[Dixielandjazz] "Carnegie Hall Treasures" reviewed - New York Times, December 4, 2011

[Robert Ringwald]

I've been on the stage of Carnegie Hall.  Unfortunately it was not to play.  Molly and I were sitting behind the band at the Turk Murphy, Jim Cullum concert.  From back there, all I could hear was the rhythm section and the horns bouncing off the back wall a split second later.  

During the intermission I told Cullum and he took us, Molly and me,  up to his box.  The sound was great from there.  

I cannot believe in the following article that the Benny Goodman 1938 concert was not even mentioned.  

--Bob Ringwald 

*******    

Getting to Carnegie Hall
by Phillip Lopate
New York Times, December 4, 2011
To celebrate the 120th birthday of Carnegie Hall, whose very name is synonymous with
musical excellence, its overseers have put together a lavishly illustrated volume
and accompanying trove of memorabilia. "Carnegie Hall Treasures" (Harper Design/HarperCollins,
$75), by Tim Page and the Carnegie Hall staff, is a sort of glorified publicity kit
-- the kind of thing you might give donors as a souvenir or sell to members of the
public who wish they had been there. Do not look for complexity, skepticism or critical
analysis, much less sober institutional history. What we have here is an orgy of
self-congratulation that is both awkward and touching.
The book opens with no less than three prefaces: one by Carnegie Hall's chairman,
Sanford I. Weill, and its executive and artistic director, Clive Gillinson; another
by the music critic Tim Page, who also writes the introduction; and a third (officially
a "foreword") by the pianist Emanuel Ax. Page, normally an astute critic, is here
playing the role of corporate cheerleader and puffmeister: "'Carnegie Hall Treasures'
is not a traditional history. No attempt has been made to be all-inclusive, and many
significant artists who have appeared at Carnegie Hall cannot be commemorated here.
Instead, consider this volume a keepsake of a beautiful and noble place in the midst
of America's largest city -- a place to which generations have come for celebration
and solace, in times of joy and trouble, with new loves and fondly remembered elders."
The once-over-lightly historical account that follows tells how the millionaire philanthropist
Andrew Carnegie, on a honeymoon ocean liner with his younger, musically inclined
wife, Louise, met the New York conductor Walter Damrosch, and both persuaded him
to finance the construction of a first-class symphony hall; how it was built for
a million dollars and opened in 1891; how the architect, William Tuthill, had never
built an auditorium but came up with a superb acoustic environment; how the hall
became home to a procession of illustrious classical musicians, novelty acts, dancers,
speakers, pop stars and jazz artists, until 1957, when it faced demolition for the
usual Manhattan real estate reasons; how it hung by a thread for years until the
violinist Isaac Stern spearheaded a successful campaign to preserve the venerable
establishment for the foreseeable future.
It would be nice to have heard a little more about what architectural decisions made
the hall so acoustically right, or why the New York Philharmonic left its home in
Carnegie Hall for Lincoln Center, beyond the assertion that Robert Moses wanted it
that way. Nor do we hear anything about the abortive recent attempts to reunite the
Philharmonic with Carnegie Hall. Nor is any context offered to compare it with other
great symphony halls of the world.
Instead we are constantly told that Carnegie Hall is unique. "Everywhere in the world,
music enhances a hall, with one exception. Carnegie Hall enhances the music," Stern
is quoted. No explanation, just reiteration. The operative word is "magic," repeated
so often as to seem self-hypnotic, incantatory. Martha Graham writes in a letter
of thanks that "the strange spirit and magic of Carnegie Hall hovered over us." Frank
Sinatra sends a note of appreciation on the Hall's 100th anniversary: "Something
magical happens when stepping on to the hallowed Carnegie Hall stage." The aura is
extended from the hall to its various performers. In caption paragraphs accompanying
pictures of individual artists, we are told that Leopold Stokowski was a "wizard"
who took over "the Philadelphia Orchestra and made it a thing of magic." A photo
of Leonard Bernstein conducting a Young People's concert elicits the comment: "A
bewitched child stands in the Carnegie Hall aisles, looking up at the magical man
on the stage." In short, it is the myth of Carnegie Hall that is being preserved
here -- the myth that gave rise to a 1947 Hollywood movie called "Carnegie Hall,"
with an all-star cast that included Stokowski, Arthur Rubinstein, Ezio Pinza, Jan
Peerce and Jascha Heifetz. Much might have been said about the declining place of
classical music in American culture, from the days when soloists had huge followings
to the more marginal present. That subject is evaded, with the blithe assurance:
"What is most exhilarating is the knowledge that its greatest days are yet to come."
But words are not the point here. The writing, such as it is, is there to sop up
space left over from the priceless photographs, album covers and other images. Then
there's that memorabilia box: postcards, playbills, thank-you notes, brochures, each
item an impeccable facsimile of the original. The very notion of reproduced, new-minted
memorabilia is strange, since one would think the attraction in saving a playbill
or ticket stub is as an authentic aide-memoire, to yellow with age. Still, the actual
box of separate pieces proves irresistible, including a row of tickets for diva concerts
in 1972 (Anna Moffo, Leontyne Price, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Montserrat Caballe, Marilyn
Horne, Birgit Nilsson); a stunning booklet from a Billie Holiday concert ("Miss Holiday's
program will be impromptu," followed by the titles of songs she might or might not
sing); a Symphony Search coloring book; playbills for Johnny Cash, John Philip Sousa,
the Society of American Magicians, Admiral Byrd's lecture, etc. Part of what makes
this printed matter so delicious is the promise of happiness -- like a mouthwatering
poster, for jazz fans, of a New Year's Eve concert that featured Sonny Rollins, John
Coltrane, Thelonious Monk and Nina Simone, tickets ranging from $3 to $5, with the
added come-on "The bar at Carnegie Hall will be open." The changing fashions in typeface
and graphic design have a fascination all their own. With such charming graphics
adorning the original posters and playbills, it's a pity the book itself was given
such a loud, strident design -- acidic-­colored stripes on black backgrounds. If
the design tries too hard, so does the package as a whole. One wants to say: Relax,
Carnegie Hall, we love you!


--Bob Ringwald
www.ringwald.com
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