• Period: Modern (1870-)
• Country: USA
• Genres: Vocal, Keyboard, Concerto, Orchestral, Chamber, Ballet

Biography

Charles Tomlinson Griffes was among the most distinctive and poetic of American composers. In the 15 years of his artistic maturity, his style evolved from German-derived post-Romanticism to a particularly personal adaptation of French Impressionism, and finally to a strong and individual style of his own. Most commentators regard his as the greatest talent of his generation.

His older sister, Katharine, started giving him piano lessons when he was young, passing on what she learned from her own teacher, Mary Selina Broughton. When the boy was 15, he started studying directly with Broughton, who was on the faculty of Elmira Free Academy. She also taught him "taste" and "gentility," and persuaded his parents that he had such talent that he should be encouraged to become a musician. She even subsidized his travel to Berlin, where he studied piano with Ernst Jedliczka and Gottfried Galston at the Stern'sche Conservatory; his counterpoint instructors were Max Lowengard and Wilhelm Klatte, and his composition professors were Philippe Rüfer and Engelbert Humperdinck. Griffes appeared at a Conservatory concert as a piano soloist in 1904, to high acclaim; but by then his interests had turned toward composition, somewhat to Broughton's disappointment. He left the Conservatory to study privately and intensively with Humperdinck, and continued in piano with Galston. He made some money by taking in pupils in piano and harmony, and by giving some concerts.

During his German period, he wrote German-language songs and a Symphonische Phantasie. He returned to the United States in September, 1907, accepting a job at the Hackley School of Tarrytown, New York, where he remained until his death in 1920 (of pneumonia, perhaps due to the 1919-1920 influenza epidemic).

Since he died young, and because the position was a relatively minor one within the world of music, biographical information has been romanticized over the years, suggesting that Griffes was trapped in a menial job, living in poverty. In fact, he found the job interesting and was much liked by fellow faculty members and students -- he was certainly not starving. Furthermore, the job included a lengthy summer period during which he could devote himself entirely to composition and promote his works in nearby New York.

During his own lifetime, piano works such as the Roman Sketches appeared and were appreciated for their poetic and descriptive beauty. The tone poem The Pleasure Dome of Kublai Khan, the Japanese ballet Sho-jo, Five Poems of Ancient China and Japan, and a major chamber ballet, The Kairn of Koridwen, all received major premieres, drawing attention to Griffes as a composer possessed of a unique voice, exceptional craftsmanship, and melodic inventiveness. His later pieces, such as the Notturno for Orchestra (1918) and the Piano Sonata are most illustrative of his mature voice; in these works, the influences of his German and French models are completely assimilated into his own harmonically adventurous palate. ~ Joseph Stevenson, All Music Guide

(b Elmira, ny, 17 Sept 1884; d New York, 8 April 1920). American composer. He studied with Mary Selena Broughton in Elmira and with Humperdinck in Berlin, where he lived, 1903-7. He returned to teach in Tarrytown, NY. Up to c 1911 his music was within the German Romantic tradition but he then developed a more Debussian style in piano pieces (The Pleasure-Dome of Kubla Khan, 1912; Roman Sketches, 1915 - 16) and songs (Tone-images, 1912 - 14; Four Impressions, 1912-16). He became closely concerned with oriental culture (Five Poems of Ancient China and Japan, 1916 - 17; ballet Sho-jo, 1917), while his last works, including the Piano Sonata (1918), show a free handling of dissonance paralleling Skryabin.

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Charles Tomlinson Griffes (1884-1920) was one of the most important American composers at the beginning of the 20th century.

Charles Griffes was born in Elmira, New York, on September 17, 1884. He began his musical studies with his sister Katharine, who gave him his first piano lessons. In about 1899 he completed his piano education under Mary Selena Broughton, a professor at Elmira College. In 1903 she financed Griffes' musical stay in Berlin, where he studied piano with Ernst Jedliczka and Gottfried Gaston, composition with Engelbert Humperdinck and Philipp Rufer, and counterpoint with Wilhelm Klatte and Max Lowengard, all at the Stern Conservatory. A brilliant piano student, Charles Griffes nevertheless felt more attracted to composition. Thus he decided to leave the Stern Conservatory in September 1905 to study privately with Humperdinck.

When he returned to the United States in September 1907 he had already composed several songs and a Symphonische Phantasie for orchestra. At that time, Griffes became director of the music department of Hackley School in Tarrytown, New York. He kept this post until he died in 1920. An excellent teacher, Griffes was held in high esteem by his colleagues. He spent most of his free time composing and promoting his work each summer in New York City. He died at the age of 35 while he was working on a drama, Salut au Monde, based on texts of Walt Whitman. In November 1964 Elmira College held a Griffes festival to commemorate his 80th birthday.

Griffes' music reflected his eclecticism, as it revealed first German, then French and Oriental, influences before becoming more abstract. His works parallel the musical eclecticism of the Polish composer Karol Szymanowski. It is probably fair to describe Griffes' work as pre-eminent American compositions of the 20th century. Throughout his life he kept in touch with famous composers such as Feruccio Busoni and Sergei Prokofiev. He also maintained relations with American composers as revealed in his diary. Writing in this journal, he says: "At 4 [o'clock], Varèse and I came up to Laura's [Mrs. Elliot] where I played the Pantomine [The Kairn of Koridwen], [Charles] Cooper, [Henry] Cowell were there. Varèse turned [pages] for me and was much interested."

Griffes first began to write music in Berlin, where he was in contact with several German composers. He wrote at that time the songs for voice and piano based on German texts and utilizing a musical language profoundly influenced by Brahms and Richard Strauss. After 1911 Griffes' music included more elements borrowed from the French impressionists; their timbre, their free structures, and their composers' preference for descriptive pieces (see Three Tone Pictures and Roman Sketches). The Three Poems (1916) reveal a more experimental language, incorporating a lot of dissonances within the framework of a free tonality.

In 1916 Griffes became involved with Orientalism, preceding a similar interest on the part of such American composers as Harry Partch, Lou Harrison, Henry Cowell, and John Cage. After Five Poems of Ancient China and Japan (1916-1917), Charles Griffes wrote Sho-Jo (1917-1919) for Le Ballet Intime and the Japanese dancer Michio Ito. (Le Ballet Intime was directed by Adolf Bolm, ex-dancer at Les Ballets Russes. ) This piece achieved several Oriental effects through delicate orchestration. In 1917 Griffes wrote a colorful orchestral version of his most successful Oriental work, The Pleasure Dome of Kubla Khan. It was probably through French music (for example, Debussy, St-Saëns) that Charles Griffes became attracted to Orientalism.

In his last works, Charles Griffes tended to use a more abstract and structured musical style whose language became deeply complex. His Sonata for piano in three movements (1917-1918) and his Three Preludes for piano, Griffes' last completed work, clearly revealed this new turn in his music. The Three Preludes showed several similarities to Schoenberg's Sechs Kleine Klavierstücke.

Further Reading

E. M. Maisel, Charles T. Griffes: The Life of an American Composer (1943, 1984); D. K. Anderson, The Works of Charles T. Griffes: A Descriptive Catalogue (1966); and D. Boda, The Music of Charles Griffes (Dissertation, Florida State University, 1962) are major sources of information on Charles Griffes and his work.

Additional Sources

Anderson, Donna K., Charles T. Griffes: a life in music, Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1993.

Maisel, Edward, Charles T. Griffes, the life of an American composer, New York: Knopf: Distributed by Random House, 1984.

For more information on Charles Tomlinson Griffes, visit Britannica.com.

(grĭf'ĭs) , 1884–1920, American composer, b. Elmira, N.Y. A pupil of Humperdinck in Germany, he returned to the United States in 1907. Among his outstanding larger compositions are The Pleasure-Dome of Kubla Khan (Boston, 1920), for orchestra; his Poem, for flute and orchestra (1918); and Roman Sketches (1915–16), for piano, which includes The White Peacock. His tautly intense piano sonata (1918, pub. 1921) represents his mature style, in which he was free from earlier influences of German romanticism and impressionism and created a uniquely American idiom.

Bibliography

See biography by E. M. Maisel (1943, repr. 1984).

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