Silas G Pratt

[mikehopf]

Many of us know the somewhat apocryphal story of Silas G Pratt's greeting to Wagner when they met in in America: " I understand , Sir, that you are known as the Silas G Pratt of Germany!", but what do we know of this modest, shrinking violet's music?

[Mark Thomas]

Apocryphal? What a shame. It deserves to be true... 

I know nothing of Pratt beyond the fact that he write a symphony on the sinking of the Titanic.

[edurban]

His opera Zenobia, Queen of Palmyra, which I know only from the vocal score, struck me as awkwardly (as opposed to adventurously) harmonized and short on melodic gift.  I tried to learn a scene for the bass when I was a young voice student, but it really seemed not worth the trouble.  So back to Paine, Bristow, Fry et al...

David

[Ser Amantio di Nicolao]

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silas_G._Pratt (another one of my early works  ), he also wrote a book about Abraham Lincoln.

I'm quite proud of that article, incidentally - it's a collation of every scrap of information I could find about him.  Which wasn't much, believe me. 

[mikehopf]

Silas G Pratt was to music what William McGonegall was to Poetry!


Bakers Biographical Dictionary of Musicians gives a fuller picture of this eccentric composer.

Here are some highlights:

Silas Gamaliel Pratt ( 1846 - 1916)

He studied with Kullak, Kiel & Dorn and had piano lessons with Liszt.

He dedicated his Centennial Overture to General Grant and performed it to the General at Crystal Palace.

His opera Zenobia " was received in a hostile manner by the press, partly owing to the poor quality of the music, but mainly as a reaction to the exuberant and immodest proclamation of its merit in advance of the production.

His works include:

Homage to Chicago March
America - A Scenic Cantata subtitled Four Centuries of Music , Picture & Song  ( with stereopticon projections) - 1894
A Lincoln Symphony
The Tragic of the Deep ( a symphonic poem inspired by the Titanic disaster ) - 1912
The Last Inca - a Cantata
The Triumph of Columbus  - Opera ( 1892)
The Prodigal Son - Symphonic Work (1885)

He established the Pratt Institute of Music and Art in Pittsburgh

" Pratt was a colorful personality; despite continuous and severe setbacks, he was convinced of his own significance "

[eschiss1]

The Library of Congress has a few of his piano works scanned, which some of us IMSLP editors have transferred over (sometimes after neatening up a bit).  I liked them myself. (The link is at the bottom of the Wikipedia article.)

[Ser Amantio di Nicolao]

The Library of Congress has a few of his piano works scanned, which some of us IMSLP editors have transferred over (sometimes after neatening up a bit).  I liked them myself. (The link is at the bottom of the Wikipedia article.)

See also Google Books, which has a choice handful of vocal scores:
https://www.google.com/search?q=silas+g.+pratt&tbm=bks&tbo=1#hl=en&tbo=1&tbm=bks&tbm=bks&q=inauthor:%22Silas+Gamaliel+Pratt%22&sa=X&ei=IBAoT-msHOHq2AXE7Ki8Ag&ved=0CDcQ9Ag&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&fp=d617e59f721fad84&biw=1280&bih=822

I quite like* some of what I see in The Triumph of Columbus:
http://books.google.com/books?id=NNkIAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=inauthor:%22Silas+Gamaliel+Pratt%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=IxAoT9nXMYq42wXIlpnWAg&ved=0CDQQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=inauthor%3A%22Silas%20Gamaliel%20Pratt%22&f=false

*C'mon.  "Chorus of Evil Spirits"?  Really?