The Stream of Music
By
RICHARD ANTHONY LEONARD is a musicologist. His most important work to date has been the producing of NBC’s top-flight musical program, the Toscanini concerts. Now in a 454-page book he clarifies and personifies, in terms of biographical and simple technical detail, some of the mainsprings of the stream of music which daily pours into the ears of American radio audiences and concertgoers.
In this book, Mr. Leonard is concerned with serious music and its composers. He touches on popular music only by inference. Consequently his all-embracing title is somewhat misleading, for popular music, from folk song to boogie-woogie, is not only part of the stream of music but has variously fortified and derived from the serious stream and is, in effect, a companion stream. Beethoven used folk tunes popular in his day with magnificent symphonic effect, and conversely, as Mr. Leonard notes, Chopin’s Fantaisie Impromptu’s “insides were ripped out to make the popular “I’m Always Chasing Rainbows.”
The Stream of Music does, however, in a broad sense, “trace the development of music during the past three hundred years.” It consists of some seventeen profiles, arranged chronologically, of distinguished composers and their important works, ranging from Bach to Sibelius. There are, however, several startling omissions — chiefly Handel and Mendelssohn. Each is mentioned but not extensively. The author explains, “I was sorry to omit Handel, but his music is almost lost today in comparison with Bach’s. Gluck, Mendelssohn and Ravel were crowded out by their more important contemporaries — Haydn, Schumann and Debussy.” Mr. Leonard does not seek to form taste: he reflects, records, and documents it.
The Stream of Music is filled with graphic biographical detail, intelligent and lucid technical analysis, and climactic political and social snapshots. Although there is nothing factually new in any of this, it is fresh and well-organized reportage — excellent and timely propaganda for serious music. Doubledag, Doran, $4.50.
LEO LEHMAN