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William Strickland (conductor)
William Remsen Strickland (January 25, 1914November 17, 1991) was an American conductor and organist, noted for his lifelong promotion of American composers. Career Strickland was born in Defiance, Ohio, on January 25, 1914. As a young organist, he served at several prominent Episcopal churches in New York, including Christ Church (Bronxville), Calvary Church (Manhattan), and St. Bartholomew's Church (Manhattan). Strickland served as guest conductor for the Cathedral Choral Society of Washington, D.C. during World War II. In 1946 he helped found and went on to conduct the Nashville Symphony for five seasons, until 1951. Later he conducted the Oratorio Society of New York. Strickland was noted for his performances and recordings of contemporary classical works by American composers such as Samuel Barber, John J. Becker, Jack Beeson, William Bergsma, John Alden Carpenter, Henry Cowell, Norman Dello Joio, Vivian Fine, William Flanagan, Miriam Gideon, Irwin Heilner, Alan H ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Conducting
Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. It has been defined as "the art of directing the simultaneous performance of several players or singers by the use of gesture." The primary duties of the conductor are to interpret the score in a way which reflects the specific indications in that score, set the tempo, ensure correct entries by ensemble members, and "shape" the phrasing where appropriate. Conductors communicate with their musicians primarily through hand gestures, usually with the aid of a baton, and may use other gestures or signals such as eye contact. A conductor usually supplements their direction with verbal instructions to their musicians in rehearsal. The conductor typically stands on a raised podium with a large music stand for the full score, which contains the musical notation for all the instruments or voices. Since the mid-19th century, most conductors have not played an instrument when conducting, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Norman Dello Joio
Norman Dello Joio (January 24, 1913July 24, 2008) was an American composer active for over half a century. He won a 1957 Pulitzer Prize#Letters, Drama, Pulitzer Prize in 1957. Life Dello Joio was born Nicodemo DeGioio in New York City to Italian people, Italian immigrants. He began his musical career as organist and choir director at the Star of the Sea Church on City Island, Bronx, City Island in New York at age 14. His father, Casimiro, 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 orga ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Douglas Moore
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. Moore first created music while a student at Yale University from 1911 through 1917; writing usually humorous songs in a popular style for school events in addition to creating music for school plays and musical revues. His work composing music for the Yale Dramatic Association, Elizabethan Club, and Yale Glee Club drew the att ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward MacDowell
Edward Alexander MacDowell (December 18, 1860January 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.Robin Rausch (Music Specialist at the Library of Congress)MacDowell by E. Douglas Bomberger (review) ''Notes'', Volume 71, Number 2, December 2014, pp. 280-283. DOI: 10.1353/not.2014.0150Alan Levy ''American National Biography Online''. February 2000. Retrieved December 18, 2015. He received his first piano lessons from Juan Buitrago, a Colombian violinist who was living with the MacDowell family at ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harrison Kerr
Harrison Kerr (b. Cleveland, Ohio, October 13, 1897; d. Norman, Oklahoma, August 1978) was an American composer of contemporary classical music, editor, administrator, and educator. He studied in Cleveland, Ohio with James H. Rogers, in Paris with Nadia Boulanger. From 1949 to 1969, he served as professor of music and dean at the University of Oklahoma in Norman, Oklahoma. He also served as the first Executive Secretary of the American Music Center (which he helped to found) as well as the first Executive Secretary of the American Composers Alliance The American Composers Alliance (ACA) is an American nonprofit composer service organization dedicated to the publishing and promoting of American contemporary classical music. Founded in 1937 by Aaron Copland, Milton Adolphus, Marion Bauer and oth .... In addition, he served on the editorial boards of New Music Editions and New Music Quarterly Recordings. Among his many works are four symphonies and an opera entitled ''The Tower of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Homer Keller
Homer T. Keller (b. Oxnard, California, February 17, 1915; d. Upland, California 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 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Werner Josten
Werner Erich Josten (June 12, 1885 in Elberfeld, Germany – February 6, 1963 in New York City) was a German-born composer of contemporary classical music. He studied in Munich with Rudolf Siegel and in Geneva with Émile Jaques-Dalcroze, and emigrated to the United States in 1920 or 1921. He became a naturalized citizen and taught at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts from 1923 to 1949, where his notable students included Audrey Kooper Hammann. The Werner Josten Performing Arts Library at Smith College is named for him. He is best known for his symphonic poem ''Jungle'' (1928), which is inspired by African music. He also directed the first staged performance of Claudio Monteverdi’s ''L'Orfeo'' in the United States on May 11, 1929. He was married to Margaret Fatman, a member of the Lehman family The Lehman family is a prominent family of Jewish German-Americans who founded the financial firm Lehman Brothers. Some were also involved in American politics. Members hav ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frederick Jacobi
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, 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 Frederick 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 contempora ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Ives
Charles Edward Ives (; October 20, 1874May 19, 1954) was an American modernist composer, one of the first American composers of international renown. His music was largely ignored during his early career, and many of his works went unperformed for many years. Later in life, the quality of his music was publicly recognized through the efforts of contemporaries like Henry Cowell and Lou Harrison, and he came to be regarded as an "American original". He was also among the first composers to engage in a systematic program of experimental music, with musical techniques including polytonality, polyrhythm, tone clusters, aleatory elements, and quarter tones. His experimentation foreshadowed many musical innovations that were later more widely adopted during the 20th century. Hence, he is often regarded as the leading American composer of art music of the 20th century. Sources of Ives's tonal imagery included hymn tunes and traditional songs; he also incorporated melodies of the tow ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mary Howe
Mary Howe (April 4, 1882 – September 14, 1964) was an American composer and pianist. Biography She was born Mary Carlisle in Richmond, Virginia, at the home of her maternal grandparents, and would live most of her life in the Washington, D.C., area. Her father, Calderon Carlisle, was a well known and successful lawyer descended from the Scottish nobility. Her early lessons were with the noted pianist Hermione Seron. By the time she was 18, she was performing publicly and was accepted into Baltimore's Peabody Institute. It was there that she began studying with Richard Burmeister, reaching a high level of accomplishment on the piano. She also studied composition with Gustav Strube, Ernest Hutcheson, and Harold Randolph (1861–1927), and in 1933 went to Paris to study with the famous French pianist Nadia Boulanger. Shortly thereafter, she started performing with her friend Anne Hull, one of their most notable performances being Mozart's Concerto for Two Pianos. However, she m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alan Hovhaness
Alan Hovhaness (; March 8, 1911 – June 21, 2000) was an American-Armenian 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 He was born as Alan Vaness Chakmakjian ( hy, Ալան Յարութիւն Չաքմաքճեան)Julia Michaelyan"An Interview with Alan Hovhaness" ''Ararat'' 45, v. 12, no. 1 (Winter 1971), pp. 19–31. Reprinted ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Irwin Heilner
Irwin Heilner (b. New York City, May 14, 1908; d. January 18, 1991) was an American composer of contemporary classical music. His works are published by American Composers Alliancebr> Heilner lived in Brooklyn, New York. In 1932 he was a member of the Young Composers' Group, which was founded by the composer Elie Siegmeister and which met regularly at the home of the composer Aaron Coplandbr>Heilner studied with Nadia Boulanger beginning in the late spring of 1932, having been recommended by Aaron Copland Aaron Copland (, ; November 14, 1900December 2, 1990) was an American composer, composition teacher, writer, and later a conductor of his own and other American music. Copland was referred to by his peers and critics as "the Dean of American Com ...br>The two did not get along, however, and his planned three years of study lasted for just three monthHis music was conducted and recorded by William Strickland (conductor), William Strickland. External linksList of worksfrom Ame ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
