![]() ![]() We remember his years as music director and music director laureate of the Philharmonic, his concerts in Vienna and operas at La Scala, his broadcasts of Young People's Concerts, his balletic conducting technique, the parties, and the sometimes eyebrow-raising political activism.īurton Bernstein and Barbara B. We know the basics: On the Town, Wonderful Town, Candide, West Side Story, the score for On the Waterfront, symphonies and songs, and his Mass. "He acknowledged the doubtful but polite applause," writes Burton Bernstein '54JRN, the composer's younger brother and a former New Yorker staffer, "and proceeded to conduct one hell of a concert - a succès fou that nudged some war news off the front pages the next day."īernstein was regularly on the front pages from that night until his death in 1990. Bernstein had been appointed an assistant conductor of the Philharmonic only two months before, and this concert was to be broadcast nationally and to the armed forces overseas. In one of history's most improbable debuts, Bernstein - American, Jewish, 25 years old - was called to Carnegie Hall on November 14, 1943, to pinch-hit for conductor Bruno Walter, who was in bed with the flu. That's one motif of Leonard Bernstein, American Original, a book of essays and photographs celebrating the man who embodied the joy of music for millions. Bernstein, a con brio hurricane, had to blow in when and where he did. ![]() Lenny, Manhattan, Broadway, and the New York Philharmonic fell in love and danced into one another's arms, while FM radio, stereo LPs, and television allowed the rest of us in on the party. Or Philadelphia, Chicago, or Paris, for that matter. It's hard to picture this musical, political, and social Dionysus confining himself to 1950s Back Bay and Cambridge. If Leonard Bernstein had stayed in his native Massachusetts, or if he had been born a generation earlier, would he have become the Leonard Bernstein? Probably not. Leonard Bernstein conducts contralto Marian Anderson and the New York Philharmonic during a 1947 rehearsal at Lewisohn Stadium.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |