John Knowles Paine
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John Knowles Paine (January 9, 1839 – April 25, 1906) was the first
Life
Paine grew up in a musical family in Maine. His grandfather, an instrument maker, built the first pipe organ in the state of Maine and his father and uncles were all music teachers. His father carried on the family musical instrument business. One uncle was an organist. Another was a composer. In the 1850s Paine took lessons in organ and composition from Hermann Kotzschmar, completing his first composition, a string quartet, in 1855 at the age of 16. After his first organ recital in 1857, he was appointed organist of Portland's Haydn Society, and gave a series of recitals with the object of funding a trip to Europe where he hoped to further his music education.
On arrival in Europe, Paine studied organ with
Paine's well-received 1867 Berlin premiere of his
In 1889, Paine made one of the first musical recordings on
John Knowles Paine was among the initial class of inductees into the American Classical Music Hall of Fame in 1998.
The Grove Music Encyclopedia says of him:
... Paine served the Harvard community for 43 years. By his presence and by his serious concern with music in a liberal arts college, he awakened a regard for music among many generations of Harvard men. His writings testify to his insistence upon the place of music within the liberal arts...[8]
Paine Hall, the concert hall for Harvard's Department of Music, is named after him. A history of that building[9] includes many references to his pioneering role in music at Harvard.
In popular culture
At the end of the episode "A Long Ladder" (S01E04) of the HBO television series The Gilded Age, in a scene set in New York in 1882, the Boston Symphony Orchestra is shown under the composer's direction performing Paine's Symphony No. 2. The middle two movements are seen and heard in the episode: the Scherzo and the Adagio.
Principal works
Opera
- Azara
Orchestral
- Symphony No. 1, Op. 23
- As You Like It, Overture, Op. 28
- The Tempest, Symphonic Poem, Op. 31
- Symphony No. 2 in A major "In Spring", Op. 34
- Prelude from Oedipus Tyrannus, Op. 35
- Poseidon and Amphitrite: an Ocean Fantasy, Op.44
Chorus and Orchestra
- Freedom, Our Queen
- Domine salvum fac Praesidem nostrum, Op.8
- Mass in D minor, Op. 10
- St. Peter: An Oratorio, Op. 20 (1872)
- Centennial Hymn, Op. 27 (1876)
- Oedipus Tyrannus, Op. 35
- The Realm of Fancy, Op. 36
- Phoebus, Arise!, Op. 37
Organ
- Concert Variations on "The Star-Spangled Banner", [Op. 1] – 1861
- Concert Variations on the Austrian Hymn, Op. 3 #1
- Fantasy on Ein feste Burg, Op. 13
- Prelude in B minor, Op. 19 #2
- Fugue in C minor (from Four Pieces)
Hymn Tune
- Harvard Hymn (tune used for a text beginning "Deus omnium creator" by James Bradstreet Greenough, customarily sung by the assembly at ceremonies conferring Harvard degrees) [10]
Notes and references
- ^ Ann P. Hall, Celebrating John Knowles Paine's legacy Archived 2013-04-06 at the Wayback Machine The Harvard University Gazette. Retrieved January 18, 2013.
- ^ Bill F. Faucett, "George Whitefield Chadwick: The Life and Music of the Pride of New England" Northeastern University Press, 2012.
- ^ "THE FIRST SEASON 1881–1882" Archived 2017-09-01 at the Wayback Machine Boston Symphony Orchestra. Retrieved January 18, 2013.
- ^ Peter G. Davis "New World Symphonies" New York Magazine, February 6, 1989. Retrieved January 18, 2013.
- ^ "John Knowles Paine"[usurped]. The Robinson Library. Retrieved January 18, 2013.
- ^ John Knowles Paine, Theodore Thomas, and Karl Klauser (ed). "Famous Composers and their Works". Boston, J. B. Millet company, 1891.
- ^ Patrick Feaster, "Theo Wangemann biography" Thomas Edison National Historical Park. Retrieved February 3, 2012
- ISSN 0031-8299.
- ^ Reinhold Brinkmann and Lesley Bannatyne, Harvard's Paine Hall: Musical Canon & the New England Barn (Cambridge, Mass.: Department of Music, Harvard University, 2010) Archived 2013-07-21 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "The Harvard Hymn" on a Harvard Mathematics website
See also
- Il Pesceballo
External links
- Free scores by John Knowles Paine at the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)
- Free scores by John Knowles Paine in the Choral Public Domain Library (ChoralWiki)
- Works by John Knowles Paine at Project Gutenberg
- Works by or about John Knowles Paine at Internet Archive
- Somerville, Murray Forbes (May–June 2000). "Vita: John Knowles Paine". Harvard Magazine. Retrieved 2 December 2013.