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Frederick Fennell (July 2, 1914 – December 7, 2004) was an internationally recognized conductor, and one of the primary figures in promoting the wind ensemble as a performing group. Fennell was born in Cleveland, Ohio and chose percussion as his primary instrument at the age of seven. He began drumming then in the fife-and-drum corps at a camp started by his uncles. His studies at the Interlochen Arts Camp (then the National Music Camp) included being bass drummer in the National High School Band in 1931. Famed bandmaster A.A. Harding chose Fennell to be the bass drummer when the band was conducted by John Philip Sousa on July 26. Sousa conducted the band for the premiere of the Northern Pines, a march composed specifically for Interlochen. Fennell himself conducted at Interlochen at the age of seventeen. When Frederick Fennell planned his college education, his first choice had been the Oberlin Conservatory. However at the time Oberlin did not offer a degree in percussion. Actually, no school at that time offered a degree in percussion. In fact, maestro Fennell became the first person ever to be awarded a degree in percussion performance. Fennell found a compatible and fruitful relationship at the Eastman School of Music. As a student, he organized the University of Rochester marching band for the football team and held indoor concerts with the band after the football season. At Eastman, he completed both his bachelor's and master's degrees (in 1937 and 1939). He was awarded a fellowship that allowed him to study at the Mozarteum Salzburg in 1938. Fennell also studied conducting with Serge Koussevitzky at the Berkshire Music Center at Tanglewood in 1942 and was appointed Koussevitzky’s assistant at the Center in 1948. Fennell taught conducting at his alma mater, and in September 1952 he founded the Eastman Wind Ensemble, which presented its first concert on February 8, 1953. While with the Eastman Wind Ensemble, the Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra, and various other groups; Fennell recorded many of the standards of the wind band repertoire. He became one of America's most-recorded conductors. Starting with American Concert Band Masterpieces in 1953, Fennell recorded over 300 compositions on 29 albums for Mercury Records. For Mercury, Fennell recorded with the Eastman-Rocheseter "Pops", London "Pops" (actually the London Symphony Orchestra), and free-lance groups of New York musicians. However, best known are the twenty-two of these 29 Mercury albums that were with Fennell's Eastman Wind Ensemble. One of these, Lincolnshire Posy by Percy Grainger recorded in 1958, was selected by Stereo Review magazine as one of the 50 best recordings of the Centenary of the Phonograph 1877-1977. The two volume Civil War - Its Music and Its Sounds, recorded in December 1960, was a notable set of recordings also made with the Eastman Wind Ensemble, this time performing on original instruments. In 1961, Fennell received a citation and a medal from the Congressional Committee for the Centennial of the Civil War for these recordings. Almost all of Fennell's Mercury recordings were reissued on compact disc. Fennell and the Eastman Wind Ensemble were featured in the first issue of Mercury material on compact disc. In 1986 22 Sousa marches performed by the Eastman Wind Ensemble were released as a compact disc by Philips Records, which had purchased Mercury. Fennell made the first symphonic digital recording in the United States, for Telarc with the Cleveland Symphonic Winds, on April 4-5, 1978. This recording included the two Suites for Military Band by Gustav Holst. Fennell also recorded for Brain, Columbia Records, Delos, King, Kosei, Ludwig, Premier Recordings, Reference Recordings, and Sine Qua Non Superba as well as the Library of Congress label. Dr. Fennell was the associate music director of the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra (now the Minnesota Orchestra) from 1962 to 1964. In September 1965 he became conductor-in-residence at the University of Miami where he conducted the symphony orchestra and also founded a wind ensemble. He was also principal guest conductor of the Interlochen Arts Academy and Dallas Wind Symphony. At the invitation of its players, he was appointed the initial conductor of the Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra in 1984. * On the podium, Fennell evinced a courtly yet commanding manner despite his five foot one inch stature. He was known to take charge of a room with just his words, and his conducting was extremely animated. His conducting workshops were famous for including calisthenics and baton technique exercises in swimming pools. He remained highly active in the world of conducting until a few months before his death at the age of ninety at his home in Siesta Key, Florida. At the time he was conductor laureate of the Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra, principal guest conductor of the Dallas Wind Symphony *, and professor emeritus of the University of Miami Frost School of Music. Dr. Fennell was presented the Star of the Order from the John Philip Sousa Memorial Foundation in 1985, received an honorary doctorate from Eastman in 1988, and was inducted into the National Bandmasters Association Hall of Fame for Distiguished Band Conductors in 1990. He received the Theodore Thomas Award of the Conductor's Guild in 1994. * He was also inducted into the American Classical Music Hall of Fame in 2001. Fennell was said to be most fond of the honorary doctorate from Eastman, being inducted as an honorary chief of the Kiowa Nation in 1984, and the receiving a medal of honor from Interlochen. He made frequent appearances guest conducting such ensembles as the Boston Pops Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, the United States Marine Band, Interlochen Arts Academy, and the Interlochen Arts Camp. Dr. Fennell was a brother of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, a social music fraternity, and Kappa Kappa Psi, the National Honorary Band Fraternity. Frederick Fennell Hall was dedicated in Kofu, Japan on July 17, 1992. On April 4, 2006, the Interlochen Center for the Arts opened up state of the art music and academic libraries, with the music library named in honor and memory of Dr. Fennell and his wife, Elizabeth Ludwig Fennell. * Fennell wrote several books: Time and the Winds, a Short History of the Use of Wind Instruments in the Orchestra, Band and the Wind Ensemble, 1954; The Drummer’s Heritage, a Collection of Popular Airs and Official U.S. Army Music for Fifes and Drums, 1956; and The Wind Ensemble, 1988. Fennell also edited for publication over 50 scores for band performance, including many marches. One of these published in 1981 was for his favorite march, National Emblem by Edwin Eugene Bagley. He also wrote a series of sixteen articles published in The Instrumentalist under the heading ‘Basic Band Repertory’ beginning in April 1975 and concluding in February 1984. These articles were devoted to what Fennell called "...indestructible masterpieces for band that have survived the ravages of time and many an inept conductor". The 1993 Roger E. Rickson book Ffortissimo: a Bio-Discography of Frederick Fennell: the First Forty Years, 1953 to 1993, (Ludwig Music, Inc., publisher) covers in considerable detail the Fennell story, with particular attention to recordings.
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