02/20/2024
We're including Jeffrey Malecki's program notes here for our upcoming performance, "Lenny!" to give a better understanding of Bernstein and the concert's content:
“The San Diego Wind Ensemble is thrilled to have you join us for "Lenny!" With Bradley Cooper’s recent Oscar-nominated film "Maestro" renewing interest in Leonard Bernstein, we hope to give insight into his rich, multifaceted life — the conductor, the educator, and the composer — through an exhilarating performance!
The young Bernstein did not grow up in a particularly musical household. After beginning piano lessons and starting to listen intensely to records and the radio, however, he quickly immersed himself in the most robust musical orbit he could. Today’s performance of George Bizet’s “Farandole” from L’Arlesienne Suite No. 2 references his pr***en love for Bizet’s opera Carmen, which Lenny would stage among his neighborhood friends, often playing the title role in full drag himself!
As the opening scene of "Maestro" shows, Bernstein was first called to conduct the New York Philharmonic with only hours notice after his mentor fell ill. He was only 25 years old. His role as a dynamic conductor was the first one that catapulted him into the public spotlight. He would go on to lead orchestras across the world in the standard classical repertoire, a resurgence of Gustav Mahler, and contemporary works by American composers like his friend Aaron Copland. In addition to recognizing Bernstein the conductor with Copland, we also feature works by Kevin Day and Julie Giroux, our very own dynamic living composers for the wind band medium.
Between 1958 and 1972, Bernstein as director of the New York Philharmonic gave over 50 "Young People’s Concerts," broadcast on CBS. Never before had a professional orchestra catapulted education to the forefront, with Lenny’s engaging presentations making even advanced musical concepts enjoyable to the televised audience. Episodes ranged from “Musical Atoms: a Study of Intervals,” to “Liszt and the Devil,” to the lofty “What Does Music Mean?” He later went on to work with more advanced musicians, including his 1973 Harvard talks on “The Unanswered Question.” In this spirit, we will perform Vincent Persichetti’s Pageant along with some explanation that will help explain its nuanced, organized, and sometimes jarring neoclassicism.
Finally, Bernstein was of course a prolific composer. His love of musical theater produced a number of operettas and musicals. While he is probably best known for "West Side Story" (1957), "On the Town" and "Candide" written in the ten years before were also popular in their own right. All show his versatility, seamlessly incorporating jazz style, rhythmic complexities, and soaring vocal melodies. He also wrote music for the 1954 film "On the Waterfront" starring Marlon Brando, and wrote epic pieces for the concert hall including three symphonies and his "Mass."”
