Pauline Alderman

Edith Pauline Alderman (January 16, 1893 – October 11, 1983) was an American musicologist and composer. She was the founder and the first Chairwoman of the Department of Music History and Literature (musicology) at the University of Southern California, between 1952 and 1960.

Biography Early life and education Alderman was born in Lafayette, Oregon and received training in piano and organ, as well as in English and German literature in her youth. She graduated from Washington High School in Portland, Oregon. Her first teaching career started at the McMinnville junior high school in 1916 where she taught English literature.

Later life and death She moved to Europe in 1938, where she decided to take lessons from Donald Francis Tovey at the University of Edinburgh. She moved to at the University of Strasbourg for doctoral studies. Alderman presented her dissertation at USC which she named Antoine Boësset and the Air de Cour and in 1946 she received the first PhD degree in music at USC.

In addition to her songs, Alderman composed an opera Bombasto Furioso (1938) and the operetta Come On Over (1940), which won the ASCAP Award for 1940, the first time the prize was won by a woman.

The International Congress on Women in Music sponsored by International Alliance for Women in Music has established the Pauline Alderman Award for musicological and journalistic works on women in music in 1982.

Alderman's students included composer Williametta Spencer.

Works Antoine Boesset and the Air de Cour, Dissertation, 1946 A Survey of Vocal Literature (1952) Theme and Variations (1943–45) Pioneers of Music (1950) We Build a School of Music (1989) (For all intents, a rousing autobiography centered on her years at the School of Music.)