Nancy Van de Vate explained

Nancy Van de Vate
Birth Name:Nancy Jean Hayes
Birth Date:30 December 1930
Birth Place:Plainfield, New Jersey, U.S.
Death Place:Vienna, Austria

Nancy Jean Van de Vate (; December 30, 1930 – July 29, 2023) was an American-born Austrian composer, violist and pianist. She also used the pseudonyms Helen Huntley and William Huntley. She is known for operas such as All Quiet on the Western Front, and orchestral music such as Chernobyl and Journeys, including concertos like the Kraków Concerto for percussion and orchestra.

Van de Vate taught at several universities in the United States and led composers' organizations such as the Southeastern Composers League and the International League of Women Composers. In 1985, she moved to Vienna, where she taught and founded a CD company for new orchestral music together with her husband.

Life and career

Nancy Jean Hayes was born in Plainfield, New Jersey,[1] on December 30, 1930. Raised in Warren Township, New Jersey,[2] she graduated from North Plainfield High School in 1948.[3] [4] She studied piano on a scholarship at Eastman School of Music[5] [6] and music theory at Wellesley College.[7] She completed graduate degrees in music composition at the University of Mississippi and Florida State University,[8] where she earned a Ph.D.[9] She pursued further studies in electronic music at Dartmouth College and the University of New Hampshire.[10] The first professional performance of her work was in 1958 the Adagio for orchestra.

Van de Vate taught at Memphis State University from 1964 to 1966. She also played viola in the Knoxville Symphony, founded a chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW) in Tennessee, and directed the Southeastern Composers League. She taught at the University of Tennessee (1967), Knoxville College (1968–1969; 1971–1972) and Maryville College (1973–1974).[11] She moved to Hawaii in 1975 [12] where she first taught at the University of Hawaii, and from 1977 to 1980 at the Hawaii Loa College serving there also as Dean of Academic Affairs. She became influenced by Asian music; and moved to Indonesia in 1982 for three years.

In 1975, she founded the League of Women Composers and served as chairperson until 1982; it was renamed the International League of Women Composers in 1979, and was merged into the International Alliance for Women in Music in 1995.[13]

She lived permanently in Vienna from 1985.In 1990 she founded a CD company together with her husband Clyde A. Smith, Vienna Modern Masters, dedicated to new music for orchestra; she directed it after her husband's death. She taught composition at the Institute for European Studies in Vienna (IES). In 2010, the IES named her Composer-in-Residence.[14]

Personal life

In 1952, Van de Vate married Dwight Van de Vate Jr.[15] The couple had three children. They later divorced. She later married Clyde A. Smyth, who died of cancer in 1999.[16]

Van de Vate died on July 29, 2023, at age 92, at home in Vienna.[17] [18] [19]

Work

Van de Vate composed seven operas, many orchestral works including concertos for one or more instruments, and chamber music.[20] [21] Her music has been seen as influenced by Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Penderecki, Crumb and Varèse.

Several of her compositions won international awards, and were nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, the orchestral work Chernobyl also for the Koussevitsky International Recording Award.[22] Her works have been performed internationally.

Recordings

Many of Van de Vate's works were recorded by her CD company Vienna Modern Masters (VMM). A CD of orchestral works was produced in 1990, named after Distant Worlds, and played by the Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by [23] Arnold Whittall reviewed the album for Gramophone; he summarized: "Her orchestral music undoubtedly makes its presence felt, especially by means of densely dissonant climaxes whose weight and seriousness are appropriate to works with such grandly evocative titles", adding that it "lacks that distinctiveness and magnetism".[24]

Her Chernobyl and her Violin Concerto was recorded by the same performers on a 1988 CD of mainly works by Penderecki, titled after Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima.[25] Her Krakow Concerto became the title of a 1991 album by the same performers, including also her Katyn, Schoenberg's A Survivor from Warsaw, and Penderecki's Dies irae.[26]

Her vocal composition Cocaine Lil was recorded by and her ensemble belcanto, as the final track of a 1994 CD named after Hanns Eisler's Woodburry-Liederbüchlein.[27]

Opera

Orchestral

Theatre music

Music for strings

Music for percussion

Music for mixed ensembles

Choral music

Keyboard instruments

Further reading

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Nancy van de Vate . Klassik Heute . July 29, 2023 . de . August 2, 2023.
  2. https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-courier-news-notes-from-warren-towns/147328184/ "Warren Township"
  3. Williams, Alex. "Nancy Van de Vate, 92, Composer and Advocate for Women in Music, Dies", The New York Times, September 30, 2023, updated October 3, 2023. Accessed May 13, 2024. "A gifted pianist since childhood, she studied piano at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y., for a year after graduating from North Plainfield High School in 1948."
  4. https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-courier-news-nancyhayesvandevatew/54359438/ "Miss Hayes to Be Married In Wellesley College Chapel"
  5. Web site: Nancy Van de Vate is Composer-in-Residence for Eastman's Fourth Annual Women in Music Festival – Eastman School of Music . . August 4, 2023 . January 21, 2008 . She also has ties to Eastman, since she attended the school in the 1948–1949 academic year as a first-year piano major before transferring to Wellesley College.
  6. Web site: Nancy van de Vate – Produzentin und Komponistin . . August 4, 2021 . de . August 2, 2023.
  7. Book: Women in Music : An Anthology of Source Readings from the Middle Ages to the Present . Northeastern University Press . 1996 . 1-55553-239-X . Neuls-Bates . Carol . Revised . Boston . 323 . registration .
  8. Encyclopedia: Fuller . Sophie . 2007–2017 . Van de Vate, [née Hayes], Nancy ]. Grove Music Online . oxfordmusiconline.com . 10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.45091 . March 14, 2019 . 978-1-56159-263-0 .
  9. https://snaccooperative.org/view/2299384 Van de Vate, Nancy
  10. Web site: Other Notable Composers . Case . Nelly . January 31, 2018 . cengage.com . January 31, 2018.
  11. Web site: Gale In Context: Biography – Document – Nancy Van de Vate . gale.com . March 4, 2020 .
  12. Web site: Gann . Kyle . American Composer: Nancy Van de Vate . kylegann.com . August 3, 2023 .
  13. Edwards . J. Michele . Lassetter . Leslie . 2001 . Pendle . Karin . North America Since 1920 . Women & Music: A History . Second . Indiana University Press . Bloomington and Indianapolis . 328.
  14. Web site: Institute for European Studies . February 4, 2020.
  15. News: Nancy Jean Hayes Wellesley Bride; Wed in College Chapel After Graduation to Dwight Van de Vate, Jr. Yale Ph.D. Student . The New York Times . June 10, 1952 . August 1, 2023.
  16. Book: Foulkes-Levy . Laurdella . Levy . Burt J. . Journeys through the life and music of Nancy Van de Vate . 2005 . Lanham, Md. : Scarecrow Press . 978-0-8108-5135-1 . vii . August 4, 2023 . archive.org. 22621475M.
  17. Web site: Petrik . Morgana . Nancy van de Vate . Österreichische Gesellschaft für zeitgenössische Musik . July 31, 2023 . de . August 2, 2023.
  18. News: Komponistin Nancy Van de Vate in Wien gestorben . Vienna . July 31, 2023 . de . August 2, 2023.
  19. Web site: Nancy Van de Vate Biography . . January 1994 . August 4, 2023 . en.
  20. Web site: Nancy Van de Vate . Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music . 2023 . August 2, 2023.
  21. Web site: Nancy van de Vate . Klassika . 2023 . August 2, 2023.
  22. Web site: Nancy van de Vate . orchestralist.net . 2023 . August 3, 2023.
  23. Web site: Distant worlds (1985) . . 2023 . August 3, 2023.
  24. Web site: Whittall . Arnold . Van de Vate: Orchestral Works . gramophone.co.uk . Gramophone . August 3, 2023 . October 1987.
  25. Web site: Threnody for the victims of Hiroshima . Muziekweb . 2023 . August 3, 2023.
  26. Web site: Krakow concerto (1988) . Muziekweb . 2023 . August 3, 2023.
  27. Web site: Distant worlds (1985) . Muziekweb . 2023 . August 3, 2023.
  28. Web site: Works by Nancy van de Vate . . 2023 . August 3, 2023.
  29. Web site: A Peacock Southeast Flew (Concerto for Pipa & Orchestra) | Nancy van de Vate – Daniels' Orchestral Music Online .

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Nancy Van de Vate".

Except where otherwise indicated, Everything.Explained.Today is © Copyright 2009-2025, A B Cryer, All Rights Reserved. Cookie policy.