John Mauceri

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John Mauceri (2016)

John Francis Mauceri (born September 12, 1945 in New York City ) is an American conductor, educator, producer and screenwriter. In his conducting career he was guest conductor, producer and musical advisor to Tony and Olivier Award winners of Broadway musicals at their premieres at opera houses with almost all major orchestras in the world. During his multifaceted career, he directed and conducted weighty works by composers as diverse as Debussy , Stockhausen , Korngold , Hindemith , Bernstein , Sibelius , Ives , Elfman and Shore . He paid special attention to the so-called degenerate music of emigrants of the Third Reich living in Hollywood .

Study time and early career

Mauceri studied music theory and composition at Yale University , received his Bachelor of Arts in 1967 and a Master of Philosophy in music theory in 1972. His teachers included William G. Waite, Claude Palisca, Beekman Cannon, Leon Plantinga and Robert Bailey in musicology; Mel Powell , Donald Martino , Alan Forte and Peter Sculthorpe in theory and composition; Donald Currier in piano; and Gustav Meier in conducting . He also attended lectures on architecture of the 20th century with Vincent Scully , French literature with Henri Peyre , religion with Jaroslav Pelikan and Stephan Kuttner, and psychology.

In the last year of his studies on 4 December 1966 he made his debut as a guest conductor with the Yale Symphony Orchestra at Branford College in the staging of Brecht's comedy Man is Man and produced and conducted on March 11, 1967 Benjamin Britten's church parable Curlew River in the St. Thomas More Chapel of Yale University, which he performed on May 13 and 14, 1967 in the Catholic Chapel of the United Nations . He graduated cum laude , won the Wrexham Prize "for the highest musical achievement," the Francis Vernan Prize for composition and the Branford Arts Prize for artistic merit.

Equipped with a teaching license for the Faculty of Music Theory, Mauceri took over as music director of the Yale Symphony Orchestra from 1968 , which he directed until 1974 and was also a guest conductor at the Yales Opera School and then from 1974 to 1983 music director. Through Mauceri, the Yale Symphony Orchestra developed into one of the most highly regarded student orchestras in the world. Tours through Europe took him to the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, where he premiered Charles Ives 4th Symphony , Claude Debussy's ballet performance Khamma and Alexander Nikolajewitsch Scriabin's Prométhée. Le Poème du feu . In Vienna he produced and conducted with the YSO in the Wiener Konzerthaus with the Wiener Singverein Leonard Bernstein's musical theater piece Mass , which was broadcast worldwide by the PBS , the BBC and the ORF . The world premieres of Ives Three Places in New England in the original version with a large orchestra and, also by Ives, the Orchestral Set No. 2 . During the time under Mauceri, the YSO celebrated great success with the corresponding large crowds. These included in particular the American premieres of Debussy composed of 1913 ballet Khamma , as well as the original version of the musical accompaniment to the listed 1926 silent film of the Rosenkavalier by Richard Strauss . Another world premiere was Karlheinz Stockhausen's play Hymnen with 1000 actors and extras on the Yale's Cross Campus, the American premiere of Hindemith's song cycle Das Marienleben and rare performances such as Scriabin's Prometheus: The Poem of Fire , which he staged with the help of laser technology to attract the public in addition to John Cage 's Atlas Eclipticalis , Wagner's Das Rheingold , Schoenberg's Gurre-Lieder , Messiaen's Réveil des oiseaux and Stravinsky's ballet production Agon .

Mauceri began his professional career in 1973 with his orchestral debut with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and his operatic debut conducting Menotti's The Saint of Bleecker Street at the Wolf Trap Festival.

working area

Mauceri devoted himself intensively to the two typical American styles of music with Broadway musicals and Hollywood film music. He edited, restored and conducted a large number of older productions. Including the musical Oklahoma, which premiered in 1942 ! by Rodgers and Hammerstein , as well as Gershwin's Porgy and Bess , Girl Crazy and Strike Up the Band , Bernsteins Candide and A Quiet Place and the soundtracks by Miklós Rózsa , Franz Waxman , Erich Wolfgang Korngold , Max Steiner , Elmer Bernstein , Jerry Goldsmith , Danny Elfman and Howard Shore . He is one of two conductors who won the Decca Records Award for his first historical sound recordings of the degenerate music banned by the Nazis . In addition, he is particularly interested in the works of European, so-called degenerate composers , who were refugees in the 1930s in particular Hollywood emigrated. In addition, he conducted remarkable premieres of compositions by Verdi , Debussy, Hindemith, Ives, Stockhausen and Weill .

Musical productions

Amber

On March 10, 1974, Mauceri made his musical debut as the music director of the Hal Prince production of Leonard Bernstein's Candide , which initially had little popularity at the Brooklyn Academy of Music , but which enjoyed great success in the Mauceris version and received a Special Tony Award was honored for his services to the American musical theater. He later developed an operatic version of the piece with a larger orchestra and a text by Hugh Wheeler, which premiered in 1982 at the New York City Opera . In 1986 he won a Grammy for best opera sound recording. He produced the third version of the piece in 1988 as music director of the Scottish Opera , which was developed from an adaptation of a text by Voltaire by John Wells and directed by Jonathan Miller . Mauceri was able to perform all the versions that Bernstein had composed and rewritten for Candide between 1956 and 1971 . This last version of Candides premiered at the Theater Royal in Glasgow in the presence of Bernstein and was televised direct by the BBC. After it was performed at Sadler's Wells Theater in London in 1988 , it won the Olivier Award for "Musical of the Year." Bernstein himself conducted Mauceri's third version of Candide for a sound recording in London, and for it won a posthumous Grammy in 1990 for the best classical album of the year.

Gershwin

Mauceri played an outstanding role in the rediscovery of almost forgotten American musicals and their recordings on sound carriers, such as Gershwin's musical Girl Crazy , premiered in 1930 , with which he won the Edison Klassiek Award in 1990 , and the two versions from 1927 and 1930, also by Gershwin, Strike Up the Band , played on CD in 1991. On Your Toes as one of the most important musicals by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart from 1936, which he staged in 1983, Mauceri won the 96-year-old film producer, director and screenwriter George Abbott as the choreographer as a representative of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts George Balanchine and, with Hans Spialek, the last member of the orchestra that premiered On Your Toes, collaborated to ensure that the premiere was staged as accurately as possible. With 505 performances on Broadway , it was the first musical to be performed over a span of more than a generation with the same musical elements and the same arrangement from 1930. The musical was nominated for five Tony Awards and won two for Best Revival and Natalia Romanovna Makarova for Best Actress . Mauceris On Your Toes also won four Drama Desk Awards for an extraordinary revival, an extraordinary achievement by the leading actress, an extraordinary achievement by the conductor and an extraordinary achievement by the orchestra. The musical, conducted by Mauceri, was the first fully digitized sound recording of a Broadway play. The result of the success that Mauceri had with the restoration with On Your Toes found many imitators who also revised old stage plays and brought them to performance, but nobody achieved the same level of audience appeal.

Webber

In the winter of 1984 Andrew Lloyd Webber attended a performance of La Bohème at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden , where Mauceri was conducting, whereupon Webber offered Mauceri as musical advisor to oversee the production of the new Broadway musical Webber's Song and Dance , which premiered on September 18, 1985 and was nominated for eight Tony Awards but only won one, which Bernadette Peters received.

In October 1995, after a disastrous interpretation of the soundtrack for the film Evita , Webber got Mauceri and commented that Mauceri would fix things with the best London orchestra members and that black Monday would be quickly forgotten . In gratitude for helping to set the film to music, Mauceri was not even mentioned in the credits, nor was he in any way involved in the financial contributions.

because

Mauceri felt it was his responsibility to revise Kurt Weill's musical works, which were generally disorganized as German editions, for American needs. In 1978 he conducted the musical theater piece Street Scene, composed by Weill in 1947, at the New York City Opera so successfully that it was broadcast live from the Lincoln Center by the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) the following season .

With the performance of Weill's Lady in the Dark at the Edinburgh Festival in 1988 and the subsequent first professional production of Street Scene in the UK , Mauceri argued that there were no differences in the staging of Kurt Weill's works in the American and German versions. His 1991 recording of Street Scene for Decca was the first complete album of an American play by Kurt Weill. Mauceri celebrated national premieres with Street Scene in Portugal at the Lisbon Opera and in Italy at the Teatro Regio di Torino in Turin. With Mauceri, Weill's almost forgotten compositions also received new honors in Germany. In 1989 Mauceri recorded two albums with Weill's satirical ballet with singing The Seven Deadly Sins , the Singspiel Mahagonny and the first German recording in forty years of the Threepenny Opera in collaboration with Ute Lemper and with texts in German, French and English, demonstrating Weill's continuity in style and ideas .

In 2000 Mauceri worked on as a coproduction with the musicologist Ed Harsh, the New Israeli Opera , the Chemnitzer Oper and the Brooklyn Academy of Music Kurt Weill's oratorio Der Weg der Verheißung , composed in 1933 , which has never been performed in Europe with the complete fourth act and which also came to the German stage in the German language in the translation of Franz Werfel , who emigrated to the USA . Mauceri also conducted Der Protagonist in 2001, one of Weill's early works with the Berliner Philharmoniker , which was broadcast live on the radio.

Opera productions

After his debut in 1973 as an opera conductor at the Wolf Trap Festival, Mauceri completed his repertoire as a guest conductor at the Metropolitan Opera (Met) in New York City, La Scala in Milan , the Royal Opera House in London, the Deutsche Oper Berlin and many others other orchestras around the world. In 1976 he conducted the premiere of Andrew Imbrie's "Angle of Repose" at the San Francisco Opera . In 1984 Mauceri had the privilege of conducting the American and European premieres of Leonard Bernstein's " A Quiet Place " at the Washington Opera and La Scala in Milan . The collaboration and partnership with Bernstein had lasted since 1972, when Bernstein invited Mauceri to be his assistant for Carmen's new production at the Met, and lasted 18 years until Bernstein's death in 1990. During this time, Mauceri edited, supervised and conducted a large number of worldwide Bernstein's compositions including several premieres at his request.

In addition to his appearances as a guest conductor at the largest opera houses in the world, he was music director of the Washington Opera at the Kennedy Center and the Pittsburgh Opera . In Europe he worked at the Scottish Opera from 1986 where he was responsible for 22 productions and three sound recordings. From 1989 he held the same position at the Teatro Regio in Turin for three years. Mauceri was the first American conductor to have two contracts as music director at two different opera houses in Europe.

Through his intensive research in the field of operas of the 19th century, Mauceri achieved a high reputation as a musicologist of theory and practice. In this way he was able to prove that the metronome played a structural role in Giuseppe Verdi's operas .

He gave lectures and wrote many articles in various publications, especially on the need for a detailed knowledge of music theory in order to instrumentalize new compositions harmoniously.

Hollywood Bowl

After forty years of artistic standstill, the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra was restructured in 1991 by the Los Angeles Philharmonic Association and Mauceri appointed as chief conductor. During his sixteen-year tenure, Mauceri toured Japan four times with the orchestra and gave two public concerts in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo in November 1996. It was the first time that an American orchestra had been invited to Brazil, specifically for the performance of American film music. Mauceri broke all records at the Bowl with more than 300 concerts in the 18,000-seat amphitheater with a total of four million visitors during his work as chief conductor until 2009. In addition to many other honors, Mauceri received a place in the Hollywood Bowl Hall of Fame in 2007 alongside Plácido Domingo , a Young Musicians Foundation Award and the John Mauceri Day presented by the state of California as a day of its own.

Teaching

Erskine Bowles , President of the University of North Carolina (UNC) offered Mauceri the position of Chancellor at the North Carolina School of the Arts (UNCSA), which Mauceri accepted and took up on May 2, 2006. During his seven years as chancellor at this institute, he first fought to convert the school into a university in order to differentiate it from the growing number of newly established art schools and to integrate them into a normal partnership with the other universities of the UNC system. Mauceri implemented a two-semester calendar and a full summer semester. Under his leadership, his faculty ranked second in the UNC Chapel Hill system.

Mauceri increased third party funding for the UNCSA by 60 percent, found millions of dollars in funding from private foundations and the North Carolina state government during an economic recession, and the very existence of his faculty was at stake. After Mauceri left, the UNCSA had amassed $ 55 million in grants for new projects such as a new library and the construction of a building to teach the art of animation.

During Mauceri's chancellorship, the UNCSA was listed among the top hundred state schools in Kiplinger's school ranking for the first time in its history . Mauceri raised money to support a television series in which students created their own productions, such as The Nutcracker , a complete restoration of the 1943 original of Rodgers & Hammerstein's production Oklahoma (winner of a national television award), and the American television premiere of Korngold's play Much ado about nothing from Shakespeare (which won a regional Emmy for best TV art program in 2013), Mauceri guided his students to design, assist and watch productions of the Hollywood Bowl, the Vienna Konzerthaus, the Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra , the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center, the Bilbao Opera House in Spain, the Aspen Music Festival , the 50th Anniversary of the Grammy Award ceremony, the Ravinia Festival , the Washington National Opera, and the opening celebrations for the North Carolina Museum of Art and 2013 the ceremony on the occasion of the 100th festival s in the Chapel Hills Memorial Hall.

But Mauceri taught at UNCSA for 15 years at his own alma mater , Yale University, where he lectured in orchestration and conducting . He also gave guest lectures in German and Italian, and with the Yale Symphony he developed concepts for the topics of his own studies in information theory , linguistics and psychoacoustics . Mauceri left Yale in 1982 as an adjunct professor and in 1985 received the first Arts Alumni Award from Yale University for his outstanding achievements. In 2001, while he was still chancellor at UNCSA, he returned to Yale and gave lectures on the aesthetic history and effects of World War II on contemporary influences on classical music. He also conducted the Yale Symphony and the Yale Philharmonia on the occasion of the founding ceremony for the 300th anniversary of Yale College on April 19, 2001.

Media and prices

Mauceri is one of the most experienced conductors in the world when it comes to realizing concerts, musicals and operas on sound carriers. He has more than 75 audio CDs with which he won Grammies, Tonies, Oliviers, Drama Desks, Edison Klassieks, 3 Emmy Awards, 2 Diapasons d'Or, Cannes Classique, ECHO Klassiks, Billboard and four German Record Awards.

In 1999 Mauceri was named the "Standard Bearer of the Twentieth Century" for WQXR, America's most popular radio station for classical music, as well as the "Voice of the Millennium" by CNN and CNN International.

In other media, Mauceri made a brief appearance as Claude Maginot in the video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City in 2002 and played himself in the second episode of the TV series Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip , where he played the fictional "West Coast Philharmonic" conducted.

Mauceri lives in New York City with his wife Betty.

Discography

  • 1973 Bizet: Carmen (Chorus Director & Assist. To Leonard Bernstein) Deutsche Grammophon 2709 043 (Grammy Best Opera Recording)
  • 1973 Bernstein: Candide (Original 1973 Cast Recording) Columbia S2X32923
  • 1983 Rodgers & Hart: On Your Toes (1st Digital Cast Album, 1st Complete Recording) TER CDTER 1063
  • 1985 Webber: Song & Dance (Songs) RCA RCD1-7162
  • 1986 Bernstein: Candide (1982 New York City Opera), New World Records NW340 / 341-2 (Grammy Best Opera Recording)
  • 1986 Richard Rodgers: Three Ballets (First complete recordings of Slaughter on 10th Avenue / Ghost Town / La Princesse Zenobia,) Polygram 422-829675-2
  • 1987 Lerner & Loewe: My Fair Lady, Decca 421 200–2
  • 1988 Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherazade MCA Classics MCAD-25187
  • 1988 Weill: Ute Lemper Sings Kurt Weill, Decca 425 204-2
  • 1989 Weill: The Threepenny Opera, Decca 430 075-2
  • 1990 Josephine Barstow: Final Scenes (World Premiere Recording of first Alfano ending to Puccini's Turandot) Decca 430 203–2
  • 1990 Weill: The Seven Deadly Sins; Mahagonny Songspiel, London Decca 430168-2 (German Record Award)
  • 1990 Gershwin: Girl Crazy Nonesuch 9 79250-9 (1991 Edison Klassiek Award)
  • 1991 Hollywood Dreams, Philips Classics 432 109-2
  • 1991 The Gershwins in Hollywood (World Premiere Recording of New York Rhapsody, Shall We Dance Final Ballet, etc.) Philips 434 274-2 (German Record Award)
  • 1991 Gershwin: Strike Up the Band (1927 version), Elektra Nonesuch 79273-2
  • 1991 Weill: Street Scene (1990 Studio Cast World Premiere Recording), London Decca 4333 371–2 (Deutsche Schallplatten Award)
  • 1992 Blitzstein: Regina (World Premiere Recording of Original 3 Act version) Ed. Mauceri / Krasker London Decca 433812-2
  • 1992 The King and I (1992 Studio Cast Recording of Film Orchestrations with Julie Andrews & Ben Kingsley) Philips 438 007-2 [93 Billboard Award: Classical Crossover Album of the Year]
  • 1992 Rodgers & Hammerstein Overtures "Opening Night" (1st Complete Recording) Philips 434 127–2
  • 1993 Korngold: Das Wunder der Heliane, London Decca 436 636-2 (ECHO Award, Deutsche Schallplatten Award)
  • 1993 The Great Waltz, Philips 438685-2
  • 1993 Weill: Ute Lemper Sings Kurt Weill Vol. 2, Decca 436417-2
  • 1993 American Classics (Includes Duke Ellington's Harlem new edition by Mauceri) Philips 438 663-2
  • 1994 That's Entertainment III (Soundtrack) Angel / MGM Records CDQ 5 55 215 2 1
  • 1994 Hollywood Nightmares, Philips 442 425-2
  • 1994 Songs of The Earth (25 Hours on Our Planet), Philips 438 867-2
  • 1994 Berlin: Patti LuPone Sings Irving Berlin, Philips 446 406-2
  • 1995 Schulhoff: Flammen, (World Premiere Recording) Decca 444 6302 (Diapson d'Or Award)
  • 1995 Korngold: Erich Wolfgang Korngold: Between Two Worlds, London 444 170–2
  • 1995 Music For the Movies: The Sound of Hollywood, Sony Classical
  • 1995 Journey to the Stars, Philips 446 403-2
  • 1996 Webber: Evita (Soundtrack) Warner Bros. Records 9362-46346-2
  • 1996 Violin Concertos: Korngold, Weill, Krenek (World Premiere Recording) Decca 452 481–2
  • 1996 Hollywood Bowl on Broadway, Philips 446 404-2
  • 1996 Prelude to a Kiss: The Duke Ellington Album, 446 717–2
  • 1996 Always and Forever, Philips 446 681-2
  • 1997 Schoenberg in Hollywood, Decca 448 619-2
  • 2001 Weill: Der Protagonist (World Premiere recording) Capriccio 60 086 (Cannes Classique Award)
  • 2001 Star Wars: The Sound of Hollywood, Philips / Eloquence / Philips
  • 2001 Hollywood Bowl Orchestra / John Mauceri: Greatest Hits, Universal Classics 289 468 686–2
  • 2006 Gershwin: Porgy & Bess (World Premiere of Original 1935 Production Version — ed. Mauceri) Decca B0007431-02 (Diapason d'Or)
  • 2006 Elfman: Serenada Schizophrana (World Premiere Recording) Sony Classical 2876-89780-2
  • 2011 Gershwin: Strike Up the Band (1930 version) (1990 Studio Cast Recording), PS Classics PS-1100
  • 2013 Korngold: Much Ado About Nothing Op. 11 (1st Complete Recording), Toccata Classics TOCC 0160
  • 2014 Music for Alfred Hitchcock, Toccata Classics TOCC 0241

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Sorab Modi: The New Grove Dictionary of American Music . Macmillan Press Limited, 1986, ISBN 0-943818-36-2 .
  2. ↑ Beekman Cannon Obituary. Beecher & Bennett, accessed April 9, 2017 .
  3. ↑ Obituary: Professor Emeritus Donald Currier, 91st Yale University of Music, accessed April 9, 2017 .
  4. ↑ Jonathan Holloway: Wrexham Prize. (No longer available online.) Yale College April 6, 2016, archived from the original April 24, 2017 ; accessed on April 13, 2017 (English). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / yalecollege.yale.edu
  5. ^ Yale Symphony to Present Bernstein's Mass in Vienna . In: The New York Times , April 5, 1973. 
  6. ^ Sorab Modi: The New Grove Dictionary of American Music . Macmillan Press Limited, 1986, ISBN 0-943818-36-2 .
  7. ↑ Candide (3/10/1974 - 1/04/1976) . The Broadway League. Retrieved September 19, 2014.
  8. ↑ Candide (1982) . Retrieved September 19, 2014.
  9. ↑ Michael Tumelty: Backing Up the Master ... . Herald & Times Group. Retrieved September 19, 2014.
  10. ↑ Candide . The Leonard Bernstein Office, Inc ..
  11. ↑ On Your Toes (3/06/1983 - 5/20/1984) .
  12. ^ Alan Parker: The Making of Evita . Collins, 1996, ISBN 0-00-649100-6 , p. 16.
  13. ↑ KWF Trustee: Ed Harsh. Kurt Weill Foundation for Music, accessed April 16, 2017 .
  14. ↑ John Mauceri. (No longer available online.) Hollywood Bowl, archived from the original on April 22, 2017 ; accessed on April 16, 2017 (English). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.hollywoodbowl.com
  15. ^ Sorab Modi: Mauceri, John . Oxford University Press. Retrieved September 19, 2014.
  16. ↑ CD Review: Carmen (1972, Bernstein). Pamina, accessed April 16, 2017 .
  17. ^ Commerce of Creativity to Explore World of Music with Conductor John Mauceri . California State University North Ridge.
  18. ^ "Rigoletto" For the 21st Century . In: Opera Magazine . 36, No. 10, 1985, pp. 1135-1144.
  19. ↑ Hollywood Bowl Orchestra . Los Angeles Philharmonic Association. Retrieved September 19, 2014.
  20. ↑ Hugh Jackman: UNCSA Chancellor John Mauceri to conduct A Fine Romance for Motion Picture & Television Fund on May 1. University of North Carolina, School of the Arts, April 28, 2010, accessed April 17, 2017 .
  21. ↑ Linda A. Rapka: Bowled Over - Celebrating 25 Years With the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra. AFM47 Local, accessed April 16, 2017 .
  22. ↑ Homepage. North Carolina School of the Arts, accessed April 17, 2017 .
  23. ↑ Ken Keuffel: Mauceri to step down . journalnow.com. Retrieved October 2, 2012.
  24. ^ Kiplinger's Best College Values. Kiplinger, accessed April 17, 2017 .
  25. ^ Much Ado About Nothing . Korngold Society.
  26. ↑ Press Release: UNCSA Chancellor John Mauceri Receives Award from Association of Yale Alumni . UNCSA Media.
personal data
SURNAME Mauceri, John
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Mauceri, John Francis
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American conductor
DATE OF BIRTH September 12, 1945
PLACE OF BIRTH New York City