The Leonard Bernstein Letters (22 page)

Dear Leonard,

Awfully busy with unimportant things, Curtis opening etc., firing Filipinos, looking for a little house in the country to run off to. I can imagine what you are going through with the draft question: ever since I've heard that any use of musical gifts in the army or U.S.O. is discouraged, I'm all for getting out of it – at least for the present. With some imagination you ought to be able to develop an impassioned asthmatic wheeze which would send them rolling. Let me know what happens. Was Koussevitzky of any real help?

When are you coming down to New York? I've told no-one that I am back, and it is very pleasant. It was raining very hard on my terrace; I spent the morning in bed – there was a Baudelaire on the shelf and I sank into a lazy stupor and felt as sinful as if I were 16 again. The Filipino came in with new headlines
about the Russian war. I felt worthless but happy. The next time I shall have a box of chocolates! Interesting life, eh? Now the sun is out again, damn it.

Best to you,

Sam B.

Dear D,

Very comforting to know that you exist. Of course come down to the city before Draftuary the first.
⁴⁸
Let me know when. Above is my new address, apartment extraordinaire: the rest is PL-5-2966. Thanks for the letter.

Best always,

Lenny

Dave,

It appears that WNYC wants the Clarinet Sonata on their Festival of American Music sometime between 12 and 22 [February]. Could you possibly do it, via a Lincoln's Birthday week or some such device? Probably not, but I'd love it if you could, needless to say. Otherwise I shall have to get a NY guy, maybe Eric Simon with whom I'm rehearsing these days. Even he would be second choice, obviously. You're the top 5/8 man in these parts [and you] know it.

In the latter regrettable case, you'd have to send the score so that it can be used, or copied, and more scores made. Depending, in turn, on when you plan to do it in Rochester, if you still do. Do you? You see, I tend to lose track of your vibrations when you don't write.

And if you “can't write” as you put it, at least write saying you can't write.

Let me know Jack's
⁴⁹
address, the story of the Sonata, and what leprechauns (or have they become gremlins by now?) are goading you through these tough days.

Love,

L

I tripped across Whitman again yesterday.

I hope you trip too.

Read the Calamus poems again – they may have a new angle these realistic days.
⁵⁰

Dear D,

In the first place, that Complexion Soap with Lanolin, Macy's 15 cakes for something or other, is
not
the same as our soap, which is clearly labeled “Lightfoot's”, and far superior.

In the second place, I have two more pupils and have become violently busy.

The score (a beautiful job of quasi-legible gray ink) was two days late. I was all for jumping off Harvard Bridge when I heard the New England bitchvoice of Elizabeth Allen saying “It's an inflexible ryule! I'm afraid I cahwn't accept it. Good-bah.” At which moment […] Alex Thiede, a prominent Boston semi-conductor (really semi-Boston too, being a good guy) who called influential folk, explained how wars made trains late and unpredictable (lucky if they're going in the right direction), & the thing is now before the board of trustees, who must decide if they can abrogate the rule relating to deadlines, and suffer the score to enter the contest. (There being such a plethora of American talent on the boards, of course, that they can afford, the bastards, to be snooty about what scores they accept, the idiots, when the issue is a day's lateness, the lice.)

It is to be prayed for, and keened over. I charge you to organize a wake in Rochester, with Wing-of-Angel Avshalomoff as chief crier and you as bartender.

This empty prattle is induced by the extraordinary emptiness and prattledom of this office, where I still have nothing to do, and grow weary just pretending to be absorbed. For the last hour it has been the London
Times
Crossword Puzzle – something you'd go mad about. I must admit I'm writing a song, stolen heartlessly from the Double Concerto of Brahms. Mighty purty. Has to have words about love, and I'm stymied. Me, primus amoris filius! It's my last vestige of self-consciousness in the matter, being afraid I'll reveal too much. I'm sorry to hound you, but I love you very much. You will, of course, destroy this letter. Unless you some day give up the clarinet in favor of blackmail.

The office grows gradually madder, each songwriter fighting for the phonograph to demonstrate his latest horror. There's a new one about to be
plugged – a real nightmare – called “Each Time I Puff On My Cigarette”. Watch for it, if only in order to avoid it.

If you think your mad dreams about mixed up sexes are confusing, listen to this little job of mine that I cooked up in Boston last weekend. I was due at a small legendary village on Long Island to give a lecture. I arrived at a completely deserted little station –
end of the line
– called Arnold Park. (Related, among more obvious things, to Ozone Park, on my way to Rockaway, where I lectured this autumn.)
⁵¹
No one was there to meet me, but I waited a few minutes and was suddenly confronted by the most gorgeous girl imaginable, and she loved me and I loved her. At which point some dope called up to inquire about a rehearsal. I enclose 2 & 9 for a complete interpretation by Zolar Oppenheim. It is understood that this coupon puts me under no obligation whatsoever.

Bless you for all the yeoman work you did last weekend. I could never have done it without you […] especially the last five pages of the Scherzo,
⁵²
which came out very strangely primitive. Also interestin’. And my best to Jack who was truly noble.

And to you – ça va sans dire.

Lenny

Dear Len,

Of course I'll come down to N.Y.C.! Did you think I'd let an outsider play it? I can be down any time between the 14th and the 22nd. On the 13th is our “big dance” and of course I have to go, duty calls. I like dancing but not “big dances”. Maybe this time will be different. You see I'm working on dozens of theories about myself, all more or less inspired by the writing of our friend Karen Horney.
⁵³
And I've really had some results. Tell you about the whole business in N.Y.C.

I've been working hard since I saw you last. I'm at school at 7:30 a.m. and leave at 5:30. And I average 3 hrs a night of reading etc. Sunday is a field day for work. And I feel fine for it. The important thing to me is that I want to do it. None of the horrible neurotic impatience of yesteryear. If my progress in self-analysis keeps up I will be a new man and better, one day.

I didn't get your letter or your card until yesterday. The fuel ration board thought we could heat the joint [for] a month with the amt. of oil we ordinarily use for a week. So now I have a room in a small “hotel” (8 people live here). It is atop
Rochester's best restaurant and it is warm, private and
alone
. I can really be by myself now more than ever. It is not a neurotic compulsion either. I just have enuf to do and enuf to think about so that I don't need anyone. Pardon the digression.

My address is: 33 Chestnut, c/o Belvedere Hotel.

I really had no idea (?why) you would write me. If you keep writing I'm sure I will. I am going to have a lot to tell you I think. So –

When I do come to N.Y.C. I want a couple of appointments with the Frau if possible – for the purpose of seeing if I am on the right track.

Seeing mother was terrible. A tight-stomached unrelaxed experience full of hate or something very strong and uncomfortable. Good that it was short. That phase of my life is still unilluminated – a few ideas but not much evidence. Wish I understood it. I'm sure it is significant. […]

A plague on Lizzy Allen, and bless Alex T[hiede]. They had damn well better accept the score or I will personally pluck Liz's pubic hairs out one by one with ice tongs.

We are all “dovening”
⁵⁴
for you here at Rabbi Hanson's
⁵⁵
Schule.

I have had no repercussions, at least not negative ones, about anything that happened in N.Y Lenny. None, do you hear me – none. I never felt better, see.

Today I rendered at the console – piano exam – McHose
⁵⁶
– Head of department decided to wean me on Haydn symphonies. So my first score reading at the pianoforte begins. Hope I am up to it. I dazzled him with a Haydn sonata – worked up a fever pitch in 7 days. Also I am to learn accompaniments to clarinet repertoire (pronounced repertwa with a little soft palate thrown in). An excellent idea. Horn players learn horn accompaniments etc. So when we teach we can drown out our little aspiring bastards – if there is a piano in our attic.

You can contact Jack c/o Eastman School of Music. I can't recall his home address now.

I am in a strange relation to Mad now – very complex and to be told about in detail with you in N.Y.C. and incidentally, I refuse to copy a note or draw a single line in N.Y. Understand!!! I have a copying pen and some ink and I practice on every orchestration paper I turn in. I am doing lots better. You would be proud, Leannish.

How is Edys?
⁵⁷
My best to her. In the short time I knew her I became very attached to her.

It was awfully good hearing from you, son.

Dave

[Musical quotation enclosed on a slip of manuscript paper]:

What is this? – been on my mind for weeks.

“Dear Len – Terrible and wonderful things have happened to me since I saw you in NY.”

Me too. And almost the identical symptoms, for the identical length of time. Fantastic. More about it in a separate letter.

Thanks, anyway, for the case history. I was getting worried. The Frau has heard it all.

The 6/8 theme (the “lousy theme”) is, i'faith, from a Mendelssohn Trio, I think. Check on it. D minor probably.
⁵⁸

And
will
you be in NY for the 14th? Just say it, so I'll know.

And did you take the 6 Pieces back to the Northwoods? […] They are nowhere to be found. Are you copying them? Is the Cl. Sonata being copied? Sorry to trouble you with these worldly problems now, but they're
reality
aren't they?

The Frau says she now has a superficial report from the Rohrschach (first time I ever wrote it) test, but that the main, detailed job lies ahead. She says that it's full of revealing and fascinating ideas and facts. She is drawing up a paper for you – prefers not to write you – so you must come down and hear about it.

I can never tell you on paper what I went through yesterday. It was the most formidable day of my life. I'll wait till you come. Bless you in your emotional trials. Best to Mad.

And love to you,

L

Dave,

This is one of those letters that the OPA
⁵⁹
or WXQR
⁶⁰
would list as “non-essential”. But I'm all full of strange mixed feelings, and you've been elected to
receive them, willy-nilly. Brace up, boy, they're wild! All having to do with petty ridiculousnesses (!) like having had to sit with a fuming but empty lyric writer named Eddie DeLange, while he burst his stolid head trying to get a lyric to the tune I stole from the [Brahms] Double Concerto. He finally came through with a little horror called “Exactly As You Left Me” (That's How I'll Beee When You Retoin), which nauseated me so that I tore homeward to find a little peace & do a little work, only to find that the apartment had been invaded by a small army of plumbers, wreckers, carpenters, et al, who have orders to remodel the apartment, break down walls, rip out waterpipes, put in walls, put in doors, etc., for a whole week, without any warning. Christ. The noise. The dirt. The lack of walls. And of water. It's a panic. All of which leaves with only one resort – to write a non-essential letter to Uncle Dave, and get some Peace by Proxy.

Are you serene?

Do you feel jittery when walls fall around you?

Do you get peevish when you see the bathtub on its side?

Take
Oppenheim's
Little Love Tablets
.

Delicious to chew slowly!

Nibble your Neuroses away!

But tonight is better. I played a wow concert at the Stage Door Canteen,
⁶¹
and they screamed for more, and I gave autographs, and was fêted by three Australian airmen who represent a fresh, new beauty in the world. I wish you could have talked with them, heard their eternal-young speech, seen them getting drunk on milk. All with a tranquil and unconscious bravery that surpasses heroism – they leave for the raiding-grounds tomorrow.

Be good to yourself: work hard, stay healthy, and God, man, keep away from that Army – wonderful Dave.

L

L–P–,
⁶²

Now I'm in
your
class. I have a desk, a phone, stationery, – even a Steinway baby grand. The metamorphosis is awful sudden. Actually I'm back on the old lot near the big gas tank where I wrote
Our Town
. Everyone seems very pleased
to have me around – even including the Big Boss, Goldwyn himself. I may even be writing some songs with Ira Gershwin as lyricist. (All subject to change, of course.)
⁶³

Anyway, I'm here. Holy Wood is surprisingly the same as when I was here almost 3 years ago – outwardly, I mean. There are even the same extraordinary young men with wavy hair and impeccable complexions who used to be on Hollywood Blvd – still around. I wonder how they escaped the Army. And there's plenty of the Army too. Well, it's a fantastic city.

I'm not settled yet – just in a hotel. So maybe it's a little early to invite you for a weekend or a year. I must say it's relaxing to get away from N.Y. – even tho my conscience pains me no end when I think of all my skipped responsibilities.

I hope you're writing me voluminously. But don't forget who your real pal is ——> ME