San Francisco Classical Voice

Earl Bernard Murray, former Musical Director and Conductor of the San Francisco Ballet and Associate Conductor of the San Francisco Symphony, died on Sunday at California Pacific Medical Center from esophageal cancer. He was 76. A native San Franciscan, Mr. Murray was a fifth generation musician, the son of Ralph Murray, the symphony's tubist and personnel manager, and conductor of the Golden Gate Park Band for 50 years.

A trumpeter in the San Francisco Symphony under Pierre Monteux, Mr. Murray began conducting career at 18, at the podium of the San Francisco Recreational Symphony, where Monteux noticed him and eventually accepted him into his Monteux Summer Conducting School in Hancock, Maine. Later Monteux named him a "Disciple of Pierre Monteux," an honor shared by only seven of his students in the 25 years of the school. By the summer of 1951, he was conducting the San Francisco Symphony in Stern Grove concerts, and became in the following year Musical Director of the San Francisco Ballet, working with Lew and William Christiansen, the Ballet's founders. In quick succession he became the San Francisco Symphony's Assistant Conductor, in charge of the Youth Concerts, conductor of the SF Opera's Fol-de-Rol gala concerts and of many of the Standard Hour broadcasts. Time magazine named him one of San Francisco's leaders of tomorrow.

Because of his reputation as a "Pied Piper" of symphony children's concerts, KQED engaged Mr. Murray in 1957 to do TV shows on music appreciation, for which he wrote his own scripts, arranged and rehearsed the music. Since video tape and teleprompters were not yet in use, he did his shows from memory and live. Meanwhile, his work was being highly praised. The San Francisco Chronicle's music critic, Alfred Frankenstein, wrote of Mr. Murray's conducting of Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle at San Francisco State College, "He made his college instrumentalists play better than they knew how to play. The whole thing had an incandescence, a sweep and depth and grandeur of feeling all too often lacking in opera at the Opera House."

At a time when American conductors were hardly recognized much less hired, Mr. Murray was conducting engagements with the Monterey Symphony, the Salt Lake City Ballet and Boston Pops Orchestra. In 1959, he became music director of the San Diego Symphony, building the skill of that orchestra and the stature of its presentations.

From San Diego, he went to the Dallas Symphony, as Associate Director, while continuing with the San Francisco Ballet. Thereafter, his career came to a premature stop due, it has been said, to his unwillingness to promote himself and accommodate to the extra-musical aspects of a conductor's career. While he occasionally conducted such music education projects as the SF All-City Youth Orchestra, and at Cazadero Music Camp, he was in effect, semi-retired for the balance of his life. He made a considerable contribution in a career that was all too short, much of the promise left unfulfilled.

As a youth Mr. Murray studied trumpet with Benjamin Klatzkin and composition with David Sheinfeld, both of the San Francisco Symphony. While a student of 16 at Lowell High school, he made a conspicuous debut at the Opera House. He and his friend and contemporary, the late Edward Haug, were hired as herald trumpets for the opening night production of Aida. Costumed as Egyptians, they were instructed to wait for the cue from the assistant conductor, but apparently the assistant conductor was off somewhere flirting with a ballet dancer. The scream of "Trombette!" from the conductor Gaetano Merola in the orchestra pit, brought on their fanfare late as the audience roared with laughter, and their pictures were on the front page of the next morning's San Francisco Chronicle. Helped by the intercession of Klatzkin, the budding career was saved and soon, Mr. Murray was engaged by the San Francisco Symphony. He went on to graduate from Lowell High and to study with Ernst Bloch at the University of California, Berkeley.

Mr. Murray is survived by his wife, Joan who was a prominent conductor and music teacher in the San Francisco public schools and since her retirement, conductor of the Golden Gate Philharmonic All-City School Orchestra. A memorial recital was given by the Artist Faculty of the Golden Gate Philharmonic yesterday. Donations in his memory may be made to the Golden Gate Philharmonic All-City Youth Orchestra (GGP, 3058 Market Street, San Francisco, CA 94114) or your favorite charity.