Background
Reese was born in New York City.
Reese was born in New York City.
He studied law at New York University, graduating in 1921. Though he was admitted to the New York State Bar, he opted to re-enroll and pursue a Bachelor of Music from New York University, which he received in 1930.
Reese is known mainly for his work on medieval and Renaissance music, particularly with his two publications Music in the Middle Ages (1940) and Music in the Renaissance (1954). These two books remain the standard reference works for these two eras, with complete and precise bibliographical material, allowing for almost every piece of music mentioned to be traced back to a primary source. He was an avid scholar and had interests in many areas outside music, including art, architecture, and literature.
He is also remarkable in that he lacked formal musicological training.
In 1927, however, he was already teaching classes at the university in medieval and Renaissance music He continued teaching there intermittently until 1974, and he became Professor Emeritus in 1973.
He also served as a visiting professor at a number of universities, including Harvard, Duke, University of California, Los Angeles, University of Southern California, Michigan, Oxford and the Juilliard School of Music. He became vice-president in 1946 and president of the organization in 1950.
He has also held positions in the International Musicological Society(IP Multimedia Subsystem), the Renaissance Society of America, and the Plainsong and Medieval Music Society.
Also active in the music publishing industry, he headed the publication department of G. Schirmer (1940–1945) and was also director of publication at Carl Fischer (1945–1955). Furthermore, he was editor of The Musical Quarterly from 1944 to 1945. Gustave Reese had a profound impact on generations of music students through his passionate and insightful teaching.
He has left a valuable legacy in Music in the Middle Ages and These two pillars have incited a revival of interest and scholarship in the areas of early music
He is often perceived to have "raised the bar" of musicological scholarship with his thorough research, intellectual research, and comprehensive bibliographies. He commissioned other people to contribute specialist sections to these books, such as Igor Buketoff"s piece on Russian chant in Music in the Middle Ages.
Reese was married to Fine Arts administrator and cookbook author and editor, Carol Truax, from 1974 to 1975. He died, aged 77, in Berkeley, California.