Andrew Welsh Imbrie (April 6, 1921 – December 5, 2007) was an American

contemporary classical music Contemporary classical music is Western art music composed close to the present day. At the beginning of the 21st-century classical music, 21st century, it commonly referred to the post-1945 Modernism (music), post-tonal music after the death of ...

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and def ...

and pianist.

Career

Imbrie was born in New York City and began his musical training as a pianist when he was 4. In 1937, he went to Paris to study composition briefly with

Nadia Boulanger Juliette Nadia Boulanger (; 16 September 188722 October 1979) was a French music teacher, conductor and composer. She taught many of the leading composers and musicians of the 20th century, and also performed occasionally as a pianist and organis ...

and piano with

Robert Casadesus Robert Marcel Casadesus (; 7 April 1899 – 19 September 1972) was a renowned 20th-century France, French pianist and composer. He was the most prominent member of a Casadesus, distinguished musical family, being the nephew of Henri Casadesus an ...

. He returned to the United States the next year to attend

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

where he studied with

Roger Sessions Roger Huntington Sessions (December 28, 1896March 16, 1985) was an American composer, teacher, and writer on music. He had started his career writing in a neoclassical style, but gradually moved towards complex harmonies and postromanticism, a ...

, receiving his undergraduate degree in 1942. His senior thesis there, a

string quartet The term string quartet refers to either a type of musical composition or a group of four people who play them. Many composers from the mid-18th century onwards wrote string quartets. The associated musical ensemble consists of two Violin, violini ...

, was recorded by the Juilliard Quartet. During World War II he served in the U.S. Army as a Japanese translator. Afterwards, he went to the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

, where he received an M.A. in Music in 1947; there he continued to study with Sessions, who had taken a position at Berkeley. Imbrie taught composition, theory, and analysis at Berkeley from 1949 until his retirement in 1991. In the summer of 1991, he was Composer-in-Residence at Tanglewood in Lenox, Massachusetts. In addition to his principal teaching job at Berkeley, he served as a visiting professor at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

Brandeis University Brandeis University () is a Private university, private research university in Waltham, Massachusetts, United States. It is located within the Greater Boston area. Founded in 1948 as a nonsectarian, non-sectarian, coeducational university, Bra ...

Northwestern University Northwestern University (NU) is a Private university, private research university in Evanston, Illinois, United States. Established in 1851 to serve the historic Northwest Territory, it is the oldest University charter, chartered university in ...

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private university, private research university in New York City, New York, United States. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded in 1832 by Albert Gallatin as a Nondenominational ...

, the

University of Alabama The University of Alabama (informally known as Alabama, UA, the Capstone, or Bama) is a Public university, public research university in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, United States. Established in 1820 and opened to students in 1831, the University of ...

, and

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

, and had a regular teaching post at the San Francisco Conservatory. He died at his home in Berkeley, California at the age of 86. His notable students include Larry Austin, Tamar Diesendruck, Richard Festinger, Alden Jenks, Frank La Rocca, Neil Rolnick, Valerie Samson,

Allen Shearer Allen Raymond Shearer (born October 5, 1943, in Seattle, Washington) is an American composer and baritone. Life Shearer’s early musical experiences were as a singer; the majority of his works are for the voice or voices, with a later emphasis ...

, Laura Schwendinger, Nils Frykdahl, Kurt Rohde, Hi Kyung Kim, Leslie Wildman and Carolyn Yarnell.

Style

Imbrie's style was influenced early by

Béla Bartók Béla Viktor János Bartók (; ; 25 March 1881 – 26 September 1945) was a Hungarian composer, pianist and ethnomusicologist. He is considered one of the most important composers of the 20th century; he and Franz Liszt are regarded as Hunga ...

, and then by

, his teacher at both Princeton and Berkeley.Ann P. Basart, revised by Martin Brody and

Robert Commanday Robert Paul Commanday (June 18, 1922 – September 3, 2015) was an American music critic who specialized in classical music. Among the leading critics of the West Coast of the United States, West Coast, Commanday was a major presence in the Ba ...

, "Imbrie, Andrew (Welsh)", ''Grove Music Online'' (16 October 2013, accessed 18 July 2020). Imbrie preferred harmony that was non-triadic, or if triadic, non-functional, and a tightly organized, often

atonal Atonality in its broadest sense is music that lacks a tonal center, or key. ''Atonality'', in this sense, usually describes compositions written from about the early 20th-century to the present day, where a hierarchy of harmonies focusing on ...

contrapuntal In music theory, counterpoint is the relationship of two or more simultaneous Part (music), musical lines (also called voices) that are harmonically dependent on each other, yet independent in rhythm and Pitch contour, melodic contour. The term ...

texture with attention to careful motivic development; he avoided the serial techniques that dominated art music composition after the Second World War. Imbrie was also attentive to melodic line and shape to make a free atonal language accessible.

Selected compositions

Imbrie's body of work spans many genres. His chief works are: * ''Three Against Christmas'' (1960 opera) * ''Angle of Repose'' (1976 opera) * ''Dandelion Wine'' (1961 for chamber ensemble) * ''To a Traveler'' (1971 for chamber ensemble) * ''Sextet for Six Friends'' (2007 for chamber ensemble) * ''Drumtaps'' for chorus with orchestra (text by Whitman) * ''Prometheus Bound'' for chorus with orchestra (text by Green after Aeschylus) * ''Adam'' for chorus with orchestra (text from medieval and Civil War sources) * ''Requiem'' (1984, chorus with orchestra) * Three symphonies * Eight concertos * Songs for voice * Sonatas for various instruments * Chamber works for diverse instrumental ensembles * Works for choral ensembles * Five string quartets

Recordings

''First Recordings of Two Naumburg Award Compositions''. Columbia Records, MS 6597 *Violin Concerto ''Andrew Imbrie''. New York: Composers Recordings Inc., 1973. Rereleased, New World Records, 2007. *Symphony No. 3 *Serenade for flute, viola and piano *Sonata for cello and piano ''New Music for Virtuosos''. New York: New World Records, 1977. *''Three Sketches'' ''Andrew Imbrie and Gunther Schuller''. New York: New World Records, 1978. *String Quartet No. 4 ''New Music Series Vol. 3''. Neuma Records, 1993 *''Short Story'' ''Collage New Music''. Boston: GM Recordings, 1989. *''Pilgrimage'' ''Andrew Imbrie''. Boston: GM Recordings, 1993. *String Quartets 4 & 5 *''Impromptu for Violin and Piano'' ''Music of Andrew Imbrie''. New York: CRI, 1994. *Symphony No. 3 *Serenade for Flute, Viola and Piano *Sonata for cello and piano ''Dream Sequence – Chamber Music of Andrew Imbrie''. New York: New World Records, 1995. *''Dream Sequence'' *''Roethke Songs'' *''Three Piece Suite'' *''Campion Songs'' *''To a Traveler'' ''Andrew Imbrie, Requiem''. New Rochelle, NY: Bridge Records, 2000. *''Requiem'' *Piano Concerto No. 3 ''Andrew Imbrie''. Albany, NY: Albany Records, 2002. *''Spring Fever'' *''Chicago Bells'' *''Songs of Then and Now''

References

Sources

* Ann P. Basart, Martin Brody: "Andrew Imbrie", Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy (Accessed July 21, 2006) * Kennedy, Michael (2006), ''The Oxford Dictionary of Music'', 985 pages,

External links

Imbrie's San Francisco Conservatory Of Music faculty page
* three works by the composer

April 26, 1986 {{DEFAULTSORT:Imbrie, Andrew 1921 births 2007 deaths 20th-century American classical composers American male classical composers Princeton University alumni University of California, Berkeley alumni University of Chicago faculty Brandeis University faculty Northwestern University faculty New York University faculty University of Alabama faculty Harvard University staff University of California, Berkeley College of Letters and Science faculty San Francisco Conservatory of Music faculty 21st-century American classical composers Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters Composers from New York City Pupils of Roger Sessions 20th-century American male musicians