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Article

Aleksandrov, Boris Aleksandrovich  

Detlef Gojowy

(b Bologoye, 22 July/Aug 4, 1905; d Moscow, June 17, 1994). Russian composer and conductor, son of Aleksandr Vasil′yevich Aleksandrov. He studied at the Moscow Conservatory with Glier, graduating in 1929, and worked as a music director in Moscow clubs (1923–9), music director of the Red Army Theatre (1930–37), lecturer at the Moscow Conservatory (1933–41) and leader of the Soviet Radio Song Ensemble (1942–7). From 1937 to 1946 he was deputy director of the Aleksandrov Red Army Song and Dance Ensemble, which was founded by his father and, after the latter's death, came under his direction. He received the State Prize (1950) and the title People's Artist of the USSR (1958). In Dva p′yesï (‘Two Pieces’) op.1 (1928) for piano he developed a compositional system synthesizing the principle of the 12-note series (with inversions and permutations) with a harmonic set technique and mirror symmetry. Later works, such as the well-known musical comedy ...

Article

Alessandrescu, Alfred  

Viorel Cosma

revised by Ruxandra Arzoiu

(b Bucharest, 2/Aug 14, 1893; d Bucharest, Feb 18, 1959). Romanian composer, pianist, conductor, teacher, music critic, and director of music programmes. A leading figure of the first half of the 20th century, he laid the foundation of the Romanian school in music, concert life, and musical journalism. He studied with A. Castaldi, D. Dinicu, D.G. Kiriac, and E. Saegiu at the Bucharest Conservatory (1903–11), completing his education with two periods of study in Paris (1913–14, 1923–4), where he studied with d’Indy at the Schola Cantorum and with Paul Vidal at the Conservatoire. A remarkable accompanist, he worked with Enescu, Thibaud, Mainardi, Moodie, and others during the period 1919–45. As a conductor he always achieved a soberly balanced performance; he conducted more than 1500 performances at the Romanian Opera in Bucharest (1921–59), where he specialized in the French repertory (Bizet, Massenet, and Gounod). In his capacities as conductor of the Romanian Philharmonic Society, and as conductor and artistic manager of the Romanian RSO, he did much to encourage Romanian composers. He was also active as a music critic for Romanian and French reviews. Much of his compositional work was done during his youth, including ...

Article

Alpaerts, Flor  

August Corbet

revised by Corneel Mertens and Diana von Volborth-Danys

(b Antwerp, Sept 12, 1876; d Antwerp, Oct 5, 1954). Belgian composer and conductor. He studied in Antwerp at the Flemish Music School (later called the Royal Flemish Conservatory) under Peter Benoit and Jan Blockx, and conducting under Eduard Keurvels. In 1903 he became professor at the Conservatory, and was director of that institution from 1934 to 1941, when he retired. He was also active as an orchestral and operatic conductor, and was a member of the Académie Royale de Belgique.

Alpaerts was one of the outstanding personalities in Flemish musical life, both as conductor and composer; he was also a great teacher and an admirable organizer. As a composer he was, like Paul Gilson and August de Boeck, a typical Flemish representative of the Impressionist school. However, his Impressionism came closer to Richard Strauss and Respighi than to Debussy. An example of this tendency is the symphonic poem ...

Article

Ameln, Konrad  

Hans Heinrich Eggebrecht

(b Neuss, July 6, 1899; d Lüdenscheid, Sept 1, 1994). German musicologist and choir director. He studied musicology with Ludwig at Göttingen University (1919–21) and subsequently with Gurlitt at Freiburg University, where he received the doctorate in 1924 with a dissertation on the melodies Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen and Ach Gott, vom Himmel sieh' darein. He was a lecturer at the Bauernhochschule in Rendsburg (1924–5) and at the Volkshochschule in Kassel (1925–6). He then acted as music consultant to the Central Office for General Librarianship in Leipzig (1926–8) and lectured in Protestant church music at the University of Münster (1930–39). After the war he lectured at the Landeskirchenmusikschulen of Hanover (1947–8) and the Rhineland (1949–57).

In the early 1920s Ameln embarked on a fruitful career as a choral and orchestral conductor and director of choral courses. His object was the authentic performance of old music, and this was coupled with considerable editorial work. He edited the journal of the Finkenstein League, ...

Article

Bendix, Max  

Kara Gardner

(b Detroit, March 28, 1866; d Chicago, Dec 6, 1945). American violinist, conductor, musical director, teacher, and composer. Bendix was born to Jewish parents who had emigrated from Germany. His father William was a music teacher. Bendix began formal study at the Cincinnati College of Music where, at the age of twelve, he performed with the college orchestra, directed by Theodore Thomas. This began a long association between the two men, leading to Bendix’s appointment as first violinist and concertmaster of the Theodore Thomas Orchestra in 1886. In August 1893 Thomas resigned his position as music director of the Chicago World’s Columbian Exposition following a series of unsuccessful concerts. Bendix took Thomas’s place as conductor of the Exposition orchestra. This created tension between the two men, and Bendix left the Thomas orchestra in 1896. He went on to serve as conductor at the Manhattan Opera House and to conduct orchestras for world fairs in St. Louis (...

Article

Bullock, Sir Ernest  

Malcolm Turner

(b Wigan, Sept 15, 1890; d Aylesbury, May 24, 1979). English organist and educationist. He was a pupil of and assistant organist to Bairstow at Leeds (1907–12), and took the BMus (1908) and DMus (1914) degrees at Durham University, becoming a Fellow of the Royal College of Organists in 1909. His first important post, suborganist at Manchester Cathedral (1912–15), was interrupted by war service, after which he was organist at St Michael’s College, Tenbury (1919), and organist and choirmaster of Exeter Cathedral (1919–27). On Nicholson’s retirement from Westminster Abbey in 1928, Bullock succeeded him as organist and Master of the Choristers. In this post he was obliged to provide the music for several royal functions; for the coronation of King George VI (1937) he wrote the fanfares and conducted the choir and orchestra, in acknowledgment of which he was created CVO. He also provided all but one of the fanfares for the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II (...

Article

Caldwell, Sarah  

Steven Ledbetter, Patrick J. Smith, and Anna E. Kijas

(b Maryville, MO, March 6, 1924; d Portland, OR, March 23, 2006). American impresario, conductor, and director. Following her studies at the University of Arkansas and Hendrix College (1940–42), Caldwell attended New England Conservatory (NEC) on scholarship. She studied violin with richard Burgin and also the viola. During this time she became assistant to Boris Goldovosky, founder of the New England Opera Theater and director of the opera program at the Berkshire Music Center in Tanglewood. Caldwell was granted a scholarship in 1946 to perform as a violinist with the student orchestra at the Berkshire Music Festival. Two years later, she staged and conducted her first opera, Ralph Vaughan Williams’s Riders to the Sea at the same venue, prompting Serge Koussevitzky to invite her to join the Berkshire Music Center faculty in 1949. In 1951 Caldwell joined Boston University’s music faculty, and the following year she began the Boston University Opera Workshop (...

Article

Cherubini, Luigi  

Michael Fend

(Carlo Zanobi Salvadore Maria)

(b Florence, Sept 8/14, 1760; d Paris, March 15, 1842). Italian, composer, conductor, teacher, administrator, theorist, and music publisher, active in France. He took French citizenship, probably in 1794, and was a dominant figure in Parisian musical life for half a century. He was a successful opera composer during the Revolutionary period, and had comparable success with religious music from the beginning of the Restoration. He was made director of the Paris Conservatoire and consolidated its pre-eminent position in music education in Europe.

In the biographical preface to his work catalogue, compiled in 1831, Cherubini gave 8 and 14 September as his dates of birth, but the records of the baptistery of S Giovanni state that he was born on 14 September (and baptized the following day). He was the tenth of 12 children. It has been claimed that his mother died when he was four years old (Pougin, ...

Article

Cramer, Ray Ellwyn  

Charles Conrad

(b Galesburg, IL, June 28, 1940). American conductor, educator, and administrator. He was an Indiana University School of Music faculty member from 1969 until his retirement in 2005, serving as Director of Bands from 1982. He is currently the President of the Midwest Clinic, an international band and orchestra convention. Prior to his Indiana University appointment, he taught public school music in Iowa, Ohio, and Illinois.

Under his leadership the Indiana University Wind Ensemble earned an international reputation for outstanding performances at significant conferences in the United States and Japan. He has frequently conducted in Japan, and has served as the regular guest conductor of the Musashino Academia of Music in Tokyo since 1990. He has been the president of the American Bandmasters Association, College Band Directors National Association, Indiana Bandmasters Association and the Big Ten Band Directors Association. He was the 2008 honoree of the Academy of Wind and Percussion Arts of the National Band Association, and was awarded the Midwest Clinic Medal of Honor (...

Article

Dohnányi, Ernő  

Bálint Vázsonyi

[Ernst von]

(b Pozsony [now Bratislava], July 27, 1877; d New York, Feb 9, 1960). Hungarian pianist, composer, conductor, teacher and administrator. Next to Liszt he ranks as the most versatile Hungarian musician, whose influence reached generations in all spheres of musical life. He is considered the first architect of Hungary’s musical culture in the 20th century.

He received his early training in Pozsony. His father, an outstanding amateur cellist, and Károly Forstner, cathedral organist, gave him lessons in piano playing and theory. Despite the absence of professional training, he showed an extraordinary appetite for music and made rapid progress. Having finished at the Gymnasium, he decided to obtain his formal education in music at the Budapest Academy. He was the first Hungarian of significant talent to do so and his example, as well as his personal intervention, induced Bartók (his friend from early schooldays) to follow the same course. Dohnányi studied the piano with Thomán and composition with Koessler, and received his artist’s diploma in ...

Article

Foerster [Förster], Anton  

Manica Špendal

revised by Jernej Weiss

[Antonín]

(b Osenice, nr Jičín, Czech Republic, Dec 20, 1837; d Novo Mesto, Slovenia, June 17, 1926). Slovenian composer, conductor, choir director, and music educator of Czech birth. Uncle of Josef Bohuslav Foerster.

Foerster studied law (graduated in 1863) and music (including work with Smetana) in Prague. He was choirmaster of the cathedral in Senj, Croatia (1865–7), and from 1867 onward worked in Ljubljana. He was conductor of the Dramatical Society, choirmaster of the National Reading Society, choirmaster of the cathedral (1868–1909), and music teacher at Ljubljana’s secondary schools. In 1877 he established the Organ School in Ljubljana, was co-founder of the Cerkveni glasbenik (‘Church Musician’) journal, and was its long-time editor (1878–1908). After his retirement in 1909, he remained active as a composer. In 1917 he moved to Novo Mesto (Slovenia), where he devoted most of his time to collecting and arranging his compositions....

Article

Fröhlich, (Franz) Joseph  

John Warrack

revised by James Deaville

(b Würzburg, May 28, 1780; d Würzburg, Jan 5, 1862). German teacher, musical organizer, critic, theorist, conductor and composer. He studied music at the student institute of the Juliusspital in Würzburg, and studied law and philosophy at the university there. In 1801 he began his career as a violinist in the prince-bishop’s court orchestra. He also founded the Akademische Bande, a student choral and orchestral group, which in 1804 became the Akademisches Musikinstitut and was made part of the university, thus becoming the basis of the first state music school in Germany. His teaching and organizational work was of the highest importance and encompassed several disciplines and activities. He became reader in aesthetics in 1812, reader in pedagogical studies in 1819 and professor in 1821. In 1820 a singing school was established as part of the institute. He also conducted important historical concerts for King Ludwig I in ...

Article

Glackemeyer, Frederick  

Helmut Kallmann

[Johann Friedrich Conrad; Frédéric]

(b Hanover, Aug 10, 1759; d Quebec, 12/Jan 13, 1836). Canadian musician of German birth. The son of a military band musician, he is reported to have been a violin prodigy. In 1777 he enlisted in one of the Brunswick regiments destined for Canada. Discharged in 1783, he settled in Quebec, where he made a living as instrumentalist, teacher, tuner, repairman, and importer of instruments and sheet music. He was probably the first full-time musician in Canada who left a mark both immediate and lasting. His activities, probably as a director and conductor, enhanced the holding of subscription concerts in Quebec in the 1790s, featuring orchestral and chamber music by J.C. Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Pleyel and others. Many of the printed parts assumed to have been supplied by Glackemeyer are still preserved. Prince Edward (later Duke of Kent), in Quebec 1791–4, is said to have appointed him a regimental bandmaster....

Article

Housewright, L(ee) Wiley  

Jere T. Humphreys

(b Wylie, TX, Oct 17, 1913; d Tallahassee, FL, Dec 13, 2004). American Music educator, conductor, scholar, and administrator. He earned degrees from North Texas State College (BS 1934), Teachers College, Columbia University (MA 1938), and New York University (EdD 1943). He was director of music for public schools in Texas (1934–7) and New York (1938–41), and taught at New York University (1941–3) and the University of Texas (1946–7). He served as an Executive Officer in the US Army Medical Administrative Corps in the United States and Philippines (1943–6). He then taught at Florida State University (1947–66), where he was named Distinguished Professor (1961). During those years he held a Fulbright Fellowship to Japan (1956–7) and summer appointments at North Texas State University, University of Michigan, and Indiana University. He served on committees and advisory boards for the US Department of State International Cultural Presentations Program (...

Article

Kleber, Henry  

Jean W. Thomas

(b Darmstadt, Germany, May 4, 1816; d Pittsburgh, PA, Feb 20, 1897). Composer, conductor, performer, merchant, impresario, and teacher of German birth. Kleber immigrated with his family to Pittsburgh around 1832 from Darmstadt, where he was trained in piano and voice. Three years later he launched his long career in Pittsburgh as music “professor” by becoming an instructor at Western Collegiate Institute for Young Ladies. In 1839 he organized a brass band, first known as the Kleber Band, then The Pittsburgh Band, described as the first brass band west of the Alleghenies. That year also marked his entry into the music business with a piano salesroom under the name “Ye Golden Harp.” By 1850 he was operating a growing business in pianos, organs, instruments, and sheet music. The store was a gathering place for the city’s musicians, including Stephen Foster, for whom Kleber served as a mentor.

Fluent in German, French, and Italian as well as English, Kleber acted as an impresario throughout much of his career, serving as a local manager for many European touring artists who were a mainstay of the American concert stage. He also organized concerts for local musicians, featuring himself variously as conductor, pianist, and singer. Considered by some to be brash, aggressive, self-promoting, and combative, he and Augustus, his brother and business partner, gained notoriety as well as a $100 fine each in ...

Article

Morlan, (Merwyn) Eugene  

Michael L. Mark

(b Indianapolis, IN, Oct 25, 1917). American music educator, administrator, and conductor. He graduated from Indiana State Teachers College (BA 1939) and George Peabody College for Teachers (MA 1946, EdD 1966). He taught high school music and social studies in Westfield, Illinois (1939–41), and was supervisor of music for the Shenandoah County, Virginia schools (1941–54) and president of the Virginia Music Educators Association (1952–4). While on the staff of the Music Educators National Conference (1955–84), he served as assistant executive secretary, director of professional programs, and three times acting executive director. He was responsible for 73 national and regional conferences and the MENC Student Member Program, and served as the staff liaison for MENC’s seven associated organizations. In addition to his educational and administrative work, Morlan produced soldier shows in the Pacific Theater for the US Army Special Services during World War II. He was also the founding conductor of the Mormon Choir of Washington, DC, and is now conductor emeritus. He conducted the McLean (Virginia) Choral Society and guest conducted combined choirs for the Interfaith Concert at the Washington Hebrew Congregation (...

Article

Papadopoulos-Gkrekas, Iōsēph  

Anastasia Siopsi

(b Piraeus, 1897; d Piraeus, 1981). Greek composer, music teacher, conductor, music manager, and historian.

He studied music theory with Geōrgios Lampelet and Armando Marsik at Athens Conservatory, and continued his studies in Leipzig with Fritz Benesevic and Max Steinizer. From 1914, and for several years, he was a teacher of vocal training in several schools and a professor in the Academy of Film Studies, of the Higher School of Cinema. He was a member of the board of the organization ‘Ellēnikon Melodrama’ [Greek Melodrama] and directing advisor; founder and conductor of the choir in the church of the Greek community in Leipzig; and founding member of the board of the Union of the Critics of the Theatre and Music, the organization ‘Arxaion Drama’ [Ancient Drama], the Greek Society of composers, writers, and publishers, among others. He was the director of the journal Mousika Chronika [Musical Chronicles] (...

Article

Reinecke, Carl  

Reinhold Sietz

(Heinrich Carsten)

(b Altona, June 23, 1824; d Leipzig, March 10, 1910). German composer, teacher, administrator, pianist and conductor. He was given a thorough musical education by his father, J.P. Rudolf Reinecke (b Hamburg, 22 Nov 1795; d Segeberg, 14 Aug 1883), a respected music theoretician and author of several textbooks. From 1845 Reinecke travelled through Europe, from Danzig to Riga; in Copenhagen he was appointed court pianist in 1846, where his duties included accompanying the violinist H.W. Ernst as well as giving solo recitals. He was given a particularly friendly reception in Leipzig by Mendelssohn and the Schumanns, and Liszt, whose daughter was later taught by Reinecke in Paris, spoke of his ‘beautiful, gentle, legato and lyrical touch’. In 1851 he moved to Cologne, where he taught counterpoint and the piano at Hiller’s conservatory. He also gave concerts with Hiller, who recommended him to Barmen. There as musical director and the conductor of several musical societies between ...

Article

Schreker, Franz  

Christopher Hailey

(August Julius)

(b Monaco, March 23, 1878; d Berlin, March 21, 1934). Austrian composer, teacher, conductor and administrator. He is a central figure in that remarkable flowering of opera in Austria that included the works of Zemlinsky, Berg and Korngold. Integrating his aesthetic plurality (a mixture of Romanticism, naturalism, symbolism, Impressionism, Expressionism and Neue Sachlichkeit), timbral experimentation, strategies of extended tonality and conception of total music theatre into the narrative of 20th-century music has contributed to a more differentiated understanding of central European modernism.

Schreker was the oldest of four surviving children born to Ignaz Schrecker, a court photographer of Jewish birth, and Eleonore von Clossmann, a member of the Catholic aristocracy of eastern Styria. Ignaz Schrecker’s restless travels took him and his family from Vienna to Monaco, Spa, Brussels, Paris, Trieste and Pola before he settled at last in Linz in 1882. After his death in 1888 the family moved to Vienna, where in ...

Article

Vitzthumb [Fitzthumb, Witzthumb, Vistumb], Ignaz  

Dominique Dujardin

[Ignace]

(b Baden, nr Vienna, Sept 14, 1724; d Brussels, March 23, 1816). Austrian conductor, teacher, impresario and composer, active in the southern Netherlands. In 1735, at the age of 11, he arrived in Brussels and entered the service of Archduchess Marie-Elisabeth, governor of the Netherlands, as a choirboy. In 1740 he was appointed court timpanist in the same department as the trumpeter François-Antoine Vitzthumb, his half-brother. He was to hold this post for over 40 years, although his other commitments subsequently obliged him to relinquish his duties to his son Paul (1761–1838). In 1742, during the War of Austrian Succession (1740–48), he enlisted as a drummer in a regiment of Hungarian hussars commanded by Colonel Count Hadik. He was demobilized in September 1748, returned to Brussels and took up his post as timpanist again. He is mentioned among the court musicians as a composer, tenor and violinist in ...