Background
Ernest Richard Kroeger was born on August 10, 1862 in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. His father was Adolph Ernst Kroeger and his mother Eliza B. A. (Curren) Kroeger.
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Ernest Richard Kroeger was born on August 10, 1862 in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. His father was Adolph Ernst Kroeger and his mother Eliza B. A. (Curren) Kroeger.
From his father Kroeger received his first musical instruction. These lessons were supplemented by work with an array of St. Louis teachers: Egmont Froelich, Waldemar Malmeme, Charles Kunkel, Wilhelm Goldner, Peter G. Anton, Ernst Spiering, and Louis Mayer.
After a short time in business, Kroeger definitely abandoned all thought of a commercial career and in 1885 decided to make music his life work. He had already occupied several church positions, having become organist of Grace Episcopal Church at the age of fifteen and shortly afterwards transferring his activities to Trinity Episcopal Church, where he played from 1878 to 1885. From 1885 until 1921 he was organist at the Church of the Messiah. In 1879 he gave his first piano recital.
Thereafter he traveled considerably as a concert pianist besides giving annual recitals in his home city from 1893 to 1923. As a choral conductor he led the Morning Choral Club (1893 - 1903) and the Amphion Club (1910 - 12).
In 1904 he was master of programs for the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, and in 1915 he gave a series of organ recitals at the Panama-Pacific Exposition. In 1887 he became director of music at Forest Park College for Women, a position which he held for the rest of his life.
He taught summer courses at the University of California in 1915, at Cornell University, 1916-23, at Dallas, Texas, and at Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1920.
In addition to his other activities he was for a time musical director of the John Burroughs School and of the extension division of Washington University in St. Louis. He also served as chairman of the board of examiners of the Art Publication Society, St. Louis. He was a prolific composer. For orchestra he composed a symphonic overture, Hiawatha, which was first performed by the Thomas Orchestra at the Omaha Exposition, July 1898; March of the Pioneers, for the Pageant of St. Louis, May 28-31, 1914; Festival Overture in commemoration of the admission of St. Louis to the Union, played during the Missouri Centennial by the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, November 6, 1921; four symphonic overtures based on literary works: Sardanapalus (Byron), produced in New York December 15, 1897, by Anton Seidl; Thanatopsis (Bryant), first produced by Victor Herbert and given its St. Louis premiere December 15, 1898; Endymion (Keats), played in 1902 by the St. Louis Choral Symphony Orchestra; and Atala (Chateaubriand). He also composed a Symphony in B flat, from which only the Scherzo was performed, and a suite, Lalla Rookh, which was first given at the St. Louis world's fair (1904). In the field of chamber music, Kroeger composed six string quartets; a piano quintet in F minor (first performed in St. Louis in 1888); a Pastorale Sonata in F for viola and piano (1883); a Fantasie in E minor for flute; and a Sonata in F sharp minor for violin and piano. For piano, he composed a Prelude and Fugue in B flat minor; a Sonata in D flat; a Concerto in E flat; a Suite in F minor; "Twelve Concert Etudes"; and "Fifteen Etudes for the Left Hand. "
In 1904 he was made a member of the Academie Fransaise, and in 1915, of the National Institute of Arts and Letters. He was a member of the Music Teachers' National Association and its president, 1895-96, and from 1887 to 1899 he was president of the Missouri Music Teachers' Association.
(Excerpt from I Will Praise Thee About the Publisher For...)
On October 10, 1891 Kroeger married Laura A. Clark of Lebanon, Missouri, and was survived by his wife and four children, Mary, Richard, Eleanor, and Beatrice.
