Uncertainties

At the Curtis Institute of Music, Barber pursued further studies in foreign language and literature, mostly of a European background. He aimed for perfection of his craft and was inspired by English, Irish, and German literature, poetry, and music. He continued to travel in Europe together with his closest friend from the Curtis Institute, Gian Carlo Menotti, and subsequently spent a year at the American Academy in Rome. At the same time, his orchestra pieces started to be performed regularly in New York; Dover Beach, for voice and string quartet, especially, earned good critical reviews. The Overture to The School for Scandal won him a second Bearns Prize. He also pursued a career as a singer as a means of earning extra income, his first recording being Dover Beach. The “Angel Mary” Bok continued to foster his career. Following their graduation from Curtis, Barber and Menotti moved into an apartment in New York.

Beginnings

This chapter discusses the roots of Barber’s family in Pennsylvania. He began his music education early in his life. By the time he was six, his various talents were apparent to his parents. However, it was only when Barber was nine years old that he realized his dream was not to be an athlete and go to Princeton as his father, a physician, would have wished, but rather, he wanted to be a composer. His family was supportive of his ambition and urged him to take on further formal studies. His sister, Sara, also was inclined toward music and was one of the first performers of his work. In this chapter, the close relationship between Barber and his uncle Sidney Homer is described; the two spent summers and countless hours together. Barber consulted his uncle about whether music was a good direction to go in for a career. Homer saw the unmistakable talent in the child, and he molded and guided his early compositions. The chapter also discusses Barber’s earliest job as organist for Westminster Church and an elaborate work he composed for the famous organ owned by Pierre du Pont at Longwood Gardens.

Prelude to War

This chapter reveals the most accurate account of Barber’s first major commission, the Concerto for Violin and Orchestra. It was commissioned in 1939 by Samuel Fels of Fels-Naptha soap for his ward Iso Briselli, a young violinist prodigy. Barber’s work on the concerto in Switzerland was interrupted by the impending Nazi invasion in Poland and, on arriving home, the illness of his father. As the work could not be completed in time for Briselli’s debut, it was premiered instead by Albert Spalding and the Philadelphia Orchestra and received a generous response, newspapers reporting it to be an “exceptional popular success.” The chapter also features four songs on texts by Gerard Manley Hopkins, James Agee, W. B. Yeats, and Frederic Prokosch, a friend of Barber’s. It mentions the piano trio he wrote for the wedding of Barber’s sister Sara and his nomination to the National Institute of Arts and Letters as its youngest member.

Lincoln Center Commissions

For the opening week of the new Philharmonic Hall at New York’s Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in 1962, Barber composed a piano concerto in honor of the 100th anniversary of his publisher. The concerto was tailored to the technical prowess and individual style of John Browning, reflecting the Russian influence of his piano teacher Rosina Lhévinne. The second movement was a reworking of an earlier piece, Elegy, written for Manfred Ibel, a young art student and amateur flute player, to whom Barber dedicated his piano concerto. This chapter details Barber’s compositional process and influences for each movement of the concerto and describes the enthusiastic reception of the debut performance. Nearing completion of the concerto, Barber was invited to Russia as the first American composer ever to attend the biennial Congress of Soviet Composers, where he freely discussed his compositional philosophy and methods. For the concerto, Barber won his second Pulitzer Prize and the Annual Award of the Music Critics Circle of New York. His second composition for the opening season of Lincoln Center was Andromache’s Farewell, for soprano and orchestra. Based on a scene from Euripides’s The Trojan Women, the piece displayed deep emotional expression and striking imagery. With a superior opera singer, Martina Arroyo, singing the solo part, the success of Andromache’s Farewell presaged Barber’s opera Antony and Cleopatra.

The American Academy

Barber continued to receive numerous recognitions and awards for his work. In 1935, he was given the Prix de Rome, for being the most talented and promising music student at the time. With the award, he was granted two years of study at the American Academy in Rome, with full lodging and a regular stipend. In this new environment, Barber continued to flourish, winning a Pulitzer traveling scholarship, which provided him with an extended stay at the American Academy, where his fSymphony in One Movement was composed. His uncle, Sidney Homer, proudly observed Barber’s triumphs as he read stories in the local newspaper about his music being performed in America. Uncle and nephew continued to communicate regularly through letters, exchanging queries, comments, and criticisms about Barber’s new compositions. Correspondence between Mary Bok and Barber flourished. Barber wrote many songs on emotionally charged poems, which seem biographically pointed. During the summer, he and Menotti lived in a game warden’s cottage in St. Wolfgang, Austria; there he began work on the String Quartet in B minor, the second movement of which later became the famous Adagio for Strings. Both the symphony and the String Quartet were premiered at the American Academy.

Discoveries

This chapter describes Barber’s first few trips to Europe, with a fellow student, cellist David Freed, where his romance for European culture began and greatly influenced his work. He sought the most brilliant European artists, musicians, and music professors during that time, immersing himself in their works and teachings. These trips left him with a greater passion for composition as he returned to the Curtis Institute, where he proceeded to write with an utmost intensity. But his writing at this time was not without the usual peaks and troughs, as is the case with any artist. There were compositions wherein Barber doubted his talent. However, his perseverance and determination earned him his first prize in music—the Joseph Bearns Prize for a violin sonata that was lost for many years. It was also at this time that the Serenade of 1928 was born, one of the earliest orchestra pieces that launched Barber’s career. The promotion of his work by Mary Curtis Bok, the founder of the Curtis Institute of Music, was substantial.

The Last Years, 1967–1981

During the last fifteen years of his life, Barber struggled with depression, alcoholism, and creative blocks. His publisher believed this was due to the reception of Antony and Cleopatra, but Barber’s annual pilgrimages to Europe had begun much earlier, and it was more likely that the forced sale of Capricorn, the home he and Menotti had shared for three decades, contributed to his low morale. The upheaval was equivalent to the dissolution of a marriage. Money from the Metropolitan Opera commission enabled him to build a chalet in Santa Cristina, where he spent most of his time. He did not withdraw from composing but turned to what had been most gratifying: writing vocal music in short forms, choosing biographically pointed texts reflecting a preoccupation with dark and quasi-religious themes. He produced the song cycle Despite and Still, two choral works, and Mutations from Bach for brass. He wrote Chorale for Ascension Day for the Washington National Cathedral and an elaborate work for chorus, vocal solos, and the Philadelphia Orchestra, The Lovers. A commission for the new Alcoa Hall in Pittsburgh resulted in Fadograph of a Yestern Scene, an orchestral piece inspired by a passage in James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake. Barber composed Three Songs, op. 45, and in 1974 wrote a piano piece, Ballade. That commission allowed him to purchase an apartment overlooking Central Park in New York. In the summer of 1978, he began a concerto for oboe and orchestra, but as his health worsened, he realized he would not be able to complete it and titled the single movement Canzonetta for Oboe and String Orchestra. He was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, and in spite of chemotherapy, Barber died on January 23, 1981.

Introduction

Barber began his life as a composer in the 1930s, with his music veering into eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European traditions. There were three major influences in his career. The first was his formal musical education at the newly founded Curtis Institute of Music, which provided a sturdy structure to his work and was also known to be European-oriented. The second was his travels to Europe, where his acquaintances as well as the culture itself were infused into his work. The last influence was the mentoring and guidance of his uncle, composer Sidney Homer, who was married to Barber’s maternal aunt, the famous opera singer Louise Homer. For more than twenty-five years, Sidney Homer had the most profound influence on Barber of all, encouraging him to “listen to his inner voice,” which enabled him to infuse the very soul of his compositions with the romantic passion that ultimately deeply moved his audience.

A Serious Student

When the Curtis Institute of Music opened in 1924, Barber was one of its first students. Due to founder Mary Curtis Bok’s vast cultural background and contacts, the faculty at the school was highly regarded. Early in his studies at the institute, Barber was the first to have a triple major: studying piano with Isabelle Vengerova, voice with Emilio de Gogorza, and composition with Rosario Scalero. He focused intensely on his studies, choosing only a few friends and living a lonely life. It was at Curtis that he met some of the artists who would eventually launch his career, as even his fellow students admired and respected his talent. During this time, Sidney Homer’s unwavering mentoring persisted, and Homer continued to press for excellence and high standards in Barber’s work through their exchange of letters. While Barber worked at Rogers Rock, Lake George, during the summer of 1927, he produced eight songs on texts by James Stephens, many of which are published by G. Schirmer.

Recognition

This chapter describes Barber’s close relationship with Italian conductor Arturo Toscanini. Barber would frequently visit the conductor in his home, most days ending with music. This friendship resulted in Toscanini requesting that Barber write a work for the newly formed NBC Symphony Orchestra. This was a rare privilege, as Toscanini in the past had ignored American composers. His broadcasts were received with much enthusiasm from audiences. Toscanini further advanced Barber’s career by bringing his music to Latin America, with Barber being the first American composer whose work reached those shores. For Toscanini, Barber composed Essay for Orchestra and arranged the second movement of his earlier string quartet as the Adagio for Strings, which brought him international fame and became, as it were, the national funeral music of the United States, associated with the deaths of such famous names as Albert Einstein, Franklin Roosevelt, and Grace Kelly and with the tragedy of September 11, 2001. The chapter also covers Barber’s unaccompanied choral works.