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Louis Ballard
American composer and music educator
Also known as: Honganózhe, Louis Wayne Ballard
Quick Facts
- In full:
- Louis Wayne Ballard
- Quapaw name:
- Honganózhe (“Grand Eagle” or “Stands With Eagles”)
- Born:
- July 8, 1931, near Quapaw, Oklahoma, U.S.
- Died:
- February 9, 2007, Santa Fe, New Mexico (aged 75)
Louis Ballard (born July 8, 1931, near Quapaw, Oklahoma, U.S.—died February 9, 2007, Santa Fe, New Mexico) was an American composer and music educator best known for compositions that synthesize elements of Native American and Western classical music. Ballard experienced—and indeed oscillated between—Native American and Western (or Euro-American) musical worlds from an early age. His Quapaw mother and Cherokee father divorced when he was a young boy, after which Ballard lived alternately with his grandmother on Quapaw tribal territory in northeastern Oklahoma and with his mother and non-Native stepfather in southeastern Michigan. While staying with his grandmother, he was an ...(100 of 609 words)