ErnstBacon.org
Title
The Ernst Bacon Society Home Page
Contact
- The Ernst Bacon Society, Inc.
-
- Roslindale MA
- United States 02131
-
- +1.61746900
Description
American composer Ernst Bacon was born in Chicago on May 26, 1898. A recipient of three Guggenheim Fellowships and a Pulitzer Award for his First Symphony, his body of works includes symphonies, piano concertos, chamber music, ballets, and more than 250 songs, as well as several books about music. Bacon's music reflects the dual heritage of his Austrian mother and American father. While influenced by the 19th century classical tradition of Schubert and Brahms, it also reveals the strength and vitality of his American roots.
His chief aim as a composer was to express the spirit of America in music as Whitman, Emerson, Melville and others did in literature. He was deeply interested in our country's history and folklore, as well as its indigenous music; and the poetry, folk songs, jazz rhythms and geography of America as well as the landscape itself, which he hiked, climbed, and also painted -- all of these elements found their way into his music.
"The Artist should not forget his mission, perhaps the most religious of all, of sustaining faith in the worthwhileness of art and thus of life."
