Word: bernstein
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...lands, but not in his own. He left Japan four years ago, successively won first place (and 100,000 francs) in the Concours International de Jeunes Chefs d'Orchestre, the Koussevitzky Memorial Scholarship for the best young conductor at Tanglewood, and a place at the side of Leonard Bernstein as an assistant conductor of the New York Philharmonic...
...rising young conductor fall flat. He returned there between Western triumphs last year, was signed by Japan's prestigious NHK (Japanese Broadcasting Corp.) Orchestra to a six-month, $10,000 contract. Proudly, he got up on the podium to display the sweeping conducting technique reminiscent of Bernstein. But his imported hip-swinging was wasted on the musicians of the NHK. For 36 years they had served Germanic masters, who stylistically frown on conducting exertions more noticeable than an occasional swing of the index finger. The sight of the flailing young conductor reminded a critic of "a samurai warrior leading...
Liszt: Concerto No. 1, Les Préludes (Andre Watts, pianist; the New York Philharmonic, conducted by Leonard Bernstein; Columbia) confirms the astonishing first impression 16-year-old Pianist Watts made in his New York debut in January. A fluent and subtle performance...
...Conversation. The first première, a Sonata for Clarinet and Piano, played by Benny Goodman and Leonard Bernstein, had the misfortune of being the marquee come-on for an all-Poulenc concert that included some vintage works-the beautiful Fiançailles pour Rire song cycle, the lovely a cappella Motets. The sonata's first movement is nervously melodic, the second drowsily romantic, the third merely gymnastic; nowhere does the music lead the two instruments into the tense conversation the form requires. The piano simply accompanies the clarinet, as in a coloratura song, and the clarinet does little...
Enriched by such experimentation, the true spirit of jazz still belongs to its players, not to composers who study the form at the distance of a good conservatory. Leonard Bernstein has captured the sound of its blue notes-the appoggiatura tones that mimic the human voice in lament-and others have used its reiterated play-song melodies. But even among jazzmen, the only composer who has consistently written good jazz for orchestral players without merely repeating George Gershwin is Duke Ellington, and Ellington's "classical jazz" swings only because it is safe, sensual music. "We're going...