Henry Brant

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Henry Dreyfus Brant (born September 15, 1913 in Montréal , Canada , † April 26, 2008 in Santa Barbara , California ) was an American composer.

Life

Although Brant was born in Canada, his parents were American. He started composing when he was eight. In 1929 he moved to New York . There he studied at the Juilliard School of Music with George Antheil . He then worked for Paramount Pictures for several years , composing and conducting for radio, film and jazz groups. In addition, he created his first experimental works for the concert hall.

Between 1943 and 1950 he taught orchestration and composition at Columbia University and from 1947 to 1955 at the Juilliard School . From 1957 to 1980 he was a teacher of composition, conducting, flute and piano at Bennington College in Vermont . Since 1981 he has lived in Santa Barbara , California. In 1979 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters . In 2002 he received the Pulitzer Prize for the composition Ice Field . The Paul Sacher Foundation in Basel acquired in 1998 over three hundred original manuscripts of works Brants.

In addition to four operas , two ballets , several instrumental concerts and five symphonies , Brant composed numerous orchestral works, often with experimental and sometimes gigantic casts - such as a concert for symphony orchestra and a seventy-piece circus band. Since the 1950s he has been working with the technique of spatial music , in which the placement of the musicians in space and on the stage is part of the composition.

He was responsible for the music for the documentary Journey Into Medicine (1947). Brant also orchestrated some film scores by Virgil Thomson (The Plow That Broke the Plains, The River, The City and Louisiana Story) and Alex North (Cleopatra, Cheyenne Autumn, The Devil's Brigade, 2001: A Space Odyssey (rejected music, the Brant also conducted), Carny and Good Morning, Vietnam).

Works

  • Millennium I for trumpets, tubular bells and carillon
  • Antiphony I five orchestral groups and five conductors
  • Triple Concerto for violin, cello, oboe, vocal soloists, wind instruments, percussionist and piano
  • Music for piano and twenty instruments
  • Millennium II for trumpets, trombones, wind instruments, percussionists and soprano
  • Labyrinth I for orchestra
  • Labyrinth II for two orchestral groups
  • December for soprano, tenor, speaking voices, choir, wind instruments, percussionist and organ
  • The Grand Universal Circus for solos, choir voices, twelve instruments and percussionists
  • Hieroglyphics I for viola, timpani, tubular bells, celesta and harp
  • Millennium III for trumpets, trombones and percussionists
  • Hieroglyphics II for violin, percussion and piano
  • Angels & Devils , 1932
  • Origins for seventy percussion instruments, 1952
  • Immortal Combat , 1972
  • Homage to Ives , 1975
  • Orbits , 1979
  • The Glass Pyramid , 1980
  • Meteor Farm for orchestra, two choirs, jazz band, gamelan ensemble , African drummers and South Indian musicians, 1982
  • Western Springs for two orchestras, two choirs and two jazz bands, 1983
  • Litany of Tides , 1983
  • Fire on the Amstel for four boats with 25 flutists each, four jazz drummers, four church bells, three wind bands and four barrel organs , performed in Amsterdam in 1984
  • Desert Forests , 1985
  • Northern Lights Over the Twin Cities , 1986
  • Prisons of the Mind , 1992
  • 500: Hidden Hemisphere , 1992
  • Homeless People , 1993
  • Trajectory , 1994
  • A Concord Symphony after Charles Ives , 1994
  • Dormant Craters , 1995
  • Plowshares and Swords , 1995
  • Festive Eighty , 1997
  • Common Interests , 1998
  • Prophets for four cantors and shofar players , 2000
  • Glossary , 2000
  • Crystal Antiphonies , 2000
  • Ice Field for large orchestra and organ, 2001
  • Ghosts & Gargoyles for flute and orchestra, 2002

literature

  • Henry Brant: Textures and Timbres: An Orchestrator's Handbook . Carl Fischer, New York 2009, ISBN 0-8258-6827-0 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Members: Henry Brant. American Academy of Arts and Letters, accessed February 18, 2019 .
  2. ↑ Via Ice Field on The Pulitzer Prizes website
  3. ^ Frank J. Oteri: Spaced out with Henry Brant. In: New Music USA. January 1, 2003, accessed May 18, 2018 .
personal data
SURNAME Brant, Henry
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Brant, Henry Dreyfus (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American composer
DATE OF BIRTH September 15, 1913
PLACE OF BIRTH Montréal , Canada
DATE OF DEATH April 26, 2008
Place of death Santa Barbara , California