Lee Hoiby

Lee Hoiby (b Madison, WI, 17 Feb 1926). American composer and pianist. While still in high school, he began studying the piano with Gunnar Johansen, continuing with him at the University of Wisconsin (BM 1947).

He went on to study with Egon Petri at Mills College and completed his studies there in 1952. Planning a career as a concert pianist, Hoiby did not consider composition his vocation until Menotti accepted him as a student at the Curtis Institute of Music (1949–52). Following a period of compositional activity, Hoiby revived his career as a pianist, in 1978 giving a début recital at Alice Tully Hall, New York; he has since given recitals throughout the USA.

As a composer Hoiby is a modern Romantic from the lineage of Barber and Menotti. The influence of the former is evident in his warm lyricism, while that of the latter is found in a propensity for light, genial humour. Though much of his music is characterized by a disarming diatonic simplicity, his ambitious works tend towards greater harmonic and textural complexity. Interest in his music has centred chiefly around his operatic, choral and vocal works, which seem to stimulate his most deeply felt efforts. Some of these works – for example Summer and Smoke, Galileo Galilei and The Tempest – achieve an eloquence comparable to the later works of Barber. With greater critical acceptance of more conservative musical styles from the early 1980s onwards, Hoiby’s music has been performed and recorded with increasing frequency.