Herbert Elwell

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Herbert Elwell (born May 10, 1898 in Minneapolis , † April 17, 1974 in Cleveland ) was an American composer and music teacher.

Elwell studied at the University of Minnesota and with Ernest Bloch in New York. At the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau he was a student of Nadia Boulanger . His Quintet for Piano and Strings (1924), composed at this time, was more successful than George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue , which premiered in the same concert. His most performed work, the ballet The Happy Hypocrite , was written in 1925 while studying at the American Academy in Rome.

On Bloch's recommendation, Elwell became a teacher of composition and music theory at the Cleveland Institute of Music in 1928 , where he taught until 1945. Until 1954 he taught at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music , in addition he gave summer courses at the Eastman School of Music . His students included u. a. Bain Murray , Walter Aschaffenburg and Howard Whittaker . In the 1960s, he participated in a project at the University of Southern California to train music critics. In 1961 he received the Cleveland Arts Prize for Music .

Elwell composed a number of great vocal works, including the Blue Symphony for soprano and string quartet (1945), the Pastorale for soprano and symphony orchestra based on texts from the Old Testament, and The Forever Young based on anti-war poems by Pauline Hanson (composed for soprano Marie Simmelink Kraft ) . As a song composer he set to music a. a. Poems by William Shakespeare , Robert Frost and John Gould Fletcher . Conductors such as Artur Rodziński , Leopold Stokowski , William Steinberg and Howard Hanson have included his symphonic works in their repertoire. a. Performed by the violinist Sidney Harth , the soprano Lois Marshall and the pianists Arthur Loesser , Beryl Rubinstein and Beveridge Webster .

literature

swell

personal data
SURNAME Elwell, Herbert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American composer and music teacher
DATE OF BIRTH May 10, 1898
PLACE OF BIRTH Minneapolis
DATE OF DEATH April 17, 1974
Place of death Cleveland