410 PART 4 | SINCE WORLD WAR II
in the operas of Mozart and Verdi, but such writing was virtually unknown in
the American musical before West Side Story. In Leonard Bernstein, at least by
implication, Broadway had found its parallel to a Mozart.Before World War II, some classical musicians had responded to the populist
mood of the Great Depression by striving to make their music accessible to a
wider audience. After the war, although Samuel Barber, Gian Carlo Menotti, and
other composers continued to write in a melodious, inviting style, avant-garde
modernists became the dominant voice in the academy, winning an institutional
status they had been denied earlier in the century. As musical composition came
more and more to resemble scientifi c experimentation, at least in some quar-
ters, a widening gap separated the audience for classical music from contempo-
rary composers. With the notable exception of Leonard Bernstein, the classical
sphere lacked the popularizing efforts of such earlier proponents as Theodore
Thomas, Leopold Stokowski, or Aaron Copland.
Perhaps it was no coincidence, then, that other areas of musical expression,
such as jazz and the musical theater, developed higher artistic aspirations in
the postwar years. Like so many musicians throughout America’s history, jazz
instrumentalists and Broadway song writers sought ways to bring their art to its
highest level while communicating to a broad general audience. By one means
or another, America’s musical landscape has always had room for music that
embraced both artistic integrity and commercial viability.QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION AND REVIEW
- W hat effect did émigré composers have on music in the postwar United
States? - What factors led to a widening gap between postwar composers and the
audience for classical music? - Compare the aesthetic stance of John Cage with that of academic composers
such as Milton Babbitt. - How does bebop differ from swing, and how do those differences account
for the shrinking audience for jazz in the postwar years? - Compare modern jazz with music in the postwar classical sphere.
- Is Bernstein’s argument for the musical as an American classical art form
convincing? Why or why not?
FURTHER READING
Block, Geoffrey. “The Broadway Canon from Show Boat to West Side Story and the
European Operatic Ideal.” Journal of Musicolog y 11, no. 4 (autumn 1993): 525–44.
Cage, John. Silence: Lectures and Writings. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1961.
DeVeaux, Scott. The Birth of Bebop. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California
Press, 1997.
Gann, Kyle. No Such Thing as Silence: John Cage’s 4'11". New Haven, CT: Yale University Press,
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