William Kraft is a composer, conductor, teacher, timpanist, and percussionist who was born in Chicago, IL. He was awarded two Anton Seidl Fellowships at Columbia University where he earned a bachelor’s degree cum laude and a master’s degree. He worked as a freelance musician in New York, then joined the Dallas Symphony before moving to Los Angeles. Kraft was in the Los Angeles Philharmonic for 25 years, organized and directed the Los Angeles Percussion Ensemble, composed film soundtracks, and served as chairman of the composition department and holder of the Corwin Chair at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He has received numerous awards and commissions, including two Guggenheim Fellowships, a MacDowell Fellowship, fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the ASCAP Award, an American Academy and institute of Arts and Letters Music Award, and many more.
William Kraft
Studios
Veltin
William Kraft worked in the Veltin studio.
Veltin Studio was donated by alumni of the Veltin School, a school for girls in New York with a highly respected visual arts department. As the plaque just outside the entrance attests, this studio was used by poet Edwin Arlington Robinson during most of the 24 summers he spent at MacDowell. Perhaps most famously, Thornton Wilder put the finishing…