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Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

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Archives for July 14, 2016

America’s forgotten great composers

July 14, 2016 by Terry Teachout

In this week’s Wall Street Journal “Sightings” column I talk about a generation of American classical composers who fell through the cracks—and a new attempt to revive their music. Here’s an excerpt.

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What do you think of when you hear the phrase “midcentury modernism”? My guess is that your average educated American is more than likely to respond with the name of a painter like Jackson Pollock or Mark Rothko, a building like Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater, or a piece of furniture like the Eames Lounge Chair. In this country, modernism is a visual phenomenon: It’s something you see. All other manifestations of the modern movement in 20th-century American art take a back seat.

If that generalization strikes you as too broad for comfort, try answering this question: Who were Roy Harris, Peter Mennin, Walter Piston and William Schuman?

bernstein-piston-copland-schuman_1The answer is that they were American classical composers active from the ’40s into the ’70s. Among other things, they wrote symphonies that were critically acclaimed and frequently performed by such famous émigré conductors as Serge Koussevitzky, Eugene Ormandy and Leopold Stokowski. Piston and Schuman won the Pulitzer Prize, and all four men used to be fairly familiar to the general public, almost as much so as Aaron Copland, our most popular mid-century classical composer. Schuman actually appeared in 1962 as the mystery guest on the popular TV game show “What’s My Line?” Much of their best music was recorded, and many of those recordings are still in print. Yet I’d be surprised if more than a handful of people reading this column recognize any of their names, nor is their music heard much nowadays. In a column written last month for the Guardian—a British newspaper, mind you—Alan Fletcher cited the following statistic: “Some quick research shows that Harris, Mennin, Piston, Schuman and Elliott Carter (who together wrote more than 100 concert symphonic works) had, in the past five years, a total of just 20 performances by U.S. orchestras.” Four performances apiece. That’s obscurity.

Mr. Fletcher, who runs the Aspen Music Festival, is determined to put America’s midcentury classical-music modernists back on the map. “While we all rightly love 20th-century music from abroad, from Stravinsky to Ravel, for some reason we’re in danger of ignoring so much of our own great music, which is to say our own cultural DNA,” he says in the news release for a new initiative at Aspen called “An American Musical Century.” The programming for this summer’s festival, which runs through Aug. 21, includes symphonies by Harris, Mennin and Piston, all of which Mr. Fletcher describes in the release as “terrifically entertaining—variously colorful, gripping, tuneful and dramatic.”

I couldn’t agree more. I’ve never understood why the music of America’s midcentury modern composers disappeared from our concert halls….

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Read the whole thing here.

Richard Pontzious leads the Asian Youth Orchestra in a 2002 performance of William Schuman’s American Festival Overture:

William Schuman appears as the mystery guest on What’s My Line? in 1962:

So you want to see a show?

July 14, 2016 by Terry Teachout

Here’s my list of recommended Broadway, off-Broadway, and out-of-town shows, updated weekly. In all cases, I gave these shows favorable reviews (if sometimes qualifiedly so) in The Wall Street Journal when they opened. For more information, click on the title.

BROADWAY:
• An American in Paris (musical, G, too complex for small children, closes Jan. 1, reviewed here)
• The Color Purple (musical, PG-13, nearly all performances sold out last week, reviewed here)
• Fun Home (serious musical, PG-13, closes Sept. 10, some performances sold out last week, reviewed here)
• Hamilton (musical, PG-13, Broadway transfer of off-Broadway production, all performances sold out last week, reviewed here)
• Matilda (musical, G, closes Jan. 1, virtually all performances sold out last week, reviewed here)
• Les Misérables (musical, G, too long and complicated for young children, closes Sept. 4, most performances sold out last week, reviewed here)
• On Your Feet! (jukebox musical, G, reviewed here)

OFF BROADWAY:
• The Fantasticks (musical, G, suitable for children capable of enjoying a love story, reviewed here)
• Sense & Sensibility (serious romantic comedy, G, remounting of 2014 off-Broadway production, closes Oct. 2, original production reviewed here)

154f9aa8-1775-481a-b802-b77572de20fdIN GARRISON, N.Y.:
• Measure for Measure (Shakespeare, PG-13, closes Aug. 28, reviewed here)

IN GLENCOE, ILL.:
• Company (musical, PG-13, extended through Aug. 7, reviewed here)

CLOSING SOON ON BROADWAY:
• Fully Committed (comedy, PG-13, closes July 31, reviewed here)

CLOSING NEXT WEEK IN STOCKBRIDGE, MASS.:
• Fiorello! (musical, G, closes July 23, reviewed here)

Almanac: Oscar Wilde on the danger of giving advice

July 14, 2016 by Terry Teachout

INK BOTTLE“It is always a silly thing to give advice, but to give good advice is absolutely fatal.”

Oscar Wilde, “The Portrait of Mr. W.H.”

Terry Teachout

Terry Teachout, who writes this blog, is the drama critic of The Wall Street Journal and the critic-at-large of Commentary. In addition to his Wall Street Journal drama column and his monthly essays … [Read More...]

About

About “About Last Night”

This is a blog about the arts in New York City and the rest of America, written by Terry Teachout. Terry is a critic, biographer, playwright, director, librettist, recovering musician, and inveterate blogger. In addition to theater, he writes here and elsewhere about all of the other arts--books, … [Read More...]

About My Plays and Opera Libretti

Billy and Me, my second play, received its world premiere on December 8, 2017, at Palm Beach Dramaworks in West Palm Beach, Fla. Satchmo at the Waldorf, my first play, closed off Broadway at the Westside Theatre on June 29, 2014, after 18 previews and 136 performances. That production was directed … [Read More...]

About My Podcast

Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I are the panelists on “Three on the Aisle,” a bimonthly podcast from New York about theater in America. … [Read More...]

About My Books

My latest book is Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington, published in 2013 by Gotham Books in the U.S. and the Robson Press in England and now available in paperback. I have also written biographies of Louis Armstrong, George Balanchine, and H.L. Mencken, as well as a volume of my collected essays called A … [Read More...]

The Long Goodbye

To read all three installments of "The Long Goodbye," a multi-part posting about the experience of watching a parent die, go here. … [Read More...]

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