Finney, Theodore M. (Theodore Mitchell), 1902-1978

American musicologist and educator.

From the description of Theodore M. Finney Music Manuscript Collection, ca. 1700-1850. (Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center (HRC); University of Texas at Austin). WorldCat record id: 122530516

This is most likely the copy Finney sent to Volkwein Bros. who published the work in 1946.

From the description of Exultant spirit, ever new / text: Doris Jack ; music: Theodore M. Finney. [1946] (University of Pittsburgh). WorldCat record id: 708216977

Theodore Mitchell Finney, American musicologist and educator, was born in Fayette, Iowa, on March 14, 1902. He studied at the University of Minnesota (B.A. 1924), the American Conservatory at Fontainebleau, the Stern Conservatory in Berlin, and the University of Pittsburgh, earning his Master of Letters degree there in 1938. He taught at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota, from 1925 to 1932 and was supervisor of music for the public schools in Council Bluffs, Iowa, from 1933 to 1936; during that time he was also a lecturer at the Smith College Summer School. From 1936 to 1968 he was professor and head of the music department at the University of Pittsburgh.

Finney retired in 1968 and became curator of the Warrington Collection of Hymnology at the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. His career encompassed a wide range of musical interests including performance, research, music education, and librarianship. He played violin in the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra from 1923 to 1925, and was also active as a choral conductor, founding the Heinz Chapel Choir at the University of Pittsburgh in 1939. He died in Pittsburgh on May 19, 1978. He was the brother of composer Ross Lee Finney.

Finney's publications include A History of Music (New York, 1935, 1947), Hearing Music (New York, 1941), We Have Made Music (Pittsburgh, 1955), and A Union Catalogue of Music and Books on Music Printed Before 1801 in Pittsburgh Libraries (Pittsburgh, 1959, 1963). He also served as editor for J. Warrington's Short Titles of Books Relating to or Illustrating the History and Practice of Psalmody in the United States, 1620-1820 (Pittsburgh, 1970).

From the guide to the Theodore M. Finney Music Manuscript Collection TXRC98-A25., ca. 1700-1850, (Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at Austin)