Sessions, Roger Huntington (1896–1985)

US composer. His international modernist style secured a US platform for serious German influences, including Hindemith and Schoenberg, and offered an alternative to the lightweight, fashionable modernism of Milhaud and Paris. An able symphonist, his works include The Black Maskers (incidental music, 1923), eight symphonies, and Concerto for Orchestra (1971).

Born in Brooklyn, New York, he attended Harvard and Yale universities, then studied under Ernest Bloch. In 1917–21 he taught at Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts, and was head of the theoretical department of the Cleveland Institute of Music 1921–25. He lived in Italy and Germany 1925–33. He became a leading teacher of composition, serving on the faculties of Boston University, Princeton University 1935–44 and 1953–65, the University of California at Berkeley, and the Juilliard School, New York 1965–85.

Works Orchestral and chamber nine symphonies (1927–80), three dirges for orchestra; violin concerto (1940), piano concerto, concerto for orchestra (1981); two string quartets (1935, 1951), piano trio; sonata and three chorale preludes for organ; two sonatas and pieces for piano; songs to words by James Joyce and others.