Descriptive Record 
Enlarge Image1945-1960
1945
Copland was awarded the Pulitzer Prize and New York Music Critic's Circle Award for the ballet he wrote for Martha Graham, Appalachian Spring (1944), commissioned by the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Music Foundation at the Library of Congress.
1946
January 24: Elected a member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP).
1947
Received Music Critic's Circle Award for his Third Symphony (1944-46).
Again toured Latin America to lecture, perform, and conduct, under the sponsorship of the State Department.
1947-1948
Wrote Clarinet Concerto, commissioned by Benny Goodman and later choreographed by Jerome Robbins for the ballet Pied Piper (1951).
1950
Won an Academy Award ("Oscar") for the music score to the film The Heiress (1949).
Finished composing Twelve Poems of Emily Dickinson.
Appointed Charles Eliot Norton Professor of Poetics at Harvard University, where he delivered a series of six lectures (1951-52); he was the first American composer to receive this honor.
1952
Published Music and Imagination, a book based on the Charles Eliot Norton lectures he had given at Harvard University.
1953
May 26: Appeared before the Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) of the U.S. House of Representatives.
Toured Latin America to lecture, perform, and conduct on a grant made possible by the Committee for Inter-American Artistic and Intellectual Relations.
1954
April 2: Premiere of his full-length opera, The Tender Land, by the New York City Opera Company.
December 3: Elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
1956
Received Gold Medal in Music from the National Institute and American Academy of Arts and Letters.
Received first of many honorary Doctor of Music degrees, from Princeton University.
1960
Published his fourth book, Copland on Music, which included reprints from previous publications as well as new material.
))
Set and cast for the first production of Appalachian Spring. Left to right: Martha Graham, Erick Hawkins, May O'Donnell, Merce Cunningham, the four followers. A posed picture rather than a still from the dance, 1944.
Music Division, Library of Congress.
))
Martha Graham and Erick Hawkins in the first production of Appalachian Spring, 1944.
Music Division, Library of Congress.
))
The Tender Land, production shot, 1954.
Music Division, Library of Congress.