Dangerous Melodies

by Jonathan Rosenberg

  74. “Counter-Rally Cheers Attacks on Russia for ‘Intellectual Purge’; ‘Peace’ Rally Defends Soviets,” New York Herald Tribune, March 27, 1949.

  75. “2 ‘Peace’ Meetings Jeered by Pickets,” New York Times, March 27, 1949.

  76. Downes in Speaking of Peace, Daniel S. Gillmor, ed., an edited report of the Waldorf Conference, published in New York in 1949 by the National Council of the Arts, Sciences and Professions, 88–89.

  77. Speaking of Peace, 88–89.

  78. Ibid.

  79. “Shostakovich Bids All Artists Lead War on New ‘Fascists,’ ” New York Times, March 28, 1949. Excerpts are from this account; from Speaking of Peace (95–99); and from press reports: “Russians at ‘Peace’ Rally Assail U.S., Atlantic Pact, Say Moscow Is Anti-war,” New York Herald Tribune, March 28, 1949; “Shostakovich Hits Stravinsky as ‘Betrayer,’ ” New York Herald Tribune, March 28, 1949; “Vitriolic Attacks on U.S. at Parley,” Boston Globe, Ibid. Note “Shostakovich Stirs an Artistic Storm: Must All Music Meet Stalin’s Whistle Test?,” Newsweek (April 4, 1949): 20–21. On writing the address, see Fay, 172–74.

  80. Speaking of Peace, 95.

  81. “Russians at ‘Peace’ Rally Assail U.S., Atlantic Pact, Say Moscow Is Anti-war,” New York Herald Tribune, March 28, 1949.

  82. “Shostakovich Bids All Artists Lead War on New ‘Fascists,’ ” New York Times, March 28, 1949; “Shostakovich Hits Stravinsky as ‘Betrayer,’ ” New York Herald Tribune, March 28, 1949.

  83. “Shostakovich Hits Stravinsky as ‘Betrayer,’ ” New York Herald Tribune, March 28, 1949.

  84. On Prokofiev: “Shostakovich Hits Stravinsky as ‘Betrayer,’ ” New York Herald Tribune, March 28, 1949; “Shostakovich Bids All Artists Lead War on New ‘Fascists,’ ” New York Times, March 28, 1949.

  85. On Stravinsky: “Shostakovich Hits Stravinsky as ‘Betrayer,’ ” New York Herald Tribune, March 28, 1949; “Shostakovich Bids All Artists Lead War on New ‘Fascists,’ ” New York Times, March 28, 1949. Note Irving Kolodin’s column, “Shostakovich vs. Stravinsky,” New York Herald Tribune, March 28, 1949. In refusing, Stravinsky wrote, “Regret not able to join . . . but all my ethic and esthetic convictions oppose such gesture.” Elizabeth Wilson, Shostakovich: A Life Remembered (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994), 239.

  86. Nicolas Nabokov, Bagazh: Memoirs of a Russian Cosmopolitan (New York: Atheneum, 1975), 237.

  87. Speaking of Peace, 99. Note Nabokov, 237–38.

  88. Ibid.

  89. Arthur Miller, Timebends: A Life (New York: Grove Press, 1987), 239.

  90. Howard Pollack, Aaron Copland: The Life and Work of an Uncommon Man (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1999), 48–49. Copland in Paris: Pollack, chs. 4–6; Aaron Copland and Vivian Perlis, Aaron Copland, 1900–1942 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1984), 41–92.

  91. “Effect of the Cold War on the Artist in the U.S.,” Aaron Copland: A Reader: Selected Writings, 1923–1972, Richard Kostelanetz, ed. (New York: Routledge, 2004), 128–31.

  92. “Effect of the Cold War on the Artist.”

  93. Copland quoted in Speaking of Peace, 90–91.

  94. Ibid.

  95. “Pickets Boo 18,000 at Peace Parley,” Washington Post, March 28, 1949. Note “Vitriolic Attacks on U.S. at Parley,” Boston Globe, March 28, 1949.

  96. “Russians at ‘Peace’ Rally Assail U.S., Atlantic Pact, Say Moscow Is Anti-War,” New York Herald Tribune, March 28, 1949. Note “At the Waldorf: Lightning on the Left,” Christian Science Monitor, March 28, 1949.

  97. “State Dept. Acts to Block Tour of Soviet Group,” New York Herald Tribune, March 30, 1949. Note “Goodbye Now,” Time (April 11, 1949): 22.

  98. “Red ‘Peace’ Junket Ends before Start,” Washington Post, March 30, 1949. Note “U.S. Spikes ‘Peace’ Tour Scheduled for 18 Reds, Orders Them to Leave,” Philadelphia Inquirer, March 30, 1949.

  99. “U.S. Spikes ‘Peace’ Tour Scheduled for 18 Reds, Orders Them to Leave,” Philadelphia Inquirer, March 30, 1949.

  100. “Yale Refuses Hall for Shostakovich,” New York Times, March 30, 1949. Note “Marsalka Loses His Job at Yale,” New York Times, April 12, 1949.

  101. “Moves to Block Shostakovich Chicago Visit,” Chicago Tribune, March 29, 1949.

  102. “ ‘World Peace Rally’ Speakers Here Attack North Atlantic Pact,” Chicago Tribune, April 7, 1949.

  103. “Soviet Parley Sponsors Seek Huge ‘Peace Roll Call,’ ” Christian Science Monitor, April 4, 1949. Note “Shostakovich Off to Moscow, ‘Glad to Be Returning Home,’ ” New York Herald Tribune, April 4, 1949.

  104. “Shostakovich Holds U.S. Fears His Music,” New York Times, May 27, 1949.

  105. “Mephisto’s Musings,” Musical America (November 15, 1949): 11.

  106. “Mephisto’s Musings,” Musical America, Ibid. Shostakovich also heard the Juilliard String Quartet perform three Bartók quartets in New York, though he noted, incorrectly, that Bartók had died of malnutrition in the city in 1945, “in terrible straits.” Ibid.

  107. “Mephisto’s Musings,” Musical America, Ibid.

  108. “Mephisto’s Musings,” Musical America, Ibid. For Shostakovich’s view of Stravinsky, beyond his assessment at the Waldorf conference, see “Shostakovich Says Stravinsky Betrays Russia,” New York Herald Tribune, May 27, 1949. He fiercely criticized his music and called him “a traitor to his motherland.”

  109. “Shostakovich Gives Views on New York,” New York Times, May 28, 1949.

  110. In 1950, Shostakovich criticized American literature, attacking Upton Sinclair and John Steinbeck. “Russian Assails Authors,” New York Times, July 7, 1950.

  111. Upon the conclusion of the event, an “action committee” was established to continue the work of the conference. “ ‘Action’ Unit Set Up for Peace Parley Goals,” New York Times, March 28, 1949.

  112. “Peace: Everybody Wars over It,” Newsweek (April 4, 1949): 19–22.

  113. “Tumult at the Waldorf,” Time (April 4, 1949): 23–24.

  114. “Red Visitors Cause Rumpus,” Life (April 4, 1949): 39–43. For further editorial discussion, see website.

  115. “Don’t Be Fooled,” Philadelphia Inquirer, March 29, 1949.

  116. “Ban on Delegates Upheld,” New York Times, April 20, 1949. Note Los Angeles Times letters opposing the visit: “If Nazi Conductor Is Barred, Why Should Reds Be Let In?” Los Angeles Times, March 23, 1949; “Foreign Artist Policy,” Ibid., March 28, 1949; “Shostakovich, Furtwaengler,” Ibid., March 31, 1949.

  117. “Alumnus Protests Yale Ban,” New York Times, April 2, 1949.

  118. “Dinner without Tension,” New York Herald Tribune, March 29, 1949.

  119. “Juri Jelagin Writes a Letter to Shostakovich,” Musical America (April 1, 1949): 14. The letter, submitted by Alexander Kerensky, first appeared in the New York Herald Tribune on March 27, 1949.

  120. Ibid.

  121. “Calling Washington,” Washington Post, March 29, 1949.

  122. Ibid.

  123. “The Kremlin in New York,” New York Herald Tribune, April 3, 1949. Note Dwight Macdonald’s piece for its description of Shostakovich: “pale, slight, sensitive-looking; . . . tense, withdrawn, unsmiling—a tragic and heart-rending figure.” “The Waldorf Conference,” Politics (Winter 1949): 313–26.

  124. “On the Horizon,” Commentary (May 1949): 487–93.

  125. Ibid.

  126. “The Cultural Conference,” Partisan Review (May 1949): 505–11.

  127. Ibid. Note “The Tragedy of Shostakovich,” New Leader (March 26, 1949): 6. The Reverend Norman Vincent Peale of the Marble Collegiate Church denounced the event. “Conference Seen as Red ‘Invasion,’ ” New York Times, March 28, 1949.

  128. The Berlin meeting comprised intellectuals from some twenty countries, most from the United States and Western Europe. Richard Pells, Not Like Us: How Europeans Have Loved, Hated, and Transformed American Culture since World War II (New York: Basic Books, 1997), 70–76; Saunde
rs, The Cultural Cold War, 73–84. Nabokov said he was unaware at the time that the CIA funded the organization.

  129. “Dmitri Shostakovich: Tragedy of a Great Composer,” Allegro (October 1950): 10–12, 31.

  130. Ibid.

  131. Ellen Schrecker, Many Are the Crimes: McCarthyism in America (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998). Schrecker notes that American Communists spied for the Soviet Union in this era, but contends that such activities did not at all justify the political repression that characterized the period.

  132. Extension of Remarks of Hon. Fred E. Busbey of Illinois, Congressional Record, 83rd Congress, 1st session, January 16, 1953, appendix, A169–A171.

  133. Ibid.

  134. Ibid. Note “Copland Ideas Out of Tune, Busbey Says,” Washington Post, January 17, 1953.

  135. “Inaugural Concert Bars Copland’s ‘Lincoln Portrait,’ ” Washington Post, January 15, 1953.

  136. Aaron Copland and Vivian Perlis, Copland: 1900 through 1942 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1984), 344.

  137. “Ban on Copland Work at Inaugural Scored,” New York Times, January 17, 1953. The League’s statement to the committee was also sent to the Times. Aaron Copland and Vivian Perlis, Copland since 1943 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989), 185.

  138. Copland since 1943, 185.

  139. “Wicked Music,” New Republic (January 26, 1953): 7. In Music and Imagination (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1952), Copland criticized the lack of creative freedom composers had in the Soviet Union, 74–77.

  140. “Copland on Lincoln,” New York Times, February 1, 1953.

  141. “Music Censorship Reveals New Peril,” Washington Post, January 18, 1953. Note “American Music Is Comfortably of Age,” Ibid., January 25, 1953.

  142. “A Lincoln Portrait,” Washington Post, January 19, 1953.

  143. “Basic Freedom,” Washington Post, January 24, 1953.

  144. Copland since 1943, 186.

  145. Copland since 1943, 189. It is not clear where this statement appeared. The Copland-Perlis volume also quotes from a letter that Copland apparently wrote to President Eisenhower about the matter, though there is no record of it in the Eisenhower Library. Ibid., 187.

  146. Copland since 1943, 190–91.

  147. Pollack, 457.

  148. On the 1941 South America trip, see “Portrait of an American Composer,” New York Times, August 24, 1941.

  149. Senate Committee on Government Operations, Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, State Department Teacher-Student Exchange Program, 83rd Congress, 1st session, May 26, 1953, Testimony of Aaron Copland, 1268–69.

  150. Ibid., 1269.

  151. Ibid., 1270.

  152. Ibid., 1267–89.

  153. Ibid., 1273.

  154. Ibid., 1278–79.

  155. Ibid., 1280.

  156. Ibid., 1283.

  157. Ibid., 1284. In a statement prepared later, Copland said he had read over the account on the fine arts panel in the New York Times, noting, “I do not personally remember having seen anyone at the conference who is not listed in those published reports.” Copland since 1943, 197.

  158. Senate Committee on Government Operations, Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, State Department Teacher-Student Exchange Program, 83rd Congress, 1st session, May 26, 1953, Testimony of Aaron Copland, 1289.

  159. Copland since 1943, 198, 202.

  160. “Not Red, Says Aaron Copland, After McCarthy Group Quiz,” Baltimore Sun, May 27, 1953. On that date, note “All Red Ties Denied by Aaron Copland,” New York Times; “Aaron Copland Denies He Ever Was Communist,” Boston Globe; “Aaron Copland Denies He’s Red,” New York Herald Tribune. Full statement in Copland since 1943, 193.

  161. Copland since 1943, 193, 195.

  162. Pollack, 458. Note Copland since 1943, 198–99.

  163. Copland since 1943, 200. In a follow-up letter to Copland, Kennedy wrote, “I, too, deplore the intrusion of a political counterpoint, which to my mind is sadly out of key in any artistic enterprise.” Ibid., 200.

  164. Copland since 1943, 201.

  165. Ibid., 201.

  166. Ibid., 202. See “Dean of Our Composers at 60,” New York Times Sunday Magazine, November 13, 1960.

  167. Pollack, 460.

  Chapter Eight: “Khrushchev Wouldn’t Know a B-flat if He Heard One”: Symphony Orchestras Fight the Cold War

  1. I wish to acknowledge that the discussion of the Bernstein trip to Moscow draws on my essay in Leonard Bernstein, American Original: How a Modern Renaissance Man Transformed Music and the World during His New York Philharmonic Years, 1943–1976, Burton Bernstein and Barbara Haws, eds. (New York: Harper Collins, 2008), 124, 126–29. Bernstein’s words from Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic in Moscow, a documentary directed by Richard Leacock, sponsored by the Ford Motor Company. The documentary was taped before a live audience in Moscow on September 11, 1959, and broadcast on WCBS-TV on October 25, 1959. It can be viewed at the New York Philharmonic Archive, Lincoln Center, New York City (NYPA).

  2. See Barry Seldes, Leonard Bernstein: The Political Life of an American Musician (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009), esp. chs. 2–3.

  3. On the Cold War’s cultural dimension, see website.

  4. John Lewis Gaddis, We Now Know: Rethinking Cold War History (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), 129.

  5. Gaddis, 129. Melvyn P. Leffler writes that the U.S. was inclined to “explore the parameters of détente.” For the Soul of Mankind: The United States, the Soviet Union, and the Cold War (New York: Hill and Wang, 2007), 133.

  6. Kenneth Osgood, Total Cold War: Eisenhower’s Secret Propaganda Battle at Home and Abroad (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2006), 57. Osgood does not believe this was a genuine peace initiative, but claims the U.S. exploited the moment to advance its overseas aims (63–65).

  7. “Text of Speech by Eisenhower Outlining Proposals for Peace in the World,” New York Times, April 17, 1953.

  8. According to Osgood, the speech sought to seize the “peace initiative” from Moscow (65).

  9. Osgood, 217.

  10. See Kiril Tomoff, Virtuosi Abroad: Soviet Music and Imperial Competition during the Early Cold War, 1945–1958 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2015), 116–29. Cellist Mstislav Rostropovich also performed in the U.S. in this period.

  11. See Osgood, 217.

  12. Dwight Eisenhower to Edgar N. Eisenhower, November 22, 1955, Ann Whitman file, Eisenhower Diary Series, box 11, Eisenhower Diary–November 1955, Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas. (I encountered this source in Osgood’s Total Cold War, and requested the document from the Eisenhower Library.)

  13. Osgood, 218. According to one report, peoples around the world perceived American culture as barren and saw Americans as a “gadget-loving people produced by an exclusively mechanical, technological and materialist civilization.” Operations Coordinating Board, “Position Paper, President’s Emergency Fund for International Affairs,” January 4, 1955, OCB Central files, box 14, OCB 007 (file 1), Eisenhower Library. (I encountered this source in Osgood, and requested the document from the Eisenhower Library.)

  14. Quoted in Naima Prevots, Dance for Export: Cultural Diplomacy and the Cold War (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1998), 11.

  15. Ibid. Note “U.S. Lifts Curtain on Culture Drive,” New York Times, February 28, 1955.

  16. See website for a Senate hearing and two congressional reports, which explore this in depth.

  17. US Congress, House Report of a Special Subcommittee to the Committee on Education and Labor, Federal Grants for Fine Arts Programs and Projects, 83rd Congress, 2nd sess., 1954, 1.

  18. Ibid., 5–6.

  19. Ibid., 7.

  20. Ibid. The senators’ words appear in this House subcommittee report.

  21. US Congress, House, Congressman Frank Thompson of New Jersey Extension of Remarks on the Boston Symphony Orchestra Aid the President in Lifting the Iron Curtain, Congr
essional Record—Appendix (July 26, 1955): A5492–93. Thompson asked that Washburn’s remarks be included in the record.

  22. US Congress, House, Congressman Frank Thompson of New Jersey Extension of Remarks on the Boston Symphony Orchestra Aid the President in Lifting the Iron Curtain, Congressional Record—Appendix (July 26, 1955): A5492–93.

  23. US Congress, House, Subcommittee on the Committee on Appropriations, The Supplemental Appropriations Bill, 1956, 84th Cong., 1st sess. June 13, 14, 20, 1955, 277–78.

  24. Ibid., 281.

  25. “Music in the Post-War World,” Musical Courier (March 5, 1944): 14.

  26. “Music’s Cue Given at San Francisco Conference,” Musical America (May 1945): 16. The music journals demonstrate the extent to which reflections on music were wedded to the desire for peace and cooperation.

  27. “New York Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra Green Room Intermission,” October 30, 1949, Clipping file, NY Philharmonic, 1949–1950, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Lincoln Center, New York (NYPLPA).

  28. “Immigration, Naturalization of Foreign Musicians,” Musical America (December 1, 1952): 14.

  29. “British Broadcasting Corporation, Scottish Home Service, Speech of Floyd G. Blair, July 16, 1951, box 021-03, folder 39, Tours: Edinburgh, 1951, NYPA. Note “Artistic Interchange,” New York Times, August 12, 1951.

  30. Carlton Sprague Smith to Henry Cabot, December 5, 1947, International Music Fund, Trust 7X, box 3, Boston Symphony Orchestra Archives, Symphony Hall, Boston, MA (BSOA).

  31. International Exchange Program, “Procedural Provisions with Respect to Advisory Panels,” n.d. (prob. 1954), 1–2, box 100, folder 1, Bureau for Educational and Cultural Affairs Historical Collection (hereafter CU collection), Special Collections, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR. On the panel’s importance, see “Music Advisory Panel Meeting,” April 24, 1957, 2, CU collection, box 100, folder 3.

  32. On the lack of American pieces played on the 1955 New York Philharmonic’s European tour under Mitropoulos, see “Music Advisory Panel, International Exchange Program, February 8, 1955, 2, CU collection, box 100, folder 1; International Exchange Program memo from Robert C. Schnitzer to International Exchange Service, 2, March 16, 1955, CU collection, Box 48, folder 6; and Music Advisory Panel, October 11, 1955, 1–2, CU collection, box 100, folder 1.