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Gail Kubik

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Gail Thompson Kubik (September 5, 1914, South Coffeyville, Oklahoma – July 20, 1984, Covina, California) was an American composer, music director, violinist, and teacher.[1]

Gail Kubik
in memory of Gail Kubik, American composer who lived in Venasque, 1963–1983

Early life, education, and career

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Kubik was born to Henry and Evelyn O. Kubik. He studied at the Eastman School of Music with Howard Hanson[2], the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago with Leo Sowerby, and Harvard University with Walter Piston and Nadia Boulanger.

He taught violin and composition at Monmouth College and composition and music history at Dakota Wesleyan University[3], Columbia University (1937), Teachers College. Among his students included Gordon Binkerd and Marjorie Merryman.[3][4]

In 1939, his Danse won 2nd prize in the Kansas state music club piano composition contest.[5] He joined NBC Radio as staff composer in New York in 1940. By the end of 1940 he was in Hollywood, where the army recruited him (with rank of Corporal) to be music director for the Motion Picture Bureau at the Office of War Information. During World War II, he composed and conducted the music scores of many of the OWI's films, including for their Overseas Film Unit, which took him to England in 1944.[6]

He was an editor for Mercury Music Corporation, editing their American Music for Piano series.[7]

In 1943, he was a board member of the Los Angeles-based Musicians' Congress Committee (along with Aaron Copland, Darius Milhaud, Lena Horne, William Grant Still and other musical luminaries). This committee was formed and sponsored by Max Silver with a goal of promoting American art music during the war, and was suspected of being a Communist front.[8][9]

In 1945 Kubik had successfully sued the membership organization American Composers' Alliance for licensing his music for profit without his consent.

He won the 1952 Pulitzer Prize for Music for Symphony Concertante.[1]

Between his Pulitzer Prize, and the success of his score for UPA's Gerald McBoing-Boing, his reputation was such that in 1953 he signed a guaranteed publishing contract with ASCAP's Chappell Music. The musical trades positioned this deal as part of an ongoing competition between ASCAP and BMI for the prestige of signing contracts with respected composers.[10]

From 1963 to 1983 he lived in Venasque, France. From 1970 until his death, he was composer-in-residence at Scripps College in Claremont, California.

He was a National Patron of Delta Omicron, an international professional music fraternity.[11] He was on the national advisory board for the University of Missouri Kansas City's Institute for Studies in American Music founded in 1967.[12] He was a Guggenheim fellow in 1944 and 1965[13], and was a permanent Fellow at MacDowell[14]. He was one of the composers interviewed for Irwin Bazelon's book Knowing the Score: Notes on Film Music.[15] He was the dedicatee of Ingolf Dahl's 1944 Music for Brass Instruments.[16]

Works

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  • American Caprice for piano and orchestra (1933 ; orch. 1936)
  • Piano Trio (1934)
  • Violin Concerto, Op. 4 (1934/36, dedicated to Jascha Heifetz)
  • Danse for piano (1939)
  • Violin Concerto No. 2 (1940/41, dedicated to Ruggiero Ricci)
  • Suite for 3 recorders (1941)
  • Sonatina for Piano (dedicated to Walter Piston) (1941)
  • Sonatina for Violin (1943)[17]
  • Symphony No. 1 in E-flat major (1946)
  • Sonata for piano (1947)
  • Nocturne for flute and piano (1947)[18]
  • Little Suite for flute and two clarinets (1948)[18]
  • Celebrations And Epilogue, 10 short pieces for piano (1938-50)
  • Symphony Concertante for piano, viola, trumpet and orchestra (1952)
  • Symphony No. 2 in F major (1954-6)
  • Symphony No. 3 (1956)
  • Divertimento No. 1 for thirteen players (1959)
  • Divertimento No. 2 for eight players (1959)
  • Sonatina for clarinet and piano (dedicated to Nadia Boulanger) (1959)
  • String Quartet (1960)
  • In Praise of Johnny Appleseed (for bass, chorus, and orchestra), based on the Vachel Lindsay poem, entered into the 1942 National Federation of Music Clubs' choral composition contest. (Kettering won this contest with a work based on a Vachel Lindsay Johnny Appleseed poem)[19]
  • Symphony for 2 pianos (reworked from Symphony No. 1) (1949-79)
  • Music for Cleveland, for piano, premiered July 25 1968 by Jacob Maxin[20]
  • Prayer and Toccata for 2 pianos and organ (1969-79)

Opera

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  • Boston Baked Beans (1952)
  • A Mirror for the Sky (a folk opera, first performed 1957)

Film scores

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References

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  1. ^ a b "BMOP: Music of American Composer Gail Kubik". New Music Buff. 2022-02-17. Retrieved 2024-05-10.
  2. ^ Judiciary, United States Congress House Committee on the (1966). Copyright Law Revision: Hearings Before Subcommittee No. 3 of the Committee on the Judiciary, House of Representatives, Eighty-ninth Congress, First Session. U.S. Government Printing Office. p. 303.
  3. ^ a b Villamil, Victoria Etnier (1993). A Singer's Guide to the American Art Song, 1870-1980. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 50. ISBN 978-0-8108-2774-5.
  4. ^ Libraries, Boston Area Music (1983). The Boston Composers Project: A Bibliography of Contemporary Music. MIT Press. p. 348. ISBN 978-0-262-02198-2.
  5. ^ Snoddy, Abbie L (March–April 1939). "Kansas Announces Winners in Composers' Contest". Music Clubs Magazine. XVIII (4). National Federation of Music Clubs: 10.
  6. ^ Kubik, Gail T. (1946). "Composing for Government Films". Modern Music. 23 (3): 189–192.
  7. ^ Slomski, Monica J. (1994-11-21). Paul Creston: A Bio-Bibliography. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. p. 141. ISBN 978-0-313-03643-9.
  8. ^ Guide to Subversive Organizations and Publications (PDF) (2nd ed.). Washington DC: Committee on Un-American Activities, U.S. House of Representatives. December 1, 1961. p. 221.
  9. ^ Activities, Estados Unidos Congress House Committee on Un-American (1956). Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-fourth Congress, Second Session. U.S. Government Printing Office. p. 3827.
  10. ^ Horowitz, I.S. (April 25, 1953). "ASCAP Classical Battle - Guarantees Would Halt BMI Snithces". The Billboard: 1.
  11. ^ Delta Omicron Archived January 27, 2010, at the Wayback Machine
  12. ^ "TimesMachine: Sunday June 27, 1971 - NYTimes.com". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-11-11.
  13. ^ "Gail T. Kubik – John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation…". Retrieved 2024-11-11.
  14. ^ "TimesMachine: Wednesday July 25, 1984 - NYTimes.com". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-11-11.
  15. ^ Marks, Martin Miller (1997). Music and the Silent Film: Contexts and Case Studies, 1895-1924. Oxford University Press. p. 235. ISBN 978-0-19-506891-7.
  16. ^ Dahl, Ingolf (1949). Music for Brass Instruments. Alfred Music. ISBN 978-1-4574-9615-8.
  17. ^ Shepherd, Arthur (1927). Triptych: for high voice and string quartet. Society for the Publication of American Music. p. 30.
  18. ^ a b Toff, Nancy (1996). The Flute Book: A Complete Guide for Students and Performers. Oxford University Press. p. 271. ISBN 978-0-19-510502-5.
  19. ^ "Award to Miss Kettering with Bornschein in Contest" (PDF). The Diapason. 34 (3): 12. February 1, 1943. Archived from the original (PDF) on October 31, 2022. Retrieved October 31, 2022.
  20. ^ Kirby, Fred (August 10, 1968). "Classical Notes". Billboard. p. 38.
  21. ^ "TimesMachine: Friday September 4, 1942 - NYTimes.com". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-11-11.
  22. ^ Gevinson, Alan (1997). Within Our Gates: Ethnicity in American Feature Films, 1911-1960. University of California Press. p. 147. ISBN 978-0-520-20964-0.
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