John Knowles Paine

John Knowles Paine (1839-1906) founded the music department at Harvard University and was America's first accomplished composer of orchestral symphonies. Paine studied music with a German émigré before departing for Germany in 1858, studying at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik; he returned in 1861. In addition to founding the music school at Harvard, Paine was an early founder of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Paine's two symphonies are among the most distinctive American works in the genre, dating from the nineteenth century. He also composed the oratorio St. Peter, a Funeral March for President Lincoln (1865), and many piano pieces and songs.