Virgil Thomson (November 25, 1896 – September 30, 1989) was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music. He has been described as a modernist,Dickinson, Peter. 1986. "Stein Satie Cummings Thomson Berners Cage: Toward a Context for the Music of Virgil Thomson". The Musical Quarterly 72, no. 3:394–409.Lerner, Neil William. 1997. "The Classical Documentary Score in American Films of Persuasion: Contexts and Case Studies, 1936–1945". PhD diss. Duke University.Kime, Mary W. 1989. "Modernism and Americana: A Study of The Mother of Us All". Ars Musica Denver 2, no. 1 (Fall): pp. 24–29.Watson, Steven. 1998. Prepare for Saints: Gertrude Stein, Virgil Thomson, and the Mainstreaming of American Modernism. New York: Random House, 1998; (cloth); reissued in paperback, University of California Berkeley Press, 2000; a neoromantic,Thomson, Virgil. 2002. Virgil Thomson: A Reader: Selected Writings, 1924–1984, edited by Richard Kostelanetz. New York: Routledge; . p. 268 a neoclassicist,Glanville-Hicks, Peggy. 1949b. "Virgil Thomson". The Musical Quarterly 35, no. 2 (April): 209–225, citation on p. 210 and a composer of "an Olympian blend of humanity and detachment"Glanville-Hicks, Peggy. 1949a. "Virgil Thomson: Four Saints in Three Acts". Notes, second series, 6, no. 2 (March): pp. 328–330. whose "expressive voice was always carefully muted" until his late opera Lord Byron which, in contrast to all his previous work, exhibited an emotional content that rises to "moments of real passion".Griffiths, Paul. 2001. "Thomson, Virgil", in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell. London: Macmillan Publishers; New York: Grove's Dictionaries.
Biography
Early years Thomson was born in Kansas City, Missouri. As a child he befriended Alice Smith, great-granddaughter of Joseph Smith, founder of the Latter-day Saint movement. During his youth he often played the organ in Grace Church (now Grace and Holy Trinity Cathedral), as his piano teacher was the church's organist. After World War I, he entered Harvard University thanks to a loan from Dr. Fred M. Smith, the president of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and father of Alice Smith. His tours of Europe with the Harvard Glee Club helped nurture his desire to return there.
At Harvard, Thomson focused his studies on the piano work of Erik Satie. He studied in Paris on fellowship for a year, and after graduating lived in Paris from 1925 until 1940. While studying in Paris he was influenced by several French composers who were members of "Les Six" including: Darius Milhaud, Francis Poulenc, Arthur Honegger, Georges Auric, and Germaine Tailleferre."Virgil Thomson", Encyclopædia Britannica He eventually studied with Nadia Boulanger and became a fixture of "Paris in the twenties".
In Paris in 1925, he cemented a relationship with painter Maurice Grosser, who was to become his life partner and frequent collaborator. Later he and Grosser lived at the Hotel Chelsea, where he presided over a largely gay salon that attracted many of the leading figures in music and art and theater, including Leonard Bernstein, Tennessee Williams, and many others. He also encouraged many younger composers and literary figures such as Theodor Adorno, Ned Rorem, Lou Harrison, John Cage, Frank O'Hara, and Paul Bowles. Grosser died in 1986, three years before Thomson.Patricia Juliana Smith (2002), "Virgil Thomson", glbtqarchive.com
His most important friend from this period was Gertrude Stein, who was an artistic collaborator and mentor to him. After meeting Stein in Paris in 1926, Thomson invited her to prepare a libretto for an opera which he hoped to compose. Their collaboration resulted in the premier of the groundbreaking composition Four Saints in Three Acts in 1934. At the time, the opera was noted for its form, musical content and the portrayal of European saints by an all-black cast. Years later in 1947, he collaborated once again with Stein on his provocative opera The Mother of Us All which portrays the life of the social reformer Susan B. Anthony. Thomson incorporated musical elements from Baptist hymns, Gregorian chants and popular songs into both scores while demonstrating a restrained use of dissonance.
Thomson's contributions to music were not limited to the operatic stage, however. In 1936, he established a collaboration with the film director Pare Lorentz and composed music for the documentary film The Plow That Broke the Plains for the United States government's Resettlement Administration (RA). Thomson incorporated folk melodies and religious musical themes into the film score and subsequently composed an orchestral suite of the same name which was recorded by Leopold Stokowski and the Hollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra in 1946 for RCA Victor (# 11-9522,11-9523).The Plow That Broke the Plains – Suite score by Virgil Thomson as recorded by Leopold Stokowski and the Hollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra in 1946 on archive.org In 1938 he also formed a collaboration with Lorentz and the operatic singer Thomas Hardie Chalmers on the documentary film The River for the United States government's Farm Security Administration.The River by Farm Security Administration, Paul Lorentz & Virgil Thomson on Archive.org Thomson composed an orchestra suite based on the score; when it was published, the musical journal Notes commented: "Delightful as background music, the piece is an awful bore when you try to give it your full attention".Evett, Robert. "Virgil Thomson: Suite from The River", Notes, vol. 16, no. 1 (December, 1958), pp. 162–163
Subsequently, in 1948 he collaborated with the director Robert J. Flaherty on the docufiction film Louisiana Story, for which he received the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1949. At the time, the award was the only Pulitzer Prize in music granted for a musical composition written exclusively for film.The Pulitzer Prizes – Music for the Film Louisiana Story by Virgil Thomson – 1949 Pulitzer prize Winner, Virgil Thomson on pulitzer.org Thomson's suite based on the score was premiered by Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1949 to widespread critical acclaim.
Following the publication of his book, The State of Music, Thomson established himself in New York City as a rival of Aaron Copland. Thomson's criticisms of Copland were phrased in terms that brought accusations of antisemitism, but Copland remained on good terms with him, and Thomson admitted his envy of Copland's greater success as a composer.Ivry, Benjamin. "Was Our Greatest Composer-Critic an Unrepentant Anti-Semite?", Forward, April 10, 2015 Thomson was also a music critic for the New York Herald Tribune from 1940 to 1954.See Virgil Thomson biography here A fellow critic, Robert Miles, accused him of being "vindictive and of settling scores in print".Miles, Robert. "Virgil Thomson All Told", The Sewanee Review, vol. 106, no. 1 (Winter, 1998), pp. xx–xxii In a 1997 article in American Music, Suzanne Robinson writes that Thomson, motivated by "a mixture of spite, national pride, and professional jealousy" was consistently "severe and spiteful" to Benjamin Britten.Robinson, Suzanne. "An English Composer Sees America: Benjamin Britten and the North American Press, 1939–42", American Music, vol. 15, no. 3 (Autumn 1997), pp. 321–351 Miles records that Thomson agitated for more performances in New York of new music, including his own.
Thomson's definition of music was "that which musicians do",Rorem, Ned A Ned Rorem Reader (New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, 2001) p. 223 and his views on music are radical in their insistence on reducing the rarefied aesthetics of music to market activity. He even went so far as to claim that the style a piece was written in could be most effectively understood as a consequence of its income source.
Later years In 1969, Thomson composed Metropolitan Museum Fanfare: Portrait Of An American Artist to accompany the Museum's Centennial exhibition "New York Painting And Sculpture: 1940–1970".Finding aid for the George Trescher records related to The Metropolitan Museum of Art Centennial, 1949, 1960–1971 (bulk 1967–1970). The Metropolitan Museum of Art; retrieved August 6, 2014.Tommasini, Anthony, Virgil Thomson's Musical Portraits (New York: Pendragon Press, 1986), p. 19. .
Thomson became a sort of mentor and father figure to a new generation of American tonal composers such as Ned Rorem, Paul Bowles and Leonard Bernstein, a circle united as much by their shared homosexuality as by their similar compositional sensibilities.Hubbs, Nadine. The Queer Composition of America's Sound; Gay Modernists, American Music, and National Identity (Berkeley and Los Angeles, California: University of California Press, 2004). Women composers were not part of that circle, and one writer has suggested that, as a critic, he selectively omitted mention of their works, or adopted a more passive tone when praising them.Karen L. Carter-Schwendler. "Virgil Thomson's Herald Tribune Writings: Fulfilling the 'Cultural Obligation' Selectively", in IAWM Journal, June 1995, pp. 12–15.
Awards and honors Thomson was a recipient of Yale University's Sanford Medal.Leading clarinetist to receive Sanford Medal , tourdates.co.uk; accessed October 31, 2015. In 1949, he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music for the score to the film Louisiana Story and in 1977, he was awarded The Edward MacDowell Medal by The MacDowell Colony for outstanding contributions to American culture. In addition, the Kennedy Center Honors award was bestowed upon Thomson in 1983. In 1988, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Ronald Reagan.Lifetime Honors – National Medal of Arts , nea.gov; accessed October 31, 2015.Virgil Thomson: Music Chronicles 1940–1954 Virgil Thomson. Library of America and Penguin Random House, New York 2014 See Chronology 1988. Virgil Thomson and National Medal of Arts and Ronald Reagan He was a National Patron of Delta Omicron, an international professional music fraternity.Delta Omicron , delta-omicron.org; accessed October 31, 2015.
Death Thomson died on September 30, 1989, in his suite at the Hotel Chelsea in Manhattan, aged 92. He had lived at the Chelsea for close to 50 years.
Works Thomson's compositions are:
Operas
Four Saints in Three Acts, libretto by Gertrude Stein (1928) The Mother of Us All, libretto by Gertrude Stein, 1947 Lord Byron, libretto by Jack Larson (1966–1968)
Ballet
Filling Station choreography by Lew Christensen (1937) Bayou choreography by George Balanchine (1952); music from Acadian Songs and Dances from the film Louisiana Story The Harvest According choreography by Agnes de Mille (1952); music from Symphony on a Hymn Tune, Concerto for Cello, and Suite from The Mother of Us All Hurray! (originally entitled Fourth of July, 1900) choreography by Erick Hawkins (1975) music: Symphony No. 2 Parson Weems and the Cherry Tree choreography by Erick Hawkins (1975)
Film scores
The Plow That Broke the Plains, film by Pare Lorentz (1936) Produced by the Works Progress Administration—Farm Security Administration The River, film by Pare Lorentz (1937) Produced by the Works Progress Administration—Farm Security Administration The Spanish Earth, film by Joris Ivens and Ernest Hemingway (1937) A montage of recorded Spanish folk music made in collaboration with Marc Blitzstein Tuesday in November, a U.S. Office of War Information film by John Berry (1945) Louisiana Story, film by Robert Flaherty (1948) The Goddess La Deesse, film written by Paddy Chayevsky, directed by John Cromwell (1957) Power Among Men, produced by the United Nations film unit (1958) Journey to America, a film for the U.S. Pavilion at the New York World's Fair, produced and directed by John Houseman (1964) The Baby Maker, film by James Bridges (1970) Suddenly an Eagle, ABC News film (1975)