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Strange Fruit


Thu, May 24, 2012

Lena Horne and author David Margolick take us through the tangled story of a short song –Strange Fruit, 1930. (This Fishko Files was produced in 2000)

Next week will see the release of the cast album of the Tony-nominated Broadway production of Porgy and Bess.  As WNYC’s Sara Fishko tells us, the controversy over the style and scale of the musical is in keeping with the long history of the piece.  Here is the next Fishko Files…

 

 

 

Arguably the most famous song from Porgy and Bess is Summertime. Listen to the Fishko Files piece on Summertime here.

 

Regarding all of the different versions of Summertime, Tim Page, professor at the Annenberg School of Journalism and the Thorton School of Music at the University of Southern California, spoke with us about the different iterations Porgy and Bess has taken on throughout the years.

Tim Page

"In our lifetimes Porgy and Bess was this famous work that nobody really knew except for the sections which were sung and played by lots of different people. Whether or not one thinks it really works as a complete opera is certainly open to question. But I think all our lives we’ve been hearing new takes on Porgy and Bess… The only thing that would really bother me would be if the possibility of hearing the complete work disappeared."

 

Here's John McWhorter of The New Republic on the role of music in the opera and the current Broadway production.

 

John McWhorter

"There is a divide there. And the people who put this together are theater people. And God bless theater people – I’m a theater person – but this one came with the music in it. And the problem is if you’re going to address this as theater, well what it’s really about is there’s a beggar and he falls in love with a good time girl. And people have some drug problems and she can’t quite pull herself away from Crown. And they’re on an island. And she goes away. That’s it. It’s kind of a thin story, even the people who put this together seem to have a problem with that. That Porgy and Bess doesn’t seem fully realized and that’s because they’re fully realized in music that is much larger than the archetypal characters that they are."

 

One of the biggest and most operatic productions of Porgy and Bess was staged at the Metropolitan Opera in 1985, almost exactly 50 years after the first production opened at New York’s Alvin Theatre. The issues of Porgy and Bess’ genre-bending style came up once again. From the New York Time’s critic Donal Henahan review: 

“Wednesday night's uncut performance took a grand opera approach to a work that until recent years has been treated as a Broadway musical, and generally mistreated, at that. Sometimes the Met's approach worked wonderfully, but at other times it exposed unnecessarily the opera's musical and dramatic weaknesses.�

 

A few versions of Porgy and Bess over the years…

 

• “Porgy and Bess.â€� Original Cast. MCA records. Recorded 1940.

• “Porgy and Bess.â€� Houston Grand Opera. 1970s. RCA, 1977.

• “Porgy and Bess.â€� Current Cast. P.S. Classics. Release date May 22nd.

 

For more from the speakers in this edition of Fishko Files…

• Hilton Als is a writer and theater critic. He wrote this review of Porgy and Bess for The New Yorker.
• John McWhorter is a journalist, writer and cultural critic. His The New Republic review is available here.

 

With some good advice from her mother (“who needs Harvard?�), political dynamo Bella Abzug went to law school and later exploded on the political consciousness in the 1970s. As WNYC’s Sara Fishko tells us, listening to Bella is still a powerful experience.  (Produced in 2008).

WNYC Production Credits...

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko
Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer
Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister
Managing Editor, WNYC News: Karen Frillmann

This coming Wednesday, a rare performance of the Busoni Piano Concerto will be heard at Carnegie Hall. As WNYC’s Sara Fishko tells us, Busoni was a musician with a fantastic combination of gifts, musical styles and inspiring thoughts about music’s future. Here is the next Fishko Files.

 

 

Marc Andre-Hamelin's performance of the Busoni piano concerto will be heard at Carnegie Hall, Wednesday May 9th. It will be broadcast as part of WQXR's Spring for Music Festival. For more information here.

Busoni, with his diverse musical styles and interests, had a huge sphere of influence as a teacher as well. Here’s more on some of Busoni’s most influential pupils.

Kurt Weill (1900-1950), the great symphonic and theater composer whose Threepenny Opera (with Bertolt Brecht) is a beloved classic.

The Kurt Weill Foundation for Music honors the legacies of Weill, and actress-singer Lotte Lenya. For more, visit their website.

Kurt Weill Sings and plays “Sweet Low�

 

Edgard Varese (1883-1965) the adventurous composer who, in describing his work, preferred to use the term “organized sound� to “music.�  

 

More on Varese.

Edgard Varese - "Ionisation"

 

Stefan Wolpe (1902-1972) the composer whose operas and orchestral works reflected his connection to Abstract Expressionist painters and the Dadaist movement.

For more, visit The Stefan Wolpe Society.

Stefan Wolpe: String Quartet, ii

 

Egon Petri (1881-1962), the brilliant pianist who was more a Busoni disciple than a mere student, and who devoted his life to performing Busoni’s music (as well as that of Bach and Liszt). 

More on Petri.

Egon Petri plays Franz Liszt Petrarch Sonnet op 123 Definitive

Alexander Brailowsky (1896-1976), the Ukrainian/French pianist, whose specialty in the music of Chopin didn’t stop him from having a staggering repertoire of other music, as well.

More on Brailowsky and his music.

Alexander Brailowsky plays Chopin Concerto E-minor

 

Dimitri Mitropoulos (1896-1960) whose tenure as Music Director at the New York Philharmonic in the 50s pushed the orchestra to expand its repertoire to more modern music.

For more on Mitropolous.

Dimitri Mitropoulos conducts New York Philharmonic in rehearsal and concert

 

 

Dimitri Tiomkin (1894-1979), the ubiquitous Russian-born film composer, whose scores embellished more than one hundred films in the Hollywood Golden Age, and who received 22 Academy Award nominations.

More on Tiomkin.

Dimitri Tiomkin – Greatest Hits

 

 

 

Otto Luening (1900-1996), the German-American composer and conductor who was an early pioneer of tape music and electronic music, and who himself turned into a teacher of notable students (Wuorinen, Corigliano, Sollberger etc.)

 

More on Luening.

 

Otoo Luening – “Low Speed� (1954)

 

 

WNYC Production Credits...

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko
Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer
Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister
Managing Editor, WNYC News: Karen Frillmann

As we say good-bye to April, which is National Poetry Month, WNYC’s Sara Fishko listens to recorded poets, and asks, how do their speaking voices compare to their poems?

WNYC Production Credits...

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko
Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer
Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister
Managing Editor, WNYC News: Karen Frillmann

As World War Two was ending in the mid 1940s, John Huston began to make a film for the US Army on veterans who’d been psychologically damaged in battle. As WNYC’s Sara Fishko tells us, the film “Let There Be Light� was filled with gripping footage of ailing veterans.  But the film never saw the light of day until thirty-five years later.  Here is the next Fishko Files…

 

 

Let There Be Light

 

Let There Be Light was controversial in its time and for many decades after. Even though it was commissioned by the U.S. Army, they shelved it for reasons that are still not completely clear. The details are dramatic: Minutes before a screening of the film at the Museum of Modern Art military police marched into MoMA to seize the print. They claimed Huston had not received the proper release forms from the soldiers.

Here are two reviews of the film:

James Agee, 1946

“John Huston’s Let There Be Light, a fine, terrible, valuable non-fiction film about psychoneurotic soldiers, has been forbidden civilian circulation by the War Department. I don’t know what is necessary to reverse this disgraceful decision, but if dynamite is required, then dynamite is indicated.�

Andrew Sarris, 1981
(The film first saw the light of day in 1981 after organizers of a John Huston film festival pushed for its release. They succeeded in organizing a screening.)

“Nothing in Agee’s elegantly-lean critiques had prepared me for the sheer conventionality and unoriginality of the work. Why on earth would the top brass object to a film which attributed to an army psychiatrist the combined talents and powers of Mandrake the Magician and Bernadette of Lourdes? Indeed, Let There Be Light could be subtitled The Song of Sigmund as it depicts a series of Freudian-faith-healing sessions as so many clinical epiphanies crossing over from the medical to the miraculous.�

In Huston’s film Let There Be Light, the phrase to describe what we know as PTSD was “psychoneurotic soldiers.� The comedian George Carlin, in one of his legendary routines, traced the language surrounding psychologically battle-scarred Veterans, starting with World War I and moving toward modern times.

 

 

By the way…

Had Let There Be Light been available at the time, it would’ve shown viewers a side of the war they’d never seen. Other films of the era provided info and insight into the war before the world of 24-hour news.

 

Why We Fight, Directed by Frank Capra – A series that ran from 1942 to 1945

A morale-building propaganda series featuring never before seen on-the-ground combat footage.

 

The Negro Soldier – 1944, Directed by Stuart Heisler, Produced by Frank Capra

View the film here.

This film was meant to encourage African American soldiers to join the army. It helped pave the way for military desegregation.

 

For more from the speakers in this edition of Fishko Files…

• Daniel Eagan is a writer and film critic. He writes the Smithsonian Magazine blog “Reel Culture.â€� You can read the blog, here. Eagan also wrote about Let There Be Light in his book, America’s Film Legacy, 2009-2010, Continuum Press.
• David Van Taylor is a documentary filmmaker, who is co-producing/directing six, hour-long documentaries as part of To Tell the Truth, “the ultimate documentary – on documentaries.â€� To read more about “To Tell the Truth,â€� click here.

 

WNYC Production Credits...

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko
Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer
Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister
Managing Editor, WNYC News: Karen Frillmann

 

 

Next weekend The Little Orchestra Society will end its season with Sergei Prokofiev’s popular piece of 1936, Peter and the Wolf.  As WNYC’s Sara Fishko tells us, millions of children listened to the narrated musical saga, which used the instruments of the orchestra to evoke its characters and action.  But that’s only part of the story…

 

 

Peter and the Wolf will be performed at The Little Orchestra Society on April 21st and 22nd. For more information visit their website.

 

 

Read the English translation of Prokofiev's text for Peter and the Wolf here

 

Walt Disney and Sergei Prokofiev met in Hollywood in 1938. Later, Disney made this promotional film about their meeting. (The man at the piano is an actor, not Prokofiev)

 

Peter and the Wolf showcased some of the great voices and orchestras of the 20th century. See a list of some of the recordings used in Fishko Files, below. 

Peter and the Wolf(s)

1. Koussevitzky Conducts Prokofiev: Boston Symphony, Serge Koussevitzky, conductor, Richard Hale, narrator.  Pearl 1991. (recorded 1939)
2. Boston Symphony Orchestra, Serge Koussevitzky, conductor, Eleanor Roosevelt, narrator. Listen to the recording here. (Recorded 1950)
3. Vienna State Opera Orchestra, Mario Rossi, conductor, Boris Karloff, narrator. Vanguard, 1992. (Recorded 1957)
4. Vienna State Opera Orchestra, Sir Eugene Goossens, conductor, Jose Ferrer, narrator. MCA, 1989. (Recorded 1959)
5. Stadium Symphony Orchestra of New York, Leopold Stokowski, conductor, Bob Keeshan, narrator. Everest, 1997.
6. Academy of London, Richard Stamp, conductor, John Gielgud, narrator. Virgin, 1989. (Recorded 1989)
7. Orchestra of St. Luke’s, James Levine, conductor, Sharon Stone, narrator. DG, 2001. (Recorded 2001)
8. The Philadelphia Orchestra, Eugene Ormandy, conductor, David Bowie, narrator. RCA, 1978. (Recorded 1978)
9. New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein, conductor and narrator. Sony, 1998. (Recorded 1960)
10. Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Zubin Mehta, conductor, Itzhak Perlman, narrator. EMI, 1996. (Recorded 1986)

Other Music by Prokofiev Used in this Episode

1. Romeo and Juliet, excerpt from Suite #2 Op. 64 C. Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Armin Jordan, conductor. Erato, 1992.
2. Sonata #6, excerpt from 1^st movement, Sviatoslav Richter. Philips Classics, 1998.
3. Winter Bonfire, Op. 122, excerpt from “Departure.� The New London Orchestra. Ronald Corp, conductor. Hyperion, 1991.

 

For more from the speaker in this episode of Fishko Files...

Visit Professor Harlow Robinson's website, here. You can see his book, "Sergei Prokofiev: A Biography," here. 

WNYC Production Credits...

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko

Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer

Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister

Managing Editor, WNYC News: Karen Frillmann

 

 

On this day 50 years ago, a now-famous classical concert turned into a musical battleground –with very instructive results.  WNYC’s Sara Fishko tells the story, in this edition of Fishko Files…

 

 

 

 

 

At a now-historic Carnegie Hall concert on April 6^th, 1962,  Glenn Gould and Leonard Bernstein set out to collaborate on a performance of the Brahms d minor Concerto with the New York Philharmonic.  Behind the scenes, the two musical stars could not agree on the interpretation: Gould told Bernstein that he wanted to play down the “virtuosic� elements of the piece, and play in a more meditative style.  Maestro Bernstein argued in favor of playing the piece as he often had, in the traditional way.  They were at such odds that Bernstein issued a “disclaimer� before he launched into the performance—which they played “Gould’s way.� 

 “Why am I conducting it? Because I am fascinated, glad to have the chance for a new look at this much-played work; because, what’s more, there are moments in Mr. Gould’s performance that emerge with astonishing freshness and conviction and, thirdly, because we can all learn something from this extraordinary audience who is a thinking performer.�

For the first time in anyone’s memory a classical music conductor felt he had to warn the audience about the unorthodox performance to follow. The Times critic the next day was negative, and even a little snide. The entire review is written as an open letter to a fictional character, the writer Harold Schonberg’s childhood friend, “Ossip.�

 

To read the full review from The New York Times, click here.

 

“Such goings-ons at the New York Philharmonic concert yesterday afternoon! I tell you, Ossip, like you never saw….First the conductor comes out to read a speech. He says that he doesn’t like the way the pianist will play the concerto…�

“The Gould boy played the Brahms D Minor Concerto slower than the way we used to practice it. (And between you, me and the corner lamppost, Ossip, maybe the reason he plays it so slow is maybe his technique is not so good.)�

This immediate critique, though, didn’t hold in history. A more contemporary examination of the concert comes from critic Tim Page in 1998, from the liner notes of the disc made from the radio recording of the program.

“All in all, this is a revelatory disc, exploring aspects of Brahm’s vast, symphonic conception that had been long neglected. Moreover, it is an important souvenir of two great musicians – musicians who could collaborate on an interpretation that was significant, original and moving, even when in substantial disagreement about just what the interpretation should be.�

 

By the way, the reason we can hear this concert at all, 50 years later, is that it was broadcast on radio and preserved on disc.  Columbia Records finally released it as a recording in 1998. In the liner notes, the late Schuyler Chapin (director of Columbia Masterworks in the 50s and 60s) admitted that Columbia’s original decision not to formally record the concert was a mistake, and calls the performance “another marvelous example of Glenn Gould’s splendid and curious mind at work…"

 

The recording of the concert, Brahms: Piano Concerto No. 1, is available here.

 

To the world in general, Leonard Bernstein was a great, multi-talented figure. But to New Yorkers, he was the conductor of our home-town orchestra, the New York Philharmonic.  WNYC’s  Sara Fishko spoke to five NY Phil players who had strong memories of “Lenny.� (originally produced in 2000). 

WNYC Production Credits

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko

Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer

Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister

WNYC Newsroom Editor: Karen Frillmann

Miklos Rozsa was one of Hollywood's most celebrated composers. His work on film noir classics in the 40's and epic films in the 50's was, and still is, well known. But, as WNYC’s Sara Fishko tells us, it turns out Rozsa had another composing life.

WNYC Production Credits

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko

Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer

Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister

WNYC Newsroom Editor: Karen Frillmann

A new staging of the play Death of a Salesman opened last night on Broadway, with incidental music by Alex North. The score goes back 63 years to the play’s original production.  In today’s Fishko Files, WNYC’s Sara Fishko has this appreciation of North’s musical gifts…

 

 

 

For more information about the current production of Death of a Salesman visit the show’s website.

 

In 1985, a new film of Death of a Salesman starred Dustin Hoffman, with direction by Volker Schlondorff.  In an attempt to “update� the material, they threw out Alex North’s music, and replaced it with a “rock�-style score.  The score was poorly received, and at that point Dustin Hoffman got involved and contacted North, hoping to emerge with a solution to the problem of how to score the film.

 

Author and composer George Burt recounts the story...

Alex was so hurt, I mean it’s hard to have a score that you’ve poured your heart into thrown out. Especially by some young turks who don’t know from Adam. So he was angry, didn’t want to talk to Hoffman. But Hoffman insisted and he came over to Alex’s house. And as it turns out the two of them sat at the piano for three days. And Alex just played through the whole score on the piano and he explained to Hoffman why he did this and that. Well, Hoffman was astounded. He admitted he never even thought of music in the film – in film before. Like a lot of actors, I must say. And he hugged Alex and in fact kissed him on his forehead.

So Hoffman went back to the studio and fired those young guys and ordered Alex’s music, which had been recorded, to be put back in the film. And ordered that not a single decision about the score or how the score was cut into the film was to be made without Alex’s approval. This has never happened before, I don’t think, in the history of film.

Johnny Mandel, (composer I Want to Live, The Americanization of Emily, and other films) admitted that he used to steal sheet music from Alex North’s sketches.

When he was doing sketches or little scores that he orchestrated later, or some of the small cues, I'd see if I could get copies of them. I wanted to see what he did. Because he was so interesting in terms of what he used in the way of sounds. Using the low flutes and using these different things. Things that I gravitated towards, anyway. You know, anybody can write large orchestra parts where everybody's doubling everybody. But it's those little things like - almost chamber music - that he wrote, that are so interesting, too.

 

Elia Kazan had first worked with North on Death of a Salesman, and North’s music made an impression on him. It was Kazan who hired North for the score for A Streetcar Named Desire. Historians and film music buffs agree that Alex North’s score for "Streetcar" was the first jazz-inflected score for an American Film.

 

 

More information about the speakers in this edition of Fishko Files...

• George Burt's book, The Art of Film Music, is available here. You can also visit his website.
• Gordon Davidson is a producer/director, now based in Los Angeles. He was artistic director of the Center Theatre Group - which consists of the Mark Taper Forum, Ahmanson Theatre, and the Kirk Douglas Theatre. He directed Children of a Lesser God and Shadow Box - both on Broadway. He also produced Arthur Miller's American Clock, for which Alex North provided a score.

 

 

WNYC Production Credits

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko

Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer

Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister

WNYC Newsroom Editor: Karen Frillmann

You have only two more weeks to see the “Photo League� photography show at the Jewish Museum, entitled “Radical Camera.�  As WNYC’s Sara Fishko tells us, the League was not just a convenient place to meet other photographers. The “Photo League� was organized around a way of looking at the world. Here is the next Fishko Files.

"The Radical Camera: New York's Photo League" at The Jewish Museum closes on Sunday, March 25th. For more information, visit the museum's website.

Photo slide show prepared by Laura Mayer

 

 

For more from the speakers in this edition of Fishko Files...

• Vivian Cherry's most-recently published photo book is Vivian Cherry's New York. You can see it here.
• To see a collection of Rebecca Lepkoff's photos taken during the late 30s through the early 50s, see her book Life on the Lower East Side: Photographs by Rebecca Lepkoff, 1937-1950.
• Marvin E. Newman's work is featured in this blog post, here.
• Ida Wyman's work was recently exhibited at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art.

 

 

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko

Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer

Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister

WNYC Newsroom Editor: Karen Frillmann

 

 

Pianist Murray Perahia, as WNYC’s Sara Fishko tells us, has found Bach -- late in a stellar pianistic career. He talks about Bach, harpsichords, Horowitz and musical storytelling in this Fishko Files episode (originally produced in 2000).

 

Murray Perahia will perform music by Bach and others in a recital at Avery Fisher Hall on March 25^th.  For more information visit Lincoln Center’s website.

 

WNYC Production Credits

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko
Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer
Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister
WNYC Newsroom Editor: Karen Frillmann

This Sunday, the Motion Picture Academy gives out its Oscars, and the silent film “The Artist� is nominated in ten categories.  As WNYC’s Sara Fishko tells us, that film is driven by a story engine that just won’t quit.  Here is the next Fishko Files…

 

 

 

 

 

 

An Old Story is Told Again

The story: A young person with ambition meets an established star. Their positions begin to reverse as the newcomer rises and the older star-mentor declines. It often ends tragically.

Maybe one reason this story is so often told is that some version of this narrative happened to so many people in Hollywood – especially in the early days of talking pictures.

• John Gilbert and Ina Claire: Silent actor John Gilbert (1897 – 1936) was a huge movie star, who made an awkward transition to sound films. Just as his career began to collapse, his wife Ina Claire rose to stardom in talking pictures.

• John Barrymore (1882 – 1942) starred in over 60 films across a quarter of a century. While Barrymore’s move into talking films went relatively well, his downfall was drink. Barrymore’s quick decline and early death (at age 60) was urged along by ingesting dangerous alcoholic concoctions during Prohibition.

• Marshall “Mickeyâ€� Neilan (1891 – 1958) was a successful actor, producer, writer, and director - who worked with stars like Mary Pickford (Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, The Little Princess, etc.). Neilan, too, had trouble with the transition from silent films to talkies. As Smithsonian Magazine Film Blogger Daniel Eagan says, “he just couldn’t keep up with what audiences wanted.â€� His story was a slight variation on the theme: He and his wife Blanche Sweet both achieved a certain amount of success and they both struggled as the sound era came in, ultimately causing their careers to falter. Neilan later succumbed to alcoholism.

 

A similar story appears front and center in many films. A selection...

 

Limelight, 1952
A fading comedian (Charlie Chaplin) saves a suicidal ballerina (Claire Bloom). Her star waxes while his wanes.

 

 

 

 

For more from the guest in this edition of Fishko Files...

Daniel Eagan is a critic and author. His most recent book is America's Film Legacy, 2009 - 2010. You can read Eagan's blog at Smithsonian Magazine here.

 

WNYC Production Credits

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko
Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer
Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister
WNYC Newsroom Editor: Karen Frillmann

Every musician is different; some love to play music that everyone knows, and others love to explore new musical horizons. In this archival edition of Fishko Files, Sara Fishko spoke to one pianist who has somehow managed to do both; and who's tried to open people's ears in the process (Produced during Pollini’s “Perspectives� series at Carnegie Hall, 2001).

 

WNYC Production Credits

Executive Producer: Sara Fishko
Assistant Producer: Laura Mayer
Mix Engineer: Wayne Shulmister
WNYC Newsroom Editor: Karen Frillmann

This Author: Sarah Fishko

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