Classic Ross Amico

Tag: Juilliard School

Peter Mennin Forgotten Genius

The eeriest thing about Peter Mennin is not that he was born in Erie, PA, but that his music is now almost never performed. His Symphony No. 3 was shortlisted for a Pulitzer Prize in 1950. Good luck ever hearing it unless it’s on a recording.

Mennin’s studies with Norman Lockwood at the Oberlin Conservatory were interrupted by World War II, during which he served in the U.S. Army Air Force. Later, he studied with Howard Hanson at the Eastman School. He completed his Third Symphony on his 23rd birthday to fulfill his PhD requirements. The work immediately catapulted him to fame.

He lost the Pulitzer to Gian Carlo Menotti and the opera “The Consul.” However, a performance of the symphony by the New York Philharmonic paved the way for his appointment to the composition faculty of the Juilliard School.

Mennin was also a successful administrator. In 1958, he was named director of the Peabody Conservatory. In 1962, he became Juilliard’s president, a position he held until his death in 1983. In that capacity, he oversaw the school’s move from Claremont Avenue to Lincoln Center. He introduced both the drama and dance departments, he commenced the Master Class Program, and he attracted many high-profile artists as teachers.

In all, he composed nine symphonies (the first two were later withdrawn); also concertos for piano, cello, and flute, sundry orchestral pieces (including “Concertato: Moby Dick”), chamber works, choral pieces, and instrumental music.

Mennin was born to Italian immigrants one hundred years ago today. His brother was the composer Louis Mennini, who retained the family surname.

I just found the Albany Symphony Ochestra’s CD of Mennin’s Symphonies Nos. 5 & 6, with “Concertato: Moby Dick,” at Princeton Record Exchange only last week. The price: $1.00. That’s a penny a year. Somebody give this guy some performances, already!

Buon Centenario, Peter Mennin!

Symphony No. 3, with Dimitri Mitropoulos and the New York Philharmonic

John Ogdon plays the Piano Concerto

Fantasia for String Orchestra

“Concertato: Moby Dick”

“Folk Overture”

In the Erie Hall of Fame

How nice it would have been to acknowledge this important anniversary by sharing some of Mennin’s music over the radio, had my shows not been dropped by WWFM!

PHOTO: An eerie Octo-Mennin, courtesy of Gordon Parks

May 17, 2023
Remembering Vincent Persichetti

Vincent Persichetti was born in Philadelphia on this date in 1915. He died there in 1987. Although he seems to have had more of a lasting influence as a teacher – having molded legions of budding composers through his work at Combs College of Music, the Philadelphia Conservatory, and the Juilliard School – his own compositions are invariably well-crafted and certainly well worth listening to.

Somewhere, I’ve got one of his manuscripts in a box of musical collectibles I acquired at Freeman’s Auction House, back in the day when, if no one bid on a lot, it would go down to a dollar. It may have been in with a box of conductor James De Preist’s homework. I ought to make a point to dig that out. Nothing major, maybe a fanfare or something, a short work for brass.

The Philadelphia Orchestra used to play his work from time to time, but I haven’t seen any of Persichetti’s music on their programs for years. There is a document from the Muti era, on New World Records, a CD of live performances of the Symphony No. 5 for strings and the Piano Concerto, with Robert Taub as soloist. Frankly, I prefer this symphony, recorded by Ormandy and posted here in four movements:

I. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ajw4Ayhd1AA

II. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2hkAvb3Gx7A

III. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7BASajjHG08

IV. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rONwSSdlDE

A 1983 documentary on Persichetti

An interview with Bruce Duffie

http://www.bruceduffie.com/persichetti.html

An afternoon with Tim Page

https://www.wnyc.org/story/an-afternoon-with-vincent-persichetti/

Happy birthday, Vincent Persichetti!

PHOTO: The Vincent Persichetti historical marker outside the Curtis Institute of Music, from which he graduated in 1939

June 6, 2022
Remembering Pianist Joseph Kalichstein

I know it’s been a few days since pianist Joseph Kalichstein died, but I can’t seem to have been able to find the time or focus to report it. Kalichstein, who was equally accomplished as a recitalist, soloist, and chamber musician, died at his home in Maplewood, NJ, on Thursday.

His career spanned half a century. He was part of generation of Juilliard-trained musicians, including Itzhak Perlman, Pinchas Zukerman, Emanuel Ax, Leonard Slatkin, and James Levine, who rose to the top of their respective fields to become highly-visible and frequently-recorded performers.

It was Claudio Arrau who heard him in Tel Aviv, when Kalichstein was 14 years-old. (Kalichstein later stated he had been able to read music before he could read words.) Arrau arranged for him to be brought to Juilliard in 1962. Kalichstein himself later taught there, beginning in 1983.

He attracted the admiration of Leonard Bernstein, who invited him to perform on one of his televised Young People’s Concerts, and Rudolf Serkin, George Szell, and William Steinberg, who sat on the jury for the Leventritt Competition in 1969. Kalichstein won the the competition by unanimous decision.

In 1976, with violinist Jaime Laredo and cellist Sharon Robinson, he formed the Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio. The trio made its public debut at the Inauguration of President Jimmy Carter in 1977. Kalichstein’s final performance, in Phoenix on March 17, was with the ensemble, playing works by Schumann, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, and Brahms.

A sensitive interpreter and a self-effacing one, Kalichstein excelled as a collaborator, with a widely remarked-upon lack of ego. His peers, students, and audiences all benefited from his devotion to music.

I was privileged to attend a few of his performances with the Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio in Philadelphia. Locally, he also appeared as soloist in Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4, with the Princeton Symphony Orchestra, in 2014.

Kalichstein’s repertoire embraced the core composers of the 18th and 19th centuries, 20th century masters such as Ravel, Bartók, and Shostakovich, and, with the trio, more contemporary works by Leon Kirchner, Arvo Pärt, Richard Danielpour, and Daron Hagen.

He was 76 years-old.

Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 22

Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 with Szell

Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio in Beethoven’s “Triple Concerto”

Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio perform Brahms, Dvořák and Mendelssohn

Kalichstein talks Brahms with David Dubal

The Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio’s chamber music recordings across a broad repertoire are generously represented on YouTube, but most of them are posted in individual movements. So if you’re interested in more, definitely poke around!

PHOTO: Joseph Kalichstein (center) with Jaime Laredo and Sharon Robinson

April 3, 2022
Bella Davidovich at 90 & Zukerman at 70

Pinchas Zukerman is 70 today. Tell that to Bella Davidovich. The formidable pianist has just turned 90.

Davidovich first attained international recognition through a shared first prize at the 1949 Warsaw Chopin Competition. This was the launch of a successful career that took her all over the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. She played with every major Soviet conductor. She was soloist with the Leningrad Philharmonic for 28 consecutive seasons.

In 1978, she emigrated from the USSR to the United States, where she became a naturalized American citizen. Prior to the move, she taught at the Moscow Conservatory for sixteen years. She has taught at the Juilliard School since 1982. Her son (with the late violinist Julian Sitkovetsky) is Dmitry Sitkovetsky.

I don’t think a month goes by without someone at the station playing one of her superlative Chopin recordings. We’ll sample her artistry – though not to the neglect of Zukerman – today between 4 and 7 p.m. EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

Davidovich plays Chopin’s Grande valse brillante:

And the Scherzo No. 2:

July 16, 2018
Jerome Lowenthal Celebrates 85 Years

Today is the 85th birthday of Philadelphia-born pianist Jerome Lowenthal. Now chair of the piano department at the Juilliard School, here he is in 1968 with Leopold Stokowski, rehearsing Rachmaninoff’s “Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini.”

And in a more recent interview:

https://www.livingtheclassicallife.com/26-jerome-lowenthal/2015/10/16/episode-26-jerome-lowenthal#comments-56207791e4b0b077de882b14=

February 11, 2017

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