# Do some composers write under a pen name?



## Chopinator

I've been wondering this for quite some time. My name is actually very common (at least my last name), so I feel as if it wouldn't be a name anybody would recognize as a composer. When someone says the name Chopin or Beethoven, you immediately think of the composer. When someone says the name Smith or Jones, no one person stands out above the rest.

So, do some composers write under "pen names"?


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## Sid James

The best known one, I think, was Philip Heseltine who had the pseudonym of* Peter Warlock*. He was a British 20th century composer. I don't know of any other. I know Heseltine was a music critic, I wonder if he used that pseudonym to keep his composing and critic _hats_ separate? Eg. write music under the name Warlock (all recordings of his music I have seen use Warlock), and write music criticism under Heseltine. I really don't know.


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## Klavierspieler

Never mind, Sid beat me to it.


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## Kopachris

P.D.Q. Bach, anyone?


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## PetrB

Even when the name is near or identical to another well-known name, it seems people tend to keep their own:

There was the American president John Adams.

John Adams, born 1947, is an American contemporary classical composer [John Coolidge Adams.]
John Adams. born 1953, is an American contemporary classical composer [John Luther Adams.]

People seem to manage to keep those three same-named individuals, those two composers, apart. No one changed their name....

George Gershwin ~ née, Jacob Gershowitz

Aaron Copland's father Anglicized the family surname "Kaplan" to "Copland" before emigrating from Russia to the United States.

Mentioned already is composer Peter Warlock, that name a pseudonym for Philip Heseltine. 
Heseltine, in his role as critic, would attend premieres of music by Warlock the composer (his 'alter ego') and then proceeded to write the most consistently negative and disparaging reviews of his own music! This was a much-conflicted fellow.

Many a performer has altered either first, last, both names or taken a new name completely to make their stage name more readily recognizable, easier to read, spell, remember, and pronounce.


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## Sid James

^^Your John Adams examples remind me of *Elmer and Leonard*, *the two Bernsteins*. They were unrelated, the former being a composer of film music, the latter the conductor-composer-musical polymath we all well know here. Both were also New Yorkers.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

I want to compose under a pseudonym. 

The only two I know of are PDQ Bach (Peter Schickele) and Peter Warlock (Philip Heseltine)


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## Sid James

A famous name change was the singer* Ray Charles*. His original name was Ray Charles Robinson, but he dropped the 'Robinson' not to be confused with the famous boxer of his time, Sugar Ray Robinson. There is a scene in the movie _Ray_, where Ray Charles (played by Jamie Foxx) says he doesn't care what name is on his records as long as he gets more money from selling his records. This was at the time he made his first record and therefore had to make the name change.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

Ooh ooh I know one!

Bob Dylan, formerly Robert Allen Zimmermann


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

Just realised I also know that Billie Holiday's real name was Eleanora Harris.


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## Klavierspieler

Sid James said:


> ^^Your John Adams examples remind me of *Elmer and Leonard*, *the two Bernsteins*. They were unrelated, the former being a composer of film music, the latter the conductor-composer-musical polymath we all well know here. Both were also New Yorkers.


Or even worse, the two Einsteins: Alfred and Albert.

On a side note, I notice I just passed 2000 posts. Yay me.


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