Word: toscanini
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Despite the book's faults--its over-ambitiousness, its sometimes befuddling organization, and an occasional lack of theoretical rigor that will displease the sociologically-minded--Understanding Toscanini will captivate classical music lovers as well as those who want to understand the state of the performing arts in America...
...BOOK begins with an account not of Toscanini's youth, but of America's. As Horowitz tells it, Americans in the 19th century were at once proud of their liberation from the pretentiousness of the arts in Europe and deeply humbled by the achievements of the Europeans...
Soon afterward, Toscanini settled in New York and robbed Mahler of his pre-eminence. More than that, Horowitz argues, Toscanini contributed to the historical circumstances that deprived America the chance of developing a vibrant, unfossilized musical culture...
...After Toscanini had more than proved his genius as leader of the New York Philharmonic in the 1930s, NBC radio hired him, formed an orchestra for him, and launched a media blitz that celebrated the maestro as the foremost conductor of the European music...
Although an Italian, Toscanini was portrayed as embodying the panoply of virtues that Tocqueville, a century before, had labeled as particularly "American": pragmatism, efficiency, and belief in democracy. In addition, Horowitz writes--and this is a fascinating insight--Toscanini seemed to fulfil America's dream of denying the significance of the past, which seemed to dictate that American art would continue to lag behind Europe...