The American composer George Rochberg (born 1918) produced important works in several distinct styles, both tonal and atonal.

George Rochberg was born in Paterson, New Jersey, on July 5, 1918. He began studies in composition and counterpoint with Weisse, Szell, and Mannes at the Mannes School in 1939, after receiving a B.A. from Montclair State Teachers College. For a time in the 1930s he wrote popular songs under a pseudonym. In 1942 he interrupted his studies at Mannes for three years of military duty as a second lieutenant in the infantry. He was wounded in action. Resuming his education upon his return, he received degrees from the Curtis Institute (B.M., 1947), where he studied with Scalero and Menotti, and from the University of Pennsylvania (M.A., 1948).

Rochberg taught harmony, counterpoint, and form and analysis at Curtis from 1948 to 1954 and served first as editor and then as director of publications for the Theodore...