The Leonard Bernstein Letters

by Leonard Bernstein

  It's an open season on Kaddish, all right. The President. Marc. I take it you've read substantially what we've read: first an auto accident; then a new story about being beaten by three sailors; then the blessed word robbery reiterated by the Consul in Martinique, & now by the police.

  We pray the story gets no murkier – or should I say clearer? We are all shocked and miserable, as you must be, & I wish we could be together, at last, at last.

  The Kaddish itself gets its comeuppance in Boston this week, Friday the 31st. I wish you could be there. It will be a regular reunion: B[urton] B[ernstein]'s birthday and all. Felicia is there already, rehearsing. I'm staying out of it 'til the last minute: Münch is in love with the piece, but scared witless, & can't beat it (7/8, etc.) the chorus … Jenny T … oy. Maybe you're wise to miss it.

  Marc is dead, & I've lost an arm. Felicia can't stop crying. Come home, darling Shirley – we want you with us! It's been far too long, too many distances, interruptions, silences. Please come home.

  I love you as always –

  L

  Do you realize we have loved Marc for 25 years?

  Kaddish: they loved it in Tel-Aviv, but it may never go in English. I'm nervous.

  495. William Schuman to Leonard Bernstein

  27 January 1964

  Dear Lennie,

  I couldn't get you by phone to tell you several things.

  In the first place, yesterday's performance of the Eroica was undoubtedly the best, the most exciting and the most moving that I have ever heard. Frankly I had not expected to stay tuned in after the Varèse. You wouldn't let me get back to work.

  I wanted to speak to you about Marc. Actually, you two were so close, I felt the need of making a condolence call. Schuyler Chapin tells me that you and Dave Oppenheim are planning a memorial program this spring. Of course this is wonderful, and I am wondering whether you could consider doing one or two pieces from Sacco-Vanzetti.123 And here, I keep wondering whether Marc finished the vocal score. In my last conversation with him – just one year ago this month – I gathered that mostly it was done. If this is the case, could not the work be completed and orchestrated by another? If this is a possibility, I am very much afraid that you are the only one who can do it. It's a thought.

  And mostly, I called to wish you with all affection a stunning success with the new work this week.124

  Yours,

  Bill

  496. Walter Hussey to Leonard Bernstein

  The Deanery, Chichester, England

  10 February 1964

  Dear Dr. Bernstein,

  This is splendid news! I am indeed delighted to hear that you will write something for our Festival. It will be a great privilege for us all and I can assure you that everyone will do their utmost to do justice to the work.

  Yes, by all means change from the second Psalm to something more familiar if you wish. We shall be very happy to leave it to you. And as regards the time, of course, we must leave this also to you: but the joint Festival with Winchester and Salisbury goes in rotation and so is only held here once in three years. It is to be held here at the end of July, 1965, and so as you can well imagine we are very much hoping that it may be possible to perform the work then. I shall be sad for it to receive its premier[e] elsewhere! However, I am so proud and pleased that you will write something for us that it would be unfair and presumptuous to try and press further.

  I will try to send you within a few days particulars as to the sort of numbers that will be available in the combined choirs, in case this should be of any assistance to you. Please let me know if there is anything further I can do.

  Again, my warmest thanks,

  Yours sincerely,

  Walter Hussey

  497. Walter Hussey to Leonard Bernstein

  The Deanery, Chichester, England

  14 August 1964

  Dear Dr. Bernstein,

  We are all tremendously looking forward to the setting of the second Psalm which you kindly said you would write for us for our three Choirs Festival next year.

  This year's festival has just taken place at Salisbury and I thought perhaps you would be interested to see what has been happening, so I am sending you a copy of the programme. A tremendous lot of people turned up and it proved very successful – I think the performance of Britten's Cantata Misericordium was quite outstanding.

  Our Choirmaster and Organist has given me one or two particulars which he thinks might be helpful to you. The string orchestra will probably be the Philomusica of London, a first rate group. In addition, there could be a piano, chamber organ, harpsichord and, if desired, a brass consort (three trumpets, three trombones). It is not really possible to have a full symphony orchestra for reasons of space and expense and the fact that the combined strength of the three cathedral choirs is about 70 to 74 (all boys and men).

  The Festival was founded a good while ago, but then lapsed for about thirty years and has recently been re-started with great success. I think it has throughout its time been of great value to English church music as a means of hearing works of large scale, impossible for any single Cathedral choir, but I am certain it must also provide new works in new idioms to keep the tradition really alive. I hope you will feel quite free to write as you wish and will in no way feel inhibited by circumstances. I think many of us would be very delighted if there was a hint of West Side Story about the music. I hope you will not mind my writing like this, but I talked of it with Chuck Solomon125 when he was here recently, and he said I was certainly to say it to you.

  Once again let me say how enormously grateful I am to you for saying that you will help us in this way. It will be exactly what I should wish for when the Festival is here at Chichester next year.

  Yours sincerely,

  Walter Hussey

  498. Leonard Bernstein to Aaron Copland

  19 September 1964

  Sonnet on receiving an honorary doctorate with Aaron Copland126

  This day, my will demurring, I grew old.

  I could have written memoirs on that stage

  For the first time. A long wave had unrolled,

  And beached me, spent with swimming and with age.

  Doctor honoris causa. First for him,

  A craggy cedar planted by the sea

  Since Adam. Then they called on me to swim

  Ashore, and simulate that salty tree.

  A poor impostor, I, Not even brave,

  A plotter with no plan, and less than bold.

  They fished me, red-eyed flounder, from the wave,

  Wounded, rigid, open-mouthed, and cold.

  With velvet bait they plucked me from the sea

  And dropped me, panting, near a cedar tree.

  Much love,

  L

  499. Walter Hussey to Leonard Bernstein

  The Deanery, Chichester, England

  22 December 1964

  Dear Dr. Bernstein,

  I do apologize for burdening you with another letter. I have a horrid fear that you will be regarding me as an arch nuisance but I am most eager that we should have the work which you promised for our combined Choirs in time to learn it and rehearse it properly before the Festival. May I say again that I hope you will feel entirely free to write your setting exactly as you wish to. I hope you would not, at any rate on our behalf, feel any restrictions from the point of view of tradition or convention. The work would not be performed during any sort of religious service and I firmly believe that any work which is sincere can suitably be given in a cathedral and to the glory of God. No one feels more proud and grateful than I do of the tremendous value of the tradition of English Cathedral music, but I am sure that it is a very good thing for something like our Three Cathedrals Festival to have a sharp and vigorous push into the middle of the 20th century, and if you should feel inclined to write something that would do this I am sure nobody could do it better and we should be most happy and grateful.

  It would be a great help if I could know the title and
description of the work within the next six weeks as our preliminary announcements and publications will be appearing very soon after that.

  Again, do let me apologize if I seem tiresomely importunate, but Chuck Solomon assures me that we shall get the work and I am most anxious that we should have it in time to prepare it properly. The prospect is a tremendous thrill to us all. I can assure you that the musicians will do their utmost to do [it] full justice, and I do not believe they will fail. I am more grateful to you than I can possibly say.

  I do not suppose there is any chance of your being in England at the end of July? We should of course be delighted to welcome you to Chichester and I believe that in the place itself and the Festival Theatre as well as the Music Festival you would find much to enjoy.

  With all good wishes,

  Yours sincerely,

  Walter Hussey

  500. Leonard Bernstein to Mary Rodgers

  [New York, NY]

  [1964]

  Dear Mary,

  I just found a most moving note from you, dated a year ago, apropos the assassination [Letter 489]. In all the grief of those days a lot of mail went unanswered. But this one cannot go unanswered. Thank you, you dear girl, and irreplaceable assistant!

  Love,

  L

  (If you haven't been a “children's expert” heretofore, you sure will be after the new one. Have a good one!)

  501. Leonard Bernstein to David Diamond

  28 January 1965

  Dear Dd,

  Finally the date is settled for your celebration – the week of 25 April, '66, concerts on 28th, 29th, 30th and 2 May. I had planned for you to conduct the Rounds and the Piano Concerto (for which Schumacher is already engaged); but having since received the 5th Symphony, which I find your absolute best to date, I will take the occasion to open the program with it myself (sorry to do you out of one conducting stint) – and then you can conduct the concerto with T[homas] S[chumacher]. I'm delighted and hope that you are. (The program will probably close with a staple – Sibelius #1 or something.127 The whole year is devoted to a survey of the symphony in the 20th century, including all 7 of Sibelius, owing to his centenary. And that's another reason for doing your 5th instead of the Rounds. There'll also be some others you'll love – Vaughan Williams #4, Aaron #3, Nielsen #3, Bartók 2-pno Concerto, & Webern Op. 20, Mahler #7, #8 & #9! A big year, a lot of work: I look forward to it.)

  What are you doing in Florence? What has happened to the Iron Curtain trip? Last I heard, you were in Copenhagen.

  You've probably heard about the collapse of Skin of Our Teeth: a dreadful experience, the wounds still smarting. I am suddenly a composer without a project, with half of that golden sabbatical down the drain. Never mind, I'll survive.128

  Good news about Aspen. But the best news is the 5th Symphony. I have the “waves” in the first part, and the end particularly. The fugue is a killer. I hereby accept the dedication with due formal ceremony and much affection.

  L

  502. Walter Hussey to Leonard Bernstein

  The Deanery, Chichester, England

  5 February 1965

  Dear Dr. Bernstein,

  I am very sorry to bother you with another letter and I do not want to seem impatient, but I am constantly being pressed by the Organist and Choirmaster for particulars as to title etc. of the work which you most kindly said you would write for us. He is directing the Three Choirs Festival and has got to get his publicity out and tells me that it cannot be held up any longer. I am sure you will understand.

  He also tells me that the music has to be printed and then circulated to the three choirs to practice individually before they come together for common rehearsals. I am sure you are conscious of all this and please do not think me impatient; but your work would of course be the highlight of the Festival and all of us are most anxious that it should be done as well as we can possibly manage.

  Again, my apologies for bothering you with a tiresome letter.

  Yours sincerely,

  Walter Hussey

  503. Leonard Bernstein to Walter Hussey

  New York, NY

  24 February 1965

  My dear Dean Hussey,

  I was on the verge of writing you a sad letter saying that I could not find in me the work for your Festival when suddenly a conception occurred to me that I find exciting. It would be a suite of Psalms, or selected verses from Psalms, and would have a general title like Psalms of Youth. The music is all very forthright, songful, rhythmic, youthful. The only hitch is this: I can think of these Psalms only in the original Hebrew. I realize that this may present extra difficulties of preparation; but more important, does it present difficulties of an ecclesiastical nature? That is, are there no objections, in principle, to Hebrew being sung in your Cathedral? If not, do let me know soon, so that I may plunge ahead, and have a working score for you by early April. The orchestration would follow a month or so thereafter.

  If there are objections I should also know soon, for obvious reasons. I would be sad, but I would understand.

  Faithfully yours,

  Leonard Bernstein

  P.S. The Psalms involved would be:

  Nos. 23, 100 and 131, complete;

  No. 2, vs. 1–4; No. 108, vs. 3; No. 133, vs. 1.129

  504. Walter Hussey to Leonard Bernstein

  The Deanery, Chichester, England

  2 March 1965

  Dear Mr. Bernstein,

  Thank you very much for your letter. I was delighted to receive it and am indeed grateful for all the good news it contains.

  I do not think that there is any ecclesiastical objection to the use of Hebrew. The meaning of the words could always be supplied by a translation in the programme. It will of course, as you say, present a little problem in the preparation of the work, but no doubt it will be possible for the Hebrew to be printed phonetically as in Bloch's Sacred Service.

  I will write to you again shortly giving you the numbers in the choir etc. In the meanwhile let me say again how pleased and excited I am at the splendid news of your letter – and in this the Choirmaster and Organist joins me.

  Yours sincerely,

  Walter Hussey

  505. Solomon Braslavsky to Leonard Bernstein

  Temple Mishkan Tefila, Boston, MA

  16 March 1965

  My dearest Lennie,

  Last Friday I received your record of the Kaddish Symphony.

  I immediately opened the wrapping and looked for a bill, but instead I found a very “long letter” from you consisting of four priceless words. Last Saturday morning I saw your father in the Temple and I told him that I just got a priceless Purim present from Lennie.

  Well, needless to say how happy I am to be able to play the Symphony again and again in search for some more jewels of liturgical value which only you are capable of working in such an artistic manner, and for this I am very much indebted to you.

  I shall also like to listen again to the recitations so beautifully done by Felicia and evaluate it from its philosophical as well as its artistic point of view. I only regret that I am at present extremely busy with my duties in the Temple and I shall have to wait for a while before I will be able to put aside a few hours for a thorough consideration of this beautiful music.

  With many thanks and all of my best wishes to you and your dear family, for good health and lots of happiness.

  Your devoted,

  Solomon

  P.S. I shall write to you after my first hearing of the records in the near future […]

  506. Walter Hussey to Leonard Bernstein

  The Deanery, Chichester, England

  14 April 1965

  Dear Dr. Bernstein,

  I promised to let you have the particulars as regards the choir and the orchestra for the Festival in July. I have now got these from John Birch.

  There are 46 boys, 8 male altos, 9 tenors and 12 basses. All the adults are professional singers and the boys are all members of our three Choir Schools,
and I think really very competent.

  The orchestra is the Philomusica of London and the players required for the rest of the programme are strings – 3.2.2.2 (3 players), 1 (1 player) – 18 players in all plus a chamber organ. Other players could be provided if you wished, for example trumpets and trombones, percussion, piano and harpsichord. I dare say you know of the orchestra but I think it is fair to say that they are highly competent players and perhaps the best chamber orchestra in London.

  We are all tremendously excited about The Psalms of Youth. I do hope all goes well. I cannot tell you how grateful I am to you.

  Please let me know if there is any further help or information I can give you.

  Yours sincerely,

  Walter Hussey

  507. Leonard Bernstein to Walter Hussey

  11 May 1965

  Dear Dr. Hussey,

  The psalms are finished, Laus Deo, are being copied, and should arrive in England next week. They are not yet orchestrated, but should be by June, and you should receive full score and parts in ample time for rehearsal. Meanwhile the choral preparation can start forthwith.

  I am pleased with the work, and hope you will be, too; it is quite popular in feeling (even a hint, as you suggested, of West Side Story),130 and it has an old-fashioned sweetness along with its more violent moments. The title has now been changed to Chichester Psalms (“Youth” was a wrong steer; the piece is far too difficult). The work is in three movements lasting about eighteen and a half minutes, and each movement contains one complete psalm plus one or more versions from another complementary psalm, by way of contrast or amplification. Thus:

  I. Opens with a chorale (Ps 108, vs. 3) evoking praise; and then swings into Ps. 100, complete, a wild and joyful dance, in the Davidic spirit.

  II. Consists mainly of Ps. 23, complete, featuring a boy solo and his harp, but interrupted savagely by the men with threats of war and violence (Ps. 2, vs. 1–4). This movement ends in unresolved fashion, with both elements, faith and fear, interlocked.