Collection Information
Collection
Paul Price percussion collection
Location
Sousa Archives and Center for American Music
Provenance
Personal collection of percussionist Paul Price; donated by his widow, Phyllis Price, at the instigation of the Percussive Arts Society and University of Illinois percussion faculty member Tom Siwe
When acquired
January 26, 1987
Description
Paul Price (1921-1986) was a respected percussionist, composer, conductor, publisher of percussion music, and music educator during the four decades following the end of World War II. Through these activities he was influential in promoting the growth of the percussion ensemble movement in the United States and in stimulating the remarkable interest in composing for percussion in the latter half of the 20th century. He was a faculty member of the University of Illinois School of Music from 1949 to 1956. His personal collection at the University of Illinois, consisting primarily of percussion materials, includes 17 books and methods, 548 music titles, 66 records and albums, 199 open-reel tapes, 16 cassettes, and one unidentified 16mm. motion picture film. Among numerous manuscripts, non-commercial recordings, and other forms of unpublished music materials are works of several well-known American 2Oth-century composers including Lou Harrison, Michael Colgrass, and Henry Cowell, as well as works by Price himself. Among tapes, performances by the Manhattan Percussion Ensemble with Paul Price as conductor are heavily emphasized. Collections File folder (“Paul Price”) contains a file of Price’s personal correspondence including over 100 letters from 20th-century composers of percussion music as well as clippings, fliers, programs, and pictorial material.
Access/Finding Aids/Bibliography
See the Paul Price Percussion Music and Papers, 1961-1982 Finding Aid in the Sousa Archives and Center for American Music.
Index terms
Colgrass, Michael
Cowell, Henry
Fairchild, Frederick
Harrison, Lou
Manhattan Percussion Ensemble
Manuscripts
Percussion music
Price, Paul
Recordings: LP
Recordings: tape
See also
“Price, Paul William” in Anderson, E. Ruth. Contemporary American composers: a biographical dictionary (Boston: 1982), p.351 [ML106.U3 A52C6 1982]