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Symphonic Dances from West Side Story Prologue |
Composed: 1960 Estimated length: |
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Born on August 25, 1918, in Lawrence, Massachusetts; Died on October 14,1990, in New York, NY |
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First performance: First performed by the New York Philharmonic, conducted by Lukas Foss, at New York's Carnegie Hall on February 13, 1961. |
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First Nashville Symphony performance: These are the Nashville Symphony's first performances of this work on a Classical program. |
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A pivotal scene in Bradley Cooper’s film Maestro depicts the young Leonard Bernstein being challenged by his mentor Koussevitzky (the conductor who premiered Second Rhapsody) to choose between his commitment to the “serious” concert world or the popular medium of Broadway. The revolutionary impact of his 1957 musical West Side Story lies in part in the fact that it attempts to bridge the gap, as it was then perceived, between “entertainment” and “art” by using tightly integrated dance and music to unify the narrative.
As biographer Humphrey Burton notes, “even in its show form, West Side Story is symphonically conceived.” From the start, the vital pulse of the dance had also been integral to its conception. A concert suite of the musical was therefore inevitable. In the winter of 1960-61, Bernstein (with assistance from his colleagues Sid Ramin and Irwin Kostal as orchestrators) prepared Symphonic Dances as part of a “Valentine” by the New York Philharmonic for Bernstein.
WHAT TO LISTEN FOR
Symphonic Dances weaves together nine episodes from West Side Story—though not in their original dramatic sequence. The music for the Prologue’s danced confrontation between Jets and Sharks boils with tension. Menace yields to the fragile hope expressed in “Somewhere,” a dream vision of a world that makes love possible. A brief Scherzo hints at the Americana landscapes of Bernstein’s friend Aaron Copland and provides a transition to “Mambo” in the Dance at the Gym scene, where Tony and Maria meet and instantly fall in love. The stylized energy of the dances curbs the rival gangs’ violent impulses, while the gentle rhythms of “Cha-cha” focus on the young lovers.
The brief “Meeting Scene” is set against the ever-present threat of violence, here channeled into a thrilling jazz-fugue sequence (“Cool”). Bernstein unleashes the pent-up ferocity of ethnic hatred between the Sharks and Jets in the climactic “Rumble.” But the possibility of a way out of this dead end returns in the lyrical intensity of Maria’s “I Have a Love,” introduced by a meandering flute solo. The harmonies darken once more into a funereal procession, and a brief reprise of the “Somewhere” chorus concludes the Suite.
Scored for 2 flutes, piccolo, 2 oboes, English horn, 2 clarinets, E-flat clarinet, bass clarinet, alto saxophone, 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, 4 percussion players, harp, celesta/piano, and strings
− Thomas May is the Nashville Symphony's program annotator.
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