Denes Agay (June 10, 1911 - January 24, 2007) was a Hungarian-born American composer, arranger and author. [1]
Agay was born and raised in a small village near Budapest [2] and began playing piano at the age of three. In 1934 he completed his musical studies at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest.
Agay conducted the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra in a performance of a symphony which he composed. He worked as a film composer; one film assignment was writing the background music for Hedy Lamarr's nude scene in the 1933 film Ecstasy . [3] [4]
Agay was Jewish, and after the rise of Nazism, he emigrated to New York in 1939. In 1942 he became an American citizen and joined the military, entertaining patients in the hospital wards. His parents were murdered in Auschwitz.
In 1948, he wrote the score for "My Romance", which folded on the road before getting to Broadway. A new score was written by Sigmund Romberg for Broadway, but the show wasn't successful.
After the Second World War Agay worked as a teacher, composer and publisher, and as a conductor and arranger on the NBC show Guest Star. He wrote more than 90 books about musical subjects, including a multi-volume collection of piano arrangements, The Young Pianist's Library, and in 1975 produced the popular anthology, Best Loved Songs of the American People. [5]
Agay also continued to compose. His lively Sonatina no. 3 was frequently performed by young performers at piano recitals.
Agay died in Los Altos, California in 2007 at the age of 95. [3] [4]
Béla Viktor János Bartók was a Hungarian composer, pianist, and ethnomusicologist. He is considered one of the most important composers of the 20th century; he and Franz Liszt are regarded as Hungary's greatest composers. Through his collection and analytical study of folk music, he was one of the founders of comparative musicology, which later became ethnomusicology.
George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist whose compositions spanned popular, jazz and classical genres. Among his best-known works are the orchestral compositions Rhapsody in Blue (1924) and An American in Paris (1928), the songs "Swanee" (1919) and "Fascinating Rhythm" (1924), the jazz standards "Embraceable You" (1928) and "I Got Rhythm" (1930), and the opera Porgy and Bess (1935), which included the hit "Summertime".
Richard Charles Rodgers was an American composer who worked primarily in musical theater. With 43 Broadway musicals and over 900 songs to his credit, Rodgers was one of the most well-known American composers of the 20th century, and his compositions had a significant influence on popular music.
Thomas Wright "Fats" Waller was an American jazz pianist, organist, composer, violinist, singer, and comedic entertainer. His innovations in the Harlem stride style laid much of the basis for modern jazz piano. His best-known compositions, "Ain't Misbehavin'" and "Honeysuckle Rose", were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1984 and 1999. Waller copyrighted over 400 songs, many of them co-written with his closest collaborator, Andy Razaf. Razaf described his partner as "the soul of melody... a man who made the piano sing... both big in body and in mind... known for his generosity... a bubbling bundle of joy". It is likely that he composed many more popular songs than he has been credited with: when in financial difficulties he had a habit of selling songs to other writers and performers who claimed them as their own.
George Johann Carl Antheil was an American avant-garde composer, pianist, author, and inventor whose modernist musical compositions explored the modern sounds – musical, industrial, and mechanical – of the early 20th century. Spending much of the 1920s in Europe, Antheil returned to the United States in the 1930s, and thereafter spent much of his time composing music for films, and eventually, television. As a result of this work, his style became more tonal. A man of diverse interests and talents, Antheil was constantly reinventing himself. He wrote magazine articles, an autobiography, a mystery novel, and newspaper and music columns.
John Harold Kander is an American composer, known largely for his work in the musical theater. As part of the songwriting team Kander and Ebb, Kander wrote the scores for 15 musicals, including Cabaret (1966) and Chicago (1975), both of which were later adapted into acclaimed films. He and Ebb also wrote the standard "New York, New York".
Oscar Levant was an American concert pianist, composer, conductor, author, radio game show panelist, television talk show host, comedian, and actor. He was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for recordings featuring his piano performances. He was equally famous for his mordant character and witticisms, on the radio and later in movies and television, as for his music.
Sigmund Romberg was a Hungarian-born American composer. He is best known for his musicals and operettas, particularly The Student Prince (1924), The Desert Song (1926) and The New Moon (1928).
Charles Rudolf Friml was a Czech-born composer of operettas, musicals, songs and piano pieces, as well as a pianist. After musical training and a brief performing career in his native Prague, Friml moved to the United States, where he became a composer. His best-known works are Rose-Marie and The Vagabond King, each of which enjoyed success on Broadway and in London and were adapted for film.
Morton Gould was an American composer, conductor, arranger, and pianist.
Jerome Moross was an American composer best known for his music for film and television. He also composed works for symphony orchestras, chamber ensembles, soloists and musical theater, as well as orchestrating scores for other composers.
David Lee Shire is an American songwriter and composer of stage musicals, film and television scores. The soundtracks to the 1976 film The Big Bus, The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, The Conversation and All the President's Men, and parts of the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack such as "Manhattan Skyline", are some of his best-known works. His other work includes the score of the 1985 film Return to Oz, and the stage musical scores of Baby, Big, Closer Than Ever, and Starting Here, Starting Now. Shire is married to actress Didi Conn.
Wally Harper was an American musical director, composer, conductor, dance arranger, and musical supervisor for many Broadway and Off-Broadway productions. For three decades from the mid-1970s, he worked with Barbara Cook as pianist, music director and arranger.
Ernö Rapée was a Hungarian-born American symphonic conductor in the first half of the 20th century whose prolific career spanned both classical and popular music. His most famous tenure was as the head conductor of the Radio City Symphony Orchestra, the resident orchestra of the Radio City Music Hall, whose music was also heard by millions over the air.
William Leon Goldenberg was an American composer and songwriter, best known for his work on television and film.
Will Vodery was an American composer, conductor, orchestrator, and arranger, and one of the few black Americans of his time to make a name for himself as a composer on Broadway, working largely for Florenz Ziegfeld.
Benjamin Dewey McPeek was a Canadian composer, arranger, conductor, and pianist.
Judith Lang Zaimont is an American composer and pianist.
Minuetta Shumiatcher Borek Kessler was a Russian-born Canadian and later American concert pianist, classical music composer, and educator. A child prodigy, she performed her first composition at a recital at the age of 5 in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, and went on to study at the Juilliard School in New York City. She composed hundreds of pieces, including music for piano, violin, voice, flute, clarinet and cello, as well as for chamber ensembles. She performed all over Canada and in Boston and New York, including performances at Carnegie Hall and The Town Hall, and with the Boston Civic Symphony and the Boston Pops. The New York Times called her "a rare phenomenon among the younger pianists of today – more musician than pianist". She also taught musical composition to young children, creating and patenting a game called "Staftonia" for this purpose.
Donald Heywood was a Trinidadian-born American songwriter, composer, writer and director. He composed for "I'm Coming Virginia" in 1926, which became a hit for Ethel Waters. He became a prominent figure in black musical theater, and produced scores for films such as Moon Over Harlem (1939) and Murder on Lenox Avenue (1941).