Aaron Copland was one of the most innovative and highly respected
American classical composers of the twentieth century.
Teenage musician
Copland was born in Brooklyn to a family of Lithuanian Jewish descent
on November 14, 1900. Although never directly encouraged by his parents, Copland demonstrated an interest in and talent for music by his
teenage years. He took piano lessons from his older sister and, while in
high school, began studying music in Manhattan with Rubin Goldmark
(1872–1936), a private instructor who taught Copland the basics of
music theory and composition. Copland also attended many concerts,
educating himself in the great works written for orchestra.
Copland left New York at the age of twenty to study at the Summer
School of Music for American Students in France. There he found a
home within a musical community, and he sold his first composition to
the most well-known music publisher in the country. In 1925, he composed a piece for the Boston Symphony Orchestra at the request of conductor Serge Koussevitsky (1874–1951). His Symphony for Organ and
Orchestra marked Copland’s entry into professional American music.
Jazz and folk influences
Copland’s compositions were heavily influenced by jazz. The young
composer incorporated the techniques and sounds of jazz—which he
saw as the first truly American musical movement—to develop a new
type of symphonic music. He hoped this new American music would
distinguish itself from its European roots.
Copland moved away from jazz in the late 1920s and concentrated
instead on the popular music of other countries, including the folk
music of Mexico. Certain that classical music could be as popular as jazz
in America, he joined various composers’ organizations to promote
music and build audiences. Copland wanted to help lead the way as a
music pioneer. To that end, he partnered with his friend Roger Sessions
(1896–1985), also a composer, to present the works of young composers
in the Copland-Sessions concerts.
Around this same time, Copland began planning the first American
music festival. Europe had been hosting such festivals for years, and
Copland felt it was time for America to catch up to Europe, musically
speaking. The Yaddo Festival of American Music made its debut in 1932.
Ballets, movies, and a fanfare
By the mid-1930s, Copland was one of the most popular composers in
America. He applied his talent to writing music for ballets and movies,
hoping to win wider audiences. His collaborations with modern dance
choreographers Agnes de Mille (1905?–1993) and Martha Graham
(1894–1991) produced two of the most beloved works of American
dance—de Mille’s Rodeo (1942) and Graham’s Appalachian Spring
(1944), for which Copland won the Pulitzer Prize. Some of his most famous movie scores are those he wrote for Of Mice and Men (1939), Our
Town (1940), and The Heiress (1949), for which he won an Academy
Award for best score.
During this period, Copland also wrote what has become his most
familiar work. Written in 1942 for the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra,
Fanfare for the Common Man, for brass and percussion, has often been
played at national political events and by various rock bands.
Conductor, teacher, writer
In the 1950s, Copland turned his attention to conducting, and his output as a composer began to slow down. He toured the world for the next
twenty years, conducting his own work as well as that of other composers. During this time, he also made many important recordings that
preserve the major works of mid-twentieth-century American music.
By the early 1970s, Copland’s career as a composer of original works
was behind him. He conducted his last symphony in 1983. His other
major contribution to American music was as a teacher at colleges and
music festivals, where he inspired many young composers and musicians.
He also earned acclaim as a scholar of music, writing more than sixty articles and essays and publishing five books by the time of his death in
1990. Because of his own compositions as well as the ardent support he
lent to other American composers, Copland is recognized as one of the
major influences on American music.