Editing Samuel Barber (section)

===Education and early career (1924–1941)===
As a young boy, Barber took private lessons from William Hatton Green. Constant Vauclain, one of Barber's peers, described Green being one of Barber's greatest early influences.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Samuel Barber remembered: a centenary tribute |date=2010 |publisher=University of Rochester Press |isbn=978-1-58046-350-8 |editor-last=Dickinson |editor-first=Peter |series=Eastman studies in music |location=Rochester, NY |pages=10}}</ref> At the age of 14, Barber entered the youth artist program at the [[Curtis Institute of Music]] in Philadelphia, where he ultimately spent ten years developing his talents as a triple prodigy in composition, voice, and piano.<ref name="obit"/> During his initial studies at Curtis, he simultaneously attended and graduated from West Chester High School (later [[West Chester Henderson High School]]), during which time he composed his school's alma mater which is still in use.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://pabook.libraries.psu.edu/literary-cultural-heritage-map-pa/bios/Barber__Samuel|title=Samuel Barber|author=Michelle Vincent|website=Pennsylvania Center for the Book|publisher=Pennsylvania State University|date=Spring 2005}}</ref> Following his graduation from high school in 1928, he entered the adult professional program at Curtis from which he graduated in 1934.{{sfn|Heyman|2001}} At Curtis he studied piano with [[George Frederick Boyle]]{{sfn|Heyman|2001}} and [[Isabelle Vengerova]],{{sfn|Heyman|2001}} [[Musical form|composition]] with [[Rosario Scalero]],<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.npr.org/2011/07/18/124272297/the-life-and-music-of-samuel-barber|title=The Life and Music of Samuel Barber|author=Ted Libby|work=[[NPR]]|date=March 5, 2010}}</ref> conducting with [[Fritz Reiner]],{{sfn|Heyman|2001}} and voice with [[Emilio de Gogorza]].<ref name="obit"/> In 1928, he met fellow Curtis schoolmate [[Gian Carlo Menotti]], who became his partner in life as well as in their shared profession.{{sfn|Heyman|2001}} During his last year at Curtis he became a favorite of the conservatory's founder, [[Mary Louise Curtis Bok]]. It was through Mrs. Bok that Barber was introduced to his lifelong publishers, the Schirmer family.{{sfn|Heyman|2001}}

From his early adulthood, Barber wrote a flurry of successful compositions, launching him into the spotlight of the classical music world. According to Walter Simmons, Barber's earlier compositions contain certain characteristics that directly relate to the "childhood" period of his composition, extending to 1942. The use of [[Tonality|tonal harmony]], unresolved [[Consonance and dissonance|dissonance]], moderate [[chromaticism]], and largely diatonic, lyrical melodies are some of the defining features of this period in his compositional career.{{sfn|Simmons|2004|page=219}} At the age of 18, he won the [[Joseph H. Bearns Prize]] from [[Columbia University]] for his [[violin sonata]] (since lost or destroyed by the composer).<ref name="obit"/> He won the Bearns Prize a second time for his first large-scale orchestral work, [[The School for Scandal (Barber)|an overture]] to ''[[The School for Scandal]]'', which was composed in 1931 when he was 21 years old.{{sfn|Heyman|2001}} It premiered successfully two years later in a performance given by the [[Philadelphia Orchestra]] under the direction of conductor [[Alexander Smallens]].<ref name="obit"/>

While a student at Curtis, Barber also pursued other music development opportunities as well as personal interests through travels in Europe; mainly in the summer months when school was not in session but also sometimes for longer periods. His first European trip began in the summer of 1928 in which he visited Paris, Brittany, and Italy with cellist and composer David Freed.{{sfn|Heyman|1992|p=58}} He continued to travel in Europe in the fall of 1928 without Freed to other European cities in Czechoslovakia, Germany, Switzerland, and Austria; during which time he first visited the city of Vienna which would later become an important city in his musical development. During this first stay in Vienna in 1928 he formed a friendship with composer [[George Antheil]].<ref name="Pollack">{{harvnb|Pollack|2023|loc=Ch 4: "Other Formative Experiences"}}</ref>

Barber returned to Italy in the summer of 1929 using funds he received upon winning the Bearns Prize; this time with Menotti as his travel companion. He returned to Paris in the summer of 1930, and in the summers of 1931 and 1933 both Barber and Menotti studied composition with [[Rosario Scalero]] in [[Montestrutto]], [[Turin]] while staying with Menotti's parents in [[Cadegliano-Viconago|Cadegliano]].<ref name="Pollack"/> After winning the Bearns Prize a second time in April 1933, he extended his stay in Europe beyond the summer of that year to pursue further studies in Vienna; staying in that city in the Autumn of 1933 into the early part of 1934.<ref name="Pollack"/> During this period his studies were mainly focused on developing his talents as a vocalist with the intent of pursuing a career as a [[baritone]].<ref name="one twelve"/> He also studied conducting independently during this period;<ref name="one twelve">{{harvnb|Heyman|1992|p=110}}</ref> making his professional conducting debut in Vienna on January 4, 1934.{{sfn|Broder|1985|p=26}} In March 1934 he returned to Philadelphia to finish his studies at Curtis.{{sfn|Heyman|2001}}

After graduating from Curtis in the spring of 1934, Barber pursued further studies in conducting and singing with John Braun in Vienna in the summers of 1935 and 1936 through the aid of a Pulitzer traveling scholarship.{{sfn|Heyman|2001}}<ref name="obit"/> He soon after was awarded the [[Rome Prize]] which enabled him to pursue further studies at the [[American Academy in Rome]] from 1935 to 1937.{{sfn|Heyman|2001}} He was awarded a [[Guggenheim Fellowship]] in 1946 and also studied conducting privately with [[George Szell]].<ref name="obit"/>{{sfn|Heyman|2001}}

In his early career Barber had a brief career as a professional [[baritone]], performing on the NBC Music Guild concert series and earning a weekly contract on NBC radio in 1935. Musicologist Barbara Heyman wrote that Barber's recording of his own setting of [[Matthew Arnold|Arnold]]'s [[Dover Beach]] was hailed as having "singular charm and beauty, intelligently sung by a naturally beautiful voice".<ref name=sbhr/> First-hand experience as a singer and an intuitive empathy with the voice would find expression in the large legacy of songs that occupy some two-thirds of his output.{{sfn|Heyman|2001}}

Barber's first orchestral work to receive international attention was his ''[[Symphony in One Movement (Barber)|Symphony in One Movement]]'' which he wrote while studying composition in Rome. The work was premiered by the [[Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia]] in Rome under the baton of [[Bernardino Molinari]] in December 1936, and was soon after programmed by symphony orchestras in New York City and Cleveland. The work was the first symphonic composition created by an American to appear at the [[Salzburg Festival]], where it was performed in 1937.{{sfn|Heyman|2001}}

In 1938, when Barber was 28, his ''[[Adagio for Strings]]'' was performed by the [[NBC Symphony Orchestra]] under the direction of [[Arturo Toscanini]], along with his first ''[[Essay for Orchestra]]''. The Adagio had been arranged from the slow movement of Barber's [[String Quartet (Barber)|String Quartet, Op. 11]]. Toscanini had rarely performed music by American composers before (an exception was [[Howard Hanson]]'s [[Symphony No. 2 (Hanson)|Symphony No. 2]], which he conducted in 1933).{{sfn|Heyman|1992|p=164}} At the end of the first rehearsal of the piece, Toscanini remarked, "Semplice e bella" (simple and beautiful). From 1939 to 1942, Barber taught composition at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia.{{sfn|Heyman|2001}}

During this time, there was a major turning point in Barber's music. In 1940, he wrote a choral piece using [[Stephen Spender]]'s war poem, "A Stopwatch and an Ordnance Map". From this point forward, World War II caused his second phase of composing. This new phase was greatly influenced by other composers such as [[Igor Stravinsky|Stravinsky]], [[Arnold Schoenberg|Schoenberg]], [[Béla Bartók|Bartók]], and genres such as [[jazz]]. His new era of composition would feature a greater involvement in American literature and culture.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Pollack |first=Howard|author-link=Howard Pollack|date=Summer 2000|title=Samuel Barber, Jean Sibelius, and the Making of an American Romantic |jstor=742563|journal=[[The Musical Quarterly]]|volume=84 |issue=2 |pages=175–205 |doi=10.1093/musqtl/84.2.175 |issn=0027-4631}}</ref>