Bispham Memorial Medal Award

The Bispham Memorial Medal Award was an award for operas written in English which was named for baritone David Bispham, who was a great proponent of performing opera in English in the United States. It was traditionally awarded to American composers, frequently for an opera on an American subject. It originated from the Opera in Our Language Foundation, Inc., founded by composer Eleanor Everest Freer, and Edith Rockefeller McCormick in 1921. After David Bispham's death in October 1921, Eleanor Everest Freer also founded the David Bispham Memorial Fund, Inc., in March 1922. Eleanor Everest Freer was chairman, and Edith Rockefeller McCormick was treasurer, of both organizations. On April 7, 1924, the two organizations merged to become the American Opera Society of Chicago. The first medal was awarded by the American Opera Society of Chicago in 1924 to Ernest Trow Carter, for his opera The White Bird, which saw its first full performance at the Studebaker Theater, in Chicago, on March 6, 1924. (The Opera in Our Language Foundation, Inc. sponsored the performance.) The last medal went to Virgil Thomson in 1955 for his opera, Four Saints in Three Acts. The award was funded, in part, by Eleanor Everest Freer, who was also one of its recipients (for The Legend of the Piper). Other recipients include (alphabetically by author):

• George Antheil (for Helen Retires)
• Ernst Bacon (for A Tree on the Plains)
• Alberto Bimboni (for Winona)
• J. Lewis Browne (for The Corsican Girl (La Corsicana))
• Simon Bucharoff (for Sakahara)
• [Frank Patterson]] (for The Echo)
• Charles Wakefield Cadman (for Shanewis)
• Charles Frederick Carlson (for Phelias)
• Ernest Trow Carter (for The White Bird)
• Frederick Shepherd Converse (for The Pipe of Desire)
• Walter Damrosch (for Cyrano de Bergerac)
• Francesco Bartolomeo de Leone (for Alglala)
• Henry Purmort Eames (for Priscilla and John Alden)
• Pietro Floridia (for Paoletta)
• Hamilton Forrest (for Yzdra)
• Aldo Franchetti (for Namiko-San)
• Eleanor Everest Freer (for Legend of the Piper)
• George Gershwin (for Porgy and Bess)
• Louis Gruenberg (for The Emperor Jones)
• Henry Hadley (for Azora, the Daughter of Montezuma)
• Howard Hanson (for Merry Mount)
• W. Franke Harling (for A Light from St. Agnes)
• S. W. Harwill (for Bella Donna)
• Victor Herbert (for Natoma and Madeleine)
• John Adam Hugo (for The Temple Dancer)
• Frederick Jacobi (for The Prodigal Son)
• Wesley LaViolette (for Falstaff)
• William Lester (for Manabozo)
• Clarence Loomis (for Yolanda of Cyprus)
• Otto Luening (for Evangeline)
• Ralph Lyford (for Castle Agrazant)
• Quinto Maganini (for The Argonauts)
• William J. McCoy (for Egypt)
• Mary Carr Moore (for "Narcissa," or The Cost of Empire)
• Marx E. Oberndorfer (for Roseanne)
• Bernard Rogers (for The Marriage of Aude)
• Karl Schmidt (for The Lady of the Lake)
• John Laurence Seymour (for In the Pasha's Garden)
• Charles Sanford Skilton (for Kalopin)
• Theodore Stearns (for The Snow Bird)
• Humphrey John Stewart (for The Hound of Heaven)
• Deems Taylor (for The King's Henchman)
• Jane Van Etten (Andrews) (for Guido Ferranti)
• Isaac Van Grove (for The Music Robber)
• Clarence Cameron White (for Ouanga!)

References

• David Ewen, Encyclopedia of the Opera: New Enlarged Edition. New York; Hill and Wang, 1963.
• List of winners, cited on Opera-L