Richard Hageman

Richard Hageman
Background information
Birth name	Richard Hageman
Born	July 9, 1881(1881-07-09) Leeuwarden, Friesland, Netherlands
Died	March 6, 1966(1966-03-06) (aged 84) Beverly Hills, California, United States
Genres	20th-century classical music Film scores
Occupations	Composer, Songwriter, Conductor, Pianist, Actor
Instruments	Piano
Years active	1899–1954
Associated acts	John Ford, Frank Lloyd, Merian C. Cooper

Richard Hageman (9 July 1881, Leeuwarden – 6 March 1966, Beverly Hills) was a Dutch-born American conductor, pianist, composer, and actor.

Biography

Hageman was born and raised in Leeuwarden, Friesland, Netherlands. He was the son of Maurits Hageman of Zutphen and Hester Westerhoven of Amsterdam. A child prodigy, he was a concert pianist by the age of six. He studied in Amsterdam and gave lessons as a piano teacher. As a young man he was an accompanist for singers and with the Amsterdam Royal Opera Company, of which he became the conductor in 1899. For a short time he was accompanist to Mathilde Marchesi in Paris.^[1] He travelled to the United States in 1906 to accompany Yvette Guilbert on a national tour. He stayed and eventually became an American citizen.

He was a conductor for the Metropolitan Opera between 1914 and 1932, head of the opera department at the Curtis Institute from 1932 to 1936, and music director of the Chicago Civic Opera and the Ravinia Park Opera for seven years. He was a guest director of orchestras like the Chicago, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles symphony orchestras. He conducted the Philadelphia Orchestra summer concerts for four years and from 1938 on he conducted at the Hollywood Bowl summer concerts for six seasons.^[2]

He is known to the film community for his work as an actor and film score composer, most notably for his work on several John Ford films in the late 1930s. He shared an Academy Award for his score to Ford’s 1939 western Stagecoach. He also had minor roles in eleven movies, for example as opera conductor in The Great Caruso. He became a member of ASCAP in 1950.^[3]

Hageman also composed more serious vocal music. His 1931 opera Caponsacchi, first performed in Freiburg with the title Tragödie in Arezzo in 1932, was staged at the Metropolitan Opera in 1937^[4] with Lawrence Tibbett in the title role.^[5] His "concert drama" The Crucible was performed in Los Angeles in 1943.^[6] While his large musical compositions are rarely heard today, a few of his art songs are well-known and highly regarded, especially "Do Not Go, My Love", a setting of a Rabindranath Tagore poem.

He was a National Patron of Delta Omicron, an international professional music fraternity.^[7]

Larger musical works and chamber music

Stage:

• Caponsacchi (Op. 3, R. Browning), 1931
• I Hear America Call (oratorio, R.V. Grossman), Bar, SATB, orch, 1942
• The Crucible (oratorio, B.C. Kennedy), 1943

Orchestra:

• Overture ‘In a Nutshell’; Suite, str

Chamber:

• October Musings, violin and piano, G. Schirmer, 1937
• Recit and Romance, vc, pf, 1961

Published songs

• Do Not Go, My Love (Rabindranath Tagore), Winthrop Rogers/G. Schirmer, 1917
• May Night (Tagore), 1917
• The Cunning Little Thing (Unknown Author), Winthrop Rogers, 1917
• At the Well (Tagore), Winthrop Rogers/G. Schirmer, 1919
• Happiness (Jean Ingelow), Winthrop Rogers/G. Schirmer, 1917/1920
• Charity (Emily Dickinson), G. Schirmer, 1921
• Nature’s Holiday (T. Nash), 1921
• Ton coeur est un tombeau (Jacques Boria), G. Schirmer 1921
• Animal Crackers (C. Morley), G. Schirmer, 1922
• Evening (Anonymous text), Ricordi, 1922
• Christ Went Up Into the Hills (Katherine Adams), Carl Fischer, 1924^[8]
• Me Company Along (James Stephens), Carl Fischer, 1925
• Grief (Ernest Dowson), Carl Fischer, 1928
• Dawn shall over Lethe Break (Hilaire Belloc), Boosey & Hawkes, 1934
• The Donkey (G. K. Chesterton), Boosey & Hawkes, 1934
• The Little Dancers (Laurence Binyon), Boosey & Hawkes, 1935
• The Night Has a Thousand Eyes (F. W. Bourdillon), Boosey & Hawkes, 1935
• Christmas Eve (Joyce Kilmer), Galaxy, 1936 (arranged for mixed chorus by Philip James, Galaxy, 1937)
• The Rich Man (Franklin P. Adams), Galaxy, 1937
• Song without Words (vocalised for coloratura voice with piano), Carl Fischer, 1937
• This Thing I do: a soliloquy for baritone voice with piano accompaniment (Arthur Goodrich), Carl Fischer, 1937
• Music I Heard with You (Conrad Aiken), Galaxy, 1938
• To a Golden-haired girl (Vachel Lindsay), Carl Fischer, 1938
• Miranda (Hilaire Belloc), Galaxy, 1940
• Mother (Margaret Widdemer), Galaxy, 1940
• Love in the winds (Richard Hovey), Galaxy, 1941
• Little Things (Witter Bynner), Galaxy, 1943
• Voices (Witter Bynner), Galaxy, 1943
• Don Juan Gomez (Elizabeth Jane Coatsworth), Galaxy, 1944
• Fear not the Night (Robert Nathan), Carl Fischer, 1944
• Lift Thou the Burdens, Father, a sacred song (Katherine Call Simonds), Galaxy, 1944
• En una noche serena/Alone in the night (Andres de Segurola, tr. Robert B. Falk), Galaxy, 1945
• Contrasts (Elizabeth Jane Coatsworth), Galaxy, 1946
• The Fiddler of Dooney (William Butler Yeats), G. Schirmer, 1946
• A Lady comes to an Inn (Elizabeth Jane Coatsworth), Galaxy, 1947
• The Fox and the Raven (Guy Wetmore Carryl), Galaxy, 1948
• The Summons (Tagore), Galaxy, 1949
• Is it you? (Robert Nathan), Galaxy, 1951
• Trade Winds (John Masefield), Galaxy, 1952
• Scherzetto (Alfred Kreymborg), Galaxy, 1952
• All Paths Lead to you (Blanche Shoemaker Wagstaff), Galaxy, 1953
• Let me Grow Lovely (Karle Wilson Baker), Carl Fischer, 1953
• Sleep Sweet (Ellen Huntington Gates), Galaxy, 1953
• Walk slowly (Adelaide Love), Carl Fischer, 1953
• I see His Blood upon the Rose (Joseph M. Plunkett), Galaxy, 1954
• Velvet Shoes (Elinor Wylie), Galaxy, 1954
• How to go and Forget (Edwin Markham), G. Schirmer, 1956
• Praise (Seumas O'Sullivan), G. Schirmer, 1956
• Under the Willows: Shoshone love song (Mary Hunter Austin), G. Schirmer, 1957
• When the Wind is Low (Cale Young Rice), Galaxy, 1957
• Die Stadt/The Town (Theodor Storm, tr. Robert Nathan), G. Schirmer, 1958
• Betterliebe/Beggar's Love (Theodor Storm, tr. Robert Nathan), G. Schirmer, 1958
• Am Himmelstor/At Heaven's Door (Conrad F. Meyer, tr. Robert Nathan), G. Schirmer, 1958
• Nocturne (Jean Moréas, tr. Robert Nathan), G. Schirmer, 1960
• So love returns, (Robert Nathan), Ricordi, 1960
• Sundown (Lew Sarett), Carl Fischer, date unknown

Film scores

all directed by John Ford:

• Stagecoach, 1939
• The Long Voyage Home, 1940
• Fort Apache, 1948
• 3 Godfathers, 1948
• She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, 1949
• Wagon Master, 1950

Footnotes

References

• Miller, Philip Lieson (1992), "Hageman, Richard", in Sadie, Stanley, The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, 2, London: Macmillan Press Ltd., p. 594 
• Miller, Philip Lieson and Michael Meckna. "Hageman, Richard", Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy (accessed 20 June 2007), grovemusic.com (subscription access).
• Wlaschin, Ken (2006). Encyclopedia of American Opera. Jefferson, NC, and London: McFarland & Company. p. 155. ISBN 0-7864-2109-6. 

External links

• Richard Hageman at the Internet Movie Database