Otto Kinkeldey

Otto Kinkeldey (1878–1966) was an American music librarian and musicologist. He was the first president of the American Musicological Society and held the first chair in musicology at any American university.^[1][2]

Kinkeldey was born in New York on November 27, 1878.^[3] He received his B.A. in 1898 from City College of New York and his M.A. from New York University in 1900.^[1] In a somewhat unusual step for an American at the time, he studied for his doctorate at a German university, the Royal Academic Institute for Church Music in Berlin, where he received his Ph.D. in 1909.^[1] Returning to New York, he served in the United States Army during World War I.^[4] He became head of the New York Public Library's music division, serving in that capacity from 1915 to 1923.^[3]

In 1923, he moved to Cornell University, becoming a professor of musicology ^[4] and in 1930 the fourth librarian of the Cornell University Library.^[1] Following his retirement in 1946, he continued to teach classes at Cornell and other universities.^[1] He was elected the first president of the American Musicological Society in 1935, which honored him posthumously in creating the Otto Kinkeldey Award. The award is given each year to recognize the most distinguished book in musicology published during the previous year.^[2]

Kinkeldey was a visiting distinguished professor at the University of North Texas College of Music from 1951 to 1952, seven years after its rapid growth as a large, comprehensive school of music.^[5] While at North Texas, Kinkeldey profoundly influenced Anna Harriet Heyer (1909–2002), another pioneer music librarian. Heyer built the North Texas music library into one of the largest academic music collections in the United States. In 2010, the UNT College of Music housed over 300,000 volumes of books, periodicals, scores, dissertations, and reference works, as well as 900,000 sound recordings. In 1957, Heyer achieved profession-wide recognition with her publication of a groundbreaking bibliography, Historical Sets, Collected Editions, and Monuments of Music: A Guide to their Contents.^[6]

Kinkeldey died in South Orange, New Jersey, September 19, 1966.^[3]

Notes

References

• "Cornell University Library History: Cornell’s University Librarians". Cornell University Library. 2006. http://rmc.library.cornell.edu/libraryhistory/librarians/kinkeldey.html. Retrieved 2009-06-27. 
• "Guide to the Otto Kinkeldey Papers, 1902-1966". Cornell University Library. http://rmc.library.cornell.edu/ead/htmldocs/RMA01000.html. Retrieved 2009-06-27. 
• "The Otto Kinkeldey Award Winners". American Musicological Society. http://www.ams-net.org/awards/kinkeldeywinners.php. 
• "Oxford Grove Music Encyclopedia: Otto Kinkeldey". Answers.com. http://www.answers.com/topic/otto-kinkeldey. Retrieved 2009-06-27. 
• Who Was Who in Literature, 1906-1934, based on entries that first appeared in Literary Yearbook (1906–1913)
• Literary Yearbook and Author's Who's Who (1914-1917), Literary Yearbook (1920-1922), and Who's Who in Literature (1924-1934), two volumes, Gale Research, Detroit (1979)
• Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, Sixth edition, Revised by Nicolas Slonimsky (1894–1995), Collier Macmillan Publishers, London
• Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, Seventh edition, Revised by Nicolas Slonimsky (1894–1995), Macmillan Publishing Co., New York Schirmer Books, New York (1984)
• Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, Eighth edition, revised by Nicolas Slonimsky (1894–1995), Macmillan Publishing Co., New York (1992)
• Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, Ninth edition, edited by Laura Diane Kuhn (born 1953), Schirmer Books, New York (2001)
• Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Twentieth-Century Classical Musicians, by Nicolas Slonimsky (1894–1995), Schirmer Books, New York (1997)
• Biographical Dictionary of American Music, by Charles Eugene Claghorn (1911–2005), West Nyack, New York (1973)
• Biography Index. A cumulative index to biographical material in books and magazines; Volume 1: January, 1946-July, 1949, H.W. Wilson Co., New York (1949)
• Biography Index. A cumulative index to biographical material in books and magazines; Volume 2: August, 1949-August, 1952, H.W. Wilson Co., New York (1953)
• Biography Index. A cumulative index to biographical material in books and magazines; Volume 7: September, 1964-August, 1967, H.W. Wilson Co., New York (1968)
• Biography Index. A cumulative index to biographical material in books and magazines; Volume 10: September, 1973-August, 1976, H.W. Wilson Co., New York (1977)
• Biography Index. A cumulative index to biographical material in books and magazines; Volume 17: September, 1990-August, 1992, H.W. Wilson Co., New York (1992)
• Dictionary of American Library Biography, edited by Bohdan Stephen Wynar (born 1926), Libraries Unlimited, Littleton, Colorado (1978)
• The New Grove Dictionary of American Music, Four Volumes, edited by Hugh Wiley Hitchcock (1923–2007) & Stanley Sadie (1930–2005), Macmillan Press, London (1986)
• The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 20 Volumes, edited by Stanley Sadie (1930–2005), Macmillan Press, London (1980)
• The New Oxford Companion to Music, Two Volumes, edited by Denis Arnold (1926–1986), Oxford University Press (1983)
• The New Oxford Companion to Music, 1974 edition, by Percy Alfred Scholes (1877–1958), edited by John Owen Ward, Oxford University Press (1974)
• Who Was Who in America; a component volume of Who's Who in American History, Vol. 4, 1961-1968, Marquis Who's Who, Chicago (1968)