Bernstein - a great composer?
Laaber-Verlag is dedicating a compendium to Leonard Bernstein that focuses on his compositional work.
The anniversary year of Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) has shown this impressively: The fascination for this exceptional musician is unbroken; he is still highly regarded as an eccentric conductor and as a rediscoverer of Gustav Mahler's music. And the composer? The Laaber publishing house has now dedicated a volume of its renowned book series "Great Composers and their Time" to Bernstein and his compositional activity in all its facets. It is an astonishing undertaking to present the "enfant terrible" of the scene in a row with such important exponents as Beethoven, Brahms or Mahler. But this is precisely the appeal of this compendium: its objective, musicological approach. It is not a biography, rather the book consists of specialist essays on selected topics, five of which are dedicated to the composer Bernstein, five others to individual works such as the wonderful Chichester Psalms.
And there really is a lot to discover, especially as Gregor Herzfeld's essay "In Search of an American Music" at the beginning looks at the beginnings of classical music production in the USA. Ulrich Wilker devotes himself to Bernstein's symphonic oeuvre in "Crisis Scenarios and Weltanschauungsmusik", while Nils Grosch explains his "Musical Comedies". Of course, there are also reflections on Bernstein as a conductor and on his "mediation of music in film and television" - long before the education wave. His role in the cultivation of Mahler is also critically reflected upon.
The book is supplemented by a detailed chronology that begins as early as 1892 with the birth of the Orthodox Hasidic father, Shmuel Yosef. This is followed by an extensive 42-page chronology of his life and work, which also includes important political events. Editor Andreas Eichhorn presents an interesting, varied book with a list of works that shows how extensive Bernstein's compositional oeuvre is, alongside the West Side Story is - even if only a selection is listed.
Leonard Bernstein and his time, edited by Andreas Eichhorn, 407 p., € 37.80, Laaber-Verlag, Laaber 2017, ISBN 978-3-89007-768-0
