Joe Horowitz

The South Dakota Symphony concert I last wrote about in this space has now come and gone. In every way, it fortified my impression that this is an orchestra that deserves to be a national model. The program comprised Lou Harrison’s Piano Concerto and Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade. That is: it introduced to Sioux Falls an American masterpiece that is … [Read more...] about Curating American Repertoire in South Dakota

I have often extolled Lou Harrison’s Piano Concerto as quite possibly the most formidable concerto by any American. And I have often extolled the South Dakota Symphony as a national model. This Saturday night at 8:30 pm ET, the South Dakota Symphony performs the Harrison concerto – a concert that will be livestreamed (but not archived), if you … [Read more...] about A Saturday Night Livestream: Lou Harrison’s Piano Concerto in South Dakota

What did Gustav Mahler and Leonard Bernstein have in common? As is well known, Bernstein was a triumphant advocate of Mahler’s symphonies at a moment when they had yet to enter the mainstream repertoire. And both were outsiders – Mahler as a Jew in Vienna, and Bernstein as someone trying to resolve the oxymoron “American classical musician.” But in my NPR interview yesterday … [Read more...] about Mahler, Bernstein, and “The Marriage”

When was the last time an American President cited the arts as a vital component of the ‘”state of the union”? John F. Kennedy did, in 1963. That’s the starting point of my new book The Propaganda of Freedom: JFK, Shostakovich, Stravinsky and the Cultural Cold War (currently available at a 30 per cent discount via University of Illinois Press). It’s also the … [Read more...] about “The Propaganda of Freedom” — A Podcast