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Jean Chesley Musick
was born on August 6, 1910 in Colorado Springs,
Colorado. He was a son of pharmacist William Jasper
Musick (1876 - 1941) and Grace Linda (Kiser) Musick
(1876 - 1963) 1 In the spring of 1927,
Mr. Musick was selected for the National High School
Orchestra in Dallas and the following year as first horn
in Chicago.
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Colorado Springs High School Yearbook,
1928
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After completing his primary and secondary
education in Colorado, Mr. Musick was given a four-year
scholarship to the University of Rochester's Eastman
School of Music.2 An honor student for all four years,
he was also Chairman of his class. He earned his
Bachelor of Music degree in three years (1931) and
completed the academic requirements for the degree of
Master of Music in his fourth scholarship year. The
topic of his master's thesis was the symphonies and tone
poems of Jean Sibelius and the degree was granted in the
class of 1934. In the fall of 1932, while working on his
thesis, he was invited to join the Cincinnati Symphony
Orchestra as assistant first horn to Max
Hess. Mr. Musick moved to second horn
the following season replacing Gustav Albrecht.
Upon the retirement of Mr. Hess, Mr. Music ascended to
solo horn for the the 1937 - 1938 season.
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Cincinnati Symphony Horn Section 1933 : Hans Lind,
Vincent Capasso, Gustav
Albrecht, Max Hess (principal), Jean C. Musick
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In 1938, following one season as solo horn of the
Cincinnati Symphony, Jean C. Musick moved to Los Angeles
to join the orchestra of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Studios. Some of his movie credits include
the following: 3
"Random
Harvest" (MGM, 1942)
"Lassie
Come Home" (MGM, 1943)
In 1943 Mr. Musick enlisted in the United States Coast
Guard, stationed at Government
Island, California as a Musician First Class and
was assigned to the Coast Guard Reserve Band at
Alameda. Following the war he returned to Los
Angeles to resume his career in the studios:
"The
Yearling" (MGM, 1946)
"Courage
of Lassie" (MGM, 1946)
"The
Thing From Another World" (RKO, 1951)
"On
Dangerous Ground" (RKO, 1951)
"Take
the High Ground!" (MGM, 1953)
"Untamed"
(20th Century Fox, 1955)
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photo courtesy of
Howard Hilliard
Los Angeles Philharmonic Horn Section
for a performance of Sinfonia Domestica (1939)
(back, l-r): Sinclair Lott (5), Jean C. Musick (7),
Walter Horning (3), Huntington Burdick (2)
(front, l-r)): Luigi de Fabrity (6),
Odolindo Perissi (4), Vincent de Rosa (8), James
Stagliano (1)
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On March 25, 1948 Mr. Musick submitted
a Declaration of
Candidacy to be considered as Independent
Progressive Party candidate for election
to the office of Member of County Central
Committee for the 45th Assembly
District of Los Angeles in the election to be
held on June 1, 1948.
On March 7, 1956, Mr. Musick received a subpoena
to testify before a subcommittee of the U.S.
House of Representatives Committee on
Un-American Activities. In the afternoon session
on April 20, 1956 he was asked about his 1948
Declaration of Candidacy but refused to identify
the signature as his, and declined to answer
subsequent questions invoking his first and
fifth amendment rights. The committee believed
that he should be in a position to give it
"important facts relating to the plan of the
Communist Party in 1948 to use musicians who
were members of the Communist Party to promote
the interests of the Independent Progressive
Party."4 His refusal to answer
the committee's questions apparently led to him
being blacklisted
from further work in the studios. He then
started his own acoustical engineering company.
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Press-Telegram. Long Beach,
CA, March 8, 1956
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While he was living in Cincinnati Mr. Musick
married Thelma Cox, a daughter of William Allen and
Martha E. (Shaw) Cox. Thelma was born on August 21, 1903
and was some seven years older than Mr. Musick. The
couple never had children. Thelma passed away on
February 18, 1983.
When his friends from high school, Dr. Winthrop and Lois
Crouch, heard that Jean was now a widower, they invited
him to come back to Colorado Springs for a reunion with
another classmate.5 As a result Mr. Musick and Mrs.
Olive Bradley Whitney were married at the Crouch home on
December 28 1983. Olive was the widow of Dr.
Roger Whitney. Both she and Dr. Crouch were
members of Mr. Musick's high school class in 1928, Dr.
Crouch having also been a colleague in the school
orchestra. Mr. and Mrs. Musick were active in Colorado
Springs society. In January 1986 he was elected
treasurer of the Friends of the Pioneers' Museum, and
was one of the "key people" behind the publication of The
Invisible People of the Pikes Peak Region: An Afro
American Chronicle, by John Stokes Holley.
He was also a Patron contributor to the High Country Research Fund.
Jean C. Musick died on January 21, 2002, at the age of
ninety one; his second wife, Olive Bradley Whitney
Musick died on February 6, 2004 at the age of
ninety-three.
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Jean and Olive, August, 1983
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Presenting Mr. and Mrs. Musick, December 28,
1983
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