May 30, 1907 – July 7, 1995

Edwin L. Gerhardt fell in love with the marimba, its sound, and everything about it, in 1921, at the age of 14 after attending a concert by the U.S. Marine Band at the Lyric Theatre in Baltimore, Maryland. A young Marine marimba soloist performed that evening, and it changed Ed’s outlook on music for the rest of his life. Following the concert, he immediately started building crude imitations of the marimba and began saving money in order to buy himself a real instrument.By 1926, Ed Gerhardt was performing as a marimbist throughout the Baltimore area – performing for churches, lodges, minstrel shows, and vaudeville shows. He performed on radio station WCAO in 1928, and performed with the Rosewood Marimba Band in the late 1930’s to early 1940’s.

Ed’s interest in the marimba gradually shifted from the perspective of performing on the instrument to its historical significance while working for the Johns Hopkins press and bookstore. It was then that he began collecting books on music. His collection of books, recordings (including Edison cylinder recordings dating back to 1902), and other lore about the marimba (and by now the xylophone), grew and grew over the years. In 1963 the Library of Congress expressed an interest in obtaining the collection, but Ed hesitated, feeling he would lose personal contact with it.

When Dale Rauschenberg came to Baltimore in 1966 to become the percussion instructor at Towson University, he and Ed Gerhardt met in early 1967 and became close friends. By 1970 Ed Gerhardt had decided to donate his collection to Towson University and served as its curator, continuing to add more and more information, recordings, and memorabilia to the collection until it became one of the largest in the world.

In 1995, through the urging of Dale Rauschenberg and other officials from the international organization, the Percussive Arts Society, Mr. Gerhardt was persuaded to donate his collection to the Percussive Arts Society’s museum at the national headquarters in Lawton, Oklahoma where percussionists from throughout the world would have access to its information. The Edwin L. Gerhardt Marimba/Xylophone Collection was transferred to the Percussive Arts Society’s national museum in Oklahoma on June 21, 1995. Ed Gerhardt passed away just 16 days later.

The biography of Edwin L. Gerhardt was submitted by Prof. Dale Rauschenberg, Department of Music, Towson University.