Katherine Hoover

Hoover had always written poetry since her youth finding both a striking difference and similarity between music and words. "This Way About"(2015). was her first book of poetry where she shares glimpses into her life.

She was the composer in residence for the Fourth Festival of Women Composers at Indiana University of Pennsylvania (1996).

Hoover co-founded Papagena Press in 1988 with her husband (Richard Goodwin, whom she married in 1985) to publish her works. The first piece to be published was Kokopeli (1990), a work for solo flute inspired by the Hopi tribe and the American Southwest. It won the National Flute Association's Newly Published Music Competition (1991). This was Hoover's second of six NFA Newly Published Music awards. She wrote that "Out of all of my achievements in music, I was overcome with the success of Kokopeli."

Hoover became a faculty member at the Teachers College, Columbia University (1984-1989), where she taught theory and composition to graduate students.

Hoover was honored as a finalist for the Kennedy Center Friedheim Award's Outstanding New American Chamber Work award (1978). Her successes continued, becoming a finalist once again and being awarded a National Endowment for the Arts Composer's Fellowship (1979).

Hoover was involved with women's arts organizations and has worked to bring the works of women composers to the public's notice. She began work with the Women's Inter-Art Center in New York (1977. Here she organized Festivals I, II, and III of Women's Music which presented music by 55 historical and contemporary women composers.

The first publication of her work was Three Carols (1972) for choir and flute, published by Carl Fischer.

Her career as a composer began at a time when few women composers earned recognition in classical music in the 1970s. As shown in her list of known work, below, she has composed pieces for solo flute, mixed ensembles, chamber orchestra, choir acapella, full orchestra and many other combinations of instruments and voice. Some of her flute pieces incorporated Native American themes.

In 1969, Hoover began teaching flute and theory at the Manhattan School of Music. She shared that, as a theory teacher she learned a great deal about compositional techniques, as it forced her to carefully analyze a wide spectrum of music scores. Also, during this time at Manhattan, she continued her graduate studies and received her Master of Music in Music Theory in 1974. It was also where she studied how other people identify with sounds. She was a faculty member of Manhattan School of Music for seventeen years.

From 1962–1969, 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 she received 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. She married John Schwab in 1964. They divorced after eight years.

Hoover attended the Yale Summer Sessions in 1960 and 1961, where she studied flute, theory, and composition. During this time, she also studied with flutist William Kincaid in Philadelphia. She later wrote that she owed " much of her success to her mentor, William Kincaid, teaching her more about music than any other composer".

Hoover began her academic studies at the University of Rochester in 1955. After two years of general studies she was accepted to Eastman School of Music, where she studied with flutist Joseph Mariano, and began studying composition. She graduated with a Bachelor of Music in Music Theory and a Performer's Certificate in Flute in 1959. 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."

Katherine Hoover (December 2, 1937 – September 21, 2018) is remembered by the National Flute Association as an "artist—flutist, teacher, entrepreneur, poet, and, most notably, a distinguished composer". Her work received many honors, including a National Endowment Composer's Fellowship, an Academy of Arts and Letters Award in composition, the National Flute Association's Lifetime Achievement Award. There are two works where she cowrote under the pseudonym Kathryn Scott.

Hoover was born in Elkins, West Virginia, on December 2, 1937. Her mother was a painter/artist and editor, and her father was a biochemist. Her family lived in Washington, D.C., then moved to Philadelphia during World War II. She attended school in Philadelphia.