Arranger, composer and educator from Irvington, New Jersey, who attended the Eastman School of Music, Fontainebleu, and McGill University. In 1947, he graduated from Eastman with a Bachelor of Arts and then furthered his studies in the school’s masters program. He honed his composing skills under the watchful eyes of Nadia Boulanger and Darius Milhaud.
In 1949, he became a member of the faculty at the Crane School of Music at SUNY’sPotsdam campus. Here he assumed the roles of coordinator of keyboard curriculum and Professor of Music.
In 1957, he completed his formal education with a doctor of musical arts at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec. He became the composer-in-residence for the Hempstead public school system in New York on the strength of a fellowship from the Ford Foundation in 1959. In 1962, he published Harmonization at the Piano, a popular textbook that was published five more times over the next twenty-eight years.
He died in June 2019 when he was 94 years old.
He is credited with more than 250 arrangements and compositions, such as a cantata based on “The Natural Superiority of Men”, a poem by Jean Pearson, and Domestic Relations, a chamber opera inspired by “Harlem Tragedy”, a short story by O. Henry.
Other works include: “Ballad and Tango”; “Be Like the Bird”; “Berceuse & Dialogue”; “Brass Quintet”; “Concertino for Tuba and String Orchestra”; “Dorian Tune”; “Fanfare, Air and Finale”; “Fleet Flute Fling”; “Gliding”; “Licorice Licks for Clarinet Quartet”; “Mini-Suite”; “Pop Suite #4”; “Sax Lix”; “Sonatina”; “Suite”; “Ten Duets for Trumpet and Horn”; “Three Waltzes in Black & White”; “Variations for Tuba and Piano”; “Variations for Tuba” (“The Cobbler’s Bench”); “Voyage to Mars”; and, “A Walking Tune”.
The Principal Brass of the New York Philharmonic and Boston Symphony Orchestra recordings
Canzon in Double Echo (Giovanni Gabrieli)
Arranger – Arthur Frackenpohl
Chicago Symphony Low Brass Ensemble recordings
O Holy Night (Adolphe Charles Adam)
VOX 7501 (CD: Christmas with the Symphony Brass of Chicago)
Conductor – Barry Faldner
Arranged – Arthur Frackenpohl
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