John Alden Carpenter (February 28, 1876 – April 26, 1951) was an American

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 ...

. Carpenter's compositional style was considered to be mainly "mildly modernistic and impressionistic"; many of his works strive to encompass the spirit of America, including the patriotic ''The Home Road'' and several other

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...

-inspired works. He was among the first classical composers to incorporate elements of jazz and

ragtime Ragtime, also spelled rag-time or rag time, is a musical style that flourished from the 1890s to 1910s. Its cardinal trait is its syncopated or "ragged" rhythm. Ragtime was popularized during the early 20th century by composers such as Scott J ...

in their pieces.Slonimsky, Nicolas. ''Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians''. 7th ed. New York: Schirmer, 1984

Biography

Carpenter was born in

Park Ridge, Illinois Park Ridge is a city in Cook County, Illinois, United States, and a Chicago suburb. Per the 2020 census, the population was 39,656. It is located northwest of downtown Chicago. It is close to O'Hare International Airport, major expressways, ...

on February 28, 1876, and raised in a musical household. He was educated at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of highe ...

, where he studied under John Knowles Paine, and was president of the Glee Club, also writing music for the Hasty-Pudding Club. Showing great promise as a composer, he had a few lessons with

Edward Elgar Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet, (; 2 June 1857 – 23 February 1934) was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestr ...

during a trip to Rome in 1906.Thomas C. Pierson. "Carpenter, John Alden." Grove Music Online. ''Oxford Music Online''. Oxford University Press, accessed September 3, 2013, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/04993. later returning to the United States to study under Bernhard Ziehn in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

through 1912. It was there he earned a comfortable living as vice-president of the family business, a shipping supply company, from 1909 to his retirement in 1936. After his retirement, he spent much of his time composing. Carpenter served as Chairman of the Board of Children's Home Society of Illinois and a life trustee of the Children's Home Society of Illinois Foundation. He died in Chicago on April 26, 1951.

Works

Carpenter composed three ballets: ''Krazy Kat: A Jazz Pantomime'', based on the ''

Krazy Kat ''Krazy Kat'' (also known as ''Krazy & Ignatz'' in some reprints and compilations) is an American newspaper comic strip, by cartoonist George Herriman, which ran from 1913 to 1944. It first appeared in the ''New York Evening Journal'', whose owne ...

'' comics, was premiered at the New York Town Hall on 20 January 1922, and was the first work by a concert composer to use the word 'jazz' in its title; possibly his best-known is ''Skyscrapers'' (1926), set in New York (it premiered at the

Metropolitan Opera The Metropolitan Opera (commonly known as the Met) is an American opera company based in New York City, resident at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center, currently situated on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. The company is opera ...

), but equally inspired by his native Chicago. One of his most famous works was 1914's impressionistic orchestral suite ''Adventures in a Perambulator''. It was recorded in stereo in 1956 by Howard Hanson and the Eastman-Rochester Orchestra for

Mercury Records Mercury Records is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group. It had significant success as an independent operation in the 1940s and 1950s. Smash Records and Fontana Records were sub labels of Mercury. In the United States, it ...

, which initially released it on LP; Philips later reissued the recording on CD. In 1932, Carpenter completed ''Song of Faith'' for the

George Washington George Washington (February 22, 1732, 1799) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first president of the United States from 1789 to 1797. Appointed by the Continental Congress as commander of ...

bicentennial. His first symphony (Symphony No. 1, in C) was premiered in Norfolk Connecticut in 1917 and revised for the 50th anniversary of the

Chicago Symphony Orchestra The Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) was founded by Theodore Thomas in 1891. The ensemble makes its home at Orchestra Hall in Chicago and plays a summer season at the Ravinia Festival. The music director is Riccardo Muti, who began his tenu ...

, who performed it on October 24, 1940. Bruno Walter premiered his second symphony with the New York Philharmonic in 1942. He also wrote many piano pieces and songs, including the song cycle ''

Gitanjali __NOTOC__ ''Gitanjali'' ( bn, গীতাঞ্জলি, lit='Song offering') is a collection of poems by the Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore. Tagore received the Nobel Prize for Literature, for the English translation, Gitanjali:'' Song Off ...

'', with poems by

Rabindranath Tagore Rabindranath Tagore (; bn, রবীন্দ্রনাথ ঠাকুর; 7 May 1861 – 7 August 1941) was a Bengali polymath who worked as a poet, writer, playwright, composer, philosopher, social reformer and painter. He resh ...

Recordings

Carpenter made two published commercial sound recordings. In December 1927, he joined the mezzo-soprano Mina Hager to record the voice and piano version of his set of ''Water-Colors'' (settings of four ancient Chinese poems in English translations) for a small subscription label, the Chicago Gramophone Society. In April 1932, Carpenter recorded the spoken narration in his ''Song of Faith'' with the Chicago A Cappella Choir, the Philadelphia Orchestra and conductor Noble Cain, for Victor. Carpenter made at least one private, non-commercial recording; it is possible that one or more private or off-air recordings of his performances also survive, for instance among the Mina Hager papers in Chicago.

Honors

Carpenter was the recipient of many honors during his lifetime: * He was a member of

Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Fraternity of America (colloquially known as Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, Phi Mu Alpha, or simply Sinfonia) () is an American collegiate social fraternity for men with a special interest in music. The fraternity is open to men "w ...

music fraternity * He was made a Knight of the French Legion of Honor in 1921 * He received an honorary M.A. from Harvard in 1922 * He received an honorary Mus. Doc. from the University of Wisconsin in 1933 * He was elected a Fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, a ...

in 1933. * He was awarded the Gold Medal of the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1947

Personal life

In 1901, Carpenter married Rue Winterbotham, and they had one daughter, Genevieve Baldwin Carpenter, later Genevieve Carpenter Hill. After his wife's death in 1931, he married Ellen Borden.

References

External links

* *
John Alden Carpenter letters to Remsen Bird
at

the Newberry Library The Newberry Library is an independent research library, specializing in the humanities and located on Washington Square in Chicago, Illinois. It has been free and open to the public since 1887. Its collections encompass a variety of topics rela ...

John Alden Carpenter Papers
at

Mina Hager Papers
at

{{DEFAULTSORT:Carpenter, John Alden 1876 births 1951 deaths 19th-century American composers 19th-century classical composers 19th-century American male musicians 20th-century American composers 20th-century American male musicians 20th-century classical composers American male classical composers American Romantic composers Classical musicians from Illinois Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Harvard University alumni Jazz-influenced classical composers People from Park Ridge, Illinois Pupils of Bernhard Ziehn Pupils of John Knowles Paine