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 The article in the April issue about the musical tribute by the Juilliard Percussion Ensemble to Lou Harrison ["Percussionists Celebrate Lou's Legacy"] contained a biographical sketch that failed to mention an important phase of his musical and personal life: his time and work at Black Mountain College in North Carolina. John Cage recommended Lou Harrison in 1951 to Black Mountain College to help him recover from a nervous breakdown. The experimental school had attracted a circle of Schoenberg followers as well as other avant-garde musicians. The move was decisive in charting a new direction in Harrison's work that showed less influence by Schoenberg and Cage. While there he completed and composed some of his major works, and collaborated with writer Charles Olson, painters Ben Shahn and Robert Rauschenberg, and dancer Katherine Litz. He also launched the Black Mountain College Music Press, with funds donated by Charles Ives, which printed Cage's Haiku. He discovered in this idyllic setting that he could never live in a city again. In 1953 he settled near the village of Aplos, Calif., where he continued to work on compositions he had started at the college.The intellectual-creative-practical environment of Black Mountain College provided just what Harrison needed to nourish his interest in exotic and "found" percussive instruments, though he taught courses in traditional music as well. The B.M.C.-Juilliard connection bears further exploration, and not just for Lou Harrison. Among those who later came to Juilliard were Frederick Cohen, director of the Opera School; Marie Tavroges Stillkind, assistant editor of The Juilliard Review from 1960 to 1962; and Ruth Currier, dancer with José Limón, and my roommate at B.M.C. in summer 1944.Alma Stone Williams ('46, piano)
Savannah, Ga.The Juilliard Journal welcomes letters to the editor. Please send letters to: Senior Editor, Publications, The Juilliard School, Room 442A, 60 Lincoln Center Plaza, New York, NY 10023. Or e-mail your letter to journal@juilliard.edu; write "letters" in the subject heading. Letters may be edited for content or length.
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