Joseph Willard Roosevelt

Joseph Willard Roosevelt (January 16, 1918 – May 18, 2008) was an American pianist and composer. He was born in Washington, D.C., as the second son of Kermit Roosevelt and Belle Wyatt Willard. Roosevelt’s paternal grandparents were President Theodore "T.R." Roosevelt Jr. and Edith Kermit Carow Roosevelt. He was named after his grandfather Joseph Edward Willard, who served as Lieutenant Governor of Virginia and United States Ambassador to Spain. Roosevelt had siblings, including Kermit Roosevelt Jr.

His family members include notable relatives such as his nephew, Mark Roosevelt, and great-nephews Kermit Roosevelt III, John Palfrey, and Quentin Palfrey. Roosevelt attended Groton School and Harvard University, following a family tradition of education at these institutions. He studied piano with Nadia Boulanger in France.

During World War II, Roosevelt served in the Pacific theater. He was commissioned into the Naval Reserve on August 19, 1940, and was promoted to the rank of lieutenant on March 1, 1943. He commanded the USS Greene (APD-36), supporting the invasion of southern France in August 1944 and later participating in escort duties in the Pacific.

As an educator, Roosevelt taught music at several institutions, including The Hartt School, Mannes College of Music, Fairleigh Dickinson University, and the Longy School of Music. His compositions are published by the American Composers Alliance and Merion Music.

Roosevelt was married twice. On December 22, 1943, he married Nancy Thayer in New York City. At the time, Nancy believed her father was poet Scofield Thayer; however, she was actually the daughter of poet E.E. Cummings. Roosevelt and Nancy had two children before their divorce in 1954: Simon Willard Roosevelt (1945–1965), a Columbia University student who died in a motorcycle accident at age 19, and Elizabeth Françoise Roosevelt (born 1947), who married Derek C. Aldred in January 1966 in Hammersmith, England.

Roosevelt’s second marriage was to Carol Adele Russell on May 28, 1955, in Mendon, Vermont. They had three children: Dirck Roosevelt, Caleb Willard Roosevelt, and David Russell Roosevelt. Dirck Roosevelt became a professor at Teachers College, Columbia University, and married Nancy Glowa. Caleb Roosevelt died in a car accident in 1982, and David Roosevelt died after flipping his father's truck in 1986.

Joseph Willard Roosevelt passed away at his home in Orient, New York, on May 18, 2008, at the age of 90. Through his eldest son Simon, Roosevelt was a grandfather to Simon Cummings Roosevelt, an attorney who married Lolita Ximena Echavarria in 1999.

His compositional works include operas such as "And the Walls Came Tumbling Down" (1976), orchestral pieces like "Amistad" (1960) and concertos for cello and piano, chamber works including "Flute and Fiddle," "Lament for Willie Thomas Jones," and "String Quartet." Roosevelt also composed vocal music, with pieces setting texts by authors such as Phyllis Wheatley, E.E. Cummings, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Edgar Allan Poe, and others, spanning various formats including songs, operas, and chamber pieces.