Mary Helen Snow McCarty (26 August 1928 - 14 October 2012) was an American composer, organist/pianist, and publisher who wrote ''The Waveform Music Book: Composing, Teaching, Performing Electronic Music with the

ARP 2600 The ARP 2600 is a semi-modular analog subtractive audio synthesizer produced by ARP Instruments, Inc. History Developed by a design team headed by ARP namesake Allen R. Pearlman and engineer Dennis Colin, the ARP 2600 was introduced in 1971 ...

Synthesizer'' in 1977. She published most of her work under the names Mary Snow or Mary McCarty Snow.

Life

Snow was born in Brownsville, Texas, to Carrie Beth Sewell and Harry Evans Snow. She married Darrell Keith McCarty in 1951. They had four children before divorcing in 1981. She and her husband formed the Lariken Press publishing company, which published her ''Waveform Music Book''. Snow earned a B.A. at

Indiana University Indiana University (IU) is a system of public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana. Campuses Indiana University has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration of IUPUI. * Indiana Univers ...

and a M.M. at the

University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the Unive ...

. Her teachers included Anis Fuleihan and Burrill Philips. She gave private piano lessons, taught at Texas Technological University, and served as an organist at several churches in Lubbock, Texas: the First Christian Church, First Covenant Presbyterian Church, Forrest Heights Methodist Church, and St. Christopher's Episcopal Church. She also established the Lubbock chapter of People Against Violent Crimes, and created a fundraiser for the organization called the “Bach-a-Thon.” Snow received grants from the

National Endowment for the Arts The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the federa ...

in 1977 and 1980, as well as a grant from Texas Technological University to compose a work based on desert land cultures. She composed electronic music for university theatre productions (listed below). Her works were published by the

American Music Center New Music USA is a new music organization formed by the merging of the American Music Center with Meet The Composer on November 8, 2011. The new organization retains the granting programs of the two former organizations as well as two media progra ...

, I. E. Clark, and Lariken Press. They include:

Band

*Toccata

Book

*''The Waveform Music Book: Composing, Teaching, Performing Electronic Music with the Arp 2600 Synthesizer''

Chamber

*''Five Monodies'' (clarinet)

Dance

*Ezekiel I (actor, dancer, and tape)

Electronic

*''Bacchae'' (text based on

Euripides Euripides (; grc, Εὐριπίδης, Eurīpídēs, ; ) was a tragedian of classical Athens. Along with Aeschylus and Sophocles, he is one of the three ancient Greek tragedians for whom any plays have survived in full. Some ancient scholars ...

) *''Hieroglyphs'' (instruments and tape) *''Mandora'' (violin and tape) *''Obsidion II'' *''Voyages: Columbus/Apollo II''

Theatre

* Dr. Faustus *Indians * MaratSade *

Peer Gynt ''Peer Gynt'' (, ) is a five-act (drama), act play (theatre), play in verse (poetry), verse by the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen published in 1876. Written in Norwegian language, Norwegian, it is one of the most widely performed Norwegian pla ...

*Shining Princess of the Slender Bamboo * The Tempest

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Snow, Mary McCarty American women composers Electronic music 1928 births 2012 deaths People from Texas Texas Tech University faculty