 26, 1993) was an American composer. Life Gaburo was born in Somerville, New Jersey. He served as a professor of music at the University of Illinois, the University of California, San Diego, and the University of Iowa. His notable students include Louise Spizizen, James Tenney, Betty Ann Wong, and Allen Strange. He is renowned as a teacher, pioneer of electronics in music, jazz pianist, writer, ecologist, publisher, and proponent of compositional linguistics. In 1968, he joined the faculty at the new San Diego campus of the University of California where in 1972 a Rockefeller Foundation grant enabled him to start NMCE IV, this time with an actor, a virtuoso speaker, a mime, a gymnast, and a sound-movement artist. Until his resignation from UCSD in 1975 he produced a large number of integrated theatrical works, such as the collection Lingua and Privacy. In 1975, Gaburo founded Lingua Press, which produces scores, books, records, audio tapes, videotapes, and films. This firm is dedicated to putting forth unique artist-produced works in all media having to do with language and music. Many of the publications have been exhibited in book art s

Kenneth Lampl

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Kenneth Lampl (born November 7, 1964) is an American composer and lecturer known for his film, television and choral music. He is the former head of the Australian National University School of Music. Biography Born in the Bronx, New York, Lampl studied saxophone with Paul Jeffrey and Sahib Shihab at Rutgers University and was a member of the Rutgers University Jazz Ensemble. After college, Lampl performed as part of jazz drummer Chico Hamilton’s sextet, the Young Altos, performing at the Lincoln Center, the Apollo Theater, and the JVC Jazz Festival. Lampl began his first classical composition studies with Pulitzer Prize winning composer Charles Wuorinen in the graduate program at Rutgers University. Lampl’s first international recognition came with the winning of the “Prix Ravel” in composition from the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau, France and his first orchestral piece “Parallax” won the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra Young Composers Award, the ASCAP Awards for Young Composers. and the Joseph H. Bearns Prize in Composition from Columbia University. In 1996 Lampl received his DMA in Composition from the Juilliard School studying with Milton Babbitt and John Corigliano, an

Kent Kennan

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Kent Wheeler Kennan (April 18, 1913, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin – November 1, 2003, in Austin, Texas) was an American composer, author, educator, and professor. Biography He learned to play the organ and the piano and received degrees in composition and music theory from the University of Michigan and the Eastman School of Music. At the age of 23, he was awarded the Rome Prize, which allowed him to study for three years in Europe, primarily at the American Academy in Rome. He was the half brother of the diplomat and historian George F. Kennan. For most of his career, Kennan was a professor at the University of Texas at Austin, also teaching briefly at Kent State University. His work as a professor was briefly interrupted by World War II, when he served as a bandmaster for the United States Army. Upon his release, he taught for two years (1947-1949) at Ohio State University before returning to the University of Texas. His compositions include works for orchestra, chamber ensemble and solo instrument as well as songs and choral music. His Sonata for Trumpet and Piano is part of the standard repertoire for many collegiate trumpet studios. His Night Soliloquy was written in 1936 and is se

Kermit Poling

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Kermit Poling (born 1960 in Cleveland, Ohio, United States) is an American conductor, violinist, and composer. Kermit Poling is Music Director of both the South Arkansas Symphony and the Shreveport Metropolitan Ballet. He has performed extensively throughout the United States and abroad, including concerts in Mexico, England, Ireland, France, Austria, Italy and Switzerland. His many guest conducting appearances have included the Orquesta Sinfónica del Estado de México, the Riverside (NJ) Symphonia, the Moscow Chamber Orchestra and Moscow Ballet, Filharmonia Veneta, Ballet South, Opera Lewanee!, the Adrian Symphony, the Mayormente Mozart Festival of Puerto Rico, and the Inter-American Festival of Contemporary Music. A virtuoso violinist, he performed 27 seasons as concertmaster of the Shreveport Symphony Orchestra, having also performed many solo works with the orchestra. He remains the Shreveport Symphony’s Associate Conductor, having previously served as Interim Music Director. Also a composer and arranger, Poling’s has composed a dozen ballets including Snow White, Wizard of Oz, Aladdin, Phantom of the Opera and Beauty and the Beast. In 2003, he also arranged and conducted a new

Kerry Muzzey

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Kerry Muzzey (born 1970) is an American classical composer. Early life Muzzey was born and raised in Joliet, Illinois. Muzzey graduated from Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois, with a degree in piano performance. Career In 2007, he was commissioned by director Bill Purple and Iron Ocean Films’ executive producers Jessica Biel and Michelle Purple to create the score for Iron Ocean Films’ first film, Hole in the Paper Sky. In that same year he also lent several instrumental compositions to the Robert Redford– and Terrence Malick–produced documentary, The Unforeseen. Muzzey also scored the film Amexicano. In 2009, Kerry Muzzey was approached by the music supervisor of Glee about using Muzzey’s composition “Looking Back” as a love theme in the first two episodes of the series. The music was well received and was used in multiple episodes of the series. In 2011, Muzzey was commissioned to score the Wendie Malick film What Happens Next, followed by Holiday Engagement. Kerry Muzzey’s contemporary classical music has been featured on So You Think You Can Dance, for which Muzzey created a custom version of his composition “Bernini’s Angels” In 2012, choreographer Christopher Scott use

Kevin Keller (composer)

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Kevin Keller (born April 27, 1967) is an American composer and recording artist known primarily for “ambient chamber music”, a style that combines live instruments with electronic effects. Biography Starting out as a guitarist in his teen years, Keller turned to the piano while attending Jesuit High School, inspired by the music of Claude Debussy, Brian Eno, and Harold Budd. As a composition student, Keller composed ballet scores and chamber music, including a string quartet premiered by the Kronos Quartet at the 1986 Festival of New American Music. Keller later studied Film Scoring at Berklee College of Music under the tutelage of Pinar Toprak. Keller’s first solo recording “The Mask of Memory” (1994) came to the attention of radio producer Stephen Hill, who included several tracks on a Hearts of Space program titled “Digital Planet” in 1995. This was followed by a Living Room Concert and feature on Echoes, whose host John Diliberto named Keller’s second CD “Intermezzo” as one of the Top 25 records of 1996. In total, Keller has released 15 full-length recordings and several EPs and compilations, working with musicians such as cellist David Darling, guitarist Jeff Pearce and Keller

Kevin Puts

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Kevin Matthew Puts (born January 3, 1972) is an American composer, best known for his opera The Hours and for winning a Pulitzer Prize in 2012 for his first opera, Silent Night, He studied composition and piano at the Eastman School of Music and Yale University, earning the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Eastman School of Music. Among his teachers were Samuel Adler, Jacob Druckman, David Lang, Christopher Rouse, Joseph Schwantner, Martin Bresnick, and, in piano, Nelita True. He also studied at the Tanglewood Music Festival with William Bolcom and Bernard Rands. Career He is composer-in-residence at the Fort Worth Symphony and has received a commission from the Aspen Music Festival. His Cello Concerto was premiered by Yo-Yo Ma. Puts’ works have been performed by the St. Louis Symphony, the Pacific Symphony, the Utah Symphony (with Evelyn Glennie as percussion soloist), the Miró Quartet, and Concertante. He is a frequent composer in residence at the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, which commissioned his fourth symphony and his flute concerto. His alma mater commented: :For several years, Kevin Puts received reviews describing him as a “promising composer” and “a young co

Kim Kashkashian

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Kim Kashkashian (born August 31, 1952) is an American violist. She has spent her career in the U.S. and Europe and collaborated with many major contemporary composers. In 2013 she won a Grammy Award for Best Classical Instrumental Solo. She is recognized as one of the world’s top violists. Early life and education Kashkashian was born to Armenian-American parents Her father had a baritone voice and sang Armenian folk songs, which influenced her. Kashkashian is one of the founders and (as of 2016) the Artistic Director Recognition Kashkashian is widely recognized as one of the world’s top violists. BBC Music Magazine wrote in 1997 that she is one of the “most sought-after violists for chamber music in America.” NPR’s All Things Considered noted in 2007 that she is “one of only a few violists with an international solo career.” Honors and accolades *Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition 2nd prize, 1980 *Elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 2016 Discography A partial list of her recordings includes: *Asturiana. Transcribed songs of Manuel de Falla, Alberto Ginastera, Xavier Montsalvatge, Carlos Guastavino, and Carlos López Buchardo. Kim Kashkashian, v

Kimo Williams

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James “Kimo” Williams (born January 8, 1950) is an American composer, musician and professor who has performed with a number of ensembles including his ensemble Kimotion and the Lt. Dan Band, that he co-founded with film/TV actor Gary Sinise. While he is perhaps best known for his work with the Lt. Dan Band, Williams has worked on a number of other projects including: award-winning photography, releasing multiple CDs, writing several classical Symphonies and String Quartets. Cognizant of the opportunities he had, as well as those he did not due to a childhood in which he moved often, Williams speaks to students about his history, their future and their need to combat mediocrity. Background James Kimo Williams was born in Amityville, New York, and spent much of his childhood divided between U.S. Air Force bases, and on his grandparents’ sharecropper farm in North Carolina, where he picked tobacco, plowed fields and tended livestock on their rural farm. In 1968, he moved to Hawaii to join his father (a career Air Force Sergeant) and attended Leilehua High School. A dedicated, but inexperienced guitar player, he also took up sports and was an all-star football performer with a scholar

Kimya Dawson

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Kimya Dawson (born November 17, 1972) is an American folk singer-songwriter, one half of the anti-folk duo the Moldy Peaches. Dawson’s work with the Moldy Peaches earned them a cult following and critical acclaim, with their 2001 song “Anyone Else but You” landing a spot in multiple acclaimed indie film soundtracks. “Anyone Else but You” as performed by Michael Cera and Elliot Page charted on the Billboard Hot 100 after its prominent inclusion in the 2007 film Juno, the soundtrack of which includes several songs by Dawson and her associated musical acts. The song remains Dawson’s highest charting single to date. In addition to her work with the Moldy Peaches, Dawson has released seven solo studio albums and collaborated with various other artists from a diverse range of genres, including Aesop Rock, They Might Be Giants, The Mountain Goats, and Third Eye Blind. Career Dawson became well known as co-founder of the Moldy Peaches alongside Adam Green. Since the Moldy Peaches went on hiatus in 2004 Dawson has released a string of lo-fi homemade albums and toured widely in North America and Europe. Dawson’s children’s album, Alphabutt, was released on September 10, 2008. Song titles inc

Kirke Mechem

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Kirke Mechem (born August 16, 1925) is an American composer. His first opera, Tartuffe has had over 350 performances in nine countries. His memoir, Believe Your Ears: Life of a Lyric Composer, was published by Rowman & Littlefield in 2015; it won ASCAP Foundation’s 48th annual Deems Taylor/Virgil Thomson Award for outstanding musical biography. Background Mechem was born in Wichita, Kansas, on August 16, 1925. During World War II, he served two and half years in the army, and then enrolled at Stanford University. He took a harmony course taught by Harold Schmidt, the choral director, and continued his study of harmony and counterpoint, changing his major to music at the end of his junior year. His principal teachers at Stanford were Leonard Ratner (harmony and counterpoint) and Sandor Salgo (orchestration and conducting). In his senior year, Mechem orchestrated and conducted the student variety show. He earned a master’s degree at Harvard in 1953, studying composition with Walter Piston and Randall Thompson, and was winner of the Boott Prize for vocal composition. He was assistant choral director for three years at Stanford, composing both choral and instrumental music and conducti

Koncept

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Keith Michael Whitehead (born October 10, 1985, in Queens, New York City, United States), popularly known by his stage name Koncept, is an American rapper, singer and songwriter. A former employee at Fat Beats, Koncept started out drawing graffiti and also had a short stint as a DJ before he went on to start writing songs and doing freestyles until he released his first EP in 2010 titled Playing Life. In 2012, he had his first break with his debut solo album titled Awaken which featured guest appearances from Soul Khan, Homeboy Sandman, Royce da 5'9" and Sene with production credits from J57 and Marco Polo. In 2015, he collaborated with J57 to release an EP titled The Fuel which had its fair share of positive review from notable magazines including Respect Magazine, DJ Booth, HipHopDX and The Source. Early life Koncept was born and raised in Queens, New York City. He went to high school in Warwick, New York, and attended Community College in Burlington, Vermont, where he used to DJ at nights. Koncept majored in Graphic Design. In 2007, he started working at Fat Beats, a New York City-based hip hop records store where he met producer and music partner J57 as well as the group called

Konstantin Orbelyan

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Konstantin Aghaparonovich Orbelyan (; ; July 29, 1928 – April 24, 2014) was an Armenian pianist, composer, head of the State Estrada Orchestra of Armenia. He was awarded People’s Artist of the USSR in 1979. Other positions held by him included the board member of the Union of Soviet Composers, Armenian Composer’s Union secretary since 1983, and the Vice-President of All-Soviet Musical Society of the USSR. He was the uncle of his namesake Constantine Orbelian. Discography *“Государственный эстрадный оркестр Армении п/у Константина Орбеляна” (1968) As composer *“Birch Whispers” (), sung by Dmitri Hvorostovsky on the 2005 Delos Records compilation “Moscow Nights” (conducted by Constantine Orbelian). References External links * *Orbelyan in Jazz: XXth century Russian encyclopedia *Orbelyan *Orbelyan’s Official Website *Konstantin Orbelyan at All About Armenian Jazz

Kramer (musician)

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Mark Kramer (born November 30, 1958, in New York City, United States), known professionally as Kramer, is a musician, composer, record producer and founder of the New York City record label Shimmy-Disc. He was a full-time member of the bands New York Gong, Shockabilly, B.A.L.L. and Bongwater; has played on tour (usually on bass guitar) with bands such as Butthole Surfers, Ween, Half Japanese and The Fugs (1984 reunion tour); and has performed regularly with John Zorn and other improvising musicians of New York City’s “downtown scene” of the 1980s. Kramer’s work as a producer has been with bands such as Galaxie 500 (whose entire oeuvre he produced), Low (whom he discovered and produced), Half Japanese, White Zombie, Gwar, King Missile, Danielson Familie, Will Oldham, Daniel Johnston, and Urge Overkill, including their hit cover of “Girl, You’ll Be a Woman Soon”. Early music career Kramer’s first experience in the New York music scene came when he played in the band New York Gong, led by Daevid Allen, in 1979 and 1980. Kramer played organ on one song on their 1979 album About Time. In 1980, Kramer joined the band The Chadbournes, led by Eugene Chadbourne, which also included David Li

Kristin Kuster

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Kristin P. Kuster (born 1973) is an American composer of symphonic, vocal and chamber music. Biography Kuster was born Kristin Peterson in Raleigh, North Carolina and grew up in Boulder, Colorado. She received her Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Michigan, where she studied with William Bolcom, Michael Daugherty, Evan Chambers, and William Albright. She was awarded the Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the Underwood Emerging Composer Commission from American Composers Orchestra. Kuster is an Associate Professor of Composition at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance. She lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She was married to Andrew Kuster from 1997 to 2011. Style Kuster “writes commandingly for the orchestra,” and her music “has an invitingly tart edge” (The New York Times). Kuster’s colorfully enthralling compositions take inspiration from architectural space, the weather, and mythology. Her orchestral music “unquestionably demonstrates her expertise in crafting unique timbres” (Steve Smith, Night after Night). Works Orchestra and orchestra with voices * Iron Diamond (2005) * Myrrha (2006) * Beneath This S

Kurt Farquhar

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Kurt Farquhar is a Los Angeles–based television and film composer. Farquhar is a eleven-time BMI award winner, including four for The Neighborhood, four for The King of Queens one for The Game and two for Being Mary Jane. He is known for composing the scores for The King of Queens, Girlfriends, Sister, Sister, Moesha, Being Mary Jane, The Game, Black Lightning, The Neighborhood, and Real Husbands of Hollywood. Farquhar’s career is notable for having scored more prime-time television series than any other African-American composer to date. Currently, Farquhar composes the score to the CBS soap opera Beyond the Gates. In 2026, he was nominated for a NAACP Image award for Outstanding Soundtrack for “The Proud Family: Louder & Prouder”. A native of Chicago, he is the youngest of five children. He is the younger brother of television producer and writer Ralph Farquhar, and the two have worked together on several shows. Farquhar musical education took him from the streets of Chicago to the famed Berklee College of Music in Boston, The National Conservatory of Music in Versailles, France, and Eastern Illinois University, where he studied with noted percussion teacher Johnny Lane. In his l

Kurt Roger

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Kurt George Roger (3 May 1895 – 4 August 1966) was an Austrian–American composer. Roger was born in Austria on 3 May 1895 to Viennese parents and studied in Vienna with Guido Adler, and in class with Arnold Schoenberg - though not following Schoenberg’s 12-tone system. He taught at the Vienna Conservatoire from 1923 to 1938 and his works were receiving high-profile performances (including the premiere of his String Quintet No.1 by the Rosé String Quartet) until the Nazi Anschluss forced his emigration to the United States via London. He became an American citizen in 1945 and held teaching positions in New York and Washington DC, lecturing at several universities and giving radio talks, notably on Bruckner and Mahler. His music has received many notable performances including those by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Rafael Kubelik, the Rochester Philharmonic under Erich Leinsdorf, the New York Chamber Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra of Washington DC, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Northern Orchestra under Sir Charles Groves and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales under Jac van Steen. From 1948 onwards Roger was invited back to Austria on lecture tours, whose

Kurt Stallmann

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Kurt Stallmann (born 1964) is an American composer who lives and works in Houston, Texas. Education Kurt Stallmann was born in Rockford, Illinois. In 1987, he received a bachelor’s degree in music from Northern Illinois University. That year, he moved to Boston, Massachusetts, where he composed, improvised, and collaborated with modern dance choreographers. In 1990, Yasuko Tokunaga invited Stallmann to join the Dance Division faculty at The Boston Conservatory to design a course for dancers that developed listening and analysis skills for the purpose of creating new choreography. In 1992, after several years of working with dance, he returned to a concentrated musical environment by entering the PhD program in music composition at Harvard University, where his primary teachers were Bernard Rands and Mario Davidovsky. As a student, he also assisted composer Ivan Tcherepnin with electronic music courses for several years. Teaching In 1999, after graduating, Stallmann joined the Harvard Music Department faculty, as Assistant Professor of Music. During this time, he combined the two studios then at Harvard (HEMS, created by Tcherepnin, and HCMC, created by Davidovsky) into one entity,

Kurt Weill

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Kurt Julian Weill (; ; March 2, 1900 – April 3, 1950) was a German-born American composer active from the 1920s in his native country, and in his later years in the United States. He was a leading composer for the stage who was best known for his fruitful collaborations with Bertolt Brecht. With Brecht, he wrote his best-known work, The Threepenny Opera, which includes the ballad “Mack the Knife”. Weill held the ideal of writing music that served a socially useful purpose, Gebrauchsmusik. He also wrote several works for the concert hall and a number of works on Jewish themes. He fled Nazi Germany in 1933, arriving in the United States two years later. Settling in New York, he made a substantial contribution to American musical theater through works such as Lady in the Dark and Street Scene. Family and childhood Weill was born on March 2, 1900, the third of four children to Albert Weill (1867–1950) and Emma Weill (née Ackermann; 1872–1955). He grew up in a religious Jewish family in the “Sandvorstadt”, the Jewish quarter in Dessau in Saxony (now part of Saxony-Anhalt), where his father was a cantor. At the age of twelve, Weill started taking piano lessons and made his first attempts at

Kyle Gann

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Kyle Eugene Gann (born November 21, 1955, in Dallas, Texas) is an American composer, professor of music, critic, analyst, and musicologist who has worked primarily in the New York City area. As a music critic for The Village Voice (from 1986 to 2005) and other publications, he has supported progressive music, including such “downtown” movements as postminimalism and totalism. Biography Gann was born in 1955 and raised in a musical family. He began composing at the age of 13. After graduating in 1973 from Dallas’s Skyline High School, he attended Oberlin Conservatory of Music, where he obtained a B.Mus. in 1977, and Northwestern University, where he received his M.Mus. and D.Mus. in 1981 and 1983, respectively. As well as studying composition with Randolph Coleman at Oberlin, he also studied Renaissance counterpoint with Greg Proctor at the University of Texas at Austin. which was written for solo piano in 1959 and later revised. The creation of November was inspired by Johnson’s UCLA college friend La Monte Young’s Trio for Strings, written in 1958. Johnson recorded part of it in 1962 on audio cassette. November was in turn an inspiration for Young’s 1964 The Well-Tuned Piano. Youn

La Monte Young

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La Monte Thornton Young (born October 14, 1935) is an American composer, musician, and performance artist recognized as one of the first American minimalist composers and a central figure in post-war avant-garde music. He is best known for his exploration of sustained tones, beginning with his 1958 composition Trio for Strings. His compositions have called into question the nature and definition of music, most prominently in the text scores of his Compositions 1960. Young played jazz saxophone and studied composition in California during the 1950s, and subsequently moved to New York in 1960, where he was a central figure in the downtown music and Fluxus art scenes. He then became known for his pioneering work in drone music (originally called dream music) with his Theatre of Eternal Music collective, alongside collaborators such as Tony Conrad, John Cale, and his wife, the multimedia artist Marian Zazeela. In 1964, he began work on his unfinished improvisatory composition The Well-Tuned Piano, iterations of which he has performed throughout subsequent decades. Young worked extensively with Zazeela between 1962 and her death in 2024; together, the two recorded, performed live, and d

Lane Tietgen

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Lane Tietgen (born Topeka, Kansas ) was an American poet, composer and musician who sang and played guitar and bass. Tietgen lived in the Bay Area in California. He died on 14 July 2020, as reported in the Sonoma News A number of Tietgen’s songs have been covered by famous musicians, including “Captain Bobby Stout” and “Martha’s Madman” by Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, “Early Bird Cafe” by John Mellencamp, “It Can’t Make Any Difference to Me” by Dave Mason, and “Red and Black Blues” by Ringo Starr. In 2006 Ice Cube used a melody by Tietgen for his song, “Click, Clack – Get Back!,” on the album Laugh Now, Cry Later. Tietgen began his musical career as the guitarist and primary songwriter for The Serfs, who achieved some fame in and around the band’s home state of Kansas. In 1970, the blues-jazz-rock band, The Jerry Hahn Brotherhood, recorded seven Tietgen compositions, including “Captain Bobby Stout”, “Early Bird Cafe”, and “Martha’s Madman”. The Jerry Hahn Brotherhood featured Hahn, Mike Finnigan, Clyde Graves and George Marsh. In 2009 The Serfs were inducted into the Kansas Music Hall of Fame. That same year, Tietgen released a solo album, Wheels of Fortune, featuring all original so

Larry Austin

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Larry Don Austin (September 12, 1930 – December 30, 2018) was an American composer noted for his electronic and computer music works. He was a co-founder and editor of the avant-garde music periodical Source: Music of the Avant Garde. Austin gained additional international recognition when he realized a completion of Charles Ives’s Universe Symphony. Austin served as the president of the International Computer Music Association (ICMA) from 1990 to 1994 and served on the board of directors of the ICMA from 1984 to 1988 and from 1990 to 1998. Early life Austin was born in Duncan, Oklahoma. He received a bachelor’s (Music Education, 1951) and master’s degree (Music, 1952) from University of North Texas College of Music. In 1955 he studied at Mills College, and from 1955 to 1958 he engaged in graduate study at the University of California, Berkeley, leaving to accept a faculty position at the University of California, Davis. Austin studied with Canadian composer Violet Archer at the University of North Texas, French composer Darius Milhaud at Mills College, and with American composer Andrew Imbrie at the University of California, Berkeley. Teaching career Austin taught at the Universit

Larry Grossman (composer)

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Larry Grossman (born September 3, 1938) is an American composer of stage and screen. Early life A Chicago native, Grossman graduated from Northwestern University School Communication in 1960. Career He started working in New York City as a vocal coach and accompanist. One of his songs was used in the revue No Shoestrings (1962). Grossman began working with lyricist Hal Hackady in 1968, and their first piece together was the title song for the play Play It Again, Sam. The pair collaborated on the Broadway musicals Minnie’s Boys (1970) and Goodtime Charley (1975). Grossman composed Snoopy: The Musical with Hackady in 1975, which has since been performed in six languages worldwide with the first London production receiving an Olivier award nomination. Grossman collaborated with theatre legend Harold Prince on Broadway productions of A Doll’s Life (1982) and Grind (1985), for which he received Tony nominations. He adapted the 1973 film Paper Moon, itself based on a 1971 novel, into a musical of the same name, which premiered at the Paper Mill Playhouse in 1993. A revised version was staged at the Goodspeed Opera House, the Walnut Street Theatre, and then Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D

Larry Harlow (musician)

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Larry Harlow (born Lawrence Ira Kahn; March 20, 1939 – August 20, 2021) was an American salsa music pianist, performer, composer, band leader and producer. He was born into a musical American family of Jewish descent. Background Summary Harlow was born Lawrence Ira Kahn on March 20, 1939, in Brownsville, Brooklyn, the son of Rose ( Sherman; 1910–1975) and Buddy Kahn ( Nathan Kahn; 1909–1981), and brother of Andy Harlow ( Andre H. Kahn; born 1945). His mother was an opera singer with the stage name Rose Sherman in New York. His father was the bandleader at the Latin Quarter in New York under the name Buddy Harlowe. Harlow was affectionately nicknamed “El Judío Maravilloso” (The Marvelous Jew). Contributions Among Harlow’s further contributions to music was his insistence on creation of a Latin Grammy Award (before the category merged in 2010 with less-specific jazz ones. A year after the trustees who oversee the Grammy Awards cut 31 categories in May 2011, they drew fierce protests from Latin jazz musician Bobby Sanabria, Carlos Santana, Paul Simon and Herbie Hancock among others, and the Grammys Trustees Board voted to reinstate the award for Best Latin Jazz Album in June 2012). La

Larry Mullins (musician)

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Lawrence Edward Mullins, also known as Toby Dammit, (born 13 December 1966 in Knoxville, Tennessee) is an American musician, record producer, and composer. A multi-instrumentalist (primarily drums, percussion, and keyboards), Mullins is best known as a member of the bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Swans, as well as a former member of The Stooges and other incarnations of Iggy Pop’s bands. He has also worked extensively in music for films and television, and had a performance role in the German cable series Babylon Berlin. Music career Mullins played drums in Iggy Pop’s band from 1990 to 1999, recording three albums and additional works created specifically for films. In 2011, he joined Iggy and The Stooges in England, and remained their live drummer until their final performance in 2013. Mullins joined Swans in 1995 and continued working with Swans frontman Michael Gira in Angels of Light into 2003. He rejoined Swans in 2019 for the recording of their album Leaving Meaning, and remains a member as of 2026. Mullins’s percussion work appeared throughout the score for Johnny Depp’s 1997 film The Brave, where he is credited as “Lawrence Mullins.” His original composition for the

Larry Polansky

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Larry Polansky (October 16, 1954 – May 9, 2024) was an American composer, guitarist, mandolinist, and academic. Biography Polansky was born on October 16, 1954, in New York City to first-generation Jewish-American parents. He grew up in Valley Stream, Nassau County, Long Island. He became fascinated with the guitar from an early age, which remained central to his work throughout his life. He failed his senior-year English class but was allowed to graduate from high school in 1972 due to high SAT scores. The brother of the writer Steven Polansky, Polansky read mathematics and music at the University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC), graduating in 1977. Music historian and musician Amy C. Beal was his long time partner and frequent musical collaborator. Polansky died on May 9, 2024, at the age of 69. Discography Source: * freeHorn (2017, Cold Blue Music) * Three Pieces for Two Pianos (2016, New World Records) * The World’s Longest Melody (2010, New World Records, featuring Zwerm guitar quartet) * The Theory of Impossible Melody (1990, Artifact Recordings; 2008 Reissue on New World Records) * Trios (2004, Pogus CDs, with Douglas Repetto, Tom Erbe, Chris Mann, Christian Wolff) * Four V

Laura Clayton

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Laura Clayton (born December 8, 1943) is an American pianist and composer. She was born in Lexington, Kentucky, and studied at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore and at Columbia University, New York, with Mario Davidovsky. She began studying composition with Darius Milhaud at the Aspen Music School and graduated with a Master of Music in Composition from the New England Conservatory in Boston. She lived for a while in Brazil and then continued her studies at the University of Michigan, graduating with a Doctorate of Musical Arts. After completing her education, she worked as a composer. In 1980, her work was chosen to represent the United States at the International Rostrum of Composers. Her compositional style has been describes as rhythmically complex with a “highly refined sense of mystery”, inspired by images of nature. Cree Songs for the Newborn, based on creole poems, was chosen to represent the USA at the 1980 UNESCO International Rostrum of Composers in Paris. Honors and awards *Charles Ives Prize from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, 1980 *Walter B. Hinrichsen Award *NEA awards *Jerome Foundation grant *University of Michigan grant *Alice M. Ditso

Laura Kaminsky

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Laura Kaminsky (born September 28, 1956) is an American composer, producer of musical and multi-disciplinary cultural events, and educator. She was born in New York City, graduated from the High School of Music and Art, and studied with Joseph Wood at Oberlin College and Mario Davidovsky at City College of New York. She graduated from City College/CUNY with a Master of Arts degree in composition in 1980. Career Kaminsky has maintained an active composing studio and has had her music performed internationally. She is the recipient of numerous prestigious awards and fellowships. In addition, her music has been extensively recorded. She has received national recognition for her innovative cultural programming and has held posts at a number of important institutions including New York City’s 92nd Street Y, Town Hall, and Symphony Space, where she is currently artistic director. In 1984 she co-founded and remains the artistic director of the new music collective, Musicians Accord, which is in residence at City College of New York, where the ensemble members work with Professor David Del Tredici and his graduate composition students. From 1992-93 Kaminsky lived and worked in Ghana, where

Laura Schwendinger

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Laura Elise Schwendinger (born January 26, 1962) was the first composer to win the American Academy in Berlin’s Berlin Prize. Biography Schwendinger was the first composer to win the American Academy in Berlin Prize, and her opera Artemisia, is the winner of the 2023, American Academy of Arts and Letters Charles Ives Opera Award, the largest such award for vocal music in the US. Additionally, she is a recipient of a 2009 Guggenheim Fellowship and fellowships from the Yaddo Colony, MacDowell, Bogliasco Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Conference Center. She is a Professor of Composition at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where she is also the Artistic Director of the Contemporary Chamber Ensemble and Head of Composition. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California Berkeley, where she studied with Andrew Imbrie and Olly Wilson. Schwendinger has been invited to present her music to seminars at Harvard University, Northwestern University, the University of Chicago, Yale University, the Juilliard School, the University of California at Berkeley Davis, University of California Los Angeles, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and the Royal Irish Academy o

Laura Sedgwick Collins

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Laura Sedgwick Collins (c. 1859 – April 20, 1927) was an American musician, composer, lyricist, and actress. Born in Poughkeepsie, she was active as a music educator and composer in New York. While she composed a wide range of works, she was most productive in creating music for the stage and as a composer of art songs. She is remembered for being the first American woman to study music composition with Antonín Dvořák. and Emily L. Collins, Laura Collins was born in Poughkeepsie, New York, c. 1859. Her mother was a painter and her father was a civil servant. Her initial music studies were with her mother, followed by studies under W. H. B. Matthews, Henry Wolfgang Amadeus Beale, Oscar Coon, and Carl Bergstein. She belonged to the Music Teachers National Association, and was a prolific writer of songs for children for use in music education. an organization credited as providing opportunities for women composers at a time when opportunities were rarely available elsewhere. Laura Sedgwick Collins died on April 20, 1927, aged 68, at the Knickerbocker Hospital in Manhattan. Resurgence of her music In the early 1990s, there was a brief resurgence of interest in Collins’s music in the Ne

Laura Shigihara

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is a Japanese-American singer-songwriter, composer, video game developer, and Twitch streamer. She is best known as the lead composer and sound designer for the tower defense game Plants vs. Zombies and the creator of the acclaimed indie RPG Rakuen. Shigihara has worked on over 30 other published video game titles including Deltarune, World of Warcraft, To the Moon, defunct mobile game High School Story and the 5th Anniversary Edition of Super Meat Boy. She co-created the ending theme song for Minecraft: The Story of Mojang with C418 and worked together with Yasunori Mitsuda on the official Square Enix Chrono Trigger/Chrono Cross 20th Anniversary Album. Early life Born in the United States to a Japanese father and a French American mother, Shigihara grew up in both the US and Japan. she was given an old version of Sonar (known as Cakewalk since 2018) which she used to start learning about mixing, arranging and production by recreating old video game soundtracks and composing her own songs. After a friend leaked her original material to record companies in Japan, Shigihara was offered record contracts as a singer there, but ended up turning them down for personal reasons. Career Sho

Lauren Bernofsky

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Lauren Bernofsky is an American composer of solo, chamber and choral music as well as larger-scale works for orchestra, film, musical, opera, and ballet. Trained as a violinist, she is particularly known for her writing for brass and winds. Her Concerto for Trumpet and Orchestra is frequently performed as audition and recital repertoire and has been featured in the journal of the International Trumpet Guild; it was also the subject of a doctoral dissertation. Her piece “Sonatine” for flute and piano won the National Flute Association’s Newly Published Music Competition. She has taught at the Peabody Institute. Bernofsky studied at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts (NOCCA), The Hartt School, where she was a student of Eric Rosenblith, New England Conservatory of Music, and at Boston University, where she studied under Lukas Foss. While at NOCCA, she met and took lessons from Ellis Marsalis. Bernofsky’s music is generally tonal/modal, showing influences of Shostakovich, Ravel, Prokofiev, klezmer, and other Eastern European folk music, and often features soaring melodic lines set over syncopation-fueled rhythms and contemporary/experimental approaches to chord structure. Her Tr

Laurence Traiger

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Laurence Traiger (October 16, 1956 – October 18, 2024) was an American composer. Originally from Bellmore, Long Island, New York, he studied and worked in Europe since 1976. Life and career At age 11 he composed duos for violin; at age 14 he took lessons in harmony, counterpoint and composition from his violin instructor, William Cosgriff, and at 16 had a work performed at the Hartt School of Music. In 1974 he graduated from John F. Kennedy High School (Bellmore, New York) where he studied under Barry A. Beeber and performed with the Long Island Youth Orchestra and the Long Island Holiday Festival Orchestra under Martin C. Dreiwitz. He received a scholarship from the University of Kansas, studying composition under Prof. John Pozdro. Leaving Kansas after his sophomore year, he moved to Europe. He first studied with Prof. Cesar Bresgen at the Mozarteum University of Salzburg, graduating in 1980. From 1980 to 1982 Traiger studied at the Conservatoire National in Paris with Ivo Malec. In 1982 he became a student in the master class of Wilhelm Killmayer at the Munich College of Music. His list of works include chamber music, choral music, orchestral music, film music as well as composi

Laurie San Martin

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Laurie Ann San Martin in Oakland, California. where she was one of the last students of Richard Swift before his retirement. In 1999, she was awarded a MacDowell Colony Fellowship. She was awarded an American Academy of Arts and Letters Charles Ives Scholarship in 2000. In 2003, she obtained her PhD in theory and composition at Brandeis University; her doctoral dissertation Compositional devices: How melodic and harmonic elements function to achieve a large-scale dramatic structure in the first movement of Andrew Imbrie’s “Spring Fever” was supervised by Martin Boykan. In April 2010, her piece Two Pieces for Piano and Percussion was performed at a Louis Karchin premiere at the Kaufman Music Center, performed by the Washington Square Ensemble. In 2011, the American Contemporary Music Ensemble selected her piece Linea Negra, which The New York Times called “fitfully leaping and rolling”, to be performed at Joe’s Pub. In 2016, she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. She won the 2018 American Academy of Arts and Letters Andrew Imbrie Award in Music. Her piece Seven Pines premiered at Radius Ensemble’s May 2019 concert; Zoë Madonna of the Boston Globe compared it to “a series of alchem

Laurie Spiegel

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Laurie Spiegel (born September 20, 1945) is an American composer. She has worked at Bell Laboratories, in computer graphics, and is known primarily for her electronic music compositions and her algorithmic composition software Music Mouse. She is also a guitarist and lutenist. Spiegel’s musical interpretation of Johannes Kepler’s Harmonice Mundi appeared on “Sounds of Earth” section of the Voyager Golden Record. Her 1972 piece “Sediment” was included in the 2012 film The Hunger Games. She has been inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame. Education Spiegel was born on September 20, 1945, in Chicago. Her early musical experiences were largely self-directed, beginning with the mandolin, guitar, and banjo she had as a child, which she learned to play by ear. She became interested in electronics after using a tape-operated computer at Purdue University as part of a high school class field trip. At the age of 20, she taught herself Western music notation, after which she began writing down her compositions. Spiegel attended Shimer College in Naperville, Illinois, through the school’s early entrance program. She subsequently spent a year at the University of Oxford through an exch

Lawrence Benjamin Brown

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Lawrence Benjamin Brown (August 29, 1893 – December 25, 1972) was an American singer, composer and pianist born in Jacksonville, Florida. He is best known for his arrangements of Negro spirituals, many of which he performed as accompanist for Paul Robeson, performing on piano and singing harmony. Early life Lawrence was raised by his father, Clark Benjamin Brown, and his stepmother, Cenia Brown. Lawrence’s birth mother died when he was three years old. Clark and his father were formerly enslaved. Education and early career Brown’s first music teacher was William Riddick, and was sent to study his principal instrument, piano, in Boston, Massachusetts. He worked as an elevator operator to make up for the costs his scholarships did not cover. He made his debut as a concert accompanist for tenor Sydney Woodward, and was later discovered by tenor Roland Hayes, with whom he toured from 1918 to 1923, including a performance at Buckingham Palace in 1921. While in England, he attended Trinity College for advanced training, where he received education in composition from Amanda Aldridge. In addition to piano and vocal arrangements, he performed string arrangements with cellist Beatrice Harri

Lawrence Chandler

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Lawrence Dean Chandler (born 27 November 1961) is a British American composer, musician, producer and sound artist based in London. Best known as a founding member of seminal New York duo Bowery Electric, he works in ambient, contemporary classical, electronic and experimental styles. Life and career Chandler studied English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences before pursuing formal training in music composition. Following Bowery Electric’s final tour in 2000, he took a hiatus during which he studied composition privately with La Monte Young and Pauline Oliveros, with Conrad Cummings at The Juilliard School, worked for Philip Glass and completed a Master of Music in Composition from Goldsmiths College in London. He returned in 2009 with Everybody Here Is Fine, commissioned for Make Music New York and premiered at The Bell House, Brooklyn on 21 June 2009. Subsequent works include: Music for Rock Ensemble, commissioned for 50 Years of Minimalism, premiered by Chandler, Katia and Marielle Labèque and ensemble at Kings Place, London on 26 November 2011;The Tuning of the World, a realisation of his evolving 24-hour, 24 part, sustained

Lawrence Dillon

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Lawrence Dillon (born July 3, 1959) is an American composer, and Composer in Residence at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. His music has a wide range of expression, generally within a tonal idiom notable both for its rhythmic propulsiveness and a strong lyrical element. Acclaimed particularly for his chamber music, he has also written extensively for voice and large ensembles. Early life and education Dillon was born in Summit, New Jersey to James and Jeanne Beaumont Dillon. He was the youngest of eight children. His father died of a brain tumor when Lawrence was two; his mother lived well into her nineties. He lost 50% of his hearing in an early childhood bout with chicken pox. Intrigued by his siblings’ piano lessons, he began his own at age seven, and soon developed a habit of composing a new work for his lesson each week. After undergraduate studies at the Hartt School of Music, he became the youngest composer to earn a doctorate at The Juilliard School, winning the Gretchaninoff Prize upon graduation (1985). He studied privately with Vincent Persichetti, and in classes with Milton Babbitt, Elliott Carter, David Diamond, Leon Kirchner and Roger Sessions. Oth

Lazar Weiner

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Lazar Weiner (, October 24, 1897 – January 10, 1982) was a Russian and American composer of Jewish music. He also worked as conductor, vocal coach, and accompanist. He was trained as a pianist at the Kiev Conservatory where he began his studies at the age of 13. He studied music composition in New York with Frederick Jacobi and Robert Russell Bennett, and was also well known vocal coach in Manhattan. The composer Yehudi Wyner was his son. Works Weiner composed more than 200 art songs as well as Yiddish and Hebrew cantatas and full synagogue services. He wrote several cantatas, among them Legend of Toil (1933), Fight for Freedom (1943), and To Thee, America (1944). He also wrote the music to the Yiddish play Generations of Green Fields (1974). References External links * Biography at the Milken Archive of Jewish Music

Lazare Saminsky

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Lazare Saminsky (born Lazar Semyonovich Saminsky; ; 8 November 1882 – 30 June 1959) was a Russian-American performer, conductor and composer, especially of Jewish music. Life Born to a merchant family in Valehotsulove (now ), near Odessa, Saminsky received a broad education in the arts, sciences and languages. He studied music at the Odessa Conservatoire from 1903–1905, and then went to Moscow, where he studied mathematics and philosophy as well as music. Expelled for his participation in the student protests of 1905, he went to St.Petersburg, where he studied with Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Anatoly Lyadov, and Nikolai Tcherepnin. While still a student he became a founder member, with Mikhail Gnesin, Lyubov Streicher, and others, of the ‘Society for Jewish Folk Music’. He wrote music for the Society and helped organise its earliest publication. He continued an active member, even though from 1911 to 1918 he lived in Tbilisi, where he also interested himself in Georgian and Armenian music, and from 1917 to 1918 he was head of the conservatory. During this period he also wrote an opera Tsar Yulian (Emperor Julian) (which he later destroyed), and researched Jewish music of the Caucasian

Leah Reid

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Leah Christinne Reid After attending Walnut Hill School as a composition and vocal performance major, In 2016, her piece Single Fish was performed at MicroFest by Accordant Commons in Los Angeles; Elizabeth Hambleton of New Classic LA called it “a great celebration of the sounds three humans can make together”. In 2017, she was appointed a MacDowell Fellow. Her experimental piece “Sk(etch)”, where she would record herself writing words, was featured on NPR Morning Edition in January 2022, and it won the Tesselat Electronic Music Competition. and she was the first-place winner of the 2022 Musicworks Electronic Music Composition Contest with her acousmatic piece Reverie. In 2023, she was awarded a second MacDowell fellowship. She works at the University of Virginia as an assistant professor of composition. She has also served in Society for Electro-Acoustic Music in the United States as vice-president for programs and projects, as well as vice-president of the International Alliance for Women in Music. As of 2022, she lived in Woburn, Massachusetts. She is married to James DeMuth. References

Lee Hoiby

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Lee Henry Hoiby (February 17, 1926 – March 28, 2011) was an American composer and classical pianist. Best known as a composer of operas and songs, he was a disciple of composer Gian Carlo Menotti. Biography Hoiby was born in Madison, Wisconsin. A child prodigy, he began playing the piano at the age of 5. He studied at the University of Wisconsin under notable pianists Gunnar Johansen and Egon Petri. He then became a pupil of Darius Milhaud at Mills College. Hoiby became influenced by a variety of composers, particularly personalities in the twentieth century avant garde, including the Pro Arte String Quartet led by Rudolf Kolisch, brother-in-law of Arnold Schoenberg. During his youth, Hoiby played with Harry Partch’s Dadaist ensembles. Following his studies at Mills College, he entered the Curtis Institute of Music where he was mentored in music composition by Gian Carlo Menotti, who introduced Hoiby to opera, and involved him in the Broadway productions of The Consul and The Saint of Bleecker Street. Though at first he intended to pursue a career as a concert pianist, he eventually became more interested in composing. Hoiby died on March 28, 2011, aged 85, in New York City from me

Lee Pattison

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Lee Pattison (July 22, 1890, in Grand Rapids, Wisconsin – December 22, 1966, in Claremont, California) was a noted American pianist, composer, arranger, opera director, and teacher. From about 1919 until 1931 he was a member of the popular two-piano team of Guy Maier and Lee Pattison. Lee Pattison Recital Hall at Scripps College in Claremont, California, is named for him. Early life Lee (Marion) Pattison was born in Grand Rapids, Wisconsin, on July 22, 1890. His father, Joseph Marion Pattison, was a public school teacher, and his mother, Mary Alice McVicker, a private music teacher. While he was still a boy, his family moved to Iowa. Maier and Pattison returned to Boston in 1914. Maier and Pattison After Maier and Pattison heard a two-piano performance by Harold Bauer (1873–1951) and Ossip Gabrilowitsch (1878–1936), they began to play together. In 1928, they gave the Carnegie Hall premiere of Mozart’s Andante and Variations, K. 501, a work composed in 1786 but never before played in the New York hall. As their reputation grew, they became known as “The Piano Twins.” In March 1937, Maier and Pattison joined in a reunion concert on the stage of the Works Progress Administration Theat

Leilehua Lanzilotti

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Leilehua Lanzilotti (born November 5, 1983), is a Kanaka Maoli composer, multimedia artist, performer, and scholar of contemporary classical music. Early life and education Lanzilotti grew up in Honolulu, Hawaiʻi. Lanzilotti spent much of her childhood playing in the galleries and gardens of The Contemporary Museum in Honolulu as a child where her mother was Curator of Education. Lanzilotti attended Punahou School and Beijing Normal University Middle School No. 2 (School Year Abroad), and then continued her education at Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, Yale School of Music, and Manhattan School of Music. and the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin. Andrew Norman, Caroline Shaw, Lanzilotti premiered Dai Fujikura’s Viola Concerto, Wayfinder, at the Tokyo Metropolitan Theatre during the 2022 Born Creative Festival. Lanzilotti’s album in manus tuas (New Focus Recordings, 2019), was featured in Bandcamp’s The Best Contemporary Classical Albums of 2019 and The Boston Globe Top 10 Classical Albums of 2019. Other albums including Lanzilotti’s music are forever forward in search of the beautiful (New Focus Recordings), In addition to Lanzilotti’s work as a soloist performing her own wor

Leith Stevens

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Leith Stevens (September 13, 1909 – July 23, 1970) was an American music composer and conductor of radio and film scores. Early life and education Leith Stevens was born in Mount Moriah, Missouri, He was a child prodigy pianist who accompanied operatic vocalist and early audio recording artist Madame Schumann-Heink. During World War II Stevens worked as radio director for the Southwest Pacific Area for the U.S. Office of War Information. He was musical director of the War Production Board (WPB) series Three Thirds of a Nation presented on Wednesdays on the NBC Blue Network. Career As early as 1934, Stevens was active in radio broadcasting. Radio highlights in an April 28, 1934, newspaper listed “Romantic songs have been chosen by Charles Carlile, tenor, for his broadcast with Leith Stevens’ orchestra over WBBM at 5:45.” Stevens worked as an arranger for CBS radio, and his numerous radio credits over several decades include The Abbott and Costello Show, Academy Award Theater, Action Eighty, American School for the Air, Arch Oboler’s Plays, Big Town, The Black Book, CBS Radio Workshop (later called Columbia Workshop), The Doctor Fights, Encore Theater, Escape, The Free Company Rogue'

Lejaren Hiller

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Lejaren Arthur Hiller Jr. (February 23, 1924 – January 26, 1994) was an American composer, computer scientist, and chemist. Career Hiller was born on February 23, 1924, in New York City. His father, Lejaren Hiller Sr., was a well-known art photographer who specialized in historical tableaux. As a child, Lejaren Jr. played piano, oboe, clarinet, and saxophone. While earning a degree in chemistry at Princeton University, he also studied composition with Roger Sessions and Milton Babbitt. In 1957, he collaborated with Leonard Isaacson on his Illiac Suite, Hiller was met with hostility from the musical establishment; both Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of Musicians and The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians refused to include him until shortly before his death. A majority of Hiller’s works after 1957 do not involve computers at all, but might include stochastic music, indeterminacy, serialism, Brahmsian traditionalism, jazz, performance art, folk song and counterpoint mixed together. In 1958, Hiller founded the Experimental Music Studios at the University of Illinois. He created the MUSICOMP (“MUsic SImulator-Interpreter for COMpositional Procedures”) programming language for

Leland (musician)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Brett Leland McLaughlin (born July 22, 1987) is an American singer and songwriter. Based in Los Angeles, California, he has worked closely with a range of popular artists, including Selena Gomez, Troye Sivan, Daya, Andy Grammer, Kelsea Ballerini and Allie X. In December 2017, McLaughlin signed with Vertigo Berlin/Universal Music Germany for his career as a singer and is currently published by Sony/ATV Music Publishing. Since 2017, he has been the resident songwriter and producer for RuPaul’s Drag Race and some of its spin-offs. McLaughlin graduated from Belmont University’s School of Music in 2009 with a major in commercial voice. Discography Soundtrack albums Extended plays Singles As lead artist As featured artist Guest appearances Television RuPaul’s Drag Race Leland co-wrote Kardashian: The Musical, as well as the songs “VH1 Divas Live” and “Kitty Girls”, which were featured on the ninth season and All Stars 3 of VH1’s RuPaul’s Drag Race. He was a guest on the sixth episode of All Stars 3, second episode of All Stars 4, twelfth episode of season 12, the seventh episode of All Stars 6 and the seventh episode of Drag Race 18. Leland co-wrote “I’m That Bitch” and “You Think You Kn

Lena Raine

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Lena Raine ( or ; born February 29, 1984), also known as Lena Chappelle or Kuraine, in Seattle, Washington. Her father is a musician and her mother is a dancer. She had an early exposure to music due to participation in choir at a young age. Her father was also a violinist. Raine began working at large studios while located in Seattle, Washington, She worked on Guild Wars 2 at ArenaNet for six years as a designer and soundtrack composer. being released during the same time as her personal work on websites like Bandcamp. She subsequently composed another three new tracks for “The Wild Update” released in 2022, and then five new tracks for the 2024 “Tricky Trials” update. Raine assisted with the soundtrack for the second chapter of Deltarune and first worked with Wishes Unlimited as the composer for the adventure RPG Chicory: A Colorful Tale, On June 8, 2023, Wishes Unlimited announced their new game Beastieball, with Raine returning as the composer. On November 12, 2024, the game entered early access and the existing soundtrack was released on Raine’s Bandcamp page, with all tracks released during early access planned to be later added to the album. On May 28, 2024, Raine announced

Lennie Niehaus

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Leonard Niehaus (June 1, 1929 – May 28, 2020) was an American alto saxophonist, composer and arranger on the West Coast jazz scene. He played with the Stan Kenton Orchestra and served as one of Kenton’s primary staff arrangers. He also played with Ray Vasquez and trombonist and Vocalist, Phil Carreon and other jazz bands on the U.S. West Coast. Niehaus had a close association as composer and arranger on motion pictures produced and directed by Clint Eastwood. He continued to serve as a staff arranger for Kenton into the 1960s. He would go on during that time to write and arrange music for entertainers acts such as the King Sisters, Mel Tormé, Dean Martin, and Carol Burnett. Orchestrating and composing for television and film By the age of 33, in 1962, he began orchestrating for television and film composer Jerry Fielding. Niehaus worked with Fielding on approximately seventy TV shows and films like Hogan’s Heroes, Charlie’s Angels and McMillan & Wife. Films on this list include Straw Dogs (1971), Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974) by Sam Peckinpah, the comedy The Bad News Bears (1976), and the horror film Demon Seed (1977). After Fielding’s death Niehaus came into his own a

Lennie Tristano

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Leonard Joseph Tristano (March 19, 1919 – November 18, 1978) was an American jazz pianist, composer, arranger, and teacher of jazz improvisation. Tristano studied for bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music in Chicago before moving to New York City in 1946. He played with leading bebop musicians and formed his own small bands, which soon displayed some of his early interests – contrapuntal interaction of instruments, harmonic flexibility, and rhythmic complexity. His quintet in 1949 recorded the first free group improvisations. Tristano’s innovations continued in 1951, with the first overdubbed, improvised jazz recordings, and two years later, when he recorded an atonal improvised solo piano piece that was based on the development of motifs rather than on harmonies. He developed further via polyrhythms and chromaticism into the 1960s, but his music was infrequently recorded. Tristano started teaching music, especially improvisation, in the early 1940s, and by the mid-1950s was concentrating on teaching in preference to performing. He taught in a structured and disciplined manner, which was unusual in jazz education when he began. His educational role over three decades meant that

Leo Birenberg

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Leo Birenberg is an American composer and orchestrator for film and television. Career Born in Kentucky and raised in Chicago, Birenberg studied composition at NYU and USC. While there, he started composing his first scores in collaboration with his roommate, filmmaker Jeremy Reitz. His favorite score is from Out of Africa. Under Beck’s tutelage, Birenberg worked as the score coordinator on numerous large projects, including The Muppets, Pitch Perfect, Runner Runner, and Frozen. In 2014, Birenberg started composing additional music for Beck’s films, including Muppets Most Wanted, Edge of Tomorrow, and Ant-Man. In 2014, Birenberg also started composing his own original scores for television shows, including Next Time on Lonny, The Britishes, Big Time in Hollywood, FL, and the YouTube Red series Sing It! In 2016, Birenberg received an email from producer Eric Appel, and asked to compose music for the then-upcoming FX series Son of Zorn. Upon approaching the series, he took the original up-beat synth-heavy score and replaced it with something that spanned a vast array of musical styles, sampling the styles of country music and church choirs. In 2017, Birenberg released a soundtrack fo

Leo Ornstein

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Leo Ornstein (born Lev Ornshteyn; ; c. December 11, 1895 – February 24, 2002) was an American experimental composer and pianist of the early twentieth century. His performances of works by avant-garde composers and his own innovative and even shocking pieces made him a cause célèbre on both sides of the Atlantic. The bulk of his experimental works were written for piano. Ornstein was the first important composer to make extensive use of the tone cluster. As a pianist, he was considered a world-class talent. By the mid-1920s, he had walked away from his fame and soon disappeared from popular memory. Though he gave his last public concert before the age of forty, he continued writing music for another half-century and beyond. Largely forgotten for decades, he was rediscovered in the mid-1970s. Ornstein completed his eighth and final piano sonata in September 1990 at the age of ninety-four, making him the oldest published composer in history at the time (a mark since passed by Elliott Carter). Early life Ornstein was born in Kremenchug, Poltava Governorate, Russian Empire (today part of Ukraine). He grew up in a musical environment—his father was a Jewish cantor (Hazzan), while a viol

Leo Rich Lewis

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Leo Rich Lewis (February 11, 1865 – September 8, 1945) was an American composer. Biography Leo Rich Lewis was born in Woodstock, Vermont on February 11, 1865. He graduated from Tufts College in Massachusetts in 1887, and earned two degrees from Harvard University in 1888 and 1889. Among Lewis’s notable students was Alan Hovhaness. He was also instrumental in securing the acceptance of the African American composer Jester Hairston to Tufts in 1927. Lewis died at Cambridge Hospital in Massachusetts on September 8, 1945. References External links *

Leo Rowlands

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Leo Rowlands, O.F.M. Cap. (1891–1967) was a Welsh Catholic priest and musical composer, associated with Rhode Island. Early life Rowlands was born to Welsh parents (his father was a Congregationalist missionary) in Madagascar on 17 September 1891 and spent the first seven years of his life there before returning to be educated in schools in London and Wales. In 1912 he graduated in music from the University of Wales, Cardiff, going on to the Royal Academy of Music where he studied the piano, composition and singing with Frederick Corder and York Bowen and took his doctorate in music in 1914. In the same year he was received into the Roman Catholic Church and joined the army, serving as a cyclist and gunner in Italy and Flanders. He was captured in Neuve Chapelle in March 1918 and remained a prisoner until the end of the war. Musical career After a period as a music teacher at the Seaford School in Seaford on the south coast of England, Rowlands joined the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin in 1920 and was ordained a priest in 1926. He spent the 1930s-1940s at the Friary of St Francis, Providence, Rhode Island, as part of a mission of the British Capuchin Province to the United States.

Leo Schulz

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Leo Schulz (March 28, 1865 – August 12, 1944 ) was a Kingdom of Prussia-born American cellist. Biography Schulz was born in Poznań, the then Kingdom of Prussia, currently Poland. His grandfather, a bandmaster in the Prussian army, was originally named Soltys but was obliged to adopt the German name Schultz. As a child he toured Germany as a pianist along with his sister, a violinist. At 13 attended the Royal Academic High School of Music in Berlin, where he studied under Robert Hausmann, Richard Barth, Woldermar Bargiel, Friedrich Kiel, and Joseph Joachim. He was a principal cellist in Berlin as well as in the Gewandhaus Orchestra of Leipzig from 1886 to 1889. In 1889 Schulz moved to Boston to take the post of principal cellist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He was professor of the New England Conservatory. He became a United States citizen in 1893. He was succeeded by Alfred Wallenstein. While in New York, he was also president of the New York Tonkünstler, played in the Mannes String Quartet and the Margulies Trio. He taught at the National Conservatory of Music of America in New York and at Yale University. In 1906 he started his own Leo Schulz Quartet. In the 1920s, with Mikh

Leo Smit (American composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Leo Smit (January 12, 1921 – December 12, 1999) was an American composer and pianist. Life Leo Smit was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. As a child his mother took him to the Soviet Union where he studied with the composer Dmitri Kabalevsky. He later studied piano in New York with Isabella Vengerova and José Iturbi and composition with Nicolas Nabokov. While working as George Balanchine’s rehearsal pianist, he met Igor Stravinsky. He often gave thematic recitalssometimes illustrated with his own slidesand performed a great deal of new music, especially works by Aaron Copland. His breakthrough as a composer came in 1957, when the Boston Symphony Orchestra played his First Symphony. In that year he moved to Los Angeles to teach at the University of California, Los Angeles. From 1962 he taught at the State University of New York at Buffalo. and Magic Water (1978). Later in his life, he composed nearly 100 songs to texts by Emily Dickinson. During recording sessions in 1978 and 1993, he recorded the complete solo piano music of Copland for Sony Classical, which has been issued as a 2-CD set. David Dubal praised these performances as “vivid, beautifully proportioned, and poetic”, and

Leo Sowerby

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Leo Salkeld Sowerby (1 May 1895 – 7 July 1968) was an American composer and church musician. He won the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1946 and was often called the “Dean of American church music” in the early to mid-20th century. His many students included Florence Price and Ned Rorem. Biography Leo Sowerby, son of Florence Gertrude Salkeld and John Sowerby, was born on 1 May 1895, in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where he began to compose at the age of 10. His interest in the organ began at the age of 15, and he was self-taught at the instrument. He studied composition with Arthur Olaf Andersen at the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago. Early recognition came when his Violin Concerto was premiered in 1913 by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. He spent time in France during the First World War in the role of bandmaster. In 1919, Sowerby became associate organist at Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago, and in 1927 he became organist and choirmaster at St. James Episcopal Church in Chicago, which was consecrated as a cathedral in 1955 while he was there. In 1962, after his retirement from St. James, he was called to Washington National Cathedral to become the founding director of the C

Leon Bates (pianist)

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Leon Bates (November 3, 1949 – November 21, 2025) was an American classical pianist. Background Leon Bates was born in Philadelphia, where by the age of six he had excelled in the study of music, specifically at playing the piano and violin. As a young artist, Bates was an understudy of Irene Beck. He also was a student of Natalie Hinderas at the Esther Boyer College of Music at Temple University in Philadelphia. While growing up, Leon Bates divided his time between two disparate passions: the pursuit of music and the physically demanding sport of body building. According to Karima A. Haynes, Leon Bates grew up defying stereotypes. Bates claims that the two disciplines have synergistic benefits. “The last piece on the program is the one that is the most demanding and dynamic. You don’t want to run out of energy as you are coming to the piece that demands the most from you. (Haynes qtd Bates 164).” Bates died on November 21, 2025. Career Bates toured the world, performing with many symphonies. In the United States, he has performed with both Philadelphia and Cleveland Orchestras, as well as New York and Los Angeles Philharmonics. He also performed with various symphonies such as Atl

Leon Carr

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Leon Carr (June 10, 1910 – March 27, 1976) was an American songwriter, composer, arranger, pianist, and conductor. He developed several famed marketing jingles used in advertisements, including “Sometimes You Feel Like a Nut…” for Mounds candy, “See the USA in Your Chevrolet” for Chevrolet, and the “Bert the Turtle” theme song for the 1952 nuclear public education awareness film Duck and Cover. Early life and education Carr was born in Allentown, Pennsylvania, on June 10, 1910. Carr was educated at Pennsylvania State University. He also studied the Schillinger System at New York University in New York City. Career Carr moved to New York City in 1935. His marketing jingles are among the best known in the history of broadcast advertising. His biggest non-jingle hit was “There’s No Tomorrow”, a parody of “O Sole Mio”, which was popularized by Tony Martin in the film Two Tickets to Broadway; it spent 27 weeks on the Billboard charts in 1949, peaking at #2. Carr’s other popular song compositions include “Bell Bottom Blues”, “Hotel Happiness”, “Herthquake”, “Hey There Lonely Girl”, “Your Socks Don’t Match”, “A Man Could Be a Wonderful Thing”, “Goblins in the Steeple”, “Big Name Button”

Leon Kirchner

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Leon Kirchner (January 24, 1919 – September 17, 2009) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he won a Pulitzer Prize for his String Quartet No. 3. Life and career Kirchner was born in Brooklyn, New York. He began his music studies at the age of four. Five years later, his family moved to Los Angeles. He began composing while a student at Los Angeles City College. With the encouragement of his piano teachers and Ernst Toch, he entered the University of California, Los Angeles to study with Arnold Schoenberg. Kirchner began graduate studies at the University of California, Berkeley and was awarded the George Ladd Prix de Paris in 1942. As World War II put Europe in turmoil, he went to New York and studied with Roger Sessions. At the war’s end, he returned to Berkeley as a lecturer and assisted Sessions and Ernest Bloch in theory. Kirchner held a Slee Professiorship at the University of Buffalo (succeeding Aaron Copland), and professorships at the University of California, University of Southern California, Yale University, the Juilliard School of Music, an

Leon Milo

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Leon Milo (December 10, 1956 - August 31, 2014) was an American composer, percussionist and sound artist. He was known for music and sonic environments in which instruments, electronics, natural sounds and synthesis are unified. His music is internationally recognized. Biography Early years Growing up in the Hollywood Hills, Milo had access to the most important artists on the west coast. In his teens, he studied with the renowned drummers Bill Douglass, Charles Flores and Joe Porcaro. At 15 years old, he began studying timpani and orchestral percussion with William Kraft, who introduced him to the classical orchestral repertoire and contemporary music. Milo went on to study with Kraft’s own teacher, Saul Goodman, at the Juilliard School. New York In 1975, Milo was accepted into the Juilliard School to study timpani and percussion with Saul Goodman and Elden C. “Buster” Bailey. At the same time and also at Juilliard, he began studying composition and contemporary music analysis with Stanley Wolfe, who encouraged him while writing his first pieces. Between 1975 and 1981 he worked in numerous orchestras and ensembles at Juilliard and as a freelance percussionist in New York City and

Leon Stein

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Leon Stein (September 18, 1910 in Chicago – May 9, 2002 in Laguna Hills, California) was an American composer and music analyst. Stein attended DePaul University, where he achieved his MM in 1935 and his Ph.D. in 1949; he studied under Leo Sowerby, Eric DeLamarter, Frederick Stock, and Hans Lange. He taught at DePaul from 1931 to 1978; he was dean of the School of Music there between 1966 and 1976. Stein was also Director of the Graduate Division at De Paul University of Music. College of Jewish Studies, Chicago. He directed a number of Chicago ensembles, including the City Symphony of Chicago. Stein’s compositions were modernist in character; his works for saxophone are his most popular pieces. He also wrote on music, particularly Jewish music. His manuscripts are held in the Richardson Library at DePaul. He has two sons. Books *The Racial Thinking of Richard Wagner (1950) *Structure and Style: The Study and Analysis of Musical Forms (1962, 3rd ed. 1979) *Anthology of Musical Forms (1962) Music ;Stage *The Fisherman’s Wife (1954) *Deirdre (1955) *2 early ballets ;Orchestral *Violin Concerto (1939) *3 Hassidic Dances (1940–41) *Symphony No. 1 (1940) *Symphony No. 2 (1942) *Triptych

Leonard B. Meyer

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Leonard B. Meyer (January 12, 1918 – December 30, 2007) was a composer, author, and philosopher. He contributed major works in the fields of aesthetic theory in music, and of compositional analysis. Career Meyer studied at Columbia University, where he received a B.A. in Philosophy and an M.A. in Music. He continued at University of Chicago, where he was awarded a Ph.D. in History of Culture in 1954. As a composer, he studied under Stefan Wolpe, Otto Luening, and Aaron Copland. In 1946, he became a member of the music department at the University of Chicago, in 1961 he was appointed professor of music at the University of Chicago and in 1975 professor of music and the humanities at the University of Pennsylvania. He became professor emeritus at Pennsylvania in 1988. Meyer’s 1967 work “Music, the Arts, and Ideas,” was influential in defining the transition to postmodernism in light of new works such as George Rochberg’s Music for the Magic Theater, which was premiered at the University of Chicago in 1967. Other major written works include The Rhythmic Structure of Music (with Grosvenor Cooper, 1960), Explaining Music (1973), and Style and Music: Theory, History, and Ideology (1989;

Leonard Bernstein

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Leonard Bernstein ( ; born Louis Bernstein; August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, pianist, music educator, author, and humanitarian. Considered to be one of the most important conductors of his time, he was the first American-born conductor to receive international acclaim. Bernstein was “one of the most prodigiously talented and successful musicians in American history” according to music critic Donal Henahan. two Tony Awards, and 16 Grammy Awards (including the Lifetime Achievement Award) as well as an Academy Award nomination. He received the Kennedy Center Honor in 1981. As a composer, Bernstein wrote in many genres, including symphonic and orchestral music, ballet, film and theatre music, choral works, opera, chamber music, and pieces for the piano. Bernstein’s works include the Broadway musical West Side Story, which continues to be regularly performed worldwide, and has been adapted into two (1961 and 2021) feature films, as well as three symphonies, Serenade (after Plato’s Symposium) (1954) and Chichester Psalms (1965), the original score for Elia Kazan’s On the Waterfront (1954), and theater works including On the Town (1944), Wonderful T

Leonard Kastle

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Leonard Gregory Kastle (February 11, 1929 – May 18, 2011) was an American opera composer, librettist, and director, although he is best known as the writer/director of the 1970 film The Honeymoon Killers, his only venture into the cinema, for which he did all his own research. He was an adjunct member of the SUNY Albany music faculty. In 1956, Kastle composed a thirteen-minute “made-to-measure” opera, titled The Swing, for two singers, a speaking part, and piano accompaniment. It was commissioned by and broadcast on the NBC television network on Sunday, June 10, 1956, at noon. He also wrote The Pariahs, about the sinking of the whaler Essex, a trilogy of operas about the Shakers known under the collective title The Passion of Mother Ann: A Sacred Festival Play, a children’s opera called Professor Lookalike and the Children, a piano concerto, sonatas for piano and violin, and three unproduced screenplays, Wedding at Cana, Change of Heart, and Shakespeare’s Dog. In a 2003 interview for the Criterion Collection, he said that no producer wanted Wedding at Cana, just another Honeymoon Killers, which he did not want to do. After The Honeymoon Killers, Kastle returned to teaching and comp

Leonard Rosenman

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Leonard Rosenman (September 7, 1924 – March 4, 2008) was an American film, television and concert composer with credits in over 130 works, including East of Eden, Rebel Without a Cause, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, Battle for the Planet of the Apes, Barry Lyndon, Race with the Devil, and the animated The Lord of the Rings. Life and career Rosenman was born in Brooklyn, New York, United States. Amongst Rosenman’s earliest film work were the scores for James Dean movies East of Eden (1955) and Rebel Without a Cause (1955). and it was Dean who introduced him to director Elia Kazan. Dean also lobbied George Stevens to let Rosenman score Giant, but Stevens preferred Dimitri Tiomkin. Rosenman remarked, “The year I did my first film, I had five major performances in New York.” But “the minute I did my first film, I didn’t have a performance there for 20 years. They would never say, ‘I don’t like them’. They wouldn’t look at them.” Rosenman instead wrote a largely atonal score, with a recurring motif as the main “theme,” building to a tonal conclusion. He provided scores to science fiction movies like Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970), Battle for the P

Leonardo Balada

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Leonardo Balada Ibáñez (born September 22, 1933) is a Spanish-American classical composer, who is noted for his operas and orchestral works. Life Balada was born in Barcelona, Spain. After studying piano at the Conservatori Superior de Música del Liceu in Barcelona, Balada emigrated to the United States in 1956 to study at the New York College of Music on scholarship. He left that institution for the Juilliard School in New York, from which he graduated in 1960. He studied composition with Vincent Persichetti, Alexandre Tansman and Aaron Copland, In 1981, he became a naturalized citizen of the United States. He taught at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania starting in 1970, and retired in 2020. Works Opera *Hangman, Hangman!, chamber opera (1982) *Zapata, opera (1984) *Christopher Columbus, opera (1986) *Death of Columbus, opera (1996) *The Town of Greed, chamber opera (1997) (sequel to Hangman, Hangman!) *Faust-bal, opera (2007) *Resurrection of Columbus, opera (2013) Orchestral *Symphonies **Symphony No. 1 Sinfonia en Negro, a homage to Martin Luther King (1968) **Symphony No. 2 Cumbres, a short symphony for band (1972) **Symphony No. 3 Steel Symphony (1972) **

Leopold Auer

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Leopold von Auer (; June 7, 1845 – July 15, 1930) was a Hungarian violinist, academic, conductor, composer, and instructor. Many of his students went on to become prominent concert performers and teachers. Early life and career Auer was born in Veszprém, Hungary, 7 June 1845, to a poor Jewish household of painters. He first studied violin with a local concertmaster. He later wrote that the violin was a “logical instrument” for any (musically inclined) Hungarian boy to take up because it “didn’t cost much.” At the age of 8 Auer continued his violin studies with , who also came from Veszprém, at the Budapest Conservatory. Kohne was concertmaster of the orchestra of the National Opera. A performance by Auer as soloist in the Mendelssohn violin concerto attracted the interest of some wealthy music lovers, who gave him a scholarship to go to Vienna for further study. He lived at the home of his teacher, Jakob Dont. Auer wrote that it was Dont who taught him the foundation for his violin technique. out of poverty. An audition with Henri Vieuxtemps in Graz was a failure, partly because Vieuxtemps’ wife thought so. A visit to Paris proved equally unsuccessful. Auer decided to seek the advice

Lera Auerbach

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Lera Auerbach (, born Valeria Lvovna Averbakh, ; October 21, 1973) is a Soviet-born Austrian-American classical composer, conductor and concert pianist. Early life and education Auerbach was born to a Jewish family in Chelyabinsk, a city in the Ural Mountains. Her mother was a piano teacher, many of whose ancestors had also been musicians. She also studied comparative literature at Columbia University and earned a piano diploma at the Hochschule für Musik Hannover. Performances Auerbach made her Carnegie Hall debut in May 2002, performing her own Suite for Violin, Piano and Orchestra with violinist Gidon Kremer conducting the Kremerata Baltica. She has appeared as solo pianist at such venues as the Great Concert Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, Tokyo Opera City, Lincoln Center, Herkulessaal, Oslo konserthus, Chicago’s Theodore Thomas Orchestra Hall and the Kennedy Center. Compositions Auerbach’s compositions have been commissioned and performed by a wide array of artists, orchestras, choirs and ballet companies including Gidon Kremer, the Kremerata Baltica, David Finckel, Wu Han, Vadim Gluzman, the Tokyo, Kuss, Parker and Petersen String Quartets, the SWR and NDR symphony orchestra

Leroy Anderson

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Leroy Anderson ( ; June 29, 1908 – May 18, 1975) was an American composer of short, light concert pieces, many of which were introduced by the Boston Pops Orchestra under the direction of Arthur Fiedler. John Williams described him as “one of the great American masters of light orchestral music.” Early life Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts to Swedish parents, Anderson was given his first piano lessons by his mother, who was a church organist. He continued studying piano at the New England Conservatory of Music. In 1925, Anderson entered Harvard College, where he studied musical harmony with Walter Spalding, counterpoint with Edward Ballantine, canon and fugue with William C. Heilman, orchestration with Edward B. Hill and Walter Piston, composition, also with Piston, and double bass with Gaston Dufresne. He also studied organ with Henry Gideon. He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts, magna cum laude in 1929 and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. At Harvard University Graduate School, he studied composition with Walter Piston and George Enescu and received a Master of Arts in Music in 1930. He and his brother played in dance orchestras on Scandinavian cruise ships in the summers of 1930 an

Leroy Ostransky

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Leroy Ostransky (January 17, 1918 – October 11, 1993) was an American composer, music educator, and writer of books on jazz. Early life Ostransky grew up in a Jewish ghetto on the Lower East Side in New York city, the son of Russian Jewish immigrant parents, Max Ostransky and Sophie Ostransky (née Friedman). Ostransky’s father, a saloon owner during prohibition known to the neighborhood as “Sharkey”, had greater aspirations of success for his son Leroy as a violinist. Ostransky’s memoir details his difficult relationship with his father, who could be both physically and emotionally manipulative and even abusive. Musical career After leaving home at seventeen, Ostransky worked as a pianist in a jazz club before receiving his doctorate in musical arts at the State University of Iowa in 1959. He went on to found the Workshop Band, one of America’s early experimental jazz bands. In addition to his published books, Ostransky composed 75 educational pieces and had five of his compositions performed by the Seattle Symphony. Literary work As an author about the history of jazz, Ostransky wrote several books on the subject. Paul Oliver has found that few authors “were as liberal with their

Leroy Robertson

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Leroy Robertson (December 21, 1896 – July 25, 1971) was an American composer and music educator. Robertson was born in Fountain Green, Utah. One of his earliest instructors was Anthony C. Lund. He graduated from the New England Conservatory of Music with a certificate in public school music and diplomas in composition, violin (after studies with Harrison Keller), and piano in 1923, the same year he was awarded the Endicott prize for “Overture in E Minor”. Following his graduation, Robertson taught music at North Cache High School in Richmond, Utah and at Pleasant Grove High School in Pleasant Grove, Utah, where he also supervised music in the Alpine School District. Robertson was appointed to the music faculty at Brigham Young University in 1925. He soon became professor and chairman of the music department, a position he held until 1948. In 1930, Robertson studied with Ernest Bloch at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. He would continue his studies with Bloch in Roveredo Capriasca, Switzerland in 1932, and with Hugo Leichtentritt in Berlin, Germany, in 1933. Robertson received a BA degree and an MA degree from Brigham Young University in June 1933. Between 1933 and 1945, Rob

Les C. Copeland

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Leslie Crawford Copeland (June 4, 1887 – March 3, 1942) was an American composer and pianist. Leslie was the youngest of six children born to Willis Emerson Copeland and Fannie Amelia Searles. He was an acquaintance of S. Brunson Campbell, a white player who had studied under Scott Joplin in Sedalia, Missouri. In his late teens, he performed in Lew Dockstader’s minstrel troupe, the Lew Dockstader Minstrels. At this same time, he would write three notable rags which were featured in the Minstrels: Cabbage Leaf Rag, Invitation Rag (containing heavy foreshadowing of the novelty piano genre ), and the Dockstader Rag. He also wrote songs during this time. After 1912, Copeland left the Dockstader company and began performing in vaudeville, working for various companies including that of Benjamin Franklin Keith. During this time, he wrote several songs for vaudeville with lyricist Jean Havez. He also wrote his famous “38th Street Rag” in this period. Copeland continued performing, eventually contributing a song (I Ain’t Married No More) to the Ziegfeld Follies of 1917. His work took him across the U.S. and parts of Europe, performing at various venues such as the New York Bar in New York Cit

Leslie Adams (composer)

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Harrison Leslie Adams Jr. (December 30, 1932 – May 24, 2024) was an American composer. His works have been performed by the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, Iceland Symphony Orchestra, Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, and Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, and commissioned by the Cleveland Orchestra, Ohio Chamber Orchestra, Cleveland Chamber Symphony, and the Center for Black Music Research, among others. Metropolitan Opera artists have performed his vocal works internationally. He has also received composition awards from the National Association of Negro Women and the Christian Arts National Competition for Choral Music. Adams began to study music at an early age, having lessons with neighbor and violinist Dorothy Smith at four years old. Adams earned a Bachelor of Music Education from Oberlin College in 1955, a Master of Music from California State University, Long Beach in 1967, and a Ph.D. in Music from Ohio State University in 1973. (composed 1986) was the focus of a significant portion of Y. C. Williams’s New Perspectives on Music (ed. J. Wright with S.A. Floyd Jr, published Warren, Michigan, 1992, pages 172–209). This music drama is very loosely based on Martin Delany’s novel

Leslie Bassett

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Leslie Raymond Bassett (22 January 1923 – 4 February 2016) was an American composer of classical music. He received the 1966 Pulitzer Prize in Music. He had a lifelong relationship with the University of Michigan School of Music. He received the MM there, and in 1956 was the recipient of the university’s first DMA. Bassett was a member of the University of Michigan faculty from 1952 until 1992. Upon retirement from active teaching in 1992, he held the title of Albert A. Stanley Distinguished University Professor Emeritus of Composition until his death in 2016. Biography Early life and education Bassett was born in 1923 in Hanford, California. He was a member of the Gamma Pi chapter of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia at California State University-Fresno, 1942. After studying piano, cello, and trombone, he served in the U.S. military during World War II. He served as a trombonist, composer and arranger with the 13th Armored Division Band. After his military service, Bassett attended the University of Michigan where he studied composition with Homer Keller and Ross Lee Finney. A Fulbright fellowship in 1950 supported study in Paris at the Ecole Normale de Musique with Arthur Honegger and also

Lester Trimble

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Lester Albert Trimble (August 29, 1923 Bangor, Wisconsin – December 31, 1986 New York City) was an American music critic and composer of contemporary classical music. Encouraged by Schoenberg, who had seen some of his scores, Trimble entered the Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University). While there he studied with Nikolai Lopatnikoff and Frederick Dorian and wrote music criticism for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. He earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in violin and composition from Carnegie in 1948, followed by a Masters in composition. During this time he also spent summers at the Berkshire Music Center at Tanglewood where he studied with Darius Milhaud and Aaron Copland. In 1950, Trimble went to Paris where he continued studies with Nadia Boulanger and Arthur Honegger. He returned from Paris in 1952 and settled in New York, where he was engaged by Virgil Thomson as a critic for the New York Herald Tribune, a post he held for ten years. Trimble was also the music critic for The Nation (1957–62), the Washington Evening Star (1963–8) and Stereo Review (1968–74). He became the managing editor of Musical America from 1960 to 1961 and executive director of the Americ

Lettie Alston

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Lettie Beckon Alston (1953 – March 31, 2014) was an American composer known for her piano work and a longstanding series of concerts, “Lettie Alston and Friends”. Biography Alston was born in 1953 in Detroit, Michigan, United States. Alston attended Wayne State University for her undergraduate and masters degrees. In 1983, she earned her doctorate in musical composition from the University of Michigan (UM), where she had studied with Leslie Bassett, William Bolcom and Eugene Kurtz. She composed for orchestra, chamber and vocal groups. The concerts featured contemporary classical music usually based around a central theme. The set highlighted both her work on acoustic and electric piano. Oboe Three implied jesters (unaccompanied). 1975. Available from: Alston. Percussion Visions (piano, marimba). 1979, revised 1993. Duration: 7:00. Performances include Larry Kaptein, marimba, Lettie Beckon Allston, piano, University of Michigan Symposium on Black Women Composers, August 1985. Library: AMRC. Available from: Alston. Piano Four moods for piano. 1993. Duration: 12:00. Performances include the Unisys African-American Forum Chamber Music Concert, Orchestra Hall, Detroit, April 1993. Libra

Lev Zhurbin

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Lev Zhurbin (born August 18, 1978, in Moscow, Soviet Union) is a composer and violist. Biography Lev Zhurbin immigrated to the United States in the year 1990. He is often credited simply as “Ljova”, the diminutive of his formal name. He is the son of the composer Alexander Zhurbin and the poet/lyricist/writer Irena Ginzburg. He is the author of over 70 original compositions for classical, jazz, and folk music ensembles. He has also contributed musical scores to numerous documentaries, features, shorts and animated films. the City of London Sinfonia, a string quartet for Brooklyn Rider and a commission for Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Project; arrangements for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Brooklyn Philharmonic, tenor Javier Camarena, conductor Alondra de la Parra, songwriters Natalia Lafourcade and Ricky Martin, composer/guitarist Gustavo Santaolalla, The Knights, and collaborations with choreographers Aszure Barton, Damian Woetzel, Christopher Wheeldon, Katarzyna Skarpetowska (with Parsons Dance Company), and Eduardo Vilaro (with Ballet Hispanico). In 2018, he was on the faculty of the Atelier program at Princeton University, teaching a course on collaboration with the puppeteer Bas

Lew Soloff

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Lewis Michael Soloff (February 20, 1944 – March 8, 2015) In the 1980s, he was a member of Members Only, a jazz ensemble who recorded for Muse Records. Soloff was a regular member and sub-leader of Gil Evans’ Monday Night Orchestra beginning in 1983, gaining him experience as a band leader. His 2010 recording Sketches of Spain is a tribute to the classic 1959–60 Miles Davis-Gil Evans collaboration, and he has performed the reconstructed Evans arrangements of George Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess. Soloff was also a longtime member of the Manhattan Jazz Quintet, Discography As leader *Air on a G String, 2003 - Larry Willis (piano), Francois Moutin (bass), Victor Lewis (drums) *Rainbow Mountain, 2000 - Lou Marini (saxophones, flute), Joe Beck (guitar), Mark Egan (bass), Danny Gottlieb (drums). Also with special guests: Delmar Brown (synthesizers, vocal), Hiram Bullock (guitar), Will Lee (bass), Jeff “Tain” Watts (drums), Miles Evans (trumpet), Paul Shaffer (Hammond B-3 organ) *With a Song In My Heart, 1999 Rob Mounsey (arranger), Victor Lewis (drums), Emily Mitchell Soloff (harp), Mulgrew Miller (piano), George Mraz (bass) *Little Wing, 1991 - Ray Anderson (trombone), Gil Goldstein (piano,

Lex de Azevedo

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Alexis King de Azevedo (born January 14, 1943) is an American composer, songwriter, and pianist known primarily for his film scores and his work on The Swan Princess of which one of his songs was nominated for a Golden Globe Award. De Azevedo, a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also produced the music for the LDS musical Saturday’s Warrior. Biography Lex de Azevedo was born in Los Angeles, the son of Alyce King of the King Sisters by her first marriage. He served as a musical director for The Sonny & Cher Show, Michael Jackson and the Jackson Five and the Osmonds. He composed the scores for the films Where the Red Fern Grows (1974), Against a Crooked Sky (1975), Baker’s Hawk (1976), Brigham (1977) and The Swan Princess (1994), for the latter he was nominated for a Golden Globe in 1995 for the song “Far Longer than Forever”. During the 1960s, De Azevedo produced several albums for Capitol Records, including Laurindo Almeida’s Plays for a Man and a Woman and the Four King Cousins’ Introducing the Four King Cousins. He produced the hit version, by the Youngstown, Ohio-based quartet the Human Beinz, of the Isley Brothers’ “Nobody but Me”, which rose to #8 in 1

Lia Ouyang Rusli

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Lia Ouyang Rusli, also known professionally as OHYUNG, is an American composer, musician, and artist. She is known for her work as a composer on films such as Problemista (2023) and Sorry, Baby (2025). She creates electronic and ambient music as the solo project OHYUNG. Rusli released her most recent OHYUNG album, IOWA, on 6 March 2026. Career Rusli self-released her debut OHYUNG album, (Untitled) Chinese Man with Flame, on 1 May 2018. Her sophomore album, PROTECTOR, was released on 8 April 2020 via the music collective and platform Chinabot. For her third album, OHYUNG collaborated with drummer Matt Evans to release GODLESS in 2021 with Deathbomb Arc. Collectively, these first three albums have been noted for their intensity, political themes, and multi-genre style of hip-hop, electronic, and noise music. OHYUNG’s fourth album, imagine naked!, was released on 22 April 2022 through the label NNA Tapes. The nearly two hour-long album marked a shift from Rusli’s earlier work, as it was her first completely ambient release. NPR praised imagine naked! and featured it on NPR Music’s lists of 50 Best Albums and 11 Best Experimental Albums for 2022. The track “my torn cuticles!” was also

Lila-Gene George

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Lila-Gene George (September 25, 1918 – December 22, 2017) was an American composer and pianist. Her work included chamber music, piano and vocal music. Education George graduated from the University of Oklahoma with a B.A. in English and French in 1939 and a bachelor’s in music theory in 1940. and in 1969 won the Sigma Alpha Iota Oklahoma Composer’s Award. for nine summers in Fontainebleau, France, and with Narcis Bonet for two summers. From 1963 to 1965 she studied under German-American composer Otto Luening at Columbia University. As an adjudicator for the National Piano Guild, she judged a student piano recital at a festival sponsored by the San Jacinto Music Teachers Association in March 1972. On November 20, 1986, it was reported that George would have a recital at the Horton Foote Theater at Wharton Junior Community College that Sunday. Personal life After graduating college, she married on September 11, 1941, to Richard P. George, a petroleum engineer. They were married for 66 years until Richard’s death. , the Junior League of Houston , the Houston Friends of Music (now Chamber Music Houston) , and the International Alliance of Women in Music in memory of noted composer and

Lily Strickland

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Lily Strickland (January 28, 1884 – June 6, 1958) was an American composer, painter and writer. Biography Lily Strickland was born on January 28, 1884, in Anderson, South Carolina. Her father was Charlton Hines Strickland and her mother was Teresa Hammond Reed. She had two brothers and was the only daughter. When her father died, the family moved into the home of her grandparents, Judge and Mr. J. Pinckney Reed. Strickland began studying piano at age six and was encouraged by her parents to continue composing throughout her life. She studied piano and composition at Converse College and in 1905 received a scholarship to study at the Institute of Musical Arts (later Juilliard) in New York City. In 1912, she married Joseph Courtenay Anderson, an English teacher at Columbia University. She followed Joseph around and compose, write, and paint wherever he went. They never had children due to both of their dreams of traveling and exploring the world. When Anderson became manager for an American company in 1920, the couple moved to Calcutta, and spent the next ten years in India. Strickland traveled in Africa and Asia, painted and published articles in American magazines. She received an

Linda Catlin Smith

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Linda Catlin Smith (born 1957 in New York City) is a composer based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In 2005 she became the second woman to win the Jules Léger Prize for New Chamber Music. Smith studied composition and theory with Allen Shawn in New York, and with composers Rudolf Komorous, Martin Bartlett, John Celona, Michael Longton, and Jo Kondo at the University of Victoria in British Columbia; and attended lectures of Morton Feldman, by invitation, in Buffalo, New York. She studied piano with Nurit Tilles and Gilbert Kalish at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, and with Kathleen Solose in Victoria, British Columbia, where she also studied harpsichord with Erich Schwandt. She moved to Toronto in 1981, where she produced a series of concerts at Mercer Union Gallery. She was Artistic Director of Arraymusic, one of Toronto’s major contemporary music ensembles, from 1988 - 1993. She is a member of the performance collective, URGE. She has given lectures at many universities in Canada, and has taught composition privately and at Wilfrid Laurier University. Outside of teaching, her time is devoted to writing music. Drawn to an ambiguity of harmony and narrative, her work i

Lindsay Jones (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Lindsay Draper Jones (born June 9, 1969, Durham, North Carolina) is an American composer, sound designer and educator. His career spans over three decades and includes nominations for Tony Award, Drama Desk Awards, and Helen Hayes Awards, as well as wins and nominations in regional theatre and film. He has also taught and lectured at universities and schools across the country. before finally moving to Winston-Salem, North Carolina at the age of eight, where he would spend the rest of his childhood. He attended the University of North Carolina School of the Arts and received a BFA in Acting. In 2017, Lindsay was inducted into the inaugural class of his alma mater’s Richard J. Reynolds High School Arts Hall Of Fame in Winston-Salem, NC. Career Theatrical Jones began his career in sound design and composition for theatre in 1994 when he was asked to design a production of “Suburbia” for Roadworks Productions in Chicago. Jones has worked in both Broadway and off-Broadway theatre. His Broadway credits include Slave Play (2020), The Nap (2018), and A Time to Kill (2013). He is one of only five individuals in Tony Awards history to have received nominations for both Best Sound Design of

Lionel Newman

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Lionel Newman (January 4, 1916 – February 3, 1989) was an American conductor, pianist, and film and television composer. He won the Academy Award for Best Score of a Musical Picture for Hello Dolly! with Lennie Hayton in 1969. Newman was one of ten children, the youngest of seven boys, born to Russian-Jewish immigrant parents. While the family had little money, the children’s mother, Luba, was a strong woman who encouraged them to achieve. Newman migrated to Hollywood where, at the age of 16, he began conducting for impresario Earl Carroll. This was where he met his future wife, Beverly Carroll, an Earl Carroll Vanities showgirl, and niece of the impresario. Newman had formal training in New York, and after moving to Los Angeles, he continued his studies with Joseph Achron and Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco. In the 1930s, Newman earned his stripes conducting national tours and working as the piano accompanist for Mae West. She used to scold him for holding his hands too high in the pit saying, “I’m the show, Newman, not you.” At the age of 18, he obtained a job playing piano on the Holland America ocean liner, the S.S.Rotterdam, with his “Newman’s Society Orchestra”. This trip had great

Lisa Scola Prosek

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Lisa Scola Prosek (born March 25, 1958) is an American composer and librettist. Among her compositions are two oratorios and seven operas. She is San Francisco Bay Area-based. Life and career Scola Prosek was born in New Jersey and raised in Rome. She graduated from Princeton University, where she studied with Milton Babbitt, Edward T. Cone, Lukas Foss, and Gaetano Giani Luporini. She was commissioned by San Francisco’s Thick House Theater for her operas Daughter of the Red Tzar, Belfagor and Sail the Blue Aegean. Her first operatic composition was Satyricon which premiered in 2002. She is the recipient of several commissions, grants and awards, including from the Argosy Foundation Contemporary Music Fund, the LEF Foundation, Meet The Composer, Theatre Bay Area, The Hewlett Foundation, the Zellerbach Foundation, and the American Composers Forum. In addition to her work as a composer, she is principal pianist and general manager of the San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra. Works Chamber operas * Satyricon (2002) * I Quaderni di Leonardo (2006). Opera in Italian, text by the composer, with chamber orchestra, Thick House Theater, San Francisco. Videography by Jakub Kalousek. Jim

Lloyd Ultan (composer)

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Lloyd Ultan (New York City, June 12, 1929 – October 26, 1998) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. Career Ultan received a bachelor’s degree from New York University, a master’s degree from Columbia University, and a doctorate from the University of Iowa. In 1971, he founded, and, from 1971 to 1974, served as Director of the Composer’s Residency Program at Wolf Trap Farm Park in Vienna, Virginia. Ultan served as chairman of the Department of Music at American University in Washington, D.C. for 13 years, and spent a year as visiting professor of Composition and Theory at the Royal College of Music in London. He has also lectured at Cambridge University and been a visiting composer on numerous college and university campuses in the United States. He was a professor and chairman (and later emeritus professor and chairman) of composition, music theory, and electronic and computer music at the School of Music University of Minnesota, and also served as the Director of the Electronic/Computer Music Studio. He was responsible for founding the School of Music and served as its director from 1975 to 1986. He composed over 60 works for a wide variety of genres including

Logan Nelson

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Logan Nelson (born November 11, 1996) is an American composer who has composed scores for films, video games, and modern dance productions. In 2018, he received the SABAM Award for Best Young International Composer by the World Soundtrack Academy. He composes music for The Morning Show with Carter Burwell. Life and education Nelson was born and raised in Wichita, Kansas. In his early years, he “fell in love with” the viola and studied piano and composition with local professors. where he majored in Music Composition and minored in Cinematic Arts. At USC, he studied music composition with Ted Hearne and film scoring with Garry Schyman; Career Logan Nelson has composed the music for Seasons 2 and 3 of the Emmy-winning Apple TV+ drama, The Morning Show, in collaboration with Carter Burwell. He also scored the romantic comedy, Straight Up. The film was produced by Valparaiso Pictures and stars actress Katie Findlay. As a collaborator with Kris Bowers, Logan wrote music for Netflix’s critically acclaimed Dear White People, Their song, Nebula, was described by NEST HQ (Owsla) as “mature, highly-refined synth-pop brilliantly contrasting bright, summery sounds with ghostly, melancholy voca

Lois Albright

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Lois H. Albright Billingsley (May 17, 1904 – August 26, 1995) was an American pianist, violinist, singer, conductor and composer, based in Chicago as a young woman, in Phoenix in midlife, and in New York City in her later years. Early life and education Albright was born in Elwood, Indiana, the daughter of Frank A. Albright and Catherine (Kate) Benefiel Albright. Her father was a minister. Her sisters Pearl and Maude were also musical. She began performing music as a teenager. She studied with Sidney Silber, P. Marinus Paulsen, and Louis Luntz. Career Albright played both piano and violin in recitals and concerts. After a piano recital in 1927, L. M. Spaulding in The Music News reported that “Miss Albright played with such beauty of expression and masterly technique that she won the keenest attention of her audience.” While she was in Chicago, she was active in the Chicago Radio Ensemble, the Chicago Lyric Theater, the Fine Arts Vocal Ensemble, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. She was also head of the music department at Harding College for two years. Albright moved to Arizona with her ailing mother in 1948. She was a founder and general director of the Phoenix Civic Light Opera

Lois V. Vierk

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Lois V. Vierk (born August 4, 1951, in Hammond, Indiana) is a post-minimalist composer who lives in New York City. She received a B.A. degree in piano and ethnomusicology from UCLA in 1974. She then attended Cal Arts, studying composition with Mel Powell, Leonard Stein, and Morton Subotnick, receiving her M.F.A. in 1978. She has conducted extensive study of gagaku music, studying for ten years with Suenobu Togi in Los Angeles, and for two years in Tokyo with Sukeyasu Shiba (the lead ryūteki player in Japan’s Imperial Court Orchestra). She has written many chamber works for different ensembles which are multiples of the same instrument. Her work uses glissando prominently and builds exponentially in level of activity. More recently she has written for mixed instrument ensembles, such as in her piece Timberline commissioned by the Relâche Ensemble, and Red Shift which appeared on the CD Bang on a Can Live Vol. 2. She has also composed for gagaku ensemble. Vierk received a 1993 Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award. Compositions *Kana (1976) for 3 Tenor Voices and 3 Bass Voices *Small Shadow in the Desert (1978) for 3 Clarinets *五 Guitars (Go Guitars) (1981) for 5 E

Lola Carrier Worrell

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Lola Carrier Worrell (1 July 1870 – 29 January 1929) was an American composer who wrote instrumental music, songs, and at least one piece for musical theatre. Born in St. Johns, Michigan, she studied music with Carlos Sobimo, Francis Hendricks and Horace E Tureman. Lola married Edward S. Worrell Jr. on January 12, 1891, and they had three daughters. The family maintained homes in New York and Colorado, where Lola founded the Denver American Music Society and served as its first president. She also organized and served as the pianist for the Chamber Music Quintet of Denver. Along with other musicians such as Caroline Holme Walker, Lola maintained a studio at Brinton Terrace in Denver, where she coached pianists, singers, and young composers. She gave recitals with contralto Louis Merten, whom she accompanied on piano. In addition to her work as a musician, Lola filed patents for dolls she developed in 1922, 1924, and 1925. The 1925 patent application described the doll as a “flapper doll.” Her compositions included: Instrumental *Melodie (violin and piano) *Sonata Fantasy (violin and piano) Musical Theatre *Babylonia (libretto by Lola Carrier Worrell and Hugh Abercrombie Anderson) S

Lora Aborn

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Lora Aborn Busck (May 30, 1907 – August 25, 2005) was an American composer. Biography Lora Aborn was born in New York City and began studying piano, music theory and composition at the Effa Ellis Perfield School of Music. She continued studying piano and voice in California and played in a jazz band. She attended Oberlin Conservatory where she studied composition under Dr. George W. Andrews. Aborn continued her studies at the American Conservatory in Chicago under John Palmer and was awarded a gold medal for composition at graduation. She composed a number of commissioned works, and her music has been played and recorded in the United States, China and Europe. She was honored in a list of top American women composers. For many years, Aborn was the organist, director of music and composer-in-residence at the Unitarian Universalist Church, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Unity Temple. She married Harry Busck, an antiquarian book seller who died in 1999, and had two daughters. Aborn died August 25, 2005, in Chicago. A species of moth was named Lora Aborn’s moth in her honor. Works Aborn composed five full length ballets, two operas, works for chamber choir, vocal solos and choral works. Ballet:

Loren Gold

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Loren Gold is an American keyboardist, vocalist, music director, and songwriter. He is known for his work as a touring keyboardist with prominent rock and pop acts, including Don Felder, Kenny Loggins, Roger Daltrey, The Who, Chicago, and Rush. As a music director, Gold has led world tours for artists such as Selena Gomez, Demi Lovato, Hilary Duff, and American Idol winner Taylor Hicks (for whom he co-wrote the song “The Runaround”). In 2010, he worked on the Who’s halftime show at Super Bowl XLIV. Career history Music director Gold toured in fall 2003 as the keyboard player for Hilary Duff, and continued as her musical director until 2007. In winter 2007, Gold co-wrote with the Canadian songwriter James Renald the first single for the American Idol winner Taylor Hicks, entitled “The Runaround”. Television and national performances of “The Runaround” took place starting in December 2006. Gold became the musical director and keyboard player for Taylor, touring extensively in 2007. Daltrey’s band, No Plan B, also opened for Eric Clapton on several dates during 2010. At the show of October 12, 2009, in Seattle, Pearl Jam singer Eddie Vedder joined the band on stage for performances of

Lori Laitman

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Lori Laitman (born 1955) is an American composer who has composed multiple operas, choral works, and hundreds of songs. Early life Lori Laitman was born in Long Beach, New York. Career Laitman has composed multiple operas, choral works, and hundreds of songs. Set to poetry by Joyce Sutphen, Living in the Body explores themes such as grief, loss, and the past, and their emotional toll on the body of someone looking towards the second half of their life. The cycle was composed between September 14 and December 3, 2001, and was premiered on March 7, 2002, at the North American Saxophone Alliance Biennial Conference at the University of North Texas. and the May 2016 issue of Opera News had a feature about Laitman and The Scarlet Letter. Naxos released the CD in Aug. 2017. Performances took place at The University of Oklahoma in February 2022 and at Wichita State University in April 2022. Vedem Laitman and Mason also collaborated on Vedem, a Holocaust oratorio commissioned by Music of Remembrance. Indianapolis Opera’s double bill of Vedem and Brundibar was produced March 18–20, 2022 (after several Coronavirus delays). It was the first time an opera by a woman was presented by the compan

Lou Carter

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Louis Carter (September 15, 1918 – September 25, 2005) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and songwriter. He had a long yet low-profile career. Biography Carter played in various big bands, especially those led by Jimmy Dorsey and Glenn Gray. In 1946, he founded the trio “The Soft Winds” together with Herb Ellis and Johnny Frigo. The group recorded on the Majestic and Mercury labels and wrote a number of hits, among them are “I Told Ya I Love Ya, Now Get Out” and “Detour Ahead”. The latter became a jazz standard and was played by such prominent musicians as Billie Holiday, Sarah Vaughan, Ella Fitzgerald, Irene Kral, Stan Getz, and Woody Herman. After the trio disbanded in 1950, Carter was a sideman for various bands and worked on two of Buck Clayton’s studio albums. A reunion of the Soft Winds occurred during the 1995 Floating Jazz Festival. The double album Then and Now…: The Soft Winds, 1946–1996 was released. The album included previously unreleased radio recordings from 1947 to 1948 and 11 new tracks. Carter also had a side career as a performer of novelty songs, in the persona of “Louie the Singing Cab Driver.” Bronx-accented Louie was a regular on The Perry Como Show i

Lou Harrison

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Lou Silver Harrison (May 14, 1917 – February 2, 2003) was an American composer, music critic, music theorist, painter, and creator of unique musical instruments. Harrison initially wrote in a dissonant, ultramodernist style similar to his former teacher and contemporary, Henry Cowell, but later moved toward incorporating elements of non-Western cultures into his work. Notable examples include a number of pieces written for Javanese style gamelan instruments, inspired after his introduction to noted gamelan musician Kanjeng Notoprojo. Harrison would create his own musical ensembles and instruments with his partner, William Colvig, who are now both considered founders of the American gamelan movement and world music; along with composers Harry Partch and Claude Vivier, and ethnomusicologist Colin McPhee. The majority of Harrison’s works and custom instruments are written for just intonation rather than the more widespread equal temperament, making him one of the most prominent composers to have experimented with microtones. He was also one of the first composers to have written in the international language Esperanto, and among the first to incorporate strong themes of homosexuality

Louis Calabro

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Louis Calabro (November 1, 1926 – October 21, 1991) was an Italian American orchestral composer. Biography Calabro studied piano and composition at Juilliard School of Music. Vincent Persichetti was his principal teacher there. Louis Calabro was a music professor at Bennington College of Vermont from 1955 until his death in 1991. He was a composer, teacher, conductor and a percussionist. His students included the American composer Patsy Rogers. Calabro’s original music is published by Elkan-Vogel, Theodore Presser, Tuba Press and Morningstar Music. Calabro has over 100 works to his credit including music for traditional and non-traditional chamber combinations as well as for both large and small orchestral ensembles most notably in America. Calabro believed in writing music for those he knew best and had the distinction of hearing virtually everything he wrote performed during his lifetime. There are many recordings of these performances as well as scores archived at Bennington College and at the University of Vermont. Louis Calabro founded the Sage City Symphony in 1972, an ambitious community orchestra in southwestern Vermont which is still active and continues to commission new

Louis Forbes

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Louis Forbes (born Louis Forbstein on August 12, 1902, in St. Louis, Missouri-June 17, 1981) was an American composer, songwriter and conductor. Career Forbes was a music student under the tutelage of renowned musicians Edward Kilenyi and Max Steiner. He was under contract to David O. Selznick for seven years, and later served as the director of music for Goldwyn Productions for three years. He also worked for RKO, contributing to several popular films with his musical compositions. In 1951, Forbes joined the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). Throughout his career, he penned a number of popular songs, including the “Appointment in Honduras” theme. Forbes’ talent and dedication to his craft earned him critical acclaim and recognition in the industry. He was nominated for five Academy Awards for his music scoring on the films Intermezzo (1939); Up in Arms (1944); Wonder Man (1945); Brewster’s Millions (1945); and This Is Cinerama (1952). Notably, Forbstein was the brother of Leo F. Forbstein, another prominent composer and conductor in the film industry. Forbes died on June 17, 1981, in Los Angeles, California. Film credits * Hong Kong Affair (1958) *Thi

Louis Gruenberg

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Louis Gruenberg ( ; June 9, 1964) was a Russian-born American pianist and prolific composer, especially of operas. An early champion of Schoenberg and other contemporary composers, he was also a highly respected Oscar-nominated film composer in Hollywood in the 1940s. Life and career Louis Theodor Gruenberg was born near Brest-Litovsk (now in Belarus but then in Russia), to Abe Gruenberg and Klara Kantarovitch. His family emigrated to the United States when he was a few months old. His father worked as a violinist in New York City. Young Louis had a talent for the piano, and by the age of eight Gruenberg was taking piano lessons with Adele Margulies at the National Conservatory in New York (then headed by Antonín Dvořák). Gruenberg played both solo concerts and in ensembles from the beginning, and in his early twenties he went to study in Europe with Ferruccio Busoni at the Vienna Conservatory. Before World War I, Gruenberg taught students and toured, both as an accompanist and soloist. In 1919, Gruenberg wrote The Hill of Dreams for orchestra, which gained him the highly acclaimed Flagler Prize and enabled him to devote himself more completely to composition. As Gruenberg began to

Louis Karchin

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Louis Karchin (born September 8, 1951) is an American composer, conductor and educator who has composed over 90 works including unaccompanied and chamber music, symphonic works and opera. Karchin was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and is Professor of Music at New York University. He received a B. Mus. degree from the Eastman School of Music, an M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard University, and was twice a Leonard Bernstein Fellow at Tanglewood. His principal teachers included Samuel Adler, Joseph Schwantner, Leon Kirchner, Earl Kim and Gunther Schuller. Composer Karchin’s music has been recognized by awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters (Andrew Imbrie Award, Goddard Lieberson Fellowship, and Walter N. Hinrichsen Award), the National Endowment for the Arts, and the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation. He has received commissions from the Serge Koussevitzky, Fromm, and Barlow Foundations. His 70-minute chamber opera, Romulus, a setting of the Alexandre Dumas, père play, was premiered at the Peter B. Lewis Theatre of the Guggenheim Museum in May, 2007" and subsequently issued on a Naxos CD. Other major works include American Visions, a vocal-instrumental song-cycle on poem

Louis Mennini

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Louis Alfred Mennini (November 18, 1920, Erie, Pennsylvania – February 22, 2000) was an American composer, music educator, and university administrator. Life and career Born in Erie, Pennsylvania on November 18, 1920, Mennini was the son of Amalia (née Benacci) and Attilio Mennini. His younger brother was the composer Peter Mennin. Both parents were passionate about music and supported the music education and development of their children. Louis began studies in piano and music theory at a young age, and produced his first music compositions at the age of nine. He graduated from Strong Vincent High School in Erie, Pennsylvania in 1939. Mennini began his professional studies in music at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music where he studied music composition with Normand Lockwood from 1939 through 1942. His education was interrupted by military service during World War II, and he served as a sergeant in the United States Air Force in England from 1942 through 1945. After the war, he studied music composition with Bernard Rogers and Howard Hanson at the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester. He earned three degrees from that institution; a Bachelor of Music in 1947, a Ma

Louis Moreau Gottschalk

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Louis Moreau Gottschalk (May 8, 1829 – December 18, 1869) was a Louisiana Creole and Jewish-American composer, pianist, and virtuoso performer of his own romantic piano works. He spent most of his working career outside the United States. Life and career Louis Moreau Gottschalk was born on May 8, 1829, in New Orleans, Louisiana, to Edward Gottschalk and Aimée Marie Bruslé. He had six brothers and sisters, five of whom were half-siblings by his father’s biracial mistress. Gottschalk’s family lived for a time in a tiny cottage at Royal and Esplanade in the Vieux Carré. He later moved in with relatives at 518 Conti Street; his maternal grandmother Bruslé and his nurse Sally were both Saint Dominican Creoles, the majority of which migrated to Louisiana and assimilated to Louisiana Creole society. Gottschalk was therefore exposed to a variety of musical traditions and influences and played the piano from an early age. He was soon recognized as a prodigy by the New Orleans bourgeois establishment, making his informal public debut in 1840 at the new St. Charles Hotel. Only two years later, at age 13, Gottschalk left the United States and sailed to Europe, as he and his father realized a c

Louis W. Ballard

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Louis W. Ballard (July 8, 1931 – February 9, 2007) was a Native American composer, educator, author, artist, and journalist. He is “known as the father of Native American composition.” Early life Louis Wayne Ballard was born on July 8, 1931, in Devil’s Promenade near Miami, Oklahoma. His father was Charles G. Ballard, Cherokee, and his mother Leona Quapaw was Quapaw. On his mother’s side, he was related to a prominent medicine chief of the Quapaw Tribe, and on his father’s side he was related to Joel B. Mayes, a principal chief of the Cherokee Nation. His music has been celebrated with three concerts at the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C. in 2006 as well as a memorial concert held at the same venue on November 10, 2007. Awards and recognition Ballard graduated in 1962 from the University of Tulsa, and was distinguished by being the first American Indian to receive a graduate degree in music composition. In 1969, Ballard’s Ritmo Indio, a three movement work for woodwind quintet, won the Marion Nevins McDowell Award for American Chamber Music. Ballard’s Desert Trilogy, his second work for ballet, was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 1971. In 1999, he was t

Louise Beach

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Louise Beach (born September 29, 1955) is an American composer who has worked in contemporary music and musical theater. Originally working at the State University of New York at Purchase, she won the 1995 National Association of Teachers of Singing Art Song Composition Award and is a 2002 Guggenheim Fellow, and she was composer of the musicals The Morini Strad and Sabina. Biography Louise Beach was born on September 29, 1955, in Wilmington, Delaware, and obtained her BA (1977) from Wesleyan University. She also taught at the Centre Internationale de la Danse de Paris, Florida State University, Sarah Lawrence College, and the University of Utah. After obtaining her MFA (1996) in Composition from the SUNY Purchase Conservatory, Beach studied with the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop and worked with the New Dramatists Composer Librettist Studio. Other compositions she completed include Sonata for Violin and Piano (1997) and Wondrous Love (2002), In 2002, Beach was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in music composition. She was composer for the Willy Holtzman musical The Morini Strad; Alice T. Carter of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review commended her role in the play’s 2010 world p

Louise Robyn

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Margaret Louise Robyn (23 April 1878 - 10 June 1949) was an American composer, music educator, and pianist who taught for many years at the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago, serving as director for at least one year. Her piano pedagogy methods and books are still in use today. She published and taught as Louise Robyn. Robyn was born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to Mary Ann O’Reilly and William Robyn, a merchant. Little is known about her education. She began working at the American Conservatory of Music in 1901, where she taught advanced piano and teacher training. She also chaired the children’s department and in 1937 served as Director of the conservatory. Storm Bull, Jack Fascinato, Irwin Fischer, and Ruth Crawford Seeger. In 1939, Music Clubs Magazine reported at least one Louise Robyn Club in Detroit, Michigan. Robyn collaborated on some publications with Howard Hanks, Louise Johnson, Mildred Ross, and Florence White Williams. She produced many works, all for piano or early childhood music education, which were published by Clayton F. Summy Co., Lyon & Healy, Inc., Oliver Ditson, Robyn Teaching Service, Theodore Presser Company, and Winthrop Rogers Ltd., and include: *Brok

Louise Talma

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Louise Juliette Talma (October 31, 1906 – August 13, 1996) was an American composer, academic, and pianist. After studies in New York and in France, piano with Isidor Philipp and composition with Nadia Boulanger, she focused on composition from 1935. She taught at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau, and at Hunter College. Her opera The Alcestiad was the first full-scale opera by an American woman staged in Europe. She was the first woman in the National Institute of Arts and Letters and the first woman awarded the Sibelius Medal for Composition. Career Born in Arcachon in France to an American mother, Alma Cecile Garrigues, a professional soprano who took the name Cecile Talma around 1900, and a father whose identity remains unknown. Mother and daughter returned to the United States in 1914, settling in New York City. Talma grew up surrounded by music but was also an excellent science student and considered becoming a chemist before deciding on a career as a musician. After graduating from Wadleigh High School, Talma studied chemistry at Columbia University while simultaneously studying piano and composition at the Institute of Musical Arts (now Juilliard) in New York from 192

Lowell Liebermann

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Lowell Liebermann (born February 22, 1961, in New York City) is an American composer, pianist and conductor. Early life and education Liebermann began piano lessons at the age of eight and began composing shortly after. He credits his second piano teacher, Ada Sohn Segal (a Leschetitsky student) with instilling a love of music in him. At the age of 13 he declared his desire to be a composer and at the age of 14 began composition lessons with Ruth Schonthal, a Hindemith pupil. He composed his first Piano Sonata at the age of 15 and performed it at Carnegie Recital Hall a year later. He continued his studies at the Juilliard School, where he received a BM, MM and DMA, studying composition with David Diamond and Vincent Persichetti and piano with Jacob Lateiner. He also studied conducting privately with Laszlo Halasz and spent a year between his Bachelor and master’s degrees serving as assistant conductor to Halasz. Career and works One of Liebermann’s earliest successes was the Sonata for Flute and Piano Op.23, commissioned by the Spoleto USA Festival for flautist Paula Robison and pianist Jean Yves Thibaudet, a work which has gone on to become one of the most frequently performed so

Lowell Mason

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Lowell Mason (January 8, 1792 – August 11, 1872) was an American music director and banker who was a leading figure in 19th-century American church music. Lowell composed over 1,600 hymn tunes, many of which are often sung today. His best-known work includes an arrangement of “Joy to the World” and the tune Bethany, which sets the hymn text Nearer, My God, to Thee. Mason also set music to Mary Had A Little Lamb. He is largely credited with introducing music into American public schools, and is considered the first important U.S. music educator. He has also been criticized for helping to largely eliminate the robust tradition of participatory sacred music that flourished in North America before his time. Life Mason was born and grew up in Medfield, Massachusetts, where he became the music director of First Parish (now First Parish Unitarian Universalist) Church at age 17. His birthplace residence was saved from development in 2011. It was relocated to a town park on Green Street. The Lowell Mason House foundation is an effort to create a Lowell Mason museum and music education center. The foundation remains active as of 2021. He spent the first part of his adulthood in Savannah, Geo

Lucia Dlugoszewski

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Lucia Dlugoszewski (June 16, 1925 – April 11, 2000) was a Polish-American composer, poet, choreographer, performer, and inventor. She developed a unique approach to the grand piano called the “timbre piano,” which involved using objects on the strings and playing the piano’s interior with percussion mallets, hands, or other methods. She also invented many percussion instruments, including Unsheltered Rattles, Tangent Rattles, Square Drums, and Ladder Harps. She is known for her long association with the Erick Hawkins Dance Company, for which she first composed in 1951. She served as the company’s music director until Hawkins’s death in 1994, after which she became its artistic director. Background and early years The daughter of Polish immigrants, Dlugoszewski was born and raised in Detroit. Beginning at the age of six, she studied piano under Agelageth Morrison at the Detroit Institute of Musical Arts, also known as the Detroit Conservatory of Music. Later in life, she studied pre-med at Wayne State University, where she also took physics courses. In 1950, Dlugoszewski moved to New York City, where she became based for the rest of her life. In New York, she took piano lessons from

Lucien Cailliet

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Lucien Cailliet (May 22, 1891 – January 3, 1985) was a French-American composer, conductor, arranger and clarinetist. Biography Cailliet was born in 1891 at Dampierre-sur-Moivre, in northern France. He studied at several French music conservatories, most notably the Conservatory in Dijon, where he graduated at age 22. He also received a degree from the National Conservatory in Paris. He became a bandmaster in the French Army and, in 1915, toured the United States with the French Army Band, including performances at the Panama–Pacific International Exposition. In 1919 or 1920, Cailliet emigrated to the US and joined the Philadelphia Orchestra, as a clarinetist, saxophonist, and staff arranger, where he worked closely with Leopold Stokowski. Around this time he also founded the Cherry Hill Wind Symphony, which would later become the Wind Symphony of Southern New Jersey. In 1923, at age 32, he became an American citizen, and attended graduate school at the Philadelphia Musical Academy. Cailliet served as Associate Conductor of The Allentown Band (Pennsylvania) beginning in 1934, during which time he conducted many of his own arrangements. After receiving his Doctor of Music Degree in

Lucius R. Wyatt

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Lucius Reynolds Wyatt (born August 18, 1938) is an American trumpet player, composer and professor. Wyatt was born in Waycross, Georgia. From an early age he studied piano with his mother as well as trumpet. At Central High School he worked with the bandleader E. C. Christian. Attending Florida A&M University, he studied with William P. Foster, Johnnie V. Lee, Phillip Cooper, and Lenard C. Bowie, graduating with a Bachelor of Science degree in 1959. He then attended the Eastman School of Music where he studied with Robert V. Sutton, Frederick Fennell, Sidney Mear, and Donald Hunsberger, obtaining his master’s degree in 1960. The title of his dissertation was The Mid-Twentieth-Century Orchestral Variation, 1953-1963; he received his Ph.D. in 1974. He also studied trumpet privately with Sigmund Hering. Wyatt was on the faculty of Tuskegee University from 1960 to 1963 and 1965 to 1974. During 1963-1965 Wyatt toured with the U.S. Army Headquarters Band. Since 1974 Wyatt has been on the faculty of Prairie View A&M University. Selected compositions *Rondo for brass quartet (1969) *Diversions for solo percussionist and wind ensemble (1974) *Centennial Salute for symphonic band (1978) Sele

Lucy Simon

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Lucy Elizabeth Simon (May 5, 1940 – October 20, 2022) was an American singer and composer for the theatre and of popular songs. She recorded and performed as a singer and songwriter, and was known for the musicals The Secret Garden (1991) and Doctor Zhivago (2011). In 1963, Simon began performing with her sister Carly Simon as the Simon Sisters. The duo released three albums, beginning with Meet the Simon Sisters, which featured the song “Winkin’, Blinkin’ and Nod”; based on the poem by Eugene Field, the song became a minor hit and reached No. 73 on the Billboard Hot 100. Simon won a Grammy Award in 1981 with her husband, David Levine, in the Best Recording for Children category for In Harmony, and again in 1983 in the same category for In Harmony 2. Simon received Tony Award and Drama Desk Award nominations for composing the music for the Broadway musical The Secret Garden. Early life and education Simon was born in New York City on May 5, 1940. Her father, Richard L. Simon, was the co-founder of the book publisher Simon & Schuster, Inc.; her mother, Andrea (Heinemann) Simon, was a former switchboard operator, civil rights activist, and singer. She was the older sister of musician

Ludmila Ulehla

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Ludmila Ulehla (20 May 1923– 05 December 2009) was an American composer and music educator. Biography Ludmila Ulehla was born in Flushing, Queens, New York. She began the study of piano and violin very early and wrote short compositions at the age of five. Later she studied composition under Vittorio Giannini at the Manhattan School of Music and was awarded a master’s degree. Ulehla took a position on the faculty of the same school in 1947, and was Chair of the Composition Department from 1972 to 1989. Ulehla was named Outstanding Educator in Who’s Who of American Women, and has received ASCAP awards. She wrote a book entitled Contemporary Harmony – Romanticism Through the 12-Tone Row which was published by Advance Music. Works Ulehla’s compositions were primarily for solo and chamber ensembles. Selected works include: *Elegy for a Whale *Gargoyles for Hindell *Michelangelo for Orchestra *Remembrances for Heifetz *Unrolling a Chinese Scroll *Sybil of the American Revolution, chamber opera, 1993 *Undersea Fantasy for Orchestra, 1999 *Sonata for Improvisation for clarinet, soprano saxophone and piano. References

Ludwig Engländer

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Ludwig Engländer (October 20, 1853 Vienna, Austrian Empire – September 13, 1914) was an Austrian Empire-born American composer of more than 30 musicals. He was born in Vienna, Austrian Empire. According to his obituary in The New York Times, he had studied with Jacques Offenbach. He immigrated to New York City on October 13, 1882, and became a naturalized American citizen on February 13, 1891. By the 1890s Engländer was composing prolifically, either for the New York stage, or popular songs (many of which were interpolated into various other productions including A Trip to Chinatown. Already by 1903 he had come in for criticism of his Teutonic sound. Perhaps for that reason he occasionally returned to Vienna near the end of his life to write musicals for that audience. The year before he died he is listed as having residence in Vienna. At the time of his death he was living in Far Rockaway, Queens, with his sister. Works *Der Prinzgemahl (1883); revised and translated into English as The Prince Consort (1883) *The Seven Ravens (1884) *1776 (1884) *Madelaine, oder Die Rose der Champagne (1888) *The Passing Show (1894) *A Daughter of the Revolution *The Twentieth Century Girl (1895)

Ludwig Lenel

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Ludwig Lenel (May 20, 1914 – April 22, 2002) was a German organist and composer. Early life and education Lenel was born May 20, 1914, in Strasburg, Germany during the German Empire in present-day France, the son of the late Walter and Luise (Borckenhagen) Lenel. During his youth, Lenel met and was strongly influenced by Albert Schweitzer, who frequently stayed with the Lenel family while visiting Heidelberg. He then later studied organ with Schweitzer, and assisted him on tours of Germany and Switzerland in 1932 and 1936, respectively. In between those tours, Lenel’s concert for two violins and string orchestra premiered at the Collegium Musicum in Heidelberg in 1933. In 1935, he was awarded his diploma from Hochschule fuer Musik in Cologne. In 1938, he was awarded a diploma from Basel Music Academy in Switzerland. After emigrating to the United States, Lenel worked as an organist while continuing his study of music composition at Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio, where he was awarded his masters of music degree in 1940. Career Lenel served on the faculties of Monticello College and Elmhurst College in Illinois, Westminster College in Pennsylvania, and The New School for Social Re

Luella Totten

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Luella Totten (c. 1870 – November 5, 1950) was an American pianist, composer, and music educator. She was also known as Louis von Heinrich. Early life Luella G. Totten was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the daughter of William Henry Denny Totten and Ann Elizabeth Covert Totten. Her father was in the iron business. “Pittsburgh, that wonderful city of steel, iron, coal, smoke, art and progress, with its unnumbered millions and millionaires, has produced nothing more remarkable than this woman composer,” declared a music magazine in 1908. She studied piano in Chicago, and in Vienna with Theodor Leschetizky. She also worked with Edvard Grieg. Later in life, she studied composition at Yale University School of Music. In 1900 she won the Steinert Scholarship, a competitive award for piano study at Yale. In 1902 she became the third woman to earn a Bachelor of Music degree at Yale. She pursued further studies in composition at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, and with Max Reger in Leipzig, before World War I. Career Totten taught music at Shimer College from 1894 to 1898. She had an affair with politician and physician Henry Winfield Haldeman. She was fired from her position at S

Lukas Foss

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Lukas Foss (August 15, 1922 – February 1, 2009) was a German-American composer, pianist, and conductor. Career Born Lukas Fuchs in Berlin, Germany, in 1922, Foss was soon recognized as a child prodigy. He began piano and theory lessons with Julius Goldstein Herford in Berlin at the age of six. His parents were Hilde (Schindler) and the philosopher and scholar, Martin Foss. In 1933, when Adolf Hitler came to power, the Jewish family moved from Germany to Paris, where Lukas studied piano with Lazare Lévy, composition with Noël Gallon, orchestration with Felix Wolfes, and the flute with Marcel Moyse. In 1937 he moved with his parents and brother to the United States, where his father (on advice from the Quakers, who had taken the family in upon arrival in Philadelphia) changed the family name to Foss. He studied at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, with Isabelle Vengerova (piano), Rosario Scalero (composition) and Fritz Reiner (conducting). At Curtis, Foss began a lifelong friendship with classmate Leonard Bernstein, who later described Foss as an “authentic genius.” In 1961 Bernstein conducted the premiere of Foss’s Time Cycle, while Foss would conduct the premiere of Be

Lukas Ligeti

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Lukas Ligeti (born in Vienna, Austria, 13 June 1965) is an Austrian composer and percussionist. His work incorporates elements of jazz, contemporary classical and various world musics, especially African traditional and popular music styles. Biography Ligeti is of Hungarian ancestry (although he never learned to speak the Hungarian language fluently, since his parents spoke Hungarian to one another but spoke German to him while he was growing up) and is the son of the noted composer György Ligeti (1923–2006). He was born without citizenship, due to being the child of Jewish parents who had fled from Hungary. He attended the University of Music and Performing Arts, Vienna, where he studied composition with Erich Urbanner, Kurt Schwertsik, Heinrich Gattermeyer, and Dieter Kaufmann; as well as jazz drums with Fritz Ozmec, earning a Diploma (with “unanimous distinction”) in 1993 and an M.A. (with highest grade) in 1997. He earned a Ph.D. from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa in 2020. Ligeti has done numerous cross-cultural collaborations and exchanges with non-Western musicians, experimenting with both ancient African traditional instruments and modern

Luke Flynn

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Luke Flynn (born 1988, in Dubuque, Iowa) is an American composer of film, television, and concert music. He is most widely known for his choral, orchestral, and concert band works. In the film industry, he has composed the scores for several movies, including Holmes and Watson (2018); his film music credits include numerous other titles, such as Frozen II, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, La La Land, and many others. Education Flynn graduated summa cum laude from Butler University with a masters of music composition, where he studied with Michael Schelle, and was a graduate assistant in music composition, and a teaching assistant in music technologies. He graduated summa cum laude from Clarke University, with a Bachelor of Arts in music composition, where he studied with Amy Dunker, and was the recipient of the Francis J. O’ Connor Memorial Award, Clarke University’s most prestigious award given to a single graduating senior. Flynn also studied music composition at 鹿児島国際大学, the International University of Kagoshima in Japan, with Japanese composer Tadashi Kubo. Composition Awards and Accolades (Winner, runner-up, or finalist) *Winds Composition Contest Saxony (2023) *American Priz

Luna Pearl Woolf

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Luna Pearl Woolf (born 1973) is a Canadian-American composer, producer, and dramaturg. Her oeuvre includes opera, chamber music, orchestra, and choral compositions including works for dramatic chamber music, silent film scores, and musical story-telling. Her works have been commissioned Carnegie Hall, Washington National Opera, Tapestry Opera, Minnesota Sinfonia, Salle Bourgie, ECM+, Perelman Performing Arts Center, Concours Musical International de Montréal, among others, with collaborations with artists including Jeremy Irons, Cornelia Funke, Joyce DiDonato, Frederica von Stade, Royce Vavrek, David Van Taylor, Matt Haimovitz, and Dame Evelyn Glennie amongst many others. In 2014 she was an inaugural recipient of Opera America’s first grant for female composers. Biography Luna Pearl Woolf was born in 1973 in Western Massachusetts. She received a Bachelor of Arts from Harvard University, graduating Summa Cum Laude in music composition in 1996, and a Master of Arts from Smith College in music composition. Woolf’s principal composition teachers have been Mario Davidovsky, Augusta Read Thomas, Lewis Spratlan and Don Wheelock. Woolf was awarded the Ellen Taafe Zwilich Prize from the IAW

Luther Henderson

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Luther Henderson (March 14, 1919 – July 29, 2003) was an American arranger, composer, orchestrator, and pianist best known for his contributions to Broadway musicals. Early life and career Born in Kansas City, Missouri, Henderson relocated to the Sugar Hill section of Harlem at the age of four. Following a short stint studying mathematics at the City College of New York, he enrolled at the Juilliard School of Music, where he received a Bachelor of Science degree in 1942. Drafted into the Navy during World War II, Henderson became an arranger for the Navy band stationed at the Naval Station Great Lakes, prior to becoming the staff orchestrator for The U. S. Navy School of Music in Washington, D.C., from 1944 to 1946. Following the war, Henderson began a long professional association with a number of musical notables of the era, including Duke Ellington, Lena Horne, Jule Styne, and Richard Rodgers. Notably, Henderson maintained a lengthy pre-professional relationship with Ellington, having been neighbors with the Ellington family as a child and schoolmate with his son, Mercer. Henderson went on to serve as classical orchestrator for Ellington’s symphonic works, receiving the nickname

Lyle Mays

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Lyle David Mays (November 27, 1953 – February 10, 2020) Metheny and Mays composed and arranged nearly all of the group’s music, for which Mays won eleven Grammy Awards. His teacher allowed him to practice improvisation after the structured elements of the lesson were completed. At the age of nine, he played the organ at a family member’s wedding, and at fourteen he began to play in church. Bill Evans at the Montreux Jazz Festival and Filles de Kilimanjaro by Miles Davis (both recorded in 1968) were important influences. He attended the University of North Texas after transferring from the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire. He composed and arranged for the One O’Clock Lab Band and was the composer and arranger for the Grammy Award-nominated album Lab 75. After leaving the University of North Texas, Mays toured in the US and Europe with Woody Herman’s Thundering Herd (big band) for approximately eight months. In 1975, he met Pat Metheny at the Wichita Jazz Festival and soon afterward they co-founded the Pat Metheny Group. Mays served as pianist, keyboardist, sound designer, and a core contributing composer for the group over its entire thirty-three-year existence. The group was nomi

Lynn Gumert

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Lynn Gumert (born 1961) is an American musician and contemporary composer. Biography Gumert studied at Indiana University School of Music in Bloomington, with Claude Baker, Eugene O’Brien, and Donald Freund, graduating with a Master of Music and Doctorate of Music. She also studied with Ellen Taafe Zwilich and Shulamit Ran, recorder with Eva Legene, Emily Samuels and Scott Reiss, and voice with Camilla Williams and Sudie Marcuse-Blatz. She is artistic director of Zorzal Music Ensemble which performs Spanish and Latin American music from 12th-century to contemporary. She is currently pursuing a masters in music therapy at Montclair State University, where she received the Ott award for outstanding music therapy intern. She has one daughter, Clara. Works Selected works include: *Díestas aves *Roundabout, for flute, percussion, 2 trombones, and double bass *Milkweed, for solo voice *Mary’s Lullaby *Quemar las naves, scored for voices, recorders, strings and percussion References

M Lamar

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M Lamar (born May 29, 1972) is an American composer, performer, and artist. He is an operatic countertenor and pianist whose work incorporates film, sculpture, installation, and performance. Lamar is the twin of actress Laverne Cox, and played his sister’s character pre-transition in two episodes of the Netflix show Orange Is the New Black. Early life and career Lamar was born in Mobile, Alabama, and as a child he sang as a soprano in his church’s choir. He studied painting at the San Francisco Art Institute and attended Yale for graduate school in sculpture before dropping out to focus on music. In 2014, Lamar participated in an open dialogue with authors bell hooks, Marci Blackman, and Samuel R. Delany called “Transgressive Sexual Practice” as part of hooks’ work as scholar-in-residence at The New School. He has cited the writing of hooks and Toni Morrison, as well as operatic composer Diamanda Galás’s Plague Mass, as inspirations for his work. The work is loosely based on the life and death of Willie Francis, a Black American charged with having murdered a 53-year-old white man at the age of 15; Francis’s case only received significant attention when he survived an attempted exe

Mac Quayle

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Frederick MacDonald “Mac” Quayle, Jr. is an American composer for film, television, and video games. He has worked as the score composer for several TV series, including Sam Esmail productions Mr. Robot and Gaslit; numerous Ryan Murphy productions, such as American Horror Story and its spin-offs American Horror Stories and American Crime Story, 9-1-1 and its spin-offs 9-1-1: Lone Star and 9-1-1: Nashville, Scream Queens, Feud, Pose, The Politician, Ratched, Monster, and The Beauty; as well as the series The Pact and His & Hers. Quayle has also scored additional music for films and video games, and has mixed and produced scores led by other composers. He composed the music for the film Leave the World Behind directed by Esmail. Quayle began his career in the late 1980s, working with producer Hex Hector as HQ2 and briefly performing in hip-hop band Rise Robots Rise. He worked with Cliff Martinez as an additional composer for several films, including Drive, Contagion (both 2011), and Spring Breakers (2013). He won the Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series for Mr. Robot, and has also been nominated for three other Creative Arts Emmy Awards. E

Mae Doelling Schmidt

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Mae Doelling Schmidt (née Mary Metzke; 22 May 1888 Chicago – 11 March 1965 Chicago) was an American virtuoso pianist, composer, clubwoman, and music educator from Chicago. She was on the faculty of the American Conservatory of Music. Early life Mae Doelling Schmidt, born Mary Metzke, was the youngest of four girls born to Julius (aka August) Metzke (surname also spelled Mätzke; 1847–1907) and Marie J. Schwechert (maiden; 1854–1892), both German immigrants from Prussia who married in Chicago on August 28, 1878. Mae’s mother died when she was years old. Adoptee parents Separated from her sisters when she was a toddler, Mae, when she was five, was adopted by German-born Chicagoans, Paul Wilhelm Doelling (1846-1909) Paul and Ida Doelling also adopted Paula Hoffman in 1891. Formal education At the age of 9 Doelling began studying in the Children’s Department of the American Conservatory of Music, where at age 10 she earned a Silver Medal, A 1922 report described Doelling as “forceful when necessary”, but adding that “she relies on brains rather than physical strength to bring out the beauties of the music.” She often included her own compositions in her programs. Her piano compositions

Maksim Dunayevsky

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Maksim Isaakovich Dunayevsky (; born 15 January 1945 in Moscow) is a Soviet and Russian composer. People’s Artist of Russia (2006). He is the artistic director and chairman of the artistic council of the Moscow Regional Philharmonic since 2015. Biography Maksim Dunayevsky was born on 15 January 1945 in Moscow. He is the son of the composer Isaak Dunayevsky and the ballerina of the Alexandrov Ensemble and the Moscow Operetta Theater Zoya Ivanovna Pashkova (1922-1994), born out of wedlock. Maksim’s elder brother on the father’s side, Eugene (1932-2000) was an artist. From 1969 to 1974, Dunayevsky was the conductor of the Vakhtangov Theater. In 1974-1975, he was the chief conductor and music director of the Moscow music hall, in 1985-1987 he was the Artistic Director and Chief Conductor of the State Pop Orchestra of the RSFSR (he attracted such people as Pavel Smeyan, Irina Ponarovskaya, Boris Oppenheim, Weiland Rodd, Andrey Davidyan and musicians of the rock group SV), In 1994, especially for Nikolai Karachentsov, he wrote 10 songs based on poems by Ilya Reznik, which were later included in the actor’s solo album “My Little Lady”, recorded by him in Los Angeles. He lived in the USA f

Malcolm Dalglish

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Malcolm Dalglish (born August 14, 1952) is an American hammered dulcimer player and builder, composer, and choral director. A virtuoso performer on the hammer dulcimer, he is a former member of the folk/Celtic trio Metamora and has performed frequently with the percussionist Glen Velez. In addition to the dulcimer, Dalglish also plays the spoons and bones (both traditional American percussion instruments). Beginning in the mid-1970s he honed his playing at Hap’s Irish Pub in Cincinnati in a duo with flutist and concertina player Grey Larsen. He also composes prolifically for choir, and many of his compositions are for choir with dulcimer accompaniment. He has received more than 50 commissions to compose for choirs around the world. He played the hammered dulcimer in the score for the 1981 film Tuck Everlasting. Several of his songs with the Ooolite choral group come from the poetic work of Wendell Berry. Dalglish attended Oberlin College and the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He lives in Bloomington, Indiana, where his publishing company, Ooolitic Music, is based. Discography As leader * 1977 Banish Misfortune (with Grey Larsen) (June Appal) * 1978 First of

Malcolm Goldstein

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Malcolm Goldstein (born March 27, 1936, in Brooklyn, New York) is an American-Canadian composer, violinist and improviser who has been active in the presentation of new music and dance since the early 1960s. He received an M.A. in music composition from Columbia University in 1960, having studied with Otto Luening. In the 1960s in New York City, he was a co-founder with James Tenney and Philip Corner of the Tone Roads Ensemble and was a participant in the Judson Dance Theater, the New York Festival of the Avant-Garde and the Experimental Intermedia Foundation. Since then, he has toured extensively throughout North America and Europe, with solo concerts as well as with new music and dance ensembles. Since the mid-1960s he has integrated structured improvisation aspects into his compositions, exploring the rich sound textures of new performance techniques within a variety of instrumental and vocal frameworks. Numerous ensembles such as Essential Music, Relâche, Musical Elements, The New Performance Group of Cornish Institute, L’Art pour l’art, Quatuor Bozzini and Klangforum Wien have performed his music, as well as the Ensemble for New Music/Hessischer Rundfunk, Frankfurt, of which h

Malcolm Peyton

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Malcolm Cameron Peyton (January 12, 1932 – January 26, 2025) was an American composer, concert director, conductor and teacher. Life and career Peyton was born in New York City on January 12, 1932. He grew up in Princeton, New Jersey, and received early classical training in piano starting at age 6, and in trumpet starting at age 9. From 1950 to 1956 he attended Princeton University for both undergraduate and graduate training in musical composition, studying with Edward T. Cone and Roger Sessions, and was awarded a Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship. In 1956–57 Peyton traveled on a Fulbright Scholarship to Germany to study with Wolfgang Fortner. From 1958 through 1961 Peyton, along with Edward T. Cone and William Carlin, initiated a series of contemporary chamber music concerts in New York presenting many new works. After joining the faculty at New England Conservatory (NEC) in 1965, Peyton directed with Lyle Davidson Evenings of New Music, the first continuous contemporary music series at NEC, until 1972. Subsequently Peyton directed the Composer’s Series at NEC, presenting works by faculty, invited guests, and students in NEC’s Jordan Hall. Peyton lectured at Boston University i

Man Parrish

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Manuel Parrish (born May 6, 1958) is an American songwriter, vocalist and producer. He, along with artists such as Yellow Magic Orchestra, Kraftwerk, Art of Noise, Arthur Baker, Afrika Bambaataa, John Robie, Jellybean Benitez, Lotti Golden, Richard Scher and Aldo Marin, helped create and define electro in the early 1980s. He left home at the age of 14 and became a member of the crowd that converged nightly at the Studio 54 nightclub in Manhattan. The song was featured in the film Shaun of the Dead, the video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City which sold millions of copies. It was sampled in Sway & King Tech’s 1991 song “Follow 4 Now”, from their second album, Concrete Jungle. His biggest chart success in the UK was his recording of “Male Stripper” with Man 2 Man, which peaked at No. 4 in the UK Singles Chart. He eventually signed with Elektra Records via David Bowie’s manager Tony DeFries who also managed his music career, but was dropped from the label in 1984, when they decided not to release the album he had recorded for them. Elektra signed him for dance music, his manager wanted him to create pop-rock. He has mixed, produced and worked with various artists such as Boy George, Mi

Mana-Zucca

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Mana-Zucca (December 25, 1885 – March 8, 1981) was an American actress, singer, pianist and composer. Biography Mana-Zucca was born Gussie Zuckermann (first name uncertain) in New York City on December 25, 1885. The daughter of Polish immigrants, she was a child prodigy who began composing at an early age. Mana-Zucca was interested in music when she was very young. She was frustrated at the age of three when she found that her toy piano didn’t have half tones. Her first piano teacher was her neighbor called Patotnikoff. Not long after that, her piano teacher was changed to Platon Brounoff, who was a Russian immigrant. Shortly after giving her first recital at the age of three and a half, she got a scholarship at the age of four when she had an audition for the National Conservatory of Music (New York City). In the conservatory, she studied with different teachers, including Misses Margulies and Okell. At the age of seven she began to study piano with the eminent Polish pianist and pedagogue Alexander Lambert, who taught at the New York College of Music. Lambert was not only her teacher but also her concert manager and mentor. Her practice regime, dictated by Lambert, was rigorous. So

Manoah Leide-Tedesco

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Tranquillo Manoah Leide-Tedesco (August 19, 1894 – January 29, 1982) was an Italian-American composer, conductor and violinist. Biography Tranquillo Manoah Leide-Tedesco was born in Senigallia, Italy, but grew up in Naples. His father, Lazzaro Leide-Tedesco, originally from Reggio Emilia, became rabbi of the Jewish community of Greater Naples (1904–1941) and the chief rabbi of Naples. Manoah Leide-Tedesco grew up in an artistic family of composers, singers and musicians. His brother, Enrico Leide (1887–1970) was a concert cellist and orchestra conductor, conducting the first Atlanta Symphony Orchestra from 1920 to 1930. Educated at the University of Naples, Leide-Tedesco did his post graduate studies in Czechoslovakia (1925–1931), receiving his Doctorate in Philology and Sociology. He attended the Prague Conservatory where he continued his musical studies under Ildebrando Pizzetti, Josef Suk and Karel Jirák. From 1922 through 1935, Leide-Tedesco conducted many of the leading symphony orchestras of Central Europe including the Philharmonics of Prague, Vienna and Pressburg. During this time he was entrusted with some of the first performances of the works of Maurice Ravel (L’enfant e

Mara Margaret Helmuth

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Margaret Mara Helmuth (born 1957) is an American composer. She studied at the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign, and then continued her studies at Columbia University, graduating with a doctorate in music. She was a co-editor of the Society for Electro-Acoustic Music in the United States’ newsletter along with Sylvia Pengilly and Sally Johnston Reid from 1995 to 1996. Works Helmuth is known for electronic music. She composes for fixed format and also creates interactive installations. Selected works include: *Mellipse (1989, 1995) *Abandoned Lake in Maine (1997) *Bugs and Ice: A Question of Focus (2002) *Where Is My Voice, for fixed format audio *Hidden Mountain (2007) *Staircase of Light (2003) *Hidden Mountain 2, interactive multimedia and wireless-sensor-based installation Her work has been recorded and issued on CD, including: *Sound Collaborations, v. 36 of the Consortium to Distribute Computer Music Series, Centaur Records *Implements of Actuation collaborations with percussionist-composer Allen Otte, Electronic Music Foundation *Open Space CD 16 music for tape References

Marc Blitzstein

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Marcus Samuel Blitzstein (March 2, 1905 – January 22, 1964), was an American composer, lyricist, and librettist. He won national attention in 1937 when his pro-union musical The Cradle Will Rock, directed by Orson Welles, was shut down by the Works Progress Administration. He is known for The Cradle Will Rock and for his off-Broadway translation and adaptation of The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill. His works also include the opera Regina, an adaptation of Lillian Hellman’s play The Little Foxes; the Broadway musical Juno, based on Seán O’Casey’s play Juno and the Paycock; and No for an Answer. He completed translations and adaptations of Brecht’s and Weill’s musical play Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny and of Brecht’s play Mother Courage and Her Children with music by Paul Dessau. Blitzstein also composed music for films, such as Surf and Seaweed (1931) and The Spanish Earth (1937), and he contributed two songs to the original 1960 production of Hellman’s play Toys in the Attic. Life and career Blitzstein was born in Philadelphia on March 2, 1905. His father descended from a family of Jewish bankers. Blitzstein’s musical gifts were apparent at an early age; h

Marc Daubert

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Marc Daubert (born January 13, 1963) is an American musician. He collaborated with Phish for a brief time in their early history. Daubert was a close friend of guitarist Trey Anastasio. Anastasio, Daubert, and lyricist/keyboardist Tom Marshall recorded a project entitled Bivouac Jaun. Much of this recording would end up on Phish’s debut album, known as The White Tape. When Anastasio returned to UVM in September 1984, he brought Daubert along. The most circulated Phish tape featuring Daubert is from a performance on December 1, 1984, at the club Nectar’s in downtown Burlington, Vermont. After a run of shows in February 1985 at a club called Doolin’s, Daubert quit the band. Daubert also penned the lyrics to the Phish song “The Curtain,” which was first performed live by Phish in 1987, over two years after Daubert’s departure from the band. Daubert is listed in the album credits on the CD “Lawn Boy” (Elektra Records 1990). He continues to write, produce and copyright music under his own music label Marc Daubert Music. References *The Phish Companion. A Guide to the Band and Their Music (2004) Miller Freeman Books, pages 314, 5, 329, 13, 509 *Go Phish (2000) St. Martins Press pages 9,

Marc Mellits

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Marc Mellits (born 1966) is an American composer and musician. Mellits was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He studied at the Eastman School of Music from 1984 to 1988, at the Yale School of Music from 1989 to 1991, at Cornell University from 1991 to 1996, and at Tanglewood in the summer of 1997. His composition instructors include Joseph Schwantner, Samuel Adler, Martin Bresnick, Bernard Rands, Christopher Rouse, Roberto Sierra, Jacob Druckman, Poul Ruders, and Steven Stucky. Mellits’s music has been performed throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe. His music is influenced by minimalist and rock music, and has been identified with the postminimalist stylistic trend. He often composes for electric guitar and other amplified instruments. Mellits received a 2004 Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award. Mellits’s commissions include pieces for the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Bang on a Can All-Stars, Assad Duo, Kronos Quartet, and the Meridian Arts Ensemble. His music has also been arranged by guitarist Dominic Frasca and the experimental music group Electric Kompany. Mellits is a founding member of Common Sense Composers’ Collective, which focuses on new and alte

Marc Neikrug

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Marc Edward Neikrug (born September 24, 1946) is a contemporary American composer, pianist, and conductor. He was born in New York City, the son of cellists George Neikrug and Olga Zundel. He is best known for a Piano Concerto (1966), the theater piece Through Roses (1980), and the opera Los Alamos (1988). Among his notable recent compositions are the orchestral song cycle Healing Ceremony (2010), his Concerto for Orchestra (2012), a Bassoon Concerto (2013), and the Canta-Concerto (2014). He studied with Giselher Klebe at the Hochschule für Musik Detmold from 1964 to 1968, and composition at Stony Brook University (M.M., 1971). In 1978 he was appointed consultant on contemporary music to the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. Since the late 1990s he has been artistic director of the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival. He is also known for collaborations with violinist Pinchas Zukerman. Selected recordings Camille Saint-Saëns, Sonata No. 1 in D minor for violin and piano, César Franck, Sonata in A for violin and piano, Pinchas Zukerman, violin, Marc Neikrug, piano. CD Philips 1984. References

Marc Shaiman

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Marc Shaiman ( ; born October 22, 1959) is an American composer and lyricist for films, television, and theatre, widely known for his collaborations with lyricist and director Scott Wittman, actor Billy Crystal, entertainer Bette Midler, and director Rob Reiner. Shaiman has received numerous accolades including two Grammy Awards, two Primetime Emmy Awards, a Tony Award — as well as seven Academy Award nominations. Early life, family and education Shaiman was born to a Jewish family in Newark, New Jersey, on October 22, 1959, the son of Claire (née Goldfein) and William Robert Shaiman. He grew up in Scotch Plains, New Jersey, where he attended Scotch Plains-Fanwood High School, but he left school at age 16 to start working in New York’s theaters; he later obtained a GED. Career Shaiman started his career as a theatre/cabaret musical director. He started working at Saturday Night Live as an arranger/writer. He portrayed Skip St. Thomas, the accompanying pianist for The Sweeney Sisters, a singing duo played by Nora Dunn and Jan Hooks, which earned him an Emmy nomination; he returned for an appearance on The Saturday Night Live 40th Anniversary Special, having co-created Martin Short a

Marcel Grandjany

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Marcel Georges Lucien Grandjany ( ) (3 September 1891 – 24 February 1975) was a French-American harpist and composer. Biography Early life Marcel Grandjany was born in Paris and began the study of the harp at the age of eight with Henriette Renié. At age eleven, he was admitted to the Conservatoire de Paris, where he studied with Alphonse Hasselmans, winning the coveted Premier Prix at age thirteen. Career At seventeen he made his debut with the Concerts Lamoureux Orchestra, and gave his first solo recital, winning immediate acclaim. He appeared with Maurice Ravel in Paris in 1913. His London debut was in 1922 and his New York debut in 1924. He appeared as soloist with major orchestras under the direction of Gabriel Pierné, Alfred Cortot, Walter Damrosch, Serge Koussevitzky, George Szell, Fritz Reiner and Vladimir Golschmann, among others. From 1921 to 1926, he headed the harp department of the Fontainebleau Summer School. He moved to the United States in 1936 and was appointed head of the Harp Department at the Juilliard School in 1938, where he taught until his death in 1975. In 1943 he was chosen to organize the harp department of the Conservatoire de musique et d’art dramatique

Marco Beltrami

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Marco Beltrami (born October 7, 1966) is an American composer of film and television scores. He has worked in a number of genres, including horror (Scream, Mimic, The Faculty, Resident Evil, The Woman in Black, Carrie, A Quiet Place, the Fear Street trilogy, and The Nun II), action (Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Live Free or Die Hard, World War Z), science fiction (I, Robot; Snowpiercer), Western (3:10 to Yuma, Jonah Hex, The Homesman), and superhero (Blade II, Hellboy, Jonah Hex, The Wolverine, Fantastic Four, Logan, Venom: Let There Be Carnage). A long-time collaborator of Wes Craven, Beltrami scored seven of the director’s films including the original four Craven-directed films in the Scream franchise (1996–2011), later returning for the seventh in 2026. He has also worked with such directors as James Mangold, Guillermo del Toro, Tommy Lee Jones, Alex Proyas, Ole Bornedal, Kathryn Bigelow, Bong Joon Ho, Dan Gilroy, and John Krasinski. Beltrami has been nominated for two Academy Awards for 3:10 to Yuma (2007) and The Hurt Locker (2008), and a Golden Globe Award for A Quiet Place (2018). He won a Satellite Award for Soul Surfer (2011) and an Emmy Award for Free Solo (2018).

Marco Oppedisano

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Marco Oppedisano (born November 20, 1971, in Brooklyn, New York) is an American guitarist and composer whose compositions focus on the innovative use of electric guitar in the genre of electroacoustic music. His musique concrète/acousmatic music compositions have utilized multitrack recording and extended performance techniques for electric guitar, nylon string guitar and electric bass. In addition to musique concrète, compositions by Oppedisano also consist of “live” electric guitar in combination with a fixed playback of various electronic, acoustic (specifically female voice courtesy of Kimberly Fiedelman) and sampled sounds. Oppedisano has also composed works for solo classical guitar, solo electric guitar and mixed ensemble. Biography Oppedisano began playing guitar at the age of 12 and was primarily a rock guitarist before entering studies at the Conservatory of Music at Brooklyn College. After two years of classical guitar study at Brooklyn College, he completed composition studies there with Tania León, Charles Dodge, Noah Creshevsky (Hyperrealism (music)) and George Brunner. Oppedisano completed graduate studies at the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College obtain

Marga Richter

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Florence Marga Richter (October 21, 1926 – June 25, 2020) was an American composer of classical music, and pianist. Biography Marga Richter was born in Reedsburg, Wisconsin, the daughter of the American soprano Inez Chandler (1885–1956) and a German army captain, Paul Richter. She studied piano at the MacPhail School of Music in Minneapolis with Irene Hellner and with Helena Morsztyn in New York City. She entered the Juilliard School of Music in 1945 and studied composition with William Bergsma and Vincent Persichetti and piano with Rosalyn Tureck, graduating with a BS and then MS degree in 1951. Richter was the first woman to graduate from Juilliard with a master’s degree in composition. After completing her studies, she taught music appreciation at Nassau Community College from 1971 to 1972, and later began working as a composer full-time. Richter composed several works for the Harkness Ballet in the early 1950s. Her music was also performed, recorded, and produced on numerous albums by MGM recordings at this time. During the 1970s, two of Richter’s large-scale orchestral works Landscapes of the Mind I and Blackberry Vines and Winter Fruit received significant performances, and s

Margaret Bonds

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Margaret Allison Bonds (March 3, 1913 – April 26, 1972) was an American composer, pianist, arranger, and teacher. One of the first Black composers and performers to gain recognition in the United States, she is best remembered today for her popular arrangements of African-American spirituals and frequent collaborations with Langston Hughes. She was the first African American woman to perform with the all-White and all-male Chicago Symphony Orchestra, one of the first African American women to have her music broadcast on European radio, the first African American woman to have her music performed widely in Africa, only the second African American woman in classical music to be elected to full membership in ASCAP, and the first woman, Black or white, to win three awards from ASCAP. Life Family background Margaret Jeanette Allison Majors was born in Chicago, Illinois on March 3, 1913. Her father, Monroe Alpheus Majors, was an active force in the civil rights movement as a physician and writer. His work included founding a medical association for black physicians who were denied membership in the American Medical Association on the basis of race. As an author, Majors is known for his b

Margaret Brouwer

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Margaret Brouwer (born February 8, 1940, in Ann Arbor, Michigan) is an American composer and composition teacher. She founded the Blue Streak Ensemble chamber music group. Biography Brouwer studied at Oberlin College, graduating in 1962, and received her master’s degree from Michigan State University. Having started her musical career as a professional violinist with the Fort Worth Symphony and Dallas Symphony, she went on to earn her DMA in composition from Indiana University. Her teachers have included Donald Erb, Harvey Sollberger, Frederick A. Fox, and George Crumb. From 1996 to 2008 Brouwer served as head of the composition department and holder of the Vincent K. and Edith H. Smith Chair in Composition at the Cleveland Institute of Music. She is now professor emeritus at CIM. Brouwer was in residence at the Wellesley Composers Conference in 2002 and at the MacDowell Colony in 2001, and was a Norton Stevens Fellow there in 1999. She served as Composer-in-Residence at Indiana University in 2004. In 2004 Brouwer was named a Guggenheim Fellow. In 2006, she received an American Academy of Arts and Letters award in music. In 2010 she received a Meet The Composer Commissioning/USA aw

Margaret Garwood

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Margaret Garwood (March 22, 1927, Haddonfield, New Jersey – May 3, 2015, Philadelphia) was an American composer who is best known for her operas. She turned into composition relatively late in her life, at age 35. Garwood became best known for her operatic adaptation of literary works by Nathaniel Hawthorne, including The Scarlet Letter and “Rappaccini’s Daughter”. She also composed works for instrumental chamber ensembles, orchestras, and other vocal ensembles. Many of her works were commissioned by the Pennsylvania Opera Theater. Death Margaret Garwood died on May 3, 2015, in her home in Wyncote, Pennsylvania, at age 83, from acute heart failure. # Cliff’s Edge, Songs of a Psychotic for Voice & Piano (1970) ## Squizophrenia ## Hebephrenia ## Panic ## Breakdown ## Asylum # Haiku Zoo, For Chorus (1975) ## The Whippoorwill, a semi-madrigal ## The Scarecrow, a quasi invention ## The Frog, an antiphonal trifle ## The Dragonfly, lament for a dead child ## The Cow, a fugue ## The Cat, a pseudo-oratorio # Homages, for Piano Trio (1975) # Rainsongs, for Chorus & Orchestra (Part of Choral Trilogy) (1992) ## When that I was a little tiny boy ## All day long the rain has fallen ## What lips

Margaret Rosezarian Harris

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Margaret Rosezarian Harris (September 15, 1943 – March 7, 2000) was an American musician, conductor, composer, and educator, the first African-American woman to conduct the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, and 13 other cities’ orchestras. Early life and education Margaret Rosezarian Harris was born in Chicago, Illinois, the daughter of Dewey Harris, a railroad mechanic, and Clara Townsend Harris, a dressmaker. At age 3, she was recognized as a musical prodigy, and gave her first piano recital at Chicago’s Cary Temple Auditorium, performing more than twenty short pieces from memory. She toured the United States as a child performer until age 6. At age 10, after performing a movement from Mozart’s Piano Concerto no. 20 (on November 17 and December 1, 1953) with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, she won a scholarship to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, and moved there with her mother. Her father didn’t come to Philadelphia, and he stayed in Chicago. Harris and her mother visited him. Career In 1970, she took over the role of musical director for the Broadway production of Hair, conducting an orchestra of seven older

Margaret Ruthven Lang

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Margaret Ruthven Lang (November 27, 1867 – May 29, 1972) was an American composer and violinist primarily active in Boston. Lang is often considered the first woman composer to have a composition performed by a major American symphony orchestra, when her now-lost Dramatic Overture was premiered by the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1893. Life Early life and education Margaret Lang was born in Boston, Massachusetts on November 27, 1867. She was the eldest child of Frances Morse Burrage Lang, an amateur singer, and Benjamin Johnson “B. J.” Lang, active as a conductor, pianist, organist and composer. Her father was a central figure in Boston’s musical life, and as the city’s leading choral conductor, he founded two choral societies: the Apollo Club and Boston Cecilia; as an organist he was closely associated with the Handel and Haydn Society and a number of city churches. These connections through B.J. permitted Margaret’s music to be regularly included in the programs of these ensembles. The Lang family home was a center of cosmopolitan music-making, hosting many of the period’s most eminent musical figures, including Hans von Bülow, Antonín Dvořák and Ignacy Jan Paderewski. As B.J. wa

Margaret Scoville

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Margaret Lee Scoville (3 May 1944 - 1978) was an American composer of chamber, electronic and piano music. Scoville was born in Pasadena, California. She studied music at the State University of New York, Buffalo, where she participated in the university’s Evenings for New Music as a Creative Associate Graduate Fellow and composer. Her teachers included Morton Feldman, Ramon Fuller, Lejaren Hiller, and William Kothe. Scoville’s piano pieces were recorded by George Skipworth on LP EDUCO 3097. *Pentacycle References

Margaret Wigham

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Margaret Viola Wigham (February 3, 1904 – April 17, 1972) was a composer, music educator and pianist, born in Minnesota. She was nationally known as a mid-century composer of student piano pieces. Her pieces often had an educational focus such as chromaticism, counterpoint, learning to play in different keys, or using each hand independently. Her works were published by Oliver Ditson Co., Willis Music, Harold Flammer Inc, Belwin Inc, and R. D. Row. They were also published in Braille and made available through the Library of Congress National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled. Her compositions include: Orchestra *Concerto for Two Pianos Piano *Bachette *By the Little Mill *Carefree *Fun with a Hoop *Gay Caprice *Happitat *Hop Along My Little Froggie *In the Chapel *Introduction and Sonatina *Just Before Dawn *Little Prelude *Merrily Over the Waves We Go *Musical Moods in All Keys *Musical Playmates *Now It’s Time to Run and Play *O So Happy *Old Cowboy Trail *On Swan Lake *Puppet Mischief *Rhapsody *Scampering Whole Steps *Scherzino Vocal *“I Wonder Where the Robins Go?” (words by Margaret Wigham and Wilma Wigham) References

Marguerite Melville Liszniewska

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Marguerite Melville Liszniewska (April 17, 1879 – March 7, 1935) was an American pianist, teacher, and composer. Early life and education Melville was born in Brooklyn, New York, the daughter of Charles W. Melville and Mary Theresa Hughes Melville. Her parents were both musical; her father, an organist, was born in Scotland, and her mother, a singer, was born in Canada. Her parents were also both opera singers, and her father was also a well known theatrical composer who later in life was an “advance man” for other well known opera performers. Her paternal grandfather Francis Melville was a pianoforte maker in Glasgow, Scotland. Her brother Frederick (b. 1864 d. 1944) was also an accomplished musician and multi instrumentalist who could play “any instrument he could pick up.” Frederick built his own violin, and family lore has it that he used to play organ concerts at St Patrick’s Cathedral for a dollar admission. She went to study piano and composition in Berlin at age 15, with Ernst Jedliczka and O. B. Boise, and later in Vienna with Theodor Leschetizky. “It is such a beautiful thing to study music,” she said in an interview, “Artistic things get so easily crowded to the wall or

María Grever

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María Grever (14 September 1885 – 15 December 1951) was the first female Mexican composer to achieve international acclaim. She is best known for the song “What A Difference A Day Makes” (originally “Cuando vuelva a tu lado”), which was popularized by Dinah Washington and has been covered by numerous artists. Early life María Joaquina de la Portilla Torres was born to a Spanish father (Francisco de la Portilla) and Mexican mother (Julia Torres) in León, Guanajuato. For the first six years of her life she lived in Mexico City, moving to her father’s natal city, Sevilla, in 1891. She studied music in France, with Claude Debussy and Franz Lenhard among her teachers. In 1900, she moved back to Mexico and continued her musical studies at her aunt’s solfège school. In 1907, the then 22-year-old de la Portilla married Leo A. Grever, an American oil company executive, and in 1916 became a U.S. citizen and moved to New York City, where she lived for the rest of her life. Career Grever wrote more than 1000 songs — the majority of them boleros — and her popularity reached audiences in Latin America, Europe, and the United States. She was said to have possessed perfect pitch and wrote most of

Maria Newman

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Maria Louise Newman (born January 18, 1962) is an American composer of classical music, as well as a violinist and pianist. She is the youngest child of Alfred Newman, a prominent Hollywood film composer. Maria holds the Louis and Annette Kaufman Composition Chair and the Joachim Chassman Violin Chair at the Montgomery Arts House for Music and Architecture in Malibu, California. She is also a founder of the Malibu Friends of Music. Her compositions span a wide range of genres, including large-scale orchestral works, ballet pieces, chamber music, choral and vocal works, and collaborative scores for vintage silent films. Newman has been recognized for her contributions with numerous awards and commissions. She has received musical commendations from the United States Congress (2009), the California State Senate (2009), the California State Assembly (2009), the City of Malibu (2010), and the Annenberg Foundation (2011). Life and career Maria Newman is the youngest child of nine-time Academy Award-winning composer and conductor Alfred Newman and former Goldwyn Girl and businesswoman Martha Louis Montgomery. She is part of the Hollywood Newman family dynasty, known for its musical contr

Marie Siegling

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Marie Regina Siegling (February 7, 1824 – January 2, 1920) was an American composer. Biography She was born on February 7, 1824, in Charleston, South Carolina, the eldest daughter of Prussian immigrant Johann Zacharias Siegling and his wife Mary Schnierle. Johann Siegling was an instrument maker and music publisher who founded the Siegling Music House in 1819. Her youngest brother was journalist Rudolph Septimus Siegling. Marie Siegling most likely began her musical studies under her mother. Siegling was later educated in Europe and had a career as a musician and composer. In 1844, she traveled with her father to Havana where he had a music store called Siegling & Vallote. They stayed in Cuba for three months, where she performed as “Charleston’s Jenny Lind.” Later in the year, Siegling went to Paris to study music. While on tour in Europe, she met literature professor Eduard Schuman LeClercq, whom she married in 1850. Siegling moved with her husband to Paris and ended her performing career. She had five children. While in Europe, Marie had contact with many of its greatest composers and musicians. She writes in her memoir: “I met many distinguished artists and authors, amongst the

Marilyn Crispell

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Marilyn Crispell (born March 30, 1947) is an American jazz pianist and composer. Scott Yanow described her as “a powerful player… who has her own way of using space… She is near the top of her field.” Jon Pareles of The New York Times wrote: “Hearing Marilyn Crispell play solo piano is like monitoring an active volcano… She is one of a very few pianists who rise to the challenge of free jazz.” In addition to her own extensive work as a soloist or bandleader, Crispell is known as a longtime member of saxophonist Anthony Braxton’s quartet in the 1980s and ’90s. Biography Crispell was born in Philadelphia and, at the age of ten, moved to Baltimore, where she attended Western High School. She studied classical piano at the Peabody Conservatory beginning at age seven, and also began improvising at an early age, thanks to a teacher who required all her students to improvise regardless of their skill level. Crispell was not interested in jazz until 1975, when, while living on Cape Cod, she heard John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme for the first time. She recalls: “The emotional and spiritual quality of it overpowered me… I can honestly say it’s possibly the most overpowering experience

Marilyn J. Ziffrin

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Marilyn Jane Ziffrin (August 7, 1926 – March 16, 2018) was an American composer, music educator, author, and musician. Biography Early life and education Marilyn Ziffrin was born in Moline, Illinois, to parents Betty S. and Harry B. Ziffrin, (both children of Russian immigrants who emigrated from Belogorodka, Ukraine, due to growing anti-semitism). Harry, who grew up in the then Tri-Cities of Moline, Rock Island, Illinois, and Davenport, Iowa, and Betty, who grew up in St. Louis, were first cousins; their fathers were brothers. They both were first cousins of Lester Ziffren, the famous journalist, and Paul Ziffren, the Democratic Party leader from Los Angeles. Harry Ziffrin owned a liquor distributorship in Moline, but every member of the Ziffrin immediate family played a musical instrument. She also taught private composition lessons at St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire, from 1972 to 1983. While at St. Paul’s, one of Ziffrin’s compositions students was Augusta Read Thomas, a renowned composer, who remembers Ziffrin as a role model and “an impressive teacher and musician.” She was also the author of Carl Ruggles: Composer, Painter, and Storyteller (Urbana: University of I

Marilyn Michaels

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Marilyn Michaels (born Marilyn Sternberg, February 26, 1943) is a comedian, singer, actress, impressionist, author, and composer. Family Marilyn Michaels was born in Manhattan to Russian Jewish émigré parents. Her mother was cantoress and actress Fraydele Oysher and her father was Harold Sternberg, a senior basso with the Metropolitan Opera for 37 years. Cantor and film actor Moishe Oysher was her uncle. Michaels began performing with her mother at age 7 on the Yiddish stage and throughout Canada. At 14, she was soloist in her father and uncle’s choir, and also sang duets with Oysher on the classic recording, “Moishe Oysher’s Chanukah Party”. She attended the High School of Music & Art as a music major, but switched to Art in her sophomore year. While still in high school, she was signed to Debbie Records, headed by Ray Rainwater (brother of Marvin Rainwater) and her first single, “Johnny Where Are You,” was produced by Phil Ramone. This was followed by a recording contract with RCA Victor record producers Hugo and Luigi, for which she sang “Tell Tommy I Miss Him” — the answer-song to the hit “Tell Laura I Love Her” — by Ray Peterson. She recorded both U.S. and UK versions. She lat

Marilyn Shrude

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Marilyn Shrude (born July 6, 1946) is an American composer of contemporary classical music and pianist, and Distinguished Artist Professor of composition at Bowling Green State University, since 1977. Life Born in Chicago, Illinois, Shrude graduated from Alverno College and Northwestern University. Her composition instructors include Alan Stout and M. William Karlins. Her scores are published by American Composers Alliance, Éditions Henry Lemoine (Paris), Neue Musik Verlag Berlin, Southern Music, and Thomas House. Her music has been recorded by the New World, Albany, EROL, Liscio, FoxGlove, MMC, Capstone, Orion, Centaur, Neuma, Access, and Ohio Brassworks labels. Her husband is the classical saxophonist John Sampen, and her daughter the classical/contemporary violinist Maria Sampen, both of whom have performed many of her works. Her son, producer, actor and rock guitarist, is David Sampen. Awards She is the winner of a Kennedy Center Friedheim Award (third place, 1984) and a recipient of an American Academy of Arts and Letters Lifetime Achievement Award. She won a 1998 Cleveland Arts Prize for Music. She is also a 2011 Guggenheim Fellow. References External links *Marilyn Shrude of

Marina Rosenfeld

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Marina Rosenfeld is an American composer, sound artist and visual artist based in New York City. Her work has been produced and presented by the Park Avenue Armory, Museum of Modern Art, Portikus (Frankfurt), Donaueschinger Musiktage, and such international surveys as documenta 14 and the Montreal, Liverpool, PERFORMA, and Whitney biennials, among many others. She has performed widely as an improvising turntablist, and served as co-chair of Music/Sound in the MFA program at the Milton Avery School of the Arts, Bard College, from 2007 to 2020. She has also taught at Harvard, Yale, Brooklyn College, and Dartmouth. Early life and education Born in New York, NY, in 1968, she moved with her family to New Jersey at a young age. Rosenfeld graduated from Harvard University in 1991 with an AB in music and then attended California Institute of the Arts, where she received an MFA in fine arts and music in 1994. At CalArts, her teachers included Michael Asher, Charles Gaines, Morton Subotnick, Tom Lawson, and Lucky Moscow. Work and career Rosenfeld’s first major work was the Sheer Frost Orchestra (1993). Scored for 17 women with 17 guitars and amplifiers, the piece directs its participants via

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco

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Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco (3 April 1895 – 16 March 1968) was an Italian composer, pianist and writer. He was known as one of the foremost guitar composers in the twentieth century with almost one hundred compositions for that instrument. In 1939 he emigrated to the United States and became a film composer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for some 200 Hollywood movies for the next fifteen years. He also wrote concertos for Jascha Heifetz and Gregor Piatigorsky. Biography Born in Florence, he was descended from a prominent banking family that had lived in Tuscany, specifically in Siena, until the latter half of the 19th century. His father was Amedeo and his elder brothers Ugo (born in 1890, lawyer) and Guido (born in 1891, engineer). Castelnuovo-Tedesco was first introduced to the piano by his mother, Noemi Senigaglia, and he composed his first pieces when he was just nine years old. After completing a degree in piano in 1914 under Edgardo Del Valle de Paz (1861–1920), well-known composer and pianist pupil of Beniamino Cesi, he began studying composition under renowned Italian composer Ildebrando Pizzetti, and received a diploma in composition in 1918. He soon came to the attention of compos

Marion Bauer

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Marion Eugénie Bauer (15 August 1882 – 9 August 1955) was an American composer, teacher, writer, and music critic. She played an active role in shaping American musical identity in the early half of the twentieth century. As a composer, Bauer wrote for piano, chamber ensembles, symphonic orchestra, solo voice, and vocal ensembles. She gained prominence as a teacher, serving on the faculty of Washington Square College of New York University, where she taught music history and composition from 1926 to 1951. In addition to her position at NYU, Bauer was affiliated with the Juilliard School as a guest lecturer from 1940 until her death in 1955. Bauer also wrote extensively about music: she was the editor for the Chicago-based Musical Leader and authored and co-authored several books including her 1933 text Twentieth Century Music. Throughout her life, Bauer promoted not only her own work but new music in general. Bauer helped found the American Music Guild, the American Music Center, and the American Composers Alliance, serving as a board member of the latter. Bauer also held leadership roles in both the League of Composers and the Society for the Publication of American Music as a boa

Marion Dix Sullivan

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Marion Dix Sullivan (1802–1860) (fl. 1840–50) was an American songwriter and composer. She was born in Boscawen, New Hampshire, the daughter of Timothy Dix and Abigail Wilkins and the sister of General John Adams Dix of New York. She married John Whiting Sullivan in 1825 and had one son, John Henry, who died of drowning in 1858. Little is known about her background, but she was considered the first American woman to write a “hit” song, “The Blue Juniata,” which was referenced by Mark Twain in his autobiography. The Blue Juniata was the basis for variation sets by other well-known 19th century American composers, such as Charles Grobe and J. Edgar Gould. The song was recorded in 1937 by Roy Rogers and the early Sons of the Pioneers. The song was also referenced with the full lyrics by Laura Ingalls Wilder in her book Little House on the Prairie. It was recorded again by soprano Mara Sindoni as part of her project, Parlor, Music Hall, And Church: A Quilt of Songs By American Women Composers (1790 – 1890) From the American Antiquarian Society’s Collections. Thanks to the research of Pennsylvania musician, Zachariah King, Marion’s gravesite and headstone has been located and is current

Marion Osgood

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Marion Gilman Osgood (January 4, 1859 – November 1, 1957) was an American violinist, composer, and orchestra conductor. She established her own company, the Marion Osgood’s Ladies Orchestra, which was the first women’s orchestra organized for professional work in the United States. She was one of the leading solo violinists in the country. Biography Marion G. Osgood was born in Chelsea, Massachusetts. Her father was associated as a teacher with Lowell Mason, and her mother, Mary A. Osgood, was an author and music composer. George L. Osgood, a Boston musician, was her cousin, and her brother was Professor Fletcher Osgood, elocutionist. She began her musical life as a child, coming from a musical and scholarly family. Osgood worked as a violin teacher in Boston and was one of the leading solo violinists in the US. She composed and published a number of vocal and instrumental pieces, was a scholarly writer regarding art, and met with local success as a writer of short stories in romantic fiction. Osgood organized and conducted the ladies’ orchestra which bore her name. This company was established by her in 1884, was composed wholly of women artists, numbered 30 pieces, and was thorou

Marion Verhaalen

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Marion Verhaalen (9 December 1930 – 16 March 2020) was an American composer, music educator, musicologist, and nun who published books about Latin American composers and music. Life and career Verhaalen was born in Milwaukee, the fifth child of Carl and Aǵnes Sieberlich Verhaalen. She played accordion and piano by ear as a child, before beginning music lessons at age 12. She started composing organ preludes and interludes in high school. Verhaalen joined the School Sisters of St. Francis in 1949 under the name Sister Mary Vernon, and earned a B.M. in piano at Alverno College; M.M. in piano at Catholic University; and Ed.D. in music education at the Columbia University Teachers College. Verhaalen received two scholarships from the Teachers College in 1968 and 1969. She received a research grant from the Organization of American States to study composers Francisco Mignone and Camargo Guarnieri in Brazil in 1969. She was named the Outstanding Milwaukee Musician in 1980 by the Wisconsin Federation of Music Clubs. She developed a piano course for Milwaukee public schools, which was published as Keyboard Dimensions I, II, III, and IV. Verhaalen also made 11 trips to Brazil, spending a to

Marion Vree

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Marion Frances Wyma Vree-Brown (18 July 1920 – 10 April 2012) was an American composer/arranger and music educator. Vree was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, to Peter and Mina (Westrate) Wyma. She studied music at the University of Southern California, receiving her BM in 1947, MM in 1953, and DMA 1975. The title of her dissertation was The Development of Netherlands Psalmody from 1565-1773 through the Study of the Bourgeois Tune for Psalm 42. She married Henry Vree and they had a son, Dale, before Vree’s death in 1976. She remarried Harry Wesley Brown Jr. in 1980 and changed her name to Vree-Brown, although her music was published under the name Marion Vree. Vree taught music and directed choral groups in Los Angeles at Alexander Hamilton High School and at Pierce College. She participated in the 1987 Congress on Women in Music (now the International Alliance for Women in Music), during which she hosted a house concert with composer Deborah Kavasch. Vree composed and arranged music which was published by Alfred Music, Carl Fischer Music, Harold Flammer Inc., Theodore Presser Company, Shawnee Press, and Walton Music (now GIA Publications). Works Her compositions for choir (with pian

Marion W. Easterling

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Marion Wesley Easterling (March 12, 1910 - December 10, 1989) was an American music composer in the genre of southern gospel who claimed he had written around 300 songs. His compositions include “When I Wake Up To Sleep No More”, “Lord Lead Me On”, “Standing By The River”, “Rainbow Of Love”, and “When He Reached Down His Hand For Me”. His first broadcast was on December 2, 1947 Easterling died December 10, 1989, in a Birmingham, Alabama hospital and is buried in Martin Memorial Cemetery in Clanton, Alabama. References Footnotes Sources *1986 Congressional Record, Vol. 132, Pages S 4478 - S 4479 *The Montgomery Advertiser, December 12, 1989, Page 6C. Retrieved May 29, 2022. *Love, Joyanna. “WKLF celebrating 70 years of broadcasting”, The Clanton Advertiser, February 1, 2019. Retrieved June 4, 2022. WKLF celebrating 70 years of broadcasting External links *

Marjorie Goetschius

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Marjorie Goetschius (23 September 1915 – 7 May 2001) was an American composer, pianist, cellist, and singer. She was born in Raymond, New Hampshire. Her songs were interpreted by popular singers such as Frank Sinatra and Ray Charles. Life Marjorie Goetschius was the granddaughter of Maria Stefany, an opera singer, and Percy Goetschius, a music theorist and composer. She learned to play the piano at the age of five from her mother, Pauline Gaiser (1890–1975), who was a concert pianist. Marjorie met her husband Emery Deutsch at the Juilliard School of Music. A composer of serious music for the concert hall, at Deutsch’s suggestion Goetschius began composing popular songs. Her song “I Dream of You” stayed on the hit parade for 16 weeks in 1944–45. which Goetschius wrote as an adaptation of an Italian lullaby inspired by the birth of her son. * “I’ll Always Be With You” (February 7, 1945) * “Was the Last Time I Saw You (The Last Time)” * “This Is My Confession” References Further reading * * *

Marjorie Merryman

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Marjorie Merryman (born 1951 ) is an American composer, author, and music educator. She is a member of the composition faculty at the Manhattan School of Music since 2007, where she also served as Interim President, Provost and Senior Vice President at Manhattan School of Music. She previously taught at Boston University and Macalester College. While at BU, she was commissioned by many professional musical ensembles to write pieces ranging from small chamber works to a full opera. She has written and published pieces such as “Chinese Moon Poems”, a women’s choral piece based on Chinese poems about the moon. Merryman categorizes herself with other twentieth-century composers heavily influenced by Johannes Brahms—in particular, serialist composers such as those of the Second Viennese School. She has been the recipient of numerous awards, including two prizes from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Walter Hinrichsen Award, presented annually by American Academy of Arts and Letters and in 2014, the “Arts and Letters Award in Music: “This award is given in recognition of “…. outstanding artistic achievement and acknowledges the composer who has arrived at his or her own voice

Mark Abel

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Mark Abel (born April 28, 1948) is an American composer of classical music. Background After a brief stay at Stanford University in the late 1960s, Abel was active on the New York rock scene during the 1970s and early 1980s, leading his own groups, producing the bands The Feelies and The Bongos, and playing on albums of Tom Verlaine and former Left Banke mastermind Michael Brown. He returned to California in 1983 and worked in mainstream journalism for two decades, eventually becoming foreign editor of the San Francisco Chronicle. He moved away from rock during that period, immersed himself in classical and gradually began developing his hybridized style. Career Nine albums of Abel’s music have appeared since 2006. The self-released Journey Long, Journey Far and Songs of Life, Love and Death attracted little notice. But The Dream Gallery, a 69-minute song cycle for seven soloists and chamber orchestra depicting the lives of imaginary archetypal Californians, caught the interest of pianist Carol Rosenberger, director of the Delos Productions label, leading to its recording by USC Thornton conductor Sharon Lavery and the La Brea Sinfonietta. Delos’ release of Gallery in early 2012 be

Mark Adamo

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Mark Adamo (born August 1, 1962) is an American composer, librettist, and professor of music composition at New York University’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development. He was born in Philadelphia. Early life and education A native of Willingboro Township, New Jersey, Adamo attended Holy Cross High School in Delran Township, New Jersey. He attended New York University, where he received the Paulette Goddard Remarque Scholarship for outstanding undergraduate achievement in playwriting. He went on to earn a Bachelor of Music cum laude in composition in 1990 from The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., where he was awarded the Theodore Presser prize for outstanding undergraduate achievement in composition. Career At New York City Opera, he curated the contemporary opera workshop series VOX: Showcasing American Composers. Adamo served as master artist at the Atlantic Center for the Arts in May 2003. He has directed productions of his Little Women in Cleveland and Milwaukee, both of which were cited as among the best classical-music events of the year by the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, respectively; and he has annot

Mark Alburger

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Mark Alburger (April 2, 1957 – June 20, 2023) was an American composer and conductor active in the San Francisco Bay Area. He was the founder and music director of the San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra, as well as the music director of Goat Hall Productions / San Francisco Cabaret Opera. Alburger was also the editor and publisher of 21st-Century Music Journal, which he founded in 1994 as 20th-Century Music. Biography Mark Alburger was born on April 2, 1957, in Upper Darby Township, Pennsylvania. He studied composition with Gerald Levinson and Joan Panetti at Swarthmore College; Jules Langert at the Dominican University of California; and Roland Jackson, Thomas Flaherty, and Christopher Yavelow at Claremont Graduate University, where he was awarded a Ph.D. in musicology in 1996. He also studied privately thereafter with Terry Riley. Alburger was best known for his use of troping techniques, combining structures and musical passages from a wide variety of pre-existing works across cultures and eras. He has a large opus list, including many concerti, operas, song cycles, symphonies, and a thirteen-hour theatrical setting of the Bible. As a music journalist, he has published in

Mark Brunswick

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Mark Brunswick ( January 6, 1902 – May 25/26, 1971) was an American composer of the twentieth century. He had only recently completed the second act of an opera based on Ibsen’s The Master Builder when he died suddenly in London in May 1971, at the start of what was to have been an extended tour of Europe with his wife, Natascha Artin Brunswick. Brunswick had been at work on the opera for several years, and Act I had not long before received a concert performance as a work in progress at the City College of New York. Biography Born in New York City, Brunswick was the third of four children of secular Jewish parents. His father, of an Alsatian family background, was a successful manufacturer in the garment industry. His mother was an educated German-born woman, trained as an opera singer, who encouraged Mark’s artistic interests and his pursuit of an education that diverged from the conventional. He attended the Horace Mann School in New York, and later Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire. Though he took some courses in the extension division of Columbia University, he never formally acquired a college degree. Having by the age of 15 decided on a career of musical composition a

Mark Bucci

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Mark Bucci (26 February 1924 – 22 August 2002) was an American composer, lyricist, and dramatist. Influenced by Giacomo Puccini, his work is composed in a contemporary yet lyrical style, which frequently employs marked rhythms and memorable harmonies and melodies. Early life and education Mark Bucci was born on 26 February 1924 in New York City. He studied music composition with Tibor Serly in New York City from 1942 to 1945 and then at the Juilliard School with Frederick Jacobi and Vittorio Giannini. At Juilliard he was notably the first winner of the school’s Irving Berlin scholarship award in 1948 which was made possible through a donation by Rodgers and Hammerstein. Bucci also studied composition under Aaron Copland at the Tanglewood Music Center during the summers. He was awarded Guggenheim Fellowships in 1953 and 1957. He wrote the score to Holland Dills’s play Cadenza which was given its premiere at the Hedgerow Theatre (HT) in 1947. This was followed by the score for Androcles and Lion which was staged at the HT the following year. Bucci’s first opera, The Boor, was premiered at Finch College on December 29, 1949. It used a libretto by Eugene Haun based on Anton Chekhov’s 1

Mark Carlson (composer)

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Mark Carlson (born June 13, 1952) is an American composer, flutist, UCLA professor, and the founder and artistic director of the chamber music ensemble Pacific Serenades. Biography Born in Fort Lewis, Washington, and raised primarily in Modesto, California, Carlson attended Johnston College at the University of Redlands; received a B.A. from California State University, Fresno, in 1974, where he studied composition with Dennis Riley and David Bates; and received M.A. (1978) and Ph.D. (1984) degrees in Music Theory and Composition at UCLA, where he studied with Alden Ashforth and Paul Reale. His principal flute teacher was Roger S. Stevens, with whom he studied privately beginning in 1972. In 1982, he founded the Los Angeles-based chamber ensemble, Pacific Serenades, Carlson has taught music theory, composition, orchestration, and classes at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music since 1985, and also taught music theory and composition at Santa Monica College from 1993 to 2008. He retired from UCLA in July 2018 and is living in Palm Springs, California. Carlson is currently composing The Scarlet Letter, an opera in-progress, with librettist Bruce Oldstad. Selected works Concertos * Co

Mark Delpriora

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Mark Delpriora (born 1959) is an American classical guitarist and composer. Delpriora is currently Chair of the Guitar Department at the Manhattan School of Music, where he has been on the faculty since 1989. Mark is also on the faculty of The Juilliard School, where he teaches guitar studies. He studied guitar with Rolando Valdés-Blain and later with Manuel Barrueco. He studied theory/composition in his early teens with Roland Trogan and later with Giampaolo Bracali. Mr. Delpriora has recorded for Koch International Classics, Soundspells, Philips, Tzadik, and CRI. In addition, he has recorded 6 CDs with flutist Laurel Zucker on Cantilena Records. As a performer, the New York Times wrote after his debut: “The first notes of Mark Delpriora’s guitar recital established him as a musician of authority. In a little Mozart transcription by Julian Bream he showed a rare feeling for the specific gravity of a Mozartean phrase, for the inevitability of its rise and fall. Delpriora is a guitarist to be reckoned with” One of the few students chosen to participate in masterclasses by Andrés Segovia, Delpriora has performed and championed music written for, but rarely played by, Segovia, known a

Mark Engebretson

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Mark Engebretson, DMA, Northwestern University (born 1964, California) is a saxophonist and composer. His music combines computer music and live performance, the latter usually performed on saxophone. Biography Engebretson was born in California and raised in Alexandria, Minnesota. His family later moved to North St. Paul, Minnesota. His father, a retired doctor, is also a saxophonist as well as a clarinettist. Engbretson attended St. Olaf College for a year before transferring to the University of Minnesota. He is currently Professor of Composition and Electronic Music at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and director of the Alice Virginia Poe Williams Electronic Music Studio at that university. He is a member of Red Clay Saxophone Quartet and was formerly a member of the Vienna Saxophone Quartet. Aside from Northwestern University, he also studied at the University of Minnesota and the Conservatoire de Bordeaux. His teachers have included Frederick Hemke, Jean-Marie Londeix, M. William Karlins, Pauline Oliveros, Marta Ptaszynska, Michael Pisaro and Jay Alan Yim. Music As a composer his influences include Steve Reich, John Cage and György Ligeti. Eric Stokes introduce

Mark Fax

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Mark Oakland Fax (15 June 1911 – 2 January 1974) was an American composer and a professor of music. Child prodigy Born on June 15, 1911, in Baltimore, Maryland, Fax was a child prodigy. By age fourteen, Fax was employed as a theater organist playing scores to silent films in Baltimore’s Regent Theater on Saturdays, and gospel music at an African American church on Sundays. then at Eastman earning a Master’s degree in composition. While at Eastman he studied with Howard Hanson. He completed his bachelor’s of music degree with honours; won the prestigious Julius Rosenwald Fellowship in a national competition; and was elected to the All-University Honour Society. Depression-era conditions compelled him to turn down graduate fellowship offers, and he accepted a position at Paine College in Georgia, Public attention In the Washington limelight, he finally received public attention. Washington Post critic Paul Hume praised Fax’s Sonata for Clarinet and Piano as “striking…difficult…a work of surprising contrapuntal texture” and declared the composer’s oeuvre “music of rare power.” Til Victory is Won (1967), Fax’s epic operatic history of the African American experience, was mounted at the

Mark Gresham

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Mark Gresham (born 6 March 1956, Atlanta, Georgia, United States) is an American composer and music journalist. In 2003, he was the recipient of ASCAP’s Deems Taylor Award for ‘Sounds Like Home,’ an article about American composer Jennifer Higdon, published in Creative Loafing (Atlanta) on 13 November 2002. In addition to being a contributing writer for Creative Loafing (Atlanta) from 2002 to 2012, Gresham has also written for NewMusicBox (the online journal of the American Music Center) and other publications. He was a music journalist/critic for ArtsATL. Gresham initially wrote articles for the online-only publication starting in mid-2011 (at the time known as ArtsCriticATL) and then more extensively as of November 2011 upon the departure of Pierre Ruhe, its principal music critic, executive director, and co-founder. Gresham quit writing for ArtsATL in February 2019 over editorial issues that had begun to emerge near the end of 2018. At that point, what had been a very occasional personal music blog, EarRelevant, became, for Gresham, a full-time music journal for which he is both publisher and principal writer References External links *Mark Gresham’s website *EarRelevant (music

Mark Grey

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Mark Grey is an American classical music composer, sound designer and sound engineer. Education and early career Mark Grey attended San Jose State University in California, where he studied electroacoustic music and composition with Pablo Furman and Allen Strange. Grey received a Bachelor and Master of Arts in composition. Several years of teaching at the California State Summer School for the Arts allowed Grey to meet and establish ties with several contemporary composers and performers, including John Adams. Through Adams, Grey was introduced to Kronos Quartet in 1993. Kronos later recruited Grey to be one of their live performance sound designers. Composer Grey made his Carnegie Hall debut as a composer with Kronos Quartet in 2003. His solo, ensemble and orchestra music has been performed in many venues including the Sydney Opera House Concert Hall, Théâtre de la Ville in Paris, Barbican Centre in London, Het Muziektheater in Amsterdam, Carnegie Hall’s Zankel Hall, Philharmonie Hall in Warsaw, UNESCO Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City, Symphony Hall in Phoenix, Royce Hall in Los Angeles, as well as at the Ravinia, Cabrillo, OtherMinds, Perth International, and Spoleto festiv

Mark Gustavson

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Mark Gustavson (born September 19, 1959 in Brooklyn, New York) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Biography Gustavson lives on eastern Long Island and teaches at various universities in the New York City area, including Adelphi University and Nassau Community College. He graduated from the University of Illinois in 1981 and received the D.M.A. from Columbia University in 1990. Gustavson also studied at the Sweelinck Conservatory with Ton De Leeuw on a Fulbright Fellowship in 1985-86 and was a composition fellow at Tanglewood in 1979. His primary composition teachers were Chinary Ung, Ben Johnston and Fred Lerdahl. Music Western classical music, Folk music from around the world, and Jazz blended with Eastern and Western philosophy have all influenced Gustavson’s style. He mostly favors notated music that often sounds improvised. Form is often based on different approaches to variations influenced by naturally occurring cycles. Rhythm can at times be very complex or deceptively simple; for example, the third movement of Quintet for clarinet, two violins, viola, and cello is a four-voice canon of continuous eighth notes that create a background for the solo clari

Mark Mancina

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Mark Mancina (born 1957) is an American film composer. A veteran of Hans Zimmer’s Media Ventures, Mancina has scored over sixty films and television series including Speed, Bad Boys, Twister, Tarzan, Training Day, Brother Bear, Criminal Minds, Blood+, Planes, and Moana. He has also composed music for the PlayStation 3 game Sorcery. He has made several collaborations with The Walt Disney Company, and has won two Grammy Awards, and was nominated for an Annie Award for Brother Bear. For his work on the Disney Theatrical Productions adaptation of The Lion King, he was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Original Score in a Musical and won a Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album. Career Mancina has worked primarily as a composer for Hollywood soundtracks, such as his collaboration with Trevor Rabin on the soundtrack for Con Air. He arranged many of the songs behind Disney’s The Lion King (while Hans Zimmer wrote the orchestral score with Nick Glennie-Smith and Lebo M for the African chants) including the Broadway musical. He composed the score for the thriller Twister (1996) and the action films Speed (1994) and Bad Boys (1995). Mancina co-wrote several songs for Hanna-Barbera’s 1990

Mark Nichols (composer)

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Mark Nichols (born February 22, 1964) is an American playwright, composer, and lyricist, best known for his musicals Little Boy Goes to Hell (1988), Joe Bean (2003), and How to Survive the Apocalypse (2009). He is also known in the northwestern United States for his work with Fred Jamison (aka Beaverchief of the Lummi) for whom he arranged 20 Northwest Coast Native songs for orchestra, girl choir, and rock band, performed by the Seattle Symphony in 1996. Career Nichols began his writing career as a solo artist on Seattle’s PopLlama Records after playing keyboards in bands like The Squirrels and Prudence Dredge, and has composed extensively for Seattle film director, Garrett Bennett, and scored all but one of his films, which include End of the Icon, Farewell to Harry, and A Relative Thing. Nichols has written over twenty published works for theater, particularly rock operas, and operas for children. He is one of the founders and composers for the Seattle/Mumbai rock band Manooghi Hi. As an orchestrator, he is known for his work on the classic Sub Pop album by Jeremy Enigk Return of the Frog Queen. Mark has produced a number of other seminal northwest albums, particularly Trillian G

Mark Watters

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Mark Watters (born May 25, 1955) is an American composer of music for film and television. Biography Watters is a six-time Emmy award-winning composer, conductor and arranger. He was born in Irving, Texas and majored in Saxophone at the University of Southern California where he was a member of Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity. Mark served as the music director of the 1996 Summer Olympics, and the 2002 Winter Olympics. Watters has served as guest conductor for ensembles such as The Los Angeles Philharmonic, The London Symphony, The Detroit Symphony, The Dallas Symphony, and The Atlanta Symphony. In 2009, he co-conducted a nationwide tour of Star Wars: In Concert with Dirk Brosse. In August 2012, he conducted the Japanese tour featuring The Tokyo Symphony. He is a former president of the Society of Composers & Lyricists and a former member of the ATAS Board of Governors. Discography Film *Petal to the Metal - Disney *The Pebble and the Penguin - MGM - First score for a theatrically released animated film *All Dogs Go to Heaven 2 - MGM *Africa Before Dark - Disney * The Cat That Looked at a King - Disney * My Little Pony: Dancing in the Clouds - Paramount / Hasbro / SD Entertainment *Hav

Mark Wessel (composer)

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Mark Wessel (March 26, 1894 – May 9, 1973) was an American pianist and composer. Life Wessel was born in Coldwater, Michigan, and graduated from Northwestern School of Music, now known as Bienen School of Music; he later taught piano and theory there. When Wessel left Northwestern, he became a professor of piano and composition at the University of Colorado in Boulder. Wessel was a former pupil of Arnold Schoenberg. He was twice awarded Guggenheim Fellowships, in 1930 and 1932. He was also the recipient in 1930 of a Pulitzer Scholarship to further his education in Europe. In the 1938 contest of the New York Philharmonic-Symphony Society his choral-orchestral work The King of Babylon won honorable mention, while his former student David Van Vactor won the competition with his Symphony in D. He died on May 9, 1973, in Orchard Lake, Oakland County, Michigan. Selected compositions *Adagio, for orchestra *Allegro pomposo, for two pianos (pub. 1982) *The Amorous Peacock, for piano *Ballade, for solo violin, solo oboe, string orchestra (1931) *Ballade, for violin and piano (1937) *Concertino, for flute or violin and chamber orchestra (1928) *Concerto, for piano and orchestra (1941) *The D

Martha Callison Horst

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Martha Callison Horst is an American composer. Her music has been performed by Earplay, Alea III, the Empyrean Ensemble, the Fromm Players, Left Coast Ensemble, Dal Niente, Composers, Inc., members of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the Chicago Composers Consortium, and Music Beyond Performance: SoundImageSound V. Horst studied composition at Stanford University and the University of California, Davis. She is currently Professor of Composition and Music Theory in the Wonsook Kim College of Fine Arts at Illinois State University. Furthermore, she serves as an Academic Senator representing the College of Fine Arts. In the fall of 2020, she was elected Secretary of the Academic Senate placing her on the Executive Committee with the University administration. Partial list of works * Adagio for orchestra * Cloister Songs * Cloud Gate * Creature Studies * Giant Variations * Night Songs * Sonata No. 1 for piano * Straussian Landscapes * Threads * Three Meditations on Van Gogh * Widening Gyre Discography References External links * * * *

Marti Epstein

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Marti Epstein (born November 25, 1959) is an American composer. She is Professor of Composition at Berklee College of Music and the Boston Conservatory at Berklee. Education Epstein was born in Denver, Colorado in 1959, and grew up in Omaha, Nebraska and attended Omaha Burke High School, graduating with the class of 1978. She began composition studies in 1977 while still in high school with Professor Robert Beadell at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. She earned degrees from the University of Colorado (Bachelor of Music in Composition, summa cum laude, 1982) and Boston University (Master of Music in Composition, 1984; Doctor of Musical Arts in Composition, 1989). Her principal composition instructors were Charles Eakin, Joyce Mekeel, and Bernard Rands. Career Dr. Epstein has received numerous awards and commissions. In April 2020, she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for music composition. She was a fellow at the MacDowell Colony and twice a fellow in composition at the Tanglewood Music Center, where she worked with Oliver Knussen and Hans Werner Henze. Composition prizes include a Massachusetts Cultural Council Grant, Fromm Foundation Commission, Lee Ettleson Composition Priz

Martin Amlin

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Martin Amlin (born June 12, 1953) is an American composer and pianist. He was born in Dallas, Texas. He serves as the Mildred P. Gilfillan Professor of Music and Chair of the Department of Composition and Theory at the Boston University College of Fine Arts as well as Senior Director of the Boston University Tanglewood Institute Young Artists Composition Program. Career Martin Amlin received Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees and the Performer’s Certificate from the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester. At Eastman he studied piano with Frank Glazer and composition with Joseph Schwantner, Samuel Adler, and Warren Benson. He studied with Nadia Boulanger at the Ecoles d’Art Américaines in Fontainebleau and at the Ecole Normale de Musique in Paris. Amlin has been a resident at Yaddo, MacDowell, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. He has performed as soloist with the Boston Pops Orchestra and has been a rehearsal pianist for the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Tanglewood Festival Chorus. He has appeared on the FleetBoston Celebrity Series and with the M.I.T. Experimental Music Studio. Works Orchestra *Quatrains from the Rubáiyát for soprano

Martin Boykan

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Martin Boykan (April 12, 1931 – March 6, 2021) was an American composer known for his chamber music as well as music for larger ensembles. Biography Boykan was born in New York City. He studied composition first with Walter Piston at Harvard, where he received a BA in 1951. He then went to Zürich to study with Paul Hindemith, with whom he continued his studies at Yale University, earning an MM in 1953. Subsequently, he went to Vienna on a Fulbright scholarship. He also studied composition with Aaron Copland at Tanglewood (1949, 1950), and piano with Eduard Steuermann. Upon his return to the United States in 1955, he founded the Brandeis Chamber Ensemble, whose members included Robert Koff (Juilliard String Quartet), Nancy Cirillo (Wellesley), Eugene Lehner (Kolisch Quartet), and Madeline Foley (Marlboro Festival). This ensemble performed widely with a repertory divided equally between contemporary music and the tradition. At the same time Boykan appeared regularly as a pianist with soloists such as Joseph Silverstein and Jan DeGaetani. In 1964–65, he was the pianist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Erich Leinsdorf. Boykan had residencies at Yaddo (1981 and 1992), the MacDow

Martin Bresnick

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Martin Bresnick (born 1946) is a composer of contemporary classical music, film scores and experimental music. Education and early career Bresnick grew up in the Bronx, and is a graduate of New York City’s specialized High School of Music and Art. He was educated at the University of Hartford (B.A. ‘67), Stanford University (M.A. ‘68, D.M.A. ‘72), and the Akademie für Musik, Vienna (‘69–‘70), and studied composition with John Chowning, György Ligeti and Gottfried von Einem. He went on to teach at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Stanford University and the Yale School of Music. Career Bresnick’s work has received many prizes, among them: Fulbright Fellowship (1969–70), three NEA Composer Grants (1974, 1979, 1990), Rome Prize Fellowship (1975–76), MacDowell Fellowship (1977), First Prize, Premio Ancona (1980), First Prize, International Sinfonia Musicale Competition (1982), Connecticut Commission on the Arts Grant, with Chamber Music America (1983), The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center Elise L. Stoeger Prize for Chamber Music (1996), “Charles Ives Living” award, American Academy of Arts & Letters (1998), Composer-in Residence, American Academy In Rome (1999), Berlin P

Martin Kennedy (composer)

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Martin Kennedy (born March 24, 1978) is a pianist and composer of contemporary classical music. Early life and education Martin Kennedy was born in Wakefield, England to Barry and Ann Kennedy, and moved with them as a young child to the United States. He grew up in Pennsylvania and Tuscaloosa, Alabama, where he attended Central High School. As a youth, he played piano and composed pieces for the Tuscaloosa Children’s Theatre, Theatre Tuscaloosa and the Frank M. Moody Concert Hall, winning national awards and recognition for his work. He earned a Bachelor of Music degree in piano performance and composition, as well as a Master of Music in composition, from the Jacobs School of Music. In 2005, he received his Doctorate in Music Composition from the Juilliard School where he studied as a C.V. Starr fellow under Milton Babbitt and Samuel Adler. Career After receiving his doctorate, Kennedy became assistant professor of theory and composition at the Department of Music in the College of Arts and Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis. In 2023, he wrote a “Bandshell Fanfare” for the 100th anniversary of the Naumburg Bandshell’s opening, performed at the Naumburg Orchestral Conce

Marvin Hamlisch

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Marvin Frederick Hamlisch (June 2, 1944 – August 6, 2012) was an American composer and conductor. He is one of a handful of people to win Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony awards, a feat dubbed the “EGOT”. He and composer Richard Rodgers are the only people to have won those prizes and a Pulitzer Prize (“PEGOT”). Early life Hamlisch was born in Manhattan, to Viennese-born Jewish parents Lilly (née Schachter) and Max Hamlisch. His father was an accordionist and bandleader. Hamlisch was a child prodigy; by age five, he began mimicking the piano music he heard on the radio. A few months before he turned seven, in 1951, he was accepted into what is now the Juilliard School Pre-College Division. His favorite musicals growing up were My Fair Lady, Gypsy, West Side Story, and Bye Bye Birdie. Career Hamlisch attended Queens College, earning his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1967. His first hit arrived when he was 21 years old: “Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows”, co-written with Howard Liebling and recorded by Lesley Gore. It reached No. 13 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the summer of 1965. His first film score was for 1968’s The Swimmer. He won four Grammy Awards in 1974, two for “The Way We Were”.

Mary Ann Wrighten

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Mary Ann Wrighten Pownall, née Mary Matthews, (b. 1751, d. 12 August 1796) was an English singer, actress and composer. Life Mary Ann Matthews was born in England of a jeweler father and shop-keeper mother. She was apprenticed to organist Charley Griffith where she learned music, and made her debut on the stage at about age 15. She married actor James Wrighten in about 1769 in Birmingham, and the couple came to London to work in Drury Lane, where she quickly became successful as a singer and actress with Garrick and Sheridan at Drury Lane and Covent Garden. The couple had two daughters, Mary and Charlotte. They divorced in 1786 in a public scandal, and Mary Ann Wrighten emigrated to the United States to work for theater manager John Henry. Her first American appearance was at the Southwark Theater in Philadelphia in 1792, billed as Mrs. (Hugh) Pownall. She also appeared in New York City, and settled in Charleston, where she died during a yellow fever epidemic in 1796. Mary Ann Powell was scheduled to sing a concert on August 6th, 1796, and after she and her family were expected to return to England. However, on August 2nd Mary Ann discovered her daughter Charlotte had married theat

Mary Carr Moore

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Mary Carr Moore (6 August 1873 – 9 January 1957) was an American composer, conductor, vocalist, and music educator of the twentieth century. She is best remembered today for her association with the musical life of the West Coast. Early life Moore was born Mary Louise Carr on August 6, 1873, in Memphis, Tennessee, to Unitarian minister Sarah Pratt Carr and her husband Byron Oscar Carr. She passed her childhood in Memphis and Louisville, Kentucky, until the age of ten, when her family moved to the West Coast. Here she would live for the rest of her life. Gifted musically from an early age, Moore began her studies in San Francisco, taking composition lessons from J. H. Pratt and studying singing with H. B. Pasmore. She had begun teaching and composing by 1889; a song she wrote that year was later published. In 1894 she took the lead in her first operetta, The Oracle, when it was premiered by an amateur group in San Francisco. The following year, she gave up singing to devote herself fully to teaching and composition. In 1895 she began teaching in Lemoore, California, moving to Seattle in 1901. Narcissa While in Seattle, Moore began work on her second, and most ambitious, stage work.

Mary Elaine Gentemann

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Sister Mary Elaine Gentemann, CDP (October 4, 1909 – December 7, 2008) was an American religious sister and musical composer, a member of the religious order of the Sisters of Divine Providence. She is known for creating the first Mass integrating Negro Spirituals, “Mass in Honor of Blessed Martin de Porres” (1945). Personal life Gentemann was born on October 4, 1909, in Fredericksburg, Texas. At age 19, she entered the religious order of the Sisters of Divine Providence becoming known as Sister Elaine. She received a Bachelor of Music from Our Lady of the Lake College in 1929 and a Master of Music from the American Conservatory of Music. Later, she studied composition under Otto Luening, going on to study at the Juilliard School and the Teachers College, Columbia University. From 1929 to her retirement in 1999, she taught music courses at Our Lady of the Lake. During this period, she composed a Mass integrating Negro Spirituals, entitled “Mass in Honor of Blessed Martin de Porres”. Notably, this was 9 years before Our Lady of the Lake allowed Black students and 20 years before the Second Vatican Council would allow vernacular liturgy and modern music. She used the tune of “Nobody

Mary Elizabeth Turner Salter

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Mary Elizabeth Turner Salter (15 March 1856 – 12 September 1938 ) was an American soprano and composer. Life Early life and education Mary Elizabeth Turner was born in Peoria, Illinois, the daughter of Jonathan and Mary E. Hinds Turner, who had just moved to the midwest from Maine. After her birth, the Turners moved to Oquwakwa. Turner learned music from both of her parents, who were musically inclined, but it was her mother who gave her initial piano lessons. Turner Salter was also a member of the League of American Pen Women alongside such composers as Amy Beach, Gena Branscombe, and Phyllis Fergus. Reception and legacy A 1907 review of tenor John Braun’s recital in The New York Times described three of her songs as showing “cleverness and brilliancy.” A 1930 issue of The Musical Courier noted that Turner Salter was “frequently called one of the foremost song composers of America.” Her music was described by D.A. Clippinger, singer and author from Chicago, as being of the highest quality, stating, I often wondered what manner of person it was that had this peculiar gift for vocal writing, who could write songs without dreary spots in them, with no padding, with no evidence that i

Mary Ellen Childs

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Mary Ellen Childs (born April 13, 1957 in Lafayette, Indiana) is an American composer and multimedia artist and founder of the ensemble Crash. She grew up as a dancer and writes music often influenced by dance rhythms. She currently administers the McKnight Artist Fellowships for Dance. Her music is chiefly for small instrumental groups, especially for percussion, string groups or solo piano, and it usually has an essential theatrical or visual dimension. Her collaboration with accordionist Guy Klucevsek led to several works for that instrument. Her works have been widely performed by major ensembles, including a commission from the Kronos Quartet. Her 2007 recording of Dream House features the string quartet ETHEL. Reviews of her work have been published in newspapers nationwide, including The New York Times. She is based in the twin city Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota area. Discography * Now (ECM, 2015) * Kilter (“Powerhouse Pianists”, AME 2015) * Ephemeral Geometry (Documerica, Innova Recordings 2015) * Wreck (Innova Recordings, 2013) * Parterre (“Fantasy ’n’ Symmetry”, Performed by QNG, Genuine Recordings, 2012) * Oa Poa Polka (Starkland Recordings, 2012) * Farmstand Now Open

Mary Jeanne van Appledorn

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Mary Jeanne van Appledorn (October 2, 1927 – December 12, 2014) was an American composer of contemporary classical music and pianist. Education and career Born in Holland, Michigan, van Appledorn attended the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, where she studied piano and theory with Bernard Rogers and Alan Hovhaness. She received her Bachelor of Music in 1948, her Masters of Music in 1950, and her Ph.D. in music theory from Eastman in 1966. She also completed post-doctoral studies in computer-synthesized sound at MIT in 1982. She was a member of the music faculty of Texas Tech University from 1950 until 2008. She was the Paul Whitfield Horn Professor of Music from 1989 to 2000. Awards and honors * Premier Prix References External links *Mary Jeanne van Appledorn page, from Texas Tech University site *Interview with Mary Jeanne van Appledorn, January 20, 1988, bruceduffie.com

Mary Knight Wood

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Mary Knight Wood Mason (17 April 1857 – 20 December 1944) was an American pianist, music educator, and composer. She was born in Easthampton, Massachusetts, the daughter of Lieutenant-governor, manufacturer and philanthropist Horatio G. Knight and Mary Ann Huntoon Knight. She attended Miss Porter’s School in Farmington, Connecticut, where she studied music with Karl Klauser. She continued her education at the Charlier Institute in New York, and then went to Boston to study under Benjamin Johnson Lang. She had further studies in New York under Albert Ross Parsons, John Henry Cornell, and Henry Holden Huss. Knight married Charles Greenleaf Wood of Boston in 1879. Her husband was a merchant and officer for the John Hancock Life Insurance Company. They lived in Boston until 1885, when they returned to Easthampton and soon settled into high society in New York City, living in an apartment in Washington Square. She became an early member of the Manuscript Society of New York, and saw several of her compositions performed during their concerts. She began summering in Onteora Park, where in 1890 she met Mark Twain. In 1891 the Woods built a summer cottage named “Witchwood” at Onteora Park;

Mary Kouyoumdjian

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Mary Kouyoumdjian (born 1983) is an Armenian-American composer and documentarian based in Brooklyn, NY. She was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Music in 2024 for her work Paper Pianos and was nominated for Best Opera Recording for her album Adoration at the 68th Annual Grammy Awards in 2026. Early life and education Kouyoumdjian was born in the San Francisco Bay Area and grew up there. She is a first generation Armenian-American from a family directly affected by the Lebanese Civil War and Armenian Genocide. Kouyoumdjian studied at University of California, San Diego (B.A. in Music Composition); New York University with a focus on Scoring for Film & Multimedia (M.A.); and Columbia University (D.M.A. and M.A.). Primary teachers include Zosha Di Castri, Georg Friedrich Haas, Fred Lerdahl, George Lewis, Chaya Czernowin, Steven Kazuo Takasugi, Anthony Davis, Steven Schick, and Chinary Ung. Career Kouyoumdjian has been commissioned by Bang on a Can, Carnegie Hall, the Kronos Quartet, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Philharmonic, OPERA America, and many others. Her work has been recorded by artists such as The Merian Ensemble (members of the Atlanta Symphony), Kronos Quarte

Mary McDonald (composer)

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Mary McDonald (born 1956) is an American composer, arranger, producer, pianist, and organist. Early years Mary McDonald showed an early talent for music, playing hymns by ear by age five. She graduated from Carson-Newman College in East Tennessee in 1978 and took her first position as an organist at Beaver Dam Baptist Church in Knoxville. She was self-taught as a keyboard player and did not read music well, so improvised the music. With her husband’s help, McDonald transcribed tapes of the services which were accepted for publication in Pedalpoint Magazine. With the encouragement of music publisher John Purifoy, she composed her first choral anthem in 1983. Career Besides composing, McDonald works as a choral clinician throughout the United States, conducting workshops. In 1985 she took a position as accompanist for the Tennessee Men’s Chorale. In 2000 she served as the first woman President of the Southern Baptist Church Music Conference. McDonald worked as a sacred choral editor for The Lorenz Corporation for nearly twenty years and continues to work for them as a consultant. She also serves as the organist for Central Baptist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee. McDonald is a member

Mary Rodgers

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Mary Rodgers (January 11, 1931 – June 26, 2014) was an American composer, screenwriter, and author. She wrote the 1972 novel Freaky Friday, which served as the basis of a 1976 film starring Jodie Foster, for which she wrote the screenplay, as well as three other versions. Her best-known musicals were Once Upon a Mattress and The Mad Show, and she contributed songs to Marlo Thomas’ successful 1972 children’s album Free to Be… You and Me. Early life Rodgers, who was of Jewish heritage, was born in New York City. She was a daughter of composer Richard Rodgers and his wife, Dorothy Belle (née Feiner). She had a sister, Mrs. Linda Emory. She attended the Brearley School in Manhattan, and majored in music at Wellesley College. She began writing music at the age of 16 and her professional career began with writing songs for Little Golden Records, which were albums for children with three-minute songs. One of these recordings, “Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves”, which was released in 1957, featured performances by Bing Crosby of songs Mary Rodgers wrote with lyricist Sammy Cahn. She also composed music for television, including the jingle for the Prince Spaghetti commercial. Career Her first

Mary Wiggins

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Mary Wiggins (February 10, 1904 – April 17, 1974) was an American composer, educator, organist, and pianist, born in Indiana, Pennsylvania. Biography Wiggins studied composition at Carnegie-Mellon University with Roland Leich, and privately with Gladys W. Fisher and Harvey B. Gaul. Wiggins taught organ at Schenley High School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, from 1951 to 1957. She taught piano privately and at the Pittsburgh Musical Institute from 1959 to 1962, and received an award from the National Federation of Music Clubs in 1973. Wiggins died in 1974 in Pittsburgh. *pieces for organ *pieces for violin ;Piano *Catch Me! *Cathedral Bells *Frolicking Waves ;Vocal *The Ghost References

Maryanne Amacher

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Maryanne Amacher (February 25, 1938 – October 22, 2009) was an American composer and installation artist. She is known for working extensively with a family of psychoacoustic phenomena called auditory distortion products (also known as distortion product otoacoustic emissions and combination tones), in which the ears themselves produce audible sound. Biography Amacher was born in Kane, Pennsylvania, Amacher worked extensively with a set of psychoacoustic phenomena known as ‘auditory distortion products’; put simply: sounds generated inside the ear that are clearly audible to the hearer. These tones have a long history in music theory and scientific research, and are still the object of disagreement and debate. In music, they are most commonly known by the name of ‘combination tones’, ‘difference tones’, and sometimes ‘Tartini tones’ (after the violinist Giuseppe Tartini, who is credited with discovering them). Amacher herself termed them ’ear tones’ until 1992, when she discovered the work of David T. Kemp and Thomas Gold and began referring to them by the psychoacoustical terminology of ‘otoacoustic emissions’. It has since become clear that some of the sounds Amacher, and indeed

Masguda Shamsutdinova

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Masguda Islamovna Shamsutdinova (; born June 1, 1955, in Kshlau-Yelga, Bashkir ASSR) is a Tatar writer and composer. Biography Masguda Shamsutdinova was born in Bashkortostan. She studied music in Kazakhstan and graduated from Kazan State Conservatoire in the Republic of Tatarstan. She continued her studies at the Tatar History Institute and St. Petersburg State University and received a Ph.D. in 2002. The same year Shamsutdinova moved to Seattle, Washington, where she lives and works. Honors and awards *2003 Best Composer, Art-Horde International Theater Festival *2002 Best Composer, Nauruz International Theater Festival *2000 1st Place, Tatar Theater Festival *1994 Best Composer, Tatar Theater Festival *1993 Tatarstan Republican Award for contributions to national music *1983 Diploma, Romanian Drama Festival in the USSR Works Shamsutdinova’s compositions are influenced by Tartar folk music. She composes chamber and symphony music, and for film soundtracks. Selected works include: *Dervish symphonic poem 2006 *Symphony No.3, Genghis-Khan 2004 *Marriage of Geese choral 2001 *Amazons of Tartary 2002 *The Butterfly on the Snow 2002 *Hymn to Prophet Muhammad, Maulid an-Nabi 2006 Shams

Mason Bates

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Mason Wesley Bates (born January 23, 1977) is a Grammy award-winning American composer of symphonic music and DJ of electronic dance music. He is the first composer-in-residence of the Kennedy Center, and he has also been in residence with Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the San Francisco Symphony, the Pittsburgh Symphony, and the California Symphony. In addition to his notable works Mothership, Anthology of Fantastic Zoology, and The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs, he composed the score to Gus Van Sant’s film The Sea of Trees. In a 2018 survey of American orchestras, he was rated the second-most performed living composer. On September 21, 2025, his opera The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay opened the Metropolitan Opera’s 140th season. Life Bates was born in Philadelphia and raised in Richmond, Virginia, and Newtown, Virginia, where his family homestead and farm is located. He exhibited an early interest in creative writing at St. Christopher’s School and received a letter from the Mayor of Munich in response to his poem The Village of a Million People, written after a visit to the German city. His earliest choral compositions were conducted by his piano teacher Hope Armstrong Erb, a

Mathew Rosenblum

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Mathew Rosenblum (born March 19, 1954) is an American composer whose works have been commissioned, recorded and performed by musical groups such as the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, the Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra, the American Composers Orchestra, Opera Theater of Pittsburgh, FLUX Quartet, the New York New Music Ensemble, the Raschèr Saxophone Quartet, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, and Newband among other ensembles, in venues throughout North America, Europe and Asia including the Andy Warhol Museum, Leipzig’s Gewandhaus, the Tonhalle Düsseldorf, Thailand’s Prince Mahidol Hall, as well as Merkin Hall, the Guggenheim Museum, the Miller Theatre, The Kitchen, Carnegie Recital Hall, and Symphony Space in New York City. Rosenblum’s music has been recorded on such labels as Mode Records, New World Records, Albany Records, Capstone Records, Opus One Records, New Focus Recordings, and the Composers Recordings Inc. label, and has been published by Edition Peters, of Leipzig, London, and New York. Early life Rosenblum was born in Flushing, Queens and began playing the saxophone at age eight. He attended the High School of Music and Art (“Music

Matt Uelmen

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Matt Uelmen (; born July 31, 1972) is an American video game music composer and sound designer. He is best known for his work in Blizzard Entertainment’s Diablo series, which was recognized with the inaugural Excellence in Audio award by the IGDA in 2001. He also worked as a sound designer for the real-time strategy game StarCraft, and worked on World of Warcrafts expansion The Burning Crusade in 2007. From 2009 until the studio’s closure in 2017, Matt Uelmen worked as a member of the Runic Games team, as a composer and sound designer for the Torchlight games. Biography Early life and work Growing up in the South Bay area of Greater Los Angeles, Uelmen began taking piano lessons at age six from his tutor, Lenee Bilski, who provided him with a strong theoretical foundation. During college, he was also a keyboardist in a six-member bar band, where he acquired practical experience and learned about “arrangement, interaction and economy”. On December 31, 1996, Blizzard released their first game of the company’s successful series, Diablo. His work in Diablo was so well received that Uelmen was loaned to Blizzard’s StarCraft team (but stayed in Redwood City), where he did sound design; t

Matthew Aucoin

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Matthew Aucoin (born April 4, 1990) is an American composer, conductor, pianist, and writer best known for his operas. Aucoin has been commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera, Carnegie Hall, Lyric Opera of Chicago, the American Repertory Theater, the Peabody Essex Museum, Harvard University, and NPR’s This American Life. He was appointed as Los Angeles Opera’s first-ever Artist-in-Residence in 2016. He is a 2018 MacArthur Fellow. He is currently Visiting Professor of Composition and Conducting at Boston University. Biography Aucoin was born and raised in the Boston area. While attending Medfield High School, he was the keyboardist in an indie rock band, Elephantom. He attended Harvard College, where he studied poetry, graduating summa cum laude in 2012. His mentors at Harvard included Jorie Graham and Helen Vendler. As an undergraduate, Aucoin conducted productions of Die Fledermaus and Le Nozze di Figaro with the Dunster House Opera Society, now known as Harvard College Opera. Aucoin then received a graduate diploma from The Juilliard School, where he studied with composer Robert Beaser. Concurrently, he served as an assistant conductor at the Metropolitan Opera. Between 2013 and 2

Matthew Barnson

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Matthew Barnson (born 1979) is an American composer. Biography Barnson is a native of Utah He pursued graduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania and Yale University. Barnson is the youngest recipient of a Barlow Commission from the BYU College of Fine Arts and Communications. He was awarded a 2009 Charles Ives Prize. He is currently an assistant professor of composition at Stony Brook University. Works Barnson’s works have been performed by the following individuals / groups: - Arditti String Quartet - Curtis Symphony Orchestra - The New York Virtuoso Singers - Members of Alarm Will Sound - Members of the Philadelphia Orchestra - Soprano Nicole Cabell - Countertenor Ian Howell - Academy Manson Ensemble, with conductor Simon Bainbridge - Shouse Ensemble F-Plus Discography *Sibyl Tones (Tzadik Records, 2014) References External links * Matthew Barnson, official website * StonyBrook University Department of Music Faculty Profile * Guggenheim Foundation Fellow Profile * Soundcloud Page

Matthew Peterson

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Matthew Peterson (born July 22, 1984) is a classical composer of operas, choral works, orchestral and chamber music. Biography Matthew Peterson was born and raised in Grand Forks, North Dakota. He studied music composition at St. Olaf College, Indiana University Jacobs School of Music and Gotland School of Music Composition where his teachers included Mary Ellen Childs and Sven-David Sandström. Peterson is a freelance composer based in Smedjebacken, Sweden, first arriving on a Fulbright Award in 2008. His Fulbright project was the true-crime chamber opera Voir Dire, a work that received critical-acclaim after its 2017 world premiere at Fort Worth Opera. He is a member of FST (the Association of Swedish Composers) and has been commissioned by Swedish musicians and ensembles including the Swedish Radio Choir, Dalasinfoniettan, guitarist Mårten Falk, Gustaf Sjökvist Chamber Choir, Uppsala Vokalensemble, Sofia Vokalensemble, and Stockholm Saxophone Quartet. His music has been featured at international music festivals Svensk Musikvår, Purpur (South Africa), Ljudvågor, Lund Choral Festival, Jubilate and Sound of Stockholm. In 2014 Peterson was awarded the ASCAP Rudolph Nissim Award for o

Matthias Pintscher

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Matthias Pintscher (born 29 January 1971) is a German composer, conductor and academic teacher. Biography Pintscher was born in Marl, North Rhine-Westphalia. As a youth, he studied the violin and conducting. He began his music studies with Giselher Klebe in 1988 at the Hochschule für Musik Detmold in Detmold. In 1990, he met Hans Werner Henze, and in 1991 and 1992, he was invited to Henze’s summer school in Montepulciano, Italy. He later studied with German composer and flutist Manfred Trojahn. He held a Daniel R. Lewis Young Composer Fellowship with the Cleveland Orchestra from 2000 to 2002. With the 2014–2015 season, Pintscher became artist-in-residence with the Danish Radio for a period of three years. For the 2014–2015 season, he was the artist-in-residence at the Cologne Philharmonie. Pintscher concluded his tenure with the Ensemble intercontemporain at the close of the 2022–2023 season. In March 2023, Pintscher first guest conducted the Kansas City Symphony. On the basis of this appearance, the Kansas City Symphony announced in May 2023 the appointment of Pintscher as its next music director, effective with the 2024–2025 season, with an initial contract of five seasons. In Ju

Maura Bosch

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Marjorie Ann Hess a.k.a. Maura Bosch (born 1956) is an American composer. She was born in Reading, Pennsylvania, and studied at the Hartt College of Music where she received a Bachelor of Music degree in 1978, and at Princeton University where she received a Master of Fine Arts degree in 1982 and a Ph.D. in 2008, after studying with Alexander Lepak, Edward T. Cone, Milton Babbitt and Peter Westergaard. Career She married composer Jeffrey Brooks and lived for a while in Bath, England, where Brooks was composer-in-residence at Bath College. After returning to the United States, the couple settled in Minneapolis. She co-founded and ran Corn Palace Productions, a Minneapolis music theatre company, from 1990 through 1997. The company produced dozens of new works, including three of her own operas. One of them was based on a poem by James Merrill, with whom she collaborated in writing the libretto. She also founded and played with the ensemble Blackstone Bosch from 1997 until 2000. In 2007 Maura Bosch was in residence with the Tubman Family Alliance, a network of shelters for abused women, to compose a work based on their experiences. In 2009, Maura Bosch composed and wrote the libretto

Max Aruj

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Max Aruj (born August 7, 1989) is an American composer known for his work in film, television, and video games. Early life Aruj was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. He began playing classical and jazz piano at age six and started composing music in high school, including scoring a student film titled Black Martini. He earned a Bachelor of Music in composition from the USC Thornton School of Music between 2007 and 2012, along with a minor in business administration from USC Marshall School of Business. Career Aruj began his professional career with an internship at Hans Zimmer’s Remote Control Productions during his studies at USC, where he later worked extensively with composers Lorne Balfe and Rupert Gregson-Williams. He composed for the video game expansion Assassin’s Creed Valhalla: Wrath of the Druids (2021) and the Netflix animated series Mech Cadets (2023). In 2025, he composed the score for Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning in collaboration with Alfie Godfrey. Beyond screen media, Aruj co-produced the orchestral album Gravity Deluxe by electronic music artist Gryffin. Selected filmography * Crawl (2019) * Lansky (2021) * The Ice Road (2021) * Assassin’s Cr

Max Donner

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Max Donner (22 May 1883/4 – 30 May 1962) was an American violinist, composer, conductor, and teacher of violin, chamber music, and composition. Life and career The son of Adolph and Bertha Donner, he grew up in New York City and studied violin with Henry Schradieck. At age fifteen, Donner traveled to Europe and studied at Berlin’s Stern Conservatory under Gustav Hollaender (violin) and Hans Pfitzner (composition). At Stern, Donner was the first American to be awarded the Gustav Hollaender Medal. He then studied with César Thomson and Eugène Ysaÿe in Brussels, where he won first prize in violin at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels. Following a tour of Europe as a violin soloist, Donner returned to the United States, where he continued to give recitals, including with Ernestine Schumann-Heink. Donner served as the concertmaster of the Seattle Symphony under the direction of conductor Henry Kimball Hadley. He then moved to California, where he joined the violin section of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Hollywood Bowl Orchestra and taught violin, at one time heading the violin department of the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music. As a conductor, Donner worked with Los Angeles’ WPA Fe

Max Janowski

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Max Janowski (1912 – April 8, 1991) was a composer of Jewish liturgical music, a conductor, choir director, and voice teacher. Born in Berlin into a musical family, Max was the son of Chaim Janowski, a choir director, and , an opera singer. As a youth, Max studied at the Klindworth-Scharwenka Conservatory (Klindworth-Scharwenka-Konservatorium) in Berlin. In 1933, he won a piano contest, which led to him becoming the head of the piano department at the Musashino Academia Musicae in Tokyo, Japan. He emigrated to the United States in 1937 and served in the U.S. Navy during World War II. Max Janowski’s choral works include the traditional Jewish prayers “Avinu Malkeinu” (“Our Father, Our King,” a hymn for the High Holy Days), “Sim Shalom” (“Song of Peace,” which was dedicated to the American diplomat Ralph Bunche), “Yismehu,” and “ve-Shomeru”. From 1938 until his death, Janowski was the music director at KAM Isaiah Israel Congregation in Hyde Park in Chicago. On January 29, 2012, the centennial of his birth, a Gala Concert featuring several cantors, cantorial soloists, and area chorales was held at K.A.M. Isaiah Israel to celebrate Janowski’s life and music. Baritone Sherrill Milnes an

Max Kortlander

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Maximilian Joseph Kortlander (September 1, 1890 – October 11, 1961) was an American composer, arranger, and pianist. He is best known for his numerous piano rolls which he performed for QRS Music Technologies, Inc. He often collaborated with fellow QRS pianist and composer, Pete Wendling. A song they wrote together in 1922, “Whenever You’re Lonesome (Just Telephone Me)” has become a jazz standard. Life and career Source: Max Kortlander was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan in 1890 to parents Joseph and Elizabeth Kortlander. He attended the Oberlin College Conservatory after high school, and later the American Conservatory, in Chicago, Illinois. In 1914, he was hired by QRS and began writing his own compositions in 1917. His first songs were entitled “The Ragtime Sailor Man” and “Chicken Pranks”. After moving to New York City, he wrote the hit song “Tell Me” (1919), which was recorded by Al Jolson, one of the most popular singers of the time. It garnered total sales of up to $100,000. In 1928, he and Wendling wrote a theme for the popular cartoon, Felix the Cat. It was recorded by the Paul Whiteman Orchestra. The original cutting machine used by Kortlander to cut piano rolls is on disp

Max Neuhaus

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Max Neuhaus (August 9, 1939 – February 3, 2009) was an American musician, sound artist, and noted interpreter of contemporary and experimental percussion music in the 1960s. He created dozens of permanent and short-term sound installations during his career, which spanned four decades. Biography Neuhaus was born on August 9, 1939, in Beaumont, Texas, and spent childhood in New York before moving to Houston, Texas, where he graduated from Lamar High School (Houston). He studied percussion with Paul Price at the Manhattan School of Music, graduating with a master of music degree in 1962. After graduation, he attended Darmstadt Summer Courses as well as performed as a percussion soloist on concert tours throughout the United States with Pierre Boulez (1962-1963) and Karlheinz Stockhausen (1963-1964). In 1964 and 1965, he presented solo recitals in Carnegie Hall in New York City and fifteen major European cities. In 1966, he released a recording via Mass Art Inc. involving four live realizations of John Cage’s Fontana Mix (1958), an indeterminate graphic score originally intended for a tape piece, with or without additional instruments. Entitled “Fontana Mix-Feed,” Neuhaus’s realizatio

Max Stern (composer)

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Max Stern (; born March 31, 1947, in Valley Stream, New York) is a composer, critic, double-bassist, conductor and educator. He has created a rich genre of biblical compositions blending East and West in contemporary and traditional genres. Musical education Stern sang in the synagogue as a boy and began music in the public schools; playing tuba and contrabass in bands, orchestras, shows etc. In high school, he studied contrabass with Frederick Zimmermann, (NYC,1963–65), and participated in chamber music workshops led by the Budapest String Quartet at SUNY at Buffalo (1963–64). Composition- Samuel Adler, theory- Robert Gauldin, orchestration- Bernard Rogers, contrabass-Oscar Zimmerman, voice classes of Julius Huehn at the Eastman School of Music (BM, Rochester, New York 1969); privately Hall Overton (NYC, 1966 & 67). Further composition- theoretical studies with Alexander Goehr, double bass w. Gary Karr at Yale School of Music, New Haven (MM, 1970). Addition Studies at the First International Kodaly Seminar, Kesckemet, Hungary(1970) and at the Kodaly Musical Training Institute, Wellesley, Mass., pedagogy and choral conducting - Peter Erdei, solfege and folkmusic research with Kati

Max Weil

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Max Weil (November 21, 1869 — February 18, 1944) was an American violinist, conductor, composer, and music educator. He is chiefly remembered for his contributions to music in the city of Halifax, Nova Scotia in Canada. His parents were Samuel Weil and Bertha Weil (née Simon). His family was Jewish. There he was a pupil of violinists Adolf Brodsky and Hans Sitt. After returning to the United States, Weil gave his first public performance at the Reform Congregation Keneseth Israel (RCKI) in Philadelphia where he played as a soloist during religious services in September 1890. and that same month performed violin duo works with Harry Herzberg in the RCKI’s chamber music concert series. He continued to perform regularly during concerts, religious services, and public events such as funerals and weddings at the RCKI in 1891. On March 12, 1891, Weil made his New York recital debut at Steinway Hall. His repertoire in that concert included violin concertos by Louis Spohr and the Polonaise de Concert, Op. 4 by Henryk Wieniawski. He also performed songs with tenor Henry Duzensi in that concert and with pianist Max Liebling. In June 1891 he was the violin soloist in a concert given at Philad

Mel Powell

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Mel Powell (born Melvin Epstein) (February 12, 1923 – April 24, 1998) was an American Pulitzer Prize-winning composer, and the founding dean of the music department at the California Institute of the Arts. He served as a music educator for over 40 years, first at Mannes College of Music and Queens College, then Yale University, and finally at CalArts. During his early career he worked as a jazz pianist. His classic Big Band compositions include “Mission to Moscow”, “My Guy’s Come Back”, “Clarinade”, “The Earl”, and “Bubble Bath”. Early life Mel Powell was born Melvin D. Epstein on February 12, 1923, in The Bronx, New York City, He began playing piano at age four, taking lessons from, among others, Nadia Reisenberg. Powell dreamed of life as a concert pianist until his older brother took him to see jazz pianist Teddy Wilson play, Career Powell’s style was rooted in the stride style that was the direct precursor to swing piano. One composition from his Goodman years, The Earl, is perhaps his best known from that time. The song—dedicated to Earl “Fatha” Hines, one of Powell’s piano heroes—was recorded without a drummer. prompting him to devote himself to composition rather than perfor

Melinda Wagner

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Melinda Jane Wagner (born 1957 in Philadelphia) is a US composer, and winner of the 1999 Pulitzer Prize in music. Her undergraduate degree is from Hamilton College. She received her graduates degrees from University of Chicago and University of Pennsylvania. She also served as Composer-in-Residence at the University of Texas (Austin) and at the ‘Bravo!’ Vail Valley Music Festival. Some of her teachers included Richard Wernick, George Crumb, Shulamit Ran, and Jay Reise. Career A resident of Ridgewood, New Jersey, Wagner won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for her Concerto for Flute, Strings and Percussion. The Chicago Symphony has commissioned three major works, Falling Angels (1992); a piano concerto, Extremity of Sky (2002) for Emanuel Ax; the most recent of these, Proceed, Moon (2016), was premiered by the orchestra under the baton of Susanna Mälkki in 2017. Extremity of Sky has also been performed by Emanuel Ax with the National Symphony, the Toronto Symphony, the Kansas City Symphony, and the Staatskapelle Berlin. Other works have been performed by a number of orchestras, including the New York New Music Ensemble, the Network for New Music, Orchestra 2001, the San Francisco Contemporar

Meredith Monk

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Meredith Jane Monk (born November 20, 1942) is an American composer, performer, director, vocalist, filmmaker, and choreographer. From the 1960s onwards, Monk has created multi-disciplinary works which combine music, theatre, and dance, recording extensively for ECM Records. Her mother, a professional singer of popular and classical music known under the stage name of Audrey Marsh, was herself the daughter of a concert pianist of German Jewish background from Philadelphia. Meredith has a sister, Tracy (born 1948). Career Meredith Monk is primarily known for her vocal innovations, including a wide range of extended techniques, which she first developed in her solo performances prior to forming her own ensemble. In December 1961, she appeared at the Actor’s Playhouse in Greenwich Village (NYC) as a solo dancer in an off-Broadway children’s musical theater adaptation of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, entitled Scrooge (music and lyrics by Norman Curtis; directed and choreographed by Patricia Taylor Curtis). In 1964, Monk graduated from Sarah Lawrence College after studying with Beverly Schmidt Blossom, and in 1968 she founded The House, a company dedicated to an interdisciplinary

Meredith Willson

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Robert Reiniger Meredith Willson (May 18, 1902 – June 15, 1984) was an American flautist, composer, conductor, musical arranger, bandleader, playwright, and writer. He is perhaps best known for writing the book, music, and lyrics for the 1957 hit Broadway musical The Music Man and composed symphonies and popular songs. He was twice nominated for Academy Awards for film scores. Early life Willson was born in Mason City, Iowa, to Rosalie Reiniger Willson and John David Willson. He had a brother two years his senior, John Cedrick, and a sister 12 years his senior, children’s writer Dixie Willson. Willson attended Frank Damrosch’s Institute of Musical Art (which later became The Juilliard School) in New York City. He married his high-school sweetheart, Elizabeth “Peggy” Wilson, on August 29, 1920; they were married for 26 years. As a child, Willson played the bass drum for a Salvation Army band. and later the New York Philharmonic Orchestra under Arturo Toscanini (1924–1929). He then moved to San Francisco, California, as the concert director for radio station KFRC, and then as a musical director for the NBC radio network in Hollywood. His on-air radio debut came on KFRC in 1928 on Blu

Merle J. Isaac

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Merle John Isaac (October 12, 1898 – March 11, 1996) was an American composer and prolific arranger who focused on arranging famous pieces for performers of lower experience, especially school orchestras. Early life and education Isaac was born in Pioneer, Iowa on October 12, 1898 to William P. and Elizabeth J. Isaac. Merle was of Welsh and Scottish descent; his mother emigrated from Scotland as a child his paternal grandparents were Welsh. Shortly before 1900, the Isaac family moved from Iowa to Illinois. Isaac’s parents later bought a piano and he continued studying piano and organ with Carnduff until he finished eighth grade. Isaac enrolled at Crane Junior College, now known as Malcolm X College. After attending classes there in the morning, he dedicated his afternoons to practicing the church organ. This led him to a weekend job accompanying silent films on organ at movie theaters in the area. In 1993, the American String Teachers Association gave Isaac a lifetime achievement award, and annually through 1997 continued giving awards under his name. They also have an annual Merle J. Isaac composition contest to “encourage the composition, publication, and performance of music of

Merrill Bradshaw

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Merrill Bradshaw (June 18, 1929 – July 12, 2000) was an American composer and professor at Brigham Young University (BYU), where he was composer-in-residence from 1967 to 1994. Bradshaw grew up in Lyman, Wyoming; Salt Lake City, Utah; and Portland, Oregon. He was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). He studied music theory at BYU with John R. Halliday and others, after which he continued his studies in composition at the University of Illinois. He became a faculty member at BYU in 1957. He was chairman of composition and theory from 1973 to 1983, and the executive director of the Barlow Endowment for Music Composition from 1983 to 1999. From 1973 to 1978 he chaired an LDS Church committee to revise the hymnbook, although the committee was suspended before they published their intended hymnal. A different committee authored the 1985 hymnal. Bradshaw composed many pieces in an eclectic style, most notably The Articles of Faith (1960), Symphony No. 3 (1967), Symphony No. 4 (1969), “Psalm XCVI” (1979), Four Mountain Sketches (1974), the oratorio The Restoration (1974), and a viola concerto titled Homages (1979). He collaborated closely with BYU ense

Merrill Jenson

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Merrill Boyd Jenson (born January 20, 1947) is an American composer and arranger who has composed film scores for over thirty films including Emma Smith: My Story, Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration, The Testaments of One Fold and One Shepherd, Legacy, Harry’s War, and Windwalker. Many of the films Jenson composed music for were directed by Academy Award-winning director Kieth Merrill. Jenson has also composed several concert productions including a symphony that premiered at Carnegie Hall. Additionally, he has composed music for many television commercials including the acclaimed Homefront ads, music for three outdoor pageants, and several albums. Jenson lives in Provo, Utah with his wife Betsy Lee Jenson. Early life Jenson was born in Richfield, Utah on January 20, 1947. He was introduced to music at an early age with his mother teaching him how to conduct music in front of a mirror while listening to recordings of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. She also taught him to play the piano while his father taught him the trumpet. He attended Brigham Young University where he directed the BYU Cougar Marching Band and graduated with a degree in Music Composition. Soon after graduating

Michael Abels

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Michael Abels (born October 8, 1962) is an American composer best known for the opera Omar, co-written with Rhiannon Giddens, and his scores for the Jordan Peele films Get Out, Us and Nope. The hip-hop influenced score for Us was short-listed for the Oscars and was even named “Score of the Decade” by TheWrap. Other recent media projects include the films Bad Education, Nightbooks, Fake Famous, and the docu-series Allen v. Farrow. His most recent releases include Beauty which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and is now streaming on Netflix, Breaking (formerly 892) which premiered at Sundance, and his third collaboration with Jordan Peele, Nope. Abels’ works also includes many concert works, such as At War With Ourselves for the Kronos Quartet, Isolation Variation for Hilary Hahn, and the opera Omar co-composed with Grammy-winning singer/songwriter Rhiannon Giddens. Some of these pieces are available on the Cedille Records, including Delights & Dances and Winged Creatures. Recent commissions include a work for the National Symphony Orchestra and a guitar concerto for Mak Grgić. Abels is co-founder of the Composers Diversity Collective, an advocacy group to increase visibility o

Michael Alec Rose

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Michael Alec Rose (born 1959) is an American composer of chamber and symphonic music. He is Professor of Composition at Vanderbilt University’s Blair School of Music. His awards and commissions include the Walter W. Naumburg Foundation’s chamber music commission, for which he composed his String Quartet No. 2, premiered by the Meliora Quartet at Lincoln Center and the Library of Congress; a commission from the International Spoleto Festival for a violin-cello duo; twenty-five consecutive annual awards in composition from the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers, 1986–2010; string quartet commissions from the Blair and Mendelssohn Quartets; and three commissioned performances by the Nashville Symphony, including Symphony No. 1—Paths of Peace (2000). Rose’s Interferon, or Piano Concerto was performed by two orchestras in the Czech Republic in 2001. Two ballets commissioned by the Nashville Ballet were premiered in 2003–2004. The Pedagogy of Grief (Viola Sonata No. 3) was first performed at the Peabody Institute of Music, Baltimore, in 2005. Arguing with God: Concerto for Klezmer and Chamber Orchestra received its first performance in March 2007, by the Nashville Cha

Michael Carnes

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Michael Page Carnes (1950) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. Life and career Carnes was born in North Carolina. The son of a piano teacher, he received his first formal musical training on trumpet in the public schools. He formed and played in several rock bands beginning in the late 1960s. While originally a performer of popular music and jazz, Carnes became interested in classical music and resumed his education. He studied composition under John Bavicchi and Rudi Martinus van Dijk at Berklee College of Music where he received his BA in 1977, John Thow and Theodore Antoniou at Boston University where he received his master’s degree in Music in 1980 and later with Gunther Schuller. His early works were largely built with extended tonality and reflective of jazz. These include a number of guitar etudes. In the years that followed, his music became more strongly chromatic, without an obvious tonal center. Principal works from this period include Fantasy Music 1 (for flute and taped electronic sounds), Fantasy Music 2 (for harpsichord and taped electronic sounds), and Marimba Concerto. An intermediate period included Brass Quintet #2, War Songs (for voice and t

Michael Ching

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Michael Ching (born September 29, 1958) is an American composer, conductor, and music administrator. A prolific and eclectic composer, he is best known nationally as the composer of innovative operas, including his a cappella adaptation of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (2011). His other major operas include Buoso’s Ghost (1996), Corps of Discovery (2003), Slaying the Dragon (2012), Speed Dating Tonight! (2013), Alice Ryley (2015), and Notes on Viardot (2024). According to Opera America, he is one of the top 10 most-produced living North American opera or music-theater composers. He has written the librettos of many of his own operas, and has done so for nearly all of his operas composed after 2012. He is on the board of directors of the National Opera Association. Early life and education Michael Ching was born in 1958 in Honolulu, Hawaii. Before he was one year old his family left Honolulu, and he grew up in New Orleans and Saint Paul, Minnesota. Ching started piano at the age of six and was quite skilled at it, at one point considering a career as a concert pianist. In addition, he studied flute, violin, and oboe, mostly for the sake of composition. He started composing

Michael Conway Baker

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Michael Conway Baker (born March 13, 1937) is an American-Canadian composer and music teacher. He became a Canadian citizen in 1970 and lives in North Vancouver. Life and career Baker was born in West Palm Beach, Florida, and taught himself basic music theory as a child. His father is comedian Phil Baker. one Juno Award for Classical Composition of the Year (for his Concerto For Piano and Chamber Orchestra), and an ACTRA Award for Best Television Score (for A Planet for the Taking). He has composed for the National Ballet of Canada, Expo 86 in Vancouver, and two episodes of Road to Avonlea. In 1997, Baker was awarded the Order of British Columbia. He is known for having composed the Vancouver Variations, References External links * Official website

Michael Daugherty

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Michael Kevin Daugherty (born April 28, 1954) is an American composer, pianist, and teacher. He is influenced by popular culture, Romanticism, and postmodernism. Daugherty’s notable works include his Superman comic book-inspired Metropolis Symphony for orchestra (1988–93), Dead Elvis for solo bassoon and chamber ensemble (1993), Jackie O (1997), Niagara Falls for symphonic band (1997), UFO for solo percussion and orchestra (1999) and for symphonic band (2000), Bells for Stokowski from Philadelphia Stories for orchestra (2001) and for symphonic band (2002), Fire and Blood for solo violin and orchestra (2003) inspired by Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo, Time Machine for three conductors and orchestra (2003), Ghost Ranch for orchestra (2005), Deus ex Machina for piano and orchestra (2007), Labyrinth of Love for soprano and chamber winds (2012), American Gothic for orchestra (2013), and Tales of Hemingway for cello and orchestra (2015). Daugherty has been described by The Times as “a master icon maker” with a “maverick imagination, fearless structural sense and meticulous ear.” Currently, Daugherty is professor of composition at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance

Michael Dellaira

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Michael Dellaira (born August 5, 1949) is an American composer. He is a citizen of the United States and Italy and resides in New York City with his wife, the writer Brenda Wineapple. Early life and career Dellaira was born Michael Dellario in Schenectady, New York. He legally changed his surname to Dellaira, the original family name, in 1982. He started to play the violin at the age of 8, the clarinet at 12, and in high school became a drummer and lead singer in local rock bands. He enrolled in Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service but graduated in 1971 with a B.A. in philosophy. During these years he learned to play acoustic guitar, performing often in coffee-houses. At The George Washington University he studied composition with Robert Parris and conducting with George Steiner. After receiving his Master of Music degree in 1973, he served as assistant conductor of the Alexandria Symphony. A year later he went to Princeton University, where he studied with Milton Babbitt, Edward T. Cone and Paul Lansky, receiving both an M.F.A and Ph.D. in composition. He spent two summers in residence at The Composers Conference working with Roger Sessions and Mario Davidovsky. Award

Michael Djupstrom

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Michael Djupstrom (born 1980) is an American composer. Born in St. Paul, Minnesota, he grew up in White Bear Lake, Minnesota. After completing undergraduate and graduate studies in composition at the University of Michigan, Djupstrom moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he completed an Artist Diploma at the Curtis Institute of Music. His music has garnered many awards, and is published by Bright Press and Boosey & Hawkes. His composition teachers include Jennifer Higdon, Richard Danielpour, Bright Sheng and Betsy Jolas, among others. Awards *2002 – ASCAP/CBDNA Frederick Fennell Prize *2002 – Walter Beeler Memorial Composition Prize, Ithaca College *2003, 2004 – ASCAP Foundation Morton Gould Young Composer Award *2004 – William Schuman Prize, BMI Foundation *2005 – ASCAP/Lotte Lehmann Foundation Song Cycle Competition, 3rd prize *2005 – Music Teachers National Association - Shepherd Distinguished Composer of the Year *2006 – Great Wall International Composition Competition, 1st Prize & Audience Prize, Chinese Fine Arts Society *2010 – Charles Ives Fellowship, The American Academy of Arts and Letters *2012 – American Viola Society’s Maurice Gardner Composition Competition grand

Michael Friedman (composer)

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John Michael Friedman (September 24, 1975 – September 9, 2017) was an American composer and lyricist. He was a Founding Associate Artist of theater company The Civilians. His musical Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson opened on Broadway in October 2010. Friedman won a 2007 Obie Award for sustained excellence. Additionally, he received a MacDowell Fellowship, a Princeton Hodder Fellowship, a Meet The Composer Fellowship, and was a Barron Visiting Professor at The Princeton Environmental Institute in 2009. At the time of his death, he was the Artist in Residence and Director of the Public Forum at the Public Theater and was also the Artistic Director of City Center Encores! Off-Center. Background Born in Boston, Friedman grew up in Philadelphia. He attended Germantown Friends School, after which he studied history and literature at Harvard College. While at Harvard, he studied under Bernard Rands, Mario Davidovsky, and Elizabeth Swados. Career Friedman was most well known as the co-creator of the critically acclaimed musical Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson which premiered in New York at the Public Theater and subsequently transferred to Broadway. Other credits include the musical Unknown Sold

Michael Giacchino

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Michael Giacchino ( ; ; born October 10, 1967) is an American film, television, and video game score composer. He has received numerous accolades for his work, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, a BAFTA Award, and a Primetime Emmy Award, as well as three Grammy Awards. Giacchino is known for his collaborations with directors J. J. Abrams, Brad Bird, Matt Reeves, Pete Docter, Colin Trevorrow, Jon Watts, J. A. Bayona, The Wachowskis, Taika Waititi, and Thomas Bezucha. His film scores include several films from the Mission: Impossible, Jurassic World, Marvel Cinematic Universe, and Star Trek franchises, eight Pixar Animation Studios films, multiple Disney films, Rogue One, The Batman, and several other films. Giacchino also composed the score for the video game series Medal of Honor and Call of Duty and the television series Alias, Lost, and Fringe. In 2018, Giacchino ventured into directing, and in 2022, he directed the Marvel Studios Disney+ special Werewolf by Night. Early life Giacchino was born in Riverside Township, New Jersey, to an Italian family. His father’s ancestors were from Sicily, and his mother’s ancestors emigrated from Abruzzo (in southern Italy as wel

Michael Gordon (composer)

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Michael Gordon (born July 20, 1956) is an American composer and co-founder of the Bang on a Can music collective and festival. He grew up in Nicaragua. Life and career Michael Gordon was born in Miami Beach, Florida on July 20, 1956. He grew up in Nicaragua on the outskirts of Managua in an Eastern European Jewish community before moving back to Miami Beach at age eight. Gordon’s music is an outgrowth of his experience with underground rock bands in New York City and his formal training in composition at Yale where he studied with Martin Bresnick. He is based in New York City. Bang on a Can Gordon is one of the founders and artistic directors of New York’s Bang on a Can Festival, alongside fellow composers Julia Wolfe—his wife—and David Lang. He has collaborated with them on several projects. The opera The Carbon Copy Building, a collaboration with comic book artist Ben Katchor, received the 2000 Village Voice Obie Award for Best New American Work. A projected comic strip accompanies and interacts with the singers, and the frames fall away in the telling of the story. Gordon, Wolfe and Lang subsequently collaborated with librettist Deborah Artman on the ‘oratorio’ Lost Objects, the

Michael H. Weinstein

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Michael H. Weinstein (born June 26, 1960) is a Swiss composer active in America. Weinstein has written music for all major genres of art music—with the exception of opera—though he is primarily known for his works for wind ensemble. His style melds the lightness of Mozart with the rhythmic complexity of Stravinsky, and, while his music is fundamentally tonal, he employ’s twelve tone techniques to create tension and ambiguity. Weinstein’s music has been performed throughout America, Europe and Russia. His Concerto for Wind Ensemble (1989) was recorded by Eugene Corporon and the Cincinnati Wind Ensemble for the Klavier label. He has received numerous commissions including the Chamber Symphony (commissioned by the American Composer’s Forum, 2005) the Serenade for Twelve Instruments (commissioned by New England Conservatory, 2000; published by Boosey & Hawkes), The Roman Odes (commissioned by Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2001.)and Two Elegies (commissioned by the USAF Band, Washington, DC, 1998) among others. Reviewing the premiere of Weinstein’s Concerto for Horn, Anthony Tommasini described Weinsteins’s music: “The harmonic language is tonal; the style is neoclassical in th

Michael Halstenson

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Michael Halstenson is a native to North Dakota. He is a musician and composer. Currently, he resides in Elk River, Minnesota. his compositions have been performed in many places. Performances of his music have taken place in Carnegie Hall, Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, and Tampere Hall, Finland. His pieces have been broadcast on Minnesota Public Radio as well. Halstenson’s compositions have been performed by the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Appleton Symphony, Minnesota All-State Band, University of Minnesota Opera Theater, Lake Wobegon Brass Band, and the St. Olaf Band among others. Employment Michael Halstenson took the position of conductor of the North Suburban Concert Band in 1985 and kept the position for 12 years. In 1997, Steve Lyons became the conductor. Halstenson also conducted the North Suburban Chorale, St. Cloud Symphony, Buffalo (MN) Symphony, and directed music at Peace Lutheran Church in Coon Rapids, Minnesota. Halstenson retired in 2017, but makes frequent appearances at Anoka High School. During his employment, he directed the orchestra program at Anoka High School and was in charge of the music for the Anoka High School theater program. He b

Michael Harrison (musician)

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Michael Harrison (October 24, 1958 - April 17, 2026) was an American contemporary classical music composer and pianist living in New York City. He was a Guggenheim Fellow for the academic year 2018–2019. Early years Born in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, Harrison grew up in Eugene, Oregon, where his father, David Kent Harrison was a professor of mathematics at the University of Oregon and a Guggenheim Fellow for the academic year 1963–1964. As a child and teenager, he spent summers in both Chatham and Concord, Massachusetts, with his grandfather, George R. Harrison, a professor of experimental physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1930), and Dean of Science (1942–64). He graduated from the University of Oregon with a B.M. in Composition, where he later received the Distinguished Alumnus of the Year Award, and then moved to New York City to study with La Monte Young through a Dia Art Foundation Apprenticeship-in Residency. He later received an M.M. in composition from the Manhattan School of Music, studying with Reiko Fueting. Career In 1986, Harrison designed and produced the “harmonic piano”, an extensively modified grand piano with the ability to play 24 notes per octav

Michael Hennagin

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Michael Hennagin (17 September 1936 – 4 June 1993) was an American composer and university professor. Life and career Hennagin was born in The Dalles, Oregon. He studied composition at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia and at summer festivals in Aspen and Tanglewood. His composition teachers included Darius Milhaud and Aaron Copland. Hennagin began his professional career as a Hollywood composer and arranger working in film and television. He composed in all media, and music for both instrumental and vocal ensembles, including frequently performed pieces for choir, symphonic band and orchestra, and percussion ensemble. Notable compositions include soundtracks for The DuPont Show of the Week and the television series Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, ballet scores for the Lester Horton Dance Theater in Los Angeles, and his Duo Chopinesque for Percussion Ensemble and Walking on the Green Grass for Choir are performed frequently. His compositions are published by Walton Music, Southern Music Company, and Boosey and Hawkes. He received awards from American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) recognizing his continued commercial influence and success, and he

Michael Hersch

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Michael Nathaniel Hersch (born June 25, 1971) is an American composer and pianist. He currently serves as faculty at the Johns Hopkins Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, Maryland, where he completed his own studies in music composition. The New York Times has commented that he writes “extraordinarily communicative music” and that “Mr. Hersch’s music speaks for itself eloquently”. Biography Early life and musical education Born in Washington, D.C., and raised in Reston, Virginia, Hersch was introduced to classical music at the age of 18 by his younger brother Jamie, who showed him a videotape of Georg Solti conducting Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. He began his studies at the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore with Morris Cotel. In 1995 Hersch studied at the Moscow Conservatory, where he worked with Albert Leman and Roman Ledenev. That same year he also worked with John Corigliano, John Harbison, and George Rochberg at a program for young composers. Hersch then returned to Peabody for graduate studies, graduating in 1997 with a Master of Arts. Early recognition His first success came when Marin Alsop selected Hersch’s Elegy as winner of the American Composers Prize, and conduct

Michael Kohler (musician)

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Michael Kohler is an American composer, music producer and sound designer who has composed music for numerous television shows, commercials and promos since 1993. A large number of his compositions have been created for commercials and promos for Cartoon Network and its spinoff network Boomerang. He has also done compositions for Nickelodeon, Toon Disney, and E!. Kohler has been lead sound designer and mixer for series such as Adult Swim series Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law, 12 oz. Mouse, Perfect Hair Forever, Stroker and Hoop, Aqua Teen Hunger Force and its film Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters, and the first four seasons of FX series Archer. Kohler also voices himself on the Aqua Teen Hunger Force season seven episode “A PE Christmas”. Kohler composed music for Too Many Cooks, Stroker and Hoop, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law, The Bremen Avenue Experience, the original theme music for Boomerang used from its launch in 2000 to 2014, the current theme music for Boomerang, and the 2010 Cartoon Network mnemonic. He has also composed music, sound designed and mixed many animated shorts, pilot episodes, promos, and commercials since 1993 fo

Michael McLean (composer)

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Michael H. McLean (born 1952) is an American songwriter, playwright, author, and filmmaker based in Heber City, Utah. Early life McLean attended high school in the Chicago area, where he served as student body president and performed in the school’s production of The Music Man. He is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) and was the only Latter-day Saint in his graduating class. McLean served an LDS mission in South Africa. After returning from his mission he formed a band. They went around at the bottom of the club circuit, but never made a break. While a student at Brigham Young University (BYU) he took a music theory class in which he received a C and was told that he did not have what it would take to make it in music professionally. His life was saved by a kidney donor from Heber Valley Utah. Career As a composer, McLean has produced more than 20 albums of original music, selling over one million copies since his 1983 debut. Focused mainly on a Latter-day Saint audience, McLean has also produced albums with a broader appeal, such as The Forgotten Carols. McLean’s most recent musical releases have been through Shadow Mountain Records, with The

Michael Nicolella

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Michael Nicolella (born December 31, 1963, in Providence, RI) is an American classical guitarist and composer. Described as an iconoclast, he is known for his versatile, adventurous and eclectic approach to repertoire, including the incorporation of electric guitar into his concert programs and recordings. Nicolella’s repertoire ranges from the Baroque to the present. His most recent recording is his own arrangement of the complete cello suites of Johann Sebastian Bach; while his past four recordings focused on contemporary music, including his own compositions, alongside those of Toru Takemitsu, Elliott Carter, Luciano Berio, Hans Werner Henze and Steve Reich. He has championed music by such emerging composers as Laurence Crane and Jacob ter Veldhuis and has premiered many works written for him by other composers, including: Joshua Kohl, (of the Degenerate Art Ensemble), David Mesler, Christopher DeLaurenti and John Fitz Rogers, who in 2001 wrote the forty-five-minute piece Transit for Nicolella, scored for electric guitar and computer generated sound. His own compositions include works for solo guitar, chamber music with guitar, a classical guitar concerto (Guitar Concerto), and

Michael Patrick Walker

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Michael Patrick Walker is a composer, lyricist, writer, and musician. Life Walker was born in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and raised in New Freedom, Pennsylvania. He lived in Pittsburgh for several years while earning his bachelor’s degree from Carnegie Mellon University and then moved to New York City, where he currently resides. He played piano and keyboards and/or conducted for various theatrical Broadway, Off-Broadway, and touring productions including Stephen Sondheim’s Old Friends, Once Upon A Mattress (2024 Revival), Some Like It Hot, Frozen, Aladdin, If/Then, Avenue Q (conductor), the Roundabout Theatre Company’s production of The Tin Pan Alley Rag (music director/arranger), Wicked, The Lion King, Thoroughly Modern Millie, and tick, tick… BOOM! (conductor). Work as composer/lyricist Walker, with fellow composer/lyricist Gary Adler and book writer Kevin Del Aguila, wrote and created the Off-Broadway musical Altar Boyz, which won the 2005 Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Off-Broadway Musical. Additionally, the show was nominated for seven Drama Desk Awards (including two each for Walker and Adler for Best Music and for Best Lyrics) and four Lucille Lortel Awards including Be

Michael Pisaro

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Michael Pisaro (born 1961 in Buffalo, New York) is an American guitarist and composer. A member of the Wandelweiser Composers Ensemble, he has composed over 80 works for a great variety of instrumental combinations, including several pieces for variable instrumentation. Works A particularly large category of Pisaro’s works are solo works, notably a series of 36 pieces (grouped into six longer works) for the three-year, 156-concert series organized by Carlo Inderhees at the Zionskirche in Berlin-Mitte from 1997 to 1999. Another solo piece, pi (1-2594), was performed in installments by the composer on 15 selected days in February 1999, in Evanston, Illinois, in Düsseldorf in 2000–2001 and at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival in 2009 (with pianist Philip Thomas). Pisaro has also devoted works to poets including among others, his harmony series, which functions as both a kind of poetic anthology and a collection of indeterminate scores, and July Mountain which is a translation of the poem of the same name by Wallace Stevens, into a score for field recordings and several layers of percussion. Reading Spinoza is an accompanied reading of the Fifth Book of Baruch Spinoza’s Ethi

Michael Ricketts (musician)

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Michael David Ricketts (born January 21, 1965, in College Park, Maryland) is an American rock musician, and songwriter. Guitarist for heavy metal rock band ALLOY20. Michael acted as primary recording engineer for their debut CD “ALLOY20 - Part I: Lost in the Veil of Darkness”, released on October 20, 2012. Michael spends his spare time producing other acts and is also working on a solo project. He was co-founder and lead guitarist of the rock band Snydly Crunch. Snydly Crunch was featured on the 97-Underground compilation Album in 1987, and released “Revealed” in 1993. The band has performed with artists such as Pat Travers Band, Kix, and Mitch Allan with Honor Among Thieves on several occasions. With the help of local producer and engineer Ray Tilkins, Snydly Crunch recorded the independent LP Revealed, released on SMARK Records on which Ricketts was co-writer and performed on guitars, keyboards, and backing vocals. Band members Alloy20 members *Jeff Grove - lead vocals *Sean Taylor Brown - guitars *Michael Ricketts - guitars *John Taylor - bass guitars *Billy Giddings - drums, percussion Snydly Crunch members *Michael Spelta - lead vocals, keyboards (1985–1989) *Sean Patrick Mitc

Michael Rubin (composer)

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Michael Rubin II is an American music producer, composer, voice actor and lyricist best known for his work in children’s television. Rubin has created musical pieces for shows including Bubble Guppies, Blue’s Clues (in which he also voiced Mailbox), Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, and Jack’s Big Music Show, among others. His songs have been performed by artists including Ray Charles, Patti LaBelle, Macy Gray, Randy Travis, India Arie, Nell Carter, Toni Braxton, Phoebe Snow, and The Persuasions. Career Rubin began his professional career making music for advertising. He founded the music production company Murmur Music Inc. in 1993. Murmur created music and sound design for commercials and promotional pieces for American Express, AMC, AT&T, Bell South, Citibank, Coca-Cola, Fisher Price, The Food Network, General Motors, Kraft, Maxwell House, Merck, Motorola, Nabisco, Paramount Pictures, Rockport, Samsung, UPS, VH1, Viacom, Volvo and others. He founded the company Rhumba which encompasses Murmur and Dubway Studios which is run by Al Houghton. In 1995, Rubin (with writing partner Nick Balaban) created the music and sound design for the pilot episode of Blue’s Clues. Rubin and Murmur created t

Michael Sahl

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Michael Sahl (September 2, 1934 – March 29, 2018) was an American composer, pianist, and music director known for his eclectic and polystylistic approach to music. Early life and education Sahl was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He earned a B.A. from Amherst College in 1955 and an M.F.A. from Princeton University in 1957, studying under Milton Babbitt and Roger Sessions. He later studied with Luigi Dallapiccola in Florence on a Fulbright fellowship, and with composers including Israel Citkowitz, Lukas Foss, and Aaron Copland. Career In the 1960s, Sahl began composing film scores and served as a creative associate at the State University of New York at Buffalo. Sahl began collaborating with Eric Salzman during their graduate studies in composition at Princeton University, forming an alliance that would span decades and produce numerous music theater works. Musical style Sahl’s music is characterized by its polystylistic nature, combining jazz chords, romantic melodies, electric instruments, and influences from rock, tango, and blues. Selected works Dramatic works * Biograffiti (1974) * The Conjuror (1975) * Civilization and Its Discontents (1977) * Boxes (1982–83) * Dream Beach (198

Michael Sidney Timpson

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Michael Sidney Timpson (born February 26, 1970) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. He is a Professor of Music Composition at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, South Korea. Early life and education Timpson was born and raised in Mountain View, California, in Silicon Valley. His early musical training included playing baritone saxophone and bass clarinet. He was a co-founder of the jazz group Jazz on the Line with saxophonists Rent Romus and Dan Magay, developing an interest in American improvisational forms including cool jazz, bebop, free jazz, and jazz fusion. Timpson earned his Bachelor of Music (BM) in composition from the University of Southern California, where he studied with Morten Lauridsen. He received his Master of Arts (MA) from the Eastman School of Music, studying under Joseph Schwantner. He completed his Doctor of Musical Arts (DMA) at the University of Michigan, where his teachers included Samuel Adler, William Albright, and William Bolcom. Career Academic positions Timpson has held faculty positions at several American universities, including the University of Kansas, Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee, and the University of South Florida, whe

Michael Tavera

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Michael Anthony Tavera is an American composer best known for his animation scores. He has also worked on countless television series, live-action films, and direct-to-video sequels. He composed at the London Symphony Orchestra. Biography Tavera grew up in Los Angeles. He is most notable for composing music for shows such as ¡Mucha Lucha!, Star Wars Resistance, and Guardians of the Galaxy. Filmography Film Video games Games References External links *

Michael Torke

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Michael Torke (; born September 22, 1961) is an American composer who writes music influenced by jazz and minimalism. Torke was born in Milwaukee, where he attended Wilson Elementary School, graduated from Wauwatosa East High School, and studied at the Eastman School of Music with Joseph Schwantner and Christopher Rouse, and at Yale University. Works Sometimes described as a post-minimalist, his most characteristically postminimal piece is Four Proverbs, in which the syllable for each pitch is fixed and variations in the melody produce streams of nonsense words. Other works in this style include Book of Proverbs and Song of Isaiah. An early piece where he first used a certain post-minimalist style was Vanada, made in 1984. His best-known work is probably Javelin, which he composed in 1994, commissioned by the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games in celebration of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra’s 50th anniversary season, in conjunction with the 1996 Summer Olympics. Commissioned by Disney and Michael Eisner for the New York Philharmonic’s Millennium Celebration, he wrote Four Seasons, an oratorio for chorus and orchestra celebrating various aspects of the months. He wrote a balle

Michelangelo Sosnowitz

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Michelangelo Sosnowitz is an American music composer. His works include ballet, musical theater, electronic and popular music, as well as commercial, television and film. His feature film scores include A Novel Romance, winner Best Film at the NYC International Independent Film Festival, the Dan Fogler directorial debut Hysterical Psycho, the Deborah Kampmeier films Split and Tape (music by), the Julia Verdin films Lost Girls and Maya, the Steve Feder film A Brooklyn Love Story and the Deborah Twiss film trilogy Sapiosexual, Taboo and Crave, and her original streaming series Crazytown. He also wrote the music to the Colin Quinn series Cop Show. His original ballet ‘Petrouchka’ won Best Choreography at NYMF 2010. He wrote the opening theme music to The History Channel show Battles BC and original theme music for ENTV, Deadline Hollywood BlackTreeMedia and other PMC programming. Original Off-Broadway musicals include Crazy Head Space and Love in the Middle Ages. Career Michelangelo began playing the piano at the age of five. His first published music happened in High School for a PBS Documentary called Oysters in the Long Island Sound. Also while in High School, Michelangelo won the

Michelle DiBucci

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Michelle DiBucci is an American composer born in 1961 who writes scores for opera, theater, dance, film, and TV. She has composed several of the scores featured in Wendigo, Carrier, Gêmeas and Creepshow. She is primarily a theater composer, with more than 30 credits. Awards Her soundtrack for Wendigo won the WNYC New Sounds Listeners Poll: Best New Soundtracks. Her ballet, Charlotte Salomon: Der Tod und die Malerin (Charlotte Salomon: Death and the Painter), was premiered at Musiktheater im Revier in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, in 2015 under the direction and choreography of Bridget Breiner. The work was awarded the 2015 Der Faust, Germany’s highest prize for theater and dance, winning in the category of Best Choreography for Breiner. DiBucci’s music-theater work, Basetrack Live, had its New York premiere at Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), Next Wave Festival, in 2014 and was deemed part of the “Best Theater of 2014” list by Charles Isherwood of The New York Times. Her music has been performed at Komische Oper Berlin, Stockholm Concert Hall, Alice Tully Hall, the BAM Harvey Theater, and at Zankel Hall in New York City. Education DiBucci received her B.M. in Music Composition from Carne

Mickey Newbury

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Milton Sims “Mickey” Newbury Jr. (May 19, 1940 – September 29, 2002) was an American singer-songwriter. He is a member of the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. Early life and career Newbury was born in Houston, Texas, on May 19, 1940, to Mamie Ellen (née Taylor) and Milton Newbury. As a teenager, Newbury sang tenor in a moderately successful vocal group called The Embers. In 1966, country star Don Gibson had a Top Ten country hit with Newbury’s “Funny, Familiar, Forgotten Feelings” while Tom Jones scored a world hit with the same song. In 1968, Newbury saw success with four Top 5 songs across four charts: “Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)” No. 5 on the Pop/Rock chart by Kenny Rogers and the First Edition; “Sweet Memories” No. 1 on Easy Listening by Andy Williams; “Time is a Thief” No. 1 on the R&B chart by Solomon Burke; and “Here Comes the Rain Baby” No. 1 on the Country chart by Eddy Arnold. This feat has not been repeated. Early career Based on his phenomenal success as a writer, Newbury scored a solo deal with RCA and recorded Harlequin Melodies. Sonically, the album is drastically different from anything else Newbury recorded. He largely disowned t

Miguel del Águila

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Miguel del Águila (born September 15, 1957, in Montevideo) is an Uruguayan American composer of classical music. He has been nominated for the Grammy Awards three times and has received many other honors. Life In 1978, he moved to California, fleeing Uruguay’s 1970s military government. He graduated from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and studied at the Hochschule für Musik and Konservatorium in Vienna. Early premieres of his works in Vienna’s Musikverein, Konzerthaus and Bösendorfer halls introduced his music and distinctive Latin sound to European audiences. In 1989, del Águila’s work was performed in New York’s Carnegie Recital Hall (now Weill Hall), and Lukas Foss conducted the US premiere of Hexen with the Brooklyn Philharmonic. CDs of his works were released on Albany Records and KKM-Austria by 1990, including his Clarinet Concerto, Herbsttag and Hexen. He returned to the US in 1992, and in 1998 the Los Angeles Times described him as “one of the West Coast’s most promising and enterprising young composers.” He received the Kennedy Center Friedheim Award in 1995, and was music director of Ojai Camerata until 1999. He was resident composer at the Chautauqua Institution

Mikalay Shchahlou-Kulikovich

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(; 13 October 1896 – 31 March 1969) was a cultural and social activist, composer and musicologist, researcher of Belarusian church and secular music. Biography Kulikovich was born on October 13, 1896, in Moscow (according to other sources his date of birth is April 4 at the Smolensk Oblast). Born in the Orthodox Russian – Belarusian family, father’s family came from the Don Cossacks and the mother from Smolensk. Since childhood, brought up by his maternal aunt, who was Abbess of the Orthodox Monastery in Tula. He sang in the church choir, where he revealed his musical abilities. He graduated from the Moscow Synodal School of Church Music, where he was influenced by the famous reformer of Russian church music Alexander Kastalsky. Prior to 1925 he studied at the Moscow Conservatory as a singer took part in the European tour. In 1930 Kulikovich was engaged in collecting and studying Smolensk song folklore. For a time he lived in the Ukrainian SSR and from 1936 in Minsk. He worked as a music editor at the Belarusian Radio. Since 1937 he was the conductor of a symphony orchestra of the Belarusian Radio Committee. He was one of the organizers of the Opera and Ballet Theatre of Belarus. A

Mike Holober

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Mike Holober (born April 21, 1957) is an American jazz pianist, composer, arranger, and educator. Holober moved to New York in 1986, and worked as a composer and sideman pianist. After working with baritone saxophonist Nick Brignola in the late 1990s, he formed The Mike Holober Quintet, featuring original compositions and arrangements performed by Tim Ries (saxophone), Wolfgang Muthspiel (guitar), Brian Blade (drums), and Scott Colley and John Patitucci (bass). The quintet recorded two albums on Sons of Sound: Canyon (2003) and Wish List(2006). Holober’s big band, The Gotham Jazz Orchestra, released two recordings: thought Trains (Sons of Sound, 2004) and Quake (Sunnyside, 2009). The group’s most recent recording, Hiding Out, is due for release August 2019 on ZOHO. The double CD features Hiding Out , commissioned for by The Philadelphia Museum of Art (funded by the Pew Foundation), Flow, commissioned by the Westchester Jazz Orchestra (funded by a NYSCA Individual Artist’s Grant), and Jumble, commissioned by The U.S. Army Jazz Knights of West Point. The recording also includes an arrangement of Jobim’s Caminhos Cruzados, commissioned by the Westchester Jazz Orchestra and written for

Mike Johnson (guitarist)

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Mike Johnson (born 1952) is an American experimental rock guitarist and composer, best known as the co-founder and member of the Denver-based avant-rock group Thinking Plague. He has also been a member of Hamster Theatre and The Science Group, and has collaborated with several musicians, including Bob Drake, Susanne Lewis and Janet Feder. Biography Mike Johnson played in his first band at the age of 13 and began writing music at 17. He studied classical and electronic music in college in Denver but taught himself the guitar and composition. While at college in 1978 Johnson answered an advertisement at a local music store requesting a guitar player “into Henry Cow, Yes…” This put him in touch with bass guitarist and drummer Bob Drake. Johnson and Drake initially played in a few cover bands but in 1980 they began experimenting with prepared guitars and tape machines, and recording material Johnson had written. “Our goal was to combine the harder edge of progressive rock, as in Crimson and Yes, with the more modern tonalities and experimental approach as reflected in the work of the Art Bears, our major heroes at the time.” They made seven studio albums, and released one live album re

Mike Morasky

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Mike Morasky (born June 14, 1964) is an American composer, visual effects artist, director and programmer. He composed the scores for the Valve games Team Fortress 2, the Left 4 Dead series, Portal 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Half-Life: Alyx and Counter-Strike 2. He worked on visual effects for the Lord of the Rings and Matrix films, and founded the underground art bands Steel Pole Bath Tub, Milk Cult and DUH. Biography For Valve, Morasky composed the music for Team Fortress 2, Portal (with Kelly Bailey), Left 4 Dead, Left 4 Dead 2 (including composing and playing the guitar, keyboard and bass for the fictional hard rock band Midnight Riders), Portal 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Half-Life: Alyx, and Counter-Strike 2. He also worked as a senior visual effects artist and technical director on The Lord of the Rings and The Matrix film trilogies. Morasky was part of the now-defunct hardcore punk/noise rock band Steel Pole Bath Tub, which he founded in 1986 with Dale Flattum. S.P.B.T. disbanded in 2002. Filmography Visual Effects *The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) (lead massive crowd technical director) *The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002

Miklós Rózsa

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Miklós Rózsa (; April 18, 1907 – July 27, 1995) was a Hungarian-American composer trained in Germany (1925–1931) and active in France (1931–1935), the United Kingdom (1935–1940), and the United States (1940–1995), with extensive sojourns in Italy from 1953 onward. Best known for his nearly one hundred film scores, he nevertheless maintained a steadfast allegiance to absolute concert music throughout what he called his “double life”. Rózsa achieved early success in Europe with his orchestral Theme, Variations, and Finale (Op. 13) of 1933, and became prominent in the film industry from such early scores as The Four Feathers (1939) and The Thief of Bagdad (1940). The latter project brought him to Hollywood when production was transferred from wartime Britain, and Rózsa remained in the United States, becoming an American citizen in 1946. During his Hollywood career, he received 17 Academy Award nominations including three Oscars for Spellbound (1945), A Double Life (1947), and Ben-Hur (1959), while his concert works were championed by such major artists as Jascha Heifetz, Gregor Piatigorsky, and János Starker. Early life Miklós Rózsa was born in Budapest and was introduced to classical

Mildred Adair

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Mildred Grace Adair (August 5, 1895 – April 30, 1943), later Mildred Grace Adair Stagg, was an American composer, pianist and teacher. Her compositions were mostly for piano solo, although she also wrote vocal and organ works. They were composed primarily as instructional material, while her church music was published for liturgical use. Life and career Mildred Grace Adair was born on August 5, 1895, in Clayton, Alabama, US. Her parents were John D. Adair (1869–1897) and Carrie Bennett Adair (1873–1926); Adair’s father died two years after her birth. Her childhood was spent in Dothan, Alabama, where she attended local high school and later Judson College, a private women’s school in Marion, Alabama. Adair was a composer, pianist and teacher. From 1910 to 1934, she gave music lessons in Dothan, and later worked as the organist for the city’s First Baptist Church. She also chaired Dothan’s Harmony Club. Around 1934, Adair married Loring G. Stagg (born 1882), a real estate agent from West Virginia; the couple had three children: a son and two daughters. In 1935, the family moved to Orange County, Florida for one year and lived in Miami form 1938 until her death. Adair died on April 30

Milton Adolphus

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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

Milton Ager

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Milton Ager (October 6, 1893 – May 6, 1979) was an American composer, regarded as one of the top songwriters of the 1920s and 1930s. in Chicago, Illinois, the sixth of nine children. He taught himself to play the piano, and attended McKinley High School, but left after only three years and embarked on a career in music. He worked as a song plugger for music publishers Waterson, Berlin & Snyder in Chicago, and also accompanied touring singer Gene Greene and provided accompaniment to silent movies. He moved to New York City in 1914, as an arranger for the publishing firm, and began composing music in association with Pete Wendling. After some time in the US Army’s Morale Division in Fort Greenleaf, Georgia, he returned to work in 1918 and wrote his first hit song, “Everything is Peaches Down in Georgia” with lyricist Grant Clarke, for Al Jolson. He then started working with lyricist Jack Yellen, and they wrote together for the 1920 Broadway show What’s in a Name, featuring the song “A Young Man’s Fancy”. He continued to have success over the next few years with the songs “I’m Nobody’s Baby” (1921, written with Benny Davis and Lester Santly), and “Who Cares?” (1922, written with Yelle

Milton Babbitt

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Milton Byron Babbitt (May 10, 1916 – January 29, 2011) was an American composer, music theorist, mathematician, and teacher. He was a Pulitzer Prize and MacArthur Fellowship recipient, recognized for his serial and electronic music. Babbitt’s compositional approach was deeply inspired by Arnold Schoenberg’s twelve-tone technique. He built a compositional system based on permutations of the total chromatic. Biography Babbitt was born on May 10, 1916, in Philadelphia to Albert E. Babbitt and Sarah Potamkin, who were Jewish. He was raised in Jackson, Mississippi. Babbitt began studying the violin when he was four, but soon switched to clarinet and saxophone. Early in his life he was attracted to jazz and theater music, and “played in every pit orchestra that came to town”. Babbitt was making his own arrangements of popular songs by age 7, “wrote a lot of pop tunes for school productions”, and won a local songwriting contest when he was 13. A Jackson newspaper called Babbitt a “whiz kid” and noted “that he had perfect pitch and could add up his family’s grocery bills in his head. In his teens he became a great fan of jazz cornet player Bix Beiderbecke”. Babbitt’s father was a mathemati

Milton Samuels

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Isadore Milton Samuels (January 28, 1904 – January 29, 1990) was an American pianist, composer, and music publisher. Early life Samuels was born January 28, 1904, in Denver, Colorado, to Russian-Jewish Immigrants Elias Samuels and Rachel Samuels (nee Varchavsky). Elias was the first rabbi and cantor at Temple Beth Medrosh Hagadol in Denver. Samuels showed an early proclivity to music, and his father hoped he would also choose a career as a cantor. Samuels, however, was far more interested in popular music and jazz. Musical career Samuels got his first job at 13 playing piano in a local bordello and played there until he was 19 when he formed his own touring dance band. He entered the music publishing business in 1926 working as a pianist and song plugger. He continued to work as a music publisher, first in Chicago during the 1930s and early 1940s, and then in Hollywood from 1943 until the late 1960s. He worked the longest as the Hollywood manager for the publishing firm Bregman, Vocco, & Conn from 1949 until 1967. Samuels was a prolific songwriter throughout his entire life, writing popular songs in a variety of genres, production pieces, music for film, and ad jingles. He began wr

Milton Suskind

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Milton Suskind, also known by the pseudonym Edgar Fairchild, (June 1, 1898 – February 20, 1975) was an American pianist, composer, songwriter, music arranger, music editor, and conductor. He used his own name as a classical pianist and for his music compositions written in the tradition of Western classical music. He adopted the pseudonym Edgar Fairchild when performing, recording, and composing popular music such as jazz. He began this practice at the Ampico Company where he made piano rolls as a performer and arranger from 1917 through the 1920s in a variety of music genres. His work as a music editor at Ampico was equally diverse with his role as music editor extending from overseeing the Ampico rolls of classical pianist and composer Sergei Rachmaninoff and those made by jazz musician Eubie Blake. Suskind wrote the score to the Broadway musical Florida Girl (1925), and was a contributing composer to the Broadway shows The New Yorkers (1927) and The Illustrators’ Show (1936). He also worked as the pianist in the pit orchestras of several Broadway shows; sometimes in piano duos which led to him forming music partnerships with first pianist Ralph Rainger in the 1920s and later Ada

Miriam Gideon

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Miriam Gideon (October 23, 1906 – June 18, 1996) was an American composer who wrote at least 130 pieces of music. Life Miriam Gideon was born in Greeley, Colorado, on October 23, 1906. She studied organ with her uncle Henry Gideon and piano with Felix Fox. She also studied with Martin Bernstein, Marion Bauer, Charles Haubiel, and Jacques Pillois. She studied harmony, counterpoint, and composition with Lazare Saminsky and at his suggestion also composition with Roger Sessions, after which she abandoned tonality and wrote in a freely atonal or extended post-tonal style. She attended Boston University and graduated with a degree in music in 1926. Gideon moved to New York City, where she taught at Brooklyn College, City University of New York (CUNY) from 1944 to 1954 and City College, CUNY from 1947 to 1955. She then taught at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America at the invitation of Hugo Weisgall in 1955, and at the Manhattan School of Music from 1967 to 1991. She was rehired by City College in 1971 as full professor and retired in 1976. Gideon composed a lot of vocal music, setting texts by Francis Thompson, Christian Morgenstern, Anne Bradstreet, Norman Rosten, Serafin, Joaquí

Misha Segal

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Misha Segal () is an Israeli music producer and film composer. He studied music, film, and philosophy at Tel Aviv University and apprenticed under Dieter Schöhnbach in Germany. Segal also studied composition and conducting at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, after which point he attended the Berklee College of Music in Boston. Segal has stated that he has been influenced by jazz, Elton John and The Beatles. Segal has worked on several projects, including Blue Lou and Misha Project - Highly Classified, a Christmas CD with Diane Arkenstone, and a piano collection made to raise awareness for lung cancer awareness. Segal was born in Haifa, Israel, to a Jewish family. He served in the Israel Defense Forces Orchestra of the Israeli Air Force. Awards * Award of the Israeli Film Academy for Best Music (2008, nominated - Sof Shavua B’Tel Aviv) * Black Reel for Best Original Score (2012, nominated - Mooz-lum) * Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Music Composition in Children’s Programming (1984, won - for “Andrea’s Story: A Hitchhiking Tragedy”, episode 12.4 of ABC Afterschool Specials) * Brit Award (The Phantom of the Opera) Discography * Let it In (1979, as Charme) * The Phanto

Missy Mazzoli

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Missy Mazzoli (born October 27, 1980) is an American composer and pianist who has received critical acclaim for her chamber, orchestral and operatic work. In 2018 she became one of the first two women to receive a commission from the Metropolitan Opera House. She is the founder and keyboardist for Victoire, an electro-acoustic band. From 2012 to 2015 she was composer-in-residence at Opera Philadelphia, in collaboration with Gotham Chamber Opera and Music-Theater Group. Mazzoli received a 2015 Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award, a Fulbright Grant to the Netherlands, and has been nominated for three Grammy Awards for Best Classical Composition. In 2018, Mazzoli was named for a two-season term as the Mead Composer-in-Residence with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Mazzoli is a professor of composition at Bard College. She previously taught at the Mannes College of Music. Mazzoli was named the Bragg Artist-in-Residence at Mount Allison University in Canada beginning in 2022. Her music is published by G. Schirmer. Education Mazzoli was born in Lansdale, Pennsylvania and is a graduate of North Penn High School. She received a bachelor’s degree from Boston University'

Miya Masaoka

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Miya Masaoka (born 1958, Washington, D.C.) is an American composer, musician, and sound artist active in the field of contemporary classical music and experimental music. Her work encompasses contemporary classical composition, improvisation, electroacoustic music, inter-disciplinary sound art, sound installation, traditional Japanese instruments, and performance art. She is based in New York City. Masaoka often performs on a 21-string Japanese koto (musical instrument), which she extends with software processing, string preparations, and bowing. She has created performance works and installations incorporating plants, live insects, and sensor technology. Her full-length ballet was performed at the Venice Biennale 2004. She has been awarded the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship (2021), the Doris Duke Award (2013) and the Herb Alpert Award (2004), and a Fulbright Fellowship for advanced research for Noh, gagaku and the ichi gen kin. She is an associate professor in the MFA Visual Arts Department at Columbia University, and the director of the MFA Sound Art Program. Early life and education Masaoka began studying classical music at eight years old. In her early 20s, she moved

Modest Altschuler

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Modest (Moisei Isaacovich) Altschuler (February 15, 1873 – September 12, 1963) was a cellist, orchestral conductor, and composer. He was born in Mogilev, then part of the Russian Empire, now in Belarus, into a Jewish family. He studied at the Moscow Conservatory and emigrated to the United States in 1893. that soloists in the Orchestra included Mischa Elman, Josef Lhevinne, Sergei Rachmaninoff, and Vassily Safanov. Shilkret also noted that the Orchestra “played for the great ballerina Pavlova and her partner Mordkin 1910 .” After disbanding the orchestra on the eve of the first World War, Altschuler moved to California, where he built a notable reputation as a teacher and performer. With help from his cousin, film executive Joe Aller, he composed and performed in film scores, including The Sea Hawk (1924), Dawn to Dawn (1933), It’s All in Your mind (1938), Buffalo Bill Rides Again (1947), and Song of My Heart (1948), He was also active in southern California’s musical community. In 1926, he organized the Glendale Symphony Orchestra. Altschuler founded a musical dynasty which includes his niece Eleanor Aller, his grand-nephew symphony conductor Leonard Slatkin, violinist Judith Aller,

Mohammed Fairouz

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Mohammed Fairouz (born November 1, 1985) is an American composer. He is one of the most frequently performed composers of his generation and has been described by Daniel J. Wakin of The New York Times as an “important new artistic voice”. Fairouz began composing at an early age and studied at the New England Conservatory of Music and the Curtis Institute of Music. His teachers included Gunther Schuller, Halim El-Dabh, and John Heiss. Fairouz lives in New York City. Vocal music Fairouz says that he first set the poem “The True Knowledge” by Oscar Wilde to music at the age of 17 and has gone on to write hundreds of art songs and over a dozen song cycles. In Poets & Writers Magazine, he described himself as being obsessed with text. and sets poetry by Arab Andalucian poet Ibn Khafaja. Musicians for Harmony commissioned the song cycle Furia for baritone Randall Scarlata together with the Imani Winds and the Borromeo String Quartet and sets Western texts about the Middle East. Jeder Mensch, was written for Kate Lindsey with texts set from the diaries of Alma Mahler. Lindsey is also the soloist in a 2014 recording of Fairouz’s 2012 cycle, Audenesque (in memory of W. B. Yeats), with the L

Molly Joyce

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Molly Joyce is a composer, performer, and recording artist. She is currently a PhD student in Composition and Computer Technologies at the University of Virginia and teaches music production and orchestration at Berklee Online. Early life and education Molly Joyce was born in 1992 in Pittsburgh, PA. She started her instrumental music education on the violin. After a car accident permanently damaged her left hand at the age of 7, she began playing the cello by using her left hand for the bow and right hand on the fingerboard. She also learned to play the trumpet and began composing on the computer. Joyce attended The Juilliard School for her undergraduate degree (graduating with scholastic distinction). She also earned degrees at Royal Conservatory in The Hague, where she was the recipient of the Frank Huntington Beebe Fund Grant, and Yale School of Music. Joyce has studied with Samuel Adler, Martin Bresnick, Guus Janssen, David Lang, Han Lash, Missy Mazzoli, Martijn Padding, Christopher Rouse, and Christopher Theofanidis. Career Joyce has contributed compositions to many recordings of other artists. As a solo artist, she released an EP, Lean Back and Release, in 2017 and an LP titl

Mona Lyn Reese

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Mona Lyn Reese (born August 24, 1951) is an American composer, best known for her operas and choral music. Her work is melodic and accessible with an emphasis on driving or complex rhythms, movement, and contrasting textures. Her music communicates and expresses emotions traditionally or experimentally without allowing a prevailing fashion to dictate style, form, or harmony. In 2014, the San José Chamber Orchestra and Chorus performed a suite from Choose Life, Uvacharta Bachayim in the San José City Hall Rotunda. Reese received a Continental Harmony commission in 2000, created by the American Composers Forum and the National Endowment for the Arts to enable small to mid-size communities in each state to commission new pieces for the millennium. Reese’s opera The Three Fat Women of Antibes received its premier performance with orchestra in May 2009 by the San José State University Opera Workshop (Michel Singher, Music Director, Daniel Helfgot, Director). The opera, written with her husband and librettist Thomas Hassing, is a humorous chamber opera for four singers based on the W. Somerset Maugham short story of the same name. The opera premiered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1998. O

Monica Lynn

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Monica Lynn is an American composer who lives and works in the San Francisco Bay area. She graduated with a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Texas at Austin, where she studied with Stefan Kostka, David Neumeyer and Forrest Pierce. She continued her education at the University of Missouri in Kansas City where she studied with James Mobberley, Paul Rudy, Chen Yi, Zhou Long, and at the University of California, Santa Cruz where she graduated with a Doctor of Musical Arts degree, studying with Ben Leeds Carson, David Cope, Karlton Hester, David Evan Jones, Hi Kyung Kim, Paul Nauert and Peter Elsea. Lynn taught at the University of California at Santa Cruz while working on her degree. Her music has been performed internationally. Honors and awards *2009-10: UCSC Grant; ASCAP Award *2008-09: European American Musical Alliance, Lindsay and Brian Shea Fellowship; Brevard Institute Scholarship Award; selected composer, South Oxford Six, Summer in Sombor, SERBIA; Finalist, College Music Society Pacific Central/Pacific Southern SuperRegional Conference; Finalist, California Summer Music, San Francisco, CA; UCSC Grant; ASCAP Award *2007-08: UCSC Graduate Student Association Scho

Monique Buzzarté

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Monique Buzzarté (born 1960 in San Pedro, California, United States on August 26, 1960) is a composer, trombonist, and activist was a key part of an international protest on behalf of the International Alliance for Women in Music (IAWM) against discrimination based on gender by the Vienna Philharmonic. The protests lead to the admission of women as members of the Vienna Philharmonic in 1997. The orchestra announced that harpist Anna Lelkes had been admitted as the first female member of the orchestra. Lelkes had been playing with the orchestra for twenty years but she had been denied membership due to her gender. Buzzarté’s research interests include finding compositions for brass instruments by women composers. Buzzarté studied with Stuart Dempster and Ned Meredith, and is certified to teach Pauline Oliveros’s deep listening practices. She holds a BA and BMus from the University of Washington and a MMus from the Manhattan School of Music. Monique Buzzarté was the editor (with Tom Bickley) of the Anthology of Essays on Deep Listening published in 2012. Discography *Sleeping Awake Music of Noah Creshevsky (2019, Open Space 37) *E (and sometimes, why) If, Bwana with/and/by Trio Scord

Monroe Rosenfeld

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Monroe H. “Rosey” Rosenfeld (died December 13, 1918) was an American songwriter and journalist. In 1895, he was described by Ernest Jarrold in Munsey’s Magazine as being in the “front rank” of successful popular song writers, with a reputation as a “graceful, prolific, and versatile composer”. Biography Rosenfeld was born in Richmond, Virginia, the son of Jewish German immigrants. By the early 1880s, he was working in New York City as a songwriter, often using pseudonyms such as E. Heiser and F. Belasco. He started having success around 1884 with such songs as “Climbing Up the Golden Stairs”, and “Her Golden Hair Was Hanging Down Her Back”, written with Scottish-born composer Felix McGlennon and recorded by Dan Quinn. His other successes as a songwriter included “Johnny Get Your Gun” (1886, credited as F. Belasco), and his most famous work, “With All Her Faults I Love Her Still” (1888), which sold more than 100,000 copies in piano sheet music. The latter song was based on an earlier tune by Theodore Metz, but Rosenfeld was notorious for making use of lax copyright laws to claim publishing rights in his own name, and sometimes bragged that he stole some of his best tunes. Rosenfeld

Monte Carlo (composer)

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Hans von Holstein, better known as Monte Carlo (14 July 1883 — 9 June 1967), was a Danish-born American Broadway composer and author. Life Von Holstein was born in Skamlingsbanken, He came to the U.S. in 1906 to avoid studying medicine. They collaborated on a number of shows and a large number of songs. In 1930, he was living with his wife at 10 Williams Avenue in Mount Vernon, New York. In 1942, he was living at 145 West 55th Street, New York. After the death of his wife in 1956, he moved to Houston, Texas. There he became vice-president of Carsen Music Publishing, founded by his step-son, Edward C. Benjamin Sr. Songs with music or lyrics by Monte Carlo “Little Town in the old County Down” “Dinny Danny; The Irish Yacki Hula” “That Tumble-Down Shack in Athlone” “Every Tear Is a Smile in an Irishman’s Heart” “By the waters of Killarney” “Just a bit of Irish lace” “Two Blue Eyes, One Little Green Isle” “My Home in the County Mayo” “The Hills of Connemara” “The Old Wooden Bridge in Athlone” Several songs became very popular after being recorded by John McCormack in the early 1920s. Shows *The Voice of McConnell by George M. Cohan, (1918; supplied songs) *Tangerine (1921) *Elsie (1923)

Monte Cazazza

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Monte Cazazza (January 23, 1949 – June 28, 2023) was an American artist and composer best known for his seminal role in helping shape industrial music through recordings with the London-based Industrial Records in the mid-1970s. Career Cazazza, based primarily in San Francisco during his early career, is credited with coining the phrase “Industrial Music for Industrial People”. This was later used to encapsulate the Industrial Records label and the artists representing it. Later, the noise collages and experimental sound manipulation coming out of Industrial Records came to be known as industrial music. Cazazza had built up an underground reputation as a particularly volatile performer with a potentially dangerous and antisocial aesthetic. Re/Search Magazine’s Industrial Culture Handbook described his work as “insanity-outbreaks thinly disguised as art events.” The Futurist Sintesi show near the end of 1975 was heralded on a promo flier as “Sex - religious show; giant statue of Jesus got chainsawed and gang raped into oblivion”. Cazazza did not limit his “performances” to the familiar dynamic of stage, audience, and audience reaction. Much of his work involved acts designed for max

Mort Garson

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Morton Sanford Garson (20 July 1924 – 4 January 2008) was a Canadian composer, arranger, songwriter, and pioneer of electronic music. He is best known for his albums in the 1960s and 1970s, such as Mother Earth’s Plantasia (1976). He also co-wrote several hit songs, including “Our Day Will Come”, a hit for Ruby & the Romantics. According to Allmusic, Mort Garson boasts one of the most distinctive and outright bizarre resumés in popular music, spanning from easy listening to occult-influenced space-age electronic pop. He later moved to New York City where he studied music at the Juilliard School of Music. He worked as a pianist and arranger before being called into the Army near the end of World War II. Early career After leaving the forces he became an active session musician, with an ability to carry out any or all of the musical chores on any given session: composer, arranger, orchestrator, conductor, and pianist as required. In 1957, he co-wrote Brenda Lee’s minor hit “Dynamite” with Tom Glazer, and he also co-wrote Cliff Richard’s 1961 UK hit “Theme for a Dream”. In 1963, with lyricist Bob Hilliard, he wrote one of the great lounge hits of the 1960s, “Our Day Will Come”, a hit

Morten Lauridsen

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Morten Johannes Lauridsen III (born February 27, 1943) is an American composer and teacher. A National Medal of Arts recipient (2007), he was composer-in-residence of the Los Angeles Master Chorale from 1994 to 2001, and is professor emeritus of composition at the USC Thornton School of Music, where he taught for fifty-two years until his retirement in 2019. Biography A native of the Pacific Northwest, Lauridsen worked as a Forest Service firefighter and lookout on an isolated tower near Mount St. Helens. He attended Whitman College for 2 years, before traveling south to study composition at the University of Southern California with Ingolf Dahl, Halsey Stevens, Robert Linn, and Harold Owen. His works have been recorded on more than 200 CDs, five of which have received Grammy Award nominations, including O Magnum Mysterium by the Tiffany Consort, A Company of Voices by Conspirare, Sound The Bells by The Bay Brass, and two all-Lauridsen discs entitled Lux Aeterna by the Los Angeles Master Chorale led by Paul Salamunovich and Nocturnes with the Polyphony choir and the Britten Sinfonia conducted by Stephen Layton. A recipient of numerous grants, prizes, and commissions, Lauridsen chai

Mortimer Wilson

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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

Morton Feldman

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Morton Feldman (January 12, 1926 – September 3, 1987) was an American composer. A major figure in 20th-century classical music, Feldman was an important exponent of indeterminacy in music, a development associated with the experimental New York School of composers also including John Cage, Christian Wolff, and Earle Brown. Feldman’s works are characterized by notational innovations that he developed to create his characteristic sound: rhythms that seem to be free and floating, pitch shadings that seem softly unfocused, a generally quiet and slowly evolving music, and recurring asymmetric patterns. His later works, after 1977, also explore extremes of duration. Biography Morton Feldman was born in Woodside, Queens, New York City, on January 12, 1926. His parents, Irving and Frances Breskin Feldman, were Russian Jews who had emigrated to New York from Pereiaslav (Irving, in 1910) and Bobruysk (Frances, in 1901). His father was a manufacturer of children’s coats. As a child he studied piano with Vera Maurina Press, who instilled in him a “vibrant musicality rather than musicianship”. Feldman’s first composition teachers were Wallingford Riegger, one of the first American followers of

Morton Gould

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Morton Gould (December 10, 1913 – February 21, 1996) was an American composer, conductor, arranger, and pianist. Biography Morton Gould was born in Richmond Hill, New York, United States. radio program, Keep ‘Em Rolling, and Major Bowes’ Shower of Stars, as well as The Chrysler Hour on CBS, where he reached an audience of millions. In 1942, he composed music for the short film Ring of Steel, directed by Garson Kanin and produced by the Film Unit of the U.S. Office for Emergency Management. In 1943, he was hired by the William H. Weintraub advertising agency as its musical director, believed to be the first position of its kind in the advertising field. In 1936, Gould married Shirley Uzin, and lived in apartment with her and her sister on Austin Street in Forest Hills, Queens. The marriage ended in divorce in 1943, and Gould moved into an apartment on nearby 78th Avenue with his brother, Walter Gould, adjacent to Flushing Meadows-Corona Park. In the following year, Gould married Shirley Bank. This marriage, too, ended in divorce. Gould had four children with Shirley Bank. On February 16, 1945, their son Eric was born. Their first daughter, Abby, was born on February 3, 1950, Gould comp

Morton Subotnick

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Morton Subotnick (born April 14, 1933) is an American composer of electronic music, best known for his 1967 composition Silver Apples of the Moon, the first electronic work commissioned by a record company, Nonesuch. He was one of the founding members of California Institute of the Arts, where he taught for many years. Subotnick has worked extensively with interactive electronics and multi-media, co-founding the San Francisco Tape Music Center with Pauline Oliveros and Ramon Sender, often collaborating with his wife Joan La Barbara. Subotnick is one of the pioneers in the development of electronic music and multi-media performance and an innovator in works involving instruments and other media, including interactive computer music systems. Most of his music calls for a computer part, or live electronic processing; his oeuvre utilizes many of the important technological breakthroughs in the history of the genre. Early career Subotnick was born in Los Angeles, California, and graduated from the University of Denver. In the early 1960s, Subotnick taught at Mills College and with Ramon Sender, he co-founded the San Francisco Tape Music Center. During this period he also collaborated wi

Muriel Pollock

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Muriel Pollock (January 21, 1895 – May 25, 1971) was an American songwriter, composer, pianist, and organist. She wrote and performed music for Broadway shows, radio programs, children’s plays, and piano rolls. Early life Mary Pollock was born in Kingsbridge, New York, the daughter of Joseph Pollock and Rose Graff. Both parents were immigrants from Russia. Her father ran a news stand. She studied at the New York Institute of Musical Art, a precursor of the Juilliard School. Career As a young woman, Pollock played the organ in silent movie theatres, and worked at her father’s news stand. She wrote a musical, Mme. Pom Pom, in 1914, with Marie Wardall. Another 1914 work, “Carnival”, was written for a fundraising event for the Sanitarium for Hebrew Children in Rockaway Park. Pollock’s Broadway credits included Jack and Jill (1923), for which she supplied “additional music”; Rio Rita (1927–1928) and Ups-a Daisy (1928), in which she appeared playing piano duets with Constance Mering; Pleasure Bound (1929), for which she wrote the music; and the musical revue Shoot the Works (1931), for which she wrote both music and lyrics. Pollock worked at Mel-o-Dee Music Company and Rhythmodik Music C

Murray Boren

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Murray Boren (born 1950) is a composer of opera, symphonic, chamber, and vocal works. He has written nine operas and over 100 songs and chamber compositions. He also contributed to the Joseph Sonnets. Among his operas are Book of Gold and Emma; both are based on the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) history. In 2007, he retired from his position as composer-in-residence at the College of Music of the College of Fine Arts and Communications of Brigham Young University (BYU). Education and career Murray Boren received his BM and MA in composition from Brigham Young University (BYU) in 1975 and 1977 respectively. He received a DMA in composition from the City University of New York in 2002. Orson Scott Card was the librettist for Boren’s opera Abraham and Isaac based on Genesis 22 in the Bible. Boren wrote the opera Emma about Emma Smith, wife of the founder of the LDS Church, Joseph Smith. Emma received mixed reviews. It was praised for its freshness, but criticized for being overly chromatic. Allan Kozinn of The New York Times praised the vocal performances and the unique orchestral music; however, he criticized the opera’s slow pace stating that, “the sustain

Myles Boisen

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Myles Boisen (born October 19, 1956) is an American guitarist, composer, record producer and sound engineer based in the San Francisco Bay Area. He was a member of several bands, including Splatter Trio and the Club Foot Orchestra, and has collaborated with a number of musicians, including Fred Frith, John Zorn and Henry Kaiser. Boisen has also released four solo albums. Boisen is the owner and lead engineer of the Guerrilla Recording studio and the Headless Buddha Mastering Lab in Oakland, California. He has recorded, mastered and produced over 150 recordings by groups and musicians. Boisen has been described as a “beyond-jazz pioneer”, and his music, “unheard of” and “highly flammable”. Biography Boisen was born in Omaha, Nebraska on October 19, 1956. He was raised in Seattle, Washington, and has since moved to Berkeley, California. He obtained a BA degree in 1979 in 20th-Century Media and Contemporary Art from Fairhaven College at Western Washington University. Boisen’s music is primarily avant-garde jazz, experimental and free improvisation, often using prepared guitars. He plays a custom-built double-neck guitar and bass, with a Gibson SG-shaped body and necks. In 1980, Boisen

Myron Fink

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Myron Fink (born April 19, 1932) is a Chicago-born composer of opera and other pieces for voice, piano, and chamber ensemble. His compositions have been performed around the world. The Sousa Archives and Center for American Music holds the Myron Fink Music Collection, 1961–2008. Subsequently, he was awarded a Woodrow Wilson Memorial Fellowship, allowing him to study with Robert Palmer at Cornell University during 1954–55. Furthering his education, Fink received a Fulbright Scholarship to study at the Staats-Akademie der Musik in Vienna from 1955 to 1956. Operas *1954 The Boor *1956 Susanna and the Elders *1961 Jeremiah *1969 Judith and Holofernes *1981 Chinchilla *1985 The Island of Tomorrow *1997 The Conquistador *2000 Animalopera *2003 Edith Wharton: A self portrait References * http://www.myronfink.com/bio.htm

Naida McCullough

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Naida Portia McCullough (c. 1901 – September 19, 1989) was an American educator, pianist, and composer based in Los Angeles. Early life Naida McCullough was born in Colorado, the younger daughter of George A. McCullough and Georgia A. McCullough. She was raised in Denver, where she began as a performer and learned to play the church organ, and graduated from Los Angeles High School in the winter class of 1917. She and her elder sister, Yolande McCullough (1898–1964), taught music classes together as young women. Yolande married Leonard Stovall, a doctor in World War I who worked on tuberculosis prevention after the war. College activities McCullough was described in 1921 as “the first colored girl to graduate from the music department of the University of Southern California”. She was the first African American woman to receive a Pi Kappa Lambda Key (Music). McCullough was a founding member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority chapter at USC, and she helped to found the chapter at UCLA in 1925, and was a founding member of the west coast graduate chapter, in 1927. She was president of the Los Angeles graduate chapter in the 1940s, succeeded by Audrey Boswell Jones in 1945. She perform

Nancy Galbraith

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Nancy Galbraith (born 1951 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) is an American postmodern/postminimalist composer. She is professor of composition at Carnegie Mellon University. Compositions Note: This list is incomplete. Orchestral works *Morning Litany (1988) *Danza de los Duendes (1992) *Piano Concerto No. 1 (1995) *A Festive Violet Pulse (1998) *Tormenta del Sur (2001) *De Profundis ad Lucem (2002) *Fantasy for Orchestra (2003) Vocal/choral works *In Unity and Love (1997) *Christ By Whose Death (1999) *Missa Mysteriorum (1999) *Magnificat (2002) *Four River Songs (2002) *God of Justice (2004) *Requiem (2004) *Sacred Songs and Interludes (2006) *Two Emily Dickinson Songs (2007) *Novena (2007) Works for wind ensemble *with brightness round about it (1993) *Danza de los Duendes (1996) *Wind Symphony No. 1 (1996) *Elfin Thunderbolt (1998) *Dream Catchers (1998) *Concerto for Piano and Wind Ensemble (2000) *Internal Combustion (2001) *Washington’s Landing (2006) *Febris Ver Chamber music *Time Cycle (1984) *Fantasia (1986) *Into Light (1989) *Aeolian Muses (1993) *Incantation and Allegro (1995) *Rhythms and Rituals (1995) *String Quartet No. 1 (1996) *Inquiet Spirits (String Quartet No. 2)

Nancy Laird Chance

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Nancy Laird Chance (born March 19, 1931) is an American pianist and composer. She studied at Bryn Mawr College from 1949 to 1950 and Columbia University from 1959 to 1967 with Vladimir Ussachevsky, Otto Luening and Chou Wen-chung. After completing her studies, Chance worked as a piano teacher, composer and arts administrator. She received the ASCAP/Nissim prize for orchestral composition in 1981 for Liturgy and in 1984 for Odysseus. She also received two awards from the NEA, and fellowships from the MacDowell Colony and Sundance Film for composition in 1988. Her works have been performed at venues such as the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts and Carnegie Hall. Laird Chance lived and taught in Kenya from 1974-1978. Works Selected works include: *Liturgy, for orchestra, 1979 *Odysseus, suite for orchestra, 1983 *Planasthai, for orchestra, 1991 *Darksong, for chamber ensemble, 1972 *Edensong, for chamber ensemble, 1973 *Daysongs, for chamber ensemble, 1974 *Ritual Sounds, for chamber ensemble, 1975 *Ceremonial, for chamber ensemble, 1976 *Declamation and Song, for chamber ensemble, 1977 *Duos II, oboe, English horn, 1978 *Duos III, violin, violincello, 1980 *Exultation and Lamen

Nancy Plummer Faxon

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Nancy Plummer Faxon (November 19, 1914 – February 1, 2005) was an American soprano, music educator, and composer of organ music. Early life and education Nancy Blanton Plummer was born in Jackson, Mississippi, the daughter of Walter George Plummer and Emily Blanton Plummer. She graduated from Millsaps College in 1936. As a young woman she was in theatrical productions with fellow Mississippian Eudora Welty. She went on to earn master’s degrees in voice and piano in 1938, at Chicago Musical College, where she was a student of Rudolph Ganz and Nelli Gardini. She studied composition with Max Wald. Career As a young soprano in Chicago, Nancy Plummer joined the Sorrentine Touring Opera Company in 1938 as a soloist. Nancy Plummer Faxon was a member of American Women Composers. She wrote over a hundred choral and orchestral compositions, mostly for performance at Trinity Church. The Brookline Library Music Association gave a concert of Faxon’s compositions in 1985. A CD titled The Music of Nancy Plummer Faxon (2001) was recorded by the Ralph Farris Chorale and the Madison Symphony, at the Old South Church in Boston. In 1986, she was the recipient of the Orah Ashley Lamke Award from Mu Phi

Nancy Van de Vate

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Nancy Jean Van de Vate (; December 30, 1930 – July 29, 2023) was an American-born Austrian composer, violist and pianist. She also used the pseudonyms Helen Huntley and William Huntley. She is known for operas such as All Quiet on the Western Front, and orchestral music such as Chernobyl and Journeys, including concertos like the Kraków Concerto for percussion and orchestra. Van de Vate taught at several universities in the United States and led composers’ organizations such as the Southeastern Composers League and the International League of Women Composers. In 1985, she moved to Vienna, where she taught and founded a CD company for new orchestral music together with her husband. Life and career Nancy Jean Hayes was born in Plainfield, New Jersey, on December 30, 1930. she graduated from North Plainfield High School in 1948. She studied piano on a scholarship at Eastman School of Music and music theory at Wellesley College. She completed graduate degrees in music composition at the University of Mississippi and Florida State University, where she earned a Ph.D. She pursued further studies in electronic music at Dartmouth College and the University of New Hampshire. The first profe

Nannie Louise Wright

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Nannie Louise Wright (June 30, 1879 March 16, 1958) was an American composer, pianist, and music educator born in Fayette, Missouri. She graduated from Howard-Payne Junior College in Fayette and the Columbia School of Music in Chicago, Illinois. Wright studied piano with Mary Wood Chase in Chicago and with Josef Lhévinne in Berlin. She returned to Fayette to become the Director of Music at Howard- Payne College in 1909. Later, she served as President of the Missouri State Music Teachers’ Association and as Dean of Music at Central Methodist University’s Swinney Conservatory of Music in Fayette, where one of her students was William Gillock. Early life Wright was one of five children of Dr. Uriel Sebree Wright and Carrie Shafroth Wright. At the age of five, she started piano lessons from her mother. At the age of ten, her piano skills were advanced enough that she succeeded her late mother as organist at the First Baptist Church of Fayette. Career After graduations, Wright returned to Howard-Payne to teach. She eventually succeeded Marion Eloise Lasher as director of instrumental music in 1906. In this position, the music department at Howard-Payne expanded to include more music his

Natalia Raigorodsky

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Marie Leda Natalia Raigorodsky Heimsath Harter Parris (28 July 1929 - 28 August 2018) was an American composer, educator, and music critic who produced over 150 works, including two operas and two symponies. She published under the name Natalia Raigorodsky. Biography Raigorodsky was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, to Ethel McCaleb and Paul M. Raigorodsky. She grew up in Texas, then moved to Maine in the early 1940s. She graduated from Barnard College in 1952 and earned a master’s degree in composition and music history in 1963 from American University. She taught music theory and piano privately throughout her life. Raigorodsky married Charles Herman Heimsath and had two sons. In 1987, she married James L. Parris. Some of Raigorodsky’s compositions were self-published. Others were published by Culley Music and Wings of the Morning Music. Many of her works are archived at the Library of Congress. Her compositions include: Chamber *Dusk (flute and piano) Opera *The Promise of Peace *The White Cliffs (text by Alice Duer Miller) *Symphony No. 2 *Open Windows: Five Musical Settings of Poems of Spiritual Inspirations *“Psalm of Thanksgiving” *Psalms 21, 23, 27, 100, 121 *She Lies Asleep, Requie

Natalie Draper

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Natalie Draper is an American composer who teaches composition at Syracuse University’s Setnor School of Music. Biography Draper completed her Doctor of Musical Arts at the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University in 2017. Her teachers include Oscar Bettison and Joel Hoffman. In 2015, Draper was a Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center. Draper has been featured by GAMMA-UT, MusicX, SEAMUS, the Fromm Scholarship ensemble, Lunar Ensemble, and SONAR New Music Ensemble. Her works has been recognized by the Baltimore Sun, Portland Press Herald, and Fanfare, among others. Draper’s work, Timelapse Variations, was commissioned by Symphony Number One and premiered in November 2016. Works such as Decadent Music Box have garnered various awards and positive mentions. In 2018, Draper collaborated with NASA to help provide music from Timelapse Variations for a major research presentation on the impact crater of the Hiawatha Glacier. Draper has also published an article on Stephen Sondheim. Partial list of works * Decadent Music Box * Deflected Harmlessly into the Ceiling * O Sea-Starved, Hungry Sea * The Ravens of Unresting Thought * Strains in the Signal * Timelapse Variations * Water in t

Natalie Sleeth

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Natalie Allyn Sleeth (née Wakeley; October 29, 1930 – March 21, 1992) was an American composer of hymns and choral music. Sleeth was born in Evanston, Illinois. She began to study the piano at the early age of four. In 1952, she earned a BA in music theory at Wellesley College in Massachusetts. She married the Rev. Dr. Ronald E. Sleeth, a professor of Homiletics. The anthem “Hymn of Promise” was composed in early 1985, and dedicated simply “To Ron,” that is, her husband Dr. Ron Sleeth, who was diagnosed with cancer and died weeks after the anthem’s premiere. Soon after publication, the anthem became a hymn under two different names. Under the title “In the Bulb There is a Flower,” it appears as hymn #703 in the United Church of Canada hymnal, Voices United and as hymn #433 in The New Century Hymnal produced by the United Church of Christ in the US. It appears as hymn #707 under the title “Hymn of Promise” in The United Methodist Hymnal. It is frequently sung in the United Church of Canada and the United Church of Christ. The hymn was translated into German by Lothar Pöll in 1999 and is included in the Gesangbuch der Evangelisch-methodistischen Kirche. Death Sleeth died of cancer in

Natalise

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Natalise (born Robin Nathalis Chow, on September 27, 1985) is an American singer-songwriter. Natalise has been featured on television networks such as the WB, UPN, CBS, ABC, and MTV. She is also known for her appearances in The New York Times, Blender, and Maxim. Natalise’s first single “Love Goes On” from the album Forever Now was made popular when it aired on San Francisco’s KYLD, Wild 94.9. Her subsequent singles “Wonderful” and “Enough” also received airplay on San Francisco’s pop/adult AC station Alice 97.3. Natalise’s second album I Came to Play received awards for Best Dance CD, Best Produced, Best Video by a Female, and Best Dance Song by Muse’s Muse. Natalise was also voted “Girlfriend of the Day” in August 2008 by Maxim and “Video of the Week” by Blender.com. Many of Natalise’s songs, including “The Hotness” and “I Came to Play” were heard on various MTV programs, such as “Yo Momma,” “My Super Sweet Sixteen,” and “Next.” She was also heard on “Degrassi: The Next Generation” and “One Tree Hill.” Natalise has performed at various Los Angeles iconic venues, such as the House of Blues, the Roxy, and the Viper Room. She has also sung the National Anthem for the Golden State Wa

Nathan Currier

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Nathan Currier (born 1960, Huntingdon, Pennsylvania) is an American composer. Biography Coming from a musical family, Currier is son of composer Marilyn Currier (1931) and brother of composer Sebastian Currier (1959). His principal teachers were David Diamond, Joseph Schwantner, Bernard Rands, Stephen Albert and Frederic Rzewski. He studied at the Juilliard School, where he received the Doctorate in 1989, and also served on their Evening Division faculty over a ten-year period. Starting in 2007 he served for two years as a visiting faculty member at the McIntire Department of Music at the University of Virginia. In 2016 he initiated a concert series called Orchard Circle, with concerts in New York City and Philadelphia. Awards * 2008 International Sackler Prize for Music Composition * 2008-09 Fellowship at the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities * 1999 Academy Award from The American Academy of Arts and Letters * 1995-96 Rome Prize for Composition from the American Academy in Rome * 1993 Guggenheim Fellowship * 1993 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship * 1992 New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship * 1991 Fromm Foundation Grant * 1991 Charles Ives Fellowship from The A

Nathan Wang

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Nathan Tsung-hsien Wang (; born August 8, 1956) is an American film composer, who has worked extensively in both the United States and in Hong Kong. He is best known internationally for his work with Jackie Chan, and with directors Benny Chan and Stanley Tong. He also scored the Detective Chinatown film series. Early life and education Wang was born in Los Angeles, California, to parents from Shanghai, China. He began playing the piano at age three. He attended Pomona College, graduating in 1979, and received an Ambassadorial Scholarship from Rotary International to study at Oxford University. Career Wang’s first film score was for the comedy Screwball Hotel. In 1995, Wang was hired by Hong Kong film studio Golden Harvest to score the Jackie Chan film Rumble in the Bronx. The film proved a hit and Chan’s North American breakthrough. Wang has subsequently scored Chan’s films Police Story 4: First Strike (1996), Who Am I? (1998), He also worked with notable Chinese-language filmmakers like Stanley Tong, Benny Chan, Chen Sicheng (on the Detective Chinatown films) Wang is also an associate professor of film scoring at Peking University. Composer * Never Say Never (2023) * Vanguard (202

Nathaniel D. Mann

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Nathaniel D. Mann (1866–1915) was an American composer best known for his work with L. Frank Baum. He composed at least two songs with Baum, “Different Ways of Making Love” and “It Happens Ev’ry Day,” and another with John Slavin, “She Didn’t Really Mind the Thing at All,” for The Wizard of Oz stage musical in 1902, and in 1908, composed the first original film score (27 cues) for The Fairylogue and Radio-Plays, one of the earliest feature-length fiction films (and the earliest film adaptations of the novels The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The Marvelous Land of Oz, Ozma of Oz, John Dough and the Cherub, and Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, presented by Baum himself), which debuted September 24, 1908. With Baum, he also composed the musical The King of Gee-Whiz (dated February 23, 1905), which went through various titles such as Montezuma (November 1902), King Jonah XIII (September 1903), and The Son of the Sun (1905). This was collaboration with and based on a novel by Emerson Hough, which was never completed and the extant scenario published in 1969. His other works The Mayor of Tokio with William Frederick Peters (1905), The Alaskan with R. F. Carroll (1909), Imam : A Mohammedan Serenad

Nathaniel Stookey

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Nathaniel Stookey (born 25th April 1970, San Francisco, California) is an American composer and musician. Education Stookey is the son of Richard Phelps Stookey, an attorney and novelist, and Martha Milton Stookey, an actor, stage director, and teacher. Both parents came from musical families: Martha’s father was an Army bugler and cornet player, and Richard’s grandparents were church and barn-dance musicians whose descendants include Noel Paul Stookey of the folk trio Peter, Paul & Mary. Stookey spent his early childhood in the Basque village of Banca. He attended French American International School and Lowell High School in San Francisco and Lycée Hoche in Versailles, France. He began violin study at age 5 with Anna Teksler in San Francisco, continuing with Malgorzata Rouger at the École Normale de Musique de Paris, and with Daniel Kobialka of the San Francisco Symphony. As a student, he played violin and viola with the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra and sang in the chorus of Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra. He studied music theory with Donald Galfond and took his first composition lessons from Tom Constanten of the Grateful Dead at the San Francisco Community Music Cente

Ned Rorem

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Ned Miller Rorem (October 23, 1923 – November 18, 2022) was an American composer of contemporary classical music and a writer. Best known for his art songs, which number over 500, Rorem was considered the leading American of his time writing in the genre. Frequently described as a neoromantic composer, he showed limited interest in the emerging modernist aesthetic of his lifetime. As a writer, he kept—and later published—numerous diaries in which he spoke candidly of his exchanges and relationships with many cultural figures of America and France. Born in Richmond, Indiana, Rorem found an early interest in music, studying with Margaret Bonds and Leo Sowerby. He developed a strong enthusiasm for French music and received mentorship from Aaron Copland and Virgil Thomson, among others. After two productive years in Morocco, Rorem was hosted by the arts patron Marie-Laure de Noailles in Paris, where he was influenced by the neoclassicist group Les Six, particularly Francis Poulenc and Darius Milhaud. He returned to America in around 1957, establishing himself as a prominent composer and receiving regular commissions. For the American Bicentennial, he worked on seven different commissio

Ned Rothenberg

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Ned Rothenberg (born September 15, 1956) is an American multi-instrumentalist and composer. He specializes in woodwind instruments, including the alto saxophone, clarinet, bass clarinet, flute, and shakuhachi (Japanese bamboo flute). He is known for his work in contemporary classical and free improvisation. Rothenberg is a graduate of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. He was a founding member of the woodwind trio New Winds with J. D. Parran and Robert Dick. He has performed with Samm Bennett, Paul Dresher, Fred Frith, Evan Parker, Marc Ribot, Elliott Sharp, John Zorn, Yuji Takahashi, Sainkho Namtchylak, and Katsuya Yokoyama. Discography As leader * Trials of the Argo (Lumina, 1981) * Portal (Lumina, 1983) * Trespass (Lumina, 1986) * Overlays (Moers, 1991) * Opposites Attract with Paul Dresher (New World, 1991) * Power Lines (New World, 1995) * Real and Imagined Time (Moers, 1995) * Amulet with Sainkho (Leo, 1996) * Monkey Puzzle with Evan Parker (Leo, 1997) * Port of Entry (Intuition, 1998) * Ghost Stories (Tzadik, 2000) * Tools of The Trade with Denman Maroney, (CIMP, 2001) * Intervals (Animul, 2002) * Decisive Action with Satoh Masahiko (BAJ, 2004) * En Passant with Peter A. Sch

Neil Rolnick

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Neil Burton Rolnick (born October 22, 1947) is an American composer and educator living in New York City. Life Rolnick was born in Dallas, Texas, and studied English literature at Harvard University where he received a BA in 1969. He then turned to music, studying composition first at the San Francisco Conservatory in 1973–74), then with Richard Felciano, and finally with Andrew Imbrie and Olly Wilson at the University of California, Berkeley, where he received an MA in 1976 and a PhD in 1980. Concurrently he also studied computer music with John Chowning at Stanford University and was a visiting researcher at IRCAM in Paris from 1977 to 1979 (Marshall 2001). Rolnick also studied composition with Darius Milhaud (Oteri and Rolmick 2013) and John Coolidge Adams, and computer music with James A. Moorer. He has lived in New York City since 2002. Teaching From 1981 to 2013 Rolnick taught at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where he founded the iEAR Studios (Marshall 2001). In 1991, as head of Rensselaer’s Arts Department he led the establishment of the nation’s first MFA program in Integrated Electronic Arts. Musical production Rolnick’s compositions have appeared on 18 records and

Neil Slater

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Kenneth Neil Slater (born July 3, 1931) is an American educator, composer, and pianist. In 2008, he retired as professor emeritus. He has composed over 80 works for jazz ensemble and has written for symphony, chamber groups, a cappella choir, opera, and musical theatre. Career Early years Slater was born in July 1931 in Turtle Creek, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Pittsburgh. Beginning at age six, he learned piano from a friend of his parents. In 1952 he graduated from Mansfield University of Pennsylvania. Two years later he received a master’s degree in composition from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh. Beginning in 1960, he took night classes for about two years at Teachers College, Columbia University, studying pedagogy, piano, and composition. From 1954 to 1956, Slater served in the U.S. Army, spending most of his time with the 97 Army Band at Fort Sill as a pianist but also playing French horn and valve trombone. He backed guest stars in shows produced by Daniel Melnick of the Music and Entertainment Section of Special Services. One such show featured vocalist Peggy King, who entertained the troops at Fort Sill in 1956. Slater also directed a weekly television show from Fort Sill.

Nellie Weldon Cocroft

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Ellen Weldon Cocroft (November 4, 1885 – June 27, 1986) was an American musical composer. Early life Ellen Estelle Weldon was born on November 4, 1885, in Quitman, Georgia, the daughter of Richard Weldon and Virginia (Massey) Weldon. She was the eldest of three daughters, including Jeanivieve (b. 1893) and Minnie (b. 1896). Nellie Cocroft was a church organist and choir director in Thomasville. Her husband ran a music store, and published her compositions to sell in the shop under the name “N. Weldon Cocroft”. Published works by Nellie Weldon Cocroft included “When the Birds are Singing in the Springtime” (1909), “Pinywoods Rag” (1909), and “I’se Gwine to Highball” (1910). After a lengthy divorce in 1923-1924, and upon losing custody of her son, Cocroft’s “Georgia Cracker”, performed by pianist Nora Hulse (d. 2020), was included in Hulse’s 2002 compilation Ragtime refreshments: 25 rags by women composers. Music by Nellie Weldon Cocroft is played at the “Jazz & Swing Club” at the Georgia Music Hall of Fame. References External links * * Nellie Weldon Cocroft at WorldCat.

Nerida Tyson-Chew

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Nerida Tyson-Chew (born 1965) is an Australian music composer, conductor and orchestrator, principally working in screen music. She won her first Australian Guild of Screen Composers (AGSC) Award, in 1996, for her work on Hotel Sorrento (1995) and Brilliant Lies (1996). With Hotel Sorrento she was also nominated for an AFI Award for Best Original Music Score in 1995. In 2003 she won the Screen Music Award, co-presented by AGSC with APRA AMCOS, category Best Music for a Mini-Series or Telemovie for Evil Never Dies ; in 2007 she won Best Music for a Television Series or Serial for Two Twisted, episode “Delivery Man” (2006) and she won Best Music for a Documentary for Trishna & Krishna: The Quest for Separate Lives (2009) in 2010. At the APRA Music Awards of 2020 she was acknowledged for her Distinguished Services to the Australian Screen. Biography Nerida Tyson-Chew was born in 1965. She was raised in Sydney where she attended the State Conservatorium of Music, then University of Sydney for a Bachelor of Music with honours in composition. When composing she uses “4 Ps : Pencil, Paper, Piano and Performer.” She began her career as an orchestrator for Australian composer Bruce Rowland.

Netty Simons

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Netty Simons (née Rothenberg) (26 October 1913-1 April 1994) was an American pianist, music editor, music educator and composer. Biography Netty Simons was born in New York City and studied music at Third Street Music School. She graduated from New York University where she studied with Marion Bauer and Percy Grainger from 1931 to 1937, and taught at the Third Street Music School from 1928 to 1933. In 1933 she began studies with Alexander Siloti at the Juilliard School of Music, and in 1938 with composer Stefan Wolpe. From 1961 to 1962 she was producer and coordinator of concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York City. She received a Recording Publication Award from the Ford Foundation in 1971. Her papers are archived at the New York Public Library Selected works *Songs for Wendy for voice and viola (c.1975) *Quartet *Quartet for Strings *Quintet *Night Sounds for piano *Windfall *Illuminations *Piano Work 1952 *2 Dot for 2 Pianos *Trialogue I: The Tombstone Told When She Died for alto, baritone and viola (1963); words by Dylan Thomas *Trialogue II: Myselves Grieve for alto, baritone and viola (1969); words by Dylan Thomas *Trialogue III: Now (Now, Say Nay) for mezzo-soprano, baritone a

Nicholas Van Slyck

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Nicholas Van Slyck (October 25, 1922 - July 3, 1983 ) was an American composer of classical music. He founded the New School of Music in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1976. Early life He was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on October 25, 1922. He graduated from Kent School in Kent, Connecticut in 1940 and Harvard University (Class of 1944) where he studied with Walter Piston. He served in the United States Navy from March 1943 to June 1945 in World War II. He was a Seaman 2nd Class (Musician) and served with the 30th Construction Battalion (Seabees). While attending Harvard in the 1940s, he was also the director of the Harvard Chamber orchestra. Career He was a composer and concert pianist. From 1950 to 1962, he was the director of the South End Music Center in Boston, Massachusetts and from 1962 to 1976, he was the director of the Longy School of Music of Bard College. From 1962 to 1967, he was the conductor of the Quincy Symphony. The Vermont Symphony Orchestra played his music at the 10 year anniversary of the New School. Honors *1983 Composer of the Year from Music Teachers National Association Works References External links *Allmusic profile *The Harvard Crimson coverage abo

Nick Didkovsky

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Nick Didkovsky (born 22 November 1958) is a composer, guitarist, computer music programmer, and leader of the band Doctor Nerve. He is a former student of Christian Wolff, Pauline Oliveros and Gerald Shapiro. He received a master’s degree in Computer Music from New York University in 1987 and went on to develop a Java music API called JMSL (Java Music Specification Language). JMSL is a toolbox for algorithmic composition and performance. JMSL includes JScore, an extensible staff notation editor. JMSL can output music using either JavaSound or JSyn. He has presented papers on his work at several conferences. He was a composing member of the Fred Frith Guitar Quartet for the ten years of the band’s tenure, and has also played in John Zorn’s band. record label is a harbor for his more extreme musical projects such as “split”, a guitar collaboration with Dylan DiLella of the technical death metal band Pyrrhon . His debut solo album was released in 1997 and featured contributions from Frith. His second album, Body Parts, came out of a collaboration with Guigou Chenevier. Didkovsky has composed for or performed on a number of CDs including: * 1987, Doctor Nerve Armed Observation, Label:

Nick Driver

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Nick Driver is an American rock and Americana singer-songwriter, based in North Carolina. In 2010, he released his debut solo album, Warm Is Your Color, which had a top-ten song hit on SiriusXM’s The Coffee House radio station. Wildy’s World stated about Warm Is Your Color that “Driver looks to bring the energy of punk to the finesse and precision of pop music.” He has released several full-length albums and singles since, and his songs have been featured on the television shows Bad Girls Club: Atlanta, Kourtney and Kim Take Miami, The Real World: St. Thomas, and The Real World: Portland. On September 9, 2014, he released the EP Staring at My Ceiling in the Dark. Driver tours and records as part of The Nick Driver Band, which has appeared at festivals such as FloydFest. In 2011, he was nominated at the John Lennon International Songwriting Contest for folk, and in 2012, he was nominated for Humanitarian Songwriter of the Year at the Las Vegas Music Awards. Early life, education and early career Driver was born in Zebulon, North Carolina, where he grew up on a farm. Driver has stated that “I wanted to play music for as long as I can remember. I guess around 1999 it hit me that makin

Nickitas J. Demos

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Nickitas John Demos (born 1962) is a Greek American composer. He is known for his inventive inclusion of Greek elements and influence in his music. Education Demos holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Composition from the Cleveland Institute of Music and Case Western Reserve University where he studied with Donald Erb. He also holds a Master of Music degree in composition from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music where he studied with Donald Erb, Eugene O’Brien, Harvey Sollberger, and John Eaton. He received a Bachelor of Music degree in clarinet performance from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where he studied composition with Roger Hannay. Critical acclaim His music has been described as “rich… powerful” having “remarkable substance” as well as “lively… attractive, kinetic and… intriguing” by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution; as “fresh and exhilarating” by The Nashville Scene; as “…compelling…deeply evocative music…well worth exploring…” by the Georgia Music News and as “ambitious…sophisticated” and “…a reflection of the current mix of styles and aesthetic postures” by the New York-based magazine, The New Music Connoisseur. The premiere of his work,

Nickolas Mohanna

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Nickolas Mohanna is an American artist, composer, and guitarist. His interdisciplinary practice employs a variety of media to explore and blur the borders between music, sound art, video and drawing. Biography Born in Omaha, Nebraska in 1979 , he moved to the Bay Area to study printmaking at San Francisco State University and later went to the University of California, Davis for an MFA in Art Studio. While there he took courses with Mike Henderson, Bob Ostertag, Annabeth Rosen, Douglas Kahn, and Wayne Thiebaud. He lives and works in New York. Work In his sound compositions, there is a “tendency of sculpting and orchestrating a minimal array of sounds into sonically rich and spacious atmospheres.” Some pieces explore field recordings processed into abstract soundscapes with electroacoustic procedures. “While other arrangements invoke a post-punk minimalism with flashes of Arthur Russell.” Most of the sounds are sourced from local environments. While certain tracks “bury melodies in multiple layers of distortion to reveal their latent chromatic richness through gradually mutating textural contrast.” The “consistent tone makes it all flow together like raindrops forming a lake.” The m

Nico Muhly

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Nico Asher Muhly (; born August 26, 1981) is an American contemporary classical music composer and arranger who has worked and recorded with both classical and pop musicians. A prolific composer, he has composed for many notable symphony orchestras and chamber ensembles and has had two operas commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera. Since 2006, he has released nine studio albums, many of which are collaborative, including 2017’s Planetarium with Sufjan Stevens, Bryce Dessner & James McAlister. He is a member of the Icelandic music collective and record label Bedroom Community. Biography Early years and personal life Muhly was born in Vermont to Bunny Harvey, a painter and teacher at Wellesley College, and Frank Muhly, a documentary filmmaker. Muhly was raised in Providence, Rhode Island, and sang in the choir at Grace Episcopal Church in Providence. He began studying piano at age 10. He graduated from the former in 2003 with a Bachelor of Arts in English and received a Master’s degree in music in 2004 from Juilliard, where he studied composition with John Corigliano and Christopher Rouse. In 2014, Muhly told the New York Times that he lived on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in New

Nicola Montani

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Nicola Aloysius Montani, KCSS (6 November 1880 in Utica, New York – 11 January 1948 in Philadelphia ) was a conductor, composer, arranger, and publisher of sacred music. His earliest musical studies were in Indianapolis with his brother Gaetano, Charles Schultze, composition with H. D. Beissenherz, organ with W. H. Donley, and Leslie E. Peck. In Indianapolis he formed part of the Montani Brothers Orchestra, and was also a member of the early Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra under Karl Schneider. In 1903 he studied in Rome at the Conservatory of St. Cecilia, studying voice with Clara Bretschneider and future wife Catherine Sherwood, organ with Filippo Capocci, Gregorian chant with Rodolfo Kanzler and Antonio Rella. Further personal studies were pursued in Rome with Don Lorenzo Perosi, director of the Sistine Chapel Choir. In 1906 he studied Gregorian chant with the Benedictine Solesmes monks exiled on the Isle of Wight in Appuldurcombe House, including with Dom André Mocquereau and Dom Eudine. Upon his return to New York, he was music director of Newark’s Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart, and professor of music at the Immaculate Conception Seminary in Mahwah, NJ. He moved to Ph

Nicolas Collins

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Nicolas Collins (born March 26, 1954, in New York City) is a composer of mostly electronic music, a sound artist and writer. He received his BA and MA from Wesleyan University, and his PhD from the University of East Anglia. Upon graduating from Wesleyan, he was a Watson Fellow. Biography In the 1980s Collins was “a pioneer in the use of microcomputers in live performance, and has made extensive use of ‘home-made’ electronic circuitry, radio, found sound material, and transformed musical instruments.” Trained in the experimental compositional tradition of Alvin Lucier, David Behrman, and David Tudor, all of whom he worked with closely, Collins also immersed himself in the New York Improvised Music scene of the 1980s. Using home-built instruments that combined circuitry, simple computers and traditional instruments such as trombones and slide guitars, he collaborated and performed with Tom Cora, Shelley Hirsch, Christian Marclay, Zeena Parkins, John Zorn and others. Collins’s compositions frequently ask performers to respond to unpredictable musical cues, as in Devil’s Music (1985), in which the performer DJs with snippets of live scanning radio, or Still Lives (1993), in which a so

Nicolas Flagello

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Nicolas Oreste Flagello (March 15, 1928 – March 16, 1994) was an American composer and conductor of classical music. He was one of the last American composers to develop a distinctive mode of expression based wholly on the principles and techniques of late romanticism. Biography Early life Nicolas Flagello was born in New York City, into a musical family. His father Dionisio was an amateur oboist, his mother Genoveffa was a vocalist and his maternal grandfather Domenico Casiello was a composer who is reputed to have studied with Giuseppe Verdi. His brother Ezio Flagello was a bass who sang at the Metropolitan Opera. After his family emigrated to the United States from Salerno, Nicolas continued to enjoy strong family ties with his Italian relatives which created a lasting impression on him. At the age of three, he undertook piano lessons with a maternal aunt, and soon began voice lessons, studies on the violin and lessons on several woodwind instruments. By the age of seven he appeared in public recitals as a pianist and also vocalized as a boy-soprano earning the nickname “Il Poccolo Caruso”. In the 1930s, Flagello embarked upon an Old World apprenticeship with the Italian-America

Nicolas Nabokov

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Nicolas Nabokov (Николай Дмитриевич Набоков; 17 April 1903 – 6 April 1978) was a Russian-born composer, writer, and cultural figure. He became a U.S. citizen in 1939. Life Nicolas Nabokov, a first cousin of Vladimir Nabokov, and of the baron Eduard von Falz-Fein, was born to a family of landed Russian gentry in the town of Lubcza near Minsk, and was educated by private tutors. In 1918, after his family fled the Bolshevik Revolution to the Crimea, he began his musical education with Vladimir Rebikov. After living briefly in Germany he settled in Paris in 1923, where he studied at the Sorbonne. Nabokov was married five times. His first wife was the Russian princess Nathalie Shakhovskaya (1903–1988). His last (1970–1978) was the French photographer Dominique Nabokov. He had three sons: French publisher Ivan Nabokov, Alexander Nabokov, and anthropologist Peter Nabokov. His close friends included the philosopher and fellow émigré Isaiah Berlin and composer Igor Stravinsky. Career After the years in Paris from 1923 to 1932, in 1933 he moved to the U.S. as a lecturer in music for the Barnes Foundation. He taught music at Wells College in New York from 1936 to 1941, then moved to St. John'

Nicolas Slonimsky

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Nicolas Slonimsky (April 27 1894 – December 25, 1995), born Nikolai Leonidovich Slonimskiy (), was a Russian-American musicologist, conductor, pianist, lexicographer, and composer. Best known for his writing and musical reference work, he wrote the Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns and the Lexicon of Musical Invective, and edited Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of Musicians. Biography Early life in Russia and Europe Slonimsky was born Nikolai Leonidovich Slonimskiy in Saint Petersburg. He was of Jewish origin; his grandfather was Rabbi Chaim Zelig Slonimsky. His parents adopted the Orthodox faith after the birth of his older brother, and Nicolas was baptized in the Russian Orthodox Church. His maternal aunt, Isabelle Vengerova, later a founder of Philadelphia’s Curtis Institute of Music, was his first piano teacher. He grew up in the intelligentsia. After the Russian Revolution of 1917, he moved south, first to Kiev , then to Constantinople, and ultimately to Paris, where many other Russian musicians and his sister Yulia Slonimskaya Sazonova had already fled. He worked as accompanist to the conductor Serge Koussevitzky, and he toured Europe in 1921–22 as accompanist to tenor

Nikka Costa

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Domenica “Nikka” Costa (born June 4, 1972) is an American singer whose music combines elements of pop, soul, and blues. She began her career as a child singer in the early 1980s. She is the daughter of music producer Don Costa. Early life Nikka Costa was born in Tokyo, Japan to Italian-American parents. She was exposed to music from childhood, often surrounded by well-known artists as she traveled with her father, producer and musician Don Costa. At age five, Nikka recorded a single with Hawaiian singer Don Ho. At age nine, she recorded an album with her father accompanying on guitar, and performed with Frank Sinatra on the White House lawn. Also at age nine, she recorded the song “(Out Here) on My Own” (from the movie Fame) with her father. The single reached No. 1 in Italy, No. 72 in Germany, No. 7 in Switzerland, No. 32 in the Netherlands, and No. 13 in the Flanders region of Belgium., . The album Nikka Costa was released (outside of the U.S.) in 1981. Her second album, Fairy Tales (cuentos de hadas), was released in 1983. Don Costa died of a heart attack shortly after the album was recorded. The pop album Here I Am… Yes, It’s Me (Loca Tentación) was released in 1989. Adult ca

Nikki McKibbin

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Katherine Nicole McKibbin (September 28, 1978 – November 1, 2020) was an American rock music singer-songwriter who finished third in the debut season of the reality television series American Idol. Before American Idol, McKibbin appeared in the first season of Popstars. In May 2007, she released a rock album called Unleashed. American Idol In 2002, McKibbin appeared on the first season of American Idol, placing third. McKibbin was in the bottom three every week except one, a total of six times (including elimination). Post-Idol career Immediately following her stint on American Idol, McKibbin signed with 19 Management and RCA Records. They urged her to record a country album, but she was determined to stay true to her rock roots; she rejected the idea, saying she felt she would be “selling out.” The creative differences resulted in no releasable recordings being produced. McKibbin ran Angelfire Productions, a karaoke company, but after Idol, “got out of the karaoke business” to focus on her music career. In 2004, she appeared on the holiday CD Christmas in a Fishbowl with several other reality stars for Fishbowl.com. In May 2005, McKibbin joined Dallas rock band Downside. They did

Noah Creshevsky

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Noah Creshevsky (January 31, 1945 – December 3, 2020) was a composer and electronic musician born in Rochester, New York. He used the term hyperrealism to describe his work. Biography Noah Creshevsky was born Gary Cohen in Rochester, New York, to Joseph and Sylvia Cohen. He changed his surname to Creshevsky in order to honor his maternal grandparents. At the same time he also changed his first name because, he said, “I never felt like a Gary.” He studied in the preparatory division of the Eastman School of Music from the age of 6 until 1961, then earned a B.F.A. degree at the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1966, studying with Lukas Foss. There, he founded the New York Improvisation Ensemble. He also served on the faculties of Juilliard and Hunter College, and was a visiting professor at Princeton University during the 1984 academic year. This alliance of opposites is heard both in his text-sound compositions (1973-1986)—Pop Art works in which extreme and unpredictable juxtapositions of iconographic sonic materials establish links between music and society —and in later pieces, in which the integration of electronic and acoustic sources and processes “creates virtual ‘su

Noah K

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Noah Flynn Kaplan (born September 11, 1984), known professionally as Noah K, is an American composer, saxophonist, and record producer. Early life and education K grew up in Topanga Canyon, California. During high school he performed jazz professionally throughout Los Angeles. In 2002, he composed and performed music on the ABC television series Once and Again. He is a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music, where he studied with Joe Maneri and Jerry Bergonzi. He was Maneri’s last student. After graduating, K moved to Brooklyn, New York, and traveled monthly to Framingham, Massachusetts for lessons in composition, theory, and improvisation with Maneri until Maneri’s death in 2009. K received an MFA in Music Composition from Princeton University in 2015 where his advisor was Steven Mackey. In 2018 he was awarded the Harold W. Dodds Honorific Fellowship from the Princeton University Graduate School. He has been the recipient of composition fellowships from the Tanglewood Music Center and the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra. In 2022, he received a PhD in Music Composition from Princeton University. He has been visiting professor of music and adjunct professor at NYU’s Gallati

Noel Estrada

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Noel Epifanio Estrada Suárez (June 4, 1918 – December 1, 1979) Musical compositions Estrada became a government employee after being honorably discharged from the Army. He was a protocol official for the State Department. It was during the 1940s and 1950s that he wrote and interpreted his songs in Puerto Rico and in the U.S. Among the many songs which he wrote were the following: “El Romance del Cafetal” (Romance of the coffee field); “Verde Navidad” (Green Christmas); “El Amor del Jíbaro” (The poor farmers Love); “Pobre Amor” (Poor Love); “Pedacito de Borinquen” (A piece of Puerto Rico); “Amor del Alma” (Love of the Soul); “Lo Nuestro Termino” (Our love is Finished); “Llévame a Ver a Jesús” (Take Me to see Jesus"); etcetera. However, it was “En mi Viejo San Juan” (In my Old San Juan) that would bring Estrada international acclaim. “En Mi Viejo San Juan” Estrada composed “En mi Viejo San Juan” in the 1940s, in New York City. It is Estrada’s most popular composition, and is considered a second national anthem by many Puerto Ricans, especially those who live abroad. The City of San Juan honored Estrada as an adopted citizen and would later adopt the song as its official city anthem.

Noel Katz

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Noel Katz is an American composer and lyricist. He is best known for Such Good Friends, an original musical comedy presented at the fourth annual New York Musical Theatre Festival in 2007, where it won five awards, including Talkin’ Broadway’s Citation as the season’s best musical. It tells the story of three old friends working together in the early years of live television who are forced to name names before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and the consequences of the different choices each character makes. The NYMF presentation of Such Good Friends featured Tony nominees Liz Larsen and Brad Oscar. Katz composed Our Wedding, The Musical, a musical written for his own actual wedding, which was featured in The New York Times in 2003. He has composed scores for a variety of Second City (NY) improv-based revues, including We Built This City on Rent Control, A Time For Heroes and Hoagies, and Generation F’d. He has also taught song improvisation at Fairleigh Dickinson University, Circle in the Square and the National Dance Institute. Works * Through the Wardrobe * Murder at the Savoy * The Heavenly Theatre (composer) * The New U. * On the Brink * Not a Lion * The Christmas

Noël Lee

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Noël Lee (December 25, 1924 – July 15, 2013) was an American classical pianist and composer. Biography Born in 1924 in Nanjing, China, Lee studied music in Lafayette, Indiana, then attended Harvard University, studying with Walter Piston, Irving Fine, and Tillman Merritt and was also a student at the Longy School of Music in the early 1940s. Following World War II, he traveled to Paris, where he studied music with Nadia Boulanger and was a friend of Douglas Allanbrook. He composed orchestral, chamber, piano, vocal, and film music. In addition, he completed several unfinished piano works by Franz Schubert, and composed cadenzas for piano concertos by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven. He was also well known for his piano accompaniment. Lee was a visiting professor at Brandeis University, Cornell University, and Dartmouth College. He received numerous awards throughout his career, an award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters for his creative work in 1959, and from France, twice laureate of the Fondation de France, in 1998, the grade of Commandeur of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, and, in 1999, from the city of Paris, the Grand Prix de la Musique. Lee’s fi

Noelle Scaggs

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Noelle Scaggs (born October 8, 1979) is an American musician and singer-songwriter from Los Angeles, known as the co-lead singer of the pop group Fitz and the Tantrums. Scaggs has also had numerous collaborations with the Black Eyed Peas, Dilated Peoples, Quantic, Mayer Hawthorne, and Damian Marley. In 2008 she became a co-lead singer of the indie pop and neo-soul band Fitz and the Tantrums, and is featured on their 2010 album Pickin’ Up the Pieces, which hit No. 1 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart. She has toured extensively with the band and performed on shows such as Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Conan, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Ellen, GMA, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, and The Late Late Show with James Corden. She has been critically acclaimed for her “powerhouse vocals” and charismatic on-stage presence. Early life Scaggs was born on October 8, 1979, in Denver, Colorado. Her father was a DJ and Scaggs was exposed to his vinyl collection at a young age, including Parliament, Teena Marie, and The Pointer Sisters. She also listened to her parents play artists such as Marvin Gaye and The Temptations during house parties, and was influenced as a young singer by the music of

Nokuthula Ngwenyama

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Nokuthula Ngwenyama (born June 16, 1976) is an American solo violist and composer of Ndebele and Japanese descent. She is a recipient of the Avery Fisher Career Grant and has won the Primrose International Viola Competition and the Young Concert Artists International Auditions. Background Sixteen-year-old Nokuthula Ngwenyama came to international attention when she won the Primrose International Viola Competition in 1993 and the Young Concert Artists International Auditions in 1994. Since then, she has been a soloist with orchestras around the world, including the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Charlotte Symphony Orchestra, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic and the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington. She has appeared in recital at the Kennedy Center, Japan’s Suntory Hall, the Louvre, and the White House. She is an alumna of the Crossroads School, Colburn School for the Performing Arts, Curtis Institute of Music, and the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris as a Fulbright Scholar. She also has a Master of Theological Studies degree from Harvard University. She is a past president of the American Viola Society

Norman Cazden

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Norman Cazden (September 23, 1914, in New York City – August 18, 1980, in Bangor, Maine) was an American composer. The son of Russian immigrants, he studied first at the Juilliard School of Music and New York’s City College, and then in 1944 at Harvard University under Aaron Copland and Walter Piston. While still a student at the Juilliard School, he composed for dance companies and wrote his first symphony. He also performed as a concert pianist and was a piano teacher at Juilliard from 1934 to 1949. After 1941, he worked at Camp Woodland in the Catskill Mountains, where he succeeded Herbert Haufrecht as musical director from 1945 to 1960. Cazden also taught at the Peabody Conservatory, the University of Michigan, and since 1950 at the University of Illinois in Champaign Urbana. After being investigated by the House Un-American Activities Committee, he lost this position in 1953 and received no academic position for the next 16 years. He gave private piano lessons during this time and worked on research on folk music. Beginning in 1969 he taught at the University of Maine. Cazden composed an operetta, music for the stage, two symphonies, two chamber music concerts, a brass suite,

Norman Dello Joio

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Norman Dello Joio (January 24, 1913 – July 24, 2008) was an American composer active for over half a century. Best known for his choral music, he won a Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1957. Life Dello Joio was born in New York City to Italian immigrants. He began his musical career as organist and choir director at the Star of the Sea Church on City Island in New York at age 14. His father, Casimiro Dello Joio, was an organist, pianist, part-time composer, and vocal coach and coached many opera stars from the Metropolitan Opera. He taught Norman piano starting at the age of four. In his teens, Norman began studying organ with his godfather, Pietro Yon, who was the organist at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. In 1939, he received a scholarship to the Juilliard School, where he studied composition with Bernard Wagenaar. While he was a student, he worked as organist at St. Anne’s Church, but he soon decided that he didn’t want to make his living as an organist. In 1941, he began studying with Paul Hindemith, who encouraged him to follow his own lyrical bent, rather than sacrificing it to atonal systems. He received numerous awards and much recognition. He was a prolific composer in a variety of ge

Norman Gimbel

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Norman Gimbel (November 16, 1927 – December 19, 2018) was an American lyricist and songwriter of popular songs and themes to television shows and films. He wrote the lyrics for songs including “Ready to Take a Chance Again” (with composer Charles Fox) and “Canadian Sunset”. He also co-wrote “Killing Me Softly with His Song”. He wrote English-language lyrics for many international hits, including “Sway”, “Summer Samba”, “The Girl from Ipanema”, “How Insensitive”, “Drinking-Water”, “Meditation”, “I Will Wait for You” and “Watch What Happens”. Of the movie themes he co-wrote, five were nominated for Academy Awards or Golden Globe Awards or both, including “It Goes Like It Goes”, from the film Norma Rae, which won the Academy Award for Best Original Song for 1979. Gimbel was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1984. Background Gimbel was born on November 16, 1927, in Brooklyn, New York City, the son of Lottie (Nass) and businessman Morris Gimbel. His parents were Jewish immigrants from Austria. He studied English at Baruch College and Columbia University. Gimbel said that he relied on Lieberman to inspire his songwriting creativity since he had passed the most creative days o

Norman Spencer (composer)

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Norman Spencer Matthews (March 3, 1891– February 15, 1940), was an American musician and songwriter. He is best known for having served as musical director/composer for Warner Brothers’ /Leon Schlesinger’s Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoon shorts from 1933 to 1936. Career Spencer was born in Minneapolis. By 1911 he was living in California and working as a pianist. Beginning in 1919 he was credited as a songwriter for many songs as well as writing scores for musical stage shows. Spencer served as composer and director of music for Leon Schlesinger Productions from 1933 to 1936, along with fellow composer Bernard Brown, creating film scores for animated short films in the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series produced by Leon Schlesinger. His son Norman, Jr. reportedly handled the musical arrangements for both series. Filmography Clifford McCarty lists the following credits for Norman Spencer: *Buddy’s Day Out (1933) *I’ve Got to Sing a Torch Song (1933) *Beauty and the Beast (1934) *Buddy and Towser (1934) *Buddy of the Apes (1934) *Buddy the Detective (1934) *Buddy the Gob (1934) *Buddy the Woodsman (1934) *Buddy’s Bearcats (1934) *Buddy’s Beer Garden (1934) *Buddy’s Circ

Octavio Vázquez

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Octavio Vázquez Rodríguez (born September 10, 1972) is a Galician-American New York-based composer of classical music. Biography Born in Santiago de Compostela (Galicia, Spain), Vázquez spontaneously started writing music at age 7. Not knowing how to notate music at that age, he created his own system. At age 12 he became music director at St. Peter’s church in Lugo. In 1989 he moved to Madrid, where he studied at the Adolfo Salazar Conservatory and the Madrid Royal Conservatory, taking degrees in piano, collaborative piano, and theory. While in Madrid he also worked as assistant conductor to Oscar Gershensohn and pursued graduate studies in conducting and musicology. After winning the prestigious Barrié de la Maza Foundation Scholarship, he went on to study composition at the Peabody Institute in Baltimore, and afterwards obtained his doctorate from the University of Maryland, College Park, where he was on a full Fellowship. Since 1999 he resides in New York City. He is primarily interested in the “…emotional impact of his music and direct communication with the listener”. His music has been described as “…a burning torch for the next century” by Mark Greenfest, of the New Mus

Ofer Ben-Amots

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Ofer Ben-Amots (Hebrew: עופר בן-אמוץ; born October 20, 1955) is an Israeli-American composer and teacher of music composition and theory at Colorado College. His music is inspired by Jewish folklore of Eastern-European Yiddish and Judeo-Spanish Ladino traditions. The interweaving of folk elements with contemporary textures creates the dynamic tension that permeates and defines Ben-Amots’ musical language. Biography Born in Haifa, Israel, Ofer Ben-Amots gave his first piano concert at age nine and at age sixteen was awarded first prize in the Chet Piano Competition. Ben-Amots would attend the Rubin Academy of Music at Tel Aviv University from 1978 to 1979, where he pursued undergraduate studies in composition and theory with Josef Dorfman, piano with Alexander Volkov, and percussion with Gideon Steiner. Soon after, Ben-Amots was invited to study at the Conservatoire de Musique in Geneva, Switzerland. There he studied composition with Pierre Wismer, and privately with Alberto Ginastera. In 1980, Ben-Amots would begin attending Hochschule für Musik in Detmold, Germany, where he would receive degrees in composition, music theory, and piano upon his graduation in 1986. Following his arr

Ole Bull

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Ole Bornemann Bull (; 5 February 181017 August 1880) was a Norwegian virtuoso violinist and composer. According to Robert Schumann, he was on a level with Niccolò Paganini for the speed and clarity of his playing. Background Bull was born in Bergen, Norway. He was the eldest of ten children of Johan Storm Bull (1787–1838) and Anna Dorothea Borse Geelmuyden (1789–1875). His brother, Georg Andreas Bull became a noted Norwegian architect. He was also the uncle of Edvard Hagerup Bull, Norwegian judge and politician. His father wished for him to become a minister, but he desired a musical career. At the age of four or five, he could play all of the songs he had heard his mother play on the violin. At age nine, he played first violin in the orchestra of Bergen’s theatre and was a soloist with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra. At eighteen, he was sent to the University of Christiania, but failed his examinations. He joined the Musical Lyceum, a musical society, and after its director Waldemar Thrane was taken ill, Bull became the director of Musical Lyceum and the Theater Orchestra in 1828. during which visit he also travelled to some of the more remote parts of Britain. Catherine Darwin

Oliver Wallace

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Oliver George Wallace (August 6, 1887 – September 15, 1963) was a British-American composer and conductor from London. He was especially known for his film music compositions, which were written for many animation, documentary, and feature films from Walt Disney Studios. Biography Wallace was born on August 6, 1887, in London. After completing his musical training, he emigrated to the Canada originally, and then shortly after to the United States in 1904, becoming a US citizen ten years later. He initially worked primarily on the West Coast in Seattle as a conductor of theater orchestras and as an organist accompanying silent films. At the same time, he also made a name as a songwriter, writing tunes such as the popular “”. With the advent of the talking film era, he worked increasingly for Hollywood film studios in the 1930s. In 1936 he joined Disney Studios and quickly became one of the most important composers in the studio for animated short films. He provided the music for 139 of these shorts. One of his best-known pieces is the song “Der Fuehrer’s Face” from the 1942 Donald Duck propaganda cartoon, though he was uncredited. This parody of a Horst Wessel song was, mainly throu

Olly Wilson

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Olly Woodrow Wilson, Jr. (September 7, 1937 – March 12, 2018) was an American composer of contemporary classical music, pianist, double bassist, and a musicologist. He was one of the most preeminent composers of African American descent in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. He is known for developing a list of Heterogenous Sound Ideals that is widely used to dissect different aspects of music, with an emphasis on African culture. According to Wilson himself, “The essence of Africanness consists of a way of doing something, not simply something that is done” (1991). This motto is the basis of Wilson’s work in the realm of ethnomusicology. He is also known for establishing the TIMARA (Technology in Music and Related Arts) program at Oberlin Conservatory, the first-ever conservatory program in electronic music. Biography Wilson was born in St. Louis, Missouri, to Alma Grace Peoples Wilson, a seamstress, and Olly Woodrow Wilson, Sr., an insurance salesman and butler. He graduated with a B.M. degree from Washington University in St. Louis in 1959, and earned an M.M. degree in music composition in 1960 from the University of Illinois. His composition instructors included Robert Wy

Omar Hakim

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Omar Hakim (born February 12, 1959) is an American drummer, producer, arranger and composer. His session work covers jazz, jazz fusion, and pop music. He has worked with Weather Report, David Bowie, Foo Fighters, Chic, Sting, Madonna, Dire Straits, Bryan Ferry, Journey, Kate Bush, George Benson, Miles Davis, Daft Punk, Mariah Carey, the Pussycat Dolls, David Lee Roth, Celine Dion, and Thundercat. Early life Hakim was born in New York City on February 12, 1959. His father, Hasaan Hakim, was a trombonist. and first performed in his father’s band four or five years later. At the end of 1984, Hakim joined Dire Straits as drummer while recording their fifth album Brothers in Arms at the now-abandoned AIR Studios in Montserrat. Hakim temporarily replaced the band’s then-permanent drummer Terry Williams, who had been sidelined and released from the recording sessions by producers Mark Knopfler and Neil Dorfsman, as his drumming performance was felt to be unsuitable for the desired sound of the album after most of the album tracks had been recorded. Hakim re-recorded all the drum tracks on the album within three days and then left for other commitments. Hakim and Williams are both credited

Onaje Allan Gumbs

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Onaje Allan Gumbs (born Allan Bentley Gumbs, September 3, 1949 – April 6, 2020) was a New York–based pianist, composer, and bandleader. Early life and career Gumbs was born in Harlem, a neighborhood in New York City, to parents who had immigrated to the United States from the Caribbean. Gumbs’ mother was from Montserrat, while his father, a New York City police officer, was from Anguilla. He was the nephew of Hubert Harrison’s daughter-in-law. As a child, Gumbs was fascinated by the film and television music of Henry Mancini. Gumbs graduated from the State University of New York at Fredonia, and during his years there was a member of a student-organized jazz ensemble. In 1971, Leroy Kirkland introduced Gumbs to the Detroit guitarist Kenny Burrell, to whom Onaje gave a demo tape. The following day, Gumbs received a call to play with Burrell at Baker’s Keyboard Lounge in Detroit. This work led to further performances with major jazz musicians such as bassist Larry Ridley as well as The Thad Jones/ Mel Lewis Orchestra. During the early 1970s, Gumbs replaced Nat Adderley, Jr. in a contemporary jazz ensemble called Natural Essence, which included during these years Buddy Williams and T.

Onzy Matthews

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Onzy Durrett Matthews, Jr. (January 15, 1930 – November 13, 1997) was an American jazz pianist, singer, arranger, composer, and television and movie actor. He is best known for the big band arrangements done for the Lou Rawls albums Black and Blue and Tobacco Road, as well as arrangements for several of Ray Charles’ 1960s releases. He had his own big band for many years and recorded numerous tracks for Capitol Records, including two albums released under his own name. He later had a close relationship with the Duke Ellington orchestra, working as a pianist, arranger and conductor through the late 1960s and 1970s. Biography Early days and move to Los Angeles Onzy Durrett Matthews, Jr. was born on January 15, 1930, to Onzy Matthews and Leola Jones in Fort Worth, Texas. He grew up in Dallas until his early teens when his mother moved to Los Angeles seeking better-paying work. His early exposure to music was through singing in a church gospel choir. He graduated from high school early, at the age of 16, and primarily wanted to be a singer. “I taught myself to accompany myself on piano and then I found out you had to have arrangements.” Curtis Amy included two of Matthews’ original tune

Orion R. Farrar

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Orion R Farrar was a marching band director and composer. Farrar was born in Indianapolis, Indiana in 1866, son of an English shoemaker and an Indiana woman. Soon after his birth, his family moved to Warren, Ohio. At the age of 19, Farrar enrolled in the famous Dana Musical Institute in Warren, studying theory, composition, and cornet playing. Following graduation, he taught brass instruments and conducted the Institute band for 7 years. He resigned from Dana in 1896 to organize the Indiana State Band, which he led for two years. He then returned to Ohio to form the Ohio State Band (unrelated to Ohio State University). He moved to Youngstown, Ohio in 1901, where he led the Youngstown Military Band. In 1915, he conducted the Lima, Ohio Municipal Band. He became a member of Old Erie Masonic Lodge No 3 in 1894 and was active until 1904, when he was expelled for non-payment of dues. The final years of Farrar’s life remain a mystery. He was purported to have died in California in 1929, but this is undocumented. As a march composer, Farrar is most remembered for “Bombasto”, “Indiana State Band”, and “Hi Henry’s Triumphal”. “Bombasto” found an enduring place in the circus band repertoire,

Orlando Jacinto Garcia

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Orlando Jacinto Garcia (born 1954; surname sometimes spelled García) is a Cuban-American composer of contemporary classical music. Life and career Garcia received a DMA degree in composition from the University of Miami in 1985. He also studied composition with Morton Feldman. He is a guest composer and lecturer at national and international festivals. His music has been performed numerous artists such as Joan La Barbara, Bertram Turetzky, Luis Gómez-Imbert, Jan Williams, Joseph Celli, Odaline de la Martinez the Gregg Smith Singers, and many orchestras in the Americas and Europe. Garcia is the founder and director of several international festivals that include the New Music Miami Festival and the Music of the Americas Festival. He is the founder and artistic director of the NODUS Ensemble and the Florida International University (FIU) New Music Ensemble. Awards and recognitions Garcia is the recipient of numerous honors and awards from organizations and cultural institutions, including the Nuevas Resonancias, ACF Sonic Circuits, Bloch International Competition, and fellowships, residencies, and other awards from the Rockefeller, Fulbright, Dutka, and Cintas Foundation (1994/95 and

Oscar Rasbach

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Oscar Rasbach (August 2, 1888 – March 23, 1975) was an American pianist, composer and arranger of art songs and works for piano. Biography Oscar was born in Kentucky, but studied “academic subjects in Los Angeles”. He also studied music with Ludwig Thomas, Julius Albert Jahn, José Anderson, and A. J. Stamm. He became a businessman, but went to Vienna to study piano with Theodor Leschetizky and music theory with Hans Thorton. He returned to the United States in 1911 and settled in San Marino, California. There he worked as a pianist, accompanist, teacher, and choral director. His obituary in the local news and the Musical Times claimed that he was a founding member of ASCAP, but the 1966 ASCAP Dictionary says that he joined in 1932. Music Rasbach composed two operettas, around 20 published songs, solos for student pianists, and a few arrangements and instrumental pieces. His most important musical composition was his 1922 setting of Trees, the popular poem by Joyce Kilmer, published by G. Schirmer. It was performed and recorded by many important singers of the 20th century, such as Ernestine Schumann-Heink, John Charles Thomas, Nelson Eddy, Robert Merrill, Paul Robeson, Richard Taub

Otis Bardwell Boise

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Otis Bardwell Boise (August 13, 1844 – December 2, 1912) was an American composer and music educator. Biography Boise was born in Oberlin, Ohio. When he was a child, his family moved to 19th-century American male composers Cleveland, Ohio. He showed his musical talent early on and became organist at St Paul’s Church in 1858. From May 1863 until September 1865 he studied at the Leipzig Conservatory. His teachers include Ignaz Moscheles, Ernst Ferdinand Wenzel, Ernst Friedrich Richter, Moritz Hauptmann, as well as Ferdinand David and Carl Reinecke. For a short time he taught in Berlin at the academy of Theodor Kullak. From 1865 to 1870 he was an organist and music teacher in Cleveland. In 1869 he married his wife Anastasia Virginia (1846–1937), who translated many German songs into English, in Cleveland. From 1870 to 1876 Boise worked as a teacher for harmony and composition at the Conservatory of Music and as organist of the Presbyterian church in New York City. Between 1876 and 1878 he lived in Weimar and Wiesbaden in Germany. Boise often visited Franz Liszt, with whom he discussed composition and American music education, and played through manuscripts. He also spend time with Joa

Otis René

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Otis Joseph René Jr. was an American songwriter and record label owner. As a songwriter, he is notable as the co-author of “When It’s Sleepy Time Down South”, which became a signature song for Louis Armstrong. Biography Otis René was born in New Orleans. Prior to devoting his full-time efforts to music, Otis René was a pharmacist in New Orleans. He moved to Los Angeles and married in 1930. He is best known as the co-author of the 1931 song “When It’s Sleepy Time Down South”, co-written with his brother Leon René, and Clarence Muse. Other songs co-written by Otis René include “Someone’s Rocking My Dreamboat”, included by Murray Head on his 1975 album Say It Ain’t So and “That’s My Home”, included by Tony Bennett on his 2002 album, A Wonderful World. During the 1940s, with his brother, Leon René, Otis René established and ran the independent rhythm and blues labels Exclusive Records and Excelsior Records. Otis was responsible for and publicly identified with Excelsior Records, In support of their record labels, Otis René and Leon René purchased their own record plant, but when the format changed from 78 rpm to 45rpm, they could not press the new speed. Otis René’s Excelsior label exi

Ottalie Mark

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Ottalie Mark (born Thilla Mark, October 3, 1896 - November 13, 1979) was an American musicologist, copyright consultant, composer, and music editor. Early life and education Ottalie Mark was born on October 3, 1896, the daughter of Hyman David and Rose (née Glass) Mark, who immigrated to the United States from Lithuania in the 1880s. The family lived at 76 Chrystie Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, and her father worked in the garment industry. She was the eighth of nine children, four brothers and five sisters. She was brought up in an Orthodox Jewish household. Mark was educated at Washington Irving Art School (a branch of the Wadleigh High School for Girls), and NY Prep School. She got her undergraduate degree from NYU in Pre-Law. She studied music with conductor Sunia Samuels and violinist Michael Sciapiro. Career Mark’s first job after military service was as secretary to Martha Wilchinski, Head of Publicity at Roxy Rothafel’s Capitol Theatre, in the early 1920s. She was also a cueing assistant to Ernö Rapée, the Capitol Theatre’s Music Director. A “cueing assistant” is a person who works with an orchestra in a silent film theater, instructing the musicians on which

Otto Floersheim

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Otto Floersheim last name pronounced Flairs-hime (born in Aix-la-Chapelle, 2 March 1853; died 30 November 1917) was an American composer, critic and editor. Career He received his musical education under Ferdinand Hiller in Cologne, and emigrated to the United States in 1875. There he became an editor of the Musical Courier in 1880. From 1894 to 1904, he was in charge of its Berlin bureau. James Huneker describes him as “fat, rather pompous, good-humoured and perspiring.” He is remembered for a damning review of an early performance of Richard Strauss’s A Hero’s Life: “… alleged symphony … revolutionary in every sense of the word. The climax of everything that is ugly, cacophonous, blatant and erratic, the most perverse music I ever heard in all my life, is reached in the chapter ‘The Hero’s Battlefield.’ The man who wrote this outrageously hideous noise, no longer deserving of the word music, is either a lunatic, or he is rapidly approaching idiocy.” (Musical Courier, April 19, 1899) Works His orchestral compositions include a “Prelude and Fugue,” which was played in New York City under the direction of Theodore Thomas; “Alla Marcia,” which was produced under Frank van der Stu

Otto Luening

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Otto Clarence Luening (June 15, 1900 – September 2, 1996) was a German-American composer and conductor, and flutist. He was an early pioneer of tape music and electronic music. Biography Luening was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin to German parents, Eugene Luening, a conductor and composer, and Emma (nee Jacobs), an amateur singer. When he was 12, his family moved to Munich, where he studied music at the State Academy of Music. At age 17, he moved to Switzerland and attended the Municipal Conservatory of Music in Zürich and University of Zurich, where he studied with Ferruccio Busoni and Philipp Jarnach, and was also an actor and stage manager for James Joyce’s English Players Company. He returned to the United States in 1924, and appeared mainly as a conductor of operas, in Chicago and the Eastman School of Music. His conducting premieres included Virgil Thomson’s The Mother of Us All, Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Medium, and his own Evangeline. Luening’s tape music, including A Poem in Cycles & Bells, Gargoyles for Violin & Synthesized Sound, and Sounds of New Music demonstrated the early potential of synthesizers and special editing techniques for electronic music. An October 28, 1952

Otto Sutro

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Otto Sutro (1833 – January 19, 1896) was a German-born American organist, conductor, minor composer, publisher and music store owner, and a leading figure in the musical life of Baltimore, Maryland. Biography Sutro was born to a Jewish family in Aachen, Germany. He has six brothers and three sisters. His brother Adolph Sutro became the first Jewish Mayor of San Francisco and built the Sutro Baths. His brother Theodore Sutro, husband of Florence Sutro, was seminal in the building and financing the Sutro Tunnel first proposed by his brother Adolph. They had two daughters, Rose and Ottilie Sutro, who were the first recognised piano-duo team. Sutro sat for portrait artist David Dalhoff Neal in 1889 (see image). Rapheal Tuck & Son created a litho art card Character Otto Sutro. References

P. G. Lowery

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Perry George Lowery (Topeka, October 11, 1869 – Cleveland, December 15, 1942) was an American composer, conductor, cornet player, and a circus sideshow manager of African American entertainment and musical ensembles. Early life Born October 11, 1870, P. G. Lowery came from a musical family. He played the drums in a family band, but later transitioned to cornet. Most African Americans worked in agriculture, domestic work, or unskilled labor. The following year he played with the Wallace Circus. Next Lowery became a cornetist with the Original Nashville Students and P. T. Wright’s Colored Comedy Company. In 1897 or 1899 he studied at the Boston Conservatory under the direction of Henry C. Brown. In the summer of 1898 he played solo cornet at the Trans-Mississippi Exposition in Omaha, Nebraska with the Original Nashville Students. And in 1899 he started the P.G. Lowery’s Famous Concert Band and P.G. Lowery’s Vaudeville Company, an important accomplishment because he was the first African American to bring his own vaudeville troupe to the circus. During the early 1900s he published a newspaper column, “The Cornet and Cornetists of Today” in The Freeman. Late career P.G. Lowery led and

Pamela J. Marshall

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Pamela J. Marshall (born 31 May 1954) is an American horn player and composer. She was born in Beverly, Massachusetts, and studied horn, electronic music and conducting at the Eastman and Yale Schools of Music. After completing her education, she settled in Lexington, Massachusetts. She plays French horn in orchestra and composes for synthesizer, brass, mandolin and orchestra. Since 2015, she has been a key participant in The k a rl h e nn i ng Ensemble (Boston), both as hornist and composer. Marshall has written software and developed sounds for Kurzweil Music Systems and worked at Powersoft Corporation as a technical writer. She established her own music publishing company, Spindrift Music. Selected works Marshall composes chamber, vocal and orchestral music. *Colored Leaves for solo horn (1964) *Hillslide for brass quintet and alphorn solo (1992) *Through the Mist (2015) Ravello Records RR7901, ASIN: B00RLXVX9G References

Pamela Z

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Pamela Z (born 1956) is an American composer, performer, and media artist best known for her solo works for voice with electronic processing. In performance, she combines various vocal sounds including operatic bel canto, experimental extended techniques and spoken word, with samples and sounds generated by manipulating found objects. Her performance work often includes video projections and special controllers with sensors that allow her to use physical gestures to manipulate the sound and projected media. Z’s solo albums are Echolocation (1987), and A Delay is Better (2004), and A Secret Code (2021). Her fixed-media sound works for radio and new media installations for art galleries have manifested in solo exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA, New York), the Krannert Art Museum (Champaign, Illinois), Savvy Contemporary (Berlin), Trondheim Elektroniske Kunstsenter (Trondheim, Norway), the Fine Arts Center Galleries at Bowling Green State University, and the Chico University Art Gallery (Chico, California), and in group exhibitions in the Dakar Biennale, Sénégal, the Whitney Museum of American Art, San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery, Erzbischöfliches Diözesanmuseum, Col

Patricia Alessandrini

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Patricia Alessandrini (born 1970) is an American composer, sound artist, and musicologist. A 2022 Guggenheim Fellow and 2024 MacDowell Fellow, Alessandrini specializes in electronic music and sound art. She is also an academic who specializes in the interdisciplinary study of music and technology, having worked in the faculty of Stanford University and Goldsmiths, University of London. Early life and music career Patricia Alessandrini was born in 1970 in the United States. She attended Bologna Conservatory, Conservatoire de Strasbourg, and IRCAM; Ivan Fedele, Tristan Murail, and Thea Musgrave were her composition teachers. As an artist, Alessandrini specializes in electronic music and sound art, as well as social and political issues and the reexamination of canonical works. In 2023, her album Leçons de ténèbres, performed by Riot Ensemble, was released from Huddersfield Contemporary Records; In a 2024 review for the Edinburgh Music Review, Simon Barrow praised her piece “Il y a plus d’eau que prévu sur la lune” as “cleverly crafted”. She was awarded a MacDowell Fellowship in 2024. She is a 2024-2025 Rieman and Baketel Fellow for Music at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute. Academic c

Patrick Grant (composer)

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Patrick Grant (born 1963) is an American composer living and working in New York City. His works are a synthesis of classical, popular, and world musical styles that have found place in concert halls, film, theater, dance, and visual media over three continents. Over the last three decades, his music has moved from post-punk and classically bent post-minimal styles, through Balinese-inspired gamelan and microtonality, to ambient, electronic soundscapes involving many layers of acoustic and electronically amplified instruments. Throughout its evolution, his music has consistently contained a “…a driving and rather harsh energy redolent of rock, as well as a clean sense of melodicism…intricate cross-rhythms rarely let up…” Known as a producer and co-producer of live musical events, he has presented many concerts of his own and other composers, including a 2013 Guinness World Record-breaking performance of 175 electronic keyboards in NYC. He is the creator of International Strange Music Day (August 24) and the pioneer of the electric guitar procession Tilted Axes. References External links * * * *

Patrick Greene (composer)

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Patrick Greene (born 1985) is an American composer and performer of contemporary classical music. A lifelong resident of New England, he has been based in Boston, Massachusetts, since 2008. Education Greene earned his MM in Composition from the Boston Conservatory in May 2010, where his primary teachers were Andy Vores and Dalit Warshaw. While at the Conservatory, he also studied with Jan Swafford and Curtis Hughes. His undergraduate career was at Trinity College, where he earned his B.A. in Music in 2007. His primary teachers at Trinity were Gerald Moshell and Douglas Bruce Johnson. Musical style In writing about Greene’s style, Jonathan Blumhofer of the Boston Classical Review notes “his musical language is … diverse,” with a “wide emotional breadth.”. His music has been called “undeniably expressive and smartly crafted.” Greene has described his music as “extractive,” rather than “abstractive,” while still noting the unique expressive power of music as an abstract medium. In interviews, Greene has cited the work of composers like Maurice Ravel, Steven Stucky, Igor Stravinsky, Toru Takemitsu, and Charles Ives as inspiration; he also draws influence from Anglican choral traditio

Patrick Liddell

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Patrick Liddell is a composer and video artist living in Oakland, California. He earned his Doctor of Music from Northwestern University in 2009. His thesis is titled “Arrow To The Sun: Postmodernism As Compositional Tool”, which outlines the contextual processes in postmodernist art, as well as includes a detailed description of the compositional, theoretical, and contextual framework for all his output. The music from “Arrow To The Sun” was the basis for Liddell’s first solo studio release. Career He has worked as a member of many ensembles within many genres, including The Zvooks (ska, reggae, Chicago/Germany), Function Ensemble (progressive rock, Melbourne/Chicago), Maurice (math rock, Chicago), The University of Chicago Gamelan, aperiodic (art music, Chicago), The University of California, Berkeley Gamelan (Javanese, Sari Raras), Gamelan Encinal (new music, Mills College, Oakland, CA), Gamelan Sekar Jaya (Balinese, Berkeley, CA), Steady Eddy And The Shakers (soul and funk covers, San Francisco), and ANiMA Art And Music (electronic, Seattle). Liddell has regularly performed live and improvised video as a guest with countless groups in Chicago and the San Francisco Bay Area, as

Patti Scialfa

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Vivienne Patricia Scialfa ( ; is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. Scialfa has been a member of the E Street Band since 1984 and has been married to Bruce Springsteen since 1991. In 2014, Scialfa was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the E Street Band. Early life and education Scialfa grew up in Deal, New Jersey, on the Jersey Shore. She was the middle child of Patricia (née Morris) Scialfa and Joseph Scialfa. Her mother is Irish; from Belfast, Northern Ireland. Her father was of Sicilian ancestry. She also has half-siblings from her father’s second marriage. Her father was a successful local entrepreneur, who started a television store and became a real estate developer. Scialfa began writing songs at an early age. She attended Asbury Park High School, where she graduated in 1971. In 1984, Scialfa joined the E Street Band, three or four days before the opening show of the Born in the U.S.A. Tour. In 1986, she appeared on the Rolling Stones’ Dirty Work album, leaving her vocal mark on “One Hit (To the Body)” as well as other tracks. She worked with Keith Richards on his first solo album Talk Is Cheap. Steve Jordan, who co-produced the Richards r

Patty Stair

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Patty Stair (November 12, 1869 – April 26, 1926 ) was an American organist and composer. Biography Patty Stair was born in Cleveland, Ohio, the niece of tenor Edwin Stair. She studied with music teachers including Franklin Bassett and at Hathaway Brown school for girls. She taught organ at the Cleveland Conservatory of Music from about 1889 to 1921 and served as organist for several churches in the Cleveland area. She was the first woman member and served as dean of the Ohio Chapter of the American Guild of Organists, and directed the chorus of the Forthnightly Musical Club. She also served as president of the Women’s Music Teachers association of Cleveland. Stair never married, and died of pneumonia in Cleveland in 1926. Later that year as part of Cleveland Music Week celebrations, along with other recently deceased Cleveland musicians Johann Beck and Fanny Snow Knowlton, she was honored with a prominent exhibit at the Cleveland Public Library. Works Stair composed for orchestra, songs and sacred anthems, and produced two light operas. Selected works include: *Intermezzo for orchestra *Six songs (“If I could take your tears, love,” “Madrigal,” “Love song,” “When daisies bloom,” Da

Paul Abraham

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Paul Abraham (; 2 November 1892 – 6 May 1960) was a Jewish-Hungarian composer of operettas, who scored major successes in the German-speaking world. Abraham was born in Apatin, Austria-Hungary (today Serbia), and studied at the Royal National Hungarian Academy of Music in Budapest from 1910 to 1916. He studied cello with Adolf Schiffer and composition with Viktor Herzfeld. Career Abraham was a son of Jakab Ábrahám (c. 1859–1909) – who was a merchant from Apatin, later head of a small private bank – and Flóra Blau (1872–1943), who came from Mohács (South-Hungary, next to Danube). Like many other composers of operettas, Abraham started with works of a serious nature. During the decade following his studies he wrote, among other things, sacred music, string quartets and a concerto for violoncello. When he was appointed conductor at the Budapest Operetta Theatre in 1927 he found his way to this more popular art form which was more suited to his talent. He wrote his first operetta, Der Gatte des Fräuleins, in 1928. With his third, Viktoria und ihr Husar (1930), he achieved a resounding success. Through this work, and the next two operettas from 1931 and 1933 Die Blume von Hawaii (The Fl

Paul Alan Levi

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Paul Alan Levi (born June 30, 1941, in New York City) is an American composer whose compositions have been performed in Carnegie Hall, among other major venues in United States and Europe, as well as on national television. He is the composer of the 1971-1984 PBS identity music. Biography Levi received a B.A. in music at Oberlin College and later received his M.M. and D.M.A at Juilliard while studying with composition teachers Hall Overton and Vincent Persichetti. He has taught at the Aaron Copland School of Music, Rutgers University, Manhattan School of Music, New York University, Lehman College, and Baruch College, and has been the composer in residence at Wolf Trap Farm Park, Portland State University, and the White Plains High School. Levi has won numerous awards and grants including a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Grand Prize for Opera from the National Music Theater Network, Fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the American Composers Alliance Recording Award, and grants from the American Music Center and Meet the Composer. He lived for a year in Munich on a DAAD Grant and has had residencies at several artist colonies. Levi’s commissions include the Chamber Musi

Paul Bowles

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Paul Frederic Bowles (; December 30, 1910 – November 18, 1999) was an American composer, author, and translator. He became associated with the Moroccan city of Tangier, where he settled in 1947 and lived for 52 years to the end of his life. Following a cultured middle-class upbringing in New York City, during which he displayed a talent for music and writing, Bowles pursued his education at the University of Virginia before making several trips to Paris in the 1930s. He studied music with Aaron Copland, and in New York wrote music for theatrical productions, as well as other compositions. He achieved critical and popular success with his first novel The Sheltering Sky (1949), set in French North Africa, which he had visited in 1931. Life 1910–1930: family and education Paul Bowles was born in Jamaica, Queens, New York City, as the only child of Rena (née Winnewisser) and Claude Dietz Bowles, a dentist. His childhood was materially comfortable, but his father was a cold and domineering parent, opposed to any form of play or entertainment, and feared by both his son and wife. According to family legend, Claude had tried to kill his newborn son by leaving him exposed on a window-ledge du

Paul Creston

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Paul Creston (born Giuseppe Guttoveggio; October 10, 1906 – August 24, 1985) was an American composer of classical music. He composed six symphonies and several concertante works for violin, piano, accordion, marimba and saxophone. He has been described as a leading American Neo-Romantic composer of his time. Biography Born in New York City to Sicilian immigrants, Creston was self-taught as a composer. His work tends to be fairly conservative in style, with a strong rhythmic element. His pieces include six symphonies; a number of concertos including two violin concertos and a marimba concerto (premiered by Ruth Stuber); a piano concerto, premiered by Earl Wild; concerto for two pianos and orchestra; an accordion concerto; and a concerto for alto saxophone dedicated to Cecil Leeson). The sonata was arranged by Marco Ciccone for saxophone and orchestra in 2008. Creston composed a suite for organ, Op.70. Several of his works were inspired by the poetry of Walt Whitman. Creston was one of the most performed American composers of the 1940s and 1950s. Several of his works have become staples of the wind band repertoire. Zanoni, Prelude and Dance and the Celebration Overture have been and

Paul Dirmeikis

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Paul Dirmeikis (born 1954) is a French-speaking poet, composer, singer, and painter who lives in Brittany, France. He is of Lithuanian ancestry, and a member of the Lithuanian Composers Union. Dirmeikis was born in Chicago, Illinois. As a writer, in the 1990s he began a large cycle of poems inspired by the German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen’s entire musical output. Works Compositions (selective list) Seventy compositions are now listed in his catalogue, including: *Message laissé à Pondichéry le 18 novembre 1973 (Message Left in Pondicherry on 18 November 1973), for voice, saxophone, electric bass, vibraphone, crystal glasses, percussion, and piano *Papier à musique (Music Paper), for voice and papers (4 performers) *Un seul or, for voice, flute, saxophone, electric bass, tampura, and piano *J. C., for voice, electric guitar, intratonal carillon, and computer-generated sounds (1983) *String Quartet No. 1, op. 1 (1984) *Le ciel sous la terre (Heaven in the Earth), String Quartet No. 2, op. 10 (1985) *Un unique corps (A Unique Body), for overtone singer, flute, tampura, mugaveena, and electric bass *Nous, les esprits, nous dansons (We, the Spirits, We Dance), for voice, two saxoph

Paul Dresher

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Paul Joseph Dresher (born January 8, 1951, in Los Angeles) is an American composer. Paul Dresher was born and raised in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles. From an early age, he was surrounded by music, deeply influenced by the sounds of Elvis Presley, as well as the folk and blues revivals that defined the 1960s. Rock and roll was an integral part of his formative years, and he began immersing himself in music in 1965–1966. Dresher’s musical upbringing was diverse. In addition to popular music, he was exposed to classical and contemporary classical music. His father, a mathematics professor at UCLA, was a passionate music enthusiast who often took his son to concerts and operas in Los Angeles, particularly at Schoenberg Concert Hall. Classically trained in piano from a young age, Dresher later developed a keen interest in world music during his teenage years. He began studying Indian music and listening extensively to music from Indonesia and other global traditions. Concurrently, he explored the technical side of music by experimenting with home tape recorders—reversing tape, overdubbing, manipulating speeds—and later delved into feedback after being influenced by Jimi Hendrix. These

Paul E. Beaudoin

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Paul E. Beaudoin (born 10 April 1960) is an American composer, visual and interdisciplinary artist, and writer. His work engages sound, image, and text across composition, installation, video, and photography. A Fulbright Fellow to Estonia, his projects have been presented at festivals and galleries internationally. Early life and education Beaudoin was born in Hialeah, Florida. He earned a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Miami in 1983, a Master of Music from the New England Conservatory in 1987, and a Ph.D. in music theory and composition from Brandeis University in 2002. His early compositions include dance re:pnmr, premiered by pianist Guy Livingston; he was commissioned by Boston Symphony Orchestra flutist Fenwick Smith for windows of mythology, and his string quartet ein brief was performed by the Lydian String Quartet and the June in Buffalo Quartet. Shift to interdisciplinary practice Beaudoin’s 2015 Fulbright Fellowship to Estonia coincided with an expansion of his practice into visual and spatial domains. Drawing on post-Cagean ideas of indeterminacy and silence, he began to approach sound, image, and text as parallel forms of notation, each framing percept

Paul Elwood

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Paul Iserman Elwood (born 1958, died 2025) was a composer and banjo player from Greeley, Colorado. He received his B.M.E. at Wichita State University and his M.M. in composition from Southern Methodist University and his Ph.D. in Composition from the State University of New York at Buffalo. He served on the faculty at Brevard College in North Carolina where he taught composition, music theory and sight singing. In the fall of 1998 he was the Southern Regional Visiting Composer at the American Academy in Rome. He is currently a professor at the University of Northern Colorado. List of works * “Let’s Go Pet The Lion: an example of minor 6ths” * Over Looking Glass Falls (2006), orchestra, premiered February 2007 by the North Carolina Symphony. The concert was broadcast by WCPE-FM on July 2, 2007. * Psalm Eight (2005), mixed chorus (SATB), King James text. * Winter Fires (2005), women’s chorus (SAA), Text by David St. John. * Hymn (2005), women’s chorus (SAA), Text by Jack Kerouac. * In the Middle (2005), mixed chorus (SATB), Text by Paul Elwood. * Capricious Apparitions for 2 violas and bowed banjo (2009) References External links *