LEADER 04459cam 2200373 i 4500001 ocm06085523 005 20141212032245.0 008 800221s1980 nyuaf b 001 0aeng 010 80011624 020 0684164965 : |c$17.50 035 (Sirsi) o06085523 035 (OCoLC)6085523 040 DLC |cDLC |dERE |dUtOrBLW 049 EREM 050 00 ML410.L947 |bA3 082 0 780/.92/4B 100 1 Luening, Otto, |d1900-1996. |=^A638869 245 14 The Odyssey of an American composer : |bthe autobiography of Otto Luening. 260 New York : |bScribner, |c©1980. 300 x, 605 pages, 4 unnumbered leaves of plates : |billustrations, portraits ; |c24 cm 336 text |2rdacontent 337 unmediated |2rdamedia 338 volume |2rdacarrier 500 Includes index. 504 "A selected list of compositions": pages 585-592. 504 Includes bibliographical references (pages 595-596), discography (pages 593-594), and index. 505 00 |tFrom the family archives -- |tOn the farm: Wauwatosa, Wisconsin -- |tPiano lessons, and a "very modern" waltz -- |tIn town: Madison, Wisconsin -- |tAn unconventional German education -- |tRefugees and Dadaists in Zurich -- |tEdith Rockefeller McCormick and the Zurich conservatory -- |tStrauss, Nikisch, Busoni, Joyce -- |tZuricher cadenza: mountain climbing -- |tChicago in the twenties -- |tChicago coda: ethnological conducting -- |tThe Eastman school of music -- |tCologne -- |tBarnstorming in New York -- |tHow to make an American opera -- |tFrontier music: a university in Arizona -- |tA new college in Vermont -- |tThe WPA and a chamber orchestra -- |tLange festivals, southern barnstorming -- |tThe business of music -- |tColumbia university -- |tCompositions and composing -- |tScherzo and adagio: gambling and divorce -- |tElectronic music -- |tElba, Roma, Tunisia. 520 Born in Milwaukee in 1900, Otto Luening grew up in the rich musical culture of German immigrants. At the age of five he wrote his first piece of music - a "very modern" waltz. When his father, a conductor and conservatory teacher, heard it he said, "It must be discouraged, an artis'?s life is much too difficult in the United States." In 1912 the Luenings moved to Munich, where Otto studied flute at the Royal Academy. Soon after World War I began, Luening fled to Zurich, where he studied with the legendary Ferruccio Busoni and played in the Tonhalle Orchestra under such conductors as Richard Strauss. In Zurich he found a patron in Edith Rockefeller McCormick. He also acted in James Joyce's theater group and took part in some of the bizarre musical projects of the Dadaists. Back in America in the twenties, he worked as a pit musician in a Chicago movie theater, played vaudeville piano, and organized the American Grand Opera Company. His reputation as a composer, conductor, and performer soon earned him a position at the Eastman School of Music, and from there he went on to teach at the University of Arizona, Bennington College, and Columbia University. Luening has been a vital force in American music for many years. As the composer of Evangeline and as conductor of world premieres of Gian Carlo Menotti's The Medium and Virgil Thomson and Gertrude Stein's The Mother of Us All, he has fostered the growth of American opera. One of the first to compose electronic music, he has also been tireless in his work as a composer and educator to alert Americans to their musical heritage. Here is the delightful story of one man's adventures in the republic of music, and his excursions to Hollywood, Tunisia, the Cologne studio of Karlheinz Stockhausen, and the Acadian towns of Nova Scotia and Louisiana, where he wrote his opera. Here also is the story of his relationships with such different personalities as Martha Graham, Harry Partch, Edgar Varese, and Carl Sandburg. A pioneer, musical roustabout, and faithful servant of his art, Otto Luening affords us through his memoirs a vivid and full picture of twentieth-century musical life. 600 10 Luening, Otto, |d1900-1996. |=^A638869 650 0 Composers |zUnited States |vBiography. |=^A989535 919 BOOK 596 3 998 171854