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• posted by William Zucker Thursday, 28 July 2022 10:37

  I have read Robert Walton's recent article, and have to comment on several grounds.
  
  I fully understand his well placed concerns at the outset of his article, and feel that what he is referring to is the result of a whole new generation of listeners with totally different expectations (and dare I say it) different standards.
  
  What is presently occurring is very sadly inevitable. The process may or may not have taken longer in the UK than in the USA, due to the fact that in the UK the light music tradition is older and far more solid, as I have regretfully observed in an article I have written for the RFS many years ago, but the inevitable process is still occurring.
  
  The offerings of today at musical events are a far cry from what many of us have grown up with and understandably have come to love and cherish.
  
  Many of the light music figures whose work we have so enjoyed have gradually disappeared from the scene. Of those who remained longer, the quality of their work gradually cheapened, in the interest of commercialization, as Reuben Musiker put it so well in his excellent book on the subject. It is also a reason why, in most cases, when there are multiple versions of a selection or arrangement by the same light music conductor, I will almost always urge the interested listener to seek out the first version offered by that conductor.
  
  At one time, at least here in New York City, up until at least the early 80's from which point the events steadily diminished, a plethora of outdoor summer music events were being offered, all over the city, in the form of light classics as well as band concerts, some even commencing in late June and running through mid-October. These have ultimately have disappeared; the outdoor events now consist of a sort of popular music of a far lesser quality, which I and others attend chiefly for the outdoor environment, but I at least do not come with the expectation of any lasting musical fulfillment, such as for example one such concert I remember as conducted by Robert Russell Bennett offering the Beethoven Egmont Overture, the R. Strauss Horn Concerto No. 1, and his own Suite of Old American Dances. This sort of wonderful offering is presently as dead as the dodo.
  
  The serious classical music field has not been immune to this sort of cheapening of standards either. The offerings have largely boiled down to the "101 Greatest Works of Music" which are offered year in and year out, punctuated by a new work by an unknown composer, most likely of a nature that very few of us would care to cultivate any further, all to keep alive the illusion that music is still a living, breathing art (if so, certainly not the best way to go about it). Much of what I refer to is a reflection of what is taught to students in their curriculums in music learning institutions, ultimately based on what will draw in the most money.
  
  A young conducting student, emerging from such a learning process, well equipped to do a bang up job on any of the Big Three Stravinsky ballets, will flounder helplessly without a clue of how to proceed, if handed a score by Elgar (outside the UK), late Strauss or late Sibelius, by Dohnanyi or Weiner, Berwald or Halvorsen, or D'Indy or Glazunov.
  
  This is why I feel that all this material, even if not performed in public concerts, should be preserved on recordings, and here I am referring to light music of yesteryear as well as serious music by composers such as those named above. Tastes do change over several generations, and what may seem to today's generation as less engaging, future generations may well find something to draw the attention and to further cultivate.
  
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  Getting back to Bob's article, I find that he is now referring to arrangements of songs that might otherwise be forgotten. For me, the arrangements of a set melody by a given figure are equivalent to that individual's own compositions, often infused as they are with the same individuality, given that person's own creativity. But here I would like to raise an objection to a point I often have seen in Bob's articles.
  
  I raise absolutely no question that Robert Farnon was one of the greatest arrangers in the field, and will not ever deny that distinction to him. However, I will raise a strenuous objection when I see him described as the very greatest, when I know for a fact that there are arrangements on recordings by Andre Kostelanetz, Morton Gould, Leroy Anderson, David Rose, Percy Faith, and the lesser known Domenico Savino that I could describe as equally great and equally individual. Indeed, as one example, I find the song "The Birth of the Blues" in Morton Gould's setting (original Columbia recording) as actually superior to the one by Robert Farnon.
  
  I basically like Farnon's work, as much as the next one, although as with any other figure I would hardly say that I like absolutely every last note he committed to paper. When David Ades, after some initial correspondence between us, endeavored to persuade me to join the RFS, he had to convince me that the group deals with music of other light music conductors and composers as well as Robert Farnon.
  
  Farnon is simply one figure in this genre for me, one of the greats, to be sure, but among others equally great. And with that in mind, I would not be so presumptuous as to suggest that any one of these could be considered as greater than any of the others.
  
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  As for Bob's analysis of the selection he is writing about, I have already expressed my feelings in past comments about the concentration of attention on the instrumentation rather than on the overall essence of the piece. Moreover, I would raise a serious question about any influence of Debussy or Ravel on Farnon's work. Of Delius very possibly, in certain selections, but hardly of either of the two Frenchmen, if at all. If anyone else hears it, I would like specific examples pointed out to me.

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