Although marred by unexplained omissions and bowdlerizations, the publication of “The Leonard Bernstein Letters” brought to mind a dinner I attended at Bernstein’s Fairfield, Conn., home around 30 years ago. Unlike the interviewer, Jonathan Cott, author of “Dinner With Lenny: The Last Long Interview With Leonard Bernstein,” I did not ask the maestro any portentous…
The Leonard Bernstein Letters Edited by Nigel Simeone Yale University Press, 624 pages, $38 No one ever questioned Leonard Bernstein’s gifts. His innate musicality was apparent prodigiously early, as were his verbal intelligence, his energy, and his limitless self-confidence. Almost everyone who knew the young Bernstein assumed he would achieve great things. Whether his later…
As this fall’s concert season kicks off, Manhattanites in search of classical performances with a dollop of Yiddishkeit will have a delightful array of choices, starting with the genial ghost of beloved Austrian Jewish violinist Fritz Kreisler, which presides over the New York Philharmonic’s Opening Gala. On September 27 at Avery Fisher Hall, Itzhak Perlman…
• Aaron Copland owed much of his career to Serge Koussevitzky. • Leonard Bernstein was in Tanglewood’s first class and became a Koussevitzky protégé and a worldwide symbol of Tanglewood. • Paul Fromm was insired by Koussevitsky to create the Fromm Music Foundation to support new music. • Erich Leinsdorf inaugurated Tanglewood’s Festival of Contemporary…
As summertime slowly approaches, concerts of music both minimal and maximal will enchant Manhattanites in search of aural Yiddishkeit. On April 29 at the Walter Reade Theater, flutist Claire Chase will perform Steve Reich’s “Vermont Counterpoint” in its version for flute and tape; the alternate version, for eleven flutes, would doubtless exceed even the gifted…
The director Charles S. Dubin, who died on September 5 at age 92, was a showbiz survivor who got himself and his family through the entertainment industry blacklist era. Born in 1919 on Hart street “in the slums of Williamsburg, Brooklyn” to a Russian Jewish family, as Dubin proudly told a 2003 interviewer, he sang…
If you happened to see some Jets and Sharks dancing in the middle of Times Square last week, rest assured that you were not hallucinating. The flash mob you saw was a group of New York City dancers performing some moves choreographed by Jerome Robbins for “West Side Story.” The flash mob was organized by…
Why does it begin with a shofar call? Once you compare the famous, startling first three notes of Leonard Bernstein’s “West Side Story” score with a real shofar sounding “Tekiah g’dolah,” as I did in 1996 to demonstrate this point on WNYC, the resemblance is undeniable. Once you notice it, this shofar theme is woven…
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