Biography on Spencer Huffman:
Walter Spencer Huffman was born in Wichita, Kansas in 1921 and lived there until moving to Baltimore, MD at age 6. A self-taught pianist and composer, Huffman did not start formal training in music until he was 18 years old. This formal training led Huffman to the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University, where he began his studies in composition in 1940. His studies were interrupted by World War I as he spent three years serving the U.S. Army Air Corps. Following the war, Huffman completed his studies at Peabody in 1947, joining the faculty two years later.¹ After six years of teaching, Huffman left his post at Peabody to pursue composition full time while teaching composition privately.
Spencer studied with renowned composers Aaron Copland and Nadia Boulanger.¹ The majority of his works were performed in the Baltimore and Washington, D.C areas with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and the National Symphony of Washington. Huffman’s works include chamber music, sonatas for piano and strings, sonatas for piano and winds, symphonies, concertos, wind ensembles, choral music and songs, works for two pianos, band marches, solo piano music, and one opera. One of his major achievements was writing a sonata for every instrument in the concert band.
Spencer Huffman’s music was not similar to any contemporary music of the time but rather resembled the style of Mozart and Brahms. Due to this, many of his works were not well received. Our group decided to study Spencer Huffman’s songs in an attempt to bring his name and music back to the forefront. Being a prominent Peabody student and professor, we were excited to see what his songs were like. Spencer has four collections of songs that vary in voice type. Two members of our group are working toward graduate degrees in voice performance, leading to a strong inclination to work on a piece for soprano and piano. In order to determine which piece to work on, we looked for a text that intrigued us, a melodic line that was friendly to the voice, and a piano line that would work well with the voice instead of overpowering it.
1.“W. Spencer Huffman, Composer (1921 – 2005).” W. Spencer Huffman, Composer (1921 – 2005). Accessed April 26, 2019. http://spencerhuffman.org/.
