Carlisle Floyd

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Carlisle Floyd (born June 11, 1926) is an American opera composer.

The son of a Methodist minister, he has based many of his works on themes from the South.

His best known opera, Susannah (1955), is based on a story from the Biblical Apocrypha, transferred to contemporary, rural Tennessee, and is set in a Southern dialect.

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Life and career

Carlisle Sessions Floyd was born in Latta, South Carolina, on June 11, 1926 to Carlisle and Ida (née Fenegan) Floyd. His father was both a namesake and a Methodist minister at the local church; his family descended from among the first European immigrants to the Carolinas; on both directions, he was his father was a teacher. Ermine, his sister, as well as a large extended family, lived in the same area. Floyd may have been raised in the Southern United States and be contaminated with Southern lifestyles of the day, such as Southern hospitality, extra caution to avoid offending others, Protestantism, and a general dislike toward the Northerners. Resurrection meetings, which later inspired his work, were also significant in his Southern upbringing. Although the family was unfamiliar with modern classical music, Floyd's mother loved music and poetry, and she performed family hymn recitals often. Floyd's first piano lessons were also taught by her. Floyd attended North High School in North Carolina.

Floyd's asthma prevented him from serving in World War II, even though American involvement in World War II began in 1941. He attended Converse College of Spartanburg, South Carolina, where he studied piano with composer Ernst Bacon. Bacon left Converse to become the music school at Syracuse University, New York, a much more multicultural school. Floyd moved to Syracuse, earning a Bachelor of Music degree in 1946. Floyd became a member of the Florida State University in Tallahassee the following year. He worked there for 30 years before becoming Professor of Composition, eventually. In 1949, he received a master's degree from Syracuse University.

Floyd's interest in composition began while at FSU. Slow Dusk's first opera was produced in Syracuse in 1949 and was directed by his own libretto. In 1951, his next opera, The Fugitives, was performed at Tallahassee, but was later cancelled.

Susannah was Floyd's third opera. It was first performed at the Ruby Diamond Auditorium in February 1955, with Phyllis Curtin playing the title and Mack Harrell as the Reverend Olin Blitch. The opera was also performed at the New York City Opera in the following year, winning him international famousness. Erich Leinsdorf conducted, with Curtin and Norman Treigle as Blitch. The opera was named New York Music Critics' Circle Award for its conduct. It was selected to be America's official operatic entry at the 1958 World's Fair in Brussels, directed by Frank Corsaro, with Curtin, Treigle, and Richard Cassilly.

He began as M. D. Anderson professor at the University of Houston in 1976. He co-founded the Houston Opera Studio, along with David Gockley, as an extension of the University of Houston and the Houston Grand Opera, with students including Michael Ching and Craig Bohmler.

Wuthering Heights, a descendent of Emily Bronten, premiered at the Santa Fe Opera in 1958, with Curtin as the heroine. Pilgrimage, Pilgrimage's solo cantata on biblical texts, was first heard as a soloist at Treigle in 1960. Jonathan Wade, commissioned by the Ford Foundation, was Floyd's most dramatic opera set in South Carolina during the Reconstruction period. On October 11, 1962, it was first performed at the New York City Opera. In a large cast directed by Julius Rudel and directed by Allen Fletcher, Theodor Uppman, Curtin, Treigle, and Harry Theyard performed. Floyd revived it in 1989 for performances at four major opera houses in the United States, beginning at the Houston Grand Opera.

The Sojourner and Mollie Sinclair, Floyd's next opera, was a drama about Scottish settlers of the Carolinas. Patricia Neway and Treigle appeared in Rudel's role as Rudel's lead actors. In 1966, the opera Markheim (after Robert Louis Stevenson) was first seen at the New Orleans Opera Association, with Treigle (to whom it was dedicated) and Audrey Schuh leading the cast. Floyd himself served as stage manager.

The Ford Foundation funded Opera Of Mice and Men (after John Steinbeck). It was premiered at the Seattle Opera in 1970, under Corsaro's direction. In Jacksonville, Florida, Corsaro directed Curtin in a monodrama on the royal subject Eleanor of Aquitaine, Flower and Hawk. The play was also displayed at Carnegie Hall.

Doll by Bilby (after Esther Forbes) was commissioned by the Houston Grand Opera, where it debuted in 1976 with Christopher Keene conducting and David Pountney directing. Willie Stark (after Robert Penn Warren), composer Willie Stark, was also for Houston, where it first appeared in 1981 in a stage by Harold Prince. After a hiatus of nearly 20 years, another Floyd opera, Cold Sassy Tree, opened in Houston in 2000 (after Olive Ann Burns). Patrick Summers directed Bruce Beresford, and Patricia Racette led the cast. It was later developed by a number of American opera companies.

Floyd returned to Tallahassee after being recalled from the University of Houston in 1996. He had composed a Piano Sonata in the 1950s (1957, two years after Susannah), but it wasn't until Daniell Revenaugh that it was played at a Carnegie Hall recital in 2009, aged 74. Revenaugh helped with the piece (Floyd himself had no idea about it), and their rehearsal sessions and live recording of the event were shot for posterity. The recording was made on the Alma-Tadema Steinway, which graced the White House during Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson's tenures.

On March 5, 2016, the Houston Grand Opera conducted Prince of Players, a chamber opera about the 17th-century actor Edward Kynaston, conducted by Summers. A live recording of the premiere was nominated for a Grammy Award.

Floyd died in Tallahassee, 2021, at the age of 95. He had no children but was rescued by four nieces, Ermine's daughters. Boosey and Hawkes, his publisher, announced his death but did not reveal the reason.

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Awards and honors

• 1956 Guggenheim Fellowship
• 1957 Citation of Merit from the National Association of American Conductors and Composers
• 1959 Ten Outstanding Young Men of the Nation Award from the U.S. Junior Chamber of Commerce
• 1964 Distinguished Professor of Florida State University Award
• 1983 Honorary degree from Dickinson College
• 1983 National Opera Institute's Award for Service to American Opera – the highest honor the institute bestows
• 1993 Brock Commission from the American Choral Directors Association.
• 2001 Inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters
• 2004 National Medal of Arts from the White House
• 2005 Honorary Doctorate from Florida State University
• 2008 National Endowment for the Arts Opera Honoree for lifetime work
• 2010 Anton Coppola Excellence in the Arts Award from Opera Tampa
• 2012 Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Man of Music – the highest honor for a member of the American music fraternity.