Composers Datebook American Public Media

Synopsis
On today’s date in 1995, an opera by American composer Amy Beach received its first professional production at Lincoln Center in New York City — 63 years after Beach completed it in the summer of 1932.

Beach was 65 years old in 1932 and for years had wanted to write an opera on an American theme. She settled on a play by Nan Bagby Stephens, a writer from Atlanta. Their operatic collaboration was entitled Cabildo, after the famous prison in New Orleans where the pirate Pierre Lafitte was imprisoned during the War of 1812. Stephens even supplied Beach with authentic Creole songs and dances to incorporate in her score.

Beach had a concise one-act opera finished by August of 1932, but it was never staged during her lifetime. Both the Great Depression and the outbreak of World War II postponed various attempts at a staging. Sadly, when an opera workshop at the University of Georgia finally got around to an amateur production in 1945, Beach had already died.

The manuscript of the opera remained unpublished for decades, but with the passage of time, interest in Amy Beach led to the Lincoln Center performance in 1995, conducted by Ransom Wilson.

Music Played in Today's Program
Amy Beach (1867-1944): Cabildo; ensemble; Ransom Wilson, conductor; Delos 3170

Synopsis
In the 1960s, American composer Steve Reich prepared some electronic pieces consisting of gradually shifting tape loops of the same prerecorded — and enigmatic — spoken phrases excerpted from someone telling a story. Reich quickly realized he could produce the same effect with conventional instruments and live musicians. These repetitive patterns and the gradual shifts came to be labeled “minimalist.”

Three decades later, in May of 1993, Reich and his wife, the video artist Beryl Korot, created a large-scale piece they dubbed a “documentary video opera.” Titled The Cave, it investigated the roots of Christianity, Judaism and Islam through prerecorded interviews, images projected on multi-channel video screens, and live musical accompaniment utilizing the speech patterns of the interviewees as the starting point for much of the score.

On today’s date in 2002, at the Vienna Festival, Reich and Korot premiered another music theatre piece, Three Tales, intended as symbolic parables of technology in the 20th century, the three topics being the crash of the Hindenburg, the early atomic bomb tests in the Pacific Islands and the cloning of a sheep named Dolly.

Music Played in Today's Program
Steve Reich (b. 1936): Music for Large Ensemble; Alarm Will Sound and Ossia; Alan Pierson, conductor; Nonesuch 79546

Synopsis
Primitive man probably imitated animal sounds for both practical and religious reasons. More recently, the Baroque-era composer Heinrich Franz von Biber imitated one particular animal for comic effect in his Sonata Representing Animals, and, in early 20th century slang, it’s simply “the cat’s meow.”

Now speaking of cats, they’re supposed to have nine lives — but would you believe 8,949?

On today’s date in 1981, Cats, a musical by British composer Andrew Lloyd Webber opened at the New London Theatre in the city’s fashionable West End. Despite a bomb threat and brief evacuation of the theatre, the premiere of Cats was a great success. 8,949 performances later, on the same date in 2002, when the show finally closed, it had long since entered the Guinness Book of World Records as the longest-running musical to date.

In London, it took in 136 million British pounds in ticket sales. Worldwide, Cats has taken in billions of dollars, has been seen by millions, and has been performed in 11 different languages in over 26 countries.

And if you asked your cat to comment on all this, they would probably say, “Why are you surprised?” and saunter away.

Music Played in Today's Program
Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber (1644-1704): Sonata Violino Solo Representativa; Il Giardino Armonico; Giovanni Antonini, conductor; Teldec 21464

Andrew Lloyd Webber (b. 1948): Cats Overture; Original Broadway Cast orchestra; Geffen 22031

Synopsis
Is the customer always right? Apparently Giuseppe Verdi thought so — to a degree, at least.

On today’s date in 1872, Verdi sent a note to his publisher with an attached letter he had received from a disgruntled customer, a certain Prospero Bertani, who had attended not one, but two performances of Verdi’s new opera, Aida.

Bertani said, “I admired the scenery … I listened with pleasure to the excellent singers, and took pains to let nothing escape me. After it was over, I asked myself whether I was satisfied. The answer was ‘no’.”

Since everyone else seemed to think Aida was terrific, Bertani attended a second performance to make sure he wasn’t mistaken, and concluded, “The opera contains absolutely nothing thrilling or electrifying. If it were not for the magnificent scenery, the audience would not sit through it.”

Bertini itemized his expenses for tickets, train fare, and meals, and asked Verdi for reimbursement. Verdi was so amused that he instructed Ricordi to pay Bertani — but not the full amount, since, as Verdi put it: “… to pay for his dinner too? No! He could very well have eaten at home!”

Music Played in Today's Program
Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901): ‘Aida’ excerpts

Synopsis
Some classical music snobs look down their nose at film scores, considering them less “serious” than “art” music written for the concert hall.

Aaron Copland, for one, deplored this attitude. He admired the work of composers like Bernard Herrmann, Alex North, David Raksin and Elmer Bernstein, whose successful Hollywood careers earned them financial rewards on the West Coast, if not the respect of the snootier East Coast music critics. Copland had spent some time in Hollywood, and knew what was involved in completing a film score on time and on budget.

On today’s date in 1940, at Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood, the press was invited to a special preview showing of a new film version of Our Town. To match Thornton Wilder’s nostalgic stage play about American life in Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire, Copland’s score employed harmonies suggestive of old New England church hymns.

For once, audiences and critics were impressed, and Copland quickly arranged an Our Town concert suite, which premiered on a CBS Radio broadcast in June 1940. He reworked this suite for its first public performance by the Boston Pops and Leonard Bernstein in May 1944.

Music Played in Today's Program
Aaron Copland (1900-1990): Our Town Suite; Saint Louis Symphony; Leonard Slatkin, conductor; BMG 61699

Synopsis
Stephen Sondheim was 32 years old when his musical A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum opened on Broadway on today’s date in 1962. The best seats would have cost you $8.60, but decent tickets were available for three bucks in those days — and, much to Sondheim’s relief, New Yorkers snapped them up in short order.

The trial run of Forum in Washington, D.C. had been a near disaster, and, as this was the first major musical for which Sondheim wrote both the lyrics and the music, he had a lot riding on the show’s success.

Audiences and critics alike loved the over-the-top fusion of an ancient Roman comedy by Plautus with the kick-in-the-pants conventions of American Vaudeville, spiced up with a liberal dash of Burlesque dancers in Roman costumes. As the New York Times review put it, the cast included six courtesans who “are not obliged to do much, but have a great deal to show.”

Forum won several Tony Awards in 1962, including Best Musical. Even so, while Sondheim’s lyrics were praised, his music was barely mentioned; his skill as a composer were not yet fully appreciated. That would occur several years — and several shows — later.

Music Played in Today's Program
Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021): A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum; 1996 Broadway Cast; Angel 52223