Composers Datebook

Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 was first heard on this day in Budapest in 1889, with the 29-year-old composer conducting.

Originally billed as a “symphonic poem,” a newspaper in Budapest even printed a detailed program, obviously supplied by Mahler himself. For subsequent performance in Europe, Mahler quickly withdrew these “Cliff’s Notes” to his Symphony.

Twenty years later, in December of 1909, Mahler conducted its American premiere at Carnegie Hall, during his first season as music director of the New York Philharmonic.

The symphony drew mixed reviews:

The New York Times wrote, “There are matters in it, that as absolute music, have no evident significance, and that serve merely to puzzle and perplex.”

The critic for the Sun took a dislike to the symphony’s finale, suggesting “when the weather is bad in Tyrol, it is beyond the power of language to characterize.”

Mahler’s own reactions are recorded in a letter he sent from New York to Bruno Walter back in Europe: “The day before yesterday I did my Symphony No. 1 here, without getting much reaction. However, I myself was fairly pleased with that youthful effort … The audiences here are very lovable and relatively better mannered than in Vienna. They listen attentively and very sympathetically. The critics are the same as anywhere else. I don’t read any of them.”

Gustav Mahler (1860-1911): Symphony No. 1; Minnesota Orchestra; Edo de Waart, conductor; Virgin 61258

The modern Hungarian city we know as Budapest is really three older settlements merged into one: Buda, on the west bank of the Danube, was the royal seat of the medieval Hungarian kings; Obuda, just to the north, was an ancient Roman provincial capital; and Pest, is a newer city situated on the east bank of the Danube. These three became the modern-day city Budapest in 1873.

In 1923, to celebrate modern Budapest’s 50th anniversary, the Hungarian government commissioned two of its greatest composers, Béla Bartók and Zoltán Kodály, to compose orchestral pieces which both premiered on today’s date that year.

Bartók’s contribution was a lively Dance Suite, with themes reminiscent of Hungarian folk melodies, although no actual folksongs are quoted. It’s one of his most genial and upbeat orchestral scores.

Kodály’s contribution was his Psalmus Hungaricus for tenor, chorus and orchestra, a free setting of a 16th century Hungarian translation of Psalm 55, in which the Psalmist pleads for deliverance from his persecutors.

That Psalm had a special political resonance for Zoltán Kodály, who had fallen out of favor with the right-wing Hungarian regime then in power. Despite its melancholy tone, Psalmus Hungaricus was an instant hit in Hungary and elsewhere, and helped established Kodály’s international reputation as one of his country’s greatest composers.

Béla Bartók (1881-1945): Dance Suite; Philharmonia Hungarica; Antal Dorati, conductor; Mercury 432 017

Zoltán Kodály (1882-1967): Psalmus Hungaricus; Lajos Kozma, tenor; Brighton Festival Chorus; London Symphony; István Kertész, conductor; London 443 488

Today’s date marks the official birthday of a quintessential American form of 20th century music — for cartoons.

It was on November 18, 1928, that the first-ever animated cartoon with its own synchronized soundtrack debuted at the Colony Theater in New York City. This was Walt Disney’s Steamboat Willie starring Mickey Mouse, who amazed audiences when he spoke up in a squeaky, falsetto voice provided by none other than Disney himself. Mickey pulled the whistle on his steamboat — a startling sonic effect in those days — and, oblivious of the impending animal rights movement, coaxed music from various squeezed and plucked barnyard colleagues.

That music was composed by a quiet, unassuming theater organist out of Kansas City named Carl Stalling, who was soon lured to Hollywood by Disney to work on subsequent Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphony cartoons. In 1936, Stalling joined the Warner Brothers studios, and for the next 22 years was the music director for classic Porky Pig, Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck cartoons.

Stalling’s wonderfully wacky and endlessly inventive music was usually ignored by “serious” music critics as beneath notice. Ironically, his scores feature the same dizzying shifts of mood, tempo and instrumentation as the most complex avant-garde scores of the post-war period: Stockhausen and Boulez meet Tweety and Sylvester?

Carl Stalling (1888-1974): Dinner Music for a Pack of Hungry Cannibals and To Itch his Own; Warner Bros. Studio Orchestra; Warner Bros. 26027

On today’s date in 2005, the chancel of the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis was transformed into a performance stage for vocal soloists, choirs, and the Minnesota Orchestra led by Osmo Vänksä.

The occasion was the world premiere performance of a new oratorio, To Be Certain of the Dawn, featuring music by American composer Stephen Paulus and a text by British-born poet Michael Dennis Browne. The Basilica had commissioned the oratorio as a gift to Temple Israel in Minneapolis in commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camps in 1945.

As Paulus explained, the idea for the oratorio began with a former rector of the Catholic basilica, who felt that Christians should acknowledge and teach about the Holocaust as much as — or more so — than Jews. “It was he who decided that an oratorio would be a powerful vehicle for communicating … [and] that children are key to the prevention of genocide, both today and in the future,” he wrote.

With telling effect, actual informal photographs of Jewish children taken in European ghettos during the 1930s and 40s were projected onto screens during the performance. As poet Michael Dennis Browne wrote, “The faces of children are the sun, moon and stars of this work.”

Stephen Paulus (1949-2014): To Be Certain of the Dawn; Minnesota Chorale; Minnesota Boychoir; Basilica Cathedral Choir and Choristers; Minnesota Orchestra; Osmo Vänskä, conductor; Bis CD-1726

On today’s date in 1777, the German composer Christoph Willibald Gluck was baffled by Parisian audiences and wrote these lines to a friend:

“I am so much disgusted with music that at present that I would not write one single note for any amount of money … Never has a more keenly-fought battle been waged than by the enemies of my new opera, Armide. The intrigues against my previous operas were no more than little skirmishes in comparison. Admirers tell me, ‘Sir, you are fortunate to be enjoying the honor of persecution’ and ‘every genius has had the same experience’— Bah! To the devil with their fine speeches!

“Still, yesterday, at the eighth performance of Armide, the hall was so tightly packed that when a man was asked to take off his hat, he replied, ‘Come and take it off yourself, I can’t move my arms!’ — which caused laughter. I have seen people coming out with their hair bedraggled and their clothes drenched as though they had fallen into a stream. Only the French would pay for such an experience!”

Gluck would ultimately triumph in Paris and could count among his most ardent supporters none other than the French queen, Marie Antoinette — who presumably had a much cooler and certainly less crowded box at the opera.

Christoph Willibald von Gluck (1714-1787): Act Two Aria from Armide; Rockwell Blake, tenor; Monte Carlo Philharmonic; Patrick Fournillier, conductor; EMI 55058

Christoph Willibald von Gluck (1714-1787): Don Juan Ballet Music; Rhine Chamber Orchestra of Cologne; Jan Corazolla, conductor; Christophorus 74507

Today’s date marks the anniversary of the first performance of Jerome Kern’s Show Boat, produced in 1927 at the National Theater in Washington, D.C. by Florenz Ziegfeld.

Show Boat’s book and lyrics were by Oscar Hammerstein II, adapted from Edna Ferber’s novel, which had been published only the year before. It was a most unusual story for a musical, and dealt frankly with alcoholism and interracial marriage. Mixing tragic and comic elements was something simply unheard of in American musical theater of that time.

Ziegfeld’s secretary recalled that before the Washington premiere, he fretted that audiences would be disappointed that the girls on stage were wearing much too much clothing for a typical Ziegfeld show. There was little or no applause following the November 15 premiere, and he assumed that Show Boat was a flop. But the Washington audiences were simply too stunned to react.

When Ziegfeld’s secretary told his boss that there were long lines waiting to buy tickets for subsequent performances, at first he didn’t believe it. But by the time Show Boat opened on Broadway the following month, even the great Ziegfeld knew he had a hit on his hands — and one based on great music and a powerful book, with nary a scantily-glad show girl in sight!

Jerome Kern (1885-1945): Selections from Show Boat; Royal Liverpool Philharmonic; Carl Davis, conductor; EMI 4573

If ever there was a red-letter day in American music, November 14 must surely be it. For starters, it’s the birthday of Aaron Copland, who was born in New York City on today’s date in 1900 — and then there’s all that happened on November 14 in the life of Leonard Bernstein.

Here’s how Bernstein explained it: “I never forget a Copland birthday. Two of the most important events of my life happened on November 14 — the first in 1937 when Aaron and I met for the first time … Now, I worried and complained terrifically back then and always took my troubles to Aaron, who would tell me to ’stop whining.’ He seemed to have such complete confidence in me that he didn’t show a bit of surprise when on Sunday, November 14, 1943, I made a dramatic success by filling in for the ailing Bruno Walter and conducting the New York Philharmonic. All Aaron’s predications came true — and on his birthday!”

As if that weren’t enough, in 1954, again on Copland’s birthday, Bernstein made his TV debut presenting Beethoven’s draft sketches for the opening of his Symphony No. 5. It proved a smash success — and led to Bernstein’s televised Young Person’s Concerts that brought classical music to millions of Americans coast to coast.

Aaron Copland (1900-1990): Piano Blues No. 3; James Tocco, piano; MPR 201

On this date in 1961, cellist Pablo Casals gave a chamber concert at the White House, at the invitation of President John F. Kennedy. The concert was given in honor of Governor Luis Muñoz of Puerto Rico, the home of Pablo Casals. Casals played works of Mendelssohn, Schumann and Couperin, with his own composition, Song of the Birds, as an encore.

While eminent guests raved over the performance, the cellist’s laconic comment was simply, “It went well.” Casals could afford to be blasé. After all, he had played at the White House before — for President Teddy Roosevelt back in 1904!

Aaron Copland was also invited to the November 13th White House concert in 1961. In a diary entry, he noted: “Pierre Salinger and Senator Mike Mansfield were at our table. President Kennedy was in full view the entire time… I was surprised at his reddish-brown hair. No evil in the face, but plenty of ambition there, no doubt. Mrs. K. statuesque … After dinner we were treated to a concert by Pablo Casals. No American music. The next step.”

That “next step” came the following spring. In May of 1962, the Kennedys presented Copland’s ballet Billy the Kid at the White House for the visiting president of the Ivory Coast Republic, with Copland as guest of honor.

Pablo Casals (1876-1973): Song of the Birds; Patrick Demenga, cello; Gerard Wyss, piano; Novalis 150117

Aaron Copland (1900-1990): Billy the Kid Ballet; Dallas Symphony; Eduardo Mata, conductor; Dorian 90170

On today’s date in 1943, the Boston Symphony and conductor Serge Koussevitzky gave the first performance of a Symphony for Strings by American composer William Schuman.

Schuman was 33 at the time, but Koussevitzky had already been programming and commissioning his music for about five years. Koussevitzky had already given the premiere performances of his popular American Festival Overture and Symphony No. 3.

Schuman’s Symphony for Strings is dedicated to the memory of Koussevitzky’s wife, Natalie, whose family fortune had enabled Koussevitzky to establish himself as a conductor, found a publishing house, and commission many of the 20th century’s most significant works, including Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms and Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra.

In Russia, the Koussevitzkys championed Russian music. In France, they supported French composers. And, beginning in 1924, when Koussevitzky became the music director of the Boston Symphony, many American composers benefited from this remarkable couple’s enthusiasm for new music. Symphony for Strings is just one of a long list of the Koussevitzky’s American commissions, which includes works by Aaron Copland, Roy Harris, Samuel Barber, Walter Piston and Leonard Bernstein.

Taken as a whole, the concert music commissioned by Serge and Natalie Koussevitzky remains one of the most remarkable musical legacies of the 20th century.

William Schuman (1910-1992): Symphony No. 5 (Symphony for Strings); I Musici de Montreal; Yuli Turovsky, conductor; Chandos 9848

At Carnegie Hall in New York City on today’s date in 1990, a new work by American composer and jazz trumpeter Hannibal Lokumbe had its premiere performance by the American Composers Orchestra. November 11 also happens to be the birthday of its composer, who was born Marvin Peterson, in Smithville, Texas, in 1948, but now goes by the name Hannibal.

The new work was an oratorio, African Portraits, which traces the story of slavery in America and Black culture’s contributions to American music. It’s scored for orchestra, jazz quartet, blues guitar, chorus, gospel singer, plus African storyteller and African instruments. In composing this work, which in Biblical terms he calls his personal “burning bush,” Hannibal drew inspiration from a variety of sources, ranging from the spirituals he listened to while working in the cotton fields of Texas to the drums of the Masai people in Africa, with whom he lived for a time.

A critic for the Washington Post described the work as follows:

“The dramatic power conveyed by Portraits is cumulative. It’s derived from the drums and the chants, the procession of blues, jazz and gospel refrains, the symphonic sweep and narrative form, the great compression of time, anguish and triumph. It's a listening experience you’ll not soon forget.”

Hannibal Lokumbe (b. 1948): African Portar; Chicago Symphony Orchestra; Daniel Barenboim; Teldec 81792