Gail Kubik

Biography

Gail Kubik (5 September 1914, South Coffeyville, Okla. – 20 July, 1984, Covina, Calif.) was an American composer and educator.

As a young boy, Kubik studied music with his mother, a concert singer. He attended the Eastman School of Music, studying violin and composition and receiving a Bachelor of Music degree in 1934. He continued his studies at the American Conservatory of Music (Chicago) with Leo Sowerby and at Howard University with Walter Piston.

Kubik taught at the Teachers College of Columbia University and was a staff composer for the National Broadcasting Company radio network. From 1943-45, he served in the armed forces as a composer and conductor for the U.S. Army Air Forces Films and Radio Division. After World War II, he traveled throughout Europe presenting lectures and conducting operas and concerts.

From 1970 to 1980, Kubik became composer-in-residence at Scripps College in Claremont, California. He left that position in 1980, when a lawsuit brought by him against the college failed to overturn a mandatory retirement regulation.

Kubik was the recipient of many honors and awards, including a Guggenheim Fellowship (1943) and the American Prix de Rome (1950 and 1951). His Symphonie Concertante was the Pulitzer Prize winner in music in 1958, and the music he wrote for the cartoon Gerald McBoing Boing won both an Academy Award and the British Film Institute Award in 1950.

Of his works for band, Stewball Variations was frequently performed during the 1960s.

Works for Winds

Resources

Gail Kubik, Wikipedia Accessed 8 October 2020
Heritage Encyclopedia of Band Music. "Gail Kubik." Accessed 8 October 2020