Gustave Reese

Reese was born in New York City on November 29, 1899.{{sfn|Haar|2001|loc=§ para. 1}} He was an avid scholar and had interests in many areas outside music, including art, architecture, and literature. He studied law at New York University, graduating in 1921. Though he was admitted to the New York State Bar, he opted to re-enroll and pursue a Bachelor of Music from NYU, which he received in 1930.{{sfn|Roesner|1977|p=579}}

In 1927, however, he was already teaching classes at the university in medieval and Renaissance music. He continued teaching there intermittently until 1974, and he became Professor Emeritus in 1973. He also served as a visiting professor at a number of universities, including Harvard, Duke, UCLA, USC, Michigan, Oxford and the Juilliard School of Music. At his death he was still leading doctoral seminars in the Graduate School of the City University of New York. He was a founder-member of the American Musicological Society (AMS) from 1934, serving as its first secretary (1934–1946). He became vice-president in 1946 and president of the organization in 1950. He has also held positions in the International Musicological Society (IMS), the Renaissance Society of America, and the Plainsong and Medieval Music Society.{{sfn|Haar|2001|loc=§ para. 2}}

Also active in the music publishing industry, he headed the publication department of G. Schirmer (1940–1945) and was also director of publication at Carl Fischer (1945–1955). Furthermore, he was editor of The Musical Quarterly from 1944 to 1945.{{sfn|Haar|2001|loc=§ para. 1}}

Gustave Reese had a profound impact on many generations of music students through his passionate and insightful teaching. He has left a valuable legacy in Music in the Middle Ages and Music in the Renaissance. These two pillars have incited a revival of interest and scholarship in the areas of early music. He is often perceived to have 'raised the bar' of musicological scholarship with his thorough research, intellectual rigour and comprehensive bibliographies.{{sfn|Haar|2001}} He commissioned other people to contribute specialist sections to these books, such as Igor Buketoff's piece on Russian chant in Music in the Middle Ages.{{sfn|Kozinn|2001}}

Reese married Fine Arts administrator and cookbook author and editor Carol Truax in 1974. He died, aged 77, in Berkeley, California.{{sfn|NYT|1977|loc=§ para. 1}}

• {{cite book |last=Reese |first=Gustave |year=1940 |title=Music in the Middle Ages: With an Introduction on the Music of Ancient Times |publisher=W. W. Norton & Company |location=Lanham |isbn=978-0-393-09750-4 }}
• {{cite book |last=Reese |first=Gustave |year=1954 |title=Music in the Renaissance |publisher=W. W. Norton & Company |location=New York |isbn=978-0-393-09530-2 |author-mask=2 }}
• Fourscore Classics of Music Literature: A Guide to Selected Original Sources on Theory and Other Writings on Music Not Available in English. New York, Da Capo Press, 1970. {{ISBN|0-306-71620-8}}

• {{cite journal |last=Reese |first=Gustave |date=January 1934 |title=The First Printed Collection of Part-Music: (The Odhecaton) |journal=The Musical Quarterly |volume=20 |issue=1 |pages=39–76 |doi=10.1093/mq/XX.1.39 |jstor=738710 }}
• Reese, Gustave. "Josquin Desprez (biography)" The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Stanley Sadie. London, Macmillan, 1980. (20 vol.) {{ISBN|1-56159-174-2}}.
• {{cite encyclopedia |last1=Macey |first1=Patrick |last2=Noble |first2=Jeremy |last3=Dean |first3=Jeffrey |last4=Reese |first4=Gustave |author-link4=Gustave Reese |year=2011 |orig-year=2001 |encyclopedia=Grove Music Online |title=Josquin (Lebloitte dit) des Prez |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |doi=10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.14497 |isbn=978-1-56159-263-0 |url-access=subscription |url=https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000014497 }} {{Grove Music subscription}}

• {{cite book| last1=Reese |first1=Gustave|first2=Jeremy |last2=Noble |first3=Lewis |last3=Lockwood|first4=Jessie Ann |last4=Owens |first5=James |last5=Haar |first6=Joseph |last6=Kerman |first7=Robert |last7=Stevenson |url=https://archive.org/details/newgrovehighrena0000unse_t9n5 |title=The New Grove High Renaissance Masters: Josquin, Palestrina, Lassus, Byrd, Victoria |series=The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians: The Composer Biography Series |location=London |publisher=Macmillan |year=1984 |isbn=0-393-30093-5}}
• Essays in Musicology in Honor of Dragan Plamenac on his 70th Birthday. Pittsburgh, University of Pittsburgh Press, c1969. {{ISBN|0-8229-1098-5}}
• A Compendium of Musical Practice. New York, Dover Publications, 1973. {{ISBN|0-486-20912-1}}

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• {{cite encyclopedia |last=Haar |first=James |author-link=James Haar |year=2001 |encyclopedia=Grove Music Online |title=Reese, Gustave |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |doi=10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.23052 |isbn=978-1-56159-263-0 |url-access=subscription |url=https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000023052 }} {{Grove Music subscription}}
• {{cite news |last=Kozinn |first=Allan |date=September 11, 2001 |title=Igor Buketoff, 87, Conductor And Expert on Rachmaninoff |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/11/arts/igor-buketoff-87-conductor-and-expert-on-rachmaninoff.html |url-access=limited }}
• {{cite journal |last=Roesner |first=Edward H. |date=October 1977 |title=Gustave Reese (1899-1977) |journal=The Musical Quarterly |volume=63 |issue=4 |pages=579–581 |doi=10.1093/mq/LXIII.4.579 |jstor=741726 }}
• {{cite news |date=September 13, 1977 |title=Gustave Reese, Honorary Head Of the Musicologicai Society, 77 |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1977/09/13/archives/gustave-reese-honorary-head-of-the-musicological-society-77.html |url-access=limited |ref={{sfnRef|NYT|1977}} }}

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• {{cite book |last=Evans |first=Beverly J. |editor-last1=Classen |editor-first1=Albrecht |year=2010 |title=Handbook of Medieval Studies: Terms – Methods – Trends |chapter=Reese, Gustave |pages=2581–2584 |publisher=De Gruyter |location=Berlin, New York |isbn=978-3-11-021558-8 |doi=10.1515/9783110215588.2581 }}
• {{cite journal |last=Hamilton |first=David |date=January 1978 |title=Tributes to Gustave Reese 1899–1977 |journal=Early Music |volume=6 |issue=1 |pages=99–102 |doi=10.1093/earlyj/6.1.99 }}
• {{cite journal |last=Mendel |first=Arthur |author-link=Arthur Mendel |date=Autumn 1977 |title=Gustave Reese (1899-1977): A Personal Memoir |journal=Journal of the American Musicological Society |volume=30 |issue=3 |pages=359–365 |jstor=831046 |doi=10.2307/831046 }}
• {{cite book |last=Steinzor |first=Curt Efram |year=1989 |title=American Musicologists, C. 1890-1945: A Bio-Bibliographical Sourcebook to the Formative Period |publisher=Greenwood Press |location=New York |isbn=978-0-313-26197-8 |url=https://archive.org/details/americanmusicolo0000stei |url-access=limited }}

• {{DIAMM|aid=690|aname=Gustave Reese}}
• The [https://archives.nypl.org/mus/20245 Gustave Reese Papers] in the Music Division of New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.

{{Josquin des Prez}}

{{portal bar|Classical music|Middle Ages|Biography|Music}}

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Category:1899 births

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