Warner Jepson (March 24, 1930 – July 5, 2011) 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 ...
from
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania
Bethlehem is a city in Northampton County, Pennsylvania, Northampton and Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, Lehigh counties in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, Bethle ...
. In 1952, he graduated from
Oberlin Conservatory of Music
The Oberlin Conservatory of Music is a private music school, music conservatory of Oberlin College, a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Oberlin, Ohio. It was founded in 1865 and is the ...
with a degree in composition. He spent most of his remaining years in the
San Francisco Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a List of regions of California, region of California surrounding and including San Francisco Bay, and anchored by the cities of Oakland, San Francisco, and San Jose, California, S ...
. He was a pioneer in the
electronic music
Electronic music broadly is a group of music genres that employ electronic musical instruments, circuitry-based music technology and software, or general-purpose electronics (such as personal computers) in its creation. It includes both music ...
scene. Early works from the late 1950s include collaborations with dancers
Anna Halprin
Anna Halprin (born Hannah Dorothy Schuman; July 13, 1920 – May 24, 2021) was an American choreographer and dancer. She helped redefine dance in postwar America and pioneer the experimental art form known as postmodern dance and referred to her ...
,
Simone Forti
Simone Forti (born March 25, 1935) is an American postmodern artist, dancer, choreographer, and writer. Since the 1950s, she has exhibited, performed, and taught workshops all over the world. Her innovations in Postmodern dance, including her se ...
, and visual artist
Robert Morris (artist)
Robert Morris (February 9, 1931 – November 28, 2018) was an American sculptor, conceptual artist and writer. He was regarded as having been one of the most prominent theorists of Minimalism along with Donald Judd, but also made important contri ...
.
Jepson composed a variety of works including
film
A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally, sinc ...
and
ballet
Ballet () is a type of performance dance that originated during the Italian Renaissance in the fifteenth century and later developed into a concert dance form in France and Russia. It has since become a widespread and highly technical form of ...
scores. His
sculpture
Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...
and
photography
Photography is the visual arts, art, application, and practice of creating images by recording light, either electronically by means of an image sensor, or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. It is empl ...
was featured at the
San Francisco Museum of Art
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is a modern and contemporary art museum and nonprofit organization located in San Francisco, California. SFMOMA was the first museum on the West Coast devoted solely to 20th-century art, and has b ...
. He received an
Emmy
The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the year, each with their own set of rules and award catego ...
in 1974 for a piece done in connection with
KQED.
Program from 1969 Warner Jepson Retrospective
held at the Richmond Art Museum, Richmond, California
Richmond is a city in western Contra Costa County, California, United States. The city was municipal corporation, incorporated on August 3, 1905, and has a Richmond, California, City Council, city council. . Accessed March 26, 2017.
Film scores
* 1972 ''Gold''
* 1971 ''Luminous Procuress''
* 1968 ''The Bed''
References
1930 births
2011 deaths
American male composers
20th-century American composers
People from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania
Musicians from Pennsylvania
Oberlin Conservatory of Music alumni
20th-century American male musicians
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