Okay, I admit it. I over-edit my posts. I reread them and alter them until I think they read best. I especially edit them if I happen to notice a factual error.
I was scrolling through some old posts last week, and paused when I came to an amazing photo, taken after a New York Philharmonic concert in 1977, of all the contemporary composers whose works Pierre Boulez programmed during his tenure as music director of the orchestra.
I had previously identified one of them, in the front row, as Hershy Kay, but glancing at it again, I realize, to my embarrassment, that it is actually Ulysses Kay. So even though the post was committed over a year ago (on April 14, 2020), I hit the “edit” option to correct it. And, wouldn’t you know it, the photo disappeared.
You see, it’s one of the quirks of “New Facebook” that when you attempt to edit a post with forwarded content as the image, the image goes away. I’ll never be able to get the photo back on the old post, but since it’s a slow news day, I figured I’d plug it in again today.
I actually discovered it for the first time after it was shared on the Aaron Copland page, from a post by composer Daniel Plante, over at the Pierre Boulez Appreciation Group.
Here are the names of the subjects (hopefully now correct), with Boulez standing in the foreground, proudly displaying his trophies.
First row (left to right): Milton Babbitt, Lucia Dlugoszewski, Ulysses Kay, George Rochberg, and Mario Davidovsky.
Second Row: David Gilbert, Stephen Jablonsky, Jacob Druckman, Roger Sessions, William Schuman, and Aaron Copland.
Third Row: Donald Martino, Donald Harris, Daniel Plante, Morton Gould, Vincent Persichetti, and Roy Harris.
Fourth Row: Charles Wuorinen, Carmen Moore, Sydney Hodkinson, David Del Tredici, Earle Brown, Harley Gaber, Stanley Silverman, John Cage, and Elliott Carter.
It will surprise no one (except me, apparently) that we are living in a disposable world, and that Facebook is no place for perfectionism!
