Henry Kimball Hadley was an American composer and conductor.

Life

Hadley was born into a musical family in Somerville, Massachusetts

Somerville, Massachusetts

Somerville is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, located just north of Boston. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 75,754 and was the most densely populated municipality in New England. It is also the 17th most densely populated incorporated place in...

. His father, from whom he received his first musical instruction, was a secondary school music teacher, his mother was active in church music, and his brother Arthur went on to a successful career as a professional cellist. Hadley studied violin and harmony, and, from the age of fourteen, he took composition lessons from the prominent American composer George Whitefield Chadwick

George Whitefield Chadwick

George Whitefield Chadwick was an American composer. Along with Horatio Parker, Amy Beach, Arthur Foote, and Edward MacDowell, he was a representative composer of what can be called the New England School of American composers of the late 19th century—the generation before Charles Ives...

. Under Chadwick's tuteladge, Hadley composed many works, including songs, chamber music, a musical, and an orchestral overture.

In 1893, Hadley toured with the Laura Schirmer-Mapleson Opera Company as a violinist. But he left the tour when the company encountered financial difficulties and was unable to pay his salary.

In 1894, he travelled to Vienna

Vienna

Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

 to further his studies with Eusebius Mandyczewski

Eusebius Mandyczewski

Eusebius Mandyczewski was a musicologist, composer, conductor, and teacher. He was an author of numerous musical works and is highly regarded within Austrian, Romanian and Ukrainian music circles.- Family and friends :...

. Hadley loved the artistic atmosphere of the city, where he could attend countless concerts and operas, and where he occasionlly saw Brahms

Johannes Brahms

Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist, and one of the leading musicians of the Romantic period. Born in Hamburg, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria, where he was a leader of the musical scene...

 in the cafes. During this period Hadley also befriended the German-American conductor Adolf Neuendorff

Adolf Neuendorff

Adolf Heinrich Anton Magnus Neuendorff, also known as Adolph Neuendorff was a German-American composer, violinist, pianist and conductor, stage director and theater manager.-Early years:...

, who gave him gave him advice regarding his compositions.

Returning to the United States in 1896, Hadley took a position as the musical instructor at St. Paul's Episcopal School for Boys in Garden City

Garden City, New York

Garden City is a village in the town of Hempstead in central Nassau County, New York, in the United States. It was founded by multi-millionaire Alexander Turney Stewart in 1869, and is located on Long Island, to the east of New York City, from mid-town Manhattan, and just south of the town of...

, New York. He wrote some of his important early compositions during his time there, including his overture In Bohemia, and his first and second symphonies. He also found prominent conductors to perform them, such as Walter Damrosch, Victor Herbert

Victor Herbert

Victor August Herbert was an Irish-born, German-raised American composer, cellist and conductor. Although Herbert enjoyed important careers as a cello soloist and conductor, he is best known for composing many successful operettas that premiered on Broadway from the 1890s to World War I...

, John Philip Sousa

John Philip Sousa

John Philip Sousa was an American composer and conductor of the late Romantic era, known particularly for American military and patriotic marches. Because of his mastery of march composition, he is known as "The March King" or the "American March King" due to his British counterpart Kenneth J....

, and Anton Seidl

Anton Seidl

Anton Seidl was a Hungarian conductor.-Biography:He was born at Pest, Hungary. He began the study of music at a very early age, and when only seven years old could pick out at the piano melodies which he had heard at the theatre...

. Hadley made his own debut as a conductor on January 16, 1900, at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel, leading a program mostly made up of his own works.

In an age when American orchestras preferred European conductors to home grown ones, Hadley felt that he needed to establish himself in Europe. So he returned to Europe in 1904 to tour, compose, and study with Ludwig Thuille

Ludwig Thuille

Ludwig Thuille was a German composer and teacher, numbered for a while among the leading operatic composers of the 'Munich School', whose most famous representative was Richard Strauss.-Biography:...

 in Munich. It is possible that his studies with Thuille were suggested by Richard Strauss

Richard Strauss

Richard Georg Strauss was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, which include Der Rosenkavalier and Salome; his Lieder, especially his Four Last Songs; and his tone poems and orchestral works, such as Death and Transfiguration, Till...

, whom Hadley met shortly after arriving in Europe. Hadley composed his symphonic poem Salome

Salome

Salome , the Daughter of Herodias , is known from the New Testament...

in 1905, not realizing that Strauss, whom he greatly admired, was working on an opera on the same subject. The work was eventually performed in at least 19 European cities, and he was invited to conduct it, along with his newly finished third symphony, with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra

Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra

The Berlin Philharmonic, German: , formerly Berliner Philharmonisches Orchester , is an orchestra based in Berlin, Germany. In 2006, a group of ten European media outlets voted the Berlin Philharmonic number three on a list of "top ten European Orchestras", after the Vienna Philharmonic and the...

 in 1907. In the same year, he obtained a position as an assistant conductor at the opera house in Mainz

Mainz

Mainz under the Holy Roman Empire, and previously was a Roman fort city which commanded the west bank of the Rhine and formed part of the northernmost frontier of the Roman Empire...

. In April 1909, his first opera, Safié

Safié

Safié is a one act opera by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley. The opera's libretto was written in English by Edward Oxenford, but its premiere, on April 4, 1909 in Mainz, Germany, was given in a German translation by Otto Neitzel...

, premiered in Mainz under the composer's baton.

Later that year he returned to the United States to take a position as conductor of the Seattle Symphony Orchestra. In 1911, he became the first conductor of the San Francisco Symphony

San Francisco Symphony

The San Francisco Symphony is an orchestra based in San Francisco, California. Since 1980, the orchestra has performed at the Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall. The San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra and the San Francisco Symphony Chorus are part of the organization...

. Hadley encountered some difficulties in San Francisco, where he tried to turn a group of theater musicians in to a first rate orchestra. He brought a number of excellent musicians from the east, including his brother Arthur, to be principals in the new orchestra, but this created some resentments among the locals. None-the-less, by his departure in 1915, the orchestra had made great strides.

Hadley returned to New York in 1915, where he made many appearances as a guest conductor, and premiered many of his best known works. In 1918 he married the concert singer Inez Barbour, who thereafter sang many of her husband's works. Between 1917 and 1920 three of Hadley's operas received high profile premieres, including Cleopatra's Night

Cleopatra's Night

Cleopatra's Night is a short opera in two acts by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley. Its libretto is by Alice Leal Pollock based on a story by French author Théophile Gautier. The opera premiered at the Metropolitan Opera on January 31, 1920...

which bowed at the Metropolitan Opera

Metropolitan Opera

The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...

 on January 31, 1920. Hadley conducted some of the performances, becoming the first American composer to conduct his own opera at the Met, and the opera was revived the following season. Several critics judged it the best among the ten American operas to appear at the Met to that point.

In 1921 Hadley was invited to become the associate conductor of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, the first American conductor to hold a full-time post with a major American orchestra. During his years there, his conducting received excellent reviews. As well as occasionally taking the helm for regular Philharmonic concerts, Hadley was assigned to lead stadium concerts during the summer, where he selected many works by American composers. He was eventually asked to regularly select American works for the Philharmonic to perform. He remained in this post until 1927, when he resigned.

In that same year, Hadley was invited to conduct the first half of the season of the Philharmonic Orchestra of Buenos Aires, in Argentina

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

, the first American to conduct the orchestra (the second half was conducted by legendary Clemens Krauss

Clemens Krauss

Clemens Heinrich Krauss was an Austrian conductor and opera impresario, particularly associated with the music of Richard Strauss.-Biography:...

).

In 1929, Hadley was invited to become the conductor of the newly formed Manhattan Symphony Orchestra. He led the orchestra for three seasons, including an American work in every concert. He then stepped down due to his frustrations with fundraising for the orchestra in the wake of the stock market crash.

In 1930, was invited to conduct six concerts with New Symphony Orchestra in Tokyo, Japan. His visit to the orient was met with great enthusiasm, and he composed a new orchestral suite, Streets of Pekin, inspired by a side trip to China, and led its world premiere with the Japanese orchestra.

In 1933, Hadley founded the National Association for American Composers and Conductors, which exists to this day. He was also instrumental in establishing the Berkshire Music Festival at Tanglewood

Tanglewood

Tanglewood is an estate and music venue in Lenox and Stockbridge, Massachusetts. It is the home of the annual summer Tanglewood Music Festival and the Tanglewood Jazz Festival, and has been the Boston Symphony Orchestra's summer home since 1937. It was the venue of the Berkshire Festival.- History...

, Massachusetts

Massachusetts

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

 in 1934.

In 1932, Hadley was diagnosed with cancer. Surgery was initially successful, and Hadley continued his career as a composer and guest conductor. However, Hadley's popularity as a composer began to wane, as popular and especially critical opinion turned against the robust romanticism which Hadley's music embodied. Hadley's cancer recurred, and he died in New York City in 1937.

Works

Henry Hadley was one of the most performed and published American composers of his day. He considered himself first and foremost an orchestral composer, to which his many overtures, symphonic poems, orchestral suites, and symphonies attest. He also wrote brief concertos for both cello (his Konzertstuck) and piano (his Concertino, Op. 131).

Yet he also wrote a large number of stage works, including several operettas and musicals, along with his five operas. Though his operas Azora and Cleopatra's Night received the most attention, his comedy Bianca, which won a prize offered by the American Society of Singers for the best chamber opera in English, perhaps due to its modest demands, received a number of performances during Hadley's lifetime and a few afterawards, even appearing in Japan in the early 1950s.

During his years in San Francisco, Hadley made friends among the city's elite, which led him to become a member of the exclusive Bohemian Club

Bohemian Club

The Bohemian Club is a private men's club in San Francisco, California, United States.Its clubhouse is located at 624 Taylor Street in San Francisco...

, for which he wrote three "music dramas", designed to be given a single performance outdoors at the Bohemian Grove

Bohemian Grove

Bohemian Grove is a campground located at 20601 Bohemian Avenue, in Monte Rio, California, belonging to a private San Francisco-based men's art club known as the Bohemian Club...

 in Northern California. These works were very similar to operas, but also contained some spoken dialogue. Hadley later adapted music from these works to be performed as orchestral suites.

Hadley also wrote a large number of cantatas and oratorios, some of them, such as Resurgam, conceived on a very large scale. Among his more modestly scaled works are a large number of art songs, some of which he orchestrated. He also wrote a number of chamber works.

Hadley was also a pioneer in film music. He was invited by Warner Bros.

Warner Bros.

Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...

 to conduct The New York Philharmonic

New York Philharmonic

The New York Philharmonic is a symphony orchestra based in New York City in the United States. It is one of the American orchestras commonly referred to as the "Big Five"...

 for the soundtrack music for its 1926 film, Don Juan

Don Juan (1926 film)

Don Juan is a Warner Brothers film, directed by Alan Crosland. It was the first feature-length film with synchronized Vitaphone sound effects and musical soundtrack, though it has no spoken dialogue...

with John Barrymore

John Barrymore

John Sidney Blyth , better known as John Barrymore, was an acclaimed American actor. He first gained fame as a handsome stage actor in light comedy, then high drama and culminating in groundbreaking portrayals in Shakespearean plays Hamlet and Richard III...

; this was the first feature film with synchronized music and sound effects. He was also filmed with the New York Philharmonic conducting the overture to Wagner's opera Tannhäuser

Tannhäuser (opera)

Tannhäuser is an opera in three acts, music and text by Richard Wagner, based on the two German legends of Tannhäuser and the song contest at Wartburg...

. He wrote a complete original score for the 1927 Barrymore film When a Man Loves

When a Man Loves

Manon Lescaut is a 1926 silent German feature film based on the oft-filmed novel by Abbe Prevost. It stars Lya De Putti and was directed by Arthur Robison. It was produced and distributed by renown German film company Universum Film AG better known as UFA. A young actress named Marlene Dietrich had...

.

The majority of Hadley's personal papers and scores are housed in the Music Division of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.

During his lifetime, Hadley's music was immensely popular, and was a regular part of the repertory of America's top orchestras, and was also performed in Europe. Many legendary conductors performed his music, including Gustav Mahler

Gustav Mahler

Gustav Mahler was a late-Romantic Austrian composer and one of the leading conductors of his generation. He was born in the village of Kalischt, Bohemia, in what was then Austria-Hungary, now Kaliště in the Czech Republic...

, Leopold Stokowski

Leopold Stokowski

Leopold Anthony Stokowski was a British-born, naturalised American orchestral conductor, well known for his free-hand performing style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from many of the great orchestras he conducted.In America, Stokowski...

, Serge Koussevitzky

Serge Koussevitzky

Serge Koussevitzky , was a Russian-born Jewish conductor, composer and double-bassist, known for his long tenure as music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra from 1924 to 1949.-Early career:...

, and Karl Muck

Karl Muck

Karl Muck was a German-born conductor of classical music. He based his activities principally in Europe and mostly in opera. His American career comprised two stints at the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He endured a public outcry in 1917 that questioned whether his loyalties lay with Germany or the...

. But recently his music has been largely neglected, although a few recordings of his music have been issued.

Operas

• Safié
  Safié
  Safié is a one act opera by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley. The opera's libretto was written in English by Edward Oxenford, but its premiere, on April 4, 1909 in Mainz, Germany, was given in a German translation by Otto Neitzel...
  
  Op. 63, 1909
• Bianca
  Bianca (opera)
  Bianca is a one act opera by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley. The opera's libretto was an English-language adaptation of Carlo Goldoni's comedy The Mistress of the Inn by Grant Stewart...
  
  Op. 79, composed c. 1913, produced 1918
• Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma
  Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma
  Azora, The Daughter of Montezuma is an opera in 3 acts by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley to a libretto in English by author David Stevens.-Synopsis:The story takes place at the time of the conquest of the Aztecs by Cortez...
  
  Op. 80, c. 1914, produced 1917
• Cleopatra's Night
  Cleopatra's Night
  Cleopatra's Night is a short opera in two acts by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley. Its libretto is by Alice Leal Pollock based on a story by French author Théophile Gautier. The opera premiered at the Metropolitan Opera on January 31, 1920...
  
  Op. 90, 1920
• A Night in Old Paris
  A Night in Old Paris
  A Night in Old Paris is a short dramatic opera by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley with an English libretto by Frederick Truesdell, based on a play by Glen Macdonough. It premiered on December 14, 1924 in a private performance at the Metropolitan Opera House as part of a "Lambs Gambol", a...
  
  1924

Symphonies

• Symphony No. 1 in D minor Op. 25 Youth and Life, 1897
• Symphony No. 2 in F minor Op. 30 The Four Seasons, 1899
• Symphony No. 3 in B minor Op. 60 1907
• Symphony No. 4 in D minor Op. 64 North, East, South, West, 1910
• Symphony No. 5 in C minor Op. 140 Connecticut, 1935

Symphonic Poems

• Salome Op. 55, 1905
• The Culprit Fay Op. 62, 1909
• Lucifer Op. 66, 1914
• Othello Op. 96, 1919
• The Ocean Op. 99, 1921

Musical theatre

• The Atonement of Pan, A Music-Drama 1912, a Grove Play
• Semper Virens 1923, a Grove Play
• The Legend of Hani 1933, a Grove Play

Other Orchestral Works

• In Bohemia: Concert Overture, Op. 28
• Herod Overture, Op. 31
• Konzertstuck for violoncello and orchestra, Op. 61 (1909)
• "Aurora Borealis": Overture
• Otello overture, Op. 96 (1919)
• Streets of Pekin
  Streets of Pekin
  Streets of Pekin is an orchestral suite written by American composer Henry Kimball Hadley while visiting Japan in the summer of 1930. It became one of his most popular late works....
  
  (1930)
• The Enchanted Castle, Op. 117
• San Francisco, Op. 121 (1931)
• Concertino for Piano and Orchestra, Op. 131
• Scherzo Diabolique, Op. 135 (1934)

Cantatas and Oratorios

• In Music's Praise Op. 21
• The Princess of Ys Op. 34
• The Legend of Granada Op. 45
• The Nightingale and The Rose Op. 54
• The Fate of Princess Kiyo Op. 58
• The Golden Prince Op. 69
• Music: An Ode Op. 75
• The Fairy Thorn Op. 76
• Prophesy and Fulfillment Op. 91
• Resurgam Op. 98
• Mirtil in Arcadia Op. 100
• Belshazzar Op. 112
• Divine Tragedy Op. 139

Chamber Works

• String Quartet No. 1 in A major, Op. 24
• Piano Trio No. 1 in C major, Op. 26
• Piano Quintet in A minor, Op. 50
• Piano Trio No. 2 in G minor (1932)
• String Quartet No. 2, Op. 132

Selected Recordings

• The Culprit Fay. National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine. c.John Mclaughlin Williams. Label: Naxos American.
• The Ocean. National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine. c.John Mclaughlin Williams. Label: Naxos American.
• Piano Quintet in A minor. Kohon String Quartet with Isabelle Byman. Label: Vox
• Piano Trio in G minor (1932). Rawlins Piano Trio. Label: Albany Records
• Salome. Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. c. Karl Krueger. Label: Bridge
• Scherzo Diabolique. Albany Symphony Orchestra. c. Julius Hegyi Label: New World Records
• Symphony No. 2 The Four Seasons. Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. c. Karl Krueger. Label: Bridge
• Symphony No. 4 North, East, South, West. National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine. c.John Mclaughlin Williams. Label: Naxos American.

External links

• Henry Hadley Biography in the Classical Composers Database
• Henry Hadley in the Encyclopædia Britannica Online
• Henry Hadley Biography at Naxos Records
  Naxos Records
  Naxos Records is a record label specializing in classical music. Through a number of imprints, Naxos also releases genres including Chinese music, jazz, world music, and early rock & roll. The company was founded in 1987 by Klaus Heymann, a German-born resident of Hong Kong.Naxos is the largest...
  
  
• Henry Kimball Hadley and Inez Barbour Programs and Posters at the Newberry Library

Scores

• Free Hadley Scores from the Sibley Library