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Robert or I'm on books in the news. A quick look at newly published material and books of current and raised your host Robert our own director for public services at the University of Illinois Library. Well reading Michael Kennedy's portrait of Eldar published by Oxford University Press like repartee overcame my first thoughts in such a specialized biography would be of interest except with very few. It's true that the major works are at O'Gara receiving a renewed interest on phonograph records of the revival is closer to the modest resuscitation accorded Carl Nielsen rather than an extensive Mahler book neurosurgeons Mr Kennedy's major point of interest in his portrait of Al Gore is that the personality which is what seems so stuffy and so Edward Ian does indeed show in his music. The intellectuals who despise his patriotism and emotion he says could never have realised the sensitivity the mask of worldliness concealed Eldara resented that it would took him to age 50 to become famous. Somebody or something in past wounded him so deeply that he never fully recovered. These wounds show themselves only in anguish and solitude of certain passages in the music. We have so well thought of him as the epitome of Edwardian England
that we could not see the noble Algerian forest or the spindly trees or the master of the king's music. Like Kipling who suffered a similar misunderstanding and literature. Al Gore was a very complex man and is this complexity which is revealed in Kennedy's book in which he relates to the music as well to be understood in his music it was by no means necessary to enjoy this a re-examination of a man. But rather than explore the complexity I would however I would like to concentrate here on the man who lived on after his ability to make music was ritually gone. This great touching sad period has covered the last three chapters. These are the last fourteen years ago guys lie three years in 1934 when he was 63 to his death at age 77. All these years are a slow dim. says Mr Kennedy who is not one to forgo a good musical metaphor yet Eldar did not retreat from the world and shut himself off as he might have after Lady O'Gara death all around him he found signs of personal loss and he noted in a letter to a woman friend that the loss of three houses which had once meant so much to him had been sold in the space of a week. Strain to Chick clean
sweep of my old life. I am known and later he was to write I have not a single friend who cares except you which was a rather typical complaint for all of his public reticence Al Gore was one to pour out his world not only in his music but to his friends he was given to long spells of depression except that he was in when he was in high spirits and devoted to what he called these japes untrue at these times of practical joking a pony most of it is hard to bear as his depressed spouse. Certainly both of these moods show up in his music. We don't know Lady elgato I tolerated these extremes and now she would recognise his genius when I was young and when I don't almost a forced or manly shy retiring man into world fame was now gone. Kennedy believes the combination of God's death with the emergence of a postwar world that he hinted was enough to extinguish the creative life of such a highly strung man. I have settled just sort of milestone for Tim he once wrote and to fill the void he took operation horses and dogs and automobiles which he drove around the countryside. We know his place in the woods and streams of England or streams of the sound which also appear in his music and he was as I said Kennedy expanding his knowledge of architecture history and folklore
that expansion is characteristic of the agile mind the truly self educated all his life he read absorbed and retained an outage. It's not important to remember that Al Gore was also virtually and thoroughly self educated and composing. He conducted during his period occasionally and was notoriously impatient with that plane he was known to leave the platform and things didn't go right. He was totally jealous of his reputation on the whole it was only for only occasionally 70th birthday 1927. He raged that he had no pleasant memories of connected with music. Kennedy writes It's a terrifying and tiresome statement from a man who had received the adulation of a nation if not all the critics who were as usual skeptical of the self-taught was such a statement was indicative the self-doubt at hold over him. He did indeed look like a retired general. Kennedy notes but his detractors did not notice the troubled and withdrawn as they heard only the pomp and circumstance they did not listen to the note of resignation was 75 or rather enjoyed replying to criticisms in the press. And he had a few moments of pleasure when the now declining legion of adulate hers were spark enough to fight for him. But in October 1933 he was found of a malignant
tumor on the say I think no he died in February 1934. He's music not forgotten yet ignored. He had created a distinctive personal idiom and as such we are rediscovering him today not his master the king's music but a highly individual voice and who have discovered that voice. Read portrait of Eldar by Michael Kennedy. Books in the news is prepared and presented by Robert R. almond sponsored by the Illinois State Library. This program was distributed by the national educational radio network.
Series
Books in the news
Episode
Portrait of Elgar
Producing Organization
National Association of Educational Broadcasters
Illinois State Library
Contributing Organization
University of Maryland (College Park, Maryland)
AAPB ID
cpb-aacip/500-tm720v7x
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Description
Episode Description
In program number 372, Robert Orem talks about Michael Kennedy's "Portrait of Elgar."
Series Description
A quick look at newly published material and books of current interest.
Broadcast Date
1969-01-29
Topics
Literature
Media type
Sound
Duration
00:04:57
Embed Code
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Credits
Producing Organization: National Association of Educational Broadcasters
Producing Organization: Illinois State Library
Speaker: Orem, Robert
AAPB Contributor Holdings
University of Maryland
Identifier: 61-35d-372 (National Association of Educational Broadcasters)
Format: 1/4 inch audio tape
Duration: 00:04:42
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Citations
Chicago: “Books in the news; Portrait of Elgar,” 1969-01-29, University of Maryland, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed March 28, 2024, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-500-tm720v7x.
MLA: “Books in the news; Portrait of Elgar.” 1969-01-29. University of Maryland, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. March 28, 2024. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-500-tm720v7x>.
APA: Books in the news; Portrait of Elgar. Boston, MA: University of Maryland, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-500-tm720v7x