Ned Rorem
with Martha Oneppo
New York, New York
May 11, 1982
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Side a: pp.1-17
Family and early childhood--Quakerism--piano lessons--Margaret Bonds--reaction to Debussy, Ravel--first songs written at Northwestern--study at Curtis Institute--Rosario Scalero--copyist for Virgil Thomson in New York--Juilliard--George Gershwin Memorial Award--France--influence of parents on musical education--as writer and musician--attraction to French aesthetics--education in 20th century music before study of "classics"--writing down early pieces--originality--Leo Sowerby, Paul Bowles--first public performance at age 19--Paul Goodman--writing songs as result of uniting two loves: music and poetry--prose writing as fulfillment of need--description of his music as compared to his prose--explanation for not setting his own words to music--writing for piano and not other instruments--what constitutes good musical education?
Side b pp.17-31
Self‑taught as composer--age and proficiency--inspiration and technique--the creative process--art is hard work--deep feeling laymen--artists able to communicate deep feelings--good business heads of artists--famous letter concerning lack of payment to composers--interest in writing when young--encouragment in choosing music as career--meeting people through family friends--need to prove his intelligence--growing up in Chicago university milieu--elitist standards--pop music in '40s compared to today--New York--influence of Quakerism--A Quaker Reader--his atheism--vocal music on religious subjects--adolescence--alcoholism--psychoanalysis.
Ned Rorem
with Martha Oneppo
Yale University
October 25, 1983
Side c pp. 31-48
Study at Curtis--move to New York--working for Virgil Thomson--orchestration lessons--Thomson as writer--as composer--David Diamond--Four Saints in Three Acts--World War II--Juilliard--Gershwin Prize--move to France--Cocteau--Les Six--Georges Auric--move to Morocco--Vicomtesse de Noailles--the Aurics--the unmusical French--composer in residence at Buffalo--Music from Inside Out--teaching at Utah, Curtis--feelings about academy.
Side d pp.48-58
Advice for young composers--lack of audience for contemporary music--confusion of classical and pop genres--ubiquity of pop music--political music--Lions, War Scenes--music as hypnosis--writing vocal music--the ideal performance--music as sung expression.
AMERICAN MUSIC SERIES 96 e,f
Ned Rorem
with Vivian Perlis
New York, NY
March 31, 1997
Table of Contents
Side e pp.1-16
Art of the Song--Paul Monette--Double Concert for Jaime Laredo and Sharon Robinson--Potential literary projects--Composers in their thirties (Kernis, Danielpour, Hagen, Torke)--Language in music (Boulez, Del Tredici)--Vocal music--Decline of culture--Winterreise--Not listening to other composers’ music--David Diamond--Teaching--Finding the right texts for music--Musical structure and song order--Composing at the piano (Britten, Stravinsky, Copland)--Performing (Jerry Hadley)--Opera (Miss Julie, Harbison, Previn, Corigliano, Druckman)--Song Cycles/American Art Song (Thomas Hampson)--Composing to English texts (Crumb, Harrison)--Nationalistic music (American, French, Japanese, German)--Incorporating Jazz--Atonal music (Babbitt, Boulez)--
Side f pp. 16-29
Lukas Foss--Elliott Carter (“charm” in music)--David Diamond--Ellen Zwilich--Gerald Schwartz--George Rochberg--Periods in artists’ work (Stravinsky, Picasso, Copland)--Influence of Stravinsky (Varèse, Carter)--Imitation in music--American arts in the 20th Century--Women composers (Louise Talma)--Long-range significance of composers’ music (Babbitt, Carter, Lucier, Cage)--Composers who write (Paul Bowles, Babbitt, Cage)--Changes after first book (Paris Diary, 1966) was published--”Ugliness” as part of Art (Fauré)--Compositions resembling the composer (Copland, Thomson, Del Tredici)--Auden Poems--String Quartets (Guarneri, Emerson)--Trendy composers (Edgar Meyer, Bobby McFerrin)--The future of music--Death of parents--Germany in 1954--Anxiety and insomnia