Meyer, Leonard B.

Leonard B. Meyer was a prolific composer, author, and philosopher. Meyer studied at Columbia University, graduating with a B.A. in Philosophy and an M.A. in Music in 1948. He continued at the University of Chicago, where he was awarded a Ph.D. in the History of Culture in 1954, and served as a professor from 1946 until 1975. A composer, he studied under Stefan Wolpe, Otto Luening, and Aaron Copland. In 1975 was appointed professor of music and the humanities at the University of Pennsylvania and became professor emeritus at Pennsylvania in 1988.

His published works include Emotion and Meaning in Music (1957), which paved the way for cognitive psychological research into music and was influential for theorists in music as well as other fields. Other major written works include The Rhythmic Structure of Music (with Grosvenor Cooper, 1960), "Some Remarks on Value and Greatness in Music" (1959), Music, the Arts, and Ideas (1967), and Explaining Music (1973).