Biography
Born in Park Ridge, Illinois, on February 28, 1876, Carpenter was raised in a musical household. He was educated at Harvard, where he studied under John Knowles Paine, and was president of the Glee Club and wrote music for the Hasty-Pudding Club. Showing great promise as a composer, he journeyed to London to study under Sir Edward Elgar, later returning to the United States to study under Bernhard Ziehn in Chicago. It was there he earned a comfortable living as vice-president of the family business, a mill supply company. He was a member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia music fraternity.
Carpenter composed many works meant to encompass the spirit of America, including the patriotic, The Home Road, and several jazz-inspired works. He composed several ballets, including one based on the Krazy Kat comics, and one in 1926, possibly his best-known, titled Skyscrapers and inspired by his city of residence. One of his most famous works was 1914's impressionistic orchestral suite Adventures in a Perambulator. In 1932 he completed The Song of Faith for the George Washington bicentennial.
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He died in Chicago in 1951.
Biography text from Last.fm, available under CC BY-SA.