Robert Walter Moevs (2 December 1920 – 10 December 2007) was an American composer of

contemporary classical music Contemporary classical music is classical music composed close to the present day. At the beginning of the 21st century, it commonly referred to the post-1945 modern forms of post-tonal music after the death of Anton Webern, and included seria ...

. He was known for his highly

chromatic Diatonic and chromatic are terms in music theory that are most often used to characterize scales, and are also applied to musical instruments, intervals, chords, notes, musical styles, and kinds of harmony. They are very often used as a pair, ...

music.

Career

Moevs was born in

La Crosse, Wisconsin La Crosse is a city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of La Crosse County. Positioned alongside the Mississippi River, La Crosse is the largest city on Wisconsin's western border. La Crosse's population as of the 2020 census w ...

, and served in the

United States Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

as a pilot during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. He then received his degree from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

. Moevs was a student of

Walter Piston Walter Hamor Piston, Jr. (January 20, 1894 – November 12, 1976), was an American composer of classical music, music theorist, and professor of music at Harvard University. Life Piston was born in Rockland, Maine at 15 Ocean Street to Walter Ha ...

and

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 ...

. He taught at Harvard University and

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's ...

. He received the

Rome Prize The Rome Prize is awarded by the American Academy in Rome, in Rome, Italy. Approximately thirty scholars and artists are selected each year to receive a study fellowship at the academy. Prizes have been awarded annually since 1921, with a hiatus ...

(1952) and a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

(1962). In 1978 his Concerto Grosso was awarded the

Stockhausen Karlheinz Stockhausen (; 22 August 1928 – 5 December 2007) was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. He is known for his groun ...

International Prize in Composition. His music has been performed by the

Cleveland Orchestra The Cleveland Orchestra, based in Cleveland, is one of the five American orchestras informally referred to as the " Big Five". Founded in 1918 by the pianist and impresario Adella Prentiss Hughes, the orchestra plays most of its concerts at Sev ...

, the

Boston Symphony Orchestra The Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO) is an American orchestra based in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the second-oldest of the five major American symphony orchestras commonly referred to as the " Big Five". Founded by Henry Lee Higginson in 1881, ...

and the

Symphony of the Air The NBC Symphony Orchestra was a radio orchestra conceived by David Sarnoff, the president of the RCA, Radio Corporation of America, especially for the conductor Arturo Toscanini. The NBC Symphony performed weekly radio concert broadcasts with T ...

. His papers, including unpublished scores and recordings, are held by the Rutgers Music Library. He died in

Hillsborough, New Jersey Hillsborough Township is a township in Somerset County, New Jersey, United States. The township is centrally located in the Raritan Valley region within the much larger New York Metropolitan Area. As of the 2010 United States Census, the tow ...

.The Robert Moevs Collection
/ref>

Music

Discography

Notes

Sources *Archibald, Bruce, and Richard Wilson. 2008. "Moevs, Robert (Walter)". ''

Grove Music Online ''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 ...

'', edited by Dean Roote (accessed 1 October 2013).

'' 28/1 (Winter): 294–323. *Boros, James. 1990. "A Conversation with Robert Moevs." ''Perspectives of New Music'' 28/1 (Winter): 324–335. *Boros, James. 1990. "The Evolution of Robert Moevs's Compositional Methodology." '' American Music'' 8/4 (Winter): 383–404. *Moevs, Robert. 1966. "Some Observations on Instruction in Music Theory." ''College Music Symposium'' 6 (Fall): 69–71. *Moevs, Robert. 1969. "Music and the Liturgy." ''Liturgical Arts'' 38/1 (November): 4–9. *Moevs, Robert. 1969. "Intervallic Procedures in

Debussy (Achille) Claude Debussy (; 22 August 1862 – 25 March 1918) was a French composer. He is sometimes seen as the first Impressionist composer, although he vigorously rejected the term. He was among the most influential composers of the ...

." ''

'' 8/1 (Fall/Winter): 82–101. *Moevs, Robert. 1971. "Mannerism and Stylistic Consistency in

Stravinsky Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (6 April 1971) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor, later of French (from 1934) and American (from 1945) citizenship. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential 20th-century clas ...

." ''Perspectives of New Music'' 9/2 (10/1): 92–103. *Moevs, Robert, in conversation with

Ellen Rosand Ellen Rosand is an American musicologist, historian, and opera critic who specializes in Italian music and poetry of the 16th through 18th centuries. Her work has been particularly focused on the music and culture of Venice and Italian opera of the ...

. 1980. "Recollections—

(1887–1979)." ''

19th-Century Music ''19th-Century Music'' is a triennial academic journal that "covers all aspects of Western art music composed in, leading to, or pointing beyond the "long century" extending roughly from the 1780s to the 1930s." The Journal is "interested equally ...

'' 3/3 (March): 276–278. *Wilkinson, Carlton. 1997. "Robert Moevs's ''Heptachronon'' for solo cello." ''

'' 35/1 (Winter): 231–261.

External links

Robert Moevs

Theodore Presser Company The Theodore Presser Company is an American music publishing and distribution company located in Malvern, Pennsylvania, formerly King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, and originally based in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. It is the oldest continuing music publ ...

Robert Moevs
bach-cantatas.com
"A tribute to Moevs"
y Richard Wilson, newmusicbox.org
Recordings of some works by Robert Moevs
YouTube

by Bruce Duffie, December 28, 1988 American male classical composers American classical composers 20th-century classical composers 1920 births 2007 deaths People from La Crosse, Wisconsin Military personnel from Wisconsin United States Army Air Forces pilots of World War II Harvard University alumni Harvard University faculty Rutgers University faculty Pupils of Walter Piston 20th-century American composers Classical musicians from Wisconsin 20th-century American male musicians {{wisconsin-stub

Career

Music

Discography

Notes

Further reading

External links