{"id":78951,"date":"1984-02-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"1984-02-01T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newcriterion.com\/article\/marilyn-horneas-great-american-songbook\/"},"modified":"2024-03-22T08:48:19","modified_gmt":"2024-03-22T12:48:19","slug":"marilyn-horneas-great-american-songbook","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/newcriterion.com\/article\/marilyn-horneas-great-american-songbook\/","title":{"rendered":"Marilyn Horne\u2019s great American songbook"},"content":{"rendered":"

G<\/span>reat opera singers have always enjoyed appearing in a popular repertory. Golden Age heroes like Caruso and Gigli touched hearts and purse strings with their renditions of Italian folk songs both real and spurious. Ezio Pinza sang his way to fame on Broadway in South Pacific<\/em>, a fame that had eluded him at the Metropolitan Opera House just a few blocks away. Helen Traubel supplemented her career as Br\u00fcnnhilde and Isolde with another one performing light material in nightclubs. And in our own time the woods are full of tenor songbirds like Luciano Pavarotti, Placido Domingo, and Peter Hofmann doing crossover material ranging from folk songs and middle-of-the-road pop to soft rock.<\/p>\n

Of late the pickings haven\u2019t seemed so good for prima donnas. Even the career of Leontyne Price, with its obvious crossover potential, has seemed irrevocably bound to a serious operatic and song repertory. But now there\u2019s a new diva\u2019s hat in the pop market. In December, around the time of the release of her \u201cwith-the-help-of\u201d autobiography,<\/a>[1]<\/a> mezzo-soprano Marilyn Horne appeared on nationwide television in a two-hour program of American songs. The concert was transmitted live from Avery Fisher Hall and featured the accompanying services of conductor Leonard Slatkin, the New York Choral Artists, and members of the American Symphony Orchestra. Presented by PBS<\/span> in prime time under the \u201cLive From Lincoln Center\u201d seal of approval, the program was supported by, among others, Exxon, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts.<\/p>\n

The material Miss Horne sang was plainly meant to appeal to a broad audience. There were twenty-four songs in all, divided into five categories: folk songs, Stephen Foster, folk songs in Aaron Copland orchestrations, hymns and spirituals, and patriotic songs. Except for the Copland-orchestrated tunes, all the material was arranged specially for the occasion.<\/p>\n

The concert began with the folk-song group. The opening piece, hardly everyone\u2019s idea of folk music, was \u201cYou\u2019re a Grand Old Flag,\u201d George M. Cohan\u2019s pastiche of famous tunes, ranging from \u201cAuld Lang Syne\u201d to \u201cStars and Stripes Forever.\u201d Though the Cohan was suitably upbeat, the rest of the folk songs declined into gloomy nostalgia. \u201cShenandoah\u201d (Miss Horne\u2019s favorite song) was sung with choral backing. The result was not even corn-on-the-cob but rather creamed corn. \u201cHe\u2019s Gone Away\u201d was presented, \u00e0\u00a0la Mahler, in the manner of a tragic art song.<\/p>\n

Five Stephen Foster songs followed. Taught to Miss Horne by her mother, these songs are plainly close to Miss Horne\u2019s heart. She began the group with \u201cBeautiful Dreamer\u201d and then sang, in order, \u201cIf You’ve Only Got a Mustache\u201d (a novelty number with music by Foster and words by George Cooper), \u201cJeannie With the Light Brown Hair,\u201d \u201cCamptown Races,\u201d and finally \u201cGentle Annie.\u201d Here the clue to Miss Horne\u2019s approach came right at the beginning. \u201cBeautiful Dreamer\u201d doubtless expresses that side of the American national character which cherished gentle fantasies while it devoted almost all waking hours to the creation of a vital and often harsh reality. But \u201cBeautiful Dreamer\u201d is not a regret; it is an evocation of what might be. Though the song is written in 9\/8 time\u2014nine eighth notes to the bar, with three major stresses\u2014and marked Moderato<\/em>, Miss Horne sang it Lento<\/em>, with a heavy stress on each note. The effect was bathetic, and was made only more marked by Miss Horne\u2019s repeated distortion of the simple opening triplet rhythm.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeautiful Dreamer\u201d doubtless expresses that side of the American national character.<\/p>\n

Especially after the self-induced and self-indulgent tragedy of \u201cBeautiful Dreamer,\u201d \u201cIf You’ve Only Got a Mustache\u201d seemed remarkably trite. \u201cJeannie With the Light Brown Hair\u201d again produced a treacly mood. Sung to harp accompaniment, the song sounded repetitious and even artificial. Here a comparison with an earlier Horne performance was instructive. On an earlier \u201cLive From Lincoln Center\u201d program in 1979, shared with Joan Sutherland and the New York Philharmonic (conducted by Miss Sutherland\u2019s husband, Richard Bonynge), Miss Horne sang the song with the assistance of the Philharmonic\u2019s principal harpist, Myor Rosen. Mr. Rosen wrote his own arrangement (as did the American Symphony\u2019s harpist, Susan Jolles, on the present program) in collaboration with the soloist. His version was imaginative and beautifully played; throughout he seemed to be urging Miss Horne not to dally but instead to let the music flow naturally. Despite Miss Horne\u2019s obvious commitment to this material, it would appear that she has not yet learned that simple music must be performed simply.<\/p>\n

Miss Horne\u2019s third group was made up of five pieces\u2014\u201cSimple Gifts,\u201d \u201cAt the River,\u201d \u201cI bought me a cat,\u201d \u201cLong Time Ago,\u201d and \u201cChing-a-ring Chaw\u201d\u2014drawn from the two sets of old American songs that Aaron Copland orchestrated in 1950 and 1952. Here at least the music was not clothed, as it was elsewhere in the program, in Broadway finery. Copland\u2019s acerbic, yet haunting, orchestral palette, combined with gentle intimations of syncopation, seemed doubly welcome after all the glue. But, alas, Copland was all too respectful in these pieces of the origins of the melodies he chose. Whereas these modest reworkings might have provided a charming fillip in a concert of contemporary vocal music, in Miss Horne\u2019s concert, sandwiched as they were between sweet and sweeter, both the songs and their performer seemed overcome with nostalgia.<\/p>\n

The intermission, as is the case on all too many \u201cLive from . . .\u201d events, was devoted to advancing the cause of sainthood for the performer or performers of the evening. On this occasion, the formula was well in place. In paraphrase, the conversation ran something along the lines of: \u201cMiss Horne, everyone has said you\u2019re the greatest of your kind our century has seen, if not of all time; how do you<\/em> explain your greatness, and how can you bear the burden of it all?\u201d And her answer: \u201cMy greatness has always seemed perfectly natural, and it has been the mission of my life to preserve this gift intact. In spite of all that I am as an artist, I remain a real, down-to-earth person nonetheless.\u201d<\/p>\n

One comment of Miss Horne\u2019s deserves quotation as an illustration of just how fully she filled the wide-eyed role chosen for her. About her autobiography she trilled, \u201cI think the reason the book is having such a success is because it\u2019s honest.\u201d At least she then had the grace to admit, amidst hearty laughter (opera singers are, after all, allowed to change their minds), that she certainly didn\u2019t \u201creveal everything.\u201d Ah candor! Ah discretion!<\/p>\n

After intermission, the program returned to song. The opening group consisted of hymns and spirituals. The hymn \u201cIn the Garden\u201d and the spiritual \u201cSometimes I feel like a motherless child\u201d were both feelingly, and even relatively naturally, sung. Unfortunately, the egregious and ubiquitous chorus, harmonizing away as if every hum was a glorious tear, awakened all too many memories of the way Hollywood used to pay its dues to the upright and toiling masses of yesteryear. Of Miss Horne\u2019s rendition of \u201cBless This House\u201d I cannot write without my fingers sliding off the typewriter keys. The fourth work of this group, \u201cI just come from the fountain,\u201d seemed to me quite the best thing Miss Horne did all evening. Tellingly, she sang this short melody alone, without accompaniment. Shorn of all the saccharin and molasses supplied by her arrangers and publicists, she sang beautifully. That was, however, that. \u201cThe Lord\u2019s Prayer,\u201d closing the group, was once again stupefyingly sentimental.<\/p>\n

The final group of the concert was composed of patriotic songs, a category wide enough to include \u201cWhen Johnny Comes Marching Horne,\u201d \u201cThe Battle Hymn of the Republic,\u201d \u201cI Didn\u2019t Raise My Boy to be a Soldier,\u201d and \u201cGod Bless America.\u201d Of all these, it was the anti-war song \u201cI Didn\u2019t Raise My Boy to be a Soldier\u201d that evidently touched the hearts of the audience. The stirring \u201cBattle Hymn of the Republic\u201d was sung in a tempo more appropriate to a dead march than to the triumphant theme song of abolitionism one had always thought it to be. The close, with chorus and orchestra clamoring away, suggested nothing so much as the massed finale of Act I<\/span> of Verdi\u2019s Aida<\/em>. The final song, \u201cGod Bless America,\u201d suffered from Miss Horne\u2019s evident need to consult her music diligently, doubtless because of complications in her part attributable to the snazzy and grandiose arrangement.<\/p>\n

S<\/span>o the musical verdict on Marilyn Horne\u2019s concert, despite her undoubtedly great voice, must be negative.<\/p>\n

S<\/span>o the musical verdict on Marilyn Horne\u2019s concert, despite her undoubtedly great voice, must be negative. Her own sentimentality, the bad taste of the orchestral and choral treatment, the diva-as-girl-next-door packaging\u2014all these taken together pose some basic questions about the whole television event. What was the artistic purpose served? What was the public purpose? Finally, why was this program on public<\/em> television at all?<\/p>\n

It is difficult to believe that there was a strong artistic justification for a program of this repertory sung in this way. Marilyn Horne does not bring to this material any special folk insight. Though she has sung many of these songs on and off since she was young, she does not give any evidence\u2014as did the popular singer of the 1940s, Kate Smith\u2014of having merged her artistic persona with the music. Instead she gave the impression famous opera stars always give when engaged in singing down to their material and their audience, of condescension masked by vulgarity.<\/p>\n

In the absence of an artistic justification, the question of public purpose seems simple to formulate. Did this program in some sense serve to bind the nation together? Of course, many of Miss Horne\u2019s songs come from deep sources in our national psyche; of course, American popular culture has served in the past as an integrating and assimilating force. But this desirable goal can be served only when the artistic expression being so used is authentic<\/em>. The prima donna concertizing de haut en bas<\/em> is, however, now a sure guarantee not of authenticity but of its opposite.<\/p>\n

Then there is the whole question of doing this program on public television. Marilyn Horne is famous; she is properly highly paid for her services; she is a commercial commodity. She plainly made every attempt to choose marketable repertory and to do it in a marketable way. The result ought to have been a natural for commercial television. In the past the major TV<\/span> networks have always been interested in presenting serious music and serious musical performers in a popular format. The Bell Telephone Hour<\/em> and Leonard Bernstein\u2019s appearances on Omnibus<\/em> are examples of successful attempts to make good music pay. But now such efforts are rare. NBC<\/span> displayed more talent at balleyhoo than commitment to culture in its two \u201cLive from Studio 8H\u201d programs with Zubin Mehta and the New York Philharmonic. CBS<\/span> seems to have just about given up its televising of Philharmonic Children\u2019s Concerts.<\/p>\n

Why is commercial television so unwilling to make an investment in anything even remotely connected with \u201cserious\u201d music? The obvious answer is the famous \u201cbottom line,\u201d the corporate pressure to show profit come what may. But more is involved in the networks’ lack of responsibility for culture. There is now no pressure on commercial broadcasting to cater to any but the widest audience\u2014because of the very existence of public television. It is PBS<\/span>\u2019s task now to do all that fancy stuff, even if the stuff is no more fancy than \u201cMarilyn Horne\u2019s Great American Songbook.\u201d This attitude, it must be said, fits all too well into PBS<\/span>\u2019s grand design: transforming what started as educational<\/em> television into a de facto<\/em> fourth commercial (even though nonprofit) network.<\/p>\n

The irony of the Marilyn Horne program is that matters artistic just might have turned out rather better had the festivities been a commercial rather than a nonprofit venture. Doubtless two hours of prime air-time would have been too expensive for this kind of program. Restricting everything to one hour would have forced a welcome sharpening of focus in the repertory performed, and provided less chance for the listener to be aware of how much the same all the different pieces were in music and in performance. Perhaps even the performances themselves could have been better. Under time pressure, Miss Horne might well have decided to take many of the songs at a faster tempo, thereby nipping her incipient sentimental instincts in the bud. But above all, had \u201cMarilyn Horne\u2019s Great American Songbook\u201d been on commercial television where it belonged, it would have been judged as entertainment, not as art. Freed from the burden of serving a higher cause, it might even have been accorded some of the success it reached for but failed to garner under its high-minded PBS<\/span> sponsorship.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

    <\/p>\n
  1. <\/a>Marilyn Horne: My Life<\/em> by Marilyn Horne, with Jane Scovell. Atheneum, 258 pages, $16.95. Go back to the text.<\/a><\/font> <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1587,"featured_media":130725,"template":"","tags":[635],"department_id":[565],"issue":[3273],"section":[],"acf":{"participants":{"simple_value_formatted":"","value_formatted":null,"value":null,"field":{"ID":0,"key":"field_65fd9fbaa0408","label":"Authors","name":"participants","aria-label":"","prefix":"acf","type":"user","value":null,"menu_order":0,"instructions":"","required":0,"id":"","class":"","conditional_logic":0,"parent":"group_647e2b3c6941d","wrapper":{"width":"","class":"","id":""},"role":"","return_format":"array","multiple":1,"allow_null":0,"bidirectional":0,"bidirectional_target":[],"_name":"participants","_valid":1}},"page_number":{"simple_value_formatted":85,"value_formatted":85,"value":"85","field":{"ID":0,"key":"field_647e2bc0c860c","label":"Page Number","name":"page_number","aria-label":"","prefix":"acf","type":"number","value":null,"menu_order":1,"instructions":"","required":0,"id":"","class":"","conditional_logic":0,"parent":"group_647e2b3c6941d","wrapper":{"width":"","class":"","id":""},"default_value":"","min":"","max":"","placeholder":"","step":"","prepend":"","append":"","_name":"page_number","_valid":1}},"featured_image_credits":{"simple_value_formatted":"Marilyn Horne. 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