Kermit Moore lectures at the University of Connecticut

Composer, conductor, and cellist Kermit Moore lectured on 3/12/1974 (2015-0002/RR235). Although primarily a cellist, Kermit Moore was also a conductor, composer, and teacher. Having begun his music training as early as six-years-old, Moore began studying with cello faculty at the Cleveland Institute of Music, and went on to spend a summer at the Tanglewood Music festival all before simultaneously attending both Julliard and New York University for three years receiving an MA in Music.

Becoming the principal cellist at the Hartford Symphony in 1949, he became one of the few African Americans regularly performing in a symphony in the United States. In 1950, Moore moved to France to studying composition with Nadia Boulanger. He then lived in Brussel for four years conducting European orchestras and doing research. Upon his return to New York in 1961, he began to perform, teach, and conduct with such orchestra as the New York Philharmonic and the New York Festival Orchestra. Moore went on to help found the Symphony of the New World which actively welcomes minority artists.

Moore also was married to composer and music educator, Dorothy Rudd Moore.

RR 235 Hale Smith introduces Kermit Moore, cellist and co-founder and project director of Symphony of the New World (integrated orchestra of the United States). Moore discusses music of Black creative people, in general in the United States, from the point of view of their prowess on instruments, their ability to create music and their contribution to the American culture and the culture of "classical" music.