John Pozdro

John Walter Pozdro (born August 14, 1923 in Chicago , † January 1, 2009 in Lawrence , Kansas ) was an American composer and music teacher.

The son of a cabinetmaker and amateur musician received his first piano and theory lessons from the pianist Nina Shafran . From 1941–42 he studied piano with Edward Joseph Collins at the American Conservatory of Music . After his service in the US Army, he continued his education at Northwestern University with Robert Mills Delany (composition) and graduated in 1949 with a bachelor's degree. During his dissertation studies at the Eastman School of Music until 1958 he was a student of Howard Hanson and Bernard Rogers .

From 1949 to 1950 he taught at the University of Northern Iowa at Cedar Falls. After a visiting professor in the summer of 1950 at Northwestern University, he went to the University of Kansas in the same year . There he taught until his retirement in 1992, headed the Department of Music Theory and Composition from 1961 to 1988, and from 1958 to 1967 the annual symposium for contemporary American music. In 1961 he received the Bernard Fink Award for Outstanding Classroom Teaching , and in 1970 he was honored as one of Kansas University's Outstanding Teachers. He has also received various Kansas University research grants and has published articles in such journals as The American Music Teacher , The Composer, and College Music Symposium . As a guest composer at the University of California at Berkeley, he was honored with the University of California-Berkeley Medal in 1993.

In addition to piano works, chamber music, choral and orchestral works (including several symphonies), Pozdro also composed two stage works, the musical Hallo Kansas and the opera Malooley and the Fear Monster . The pianist David Allen Wehr recorded his Four Preludes for Piano in 1989 . Since the mid-1960s he has received regular awards from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers . In 1972 he was one of the winners of the NSOA Roth-Orchestra Competition , in 1974 he received a prize from the Delius Association , and in 1976 a prize from the National Endowment for the Arts . His Third Symphony was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 1962 .

swell

personal data
SURNAME	Pozdro, John
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Pozdro, John Walter (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	American composer and music teacher
DATE OF BIRTH	August 14, 1923
PLACE OF BIRTH	Chicago
DATE OF DEATH	January 1, 2009
Place of death	Lawrence , Kansas