Easley Blackwood, retired longtime music professor at the University of Chicago, turns 65 on Thursday. The birthday is attracting more attention outside the city. The American Symphony Orchestra will play his Symphony No. 1 on May 13 at New York’s Avery Fisher Hall as part of a program of works by students of legendary pedagogue Nadia Boulanger. Blackwood is the only surviving composer of a distinguished group that included Aaron Copland, Virgil Thomson and Walter Piston.
Blackwood completed his First Symphony in 1955. Charles Munch led the premiere with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1958 and subsequently recorded the work for RCA. The Chicago-based Cedille label has reissued that recording, paired with Blackwood’s Symphony No. 5 as performed by the CSO under James DePreist.
