Bio on Clifton Williams

Clifton Williams was an American composer, conductor, theorist, and music

educator born in Arkansas in 1923. Growing up, Williams began learning French horn
and piano, and began to stand out as a musician as early as high school, where his
classmates voted him most outstanding in artistry, talent, and versatility. He
attended Louisiana State University for his Bachelors of Music (received 1947),
where he studied under Helen Gunderson, and the Eastman School of Music for his
Masters degree (received 1949), studying under Bernard Rogers and Howard
Hanson. While at Eastman, Williams career path was set towards composing for the
wind ensemble genre, counseled by Hanson, a veteran orchestral composer, that
his compositions for wind band would garner larger audiences, not to mention a
larger amount and wider range of ensembles that would be able to perform his
works.
His first major compositional breakthrough occurred in 1956, as his concert band
piece entitled Fanfare and Allegro won the inaugural American Bandmasters
Association Ostwald Composition Prize. He would also go on to win the award the
following year, with the work entitled Symphonic Suite winning critical acclaim. As
a sidenote, in 1958 he entered his piece Symphonic Essays, though he withdrew
the work the day before the winner was to be announced after indications pointed
to his victory; Williams stated himself that winning a new competition a third
consecutive year would discourage other contemporary composers. With these
successes, Williams works quickly moved to the forefront of contemporary wind
literature.
Immediately after graduating, Williams accepted a post in the composition
department at the University of Texas. In 1966, he relocated to Miami to become the
Chair of the Theory and Composition department at the University of Miami. He
would stay at UM until his passing in 1976. Some of his most notable students
include W. Francis McBeth, John Barnes Chance, and UConns own Dr. Kenneth
Fuchs.

Program Notes
Caccia and Chorale

Clifton Williams

The two title words of this piece are borrowed from the Italian language because of their
allegorical significance. The first Caccia, means hunt or chase, and is intended to reflect the
preoccupation of most people in the world with a constant pursuit of materialism. The Chorale is, by
contrast, an urgent and insistent plea for greater humanity, a return to religious or ethical concepts.
Caccia and Chorale, published in 1973 just before his passing three years later, is very much in
the signature of Clifton Williams; however, the futility of the Caccia and its ultimate exhaustion into the
Chorale bring us yet another dimension of this composer. As the Caccia continues its relentless pursuit of
greater heights of frenzy, at times utilizing multiple time signatures simultaneously, it is finally interrupted
by a morse code figure, which persists over the sustained block chords of what signals the chase as Dr.

Williams describes it. The material found in the Chorale represents some of the most powerful emotional
music to come from Williams pen; not only in volume, but in the tension-maintaining harmonic structure
which is as dramatic as any fortissimo climax found in any of his music. The music leaves one with a
somewhat unresolved, restless feeling, although the final pianissimo chord makes every attempt to
negate this through its musical consonance. (James D. Wayne)