Alfred Bartles  Alfred Howell Bartles (November 10, 1930 – December 28, 2006) was an American composer and musician. He played the cello and piano and he is best known for "Music for Symphony Orchestra and Jazz Ensemble", a work that has been described as pioneering of the crossover between jazz and classical music. Bartles grew up in Nashville, Tennessee and studied piano under Lennie Tristano. He enrolled at Vanderbilt University in 1949 with the intention of studying music, but left at the start of the Korean War, to act as an arranger and pianist for the US Army. He obtained a master's degree in composition from Ohio University, under the direction of Karl Ahrendt, and began studying the cello. He joined the St Louis Symphony Orchestra, and played in the pit orchestra on Broadway musicals. His compositions began to be published in the 1960s, including "Music for Symphony Orchestra and Jazz Ensemble". In 1973, he accepted a position at Tennessee Technological University before moving to the Eurythmeum in Stuttgart, Germany in 1978. He moved back to Nashville in 1997, where he spent the remainder of his career. Alfred Howell Bartles was born to Paul and Martha Howell Bartles on November 10, 1930, where he was raised in Nashville. When Alfred was five years old his father died from the aftereffects of poison gas in World War I. So he and his mother lived with his mother's younger sister, Isabel Howell, who was his father type figure growing up. His parents were very musical just like Alfred as well as his grandparents too. He showed talent at a young age with music, especially with piano. He would help the family with the income, doing low wage band jobs before being able to be a part of a musician union. After spending summer of 1949 studying with Lennie Tristano, Bartles went to Vanderbilt University in the fall of 1949 wanting to get a premedical curriculum at first. However, he later transferred to Peabody College, to get studies on composition. During the Korean war, there was an Army Reserve Band in which Bartles later played for and was called out of for active duty. It later led to him transferring to University of Mississippi after army. At University of Mississippi, he started to become interested in the cello as an instrument for him despite not knowing much about it. But despite that, because of his musical past and devotion towards it, made for making the learning curve easier. Also while there he met Claus Adam a cellist for a quartet which did eventually play some of Bartles compositions.