Ralph Shapey

with Deborah Strauss

Chicago, Illinois

April 29, 1997

                                                TABLE OF CONTENTS

[DAT 1 begins]

Side f                                                                                                                         pp. 1-12

Integrity in music--Pulitzer Prize refused for Concerto Fantastique--Wynton Marsalis--audiences and music--his Contemporary Chamber [Players]--Partita-Fantasy for Cello, 14 Instruments and Percussion--National Endowment for the Arts--writing for posterity--Stony Brook Chamber Players--American orchestras--Concerto Fantastique--Shapey Violin Concerto--Clark Piano Concerto--Martinon--orchestral musicians--training in music as a business.

Side g                                                                                                                         pp. 12-24

Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra--Louis Krasner performance of Schoenberg’s Violin Concerto--Ormandy and Muti--Symphonie Concertante--difficulty of his music--great conductors of the past--I. F. Stone’s book Lust for Life--American attitude about composers--Covenant--text and music.

[DAT 2 begins]

Side h                                                                                                                        pp. 24-35

Opera in progress--Concerto Fantastique performance with the Chicago Symphony--compositional procedure--inspiration--the concert-going--forthcoming book on Shapey--religion--Covenant--Stony Book Concerto--Trio for Violoncello and Piano--Varèse’s Octandre--Concerto for Cello, Piano, and String Orchestra--Kroslish Sonate--Kennedy Award--Eighth Quartet--Beethoven’s Grosse Fugue.

Side i                                                                                                                          pp. 35-46

Habits of composing--teaching--performance--Shapey students--Queens College--Henry Weinberg--Sophie Sollberger--cliques in New York--George Perle--Contemporary Chamber Players--De Kooning--Wolpe, Varèse, Cage, and Feldman--Milton Babbitt--Jerusalem Symphony--Edward Levi, President of The University of Chicago--Leonard Meyer--job at University of Pennsylvania--job at University of Chicago--Dallapiccolla, Sessions, and Varèse--Bernard Jacobson.

[DAT 3 begins]

Side j                                                                                                                          pp. 46-57

Cage and Feldman--Contemporary Chamber Players--opera by Putché--Druzinsky--Fromm concerts--relationship between conductor and performers--religion between conductor and performers--religion and philosophy--Covenant and related information--service in army and concert of Philadelphia Orchestra.

Side k                                                                                                                        pp. 57-69

Activity after he retired--Stony Brook Concerto -Russell Sherman’s book--Bowdoin College--Louis Kaplan--Discourse I--Discourse II--Sonata Profundo--Second String Quartet and other quartets--Joel Smirnoff--Joel Krosnick--Partita-Fantasy for Cello, 14 Instruments and Percussion--Frank Miller--commissions--Riccardo Muti.

Side l                                                                                                                          pp. 69-73

Muti conducting Marriage of Figaro and William Tell--Solti conducting Sessions’ When the Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d--Session’s Concertino--Leonard Bernstein.

[DAT 3 ends before discussion of Session’s Concertino]