George Szell
A Life of Music
Michael Charry (Author)
9780252036163
Hardback, published 1 June 2011
464 pages, 34 black and white photographs
23.5 x 15.6 x 3.8 cm, 0.88 kg
Received the Best Historical Research in Recorded Classical Music Award from the Association for Recorded Sound Collection (ARSC), 2012.
— Association for Recorded Sound Collection (ARSC)
This book is the first full biography of George Szell, one of the greatest orchestra and opera conductors of the twentieth century. From child prodigy pianist and composer to world-renowned conductor, Szell's career spanned seven decades, and he led most of the great orchestras and opera companies of the world, including the New York Philharmonic, the NBC and Chicago Symphonies, the Berlin Philharmonic, the Vienna Philharmonic and Opera, and the Concertgebouw Orchestra. A protégé of composer-conductor Richard Strauss at the Berlin State Opera, his crowning achievement was his twenty-four-year tenure as musical director of the Cleveland Orchestra, transforming it into one of the world's greatest ensembles, touring triumphantly in the United States, Europe, the Soviet Union, South Korea, and Japan.
Michael Charry, a conductor who worked with Szell and interviewed him, his family, and his associates over several decades, draws on this first-hand material and correspondence, orchestra records, reviews, and other archival sources to construct a lively and balanced portrait of Szell's life and work from his birth in 1897 in Budapest to his death in 1970 in Cleveland.
Readers will follow Szell from his career in Europe, Great Britain, and Australia to his guest conducting at the New York Philharmonic and his distinguished tenure at the Metropolitan Opera and Cleveland Orchestra. Charry details Szell's personal and musical qualities, his recordings and broadcast concerts, his approach to the great works of the orchestral repertoire, and his famous orchestrational changes and interpretation of the symphonies of Robert Schumann. The book also lists Szell's conducting repertoire and includes a comprehensive discography.
In highlighting Szell's legacy as a teacher and mentor as well as his contributions to orchestral and opera history, this biography will be of lasting interest to concert-goers, music lovers, conductors, musicians inspired by Szell's many great performances, and new generations who will come to know those performances through Szell's recorded legacy.
Preface
ix
Acknowledgments
xv
Abbreviations
xix
Chronology
xxi
Introduction
1
1. The New Mozart (1897-1929)
3
2. The Conductor Spreads His Wings (1930-38)
23
3. Musical Pioneering in Australia (1938, 1939)
42
4. New World, New Beginnings (1939-46)
56
5. Cleveland: Contest and Commitment (1942-47)
78
6. Szell, the Orchestra Builder (1947-54)
105
7. George Szell and Rudolf Bing (1953-54)
141
8. Keeping the Promise: "
Second to None"
(1954-57)
149
9. The Golden Years (1957-65)
172
10. The Cleveland Orchestra in the World (1965-68)
223
11. Summers at Home
254
12. Finale: Cleveland, Japan, Korea, Anchorage, Cleveland (1968-70)
270
Epilogue
289
In Szell's Words
291
Appendix A. "
On the 150th Anniversary of Schumann's Birth,"
by George Szell
295
Appendix B. Staff and Kulas Foundation Conductors under George Szell
299
Appendix C. Apprentice Conductor Qualifications
301
Appendix D. 1957 European Tour Repertoire
303
Appendix E. 1965 European Tour Repertoire
305
Appendix F. Szell's Repertoire
307
Discography
331
Notes
355
Bibliography
397
Index
399
Illustrations follow page 104
