Biography of an interesting character and great musician who started the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

High quality reprint of American Orchestra And Theodore Thomas, The by Charles Edward Russell.

Biography of an interesting character and great musician who started the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

Excerpt from The American Orchestra and Theodore Thomas Without sounding the ever-ready pipe of vainglory, we may justly affirm that in one division of representative art the Amer ican achievement has gone beyond debate. The grand orchestra is now' more than our foremost cultural asset; it has become our Sign Of honor among the nations. Even if sceptical or scorn-f ful about our other endeavors, the world assigns to this a verity of excellence. Starting so much later than the rest and starting handicapped, we seem, despite shortcomings and our own in credulities, to have developed the orchestra above the average attainment. If we lag about other arts, we lead in this. Forty years or so have set down most of the visible signs of this gracious growth. Only so far back as 1876 they were not known to mortal sight, certainly, and otherwise had been scouted as impossible. Two bands, one leader, and an interest so small it seemed to pessimist's' a'higher power of nothing may be counted as the sorry whole of our performance in that year. In many places were small groups of instrumentalists that played together unstably and were regarded by most of their fellow townsmen as partly insane; in many-places there was for vocal music a large, sincere, and always expanding devotion. But beyond two bands and one leader, the thing we know now as the grand or symphony orchestra functioned chiefly to the ear of hope. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Studies of concert life in nineteenth-century America have generally been limited to large orchestras and the programs we are familiar with today. But as this book reveals, audiences of that era enjoyed far more diverse musical experiences than this focus would suggest. To hear an orchestra, people were more likely to head to a beer garden, restaurant, or summer resort than to a concert hall. And what they heard weren’t just symphonic works—programs also included opera excerpts and arrangements, instrumental showpieces, comic numbers, and medleys of patriotic tunes. This book brings together musicologists and historians to investigate the many orchestras and programs that developed in nineteenth-century America. In addition to reflecting on the music that orchestras played and the socioeconomic aspects of building and maintaining orchestras, the book considers a wide range of topics, including audiences, entrepreneurs, concert arrangements, tours, and musicians’ unions. The authors also show that the period saw a massive influx of immigrant performers, the increasing ability of orchestras to travel across the nation, and the rising influence of women as listeners, patrons, and players. Painting a rich and detailed picture of nineteenth-century concert life, this collection will greatly broaden our understanding of America’s musical history.

First published in 1998, this volume is the first book to focus on the American symphony. Neil Butterworth surveys the development of the symphony in the United States from early European influences in the last century to the present day, and asks why American composers have shown such allegiance to a musical form which their European contemporaries appear to have discarded. An overview of the growth of musical societies in America during the eighteenth century and the establishment of the first professional orchestras during the early part of the nineteenth century is followed by chronological analyses of the works of those composers who have played important parts in the progress of symphony in the United States, from Charles Ives, Aaron Copland and Leonard Bernstein, to contemporary figures such as William Bolcom and John Harbison. Complete with a comprehensive catalogue of symphonies and an extensive discography, this book is an indispensable reference work.

The German-American relationship was special long before the Cold War; it was rooted not simply in political actions, but also long-term traditions of cultural exchange that date back to the nineteenth century. Between 1850 and 1910, the United States was a rising star in the international arena, and several European nations sought to strengthen their ties to the republic by championing their own cultures in America. While France capitalized on its art and Britain on its social ties and literature, Germany promoted its particular breed of classical music. Delving into a treasure trove of archives that document cross-cultural interactions between America and Germany, Jessica Gienow-Hecht retraces these efforts to export culture as an instrument of nongovernmental diplomacy, paying particular attention to the role of conductors, and uncovers the remarkable history of the musician as a cultural symbol of German cosmopolitanism. Considered sexually attractive and emotionally expressive, German players and conductors acted as an army of informal ambassadors for their home country, and Gienow-Hecht argues that their popularity in the United States paved the way for an emotional elective affinity that survived broken treaties and several wars and continues to the present.