Boston Symphony Orchestra Concert Programs, Season 68, 1948-1949
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•^g&k SYMPHONY HALL, BOSTON SIXTY-EIGHTH SEASON, 1948-1949 CONCERT BULLETIN of the Boston Symphony Orchestra SERGE KOUSSEVITZKY, Music Director Richard Burgin, Associate Conductor with historical and descriptive notes by John N. Burk COPYRIGHT, 1949, BY BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, TTIC. The TRUSTEES of the BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, Inc. Henry B. Cabot . President Jacob J. Kaplan . Vice-President Richard C. Paine . Treasurer Philip R. Allen M. A. De Wolfe Howe John Nicholas Brown Roger I. Lee Alvan T. Fuller Lewis Perry Jerome D. Greene Henry B. Sawyer N. Penrose Hallowell Raymond S. Wilkins Francis W. Hatch Oliver Wolcott George E. Judd, Manager [1153] vJoi to nserviing go^g Kur P„ AT What's LOW COST happen to Propettyj ^VOHa/SL Your <ft"*6n*nt ^awmut Bank his new booklet shows how the Personal Trust Department of the Shawmut Bank can help you in the management of your property during your own lifetime, as well as providing for its future conser- vation. One important section explains the "When and Why" of the "Living Trust", and other Shawmut aids in property management and super- vision are also reviewed. Whether your resources are large or small, you should know the facts set forth in this booklet. Call at any of our 27 convenient offices^ write or telephone LA 3-6800 for our booklet: " Conserving Tour Property at Low Cost" The Optional Shawmut Bank 40 Water Street, Boston Member Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Capital and Surplus $30,000,000 "Outstanding Strength"for 113 Years [ ii54 1 : SYMPHONIANA Farewells Too Far FAREWELLS NEW YORK, April 16 — The week past has held honors on every hand for Serge Koussevitzky, who is approaching the end of his 25th and last season as conductor of the Boston Symphony Or- chestra. In Philadelphia, New Bruns- wick, N. J., Brooklyn and twice in New York, capacity audiences have shown in forceful terms the admiration and affec- tion they have for him as an artist and an individual. The season's final tour of the orches- tra, which ended in Carnegie Hall this afternoon, thus has been for the illus- trious music director a combination of triumphal progress and a multiple hail and farewell. Koussevitzky's first appearance on the stage of Carnegie Hall was the signal for a spontaneous rising of the entire audience. At the end of the concert, as conductor and soloists bowed with cho- rus and orchestra, the intensity of the ovation increased until Koussevitzky returned alone, and then everybody stood up all over again. This time he was followed closely by Gertrude Robinson Smith, a New Yorker who used to be chairman of the former Berkshire Symphonic Festival Committee, and a leading supporter of the Boston Symphony. "I have been chosen to represent your New York public to show the affection in which they hold you both as an artist appreciate and a person. We want to say thank you for the pleasure you have given us over fine 25 years, and we only wish you were 25. In this little beginning another red things • • • case you will find a 'tick-tick.' It is engraved, "To Serge Koussevitzky, 1924- 1949." The "tick-tick" was an expensive platinum watch and chain from Cartier's, for which many individual subscribers to the New York series by the orchestra gave $1 each. "I have always been happy in coming to New York," replied Koussevitzky, in a voice at first low and heavily breathed after his exertions, but which grew in strength to his ringing last sen- " tence : "I say to you, 'Au revoir.' f He drew a laugh when he remarked Boston "I knew that all of you have not liked Providence the new music I have played. But it was necessary to play it, for the good Wellesley of the art and of the young new artists, the composers. For your support in com- [H55] ing to these concerts, for your interest in hearing this music, new and old, I thank you." This ceremonial was the last in a series over the week. His career and Cnandlanaier s the nature of the Boston Symphony has been summed, in the Philadelphia Acad- Tremont and West Streets emy of Music, Tuesday. Pres. Huff of the Philadelphia Forum, under whose auspices the orchestra appears in that city, made a glowing speech. Thursday night in the gymnasium at Rutgers University, Koussevitzky had The been given the large and handsome bronze medal of the Rutgers Award. This was the second honor he has re- ceived from Rutgers, the first having "Little been an honorary doctorate of music, in 1937. The medal was presented by Dr. Potter of the university trustees, in the absence of Pres. Clothier who, by an Furs" ironic circumstance, was in Boston that night. More eloquence, more sentiment and admiration were proffered in the staid Brooklyn Academy Friday, in a speech with great by Dr. Adrian Van Sinderen, president of the Brooklyn Academy of Arts and Sciences. fashion Such tokens of esteem, coming as they • do from widely separated com- importance munities (except for the river which flows between Manhattan and Brooklyn) is proof positive of the ranks in musical circles occupied by both the Boston con- ductor and his superlative instrument. From Chandler* sSalon But this was not the end. The League of Composers is putting on a dinner for with its enviable reputa- him in the ballroom of the Waldorf As- toria Tuesday, May 10. tion for finest furs . For his two last appearances in Car- negie Hall, Koussevitzky has chosen a scarves and capes and Beethoven program, consisting of two symphonies, the First, in and jackets to caress the shoul- C major, the last, in D minor. There is more than ders of your suit, coat or meets the eye in Koussevitzky's decision to take his leave with Beethoven's dress with a lavish gesture Ninth Symphony. For him this great work, with its choral finale on Schiller's of luxury! From mink dyed "Ode to Joy," has an especial signifi- cance. It represents to him an outpour- squirrel ... to fitch ing of the best in the human spirit. It ... to fabulous silver blue was not for nothing that he also played this "brotherhood of man" Symphony at mink ... Tanglewood in the last tense weeks before the outbreak of the war. These performances were remarkably well done. The large chorus of 194 voices FUR SALON was drawn from the memberships of the Juilliard School of Music chorus SECOND FLOOR and the Collegiate Chorale, admirably prepared by Robert Shaw. The quartet of soloists were individually able and unusually well balanced. They were Frances Yeend, soprano; Eunice Al- berts, contralto; David Lloyd, tenor, [1156] and James Pease, bass, and they will be heard in the performances of the Ninth Symphony in Boston that will end the local season week after this. — Cyrus Durgin, Boston Globe TOO FAR True, it is hard to see how the ad- vent of the new rival phonograph sys- tems could be considered less than unfortunate. True, the consumer gets it in the neck, pinioned by the de facto necessity of acquiring triplicate play- ing equipment. The situation is a mess of sorts. But no such mess as the present overbearish trend might indicate. Is re- corded music of such ephemeral interest that we collectors desert it in droves at a sign of trouble? Are record sales so very undependable that right now most stores must sacrifice the suppos- edly eternal classics right and left for big discounts? Has the record war killed off the record buyer? What kind of absurdity is this! Sen- sational articles appear claiming that record collectors have ceased buying by the millions, that the business is shot to somewhere for good, that the boom is over and the bust is on. The bears are in full fettle over the land. Pessimists exult. It's a buyer's market. Don't tell me that any respectable record collector is to be downed by mere mechanical complexity. (Not when so many of us thrive on it, spend our lives making one change after an- other in the joyful search for perfec- tion!) Don't tell me that improvements, even warring and conflicting, are to be ignored by the disgusted cognoscenti. Don't even suggest that these two new records — both probably superior to the old type in the long run, both undoubt- edly more convenient in the use, both saving enormously in space and enough in price to pay for added equipment — are to be side-stepped by any large slice of our bargain-sharp coterie. Not for long. A mess — but dealers take heart, col- lectors stand on your musical feet: Mozart is still Mozart. We have all that we had before and more, though the AT YOUR DEALER'S—A FULL SELECTION OF Life New be complex. Wait a few FINE FIDELITONE NEEDLES months for your permanent three-speed Fidelitone Supreme $2.50 equipment, if you will, until the tech- Fidelitone Master 1.50 Nylon Fidelitone. 1 .25 nology of three-speed playing is better Fidelitone Deluxe 1 .00 worked out. But cut the groaning and Fidelitone Floating Point 50c forget the boycott. Edward Tatnall Canby itKIYIU/ Incorporated {Saturday Review of Literature, CHICAGO 26 April 9, 1949). ["57] You '11 leave this door with peace of mind At last you've made the time to see trustee. You and your lawyer are in- your lawyer ... to have him draw vited to consult with its officers and your will ... or bring your old will up share in their experience. As a pre- to date.