Hugh Wiley Hitchcock (September 28, 1923 in

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...

Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...

– December 5, 2007 in

New York, New York New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Uni ...

) was an American

musicologist Musicology (from Greek μουσική ''mousikē'' 'music' and -λογια ''-logia'', 'domain of study') is the scholarly analysis and research-based study of music. Musicology departments traditionally belong to the humanities, although some mu ...

. He is best known for founding the Institute for Studies in American Music at

Brooklyn College Brooklyn College is a public university in Brooklyn, Brooklyn, New York. It is part of the City University of New York system and enrolls about 15,000 undergraduate and 2,800 graduate students on a 35-acre campus. Being New York City's first publ ...

of the

City University of New York The City University of New York ( CUNY; , ) is the Public university, public university system of Education in New York City, New York City. It is the largest urban university system in the United States, comprising 25 campuses: eleven Upper divis ...

in 1971. The institute was recently renamed the Hitchcock Institute for Studies in American Music in his honor. Hitchcock received a B.A. degree from

Dartmouth College Dartmouth College (; ) is a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Although founded to educate Native A ...

in 1944 and an M.A. from the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

in 1948. After studying under

Nadia Boulanger Juliette Nadia Boulanger (; 16 September 188722 October 1979) was a French music teacher and conductor. She taught many of the leading composers and musicians of the 20th century, and also performed occasionally as a pianist and organist. From a ...

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

, he earned his Ph.D. at the

in 1954. He taught there from 1950 to 1961 and then at

Hunter College Hunter College is a public university in New York City. It is one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York and offers studies in more than one hundred undergraduate and postgraduate fields across five schools. It also admi ...

from 1961 to 1971. He taught in the CUNY system until 1993, when he retired. He served as president of the

Music Library Association The Music Library Association (MLA) of the United States is the main professional organization for music libraries and librarians (including those whose music materials form only part of their responsibilities and collections). It also serves corpo ...

, 1966–1967, the

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 f ...

Society, 1973–1993, and the

American Musicological Society The American Musicological Society (AMS) is a musicological organization which researches, promotes and produces publications on music. Founded in 1934, the AMS was begun by leading American musicologists of the time, and was crucial in legitim ...

, 1990–1992. Hitchcock did much work on music of the early

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

in France and Italy, especially on

Marc-Antoine Charpentier Marc-Antoine Charpentier (; 1643 – 24 February 1704) was a French Baroque composer during the reign of Louis XIV. One of his most famous works is the main theme from the prelude of his ''Te Deum'', ''Marche en rondeau''. This theme is still us ...

. He also made important contributions to the understanding of musical traditions in America, both popular and cultivated, and his text in this field is a standard reference work. In addition to Charles Ives, he focused particular attention on contemporary American composers including

Virgil Thomson Virgil Thomson (November 25, 1896 – September 30, 1989) was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music. He has been described as a modernist, a neoromantic, a neoclassic ...

John Cage John Milton Cage Jr. (September 5, 1912 – August 12, 1992) was an American composer and music theorist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading fi ...

, and

Henry Cowell Henry Dixon Cowell (; March 11, 1897 – December 10, 1965) was an American composer, writer, pianist, publisher and teacher. Marchioni, Tonimarie (2012)"Henry Cowell: A Life Stranger Than Fiction" ''The Juilliard Journal''. Retrieved 19 June 202 ...

. He was the co-editor of the ''New Grove Dictionary of American Music'' and a consultant for American music for ''

The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language ''Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and theo ...

''.

Books

*''The Latin Oratorios of Marc-Antoine Charpentier'' (dissertation, U. of Michigan, 1954) *''Music in the United States: a Historical Introduction'' (1969; 4th ed., 1999) *(ed., with V. Perlis) ''An Charles Ives Celebration'' (Brooklyn, NY, and New Haven, CT, 1974) *''After 100 Years: the Editorial Side of Sonneck'' (Washington DC, 1975) *''Charles Ives'' (London, 1977, 3rd ed. 1988) *(with L. Inserra) ''The Music of Henry Ainsworth's Psalter'' (Brooklyn, NY, 1981) *''Les oeuvres de

: catalogue raisonné'' (Paris, Picard 1982) *''Marc-Antoine Charpentier'' (Oxford, 1990) *''

: 129 Songs'' (New York City, 2004)

References

*Paula Morgan, "H. Wiley Hitchcock". ''

'' online. *

External links

H. Wiley Hitchcock Papers, 1949-2007
Music Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. {{DEFAULTSORT:Hitchcock, H. Wiley 1923 births 2007 deaths Dartmouth College alumni University of Michigan faculty University of Michigan alumni Hunter College faculty 20th-century American musicologists Brooklyn College faculty