Hugo Weisgall, conductor, opera and liturgical choral music composer, was born at Eibenschütz, Moravia on October 13, 1912. The son of a cantor, he grew up in Baltimore, and studied at the Peabody Conservatory, Curtis Institute, and received a PhD from Johns Hopkins in 1940. He studied composition with Roger Sessions. Weisgall founded the Chamber Music Society of Baltimore in 1948, and the Hilltop Opera in 1952. He directed the Baltimore Institute of Musical Arts, a conservatory for African-Americans. In 1952 he became faculty chair at JTS, the Jewish Theological Seminary in NY. He also taught at Julliard (starting 1957) and Queens College (starting 1961). He served as President of the American Music Center, and elected president of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters (1990). Weisgall died in Great Neck, NY on March 11, 1997. His papers, which cover a span of nearly 70 years, are kept at the NYPL. A online finding aid describes the contents of the holdings.
http://digilib.nypl.org/dynaweb/ead/music/musweisg/@Generic__BookView