Arts and Letters

When Quincy Porter died, he was heavily involved in musical activities and he had scheduled many more for the future, so his sudden death came as a great shock to his many friends and admirers.

Porter, a native of New Haven, was identified with Yale; he was a direct descendant of Jonathan Edwards and a son and grandson of Yale professors. He was graduated from Yale College in 1919 and two years later from its School of Music where he studied composition with David Stanley Smith and Horatio Parker. Subsequently he worked with Vincent d'Indy in Paris and with Ernest Bloch whom he assisted at the Cleveland Institute of Music. After filling various important posts, Porter returned to Yale in 1946 as Professor of Music. At the end of his career there he was Battell Professor of Music and Master of Pierson College.

When he was a young man, Porter played violin and viola in New York orchestras for several years and throughout his life he performed as violinist in chamber music ensembles wherever and whenever he was needed.

Chamber music seemed to be his favorite medium, both as performer and as composer. This identification with what many consider the most refined aspect of musical art and his fastidious training won for him the reputation of being a musician's musician.

His string quartets and his other works show a masterly technique which combines with a sense of form and a timing that never interrupts the flow of his musical ideas. His nine quartets are considered by connoisseurs to be lasting contributions to the musical literature of our time, although he also composed many other striking works in other media.

Porter's compositions range in mood from a brooding lyricism to joyous and exuberant dance-like presentations. His music is gay and humorous without being vulgar, fresh without being sensational, serious without being pedantic, and reflective without being dull. Porter draws on the past, but only for spiritual nourishment. He never merely imitates past masters, but his knowledge of their music has helped him to clarify his own inner vision. Porter's sounds were the songs he heard in his own inner aural world; his rhythms came from his own inner dance and they were so composed that they projected to both performer and listener.

These qualities so apparent in Porter's quartets are also present in compositions as diverse as his two violin sonatas, his Divertimento for Wind Quintet, and his piano sonata. In his two symphonies and the viola concerto, the use of the orchestra again shows great mastery in another medium. Every passage is clearly presented and the details of each musical phrase reveal themselves to the attentive listener. As the phrases unfold, the form and content of each work become clear. Perhaps it is not too bizarre to compare Porter's music to Jonathan Edwards' fervent and poetic sermons. In any event, Porter seems to combine musical logic with a great enthusiasm for the musical medium he has selected as his vehicle.

Quincy Porter was very much of a contemporary man. In his numerous important teaching positions he worked mightily for his students. His old and young colleagues profited by the zealous efforts he made on their behalf in the many honorary and active posts he held in various composers' societies.

Not unlike J. S. Bach and Telemann, who sometimes themselves actually used contemporary lithographic processes to reproduce their own music, Porter in recent years used an electric typewriter which he had mastered in order to duplicate his own scores. He even built an electric railroad to transport him from his studio at Squam Lake, New Hampshire, to the top of the hill when he needed to mail out his scores.

It may be obvious to say that it is difficult to make any valid prediction about the durability of any of the many different styles that are represented in the contemporary musical repertory at this particular moment in music history. One can venture the opinion, however, that Porter's music will last just as long as personal, poetic, and eminently musical statements are needed and accepted by society. To place the onus of the acceptance of Quincy Porter's music on society itself is precisely what he would have desired.