On January 18, 1938, teenagers and college kids across the United States were probably caught by surprise when they turned on their favorite radio broadcast Camel Caravan on CBS. Instead of the familiar swing and dance tunes, Mozart's Clarinet Quintet filled their living rooms as the popular clarinetist and bandleader Benny Goodman (1909–1986) for the first time performed classical music for a broad audience.Footnote 1 A few months later, he became the first clarinetist to record the Mozart Quintet.Footnote 2 The classical clarinet repertoire, from Mozart to Brahms, from Weber to Debussy, became a fixture in Goodman's portfolio. At the height of his popularity, he not only refocused his career but also intended to make his own mark on the world of classical music: He commissioned composers to write for him, significantly extending the clarinet repertoire. The following list represents the result of this endeavor:Footnote 3
• Béla Bartók, Contrasts for Clarinet, Violin and Piano (1938)
• Darius Milhaud, Concerto for Clarinet and Orchestra, op. 230 (1941)
• Benjamin Britten, Concerto for Clarinet (1941/42; only sketches for a first movement)
• Alex North, Revue for Clarinet and Orchestra (1946)
• Henry Brant, Concerto for Clarinet and Full Dance Orchestra (“Jazz Clarinet Concerto,” 1946)
• Paul Hindemith, Concerto for Clarinet and Orchestra (1947)
• Aaron Copland, Concerto for Clarinet and Orchestra (1948)
• Ingolf Dahl, Double Concerto (ca. 1950?; not completed; joint commission with Reginald Kell)
• Morton Gould, Derivations for Clarinet and Band (1955/56)
• Malcolm Arnold, Clarinet Concerto no. 2, op. 115 (1974)
• Gordon Jenkins, Clarinet Concerto (1977)
• William Walton, Clarinet Concerto (1982?; outcome unknown)
• Allen Shawn, Concerto for Clarinet, Cello, and Orchestra (1983)
Except for Bartók's Contrasts, which drew interest from Bartók scholars,Footnote 4 this music has not yet received proper recognition. How did these projects evolve, and why? Who was involved? How did the collaborations unfold? Addressing these questions, I focus on the commissions to Paul Hindemith (1941/47) and Darius Milhaud (1941) and draw on detailed documentation in the correspondence of Eric Simon, a Viennese-born clarinetist who advised Goodman on questions of classical clarinet technique and initiated contact with Hindemith and Milhaud. Because these letters are largely new findings, I provide complete translations of those subsequently quoted in the Appendix.Footnote 5
Biographers and Goodman scholars have often condensed Goodman's involvement with classical music into separate excursus chapters, thereby preventing a holistic view of his artistic persona.Footnote 6 Lewis A. Erenberg, who in his Swingin’ the Dream (1998) ascribes a major role to Goodman, does not reference classical music at all. David W. Stowe (1994) presents a more complex relationship between swing and other musical traditions, particularly the classical, from a sociohistorical perspective, but still reduces Goodman's impact to the 1938 Carnegie Hall concert.Footnote 7 Researchers who explicitly explore encounters between the “classical” and “jazz” spheres, such as John Howland (2009), rather focus on questions of hybrid musical styles and thus on Goodman's composing and arranging contemporaries. The clarinetist's way of bridging the “two worlds” is no less significant and representative.Footnote 8 His “double life” unfolds as a multilayered sphere for various actors, each with their own background and agenda. In this article, I examine how Goodman, as a performer, took center stage in the creation of a new repertoire and discuss how factors such as social class and migration experiences shaped the positions of the involved individuals. Initially, I address Goodman's relationship with classical music. Referring particularly to the profound premises presented by Howland, I frame this analysis within the hierarchization of musical genres of Goodman's time, which was decisively formed by intersectional biases.Footnote 9 Furthermore, I explore the specific connections of the other individuals: At the time that they were composing for Goodman, Milhaud and Hindemith were both experiencing life as expatriates, as was Simon, who had fled Austria in 1938. Through their stories, I illustrate the situation of European émigré musicians, who significantly influenced the new music scene in the United States during the 1930s and 1940s. In this respect, I build on the work of scholars such as Sabine Feisst (2011; on Schoenberg) and Erin K. Maher (2016; on Milhaud), who have examined and re-evaluated this topic from differentiated perspectives.
Throughout his career, Goodman invested a notable amount of money in financing composers to write for him. Additionally, he enabled the performances of the compositions and influenced their “afterlives” through his prominence and the networks and infrastructure available to him. The promotion of new music is thus the overall frame that I apply to this topic. Not only does it interlink the lifeworlds, networks, and agendas of the named protagonists, but it even defines their relationships. Goodman's commissioning activities can be understood as a form of patronage, as they match central criteria in this regard, that is, the regular provision of economic capital and the enabling of performances. The exertion of patronage also represents a claim to power, and it is not without reason that much of the related research focuses on the social and political elites.Footnote 10 As I will prove, performers such as Goodman can also adopt such a power position. Additionally, Goodman seized an entrepreneurial opportunity. His biographer Ross Firestone interprets Goodman's career as a migrant son's three-step journey toward the “American Dream”: Holding a job with someone else (the early dance band engagements), working for oneself (as a freelance artist), and opening one's own business (as a bandleader).Footnote 11 Although the framework of patronage helps capture social power structures within the art world of classical music, musical entrepreneurship covers Goodman's diversity as a genre-crossing commissioner, performer, and professional. To this end, I follow William Weber's call to take musicians “seriously as business people and as social forces.”Footnote 12
Approaching Classical Music
Goodman first encountered classical music, in the broadest sense, during his musical training as a child. At the age of approximately eleven, he studied European nineteenth-century method books with Franz Schoepp, a retired (German) clarinet teacher from the Chicago College of Music.Footnote 13 It is tempting to assume that characteristics of Goodman's playing, such as a flawless finger technique and a clear and controlled tone in all registers, were a result of the foundations and ethos that he adopted during those years. However, his early involvement with African American and dance music may also have contributed.Footnote 14 James Lincoln Collier points out the impacts of the early jazz clarinetists—such as Bernard Berendsohn, known for his precise technique, Ted Lewis, or Jimmy Noone, who also studied with Schoepp.Footnote 15 Thus, although parts of Goodman's performance style could possibly have been related to Schoepp's reported rigor, it cannot be confined to one particular musical genre.
Another event might just as legitimately begin the narration of Goodman's “double life,” as it features his first documented encounter with the classical repertoire per se. In 1935, he joined a string quartet at the suggestion of his producer at Columbia (and later brother-in-law) John Hammond, who himself played the viola. They eventually performed the Mozart Clarinet Quintet in the home of Emily (Vanderbilt Sloane) Hammond, John's mother.Footnote 16 At this event at Hammond's “palais” on the Upper East Side, attended by the New York elite, Goodman, who had grown up in poverty, perhaps got a taste of an opportunity to achieve prestige within the (white) middle and upper classes. Erenberg argues that Goodman, because of his lower-class origins, was placed “outside the traditional middle class value system” and that, for him, music was foremost a means of self-improvement as well as a career.Footnote 17 However, the musical world in which Goodman was socialized and in which he now operated was characterized by a dichotomy between “high” and “popular” cultures, between “art” and “entertainment,” with a hierarchical descent from the former, represented by the sacralized European canon, to the latter, denoted by the “vernacular” music rooted in African American communities. Goodman probably could not elude these structures and how they shaped his own notion of musical traditions.
Both Black and white artists explored hybrid composition and performance styles.Footnote 18 Along the boundaries and intersections between “jazz” and “classical” they negotiated social inequality and racial discrimination, as Howland demonstrates in “Ellington Uptown” (2009). Stowe attributes a specific role to swing musicians in this context, as they tended to consciously “position themselves on the median,”Footnote 19 where we also find Goodman from the moment that he presented Mozart on Camel Caravan in 1938. The eventual notion of music and musicians as “classical” (or not), however, is based not so much on stylistic characteristics as on social and racial biases, as Howland (2009) illustrates with the examples of Duke Ellington and James P. Johnson. Goodman's case also reflects this. Although he practiced racial integration early in his small jazz ensembles, he did not do so in his classical music. He sought his collaboration partners among artists who were associated primarily with the great concert halls. This meant a choice along the color line—a pattern also apparent in Goodman's commissions. Starting with the trio by Bartók in 1938, Goodman's portfolio of commissions over a period of about 45 years covered a spectrum of composers that was to some extent international but not overly diverse (see the list above): They were all male and white, from the United States or Europe. Their works appear manifold at first glance, but earlier projects in particular did not prominently feature stylistically hybrid forms.Footnote 20 Even though later projects after the war did, African American artists, for instance, were still not represented. This probably was not Goodman's deliberate decision but rather the result of the aforementioned structural factors.
Since the nineteenth century, the bourgeois sacralization of the European canon has shaped musical programs, concert halls, and cultural institutions in the United States. Regarding Goodman as a performer, this manifested in a striving for fidelity to the score and its creator. In his 1939 autobiography, coauthored with the (classical) music critic Irving Kolodin, Goodman emphasizes the role of the composer, even if dead, as the one to claim interpretational sovereignty over the work (in contrast to jazz, where the performer would take center stage):
First they [classical performers] want to take the music apart and find out just what the composer put into it, as far as each note in the individual parts is concerned. Then, after that they try to express what the composer meant in their own way, or as they say, interpret it. The difference here is that all the time you're trying to get back to the original idea of what Mozart had in mind, while in the music we play, when somebody plays a solo, he tries to put his own ideas across.…
In other kinds of music [classical music], it's the idea of measuring yourself against what a great composer was thinking.Footnote 21
Goodman constantly sought a mediator between himself and the pervasive authority of the composer. Regular coaching with “classical experts” may also have helped him remain flexible in switching quickly between the various playing styles. We know, for example, of Goodman's lessons with Simeon Bellison (soloist with the New York Philharmonic) from the late 1940s through the 1960s and with the British clarinetist Reginald Kell around 1950.Footnote 22 The first classical musician from whom Goodman took his cue in the late 1930s was the Hungarian violin virtuoso Joseph Szigeti (1892–1973).Footnote 23 When Bartók sent the score of Contrasts (composed for Goodman and Szigeti) across the Atlantic in the fall of 1938, Szigeti served as the leading reference to Goodman in the rehearsals, as a mediator between composer and performer. Goodman refers to this collaboration in his autobiography:
In rehearsing that Bartok piece I played with Szigeti last winter, I got a marvelous lesson just from working with him, and seeing the way he went about studying something.… The way Szigeti explained the score, and the way we worked it out in rehearsals, noticing how in one place you'd come across an idea that had first occurred a while back, only here it was in a different rhythm or turned upside down, or one instrument was playing a part of it while the other instrument answered with a different part, you realized it was all completely logical and carefully worked out.Footnote 24
Goodman was eager to understand the compositional structure and to learn from Szigeti's insights.Footnote 25
Under the headline “Benny Goodman, clarinetist, is taking clarinet lessons,” the New York-based magazine PM introduces Eric Simon as Goodman's teacher in an article dated July 13, 1941:
To Goodman worshipers who regard their hero as nothing less than perfect, the news that he is taking lessons may come as a bit of a shock. But the fact remains that, though many think him unrivaled in jazz clarinet playing, he admits he has a lot to learn in the classical field… . Hence the lessons with Simon. And Mr. Simon is well qualified for the job of teaching Mr. Goodman.Footnote 26
Simon (1907–1994) was a gifted multi-instrumentalist. In his birthplace of Vienna, Austria, he had studied clarinet with Viktor Polatschek and been a member of the orchestra at the Vienna State Opera.Footnote 27 He arrived in the United States in 1938 and soon became engaged with teaching and performing with various ensembles in New York. In early October 1940, he mentions Goodman as his new student in a letter to a friend.Footnote 28 Goodman had just returned to New York following a health-related break (including a back surgery). He probably consulted Simon to restore his fitness on the clarinet. The sources, however, do not tell us how their paths crossed. John Snavely, who interviewed Simon for his 1991 dissertation, suggests that John Hammond was the one who instigated the contact.Footnote 29 Hammond and Simon could have connected over their political views. Hammond was involved in New York's leftist scene.Footnote 30 A similar political orientation is also suggested in Simon's biography (featuring an engagement with a Russian orchestra in the early 1930s), his circle of friends (including musician, musicologist, and communist Georg Knepler), and especially his extensive correspondence.Footnote 31 Additionally, PM, which published the quoted article about Simon, exhibited a leftist orientation.Footnote 32 Regarding Goodman's political opinions no final claims can be made, even though he too, at least at times, maintained a closeness with left-wing circles.Footnote 33
Goodman consulted Simon for 2 years, with their meetings crammed between Goodman's numerous other commitments.Footnote 34 They worked on new pieces written for Goodman, such as a clarinet version of Milhaud's Scaramouche,Footnote 35 and quite likely on Contrasts before Goodman's performance with Szigeti and Bartók in 1941.Footnote 36 They also rehearsed standard pieces, such as the Mozart Concerto that Goodman would play in a concert at the New York Lewisohn Stadium on July 14, 1941 (Figures 1 and 2). In the first half, Reginald Stewart and the New York Philharmonic presented, among others, Beethoven's Fifth Symphony and the Mozart Clarinet Concerto (with Goodman as soloist); the second half was billed as “Benny Goodman and His Orchestra (15 musicians) playing popular works of their jazz repertoire,” including hits such as “One Clock Jump,” “Don't Be That Way,” “Sing, Sing, Sing,” and “Lady Be Good” (Figure 2).Footnote 37 Mixed programs of this kind, with predecessors in the genre-crossing concerts of James Reese Europe or W.C. Handy, became one of Goodman's specialties. As Scott DeVeaux notes, such programming may have been related to “the imposing concert environment” (such as concert halls or perhaps stadiums, as in this case), which demanded “something extra, a certain seriousness in either material or the manner of presentation to justify the new venue.”Footnote 38 According to Howland, such a program compilation was also an educational effort, following the model of pops concerts and aiming to appeal to a socially diverse audience.Footnote 39 The underlying ambition—to make “good music” (a synonym for classical music derived from the nineteenth-century sacralization of the European canon) accessible to the broader population—was certainly in line with Simon's attitude, which he expressed in a letter from 1946:
However, it is essential that our great classics of music and literature become the common good of all. They were not until 1938, and they can become so only through model performances. Through performances not only in the Imperial-Republican Burgtheater, but in performances that bring the works to the people in the suburbs.Footnote 40
Figure 1. Title page of the program book for the 1941 Stadium Concerts at Lewisohn Stadium in New York. The image gives a sense of the audience size at those events, which furthermore were broadcast on CBS. Program ID 11552, New York Philharmonic Leon Levy Digital Archives, https://archives.nyphil.org/index.php/artifact/92075bb9-88df-4294-bca7-cdac279bcd4c-0.1, accessed May 3, 2022; with courtesy of the archive.
Figure 2. Program of the July 14, 1941 concert featuring Goodman and Stewart. The titles of the tunes played by the Goodman Orchestra were penciled in by the owner of the program. Program ID 11552, New York Philharmonic Leon Levy Digital Archives, pp. 16–17, 19; with courtesy of the archive.
On this level, Simon connected with Goodman, who was playing the classics in stadiums, on recordings, and on nationwide radio broadcasts. For Goodman, who, unlike Simon, did not come from a wealthy bourgeois family, this may have had even greater symbolic value, as he had grown up in a country where previous generations had defined access to “good music” as a welfare goal.Footnote 41 Participating in this endeavor connected Goodman with left-wing intellectuals as well as it would elevate him closer to the level of upper-class patrons. However, as a businessman, Goodman might have sensed the opportunity to base his own career on more pillars. Although he probably had not known as early as 1938, it would prove wise to take that chance.
Approaching Classical Composers
After the success of the 1930s, the 1940s were marked by greater uncertainties for Goodman. These included dissolutions and reformations of the Goodman Orchestra, issues with record company contracts, and the general decline of the big band business.Footnote 42 His back pain exempted him from army service but continued to cause him problems when playing. In addition, he may have sensed creative stagnation around him. Gunther Schuller cites Ellington in this context, lamenting the “repetition and monotony of the present-day Swing arrangements which bode ill for the future, … leaving inspiration to die a slow death.”Footnote 43 Goodman needed new strategies. As he appeared primarily as a performer (unlike most of his fellow bandleaders, he usually did not arrange or compose himself), commissioning a new repertoire of classical music for him to perform may have seemed to be an obvious step. New works, which would forever be linked to his name, would serve as hallmarks for this new phase of his career. The initiative sprang from Goodman's friendship with Szigeti, who proposed approaching Bartók with a commission. The violin virtuoso was close to the composer and crucial to the promotion of his music, especially outside Hungary. Although Bartók enjoyed a strong reputation in his home country during the 1930s, his professional situation at the end of the decade was quite problematic.Footnote 44 Worried about his friend's poor financial status, Szigeti later recalled that the Bartók commission arose not only from artistic inspiration but also from these concerns.Footnote 45 Contrasts meant financial support for the composer (an honorarium of $300, covered by Goodman) and moreover secured him publicity before and shortly after he emigrated to the United States in 1940.
Goodman apparently enjoyed the role of sponsor, patron, and first performer of new music and was soon thinking about further projects. Regarding the choice of composers, it was of no interest to him whether they had previously engaged with jazz, swing, or dance music. Rather, it was their status within the classical sphere that counted, as he clarified to Vivian Perlis when interviewed for her Copland biography:
At the time there were not too many American composers to pick from—people of such terrific status—as Hindemith and Bartók. I recall that Aaron came to listen when I was recording with Bartók. Copland had a great reputation also. I didn't choose him because some of his works were jazz-inspired.Footnote 46
In Goodman's eyes, the selection of classical composers of American origin was limited, indicating that he perceived the field of classical music as still dominated by Europeans.Footnote 47 In that sense, he conformed to a preference of the music-promoting upper class that was developed in the nineteenth century and decisive for concert programming in the United States. Goodman's decision to promote this type of music, with an initial focus on European composers, could also be interpreted as an expression of his social aspirations, in the sense of Kelly Anne Harness’ theory of aristocratic patronage: A patron's choice of, for example, a certain genre, stylistic characteristics, or, as in this case, the geographical background of the composers, would mirror their social status.Footnote 48 However, Goodman was just beginning to build a network within those circles. Besides Szigeti, Simon was now one of the first with specific European connections to whom he could turn. Simon suggested commissioning Paul Hindemith, whom he contacted in early 1941:
Do you still remember me? When I contacted you about playing Harold with “us,” the Vienna Concert Orchestra, on the occasion of the first performance of your Mathis (unfortunately, due to the recently change in German circumstances, nothing came of it)…. I am Benny Goodman's teacher and advisor on classical issues…. He is looking for new pieces…. So he recently asked me who would and could write a clarinet concerto with orchestra for him. When I mentioned your name, he was very enthusiastic.Footnote 49
With these lines, Simon revived an acquaintance from his earlier professional life. Born to a well-situated Jewish family in 1907 in Vienna as Erich Simon, he enjoyed sophisticated private musical training on the piano and the clarinet.Footnote 50 Later, although he enrolled in law at the University of Vienna, he also studied conducting and worked as an editor for Universal Edition, a performer (on both clarinet and piano), and a concert manager—occupations that connected him with a number of renowned composers, such as Arnold Schoenberg.Footnote 51
However, the deteriorating political situation in Europe eventually led to a caesura. Simon was Jewish and socialist. Staying was not an option. He and his wife fled Austria in 1938, just a few weeks before the country's Anschluss to Nazi Germany. Via Switzerland, they reached France, where in early May they boarded a ship in Boulogne-sur-Mer that brought them to New York City.Footnote 52
Hindemith, who himself had left Europe in 1940, received Simon's letter at his Connecticut home. With his full professorship at Yale, concerts and composing for Hindemith were usually limited to nonteaching periods, especially the summers. In a letter to Simon dated January 28, 1941, the composer accepted the commission, suggesting a meeting with Goodman in New York, when he would travel up the East Coast for the premiere of his cello concerto.Footnote 53 The next trace of the project is a letter from Hindemith to Simon in late September 1941 in which the composer indicated that the “desired clarinet concerto can be ready on any date after the New Year.”Footnote 54 Apparently, Hindemith had not used the summer break to work on the piece. Perhaps the renewal of his professorship for another 3 years in early 1941 had prevented the project from moving forward. According to Luther Noss, there “was no time for Hindemith even to think about writing any new music during the first seven months of 1941” due to his involvement in the reorganization of Yale's School of Music and the preparation for the classes he was to teach in Tanglewood in the summer.Footnote 55 After Hindemith's letter in September 1941, there is no further evidence of the project before or during the war. Perhaps he became busy with teaching again, as Goodman did with touring. When bequeathing parts of his correspondence to Hindemith scholar Kurt von Fischer in 1970, Simon argued that, at this point, Goodman did not want to be associated with anything German, at least for the duration of the war.Footnote 56
After the collaboration with Hindemith had stopped, Simon promptly came up with an alternative. In October 1941, he wrote to Darius Milhaud in fluent French, requesting not only a concerto but also a clarinet arrangement of Scaramouche.Footnote 57 Milhaud had arrived in the United States in 1940, following the German invasion of France. Apart from his teaching position at Mills College, this phase of his career was characterized by numerous activities in networks on both the West and East Coasts, as well as great compositional productivity. Accordingly, Maher (2016) corrected the previous scholarly marginalization of this phase of Milhaud's life.
Simon and Milhaud had been in occasional contact ever since they had met in Europe prior to Simon's emigration.Footnote 58 In early May 1938, for instance, Simon wrote to Milhaud from Switzerland, where he first took refuge:
Now, many things have happened in the world since that time. The consequence for us is that Stiedry is in America and [plans to] stay there, that of course the Pierrot lunaire is not being performed here. I … am leaving Boulogne for New York on the 10th. I will see Stiedry, of course, and hope to realize in America what has become impossible in Europe.Footnote 59
Not yet 31 years old, Simon was part of a generation of young professionals whose careers ended or changed drastically in 1938. In a later interview, he recalled those days:
I should have played in the Second Mahler Symphony—but suddenly I was no longer there. It happened without me. We wanted to go to the USA and immediately after the Anschluss we applied through Zurich. We got the April quota for the USA, and on 16 May, 1938 we immigrated. And so I was here and soon got a job. I became Stiedry's assistant.Footnote 60
At a time when his future student Goodman was riding a wave of success, Simon had to re-establish professional stability. He started teaching, both privately and at The New School for Social Research in New York, an important social and professional hub for immigrants.Footnote 61 The driving force behind this position was Rudolf Kolisch, a friend of Simon's from Vienna and a major player within New York's networks of immigrant musicians.Footnote 62 Furthermore, Simon was engaged in ensembles led by Kolisch and in Fritz Stiedry's New Friends for Music.Footnote 63 Stories such as Simon's invalidate the long-held narrative of emigrants isolated in exile, against which Maher and Feisst convincingly argue in their works on Milhaud and Schoenberg.Footnote 64 Simon strengthened existing contacts, made new ones, and established a rich and diversified professional portfolio as a teacher, instrumentalist, conductor, concert manager, editor, and writer. He was socially and culturally involved in his new living environment, as were Hindemith and Milhaud. Furthermore, Hindemith, Milhaud, and Simon all obtained U.S. citizenship only a few years after their arrival.Footnote 65 In contrast to the two composers, however, Simon never considered permanently returning to Europe, although he visited Austria and other countries several times after the war. In 1939, he wrote to his friend Herbert Zipper, with whom he shared a long history and who at that time was living in Manila:
America is a country where no one is a stranger, since all are “emigrants”—there may be no one at home—, and everyone can contribute to shaping this “country.”Footnote 66
Simon indeed made his mark, realizing in the United States what he could not in Europe. As Szigeti had done earlier, he leveraged his relationship with Goodman to support composers according to his own preferences. In particular, he promoted other émigré artists who were trying to assert themselves in a new market and who sometimes struggled to adapt to the infrastructure of classical music production in the United States, as Feisst illustrates by Schoenberg's example. Goodman, on the other hand, who would still conceive of classical music as primarily European, was dependent on the network and insight that Simon provided.
Negotiating between Performer and Composer
In the projects discussed herein, Goodman left the negotiations with the composers to persons who had established the contact and were already moving within their network, such as Szigeti in the case of Contrasts. Szigeti reached out to Bartók in August 1938, negotiated the contractual terms, answered inquiries about technical and stylistic aspects of the composition, and discussed issues of interpretation.Footnote 67 In the projects with Hindemith and Milhaud, Simon assumed this role. His correspondence provides insight into how performer and composer positioned themselves and how they perceived each other. Simon balanced between them, seeking to make both feel appreciated, as we see in one of his letters to Milhaud:
If Benny didn't want to pay the full price you asked for, it wasn't to bargain. He has made arrangements with other composers (although I believe you are the only composer of your rank)…. I believe that by agreeing to his proposal you will acquire a true friend. It is not the difference of 250, but it is the sense on his part that you will cooperate with him. I am sure you know that there is an inferiority complex to overcome when a swing musician starts playing classical music.Footnote 68
Simon turned to Milhaud after contact with Hindemith was interrupted. Like Hindemith, Milhaud had already explored the clarinet in chamber music. Furthermore, Milhaud engaged with African American music and his compositions were known for featuring jazz idioms.Footnote 69 The latter, as mentioned above, may not have been as important to Goodman, but both factors—as well as both composers’ experience in working on commission—may have made them suitable candidates in Simon's eyes. With regard to Milhaud, Goodman may have also expressed his interest in Scaramouche beforehand, as a clarinet arrangement of it was requested alongside the new concerto.
Milhaud responded positively to Simon's letter of October 21, 1941, naming a price of $1,000 for the concerto and suggesting a 1-year reserve period for Goodman to perform it.Footnote 70 Simon countered with $750 and exclusivity until January 1944.Footnote 71 The guarantee of exclusive performance rights for a certain period was the norm and ranged from 2 to 3 years, with which, for instance, Bartók and Hindemith complied. Compared to other composers writing large-scale pieces for Goodman, Milhaud set the price somewhat lower. Hindemith estimated the fee for a concerto with orchestra at $2,000–4,000, and for the concerto by Copland, one of Goodman's subsequent commissions in 1947/48, $2,000 was agreed upon.Footnote 72 Compared to the fees Hindemith and Copland requested, Milhaud's initial request of $1,000 appears to have been a bargain but was still more than Goodman was willing to pay. Eventually, Milhaud accepted the partly disadvantageous conditions that Simon had mediated ($750, 2 years of exclusivity). The composer expressed high hopes for “admirable performances” and “great publicity” for his work, given Goodman's popularity, which would outweigh even the low payment.Footnote 73 Unfortunately for Milhaud, Goodman never performed the piece on stage, nor did he record it. The reasons for this remain unclear, because no statement by Goodman—either positive or negative—is known. Perhaps his busy schedule prevented further involvement with a new piece in the near future, as the request for an extension of the exclusive performance rights suggests.Footnote 74
With respect to compositional realization, Goodman (via Simon) provided Milhaud with some instructions concerning length (“about 20 minutes”) and instrumentation, as decribed by Simon: “Benny wouldn't want a big regular orchestra. Either a chamber orchestra, without clarinets, or only massive groups of strings, brass and, perhaps, percussion.” However these were “only suggestions, not prescriptions.”Footnote 75 Additionally, the composers often received a reference to Goodman's outstanding technical abilities, as Szigeti informed Bartók or Simon Milhaud.Footnote 76 Indeed, technical brilliance and virtuosic proficiency across both the low and high registers were hallmarks of Goodman's playing. The composers could easily appreciate this quality from Goodman's numerous recordings. As a result, they approached their compositions as if they could demand almost anything on the technical level.
There were no further stylistic guidelines, and Goodman did not interfere during the creation process. Only the finished score was delivered to the commissioner, who then sometimes made minor suggestions with regard to feasibility, probably with an eye toward a live performance. In the case of the Copland Concerto, for example, Goodman suggested some adjustments of particularly high notes toward the end of the piece that he was afraid would be difficult to hit. The initial version (Example 1) is preserved among Copland's sketches for the concerto at the Library of Congress, including a handwritten note at the top of the page: “1st version—later revised—Coda of Clarinet Concerto (too difficult for Benny Goodman).”Footnote 77 By this point, the performing clarinetist would have already invested extreme embouchure strength throughout the piece. I transcribed the revised (and final) version of that passage, as seen in Example 2, from the autograph piano score that Copland sent to Goodman, which is now held at Yale. Both music examples are notated in concert pitch, as Copland himself did.
Example 1. Aaron Copland, Clarinet Concerto, clarinet part, version 1 from the autograph piano score, in concert pitch, mm. 441–456. Transcribed from: Library of Congress, Aaron Copland, Clarinet Concerto Sketches, Notated Music, https://www.loc.gov/item/copland.sket0030/, accessed May 3, 2022; © 1949, 1952 The Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Inc. Copyright Renewed. Boosey & Hawkes, Inc., Sole Licensee; with courtesy of Boosey & Hawkes Bote & Bock, Berlin.
Example 2. Aaron Copland, Clarinet Concerto, clarinet part, version 2 from the autograph piano score, in concert pitch, mm. 441–456. Transcribed from: Yale University, MSS 53 Goodman Papers, box 2; © 1949, 1952 The Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Inc. Copyright Renewed. Boosey & Hawkes, Inc., Sole Licensee; with courtesy of Boosey & Hawkes Bote & Bock, Berlin.
A comparison of the two versions easily captures the simplification: More breaks, several eighth note figures simplified to quarter notes, the register partly lowered one octave. Although Copland had ascertained the feasibility level from listening to his client's recordings, Goodman distinguished between the requirements of an improvised solo, in which he occasionally bumped into a particularly high pitch, and those of a notated score, which required a certain tone at a certain time.Footnote 78 Goodman's wish to minimize the risk may have become especially pertinent when the premiere was set as a live radio broadcast in 1950 with the NBC Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Fritz Reiner.Footnote 79 An earlier experience may still have been fresh in Goodman's memory at the time: When invited in 1942 to participate in a performance of Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue with Toscanini conducting the NBC Symphony, Goodman, live on air, totally blew the famous clarinet solo at the beginning. Instead of the octave leap before the fermata in measure 10 (Example 3), a massive squeak sounded throughout the country.Footnote 80
Example 3. George Gershwin, Rhapsody in Blue, beginning of the clarinet part, in transposed pitch. Goodman squeaked in jumping from f2 to f3 in m. 10. Just the same leap is featured in Copland's first version of his Clarinet Concerto, m. 451 to m. 452 (see Example 1).
In 1950, Goodman played it safe with the Copland concerto. Even though everything went well, he took no risks with the final run and played note-by-note what should actually have been a glissando. It was not only Goodman's caution but also practical reasons that played a role in such decisions. He certainly used different reeds, perhaps even different mouthpieces, depending on where and what he was performing. On the swing stage, he probably preferred a softer reed and a wider opening between the reed and the mouthpiece, which would better allow him to bend notes, reach high pitches, and realize glissandi, which are generally challenging for the clarinet; harder reeds and smaller openings, which are common in the classical repertoire, limit this type of flexibility to provide more control over tone colors.Footnote 81 The Goodman Papers at Yale contain a typescript by Goodman entitled “My Concept of the Clarinet,” dated around December 1955, in which he describes his preferred material:
My mouthpiece, facing is long and open, similar to a Selmer HS. I always tend to use a medium soft reed, the exact shading of strength depending on whether I am playing chamber music, concerto, or with my own band. In playing against a rhythm and brass section, I would keep the reed a little farther from the soft side.Footnote 82
Without a close exchange with Goodman, the composers, some of whom had not engaged with the clarinet as a solo instrument before, were probably unaware of how such factors influenced the performance.
In the case of the Milhaud Concerto, Goodman never provided any feedback, although Simon had asked for prompt delivery of the finished score because Goodman was looking for pieces to perform in his upcoming concerts.Footnote 83 Although the composer eventually presented a concerto for full orchestra of approximately 12 minutes (thus not complying with the initial requests, which I described above), he at least delivered quickly (the autograph piano score in the Yale Music Library is dated “Milhaud/Mills, 10–22 Nov 1941”).Footnote 84
The paused project with Hindemith resumed 5 years later, resulting in the composer's only concerto for clarinet and orchestra. He eventually completed it in the fall of 1947 in Switzerland during his first postwar stay in Europe.Footnote 85 By 1949, Hindemith had grown impatient because Goodman, who had obtained exclusive rights for 3 years, still had not performed the piece. The eventual premiere was also not to Hindemith's liking, as it was part of a concert for students at the Academy of Music in Philadelphia in December 1950 with Goodman and the Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted by Eugene Ormandy.Footnote 86 Neither Hindemith, who was ill, nor his wife, who had witnessed a rehearsal, attended, but both were dismayed. Gertrude Hindemith wrote in a letter to her husband's publisher, Willy Strecker, about the rehearsal:
Unfortunately, and incomprehensibly, the concert was a “Student Concert,” and not generally advertised. Whoever made this clever arrangement for a world premiere performance I do not know.… We are shaking our heads.Footnote 87
In a letter to Ormandy, she recalled the event more than 2 years later, emphasizing that her husband was “rather disappointed with the treatment [Ormandy] gave the Clarinet Concerto,” which in Hindemith's eyes was “worth more than just one ‘First American’ performance at an afternoon youth concert.”Footnote 88 For the composer, it was not only the economic benefit of such a major commission that mattered, but also the chance to quickly reach a wide audience in the United States, as David Neumeyer notes in his introduction in the Hindemith Gesamtausgabe.Footnote 89 Hindemith presented “a large work, complex in its construction and with substantial technical requirements, as much as a display piece for composer and soloist.”Footnote 90 With the exception of Contrasts, Goodman commissioned only such large-scale works—that is, solo concertos with large orchestra. On the one hand, he recognized a lacuna in the clarinet repertoire, and he felt that he was the one who could, and even should, contribute here for the sake of his instrument. He expresses such a thought, for example, in the preface to the piano reduction of a concerto that Gordon Jenkins had written for him:
As a clarinetist I have been very concerned about the scarcity during recent years of new works for the instrument and the big orchestra. I've always felt it to be a matter of great importance to the serious student (as well as the seasoned soloist!) to be exposed to the refreshing challenge of learning and performing a new piece as a means of not only perfecting his technique but expanding and developing his understanding of the relationship between his instrument and the orchestra on the symphonic idiom.Footnote 91
On the other hand, this was the genre in which Goodman could most effectively showcase his skills as a soloist, just as he did with his big band. Even though he did not provide detailed instructions, the pieces were to a certain degree tailored to him and matched his strengths. Additionally, he had the world premiere. He could regularly introduce novelties to his audience as a performer capable of adapting his virtuosity to classical music and adapting to its standards. As a patron he would present his achievements in concerts or even on the radio and thus accessible to a broad public. Simon echoes this self-image of Goodman in a letter to Milhaud:
[…] he has made a considerable effort to present commissioned compositions. He honestly believes he is giving an impulse to contemporary composers […].Footnote 92
That the provision of financial resources to composers is just one part of what patrons contribute to musical production is common sense in the study of musical patronage. Equally important is enabling the music's performance and distribution. A performer of Goodman's rank would open the doors not only to concert halls but also to recording and radio studios. We have seen that the assurance of performances (in an appropriate setting) was a central issue for Hindemith and Milhaud. The latter eventually accepted an even lower fee and a longer reserve period to avoid jeopardizing the project.Footnote 93 Goodman held a position of power and the composers were aware of that. The correspondence with Bartók reveals that both Bartók and Szigeti perceived Goodman, the sponsor, as the decisive authority. Bartók even asked Szigeti to whom he should first send the completed work, “since the clarinetist, as commissioner, has certain rights of ownership” and should possibly have “the jus primae noctis.”Footnote 94 This wording even evokes a premodern hierarchy, just as between the aristocratic patron and their beneficiary. Eventually, Goodman would decide whether to perform the pieces. Here, the patron and businessman meet again. The former enriches his collection with big names. The second stocks up on resources, having them ready whenever required, similar to the big band arrangements in his book. In the case of Contrasts and the Copland Concerto, Goodman not only presented them frequently on stage but even recorded them. Today, they are part of most clarinetists’ portfolios. The Milhaud and Hindemith Concertos, however, received less attention from Goodman and subsequently from other clarinetists. Although the impact of performers on musical production and repertoire formation is still often underestimated, I argue that they should receive more serious attention, as they are the ultimate gatekeepers to the living repertoire—in Goodman's case reaching from the stage at Carnegie Hall to sport stadiums and via broadcasting stations into America's living rooms.
Appendix: Full translations by author of the quoted letters by Simon, Hindemith, and Milhaud, in chronological order
Eric Simon Correspondence, UCLA, box 3:
Simon (Zurich) to Milhaud (Paris), May 3, 1938 (carbon copy; orig. German):
Honored Maestro!
I have in front of me the letter you wrote to the “International Concert Bureau” in Vienna on February 17. It was about your Cantate de l'Enfant e de la Mère. Now, many things have happened in the world since that time. The consequence for us is that Stiedry is in America and [plans to] stay there, that of course the Pierrot lunaire is not being performed here. I—clarinetist, of the Pierrot Ensemble, and a member of the staff of the International Concert Bureau—am leaving Boulogne for New York on the 10th. I will see Stiedry, of course, and hope to realize in America what has become impossible in Europe.
I expect to be in Paris on Monday, May 9, and I would be very happy to have the opportunity to talk to you about your work. Could you be so kind as to let me know briefly how I can reach you on that day? I would be very grateful to you.
Hindemith Institute, Frankfurt:
Call number 3.319.1: Simon (New York) to Hindemith (New Haven), January 25, 1941 (photocopy; orig. German):
Dear and honored Maestro Hindemith, Do you still remember me? When I contacted you about playing Harold with “us,” the Vienna Concert Orchestra, on the occasion of the first performance of your Mathis (unfortunately, due to the recent change in German circumstances, nothing came of it); when we sat with the Hindemith specialist Trötzmüller in the hall of the Hotel Imperial? Anyway—I have been here for almost three years now, working as assistant conductor and clarinetist with Stiedry, among other things. One such other thing is that I am Benny Goodman's teacher and advisor on classical issues (you do know that he recently played the Mozart Clarinet Concerto with the Philharmonic). Benny is very ambitious and conscientious in this regard. He is looking for new pieces (you probably also know that Bartok wrote the trio with violin and piano for him). So he recently asked me who would and could write a clarinet concerto with orchestra for him. When I mentioned your name, he was very enthusiastic; he would like to meet you one day to discuss the matter. Would that be possible? Benny is essentially in New York right now, only he is usually on tour for more than half the week. How could a rendezvous be arranged?
I think it would be best if you wrote me when you will be back in New York at the next opportunity. I would then tell Benny, and he could then, if he is in town, accommodate you. Would that be all right with you?
Congratulations on your wonderful violin concerto, which I heard here recently.
Call number 3.319.2: Hindemith (New Haven) to Simon (New York), January 28, 1941 (photocopy; orig. German):
Dear Mr. Simon, many thanks for your letter. Basically, I am willing to write a clarinet concerto. If you would like to inform Mr. Goodman about the style of my clarinet works, you will find two recently published pieces at Associate Music Publishers: A clarinet sonata with piano and a quartet (clarinet, violin, cello, and piano). Of course, one would have to discuss everything in detail at some point. That could happen around February 15, when the Boston Symphony will be playing a new cello concerto of mine in New York; I'll be there around that time. If he is in a greater hurry, I would suggest a meeting here in New Haven.
Call number 3.319.6: Hindemith (New Haven) to Simon (New York), September 24, 1941 (photocopy; orig. German):
Dear Mr. Simon, many thanks for your message. The requested clarinet concerto can be ready on any date after the New Year, and in the instrumentation of the orchestra and the nature and duration of the piece, I want to be completely in accordance with the wishes of the commissioner. If he does not live too far from here, it would certainly be most practical if he came here once, so that everything can be discussed and settled.—Fee? For similar assignments in this country, my payments thus far have ranged from $2,000 to $4,000.—I'll be in New York tomorrow (Friday), and if I can answer any questions for you, you can find me at Associated Music Publishers all day except lunchtime.
Eric Simon Correspondence, UCLA, box 3:
Simon (New York) to Milhaud (Oakland), October 21, 1941 (carbon copy, orig. French):
Maybe you don't know that I am Benny Goodman's teacher for classical music. Talking with him, we agreed that it would be very interesting if we could have a contemporary concerto for clarinet and orchestra in the repertoire. I wonder if you would be interested in composing this work, and if so, if you could do it in the next few months, because Benny Goodman is going to start his big concert tour in January as a soloist with symphony orchestras (playing Mozart's concerto, among others), and he might suggest your concerto as an alternative. In case you are interested in this proposal, please be so kind as to answer me as soon as possible. I have also come to ask you something else: Would it be possible to adapt your Scaramouche for clarinet and orchestra? As far as I know, there is already an arrangement for saxophone and orchestra. It would be very interesting to be able to play this piece in addition to a great concerto.
Simon (New York) to Milhaud (Oakland), October 29, 1941 (carbon copy; orig. French):
I received your letter of 26 October and thank you very much. I mentioned it to Benny Goodman, who was very pleased with the interest you are showing him. With regard to the “business” question he proposes the following arrangement: He would pay you $750.00 on the terms you suggested. He would also like to have the exclusive performance rights until 1 January, 1944, being able to devote only part of the season to play as a soloist with symphony orchestras. One year would not be enough to explore all the possibilities. As for Scaramouche, Benny wants to get in touch with Elkan Vogel (perhaps he already has); he would very much like to make an arrangement of the piece for clarinet. Maybe I would help him a little (anonymously goes without saying). I would like to attempt a piano score of the version with clarinet (if it has not already been done with saxophone). I think that such a version (with clarinet) could be quite good. If you agree with this suggestion, would you be so kind as to notify your publisher? About the orchestral material he will follow your suggestion whatever it is. As for the concerto itself, it would be approximately 20 minutes long. Benny wouldn't want a big regular orchestra. Either a chamber orchestra (without clarinets), or only massive groups of strings, brass and, perhaps, percussion. The clarinet part could be very brilliant. Of course all these are only suggestions, not prescriptions. In case you agree with the conditions, B. would be very happy to sign the contract with you.
Milhaud (Oakland) to Simon (New York), November 2, 1941 (orig. French; I adopted the English version from a translation included in the archival folder and verified it with the original):
Thanks for your letter. I am very glad that the deal with Benny Goodman seems to work out alright. I shall send you a copy of the arrangement of Scaramouche for saxophone and piano (orchestral score and parts are for rent at Elkan Vogel). I am sure that it will be easy to make a clarinet part similar to the saxophone part. Concerning the concerto I accept with pleasure the suggestion to extend the exclusivity until January 1, 1944. As far as the commission is concerned, I was a little astonished that B.G. would not accept my price. I acknowledge the great pleasure it is for me to work for him, the assurance of admirable performances and great publicity for my work. Perhaps you could suggest to him in a nice way that I would like to extend the exclusivity without compensation, but that I am a little disappointed that he would also like to reduce the sum which I asked for. However, considering the great pleasure of writing a concerto for a great artist like him, if he does not want to do it otherwise, I accept his offer of $750. With regard to the orchestral parts, as it does not make any difference to him, I am considering a rental fee at some eventual publisher. When exactly does he want it? I would not like to be pressed too hard. I would have to put myself to work right away and I can do so having just finished an important work. Concerning the orchestration, I should make an orchestration practical for him. If he has to play it in a symphonic concert, wouldn't it be an inconvenience to hire a chamber orchestra? On the other hand, is it a work that he plans to play with his orchestra? I thought to write either for an orchestra of two (2 flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns, trumpets, trombones, harps, tympani, percussion and strings), or for an orchestra of one (flute, oboe, bassoon, horn, trumpet, trombone, harp, tymp., perc. and strings). I might even like the one in pairs. I don't really see why he doesn't want the clarinets in the orchestra. They are useful for the tutti. One does not suppress the violins in a violin concerto. I would avoid writing soli in the orchestra. Please talk to him seriously and tell me his suggestions. But quickly, because I have to start working immediately. One could make a contract on the following terms: 1. Exclusivity until January 1, 1944. 2. $500 upon signing the contract and the rest (250 if he does not accept my price, 500 if he would accept it!) when I send the score. 3. Rental of material from my publisher. I may come to New York at the end of December. I would be glad to see you.
Simon (New York) to Milhaud (Oakland), November 6, 1941 (carbon copy; orig. French):
I received your letter of November 2, and thank you very much. Benny today received the music of Scaramouche. He phoned me immediately and he seems to be crazy about the piece. We looked carefully at the clarinet part. I believe that it would be absolutely necessary to transpose the piece one fourth high, so that the clarinet part would read one tone lower than the saxophone part. That would be the most effective range. Since Benny likes the piece very much, I think he would want to make the effort to transpose the orchestra parts, and make the necessary changes. Benny would like to play Scaramouche on November 30 in Rochester. I already have his part transposed from the saxophone part. But there certainly remains the problem of preparing the orchestral parts and a new orchestral score. I would like to suggest that you mark in your score the changes you want, and that some collaborator of your publisher can redo the score according to your indications. If you don't know anyone to whom you could entrust this work, it would be a pleasure to do it myself. My handwriting is legible, although not calligraphic, and it would not be necessary to make a copy for the conductor. Benny asks if you could add some instruments to the Samba, letting them play alone a few bars in advance. Score and parts could be ready in two weeks, so that it would be possible to play the work on November 30. For the orchestration of the concerto, do as you wish. The main thing is that you are at your ease. Take double wind instruments, or single wind instruments, with or without clarinet; we know that everything you do will be fine. Benny would like to have the concerto “as soon as possible.” He has some engagements with symphony orchestras after the New Year (Cleveland, Pittsburgh etc.) and we would love to have the first performance in one of these concerts. I would like to suggest that you send the clarinet part, when you have finished a movement, before you have it orchestrated. Maybe you could send it with a copy of the particell, so we can start studying while you are composing. In any case I don't want you to feel rushed. If the concerto is not ready for January, it will be ready for another occasion. Please allow me to say a few words about your fees. If Benny didn't want to pay the full price you asked for, it wasn't to bargain. He has made arrangements with other composers (although I believe you are the only composer of your rank), and he has made a considerable effort to present commissioned compositions. He honestly believes he is giving an impulse to contemporary composers—and on the other hand he doesn't earn a lot of money for his symphonic engagements. He plays them, because he truly likes serious music. Benny has a very generous character, but I wouldn't advise you to insist on making him pay the difference. I believe that by agreeing to his proposal you will acquire a true friend. It is not the difference of 250, but it is the sense on his part that you will cooperate with him. I am sure you know that there is an inferiority complex to overcome when a swing musician starts playing classical music. I believe that there are no more obstacles to start your work. We are sure it will be wonderful. Benny is waiting for your contract. If you want to write to him, his address is: 3 East 69th St., New York City. In case there are any technical questions (copy of the score, parts of Scaramouche, agreement with your publisher, etc.), please write or telegraph me.
Milhaud (Oakland) to Simon (New York), November 8, 1941 (orig. English):
transposition impossible without complete new orchestration will write new clarinet part in very similar style of the saxaphon [sic] one will send it tuesday air mail
Milhaud (Oakland) to Simon (New York), November 8, 1941 (orig. French):
I received your letter this morning. I immediately looked at the orchestral score of Scaramouche. It is impossible to transpose by a fourth without redoing everything. I telegraphed you right away and made a clarinet part from the saxophone part but changed many things. I'll send it to you. I hope it will be ok. There will be no need to change the orchestration or the material. You only have to contact Elkan Vogel to rent the orchestra material. I also send Elkan Vogel a copy of the new clarinet part. I hope that Benny Goodman will be pleased with this solution and that he will play this work often and maybe make a record. Tell me if he plays it on the 30th in Rochester. The concerto contract is all right. I'll work on it from tomorrow and try to be fast. But from the 12th of December I'm traveling and it won't be practical. Anyway I will do my best. I'll send the music as soon as I'm done. Do you want to tell B. G. that I will write to him on the following basis. Compositions of a clarinet concerto $750 (paying $500 in advance. $250 when the score is delivered). Exclusivity of performance until January 1, 1944. The orchestral material and the score must be rented from my eventual publisher.
Milhaud (Oakland) to Simon (New York), November 24, 1941 (orig. French):
I've been working for two weeks without a break and the concerto is coming along very well. I'm working on the finale. But I am worried about your silence and that of B.G. You didn't answer my telegram. Why? The composition of the concerto will be finished this week and you can receive it by the end of the week. But I would like to have this matter sorted out in advance. So ask Benny Goodman to send me my contract. I never even knew if you received the arrangement of Scaramouche for clarinet. I was very happy to make this transcript for B.G. but couldn't tell if he had received it. Telegraph me.
Milhaud to Simon, March 17, 1942 (orig. French):
Benny finally sent the last check! He told me that he has no time for the concerto and requested another year of exclusivity (until January 1, 1945). I have just written to him to remind him that he made me write this concerto at full speed because he was so keen to play it. I gave him an exclusivity of 2 years. I cannot do more. But if he plays it enough during these two years, then maybe he will be able to make a special arrangement for 1944 with my publisher (Elkan Vogel) if he guarantees a certain number of performances. But for the moment I cannot modify our contract. Do you know when he's going to play it?
Hindemith Institute, Frankfurt:
Call number 3.319.7: Simon (Sherman, Conn.[?]) to Kurt von Fischer (Erlenbach), February 26, 1970 (photocopy; orig. German):
I recently read a note in the N.Y. Times regarding the upcoming Hindemith edition. In this regard, I would like to send you my correspondence with H.[indemith]. At that time, I was Benny Goodman's teacher in classical music and suggested that he have Hindemith write a concerto for him. The real fact is that after the invasion of Russia in the summer of 1941, Benny wanted to have nothing to do with anything that was German, despite Hindemith's complete integrity and Jewish wife. Milhaud and Copland wrote concertos for him at that time (Milhaud at my instigation). As you know, H. wrote a concerto for G. in 1947, after the waves had calmed down and the countries were destroyed.
Elisabeth Reisinger is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna and the principal investigator of the research project “Performers as Commissioners of New Music in the Twentieth Century.” She studied musicology and history at the University of Vienna, where she was engaged in several research projects on court music in Germany during the late eighteenth century. In 2019, Reisinger was a postdoctoral fellow at the Austrian Historical Institute in Rome and subsequently at Harvard University's Department of Music. Since 2017, she has been secretary general of the Austrian Society for Musicology.
