Allan Arthur Willman

Born in Hinckley, Illinois, Willman grew up in Abingdon.[12][13]

Willman earned a Bachelor of Music degree from Knox College Conservatory of Music in 1928 (age 19) under his original name, Allan Arthur Simpkins. He went on to earn a Master of Music degree from Chicago Musical College in 1930, where he studied with Maurice Aronson (1869–1946), Alexander Raab, and Lillian Powers (1886–1973),[14] who was an associate teacher with Raab and a former pupil of Theodor Leschetizky and Giuseppe Ferrata (1865–1928),[15] who in turn was a certified pupil of Franz Liszt.[16] Willman then studied in Paris with Nadia Boulanger and Thomas de Hartmann. Willman had been recommended to Boulanger by Paderewski.[17][18] After World War II, while serving as Chairman of the Department of Music at Wyoming, Willman took leave during the 1947–48 school year to study in Lausanne and Paris—Robert R. Becker (1909–1997), a virtuoso violinist and violist who began teaching at Wyoming in 1941, served as Acting Chairman during Willman's sabbatical.[19]

As a concert pianist, Willman performed throughout the United States and in Europe. During the summer of 1953, Willman made a European concert tour with Rudolf Kolisch, artist-in-residence at the University of Wyoming and leader of the Pro Arte Quartet They performed in cities that included Vienna and Berlin and over numerous radio networks. In particular, they performed Schönberg's "Fantasie for Violin and Piano," Op. 47, composed in 1949 and published by Edition Peters in 1952. They also performed works of Ernst Krenek, Edward Kilenyi, Beethoven, Schubert, and Kolisch.

Kolisch was Schönberg's pupil and brother-in-law by way of his sister, Gertrud. Kolisch and Willman performed four times at the Arnold Schoenberg Chamber Music Festival sponsored by the International Summer School for New Music at Darmstadt and Frankfurt, July 16–30, 1952.[20][21]

Nominated by composer A. Albert Noelte (1885–1946) of Northwestern University, Willman was accepted as a fellow of the MacDowell Colony in the summer of 1940[16][22] Willman worked there from August 4 to September 7, 1940, and composed "Where the Lilac Blows" for voice and piano. He also befriended other composers, including Mabel Wheeler Daniels and Normand Lockwood. Daniels kept in touch with Willman, writing on a least one occasion seeking advice on a composition. Lockwood composed in Laramie between 1955 and 1957.

After graduating from the Chicago Musical College in 1930, Willman began teaching at the Boguslawsky School of Music in Chicago—Moissaye Boguslawski had been a piano teacher at the Chicago Musical College.

After returning from Paris in 1936[23] Willman began teaching music at University of Wyoming, where he remained until retirement in 1974. From the school years 1941–1942 to 1973–1974, he was head of the Department of Music. Willman was a proficient recruiter of visiting professors that included:

• Harald Brager-Nielsen (no) (1949–1959), then of the University of Oslo
• Gunnar Johansen (1949–1950), then of the University of Wisconsin
• Darius Milhaud (late 1940s to early 1950s), then of Paris Conservatory

Willman was drafted into the U.S. Army March 1943 and served as an assistant director of the 524th Army Air Force Band, Sheppard Field, Texas. He also composed and arranged for the Army Air Corps radio program, as well as a small orchestra. During his time in the Army, George William Gunn (1899–1966) was acting Chairman of the Music Division at the University of Wyoming. Having served as Chairman of the Music Division at the University of Wyoming for 32 years, Willman is, as of 2014, the longest serving chairman in the history of the institution.

A 1948 University of Wyoming publication profiled four classical music composers at the university:[24]

• Hugh Allan MacKinnon (1891–1981), who also was an organist of international rank and resident organist at St. Matthew's Cathedral in Laramie since 1929[3][25][26]
• Allan Willman
• James Bruce Rodgers, PhD (1916–1992), hired by Wyoming in 1947, went on to become Chairman of the Music Department at University of Puget Sound in 1953
• Regina Willman

As a collaborative achievement, Willman was a senior faculty administrator involved with the approval and design of the Fine Arts Center at the University of Wyoming, which opened in 1972.

Willman was the third of five children born to the marriage of Arthur Burton Simpkins, DDS (1872–1937), and Lulu (née Louis Catherine Willman; 1872–1961). His brother and three sisters all predeceased him:

• Thomas Hughes Simpkins (1903–1934)
• Sylvia Hope Ann Simpkins (1901–1986), married to Arthur Leslie Decker (1898–1981)
• Eudora Mary Simpkins (1900–1986), married to Merle Robb Gallup (1889–1965)
• Isabel Burton Simpkins (1912–1939)

In 1942, Willman married Regina Kastberg Hansen (1914–1965), also a composer. In 1956, after suffering from cancer for 8 years, Regina left Allan, and soon thereafter, they divorced. But they remained in close contact until she died in 1965, after 17 years of cancer. Regina and Allan never had any children and Allan never remarried.[1]

Willman's original manuscripts, letters from prominent musicians, 26 various musical instruments including Willman's piano, art work and some of Willman's personal library were devised under the will of his estate to his nephew, Gordon Alban Gallup, PhD (born 1927), a retired professor (physics/astronomy), University of Nebraska, Lincoln.