You Are Playing That Wrong
Monday, May 11, 2015, 11:30am
Pianist Harold Bauer had never heard of the young woman dancing at the home of an acquaintance and took no notice of her name. But he watched with fascination as she gestured and posed to the sound of familiar classical music. He had never seen a performance quite like it. Her gestures seemed to...
Why They Really Built The Railroad
Sunday, May 10, 2015, 11:30am
The celebration marking the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad on May 10, 1869, was about uniting a country torn by Civil War, but long before that event, French composer Hector Berlioz suggested, tongue in cheek, why Americans were really so eager to unite east and west by rail. In his...
Resurrection
Saturday, May 9, 2015, 11:30am
In 1965, twelve years after his last stage appearance, virtuoso pianist Vladimir Horowitz felt again the urge to “communicate directly” with the audience. He decided to perform at Carnegie Hall. The sixty-one-year-old Horowitz worried about being physically up to resuming his concert...
The Catalyst
Friday, May 8, 2015, 11:30am
During the course of a long career, Malcolm Arnold developed a reputation as a composer of classical music and film scores with a strong current of humor, but during the dark days of World War II, he struggled with tragedy. In 1941, as war raged in Europe, Arnold’s brother Philip, a pilot in...
Our Poet
Thursday, May 7, 2015, 11:30am
On May 7, 1783, Mozart got around to writing from Vienna to his father in Salzburg a letter in which he introduced the man who would collaborate with him on some of the greatest operas ever written. I have looked at a least a hundre d libretti or more, but I have barely found a single one that...
A Tactful Approach
Wednesday, May 6, 2015, 11:30am
In his memoirs librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte takes credit for using tact to bring about the debut of Mozart’s masterpiece The Marriage of Figaro . [Mozart] asked me how hard it would be for me to make an opera of a comedy by Beaumarchais– The Marriage of Figaro. I liked the idea a lot and...
The Test
Tuesday, May 5, 2015, 11:30am
In the spring of 1799, Domenico Dragonetti was on his way back to London after visiting his hometown, Venice. He stopped in Vienna, where he went to meet Beethoven. A mutual friend wrote a note to Dragonetti, saying, “tomorrow morning at eight o’clock precisely, go to Prince Lichnowsky...
Slightly Different
Monday, May 4, 2015, 11:30am
No one doubted that Domenico Dragonetti was one of the greatest bass players the world had ever seen. There was some disagreement, however, as to whether he was a true eccentric or just a performer with a sense of promotion and a highly developed sense of humor. Dragonetti left his hometown, Venice...
Love in Time of War
Sunday, May 3, 2015, 11:30am
It began the way many love stories have begun ever since young men began giving music lessons to young women. In 1910, a wealthy St. Petersburg family, the Meshcherkys, welcomed nineteen-year-old Sergei Prokofiev into their musical gatherings as an alternative to the straight-laced young men in...
Managing the Manager
Saturday, May 2, 2015, 11:30am
In 1904, when cellist Pablo Casals undertook his first American tour, he had to rely upon a manager to keep track of his money. The manager told Casals that he could get bigger fees if he would wear a hairpiece. Casals had no interest in that kind of superficiality, and so the manager sent out...
Large Scale
Friday, May 1, 2015, 11:30am
Conductor Theodore Thomas wielded the baton over a massive music festival that took place in New York in May 1880, and the size of the ensemble required him to be alert with his eyes as well as his ears. The Philharmonic Orchestra was the largest, and in his opinion, the best orchestral...
Qualified to Enter
Thursday, April 30, 2015, 11:30am
At the age of twenty-five, Nicholas Slonimsky found out that playing the piano could save his life. As the Russian Revolution became increasingly deadly, he became determined to emigrate to Paris. The only way to Europe was through British-occupied Constantinople, and, on the boat from Yalta, he...
Scandal!
Wednesday, April 29, 2015, 11:30am
His career and his family relationships were bumpy; how could his love life be any different? During his courtship of Constanze Weber, Mozart hit plenty of rough spots. He reacted to one of them in a fervent letter he wrote to Constanze on April 29, 1781: In spite of all my pleas, you’ve...
Healthy Pessimism
Tuesday, April 28, 2015, 11:30am
Thanks to a decree from the Central Committee of the Communist Party, Soviet music took some hard knocks in 1948. Four major composers were accused of writing “formalistic” music that didn’t serve the needs of the people, the result being that their music was blacklisted from...
The Cruel Reversal
Monday, April 27, 2015, 11:30am
After being ruined by competition with Opera for the Nobility, a company founded by the unruly Frederick, Prince of Wales, Handel had finally begun to reverse his losses with his oratorio Alexander’s Feast , which had been a great success of 1736. Frederick’s company had brought in...
Royal Crush
Sunday, April 26, 2015, 11:30am
Frederick, Prince of Wales, son of George II and heir to the British throne, was so at odds with his father that he would do whatever he could to oppose him. Caught in the crush between father and son was the country’s greatest composer, George Frederick Handel. Frederick didn’t confine his quarrel...
That Won't Kill Me
Saturday, April 25, 2015, 11:30am
When it came to criticism, Felix Mendelssohn could take it or dish it out. In April 1834 he wrote from Düsseldorf to his friend Ignaz Moscheles, who had been rehearsing Mendelssohn’s Fair Melusina Overture for an upcoming performance. I agree completely with what you say about Berlioz...
Music for the Circumstances
Friday, April 24, 2015, 11:30am
Having heard the news of Abraham Lincoln’s death, Louis Moreau Gottschalk and some of his fellow passengers en route to San Francisco came to terms with the loss. He wrote in his journal on April 24, 1865: We are to have a meeting on board to give official expression to the sentiments of...
The Assassin
Thursday, April 23, 2015, 11:30am
As the Civil War swept the eastern United States, New Orleans pianist and Union sympathizer Louis Moreau Gottschalk made a concert tour of the northern states. He then left New York on a steamship bound for San Francisco and was off the coast of California on April 23, 1865, when he wrote in his...
Haughty Beauty
Wednesday, April 22, 2015, 11:30am
By the time Muzio Clementi had collected a good deal of Beethoven’s music, he was determined to bring Beethoven the man into his circle of friends. He wrote to his business partner, William Collard on April 22, 1807: By a little management, and without committing myself, I have at last made a...