Biography
Bacon pursued studies at the University of Chicago as well as the University of California before establishing the Carmel Bach Festival in 1935. He later held posts teaching music at the San Francisco Conservatory and at Converse College in South Carolina. The Pulitzer Prize came to him in 1932 in recognition of Symphony in D. Song remained his chief compositional focus, however, prompting him to adapt texts by numerous American poets, among them Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson. Non-diatonic scales figured regularly in his writing, and he handled counterpoint with particular mastery. Bacon also painted and produced commentary on music by himself and by other composers.