Rudolph Bennett Benetsky Papers

Rudolph “Rudi” Benetsky was born on February 24, 1925 to Marguerite Bolla Benetsky and Joseph Benetsky of Youngstown, Ohio. After being drafted to, and serving in, World War II, he attended the Philadelphia Conservatory of Music (now part of the University of the Arts), graduating in 1949 with a Master of Music Degree in Piano. Rudolph was first married to Sheila V. Whitelegg (a musician who worked under the name Sheila Whitely) in 1953; their daughter Marissa Benetsky was born in 1958. He was later divorced and remarried to Barbara Ragan in 1967.

Benetsky had a long career on Broadway as a conductor and music director. Most notably, he served as a replacement musical director during the original 1965-1971 run of Man of La Mancha, as well as the assistant conductor for the original 1983-1987 run of La Cage aux Folles. Occasionally he is credited as “R. Bennett” or “R. Bennett Benetsky.” Benetsky was also a teacher of music and a vocal coach, and according to one obituary, he was assistant director of music at Drexel University in Philadelphia. He and his family lived primarily in New York City and Marshfield, Massachusetts. He passed away on September 9, 2003 from complications of Parkinson’s disease.

Benetsky came of age as a conductor and musical director in the midst of the so-called “Golden Age” of Broadway, the period between roughly 1940 and 1965 which saw the first productions of some of today’s most beloved pieces of American musical theater: Oklahoma! (1943), Annie Get Your Gun (1946), The King and I (1951), The Music Man (1957), and many others. Benetsky and his wife Barbara, who often worked backstage at Broadway performances, assembled this collection as a means of preserving this new music in many forms, from their personal conducting and vocal scores to mass-produced cast recordings made on LPs.