DAMROSCH, WALTER JOHANNES

born Jan. 30, 1862, Breslau, Prussia [now Wroclaw, Pol.] died Dec. 22, 1950, New York, N.Y., U.S. Prussian-born American orchestral conductor and composer whose activities spanned more than half a century of American musical life. Damrosch studied with his father, Leopold Damrosch (183285), German violinist and conductor, who settled in New York City in 1871. Upon his father's death, he assumed the conductorship of the New York Symphony Society and the New York Oratorio Society, founded by his father, and also conducted at the Metropolitan Opera Company (188591). Later he organized the Damrosch Opera Company (18941900), specializing in German operas. In 1903 Damrosch reorganized the New York Symphony Society and conducted it until 1927, when it was combined with the Philharmonic Society. Like his father, Damrosch was an avowed propagandist of the Romantic composer Richard Wagner; as early as March 3, 1886, he gave a concert performance of the opera Parsifal in New York. He also presented first American performances of symphonies by Johannes Brahms and Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky. Although not in sympathy with new music, he introduced several works by contemporary European and American composers. He was a pioneer of symphonic broadcasting and also established a weekly series of radio lectures on music appreciation for schools (192842). A competent composer, Damrosch wrote several operas, which, however, lacked distinction: The Scarlet Letter (1896), Cyrano de Bergerac (1913), The Man Without a Country (1937), and The Opera Cloak (1942). He also composed incidental music to plays and published an autobiography, My Musical Life (1923; 2nd ed., 1930). He led the New York Oratorio Society (18981912); was the founder of the Institute of Musical Art, New York City (190526); and published some teaching manuals. His brother Frank Damrosch (18531937) was also a conductor.