Scope and Content Note
Music materials from the Halsey Stevens Papers consist of scores, parts, and sketches for works composed from about 1920 to 1987. These include instrumental works for keyboard, chamber ensemble, and full orchestra, as well as vocal and choral works and arrangements for varying instrumentations. The majority of titles are represented by dated pencil scores in Stevens' hand, onionskin master sheets, and ozalid reproductions of scores bearing annotations by Stevens or other conductors and performers. Additional materials include publisher proofs, score paste-ups, and lyric sheets. Numerous scores have been stamped "withdrawn" by the Stevens estate. These are omitted from Stevens' known personal works list, although many are assigned "catalog" numbers on the original crate inventories that accompanied the materials.
In addition to his own composing, Stevens spent considerable time throughout his career transcribing and arranging folk music from Eastern and Western Europe, Canada, and Latin America. Many of his arrangements of Hungarian and Slavic folk songs are based upon transcriptions by Béla Bartók. The collection also includes an extensive amount of Stevens' miscellaneous sketch materials, many of which are arranged according to their original packing inventories. These include unfinished and unidentified works, theory and composition exercises, and fragments of inked master sheets. Titles of significant works in sketchbooks are listed if known.