Reinhold Glière was born in Kiev, the second son of a maker of wind instruments who had emigrated from Saxony and married the daughter of his Polish master. Glière’s violin teachers in Kiev included Ševĉik and in 1894, at the age of twenty, he entered the Moscow Conservatory, where he studied the violin with Hřimalý, and other subjects with Arensky, Konyus, Taneyev and Ippolitov-Ivanov. It was Taneyev who found him two private pupils, Myaskovsky and the eleven-year-old Prokofiev. He taught at the Gnesin School, studied conducting for three years in Berlin, and eventually returned to Kiev, where he became director of the conservatory.

In 1920, after the revolution, he moved back to Moscow, teaching at the conservatory there until 1941 and interesting himself in the music of the various eastern Soviet republics. Glière continued the romantic Russian tradition, winning immense popularity for his Soviet ballets The Red Poppy and The Bronze Horseman, where he is also able to demonstrate his interest in wider Slavonic musical traditions. He died in 1956.

Merle J. Isaac (1898-1996) had a prolific composing and arranging career during his life, which lasted 97 years. Most of his life was spent in the Chicago area. He began his career teaching at Marshall High School, where he led a ninety-piece award winning orchestra. He noticed that there was little or no music available to orchestras with less experienced players. So he started to compose and arrange music for his young orchestra. His first arrangement was Bohm's Perpetual Motion and his original compositions include the Merle Isaac String Class Method. Isaac worked in the Chicago Schools for 35 years. After his retirement, he continued to be involved in music education. He became a clinician and an adjudicator, as well as being a frequent guest conductor in many cities across the country. While he did these, he also kept busy as he continued to write compositions and arrangements. Over the length of his career, Isaac belonged to a number of music organizations, including the Music Educators National Conference. He also received many awards, one of which was the Distinguished Service Award from the American String Teachers Association.

From the Luck's Music Library Website.