Lehman Engel

Lehman Engel was born on September 14, 1910 in Jackson, Mississippi. He attended the University of Cincinnati, the Juliard school of music, and the Roger Sessions which were taught by Roger Huntington, an American composer. He began his conducting career with Cradle Will Rock (1937) and followed it with Call Me Mister (1946), Wonderful Town (1953), Fanny (1954), Li'l Abner (1956), Jamaica (1957), Take Me Along (1959), Do Re Mi (1960), and I Can Get It for You Wholesale (1962). He was the conductor for the television version of Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew (1956), Twelfth Night (1957), Leonard Bernstein's Wonderful Town (1958), and Broadway musical version and motion picture (1959) of L'il Abner. Engle composed music for Broadway's revival of Hamlet (1939) and Anne of the Thousand Days (1948). He taught at the American Musical and Dramatic Theatre Academy and New York University. He is also an author who wrote such books as Musical Shows: Planning and Producing (1957), The American Musical Theatre (1967), Words with Music (1972), and an autobiography, This Bright Day (1974). He died on August 29, 1982 in New York City.