Clappé, Arthur

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Clappé, Arthur

Clappé, Arthur, Irish-American bandmaster and composer; b. Cork, July 22, 1850; d. Washington, D.C., Nov. 22, 1920. He was educated at the Royal Military School in London (graduated, 1873). He began his career as a bandmaster in the British Army in India. After serving as director of the Canadian Governor-General’s Foot Guards in Ottawa (1877–84), he went to N.Y. as ed. of the journal Metronome (1884–91). From 1891 to 1895 he was director of the U.S. Military Academy Band at West Point. In 1893 he founded the journal The Dominant, which he owned and pubi, from 1895 to 1910. In 1911 he organized the U.S. Army Music School at Fort Jay in N.Y. In 1918 he was commissioned a captain in the U.S. Army, and oversaw the founding of a training school for bandmasters. He publ. manuals and composed band pieces.

—Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire