Annotations to The Joy of Music
This book contains annotations to The Joy of Music (1959) by Leonard Bernstein, particularly persons and works mentioned, sources of quotes, and translations of foreign phrases.
Bull Session in the Rockies
[edit | edit source]Scene I. Why Beethoven?
[edit | edit source]Regarding the character of Younger Brother (Y.B.): Leonard Bernstein's actual younger brother was Burton Bernstein (b. 1932), who was 14 years younger than Leonard (b. 1918), and a writer. Leonard and Burton were close, and Burton was in fact a licensed pilot, though not an authority on nuclear physics.
- Beethoven Ludwig van Beethoven
- Bach – Johann Sebastian Bach
- Stravinsky – Igor Stravinsky
- Sibelius – Jean Sibelius
- Wagner – Richard Wagner
- Raff – Joachim Raff, who wrote an explicitly mountain-themed piece, Symphony No. 7 In the Alps (1877)
- As the caterpillar said to Alice, “Why not?” – the Caterpillar character from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) by Lewis Carroll, in Chapter V: Advice from a Caterpillar. The caterpillar asks “Why?”, in response to “I think you ought to tell me who you are, first.” but does not actually say “Why not?”
- Dünkt dir das? – “You think so?” alluding to the opera Tristan und Isolde (1859) by Richard Wagner, Act III Scene 1: Dünkt dich das? (Tristan) (note dative dir vs. accusative dich).
- Cedunt Helvetii – “the Helvetians yield”, here meaning “I concede [the point]”. Not a common Latin quote, presumably school Latin from (or alluding to) Julius Caesar’s Commentarii de Bello Gallico (standard book used in school).
- “Now the day is over” (1865), hymn by Sabine Baring-Gould.
- Bizet – Georges Bizet. Bernstein loved Bizet’s Carmen, producing it on from a young age.
- Berlioz – Hector Berlioz
- Schubert – Franz Schubert
Scene II. What do you mean, meaning?
[edit | edit source]- Liebestod – “love death”, famous closing song of Tristan und Isolde by Wagner
- “Thanks!” they cry. “’Tis thrilling! / Take, oh take this shilling! / Let us have no more!” – from the poem “Little birds” by Lewis Carroll in Sylvie and Bruno Concluded (1893), chapter XXIII: The pig-tale; another Carroll reference. These lines follow: Little Birds are playing / Bagpipes on the shore, / Where the tourists snore. The quoted lines state “enough, stop” (in the poem, in reference to the bagpipe playing; a humorous reference to music in poetry).