Leonard Bernstein

Rocking Around the Clock

If you were taking music classes hace muchos años during the formative years of rock and roll - that is, the late 1950's to the early 1970's - you could bet that at some time your teacher would go into spittle flinging diatribes that music in America had tanked out. One teacher even lamented that in the Soviet Union - the Megalithic Evil Empire - a DJ would announce they were going to play "typical" Russian music. Then they would put on a recording of Tchaikovsky or Khachaturian or Shostakovich or Prokofiev (whoever they were).

Once the lush, sonorous (and sometimes quite boring) sounds had faded, the announcers would follow up by saying now they would play some typical American music. Then they'd put on a platter by the rock group, the Cavemen, playing "Mustang Sally". When that - quote - "music" - unquote - ended, the DJ would smarmily point out that the Russian music was so far above the American that there need be no further comment.

"And", the [American] teacher spluttered, "it's true!

There was, though, at least one notable exception to the - quote - "serious musician" - unquote - trashing rock because it was rock. That was Leonard Bernstein, who during the Time that Rock Threatened America was the director of the New York Philharmonic and had become not only the youngest conductor to hold the baton at the NY Phil, but also the first conductor of international reputation to be trained wholly in America.

And rather than lament how the Devil's Music was taking over, Lenny would go on national television - and on programs intended, for kids for crying out loud - and say that there was indeed good rock and roll. Not that we're saying that he thought the Cavemen were exemplary (he never, as far as we know, commented on them), but in his Young People's Concerts that were broadcast from 1958 to 1972, he would sometimes use examples of Beatles songs to illustrate a musical point. Although the NY Phil had been staging the Young People's Concerts since 1924 and still does so, no one will deny the best were those hosted during Lenny's tenure.

But Lenny thought the connection with popular and "serious" music was a two way street. If people liked rock or jazz or folk music because of the melodies and harmonies, then they ought to also like music by Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven (whoever they were). True, it took a bit more effort to get a twelve-year old to sit through the fifteen-odd hours of Wagner's Ring cycle than a rendering of Eleanor Rigby, but the musical principles are really the same.

'Course, if Richard heard that and was alive today, he'd be rolling over in his grave.