Allen Music Library Special Collections

Dr. John Boda (1922-2002) was Professor of Theory, Composition and Piano at Florida State University, teaching from 1947-2001. Born in Boyceville, Wisconsin, he received his Bachelor's degree in Music at Kent State University. Following a year as apprentice conductor to George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra, he received his Master's and Doctoral degrees at Eastman School of Music. Throughout his many years in education, he remained constantly active as composer, pianist, and conductor. At FSU, Dr. Boda directed more than fifty dissertations in composition, and taught many courses in composition, theory, and opera. He was a specialist in the music of Richard Wagner, conducting Wagner's works and teaching a specific class on the Ring Cycle.

Dr. Boda was a fan of baseball, golf, and tennis, which he would play as often as his schedule would allow. He loved cooking and playing bridge. He was also a charter member and president of the Tallahassee Orchid society, collecting and cultivating those exotic flowers for decades.

Dr. Boda has written many works for large and small ensembles. Included in his larger works are Poem (for orchestra, 1994), Concertino for Piano and Chamber Orchestra (1981), Sinfonia for Orchestra (1960), and Concerto for Piano and Orchestra (1967) written for Edward Kilenyi. The Sinfonia, written under a Ford Grant, was performed by various orchestras, including the Rochester Orchestra, the Oklahoma City Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra, and the Brevard Music Festival Orchestra.

William F. Cramer taught trombone at Florida State University for more than 30 years, starting in the 1950s. He was a founding member of the International Trombone Association, and received their distinguished service award in 1987. Over the course of his distinguished career, he played a major role in the promotion and development of repertoire for his instrument.

In 1982, Dr. Cramer donated a significant portion of his collection to the Music Library. The collection contains approximately 250 works, of which more than 100 are manuscript facsimiles. Many works in the collection remain unpublished. Composers from both the Americas and Europe (particularly East Europe and Russia) are represented.

Most of the pieces were composed by contemporaries of Cramer, and many were composed as a direct result of Dr. Cramer's activity. Many of the scores are inscribed by the composer or Dr. Cramer, or both. Most works are for piano and trombone; however, there are also pieces accompanied by organ, orchestra or band, as well as pieces for trombone alone.

Individual titles do not appear in our online catalog. FSU alumnus Paul William Overly's dissertation, An annotated guide to the William F. Cramer Collection of Solo Trombone Literature in the Warren D. Allen Music Library at Florida State University (ML128.T76 O93 1990) describes the contents of the collection in detail.

A brief listing of the William F. Cramer collection is available:

Wiley Lee Housewright passed away December 13th, 2003 and left behind a legacy of early Florida music research to the FSU Music Library. Dr. Housewright joined the faculty of Florida State University as a professor of music in 1947. Among his accomplishments during his tenure were initiating a graduate program, and founding and conducting the University Singers, which he developed into one of the nation's top choral organizations. He was appointed the third Dean of the FSU School of Music in 1966 and served until his retirement in 1980.

After retirement he focussed on his research on early Florida music. His Pulitzer Prize-nominated book, A History of Music and Dance in Florida, 1565-1865 (ML200 .F6 H7 1991) was published by the University of Alabama Press in 1991, and his Anthology of Early Music in Florida (ML200.7 .F6 A5 1999) was published in 1999 by the University of Florida Press. During his career, Dr. Housewright traveled for many professional conferences and appointments, and was highly respected, even beloved, by his colleagues. He made contributions to the FSU music program which should not be forgotten.

The Housewright Archives at the Warren D. Allen Music Library contains many boxes of personal research, papers, manuscripts and drafts of Dr. Housewright's books about early Florida music. Some of the more pertinent topics of interest include notes on the music of early Florida residents including Native Americans, African-Americans, and the Spanish and other settlers of European descent; as well as church music, military music, folk music and the role music played in early social life.

While the collection almost exclusively reflects the research done for his books, there are also large portions of the collection which cover his many professional interests such as music education, and correspondence and speeches written for professional organization meetings such as the Music Educators National Conference (MENC), the Sonneck Society, and the International Society for Music Educations (ISME).

Items in the Wiley L. Housewright Archives do not appear in the online catalog; however, an print inventory and catalog has been compiled by Allison Dyer.

Edward Kilenyi Jr. (1910-2000) was a Hungarian-American classical pianist and educator of great influence in the 20th century. He was a pupil, friend, and later colleague of Ernst von Dohnányi (1877-1960), Hungarian composer and pianist. Both men served on the faculty at Florida State University (Kilenyi 1953-83; Dohnányi 1949-60), and are considered two of the most influential musicians who ever taught at FSU. Though born in Philadelphia, Kilenyi was trained at the Liszt Royal Academy in Budapest under Dohnányi. Interrupted only by his service for the U.S. Army in World War II, his performances spanned six decades, and covered a vast range of musical styles.

He performed with dozens of major orchestras in Europe and America beginning in the 1930s. Kilenyi recorded more than 100 works, some of which are being re-released on compact disc. Though FSU holds a few reel-to-reel recordings of his performances, most of his recordings are held at the International Piano Archives at Maryland (IPAM) at the University of Maryland Libraries.

The Edward Kilenyi Archive consists mainly of letters and correspondences, postcards, telegrams, promotional ephemera, business correspondences and contracts, programs, clippings, and memorabilia pertaining to Kilenyi Jr., the pianist. These are mostly from the first half of the 20th century, and are organized into 20 binders/folders. Also included are oversized posters and pictures from the pianist’s career.

The archive also holds compositions of Kilenyi Sr., the film composer. Original manuscripts of this composer are exceedingly rare, and only three scores are known to be held in other libraries, including the Library of Congress. Thus, this archive, which includes some 67 original manuscripts and some 123 published titles, is the definitive collection of this composer’s work. It offers valuable insight into how film music was composed and arranged from the 1920s to the 1940s. Also included are items pertaining to Kilenyi Sr.’s musical training in Germany from 1905-08, and later contracts and business documents with the American Society of Composers, Authors, & Publishers (ASCAP) between 1936 and 1940, and his employment with the Sam Fox Publishing company.

A basic inventory of the Kilenyi collection is available:

Ella Scoble Opperman (1873-1969) was the first director of the School of Music at the Florda State College for Women from 1911, and its first dean from 1920 until her retirement in 1944; the FSCW became Florida State University in 1947.

Opperman was an accomplished pianist and organist and served also as a vocal coach. She held degrees from Wesleyan College in Cincinnati and the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music; additionally, she studied piano privately in Berlin with Ernest Jedliczka and in Paris with Moritz Moszkowski. Her organ teachers included Alexandre Guilmant in Paris and Harold Gleason at the Eastman School of Music.

As an administrator, Opperman established courses leading to the first degree programs at the School of Music, and she requested an expansion of the Italian language program for the benefit of music students. Under her leadership, the FSCW School of Music became the first state school in the South to be accepted into the National Association of Schools of Music in 1930. From 1923 until her retirement she served as chair of the university committee overseeing the Artist Series, which included musical and theatrical performances, art exhibitions, and eventually lectures. She was active in a number of national organizations; she presented at the southern conference of MENC, and served as a member of the executive committee and as assistant secretary of the Music Teachers' National Association. The Cincinnati Conservatory awarded her an honorary Doctor of Pedagogy degree in 1943.

The Opperman Collection was a donation of Owen Sellers, faculty member and executor of Opperman's estate, and consists of twelve boxes and one folder. Its contents include photographs, newspaper clippings, grades and personal notes about students, financial records, a few letters and postcards, assorted memoribilia and realia (including her baby dress), and numerous concert programs.

A brief inventory of the collection is available: