Sergey Prokofiev
1952-54
First recordings for Boston Records include a disc of Spanish & Latin American music. And then Jorge revives Prokofiev's spiky 2nd concerto.
At this time, Bolet's agents from 1950 onwards were Mertens, Parmelee & Brown, Columbia Artists Management, 113 W.57th Street, NY.
His address in 1951 was 71, Washington Square, New York City 10012, an apartment he shared with his partner and business manager Tex Compton.
In the 1840s, New York City's elite established Washington Square, far from the increasingly commercial environment of Lower Manhattan, as the address of choice. The row of Greek Revival town houses on either side of Fifth Avenue presented the unified and dignified appearance of privilege. The houses on the square came to represent the gentility of a bygone age.
Henry James, whose grandmother lived at 18 Washington Square North, depicted this nostalgic view in his 1880 novel, Washington Square.
Airs of Spain, 1952
At some time during 1952 Bolet recorded some Spanish and Latin-American music for Boston Records, a new label in 1951, founded by the French horn player of the Boston Symphony, James Stagliano.
The disc included music by de Falla, Albeniz and selections of Cuban composer Lecuona - ...Y la Negra Bailaba! and Danza de los Nañigos from his Danzas afro-cubanos. This release was announced in the Schwann Long Playing Record Catalog of December 1952. This was Bolet’s first commercial recording.
'Mr. Bolet’s first record [see below] contains a number of selections that have met with rare favor with his recital audiences. In several of these selections his “silken touch and luxuriously rippling technique" are much in evidence. On his second disc his Cuban background stands him in good stead and this Spanish music comes to us with fine traditional flavor. We shall be looking forward to Mr. Bolet’s future recordings, and we rather expect that they will give us something of a more substantial character; perhaps
a little Mozart or Beethoven.'
(The New Records, March 1954, a monthly bulletin published by Philadelphia record retailer H. Royer Smith.)
Another review had a recommendation. 'No one interested in Spanish piano music should ignore the George Copeland (1882-1971) entries in this field. A highly individual pianist, given to intensely personal interpretations, his MGM [1951] recordings are more imaginative in repertoire, richer in performance and better tonally than the above collections [Bolet and Pennario]. R.E. in High Fidelity (December 1953)
That disc included rarities such as: Homenaje A La Jota (Joaquim Nin y Castellanos) and Danza De La Hoguera (Gustavo Pittaluga). Copeland became an Iberian specialist, performing works of Isaac Albéniz, Manuel de Falla, Enrique Granados, and others throughout the United States and Europe. In 1909, he introduced three of Albéniz's Iberia suite to the United States, playing "El Albaicín," "Malaga", and "Triana" in Boston. He quickly dropped these works from his repertoire, only including "El Polo" from the "Iberia" suite in his programmes.
There was a second disc for Boston Records (first listed in Schwann edition of January, 1953) which included some Camille Saint-Saëns, his brilliant Éude en forme de valse, Op. 52, No. 6. (These recordings are now available on the APR label.) Francis Crociata has offered some speculation about the Boston recordings. ‘The Boston label was the inspiration of James Stagliano, the Boston Symphony's principal horn in the early 1950s. He founded the label mainly to record solo and ensemble instrumental performances by himself and his BSO colleagues, but branched out to record under-represented soloists like Jorge who happened to have several successful BSO engagements from 1951-1954 - he didn't have an exclusive contract with his first label, Don Gabor's Remington.’ In a High Fidelity advert of January 1954, Boston Records give as their address Symphony Chambers, 246 Huntington Avenue, Boston.
In 1953 - date unknown - Jorge was in Mastertone Recording Studio, New York City, New York [?] making a studio recording for Remington Records: Chopin's Scherzi, No.1 in B minor, Op.20, No.2 in B-flat minor, Op.31, Scherzo No.3 in C-sharp minor, Op.39, and No.4 in E major, Op.54. Christian Johansson has said: 'Remington announced Bolet had been added to their roster in the summer of 1953, so this recording was presumably made around that time. While being Bolet’s first recording for Remington, it was released after the Prokofiev second concerto, in mid 1956.'
Ernesto Lecuona y Casado was born in Guanabacoa, Cuba on Cereria Street (today Estrada Palma). Although his birth certificate and Cuban passport have 6th August 1895 for his date of birth, Lecuona always celebrated it as 7th August 1896. He had graduated from the Conservatorio Nacional Hubert de Blanck (one of Jorge’s early mentors) in Havana with a gold medal at the age of seventeen.
He was a guest of Amelia Solberg de Hoskinson – one of Bolet’s important early patrons - when a cat on a nearby platform began miaowing at him and the table guests incessantly disturbing everyone. Not to lose the moment, Lecuona later that evening improvised a danza at the piano, imitating the event. It is full of puttering cat walks, miaowing and mischievous cat paw gestures. In September 1925, at the request of Lecuona, a foundation called Antiguos Alumnos de Blanck was created. It was initially chaired by Amelia Solberg de Hoskinson and held its inaugural concert on 24 March 1926 at the Sala Espadero.
'Two Horowitzes and four Rubinsteins rolled into one.'
On Thursday, 6 March, 1952 Jorge gave a recital that was reviewed by the Omak Chronicle, Washington State, under the heading ‘Jorge Bolet presents difficult pieces... some of the most difficult ever written'. At the close of the concert he told his audience: ‘You are a wonderful audience and this is a wonderful, majestic, beautiful country.’ He received baskets of flowers, a boutonnière which the Nelson Florist Shop presented to him and a box of beautifully gift-wrapped Okanagan apples from the local high school girls. In the Schwanda fantasy, ‘he ripped through it like two Horowitzes and four Rubinsteins rolled into one.'
Tucson Daily Citizen, 4 Apr 1952 (Tucson, Arizona)
After his recital of 3 April in the Temple of Music (incl. Weinberger/Chasins' lively "Schwanda the Bagpiper"), Jorge paid tribute to Mrs Elizabeth Healy who had helped launch him upon his career many years ago. "Located in historic downtown Tucson, the Temple of Music and Art is a refurbished 1927 theatre, built in the Spanish Colonial style that flavors so much of Tucson." He played in Tucson again on 13 April 1953 and 26 February 1958.
In Ann Arbor, Michigan on 4 May 1952 he performed for the University Musical Society.
This was Beethoven’s sublime fourth piano concerto in G major with the Philadelphia Orchestra under Thor Johnson, the conductor on the Prokofiev recording. Jorge was always very willing to replace artists. Here it is the First Lady of Brazilian pianists, Guiomar Novaes, who was indisposed. It was a big programme with Walton’s gargantuan Belshazzar’s Feast (surprisingly) in the first half.
This Beethoven concerto was quite a feature of Bolet’s early years. This concerto was premiered in March 1807 at a private concert of the home of Prince Franz Joseph von Lobkowitz. (The Coriolan Overture and the Fourth Symphony were premiered in that same concert.) However, the public premiere was not until 22 December 1808 in Vienna at the Theater an der Wien. Beethoven again took the stage as soloist. The Lobkowicz family (Lobkovicové in modern Czech, sg. z Lobkovic; Lobkowitz in German) dated back to the 14th century and was one of the oldest Bohemian noble families. The first Lobkowiczs were mentioned as members of the gentry of north-eastern Bohemia.
Hear it here in a performance of 15/16 October 1959 in Detroit with conductor Paul Paray.
A tour of Canada, October 1952
Bolet toured Canada in the autumn of 1952. Monday 6 October 1952, Théâtre Cartier, Montréal: recital on his first tour of Canada as reported in La Voix de Shawinigan 10.10.52. Gilles Boyer is not too impressed with the Liszt sonata as a piece of music (so he'd not agree with the legendary Austrian pianist Alfred Brendel that it is the greatest sonata after Beethoven). 'Le compositeur prennait des détours inutiles pour dire si peu.' (The composer takes useless detours to say so little). Schumann's Fanstasiestücke are described as 'quelque peu embrouillé' (a little confused); some Debussy preludes were more pleasing; an encore of Chopin's Minute Waltz is described as having gained nothing in Godowsky's elaborate reworking. In a lukewarm conclusion, Boyer describes the pianist as 'interesting to hear'.
8 October 1952, 8:30pm, Centre Paroissial Thetford Mines, a city in south-central Quebec. Le Nouvelliste 14.10.52 informs us that among recent guests at the Cascade Inn, a famous hotel in Shawinigan (on a small hill near the centre of the town, in Neo Tudor style) were Jorge Bolet and Tex Compton from New York.
And Jorge appeared in Vernon, British Columbia, Canada the following autumn of 1953. 'Just over 70 years ago, some influential members of Vernon decided to form an association that would focus on bringing classical and world music and dance to the North Okanagan – the North Okanagan Community Concert Association (NOCCA). However, the only venue available was the Vernon School and there was no piano to speak of.
'In the fall [autumn] of 1953, the first performer was Cuban-American pianist Jorge Bolet, who had the foresight to bring his own piano which he towed behind his vehicle. Joey Karen, one of the founders of NOCCA, remembered that she was unable to attend the premiere as she was delivering her daughter at the Vernon Jubilee Hospital, but did observe Bolet departing Vernon the next day heading south with his piano in tow.
But NOCCA needed a suitable piano.
On a trip to London, England, Dr. McMurtry of Vernon heard of a restored grand piano at the Steinway factory in Hamburg. After several telegrams and much discussion, it was decided to purchase the Steinway D9 concert grand originally built in 1886 and fully reconditioned in 1953. (Vernon Morning Star 13.8.2023)
He will perform at Texas Christian University (TCU) Ed Landreth auditorium. He is being presented by Howard Griffin, music consultant of the Masters of Tomorrow concert, under the Junior League and the TCU School of Fine Arts.
Published in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram morning edition, 3 November, 1950.
Cuban Politics 1952
On 10 March 1952 in Havana, Fulgencio Batista y Zaldívar seized power in a military coup. Declaring himself president, Batista cancelled the planned presidential elections. Fidel Castro was deprived of being elected in his run for office by Batista's move, and like many others, considered it a one-man dictatorship.Batista moved to the right, solidifying ties with both the wealthy elite and the United States, severing diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union, suppressing trade unions and persecuting Cuban socialist groups. Intent on opposing Batista, Castro brought several legal cases against the government, but these came to nothing, and Castro began thinking of alternate ways to oust the regime. He formed a group called "The Movement" which operated along a clandestine cell system, publishing underground newspaper El Acusador (The Accuser), while arming and training anti-Batista recruits. Castro stockpiled weapons for a planned attack on the Moncada Barracks, a military garrison outside Santiago de Cuba, Oriente. Castro's militants intended to dress in army uniforms and arrive at the base on 25 July, seizing control and raiding the armoury before reinforcements arrived. Supplied with new weaponry, Castro intended to spark a revolution among Oriente's impoverished cane cutters and promote further uprisings. Castro's plan emulated those of the 19th-century Cuban independence fighters who had raided Spanish barracks; Castro saw himself as the heir to independence leader José Martí. [Coltman 2003, pp. 57–75] The attack took place on 26 July 1953, but ran into trouble; 3 of the 16 cars that had set out from Santiago failed to get there. Reaching the barracks, the alarm was raised, with most of the rebels pinned down by machine gun fire. Four were killed before Castro ordered a retreat. Some rebels took over a civilian hospital; subsequently stormed by government soldiers, the rebels were rounded up, tortured and 22 were executed without trial. Accompanied by 19 comrades, Castro set out for Gran Piedra in the rugged Sierra Maestra mountains several kilometres to the north, where they could establish a guerrilla base.[Coltman 2003, 82-83] Responding to the attack, Batista's government proclaimed martial law, ordering a violent crackdown on dissent, and imposing strict media censorship. The government broadcast misinformation about the event, claiming that the rebels were communists who had killed hospital patients, although news and photographs of the army's use of torture and summary executions in Oriente soon spread, causing widespread public and some governmental disapproval. [Coltman 84] Over the following days, the rebels were rounded up; some were executed and others—including Castro—transported to a prison north of Santiago. The trial embarrassed the army by revealing that they had tortured suspects, after which they tried unsuccessfully to prevent Castro from testifying any further, claiming he was too ill. The trial ended on 5 October, with the acquittal of most defendants; 55 were sentenced to prison terms of between 7 months and 13 years. Castro was sentenced on 16 October to 15 years' imprisonment in the hospital wing of the Model Prison (Presidio Modelo), a relatively comfortable and modern institution on the Isla de Pinos. Imprisoned with 25 comrades, Castro renamed his group the "26th of July Movement" (MR-26-7) in memory of the Moncada attack's date, and formed a school for prisoners. He read widely, enjoying the works of Marx, Lenin, and Martí but also reading books by Freud, Kant, Shakespeare, Munthe, Maugham, and Dostoyevsky, analysing them within a Marxist framework. [Coltman 2003, 93-94] Author Graham Greene recalls that revolutionary Haydée Santamaría had been taken by the police to see the blinded and castrated corpse of her former fiancé (Boris Luís Santa Coloma) after his torture and murder for taking part in the attack on the Moncada barracks in 1953. (Her brother Abel had been tortured and murdered at the same time.) Greene notes quietly: “I remembered that story when the wife of the Spanish Ambassador spoke to me of Batista’s social charm.”
Towards Prokofiev
Early in the new year, Bolet had been on tour in Central America/Caribbean. A passenger manifest shows that he arrived in San Juan, Puerto Rico on 7 February 1953 on Pan Am World Airways flight 204 from Caracas, Venezuela (Maiquetia, the airport south-east of the city).
Hemerografía musical venezolana del siglo XX (February,1953) states that Jorge had performed two concerts in the Teatro Municipal [Tuesday 3 and Friday 6] in honour of José Martí (b.1853), who is considered a Cuban national hero because of his role in the liberation of his country from Spain. The 3rd was a recital of Beethoven, Brahms, Liszt, Chopin and Rachmaninoff; on the 6th, with conductor Ángel Sauce (1911-1995) and the Orquesta Sinfónica Venezuela he performed the Schumann concerto and the Paganini Variations of Rachmaninoff; Beethoven's Prometheus overture and Debussy's Suite Iberia made up the rest [Revista Nacional de Cultura, March-April 1953: Vol 14 Iss 97].
The Cuban author Alejo Carpentier (1904-1980) wrote an article - dated 10 February 1953 - "Sobre un concierto de Jorge Bolet con la Orquesta Sinfónica de Venezuela. Su interpretaciòn de Rapsodia sobre un tema de Paganini, de Rachmaninoff".
(As well as being a novelist, Carpentier was also a musicologist, an essayist, and a playwright. Among the first practitioners of the style known as “magic realism,” he exerted a decisive influence on the works of younger Latin American writers such as Gabriel García Márquez. Living in Caracas from 1945, he returned to Havana in 1959 to join the victorious Cuban revolution. He would remain faithful to Fidel Castro’s régime, serving as a Cuban diplomat in Paris from the middle 1960s until his death.)
During the 1952-3 season (possibly on this tour) Jorge was invited by the Amigos de la Música (Bogotá, Colombia) to perform. Other artists included violinists Isaac Stern, Szymon Goldberg, Mischa Elman, and the Budapest Quartet.
In the first week of January 1953, Bolet made his San Francisco debut with Prokofiev's second piano concerto. In The Jewish News of Northern California, 9 January 1953, Joseph S. Birkind mused:
'Last week’s symphony program brought to light the interesting fact that in 17 years the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra had never had occasion to play the music of Ildebrando Pizzetti, one of Italy’s leading composers, now in his seventies and known throughout Europe as an important figure in modern music. Erich Leinsdorf, the third of this season’s visiting conductors, brought us Pizzetti’s “Rondo Veneziano,” a pleasantly diverting and brilliantly scored work. (...) Pianist Bolet, with precise support from Leinsdorf and the orchestra, demonstrated that his is a pianistic talent of no mean order, and his playing was such as to suggest his appearance again with other unfamiliar masterpieces. Why shouldn’t he play Schoenberg’s concerto, for instance, or Hindemith’s, neither of which, to my knowledge, have appeared on our programs?'
Venezuelan musical life in the 1950s
Paul Pimsleur (Variety, August 1956) wrote that "in Venezuela the boom is on. Money is gushing in from oil. Earning and spending is freer in Caracas than any other city in South America; big influx of Europeans. Classical music is not a major preoccupation and has thus lagged far behind the general upsurge. In Caracas, the important manager is Enrique de Quesada, son of the Havana booking king. Booking is done via papa; there is no series in Caracas, each event is sold separately.
In Bogotá (Colombia), Ismael Arensburg, agent for Quesada, is the leading impresario. He presents 8/10 artists per season in the Teatro Colón, which seats 1,000. The hotel situation is quite rough, but the Continental is excellent and will make a good deal. The musical life of Lima, Peru is quite feeble. See further on the general page on Latin American concert life
The Charleston Gazette, 20 January 1953 (Charleston, West Virginia) reports on a recital of 19th in the Municipal auditorium: Bolet Recital Full of Polish, Lacked Warmth. Bayard F. Ennis says the Liszt Sonata is 'a work too full of bombast to provide much pleasure', and that Bolet 'does not have much in the way of tonal gradations between loud and soft'.
'Bolet needs his robust health, for last year he traveled 45,000 miles, made 67 concert and orchestral appearance in 38 states.' Eureka Humboldt Standard, 14 Mar 1953 (Eureka, California)
Le Mars Globe-Post, Iowa 30 April 1953 advertises a concert on Sunday 10 May at 4pm with Sioux SO in Sioux City Municipal Auditorium: Tchaikovsky 1. This was a benefit concert, ending with selections from Oklahoma and - appropriately? - a Rhumba (Cuban Holiday) by Donald Phillips
In the spring of 1953 he had a concert at the Hollywood Bowl which was described by Aurelio de la Vega as ‘a climax, one of Bolet’s biggest triumphs’. Aurelio de la Vega (1925-2022) was a Cuban-American composer, lecturer, essayist, and poet. Born in Havana, he went on to become Professor of Music at the University of Oriente, Santiago de Cuba, 1953-1959; treasurer, Cuban Section of the Inter-American Music Association (Caracas), 1955–1958; vice-president, Havana Philharmonic Orchestra (1956–1957), he toured the United States as lecturer (1952–1954) and settled in Los Angeles in 1959, becoming an American citizen in 1966. He was a personal friend of both Jorge and his brother Alberto.
Jorge gave the first Los Angeles Philharmonic performance of the Prokofiev concerto on August 11, 1953, with Erich Leinsdorf conducting.
'It was in Cincinnati, one and one half years ago [9 January, 1953] - writes The Michigan Daily, 13 July 1954 - that Jorge Bolet made perhaps his greatest triumph. After his performance of the Rachmaninoff Concerto No. 3, the usually apathetic Friday afternoon audience gave him an ovation that was described by old-timers as the loudest and most prolonged they had ever heard at the concerts. Bolet admitted that he was almost unnerved by the newspaper notices the next day, "which led people to expect some super-colossal Horowitz." When the concert was repeated the next day, Cincinnati's Music Hall was entirely sold out, and the performance of the concerto received the same ovation that it had the previous day.'
August 1953: Jorge Bolet faces a busy schedule this summer. On August 2 he will play at Tanglewood under Pierre Monteux, on Aug. 8 at the Brevard Festival (North Carolina), on Aug. 11 under Erich Leinsdorf in the Hollywood Bowl, and on Aug. 16 in a joint appearance with Jennie Tourel, soprano, in San Rafael, California. Mr. Bolet recently signed an exclusive contract with Remington Records. He will begin his annual fall tour on Oct. 12." (Musical America 8/1953).
On Saturday 8 August 1953, Jorge played Rachmaninoff 3 with Brevard Festival Orchestra and James Christian Pfohl. The Transylvania Times added: 'And a word for the girls - Mr Bolet is exceedingly handsome in his publicity photographs'. The concert was ar the beautiful Transylvania Music Camp, in the shadow of Mt Pisgah. Christine M. Baermann for The Waynesville Mountaineer (13 August) said that JB was somewhat nervous about the evening performance because of the dampness after a summer storm. Students had kept three hair-dryers full blast on the felt pads all afternoon. She enjoyed the fireworks of the concerto, but longed for “musician’s music”, Beethoven or Chopin.
16 August 1953: Jennie Tourel, leading mezzo soprano of the Metropolitan Opera Association, and Jorge Bolet, internationally famous pianist, will give a joint recital in Forest Meadows, Dominican College, San Rafael, Sunday afternoon, August 16, at 3 o’clock. The spectacular career of Jorge Bolet has reached new heights in the past few seasons. Last season he made his first appearance with the San Francisco Symphony and added new laurels to his already impressive career. The gates of Forest Meadows open at 1 o’clock. Sausalito News 6.8.53
Ms Tourel (1900-1973) was born in Vitebsk in the Russian Empire (now in Belarus). In 1951 she created the role of Baba the Turk in Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress. She made her American début at the Chicago Civic Opera in Ernest Moret's Lorenzaccio in 1930. Her career at the Metropolitan Opera was actually brief: she made her début in May 1937, as Mignon, and appeared for a few seasons in the 1940s as Rosina, Adalgisa and Carmen.
Spokane Daily Chronicle [Washington State] 24 October 1953
'Jorge Bolet appears Monday with the Spokane Phil. under Harold Paul Whelan [Brahms Concerto No. 2 in B flat] ‘He travels with his own $7000 concert grand piano. Bolet, who has a tour of some 65 concerts this season, is traveling by car and the piano follows him in its own especially designed trailer. Manufacturers of the piano send a tuner to each city before a concert to assure tonal perfection.’
Jorge Bolet conducts again? (16 November 1953)
On 29 July, 1953, the Alkázar Theater was officially inaugurated on Avenida de la Libertad in Camagüey. It was undoubtedly one of the best of its kind in the interior of Cuba. It belonged to the Mola e Hijos Company, which also had the Avellaneda, Guerrero, América and Camagüey theaters under its jurisdiction (Pavel Rovelo writes). At the same time, the Camagüey Concert Society, a prestigious artistic institution chaired by urologist Dr. Chalón Rodríguez Salinas, met at the Alkázar Theater, in an exclusive performance for its members, with the beautiful ballet by the eminent Cuban dancer Alicia Alonso, Cuban glory, who was already triumphantly touring Europe and America, reaping the most unfading laurels. In the first part, Alicia Alonso presented the pas de deux from the ballet Don Quixote , with music by Ludwig Minkus and choreography by Marius Petipa , and in the second part, the ballet Giselle in two acts, with music by maestro Adolf Adam and choreography by Coralli and Perrot , whose brilliant interpretation granted the Cuban dancer stardom in New York and made her one of the first dancers in the world. The orchestra was conducted by maestro Jorge Bolet . Dr. Rodríguez Salinas stated that all the seats in the theatre would be occupied by the members and that there would be no seats available for any passers-by or guest. It was an unforgettable night for the presentation of Alicia Alonso at the Alkázar theatre: the night of 16 November, 1953, at nine o'clock.
In April 1953, Bolet finally recorded Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor Op. 16 with the Cincinnati SO under Thor Johnson. The recording was released in December 1954. It had been taped in Cincinnati's Music Hall, supervised by Laszlo Halasz. It was re-released in 1974 on Turnabout in electronic stereo (coupled with Prokofiev's 5th Concerto played by Alfred Brendel and the Vienna State Opera Orchestra conducted by Jonathan Sternberg).
'The first-ever recording of Prokofiev’s malignant, ferociously demanding Second Concerto is of so much more than documentary interest.'
'This was a landmark recording in that it was the first recording ever made of this work. Even today, it is considered one of the greatest recordings of this piece. The Concerto was almost completely unknown at the time as nobody other than Bolet was performing it. The last time the work had been heard in performance by a pianist other than Bolet was when the composer himself had played it. The conductor on that occasion was Serge Koussevitzky. Bolet had actually been engaged to perform the work with Koussevitzky in 1951, a booking that came about through a chance meeting in 1949 with Koussevitzky in Venezuela at a social gathering. The great conductor had asked Bolet to play a little and was impressed by what he heard. When Koussevitzky learned that Prokofiev’s Concerto No 2 was in Bolet’s repertoire he made plans for the two of them to perform it at Tanglewood the following year. This could have been a huge break for Bolet, as Koussevitzky had the power to propel an artist he liked to the forefront. A scheduling conflict forced the concert to be postponed to the following season, but, sadly, Koussevitzky died in June of that year so the two never performed together.' (Farhan Malik)
It seems that Jorge made a small cut in the first movement cadenza, bars 164 - 173.
Prokofiev, Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op. 16
Prokofiev composed his second piano concerto at the age of 21 while on winter break from his studies at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. He had already established himself as something of a bad boy with his brilliant and original First Piano Concerto; with his second he sought to evoke darker, deeper emotions. The result is one of the most technically difficult and fascinating piano concertos in the repertoire.
The composition he called his Second Piano Concerto is first mentioned in his diaries in November of 1912. From that date until the first performance in late summer 1913, references to the Concerto occur regularly in his journals.
One of the first people to hear Prokofiev play through his new concerto was his best friend, Max Schmidthof, a classmate who had impressed Prokofiev with his encyclopedic knowledge of music. “I played him parts of the Second Piano Concerto,” Prokofiev recalled in his diary. “He likes the third movement and especially the first movement cadenza. The Finale elicited vociferous approval; I had to repeat the opening theme three times.”
Tragically, this friendship would be cut short; not long after Prokofiev completed the concerto, Max took a train to the Finnish forests and shot himself; he and his mother were in dire financial straits, and he could not pay the debts he had secretly accrued while living beyond his means. Prokofiev was one of two people who received Max’s suicide note. Shocked and devastated, he dedicated the concerto to his friend’s memory.
The concerto’s premier with the composer as soloist took place later that year in Pavlovsk, a posh suburb of St. Petersburg. Prokofiev himself recalled its controversial reception:
“Following the violent concluding chord there was silence in the hall for a few moments. Then boos and catcalls were answered with loud applause, thumping of sticks and calls for ‘encore.’ I came out twice to acknowledge the reception, hearing cries of approval and boos coming from the hall. I was pleased that the concerto provoked such strong feelings in the audience.”
Though he performed the work a few more times with greater success, Prokofiev set it aside until 1920, when he learned that the orchestral score had been burned in the aftermath of the Bolshevik takeover of Russia. Living in Paris at the time, he recomposed the concerto, making it more contrapuntally complex and giving us the version we know today.
Calvin Dotsey
The revised version was performed on 5 May 1924 in Paris, with Sergei Prokofiev (piano), Sergei Koussevitsky (conductor).
Bells make a frequent appearance in Russian classical music. Quiet, atmospheric bell tones in the finale of Prokofiev 2 have reminded some commentators of the final movement of Arnold Schoenberg’s Six Little Piano Pieces, Op. 19, composed as an elegy for Gustav Mahler. In one haunting passage (27:11)
Link to the passage played by Horacio Gutiérrez, a fellow Cuban-American, (b.1948) with Neeme Järvi and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra.
Digression: The "Soviet" Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953)
Perhaps the most surprising fact about Prokofiev's life is that, having lived in the West since 1917 after the Russian revolution (United States, Germany, then Paris), he finally chose irrevocably to return to his homeland with his family in 1936 - right at the zenith of Stalin's brutal régime.
'His decision to settle in Stalinist Russia, in the thirties, was based on a miscalculation that his fame would protect him from ideological pressures. Instead, he met with repeated humiliations.' (Alex Ross)
Overwork was fatal to the composer’s health, as was the stress he suffered in 1948, when, along with other Soviet composers, he was censured by the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party for “formalism.”
His propensity for innovation, however, is still evident in such important works as the Symphony No. 6 in E-flat Minor (1945–47), which is laden with reminiscence of the tragedies of the war just past; the Sinfonia Concerto for Cello and Orchestra in E Minor (1950–52), composed with consultation from the conductor and cellist Mstislav Rostropovich; and the Violin Sonata in F Minor (1938–46), which is laden with Russian folk imagery.
The basis of the brilliantly modernized opéra bouffe Betrothal in a Monastery (composed in 1940, produced in 1946) was the play The Duenna, by the 18th-century British dramatist Richard Brinsley Sheridan.
Just as in earlier years, the composer devoted the greatest part of his energy to musical theatre, as in the ballet The Stone Flower Op. 118 (1948–50), based upon a folktale from the Ural mountains. The ballet was choreographed by Yuri Grigorovich and first performed 22 April 1957 at the Leningrad Kirov - not without (silly) criticism: a choreographer from the Urals decided to take the ballet master Yuri Grigorovich to task. 'What on earth is Grigorovich doing? Among his semi-precious stones, there is a jasper, but there are no jaspers in these regions. I, for example, am now staging a ballet about the underwater kingdom of the Baikal. What would happen, comrades, if instead of an omul, I showed some sort of sprat?'
The lyrical Symphony No. 7 in C-sharp Minor (1951–52) was the composer’s swan song.
Prokofiev died at age 61 on 5 March 1953, on the same day as Joseph Stalin.
His greatest Soviet successes include Lieutenant Kijé, Peter and the Wolf, Romeo and Juliet (one of the summits of his art), Cinderella, Alexander Nevsky, the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies; and the huge opera (Op. 91) (Russian: Война и мир, Voyna i mir) of 1946.
Israel Vladimirovich Nestyev & Richard Taruskin (extracts)
On BBC's Desert Island Discs (June 1992), the "castaway" was one of Britain's best-loved actresses -
Prunella Scales. She's most easily recognised as Sybil Fawlty, wife of John Cleese, the manic hotelkeeper
in the television series Fawlty Towers, but it's a role which represents a very small part of all her theatre and television work. As one of her 8 discs, she choose Prokofiev's third symphony. Listen below:
Operation Music, 1954
"Bolet, Interpretive Magician"
The Fitchburg Sentinel (Massachusetts), on 14 January 1954 reported fulsomely on a concert of Wednesday, 13th.
'With the world at his fingertips, he presented a program which lifted the audience to his level. Careful not to play down to his audience, Mr Bolet selected a program which would have gone over as well at Carnegie Hall or the San Francisco Opera House. Knowing that good music appeals to people from the small city as well as the large…Schumann, Mendelssohn, Chopin (B flat minor sonata, No. 2, the Funeral March) and Liszt.'
'Not unlike the Pied Piper of Hamelin who charmed the children of that village with his flute playing, Mr Bolet from his opening number Intermezzo (Schumann) cast a spell.' Strauss/Godowsky's Fledermaus waltzes came at the end. Jorge was entertained afterward sat a buffet supper by Mr and Mrs Charles Patch of 138 Pleasant Street. He says that he plays 3 to 4 concerts a week and rarely has time to practise between October and April.
In the Pittsfield Berkshire Evening Eagle, 19 January 1954 (Massachusetts), critic Jay Rosenfeld felt Jorge should be a bit more venturesome in his repertoire (only Ravel's Tombeau de Couperin was from the 20th century).
5 February 1954: Gershwin's Concerto in F/Rhapsody in Blue in Natchitoches, Louisiana, 'Nearly 1,000 people and students attended and enjoyed the aggressive style of the brilliant young pianist.' The Current Sauce,
16/17 February 1954, Fair Park and Byrd High auditoriums, Shreveport Louisiana: Tchaikovsky Concerto No. 1 in B flat minor, Op.23. 'Bolet, soloist list second time in two seasons. One of the biggest names has engaged.'
There was a performance of the Prokofiev concerto on 12 March 1954 with Rochester Philharmonic and Erich Leinsdorf in Bailey Hall, Cornell University, in a concert that included Brahms Symphony No.3 and Debussy’s Nuages & Fêtes from Nocturnes. ‘We were considerably disturbed by the composition...the extremely demanding score came off well in Mr Bolet’s hands.’ [Cornell Daily Sun, 15.3.54]
The VIllager (Greenwich Village, NYC) on 1 April 1954 published an article about the area by Charles Jackson. 'It was a shock to learn that Ben Smirnoff, The Whitney Chemist, drugstore north of the old Brevoort had gone - though in fact they had moved to 50, University Place.' The old place had been a sort of meeting club: Vincent Price, Jorge Bolet, still - like a sensible man - a Villager, Leonard Bernstein, Boris Karloff, Celeste Hohn, Eli Wallach...
West Germany
In the spring of 1954, Bolet became one of five American musicians invited for a four-week visit to West Germany as guests of the Federal Republic; this was the first time a foreign government had acted as host to American artists. While in Germany, Bolet appeared as soloist with the Berlin Philharmonic.
(David Ewen, Living Musicians, New York 1957, 27). The outbound flight was to Frankfurt from New York's Idlewild on TWA, 30 March 1954.
On 9 March, The New York Times announced the Bonn visit. ‘Five American musicians have been selected by Andre Mertens and a member of the Ministry of Fine Arts in Berlin (1930-1933).’
Constance Keene (later to be the wife of Abram Chasins, who might be justly described as one of Bolet’s real musical mentors) wrote about the experience in The New York Times, 16 May 1954 The musicians embarked March 30 from Idlewild Airport (now JFK). They were singers Carol Brice and Barbara Gibson, John Sebastian (harmonica), Constance Keene and JB (pianists). They landed in Frankfurt on 31 March. ‘Although we had all trouped up and down the American continent, none had actually performed abroad.’ (Bolet had, of course, already done so) There were visits to Munich, Bonn, Stuttgart, Köln/Cologne and Dusseldorf. In Berlin they heard Wilhelm Furtwängler in Beethoven’s genial yet forward-looking Symphony No.2 in D major. In Hamburg the actor Paul Linkman ‘thrilled us in Molière’s Georges Dandin’.
George Dandin ou le Mari confondu ("Georges Dandin or The Confounded Husband ") is a French comedy, first performed on 18 July 1668 at the Palace of Versailles. The play showcases the folly a man commits when he marries a woman of higher rank than his own. Molière's Dandin is an impersonation of a husband who has patiently to endure all the extravagant whims and fancies of his dame of a wife.
Bolet was a fan of Wagner's music and he no doubt enjoyed meeting the great Wagnerian conductor Furtwängler. He even managed to attend the fabled Bayreuth Festival (‘a ticket, a ticket, my kingdom for a ticket’) in his last years. In The Sydney Morning Herald for March 24, 1987, he said he had told his agent that he wanted three months off next year for a photographic safari through Kenya. ‘And then I want to go to Bayreuth to see The Ring, Parsifal and Tristan." His diary for that period seems to indicate he did indeed go to Bayreuth.
❝ Jeune et brillant pianiste chilien(!) ❞
Bolet was back in Europe in May 1954 (or more likely stayed on). A photo in Musical America, July 1954 shows Jorge backstage at London's Wigmore Hall after a recital in June by American mezzo-soprano Jennie Tourel. He sailed back to New York with Tex Compton on the famous Queen Mary, departing Southampton on 3 June and arriving on the 8th; they are listed as in transit from Switzerland. His address is given on the manifest as 71 Washington Square, New York City.
The Las Cruces Sun (27 February 1955) gave information about Bolet’s career. ‘Averaging some 70 recitals a season, Bolet's schedule is indicative of the high place he has won for himself in the music world. He made his first appearance in the Hollywood Bowl in 1953 and a return engagement with the Boston Symphony, Pierre Monteux conducting, at Tanglewood, which was accorded a great ovation.’
'Young and brilliant pianist from Chile'
The Canadian Ottawa Citizen (3 Sep 1954) has an amusing notice. ‘Ottawans suffering from that oft-quoted cultural inferiority complex should have a short glimpse at the following preview before complaining that there is nothing “on” in Ottawa. In the Tremblay Concerts series at the Capitol Theatre, the Buffalo Philharmonic and Josef Krips will include Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 with Jorge Bolet, noted Chilean (sic) pianist. ‘This will be the first time in the history of the Tremblay series, Antonio Tremblay told us, that a major orchestra will perform a piano concerto.’
That concert on 30 November 1954 (repeated in Quebec on 2 December) was reviewed by Pierre Rainville in Le Droit (1.12.54) who said JB's tone was a little percussive, but that 'he knew how let us share in the poetry of the music'. The same newspaper, in September, also referred to this 'jeune et brillant pianiste chilien'. Schubert's Symphony No. 7 was also on the programme. It will be another 22 years before Jorge returns to Ottawa (September 1976).
General elections were held in Cuba on 1 November 1954. Fulgencio Batista won the presidential election running under the National Progressive Coalition banner, whilst the main opposition candidate, Ramón Grau, withdrew his candidacy before election day. The election was widely considered fraudulent. Batista's new (second) presidential term was scheduled to be from 24 February 1955 to 24 February 1959.
15 November 1954, Hill Auditorium, Ann Arbor, Michigan. Haydn: Andante con variazioni; Beethoven: Sonata in E-flat major, Op.81a; Liszt: Sonata in B minor; Chopin: Four Scherzi.
'It was a big program - big even if viewed simply as an obstacle course, and, in its execution, it was evidence of a big pianist. Bolet's artistry may need a few corners knocked off, and a few others polished, but what we heard last night was the performance of an extraordinary technician, one who has an extraordinary controlling intelligence that brings his interpretations to life.
The Beethoven sonata was a straightforward conception, in which the exuberance of the finale was particularly well conveyed. However, the slow movement somehow didn't hold one's attention throughout; and I, for one, became weary of the pianist's percussive approach to the main theme of the first movement every time it recurred Mr. Bolet's performance [of the Liszt] was nothing less than dazzling. It was massive, delicate, brilliant, and somber by turns. The sensitivity of his dynamic shadings in the slow sections was no less impressive.' David Tice, Michigan Daily
Musical America, 1 December 1954 has an interview with Jorge in his Washington Square residence. Conversation turned to companions and to the transport of his Baldwin piano.
'Nowadays the ever-busier Mr. Bolet spends most of his waking hours with two beloved traveling companions. One of them is “Tex” Compton, an old friend of his Washington days (as a military attaché in the Cuban embassy) who now serves him as personal representative and sometimes chauffeur. The other,
almost equally beloved, is “Baldwin”, a tiny Chinese pug thoroughbred whose eighteen pounds of sweet reasonableness endear him even to the most confirmed dog-haters.
'There is cause to mention, also, the contribution that Mr. Bolet’s nominal sponsor, the house of Baldwin, has made to his signal success. More accurately, it was in the course of an informal evening at the Tenafly, N. J., home of John and Letitia Ortiz (he is the firm's New York manager) that the idea of the piano van
first came into being. It was Mrs. Ortiz who made the suggestion, three seasons ago, in approximately these terms: 'If you are so dissatisfied with most of the pianos you have to play on the road, why not pick out one that you like very much and make arrangements to drag it right along with you?'
'That is just what he did.'
Josef Krips
The conductor of the above concert was the noted Austrian maestro Josef Krips (Vienna 1904 - Geneva, Switzerland 1972) whom Jorge is known to have admired.
In 1938, the Nazi annexation of Austria (or Anschluss) forced Krips to leave the country. (He was raised a Roman Catholic, but would have been excluded from musical activity because his father was born Jewish.). He moved to Belgrade, where he worked for a year with the Belgrade Opera and Philharmonic, until Yugoslavia also became involved in World War II. On his return to Austria at the end of the war in 1945 he was one of the few conductors allowed to perform, since he had not worked under the Nazi régime. He was the first to conduct the Vienna Philharmonic and the Salzburg Festival in the postwar period. Working with fellow conductors Clemens Krauss and Karl Böhm, Krips helped restore the Vienna State Opera and Vienna Philharmonic to their prewar levels.
From 1950 to 1954, Krips was principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra. Afterwards, he led the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra from 1954-1963. Under Krips' leadership, the orchestra expanded in the length of its performance season and in the number of musicians that the orchestra employed. Krips took the orchestra on tours in eastern United States and Canada, including the Maritime Provinces.
In 1955, he made a critically acclaimed recording of Mozart's Don Giovanni (the first recording I owned of the work) with the Vienna State Opera featuring a legendary cast of singers - Cesare Siepi, Fernando Corena, Walter Berry, Suzanne Danco, Lisa Della Casa and Hilde Gueden.
Cuban politics, 1954-56
In 1954, Batista's government held presidential elections, but no politician stood against him; the election was widely considered fraudulent. It had allowed some political opposition to be voiced, and Castro's supporters had agitated for an amnesty for the Moncada incident's perpetrators. Some politicians suggested an amnesty would be good publicity, and the Congress and Batista agreed. Backed by the US and major corporations, Batista believed Castro to be no threat, and on 15 May 1955, the prisoners were released. Returning to Havana, Castro gave radio interviews and press conferences; the government closely monitored him, curtailing his activities In 1955, bombings and violent demonstrations led to a crackdown on dissent, with Castro and brother Raúl fleeing the country to evade arrest. The Castros and several comrades travelled to Mexico, [Coltman 2003, 102] where Raúl befriended an Argentine doctor and Marxist–Leninist named Ernesto "Che" Guevara, who was working as a journalist and photographer for "Agencia Latina de Noticias".Fide l liked him, later describing him as "a more advanced revolutionary than I was". [Castro & Ramonet 2009, pp. 172–173] Castro also associated with the Spaniard Alberto Bayo, who agreed to teach Castro's rebels the necessary skills in guerrilla warfare.[84] Requiring funding, Castro toured the US in search of wealthy sympathisers, there being monitored by Batista's agents, who allegedly orchestrated a failed assassination attempt against him.[Coltman 105-110] Castro kept in contact with the MR-26-7 in Cuba, where they had gained a large support base in Oriente. After purchasing the decrepit yacht Granma, on 25 November 1956, Castro set sail from Tuxpan, Veracruz, with 81 armed revolutionaries. The 1,900-kilometre (1,200 mi) crossing to Cuba was harsh, with food running low and many suffering seasickness.