WEthel Atwood was an American musician and orchestra leader. With Caroline B. Nichols, she established the Fadette Ladies' Orchestra.
WMitchell "Mitch" Ayres was an orchestra leader, music arranger, composer and performer. He is best known for his many years of work with Perry Como on radio, records, and television and as the musical conductor for The Hollywood Palace.
WBenjamin Walter Bowman is an American-Canadian violinist. The Metropolitan Opera and incoming Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin appointed Bowman as concertmaster as of the 2018-19 season, after a successful one-year term in 2017-18; he shares his role with David Chan. Bowman was Grammy-nominated in 2016 for his recording with the ARC Ensemble 'Chamber Works of Jerzy Fitelberg' on the Chandos label. He has performed to critical acclaim throughout North America, Europe and Asia. He is a member or frequent guest artist for leading chamber music ensembles internationally, including the twice Grammy-nominated ARC Ensemble, Art of Time Ensemble, and Leondari Ensemble. Bowman was featured on the 2013 Juno-winning album Levant and the 2011 Juno-nominated disc Armenian Chamber Music with the Amici Chamber Ensemble. Until 2019, he was the concertmaster of the American Ballet Theatre orchestra. He is an ensemble member of Orchestra of St. Luke's.
WPercy Faith was a Canadian bandleader, orchestrator, composer and conductor, known for his lush arrangements of pop and Christmas standards. He is often credited with popularizing the "easy listening" or "mood music" format. He became a staple of American popular music in the 1950s and continued well into the 1960s. Though his professional orchestra-leading career began at the height of the Swing Era, he refined and rethought orchestration techniques, including use of large string sections, to soften and fill out the brass-dominated popular music of the 1940s.
WSidney "Sid" Feller was an American conductor and arranger, best known for his work with Ray Charles. He worked with Charles on hundreds of songs including Georgia on My Mind and worked as Charles' conductor while on tour. Ray Charles once said of him "if they call me a genius, then Sid Feller is Einstein." [739.ece]
WSir Herbert Hamilton Harty was an Irish composer, conductor, pianist and organist.
WPhilip Adolph Herfort was a German violinist, violist and orchestra leader.
WDick Manning was a Russian-born American songwriter, best known for his many collaborations with Al Hoffman. Manning composed the first full-length musical to be broadcast on television. The Boys From Boise aired on the DuMont Television Network in 1944.
WPaul Julien André Mauriat was a French orchestra leader, conductor of Le Grand Orchestre de Paul Mauriat, who specialized in the easy listening genre. He is best known in the United States for his million-selling remake of André Popp's "Love is Blue", which was #1 for 5 weeks in 1968. Other recordings for which he is known include "El Bimbo", "Toccata", "Love in Every Room/Même si tu revenais", and "Penelope".
WMarion Gilman Osgood was an American violinist, composer, and orchestra conductor. She established her own company, the Marion Osgood's Ladies Orchestra, which was the first ladies' orchestra organized for professional work in the United States. She was one of the leading solo violinists in the country.
WNicholas Perito was an American Hollywood composer and arranger and, for 40 years, the closest collaborator of singer Perry Como.
WEgo Plum is an American film composer. He is best known for his work on SpongeBob SquarePants for several episodes, The Ghastly Love of Johnny X, Making Fiends and Harvey Beaks.
WRaymond Scott was an American composer, band leader, pianist, record producer, and inventor of electronic instruments.
WWilliam Grant Still Jr. was an American composer of nearly 200 works, including five symphonies, four ballets, nine operas, over thirty choral works, plus art songs, chamber music and works for solo instruments. Born in Mississippi, he grew up in Little Rock, Arkansas, attended Wilberforce University and Oberlin Conservatory of Music, and was a student of George Whitefield Chadwick and later, Edgard Varèse. Because of his close association and collaboration with prominent African-American literary and cultural figures, Still is considered to have been part of the Harlem Renaissance.
WWolfgang Gert Stresemann was a German jurist, orchestra leader, conductor and composer. He was the intendant of the Berliner Philharmoniker from 1959 to 1978 and again from mid 1984 to early 1985, a time when Herbert von Karajan served as music director.
WDr. Sándor Szabó is a Yugoslav-born pianist, organist and harpsichordist of Hungarian descent who has worked as a performer, conductor and music director in both Europe and North America.
WRunar Tafjord is a Norwegian French horn player, brother of the tubaist Stein Erik Tafjord, and uncle of the French horn player Hild Sofie Tafjord. He is best known for being part of The Brazz Brothers.
WNayden Todorov is a Bulgarian conductor.
WRichard Smith Vaughn, known as Billy Vaughn, was an American singer, multi-instrumentalist, orchestra leader, and A&R man for Dot Records.
WTommy Vig is a percussionist, arranger, bandleader, and composer.
WWilfred Theodore Wemyes, known professionally as Ted Weems, was an American bandleader and musician. Weems's work in music was recognized with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
WPaul Weston was an American pianist, arranger, composer, and conductor who worked in music and television from the 1930s to the 1970s, pioneering mood music and becoming known as "the Father of Mood Music". His compositions include popular music songs such as "I Should Care", "Day by Day", and "Shrimp Boats". He also wrote classical pieces, including "Crescent City Suite" and religious music, authoring several hymns and masses.