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Composers for Concerts of our 60^th Season
 

Text for this page is borrowed liberally from the referenced Web sites; visit the sites noted for more detailed information.

Leroy Anderson (1908–75) was an American composer of short, light concert pieces, many of which were introduced by the Boston Pops Orchestra under the direction of Arthur Fiedler. John Williams described him as "one of the great American masters of light orchestral music." Born in Massachusetts, he was given his first piano lessons by his mother, an organist. He studied at the New England Conservatory of Music and Harvard University. He also worked as organist for the university, led the choir and the Harvard University Band, and conducted and did arrangements for dance bands around Boston. His pieces and recordings during the 50s conducting a studio orchestra were immense commercial successes. His most famous pieces are probably "Sleigh Ride" and "The Syncopated Clock", both of which are instantly recognizable to millions of people. Mitchell Parish wrote lyrics for "Sleigh Ride", which was not written as a Christmas piece, but as a work that describes a winter event. Anderson started the work during a heat wave in August 1946. For his contribution to the recording industry, Leroy Anderson has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1620 Vine Street. He was posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1988 and his music continues to be a staple of "pops" orchestra repertoire.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leroy_Anderson

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) was a German composer and organist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity. Although he introduced no new forms, he enriched the prevailing German style with a robust contrapuntal technique, an unrivalled control of harmonic and motivic organisation in composition for diverse musical forces, and the adaptation of rhythms and textures from abroad, particularly Italy and France. While Bach's fame as an organist was great during his lifetime, he was not particularly well-known as a composer. His adherence to Baroque forms and contrapuntal style was considered "old-fashioned" by his contemporaries, especially late in his career when the musical fashion tended towards Rococo and later Classical styles. A revival of interest and performances of his music began early in the 19th century, and he is now widely considered to be one of the greatest composers in the Western tradition.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Sebastian_Bach

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827), gave his first public performance as a pianist when he was eight years old. At the age of eleven he received training in piano performance and composition and, in 1787, studied in Vienna under Mozart. He also took lessons from Haydn, Albrechtsberger, Schenck and Salieri. By 1795 he had earned a name for himself as a pianist, admired in particular for his brilliant improvisations. The nobility offered Beethoven their patronage, which enabled him to live as a freelance composer without financial worries. Around the year 1798 he deve;p[ed a hearing disorder. He withdrew into increasing seclusion and was eventually completely deaf. The final years in his life were darkened by severe illness and by the struggle over the guardianship of his nephew.
http://www.lucare.com/immortal/bio.html

Johannes Brahms (1833–1897) studied piano from the age of seven and theory and composition from 13, gaining experience as an arranger for his father's light orchestra while absorbing the alla zingarese style associated with Hungarian folk music. Brahms's artistic kinship with Robert Schumann and his profound romantic passion for Clara Schumann, 14 years his elder, never left him. After a time in Düsseldorf, he worked in Detmold, settling in Hamburg in 1859 to direct a women's chorus. He was director of the Vienna Singakademie in 1863-4. Besides giving concerts of his own music, he made tours throughout northern and central Europe and began teaching the piano. He settled permanently in Vienna in 1868. In 1872-3, he briefly held the conductorship of the Vienna Gesellschaftskonzerte, but the job conflicted with his more intense longing to compose. Both the German Requiem (first complete performance, 1869) and the Variations on the St. Antony Chorale (1873) were rapturously acclaimed, bringing international renown and financial security. Soon after Clara Schumann's death in 1896 he died from cancer at age 63.
http://w3.rz-berlin.mpg.de/cmp/brahms.html

Alfred Shaddick Burt (1920–54) was an American jazz musician who is best known for composing the music for fifteen Christmas carols between 1942 and 1954, the result of a family tradition of including a carol with his annual family Christmas card. Only one of the carols was performed in public outside his immediate family circle during his lifetime, but thanks to exposure through recordings on several LPs and by hundreds of performers, the "Alfred Burt carols," as they are collectively known, have become a part of the modern Christmas music canon. Wilha Hutson, a family friend and organist at his church, joined him as lyricist in 1949. Sadly, Burt passed away from lung cancer the day after completing his last carol, "The Star Carol."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Burt

Keith Hampton is vocal music instructor at the Chicago International Charter School and director of music ministries and organist at the Park Manor Christian Church, Chicago, IL. Active as a conductor, organ soloist, and accompanist, he is in demand as a workshop clinician. He was twice chosen as one of fourteen conductors to participate in the Oregon Bach Festival Conducting Master classes and was chosen to conduct in the a cappella music workshop sponsored by Chorus America. He is also president of Dr. K.T. Productions, Inc., providing music transcriptions of Black gospel music. Hampton earned a bachelor of music education from Westminster Choir College; a master of arts from Marywood University; and a doctor of music in church music from Northwestern University. 
http://chicagocommunitychorus.cfsites.org/custom.php?pageid=1184

Franz Joseph Haydn (1732–1809) was one of the most prominent composers of the classical period, and is called by some the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet." A life-long resident of Austria, Haydn spent most of his career as a court musician for the wealthy Hungarian Esterházy family on their remote estate. Isolated from other composers and trends in music until the later part of his long life, he was, as he put it, "forced to become original." Although Haydn is still often called "Franz Joseph Haydn," the composer did not use the name "Franz" during his lifetime and this misnomer is avoided by modern scholars and historians.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Haydn
For more information on The Creation, visit http://www.musicwithease.com/haydn-creation.html.

Shawn Kirchner (b.1970) is a composer and songwriter active in musical circles in Los Angeles. His choral compositions are performed throughout the United States and abroad. In addition to composing, songwriting has become a career focus in recent years. His songs combine emotional warmth with carefully crafted lyrics, and are written in a range of styles including bluegrass, folk, country, gospel and jazz. Kirchner also maintains an active performing career as a singer and pianist. A member of the Los Angeles Master Chorale, he sings regularly with the Chorale and the Los Angeles Philharmonic at Disney Hall and at the Hollywood Bowl.
http://www.shawnkirchner.com/bio.htm

Kevin McChesney, a true handbell professional, has composed more than 400 arrangements and original works for handbells.  A talented composer, arranger, keyboardist, and guitar player, he conducts the popular auditioned community handbell ensemble, The Pikes Peak Ringers. He is in constant demand as a conductor and clinician world-wide and serves as music editor for Jeffers Handbell Supply and Ringing Word. McChesney holds a bachelor’s of music composition and theory from Colorado University.
http://www.steproject.com/KevinMcChesney.html

Daniel Pinkham (1923-2006), a prolific and versatile composer, in 1990 was named Composer of the Year by the American Guild of Organists. In 1996 he received the Alfred Nash Patterson Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award for contributions to the choral arts. He taught at Simmons College, Boston University, Dartington Hall, and was visiting lecturer at Harvard University (1957-58). In 1950 he was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship and in 1962 a Ford Foundation Fellowship. A Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, he also served on the faculty of the New England Conservatory of Music and was music director emeritus of historic King’s Chapel in Boston where he actively served from 1958 until 2000. Pinkham studied organ and harmony at Phillips Academy, Harvard University, and Tanglewood.
http://www.danielpinkham.net/bioPage.html

Joel Raney (b. 1956), born to a musical family in Alabama, began playing piano at age three. He studied piano and organ at the University of North Alabama, and later received a master of music degree from the Juilliard School of Music in piano performance. His career in music began in the Southern Baptist Church, but also includes work in New York City, Los Angeles and Chicago in both theater and jazz performance. He currently makes his living writing and arranging music for radio and television commercials in his own Chicago-based production company and studio, CATFISH. He also serves as Worship Pianist at the First Presbyterian Church of River Forest, IL.
http://www.hopepublishing.com/html/main.isx?sub=27&search=197

John Rutter (b. 1945) is an English composer, choral conductor, editor, arranger and record producer. Born in London, he read music at Clare College, Cambridge, where he was director of music from 1975 to 1979. In 1974, He visited the United States for the premiere of his cantata "Gloria" in Omaha, Nebraska. The composition has become a much-performed favorite over the years. In 1981 Rutter founded the Cambridge Singers, which he conducts and with which he has made many recordings of sacred choral repertoire, particularly under his own label Collegium Records. In 1980 he was made an honorary Fellow of Westminster Choir College, Princeton, and in 1988 a Fellow of the Guild of Church Musicians.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Rutter

Sir Harold Malcolm Watts Sargent (1895–1967) was a British conductor, organist and composer. Originally an organist, he first appeared as a conductor when his Impression on a Windy Day was performed at a Promenade Concert in 1921. He conducted the Royal Choral Society from 1928, the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra (1942-8), and the BBC Symphony Orchestra (1950-7). From 1948 he was in charge of the London Promenade Concerts. His sense of occasion and unfailing panache won him great popularity at home and abroad. He was knighted in 1947.
http://encyclopedia.stateuniversity.com/pages/20194/Sir-Harold-Malcolm-Watts-Sargent.html

Robert Schumann, (1810–1856) was a German composer, aesthete, and influential music critic. He is one of the most famous Romantic composers of the 19th century. Early in life, he planned to be a  pianist, but a hand injury intervened, and he changed to  composition. Schumann's published compositions were, until 1840, all for piano; he later composed works for piano and orchestra, many lieder (songs for voice and piano), four symphonies, an opera, and other orchestral, choral and chamber works. His writings about music appeared mostly in the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik ("The New Journal for Music"), a Leipzig-based publication that he jointly founded. In 1840, after a long and acrimonious legal battle with his piano instructor Friedrich Wieck, Schumann married Wieck's daughter, pianist Clara, a considerable figure of the Romantic period in her own right. For the last two years of his life, after an attempted suicide, Schumann was confined to a mental institution.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Schumann

Heinrich Schütz (1585–1672), a German composer and organist, was generally regarded as the most important German composer before J.S. Bach and is often considered to be one of the most important composers of the 17th century along with Claudio Monteverdi. He wrote what is thought to be the first German opera, Dafne, performed in 1627 (the music has since been lost). After being a choir-boy, he studied law at Marburg before going to Venice to study music with Giovanni Gabrieli. In 1615, he went to Dresden to serve as court composer to the Elector of Saxony a position he held until the end of his life. On several occasions he left Dresden for other activities; travelling to Venice to study and in 1633, he took a post at Copenhagen but returned to Dresden in 1641.
http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Schutz-Heinrich.htm

Gloria Shayne Baker (1923–2008) was an American composer and songwriter best known for composing the "Do You Hear What I Hear?" Christmas carol in 1962 with her then husband, Noel Regney. Born in Brookline, Massachusetts, she earned a bachelor's degree from the Boston University School of Music. After a move to New York City in the 40s, she worked as a pianist performing on demos and in front of live audiences. She also arranged music for composers such as Stephen Sondheim and Irving Berlin. Shayne Baker, who collaborated with Regney on a number of famous songs, also enjoyed a successful career on her own after their divorce. "Do You Hear What I Hear?" was written in October 1962 during the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis as a plea for peace. In a reversal of their usual roles, Regney wrote the lyrics while she composed the music.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gloria_Shayne_Baker

Diane White-Clayton is a composer noted for her majestic anthems; a vocalist with a soaring, angelic three-and-a-half octave range; a pianist with astounding technique; a compassionate and loving educator; and a minister with the heart of God. She holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in music composition from the University of California at Santa Barbara. She completed her undergraduate studies with honors obtaining a bachelor of arts in music from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri with emphases in composition, voice, and piano. A Rotary Scholar, she studied piano at the Ecole Normale de Musique in Paris, France performing throughout France and other parts of Europe as an Ambassador of Goodwill. “Dr. Dee,” as she is affectionately known, has held countless positions in higher education and in churches across the nation and travels extensively as a performer, workshop clinician and speaker.
www.lcwpublishing.com/Biography.htm

Healey Willan (1880-1968) began his musical training at age eight with studies at St. Saviour's Choir School, Eastbourne. After leaving the school in 1895, he began working as an organist and choirmaster in and around London. Although his formative years were spent in England, he spent most of his life in Canada and is best known as a Canadian composer and professor. In 1913 he began teaching at the Toronto Conservatory as head of the theory department, and the next year was appointed a lecturer in music at the University of Toronto. He later became vice-principal of the conservatory, as well as university organist, music director of the Hart House Theatre, and precentor at St. Mary Magdalene. In 1934, He founded the Tudor Singers, a Canadian vocal group he conducted until it disbanded in 1939. Best known for his organ and sacred works, his considerable output includes orchestral, choral, organ and piano, and chamber works, as well as music for plays and one opera. http://www.stmartinschamberchoir.org/Education/Bios/BioWillan.htm

Wilhelm Richard Wagner (1813-1883) was a German composer, conductor, theatre director and essayist, primarily known for his operas. Unlike most other great opera composers, he wrote both the scenario and libretto for his works. Wagner pioneered advances in musical language, such as extreme chromaticism and quickly shifting tonal centers, which greatly influenced the development of European classical music. He transformed musical thought through his idea of Gesamtkunstwerk ("total artwork"), the synthesis of all the poetic, visual, musical and dramatic arts, To try to stage these works as he imagined them, Wagner built his own opera house.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Wagner