This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon, Nov. 16, 2010 - John MacIvor Perkins, a pianist, professor and prolific composer whose concert performance was once described as "dry and cerebral, plush and dramatic," died Friday at Barnes-Jewish Extended Care of complications from liver cancer and kidney failure. He was 75 and had lived in University City since the early 1990s.
That assessment of Mr. Perkins' work appeared in a 1989 St. Louis Post-Dispatch concert review. A subsequent story in 1993 called the performance of Mr. Perkins' 1992 composition "Lyric Variations" for violin and piano, which Mr. Perkins spent a considerable amount of time writing, "Well worth the listener's wait ... meticulously structured and elegantly proportioned, with nary a note out of place. What is impressive here, to the extreme, is the music's craftsmanship."
'A Composer's Composer'
"I thought of John as a composer's composer; his music was beautifully crafted with a crystalline quality," said Robert Wykes, Mr. Perkins' fellow composer, flutist, former Washington University colleague and friend. "Lyric Variations," Wykes said, "was a model of clarity and musicality."
That work was just one of more than three dozen instrumental pieces that Mr. Perkins composed, including two one-act operas and works for orchestra, chorus, chamber ensembles, songs for voice and piano, and solo instruments.
Mr. Perkins' work did not go unnoticed. His numerous honors included a 1966 award from the American Academy and National Institute of Arts and Letters, and commissions from the Fromm Music Foundation, the New Music Circle of St. Louis, Easley Blackwood and the Smithsonian Institution.
In addition to being a lauded composer and performer, Mr. Perkins helped prepare several generations of musicians.
Composer As Teacher
Mr. Perkins joined the faculty of the University of Chicago in the early 1960s, then taught at Harvard University from 1965 through 1970. Mr. Perkins returned to his hometown in 1970 to join the music faculty at Washington University as associate professor of music, serving as chair of the music department until 1976. He retired from his full-time faculty position in June 2001, but continued until recently to teach counterpoint and composition in his emeritus capacity.
As a faculty member, Mr. Perkins had a rare quality.
"He enjoyed faculty meetings and he participated in a dispositive frame of mind," said Dolores Pesce, professor and chair of Washington University's music department. "He was involved in making music and teaching."
Mr. Perkins left a legacy at Washington University through his contribution to the design of one of the new music buildings; his other legacy will be the number of distinguished faculty members that he hired during his tenure at the university.
Mr. Perkins was acknowledged by Washington University, critics and audiences for his ability to develop and combine apparently disparate musical ideas and modes of perception. His research, the university said, has yielded theoretical articles that address 20th-century serial music and rhythmic notation, while some of his other studies have dissected the music of Igor Stravinsky, Anton Webern and Luigi Dallapiccola.
In retirement, Mr. Perkins continued to do research, teach part time at Washington University and, of course, compose music.
'Kind of Good at Everything'
John MacIvor Perkins was born in St. Louis on Aug. 2, 1935. He graduated from John Burroughs School in 1953, received his bachelor of arts degree from Harvard University in 1958 and a bachelor of music the same year from the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. He earned a master of fine arts from Brandeis University in 1962. Mr. Perkins studied with some of the most accomplished teachers and composers of the 20th century, including Nadia Boulanger in Paris, Roberto Gerhard and Edmund Rubbra in London.
Shortly after he retired in 2001, Washington University's Department of Music presented "Celebrating the Music of John MacIvor Perkins." The evening featured the operatic monologue Andrea del Sarto, for baritone, silent actress, and 12 instruments. The work, which premiered in 1981, was based on the poem by Robert Browning and was conducted by Leonard Slatkin, then conductor of the St. Louis Symphony.
"He was kind of good at everything -- astronomy, modern art, photography, storytelling," his son, Jonathan Perkins, said proudly. "He had a tremendous love for all kinds of arts and he had a real intellectual grasp of art and literature. But being a composer was most important to him."
Mr. Perkins, who was divorced, was preceded in death by his parents, Kendall Perkins and Elizabeth Perkins, and his only sibling, Amy Bethke.
In addition to his son Jonathan (Vicki) of Springfield, Ill., Mr. Perkins is survived by two other sons, Andrew Perkins (Emily), of Berkeley, Cal. And Benjamin Rain of Eugene, Ore., and four grandchildren.
The family would appreciate donations in memory of Mr. Perkins to the charity of the donor's choice.
A memorial service at Washington University is being planned for a later date.
Gloria Ross is the head of Okara Communications and the storywriter for AfterWords, an obituary-writing and production service.