Aaron Copland once observed, “If a literary man puts together two words about music, one of them will be wrong.” Lord only knows what he would have made of some of my posts.
But I would hope that I could have conjured the occasional toothy smile with a felicitous turn of phrase, or a chuckle at some weird juxtaposition or saucy irreverence.
According to Howard Pollack, in his biography, “Aaron Copland: The Life and Work of an Uncommon Man,” Copland chuckled and even giggled quite a bit. He could also be quite wry and ironic in his observations. No doubt it helped him to maintain his even temper in the face of the absurd, his coolness under pressure, and a palpable sense of dignity.
Copland is one of my very favorite composers, so it is difficult to believe I am only just getting around to taking Pollack’s book down off the shelf. I bought it new, from Borders in Philadelphia – at its original Rittenhouse Square location – in hardcover in 1999 (publisher Henry Holt and Company), then priced $33.75 (discounted from $37.50). Now very affordable copies can be had secondhand. I have to say, my copy still looks brand new.
The book runs close to 700 pages, with the last 150 devoted to appendix, notes, and index. I don’t know that Pollack is a literary man, necessarily, but he is a respected and prolific author. To his credit are biographies of Walter Piston, John Alden Carpenter, George Gershwin, and Mark Blitzstein, alongside innumerable articles and the Copland entry in the “New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.” He is a two-time Deems Taylor Award recipient, both for this book and for his tome (at 884 pages) on Gershwin.
His own musical credentials are unimpeachable, with studies in piano, musicology, and composition, and decades of teaching experience at the university level. He currently serves on the faculty of the Moores School of Music at the University of Houston.
Judging from the Copland book, his style is that of a popular biographer. His writing is accessible to the layman, he doesn’t burden the reader with a lot of unnecessary jargon, and there are no musical examples. Still, there are some things in the book, passing connections drawn and names dropped, that may glide over the heads of many, though nothing that should cause any lasting frustration to anyone.
I’m about a quarter of the way through it, and I actually found myself pausing at a point to reflect how lucky I am in being able to fully grasp just about everything I am reading, primed by a lifetime of rabid record collecting and omnivorous listening, through an unprecedented era when so much recorded music has been available. Even in college, I recall the admiration – or envy? – of some of my teachers, since in many cases I had a broader grasp of the repertoire than they did. I would always tell them, without false modesty, that I simply had more leisure; that they were actively teaching and performing, so they didn’t have the same opportunities to actually be able to explore and listen as widely as I did.
I hasten to emphasize that Pollack’s is not an arcane book. The writing is accessible and rolls along in a pleasant enough manner. You know my writing: all cluttered up with parenthetical phrases and superfluous commas and dashes. Pollack doesn’t do that. But I have the added advantage of knowing a lot of the music of just about everyone he mentions, and a broader grasp of the arts in general, especially of that era.
Of course, it also helps that I happen to adore Copland. Even if you’ve read the two-volume autobiography – more of an oral history – Copland put together with Vivian Perlis, this is still worth reading, as it draws from letters, diaries, sketches, and photographs in the Copland Collection at the Library of Congress, as well as the most recent (as of 1999) Copland scholarship, and fresh interviews conducted by the author with the composer’s relatives, colleagues, friends, and love interests. Copland was a very private man, and I’m happy to report, though Pollack occasionally touches on aspects of the composer’s life about which he himself would have been particularly reticent, he does so with taste and without sensationalism. Copland emerges as a more rounded, though no less admirable individual, a decent human being, and a likeable man.
I don’t know why, but reading the book really gives me a sense, for the first time, of just how brave, yet self-assured Copland was, in regard to his determination to earn his bread as a composer – as opposed to having to devote most of his time to teaching or performing – though he did those things for limited periods, as well as lectured and published many articles.
What also strikes me is the realization that he spent most of his life living on very meager earnings. Even as he reached middle age, though widely-acknowledged as America’s foremost composer, he still wasn’t making any real money. But he caught enough breaks and had enough connections – most importantly, he had enough talent – that his persistence eventually started to pay off. He may not have been affluent, but he always did exactly as he pleased, and the support was always there – the commissions, shelter, and food would always turn up somehow – and it was purely in pursuit of music that he lived.
He was not an extravagant man, though once he finally achieved eminence, and cut some canny deals with his publishers, he was able to treat himself to a fine car and a remote house with an enviable view. Even so, everything he did, whether in terms of expression or expenditure, he did so with economy and grace. Let it be said that Aaron Copland truly did have the gift to be simple.
Born in Brooklyn in 1900, into a Jewish immigrant family that flourished in the United States, Aaron Copland was a 20th century success story. He lived 90 years, through two world wars, the Great Depression, McCarthyism, serialism, the tumultuous ‘60s, and the Reagan era. Along the way, he knew seemingly everyone. And for most of his long life, he was regarded as the Dean of American Composers.
Pollack’s biography accomplishes the important business of making the reader want to go back and revisit the music, including a lot of the lesser known and neglected works. I’ll be doing my wildlife deliveries this morning to the austere strains of “Symphonic Ode” and other underplayed music of the 1920s. The average listener may prefer “Rodeo” and “Appalachian Spring” and “Lincoln Portrait.” But Copland is very definitely detectable as Copland in everything he did. American music’s “Dean” had the uncommon ability to reach the common man.
Happy birthday, Aaron Copland!
