The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts > Collections >
Music Division
Calendar of Exhibitions
1980s
* a concert was sponsored by the Music Division in the Bruno Walter Auditorium in conjunction with the exhibition
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*Varieties of the Compositional Experience: George Rochberg at 71
Music Division Reading Room
October 2, 1989 through January 15, 1990
Through original manuscripts and related documents, the exhibition highlights the diverse concerns that have motivated Rochberg’s compositional processes over the years, from serial technique to an eclectic tonal aesthetic.
Image: George Rochberg. Clipping File, Music Division
Notes of a Pianist: The Great Gottschalk Collection in The New York Public Library
Music Division Reading Room
June 19, 1989 through September 16, 1989
The exhibition is culled from the Music Division’s extensive Gottschalk collection with half of the items drawn from the Library’s important 1984 acquisition of the composer’s work and contains nearly 100 items featuring such unknown pieces as Gottschalk’s first and second symphonies (“La Nuit des tropiques,” once believed lost, and “A Montevideo”) and also one of three existing original Gottschalk diaries. Other items include personal correspondence, original handbills, programs, and caricatures.
Image: Louis Moreau Gottschalk photographed by Charles D. Fredricks & Co., New York. Rare Photo Collection, Music Division
*The Best of Times/The Worst of Times: Music, Dance, and the French Revolution
Music Division and Dance Collection reading rooms
February 18, 1989 through May 13, 1989
In conjunction with “Revolution in Print: France, 1789” in the Gottesman Gallery, this exhibition displays works of great beauty, quality, and historical significance from the Library’s extensive collections of 18th- and 19th-century French music and dance. From the Dance Collection come engravings, ballet libretti and scores, and caricatures that depict dance life from approximately 1777 to 1816. From the Music Division are early editions of operas, hymns, and the patriotic songs that helped spread revolutionary ideals and fervor during the numerous “festivals” and political demonstrations characteristic of this turbulent era. Also featured will be engraved portraits of the most influential composers of the period who authored these works.
The Compleat Collector: Joseph W. Drexel and His Musical Library
Music Division Reading Room
October 17, 1988 through January 28, 1989
1988 marks the 100th anniversary of the death of Joseph William Drexel and of the bequest of his extraordinary collection of music and musical literature to the Lenox Library in New York. When the Lenox and Astor libraries joined the Tilden Trust to form The New York Public Library in 1895, Drexel’s library of scores, books, manuscripts, pamphlets, and periodicals formed the backbone of the Music Division and the foundation for its future collecting. Treasures from the collection are highlighted.
John Becker: Musical Pioneer from the Midwest
Music Division Reading Room
April 4, 1988 through September 19, 1988
The legacy of composer, conductor, and American “modernist” music pioneer John J. Becker (1886-1961) is traced through music manuscripts, documents, and letters, many never before seen. The items were drawn from a collection which comprises over a thousand items, given to the Music Division in 1979 by the composer’s widow, Evelyn Patterson Becker.
Image: John Becker photographed by Mangold. Rare Photo Collection, Music Division
The Composers Organize: Fifty Years of The American Composers Alliance
Music Division Reading Room
February 2, 1988 through March 26, 1988
American composers Alliance is a membership organization which represents over 300 American composers of concert music on a professional level. Founded in 1937 to protect the performance rights of its members and to promote the use and understanding of their music, it is the oldest national service organization of its kind for composers of concert music. The exhibit includes a merging of ACA’s past and present in the form of letters, documents, record jackets, concert programs, the Laurel Leaf Awards, ACA Bulletins, photographs, a display of the composer’s tools and samples of music in various stages from sketch to final score in the ACA printing operation.
Arturo Toscanini, 1915-1946: Art in the Shadow of Politics
Vincent Astor Gallery and Main Gallery
November 10, 1987 through January 31, 1988
The maestro’s fight against Fascism is illustrated through original, unpublished documents, correspondence, photographs, films, and recordings, some of which are drawn from the Music Division’s Toscanini Legacy.
Music in the Air: The Golden Age of London’s Pleasure Gardens
Music Division Reading Room
October 5, 1987 through December 31, 1987
An exhibit in conjunction with the International Symposium on Popular Entertainment.
*Federal Flourishes: A Musical Tribute to the United States Constitution
Music Division Reading Room
May 4, 1987 through September 4, 1987
In conjunction with “Are We To Be a Nation?: The Making of the Federal Constitution” in the Gottesman Gallery, this exhibition shows a number of early and very rare pieces of patriotic music from the Revolutionary and Federal periods, but it focuses primarily on the music that was played in America’s theaters and concert halls in the 1780s and 90s and features early editions of works that the framers of the Constitution could have heard in Philadelphia as they gathered there to begin their momentous task.
Transformations in the Performing Arts in 18th-Century France
Vincent Astor Gallery
through January 17, 1987
Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Dictionnaire de musique and the score of his opera Le Devin du village as well as the score of Armide by Jean Baptiste Lully are among the manuscripts and engravings that illustrate the performing arts in France from the time of Louis XIV through the French Revolution.
G. Schirmer, Inc.: 125 Years of American Musical Life
Music Division Reading Room
October 8, 1986 through January 3, 1987
An exhibit honoring the firm’s 125 years in music publishing.
Remembering Louis Gruenberg
Music Division Reading Room
July 2, 1986 through August 29, 1986
Gruenberg’s handwritten score for The Emperor Jones; the original backdrop design by Jo Mielziner; two of Gruenberg’s film scores; pages from several versions of his huge A Song of Faith; as well as letters, photographs, memorabilia, and other manuscript material are displayed.
Image: Louis Gruenberg photographed by Ellinger, Salzburg. Iconography Collection, Music Division
Harmonizing the Arts: Original Graphic Designs for Printed Music by World-Famous Artists
Music Division Reading Room
March 1, 1986 through June 28, 1986
See related: James J. Fuld and Frances Barulich, “Harmonizing the Arts: Original Graphic Designs for Printed Music by World-Famous Artists,” Notes 43 (1986): 259-71
Features more than thirty prints expressly created to enhance music editions; among the works shown are a lithograph by Edouard Manet for Jaime Bosch’s guitar solo Plainte moresque (1866), prints by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec for Desire Dihau’s Mélodies (1985), Pierre Bonnard illustrations for Claude Terrasse’s Petites scenes familières (1983), and Picasso’s design for Stravinsky’s Ragtime (1919). The works are drawn from the Music Division’s holdings, the Library’s Prints Division, and the private collection of noted collector James J. Fuld.
Homage to John McCormack
Music Division Reading Room
November 12, 1985 through January 11, 1986 (extended to February 14, 1986)
The exhibit concentrates on four areas of the great tenor’s life: his opera career in England and the U.S.; early concert life; his efforts during World War II; and the 1929 Hollywood film “Song o’ My Heart,” with representative programs and many photographs of family and those “legends” with whom he performed. Also included in the exhibit is the costume McCormack wore as Don Ottavio in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, his favorite role.
Charles Tomlinson Griffes
Music Division Reading Room
May 29, 1985 through October 1, 1985
Image: Charles Tomlinson Griffes. Iconography Collection, Music Division
The Metropolitan Opera: The First 100 Years
Vincent Astor Gallery
September 21, 1983 through February 18, 1984
Part of a building-wide celebration of the Metropolitan Opera’s 100th anniversary; including letters, photographs, posters, and drawings drawn from the Music Division’s collections dealing with composers and conductors in the Met’s history.
Image: Metropolitan Opera House. Iconography Collection, Music Division
J. S. Bach: A Musical Offering
Music Division Reading Room
September 1, 1984 through December 31, 1984
Celebrating the 300th anniversary of Bach’s birth
Image: Engraving by C. Cook from a painting by L. Sichlong of Johann Sebastian Bach. Iconography Collection, Music Division
New York Pro Musica
Music Division Reading Room
February 23, 1983 through March 26, 1983
In celebration of the acquisition of the Archives of the New York Pro Musica, the exhibition presents a selection of programs, posters, correspondence, and photographs from its Archives. Also on display are an antique hurdy-gurdy and a 17th-century English cittern (both on loan from New York University) that were used in Pro Musica performances.
Image: New York Pro Musica. Iconography Collection, Music Division
Joseph Szigeti Remembered
Amsterdam Gallery
February 19, 1983 through April 22, 1983
Among the most valuable objects shown are the Guarnerius violin that Szigeti owned and the autograph manuscript of Béla Bartók’s Rhapsody No. 1 for violin and orchestra, dedicated to Szigeti. Programs and correspondence (including the last letters exchanged by Szigeti and Bartók in 1944) constitute a large portion of the display. Also on display are the scores of three violin concerti by Beethoven, Brahms, and Busoni, which were Szigeti’s copies that he meticulously annotated with details of the performance. The exhibition is one part of a tribute to the memory of the eminent Hungarian musician who died ten years ago; the second part was a concert given in Carnegie Hall by Isaac Stern, Yehudi Menuhin, Nikita Magaloff, Andor Foldes, David Singer, and the Guarneri String Quartet on 19 February.
Image: Joseph Szigeti. Iconography Collection, Music Division
Stravinsky in the Theatre: The Collection of Minna Lederman
Music Division Reading Room
June 1982 through September 25, 1982
In 1946 when Lincoln Kirsten and Marian Eames commissioned Ms. Lederman, long-time editor of Modern Music, to write a Stravinsky issue for Dance Index, she suggested an anthology of articles about his most widely known work, principally the ballets and operas which had been presented in the theatre. When asked to pay homage to Igor Stravinsky many distinguished figures - including George Balanchine, Leonard Bernstein, and Aaron Copland - rose to the occasion shortly after the great composer became an American citizen. The manuscripts of these tributes are displayed in this exhibit to complement the major Stravinsky centennial exhibition in the Astor Gallery.
Igor Stravinsky: A Centennial Exhibition
Vincent Astor Gallery
June 18, 1982 through September 1982
Featured items on display are major manuscripts as well as shorter compositions and corrected proofs, scores from Stravinsky’s own library, letters and handwritten personal notes, a sketchbook and drawing for a stage mask, and a number of photographs, accompanied by a sound track of recordings.
For Pleasure and Profit - The Composer as Musical Artisan
Music Division Reading Room
September 5, 1981 through February 18, 1982
In conjunction with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s Haydn/Stravinsky Festival, this exhibit examines several works by these composers. The title alludes to the fact that many compositions are shown in two or more versions; a common practice of composers seeking to revise earlier works or to earn more money from them by rescoring them for different-sized musical groups.
Bruno Walter: Theme and Variations
Vincent Astor Gallery
May 29, 1980 through August 18, 1980
The exhibit features material on public view for the first time. Original music manuscripts and sketches, books, photographs, recordings and personal memorabilia are on display, most of it from the conductor’s own collection, which was recently acquired by the Music Division. There is also a section containing Mahler’s original manuscript for the draft of the first movement of his Seventh Symphony and his text for the Eighth Symphony. Recordings of Walter’s performances from the Library’s Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound, spanning the period 1924-1960, play continuously during the exhibition. A selection of correspondence and fan letters from such distinguished celebrities as Albert Einstein, Zubin Mehta, and Thomas Mann, as well as penciled notes passed from Gustav Mahler to encourage a depressed Walter during a performance, are also displayed.
