Chase, Gilbert

Chase, Gilbert, eminent American musicologist; b. Havana (of American parents), Sept. 4, 1906; d. Chapel Hill, N.C., Feb. 22, 1992. He studied at Columbia Univ. and at the Univ. of N.C. at Chapel Hill. From 1929 to 1935 he lived in Paris and was active as a music correspondent for British and American music periodicals. In 1935 he returned to the U.S.; during 1940–43, he was consultant on Spanish and Latin American music at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. He simultaneously was active in an advisory capacity to musical radio programs. From 1951 to 1953 he was cultural attaché at the American Embassy in Lima, and from 1953 to 1955 served in the same capacity in Buenos Aires. He then was director of the School of Music at the Univ. of Okla. (1955–57), and from 1958 to 1960 cultural attaché in Belgium. From 1960 to 1966 he was a prof, of music and director of Latin American studies at Tulane Univ. in New Orleans. From 1961 to 1969 he was director of the Inter-American Inst. for Musical Research, serving as ed. of its yearbook (1964–76). In 1963 he organized the first Inter-American Conference on Musicology in Washington, D.C. In 1955 the Univ. of Miami bestowed upon him the title of Honorary Doctor of Letters. He also taught at the State Univ. of N.Y. in Buffalo (1973–74) and at the Univ. of Tex. in Austin from 1975 to 1979.

Writings

The Music of Spain (N.Y., 1941; 2^nd ed., 1959; in Spanish, Buenos Aires, 1943); America’s Music: From the Pilgrims to the Present (N.Y., 1955; 3^rd ed., rev., 1983; also tr. into German, French, Portuguese, and Spanish); Introducción a la musica americana contemporanea (Buenos Aires, 1958); A Guide to the Music of Latin America (Washington, D.C, 1962); The American Composer Speaks: A Historical Anthology, 1770 to 1965 (Baton Rouge, 1966); Two Lectures in the Form of a Pair: 1, Music, Culture and History; 2, Structuralism and Music (Brooklyn, 1973); Roger Reynolds: Profile of a Composer (N.Y., 1982).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire