100 Years of Leroy Anderson Monday, December 08, 2008
While this is a departure from our usual discussion of business and products, the folks here at Stanton’s wanted to give our official salute to the legendary American Composer, Leroy Anderson, who gave us such notable works as Blue Tango, Bugler’s Holiday, Fiddle-Faddle, and of course, as the season requires, Sleigh Ride.
Born in 1908, this last June would have been his 100th birthday. He studied first with his mother, then at the New England Conservatory of Music, and at Harvard University.
Though a composer of “light” orchestral works, his legacy has never been so diminutive. With works still being heard on the radio, TV, and in movies, he stands with many of the giants of popular concert works. It should be noted that Mr. Anderson has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, as well as a place in the Songwriters Hall of Fame.
As a slightly humorous side note, I remember playing an arrangement of Sleigh Ride in my high school band and two members of my section couldn’t decide if they thought it was a contemporary song or some older “classical” song, one was convinced it sounded like current pop music and the other thought it sounded “too well crafted to be anything modern.” Please note this was before the days of quick and easy referencer, Wikipedia.
Anyways, we felt it was appropriate before the year was out to officially honor and celebrate the life and compositions of this institution of American Composition. So here’s to you, Leroy Anderson (and according to Wikipedia, it’s luh-ROY, not LEE-roy).