Phillip T. Young

Young, Phillip T.

Phillip T. (Taylor Jr) Young. Bassoonist, teacher, organologist, b Milton, Massachussetts, 2 Mar 1926, d Victoria 9 Dec 2002, naturalized Canadian 1991, BA (Bowdoin College) 1949, M MUS (Yale) 1962. He studied bassoon with Bernard Garfield, Harold Goltzer, and Robert Bloom, and conducting with Gustav Meier. In 1949 Young joined the faculty of The Taft School (Watertown, Connecticut) as director of instrumental music, serving 1962-5 as chairman of the Department of Music. He taught 1965-9 at the School of Music, Yale University, before moving to the University of Victoria, where he was chairman 1969-77 of the Department of Music. He then continued to teach at the University of Victoria until his retirement in 1991. For many years he played bassoon in the Victoria Symphony Orchestra.

Young's research on historical woodwind instruments earned him an international reputation and many awards, including a Farwell Fellowship for extended travel to instrument collections in Europe (The Taft School, 1964), a certificate of merit 'for distinguished contribution to the field of music' (Yale University, 1983), and a Curt Sachs Award (The American Musical Instrument Society, 1989). He served on the board of governors of the AMIS 1979-88, and as its president 1991-95. Young was appointed by the Vancouver Centennial Museum (now Vancouver Museum) to select and arrange for loan all instruments exhibited at 'The Look of Music,' which opened in November 1980 (see Exhibitions) and was considered by many curators to have been one of the most important exhibitions ever held in a Canadian museum. There was no precedent anywhere for a loan exhibition of historical musical instruments on the same scale of size or significance. Young chose from the world's major museums and private collections many instruments that had never been loaned previously; approximately two-thirds of the exhibition items first appeared in North America at his instigation.

Young continued to write reviews, catalogues, and other material in his area of expertise until 2002. He donated a collection of videos of instrumental performances to the Victoria Conservatory of Music, and his research materials to the University of South Dakota, in 2000.

Writings

- et al, A Survey of Musical Instrument Collections in the United States and Canada (Ann Arbor, Mich 1974)

The Look of Music: Rare Musical Instruments, 1500-1900 (Vancouver 1980)

2500 Historical Woodwind Instruments: An Inventory of the Major Collections (New York 1982)

Loan Exhibition of Historic Double Reed Instruments, University of Victoria (Victoria, BC 1988)

4600 Historical Woodwind Instruments (London 1991)

Woodwind Instruments of the Oberösterreichisches Landesmuseum (np 1997)

Also articles for The New Grove Dictionary, Galpin Society J, and J of the American Musical Instrument Society, among others.

See also Catherine M. (Marie) Young (his wife).