Aaron Copland: The Life & Work of an Uncommon ManThe son of Eastern European Jewish immigrants, Aaron Copland (1900-90) became one of America's most beloved and esteemed composers. Howard Pollack's meticulously researched and engrossing biography presents Aaron Copland in all his symphonic grandeur and nuanced complexity. Pollack explores Copland's childhood in Brooklyn, his studies with Nadia Boulanger against the background of Paris in the 1920s, his return from France to write music commissioned by Serge Kousse-vitzky, his efforts on behalf of other composers and his involvement with Harold Clurman's Group Theatre, his romantic relationships, his work in Hollywood during the thirties and forties, his leftist activities and his hearing before a congressional committee during the McCarthy period, his controversial adoption of the twelve-tone method of composition, his conducting career, and his struggle with debilitating dementia in his final years. Pollack also details Copland's achievements as critic, teacher, and lecturer, summarizing his thoughts on such subjects as the great European tradition, the music of the United States and Latin America, postwar avant-garde, jazz, and rock. Fittingly, Pollock devotes much of his energies to informed and valuable discussions of Copland's music, explaining and clarifying its newness and originality, its aesthetic and social aspects, its distinctive and enduring personality. |
Contents
1 A Copland Portrait | 3 |
2 Background Matters | 15 |
3 Early Education and First Works | 30 |
4 Paris | 45 |
5 Copland and the Music of Europe | 57 |
6 From Sonata Movement to Grohg 192124 | 76 |
7 Return and Rediscovery | 88 |
8 The Usable Past | 107 |
19 Music for the Movies and for Keyboard 193941 | 336 |
20 From Lincoln Portrait to Danzόn Cubano 1942 | 357 |
21 From The North Star to Appalachian Spring 194344 | 378 |
22 From Jubilee Variation to Four Piano Blues 194548 | 407 |
23 From The Red Pony to the Piano Quartet 194850 | 428 |
24 The Changing Scene | 451 |
25 From Old American Songs to the Piano Fantasy 195057 | 467 |
26 From Dance Panels to Connotations 195962 | 486 |
9 From the Organ Symphony to Vocalise 192428 | 121 |
10 From Vitebsk to the Piano Variations 192830 | 142 |
11 Copland Among His Peers | 159 |
12 Copland and Younger American Composers | 178 |
13 South of the Border | 216 |
14 Personal Affairs | 234 |
15 Copland and the American Theater | 257 |
16 An Engaged Citizen | 270 |
17 From the Short Symphony to A Prairie Journal 193337 | 288 |
18 From Billy the Kid to John Henry 193840 | 314 |
27 From Emblems to Proclamation 196482 | 503 |
28 Identity Issues | 518 |
29 The Later Years | 532 |
Conclusion | 550 |
List of Works | 557 |
Notes | 564 |
| 664 | |
| 671 | |
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Common terms and phrases
Aaron Copland admired American composers American Music Appalachian Spring Arthur Berger artists ballet BHCF Billy the Kid Boston Boulanger Britten Brooklyn C-PI career Carlos Chávez CCLC choreographer Citkowitz clarinet Communist composer’s concert cond Copland wrote Copland’s music Cowell critics dance David Diamond early Erik Johns Fanfare film scores friends Gershwin Graham Grohg Harold Clurman Harris hearing helped Hollywood homosexual idea interview by author Irving Fine jazz Jewish Kennedy Koussevitzky Kraft later Leonard Bernstein letter Lincoln Portrait listeners Marc Blitzstein melody Mexico Modern Music movement Music New York musicians Ned Rorem notes Odets opera orch Paris Paul Bowles performance Perlis Phillip Ramey Piano Sonata Piano Variations piece play popular posers premiere Quartet recalled recording rhythms Salón México Schoenberg Schuman seems September Sessions solo song Stravinsky style Tender Land Theatre theme thought tion tune twelve-tone University Press violin Virgil Thomson William William Schuman work’s writing young