Ruth Shaw Wylie [1916-1989]

Posted Aug 16, 2006, by Deborah Hayes

LINKS List of Works | Essay by the composer published in 1985

RUTH SHAW WYLIE, American composer and educator, was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, on June 24th, 1916, and died in Estes Park, Colorado, on January 30, 1989, aged 72. She studied at Wayne State University (AB in French, 1937, MA in composition, 1939), with Bernard Rogers at the Eastman School (PhD in composition, 1943), and later with Arthur Honegger, Samuel Barber and Aaron Copland at the Berkshire Music Centre. She taught composition and theory at the University of Missouri (1943-49) and Wayne State University (1949-69) where she was head of the composition program from 1958 and founder, director and performer (flute, piano) in the Wayne State University Improvisation Chamber Ensemble. She was made Professor Emerita in 1969, moved to Salt Lake City,, Utah, and then settled in Estes Park, Colorado, in 1973.

She was the recipient of many grants and awards for her compositions, including a Huntington-Hartford Foundation fellowship, two MacDowell Colony fellowships, commissions from the Michigan Council for the Arts and Wayne State University, a “Friends of Harvey Gaul” award, ASCAP Standard Awards, and a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. She also published articles in the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Dance Magazine, Criticism, and other journals.

She composed about 50 works, including pieces in all media. Her early works include sonatas, symphonies, and teaching pieces for piano. Her later works are characteristically instrumental and inspired by poetic texts, pictorial themes, and personal experience. Her outstanding works include Five Madrigals (1950), Concerto Grosso for string orchestra and seven solo woodwinds (1952), String Quartet No. 3 (1956), Sonata for Flute and Piano (1960), Involution for orchestra (1967), Psychogram for piano (1968, recorded on CRI 353), The Long Look Home, suite for orchestra with poetry and slides (1975), Incubus for flute, clarinet, percussion, and ’cello ensemble (1976), Views from Beyond, suite for orchestra (1978), Music for Three Sisters for flute, clarinet and piano (1981), Seven Scenes from Arthur Rackham for two flutes, oboe, viola, cello, piano and percussion (1983), and the Concerto for Flute and Strings (1986).
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Preparerd in 1983 by Deborah Hayes, with revisions by Dr. Wylie, for The New Grove Dictionary of American Music but not used. Revised by Deborah Hayes, 2006.