Ruggles, Carl, 1876-1971

American composer.

From the description of Carl Ruggles Papers, 1894-1981 (inclusive). (Yale University). WorldCat record id: 122501161

From the description of Carl Ruggles Papers, 1894-1981 (inclusive). (Yale University). WorldCat record id: 702189342

Painter; Coral Gables, Fla., and Arlington, Vt.

From the description of Christmas card and note to E.P. and Constance Richardson, 1952. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 122557460

Charles Sprague Ruggles was born in East Marion, Massachusetts on March 11, 1876. As a boy, Ruggles took violin lessons from a local band director; after the family moved to suburban Boston in 1890, he performed in a variety of ensembles. Although he did not attend college, he studied composition and violin with several professors from Harvard and the New England Conservatory of Music, including John Knowles Paine. Ruggles' first publication, a set of songs, appeared in 1899 under the imprint of C.W. Thompson. It was at this time that Ruggles began calling himself Carl rather than Charles. In these years, he struggled to support himself as a performer, teacher, and music critic.

In 1907 Ruggles moved to Winona, Wisconsin to teach violin at the Mar d'Mar School of Music. He was soon joined by his fiancée, Charlotte Snell, a singer from Massachusetts. They married in 1908, and in 1915 they would have a son, Micah. Their jobs at Mar d'Mar lasted for only a year because of the school's financial problems, but the couple remained in Winona until 1917; Ruggles taught privately and founded the Winona Symphony Orchestra.

After meeting the writer Charles Henry Meltzer, Ruggles decided to set The Sunken Bell, Meltzer's libretto based on Gerhart Hauptmann's Die versunkene Glocke . Meltzer had connections at the Metropolitan Opera, so prospects for performance seemed good. Ruggles gave up his orchestra to concentrate on composition, and in 1917 he moved to New York to be closer to the Met. Despite his labors over a period of many years, he never completed the opera.

In New York Ruggles gave private lessons, and conducted an orchestra and chorus at the Rand School of Social Science. He also met the composers Edgard Varèse and Henry Cowell, both of whom would help promote his music. Between 1922 and 1926, Varèse's organization, the International Composers' Guild, performed five pieces by Ruggles: Angels (1922), Toys (1923), Vox clamans in deserto (1924), Men and Mountains (1924), and Portals (1926). Cowell published Men and Mountains, Portals, and Sun-Treader (1934) as part of the pioneering New Music series. With these works, Ruggles established his position as one of the leading modernist composers in America, known for his dissonant and idiosyncratic style.

Ruggles also became friendly with Charles Ives, and later with the pianist John Kirkpatrick, a leading exponent of Ives' music. As a trusted friend and talented performer, Kirkpatrick gave Ruggles detailed advice on his compositions. Researchers interested in Ruggles may wish to consult the Charles Ives Papers and the John Kirkpatrick Papers, both of which are also held at Yale.

In 1924, Ruggles moved to Arlington, Vermont, where he would remain for the rest of his life, except for 1938-43, when he taught composition at the University of Miami. Never a prolific composer, he completed only a few works in his last decades, notably Evocations, Organum, and Exaltation . Ruggles was also an artist, and in these years, he devoted much of his time to painting. He died on October 24, 1971 in Bennington, Vermont.

From the guide to the Carl Ruggles Papers, 1894-1981 (inclusive), (Irving S. Gilmore Music Library, Yale University)