American Composers (The 4th of July is coming!)

[Kevin Pearson]

I was wondering what American composers the members enjoyed? I suppose almost everyone would name Aaron Copeland, Leonard Bernstein and Ferde Grofé, but how many would name George Chadwick, Howard Hanson, David Diamond? Or maybe there are some others that you think are worth a listen. Who would they be?

Kevin

[Mark Thomas]

Arthur Foote.

[Peter1953]

Never heard of them, I'm afraid  . Are they romantic composers like Edward MacDowell and Amy Beach? I very much like her PC. And I think Louis Moreau Gottschalk deserves to be (re)discovered as an American romantic composer of mainly beautiful piano music.

[Alan Howe]

George Frederick Bristow and John Knowles Paine. I particularly like Bristow's Symphony in F sharp minor on Chandos - marvellous Mendelssohnian stuff!

[Hovite]

I suppose almost everyone would name Aaron Copeland, Leonard Bernstein and Ferde Grofé, but how many would name George Chadwick, Howard Hanson, David Diamond?

I prefer Chadwick, Hanson, and Diamond to Copeland, Bernstein, or Grofé.

And I would add Samuel Barber, Marion Bauer, George Gershwin, Philip Glass, Harold Shapero, Michael Torke.

[Amphissa]

Barber wrote some fine music, including his "over-played for good reason" Adagio for Strings and violin concerto. I like Howard Hanson's music. Arthur Foote's chamber music has always been my favorite American, and Amy Beach penned some nice pieces. I like Bernstein's Broadway-derived music, but not much else.

Never was too excited about Copland, and for some reason Paine just seems like the pages Beethoven rejected in the process of writing his symphonies, innocuous but uninspiring. Similarly, Gottschalk hasn't really caught my fancy.

I have not yet heard enough Still. He's so highly regarded that I need to listen to more of his music. I like David Diamond's music, but I'm not sure it is melodic enough to appeal to the romantic music crowd.

Gershwin is by far the American composer that I play more often than any other, followed closely by Arthur Foote.

All that said, I'll ask - What qualifies as "American"? Do you mean only people who were born in the U.S.? What about Latin America and South American?

And if you meant the U.S. only, what about composers who were not born in the U.S., but who immigrated to the U.S. After all, the U.S. is the land of immigrants.

If I were to use those broader criteria, select the one composer who immigrated to the U.S., lived, worked and died in the U.S., became a U.S. citizen and is buried in the U.S., you might be surprised at who that is -- Sergei Rachmaninoff.

[JimL]

Same applies to Stravinsky, Dave.  And one thing you guys - although the name is pronounced COPEland, there's no "e".  It's spelled Copland, like the old Sylvester Stallone movie.  And some of those composers from the 20th Century aren't really "Romantic", although I believe Diamond is a "Neoromantic".  We do try to concentrate on the style, here, for those of you who are new to the site.  Speaking of immigrant Romantic composers, the name Leopold Damrosch got quite a bit of attention at the old site.  How 'bout them violin concertos and that symphony for an enterprising label?

[Amphissa]

Thank you, Jim, for policing our posts.

Sylvester Stallone made a movie about communities of practice? Cool! Was it in English?

[JimL]

Look it up on ImDb, Dave.  Copland (or Cop Land) was a 1997 film in which Sly attempted to return to more character, less action-based roles.  He plays a sheriff in a New Jersey town populated mainly by members of the NYPD.  It was directed by James Mangold, and had an all-star cast, including Robert DeNiro, Ray Liotta and Jeanine Garofalo. 

[peter_conole]

Hi all

Thanks for the reminder about Leopold Damrosch, Jiml. There has been earlier discussion of his vioin concertos - they can be traced on archived threads (when it is safe to check them out).

I have uncovered further information since then. Here it is.

He composed four concerted works for the violin and they are given rather high praise by Swalin, Toskey and (I think -will double check) Emery. Several years ago a violinist mate played through the difficult solo part of his D Minor concerto for me. Superb. All four concertos are very large scale, with fine, grand orchestration which impressed Toskey in particular .

The works are as follows:

Konzertstuck in E Minor, probably 1860s or early 1870s, solo and orchestral score published later by Schuberth, Leipzig (1879), solo and piano score in Library of Congress

Concerto No 1 in G Major, date uncertain - possibly not published

Concerto No 2 in F Sharp Minor, composed in New York 1877. The holograph score (orchestral parts as well) was in the hands of Walter Damrosch (Leopold's son ) in 1941, when Swalin read it through and wrote his anaysis. Heaven knows where it is now.

Concerto No 3 in D Minor, published by Bote and Bock, Berlin (1878), probably in the year of composition. Solo and piano score in the Newberry Library, Chicago. AND NOTE - in 1941 the full solo and orchestral score was in the Library of Congress in 1941. I am praying (very hard) that it is still hidden away in the stacks.

Leoplod Damrosch was a giant figure in American musical life from 1871-1885 and did a lot to 'professionalise' and improve east coast musical life. Revival of his music and recognition of his achievements is long overdue. He wrote a symphony , other orchestral pieces, choral, chamber music, etc as well. Not one note recorded. And when was anything last performed?

I think he has been even worse treated than Alfred Hill in this country, although I suspect Damrosch was a weightier  man of music.

regards
Peter

[peter_conole]

Hi all

Glad tidings - and more info. The Leopold Damrosch Symphony in C Major (1878) was finally edited by Kati Agos a few years ago and published in 2005. I believe the Julliard School gave the first performance of the work at around the same time.

Best of all, the Music Division of the Library of Congress has a mountain of archival material and music manuscripts relating to the composer and various relatives, including both his sons. It seems that major donations were made about 1850 and the whole collection was re-organised in the 1990s.

regards
Peter

   

[Steven Eldredge]

I love much of the music of Amy Marcy Beach. The Concerto is lovely, as is the Violin Sonata and the Piano Quintet. She was a very talented composer with some big ideas. I also used to play a piano piece of hers called "Dreaming" on some of my programs, and it was always well-received.

Steven

[Kevin Pearson]

I accept the correction about the Copland spelling. I know better and yet made the mistake. Thanks for all the replies. It's been fun to read and learn of some names I was not familiar with. So, I will undoubtedly wind up spending more money on more recordings and thus the obsession goes on and on!

I really do love Amy Beach's material. She was really gifted and seldom heard.

Kevin

[John H White]

I'd certainly go along with Paine, Bristowe & Foote but certainly don't care for the symphonic music of their more recent fellow countrymen, the one exception being Don Gillis, whose music I extolled on our old forum.

[mbhaub]

One of my absolute favorite works of all is The Mystic Trumpeter by Frederick Converse. What a poetic, powerful and thrilling piece it is! When I first heard it (thanks again, Naxos) I was bowled over with it. I ordered a score and fully intend on playing it someday. There are many other worthy American scores worth hearing, and many of the above posts have hit on some of them. I love Chadwick's music, and Amy Beach, too.
But of all the American music I have collected, the most enjoyable, and just fun music comes from the American marching band arena. Yes -- band marches! The Viennese may own the waltz, but there's nothing as uplifting to get you in a good mood as a good old march. Sousa is ok, but far from my favorite. Composers I like the best are Henry Fillmore and Karl King, but there are many, many others who may have written wonderful ones. There are so many recordings to buy. Maybe it just brings back happy childhood memories of band concerts in the city park on weekends in Iowa, but as high-falutin as I can get with listening to monumental European symphonies, these simple marches are just magical. There are other countries (England and Germany) which also turned out some great marches, but they just don't match up in my opinion, although Kenneth Alford sure was great!  And symphony orchestras can't play marches, either. No transcription of Colonel Bogey can ever compare to a wind band playing it.
Which brings me to July 4th. It used to be that on July 4th, local bands would do concerts before the fireworks. Very nostalgic and quintessentially American. Sadly, in many parts of the country this tradition has been totally lost. Now, rock bands play the 4th. I went to show last summer and after the rock band played and screamed some incomprehensible garbage, I said something like "does anybody really think this is better than a Sousa march?" You would have thought I made some indescribably vile racist, satanic comment. People around me made comments like "what, you don't like good music? " or how square could I be? Very sad comment on what's happened to music appreciation in our culture. Of course, irony of ironies followed shortly when the fireworks display was accompanied to a recording of the strains of that great American and super-patriotic work, 1812 Overture!