Dangerous Melodies
Page 23
Offering readers an enlightened Wagner, critic Herbert Peyser argued if the Nazis actually understood the musician’s ideas, “they would shun him as the devil does holy water.” In Wagner’s words, Peyser contended, one heard “voices from our own age and our own side,” which suggested the composer would have embraced liberalism not Hitlerism. Had Wagner known how his works would be “misapplied” by those who aimed to justify horrific “abominations,” he might have preferred never to have been born.63
But such assessments were not widely held. More common was the notion, articulated by Arthur S. Garbett, editor of The Etude, that Wagner’s music had incited the Nazis, inspired Hitler, and “intoxicated the German people.”64 Writing in the Saturday Review, musicologist and critic Paul Henry Lang argued similarly. Painting a gloomy picture of the world the composer had created, Lang claimed the Ring had prepared the ground for Nazism, the victory of which promised not a “new era in human culture,” but culture’s “final destruction.”65
Even as some reflected on Wagner’s music and believed it offered a blueprint for advancing Nazi Germany’s malign wartime objectives, musicians and commentators were also convinced that classical music could help America realize its more virtuous international aims. In early 1943, Serge Koussevitzky articulated such sentiments, noting that of “all the arts, music is the most powerful medium against evil.” With its capacity to “heal, comfort and inspire,” the conductor observed, art’s task in perilous times is to “protect the fundamental values for which our armies are fighting.” Music had a special role to play in combating the evils America faced, for art and culture could serve as a “stronghold against the aggressors.”66 At the same time, Koussevitzky suggested, musicians could help by bringing the “consoling power of music” to bear in order to ease the pain of those who had lost loved ones overseas.67 If music was deployed in Germany for nefarious ends, in America, it could fortify an altruistic society in its hour of need.
In 1942, Americans witnessed a tangible expression of music’s power to strengthen the war effort, as the radio broadcast of a Russian composition became the most sensational classical music story of the war. That radio was central to one of the era’s most enduring cultural episodes suggests how important the medium had become for exposing Americans to classical music. While the public had first encountered classical broadcasts years earlier, not until the 1930s would millions tune in on a regular basis. In 1930, the New York Philharmonic, led by Toscanini, began weekly broadcasts; and the following year the Metropolitan Opera began its legendary Saturday afternoon offerings. With Toscanini’s move to the NBC Symphony Orchestra in 1937 (an ensemble created for him), Americans continued to thrill to his work, as the ensemble presented weekly broadcasts to millions of ardent listeners.68
In June 1942, the NBC Press Department announced that the Shostakovich Seventh Symphony would be played in the United States for the first time, in a July 19 broadcast performance by the NBC Symphony under Toscanini. The concert would be heard by millions on NBC stations across the country and broadcast by the corporation’s shortwave facilities around the world.69 Lending the premiere enormous appeal was the fact that the symphony had been composed by an artist from the Soviet Union, one of America’s key wartime allies. Not only did the piece help focus the nation’s attention on defeating fascism, but it also meshed with the US government’s desire to strengthen the bond between the Soviet Union and the United States.
Several months before the Seventh was heard in the United States, stories appeared about the first Soviet performances of the piece. And even before that, in the winter of 1942, Time described how the citizens of Leningrad knew Shostakovich as a “fire fighter, a trench digger, [and] an embattled citizen like themselves.” Dedicating the symphony to what he called the “ordinary” people of Leningrad, Shostakovich said, “I always try to make myself as widely understood as possible.”70 The composer told the New York Times that he had written the work to illustrate war’s effect on people. Considering his new symphony, the Russian said the last movement could be described by “one word—victory. But my idea of victory isn’t something brutal; it’s better explained as the victory of light over darkness, of humanity over barbarism, of reason over reaction.”71
As one reads the breathless NBC press release of June 19, 1942, announcing the Seventh Symphony’s American premiere, the drama of the moment is clear. The music for the piece, which had been composed “under the flame and fire of the Nazi attack on Leningrad,” had been converted into 35 mm prints of the score, and the individual instrumental parts were rushed to the United States across “enemy battlefields.” Traveling by plane from Kuibyshev to Teheran, the precious microfilm was “whisked by automobile” from Teheran to Cairo, and then flown via South America to the United States, where it was readied for the first American performance. According to the release, after negotiating with Shostakovich and VOKS (the All-Union Society for Cultural Ties Abroad), the network acquired the rights to the performance of the “sensational new work,” which was inspired by the Soviets’ repulsion of the “Nazi Hordes at Leningrad.” The release stated that the goal of the American radio performance was to “cement closer cultural ties” between the two countries by allowing the American people to hear the symphony, which NBC claimed was a musical representation of the “fight of freedom-loving peoples against Axis barbarism.” Described as an “eloquent sermon and a belligerent challenge” to the German threat, the piece was first performed in the Soviet Union on March 5, 1942.72
NBC’s overheated publicity material allowed Americans to hear still more from the Soviet composer, who was portrayed in heroic terms: “The bloody Hitlerite Hordes” marched toward the city, which was “bombarded from the air and shelled by enemy artillery.” The composer was determined to tell the valiant story of his people and he dedicated his symphony to Leningrad, to the anti-fascist struggle, and to victory. It was this composition, subtitled “The Symphony of Our Times,” which Arturo Toscanini would present to the American people. The network asked whether anyone was better suited to conduct such music than a man who was himself a “victim” of fascism. NBC’s answer was clear: The world would soon hear his performance of this “musical plea for freedom from tyranny.”73
Two days later but still a month before the Seventh’s American premiere, a lengthy article by Shostakovich appeared in the New York Times. “Stating the Case for Slavonic Culture” offered a powerful assessment of the accomplishments of Slavonic musical culture, while discussing the malevolence of the German enemy. The notion that Slavonic culture was unworthy, Shostakovich asserted, was a “dirty invention of a robber gang” that sought to conceal the crimes it had committed across Russia and throughout the Slavonic world. The gang propagating such ideas were the “fascist criminals,” who were desecrating numerous treasured historic sites. For those inclined to speak of “superior” and “inferior” members of the human race, Shostakovich contended, the German fascists were “the lowest, dirtiest, and vilest specimens.”74
Employing such vivid anti-German language in early 1942 served a twofold purpose. It advanced the idea that, in fighting Nazi Germany—“a moral monstrosity”—the United States was grappling with a malign force, a notion most Americans surely believed. Equally important, Shostakovich’s language sought to deepen the kinship between the American and Russian people in their joint effort to vanquish Germany. In explaining Slavic bravery, patriotism, and “readiness for self-sacrifice for noble ideals,” Shostakovich was not merely establishing a bond between allies against a common foe. He was also suggesting that little distinguished Slavs from Americans. With a tweak here and there, it would have been easy to imagine the same rhetoric flowing from the pen of an American patriot. “Our country” and all Slav peoples were battling the “most terrible enemy that ever stood in the way of human happiness,” the composer wrote. “In the present encounter between light and darkness,” the Slavonic nations would undertake the “great mission entrusted to
them by history!”75 Could Franklin Roosevelt have expressed more powerfully America’s reasons for fighting Hitler?
With the Toscanini broadcast approaching, a bit of behind-the-scenes drama preceded the performance, as another celebrated master of the baton, Leopold Stokowski, sought to conduct the Seventh’s premiere. Writing to Toscanini in an effort to convince him to relinquish his hold on the first performance, Stokowski, who had replaced the Italian as director of the NBC Symphony for the 1941–1942 season, spoke of his relationship with Shostakovich and his passion for the Russian’s music. Indeed, he was the first to play Shostakovich’s compositions in America. With that in mind, Stokowski wrote, “I feel confident you will wish me to broadcast this symphony.”76
In response, Toscanini said he also admired the Russian’s music, though “I don’t feel such a frenzy love for it like you.” He spoke of receiving the score and infusing his language with the politics of the era. “I was deeply taken by its beauty—its antifascist meaning.” He yearned to conduct the piece, he said. The aging maestro then asked, “Don’t you think, dear Stokowski, it would be very interesting . . . to hear the old Italian conductor (one of the first artist [sic], who strenuously fought against fascism) to play this work of a young Russian antinazi composer?” To be sure, “I have not any drop of Slavonic blood into my veins—I am only a true and genuine Latin!—but I am sure I can conduct it simply with love and honesty.” Surely, after thinking it over, Stokowski would agree that he (Toscanini) should conduct the symphony.77
Completely misunderstanding Toscanini, Stokowski expressed his gratitude over the Italian’s decision to allow him to conduct the piece. In a second letter, Toscanini apologized for his poor English and reiterated his desire to conduct the Seventh, for which he “felt the strongest sympathy.” He asked Stokowski to understand how much the composition meant to him. There will be more Shostakovich symphonies, and Stokowski would have many opportunities to conduct them.78
On Sunday, July 19, 1942, the Shostakovich Seventh received its first American performance, a premiere heard across the country and, soon afterward, overseas.79 The previous day, the composer had cabled the conductor, expressing his enthusiasm for what he believed would be a superb effort.80 The concert was widely covered in the American press,81 and the Sunday afternoon radio broadcast was preceded by the announcer’s remarks beamed to the American people and beyond. If tinged with hyperbole, the language millions heard prior to the performance is a reminder that public events in wartime America were inevitably entwined in the world struggle.
Listeners learned that the symphony’s first three movements were written during the siege of Leningrad “amid the thunder of Nazi artillery and the lurid glare of the Luftwaffe’s incendiary bombs.” Contrasting German brutality with Russian heroism and American generosity, the announcer asserted that the broadcast was dedicated to Russian War Relief, Incorporated, which had sent food and medical supplies to the Soviet Union, an act of inestimable value to the “courageous Russian people.” The organization’s chairman, Edward Carter, also spoke to those tuned in, quoting Shostakovich, who had recently cabled him to express his hope that the premiere would aid the Russians. Carter discussed the good work his agency had done, providing medical equipment, condensed milk, and cigarettes to help meet Russia’s needs. Perhaps the aid had even provided bandages, which might have been used to “bind up the burned finger of a fire-watcher” named Dmitri Shostakovich “on the roof of the Leningrad Conservatory.” Concluding, Carter alerted listeners to the appreciation Americans owed the Russians for their role in the anti-Nazi struggle.82
Resuming his preconcert duties, the announcer thanked the composer and VOKS for the decision to allow NBC to present the symphony, which had been made to fortify US-Soviet relations. After explaining the elaborate process by which the score and the instrumental parts had been transported to the United States, he offered those tuned to NBC a highly politicized description of the composition’s meaning and the atmosphere in which it had been created. Shostakovich had provided “his own motto” for the piece, a response to the old proverb, “When guns speak, the muses keep silent.” To this the composer replied, “Here the muses speak together with the guns!” The artist had accomplished his task in trying circumstances, composing the first movement as the “Nazi hordes were pounding at the gates of Leningrad with all the terrors of modern warfare.” But the citizens of Leningrad had responded nobly. Even Shostakovich had done his part, inspired by the “heroism” he witnessed every day. Highlighting America’s war aims, the announcer said the work’s finale would “hail the ultimate victory of light over darkness, of humanity over barbarism, of reason over reaction.”83
The NBC Symphony and its conductor presented a powerful performance of the Seventh (the broadcast is available on CD), after which the radio audience was asked to make a contribution to help Russia fight “against barbarism. You know at what cost she beats back the Hitler hordes.” Listeners were told about the Russians’ “indomitable will” as they sought to crush the fascist “monster.” Asking Americans to join in the fight for freedom with the people of Russia, England, China, and the other United Nations, the announcer hoped America’s free citizens would pledge 10 percent of their income for war bonds. This was essential, if the “prophecy of the music you’ve just heard is to become a fact.” To encourage the audience, they were told that all the members of the NBC Symphony had made the 10 percent pledge. The announcer implored listeners to go out the next day and do the same.84
At the symphony’s conclusion, the invited audience in NBC’s Studio 8-H reacted with “shattering applause.” Millions from coast to coast had listened, experiencing, one account noted, an enormous sense of “gratitude” toward Russia, which was “defending in oceans of blood humanity’s cause.”85 Press coverage of the performance reflected the broadcast’s deeply political character, though one is also impressed by the extent to which critics offered well-considered musical evaluations of the piece. After all, the symphony had never been heard in the United States, and most critics were evaluating a work they had experienced, almost certainly for the first time, on the radio, rather than in the concert hall.86
Readers of Life shortly encountered a series of evocative photos documenting the composer’s youth and wartime heroism.87 And subscribers to Time pondered the magazine’s cover, which pictured a sideways portrait of the stern-faced composer in a wartime fire marshal’s helmet, staring resolutely into the distance. In the background stand the burned-out shells of buildings, while the foreground is dominated by the heroic language of war: “FIREMAN SHOSTAKOVICH: Amid bombs bursting in Leningrad he heard the chords of victory.” Inside, the Time essay, “Shostakovich and the Guns,” was a lengthy traversal of recent Russian history; it included details about Shostakovich’s background, along with a description of the Seventh’s journey to America. The composition was compared to a “great wounded snake, dragging its slow length,” which took some eighty minutes to uncoil. The composer had done little to develop its bold themes, nor made much effort to reduce its “loose, sometimes skeletal structures” as one might expect in a typical symphonic work. Nevertheless, the piece did not lack power, for its “musical amorphousness” reflected the “amorphous mass of Russia at war. Its themes are exultations, agonies. Death and suffering haunt it.” But Shostakovich also captured the sound of victory. The magazine’s critic heard echoes of Ravel’s Bolero in the piece, as well as hints of Beethoven, Berlioz, Rimsky-Korsakov, Mahler, and even Poulenc and Busoni. In all, the arresting cover image, along with the rich discussion of the composer, his work, and the plight of America’s Russian ally, surely captivated readers.88
Writing for the New York Herald Tribune, music critic Francis Perkins claimed the work was often “moving, sometimes on its own account” and sometimes because of the circumstances under which it had been composed.89 Louis Biancolli, the New York World-Telegram and Sun’s critic, was struck by the symphony’s martial character, which he desc
ribed as a “literally battle-scarred score.” No city had ever been “enshrined in so stirring a tribute.”90
Americans encountered lengthy assessments of the performance in the New Republic and The Nation, both expressing severe reservations about the work, while recognizing the circumstances of its creation lent it emotional power. Writing in the New Republic, Nicolas Nabokov, the Russian-born composer and musical pedagogue who had come to the United States in 1933, observed that one was moved by the fact that the piece had been written “under the thunder of bombs.” Nevertheless, despite its “sincerity” and excellent “technical craftsmanship,” this was no great symphonic work. Calling it banal and tedious, Nabokov observed that in seeking to connect with the people, the composer had fallen short of the mark.91 In The Nation, B. H. Haggin skewered the piece, even as he pointed to its noble theme, which traced the “final victory of humanity over barbarism.” Still, it was notable for its “pretentious banalities.” Though capable of moving listeners, the Seventh was an “excessively long piece of bad music.”92
While few questioned the work’s emotional power or the brilliance of Toscanini’s performance, Olin Downes of the New York Times was also reluctant to laud the symphony, though he acknowledged America’s gratitude toward the Russian war effort. Downes was not convinced of the work’s merit, even as he observed that if calling it the “greatest symphony the modern age had produced would send the last Hun reeling from the last foot of Russian soil,” he would consider perjuring himself. But he refrained. While the piece had impressive moments, it lacked “inspiration.”93 Downes also took a political swipe at the composer, his music, and the Soviet regime, writing that Shostakovich believed “social ideology must be back of all music,” a stance the critic found lamentable. Far better to avoid “conscious ideologies” when composing; it would be still more preferable if Shostakovich was not told whether his scores had appropriately communicated “Soviet ideals.” In criticizing the Soviet system, Downes touched on issues that would become problematic in the postwar years, though such questions rarely arose during the war, as Americans were unwilling to consider the creative climate of a crucial ally.94