Do Christmas carols written by Jewish composers make them Jewish music? Musician and arts consultant Thomas Wolf takes an insider view and identifies three characteristics of Jewish Musical Tradition that go well beyond Christmas songs.
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Is there any story that typifies the mass migration of European musicians to America during the early decades of the twentieth century? Every story is a bit different, of course, but here is one that typifies the high proportion of such musicians who found success in their new country.
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On November 15, 1940, Eugene Ormandy, music director of the Philadelphia Orchestra, offered an all-Beethoven program. Such a concert would not have been unusual except for one thing. The three soloists that day were all trailblazing women. To learn more about them, read here..
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How does a parent know when a child is ready to take on a new challenge in life—whether it is riding a bicycle, taking the subway without an adult, or playing a first concert? Sometimes the question is easy to answer. At other times, it appears to be more difficult. READ HERE TO LEARN MORE.
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Today we associate the word “unprecedented” with the COVID-19 crisis and its impact on the classical music business. But is it really unprecedented? Here I talk about how we might look at history for some clues.
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My grandmother, Lea Luboshutz, joined the violin faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music in 1928. Her track record as a pedagogue was impressive based on the careers of almost 150 of her students. Much of this success probably was due to her teaching philosophy and her approach.
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For an amateur musician, my father’s opportunities to play with great musicians were extraordinary thanks to his mother-in-law, Lea Luboshutz. One musician he never collaborated with was Leonard Bernstein…but he came ever so close.
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The story of how my father, a rank amateur, finagled an abbreviated performance with the great violinist, Jascha Heifetz, is one that Lea preferred to forget. Yet, somehow, it got into the press, to her eternal mortification.
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For a long time, I thought my grandmother’s various superstitions were an anomaly. Then the acclaimed Soviet violinist, David Oistrakh, came to town and I realized they shared something more than great violin playing.
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My grandmother was a firm believer that young musicians should have proven talent at an extremely high level before she would recommend them as students for the Curtis Institute of Music. Then she met the granddaughter of her teacher Eugene Ysaÿe and all bets were off.
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I always thought it odd that my grandmother, a famous violinist, loved monkeys. In the various places she lived, there were no native habitats for monkeys and she must have been an adult before she saw a live one. But in her homes, there were always paintings, prints, photographs, toys, carvings, statues — you name it — monkeys everywhere. And it was certainly not an animal I associated with music.
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When people ask me what my grandmother was like, I usually resort to telling stories about Lea. Not only are many of these stories quite entertaining but they give a sense of my grandmother’s personality — confident, determined, disarmingly charming, with a wonderful sense of humor. One of my favorite stories is how Lea became a U.S. citizen.
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Why did I write The Nightingale’s Sonata? In the opening pages of the book, I give one answer. My mother had entrusted to me a beautiful silver podstakannik or tea-glass holder with an enameled portrait of my two uncles as children. My family had smuggled it out of Russia and eventually my mother passed it on to me along with boxes of family material. She had said, “You must tell the family story.” I promised I would.
But I had another reason for writing the book. . . .
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