Lepak, Alexander L. (1920-25th March 2009)

Author, composer, percussionist and teacher who founded the Hartt School percussion program in 1947 and directed it until 1991.

He co-wrote, with Alfred Friese, Timpani Method: A Complete Method for Timpani, published in 1954. In 1966, The Friese-Lepak Timpani Method: A Complete Method for Timpani in Four Parts, was published.

Seven years later, Award Music Co. published his “Quintet for Percussion in Three Movements”. His other compositions include “All State Mallet Solo No. 1”, “All State Snare Drum Solo No. 1”, “All State Snare Drum Solo No. 2”, “Billie’s Bounce”, “Classically Snared”, “Concerto for Mallet and Winds”, “Concerto for Mallet Instruments”, “Cresendo”, “Duo for Timpani”, “Easy Does It”, “50 Contemporary Etudes for Timpani”, “50 Master Etudes for Timpani”, “Music for Timpani, Percussion and Brass”, “32 Solos for Timpani” and “Three Fantasies”.

In 1979, Alexander appeared on Frank Sinatra’s boxed set, Trilogy. Six years later, another Friese-Lepak book, The Complete Timpani Method, was published. Stephen Gryc’s “Music for Tuba and Percussion”, published in 1999, is dedicated to him.

For almost six decades, he was Principle Timpanist with the Hartford Symphony Orchestra. In 1997, he was elected to the Percussion Arts Society Hall of Fame, and a scholarship at the Hartt School bears his name.

He died in March 2009 when he was 88 years old.

Sources:

Lepak, Alexander L. (1920-25th March 2009)

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