HOWARD HANSON (b. Wahoo NE, October 28, 1896 - d. Rochester NY, February 26, 1981), in addition to being one of America's most widely performed composers for many years, was an extremely influential music educator and a prominent conductor who tireless advocacy of American music helped to nurture the careers of many composers.
Although deeply influenced and inspired by the music and culture of his Scandinavian heritage, his music is very much American as evinced by such works as Song of Democracy (1957) for Chorus and Orchestra, and the opera Merry Mount (1933), based on a story by Nathaniel Hawthorne, which premiered at the Metropolitan Opera. Hanson's most significant contribution to American repertoire is his oeuvre of seven symphonies (the 4th was awarded the second-ever Pulitzer Prize for Prize in 1944), which rank among the best and most-widely appreciated American works in the genre.
Born to a family of Swedish Lutherans in a small town that still boasts his origins on a large road sign, Hanson studied at Wahoo's Luther College before further pursuing his musical studies at the Institute of Musical Art (later to become the Juilliard School) and Northwestern University, where he received his B.A. in 1916. He then taught at the College of the Pacific in California, becoming Dean of the Conservatory of Fine Arts in 1919. Winning the first American Prix de Rome's in 1920 enabled him to study with the great Italian composer Ottorino Respighi.
In 1924, Hanson was appointed director of the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester NY, a position he held until 1964. At Eastman, he expanded the curriculum, enhanced the faculty, developed its performing ensembles and offered the premieres of many works by emerging composers throughout the country. His students included Jack Beeson, Peter Mennin and William Bergsma. He was a frequent public speaker and contributor to various publications and the author of Music in Contemporary American Civilization (1951).
In addition to co-founding the American Music Center, Hanson was founder and long-serving president of the National Music Council.
In recent years, re-issues of the celebrated Mercury Living Presence Hanson Conducts Hanson recordings have been re-issued and new recordings by Gerald Schwarz and the Seattle Symphony have been released introducing a new generation of listeners to Hanson's music.
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First Person Sections:
·Personal & Musical
Backgrounds ofthe
Founders
·The Pre-History of
the Center
·The Center Opens
·The Center's Difficult
First Years
·Great Teachers and
Music
Education
·The State of Music in
the United States
·What is
American Music?
·On Other Composers
and Other Forms
of Music
·Later History of the
AmericanMusic Center
·Advice for Today's
Composers
·Press Release
Announcing the Opening
of the Center
Biographies:
·Marion Bauer
(1882 - 1955)
·Aaron Copland
(1900 - 1990)
·Howard Hanson
(1896 - 1981)
·Harrison Kerr
(1897 - 1978)
·Otto Luening
(1900 - 1996)
·Quincy Porter
(1897 - 1966)
