Title: Roger Sessions and his music /
Authors: Olmstead, Andrea.
Date: 1985
Publisher: UMI Research Press,
Physical description: xvii, 218 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm.
Language: English
LC class: M
Abstract: Recognized as the primary American symphonist of the 20th century, Roger Sessions (1896-1985) was one of the leading representatives of high modernism. His stature among American composers rivals Charles Ives, Aaron Copland, and Elliott Carter. Sessions was awarded two Pulitzer prizes, election to the American Academy of Arts and Letters, winning the Brandeis Creative Arts Award, the Gold Medal of the American Academy, and a MacDowell Medal, in addition to 14 honorary doctorates. This book brings together considerable previously unpublished archival material, such as letters, lectures, interviews, and articles, to shed light on the life and music of this major American composer. The author, a teaching colleague of Sessions at Juilliard and the leading scholar on his music, has written a complete biography charting five touchstone areas through Sessions's eighty-eight years: music, religion, politics, money, and sexuality.
Contents: Early biography : forty acres, apprenticeship -- Periodization and The black masters : Periodization of Sessions's music, The black masters -- The music written in Europe, 1924-1935 : the European years, Three chorale preludes for organ, Symphony no. 1 in E minor, On the beach at Fontana, Sonata for piano no. 1, Four pieces for children, Concerto for violin and orchestra -- "The wars of the present also endure", the music from 1936-1947 : university life, String quartet no. 1 in E minor, Chorale for organ, Pages from a diary, Duo for violin and piano, Turn O Libertad, Symphony no. 2, Piano sonata no. 2, The Trial of Lucullus -- Adoption of the twelve-tone system, 1951-1960 : Sessions as a teacher, String quartet no. 2, Sonata for violin, Idyll of Theocritus, mass for unison choir, Concerto for piano and orchestra, Symphony no. 3, String quartet, Symphony no. 4, Divertimento for orchestra -- The futility of conquest, the music of the 1960s : Montezuma, Psalm 140, Symphony no. 5, Piano sonata no. 3, Symphony no. 6, Six pieces for violoncello, Symphony no. 7, Symphony no. 8, Rhapsody for orchestra -- The last decade of composition, 1970-1981 : When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd, Concerto for violin, violoncello, and orchestra, Canons, Concertino for chamber orchestra, Three choruses on biblical texts, Five pieces for piano, Waltz, Symphony no. 9, Concerto for orchestra, personality.
Notes: Includes indexes.