Lipman, Samuel
Lipman, Samuel
Lipman, Samuel, American pianist, teacher, and music critic; b. Los Gatos, Calif., June 7, 1934; d. N.Y., Dec. 17, 1994. He commenced piano studies in his youth, making his debut at age 9. He attended L’École Monteux in Hancock, Maine (summers, 1951–57), and the Aspen (Colo.) Music School (summers, 1959–61), and completed his piano training with Rosina Lhévinne at the Juilliard School of Music in N.Y. (1959–62). He also took courses in government at San Francisco State Coll. (B.A., 1956) and pursued graduate work in political science at the Univ. of Calif, at Berkeley (M.A., 1958). His tours as a pianist took him all over the U.S. and Europe; he also served as music critic of Commentary (from 1976) and publ. the New Criterion (from 1982); taught at the Aspen Music School (from 1971) and at the Waterloo Music Festival in Stanhope, N.J. (from 1976), where he was artistic director (1985–93). In 1977 he won the ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award for music criticism, and in 1980 for his vol. of essays Music after Modernism (1979). He also wrote The House of Music: Art in an Era of Institutions (1982), Arguing for Music, Arguing for Culture: Essays (1990), and Music and More: Essays, 1975–1991 (1992). Lipman was a prominent figure in the American neo-conservative movement.
—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire