Katherine Hoover

Katherine Hoover (born December 2, 1937, in Elkins, West Virginia) is an American composer and flutist. She holds a performer's certificate in flute and a Bachelor of Music in music theory from the Eastman School of Music, and a Masters in Music from the Manhattan School of Music. She was a faculty member of the Manhattan School of Music for fifteen years and taught flute at the Juilliard Preparatory School. Hoover has won numerous awards for her compositions, and her music has been hailed as "fresh and individual... dazzlingly crafted."

Hoover was raised in a "non-musical family." Her mother was a painter and her father was a scientist, and they discouraged her from pursuing music as a career. However, music was the most important part of Hoover's life. She recalls being able to read music as early as four years old, before she could read words. After her family moved to Philadelphia, she began playing the flute. At age fifteen, she began playing the piano. She received "mediocre music instruction" in high school.

Because her parents discouraged her from pursuing a music major, she began her academic studies at the University of Rochester in 1955. Two years later she transferred to the Eastman School of Music, where she studied with flutist Joseph Mariano, began studying composition, and graduated in 1959 with a Bachelor of Music in Music Theory and a Performer's Certificate in Flute. Unfortunately, her composition classes left a bad impression. Hoover comments, "There were no women involved with composition at all. [I got] rather discouraged – being the only woman in my classes, not being paid attention to and so forth." After graduating from Eastman, she moved to Manhattan and spent the next ten years focusing on performing and teaching.

In the summers of 1960 and 1961, Hoover attended the Yale Summer Session, where she studied flute, theory, and composition. During this time, she studied with flutist William Kincaid in Philadelphia. From 1961–1967 Hoover taught flute at the Juilliard Preparatory School as well as a few other small schools, including the Third Street Music School. It was at the Third Street Music School that Hoover had her first positive experience as a composer. She was asked to compose a piece for a school concert, a duet for violins, which was very well received.

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