Alfred Wallenstein
Alfred Wallenstein (born October 7, 1898 , according to other information October 7, 1901 in Chicago , Illinois , † February 8, 1983 in New York City ) was an American cellist and conductor .
The descendant of Albrecht von Wallenstein grew up in Los Angeles , where he learned to play the cello. At the age of fifteen he performed as "The Wonder Boy Cellist". From 1917 to 1918 he was a cellist with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra under Alfred Hertz . From 1919 to 1922 he studied with Julius Klengel in Leipzig . He was the first cellist of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra until 1929, and he also taught at the Chicago Musical College from 1927 to 1929 and also made radio recordings.
From 1929 to 1936 he was the first cellist of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra under Arturo Toscanini , at whose suggestion he began conducting from 1931. He worked for the radio station WOR , of which he was musical director from 1935 to 1945. Here he performed all of Johann Sebastian Bach's cantatas and all of Mozart's twenty-six piano concertos . In 1942 he received the Peabody Award for his pioneering work in radio .
From 1943 to 1956 he was chief conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra . With this orchestra and the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra he performed European works from Bach's Christmas Oratorio to Beethoven's Missa solemnis to Mahler's Second Symphony , as well as the great works of contemporary American composers such as Samuel Barber , Aaron Copland , Henry Cowell , Paul Creston and David Diamond , Morton Gould and Virgil Thomson .
Wallenstein later worked as a guest conductor at festivals and orchestras in the USA and Europe. He was also a sought-after conductor for recordings by well-known soloists. He recorded piano concertos by Mozart , Chopin , Liszt , Grieg , Saint-Saëns and Szymanowski with the pianist Artur Rubinstein . With the violinist Jascha Heifetz , he made recordings of the violin concertos by JS Bach , Korngold and Castelnuovo-Tedesco . From 1958 to 1961 he directed the Caramoor Festival , from 1962 to 1964 he supervised a program for prospective conductors of the Ford Foundation at the Peabody Conservatory , and from 1968 to 1971 he taught at the Juilliard School of Music . He made his last appearance as a conductor at the age of eighty-one in 1979 with the school orchestra.
Web links
- Works by and about Alfred Wallenstein in the catalog of the German National Library
- Erik Eriksson: Alfred Wallenstein at Allmusic (English)
Individual evidence
- ^ Ullstein: Lexicon d. Music 1976
- ↑ a b Martin Bernheimer: Wallenstein, Alfred. In: Grove Music Online (English; subscription required).
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Wallenstein, Alfred |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American conductor and cellist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | October 7, 1898 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Chicago , Illinois |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 8, 1983 |
| Place of death | New York City |