Background
North was born on Dec. 4, 1910, in Chester, PA;
attended the Curtis Institute, Juilliard School,
and Moscow Conservatory; became music director of
the German Theater Group and the Latvian State
Theater, and the only American member of the Union
of Soviet Composers; returned to the US in 1935;
studied with Ernst Toch and Aaron Copland in NY,
and composed ballet scores for Martha Graham,
Hanya Holm, and Agnes de Mille; composed for the
NY stage, including scores for Life and death of
an American (1939), Of V we sing (1942), and Death
of a salesman (1949); wrote music for some 50
documentary shorts between 1937-50; in 1939 went
to Mexico as music director for the Anna Sokolow
dance troupe and studied with Silvestre Revueltas;
served as a captain in the US Army in World War
II; his Revue for clarinet and orchestra was
performed by Benny Goodman and the NY Philharmonic
under Leonard Bernstein in 1946; began scoring
feature films in the early 1950s, becoming a
leading Hollywood composer; his musical language
encompasses dissonance and lyricism, and ranges
from chamber to symphonic proportions; he was
nominated for 15 Academy Awards but did not win
one until 1986, when the Motion Picture Academy
presented him with an honorary life-achievement
award; died in 1991.
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