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Charles Tomlinson Griffes (US: /ˈɡrɪfəs/ GRIFF-fiss; September 17, 1884 April 8, 1920) was an American composer for piano, chamber ensembles and voice. His initial works are influenced by German Romanticism, but after he relinquished the German style,[2] his later works make him the most famous American representative of musical Impressionism, along with Charles Martin Loeffler. He was fascinated by the exotic, mysterious sound of the French Impressionists, and was compositionally much influenced by them while he was in Europe.[2] He also studied the work of contemporary Russian composers such as Scriabin, whose influence is also apparent in his use of synthetic scales.

Charles Tomlinson Griffes
Charles Griffes at the beginning of the twentieth century
Born(1884-09-17)September 17, 1884
DiedApril 8, 1920(1920-04-08) (aged 35)
Resting placeBloomfield Cemetery, Bloomfield, Essex County, New Jersey, U.S.[1]
EducationStern Conservatory
OccupationComposer
Years active1910–1919

Musical career


Griffes was born in Elmira, New York. He had early piano lessons with his sister Katherine and later studied piano with Mary Selena Broughton, who taught at Elmira College. Broughton had a profound impact on his personal and musical development.[2] After early studies on piano and organ in his home town, on recommendation of Broughton, he went to Berlin to study with pianist Ernst Jedliczka and Gottfried Galston at the Stern Conservatory.[3] Although recognised as a performer, Griffes grew more interested in composition. Despite being advised against it by Broughton, he left the conservatory and was briefly taught by composer Engelbert Humperdinck.[2][3] During his time in Berlin he composed several German songs and the Symphonische Phantasie for orchestra.[2]

On returning to the U.S. in 1907, he became director of music studies at the Hackley School for boys in Tarrytown, New York, a post which he held until his early death thirteen years later.[4] His post has been described as "grim and unrewarding", though it gave him financial stability. He continued to compose at Hackley in his free time and promoted his music during the summer.[2]

His most famous works are the White Peacock, for piano (1915, orchestrated in 1919); his Piano Sonata (1917–18, revised 1919); a tone poem, The Pleasure Dome of Kubla Khan, after the fragment by Coleridge (1912, revised in 1916), and Poem for Flute and Orchestra (1918). He also wrote numerous programmatic pieces for piano, chamber ensembles, and for voice. The amount and quality of his music is impressive considering his short life and his full-time teaching job, and much of his music is still performed. His unpublished Sho-jo (1917), a one-act pantomimic drama based on Japanese themes, is one of the earliest works by an American composer to show direct inspiration from the music of Japan.


Personal life


Griffes died of influenza in New York City during the worldwide Spanish Flu pandemic at the age of 35 and is buried in Bloomfield Cemetery in Bloomfield, New Jersey.[5] His papers passed to his younger sister Marguerite, who chose to destroy many that explicitly related to his life as a homosexual.[6] Donna Anderson (see below) is his current[when?] literary executor. Griffes kept meticulous diaries, some in German, which chronicled his musical accomplishments from 1907 to 1919, and also dealt honestly with his homosexuality, including his regular patronage of the bathhouses at Lafayette Place and the Produce Exchange.[7]

Charles Tomlinson Griffes was drawn into the gay world by the baths not just because he had sex there, but because he met men there who helped him find apartments and otherwise make his way through the city, who appreciated his music, who gave him new insights into his character, and who became his good friends. The gay world became a central part of his everyday world, even though he kept it hidden from his nongay associates.

George Chauncey, Gay New York, 1995

During his time as a student in Berlin he was devoted to his "special friend" Emil Joèl (aka "Konrad Wölcke"). In later life, he had a long term relationship with John Meyer (biographer Edward Maisel used the pseudonym Dan C. Martin), a married New York policeman.[6]


Musical compositions



Stage works



Orchestral works



Chamber music


  1. The Lake at Evening
  2. The Vale of Dreams
  3. The Night Winds

Piano



Organ



Songs


  1. La fuite de la lune (Oscar Wilde), 1912
  2. Symphony in Yellow (Wilde), 1912
  3. We'll to the Woods, and Gather May (W. E. Henley), 1914
  1. This Book of Hours (W. Crane)
  2. Come, Love, across the Sunlit Land (C. Scollard)
  1. Le jardin, 1915
  2. Impression du matin, 1915
  3. La mer, 1912, new setting 1916
  4. Le réveillon, 1914
  1. In a Myrtle Shade (William Blake)
  2. Waikiki (R. Brooke), E. Gauthier, M. Hansotte, New York, April 22, 1918
  3. Phantoms (A. Giovannitti)
  1. So-fei Gathering Flowers (Wang Chang-Ling), 1917
  2. Landscape (Sada-ihe), 1916
  3. The Old Temple among the Mountains (Chang Wen-Chang), 1916
  4. Tears (Wang Seng-Ju), 1916
  5. A Feast of Lanterns (Yuan Mei), 1917
  1. An Old Song Re-Sung, 1918
  2. Sorrow of Mydath, 1917
  1. The Lament of Ian the Proud
  2. Thy Dark Eyes to Mine
  3. The Rose of the Night
  1. Am Kreuzweg wird begraben (Heinrich Heine)
  2. An den Wind (Nikolaus Lenau)
  3. Auf ihrem Grab (Heine)
  4. Auf dem Teich, dem Regungslosen (Lenau)
  5. Auf geheimen Waldespfade (Lenau)
  6. Das ist ein Brausen und Heulen (Heine)
  7. Das sterbende Kind (Emanuel Geibel)
  8. Der träumende See (Julius Mosen)
  9. Des müden Abendlied (Geibel)
  10. Elfe (J. von Eichendorff)
  11. Entflieh mit mir (Heine)
  12. Es fiel ein Reif (Heine)
  13. Frühe (Eichendorff)
  14. Gedicht von Heine (Mit schwarzen Segeln)
  15. Ich weiss nicht, wie's geschieht (Geibel)
  16. Könnt’ ich mit dir dort oben gehn (Mosen)
  17. Meeres Stille (J. W. von Goethe)
  18. Mein Herz ist wie die dunkle Nacht (Geibel)
  19. Mir war, als müsst’ ich graben (Das Grab) (Christian Friedrich Hebbel)
  20. Nacht liegt auf den fremden Wegen (Heine)
  21. So halt’ ich endlich dich umfangen (Geibel)
  22. Winternacht (Lenau)
  23. Wo ich bin, mich rings umdunkelt (Heine), c1903–11
  24. Wohl lag ich einst in Gram und Schmerz (Geibel)
  25. Zwei Könige sassen auf Orkadal (Geibel), before 1910

Choral works



References


  1. "Charles Tomlinson Griffes: Biography - Classic Cat".
  2. Anderson, Donna K. (2001). Griffes, Charles T(omlinson) | Grove Music. www.oxfordmusiconline.com. doi:10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.11770. ISBN 978-1-56159-263-0. Retrieved May 9, 2019.
  3. Greene, David Mason (1985). Greene's Biographical Encyclopedia of Composers. Garden City, NJ: Doubleday. p. 1139. ISBN 9780385142786.
  4. Hershenson, Roberta (April 2, 1995). "75 Years After His Death, a Composer's Originality Is Honored". The New York Times. New York. Retrieved July 17, 2014.
  5. NNDB
  6. Dynes, Wayne (1990). Encyclopedia of Homosexuality. St. James Press. p. 506. ISBN 1-55862-147-4.
  7. "GLBTQ Encyclopedia entry for Charles Griffes". GLBTQ. Archived from the original on October 20, 2006. Retrieved December 22, 2006.

Further reading





На других языках


[de] Charles Tomlinson Griffes

Charles Tomlinson Griffes (* 17. September 1884 in Elmira, im US-Bundesstaat New York; † 8. April 1920 in New York City) war ein US-amerikanischer Komponist. Der früh verstorbene Griffes gilt als bekanntester amerikanischer Vertreter des musikalischen Impressionismus.
- [en] Charles Tomlinson Griffes

[es] Charles Tomlinson Griffes

Charles Tomlinson Griffes (Elmira, Nueva York, 17 de septiembre de 1884-Nueva York, 8 de abril de 1920) fue un compositor estadounidense de obras para piano, voz y conjuntos de cámara.



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