Wintter Watts

Wintter Watts
Born(1884-03-14)March 14, 1884
Cincinnati, Ohio
DiedNovember 1, 1962(1962-11-01) (aged 78)
Brooklyn, New York
OccupationComposer

Wintter Haynes Watts (March 14, 1884 – November 1, 1962) was an American composer of art songs.

Life and musical career

Watts was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, and his early studies were in painting, architecture, voice, and organ. He later studied at the Academy of Musical Art in New York City and in Florence, Italy. He won the Morris Loeb Prize in 1919 for his symphony Young Blood and the Prix de Rome in 1923. He returned to Italy a few years later and stayed until 1931, when he returned to the United States. After 1931 he fell into obscurity. Watts died aged 78 in Brooklyn, New York.

Musical works

Watts composed around 70 songs for voice and piano in the years between 1906 and 1924. Most were published individually by Oliver Ditson or G. Schirmer. The songs were highly esteemed in their day, and Upton praised them for their distinctly 'American' sound. His most important song cycle is his Vignettes of Italy, nine songs from 1919, settings of poems by Sara Teasdale reflecting on various Italian locations and their associated emotional recollections. Many important singers performed his songs in concert, most notably Kirsten Flagstad and John McCormack, to whom Watts dedicated several songs. None of his other music was ever published.

Published songs

  1. Love's Life (R. B. Butler)
  2. A Drop o' Dew (H. Canfield)
  3. The Joy of Man (Wanting) (unknown author)
  1. Clover (W. Bynner)
  2. Admonition—Roses and Thorns (R. W. Gilder)
  3. The Song of the Wind (N. E. Barnhart)
  1. A Hope (W. Watts)
  2. My World (Richard Watson Gilder)
  3. The Stairway (Richard Watson Gilder)
  4. The Difficulty (after Heine)
  1. Dreams (Arthur Symons)
  2. During Music (Arthur Symons)
  1. Alone (words from the Spanish)
  2. Home (D. Greenwell)
  3. It isn't the Thing You Do, Dear (unknown author)
  4. Oh, Call it by some Better Name (Thomas Moore)
  5. Surf Song (L. Hope)
  1. Like Music on the Waters (Lord Byron)
  2. Barcarole (Pai Ta-shun)
  1. Addio
  2. Naples
  3. Capri (Isle of Beauty)
  4. Night song at Amalfi
  5. Ruins of Paestum
  6. From a Roman Hill
  7. Ponte Vecchio, Florence
  8. Villa Serbelloni, Bellaggio
  9. Stresa
  1. Beloved, it is Morn (E. H. Hickey)
  2. The Mother's Song (C. R. Robertson)
  3. Golden Rose (Grace Hazard Conkling)
  4. Utopia (Frances Turner Palgrave)
  5. Magic (Harriet Morgan)
  1. With the tide (Edward J. O'Brien)
  2. Transformation (Jessie B. Rittenhouse)
  3. The nightingale and the rose (William Ernest Henley)
  1. Only A Cry (Sara Teasdale)
  2. Let it be Forgotten (Sara Teasdale)
  1. Song is so old (H. Hagedorn)
  2. Miniver Cheevy (Edwin Arlington Robinson)
  3. Dark Hills (Edwin Arlington Robinson)

Larger musical works

Footnotes

  1. 1 2 "Wintter Watts, composer, dead; Writer of Art Songs Was 78 – Did Vignettes of Italy". The New York Times. November 2, 1962. p. 31. Retrieved August 27, 2025. facsimile
  2. 1 2 3 Shirley, Wayne D. (1986). "Watts, Wintter (Haynes)". In H. Wiley Hitchcock; Stanley Sadie (eds.). The New Grove Dictionary of American Music. Vol. IV. London: Macmillan Press. p. 492. ISBN 0-943818-36-2 – via Internet Archive.
  3. ↑ Upton, William Treat (1930). Art-Song in America. Boston: Oliver Ditson Company. p. 182.
  4. ↑ The manuscript is located in the New York Public Library. Dedication: "To Éva Gauthier with all the love the law allows from Wintter Watts"
  5. ↑ Wintter, Watts. In Silhouette. OCLC 55529538.

Further reading