In Memoriam 2007

January

János Fürst, age 71. Hungarian conductor and violinist, co-founder of the Ulster Orchestra and the Irish Chamber Orchestra, former music director of the Marseille Opera and former chief guest conductor of the Helsinki Philharmonic.

Klaro Mizerit, age 92. The first music director of the Atlantic Symphony Orchestra (Halifax), he also served as music director of the Rhenish Philharmonic (Koblenz) from 1958-1968.

Sandor Salgo, age 97. Professor emeritus of music at Stanford University, former conductor of the Stanford Symphony, former music director of the San Jose Symphony, and former music director (for 36 years) of the Carmel Bach Festival.

Eleonore Schoenfeld, age 81, cellist who taught at the University of Southern Caifornia for five decades and directed the annual International Gregor Piatigorsky Seminar for Cellists.

Elmer Setzer, age 86. Former first assistant principal second violinist with the Cleveland Orchestra, his quartet made the first recording of Glenn Gould’s String Quartet. He also played horn with the US Army during World War II.

February

Julius Drossin, age 88. Composer, former cellist with The Cleveland Orchestra and former chairman of the Cleveland State University music department, he was a POW in World War II and the first person to receive a doctorate in composition from Western Reserve University.

Peter Guroff, age 47. Violist with the Pittsburgh Symphony and former principal violist of the Richmond Symphony, he also taught at the Meadowmount School.

Norman Herzberg, age 90. Former principal bassoonist of the Saint Louis Symphony, he taught bassoon at the University of Southern California for nearly 40 years and also played on many of the recordings of the Columbia Symphony Orchestra under Bruno Walter.

Siegfried Landau, age 85. The founder and first music director of the Brooklyn Philharmonic.

Gian Carlo Menotti, age 95. Composer of many popular operas, including Amahl and the Night Visitors.

Kjersten Oquist, age 36. Principal violist of the Eugene Symphony Orchestra, she also played in the Oregon Ballet Theater and Portland Opera orchestras. She and Angela Svendsen were killed by a drunk driver while returning to Portland from a rehearsal in Eugene.

Angela Svendsen, age 31. Principal second violinist of the Eugene Symphony, she also played in the Oregon Ballet Theater and Portland Opera orchestras.

March

Edgar Baitzel, age 51. Chief operating officer of the Los Angeles Opera.

Theophanis Dymiotis, age 47. Violinist with the Delaware Symphony Orchestra and co-concertmaster and composer-in-residence with the Mid-Atlantic Symphony.

Sam Green, age 87. Former tubist with the Cincinnati Symphony, he also taught at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music.

Amelia Haygood, age 87. Found of the Delos record label and a former clinical psychologist.

Wendy Klopfenstein, age 63. Principal second violinist of the Mobile Symphony, she also played with the Pensacola Symphony.

Pietro Masella, age 83. Former oboist with the Montreal Symphony.

Jon Stoll, age 68. Former violist with the Milwaukee Symphony and concertmaster of the Chattanooga Symphony.

April

Kristine Boygo, age 60. Canadian cellist and educator, she founded the Mooredale Youth Orchestra and Mooredale Concert Series. She was married to pianist Anton Kuerti.

Lewis Hugh Cooper, age 86. Former bassoonist with the Detroit Symphony and professor at the University of Michigan School of Music.

James Dixon, age 77. Former music director of the Quad City Symphony Orchestra, he also held conducting positions with the 7th Army Symphony, the New England Conservatory, and the Minnneapolis Symphony (Minnesota Orchestra).

Glenn Dodson, age 75. Former principal trombonist with the Philadelphia Orchestra, he also taught at the Curtis School of Music. Before coming to Philadelphia, he played with the Chicago Symphony and was principal trombone with the New Orleans Symphony.

Colin Graham, age 75. Former artistic director of the Opera Theater of St. Louis, he staged 55 world premieres and did much stage directing for Benjamin Britten.

Walter Hendl, age 90. Former music director of the Dallas Symphony and director of the Eastman School of Music.

Christine Nield, age 56. Former principal flute of the Florida Philharmonic, she also played with the Boca Raton Philharmonic Symphonia and taught at the Frost School

Tommy Newsom, age 78. Former assistant music director of the “Tonight Show” band, he wrote many wonderful charts used by Doc Severinsen in his appearances with professional orchestras.

Mstislav Rostropovich, age 80. One of the greatest cellists of the 20th century, he also served as music director of the National Symphony from 1977 to 1994 and played a significant role in the events surrounding the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Salvatore Silipigni, age 79. Former cellist with the Pittsburgh Symphony, he had also played with the Rochester Philharmonic and the San Diego Symphony, and had taught at Ball State University and Duquesne University.

Edgar Young, age 98. Administrator who supervised the construction of Lincoln Center.

May

Alex DePalma. Supervisor in the office of the AFM Secretary-Treasurer and familiar figure to delegates at many AFM conventions.

John Eargle, age 76. Recording engineer who recorded over 275 phono records and CDs for Delos, RCA and Mercury, and who won a Grammy for Best Engineereed Classical Album in 2001 as well as a Scientific and Technical Oscar the same year for his work on loudspeakers. He was a graduate of the Eastman School.

David Farquhar, age 79. Composer and professor of composition at Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand.

Donald Johanos, age 79. Former music director of the Honolulu Symphony.

Kyle Mills, age 31. Principal horn of the Great Falls Symphony Orchestra in Montana, he and fiancé Jenny Sengpiel died in a small-plane crash.

Leo Panasevich, age 85. Former violinist with the Boston Symphony for 46 years, he had also served as assistant concertmaster of the National Symphony and concertmaster of the Brevard Festive and had studied with George Enescu.

Jenny Sengpiel, age 25. Principal oboe of the Great Falls Symphony Orchestra.
June

James Rives Jones, age 64. Former resident conductor of the Dallas Symphony and head of orchestral studies at Southern Methodist University, he had also held positions with the Oklahoma Symphony, the Denver Symphony, Dallas Ballet, and Colorado Ballet. He won the Dmitri Mitropoulos Conducting Competition in 1967.

Christopher Rowland, age 60. Violinist with the Fitzwilliam String Quartet and director of chamber music at the Royal Northern College of Music (Manchester UK).

Paul Strauss, age 87. Former music director of the Orchestre Philharmonique de Liege.

Michael Sullivan, age 43. Associate professor of clarinet at Northern Arizona University and member of the Arizona Opera Orchestra, he won a Fulbright Scholarship to study in Munich.

Mary West, age 97. Noted Minneapolis violin teacher. Professor emeritus at the University of Minnesota, she was still teaching at the MacPhail Center for the Arts. (Personal note: I worked with Mary at the Madeline Island Music Camp and came to learn that any really good teen-age violinist was likely to study with, or have studied with, Mary. She was a great teacher and a lovely person.)

Maurice Wolfson, age 95. Former violinist with The Cleveland Orchestra, he joined the orchestra in 1945 after playing with the Boston Pops and the San Antonio Symphony.

July

Jerry Hadley, age 55. Noted American tenor.

Martha Herby, age 55. Flutist with the Oregon Symphony, she also played with the Bloch Music Festival and the Cascade Music Festival in Oregon, and had taught at the Eastman School of Music, the National Music Camp at Interlochen, MI, and Lewis and Clark College in Portland.

Natalia Karp, age 96. Polish pianist who debuted with the Berlin Philharmonic at age 18, she survived several German concentration camps, moving to London after the war, where she performed with several London orchestras, at the Proms, and founded the London Alpha Trio.

Vartan Manoogian, age 71. Professor of music at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, he had also served as concertmaster of the Chamber Orchestra of Lausanne and the Orchestre de la Suisse Romand.

Louis Moyse, age 94. Co-founder of the Marlboro Music School & Festival and noted flute teacher.

Joseph Roche, age 72. Former violinist with the Minnesota Orchestra, he founded the Macalester Trio and also performed with the Casals Festival Orchestra. He emigratred from India at a young age and graduated from the New England Conservatory.

Beverly Sills, age 78. World-famous coloratura soprano and the General Manager of the New York City Opera after her retirement from the stage.

Milton Stevens, age 64. Principal trombone with the National Symphony.
August

Richard Bradshaw, age 63. General director of the Canadian Opera Company, he had also served as chorus director at the Glyndebourne Festival and resident conductor at the San Francisco Opera.

Robert Crothers. Long-time AFM staffer, he served as Executive Assistant to the President and head of the AFM Recording Department, predecessor to the Electronic Media Services Division. He was instrumental in setting up both the Theatrical Motion Picture Special Payments Fund in 1960 and the the Phonograph Record Manufacturers\’ Special Payments Fund in 1964. (Personal note: When ICSOM, ROPA and OCSM put together the first-ever joint meeting of AFM player conferences in 1999, Bob was very generous with both his extensive conference planning experience and his contacts at the Riviera Hotel.)

Russell Johnson, age 83. Acoustician who designed many contemporary concert halls, including halls for the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Dallas Symphony, the Birmingham Symphony, as well as halls for Jazz at Lincoln Center and the Lucerne Festival.
September

Luciano Pavarotti, age 71. The most famous operatic tenor since Enrico Caruso, his “Three Tenors” concerts with Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras made millions of dollars for orchestra musicians around the world.

Harvey Shapiro, age 96. Former cello teacher at the Juilliard School.

October

Arnold Broido, age 87. Former chairman of the Theodore Presser Company, he studied piano at the Mannes School and the Juilliard School. He also served on the board of ASCAP.

Margaret Evans,age 90. Former cellist with Chicago Symphony, she also played with the Indianapolis Symphony and the National Symphony, as well as serving as principal cellist of the Grant Park Symphony.

November

Sebastian Bell, age 65. Flutist and founding member of the London Sinfonietta, he had also served as principal flute of the BBC Welsh Symphony Orchestra and was head of woodwind studies at the Royal Academy of Music.

Stephane Dalschaert, age. 77. Former violinist with the Philadelphia Orchestra, he was also a bowmaker. He was a native of Belgium and studied with Arthur Grumiaux. He had also played for the New Orleans Philharmonic and The Cleveland Orchestra.

Frank Fiatorone, age 90. Former violinist with the Chicago Symphony.

George Gaber, age 91. Professor Emeritus at the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University.

David Oppenheim, age 85. Former dean of the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University, he also ran the Columbia Masterworks label from 1950 to 1959 and also helped produced the TV series Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic.

Virginia Schneider, age 92. Former principal violist with the Louisville Orchestra, she established the Suzuki method at the University of Louisville School of Music.

Craig Smith, age 60. Founder and music director of Emmanuel Music in Boston, he led the first complete performance cycle of Bach cantatas in the US. He also conducted many of Peter Sellars’ controversial opera stagings.

William Waterhouse, age 76. Former principal bassoonist of the London Symphony Orchestra and co-principal of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, he also taught at the Royal Northern College of Music.
December

Jerome Ashby, age 51. Associate Principal Horn of the New York Philharmonic, he also taught at the Juilliard School, the Curtis Institute, and the Aspen Music Festival School.

Carlo Felice Cillario, age 92. Opera conductor and frequent accompanist to Montserrat Caballé, he conducted the legendary first Covent Garden performance of the Zeffirelli production of Tosca with Maria Callas and Tito Gobbi.

Mary Evens, age 96. Former assistant principal cellist of the Toronto Symphony and former principal cellist of the Victoria Symphony and the London (Ontario) Symphony. (Personal note: I worked with Mary in London for two years; she was a great section leader and and a wonderful colleague.)

Walter Green, age 82. Former principal bassoonist of the San Francisco Symphony and San Francisco Opera Orchestra and founding member of the Mendocino Music Festival,

Andrew Imbrie, age 86. Composer and composition teacher at the University of California at Berkeley and the San Francisco Conservatory.

Casimer Kossakowski, age 67. Principal librarian and former trumpet with the New Jersey Symphony.

Robert Moevs, age 87. Composer and former professor at Harvard University, he had works premiered by the Boston Symphony, The Cleveland Orchestra under George Szell, and Leonard Bernstein.

Sheldon Morgenstern, age 69. Founder and first music director of the Eastern Music Festival.

Danny Newman, age 88. Long-time press agent for the Lyric Opera of Chicago and internationally-renowned architect of the subscription ticket sales model, he wrote the classic text on arts marketing, Subscribe Now!

John Shamlian, age 86. Former assistant principal bassoon with the Philadelphia Orchestra, he also played in the London Symphony Orchestra after graduation from the Royal Academy of Music and service in a military band in the Canadian army.

Karlheinz Stockhausen, age 79. Composer.