Robert Ward panned and prized

Synopsis

For composers of new operas, all too often, after the heady champagne of opening night comes the strong black coffee of “the morning after” — sipped anxiously while reading the first reviews.

Imagine yourself as American composer Robert Ward, whose opera The Crucible was premiered by the New York City Opera on today’s date in 1961. Here’s what he would have read in the New York Times the following morning:

“Last night, the audience heard an opera that, in philosophy and workmanship, could have been composed at the turn of the century, or before. And, judging from the response at the end of the work, the audience loved it.”

Hmm. Not all that bad, so far.

But down a few more lines comes this zinger: “Mr. Ward is an experienced composer whose music fails to bear the impress of a really inventive mind. Melodically, his ideas had little distinction. ... [The opera’s] powerful subject cried out for intensity, for brutality and shock. ... Instead, we had musical platitudes.”

Ouch!

Oh, well, despite the nasty review, his opera did well at the box office, and, for the record, went on to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music the following year.

Music Played in Today's Program

Robert Ward (1917-2013): The Crucible; New York City Opera; Emerson Buckley, conductor; Albany 25/26

On This Day

Births

• 1685 - Italian composer and harpsichordist Domenico Scarlatti, in Naples

• 1694 - Swedish composer Johan Helmich Roman, in Stockholm

Deaths

• 1874 - German composer Peter Cornelius, 49, near Copenhagen

Premieres

• 1783 - Mozart: Mass in C minor, in St. Peter’s Church, Salzburg, with the composer conducting and his wife, Constanze, the soprano soloist

• 1873 - Bruckner: Symphony No. 2, in Vienna, with the composer conducting

• 1896 - Dvorák: symphonic poem The Golden Spinning Wheel, in London

• 1917 - Mussorgsky (arr. Cui): opera The Fair at Sorochinsky, posthumously, in St. Petersburg (see Julian date: Oct. 13)

• 1919 - Elgar: Cello Concerto, at London’s Queens Hall, with the London Symphony conducted by the composer, and Felix Salmond the soloist

• 1930 - Shostakovich: ballet, The Age of Gold, in Leningrad

• 1945 - Bloch: Suite Symphonique, by the Philadelphia Orchestra, Pierre Monteux conducting

• 1956 - William Schuman: New England Triptych, in Miami, by the University of Miami Orchestra, André Kostelanetz conducting

• 1961 - David Diamond: Symphony No. 8, by the New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein conducting

• 1961 - Robert Ward: opera The Crucible (after the play by Arthur Miller), in New York City; This work won the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1962

• 1962 - Gunther Schuller: Piano Concerto, in Cincinnati

• 1976 - Piston: Concerto for string quartet, winds, brass and percussion, in Portland, Oregon

Others

• 1739 - Handel completes his Concerto Grosso No. 6 in London (see Julian date: Oct. 15)