# Recommendations for orchestra biographies



## John Zito (Sep 11, 2021)

I am currently having a whale of a time rereading _The Cleveland Orchestra Story_ by Donald Rosenberg. It's a 600 page history of the orchestra from its founding in 1918 to the end of the Dohnányi era in the early 2000s. Rosenberg was the local newspaper critic that covered the orchestra for many years, and the book is very thoroughly researched and lovingly put together. Despite the length, it's a pleasant, breezy read with plenty of juicy backstage dish and administrative politics to keep you intrigued while he's citing figures on the minimum salary in 1958 and explaining why the wood in the new acoustical shell had to be lacquered (Szell threw a tantrum about this).

*Are there books like this about other orchestras that you would recommend?* I am most interested in histories of the institutions themselves. I'm less interested in biographies of specific music directors or memoirs of individual players. I'm aware of a few more examples:


 _Philharmonic: A History of New York's Orchestra_ by Howard Shanet and _The New York Philharmonic: From Bernstein to Maazel_ by John Canarina;
 _The Reich's Orchestra: The Berlin Philharmonic 1933-1945_ by Misha Aster.
Are these any good?


----------



## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

Music Books - A Quick Reference
Perhaps this thread will help you a bit.


----------



## John Zito (Sep 11, 2021)

Rogerx said:


> Music Books - A Quick Reference
> Perhaps this thread will help you a bit.


Yupp, I skimmed it and searched terms like "orchestra" and "philharmonic." Didn't find anything.


----------



## RICK RIEKERT (Oct 9, 2017)

Christoph Wagner-Trenkwitz's _A Sound Tradition: A Short History of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra_ was published in 2017 for the 175th anniversary celebration and is informative and entertaining.


----------



## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

<<Arturo Toscanini - The NBC Years>> - by Mortimer Frank...

Frank is one of the few critics to whom I paid attention....he and Roger Dettmer seemed to like the same stuff I did, so when they reviewed a performance, it was usually going to be pretty close to my preferences...not always, of course....


----------



## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

There aren't a lot of histories of orchestras; since they aren't "dead" I suppose. The Rosenberg book on Cleveland is extraordinary and quite unique, at least in the English speaking world. I have books on the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra, and the New York Philharmonic and that's about it. I find there's a lot of orchestra history in conductor biographies, especially if the conductors were long-term in their position. For example, you can learn a lot of the history of the Boston Symphony by reading The Karl Muck Scandal, bios of Monteux and Munch. A great deal of the history of the Philadelphia Orch is contained in books on Stokowski. (There is a small book, Philadelphia Maestros, which is pretty lame.) Jack Brymer's books are quite interesting for his inside information on the London musical scene and the histories of the Royal Philharmonic, the Philharmonic and the LSO.


----------



## John Zito (Sep 11, 2021)

mbhaub said:


> The Rosenberg book on Cleveland is extraordinary and quite unique, at least in the English speaking world.


Yeah, that's kind of what I was afraid of.



mbhaub said:


> I have books on the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra, and the New York Philharmonic and that's about it. I find there's a lot of orchestra history in conductor biographies, especially if the conductors were long-term in their position. For example, you can learn a lot of the history of the Boston Symphony by reading The Karl Muck Scandal, bios of Monteux and Munch. A great deal of the history of the Philadelphia Orch is contained in books on Stokowski. (There is a small book, Philadelphia Maestros, which is pretty lame.) Jack Brymer's books are quite interesting for his inside information on the London musical scene and the histories of the Royal Philharmonic, the Philharmonic and the LSO.


Thanks! I'll check out all of the above. What's the Chicago book (if you recommend it)?


----------



## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Chicago Symphony Orchestra: A Critical History (Willis, 1995) Northwestern University Press. Out of print. I picked up a copy on eBay for $10. Recommended.


----------

