America's great hall; Europe's great music (part 1)

How I long to conduct here!

This next year 2011-12, marks the 120th anniversary season of that most venerable of American musical institutions, Carnegie Hall.  It all came about because of a fortuitous 1887 meeting in Scotland between Andrew Carnegie and Walter Damrosch, then conductor of the Oratorio Society of New York.  Immediately the two began discussions of a new concert hall for the city.  By 1889 Carnegie had purchased the necessary parcels of land along Seventh Avenue, engaging musician and architect William Burnet Tuthill, who himself acquired the Chicago firm of Adler and Sullivan as acoustical engineers.  The $1.1 million hall opened in May 1891 with a five-day festival that included performances conducted by Tchaikovsky himself.

Tchaikovsky

To state that every significant musician of the past 120 years has performed at Carnegie Hall would not be an understatement.  To mention a few memorable events:

• (1891) Ignace Padrewski performs the Saint-Saens Fourth Piano Concerto with Damrosch and the New York Symphony.
• (1892) Soprano Sissieretta Jones becomes the first African-American to appear at Carnegie, in the lower recital hall (now Zankel Hall).  She would return for an engagement in the main auditorium the following year.
• (1893) Anton Seidl leads the New York Philharmonic in the premiere of Dvorak's Symphony No. 9, "From the New World."  That same year Sousa's band appeared in concert and the New York "Music Hall" gains its now world-famous moniker.
• (1898) The Chicago Symphony makes its Carnegie Hall debut.
• (1904) Pablo Casals debuts.
• (1906) Saint-Saens plays the organ in a New York Symphony performance of his Third Symphony.  Illinois-born Maud Powell offers the U.S. premiere of the Sibelius Violin Concerto with the Philharmonic.
• (1908) Gustav Mahler offers the American Premiere of his Second Symphony, "Resurrection," with the New York Symphony.  The following autumn he assumed the reins of the Philharmonic.

It is although the walls of this mighty edifice carry the echoes of the greats who have appeared on its stage:  Leopold Stokowski, a 16-year-old Jascha Heifetz, Caruso, Prokofiev, Gershwin, Stravinsky, and so many more.  1943 would include two momentous debuts, that of violinist Isaac Stern and a young American conductor filling in for the ill Bruno Walter:  Leonard Bernstein.

A young Isaac Stern

The famed hall was slated for demolition more than once.  When Mrs. Carnegie sold the hall in 1925 it was with the understanding that the building would remain standing until a "more suitable concert hall is built."  When the Philharmonic chose to move to Lincoln Center in the early 1960s, the hall was faced with losing 115 dates from its calendar.  It would be that young violinist Isaac Stern who would save the day (and Carnegie Hall) by lining up the philanthropic support to allow for the city of New York to buy the facility "to serve as a national center for teaching music and the development of young artists."  It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1964 and remains to this day the concert hall identified with American music.

In the seasons leading up to the May 5 anniversary of the opening of the hall, the world's great orchestras appeared in the Isaac Stern Auditorium (as the main hall is now known), including:

• The Berlin Philharmonic in November 2009 playing Brahms and Schoenberg.
• The Vienna Philharmonic opened the 2010-11 season with two works by Beethoven:  the Seventh Symphony and the First Piano Concerto.
• The Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam presented Mahler's Third Symphony.
• The Cleveland Orchestra offered concerts including Debussy, Wagner, Richard Strauss, and Toshio Hosokawa, as well as Schumann and Bartok.
• The Chicago Symphony presented a concert version of Verdi's Otello as well as Cherubini, Liszt and Shostakovich.
• The Philadelphia Orchestra offered Szymanowski, Debussy and Stravinsky in 2010 and returned in 2011 with and all-Stravinsky program.
• The Boston Symphony, sans ailing music director James Levine, appeared with Harrison Birtwistle, Mozart, Bartok, Schoenberg, Mahler, Beethoven and Max Bruch.  A hearty feast scheduled over three programs, but yet something seems to be missing. 

The "official" May 5 anniversary of the hall featured the New York Philharmonic and a star-studded array of talent including violinist Gil Shaham,Yo-Yo Ma, Emmanuel Ax, and singer Audra McDonald.  The program?  Dvorak and Beethoven on the first half and (FINALLY!) Duke Ellington and George Gershwin on the second.  Still, what of American art music (not to denigrate the immense talents of either Ellington or Gershwin)?  Or, in the words of reviewer, Anthony Tommasini, "What this program lacked was something recent or, better yet, new. In the 1891 inaugural concert Tchaikovsky conducted his “Marche Solennelle,” eight years old at the time"

So the Germans and Viennese come to New York's great hall and play their music.  (I'd be willing to wager that the Czech's play Dvorak as I heard them offer his music in Chicago many years ago, and they're not afraid to play him at home either.)  And yet, American orchestras come to our hall and play somebody else's music.  Exactly what are we apologizing for?

-TO BE CONTINUED-