This collection is also available in Archives & Manuscripts
View In Archives »
Collection Data
- Description
- The papers of the composer Charles Turner, one of Samuel Barber's few students, contain scores, sketches and notes, libretti, correspondence, diaries, photographs, programs, scrapbooks, yearbooks, clippings, and audio recordings documenting his life and career as a violinist, composer and pedagogue.
- Names
- Turner, Charles, 1921-2003 (Creator)
- Barber, Samuel, 1910-1981 (Contributor)
- Corigliano, John, 1938- (Contributor)
- Diamond, David, 1915-2005 (Contributor)
- Hollingsworth, Stanley (Contributor)
- Lee, Noël, 1924-2013 (Contributor)
- Menotti, Gian Carlo, 1911-2007 (Contributor)
- Perle, George, 1915-2009 (Contributor)
- Pollack, Howard (Contributor)
- Rorem, Ned, 1923-2022 (Contributor)
- Rothstein, Edward, 1952- (Contributor)
- Runciman, Steven, 1903-2000 (Contributor)
- Styron, William, 1925-2006 (Contributor)
- Thomson, Virgil, 1896-1989 (Contributor)
- Dates / Origin
- Date Created: 1921 - 2003
- Library locations
- Music Division
- Shelf locator: JPB 12-05
- Topics
- Composers
- teachers
- violinists
- Genres
- appointment books
- black-and-white negatives
- Photographs
- Clippings
- Correspondence
- Diaries
- military records
- Posters
- Programs
- Yearbooks
- Scores
- Scrapbooks
- Notes
- Biographical/historical: Charles Turner (1921-2003) was a composer, violinist, and teacher. Born in Baltimore, his family moved to Anderson, Indiana in 1926. Turner demonstrated an interest and talent in music from the age of three, and began studying piano at five and violin at seven. When he was twelve, Turner's family moved to Pontiac, Michigan, where he studied violin at the Detroit Institute of Musical Art. He graduated from Baldwin High School as class valedictorian in 1939, after which he won a scholarship to study for a year at the Curtis Institute of Music with Lea Luboschutz.
After his studies at Curtis, Turner entered the Navy, serving in the Pacific, and returned home at the end of World War II. He immediately moved to New York where he entered the Juilliard School, studying with Louis Persinger, Peter Mennin and Stefan Wolpe.
Gore Vidal introduced Turner to Samuel Barber in 1950, after which Turner joined the circle of musicians, artists, and intellectuals based around Capricorn, Barber and Gian Carlo Menotti's home in Mount Kisco, New York. In 1951, Turner performed Barber's Violin Concerto under the composer's direction while touring Europe. Turner became close to Barber, who encouraged the violinist to take up composition. After studying with Nadia Boulanger in Paris, Turner returned to the United States and studied with Barber for five years (he may have been Barber's only pupil). Barber dedicated his piano piece Souvenirs (1952) to Turner, and delegated Turner to orchestrate one of his final works, Canzonetta for Oboe and Strings (1978), after his death. In the weeks before the composer's death from cancer in 1981, Turner helped take care of Barber.
Turner's first successful piece, Encounter (1954), was premiered in 1955 by the Cleveland Orchestra under the direction of George Szell, and was also conducted by Fritz Reiner, Dmitri Mitropolous, and Thomas Schippers. Schippers, a friend from the Capricorn scene, continued to perform Turner's music in later years. Turner's ballet Pastorale (1957), commissioned by Lincoln Kirstein, was created for Francisco Mancion and the New York City Ballet; it was also performed by the Joffrey and several other ballet companies. His other works include Serenade for Icarus (1960) for violin and piano; The Marriage of Orpheus, an orchestral work; The Ballad of Barnaby, a setting of a W.H. Auden play; chamber pieces; and songs for voice and piano.
Turner was a MacDowell Colony fellow in 1958. Throughout his career he taught composition, harmony, counterpoint and orchestration at schools in New York City, Connecticut and Long Island. One of his students, at the United Nations International School, was the saxophonist and composer John Zorn.
Dickinson, Peter. Charles Turner: Interview with Peter Dickinson, New York City, May 13, 1981. In Dickinson, Samuel Barber Remembered: A Centenary Tribute. Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2010, pp. 73-79.
Wittke, Paul. "Samuel Barber." G. Schirmer Inc.
- Content: The Charles Turner papers contain scores, sketches and notes, libretti, correspondence, diaries, photographs, programs, scrapbooks, yearbooks, clippings, posters, and sound recordings documenting Turner's life and career as a violinist, composer and pedagogue. Scores and sketches, mostly unpublished, constitute over half of the collection. The correspondence contains letters from his colleagues and friends, including Samuel Barber, Noël Lee, Gian Carlo Menotti, and Ned Rorem, as well as from students and family. The scores hold Turner's marked-up copy of the violin part for Barber's Violin Concerto, performed under Barber's direction; and Turner's music, including the sketch for his orchestral piece Encounter; his ballet Pastorale and its re-orchestrations, and the orchestral work The Marriage of Orpheus.
The collection also contains unique audio recordings of Turner's music. The recordings hold four tape cassettes and a vinyl disc of various versions of Pastorale; two tape cassettes of Turner's Cello Sonata; an open reel tape of the 1969 performance of The Ballad of Barnaby; a vinyl demonstration disc of the songs In Youth And May and Un Jour Vendu Dire Printemps; four vinyl discs containing Turner violin performances; two vinyl discs and an open reel tape containing a 1966 performance of The Marriage of Orpheus; six vinyl discs of a performance of Encounter by the Cleveland Orchestra under George Szell; an open reel tape of songs by Turner; and nine identically-labeled vinyl discs of a chamber group featuring Turner on piano.
Further contents include four cassette tapes of music by Samuel Barber, likely published; a cassette tape of a BBC program on Barber; one cassette tape of the music of Phillip Ramey; one cassette tape labeled "student compositions;" a vinyl disc titled "A Choral Concert," contents unknown; and four unlabeled vinyl discs; three unlabeled open reel tapes; and one unlabeled tape cassette.
Inquiries regarding audio materials in the collection may be directed to the Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound (rha@nypl.org). Audio materials will be subject to preservation evaluation and migration prior to access.
- Physical Description
- Extent: 8.46 linear feet (25 boxes)
- Type of Resource
- Text
- Identifiers
- Other local Identifier: JPB 12-05
- NYPL catalog ID (B-number): b19618857
- MSS Unit ID: 18615
- Universal Unique Identifier (UUID): a24d3630-a013-013b-077e-0242ac110002
