Musicians - Nicolas Slonimsky

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	Musicians - Nicolas Slonimsky

Nicolas Slonimsky (April 27, 1894 - December 25, 1995) was a Russian-American composer, conductor, music critic, musician, and author. He emigrated to the United States in 1923. In 1958 Slonimsky took over the supervision of Baker's Dictionary of Music & Musicians and was head editor until 1992. He also wrote "Music since 1900," a survey of every important musical event in the 20th century, and The Lexicon of Musical Invective, a compilation of hilariously bad reviews by critics of composers since Beethoven's time, as well as an autobiography, Perfect Pitch. During 1986, Slonimsky made frequent Saturday afternoon visits to appear on the Doug Ordunio show, heard over KFAC-FM, Los Angeles. On one Saturday during this period a crew came out from the New York public television station, WNET, to film the entire show. Portions of this session were included in the "Aging" segment of the PBS Series "The Mind." Slonimsky possessed a sly sense of humor, a trait he would exhibit on the various appearances he made on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. He died at age 101.

Slonimsky was a great champion of contemporary music. He conducted the world premiere of Edgard Varèse's Ionisation for thirteen percussionists in 1933, of Charles Ives' Three Places in New England in 1931, and various other works. His best known book is the Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns (ISBN 082561449X), which has influenced many composers and jazz musicians.

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