In 1951, Leonard Bernstein, age 32, led the New York Philharmonic in the belated world premiere of Charles Ives’ Symphony No. 2 – music composed half a century earlier. The performance was nationally broadcast and widely noticed. Seven years after that, Bernstein began his tenure as the Philharmonic’s music director with Ives’ Second Symphony. In all, he performed Ives’ … [Read more...] about The Bernstein Story Not Told in “Maestro” — Take Four: What Happened to Charles Ives?
The Bernstein Story Not Told in “Maestro” — Take Three: Bernstein, Furtwängler, and Saying What You Think
According to a well-worn anecdote, Johannes Brahms was heard to say: “I’ll never write a symphony, you have no idea what it feels like to hear the footsteps of a giant behind one” – the giant being Beethoven. And Brahms was all of 43 years old when he finished his First Symphony, whose finale alludes to Beethoven’s Ninth. If Brahms in fact felt intimidated by his mighty … [Read more...] about The Bernstein Story Not Told in “Maestro” — Take Three: Bernstein, Furtwängler, and Saying What You Think
The Bernstein Story Not Told in “Maestro” – Take Two
J. Edgar Hoover When Jamie Bernstein told me about her father’s FBI file – and its disclosure of hate mail and picketers generated by the FBI in 1970, in the wake of the Bernsteins’ Black Panthers fundraiser -- I was impressed but unsurprised. A year before, J. Edgar Hoover had called the Black Panther Party "the greatest threat to the internal security of the … [Read more...] about The Bernstein Story Not Told in “Maestro” – Take Two
The Bernstein Story Not Told in “Maestro” – His Prophetic Disenchantment with What America Had Become
Leonard Bernstein’s musical odyssey – in some ways, not unlike the marital odyssey dramatized in the film Maestro – was ignited by ecstatic expectations that proved unsustainable. He eagerly anticipated a Great American Symphony, a new American species of musical theater, and a New World version of the New York Philharmonic. An iconic American journey, it yielded … [Read more...] about The Bernstein Story Not Told in “Maestro” – His Prophetic Disenchantment with What America Had Become
“Mahlerei” — As Inspired by Zero Mostel
For a period of three decades, I have made music with the renegade bass trombonist David Taylor. These sessions began with sight-reading Beethoven cello sonatas in my living room. They accelerated with our mutual discovery that certain Schubert songs – especially Doppelganger -- potently inflamed Taylor’s instrument. A few years ago, I threw caution to winds and turned the … [Read more...] about “Mahlerei” — As Inspired by Zero Mostel