Julia Frances Smith

Julia Frances Smith (born January 25, 1905 in Denton / Texas , † April 27, 1989 in New York City ) was an American composer and pianist.

Life

Smith took lessons from Harold von Mickwitz at the Institute of Musical Art in Dallas in her youth . She then studied at North Texas State Teachers College and from 1932 to 1939 at the Juilliard School of Music composition with Rubin Goldmark and Frederick Jacobi and piano with Carl Friedberg . At New York University she earned her Masters (1933) and PhD degrees (1952). Her dissertation, Aaron Copland: His Work and Contribution to American Music , was published in New York in 1955. In 1963 her book Master Pianist: The Career and Teaching of Carl Friedberg was published .

From 1933 to 1942 Smith was a member of the Orchestrette Classique of New York , a women's orchestra founded by Frédérique Petrides , which premiered several of her compositions. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the state of Texas, Smith composed the opera Cynthia Parker , with the performance of which she became known to a wider audience in 1939. In addition to five other operas, she composed a. a. a symphony, two orchestral suites, a wind overture, a piano concerto, chamber music works, piano pieces, choral works and songs.

From 1935 Smith taught at the Hamlin School in New Jersey, from 1940 to 1942 at the Juilliard School. In 1941 she founded the Department of Music Education at Hartt College , which she headed until 1949. From 1946 to 1948 she also taught at the Teachers College of Connecticut . Since the 1950s she has been increasingly committed to promoting women composers in the USA. As early as 1951 she organized a concert with works by Marion Bauer . With Merle Montgomery she prepared a concert with works by American composers in the Musicians Club in New York at the end of the 1960s . As chair of the American Women Composers , she published her Directory of American Women Composers in 1970 . From 1970 to 1979 she was head of the Decade of Women Committee of the National Federation of Music Clubs .

In addition, she was always active as a composer. For Lyndon B. Johnson's inauguration in 1965, Remember the Alamo! , her last opera Daisy is based on the life of Juliette Gordon Low , the founder of the Girl Scouts in the USA.

Web links

• The Handbook of Texas: Smith, Julia Frances