Tag Archives: Dr. Thomas Knoles
Irving Lowens (1916-1983) was born in New York City and graduated from Columbia University in 1939. For 15 years, he was employed by the Civil Aeronautics Administration and the Federal Aviation Administration. Lowens had a lifelong interest in American musicology, and in 1960, he began work in the Music Division of the Library of Congress. He was chief music critic for the Washington Evening Star from 1961 to 1978, and was a founding member of the Sonneck Society and the Music Critics Association. His publications include Music and Musicians in Early America (1964), Songsters Printed in America before 1821 (1976), and (with Allen P. Britton and Richard Crawford) American Sacred Music Imprints, 1698-1810 (1990). Lowens and his wife Margery Morgan Lowens shared an interest in the history of American music, and it was this interest that led Lowens to assemble an important collection of early American printed and manuscript music books. The Irving Lowens Collection was given to the American Antiquarian Society by Mrs. Lowens at her husband's death. It includes 53 volumes containing manuscript music. Both sacred and secular music are well represented in this collection, which contains vocal as well as instrumental settings.

CPM completes massive vernacular music website

The Center for Popular Music announced on March 18 the launch of its American Vernacular Music Manuscripts (AVMM) website.

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