Even if we were to restrict ourselves to his achievements as a conductor, he was one of the very top interpreters of American music, Haydn, Schumann, Mahler, Nielsen, Shostakovich – on the evidence of his recordings, too many others to catalogue.
Here’s just an example of his artistry: in London, from 1966, Lenny captured in his prime, conducting Stravinsky’s primal “Le Sacre du printemps” (“The Rite of Spring”) – without a score.
At the end of the performance, the musicians refuse to rise, but only continue to applaud him from their seats.
An appropriately orgiastic salute to Leonard Bernstein on his birthday!
PHOTO: Bernstein’s magic elevator only goes in one direction: up!
Friday was the 150th anniversary of Serge Koussevitzky’s birth, but I had just finished recording one of my radio shows, and I couldn’t muster the energy and focus to post about it. Even a photo with a link to one of his recordings would have been something, albeit inadequate in proportion to his significance as one of the great champions of modern music and, more specifically, American music.
It’s been calculated that, between 1924 and 1944, Koussevitzky presented 162 American works, 66 of which were world premieres. On his Concerts Koussevitzky, conducted in Paris in the 1920s, he also introduced Ravel’s enduring orchestration of Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition” and Honegger’s “Pacific 231.” As music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, he gave first performances of Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra and Copland’s “Appalachian Spring” suite.
“Kouss” was in on the ground floor at Tanglewood. He mentored Leonard Bernstein and others. When his wife, Nadia, died, he set up the Koussevitzky Music Foundation in her memory, to support and promote living composers. Early Foundation commissions yielded Britten’s “Peter Grimes” and Messiaen’s “Turangalîla-Symphonie.”
Kouss began his career as a double-bassist and blossomed into one of the most important conductors of the 20th century. I was remiss in not acknowledging him on his birthday anniversary. Mea culpa, and happy 150, Serge Koussevitzky!
First recording of “Pictures at an Exhibition”
Broadcast premiere of Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra (with the original wet-noodle ending, soon to be revised by the composer)
Live performance of Sibelius’ Symphony No. 7
Roy Harris’ Symphony No. 3
Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5
Rehearsing the BSO in Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Scheherazade”
Filmed performance of Randall Thompson’s “The Last Words of David”
Playing the slow movement of his Double-Bass Concerto, with piano
10-minute documentary, “The Story of Tanglewood” (1949)
Serge Koussevitzky, holding hat, with (left to right) Olivier Messiaen, Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein (lighting up), and Lukas Foss at Tanglewood in 1949 (photo by Ruth Orkin)
Leonard Bernstein never returned the Vienna Philharmonic’s score of Gustav Mahler’s “Das Lied von der Erde” (“Song of the Earth”) – the one used by Bruno Walter at the work’s premiere in 1911.
Bernstein borrowed the score in 1966. After he died in 1990, apparently his family donated his collection of scores to the New York Philharmonic. Vienna’s “Das Lied” resurfaced in 2017, when it was put on display as part of an exhibition celebrating the orchestra’s 175th anniversary. It just so happened that the exhibition was co-curated by the Vienna Philharmonic, then also celebrating its 175th year. At a point, representatives from both orchestras noted the original ownership stamp and shared a good chuckle. Oh, that Lenny. Until then, the polite Viennese had never said anything about it.
When the exhibition closed, the New York Philharmonic and the Bernstein family finally returned the score. Vienna took the high road. In a public statement, the Vienna Phil’s chairman issued a statement, “Not only are we thrilled to have back this historic score, which was originally used by Bruno Walter in the first Vienna Philharmonic performance of ‘Das Lied von der Erde,’ but we treasure its special connection to our friend and collaborator Leonard Bernstein, who maintained close relationships with the Vienna and New York Philharmonics and whose memory we cherish.”
Good save.
Lenny had marked it all up, of course. This is why I don’t lend books or recordings – especially to Leonard Bernstein.
Bernstein conducts “Das Lied” in 1972 (with English subtitles)
The finale of Gustav Mahler’s spinetingling “Resurrection” Symphony, conducted by Leonard Bernstein. Of course, the piece is so much more powerful – ecstatic and exhausting – when you take the full, 90-minute pilgrimage, but even excerpted, as here, it still puts my hair on end. Eat your heart out, Bradley Cooper. And happy birthday, Gustav Mahler!
The whole thing, probably riddled with YouTube ads:
The most widely-recognized of American classics? Perhaps. Next to “Fanfare for the Common Man” and “The Stars and Stripes Forever,” I can think of few others. George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” is 100 today.
I once heard it performed on a New Year’s Day concert in Milan. As late as the mid ‘90s, it seemed European musicians still hadn’t acquired that innate ability to swing. But the world’s a lot smaller place now, and they seem to have gotten it.
Here’s the first recording, with Gershwin at the piano and Paul Whiteman conducting. The work is abridged and played a little faster than we’re accustomed to hearing today, in large part to be able to fit it onto two sides of a 12-inch 78 rpm record.
The first recording I acquired, on LP, was with Leonard Bernstein as conductor and pianist with the New York Philharmonic, made for Columbia Records in 1964. The performance really is more expansive than most. As the years went by, I enjoyed hearing different takes on the piece, some of them attempting to recreate its original jazz band debut.
The work has been dismissed by cognoscenti as corny. In 1934, composer Constant Lambert derided it as “neither good jazz nor good Liszt.” As recently as two weeks ago, the New York Times ran an article under the title “The Worst Masterpiece,” with pianist Ethan Iverson making a straw man argument that Duke Ellington was a more important composer. Of course the “Rhapsody” is not true jazz, any more than Brahms’ Hungarian riffs could be construed as authentic Hungarian music. But it is 100 percent American.
“Rhapsody in Blue” is one of those rare pieces of classical music whose appeal transcends genre. I have an uncle, who is by no means a classical music person, who is obsessed with the work. It’s a crowd-pleaser, and deservedly so. If anything, its winning combination of optimism, energy, and naiveté reminds us of America’s “better angels” (a phrase I borrow from Lincoln on his birthday). The work is as refreshing now as it ever was, even if, one hundred years on, it seems more and more like a distant dream. It’s still a dream to be celebrated.
Bernstein, 1964
Bernstein live, 1976
Michael Tilson Thomas’ quite different conception
Incorporating Gershwin’s 1925 piano roll
Peter Nero and the Philly Pops at Independence Hall
In Woody Allen’s “Manhattan”
Paul Whiteman, who conducted the premiere of “Rhapsody in Blue,” introduces and leads it here, beginning at the 51-minute mark (with interlude for “voodoo drums???”) in the insane, pre-Code curio, “King of Jazz” (1930). Just don’t watch it too close to bed!
Live footage of Gershwin playing “I Got Rhythm” in 1931
PHOTO: (left to right) Ferde Grofé, Whiteman’s orchestrator and later composer of the “Grand Canyon Suite;” Gershwin at the piano; theatrical impresario Samuel “Roxy” Rothafel; and Whiteman, with his baton
