Marion Bauer facts for kids

Marion Bauer (1922)

Marion Eugénie Bauer (born August 15, 1882 – died August 9, 1955) was an American composer, teacher, writer, and music critic. She helped shape American music in the early 1900s.

Marion Bauer wrote music for piano, small groups of instruments (chamber ensembles), and large orchestras. She also wrote for solo singers and vocal groups. She became a well-known teacher at New York University from 1926 to 1951. There, she taught music history and how to compose music. Bauer also gave guest lectures at the Juilliard School from 1940 until she passed away.

Besides teaching, Bauer wrote a lot about music. She was an editor for the Musical Leader magazine. She also wrote and co-wrote several books, including Twentieth Century Music in 1933.

Throughout her life, Marion Bauer supported not only her own music but also new music in general. She helped start important groups like the American Music Guild, the American Music Center, and the American Composer's Alliance. She was often the only woman in a leadership role in these organizations.

Bauer's music often used interesting harmonies and sounds that were a bit different. However, it usually stayed within traditional musical styles. She did try out a more modern style called serialism for a short time in the 1940s. Many of her works were performed during her lifetime. A famous performance was when the New York Philharmonic played her piece Sun Splendor in 1947. Also, in 1951, a whole concert at New York Town Hall was dedicated just to her music.

Biography

Early life

Marion Bauer was born in Walla Walla, Washington, on August 15, 1882. Her parents were from France and had moved to the United States. Her father, Jacques Bauer, was a shopkeeper, and her mother, Julie Bauer, taught languages. Marion was the youngest of seven children. Her oldest sister, Emilie, was 17 years older. Once, when Marion was a baby, she was placed in a basket on top of the family's piano while Emilie practiced.

As Marion grew up, her father, who loved music, noticed her talent. Marion began learning piano from Emilie. After her father died in 1890, the family moved to Portland, Oregon. Marion finished school there in 1898. Then, she joined her sister Emilie in New York City to focus on becoming a composer.

Studies

In New York, Marion Bauer studied with Henry Holden Huss, Eugene Heffley, and her sister Emilie. In 1905, she met Raoul Pugno, a French musician visiting New York. Because Marion spoke both French and English, she taught English to Pugno and his family. In return, Pugno invited her to study with him in Paris in 1906.

While in Paris, Bauer also became the first American to study with Nadia Boulanger. Boulanger was a famous music teacher who later taught composers like Aaron Copland. Just as she did with Pugno, Bauer taught Boulanger English in exchange for composition lessons.

When she returned to New York in 1907, Bauer continued her studies. She also started teaching piano and music theory. From 1910 to 1911, she studied in Europe again, focusing on music form and counterpoint in Berlin. After this, in 1912, she began to be recognized as a serious composer. She even signed a seven-year contract with a music publisher.

Bauer continued to compose and teach privately. She went back to Europe to study two more times. In 1914, she returned to Berlin, but World War I cut her studies short. Almost ten years later, she studied at the Paris Conservatory with André Gedalge. She was 40 years old at the time. She explained that she wanted to improve her skills and find the right musical environment. However, her studies were cut short in 1926 when her sister Emilie was hit by a car. Bauer returned to New York, but Emilie later died from her injuries.

Career

Even though Marion Bauer never earned a college degree, she was hired by New York University's music department in September 1926. She became their first female music teacher. She taught classes in composition, music analysis, and music history. She became an associate professor in 1930. Bauer used her own books for teaching and encouraged discussions. She also strongly supported new music. Some of her famous students included Milton Babbitt and Miriam Gideon.

Besides NYU, Bauer lectured at Juilliard and Columbia University. She also gave talks and concerts about 20th-century music with pianist Harrison Potter. During the Great Depression, she taught at other schools like Mills College and the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music.

Even with all her teaching, Bauer kept composing. She spent twelve summers at the MacDowell Colony, a place for artists. There, she met other composers like Ruth Crawford Seeger. Bauer also helped create the American Music Guild, the American Music Center, and the American Composer's Alliance. She was on the board of these groups. In 1937, Aaron Copland asked her to join the board of the League of Composers. She also helped start the Society of American Women Composers in 1925.

As a writer and music critic, Bauer was respected for her smart ideas about new music. She wrote for different journals and was the editor of the Musical Leader. Her most famous book was Twentieth Century Music. She also made new music easy to understand for everyone with books like How Music Grew. Bauer believed all kinds of music were important. Her book Twentieth Century Music was one of the first to discuss serialism. It also mentioned many women composers and included jazz music, which was unusual for textbooks at the time.

Later years

In 1951, Marion Bauer retired from NYU, but she continued to lecture at Juilliard. On August 6, 1955, she attended a meeting of composers. Three days later, on August 9, 1955, she died of a heart attack while on vacation. She was almost 73 years old. She is buried with her sisters in Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, New York.

Music

Style and influences

Marion Bauer supported modern music, but her own compositions were often more traditional. Her works from the 1910s and 1920s usually had a clear musical center. She only briefly explored serialism in the 1940s. Her music often focused on strong melodies and used interesting, colorful harmonies.

Her music showed influences from both impressionistic and romantic styles. After studying with Gedalge in Paris, her style became more impressionistic. This can be heard in her 1924 works, Quietude and Turbulence. For the rest of her career, she mixed the romantic style she learned in Germany with the impressionism she found in Paris. Her friend Charles Tomlinson Griffes also influenced her. For example, her 1917 piano work Three Impressions is similar to Griffes's Roman Sketches.

Bauer played an important role in developing new kinds of harmony in American music. Along with Ernest Bloch, she was one of the first American composers to experiment with quintal harmony. This means building chords using intervals of a fifth. Her 1926 piano version of Sun Splendor shows this. This technique later influenced the music of Aaron Copland.

Notable collaborations and performances

During her lifetime, Marion Bauer's music was well-liked by musicians, critics, and the public. In 1912, the famous violinist Maud Powell asked Bauer to write "Up the Ocklawaha." This piece for violin and piano was praised when it was first performed. In 1915 and 1916, well-known opera singers performed concerts featuring only Bauer's songs.

Because she was active in many music groups, Bauer was able to have her larger works performed. She was the second woman to have her music played by the New York Philharmonic. Leopold Stokowski conducted the first performance of her Sun Splendor at Carnegie Hall in 1947.

One of the most important moments in Bauer's career was a concert on May 8, 1951, at New York Town Hall. This concert was completely dedicated to her music. It featured works from her entire career, including two pieces that had never been performed before. A critic from New York Times wrote positively about the event, saying her music was clear and sincere.

Personal life

Personality

Friends, colleagues, and students remember Marion Bauer as a kind, warm, and generous person. Milton Babbitt, one of her students, said that he and his classmates affectionately called her "Aunt Marion." This was because of her motherly manner and how comfortable her classes felt, like having tea in a friendly parlor. Babbitt also described her as generous and sensitive, especially in helping her students with their careers.

Religious affiliation

Marion Bauer was born to Jewish parents. However, it is not clear if she practiced Judaism as an adult. Her memorial service was led by a rabbi. But she was later cremated, which is not allowed in traditional Jewish law. Some former students believed she practiced Christian Science. A letter she wrote in 1923 also showed her interest in publishing a song for a Christian Science service. However, there is no official confirmation of her religious beliefs.

Legacy

Marion Bauer's legacy includes her many compositions (at least 160 works) and her five books. But her impact on the careers of other composers, like Ruth Crawford Seeger and Milton Babbitt, is also very important. Both became well-known American composers.

After meeting at the MacDowell Colony in 1929, Bauer encouraged Crawford's composing efforts. She greatly helped Crawford's musical growth and made her more visible in the music world. Bauer used her position at the Musical Leader to publish a very positive review of Crawford's music. She also introduced Crawford to an editor at a major publishing company.

Bauer also played a big part in Babbitt's career. Babbitt decided to study with her at NYU in 1934 after reading her book Twentieth Century Music. He remembered how much he appreciated that her book discussed modern music that was often ignored by others. He especially liked her discussion of serialist composers, which included musical examples. During the Great Depression, it was very expensive to buy new music scores, and few libraries had them. Babbitt greatly respected Bauer, saying in 1983 that she was "a wonderful lady" whose name he would try to "immortalize."

Works

(From the list of Bauer's works in New Grove unless otherwise indicated)

Written Works

(From the list of Bauer's works in New Grove)

• With Ethel Peyser: How Music Grew: From Prehistoric Times to the Present Day (New York: 1925, rev. 1939)
• With Ethel Peyser: Music through the Ages: a Narrative for Student and Layman (New York, 1932, enlarged 3/1967 by Elizabeth Rogers as Music through the Ages: an Introduction to Music History)
• Twentieth Century Music (New York, 1933, rev. 2/1947)
• Musical Questions and Quizzes: a Digest of Information about Music (New York, 1941)
• With Ethel Peyser: How Opera Grew: from Ancient Greece to the Present Day (New York, 1956)

See also

In Spanish: Marion Bauer para niños