L'Italo-Americano

L'Italo-Americano THURSDAY, MARCH 9, 2017 www.italoamericano.org 4 A rturo Toscanini's boister- ous humanity comes alive throughout a new biogra- phy by eminent music historian Harvey Sachs. To mark the 150th anniversary of the legendary con- ductor's birth, "Toscanini - Musician of Conscience" will come out next spring from Liveright Publishing Corp., a division of W.W. Norton & Co. The monumental biography presents the man as he was — certainly generous, courageous and principled. He tended to have "boundless generosity towards other people and musical and charitable organizations that he believed needed assistance, and in his love for his family, for Italy, and for human freedom". But he also had major character flaws. Besides his fierce, explosive tem- per, he was excessively harsh towards some musicians, and equivalent of a rock star today, he had many extramarital encoun- ters. His human flaws are told beyond our fallible praise or blame in this biography that in exploring his life illuminates his art. Sachs, a musicologist who writes for The New York Times, published a previous study on the great virtuoso in 1978, but to mark the anniversary a more detailed book was needed. In 2002 Sachs edited a generously annotated collection of Toscanini's letters. Emanuela Castelbarco, Toscanini's only surviving grand- child, made available documen- tary material that contributed greatly to the substance of the new book. An uncorrected ver- sion of "Toscanini - Musician of Conscience" was provided to us in advance. The most influential maestro in several generations, he was nearsighted but had a phenomenal photographic memory. He did not use printed scores while perform- ing, and by the end of his career had memorized 250 symphonic works and more than 100 operas. His disciple Gianandrea Gavazzeni referred to the "evolu- tionary quality of his operation, which was tireless, never sated, never still". Toscanini was born in Parma on March 25, 1867 and died on Jan. 16, 1957, his distinguished life spanning nearly a century of political turmoil. He breathed his last in Riverdale, New York, where his American career was based as he brought classical music to new audiences. On his passing, a pontifical mass was held at New York's Saint Patrick's Cathedral and later the coffin was flown to Milan. More than 250,000 people stood in the rain to watch as the hearse slowly proceeded from La Scala. De Sabata played the Funeral March from Beethoven's "Eroica" symphony as a surreal silence descended over the crowd. The hearse then briefly paused at via Durini in front of the house that had been Toscanini's favorite home. Final stop, the Cimitero Monumentale. It was a fitting tribute. Toscanini had long been home- sick for Milan. However much he appreciated the New York atmos- phere, he said "I want to get back to Milan as soon as possible. I must, I must." He had been the heart and the soul of La Scala and as well of New York's Metropolitan Opera. He dominated the NBC Symphony, the New York Philharmonic, and the glamourous Bayreuth, Salzburg and Lucerne festivals. He made music's meaning clear through vivid body motion, a precise beat and an improvisato- ry looseness of opera. Also an impassioned patriot and rebel, he was an outspoken anti-fascist. Soon after Mussolini led his march on Rome in 1922, he told friends that if he were capable of killing a man, he would kill Mussolini. Fascists attacked him in Bologna in 1931. He was slapped across the face for refusing to per- form the Fascist Party anthem "Giovinezza". In the aftermath of the incident he wrote: "The con- duct of my life will always be the reflection of my conscience, which does not know dissimula- tion or deviations of any type — reinforced, I admit, by a proud and scornful character, but clear as crystal and just as cutting." The political conditions in Europe were becoming oppres- sive. "I cannot alienate myself from life," he wrote in 1938. "Everyone ought to express his own opinion honestly and coura- geously — then dictators, crimi- nals, wouldn't last so long." The daughter Wally Toscanini said her father's anti-German sen- timent was there since the eve of WWI. One day he had a very ani- mated discussion with Puccini for whom he conducted the world premieres of "La Bohème", "Madama Butterfly", "La Fanciulla del West" and the unfin- ished score of "Turandot". Puccini was complaining that everything was going bad in Italy. "Let's hope that the Germans come to put things in order", he said. "Papà went wild," Wally said. "He jumped to his feet and shut himself in the house. He said he wouldn't go out again because if he were to see Puccini he would hit him. Some friends came to our house to try to make peace between the two, but Papà chased them out brusquely … Friends came to the window and said 'Puccini asks you to forgive him'. Papà shouted: 'If I meet him, I'll box his ears!' After a week, how- ever, they were reconciled." Appointed Senator for Life in 1949, he renounced the title, explaining to Presidente della Repubblica Luigi Einaudi that "averse to any sort of accumula- tion of honors (…), I wish to end my existence in the same simplic- ity with which I always lived". The new biography "Toscanini - Musician of Conscience" written by eminent music historian Harvey Sachs will come out next spring The sound and the fury of Arturo Toscanini MARIELLA RADAELLI NEWS & FEATURES TOP STORIES PEOPLE EVENTS

• Cover